The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1897-07-07
DR., TALMAGES SERMON.
SUNDAYS DISCOURSE BY THE NOTED
DIVINE.

of the Minister'S Discourse, and It Was
Delivered Before the Chautauqua at
Beatrice, Neb.-An Eloquent Tribute.
TEXT: "What wilt thou, Queen Esther7"
Esther ", 8.
This question which was asked of a queen
thousands Of years ago all civilized ma
tions are this day asking Of Queen Victoria.
"What wilt thou have Of honor, Of reward
or reverence or service, Of national and in
ternational acclamation? What wilt thou,
the queen of the nineteenth century,
T The seven miles Of procession through the
streets Of London will be a small part OF
the congratulatory procession whose mul"
titudinous tramp will encircle the earth.
The celebrative anthems that will sound
up from Westminster Abbey and st. Pauls
cathedral in London will be less than tho
vibration Of one harp string as compared
with the doxologies which this hour roll up
from all nations in praise to God for the
beautiful life and the glorious reign OF this
oldest queen amid many centuries. From
5 o'clock Of the morning OF 1887, when the
Archbishop of Canterbury addressed the
embarrassed and weeping and almost az"
frighted girl of eighteen years with the
startling words, "your majesty" until this
SlxGlGGu duulSSISdIy " uO4 u
the prayer Of all good people on all sides o.
the seas, whether that prayer be offered by
the 300, 600, 900 Of her subjects or the larger
number Of millions who are not her sub"
iects, whether that prayer be solemnized III
church or rolled from great orchestras OF
poured forth by military bands from forts
and battlements and in front Of triumphant;
armies all around the world, has been and
is now, "God save the queen"
Amid the innumerable columns that have
been printed in euloey Of this queen at tho
approaching neutrality-suspicious. which,
put together, would be literally miles long
it seems to me that the chief cause of CON-
graduation to her and Of praise of God has
not yet been properly emphasized, and II;
many cases the chief key note has not been
struck at all. We lave been told over anc
over again what has occurred in the Victo.
rian era. The mightiest thing she has done
has been almost ignored, while she has
been honored by having her name attached
70 individuals and events for whom and foI
which she had no responsibility. We have
put before us the names Of potent anC:
0randly useful men and woman who have
lived during her reign, but l do not suppose
that she at all helped Thomas Carlyle IN
twisting his involved and mighty ~5atires,
Or helped Disraeli in issuance OF his cpl
grammatic wit, or helped Cardinal New
man in his crossing over from religion
to religion, or helped to inspire the en-
chanted sentiments OF George Eliot and
Harriet Martineau and Mrs. Browning,
or helped to invent any Of George Cruik-
shank's healthful cartoons, or helped
George Grey In founding a British South
African empire, or kindled the patriotic
fervor with which John Bright stirred the
masses, or had anything to do with the
Invention of the telephone or photograph,
80 l-f1lsn- ,o - . %lo co;annn ~ hon n
teriology, or the directing Of the RoentSen
rays which have revolutionlzed surgery, or
helped in the inventions for facilitating
printing and reilroading and ocean voyag-
ing. Oneis not to be credited or discredited
for the virtue or the vice, the brilliance or
the stupidity Of his or her contemporaries.
While Queen Victoria has been the friend
of all art, all literature, all science, all in
vention, all reform, her reign will be most
remembered for all time and all eternity as
the reign of Christianity.
Beginning with that scene at o'clock In
the morning 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, not
only in the sublime liturgy Of her estab,
lished church, but on all occasions, she has
directly or indirectly declared, 81 believe in
God the Father Almighty, maker Of heaven
EuQ edILu, duu Ill OcSuS I'LL hio Why pS-
gotten Son." I declare 1t, fearless OF con-
tradiction, that the mightiest champion OF
Christianity to-day Is the throne OF Eng
land. The queens book, so much criticised
at the time Of its appearance, some saying
II was not skinfully done and some saying
that the private affairs Of q household
ought not so to have been exposed, was
nevertheless q book OF vast usefulness
from the fact that it showed that
80 -11-A-rloI-aI IN oil hnr
life and that Crock Of Ages"
was not an unusual song in Windsor Castle.
Was her son, the Prince of Wales, down
with an illness tina baf1ed the greatest
doctors of England? Then she proclaimed
a day of prayer to Almighty God, and in
answer to the prayers Of the whole civilized
world the Prince got we'll. Was ~Sevastopol
to be taken and the thousands of bereaved
homes of soldiers to be comforted, she
called her nation to its knees, and the
prayer was answered. See her walking
through the hospitals like an angel Of
mercy. Was there ever an explosion OF
fire damp in the mines of Sheffield or
Wales and her telegram was not the first to
arrive with holp and Christian. sympathy?
Is President Garfield dying at Long Branch
and is not the cable under the seq reaching
to Balmoral. Castle kept busyin announcing
the symptoms of the sufferer?
I believe that no throne since the throne
of David and the throne Of Hezekiah and
the throne of Esther has been in such con-
slant touch with the throne Of heaven as
the throne of Victoria. From what l know
of her habits she reads the Bible more than
she does Shakespeare. She admlreS the
HYMNS Of Horatio Bonar more than she
does Byron's "Corsair." She has not know
ingly admitted into her presence a corrupt
man or dissolute woman. To very dlstln-
guished novelists and very celebrated
prima donnas she has declined reception
because thew were immoral. All the COM
ing centuries Of time cannot revoke the
advantages of having had sixty years OF
Christian womanhood enthroned In the
palaces OF England. Compare her court
surroundings with what were the court
surroundings in the time of Henry VIII,
or what were the court surroundings
in the time Of Napoleon, in the time Of Louis
XVI, in the times Of men and women whose
names may not be mentioned In decent So
ciety. Alas! for the revelries, and the worse
than Belshazzar feasts, and the more than
Herodian dances, III the scenes from
which the veil must not be lifted. You
need, however, in order to appreciate the
purity and virtuous splendor Of Victoria's
reign to contrast it somewhat with the
gehennas and the pandemoniums OF many
Of the throne rooms OF the past and some
of the thronerooms Of the present. l call
the roll Of the queens Of the earth, not that
I would nave them come up or come back,
but that I may make them the background
of a picture in which I can better present
the present septuagenarian, so soon to be
an octogenarian, now on the throne of Eng
land, her example so thoroughly on the
right side that all the scandal mongers in
all the nations in six decades have not
been able to manufacture m evil suspicion
in regard to her that could be made to
stick; Maria of Portugal, Isabella and
Eleanor ani Joanna of Spain, Catherine Of