The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1899-05-19
AN ETERNAL GLOOM.
DR.. TalmBge Pictures the Earth
Without the Gospel.
vIvIdIy Portrnys the Gloom of nm In
HdeI WorId--Triumph of Atheism
would Mean Death of
civilization.
Copyright, Louis Klopsch, 1891
Washington, May II

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The text is Acts ego: THE sun shall
be turned into darkness"
Christianity is the rising sun of our
time. and men have tried with the up
rolling vapors of skepticism and the
smoke of their blasphemy to turn the
sun into darkness. Suppose the arch
angels of malice and horror should be
let loose n little while and be allowed TO
extinguish and destroy the sun in the
natural heavens! They would take the
oceans from other worlds and pour
them on the luminary of the planetary
system and the waters go kissing down
amid the ravines and the caverns. and
there is explosion after explosion. until
there are only few peaks of fire left
i'm the sun, and these are cooling down
and going out until the vast continents
of flame are reduced TO a small acreage
of fire. and that whitens and cools Off
until there are only few Goals left.
and these are whitening and going out
until there is not n speck LETT in all the
mountains of ashes and the valleys OF
ashes and the chasms Of ashes. An eN-
tinguished sun, A dead sun. \ buried
sum Let all worlds wall at the stupen-
dous obsequies.
OF course this withdrawal Of the solar
lipht and heat throws our earth into
universal chill, and the tropics become
the temperate. and the temperate be-
comes the arctic. and there are frozen
rivers and frozen lakes and frozen
oceans. From arctic and antarctic re-
pions the inhabitants gather in toward
the center and find the equator as the
poles. The slain forests are piled up
| into a great bonfire, and around them
gather the shivering villages and cities.
The wealth of the coal mines is hastily
pourcd into the furnaces and stirred
| into rage of combustion, but soon the
| honfires begin TO lower. and the fur
naccs begin 10 go out and the nations
| begin TO die. CotopaNi. Ncsuvius. Etna.
| Stromboli, California gcyscrs, cease TO
smoke. and the ice of huilstorms re-
mains unmelted i'm their crater. All
| the flowers have hreathed their last
breath. Ships with sailors frozen at
the mast. and helmsmcn frozen at the
wheel, and passengers frozen in the
cabin, all nations dying, first NJ the
north and then NJ the south Child
frosted and dead in the cradle. Octo-
genarian frosted and dead ut the
hearth. Workmen with frozen hand on
the hammer and frozen foot on the
shuttle. Winter from sea to sea. All
congealing winter. Perpetual winter.
/ Globe of frigidity. Hemisphere shack
NJ
ice. Universal Nova Zembla. The earth
an ice foe grinding against other ice
foes. The archangels of malice and
horror have done their work, and now
they may take their thrones Of glacier
and look down upon the ruin they have
wrought. What the destruction Of the
sun i'm the natural heavens would be
TO our physical earth. the destruction
of Christianity would be to the moral
world The sun turned into darkness!
Infdclity in our time is considered n
great Joke There are people who re-
ioicc to hear Christianity caricatured
ard 10 hear Chri-t cseailcd with bubble
md quirll and instrumentation and
badinucc and harlcouinadc. propose
to-day TO take iufdclity and atheism
ont Of the realm of iocularity into one
Of tragedy and show YOU what iufdels
propose and what If thew are successful
they viii ACCOMPLISH. There are those
in our communities who would Ike to
see the Christian religion overthrown
and who say the world would he better
without il. | want to show YOU what
is the end Of this road and what is the
terminus Of this crusade and what this
world win he when atheism md irGdel-
ity have triumphed over il. If they can
! say, if they can. reiterate it. If they
can.
In the first place. II win he the com
plctc and unutterahle DEGRADATION OF
womanhood. I win prove II hv facts
and arguments which no honest man
win dispute. In al communities and
cities and states and nations where the
Christian reelection has been dominant
womnu's condition has been amelio-
rated and improved. and She is deferred
to and h0nored in n thousand things
and every gentleman takes Off his hat
before her. If your associations have
been good. you know that the name OF
wife, mother, daughter. SUGGESTS gra-
cious surroundings. You know there
are no better schools ana seminaries
in this country than the schools and
seminaries for our young ladies'. Yor
know that while woman may suffer in
justice in England and the United
States she has more of her rights in
Chrstendom than she has anywhere
else.
Now, compare this with woman's con
diton in lands where Christianity hn,
made little or no advance-in China
in Barbary, in Borneo, in Tartary, il
Egypt, in Hindustan. The Burmese sci
their wives and daughters Ms so many
sheep. The IIindoo Bible makes il dis
graceful and an outrage for II woman t.
listen TO music or look out OF the win
dow in the absence of her husband ant
gives as lawful ground for divorce
womQn's beginning TO eat before he
husband has finished his meal. Wha