Peninsula enterprise. [volume] (Accomac, Va.) 1881-1965, 1897-10-09
REVERENCE FOR AGE.
JOSEPH AID HIS DEVOTION TO HIS
OLD FATHER.

JOSEPH AID HIS DEVOTION TO His
OLD FATHER.
DIR. TalmnEe breaches II Sermon on En-
thcrly Love and FiliaI Devotion-Rus
ticity In a Palace-The migrate and the
Fate That Should BE His.
copyright. 1887. by American Press Asso
citation.
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3.-Dr. Talmagt
in his sermon shows us Il scene of ten
derness and reverence and tells us how
we ought to treat old people. His text is
Genesis XIV 2S, 81 will go and see him
before | die -
Jacob had long since passed the hun
,lred year milestone In those times peo-
pie were distinguished for longevity. In
the centuries after persons lived to great
age. Galen, the most celebrated ply
stefan of his time, took so little of his
own medicine that he lived to 140 years.
a man of undoubted veracity on the
witness stand i'll England swore that he
remembered an event $50 years before.
Lord Bacon speaks of Il countess who
had cut three sets of teeth and died at
ITO years Joseph Circle of Pennsylva.
MIA lived $40 years. III 1857 IL book was
printed containing the names OF 81 per-
SONS who lived 40 years, and tho names
m
Among the grand old people of whom
we have record was Jacob, the shepherd
of the text. But he had II bad lot OF
boys. They were jealous and ambitious
and every way unprincipled. Joseph,
however, seemed to be an exception,
but lie had been gone many years, and
the probability was that he was dead.
AS sometimes now III Il house you will
find kept ut the table Il vacant chair, Il
plate, knife, Il fork, for some deceased
member of tho family, so Jacob kept i'll
his heart place for his beloved Joseph.
There sits the old man, the flock OF ITO
years in their flight having alishted
long enough to leave the marks Of their
claw on forehead and cheek and temple.
His long beard SHOWS down over his
chest. His eyes are somewhat dim, and
he can see farther when they are closed
than when they AFRO open, for he can see
clear back into the time when beauti-
ful Rachel, his wife, WAS living aud lis
children shook tho oriental abode with
their merrimcnt.
The Dead Alive.
The centcnarian is sitting dreaming
ever the past when he hears Il wagon
rnmbling to the front door He gets up
and goes to the door to see who has ar
rived, and his long absent sons from
Egypt come in and announce to him
that Joseph. instead of being dead, Is
living in Ill Egyptian palace, with all
the investiture of prime minister, next
to. the king in the mightiest empire of
all the world The news was too sudden
and too glad for the old man, and his
cheeks whiten, and he has daZed look,
and his staff falls out of his hand, and
he would have dropped had not the sons
caught him and led him to a lounge
and put cold water on his face and
famed him little
In that half dclirium the old man
mumbles something about his son ,Jo-
seph He says: "You don't mean 10
seph, do yon-nly dear son who has
been dead so long? You don't mean
Joseph, do you?" But after they had
fully rcsuscitated him and the news
was confirmed the tears begin their
winding way down the crossroads of
the wrinkles, and the sunkcn lips of the
old man culver, and he brings his bent
fingers together as he says: Joseph is
yet alive. will go and see him before
die. -
1t did not take the old man IL great
while to get ready, warrant you. He
put on the best clothes that the shep-
herds wardrobe could afford. He got
into the wagon, and though the aged
are cautious and like to ride slow the
wagon did not get along fast enough for
this old man, and when the wagon with
the old man met Joseph's chariot COM
ing down to meet him and Joseph got
out of tho chariot and got into the wag-
or and threw his arms around his ia
theirs neck it was an antithcsis Of roy
atty and rusticity, of simplicity and
pomp, of flial affection and paternal
love- which leaves us so much i'll doubt
whether we had better hugh or cry,
that we do both. So Jacob kept the res
olution of the text-'I will go and see
him before die.
Tho Cord That IL Not Snapped.
What strong and unfailing thing is
parental attachment Was it notalmost
time for Jacob to forget Joseph? Tho
hot suns of many summers had blazed
on the heath; tho river Nile had over
flowed and rcccdcd, overfowed andre
coded again and again; the seed had
been sown and the harvests reaped;
stars rosa and sci; years of plenty and
years of famine had passed on, but the
love Of Jacob for Joseph in my text is
overwhelmingly dramatic. Oh, that is
cord that is not snapped, though pull
ed on by many decades Though when
the little child expired the parents may
not have been moro than % years of
age, aud now they are rs, yet the vi
sion of the cradle, and the childish face,
and the first uttcrances Of the infantile
lips arc fresh today, i'll spite of the pas
sage of half century Joseph was as
fresh in Jacob S memory as ever though
ut II years of age the boy had disap-
peared from the old homestead. I found
in our family record the story of an in
FAINT that has, died so years before, and
said to my parents, 'What is this rec
ord and what does it mean?" Their
chief answer was long, deep sigh. 1t
was yet to them a very tender sorrow.
What does that all mean? Why, it
means our children departed are ours
yet, and that cord of attachment reach
Ing across the years will hold us until
it brings us together in the palace, as