The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1897-11-11
TALMAGE'S SER MON.
Some New Lessons Ora Wn From
the Story Of Joseph.
Strength of Parental Attachment Our
Children Always Children, No Matter
Tow Old They Grow-The Beau
ties OF Filial Affection.


The text is:
will go and see him before I die.-Genesis.
xiv. rs.
Jacob had long since passed the 100
year milestone. In those times people
were distinguished for longevity. In
the centuries after, persons lived to
great age. Galen, the most celebrated
physician OF his time, took SO little Of
his own medicine that he lived to 40
years. A man of undOubted veracity
on the witness stand in England swore
that he remembered an event $50 years
before. Lord Bacon speaks of Il coun-
tess who had cut three sets of teeth and
died at 40 years. Joseph Crele, of
Pennsylvania, lived $40 years. Ia 1857
u book was printed containing the
names of 81 persons who lived 40
years, and the names Of Ii persons who
lived $50 years.
Among the grand old people of whom
we have record was Jacob, the shep-
herd of the text. But he had bad lot
of boys. They were jealous and am
bilious and every way unprincipled.
Joseph. however, seemed to be an ex-
ception; but he had been gone many
years, and the probabilit was that he
| was dead. As sometimes now in a
mouse you will find kept at the table a
| vacant chair, plate, a knife. a fork,
| for some deceased member of the fam
| lily, SO Jacob kept in his heart place
! for his beloved Joseph. There sits the
| old man, the flock of 40 years in their
flight having alighted long enough to
| leave the marks of their claw on fore
head and cheek and temple. His long
| beard SHOWS down over his chest. His
| eyes are somewhat dim, and he can see
when they are open, for he can see
clear back into the time when beauti-
full Rachel, his wife, was living, and
his children shook the oriental abode
with their merriment.
| The centenarian is sitting dreaming
over the past when he hears wagon
rumbling to the front door. He gets
up and goes to the door to see who has
arrived, and his long-absent sons from
| Egypt come in and announce to him
that Joseph, instead of being dead, is
living in an 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 a
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 a little.
In that half delirium the old man
mumbles something about his son Jo-
seph. He says: "Iou don't mean Jo-
seph, do you? my dear son who has
been dead SO long? You don't mean
Joseph, do your But after they had
fully resuscitated him, and the news
was confirmed, the tears begin their
winding way down the crossroads of
the wrinkles, and the sunken lips of
the old man culver, and he brings his
bent fingers together as he says: 90
seph is yet alive. | will go and see
him before die
1t did not take the old man a great
while to get ready, | warrant you. He
|
herds wardrobe could afford. He got
into the wagon. and though the aged
are cautious and like to ride slow, the
wagon did not go fast enough for the
old man; and when the wagon with
the old man met Josephs chariot com
ing down to meet him, and Joseph got
out of the chariot and got into the
hi Ii,
fathers neck. it was an antithesis of
royalty and rusticity, of simplicity and
pomp, of tilial affection and paternal
love, which leaves Us SO much in doubt
whether we had better laugh or cry
that we do both. SO Jacob kept
the resolution of the text will 90
and see him before | die
What strong and unfailing thing is
parental attachment. Was it not al.
most time for Jacob to forget Joseph?
The hot suns of mary summers had
blazed on the heath; the river Nile had
overlooked and receded, overlooked
and receded again and again; the seed
had been sown and the harvests reaped:
stars rose and set; 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
a cord that is not snapped, though
pulled on by many decades. Though
when the little child expired the par.
ents may not have been more than %
years of age, and now they are 20,
yet the vision of the cradle,
and the childish face. and the
first utterances of the infan-
tile lips are fresh to-day. in spite
of the passage of a half century. Joseph
was as fresh in Jacobs memory as
ever, though at II years of age the boy
had disappeared from the old home.
stead. L found in our family record
the story of an infant that had died sc
years before, and l said to my parents:
What is this record, and what does it
mean?" Their chief answer was a
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 reaching across the years
will hold us until it brings us together
| in the nalapa I.oph op5 Joro~b