The Penn's Grove record., 1900-11-02
DR.. TALMAGES SERMON
SUNDAYS DISCOURSE Blythe NOTED
DIVINE.


Subject: The Golden Calf of Modern Idol
airy = The Spirit of Greed Destroys
Those Who Are in Its Grasp Money
Got wronsfully is a Curse.
Copyright 1901
WASHINGTON, D. Gin this discourse
DR.. Taimage shows how the spirit Of
greed destroys when it takes possession
Of a man and that money got in wrong
WAYS is a curse; text, Exodus xxi, 20,
"And he took the calf which they had
made and burnt i. in the fire and ground
it to powder and strewed it upon the
water and made the children Of Israel
drink of it."
People will. have a god of some kind,
Here co , the Israelites, breaking of
their golden earrings. the men as well az
the women, for in those times there was
masculine rs well as feminine decoration.
Where ! they get these beautiful gold
earrings, coming up. as they did. from the
desert? Oh, they borrowed them of the
Egyptians when they left Egypt. These
earrings are piled up into a pyramid OF
glittering beauty. "Any more earrings
to bring?' says Aaron. None. Fire is
kindled, the earrings are melted and pour
ed into q mold not of an eagle or a war
charger, but Of a silly calf; the gold cools
idol is set up on it's four legs. An altar
is built in front of the shining calf. Then
the people throw up their arm and gy-
rate and shrek and dance vigorously and
worship
Moses has been six weeks on Mount
Sinai. ard he comes back and hears the
bowling and sees the dancing of these
golden calf fanatics, and he loses his pa
thence, and he takes the two plates of
stone on which were written the Ten Com
m~andments and filings them SO hard
against a rock that they split all to pieces,
When a man gets angry. he is apt to
break all the Ten Commandments. Moses
rushes in, and he takes this calf god and
throws it into a hot fire until it is melted
all out of shape and then pulverizes it,
not by the modern appliance of nitro mu-
Ratio acid, but by the ancient appliance of
inter or by the old fashioned file. He stirs
for the people a most nauseating draft.
He takes this pulverized golden calf and
throws it in the only brook which is ac-
cessible, and the people are compelled to
drink of that brook or not drink at all.
But they did not drink all the glittering
stuff thrown on the surface. Some of it
flows on down the surface of the brook to
the river and then flows on down the river
to the sea, and the sea takes it up and
bears it to the mouth of all the ~rivers, and
when the tides set back the remains OF
Potomac and the Hudson and the Thames
and the Clyde and the Tiber. And men
go out and they skim the glittering sur
face, and they bring it ashore and they
make another golden calf. and California
and Australia break off their golden ear
rings to augment the pile, and in the fires
Of financial excitement and struggle all
these things are melted together, and
while we stand looking and wondering
what will come of it, 10, we find that the
golden calf of Israelitish worship has be
come the golden calf of European and
American worship.
golden calf of modern idolatry. 1t lis not
like other idols, made out of stocks OF
stone, but it has an ear so sensitive that II
can hear the whispers on Wall street and
Third street and State street. and the
footballs in the Bank of England and the
hutter OF a Frenchman's heart on the
bourse. 1t has an eye SO keen that it can
see the rust on the farm of Michigan
wheat and the insect in the Maryland
peach orchard and the trampled grain UNI
der the hoof of the Russian war charger.
1t is so mighty that it swings any way it
will the worlds shipping It has it's foot
'ers. 1t started the American Civil Wal
and under God stopped it, and it decided
the Turko- Russian contest. One broker
In September, 1869, in New York, shouted,
"One hundred and sixty for a million?'
and the whole continent shivered. The
golden calf of the text has. as far as Amer
lea is concerned, it's right front foot in
New York, its left front foot in Chicago,
it's right back foot in Charleston, its left
back foot in New Orleans, and when it
shakes itself it shakes the world. Oh, this
is a mighty god-the golden calf Of the
worlds worship!
But every god must have it's temple, and
this golden calf of the text is no excep-
Cathedral in England, and st. Peters in
Italy, and the Alhambra Of the Spaniards,
and the Parthenon of the Greeks, and the
Tai Mahal of the Hindoos, and all the
cathedrals put together. It's pillars are
grooved and fiuted with gold. and its
ribbed arches are lowering gold, and its
chandeliers are descending gold, and it's
floors are tessellated gold, and it's vaults
are crowded heaps of goll and its spires
and domes are soaring gold, and its organ
pipes are ~resounding gold, and it's pedals
are tramping gold, and it's stops pulled out
are flashing gold, while, standing at the
head Of the temple, as the presiding diety;
are the hoofs and shoulders and eyes and
ears and nostrils of the calf of gold.
Further, every god must have not only
its temple, but its altar of sacrifice, and
this golden calf Of the text is no exception.
Its altar is not made out of stone as other
affairs, but out of counting room desks
and freproof safes, and it is a broad, a
long, a high altar. The victims sacrificed
On it are the Swartouts and the Ketchams
and the Fisks and ten thousand other
people who are slain before this golden
calf.
What does this god care about the
groans and struggles of the victims before
it? With cold, metallic eye, it looks on
and yet let's them suffer. What an altar!
What a sacrifice Of mind, body and soul!
The physical health Of 9 great multitude
is flung on to this sacrificial altar. They
cannot sleep, and they take choral and
morphine and intoxicants.
Some of them struggle in a nightmare OF
stocks, and at ! o'clock in the morning
suddenly rise up shouting: ga thousand
shares of New York Central-one hun
bred and eight and a half, take it!'-untiI
the whole family is affrighted, and the
SPECTATORS fall back on their pillows and
sleep until they are awakened again by a
corner" in Pacific Mail, or a sudden
rise" of Rock Island.
Their nerves gone, their digestion gone
their brain gone, they die. The gowned
ecclesiastic comes in and reads the funer
al service, blessed are the dead who die
in the Lord" Mistake. They did not
Idle in the Lord" the golden calf kicked
them.
The trouble is, when the men sacrifice
themselves on this altar suggested in the
text they not only sacrifice themselves
but they sacrifice their families.
If a man by a wrong course is determ
med to go to perdition, | suppose yot
will have to let him go. But ne puts hi.
wife and children in an equipage that i,
the amazement of the avenues, and Thu
driver lashes the horses into two whirl
winds, and the spokes flash in the sun ant
the golden headgear of tue harness CLEANS
until black calamity takes the bits of til.
horses and stops them and shouts to tn.
luxuriant occupants of the e~quipage, .Ge
out!" They get cut. They get down
That husband and father flung his family
so hard they never got up. There wa
the mark on them for life-the mark OF
split hoof-the death dealing hoof Of th,
golden calf.
Solomon offered in one sacrifice on on
occasion $1,000 oxen and l2O,0 900 sheep
But that wal a tame sacrifice compared
with the multitude of men who are sac
rificing themselves on this altar of tn
Golden calf and oacrrEo;nr fbo;r foro :i;n