The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1896-10-19
CHRIST AS THE HUSBANDMAN.
TALMAGE FRAMES HIS SERMON IN
4 RUSTIC BOWER.


err on Large ScaIe-Elishs an Az
ricuIturaIist-Deep Flowing For
OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES Compose
the Largest Denomination in the
Country.
Washington. Oct. IS. 1S96.-This
sermon. at this season, after most people
have had good. long breath OF the coun-
try. if they do not actually live there, will
revive many pleasant memories, While 1t
deals with great religious truths. Or.
Talrnage's text was John 10: /; My father
is the husbandman.
This last summer, having gone in dill
ferent directions over between five ana
six thousand miles of harvest fields, can
hardly open my Bible without smelling
the breath of neW-mown hay and seeing
the golden light of the wheat field. And
when open my Bible to take my text,
the Scripture leaf rustles like the tasSels
of the corn.
We were nearly all Of us born in the
country. We dropped corn in the hill. aud
went on Saturday to the mill, tying the
grist in the center of the sack so that
the contents on either side the horse bal
anced each other; and drove the cattle
afeld our bare feet wet with the dew, and
rode the horses with the halter to the
brook until we fell off. and hunted the
NOV for nests until the feathered occu-
pants went cackling away. We were near.
ly all of us born in the country and all
would have stayed there had not some adj
venturous lad on his vacation come back
e.
set the whole village on fire with ambition
for city life. So we all understand rustic
illusions. The Bible is full of them. In
Christs sermon on the Mount you could
see the full-bloWn lilies and the glossy
back of the crows wing as it flies over
Mount Olivet. David and John, Paul and
Isaiah find in country life source OF fire.
quent Illustration while Christ in the
text takes the responsibility of calling
God a farmer, declaring: My father is
the husbandman."
Noah was the first farmer. We say
nothing about Cain, the tiller of the soil
Adam was a gardener on large scale, but
to Noah was given all the acres of the
earth. Elisha was an agriculturist not
cultivating ten-acre lot, for we find him
blowing with twelve yoke of oxen. In
Bible times the land was so plenty and the
inhabitants so few that Noah was right
when he gave to every mhabitant a GER
tain portion of land; that land, if cult
waited, ever after to be his own possession.
Just as in Nebraska the United States
government on payment of SIG years ago
gave presumption right to 100 acres to any
man who would settle there and cultivate
the soil.
All classes of people were expected to
ant int "a.
ligion. 1t was supposed that they would
have their time entirely occupied with
their own profession, although l am told
that some times ministers do plunge so
deeply into wordliness that they remind
one of what Thomas Fraser said in regard
to a man in his day who preached very
well, but lived very i'll: when he is out
of the pulpit it is a pity he should ever
go into it, and when he is in the pulpit it
is pity he should ever come out of it,"
They were not small crops raised in
those times, for though the arts were rude
the plow turned up very rich soil, and
barley cotton, and flax, and all kinds of
grain came up at the call of the harvest
ers. Pllny tells of one stalk of grain that
had on it between three and four hun
dred ears. The rivers and the brooks.
through artificial channels, were brought
down to the roots of the corn, and to this
habit of turning a river wherever ii was
wanted, Solomon refers when he says:
''The kings heart is in the hand of the
Lord, and he turneth it as the rivers of
water are turned, whithersoever he will"
The wild beasts were caught. and then
nook was put into their nose and then
they We're led over the field, and to that
God refers when he says to wicked SEN
nacherib: Il will put a hook in thy nose
and l will bring thee back by the way
which thou earnest" And God has a hook
haA lr,f-
Nebuchadnezzar or Ahab or Herod He
may think himself very independent. but
sometime in his life, or in the hour of his
death, he will find that the Lord Almighty
has hook in his nose.
This was the rule in regard to the Gull
ture Of the ground: Thou shalt not
pillow with an OK and an ass together >,
illustrating the folly of ever putting intel
hgent and useful and pliable men in asso-
citation with the stubborn and the unman-
ageable. The vast majority of troubles in
the churches and in reformatory institu-
tons comes from the disregard of this
command Of the Lord, Thou shalt not
plow with an OK and an ass together
Ihere were large amounts of propertv
invested in cattle The Moabites maid
100000 sheep as an annual tax Job had
Zoo sheep, 5000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen.
The time Of vintage was ushered in with
mirth and music. The clusters of the vine
were put INTO the Wine-press, and then five
men would get into the press and trample
out the juice from the grape until their
garments were saturated with the wine
and had become the emblems of slaughter.
Christ himself, wounded until covered with
the blood of crucifxion, making use of
this alusion when the question was asked
Wherefore art thou red in thine apparel
and thy garments like one who treadeth
the wine-vat?" He responded: 81 have
trodden the wine-press alone"
In all ages there has been great honor
paid to agriculture. Seven-eighths of the
people IN every country are disciples OF
the plow. A government is strong in pro-
portion as it is supported by an
athletic and industrious yeomanry. So
long ago as before the fall OF Carthage.
Strabo wrote twenty-eight books on agri-
culture; Hesiod wrote poem ON the same
subJect-"The Weeks and Days" Cato
was prouder Of his work on husbandry
than of all his military conquests. But
l must not he tempted into discussion of
agricultural conquests. Standing amid
the harvests and orchards and vieyards
OF the Bible, and standing amid the har-
vests and orchards and vineyards of our
own country-larger harvests than have
ever before been gathered-I want to run