The Bossier banner., 1893-10-05
"a BOTTLE OF TEARS"
Rev. T. Dewitt Talmagc Discourses
Upon a Unique Thcme.
Gods Intimate Acquaintance with the
Earthly Griefs of His Children
Portrayed-An Our Trials and
SorroEs Remembered.

Tears" The text was:
Put thou my tears in thy bottle Psalms
lvi, s.
Hardly mail has come to me for
s-renty years that has not contained
letters saying that my sermons have
comforted the writer's of those letters.
L have not this summer nor for twenty
years spoken on the platform of any
outdoor meeting, but coming down |
have been told by hundreds of people
the same thing. So think will keep
on trying to be ''Son of Consolation"
The prayer of my text was pressed
out of David's soul by innumerable
calamities, but it is Just as appropri-
ate for the distressed of all ages.
Within the past century travellers
and antiquarians have explored the
ruins of many of the ancient cities, and
from the very heart of those buried
splendors of other days have been
brought up evidences of customs that
long ago vanished from the world.
From among mbs of those ages have
been brought up lachrymatories, or
lachrymals, which are vials made of
earthenware. 1t was the custom for
the ancients to catch the tears that
they wept over their dead in bottle,
and to place that bottle in the graves
of the departed, and we have many
specimens of the ancient lachrymato-
ries, or tear bottle, in our museums.
When on the way from the Holy
Land our ship touched at Cyprus, we
went back into the hills of that island
and bought tear-bottles which the ma
tives had dug out of the ruins of the
old city. There is nothing more sug-
gestive to me than the tear-bottles
which brought home and put among
my curiosities. That was the kind of
bottle that my text alludes to when
David cries: PUT thou my tears into
thy bottle"
The text intimates that God has an
Intimate acquaintance and perpetual
remembrance of all our griefs, and a
vial, or lachrymatory, or bottle, in
which He catches and saves our tears;
and bring to you the coincidence Of
this Christian sentiment, Why talk
about grief? Alas! the world has its
pangs, and now, while we speak, there
are thick darknesses of soul that need
TO be lifted. There are many who are
about to break under the assault of
temptation, and perchance, II no words
appropriate to their ease be uttered,
they perish. | come on no fools err
rand. Put upon your wounds no salve
compounded by human quackery,
but pressing straight to the mark,
hail you as vessel mid-sea
cries to passing craft; "Ship
ahoy" and invite you on board a
vessel which has Faith for rud-
der, and Prayer for sails, and Christ for
Captain, and Heaven for an eternal
harbor. Catherine Rheinfeldt, a Prus-
sian, keeps boat with which she res.
cues the drowning. When storm
comes on the coast, and the other
people go to their beds to rest, she puts
out in her boat for the relief of the
distressed, and hundreds of the drown
Ing has she brought safely to The
beach. In this life-boat of the Gospel
put out to-day, hoping, by Gods help,
TO bring ashore at least one soul that
may now be sinking in the pillows of
temptation and trouble The tears
that were once caught in the lachry-
matorles brought up from Hercula-
neum and Pompeii are all gone, and
the bottle is as dry as the scoria of the
volcano that submerged them! but not
80 with the bottle in which God gathers
all our tears.
First, l remark that God keeps per-
petually the tears of repentance. Many
man has awakened in the morning so
wretched from the nights debauch
that he has sobbed and wept. Pains
In the head, aching in the eyes, sick at
neart, and unfit to step into the light,
lie grieVes, not about his misdoing, but
only about its consequences God
makes no record of such weeping. OF
all the million tears that have gushed
as the result of such misdemeanor. not
one ever got into Gods bottle. They
DRIED on the fevered cheek, or were
dashed down by the bloated hand, or
iell into the red wine cup as it came
--~agaln to the lips, foaming with still
worse intoXication. But when a man
Is sorry for his past and tries to do bet
ter-when he mourns his wasted ad.
vantages and bemoans his rejection of
Gods mercy, and cries amid the lacer
ations of an aroused conscience for helm
out of his terrible predicament, then
God listens; then Heaven bows down.
then scepters of pardon are extended
from the throne, then his crying rends
the heart of heavenly compassion: then
his tears are caught in Gods bottle.
You know the story of para disc and
the Peri. l think it might be put to
higher adaptation. An angel starts
from the throne of God to find what
thing it can on the earth worthy Of
being carried back to Heaven. It poes
down through the gold and silver
mines of earth, but finds notb;nr
worthy of transportation to the Celes.
tiaI City. 1t goes down through the
depths of the sea, where the pearls lie
and finds nothing worthy of talxing
back to Heaven. But coming To the
foot of mountain it sees wanderar
weeping over his evil ways The tears
of the prodigal start, but do not fall to
the ground, for the angels wing