Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1895-05-20


NEW YORK, May 19-Rev. Dr. Tai
IMAGES sermon in the Academy of Mu
sic this afternoon was a powerful and
eloquent plea for practical Christianity.
The subject, as announced, was, "Wng
and Hand, - the text being Ezekiel X, 81,
1.-THE likeness of the hands of man
was under their Wings
While tossed on the sea between Aus
tralia and Ceylon I first particularly
noticed this text, of which then and
there / made memorandum. This chap
ter is all ahutter with cherubim. Who
are the cherubim? An order of angels
radiant, mighty, all knowing, adoring,
worshipful When painter or sculptor
tried in temple at Jerusalem or in mar
BILE of Egypt to represent the cherubim
he made them part lion or part OK or
part eagle. But much of that is an I'M
intended burlesque of the cherubim
whose majesty and speed and splendor
we will never know until lifted into
their presence we behold them for our
selves, as l pray by the pardOning grace
of God we all may. But all the accounts
Biblical and all the suppositions human
represent the cherubim with wings, each
wing about seven feet long, vaster, more
imposing than any plumage that ever
hoated in earthly atmosphere.
Condor in flight above ChimbOrazo,
or Rocky mountain eagle aiming for the
MONDAY sun, or albatross in play with
ocean tempests, presents no such glory.
We can get an imperfect idea of the
wing of cherubim by the only wing we
u, 80 &c fIon
arm of the bird, but in some respects
more wondrous than the human arm;
with power of making itself more light
or more heavy, of expansion and con-
traction; defying all attitudes and ali
abysms; the bird looking down with
pity upon bOasting man as he tolls UP
the sides of the Adirondaclzs, while the
wing with few strokes puts the high
est crags far beneath claw and beak.
But the birds wing is only a feeble sug
gestion of cherubim S wing. The great
ness of that, the rapidity of that, the
radiance of that, the Bible again and
again sets forth.
The Wing of Inspiration.
My attention is not more attracted by
those wings than by what they reveal
when lifted. In two places in Ezekiel
we are told there were hands under the
wings-human hands, hands like ours,
''The likeness of the hands of a man
was under the wings" We have all no
ticed the wing of the cherubim, but no
one seems yet to have noticed the hu-
man hand under the wing There are
whole sermons, whole anthems, whole
doxologies, whole millenniums in that
combination of hand and wing. If this
world is ever brought to God, it will be
by appreciation of the fact that super
natural and human agencies are to go
together-that which scars and that
which practically works, that which
ascends the heavens and that which
reaches forth to earth, the joining of
the terrestrial and the celestial, the
hand and the wing
We see this union in the construction
of the Bible. The wing of inspiration is
in every chapter. What realms of the
ransomed earth did Isaiah fly over!
Over what battlefields for righteousness,
what coronations, what dOminiOns Of
gladness, what rainbows around the
throne did St. John hover! But in every
book of the Bible you just as certainly
see the human hand that wrote it. Mo-
ses, the lawyer, showing his hand in
the Ten Commandments, the foundation
of all good legislation; Amos, the herds
man, showing his hand in SMILES drawn
from fields and flocks; the fishermen
apostles showing their hand when writ
ing about Gospel nets; Luke, the physi-
clan, showing his hand by giving espe-
cial attention to diseases cured; Paul
showing his scholarly hand by quoting
from heather poets, and making argu-
ments about the resurrection that stand
as firmly as on the day he planted them,
and St. John shows his hand by taking
his imagery from the appearance of the
bright waters spread around the island
of Patmos at hour of sunset, when he
speaks of the sea of glass mingled with
fire; scores of hands writing the para
bleS, the miracles, the promises, the no
sannas, the raptures, the consultations,
the woes of ages Oh, the Bible is SO
human, so full of heartbeats, SO sympa-
thetic, so wet with tears, SO trium-
plant with palm branches, that it takes
hold of the human race as nothing else
ever can take hold of it, each writer in
his own style-JOb, the scientific; Solo
mon, the royal blooded; jeremiah, the
respondent; Daniel, the abstemious and
heroic-why, we know their style so
well that we need not look to the top of
the page to see who is the author No
more conspicuous the uplifting wing of
inspiration than the hand. the warm
hand, the flexible hand, the skillful
hand of human instrumentality. 1.-THE
likeness of the hands of a man was I'M
der the wings.
The Speed of Prayer.
Again, behold this combination of
my text in all successful Christian work.
We stand or kneel in our pulpits and So