The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1900-08-10
TALMAGE ON BOOKS
THE NOTED DIVINE GIVES PRACTICAL
HINTS ON WHAT TO READ
The Greatest Blessing of a Nation is
an Elevated Literature; Its Greatest
Curse, an Impure Literature-Some
Timely Suggestions

sends the following report of a dis
course which will be helpful to those
who have an appetite for literature
and would like some rules TO guide
them in the selection of books and
newspapers; text, Acts xix. 10. Many
OF them also used curious arts brought
their books together and burned them
before all men, and they counted the
price of them and found it $1,000 pieces
of silver"
Paul has been stirring UP Ephesus
with some lively sermons about the
sins of that place. Among the more
important results was n fact that the
citizens brought their bad books and
In a public place made a bonfire OF
them. 1 see the people coming out Of
their arms full of Ephesian literature
and tossing it into the flames. 1 hear
an economist who is standing by say
ing: Stop this waste. Here are S',ooo
worth OF books. Do you propose 10
burn them all up? If you don want
to read them yourselves, sell them and
let somebody else read them" NO"
said the people; IF these books are not
good for US, they are not good for any
body else, ana we shall stand and
watch until the last leaf has burned 10
ashes. They have don US a world OF
harm, and they shall never 90 DINERS
harm" Hear the names crdckle dhu
roarl
We'll, my friends, n of the wants
of the cities in a great bonfire OF bad
books and newspapers. We nave
enough fuel to make a blaze 200 feet
high. Many of the publishing houses
would do we'll TO hrow in the blaze
their entire stock of goods. Bring forth
the i~nsufferable trash and put it into
the fire and let it be known in the
presence of God and angels and men
that you are going TO rid your ONES
of the overlapping and UNDERTAKING.
curse of profiigate
The printing press is h mightiest
agency on earth for good and for evil.
The minister of the gospel, standing IN
a pulpit, has a responsible posltlon'
but do not hin it is as responsible
as the position of an editor or a pup
Usher. AT what distant point of time,
at what farout cycle of eternity, Will
cease the influence of a Henry j. Ray
mond or a Horace Greeley, or a James
Carbon Bennett, or a Watson WeDp'
or a Erastus Brooks or a TnomaS hlh
sella? Take Il overwhelming status
tics of the circulation of the daily and
weekly and then cipher If
you can how far up and now Tar DOWN
and how far out reaches the nf1uence
of the American printing press.
What is to be the issue of all this? L
believe the Lord intends the pruning
press to be the chief means Tor the
worlds rescue and evangelization, and
j think that the great last battle of n
world will not be fought with SWORDS
and guns, but with ypes and presses,
a purified and gospel trl-
umphing over, tramplinS down ana
crushing out forever that which Is de-
PRAYED. The only way to overcome
unclean literature is by scattering
abroad hat which is healthful. May
God speed the cylinders of an honest,
intelligent, aggressive. Christian print
ing press
GOOD BOOKS A BLESSING
1 have to tell you that the greatest
blessing that ever came 10 the NATIONS
is that of an elevated literature, and
the reates scourge has been that Of
unclean literature This last has its
victims in all occupations and depart
mentS. 1t has helped to fill insane aSy-
lums and penitentiarieS and aims
houses and dens of shame. The bodies
of this infection lie in the hospitals
and In the grave, Willie lIcll SOuL a. Z
being tossed over into a lost eternity,
am avalanche of horror and diSpair!
The london plague was nothing TO 1t
That counted it's victims by thousands,
but this modern pest has alread SHOW
eled its millions into the harnel house
of the morally dead. The longest rail
train that ever ran over n tracks was
not long enough or large enough to
carry the beastliness and the putrefac-
ton which nave been gathered up In
bad books and newspapers in n last
20 years.
Now, it is amid such circumstances
tina I put a question of overmasterlng
importance to you and your families.
What books and newspapers shall we
read? You see I group them together.
A is only a book in a swifter
and more portable shape, and the same
rules which will apply to book reading
will apply to newspaper reading. What
shall we read? Shall our minds be re-
ceptacle of everything that an author
has a mind to write? Shall there De
no distinction between the tree OF life
and the tree of death? Shall we stoop
down and drink out of the trough
which the wickedness of men has filled
with pollution and shame? Shall we
mire in impurity and chase fantastic
win-o'-the wiSpS across the SWampS
when we might walk in the blooming
sordens Of God? Oh, mo- For the
sake of our present and everlasting
welfare We must make an intelligent
and Christian choice.
Standing, as we do, chin deep in ficti-
tious literature, the question thal
Young people are asking is, shall we
read novels?" j reply, There are nov
els that are pure, god, Christian, ele-
waiting to the heart and ennobl1nS "a
the life But I have still further bo
say that I believe that 70 out OF the
100 novels in this day are baleful ano
destructive t b last degree. A pure
work OF fiction is history and poetry
combined. 1t is a history OF things
around US with the license and the as.
sumed names of poetry. The 4
can never pay the debt whish 1t owes
to such writer's Of fiction as Haw-
thorne and McKinzie and Landon am
Hunt and Arthur and others whose
names r familiar TO all The folliee
OF high life were never better exposed
han by Miss Edgeworth. The memo
ries of the past were never more faith
fully embalmed than in the writings