The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1894-04-06
OUT OF BRICKKILNS.
DR.. TALMAGE BREACHES UPON THE
SUSTAINING POWER OF RELIGION.

BROOKLYN, April lin the Brooklyn
Tabernacle this forenoon Rev. DR.. Tai
mage preached to a crowded audience OF
asubiect of unusual interest, as illustrat
ing the sustaining power of religion tC
those who are in daily contact with the
world, it's trials and temptations. The
text chosen was Psalms xviii, 10
Though we have lain among the pots
yet shall we be as the wings of a dove
covered with silver and her feathers
with yellow gold"
| suppose you know what the Israelites
did down in Egyptian slavery. They
made bricks. Amid the utensils of the
brickkiln there were also other utensils
of cookery-the kettles, the pots, the
pans, with which they prepared their
daily food, and when these poor slaves,
tired of the days work, lay down to rest
they lay down among the implements of
cookery and the implements of hard
work. When they arose in the morning,
they found their garments covered with
the clay, and the smoke, and the dust,
and besmirched and begrimed with the
utensils of cookery.
But after awhile the Lord broke up
that slavery, and he took these poor
slaves into land where they had better
garb, bright and clean and beautiful ap-
parel. No more bricks for them to make.
Let Pharaoh make his own bricks. When
David, in my text, comes to describe the
transition Of these poor Israelites from
their bondage amid the brickkilns into
the glorious emancipation for which God
! had prepared them, he says, Though ye
have lain among the pots, yet shall We
be as the wings of a dove covered with
silver and her feathers with yellow
gold"
A HARD TASKMASTER.
Miss Whately, the author of cele-
brated book, Life In Egypt" said she
sometimes saw people in the east cooking
their food on the tops of houses, and that
she had often seen just before shutdown
pigeons and doves, which had during the
heat of the day been hiding among the
kettles and the pans with which the food
was prepared, picking up the crumbs that
they might find. Just about the hour of
sunset they would spread their wings
and fly heavenward, entirely unsoiled by
the region in which they had moved, for
the pigeon is very clearly bird.
And as the pigeons flew away the set
ting sun would throw silver on their
wings and gold on their breasts. So you
see it is not farfetched simile or an
unnatural comparison when David, in
my text, says to these emancipated Isra-
elites, and says to all those who are
brought out of any kind of trouble into
any kind of spiritual joy, Though we
have lain among the pots, yet shall we
be as the wings of a dove covered with
silver and her feathers with yellow gold.'
Sin is the hardest of all taskmasters
Worse than Pharaoh, it keeps us drudg-
ing in a most degrading service, but |
after awhile Christ comes, and he says, |
"Let my people co." and we pass out |
from among the brickkilns of sin into |
the glorious liberty of the gospel. We
put on the clean robes of Christian
profession, and when at last we soar
away to the warm nest which God has
provided for us in heaven we shall go
fairer than dove, it's wings covered
with silver and its feathers with yellow
gold.
THE DOVE AS A COMPARISON.
am going to preach something which
some of you do not believe, and that is
that the grandest possible adornment is
the religion of Jesus Christ. There are
great many people who suppose that
religion is a very different thing from
what it really is. The reason men con-
denim the Bible is because they do not
understand the Bible. They have not
properly examined it. DR.. johnson said
that Hume told a minister in the bishop
ric of Durham that he had never par
ticularly examined the New Testament.
yet all his life warning against it. Hal
ley, the astronomer, announced his skep-
ticism to Sir Isaac Newton, and Sir Isaac
Newton said: "Now, sir, have exam
ined the subject, and you have not. And
/ am ashamed that you, protesting to be
a philosopher, consent to condemn a
thing you have never examined"
And so men reject the religion of Jesus
Christ because they really have never in
vestigated it. They think it something
something that will not
work, something Pecksniffian, something
something repulsive, when
it is so bright and so beautiful you might
compare it to chaffinch, you might COM
pare it to robin red breast, you might !
compare it to a dove-its wings covered &
with silver and its feathers with yellow I
gold.
But how is it if young man becomes
q Christian All through the clubrooms {
where he associates, all through the bust
ness circles where he is known, there is '
They say, "Whata pity
that young man who had such bright E
should so have been despoiled !
by those Christians, giving up all his
worldly prospects for something which '
S of no particular present WORTH" Here
s young woman who becomes Chris Z
,ian-her voice, her face, her manners
he charm of the drawing room. :
Now all through the fashionable cir .
les the whisper goes, "What pity that
;uch bright light should have been ex-
fhot c,1cb orroaaf,,1 o,o,& II