The Monitor-register., 1897-03-26

We Have Only to Use the Same Com
mon Sense For Religion That We Do
For Everything Else.
WASHINGTON, March 21.-From many
conditions of life DR.. Talmage, in this
sermon, draws graphic illustrations of
one of the sublimest theories of religion
namely, vicarious sacrifice. His text
was Hebrews tx, %, Without shedding
Of blood is no remission"
John G.. Whittier, the last of the great
school of American poets that made the
last quarter of a century brilliant, asked
me in the White mountains n morning
after prayers, in which 1 had given out
Cowper's famous hymn about the
fountain filed with blood, "Do you
really believe there is a literal applica-
ton of the blood of Christ to the soul?"
My negative reply then is my negative
reply now. The Bible statement agrees
with all physicians and all psychologists
and all scientists in saying that the
blood is the life, and in the Christian
religion it means simply that Christ's
life was given for u life. Hence all
this talk of men who say the Bible story
of blood is disgusting and that they
don't want what they call a slaughter
house religion" only shows their inca
pacity or unwillingness to look through
the figure of speech toward the thing
signified. The blood that on the darkest
Friday the world ever saw oozed or
trickled or poured from the brow, and
the side, and the hands, and the feet of
the illustrious sufferer, back of Jerusa-
lem, in a few hours coagulated and
dried up and forever disappeared, and if
man had depended on the application of
the literal blood of Christ there would
not have been a soul saved for the last
IS centuries.
In order to understand this red word
of my text we only have to exercise as
much common sense in religion as we
do in everything else. Pang for pang,
hunger for hunger, fatigue for fatigue,
tear for tear, blood for blood, life for
life; we see every day illustrated. The
act of substitution is nc novelty, al
though I hear men talk as though the
idea of Christ S suffering substituted for
our suffering were something abnormal,
something distressingly odd, something
wildly eccentric, a solitary episode in
the worlds history-when I could take
you out into this city and before sun
down point you to five hundred cases of
substitution and voluntary suffering of
one in behalf of another.
Overwork.
At 2 O'Clock tomorrow afternoon go
among the places of business Or toll. 1t
will be no difficult thing for you to find
men who by their looks show you that
they are overworked. They are prema-
turely old. They are fastening rapidly
toward their decease. They have gone
through crises in business that shattered
their nervous system and pulled on the
brain. They have a shortness of breath
and a pain in the back of the head and
at night an insomnia that alarms them.
Why are they drudging at business early
and late? For fun? No. 1t would be
difficult to extract any amusement out
of that exhaustion. Because they are
avaricious? In many cases no. Because
their own personal expenses are lavish?
No. A few hundred dollars would meet
all their wants. The simple fact is the
man is enduring all that fatigue and ex-
ASPIRATION and wear and tear to keep
his home prosperous. There is an invis-
ible line reaching from that store, from
that bank, from that shop, from that
scaffo1ding, to a quiet scene a few blocks
away, a few miles away. And there is
L -oo-N -G AI.L 1---
He is simply the champion of a home
stead for which he wins bread and ward
robe and education and prosperity, and
in such battle 10, 900 men fall. Of ten
business men whom I bury nine die of
overwork for others. Some sudden dis
ease finds them with no power of resist
ance. and they are gone. Life for life.
Blood for blood. Substitution!
At l O'Clock tomorrow morning. the
hour when slumber is most uninter-
rupted and most profound, walk amid
the dwelling houses of the city. Here
and there you will find a dim light be-
cause it is the household custom to keer
a subdued light burning, but most OF
the houses from base to top are as dark
as though u~ninhabited. A merciful God
has sent forth the archangel of sleep,
and he puts his wings over the city.
But yonder is a clear light burning, and
outside Oh the window easement is a
glass or pitcher containing food for g
sick child. The food is set in the fresh
air. This is the sixth night that mother
has sat up with that sufferer. She has
to the last point obeyed the physicians
prescription, not giving a drop too much
or too little Or a moment too soon or toe
late. She is very anxious, for she has
buried three children with the same
disease, and she prays and weeps, each
prayer and sob ending with a kiss of the
pale cheek. By dint of kindness she gets
the little n through the ordeal. After
it is all over the mother is taken down.
Brain Or nervous fever sets in, and one
with a mothers blessing and goes up to
join the three in the kingdom of heaven.
Life for lifel Substitution! The fact is
that there are an uncounted number OF
mothers who, after they have navigated
a large family of children through all
the diseases of infancy and got them
fairly started up the Towering slope Of
boyhood and girlhood have only strength
enough left to die. They fade away.
Some call it consumption. Some call it
nervous prostration. Some call it in
termittent or malarial indisposition.
But 1 call it martyrdom of the domestic
circle. Life for life. Blood for blood.
Substitution
Substitution.
Or perhaps the mother fingers long
enough to see a son get on the wrong
road, and his former kindness becomes
rough reply when she expresses anxiety
about him. But she goes right on, look
ing carefully after his apparel, remem-
boring his every birthday with some
memento, and, when he is brought home
worn out with dissipation, nurses him
till he gets we'll and starts him again
and hopes and expects and prays and
counsels and suffers until her strength
gives out and she fails. She is going,
and attendants, bending over her pillow,
ask her if she has any message to leave,
and she makes great effort to say some
thing, but out of three or four minutes
of indistinct utterance they al catch
but three words, my poor boyr' The
simple fact is she died for him. Life for
life. Substitution
About SO years ago there went forth
from our northern and southern homes
hundreds of thousands of men % do bat
tie for their country. All the poetry OF
war soon vanished and left them moth
ing but the terrible prose. They waded
knee deep in mud. They slept in snow
banks. They marched till their cut feet
tracked the earth. They were swindled