The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1899-03-31
LIFE In GREAT CITIES
DIR. TALuAGE TELLS OF ITS
SPLENDGR AND ITS WOE
The Pulpit orator Draws Some Useful
and Helpful Lessons From HIS Own
Observations-The Voice of the Streets

Copyright, 1899, by American Press
Association.)
In this discourse DR.. Talmage. who
has lived the most Of his life in cities,
draws practical lessons from his own
observation: text, Proverbs i, 20, Wis
dom crieth without; she uttereth her
voice in the streets"
We are all ready to listen to the
voices Of nature-the voices Of the
mountain, the voices of the sea, the
voices Of the storm, the voices Of the
star. AS in some of the cathedrals in
Europe there is an organ at either end
Of the building, and the one instrument
responds musically to the other, so IN
the great cathedral of nature day re-
spends to day and night to night and
flower to flower and star to star in the
great harmonies Of the universe. The
springtime is an evangelist in blossoms
preaching Of Gods love, n the winter
is a prophet-white bearded-denounc-
ing woe against our sins. We are all
ready to listen to the voices of nature,
but how few Of US learn anything from
the voices Of the noisy n dusty
street? You go to yOu mechanism n
to your work and 10 your merchandise,
and you come back again, and often
with how different a you pass
through the streets. Are there no
things for us to learn from these pave
ments owe which W. pass? Are there
no tufts Of truth growing up between
these cObblestOnes, beaten with the
feet of toll and pain and pleasure, the
slow tread of old age and the quick
step Of childhood? Aye, there are great
harvests to be reaped, and now I thrust
in the sickle because the harvest is
ripe. Wisdom crieth without; she ut
tereth her voice in the streets"
In the first place, the street impresSes
me with the fact that this life is a
scene of toll and struggle. By 10
o'clock every day the city is Earring
and humming with voices, and covered
with the breath Of smokestacks, and
a rush with traffickers. nee in awhile
you find a nan going along with folded
arms and with leisurely step, as though
he had nothing to do; but for the most
part, as You find men going down these
streets on the a to business, there
is anxiety in their faces, as though they
had some errand which must be exc
cuted at the first possible moment. o
are jOstled by those who have bargains
to make and notes to sell. Up this lad
ueI Nllll d " VI pllChas Oul VI klilo
bank with a roll of bills, on his dray
with a load of goods, digging a cellar,
or shingling a roof, or shoeing a horse,
or building a Wall, or mending a watch,
or binding a Dook. Industry, with her
thousand arms and thousand eyes and
thousand feet goes on singing her song
O. work, work, work, while the mills
drum it and the steam whistles fife 1t.
All his not because men low toll.
Some one remarked, Every ma is as
lazy as he car afford to be." But it is
because necessity with stern brow
with uplifted whip stands over you
ready whenever you relax your toll to
make your shoulders sting with the
lash.
THE WORLDS OIL AND ANXIETY
Can it be that passing up and down
these streets on you way to work and
business that you do not learn anything
of the worlds toll and anxiety and
struggle? Oh, how many dropping
hearts, how many eyes on the watch,
how many miles travelled, how many
burdens carried, how many losses suf-
fered, how many battles fought, how
many victories gained, how many de-
feats suffered, how many exasperations
endured; what losses, what hunger,
what wretchedness, what pallor, what
disease, what agony, what despair!
Sometimes l have stopped at the corner
of the street as the multitudeS went
hither and yOn, and it has seemed to
be a great pantOmime, and as l looked
upon it my heart broke. This great tide
of human life that goes down the street
is a rapid, tossed and turned aside, and
dashed ahead, and driven back-beau-
tiful in it's confusion and confused in
it's beauty. In the carpeted aisles of the
forest. in the woods from which the
eternal shadow is never lifted, on the
shore of the sea over whose iron coast
roe1o. +IA +nrn1n1 FOO " ~ y l1in r the
cracked cliffs with a baptism of whirl-
wind and tempest, is the best place to
study God, but in the rushing swarm
ing, raving street is the best place to
study man.
CONG down to your place of business
and coming home again, l charge you
to look about-see these signs Of power
ty, of Indebtedness, of hunger, OF sin,
of bereavement-and as you go through
the streets, and come back through the
streets, gather up in the arms OF your
prayer all the sorrow, all the losses, all
the s~ufferings, all the ~bereavements OF
those whom you pass, and present them
in prayer before an all sympathetic
God. In the great day of eternity
there will be thousands of persons with
whom you in this world never ex-
changed one word, will rise up and call
you blessed and there will be a thou
sand fingers pointed at you in heaven,
SOY lIS. I'D 10 TIE lIIdu, lldL 10 Xix
woman who helped me when I was
hungry and sick and wandering and
lost and heartbroken. That is the man,
that is the woman" and tina blessing
will come down upon you as Christ shall
say: Il was hungry, and we fed me;
l was naked, and we clothed me; I was
sick and in prison, and We visited me;
as We did it to these poor
waits of the streets, We did it to me-"
Again, the street impresses me with
the fact that all classes and conditions
of society must commingle. We some
times culture a wicked exclusiveness
Intellect despises ignorance. Refine
ment will have nothing to do, with
boorishness. Gloves hate the sunburne6
hand. and the high forehead depises
the fiat head, and the trim hedgerov
will have nothing to do with the wilC
copsewood, and Athens hates Nazareth
This ought not to be so. The astrono'
mer must come down from his starry
revelry and help US in our navigation
The geo must come away from hi:
study Of the human organism n SCI
our broken bones. The chemist mus
come avvaU from his Ia hOraTOrV where