The Globe-republican., 1893-12-08
KING FROST.
How God Crowns the Valleys and
the Mountains.
DIR. Talmase Observes the Hand OF the
Divine Workman in Its Beauty and
Its Beneficence-
and Illustrations.

o"Outs-hSc years nave SdthcTcu
in the First. Second and Third Presby-
terian tabernacles successfully, DIR.
Talmage preached this gospel sermon.
after commenting upon an appropriate
Scripture lesson and giving out the
most inspiring hymns The subject
was: The Mission of the Frost"
Text, Job xxxvii. 10: ''By the breath
of God frost is given"
Nothing is more embarrassing to an
organist or pianist than to put his fin
ger on the key of an instrument and
have it make no response. Though all
the other keys are in full play, that
one silence destroys the music. SO in
the great cathedral of nature if one
part fails to praise the Lord the
harmony is halted and lost While fire
and hail. snow and vapor. respond to
the touch of inspiration. if the frost
made no utterarce the orchestral rem
dering would be hopelessly damaged
and the harmony forever incomplete.
l am more glad than can tell that the
white key of the frost sounds forth as
nightly as any of the other keys, and
when David touches it in the Psalms it
sounds forth the words: HE scattereth
Job touches it in my text it resounds
with the words: by the breath of God
frost is given
First. think of frost as a painter.
He begins his work on the leaves and
continues it on the window-pan
With a palette covered with all manner
of cOlors in his lief hand. and pencil of
crystal in his right hand, he sits down
before humblest bush in the latter part
of September. and begins the sketch
ing of the leaves Now he puts upon
the foliage a faint pallor, and then a
touch of brown, and then a hue of
orange. and then a flame of fire. The
beech and ash and oak are turned first
into sunrise and then into sunsets of
vividness and splendor. All the leaves
are penciled one by one. but sometimes
whole forest in the course of few
days shows great velocity of work.
Weenix, the Dutch painter. could make
in summer day three portraits of life
size, but the frost in ten days can paint
ten mountains in life size. 1t makes
the last DAYS of an autumnal wood the
day of its chiefest glory.
But the door of that great museum of
autumnal coloring is now closed for a
twelve-month. and another spectacle.
just as wonderful, is about to open.
put you on the alert. and ask you to
put Your children on the alert. Tired
Of working on the leaves. the frost will
soon turn to the window panes You
will soon waken on a cold morning and
find that the windows of your home
have during the night been adorned
with curves, with coronets, with eX-
quisiteness, with pomp, with almost
supernatural spectacle Then You will
what my text says, as it de-
clares: by the breath of God frost is
given" You will see on the window
pane. traced there by the frost, whole
gardens of beauty, ferns, orchids. daft.
fodils, heliotropes, china asters. fount-
aims. statues hounds on chase. roe
bucks plunging into the stream. battle
scenes with dying and dead. cata-
falques of kings. triumphal process
sions. and as the morning sun breaks
through You will see cities on fire. and
commandment with bursting shell. and
as for some great victory.
coronatiOns, and angels on the wing.
All night long. while you were sleep
ing. the frost was working, and you
ought not let the warmth Obliterate
studied it. absorbed it. set it up in
your memory for perpetual refresh
ment. and realized the force
and magnitude and intensity of
my text: by the breath of
God frost is given" Oh. what
God we have! What resources are
implied by tie fact that he is able to
do that by the finger of the frost fifty
times in one minute and on hundred
thousand window panes for thousands
of winters. The great art galleries of
Venice and Naples and Dresden are
carefully guarded. and governments
protect them. for, once lost, they can
never be reproduced, but God set up i.l
the royal galleries of the frost pictures
such as no human art could ever pro-
iuce, hundreds of thousands of them.
only for four or five hours. and then
rubs them out. making the place clear
for a display just as magnificent the
next morning. No one but God
could afford to do that. 1t would
bankrupt every thing but infinity and
omnipotence.
Next speak of the frost as a physi
clan. Standing at the gates of New
York harbor autumn before last the
frost drove back the cholera. saying:
Thus far shalt thou come and no
farther" From Memphis and New
Orleans and Jacksonville he smote the
fever plague till it reeled back and de-
parted. The frost is physician that
doctors cities. nations and continents.
He medicines the world. Quinine for
malaria. antifebriie for typhoids. sui
phonal for sleeplessness. anti-spasnod-
ic for disturbed nerves. bat in all
there is no remedy like
the small pellets prepared by
the cold, and no physician SO
skilliul or SD mighty as the
front Scotland has had great physi-
clans, but her greatest doctors have
been the Abernethies and Abercromt les
that have come down over the High
lands hOrsed on the north wind. En-