The Middleburgh post. [volume] (Middleburgh, Snyder Co., Pa.) 1883-1916, 1899-11-02
TO ENJOY LONG LIFE.
A Prescription Prepared by Rev.
Dr.. Talmage
Rsligio. VIII Offset the Disaipatisns
Aad DestrOyers Of Life-Ths
Gospel a Chariot fer
the Living.

copyrighted. 1899. by Louis Klopsch)
Washington. Sept. Il.
In this discourse DR.. Talmage gives
prescriptions for the prolongation Of
life and breaches the gospel of physical
health. The text is Psalms 81, 16, with
long life will l satisfy him."
Through the mistake Of its friends re-
ligion has been chiefly associated with
sick beds and graveyards. The whole
subject to many people is odorous with
chlorine and carbolic acid. There are
people who cannot pronounce the word
religion" without hearing in il the clip
ping chisel Of the tombstone cutter. 1t
is high time that this thing were
changed and that religion, instead Of
being represented as n hearse to carry
out the dead, should be represented as
chariot in which the living are to tri-
umph.
Religion, SO far from subtracting
from ones vitality, is a glorious add
tion. 1t is sanative, curative, hygienic.
1t is good for the eyes, good for the
ears, good for the spleen, good for the
digestion, good for the nerves, good for
the muscles. When David in another
part Of the psalm prays that religion
may be dominant, he does not speak Of
1t as mild sickness or an emaciation or
an attack Of moral and spiritual cramp.
He speaks Of il us "the saving health Of
all nations" while God in the text prom
ises longevity to the pious, saying:
with long life will satisfy him." The
fact is that men and women die too
soon. 1t is high time that religion
joined the hand of medical science in at
tempting to improve human longevity.
Adam lived 93O years; Methuselah lived
800 years. As late in the history Of the
world as Vespasian there were at one
time In his empire IS people l35 years
old. So far down as the sixteenth cen
tury Peter Tartan died at 1S5 years OF
age. do not say that religion will ever
take the race back to antsdiluvian lon
gevity, but do say the length Of life
will be increased.
1t is said in Isaiah: "The child shall
die . hundred years old" Now, il, &C.
cording to Scripture, the child 10 TO be
. hundred years old, may not the men
and women reach to 800 and 400? The
fact 10 that we are mere dwayfs and
compared, with some Of the
generations that are to come. Take
the African race. They have been up-
der bondage for centuries. Give them
. chance, and they develop Frederick
Douglass or q Touksaint LOuverturs.
And, IL the white race shall be brought
from under the serfdom Of sin, what
shall be the body, what shalt be the
soul3 Religion has only just touched
our world. Give 1t full power for few
centuries, and who can tell what win be
the strength of man and the beauty Of
women and the longevity Of all?
My design is to show that practical re-
ligion is the friend of long life. Iprove
it first from the fact that II makes the
care of our health positive Christian
duty. Whether we shall keep early or
late hours, whether we shall take food
or indigestible, whether there
shall be thorough or incomplete masti-
cation, are questions very ofton de-
ferred to the realm of whimsicality. But
the Christian man lifts this whole prob
lem of health into the accountable and
the Divine. He says: God has given
me this body, and He has called it the
temple Of the Holy Ghost, and to de-
face its altars or mar its walls or crum.
BILE its pillars is a God defying sacri-
lege." He sees Gods caligraphy in
every page. anatomical and phyRolog-
ical. Hesays: God has given me won
derful body for noble purposes"-that
arm with 80 curious bones-wielded by
+6 curious muscles and all under the
brains telegraphy, $50 pounds OF blood
rushing through the heart every hour,
the heart in "a hours beating 100000
times, during the "a hours the lungs
taking in 81 hogsheads of dir, and all
this mechanism not more mighty than
delicate and easily disturbed and de-
molished. The Christian man says to
himself: "If hurt my nerves, il hurt
my brain, II hurt any of my physical
faculties, insult God and call for dire
retribution." Why did God tell the Le-
vites not to offer to Him in sacrifice ami
mails imperfect and diseased? He meant
to tell us in all the ages that we are TO
offer TO God our very best physical con-
dition. and u man who through irreg-
ular or gluttonous eating ruins his
health is not offering to God such sac
riice. Why did Paul write for his cloak
at Troas? Why should such q great
man as Paul be anxious about . thing
SO insignificant as an overcoat? 1t was
because he knew that with pneumonia
and rheumatism he would not be worth
half as much to God and the church as
with respiration easy and foot free.
An intelligent Christian man would
consider II an absurdity to kneel down