The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1894-04-06
RESURRECTION DAY.
Rev. 7. Dewitt Talmage's Easter
tide Discourse.
What VIII the Day of Resurrection Do
fOf the CemeterIes?-The Last Mys-
terry OF the Resurrection
Made Plain.


Made Plain.
Eastertide was productive of the fol.
lowing sermon by Rev. 7. Dewitt Tai.
mage in the Brooklyn tabernacle. His
subject was; Easter in Greenwood" +"
and the text:
And the field OF Ephron. which was in Mach
pelah, which was before Mamre. the field and
the cave which was therein, and ali the trees
that were in the Held that we're IN all the
borders roundabout. we're made sure unto Abra-
ham.-Genesis xiii. H. IS
Here is the first cemetery ever laid
out Machpelah was its name. II was
an arborescent beauty, where the
wound of death was bandaged
with foliage, Abraham, a rich
man, not being able to briLe the
king of terrors, proposes here, as far
as possible, to cover up the ravages.
He had no doubt previously noticed
this region, and now that Sarah, his
wife, had died-that remarkable per-
son, who, at ninety years of age, had
born to her the son Isaac, and who
now, after she had reached one hun
dred and twenty-seven years, had ex-
pired-Abraham is negotiating for a
family plot for her last slumber. Eph-
ron owned this real estate, and
after, In mock sympathy for Abraham,
refusing to take anything for it, now
sticks on a big price-four hundred
sheckels of silver The cemetery rot
is paid for, and the transfer made, in
the presence of witnesses in a public
place, for there were no deeds and no
halls of record in those early times.
Then in cavern of limestone rock
Abraham put Sarah, and a few years
after himself followed, and then Isaac
and Rebekah, and then Jacob and
Leah. Embowered, picturesque and
memorable Machpelah! That Goods
acre" dedicated by Abraham has been
the mother of innumerable morturv
observances. The metropolis of every
civilized land has We'd with its metrop-
oils.
The most beautiful hills of Europe
outside the great cities are covered
with Obelisk, and funeral vase, and
arched gateways, and columns, and
parterres in honor of the inhumated.
The Appian Way of Rome was bor-
dered by sepulchral commemOrations.
For this purpose Pisa has its arcades of
marble sculptured into excellent bas
reliefs and the features of dear faces
that have vanished. Genoa has its
terraces cut into tOmbs, and Constan-
tinople covers with cypress the silent
habitatiODs, and Paris has it's Pere la
Chaise, on whose heights rest Balzac,
and David, and Marshal Ney, and Cri-
vier, and La Place, and Moliere, and
mighty group of warrior =, and paint
ers, and musicians. In all foreign ma
tions utmost genius on all sides is ex-
pended in the work of interment,
mummification and incineration.
Our own country consents to be sec
ond to none in respect to the lifeless
body. Every city and town and neigh
borhood of any intelligence or virtue
has, not many miles away, its sacred
inclosure, where affection has engaged
sculptor's chisel and florists spade and
artificer in metals. Our own city has
shown its religion as we'll as its art, in
the manner in which it holds the mem
ory of those who have passed forever
away, by its Cypress Hills, and it's
Evergreens, and its Calvary, and Holy
of our Greenwood, with now about
two hundred and seventy-five thousand
inhabitants sleeping among the hills
that overlook the sea, and by lakes,
embosomed in an Eden of flowers, our
American Westminster Abbey, an
Acropolis of mortuary architecture, a
Pantheon of mighty ones assembled,
elegies in stone, Iliads in marble,
whole generations in peace waiting for
other generations to join them. No
dormitory or breathless sleepers in all
the world has so many mighty dead.
Among the preachers of the Gospel,
Bethune and Thomas Dewitt, and
Bishop James and Tying, and Abeel,
the missionary, and Beecher and Bud
dington. and McClintock and Inskip,
and Bangs and Chaplin. and Noah
Schenck and Samuel Hudson Cox.
Among musicians, the renowned
Gottschalk and the holy Hastings.
Among philanthropists, Peter Cooper
and Isaac I. Hopper, and Lucretia
Mott and Isabella Graham, and Henry
Bergh, the apostle of mercy to the
brute creation. Among the literati,
the Carys, Alice and Phoe be; James K.
Paulding and John @. SAKE. Among
journalists, Bennett and Raymond and
Greeley. Among scientists, Ormsby
Mitchell, warrior as well as astrOno-
mer, and lovingly called by his sol
diers ''Old Stars" Prof. Proctor and
the Drapers, splendid men, as l well
know, one of them my teacher, the
other my clasS-mate.
Among inventors, Elias Howe, who
through the sewing machine, did more
to alleviate the tolls of womanhood
than any man that.ever lived, and Prof
Morse, who gave us magnetic telegra.
ply; the former doing his work with
the needle, the latter with the thunder.
bolt Among physicians and surgeons
Joseph c. Hutchinson and Marion
Sims and DIR. Valentine Mott, with the
following epitaph which he ordered
cut in honor of Christian religion: my
implicit faith and hope is in a merciful
Redeemer, who is the resurrection and
the life Amen and amen" This is
our American Machpelah, as sacred
TO us as the Machpelah in Canaan, od
which Jacob uttered shat pastoral
poem in one vers: "There they buried
Abraham and Sarah, his wife; there
they buried Isaac and Rebekah, hi:
wife, and there buried Leah"
At this Easter service / ask and an
swer what may seem novel question
but it will be found, before 1 get
through, a practical and useful and
tremendous question: What will res
direction day do for the cemeteries
First, / remark, it will be their super
nal Identification. At certain seasons