Capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1893-1895, 1894-02-21
A PATH THAT SHINES.
REV. DR.. TALMAeE breaches UPON
THE LIGHTNING OF THE SEA.

Irradlated Wave Of Gladnsss-The Glow
of Good Deeds.
BROOKLYN, Feb. 1s.-In the Brooklyn
Tabernacle this forenoon Rev. DIR. Tai.
mage preached an unusually attractive
and eloquent gospel sermon to crowd.
cd audience, who listened with rapt in
terest. The subject was 1.-THE Lightning
Of the Sea-" the text selected being JOB
XII. 80, "He maketh path to shine after
him."
II for the next thousand years minis
ters of religion should preach from this
Bible, there will yet be texts unexpound-
ed and unexplained and unappreciated.
What little has been said concerning this
chapter in Job from which my text is
taken bears on the controversy as to
what was really the leviathan described
as disturbing the sea. What creature it
was know not Some say it was whale
Some say it was crocodile. My own
opinion is it was sea monster now ex-
tinct. No creature now floating in Med
lterranean or Atlantic waters CORE
spends to Jobs description.
LIGHTNING OF THE SEA.
What most interests me is that as it
moved on through the deep it left the
waters flashing and resplendent. In the
words Of the text, HE maketh a path
to shine after him." What was that IL
lumined path? 1t was phosphorescence.
You find it in the wake of a ship in the
night, especially after rough weather.
Phosphorescence is the lightning of the
sea. That this figure of speech is cor
rect in describing its appearance am
certified by an incident. After crossing
the Atlantic the first time and writing
from Basle, Switzerland, to an Ameri-
can magazine an account of my voyage,
in which nothing more fascinated me
than the phosphorescence in the ships
wake, 1 called it the lightning of the sea.
Returning to my hotel, found book
Of John Ruskin, and the first sentence
my eyes fell upon was his description of
phosphorescence, in which he called it
1.-The lightning of the sea-"
Down to the postoffice 1 hastened to
get the manuscript, and with great labor
and some expense got possession of the
magazine article and put quotation
marks around that one sentence, al
though it was as original with me as
with John Ruskin. suppose that nine
tenths of you living SO near the sea-
coast have watched this marine appear
ance called phosphorescence, and hope
that the other one-tenth may some day
be SO happy as to witness it. 1t is the
waves of the sea diamonded; it is the in
forescence of the pillows; the waves of
the sea crimsoned as was the deep after
the sea fight of Lepanto; the waves of
the sea on fire.
There are times when from horizon to
horizon the entire ocean seems in con-
fagration with this strange splendor as
it changes every moment to tanner or
more dazzling color on all sides of you.
You sit looking over the taffrail of the
yacht or ocean steamer, watching and
waiting to see what new thing the God
of beauty will do with the Atlantic. 1t
is the ocean in TRANSPORTATION; it is the
marine world casting its garments of
glory in the pathway of the Almighty as
he walks the deep; it is an inverted firma-
ment with all its stars gone down with
it. No picture can present it, for pho
tographer's camera cannot be success
fully trained to catch it, and before it
the hand of the painter drops its pencil,
.overawed and powerless.
This phosphorescence is the appear
ance of myriads of the animal kingdom
rising, falling, playing, flashing, living,
dying. These luminous aninalcules for
nearly $50 years have been the study of
naturalists and the fascination and SOL
emnization of all who have brain enough
to think. Now, God, who puts in his
Bible nothing trivial or useless, calls the
attention of job the greatest scientist
of his day, to this phosphorescence, and
as the leviathan of the deep sweeps past
points ont the fact that che maketh
path to shine after him."
WAKE MADE BY BAD MAN.
Is that true of us now, and will it be
true of us when we have gone? Will |
there be subsequent light or darkness? |
Win there be trail of gloom or good |
cheer? Can any one between now and |
the next 100 years say of us truthfully |
as the text says Of the leviathan of the |
deep, HE maketh path to shine after
himF' For we are moving on. While |
we live in the same house, and transact
business in the same store, and write on
the same table, and chisel in the same
studio, and thrash in the same barn, and
worship in the same church, we are in
motion and are in many respects NOV
ing on, and we are not where we were
10 years ago, nor where we will be 10
years hence. Moving on!
Look at the family record, or the al
manac, or into the mirror, and see if any
one of you is where you were. All in
motion. Other feet may trip and stun
BILE and halt, but the feet Of not ope mo- |
ment for the last 60 centuries has tripped |
or stumbled or halted. Moving on! So |
ciety moving on! The world moving oni
Heaven moving onl The universe mov-
ing on! Time moving onl Eternity mov-
ing on! Therefore it is absurd to think |
that we ourselves can stop, as we must |
move with all the rest. Are we like the
creature of the text. making our path TO