The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1900-01-12
PILLARS OF SMOKE.
TRIALS OF TRUTH EXPRESSED WITH A
BIBLICAL SYMBOL.
Rev. DIR. TaImage Sets Forth the Suf-
fering of the Church, of God I'm a Pow
erful Sermon A Plea for Unity of
Endeavor.
Copyright, Louis Klopsch. 1899

has struggled are by DR.. Talmage mere
set forth under a Bible symbol of great
sug~gestiveness and power; text, Solo
mons Song, iii. 6. Who is this that
cometh out Of the wilderness like pill
lars OF smoker"
The architecture of the smoke is
wondrous, whether God with his finger
curves 1t into a cloud, or rounds it into
a dome, or points il in a spire, or
spreads it in a wing, or, as in the text,
HOSTS it in a pillar. Watch it winding
up from the country farmhouse in the
early morning. showing that the pas
toraI industries have begun, or see it
ascending from the chimneys of the
city, telling of h homes fed, the fac
tories turning out valuable fabrics, the
printing presses preparing book and
newspaper and all the 10000 wheels
of work in motion On a clear day this
vapor spoken of mounts with such
buoyancy, and spreads such a delicate
veil across the sky, n traces such
graceful lines of circle and Semicircle,
and waves and losses and sinks and
scars and scatters with such ~affiuence
of shape and color and SuggeStiveness
that, il you have never noticed it, you
are like a man who n all his life liv-
ed in Paris, and yet never seen the
Luxembourg, or all his life in Rome and
eve seen h Vatican, or all his life
at Lockport and never seen Niagara.
Forty-four times the Bible speaks of
the smoke, and il is about time hat
somebody preached a sermon recogniZ-
ing this strange, weird, beautiful, elias
tic, charming, terrific and fascinating
vapor. Across the Bible sky floats the
smoke of Sinai, the smoke of Sodom,
h smoke Of Al, the smoke of the pit,
the smoke of the volcanic hills when
God touches them, and in my ext 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 suffer-
ing the church OF God has ndured
What do / mea by the church? 1
mean not a building, not a 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 Observation-Disclosures Tay-
lor burned at Hadleigh, Latimer burn
ed at Oxford John Rogers burned at
Smjthfield, John Hooper burned at
Gloucester, John Huss burned at Con-
stance, Lawrence Saunders burned al
Coventry, Joan of Arc burned at
Rouen.
CATHOLICS AND PROTESTANTS.
Protestants have represented Cath
olics as having a monopoly of perse-
cutors, but both Protestant n Cath
Ole have practiced Infamous cruelties.
The Catholics during the reign of Hun
neric were by Professionals put to the
worst fortunes, stripped of their cloth
ing, hoisted in the air by pulleys with
weights suspended from their feet,
then let down, and ears and eyes, nose
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 Prot
estants mass might moi be said public
ly, no Catholic priest or bishop might
utter his faith in a voice of persuasion.
no Catholic might teach the young. If
a Maynard child of a papist would but
become an apoState, the law wrested
for him from his parents a share OF
their property. Such were the methods
adopted to prevent the growth OF
popery."
Catholicism as we'll as Professionalism
has had it's martyrs 1t does seem as
if whe any one sect got complete
dominancy in any lane the devil OF per-
secution and cruelty toe possession
Of that sect. Then see the Catholics
after the H~uguenOts-. See the gentlles
after the Jews in Touraine, where a
great pit was dug and fire lighted at
the bottom of the pit, and 100 Jewish
victims were consumed. See the Pres
byterian parliament of England, more
in their treatment of OPP
ponents than had been the criminal
Persecution against the Bap-
fists by Paedo-Baptists, persecution OF
the Established church against the
church, persecution against
the Quakers, persecution against the
Under Emperor Diocle-
tian IA, 600 Christians were maSsacred,
and 700, 900 more OF them died from
Punishment and exposure.
Witness the sufferings Of Wal
denses, of the Albigenses, Of the Mes
Witness st. Bartholomew
Witness the Duke Of ALIVE
out of life $4,000 Christians.
Herod and Nero and Decius
and Hildebrand and T~orquemada and
of Montfort and Lord Claver-
house. who, when told that he u
give account for his cruelties, said: Il
no need to account to man. and
as for God I will take him in my W
A red line runs across the
church history Of 1900 years. a line of
Not by the hundreds Of thou
sands but by the millions. must we
those slain for Christs sake. No
John Milton put the groans of
he martyrs to an immortal tune, writ
ng:
o Lord, thy slaughtered saints
whose bones
lie sea ttered on the Alpine mountains
cold.
The smoke of martyrs homes and
bodies if rolling up all at once
would ave eclipsed the monday sun
md urned the brightest day the world
,ver saw into a midnight. Who is
his that cometh up out of the wilder
less like pillars OF smoker"
Has persecution ceased? Ask that
7oung man who is trying TO be a
Christian in a store or factory, where
rom morning to night he is the butt of
LII the mean witticisms of unbelieving
Ask that wife whose hus-
,apd makes her fondness for the house
IL Cd and even her kneeling prayer
,yr the bedside a derision n is no
more nt for her holy companionship