The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-03-12
VISIT TO DAMASCUS.
His Escape From a Mob in a Basket
Let Down by the Wall.

Talnaee Points Out the Many Ie--
sons to Be Learned From the Story.
Mobile Ala March 11.-Rev. r. De
Witt Talmace. d D., who is now visiting
the south. selected as the subject of to
DAYS sermon. "Unappreciated Services,
the text being taken from .. Cor. ll:33,
Through a window, in a basket was
let down by the wall.
Damascus is a city of white and glisten-
Inc architecture sometimes called the
eve of the east" sometimes called "a
pearl surrounded by emeralds,' at one
time distinguished for swords of the best
material called Damascus blades, and up
holstery of richest fabric called damasks,
A horseman by the of Paul, riding
toward this city, had been thrown from
the saddle. The horse had dropped under
q fash from the sky which at the same
time was so bright it blinded the rider for
many DAYS. and think so permanently
injured his cyesiCht that this defect of
vision became the thorn in the flesh he az
terward speaks of. He started for Damas-
Gus TO butcher Christians, but after that
hard fail from his horse he was changed
man and preached Christ in Damascus
till the city was shaken to its foundation.
The mayor gives authority for his ar
rest. and the popular cry is, xiii him
Kill himi' The city is surrounded by
high wall, and the gates are watched by
the police lest the Cilcian preacher es-
cape. Many of the houses are built on
the wall and their balconies projected
clear over and lowered above the gardens
outside 1t was customary to lower
baskets out of these balconies and pull up
fruits and flowers from the gardens To
aav~ i-ff ut N ma torn #
Mount Sinai are lifted and let down in
baskets. Detectives prowled around
from house to house looking for Paul, but
his friends hid him now in one place now
IN another. He is no coward, as fifty in
cidents in his life demonstrate. But he
he feels his work is not done yet, and so
he evades assassination. is that
preacher here2' the foaming mob shouted
at one house door. is that fanatic here2'
the pokce Shout at another house
door. Sometimes on the street
incognitO he passes through
crowd of clenched fists, and sometimes he
secrets himself on the housetop. AT last
the infuria5ed populace get on sure track
Of him They have positive evidence
that he is in the house of one of the
christians, the balcony Of whose home
reaches over the wall. Here he isl
Here he is" The vociferation and bias
phemy and bowling of the pursuers are
at the front door They break in. Fetch
out that gOspelizer, and let us hang his
head on the city gate. Where is he?"
The emergency was terrible. Providen-
TALLY there was a good stout basket in
the house, Pauls friends fasten a rope
to the basket Paul steps into it. The
basket is lifted to the edge of the balcony
on the wall, and then while Paul holds on
to the rope with both hands his friends
lower away, carefully and cautiously,
slowly but surely, further down and
further down, until the basket strikes
the earth, and the apostle steps out and
afoOt and alone starts on that famous
missionery tour, the story of which has
astonished earth and heaven. Appropri-
ate entry in Paul's diary of travels:
Through a window in basket was |
let down by the wall"
Observe, first, on what slender tenure
great result hang The ropemaker who
twisted that corh fastened TO that lower
ing basket never knew how much
would depend on the strength of it, How
if it had been broken and the apostles
life had been dashed out, What would
have become of the Christian church
All that magnificent missionary work in
Pamphylia, CappadoCia Galatia, Mace
donla would never have been accom-
phshed. All his writings that make up
SO indispensable and enchanting part of
the New Testament would never have
been written. The story OF resurrection
would never have been so glOriOusly told
as be told it. That example of heroic and
triumphant endurance al Phillip, in the
Mediterranean eurOclydon, under tiagel-
lation and at his bcheading would not
have kindled the courage of ten Thousand
martyrdOmS. But the rope holding that
basket, how much depended on it. So
again and again great results have hung
on what seemed slender circumstances.
Did ever ship of many thousand tons
crossing the sea have such important pas
senger as had once boat of leaves, from
tatfrail to stern only three or four feet,
the vessel made waterproof by coat of
bitumen and floating on the Nile with the
infant lawgiver of the Jews on board?
What if some crocodile should crunch it,
What II some Of the cattle wading in for
drink should sink it, Vessels of war
sometimes carry forty guns looking
through the portfolios, ready to open
battle. But that tiny craft on the Nile
seems to be armed with all the guns of
thunder that bonn barded Sinai at the law
giving, On how fragile craft sailed how
much of historical Importance
The parsonage at Epworth, England, is
on fire III the night, and the father rushed
through the hallway for the rescue of his
children. Seven children are out and
safe on the ground. but one remains in
bllb CNAlSu lLlllB DullQiuR. ludI one wakes,
and finding his bed on fire and the build
ing crumbling, comes TO the window, and
two peasants make a ladder of their
bodies, one peasant standing on the
shoulder of the other, and down
the human ladder the boy descends-
John Wesley. If you would know
how much depended on that ladder of
peasants ask the millions of Methodists
on both sides of the sea Ask their mis-
sion stations all round the world. Ask the
hundreds of thousands already assembled
TO join their founder, who would have
persisted but for the living stair of peas
ants shoulders
An English ship stopped at Pitcain
Island, and right in the midst of surround
ing cannibalism and squalor, the pas
sengers discovered a Christian colony of
churches and schools and beautiful homes
and highest style of religion and civiliza-
ton. For fifty years no missionary and
no Christian influence had landed there.
Why this oasis of light amid a desert of
heathendom Sixty years before, a ship
had met disaster, and one of the sailors,
unable to save anything else, went to his
trunk and took out a Bible which his
mother had placed there, and swan
ashore, the Bible held in his teeth. The
book was read on all sides until the rough
and vicious population were evangelical,
and church was started, and an enlight-
ened commonwealth established, and the