The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1894-10-12
TRUE CHRISTIANITY.
It's Trials Discussed by DR.. Tai
mage.
~As a Lamb to the Slaughter" Was Led the
Beautiful Hadassah, but She Tri-
umphed by the Integrity
OF Her Faith.

Kew. L. Dewitt Talmage, who is still
absent from Brooklyn on his tour of
the world, gave out for his sermon
through the press last week the story
of the beautiful Hadassah, the text be-
ing from Esther IL. z: ''And he
brought up Hadassah." Following is
the sermon:
A beautiful child was born in the
and a captive, her parents having been
stolen from their Israelitish home and
carried to Shushan, and had died. leav-
ing their daughter poor and in a
strange land. But an Israelite, who
had been carried into the same captiv-
| ity, was attracted by the case of the
orphan. He educated her in his holy
religion, and under the roof of that
good man this adopted child began to
develop sweetness and excellence of
character if ever equaled, certainly
never surpassed. Beautiful Hadassah!
Could that adopted father ever spare
her from his household? Her
artlessness;herg irlish sports;her innno-
cence; her orphanage, had wound
themselves thoroughly around his
heart just as around each parents
heart among us there are tendrils
climbing, and fastening and blossom
ing, and growing stronger. 1 expect
he was like others who have loved ones
at home-wondering some times if
sickness will come, and death and be-
reavement. Alas! Worse than any
thing that the father expects happens
to his adopted child. Ahasuerus, a
princely scoundrel, demands that
Hadassah, the fairest one in all the
kingdom, become his wife. Worse
than death was marriage to such a
monster of iniquity! How great the
change when this young woman left
the home where God was worshiped
and religion honored, to enter palace
devoted to pride. idolatry and sensual
| ity! ''As lamb to the Slaughter
Ahasuerus knew not that his wife
was a Jewess. At the instigation of
the infamous prime minister the king
| decreed that all the Jews in the land
should be slain. Hadassah pleads the
cause of her people, breaking through
the rules of the court and presenting
herself in the very face of death. cry
ing: IF l perish, l perish" Oh, it
was sad time among the enslaved
people! They had all heard the decree
concerning their death. Sorrow. gaunt
and CHASTITY. sat in thousands of house
holds, and mothers wildly pressed their
infants to their breasts as the day of
massacre fastened on, praying that the
same sword-stroke which slew the
mother might also slay the child, rose
bud and bud perishing in the same
blast.
But Hadassah is busy at court. The
hard heart of the king is touched by
her story, and although he could not
reverse his decree for the staying of
the Jews. he sent out an order that
they should arm themselves for de-
Tense. On horseback, on mules, on
dromedaries, messengers sped through
the land bearing the kings dispatches,
and shout of joy went up from that
enslaved people at the faint hope of
success.
The day of execution dawned. Gov
eminent officials, armed and drilled,
cowed before the battle shout of the
oppressed people. The cry of defeat
rang back to the palaces, but above the
mountains of dead, above -, 900 crushed
and mangled corpses, sou nded the tri-
umph of the delivered Jews and their
enthusiasm was as when the Highland
ers came to the relief of Lucknow, and
the English army, which stood in the
very jaws of death, at the sudden hope
of assistance and rescue, lifted the
shout above the belching cannon and
the death-groan of hosts, crying: 1--WE
are saved! We are savedr'
My subject affords me opportunity of
illustrating what Christian character
may be under the greatest advantages.
There is no Christian now exactly what
he wants to be. Your standard is
much higher than anything you have
attained unto. If there be any man so
pulled up as to be thoroughly satisfied
with the amount of eXcellency he has
already attained, l have nothing to say
to such a one. But to those who are
dissatisfied with past attainments, who
are toiling under disadvantages which
are keeping them from being what
they ought to be, l have a message
from God. You each of you labor I'M
der difficulties. There is something in
your temperament; in your worldly cir
cumstances: in your calling, that acts
powerfully against you. Admitting all
this, introduce to you Hadassah of
the text, noble Christian. notwith-
standing the most gigantic difficulties.
She whom you might have expected to
be one of the worst of women, is one
of the best.
| In the first place. our subject is an
illustration of what Christian charac
ter may be under orphanage. This
Bible line tells long story about
| Hadassah. "She had neither father nor
mother" A nobleman has become her
guardian, but there is no one who can
take the place of a parent. An indi-
vidual will go through life bearing
| the marks of orphanage. 1t will re-
quire more strength, more persistence,
more grace, to make such an one the
right kind of Christian. He who
at 40 years loses parent must reel
under the blow. Even down to old
age men are accustomed to rely
upon the counsel, or be powerfully in
fuenced by the advice of parents, if
they are still alive. But how much
greater the bereavement when it comes
in early life, before the character is
sclf-reliant, and when naturally the
heart is unsophisticated and easily
tempted
And yet behold what a nobility of dis
position Hadassah exhibited! Though
father and mother were gone, grace
had triumphed over all disadvantages.
Her willingness to self-sacrifice; her
control over the king: her humility;
her faithful worship of God, show her