Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1893-04-17
EXCUSES FOR DELAY.
DR.. TALMAGE ON THOSE INVITED
TO THE WEDDING FEAST.

How Very Illogical Men Are In Their At
titude Towar,. the Claims ofChristianity.
! Poor Doctors, Poor Farmers, Poor Law
ycrs and Poor Christians
BROOKLYN, April 16.-Rex. DR.. Tai
image in his sermon in the Brooklyn
Tabernacle this forenoon spread before
khe great audience in eloquent words
Ehe beauty and attractiveness of the
i,ospel feast, the text chosen being from
Luke xiv, IS, land they all with one
consent began to make excuse"
! After the invitations to a devee are
bent out the regrets come in One man
apologies for nonattendance on one
around. another on another ground.
1.-The most of the regrets are founded on
prior engagements. So in my text 4
krreat banquet was spread, the invita-
itions were circulated, and now the re-
tgrets come in. The one gives an agri-
cultural reason, the other a stock deal
er's reason, the other domestic reason
all poor reasons. The agricultural rea
Son being that the man had bought
Farm and wanted to see it. Could he
mot see it the next day? The stock deal
er's reason being that he had bought five
yoke of oxen, and he wanted to go and
brove them. He had no business to buy
them until he knew what they were.
Besides that a man who can own five
yoke of oxen can command his own
time Besides that he might have yoked
Two of them together and driven them
on the way to the banquet, for locomo-
= n N1,o
tman who gave the domestic reason said
Ne had got married. He ought to have
taken his wife with him. The fact was
they did not want to go. ''And they all
swith one consent began to make ex-
euse." So now God spreads great BAN
Duet; it is the gospel feast, and the table
reaches across the hemispheres, and the
Invitations go out and multitudes come
land sit down and drink out of the chaLces
of Gods love, while other multitudes de-
cline coming-the one giving this apollo
gy and the other giving that apology.
i'And they all with one consent began to
make excuse" l propose this morning,
$50 far as God may help me, to examine
hhe apologies which men make for not
Entering the Christian life.
Apology the first: l am not sure there
Us anything valuable in the Christian re-
Ggion. 1t is pleaded that there are SO
many impositions in this day-so many
things that seem to be real are sham. a
sgilded outside may have a hollow inside.
There is so much quackery in physics, in
ethics, in politics, that men come to the
habit of incredulity, and after awhile
they allow that incredulity to collide
with our holy religion.
! IT HAS MADE A GOOD RECORD.
But, my friends, l think religion has
made a pretty good record in the world.
How many wounds it has salved; how
many pillars of fire it has lifted in
the midnight wilderness; how many 81
moon struck Saharas it hath turned into
the gardens of the Lord; how it hath
stilled the chopped sea! What rosy light
pit hath sent streaming through the rift
of the storm cloud wrack; what pools of
cool water it hath gathered for thirsty
iHagar and Ishmael; what mamma whittier
than cOriander seed it hath dropped all
around the camp Of hardly bestead pill
igrims; what promises it hath sent out
like holy watchers to keep the lamps
burning around deathbeds! Through the
darkness that lowers into the sepulcher.
what flashes Of resurrection morn!
. Besides that. this religion has made SO
many heroes. It brought Summerfeld,
the Methodist, across the Atlantic ocean
with his silver trumpet to blow the &C
ceptable year Of the Lord, until it seemed
as if all our American cities would take
the kingdom Of heaven by violence. 1t
sent Jehudi Ashman into Africa alone,
=
lift the standard of civilization and
Christianity. It made John Milton
among poets, Raphael among painters.
christopher Wren among architects,
Thorwaldsen among sculptors, Handel
among musicians, Dupont among mill
tary commanders; and to give new wings
to the imagination, and better balance
to the Judgment, and more determine
tion to the will, and greater usefulness
ito the life, and grander nobility to the
soul, there is nothing in all the earth
like our Christian religion.
| Nothing in religion! Why, then, all
those Christians were deceived when III
their dying moment they thought they
saw the castles of the blessed; and your
child, that with unutterable agony you
put away into the grave-you will never
see him again, nor hear his sweet voice,
nor feel the throb Of his young heart?
There is nothing in religion! Sickness
will come upon you. Roll and turn on
your pillow No relief. The medicine
may be bitter, the night may be dark, the
pain may be sharp. No relief. Christ
never comes to the sick room. Let the
pain stab. Let the fever burn. Curse it
and die There is nothing in religion!
AFTER awhile death will come. You will
hear the paving of the pale horse on the
threshold. The spirit will be breaking
away from the body, and it will take
hght-whither, whittier? There is no
God, no ministering angels to conduct.