The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-06-10
ExPURGATIoN OF THE BIBLE.
TALMAGE on THE COMMANDMENT
OF THE SCRIPTURES.

He Expresses Surprise That Clergy
men Are Found in the Ranks of
Those Trying TO Pick Flaws i'm the
Book of BOOks-TaImaEe Asserts
His Belief in the Miraculous Facts
ChrOnfcIed in the Scriptures.
New York June 9.-In his sermon for
to-day. Rev. DR.. Taimage deals with
subject that is agitating the entire Chris
tan church at the present moment. viz:
'Expurgation of the Scriptures" The
text chosen was. Let God be true. but
every man liar" Romans "a.
The Bible needs reconstruction, accord
ing to some inside and outside the pull
pit 1t is no surprise that the world bonn
bards the Scriptures. but it is amazing to
ind Christian ministers picking at this
in the Bible and denying that until many
good people are left IN the fog about
what parts of the Bible they ought to be-
lieve, and what parts reject. The helm
BUSINESS of finding fault with the Bible
at this time is most evident. In our day the
Bible is assailed by scurrilty. by mis-
representation, by infdel scientists. by
all the vice of earth and all the venom
of perdition. and at this particular time
even preachers Of the gospel fall into line
of criticism Of the Word Of God. Why,
it makes me think of a ship in a Sep
TENDER equinox, the waves dashing to the
top of the smoke-stacK, and the matches
fastened down. and many prophecying
the laundering of the steamer, and al that
time some of the crew with axes and
4 H..H.
and they try to saw off some of the
planks and pry out some OF the timbers
because the timber did not come from
the right forest! 1t does not seem to me
a commendable business for the crew TO
be helping the winds and storms outside
with their axes and saws inside. Now,
this old gospel ship, what with the roaring
of earth and hell around the stem and
stern, and mutiny on ueck is having a
very rough voyage, but ! have noticed
that not one of the timbers has started,
and the captain says he win see IL
through. And l have noticed that keelson
and counter-timber-knee are built out of
Lebanon cedar. and she is going to wealth
er the gale, but no credit to those who
make mutiny on deck.
When l see protested Christians in this
particular day finding fault with the
Scriptures, II makes me think of the fort
ress terrifcally bombarded, and the men
on the ramparts. instead of swabbing out
and loading guns, and helping fetch up the
ammunition from the magazine, are try
ing with crowbars to pry out from the wall
certain blocks of stone because they did
not come from the right quarry Oh men
on the ramparts, better fight back, and
fight down the common enemy, instead of
trying to make breaches in the wall.
While l oppose this expurgation of the
Scriptures, / shall give you my reasons
for such opposition. What" say some
of the theological evolutionists, whose
brains have been added by too long brood
ing over them by Darwin and Spencer,
you don't now really believe all the story
of the Garden of Eden. do your" Yes as
much as | believe there was roses in my
garden last summer. But" say they,
you don't really believe that the sun and
moon stood still?" Yes. and if l had
strength enough to create sun and moon
could make them stand still. or cause
the refraction Of the suns rays so il would
appear to stand still. But" they say,
you don't really believe that the whale
swallowed Jonah? Yes. and if I were
strong enough to make a whale / could
have made very easy ingress for the re-
fractory prophet leaving to Evolution to
eject him, if he were an unworthy tenant!
But" say they, you don't really believe
that the water was turned into wine?'
Yes, just as easily as water now is often
turned into wine with an admixture of
"
you don't really believe that Samson slew
a thousand with the jaw-bone of an ASST"
Yes, and l thing that the man who in this
day assaults the Bible is welding the same
weapon!
There is nothing in the Bible that stag
gers me- There are many things l do not
understand l do not pretend to under
stand But that would be a very poor
sand. But that would be a very poor
God who could be fully understood by the
human. That would be a very small In
finite that can be measured by the finite.
You must not expect to weigh the thun-
derbolts of Omnipotence in an apothe-
cary's balances. Starting with the idea
that God can do anything, and that he
was present at the beginning, and that
he is present now, there is nothing in the
Holy Scriptures to arouse scepticism in
my heart. Here l stand, a fossil of the
ages, dug up from the tertiary forma-
ton, fallen off the shelf of an antiquarian,
a man in the latter part of the glorious
nineteenth century believing in a whole
Bible from lid to lid!
l am opposed to the expurgation of the
Scriptures in the first place, because the
Bible in its present shape has been so
miraculously preserved. Fifteen hundred
years after Herodotus wrote his history
there was only one manuscript copy of it.
Twelve hundred years after Plato wrote
his book there was only one manuscript
copy of it. God was so careful to have
US have the Bible in just the right shape
that we have fifty manuscript copies of
the New Testament a thousand years
old, and some of them fifteen hundred
years old. This book handed down from
the time of Christ, or just after the time
of Christ, by the hand of such men as
Origen in the second century, and Ter
tullian in the third century, and by men
of different ages who died for their prin-
ciples. The three best copies of the New
Testament in manuscript in the possession
of the three great churches-the Protes-
tant church of England, the Greek church
of st. Petersburg and the Romish church
of Italy.
1t is a plain matter of history that
1lschendorf went to a convent in the
peninsula of Sinai and was-by ropes lifted
over the wall into the convent, that being
the only mode of admission, and that he
saw there in the waste basket for kind
ling for the fires, a manuscript of the
Holy Scriptures. That night he copied
many of the passages of that Bible, but
1t was not until fifteen years had passed
OF earnest entreaty and prayer and coax
m hi