The Wilmington daily Republican. (Wilmington, Del.) 1890-1902, 1899-11-13
SETTLED IN HEAVEN.
DR.. TALMAoE ON DIVINE iNTERPo SE-
TON IN HUMAN AFFAIRS. /,
The Fate Of Nations as Well as of In
dividuals In Gods Hands - The
World Not Governed In HaphaE-
ard Way.


World Not Governed In = Haphaz-
ARD Way.
copyright, Louis Klopsch. 1891
WASHINGTON, Nov. 1.-THE idea that
things In this world are at loose ends
and going at haphazard Ia in this dis
course combated by DR.. Talmage. The
text is Psalms cxi~ 80. Forever, o
Lord thy word Is settled in heaven"
This world has been In process Of
change ever since 1t was created-moun-
tains born, mountains dying. and they
have both cradle and grave. Once this
planet was all fluid. and no being such as
you or have ever seen could have lived
on it minute. Our hemisphere turns Its
face to the sun and then turns Its back.
The axis Of the earth's revolution has
shifted, The oarth's center of gravity Is
changed, Once fowSrs grew in the arc
tic and there. was snow 10 the tropic.
There has been = redistribution Of land
and sea, the land crumbling INTO the sea,
the sea swallowing the land. Ice and
fire have fought for the possession of this
planet. The chemical composition of 1t
10 ulAClCAL INV AlVhi Whot ~ uhSS Whhs
Volcanoes once terribly alive are dead,
not one throb Of fiery pulse, not one
breath of vapor-the ocean changing its
amount of saline qualities. The internal
fires Of the earth are gradually eating
their way to the surfaces-upheaval and
subsistence Of vast realms Of continent.
Moravians in Greenland have removed
their boat poles because the advancing
sea submerged them. Linnaeus records
that in 81 years great stone was 100
feet nearer the water than when he
wrote. Forests have been buried by the
sea, and land that was cultured by farm
er's hoe Gun be touched only by sailors
anchor. Loeb Nevis Of Scotland and
Dingle bay of ireland and the 6ords Of
Norway, where pleasure boats now float,
were once valleys and glens. Many Of
the islands of the sen are the tops Of
sunken mountains. Six thousand miles
of the Pacific ocean are sinking. The d.
ameter of the earth, according to scien-
tific announcement, Is 189 miles less than
1t was. The entire confguration Of the
earth Is altered. Hills are denuded Of
their forests. The frosts and the wa
tiers and the air lombard the earth till it
surrenders to the assault. The so called
Everlasting hills" do not last. Many
railroad companies cease to build iron
bridges because the iron has life of its
own, not vegetable life or an animal
life, but a metallic life, and when that
life dies the bridge goes down. Oxida'
ton Of minerals is only another term for
describing their death. Moses and sea.
weeds help destroy the rocks they deco.
rate.
The changes Of the inanimate earth
only symbolic the moral changes. Soci-
ETY. ever becomes different for better or
worse. Boundary lines between nations
are settled until the next war unsettles
them. Uncertainty strikes through laws
and customs and legislation. The char
acteristic of this world is that nothing in
it is settled. At time when we hoped
that the arbitration planned last summer
at The Hague, Holland, would forever
sheathe the sword and spike the gun and
dsmantle the fortress the world has on
hand two wars which are digging graves
for the flower of English and American
soldiery. From the presence Of such geo.
logical and social and national and inter-
national unrest we turn with thanksg%v-
ing and exultation to my text and find
that there are things forever settled, but
in higher ATTITUDES than we have ever
trod. Forever, o Lord, thy word is set
tied in heaven"
Fate of Nations Settled.
High up in the palace Of the sun at
least five things are settled--that nations
which go continuously and persistently
wrong perish; that happiness is the re-
suit Of spiritual condition and not Of
earthly environment; that this world is a
schoolhouse for splendid or disgraceful
graduation; that with or without us the
world Is to be made over into a scene of
arborescence and purity; that all who
are adjoined to the unparalleled One Of
Bethlehem and Nazareth and Golgotha
will be the subjects Of supernal felicity
without any taking off.
Do you doubt my first proposition-that
nations which go wrong perish? We
have In this American nation all the ele.
ments of permAnence and destruction.
We need not borrow from others any
trowels for upbulding or torches for
demolition. Elements Of ruin-nihilism,
inAdelity, agnosticism, Sabbath desecra.
ton, inebriety, sensuality, extravaganza,
frHud; they are all here. Elements Of
safety--God worshiping men and wo'
men by the scores of millions, honesty,
benevolence, truthfulness, self sacrifice,
industry, sobriety and more religion than
has characterized any nation that has
ever existed; they are all here. The
only question is as to which Of the forces
will gain dominancy--the one class as
cendant, and this United States govern
ment, think will continue as long as
the world exists; the other class ascend
ant, and the United States goes into
such small pieces that other govern
ments would hardly think them worth
picking up.
Have you ever noticed the size of the
cemetery of dead nations, the vast Green
wood and Pere lie Chaise, where mighty
kingdoms were buried? Open the gate
and walk through this cemetery and read
the epitaphs. Here lies Carthage, born
100 years before Rome, great commercial
metropolis on the bay of Tunis, a part of
an empire that gave the alphabet to the
Greeks and their great language to the
Hebrews; her arms the terror of nations,
commanding at one time 10000 miles Of
coast; her Hamilcar leading forth 80 my
riads, or 100000 troops; her Hannibal
carrying out in manhood the oath he had
taken in boyhOod to preserve eternal en-
nifty to Rome. leaving costly and impos-
ing monuments at Agrigentum gha1tly
heap of ruins; Carthage, her colonies on
every coast, her ships blowing every sea;
Carthage--where are her 'splendors now
All cxtinguished. Where are her swords
The last one broken. Where are her tow
ers and long ranges Of magnificent archi-
lecture? Buried under the sands Of the
lBagradas As ballast of foreign ships
much Of her radiant marble has been car
ried away to build the walls of transmed-
iterrancan cathedrals, while other blocks
have been blasted in modern times by the
makers of the Tunis railway. And all Of
that great and mighty city and kingdom
that the tourist finds today is here and
there a broken arch of what was once a
so mile aqueduct. Our talented and gen.
ial friend. Henry NJ. Field. in one of his
matchless books of travel, labors hard to
prove that the slight ruins Of that city
are really worth visiting. Carthage bur-
led in the cemetery of dead nations. Not
one altar to the true God did she rear.
Not one Of the Ten Commandments but
she conspicuously violated. Her doom
was settled in heaven when it was decid-
~ f,1 Lof i,,t hn nj tipr hut M.