Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1895-05-25
THE WONDROUS HAND
REV. 7. De WITT .TALMAeE IN THE
METROPOLITAN PULPIT.

! REV. 7. DE WITT -TALMAGE IN THE
METROPOLITAN PULPIT.
Christ Was Divine and Also Very Human.
The Religion Of Some Christians Is All
Wing Good Wrought In Cities-The
ToEIers' Everlasting Rest.
NEW YORK, May 19.--Rev. DIR. Tai.
IMAGES sermon III the Academy of Nu-
sic this afternoon was a powerful and
eloquent plea for practical Christianity
The subject, as announced, was, wing
and Hand, the text being Ezekiel x, 81,
1.-THE likeness of the hands Of a man
was under their wings =
While tossed on the sea between Aus
tralia and Ceylon / first particularly
noticed this text, of which then and
there I made memorandum. This chap
ter is all afintter with cherubin Who
are the cherubim? An order of angels
! radiant, mighty, all knowing, adoring,
/ worshipfuL When painter or sculptor
1 tried III temple at Jerusalem or i'll 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 burlcsque 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 pray by the pardoning grace
Of God We all may. But all the accounts
Biblical and all the suggestions human
represent the cherubim with wings, each
wing about seven feet long, vaster, more
! imposing than any plurnage that ever
floated 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
/ see--the birds pinion-which is the
! arm Of the Bird but i'll 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 all
abysms; tho bird looking down with
/ pity upon Boosting man as he tolls up
{ the sides of the Adirondacks, while the
wing with few strokes puts the high
est crags far beneath claw and beak.
But the bird S wing is only a feeble sag
gestion of cherubims 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,
Tho likeness of the hands Of 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 III that
combination of hand and wing. If this
world is ever brought to God, it viii 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 battleields 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
SEES the lawyer, showing his hand III
| the Ten Commandments, the foundation
of all good legislation; Amos, the herds
man, showing his hand in SMILES drawn
from fields and focks; the fishermen
apostles showing their hand when writ
ing about Gospel nets; Luke, the physi-
elan, showing his hand by giving cspe-
3ial attention to diseases cured; Paul
showing his scholarly hand by quoting
from heather poets, and making argu-
uiAsiAf9 tNDOut lLN tIiCt el6tIitl
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
bies, 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 sizillful
hand of human instrumentality. 1.-THE
likeness Of the hands Of a man was I'M
| ucf inc 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
cial meetings and reformatoiy associa-
tious offering prayer. Now, if anything
has wings, it is prayer 1t can fly farther
and faster than anything | can now
think of In one second of time from
where You sit it can fly to the throne of
God and alght i'll England. In one sec
ond Of time from where you sit it can
fly to the throne of God and alght in
India 1t can girdle the earth in
/ shorter time than you can seal Il letter,
or clasp a belt, or hook an eye Wings,
whether that prayer starts from an in
'ant's tongue or the trembling lip Of
seutonariaii, rising from the heart of a
| 'arner's wife standing at the dashing
,hurn, or before the hot breath of
ountrv oven, they soar away and pick
t;S4 &. !, :, 4 I, c o.