Republican news item. [volume] (Laport, Pa.) 1896-19??, 1898-08-11
DR. TALMAGE'S SERMON.
SUNDAYS DISCOURSE Blythe NOTED
DIVINE.

VA OtneTB u IuI1u OElIu0 compared w 1Cn
Assassination of Yourself.
TEXT: "Do thyself no harm."-Acts
i6: 2S.
Here is would-be suicide arrested in
his deadly attempt. He was sheriff, and
according to the Roman law, a bailiff him
ielf must suffer the punishment due an es-
saped prisoner; and II the prisoner break
{nR Jail was sentenced to be endungeoned
ior three or four years, then the sherih
must be endungeoned for three or four
fears, and If the prisoner breaking jail was
80 have suffered capital punishment, then
;he sheriff must suffer capital punishment.
The sheriff had received especial charge to
Keep a sharp lookout for Paul and Silas.
The government had not much confidence
n bolts and bars to keep safe these two
elergymen, about whom there seemed to
3e something strange and supernatural.
Sure enough, by miraculous power, they
Are free, and the sheriff, waking out of q
found sleep, and supposing these ministers
have run away, and knowing that they
were to die for preaching Christ, and real
lzing that he must therefore die rather
than go under the executioner's axe on the
morrow and suffer public disgrace, resolves
70 precipitate his own decease. But before
the sharp, keen; glittering dagger of the
sheriff could strike his heart one of the un-
ioosened prisoners arrests the blade by the
command, "Do thyself no harm -
In olden times, and where Christianity
bad not interfered with it, suicide was
considered honorable and a sign Of cour-
age. Dem osthenes poisoned himself when
sold that Alexander's ambassador had de-
mnnded the surrender OF the Athenian
orator. Isocrates killed himself rather
than surrender to Philip of Macedon.
Cato, rather than submit to Julius Cesar,
took his own life, and three times after his
wounds had been dressed, tore them open
sr1, s1-A1 I-tt1 l.
father than submit to Pompey, the con-
gueror. Hannibal destroyed hts life by
poison from his ring, considering life un-
bearable. Lycurgus a suicide, Brutus a
suicide. After the disaster of Moscow,
Napoleon always carried with him a prep
aration of poison, and one night his
servant heard the ex emperor arise, put
something in a glass and drink 1t, and
soon after the groans aroused all the at
tendants, and it was only through utmost
medical skill that he was resuscitated.
Times have changed, yet the American
conscience needs TO be toned up on the
subject of suicide. Have you seen paper
In the last month that did not announce the
passage out of life by ones own behest?
Defaulters, alarmed at the idea of exposure
quit life precipitately. Men losing large
fortunes go out of the world because they
cannot endure earthly existence. Frus-
trated affection, domestic infelicity, dys-
PCptlC pdtl0uSo, duStI. ICluOISc, cuVY,
jealousy, destitution, misanthropy, are
considered sufficient causes for abscond-
Ing from this life by Paris green, by lauda-
mum, by belladonna, by Othello's dagger,
by halter, by leap from the abutment Of q
bridge, by firearms. More cases of felo
de Sc in the last two years than in any two
years OF the worlds existence, and more
In the last month than in any twelve
months. The evil is more and more spread
Ing.
A pulpit not long ago expressed some
ioubt as to whether there was really any,
hing wrong about quitting this life when
1t became disagreeable, and there are
'ound in respectable circles people apollo
getic for the crime which Paul in the text
arrested. I shall show you before get
through that suicide is the worst Of all
crimes, and I shall lift warning unmis-
.Akable. But In the early part of this SER
mon wish to admit that some of the best
Christians that have ever lived have COM
mitted self-destruction, but always in de-
more doubt about their eternal felicity
han have of the Christian who dies in
lis bed in the delirium of typhoid fever
While the shock of the catastrophe is very
great. charge all those who have had
Christian friends under cerebral alteration
step off the boundaries of this life, to have
10 doubt about their happiness, The dear
nd frenzied state into perfect safety. How
)hrist feels towards the insane you may
now from the way He treated the de-
loniac of Gadara and the child lunatic,
nd the potency with which He hushed
mpests either of sea or brain.
Scotland, the land prolific of intellectual
iants, had none grander than Hugh Miller.
eat for science and great for God. He
IS an elder in st. Johns Presbyterian
iurch. He came of the best Highland
bod, and was descendant of Donald
y, aman eminent for piety and the rare
of second sight. His attainments,
mblng up as he did from the quarry and
g wall of the stone mason, drew forth
astonished admiration of Buckland and
urchison, the scientists, and DIR. Chal-
ers, the theologian, and held universities
,eilbound while he told them the story of
hat he had seen Of God in "The Old Red
ndstone." That man did more than any
her being that ever lived to show that
God of the hills is the God of the Bible,
I'D he stuck his tuning-fork on the rocks
Cromarty until he brought geology and
zoology accordant in divine worship. His
ro books, entitled Footprints of the
reator" and "The Testimony of the
ocks," proclaimed the banns Of an ever
sting marriage between genuine science
d revelation. On this latter book he
lied day and night. through love of nature
d love OF God, until he could not sleep
his brain gave way, and he was found
Id with revolver by his side, the cruel
,trument having had two bullets-one
him and the other for the gunsmith,
at the coroner's inquest was examin-
it and fell dead. Have you any doubt
the beatiflcation of Hugh Mill er after
hot brain had ceased throbbing that
nter night in his study at Portobello?
.ong the mightiest OF earth, among the
Shtiest of heaven.
10 one doubted the piety of William Cow
the author OF those three great hymns,
], For a Closer Walk With God.'
hat Various Hindrances We Meet"
acre Is Fountain Filled With Blood
liam Cowper, who shares with Isaac
it's and Charles Wesley the chief honors
Christian hymnology. In hypochon-
he resolved to take his own life, and
ito the River Thames, but found man
ed on some goods at that very point
which he expected to spring, and
back to his home, and that night
W himself upon his own knife, but the
% broke; and then he hanged himself
he ceiling, but the rope broke.
hile we make this merciful and right
sallowancein regard to those who were
,ged into mental incoherence, declare
the man who, in the use of his reason,
his own act, snaps the bond between his
I, ;rlA