Highland recorder. (Monterey, Highland County, Va.) 1877-1972, 1894-05-04
REV. DR.. TALMAGE
The Eminent Brooklyn Divine'S Sun
day Sermon
Subject: "Fairest of the Fair

mon ) COuS W, To-
The human race has during centuries been |
improving. For awhile II DETECTED and de-
generated, and from all can read for ages
the whole tendency was toward bar0arlsm,
but under the ever widening and deepening |
influence of Christianity the tendency Is now
in the upward direction. The physical APP
pearance of the human race 1s seventy-nYe
per cent. more attractive than IN the SIX
teenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
From the pictures on canvas and the races IN l
forms in sculpture OF those who were conslo-
cred the grand looking men and the attrac-
tive women Of 200 years ago | conclude the
SUPERIORITY of the men and women OF our
time. Such looking people OF the past CEN
turies as painting and sculpture nave pre-
sented as fine specimens of beauty and dig
nitv would be in our time considered deiorm-
ity and responsiveness complete Inc TACT
that many men and women in antedlluvlan
times we're eight and ten feet high tended 10
make the human race obnoxious rather tnan
winning. Such portable mountains OF hu-
man flesh did moi add to the charms Oh the
world. ,.,.
But in no climate and In no age did there
ever appear any one who in physical at
tractiveness could be compared to Him
whom nv text celebrates thousands OF years
before He put His infantile foot on the nlll
hack of Bethlehem. He was and Is altogether
lovely. The physical appearance OF Carlst
is Tor the most part, an artistic guess oono
writer's declare Him to have been brunette
! or dark complexonsd. st. john, OF Dlnas-
ems writing 100 years ago, and so much
nearer than ourselves to the time OF Cnr'st,
/ ami henee with more likelihood OF accurate
/ tradition. represents Him vita bear olacS.
and curly eyebrows joinei together, an
UyeUow complexion. and long myers ike
HiS mother" An author, writing 1900 years
ago, represents Christ as blond: "dlS ha,r
is the color OF wine an l golden at the roof,
straight AMI without lu5ter, but IRON tne
level of the ears. curling and glossy, an
divided down the center after the fashion OF
/ the Nazarenes. His forehead is even AMI
smooth His face without bIemis1 AMI en-
HANGED by a temporal bloom, His couuten-
ance ingenious and kind. Nose an mouth
are in no way faulty. His beard IS tu'I, OF
the same color as HIS hair and forSed in
form; His eyes blue and extremely bri'-
liant"
NV oplnion is, it was Jewish face HIS
mother was Jewess, and there is no wo-
manhood on earth more beautiful than Jew
ish wonanhooJ. Alas that He lived 50 long
before the daguerrean and Photographic
arts were born, or we might have known His
exact features. know that sculpture an
painting were born long before Christ, an
they might have transferred ron olden
times to our timas the torenead, the nostrl''
the eve, the lips OF our Lor l..
Phidas, the sculptor pat down ms chlsei
OF enchantment 900 years before Christ came:
WHY did not some one take up that chIsel
and give us the side face or full face OF our
T,ord2 Polvgnotis. the painter, put down
his pencil 400 years before Christ. Why dld
not some one take it up aud give us at least
the eve of our Lori-he eye, that sovereign
ofthe face? Dionysius, the literary artist
strange
darkening of the heavens at the time OF
Christ's cruciixion near Jerusalem, and not
knowing what it was, but describing IT as a
peculiar eclipse of the sun, AMI saying,
t'Either the Diety suffers or sympathtz's
with some sufferer" that Dlonysius might
have put his pen 10 the work and drawn the
portrait of our Lord. But, no; the me arts
were busy perpetuating the lorh anu APP
nearance of the worl Is favoriteS only, ana
not the form and appearance Of the peasantry,
among whom Christ appeared.
IT was not uutil the titteenth century, or
until more than 400 years after Christ, tlat
talented painters attempted by pencil 20 give
ms the idaa of Christ's face. The pictures
hefore that time were so offensive that the
council at Constantinople foroa1e tner ex-
hibit;on. But Leonardo da Vlncl, IN tne H.
teenth century, presented Cnrsts race On
two canvases. yet the one was rsp1lsive
face and the other an effeminate face. Rlpn-
ael's face of Christ is a weak face. Albert
Durars face o. Christ was a savage face.
Titian's face of Christ is an expressioniesS
face The migatiest artists, either with pen
oil or chisel. have made signal failure in at
tempting to give the forehead, tine cneek,
the ewes, the nostril, the mouth OF our blessed
Lord.
But about His face can tell you something
positive and beyond controversy. am sure
Z. n e0,,If,,l faoo The face is only the
curtain of the soul 1t WAS impossible that
a disposition like Christ's should not have
demonstrated itself in His physioSnomy'
2 Kindness as an occasional impulse my giVs
no illumination to the features, but Kindness
as the lifelong, dominant habit will pro III -
a attractiveness of countenance as c9rtalhiy u
the shining of the sun produces flowers
Children arr afraid of Il scoying or nara
, ysaged man. They cry out il he proDosest(
/ take them. If he try to cares them, D
" eyokes a slap rather than kiss. All motner
l. know how harl it is to get their liliron u
10 90 toam3n or woman OF foroidding appear
Id noe But no sooner did Christ APPEAR II
ID the domestic group than there was an Id
Tantile excitement an the youngsters oeSa
id 10 struggle 10 get out oitneir motnerS ar 'ns
- They could not hold the children bach
~ MstsnJ hack with those children" scode
0' some o. the disciples. Perhaps the little one
! may have been playing in the dirt, An tnet
faces NAV not have been clean, or thsy ma
, not have been we'll clad, or the disciples ma
W have thought Cnrist's religion was rellgIo
1t chiefly for big folks. But Christ made Ia
a. infantile exctem mt still liyelier by HIS "
inc that He liked children better than grow
people. declaring Except ye beco ne as
IL little child We cannot enter into the Kihgdo
y of God" ,i
d. Alas for those people who do not like cnl
a. dren! They had better stay out OF neav9a
for the place is iull of them. That, tnlns
- is one reason why the vast majority OF u
human race die IN infancy Onrist -
fond OF children that He taxes them 70 H'l
self before the world has time to despoil an
harden them. and so they are now at Il
,-indows OF the palace AMI on the doorstel
, and PLAYING on the green. Sometlm
M,tthew or Mark or Luke tells story
Christ and only one tells it, but Matthew
Mark and Luke all join in that picture
i, Thirst yirdled by children, and l Know
what oecurred at that time that Christ haa
face iull OF geniality.
Not only was Christ altogether lovely
| HIS countenance. but lovely In His haots.
know without being told, that the Lori w
made the rivers and lakes ami OCEANS W
cleanly in HIS appearances. lie dlsllKeu
= disease OF eprosy not only because IL "
r distressing, but because 1t was nos ciean, ~
= HE curative words we're ~ will. Be tn
J. clean He declared Himself in favor
Y thoroughly washing and opposed TO sup
fcjaI washing when H denounced the hyp
critics for making clean only "the outside
the platter," ami He appau1s His disclp
by saving. "Now are We clean, and CIV
. directions to thosa who tasted, among ott
things. He says, Wash thy face, ana 10
- blind man whom He was doctorlng, 1T