The Maryville times. (Maryville, Tenn.) 1884-1944, 1893-06-28
"THE TRRESHING MACHINE"
The Subject of Sermon by Rev.
T. Dewitt Talmage, D. D.
The Human Family All Go Through Some
Kind of Threshing Process Trouble
the Great Thresher-No Compli-
ment to Us IL We Escape
Great Trial.

VI thc HteliCS dIt uOb buItsHcu WIN
threshing instrument, neither is a cart wheel
turned about upon the cummin, but the dtches
are beaten out with a staff and the cummin
with rod Bread corn is bruised; because he
will not ever be threshipg it."
There are three kinds of seed men
toned: fitches, cummin, and corn. OF
the last we all know. But it may be
well to state that the fitches and
the cummin were small seeds, like the
carraway or the chicke-pea. When
these grains or herbs were to be
threshed they were thrown on the floor
and the workmen would come around
with staff, or rod, or fail, and beat
them until the seed would be separated;
but when the corn was to be threshed
that was thrown on the floor, and the
men would fasten horses or oxen to a
cart with iron-dented wheels; that cart
would be drawn around the threshing-
ing floor, and so the work would be ac-
complished. Different kinds of thresh-
ing for different products. THE fitches
are not threshed with threshiug in
strument, neither is a cart-wheel turned
about upon the cummin; but the fitches
are beaten out with staff, and the
cummin with a rod. Bread corn is
bruised, because he will not ever be
threshing it."
The great thought that the text
presses upon our souls is that we all go
through some threshing process. The
fact that you may be devoting your
life to honorable and noble purposes
will not win you any escape. WILDER
force, the Christian emancipation, was
in his day derisively called Doctor
Cantwell.' Thomas Darlington Mac
Ruley, the advocate of all that was
good long before he became the most
conspicuous historian of his day, was
caricatured in one of the quarterly re-
views as "Babbletongue Macauley."
Norman Mcleod, the great friend of
the Scotch poor, was industriously ma
ligned in all quarters, although on the
day when he was carried out to his
burial workman stood and looked at
the funeral procession and said, IF he
had done nothing for anybody more
than he has done for me, he should
shine as the stars forever and ever"
All the small wits of London had their
fling at John Wesley, the father OF
Methodism.
If such men could not escape the ma
ligning of the world, neither can you
expect to get rid of the sharp, keen
stroke of the tribulum. All who will
live godly in Christ Jesus must suffer
persecution. Besides that, there are
the sicknesses and the bankruptcies,
and the Invitations, and the disappoint-
ments which are ever putting cup OF
aloes to your lip. Those wrinkles on
your face are hieroglyphics, which, il
deciphered, would make out thrill.
ing story of trouble. The footstep OF
the rabbit is seen the next morning on
the snow, and on the white hairs of the
aged are the footprints showing where
swift trouble alighted.
Even amid the joys and hilarities Of
life, trouble will sometimes break in
AS when the people were assembled in
the Charlestown theater, during the
Revolutionary war, and while they
were witnessing farce, and the audi
enee was in great graduation, the
guns of an advancing army were heard
and the audience broke up in wild
panic and ran for their lives; so oftimes
while you are seated amid the joys anG
festivities of this world you hear the
cannonade of some great disaster. AL
the fitches, and the chmmin and the
corn must come down on the threshine
floor and be pounded.
Ny subject, in the first place, teaches
us that it is no compliment to us if W,
| escape great trial. The ftches and tn,
| cummin on the threshing floor nigh
look over to the corn on another thresh
| ing floor and say: Look at that poor
miserable bruised corn, We have onl,
been little pounded, but that ha
! been almost destroyed" Well, tn,
corn, if it had lips, would answer anC
say: "Do you know the reason 20,
have not been as much pounded as
| have? 1t is because you are not of S,
much worth as am; if you were yo'
would be rs severely run over" Ye
there are men who suppose they are tn
Lords favorites simply because thei
barns are full, and their bank accoun
is flush, and there are no funerals il
the house. 1t may be because they ar
fitches and cummin: while down at tn
end of the lane the poor widow may b
| the Lords corn. You are but littl
pounded because you are but littl
l worth, and she bruised and ground be
cause she is the best part of the har
vest.
The heft of the threshing machine i
according to the value of the grain. /
you have not been much threshed i
J life, perhaps there is not much I
thresh! If you have not been niue,
shaken of trouble, perhaps it is becaus
there is going to be very small yield
When there are plenty of blackberrie
the catherers go out with large has
kets: but when the drought has almos
consumed the fruit then quart mea.
! ure will do as well. 1t took the venom
GUS snake on Paul's hand and tn
pounding of him with stones until h
was taken up for dead, and the jan
ming against him of prison gates, an
the Ephesian moderation, and tn
skinned ankles of the painful stocks
and the laundering of the Alexandra
corn-ship, and the beheading stroke c
the Roman sheriff to bring Paul to HI
proper deviopEert.
1t was not becaLse Robert Moffa
and Lady Rachel Russell and Frederic
Oberlin were worse than other peopl