The Banner-Democrat. [volume] (Lake Providence, East Carroll Parish, La.) 1892-current, 1893-12-16
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
The Brooklyn Preacher Talks
About Lifeboats.
Good Works and Christian lnconsisten'
cies and Their Defects-The One
Safe Llfeboat, with Room
for All

Unsafe Lifeboats" furnished Kew.
L. Dewitt Talmage with d subject for
q recent sertioi at the Brooklyn tab
eiiidc1e. He took for his text:
Then the soldiers cut on the ropes of the boat,
and let her fall ofY.-Acts xvii. B.
While your faces are yet somewhat
bronzed by attendance on the interna-
tional boat contest between the Vigil
liant and the Valkyrie, address you
Good things when there Il no betting
or dissipation, those outdoor sports.
We want more fresh air and breeziness
in our temperaments and our religion.
A stale and slow and lugubrious reli-
gion may have done for other times, yet
will not do for these. But my text
calls our attention to a boat of differ
emit sort, and instead of the Atlantic, 1t
Is the Mediterranean, and instead OF not
wind enough, as the crews Of the vig-
liant and Valkyfle the other day COM
planned, there is too much wind and
the swoop of Euroclydon. l am
not calling your attention SO
much to the famous ship on which
Paul was the distinguished passenger
but to the lifeboat of that ship which
no one seems to notice. For q fort
night the main vessel had been tossed
and driven. For that two weeks, the
account says, the passengers had ''con-
tinued fasting" l suppose the salt
water, dashing over. had spoiled the
sea biscuit, and. the passengers were
seasick anyhow. The sailors said: at
is no use; this ship must go down." and
they proposed among themselves to
lower the lifeboat and get into it, and
take the chances for reaching shore,
although they pretended they were
going to get over the sides of
the big ship and down into the life
boat only to do sailors duty. That
was not sailor-like, for the sailors that
have known were all intrepid fellows,
and would rather go down with the
ship than do such a mean thing as
those Jack Tars of my text attempted.
When on the Mediterranean last June
the Victoria sank under the ram
of the Camperdown the most ma
jestic thing about that awful
scene was that all the sailors stayed at
their posts doing their duty. As a
class all over the world sailors are
valorous, but these sailors of the text
were exceptional and pretended to do
duty while they were really preparing
for fight in the lifeboat- But these
marines" on board-sea soldiers
had in special charge a little mis-
sionary who was turning the
world upside down, and when these
marines saw the trick the sailors were
about to play they lifted the cutlasses
from the girdles and chop! chop! went
those cutlasses into the ropes that held
the lifeboat, and splashl it dropped
into the sea. My text describes it:
1.-THE soldiers cut off the ropes of the
boat, and let her fall off," As that
empty life-boat dropped and was cap
sized on sea where for two weeks
winds and pillows had been in battle,
/ think that many on board the main
vessel felt their last hope of ever
reaching home had vanished. In that
tempestuous sea small boat could not
have lived five minutes.
My subject is Unsafe Lifeboats. y
We can not exaggerate the Importance
of the lifeboat. All honor to the mem.
DRY of Lionel Lukin, the coach builder
of Long Acre, London, who invented
the first lifeboat, and 1. do not blame
him for ordering put upon his tomb
stone in Kent the inscription that you
may still read there:
'sThis Lionel Lukin was the first who
built a libeboat, and was the original
inventor of that principle Of snfety, BY
which many lives and much property
have been preserved from shipwreck
and he obtained for it the kings pat.
ent in the year 1885,"
All honor to the memory of Sir VIII
liam Hillary, who living in the Isle Of
Man, and after assisting with his OWL
hand in the rescue of three hundred
and five lives of the shipwrecked,
stirred the English parliament to quick
action in the construction of lifeboats
Thanks to God for the sublime and pa
thetic and Divine mission of the life
boat No one will doubt its impor
tant mission who has read of the wreck
of the Amazon in the bay of Biscay; Of
the Tweed running on the reefs of the
gulf of Mexico, or of the Ocean Mon
arch on the coast of Wales, or OF the
Birkenhead on the cape of Good Hope
or of the Royal Charter on the coast Of
Anglesea, or of the Exmouth on the
Scotch breakers, or of the Cam bria or
the Irish coast, or of the Atlantic OF
the rocks of Nova Scotia, or Of the
Lexington on Long Island sound. tt
add still further to the Importance O
the lifeboat, remember there are a
least three million men following thu
sea, to say nothing of the uncountet
millions this moment ocean passengers
We 'sland-lubbers," as sailors call us
may not know the difference between
a marlinespike and a ring bolt, or any
thing about heaving log, or rigging
out flying jib-boom, or furling top
sail, but we all realize to greater O.
less extent the importance of a life
boat in the matter of the souls rescue
There are times when we all feel tina
we are out at sea, and as man,
disturbing and anxious question
strike us as waves struck tina
vessel against the sides of which
the lifeboat of my text dangled. Ques
tions about the church. Question
about the world. Questions about God
Questions about our eternal destiny
Every thinking man and woman hav
these questions, and in proportion a
they are thinking people do thes