The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1894-02-23
A PATH THAT SHINES.
REV, DR.. TALMAGE breaches UPON
THE LIGHTNING OF THE SEA.

An Unusually Attractive and Eloquent Ser
mon-The Pathway of tho Almighty-An
Irradiated Wave Of Gladness-Tho Glow
Of Good Deeds.
BROOKLYN, Feb. ls.-fn the Brooklyn
Tabernacle this forenoon Rev. DR.. Tai
mage preached an unusually attractive
and eloquent gospel sermon to crowd
ed audience, who listened with rapt in
terest. The subject was 1.-The Lightning
Of the Sea-" the text selected being Job
xii, 80, He maketh a path to shine after
him."
If for the next thousand years minis
ters Of religion should preach from this
Bible, there will yet be texts uhexpound.
ed and unexplained and unappreciated.
What little has been said concerning this
chapter in Job from which my text is
taken bears on the controversy as to
what Was really the letiathan described
as disturbing the sea. What creature it
was ] know not. Some say it was whale.
Some say it was crocodile. My own
opinion is it was sea monster now ex-
linct. No creature now floating in Med
terranean or Atlantic waters, CORE
lponds to Jobs description.
LIGHTNING OF THE SEA.
What most interests me is that as it
moved on through the deep it left the
waters flashing and Respondent. In the
words of the text, "He maketh path
to shine after him." What was that IL
lumined path? 1t was phosphorescence.
You find it in the wake of ship in the
hight, especially after rough weather.
Phosphorescence is the lightning of the
sea. That this figure of speech is cor
rect In describing its appearance am
certified by an incident After crossing
the Atlantic the first time and writing
from Basic, Switzerland, to an Ameri-
can magazine an account Of my Voyages
in which nothing more fascinated me
than the phosphorescence in the ships
wake, l called it the lightning of the sea-
Returning to my hotel, found a'book
of John Ruskin, and the first sentence
my eyes fell npon was his description Of
phosphorescence, in which he called it
1.-The lightning of the sea-"
Down to the postoffice I fastened to
get the manuscript, and with great labor
and some expense got possession of the
magazine article and put quotation
marks around that one sentence, al
though it was as original with me as
with John Ruskin. suppose that nine
tenths Of you living so near the sea-
coast have watched this marine appear
ance called phosphorescence, and hope
that the other one-tenth may some day
be so happy as to witness it. It is the
waves of the sea diamonded; it is the in
forescence of the pillows; the waves of
the sea crimsoned as was the deep after
the sea fight of Lepanto; the waves OF
the sea on fire.
There are times when from horizon to
horizon the entire ocean seems in con:
Migration with this strange splendor as
it changes every moment to tanner OF
more dazzling color on all sides of you.
You sit looking over the taffrail of the
yacht OF, ocean steamer; watching and
waiting to see what new thing the God
of beauty will do with the Atlantic. Il
is the ocean in TRANSPORTATION; it is the
marine world casting its garments OF
glory in the pathway of the Almighty as
he walks the deep; it is an inverted f;rma-
ment with all its stars gone down with
it. No picture can present it, for pho
tographer's camera cannot be success.
fully trained to catch it, and before il
the hand of the painter drops its pencil,
overawed and powerless.
This phosphorescence is the appear
ance of myriads of the animal kingdom
rising, falling, playing, flashing, living,
dying. These luminous anifnalcules fol
nearly $50 years have been the study Of
naturalists and the fascination and sol.
emnization of all who have brain enough
to think. Now, God, who puts in his
Bible nothing trivial or useless, calls the
attention of Job, the greatest scientist
of his day, to this phosphorescence, and
as the leviathan OF the deep sweeps past
points out the fact that che maketh g
path to shine after him."
| WAKE MADE BY A BAD MAN.
Is that true of us now, and will it BIZ
true of us when we have gone? Will
there be subsequent light or darkness
Will there be a trail of gloom or gooG
cheer2 Can any one between now ant
the next 100 years say of us truthfully
as the text says of the leviathan Of the
deep, He maketh path to shine after
him?" For we are moving on. While
we live in the same house, and transact
| business in the same store, and write OF
the salhe table, and chisel in the same
studio, and thrash in the same barn, ant
worship in the same church, we are il
motion and are in many respects NOV
ing on, and we are not where we were
10 years ago, nor where we will be II
years hence. Moving on!
Look at the family record, or the al
manac, or into the mirror and see if any
one of you is where YOU were. All il
motion. Other feet may trip and STUN
BILE and halt, but the feet Of not one mo
fnent for the last go centuries has trippe(
or stumbled or halted. Moving on! So
ciety moving on! The world moving on
Heaven moving on! The universe NOV
ing onl Time moving onl Eternity NOV
ing on! Therefore it is absurd to thinl
i that we ourselves can stop, as we mus
move with all the rest. Are we like tn
creature of the text, making our path t.
shine after us? 1t may be a peculia
question, but my text suggests it.
i What influence will we leave in thi
world after we have gone through it
None" answer hundreds of voices; wv
I are not one of the immortals. FIT,
! years after we are out of the world i
1 will be as though we never inhabited it.
You are wrong in saying that. pas
down through this audience and u
! through these galleries, and l am look
ing for some one whom cannot find.
+ am looking for one who will have n
influence in this world 100 years iron
now. But l have found the man VIII
has the least influence, and i inquir
into his history, and I find that by ye
or no he decided some ones eternity
In time Of temptation he gave an affirm
alive or a negative to some Temptation
which another, hearing of, was induce
to decide in the same Way