Owingsville outlook. [volume] (Owingsville, Ky.) 1879-192?, 1897-04-01
EUROPEAN CRISIS.
ne Works of Greece Esto'led by Few
DR.. 7. Dewitt Talmage.
." Explains In an Eloquent sermon How
the f.op'r of E'cry Nation Ar. Debt-
ors In Macy Ways to the Inhnb-
itants of ths H,ilas.

,,, r.on,, q, 80 S.,i,a H.. ,,,.I,
ors In May Ways to tn. Inhnb-
hants of ths H'iias.
Dr. Talmagc SUNDAY took for his
text: Romans l., II: Il am debtor both
10 the Greeks and the barbariaus
At this time, when that behcmoth of
denominations. Nohammrdanism. after
Aaving gorgcd itself on the carcasscs
nf a hundred thousand Armenians. is
trying To put it's paws upon one of the
fairest of all nations. that of the
Greeks. | preach this sermon of SYM
pathy and protest. forcvery intelligent
nerson ON this side of the sea. as we'll
aS the other side, like raul. who wrote
the text, Is debtor to the Greeks
he present crisis is emphasized
10y the guns of the allied pow
rrs of Europe, ready to be unlim-
bered against the IIcllencs, and | am
asked To speak out Paul. with a mas
ter intellect of the ages, sat in bril-
liant Corinth. the great Aero Corinthus
'ortrcss frowning from the height of
l.GSi feet, and in the house of tiaius.
where he was "A guest. a biz pile of
money near him, which he was taking
to Jerusalem To the poor. In this let.
ter to the Romans, which Chrisostum
admired 81 much that he ha it read
10 him twice a week. raul practically
says: II, the apostle, am BANKRUPT |
owe what | can not pay. but " i'll nav
as large a per ccntage as can. IL
is an obligation Tor what Greek
"A
Greek architecture and Greek prowcss
have done for me. Twill pay all can
in installmcnts of evangelism. am
insolvent to the Greeks" IIcllas, as
the inhabitants call it, or Greece, as
we call il, is insignificant in size, a bout
a third rs large as the state of New
York, but what ii lacks in breadth it
makes up in height, with its noun
tains Cylene, and Eta, and 1ayGetus,
and Tymphrestus, each over 1000 feet
in elevation, and its Parnassus. over
5000. Just the country for great men
Ia be born in, for in all lands most of
the intellectual and moral giants were
not born on the plain, but had for era
die the valley between two noun
tains That country, no part of which
is more than 40 miles from the SEA, has
made its impress upon the world as no
other nation, and it to-day holds a
first mortgage of obligation upon all
civilized people. While we must leave
to statesmanship and diplomacy the
settlement of the intricate questions
which now involve all Eurone' and in
directly all nations, it is time for all
churches, all schools. all universities
all arts. all literature To sound ont in
the most emphatic wav the declara.
ton: ia debtor to the Greeks
In the first place. we owe to their
LANGUAGE our New Testament. All If
il was first written in Crock. except
the Book of Matthew and that writ
ten in the Aramean lappua~e yas
soon mt into Greek bv onr Saviours
brother. James To the Greek Ian
ruape we owe the best sermon ever
preached. the best letters ever written.
the best visions ever kindled. All the
parables in Greek All the Miracles
n Greek The sermon on the mount
/, Greek. The story of Rethlehen
Aao,Satha and Oliyet and Jordan
inks and Galilean beacnes ana fA,s.i-
me embarkation and Pentecostal
tongues and seven trumpets that sound
ed over Patmos, have come to the
world in liquid. symmetrio, pictur
esque, philosophic, unrivaled Greek,
instead of the gibberish language in
which many of the nations of the
earth at that time jabbered. Who can
forget it and who can eXaggerate its
thrilling Importance, that Christ and
Heaven were introduced to us in the
language of the Greeks, the language
which Homer had sung, and Sophocles
dramatized, and Plato dialogued, and
Socrates discoursed, and Lycurgus
legislated, and Demosthenes thun-
dered his Grafton on The Crown"
Everlasting thanks to God that the
waters of life were not handed to the
world in the unwashed cup of cor
rupt languages from which ma
tons had been drinking, but in
the clean, bright, golden-lipped, en-
erald-handled chalice of the iellenes-
Learned Curtius wrote a whole column
about the Greek verb. Philologists
century after century have been meas
uring the symmetry Of that language,
laden with elegy and Philippe, drama
and comedy, Odyssey and Had; but
the grandest thing that Greek language
ever accomplished was to give to the
world the benediction, the comfort,
the irradiation, the salvation of the
Gospel OF the Son of God For that
we are debtors to the Greeks.
And while speaking of our philolo-
cal oblipation let me call your atten-
ton to the fact that many of the intel
lectual and moral and theological lead
ers of the ages got much of their dis
cipline and effectiveness from Greek
literature. 1t is popular to scott at the
dead languages, but 50 per cent of the
worlds intellectually would have been
taken off if, through learned institu-
tions our young men had not, under
competent professors, been drilled in
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