Peninsula enterprise. [volume] (Accomac, Va.) 1881-1965, 1900-07-14
GODS SAVING GRACE.
LIKE SALT IN ITS PRESERVATiVE
QUALITY.

DIR. Talmage Draws Inspiration From
DISQUALIFICATION a Purifier Of
Body and Soul-NO Sinner Beyond
Its Influence.
WASHINGTON, July S.-Dr. Talmage
is now travelling in Norway, where he
has been deeply interested in the nat
ural phenomena and the quaint social
life of that wonderful land In his dis
course this week he argues, contrary
10 the opinion of many, that religion is
an active principle which works con-
stantly for the welfare of body and
mind and soul. His text is Luke xiv,
"a, salt is good"
The Bible is a dictionary of the fin
est SMILES. 1t employs, among liv-
ing creatures. storks and eagles and
doves and unicOrns and sheep and cat
tie; among trees, sycamores and tere-
binthS and pomegranates and almonds
and apples; among jewels. pearls and
amethysts and jacinths and chrySo-
praSeS. Christ uses no stale illuStra-
tons. The lilies that he plucks in his
discourse are dewy fresh; the ravens in
his diScOurSeS are not stuffed speci-
mems of birds, but warm with life
from wing tip to wing tip; the fish he
points to are not dull about the gillS, as
though long captured, but a-sQuirm in
the wet net just brought up on the
beach of Liberals. In my text, which
is the perOratiOn of one of his sermons,
he picks up a crystal and holds it be-
fore his congregation as an illustration
of divine grace IN the heart when he
says what we all know by experiment,
salt is good"
Beauties of Salt.
1 shall try to carry out the Saviour's
idea in this text and in the first place
say to you that grace is like salt in its
beauty. In Galicia there are mines of
salt with excavations and underground
passages reaching, am told. $50 miles.
Far underground there are chapels and
halls of reception, the columns, the al
tars and the pulpits of salt. When the
king and the princes come to visit
these mines, the'whOle place is illumi-
mated and the glory of crystal walls
and crystal ceilings and crystal floors
and crystal columns, under the glare
of the torches and the lamps, needs
words Of crystal to describe it. But
you need not go so far as that to find |
the beauty of salt. You live in land |
which produces millions of bushels of 7,
1t in a year. and you can take the |
morning rail train and in a few hours |
get to the salt mines and salt springs, |
and you have this article morning. |
noon and night on your table. Salt |
has all the beauty of the snowflake !
and water foam, with durability added. |
1t IL beautiful to the naked eye, but
under the glass you see the stars, and !
the diamonds, and the white tree
branches, and the splinterS, and the
bridges of fire as the sun glints them.
There is more architectural skill in one
of these crystals Of salt than human
ingenuity has ever demonstrated in an
Alhambra or st. Peters.
1t would take all time, with an in
fringement upon eternity, for an angel
of God to tell one-half the glories in a
salt crystal. So with the grace of God;
1t is perfectly beautiful. l have seen
it smooth out wrinkles of care from the
brow; l have seen it make an aged
man feel almost young again; | have
seen it lift the STOPPING shoulders and
put sparkle into the dull eye. Solomon
discovered its therapeutic qualities
when he said, ut is marrow to the
bones" 1t helps to digest the food and
t. purify the blood and to calm the
pulses and quiet the spleen, and in
stead of Tyndalrs prayer test of 20
years ago, putting a man in a philo-
sophical hospital to be experimental
upon by prayer, it keeps him so well
that he does not need to be prayed for
as an invalid. l am speaking now Of a
healthy religiOn-nOt Of that morbid
religion that sits for three hours on a
gravestone reading Herveys "Medita-
lions Among the TOmbS"-a religion
that proSpers best in bad state of the
liver. | speak Of the religion that
Christ preached. | suppose, when that
religion has conquered the world, that
disease will be banished and that a
man 100 years of age will come In
from business and say, Il am tired; |
think it must be time for me to CO." ,
and without one physical pang heaven
will have him.
But the chief beauty Of grace is in
the SOUL 1t takes that which was hard
and cold and repulsiye and makes it
oil over again. 1t pours upon ones ma :
ture what David calls "the beauty of :
holiness" 1t extirpates everything G
that is hateful and unclean. If jeal-
busy and pride and lust and worldli-
hess Turk about, they are chained and :
nave very small sweep. Jesus throws .
upon the soul the fragrance Of a sum- n
ner garden as he comes in, saying, II h
I'm the Rose of Sharon" and he sub Il
nerges it with the glory of spring Il
horning as he says, II am the light" O
Oh, how much that grace did for the il
hree JOhnsi 1t took John Bunyan.
he foul mouthed. and made him John e
3unyan. the immortal dreamer; it took n
Ohm Newton, the infidel sailor, and in II
he midst of the hurricane made him II
ry out, my mothers God. have mer- G.
y upon mew 1t took John Summer u
leld from life of sin and by the hand +
T Christian maker of edge tools led h,
i'm into the pulpit that burns still Il
With the light of that Christian elo- II
uence which charmed thousands to W
be Jesus whom be once despised. All, II
on may search all the earth over for o,
so beautiful or identifying o.
s the grace Of Godl Go all through &c
he deep mine passages of Wieliczka n
nd amid the underground kingdoms st
salt in HallStadt and show me any &c
b Inn. ca nrn,,iri4o "a .uo....l.. iD.a.l.. ~