Connecticut western news., 1895-04-11
TWELVE WIDE GATES
REV. oR. rALMAGE ON THE EN-
 FRANCES TO HEAVEN.

FRANCES TO HEAVEN.
 He Preaches to Mighty Throng at the Great Academy of Music In New York. ] His Subject. 'sIhe Gates of Heaven.~
 NEw YORK, April 7.-The bright spring weather has brought still larger crowds to the Sunday afternoon services conducted by Rev. Dr. Talmage. He took for his subject today .'The Gates of Heaven," the text being Revelatio on xxi, IS, "On the east three gates; on the north three gates; on the south three gates; on the west three gates"
 The Cashmere gate of Delhi, where converRed a heroism that makes one's nerves jingle, tho Lucknow gate. still dented and scarred with sopoy lombard ment the Madeline gate with its em- blazonfy in lronse, tho hundred gates of Thebes, the wonder of centuries, all go out of sight before the gates of my text.
 Our subject speaks of great metrop-
 
 doubted. Standing on the wharf and looking of upon the harbor and seeing the merchantmen coming up the bay, the flags of foreign nations streaming from the topgallants, you immediately make up your mind that those vessels come from foreign ports, and you say, That is from Hamburg, and that is from Marseillos and that is from South ampton. and that is from Havana, and your supposition is accurate But from the city of which I am now speak ing no weather beaten merchantmen or frigates with scared bulkhead have ever come. There has been a vast emil grafton into that city, but no emigration from it. so far as our natural vision can descry.
 ''There is no such city, says the un- high towers with mighty telescope and have swept the heavens. and have seen spots on the sun and oaverns in the moon. but no towers have ever risen on my vision, no palaces, no temples, no shining streets, no massive wall There is no such city" Even very good peo- pie tell me that heaven is not a material organism, but grand spiritual fact. and that the Bible descriptions of it are in all cases to be taken figurative]y. I bring in reply to this what Christ said, and he ought to know, 'I go to pre- pare'-not theory, not a principle, not sentiment but ''I go to prepare a place for you. The resurreoted body implies this. If my foot is to be reform ed from the dust it must have some thing to tread on. If my hand is to be reconstructed, it must have something to handle. If my eye, having gone out in death, is to be rekindled, must have something to gazo on. Your ad- verse theory seems to imply that the resurrected body is to be hung on noth- ing, or to walk in air, or to float amid the intangibles. You may say if there be material organisms then soul in heaven will be cramped and hindered in its enjoyments. but I answer, Did not Adam and Eve have plenty of room in the garden of Eden? Although only a few miles would have described the cir conference of that place, they had ample room. And do you not suppose that God, in the immensities, can build a place large enough to give the whole race room, even though there be mate- rial organisms?
 The Prospect.
 Herschel looked into the heavens. As a Swiss guide puts his Alpine stock be- tween the glaciers and crosses over from crag to crag. so Herschel planted his tele- ooopo hot tho uuorldo aud ,yl,da1 from star to star until he could an- nounce to us that we live in part of the universe but sparsely strewn with worlds. and he peers out into irhm ensity until he finds a region no larger than our solar system in which there are 50,- 900 worlds moving. And Professor Lang says that by philosophic reason ing there must be somewhere a world where there is no darkness, but everlast- ing sunshine, so that do not know but that it is simply because we have no telescope powerful enough that we can not see into the land where there is no darkness at all and catch a glimpse of the furnished pinnacles As a conquer ing army marching on to take city comes at nightfall to the crest of mountain from which, in the midst of the landscape, they see the castles they are to capture and rein in their war chargers and halt to take good look be- fore they pitch their tents for the night, so now, coming as we do on this noun tain top of prospect, command this regiment of God to rein in their thoughts and halt, and before they pitch their tents for the night take one good, long look at the gates of the great oity. '.On the east, three gates; on the north, three gates; on the south, three gates, and on the west three gates.
 In the first place, I want to examine the architecture of those gates Pro- prietors of large estates are very apt to have an ornamented gateway. Some. times they spring an arch of masonry, the posts of the gate fanked with lions in statuary, the bronze gate a represen- tation of intertwining foliage, bird haunted, until the hand of architectural genius drops exhausted, all it's life fro zen into stone. Gates of wood and iron and stone guarded nearly all the old cities. Moslems have inscribed upon their gateways inscriptions from the Koran of the Mohammedan. There have been a great many fine gateways, but Christ sets his hand to the work and for the upper city swung a gate such as no eye ever gazed on, untouched of in spiration.H With the nail of his own cross he cut into its wonderful traceries stories of past suffering and of gladness 10 come There is no wood or stone or bronze in that gate, but from top to base and from side to side it is all of pearl Not one piece picked up from Ceylon banks, and another piece from the Persian gulf, and another from the island of Marguerite, but one solid pearl picked up from the beach of everlasting light by heavenly hands and hoistec