The commonwealth. (Greenwood, Miss.) 1896-1923, 1897-07-01
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
etoria, the Christian Empress Of
q Christian People.
] Most Conspicuous Service to Humanity
Ethe Example OF Her Daily Life-Ths
Political Competency Of
Women.

Political Competency of
Women.
lev. 7. Dewitt Talmage delivered
following Victorian jubilee dis
nrse at the Beatrice (Neb.) Chau-
nqua, basing it upon the text:
What wilt thou, Queen Esthers-Esthcr. y, )
This question, which was asked of a
peen thousands of years ago, all civil
ID nations are this day asking of
neen Victoria: What wilt thou have
honor, OF reward, or reverence. or
Ervice, Of national and international
4clamationp What wilt thou, the
S84v0een of the nineteenth century?' The
wen miles of procession through the
@4eteets of London day after tomorrow
MAl9all be a small part of the congratula-
M9ary procession whose multitudious
%s14mp will encircle the earth. The
161plebrative anthems that will sound up
~ ION Westminster Abbey and st. paul's
YN4thedral in London will be less than
a344e vibration of one harp string as
v 0tnpared with the doxologies which
Mis hour roll up from all nations in
Sa< raise to God for the beautiful life and
re glorious reign of this oldest queen
IN Eenid many centuries. From 5 o'clock
AAAt the morning of 1897, when the arch
Ss94ehop OF Canterbury addressed the
"a &Snbarra ssed and weeping and almost
righted girl of1s years with the
'Setertling words, Your Majesty" until
sss9tE. sixtieth anniversary of her
SaSnthronement the prayer of all
rood people on all sides of
sS$he seas, whether that prayer be of
u ercd by the 800, 0o0, 900 of her subjects
attic larger plumber of millions who
6re not her Subjects, whether that
fNkE4yer be solemnized in church, or
5t6lled from great orchestras, or poured
North by military bands from forts and
M6gttlements and in front of triumph
mt armies all around the world, has
v been and is now God save the queen"
Amid the innumerablc columns that
have been printed in eulogy Of this
queen at the approaching anniversary
4EOlumns which, put together, would
I pc literally miles long it seems to me
That the chief cause Of congratulation
10 her and of praise to God has not yet
been properly emphasized, and il
many eases the chief keynote has not
been struck at all. We have been told
.5pyer and over again what has occurred
In the Victorian era. The mightiest
she has done has been almost
ignored, while she has been honored by
shaving her name attached to individ-
*uals and events for whom and for which
$she had no responsibility. We have
8put before us the names of potent and
Rgrandly useful men and ome who
have lived during her reign, but do
not suppose that she ut all helped
Thomas Carlyle in twisting his in
volved and mighty satires, ior helped
Disraeli in issuance Of his epigram-
matte wit on helped Cardinal Newman
in his crossing over from religion to re-
ligion, or helped to inspire the en-
chanted sentiments of George Eliot
and Harriet Martineau and Mrs. Brown
ing, or helped to invent any of George
NrnlRshank HeaIlhlui cartoons, or
helped George Grey in founding a
British South African empire, or kim
died the patriotic fervor with which
John Bright stirred the masses, or had
anything to do with the invention of
the telephone Or monograph, or the
building up of the science of bacteriol-
ogy, or the directing OF the Roentgen
rays which have revolutionized sur
gerry, or helped in the inventions for
facilitating printing and r~ailroading
II ocean voyaging. One is not to be
credited or discredited for the virtue or
the vice, the brilliance Or the stupidi-
ty, OF his orh her contemporaries.
While Queen Victoria has beer the
friend of all art, all literature, all sci
ence, all invention. all reform. her
reign will be most remembered for all
time and all eternity us the reign of
Christianity. BEGINNING with that
scene at five o'clock in the moaning, in
Kensington palace, where she asked
the archbishop of Canterbury to pray
for her, and they knelt down, implor-
ing Divine guidance, until this hour,
moi only in the sublime liturgy of her
established church, but on all occa-
sions, she has directly or indirectly de-
clared: Il believe in God the Father
Almighty, maker of Heaven and earth,
and in Jesus Christ His only begotten
Son." | declare it, fearless of any con-
tradiction, that the mightiest cham
pion of Christianity to-day is the
throne of England. The queens book.
SO much criticised at the time OF it's
appearance, some saying it was not
skillfully done, and some saying
that the private affairs of a
household ought not $50 to have
been exposed, was nevertheless a
book OF vast usefulness from the Tact
that it showed that a acknowl-