The Monitor-register., 1897-06-25
GOD SAVE THE QUEEN

WCToRlA'6 JUBILEE is THE THEME OF
REV. DR.. TALMAGE'S DISCOURSE.
The Eloquent Preacher Pays a Fine Trib-
ute to England's Beloved Ruler and En-
forces the Lesson of Her Life-The
Greatest Coronation.
BEATRICE, Neb., Jure 20.-This is
DR.. Tslmage's third annual visit to the
Chautauqua here, one of the greatest
throngs ever assembled on this CONT
nent. He lectured yesterday; he preach
es today. Text, Esther V, 3, "What wilt
thou, Queen Esther:"
This question, which was asked of a
queen thousands of years ago, all civil
lized nations are this day asking of
Queen Victoria. "What wilt thou have
Of honor, of reward or reverence or
service, of national and international
reclamation? What wilt thou, the queen
Of the nineteenth century," The seven
miles of procession through the streets
of London day after tomorrow will be a
small part of the oongratulatory process
sion whose multitudinous tramp will
encirole the earth. The c~elebrative an
thems that will sound up from West
minister abbey and st. Paul's cathedral
in London will be less than the vibra-
tion of one harp string as compared
with the doxologies which this hour roll
up from all nations in praise to God for
the beautiful life and the glorious reign
of this Oldest queen amid many cen
turies. From 5 O'Clock of the morning
of 1887, when the archbishop of Canter-
bury addressed the embarrassed and
weeping and almost affrighted girl of IS
years with the startling words, "your
majesty, until this sixtieth anniversary
of her enthronement, the prayer of all
good people on all sides of the seas,
whether that prayer be offered by the
800, 900, 900 of her subjects or the larger
number of millions who are not her sub
jects, whether that prayer be solemnized
in church or rolled from great orchestras
or poured forth by military bands from
forts and battlements and in front of
triumphant armies all around the world,
has been and is now, "God save the
queen"
Amid the innumerable columns that
have been printed in eulogy of this
queen at the approaching anniversary
columns which, put together, would be
literally miles long-it seems to me that
the chief cause of congratulation to her
and of praise to God has not yet been
properly emphasized, and in many cases
the chief key note has not been struck
at all. We have been told over and over
again what has occurred in the Victo-
rian era. The mightiest thing she has
done has been almost ignored, while
she has been honored by having her
name attached to individuals and events
for whom and for which she had no re-
sp~onsibility. We have put before us the
names of potent and grandly useful men
and women who have lived during her
reign, but l do not suppose that she at
all helped Thomas Carlyle in twisting
his involved and mighty s~atires, or
helped Disraeli in issuance of his cpl
grammatic wit, or helped Cardinal New
man in his crossing over from religion
to religion, or helped to inspire the en-
chanted sentiments of George Eliot and
Harriet Martineau and Mrs. Browning,
or helped to invent any of George Cruik-
shank healthful cartoons, or helped
George Grey in founding a British
South African empire, or kindled the
patriotic fervor with which John Bright
stirred the masses, or had anything to
do with the invention of the telephone
OF photograph, or the building up of the
science of bacteriology, or the directing
of the Roentgen rays which have revo-
~lutionized surgery, or helped in the in
ventions for facilitating printing and
r~ailroading and ocean voyaging. One is
not to be credited or discredited for the
virtue or the vice, the brilliance or the
stupidity of his or her contemporaries.
While Queen Victoria has been the
friend of all art, all literature, all sci
ence, all invention, all referm, her
reign will be most remembered for all
time and all eternity as the reign of
Christianity.
Beginning with that scene at .
O'Clock in the morning in Kensington
palace, where she asked the archbishop
of Canterbury to pray for her, and they
knelt down, imploring divine guidance
until this hour, not only in the sublime
liturgy of her established church, but on
all occasions, she has directly or indi-
rectly declared, II believe in God The
Father Almighty, maker of heaven and
earth, and in Jesus Christ, his only be.
gotten Son." I declare it, fearless o.
contradiction, that the mightiest cham.
pion of Christianity today is the throne
of England. The queens book, so much
criticised at the time of its appearance,
some saying it was not skillfully done
and some saying that the private affairs
of a household ought not so to have
been exposed, was nevertheless a book
of vast usefulness from the fact that it
showed that God was acknowledged in
all her life and that Rock of Ages
was not an unusual song in Windsor
castle. Was her son, the Prince of
Wales, down with an illness that baffied
the greatest doctors of England? Then
she proclaimed a day of prayer to AL
mighty God, and il answer to the pray
ers of the whole civilized world the
prince got we'll. Was Sevastopol to be
taken and the thousands Of bereaved
homes of soldiers 10 be comforted, she
called her nation to its knees, and the
prayer was answered. See her walking
through the hospitals like an angel of
mercy. Was there ever an explosion of
fire damp in the mines of Sheffield or
Wales and her telegram was not the
first to arrive with help and Christian
sympathy? Is President Garfield dying
at Long Branch and is not the cable un-
der the sea reaching to Balmoral castle
kept busy in announcing the symptoms
of the sufferer?
The Christian Queen.
l believe that no throne since the
throne of David and the throne of Heze-
kiah and the throne of Esther has been
in such constant touch with the throne
Of heaven as the throne of Victoria.
From what I know of her habits she
reads the Bible more than she does
Shakespeare. She admires the hymns
of Horatio Bonar more than she does
Byron's "Corsair." She has not know
ingly admitted into her presence a cor
rupt man or dis-clute M To very
distinguished novehsts and very cele-
brated prima donnas she has declined
reception because they were immoral.
All the coming centuries of time can
not revoke the advantages of having
had go years of Christian womanhood
enthroned in the palaces of England.
Compare her court surroundings with
what were the court surroundings in
the time of Henry VIII, or what were
the court surroundings in the time of
Napoleon, in the time of Louis XVI,