Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1897-06-02
REV. DR.. TALMAGE.
he Eminent DiVine's SUNDAY
Discourse.
Coils Perfect Harmony and the Discorn
That Was Made by Sin-The Time il
Coming When the World VIII Again
Re-Ound To Heavenly Harmonies

| That Was Made by Sin-The Time Il
| Coming When the World VIII Again
| Re-ound to Heavenly Harmonies.
TEXT: who laid the cornerstone thereof
when the morning stars sang together?''-
Job 80, 6, z.
We have all seen the ceremony at the Law
Ing of the cornerstone Of church asylum or
Masonic temple. Into the hollow of the
stone were placed scrolls of history and i'm
portant documents, to be suggestive it, 100
or 200 years after, the building should be
| destroyed by fire or torn down We re-
member the silver trowel or iron hammer
| that smote the square piece OF granite into
sanctity. We remember some venerable
| man who presided welding the trowel or
| hammer We remember also the music as
| the choir stood on the scattered stones and
timber OF the building about to be con
structed- The leaves of the notebooks
huttered in the wind and were turned over
with great rustlinS, and we remember
now the bass, baritone. tenor, contralto
ana soprano voices commingled. They had
Tor many days been rehearsing the special
programme that it might be worthy of the
cornerstone laying.
In my text the poet of Uz calls us to a
grander ceremony-the laying of the foun-
dation of this great temple of "A world
The cornerstone was block of light and
the trowel was of celestial crystal All
about and on the embankments of clouds
stood the angelic choristers unrolling their
librettos of overture, and other worlds
clapped shining cymbals while the cere-
mony went on, and God. the Architect by
stroke of light after stroke of light. dedi-
| Gated this great cathedral of a world with
mountains for pillars and sky for frescoed
ceiling and Towering fields for a floor and
sunrise and midnight aurora for uphol-
stery. "Wh" laid the cornerstone thereof
when the morning stars sang together?''
The fact is that the whole universe was a
\ "a am lI.4f. s.n1A IA.
ramb, musical portfolio. The great sheet
OF immensity had been spread ont, and
written on 1t were the stars, the smaller of
them minims. the larger of them sustained
notes. The meteors marked the staccato
passages, the whole heavens a gamut with
all sounds, intonations modulations, the
space between the worlds musical in
terval, trembling of stellar light n quayer
the thunder a bass clef the wind among
trees treble clef. That is the way God
made all things perfect harmony.
But one day "A harp string snapped in the
great orchestra. One day a voice sounded
out of tune. One day discord harsh and
terrific, grated upon the glorious antiphon.
1t was sin that made the dfssonance and
that harsh discOrd has been sounding
through the centuries. All the work of
Christians and phiianthropistS and reform
| ers of all ages is to stop that discord and
get all things back into the perfect har-
mony which was heard at the laying of the
cornerstone when the morning stars sang
together. Before l get through If l am
divinely helped, | will make it plain that
| sin Is discord and righteousness harmony:
| that in general things are out of tune is as
plain as to a musicians ear is the unhappy
clash of clarinet and bassoon in an orches-
| tral rendering
The worlds health out Of tune: weak
lungs and the atmosphere in collision, dis
| ordered eye and MONDAY light in quarrel
rheumatic limb and damp weather in strug-
gle; neuralgias, and pneumonias. and con-
sumptions, and epiieptics in hocks sweep
the neighborhoods and cities. Where you
| find one person with sound throat and keen
| eyesight and alert ear, and easy respira-
tion, and regular pulsation, and supple
limb, and prime digestion, and steady
nerves, you find 100 who have to be very
careful because this or that or the other
physical function is disordered.
The human intellect out of tune: the
Judgment wrongly swayed or the memory
leaky, or the will weak or the temper in
nammable, the well balanced mind excep-
tiOnai
Domestic life out of tune; only here and
there conjugal outbreak of incompata-
bility of temper through the divorce courts
OF a fiiial outbreak about "A fathers will
through the surrogate's court, or a case of
wife beating or husband poisoning through
the criminal courts, but thousands of fami-
lies with June outside and January within
Society out of tune; labor and capital
their hands on each others throat; spirit
of caste keeping those down in the social
scale who are struggling to get up, and
putting those who are up in anxiety lest
they have to come down. No wonder the
old pianoforte of society is all out of tune
when hypocrisy, and lying and subterfuge
and double dealing, and sycophancy, and
chariatanism, and revenge have for 5000
years been banging away at the KEYS and
stamping the pedals.
ON all sides there is "a shinIyracE of har-
nohies-nations in discord without realz-
ing 1t. so wrong is the feeling of nation
for nation that symbols chosen are fierce
and destructive. In this country. where
our skies are full of robins and doves and
morning iarks, we have our national sym
boil the fierce and filthy eagle as cruel "A
bird as can be found in all the ornithologi-
cal catalogues. In Great Britain, where
they have lambs and fallow deer, their SYM
Dol Is the merciless lion. In Russia where
from between her frozen north to her
blooming south all kindly beasts dwell.
they chose the growing bear, and in the
worlds heraidry favorite fgare is the
dragon, the tabled winged serpent, fero-
cious and dreadful. And fond is the
world Of contention that we climb out
through the heavens and baptize one of
the other planets with the spirit of battle
and call it Mars after the god of war and
We give to the eighth sign of the zodiac
the name of the scorpion, creature which
is chiefly celebrated for its deadly sting
But after all, these symbols are expressive
of the way nation feels toward nation-,iis-
cord wide as the continent and bridging
the seas.
suppose you have noticed how warmly
ia love dry goods stores are with other dry
goods stores, and how highly grocery men
think of the sugars of the grocery man on
the same street, and in what eulogistc
way allopathic and homeopathic doctors
speak of each other and how ministers will
sometimes put ministers on that beautiful
cooking instrument which the English call
IA spit-an iron roller with spikes II and
turned by crank before hot fire-and
then, IL the minister being roasted cries out
against il the men who are turning him
say, Hush, my brothet; we are turning
this spit for the glory of God and the good
of your soul, and you must be quiet, while
we close the service with:
'Blest be the tie that binds
Our hearts in Christian love-
The earth is diametered and circumfer-
enced with discord, and the music that was
rendered at the laying of the worlds cor
nerstone when the morning stars sang to-
gether is not heard now, and though here
and there from this and that part of So
ciety and from this and that part of the
earth there comes up a thrilling solo of
love, warbie of worship, or a sweet
duet of patience, they are drowned out by
discord that shakes the earth.
Paul says. The whole creation CroIn-
eth" And while the nightingale aud the
woodlark, and the canary. and the plover
sometimes sing so sweetly that their notes
have been written out in musical notation
and it is found that the cuckoo sings in the
| key OF ID and that the cormorant is a bassG
| in the winged choir yet sportsman's gun
and the autumnai blast often leave them
ruffied and bleediu' or dead in meadow oi
| forest. Paul was right, for the groan il
nature browns out the prima donnas of tn,
| sky.
Tartini, the great musical composer
| dreamed one night that he made contrac
with satan, the latter to be ever in th'
! composers service. But one night he
handed to satan violin, on which Diabo
lus played such sweet music that the com
| poser was awakened by the emotion and
| tried to reproduce the sounds, and there
! from was written Tartini's most famous