The Monitor-register., 1897-04-30
DARKNESS AND DAWN
REV. DR.. TALMAeE,s SERMON is FULL

REV. DR.. TALMAGE'S SERMON is FULL
OF THE BREATH OF THE FIELDS.
He Points a Moral From the Bible Story
of the Attachment of Boaz For Ruth.
The Uses of Trouble-value of Field
Cleaning.
WASHINGTON, April 25.-The sermon
of DR.. Talmage which we send out to-
day could not have been prepared by
any one not born in the country. 1t is
full of the breath of the fields. The text
is Ruth ii, 5, "And she went and came
and CLEANED in the field after the reap
ers, and her hap was to light on a part
of the field belonging unto Boaz, who
was of the kindred of Elimelech."
The time that Ruth and Naomi ar
rive at Bethlehem is harvest time. 1t
was the custom when a sheaf fell from
a load in the harvest field for the
reapers to refuse to gather it up. That
was to be left for the poor who might
happen to come along that way. If
there were handfuls Of grain scattered
across the field after the main harvest
had been reaped, instead of raking it, as
farmers do now, it was, by the custom
of the land, left in its place so that the
poor, coming along that way, might
CLEAN it and get their bread. But, you
say, "What is the use Of all these har-
vest fields to Ruth and Naomi? Naomi
is too old and feeble to go out and toll
in the sun, and can you expect that
Ruth, the young and the beautiful,
should tan her cheeks and blister her
hands in the harvest field?"
Boaz owns a large farm, and he goes
out to see the reapers gather in the
grain. Coming there, right behind the
swarthy, sun Drowned reapers, he be-
holds a beautiful woman gleaning-a
woman more fit to bend to a harp OF sit
upon a throne than to stoop among the
sheaves. All, that was an eventful day!
1t was love at first sight. Boaz forms
an attachment for the womanly cleaner
an attachment full Of undying inter
est to the church of God in all ages,
while Ruth, with an ephah, or nearly a
bushel of barley, goes home to Naomi
to tell her the successes n adventures
of the day. That Ruth, who left her ma
tive land Of Moab in darkness, and trav-
eled through an undying affection for
her mother-in-law, is in the harvest
field of Boaz, is affianced to one of the
best families in Judah, and becomes in
after time the ancestress of Jesus Christ,
the Lord Of glory. Out of so dark a
night did there ever dawn so bright a
morning?
Two Great Educators.
I learn i'll the first place from this
subject how trouble develops character.
1t was bereavement, poverty and exile
that developed, illustrated and an
nounced to all ages the sublimity of
Ruth's character. That is a very unfor-
tunate man who has no trouble. 1t was
sorrow that made John Bunyan the bet
ter dreamer, and DR.. Young the better
poet, and O'Connell the better orator,
and Bishop Hall the better preacher,
and Havelock the better soldier, and
Kitto the better encyclopaedia, and
Ruth the better daughter-in-law.
I once asked an aged man in regard
to his pastor, who was a very brilliant
man, "Why is it that your pastor, so
very brilliant, seems to have so little
heart and tenderness in his sermons?"
"Well, he replied, ''the reason is our
pastor has never had any trouble. When
misfortune comes upon him, his style
will be different" After awhile the
Lord took a child out of that pastors
house, and though the preacher was
just as brilliant as he was before, oh,
the warmth, the tenderness of his dis
coursesl The fact is that trouble is a
great educator. You see sometimes a
musician sit down at al instrument
and his execution is cold and formal
and ~unfeeling. The reason is that all
his life he has been prospered. But let
misfortune or bereavement come to that
man, and he sits down at the instru-
ment. and you discover the pathos in
the first sweep of the keys.
Misfortune and trials are great edu-
Gators. A young doctor comes into a
sickroom where there is a dying child.
Perhaps he is very rough in his prescrip-
ton and very rough in his manner and
rough in the feeling of the pulse and
4OuSA Ill III ohoWtI W Vic llutUtI y
anxious question. But years roll on,
and there has been one dead in his own
house, and now he comes into the sick
room, and with fearful eyes he looks at
the dying child, and he says, "Oh, how
this reminds me Of my Charlie!' Trou-
BILE, the great educator. Sorrow-I see
its touch in the grandest painting, l
hear its tremor in the sweetest song, I
feel its power in the mightiest argu.
ment.
Grecian mythology said that the foun-
tain of Hippocrene was struck out by
the foot of the winged horse Pegasus. 1
have often noticed in life that the
brightest and most beautiful fountains
Of Christian comfort and spiritual life
have been struck out by the iron shod
hoof of disaster and calamity. 1 see
Daniels courage best by the flash of
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS furnace. l see Paul's
proves best when l find him on the
laundering ship under the glare of the
lightning in the breakers of Melita.
God crowns his children amid the howl
ing of wild beasts and the chopping of
blood splashed guillotine and the crack
ling fires of martyrdom. 1t took the per-
Eecutions of Marcus Aurelius to develop
Polycarp and Justin Martyr. 1t took all
the hostilities against the Scotch Cove
uanters and the fury of Lord Claver-
house to develop James Renwick and
Andrew Melville and Hugh McKail, the
glorious martyrs of Scotch history. 1t
took the stormy sea and the December
blast and the desolate New England
coast and the war whoop of savages to
show forth the prowess of the pilgrim
fathers
When amid the storms they sang,
And the stars heard, and the sea,
And the sounding aisles of the dim wood
Rang to the anthems of the free.
1t took all our past national distress
es, and it takes all our present national
sorrows to lift up our nation on that
high career where it will march long
after the foreign missionaries that have
Knocked and tyrannies that have jeered,
shall be swept down under the omnipo-
tent wrath of God, who hates despotism
and who, by the strength of his own red
right arm, will make all men free. And
SO it is individually. and in the family,
and in the chaIt!i, and in the world.
that through darkness and storm and
trouble men, women, churches, nations.
are developed.
Faithful Friends.
Again, / see in my text the beauty of
unfaltering friendship. | suppose there
were plenty of friends for Naomi while
she was III prosperity, but of all her ac-
quaintances how many were willing to
trudge off with her toward Judah, when
she had to make that lonely journey?
One-the Lnrnina Of my toyt Ono Il