The Monitor-register., 1896-08-14
TT MAY BE TOO LATE.
DANGER OF PUTTING OFF THE DAY
OF REFORMATION.

There Is ANY Chance of Repentance ant
p.rdon T,evond the Grave-Shali W.
Have Another Chance?
WASHINGTON, Aug. 9.-Dr. Talmagt
to-day discusses a question that every
body some time discusses. 1t is one OF
tremendous import, Shall we have an
other chance? The text is Ecclesiastes
xi. 3, eff the tree fall toward the south
or toward the north, in the place Where
the tree falleth there it shall be. y
There is lowering hope IN the minds
of a vast multitude of people that there
will be an opportunity i'll the next worlo
of correcting the mistakes Of this; that,
however complete a shipwreck we may
make of our earthly life, it will be on
beach up which we may walk to pal
ace; that, as the defendant may lose has
case in circuit court and appeal 1t and
have it go up TO the supreme court OF
court of chancery and all the costs
thrown over on the other party, so a
man NAV lose his case i'll this World'
but in the higher jurisdiction OF eternity
have the decision of the earthly case set
aside. all UQp CtSlS 1NliI1btNA NN--
fendant be triumphant forever
The object of my sermon IS to show
YOU that common sense declares with
the text that such an expectation IS
cbimericaI ''If the tree fall toward the
sonth or toward the north, i'll the place
where the tree falleth there it shall
he " There are those who say that, if
the impenitent and unforgiven man en-
ters the next world and sees the disaster,
as n result Of that disaster he will turn,
the distress the cause of his retorma-
tion. but we have 10, 600 instances all
aronnd about us of people who have
done wrong and disaster suddenly came
unon them. Did the disaster heal them?
No, they went on.
No Hone but In the Present.
There is a man flung Of dissipations.
The doctor says to him, ''Now, my
friend, if you don't stop drinking and
don't stop this fast life you are living,
YOU will die =" The patient thanks the
nhysician for his warning and gets bet
ter: he begins to sit up, begins to walk
around the room, begins to go to busi-
ness and takes the same round of grog-
shops where he got his morning dram
and his evening dram and the drains
between. Down again. Same doctor.
Same physical anguish. Same medical
warming. But now the sickness is more
protracted, the liver more obstinate, the
stomach more irritable, the digestive
organs more rebellious. But still, under
medical skill, he gets better, goes forth,
commits the same sacrilege against his
physical health. Sometimes he wakes
I'D to see what he is doing, and he
realizes he is destroying his family, and
that his life is a perpetual perjury
against his marriage VOWS, and that
that broken hearted woman is SO differ
ent from the roseate wife he married
that her old schoolmates do not recog-
nize her on the street, and that his sons
are going out in life under the taunt of
a fathers drunkenness, and that his
daughters are going out in life under
the scarifcation of a disreputable an
cestry. His nerves are all a-jangle.
From crown of head to sole Of foot he is
one aching, rasping, crucifying, damning
torture. Where is he? He is in-hell on
earth. Does it stop him? All, mol After
awhile delirium tremens pours out upon
his pillow whole jungle of kissing
reptiles. His screams horrify the neigh
bors as he dashes out of bed crying,
"Take these things off mel" He is
drinking down the comfort of his FAM
lily, the education of his children, their
prospects for the life to come. Pale and
convalescent he sits up. Physician says
to him: "Now, my good fellow, 1 am
going to have plain talk with you. If
you ever have an attack Of this kind
again, you will die. I can't save you,
and all the doctors i'll creation can't
save you"
The patient gets up, starts out, goes
the same round of dissipation and IS
down again, but this time medicines do
not touch his case. Consultations of
physicians say there is no hope. Death
ends the scene. That process of inebria-
ton and physical suffering and medical
warning and dissolution is taking place
within stones throw of where you sit
and in every neighborhood of Christen-
dom. Pain does not reform. Suffering
does not cure What is true in regard
to one sin is true in regard to all sins,
and yet men are expecting in the next
life there will be opportunity for purga-
torial regeneration. Take up the printed
reports of the prisons of the United
States and find that the vast majority
of the criminals were there before, some
for two times, three times, four times,
six times; punished again and again,
but they go right on. Millions of incl
dents and instances working the other
way, and yet men think that in the
next world punishment will work out
for them salvable effects. Why, you and
I cannot imagine any worse torture
from another world than we have seen
men in in this world, and without any
salutary consequence.
The Next Life.
Furthermore, the prospect of reforma
tion in another world is more improb-
able than here. Do you not realize the
fact that man starts in this world
with the innocence of infancy? In the
other case, starting in the other world,
he starts with the accumulated bad
habits of a lifetime. Is it not to be ex-
pected that you could build better
ship out of new timber than out OF an
old hull that has been ground up in the
breakers? If starting with comparative
lnnocency the man does not become
godly, is it possible that starting with
sin a seraph can be evoluted? Is there
not more prospect that a sculptor will
make finer statue out Of block OF
pure white Parian marble than out OF a
black rock that has been cracked and
twisted and split and SCARED with the
storms of half century? Gould you not
write a last will and testament, or write
deed, or write an important document
on pure white sheet of paper easier
than you could write it upon sheet
scribbled all over with infamy and blot
ted and torn from top to bottom? And
yet there are those who are so uncom
mon sensical as to believe that, though
man starts in this world with infancy
and its innocence and turns out badly.
in the next world he can start with 6
dead failure and turn out well.
"But," say some people, 1--WE ought
to have another chance in the mex
world because our life here is SO very
brief. We scarcely have room to turn
around between the cradle and the
grave, the wood of the one almost strik
ing against the marble of the other. We
ought to have another chance because o.
the brevity of this life" My friends,
do you know what made the ancient
deluge necessity? Itwas the longevity
of the antediluvians. They were worse
in the second century than in the first
and worse when they got 800 years old
and worse at 400. and worse at 500, and