Connecticut western news., 1896-08-13
TT MAY BE TOO LATE.
DANGER OF PUTTING OFF THE DAY
 OF REFORMATION.

There Is Any Chance of Repentance and
 Pardon Beyond the Grave-shall We
 Have Another Chance.
 WASHINGTON, Aug. 9.-Dr. Talmage today discusses question that every body some time discusses. It is one of tremendous import, Shall we have an other chance? The text is Ecclesiastes Ri, 8, If the tree fall toward the south or toward the north, in the place where the tree falleth there it shall be. /"
 There is lowering hope Tn the minds of & vast multitude of people that there will be an opportunity in the next world of correcting the mistakes of this; that, however complete a shipwreck we may make of our earthly life, it will be on a beach up which we may walk to pal ace; that, as the defendant may lose his case in circuit court and appeal it and have it go up 10 the supreme court or court of chancery and all the costs thrown over on the other party, so man may lose his case in this world, but in the higher jurisdiction of eternity have the decision of the earthly case set aside, all the costs remitted and the de- 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 chimericaL "H the tree fall toward the south or toward the north, in the place where the tree falleth there it shall be- There are those who say that, if the impenitent and unforgiven man en- ters the next world and sees the disaster, as a result of that disaster he will turn, the distress the cause of his reforma- tion. but we have 10, 900 instances all around about us of people who have done wrong and disaster suddenly came upon them. Did the disaster heal them? No, they went on.
 No Hope hut In the Present.
 There is Q 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 physician 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 drams between Down again. Same doctor. Same physical anguish. Same medical warning But nov the sickness is more protracted, the liver more obstinate, the stomach more irritable, the digestive orkans more rebelioua But still, under medical skill, he gets better, goes forth, commits the same sacrilege against his physical health Sometimes he wakes up to see what he is doing, and he realizes he is destroying his family, and that his life is 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- nixe her on the street, and that his sons are going out in life under the taunt of . fathers drunkenness, and that his daughters are going out in life under the scarification 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 be? He is in hell on earth. Does it stop him? An, mol After awhile delirium tremens pours out upon his pillow a whole jungle of hissing reptiles. His screams horrify the neigh bors as he dashes out of bed crying, ''Take these things off mep 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. 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 in 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- tion and physical suffering and medical warning and dissolution is taking place within stone's 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 ill 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 inci- 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 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 ton in another world is more improb- able than here. Do you not realize the fact that a 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 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 innocency the man does not become godly, Is it possible that starting with sin seraph can be evoluted? Is there not more prospect that 8 sculptor will make finer statue out of a block of pure white Parian marble than out of black rock that has been cracked and twisted and split and scared with the storms of a half century? Could you not write 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