St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1900-01-20
PILLARS OF SMOKE
The Divine Symbol That Typifies
Gods Power and Mercy.
DE-. Tnlmage Speaks OF the Trial.
Through Which Truth Has Tri-
umphantly Struggled
Martyrs to Faith.
Copyright, 1899. by Louis Klopsch.l
WASHINGTON,

copyright, 1899, by Louis Klopsch.l
Washington,
The trials through which the truth
has struggled are by DR.. Talmage here
SET forth under Bible symbol Of great
suggestlveness and power, text, Solo
mons Song $50: 'Who is this that
cometh out of the wilderness like Dill
lars of sfnoke?''
The architecture of the smoke is won
drous, whether God with His finger
curves it into a cloud, or rounds it into a
dome, or points it in spire, or spreads
1t in wing, or, as in the text, hoists it
In a pillar. Watch it winding up from
the country farmhouse in the early
morning, showing that the pastoral in
dustries have begun, or see it ascending
from the chimneys of the city, telling
OF the homes fed, the factories turning
out valuable fabrics, the printing
presses preparing book and newspaper,
and all the ten thousand wheels of work
IN motion. On clear day this vapor
spoken of mounts with such buoyancy
and spreads such a delicate veil across
the sky and traces such graceful lines
OF circle and semicirc.e and waves and
losses and sinks and scars and scatters
with such affiuence of shape and color
and suggestiveness that if you have
never noticed it you are like man who
mas all his life lived in Paris and yet
never seen the Luxembourg, or all his
life in Rome and never seen the vatican,
or all his life at Lockport and never
seen Niagara. Forty-four times the
Bible speaks of the smoke, and it is
about time that somebody preached a
sermon recognizing this strange, weird,
beautiful. elastic, charming, terrific and
fascinating vapor. Across the Bible
sky floats the smoke of Sinai, the smoke
OF Sodom, the smoke of Al, the smoke of
the pit, the smoke of the volcanic hills
when God touches them, and in my text
the glorious church of God coming up
out Of the wilderness like pillars of
smoke.
In the first place, these pillars of
smoke in my text indicate the suffering
the church of God has endured. What
do mean by the church? Imean not a
building, not sect, but those who in
all ages and all lands and of all beliefs
love God and are trying to do right. For
many centuries the Heavens have been
black with the smoke of martyrdom. If
set side by side, you could girdle the
earth with the fires of persecution
Rowland Taylor, burned at Hadleigh;
Latimer, burned at Oxford; John Rog-
ers, burned at Smithfield; John Hooper,
burned at Gloucester; John Huss,
burned at Constance; Lawrence Saun-
ders, burned at Coventry; Joan Of Arc,
burned at Rouen.
Protestants have represented Catho-
lies as having q monopoly of persecut-
ors, but both Protestant and Catholic
have practiced cruelties. The Catholics
during the reign of Hunneric were by
Protestants put to the worst tortures,
stripped of their clothing, hoist ed in the
air by pulleys with weights suspended
from their feet, then let down, and ears
and eyes, and nose and tongue were
amputated, and red hot plates of iron
were put against the tenderest part Of
their bodies.
George Bancroft, the historian, says
of the state of Maryland: I'm the land
which Catholics had opened to Protes-
tants mass might not be said publicly,
no Catholic priest or bishop might ut
ter his faith in a voice of persuasion, no
Catholic might teach the young. If
maynard child of papist would but be-
come an apostate, the law wrested for
him from his parents share Of their
property. Such were the methods
adopted to prevent the growth Of po-
perry"
Catholicism as well as Professionalism
has had its martyrs. 1t does seem as
if when any one sect got complete DOM
NANCY in any land the devil of persecu-
ton and cruelty took possession of that
sect. Then see the Catholics after the
Huguenots. See the Gentiles after the
Jews in Touraine, where great pit was
dug and fire lighted at the bottom of
the pit, and 160 Jewish victims were
consumed. See the Presbyterian parlia-
ment of England, more tyrannical in
their treatment Of opponents than had
been the criminal courts. Persecution
against the Baptists by Paedo-Baptists.
Persecution of the Established church
against the Methodist church. Perse-
cution against the Presbyterians. I'm
der Emperor Dioc,etian $4,000 Chris |
tians were massacred, and 100000 more |
OF them died from Punishment and ex-
posnre.
Witness the sufferings of the Wal |
denses, of the Albigenses, Of the Nesto-
rians. Witness st. Bartholomew |
massacre. Witness the duke of Alva |
driving out of life $4,000 Christians. |
Witness Herod and Nero and Decius and |
Hildebrand and -Torquemada and earl |
of Montford and Lord Claverhouse, who,
when told that he must give account for |
his cruelties, said: 81 have no need to |
account to man, and, as for God, I will |
take Him in my own hands," A red line |
runs through the church history of 1 900 |
years, line of blood. Not by hundreds |
Of thousands, but by millions must we |
count those slain for Christ's sake. No |
wonder John Milton put the groans of |
the martyrs to an immortal tune, writ |
ing:
Avenge. o Lord. thy slaughtered saints. |
Lie scattered on the Alpine mountains cold. |
The smoke of martyrs homes and
martyrs bodies if rolling up all at once
would have eclipsed the MONDAY sun
and turned the brightest day the world
ever saw into midnight. ''Who is this
that cometh out of the wilderness like
pillars of smoke?"
Has persecution ceased? Ask that
young man who is trying to be Chris
tian in store or factory, where from
to night he is the butt Of all
the mean witticisms Of unbelieving en-
ployes. Ask that wife whose husband
makes her fondness for the house of
God and even her kneeling prayer by the
bedside derision and is no more fit
for her holy companionship than q
6lfbv croxr vnu ii he a fif cnmn9nion FIR |