The Banner-Democrat. [volume] (Lake Providence, East Carroll Parish, La.) 1892-current, 1894-01-06
TALMAGE's SERMON.
The Righteous Held In Everlasting
Remembrance.


feated-Complete and Perfect
Memory of the Saved.
| Rev. T. Dewitt Talmage delivered tn,
following sermon on s.Oblivion, and 1t
Defeats" in the Brooklyn tabernacle
taking for his text:
The righteous shall be In everlasting remem
brance.-Psaims, cxii., g.
Oblivion, and It's Defeats, is my sub
| ject to-day. There Is an old monster
that swallows down everything. II
crunches individuals, families, COM
munities, states, nations, continents,
hemispheres, worlds Its diet is made
up of years, of centuries, of ages. OF
cycles. of milleniuns, Of @ons That
monster is called by Noah Webster
and all the other dictionaries, oblivion.
1t is steep down which everything
rolls. 1t is confagration in which
everything is consumed 1t is dirge
in which all orchestras play, and a pc
Rod at which everything stops. 1t is
the cemetery of the human race. It is
the domain of forgetfulness. Oblivion!
At times it throws a shadow over all
of us, and would not pronounce it to-
day If did not come armed in the
strength of the eternal God on your
behalf to attack it, to rout it, to de-
molish it.
Why. Just lools at the way the fami-
lies of the earth disappear. For q
while they are together, inseparable,
and, to each other, indispensable, and
then they part Some by marriage
going to establish other homes, and
some leave this life, and century is
long enough to plant family, develop
it, prosper it, and obliterate it. So
the generations vanish. Walk up
broadway, New York; State state,
Boston; Chestnut street, Philadelphia;
the Strand, London; Princess street,
Edinburgh; Champs Elysees, Paris;
Inter den Linden, Berlin, and you
will meet in this year 1898 not one per-
son who walked there in the year 1893.
What cngulfment! All the ordinary
efforts at perpetuation are dead fail
ures. Walter SCOTS "Old Mortality"
may go round with his chisel to recut.
the faded epitaphs on tombstones, but
old oblivion has quicker chisel with
which he can cut out thousand cpl
taphs while "Old Mortality" is cutting
in one epitaph. Whole libraries of
biographies devoured of book
worms, or unread of the rising
generations. All the signs OF the
stores and warehouses of great firms
have changed, unless the grandsons
think that it is an advantage to keep
the old sign up, because the name of
the ancestor was more commendatory
than the name of the descendant. The
city of Rome, Italy, stands to day, but
dig down deep enough, and you come
to another Rome, buried, and go down
still further, and you will find a third
Rome. Jerusalem stands to-day, but
dig down deep enough and you will
find Jerusalem underneath, and go
on and deeper down, third Jerusa-
lem. Alexandria, Egypt, on the top
of an Alexandria, and the second on
top of the third. Many of the ancient |
cities are buried thirty feet deep, or
fifty feet deep, or one hundred feet |
deep. What was the matter? Any |
special calamitv7 s No. The winds
and waves and sands and flying dust
are all undertakers and grave-diggers,
and If the world stands Tong enough,
the present Brooklyn and New York
and London will have on top of them
other Brooklyns and New Yorlxs and
Londons, and only after digging and
boring and blasting will the archaol-
icf rf fon AScku Il
down as far as the highest spires and
domes and turrets of our present
American and European cities. Call
The roll of the armies of Baldwin /, or
Of Charles Martel, or of Marlborough,
Or OF Mithridates, or of Prince Fred
srick, or of Cortez, and not one answer
will you hear. Stand them in line and
,all the roll of the one million men in
The army of Thebcs. Not one answer.
Stand them in line, the one million
even hundred thousand infantry and
The two hundred thousand cavalry Of f
he Assyrian army under Minus, and
all the roll. Not one answer. Stand
q line the one million men of Sesostris,
he one million two HUNDRED thous and
men of Artaxerxes at Cunaxa, the two
million six hundred and forty-one
thousand men under xerxes at Their
nopyl@, and call the roll. Not one
,nswer. At the opening of our civil
var the men of the northern and south
rn armies were told that If they fell
n battle, their names would never be
orgotten by their country. Out of
he million men who fell in battle or
led in military hospitals, you can not
all the names of thousand, nor the
ames of five hundred, nor the names
t one hundred, nor the names of fifty.
oblivion! Are the feet of the dancers :
rho at the ball of the duchess of Rich
,ond at Brussels the night before Wa
erloo all still? All still. Are all the
airs that heard the guns of Bunker
I'LL all deaf? All deaf Are the eyes
hat saw the coronation of George III.
II closed? All closed. Oblivion! A
undred years from now there will not ,
e a being on this earth that knew we :
yer lived.
Yet oblivion does not remove or !
wallow anything that had better not :
e removed or swallowed. The old !
lonster is welcome to his meal This :
'orld would long ago have been over
rowded if not for the merciful re- :
,oval of nations and generations.
What if all the books had lived that