The Progress., 1894-03-31
EASTER SERMON.
DR.. TALMAGE ON THE LAST
RESURRECTION.
who Could DO Things Only as Far ~.
Man Can Uudcrstand"-Nearl All l.
Mystery.

almost hid the pull pit from view, and
the great organ gave forth its most
rapturOuS strains in honor Of the day.
In the forenoon Rev DR.. Talmagc deliv-
cred an eloquent sermon, the text be
ing taken from Genesis % xvii, xviii ::
And the field of Hebron, which was
in Machpelah, which was before
Mamre the field, and the cave which
was therein, and all the trees that
were in the field, that were in all the
borders round about, We're made sure
unto Abraham.
At this Easter service ask and an
sWer what may seem novel question,
but it will be found, before | get
through, 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
it is customary in all lands to strew
flowers over the mounds of the depart
ed. 1t may have been suggested By
the fact that Christ's tomb was in u
garden. And when ] say garden dc
not mean a garden of these ATTITUDES.
The late frosts of spring and the early
frosts of autumn are so near each other
that there are only few months OF
flowers in the field. All the flowers
we see to-day had to be petted and
coaxed and put under shelter, or they
would not have bloomed at all They
are the children of the Conservatives.
But at this season and through the
most of the year, til Holy Land is all
ablush with floral opulence.
You find all the royal family of
flowers there, some that you supposed
indigenous to the far north, and Others
indigenous to the far south-the daisy
and hyacinth, crocus and anemone,
tulip and water lily, geranium and
ranunculus, mignonette and sweet
marjoram. In the college at Beyrout
you may see DR.. Posts collection of
about eighteen hundred kinds of Holy
Land flowers; while among trees are
the oaks of frozen climes, and the
tamarisk of the tropics, walnut and
willow, ivy and hawthorne, ash and
elder, pine and sycamore. If such
floral and botanical beauties are the
wild growths of the field, think OF
what gerden must be in Palestine.
And in such a garden Jesus Christ
slept after, on the soldiers spear, his
last drop of blood had coagulated,
And then see how appropriate that all
our cemeteries should be tioralized and
tree shaded. In June Greenwood is
Brooklyn's garden.
well, them" you say, chow can
you make out that the resurrection
day will beautify the cemeteries?
Will it not leave them plowed up
ground? On that day there will be an
earthquake, and will not this split the
polished Aberdeen granite, as well as
the plain slab that can afford but two
words, Our Mary or Our Charley?' "
Well, l will tell you how resurrection
day will beautify all the cemeteries
1t will be by bringing up the faces
that were to us once, and in ou1
memories are to us now, more beauti-
full than any Gala lily, and the forms
that are to us more graceful than any
willow by the waters. Can you think
of anything more beautiful than the
temperance of those from whom we
have been parted? | do not care
which way the tree falls in the blast
of the Judgment hurricane, or if the
plowshare that day shall turn under
the last rose leaf and the last china
aster, if out of the broken sod shall
come the bodies of our loved ones not
damaged, but irradiated.
The idea of the resurrection gets
easier to understand as | hear the
monograph unroll some voice that
talked into it year ago, Just before
our friends decease. You touch the
lever, and then come forth the very
tones, the very song of the person that
breathed into it once, but is now de
parted. If man can do that, can not
Almighty God, without half trying,
return the voice of your departed?
And if he can return the voice. why
not the lips and the tongue and the
throat that fashioned the voice? And
if the lips and the tongue and the
throat, why not the brain that sug-
gested the words? And if the brain,
why not the nerves, of which the
brain is the headquarters? And if he
can return the nerves, why not the
muscles, which are less ingenious?
And if the muscles, why not the bones,
that are less wonderful? And if the
voice and the brain and the muscles
and the bones, why not the entire
body9 If man can do the photograph,
God can do the resurrection.
Will it be the same body that in the
last day shall be terminated? Yes,
but infinitely improved Our bodies
change every seven years, and vet in
one sense it is the same body. On my
wrist and the second finger of my
right hand there is a scar. made
that at twelve years of age, when, dis
gusted at the presence of two
warts, I took a red hot iron and
hnrnnA than off md h,,rrnod 4ln,,,