The Lexington dispatch. [volume] (Lexington, South Carolina) 1870-1917, 1897-03-10
WINGS OF SERAPHlM.
DIR. TALMAGE'S PRACTICAL SERMON
UPON AN EXALTED THEME.

UPON AN EXALTED THEME.
He Urges His Hearers to Aspire to Fly
Upward = Dying, He Says, Is but the
Noting Season Fer the Soul - Living
Near Christ.
WASHINGTON, Feb. 2S.-In this dis
course Dr.. Talmage takes most exalted
theme and makes it practical and useful
to tke1ast degree. The subject is
of Seraphim, :" and the text is
Isaiah vi, 2, ''With twain he covered his
face, and with twain he covered his feet,
and with twain he did fly.
In hospital of leprosy good King
Uzziah had died, and the whole land
was shadowed with solemnity, and the
ological and prophetic Isaiah was think
ing about religious things, as one is apt
to do in time of great national bereaVe-
ment, and forgetting the presence OF his
wife and two sons, who made up his
family, he has a dream not like the
dreams of ordinary character, which
generally come from indigestion, but
vision most instructive, and under the
touch of the hand Of the Almighty.
The place, the ancient temple-bulld-
ing grand, awful, majestic. Within that
temple throne higher and grander
than that occupied by any car or sui
tan or emperor. On that throne, the
eternal Christ. In lines surrounding
that throne, the brightest celestials, not
the cherubim, but higher than they, the
most exquisite and radiant ct the heav-
enly inhabitants-the seraphim. They
are called burners because they look like
fre-lips of fire, eyes of fire, feet of fire.
In addition to the features and the limbs,
which suggest human being, there are
pinions which suggest tn lithest, the
swiftest, the most buoyant and the most
aspiring of all unintelligent creation-a
bird. Each seraph had six wings, each
two of the wings for different purpose.
Isaiah's dream quivers and flashes with
these pinions, now folded, now spread,
now beaten in locomotion. with twain
he covered his feet, with twain he COW
cred his face, and with twain he did
fly"
The probability is that these wings
were not all used at once. The seraph
standing there near the throne, over
whelmed ct the insignificance of the
paths his feet had trodden as compared
with the paths trodden by the feet CT
God, and with the lameness of his loco
motion amounting almost to decrepitude
as compared with the diviHHyelocity,
6theTy ve1T Of aFq6$ nlodesty
hiSes the feet. with twain he did
cover the feet.
Standing there, overpowered by the
overwhelming splendors Of Gods glory
and unable longer with the eyes to look
upon them and wishing those eyes
shaded from the insuferable glory, the
pinions gather over the couGtenallce.
with twain he did cover the face"
Then, as God tells this seraph to 60 to
the farthest outpost of immensely en-
message of light and love and JOY and
get back before the first anthem, it does
not take the seraph great while to
spread himself upon the air with unim-
agined cele-ity, one stroke of the wing
equal to 10000 leagues of air. with
twain he did fly. y"
Humility and Inperfection.
The most practical and useful lesson
for you and me, when we see the seraph
spreading his wings over the feet, is the
lesson of humility at imperfection. The
brightest angels of God are so far be-
meath God that he charges them with
folly, the seraph so far beneath God
and we so far beneath the seraph in
service we ought to be plunged in hu-
mility, utter and complete. Our feet,
how laegard they have been IN the dl-
vine service! Our feet, how many mis-
steps they have taken! Our feet, in how
many paths of worldliness and folly
they have walked!
Neither God nor seraph intended to
put any dishonor upon that which.is one
of the masterpieces of Almighty God
the human foot. Physiologist and anat-
omist are overwhelmed at the Won
ders of its organization. The Bridge
water treatise, written by Sir Charles
Bell, on the wisdom and goodness Of
God as illustrated in the human hand,
was result of the $4,000 bequeathcd
in the last will and testament of the
Earl of Bridgewater for the encourage
ment Of Christian literature. The world
could afford to forgive his eccentricities,
though he had two dogs seated at his
table and though he put six dogs alone
in an equipage drawn by four horses
snd attended by two footmen.
With his large bequest inducing Sir
Charles Bell to write SO valuable a book
ON the wisdom of God in the structure
of the human hand, the world could af-
ford to forgive his oddities. And the
world could now afford to have another
Earl of Bridgewater, however idiosyn-
cratic, if he would induce some other
Sir Charles Bell to write a book on the
wisdom and goodness of GOD in the con-
struction of the human foot, the artic-
ulation of its bones, the fabrication OF
its Joints, the gracefulness Of its lines,
the ingenuity Of its cartilages, the deli
cacy of its veins, the rapidity of its
muscular contraction, the sensitlveness
of its nerves
I sound the praises of the human foot.
With that we halt or climb or march.
1t is the foundation Of the physical fab
ric. It is the base of Ged poised col
umn. With it the warrior braces him
self for battle. With it the orator plants
himself for eulogium. With it the toiler
reaches his work. With it the outraged
stamps his indignation, its loss an lrrep-
arabic disaster, its health an invalu-
able equipment. If you want to know
its value, ask the man whose foot pa
ralysis hath shriveled, or machinery
hath crushed, or surgeons knife hath
amputated The Bible honors it: Espe-
cial care, LEST thou dash thy foot
against a stone, He will not suffer