Connecticut western news., 1896-12-10
VISIONS OF HEAVEN.
DR. TALMAGe DESCRIBES THE EM-
 PLOYMENTS OF THE BLEsT.

DR. TALMAGe DESCRIBES THE EN-
 PLoYMENTS OF THE eLEST. Each Saved Soul, Each Great Paintsr,
 Each Great Scientist LAboring In the
 Great Workshop of Paradise-Grand So-
 eiality-rhe Library of the Universe.
 WARRINGTON, Dec. 6.-Dr. Talmage's sermon today gives 8 very unusual view of the celestial world and is one of the most unique discourses of the great preacher. The text is Ezekiel i, l, "Now 1t came to pass in the thirtieth year, in the fourth month, in the fifth day of the month. as was among the captives by the river Chebar, that the heavens were opened.
 Ezekiel, with others, had been expa- triated, and while in foreign slavery, atanding on the banks of the royal canal which he and other serfs had been condemned to dig by the order of Nebu- ohadnezzar-this royal canal in the text called the river of Chebar-the illustri- ous exile had visions of heaven. Indeed it is almost always so-that the bright est visions of heaven come not to those who arc on mountain top of prosperity, but to some John on desolate Patmos, or to some Paul in Mamertine dungeon, or to some Ezekiel standing on the banks of . ditch he had been compelled to dig-yea, to the weary, to the heart moken, to those whom sorrow has ban ished. The text is very particular to give us the exact time of the vision. It was in the thirtieth year and in the fourth month and in the fifth day of tho month. So you have had visions of earth you shall never forget. You re- member the year, you remember the month, you remember the day, you re- member the hour. Why may we not have some such vision now and it be in the twelfth month and in sixth day of the monthf
 What Arc They Doingf
 The question is often silently asked, though perhaps never audibly propound cd, What are our departed Christian friends doing nowr' The question is more easily answered than you might perhaps suppose. Though there has come no recent intelligence from the heavenly city. and we seem dependent upon the story of 18 centuries ago, still I think we may from strongest infer enoe decide what are the present occu- pations of our transferred kinsfolk. Aft CT God has made a nature he never eradicates the chief characteristic of its temperament. You never knew a man phlegmatio in temperament to become sanguine in temperament. You never knew . man sanguine in temperament to become phlegmatio in temperament. Oonversion plants new principles in the soul, but Paul and John are just as diff ferent from each other after conversion as they were different from each other before conversion. If conversion does not eradicate the prominent character istics of temperament, neither will death eradicate them. Paul and John arc as different from each other in heaven as they were different from each other in Asia Minor.
 You have, then. only by a sum in sub- traction and a sum in addition to de- cide what are the employments of your departed friends in the better world. You ara to subtract from them all earthly grossness and add all earthly goodness, and then you are to come to the conclusion that they are doing now in heaven what in their best moment they did on earth. The reason why so many people never start for heaven Is because they could not stand it if they got there if it should turn out to be the rigid and formal place some people pho tograph it. We like to come to church, but we would not want to stay here till next summer. We like to hear the "HaAeluiah Chorus" but we would not want to hear it all the time for 50 csnturies It might be on some great occasion 1t would be possibly comfort able to wear a crown of gold weighing several pounds, but it would be an af- diction to wear such a crown forever. In other words, we run the descriptions of heaven into the ground while we make that which was intended as especial and celebrative to be the exclusive em- ployment in heaven. You might as we'll, f asked to describe the habits of American society, describe Decoration day or Fourth of July or an autumnal Thanksgiving. as though it were all the time that way.
 The Different Employments.
 am not going to speculate in regard to the future world, but must, by in- evitable laws of inference and deduction and common sense. conclude that in heaven we will be just as different from each other as we are now different, and hence that there will be at least as many different employments in the oe- leetial world as there are employments here. Christ is to be the great love, the great joy, the great rapture, the great worship of heaven, but will that abol- ish employments2 No more than love on earth-paternal. filial, fraternal, oonjugal love-abolishes earthly occupa- don.
 In the first place, remark that all those of our departed Christian friends who on earth found great joy in the fine arts are now indulging their tastes in the same direction. On earth they had their gladdest pleasures amid pio- tures and statuary and in the study of the laws of light and shade and per spective. Have you any idea that that afauenoe of faculty at death collapsed and perished? Why 30, when there is more for them to look at and they have keener appreciation of the beautiful and they stand amid the very looms where the sunsets and the rainbows and thes spring mornings are wovenp Are you so obtuse as to suppose, because tho painter drops his easel and the sculptor his ohisel and the engraver his knife, that therefore that taste which he was enlarging and intensity ing for 40 or 50 years Is entirely oblit- eratedf These artists or these friends of a<t on earth worked in coarse mate rial and with imperfect brain and with frail hand. Now they have carried their art into larger liberties and into wider oiroupferenoe. They are at their old business yet, but without the fatigues, without the Limitations without the