The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1901-03-22
MISSION OF INKHORN
Power for Good or Evil Its Contents
- May Weld.
DIR TaImegc DiScourses on Influences
Brought to Bear for Worlds
ImprOvement-The Inkhorn
of Gods Mercy.

In a newway and from a peculiar text
DR.. Talmage discourses of good infiu-
ences brought to bear for the worlds
| improvement. The text is Ezekiel 9: 3:
"And one man among them was
clothed with linen, with writer's ink
horn by his side"
The poem from which my text is
taken is epic, lyric, dramatic, weird
and overpowering. 1t is more than
Homeric or Dantesque. No one ever
had such divine dreams as Ezekiel. In
vision this prophet had seen wrath
| ful angels, destroying angels, each
with sword, but in my text he sees
merciful angel with an inkhorn.
| The receptacle for the ink in olden
| time was made out of the horn of a
cow or a ram or a roebuck, as now it
| Is made out of metal or glass, and
| therefore was called the inkhorn, as
now we say inkstand. We have all
spoken of the power of the sword, OF
the power of wealth, of the power of
office, of the power of social influence,
but to-day L speak of the power for
good or evil in the inkstand. 1t is
upon your tables, holding a black or
blue or red liquid. 1t is fortress, an
armory, gateway, ransom or
demolition. ''You mistake" says
some one; sit is the pen that has the
power" No my friend. What is the
influence of dry pen? Pass it up and
down sheet of paper, and 1T leaves
no mark. 1t expresses no opinion. 1t
gives no warning. 1t spreads no intel
ligence. 1t is the liquid which the pen
dips out of the inkstand that does the
work. Here and there celebrated
pen, with which a Declaration of Inde-
pendence or a Magma Charta or
treay was signed has been kept in lit
erary museum or national archives,
but for the most part the pens,
whether, as of old, made out of reed or
still later of wing of bird or still later
of metallic substance, have disap-
peared, while the liquid which the
pens took from the inkstand remains
in scrolls which, if put together,
would be large enough to enwrap the
world. For practical, for moral, for
religious, for eternal purposes, ]
speak of the mission of ''the writer's
inllhorn."
First, mention that which is pure
y
household. 1t awaits the opportunity
to express affection or coincidence or
advice Father uses it; mother uses
it; the sons and daughters use it. 1t
tells the home news; it announces the
marriage, the birth, the departure,
the accident, the last sickness, the
death. That home inkstand, what
mission it has already executed, and
what other mission will it yet fulfill!
May it stand off from all insincerity
and all querulousness. Let it tell only
that which it would be well to read
after the hand that wrote it and the
hand that received it can write no
more. Dip out of that inkstand only
that which is paternal, maternal, filial,
sisterly, brotherly. Sacred let it be
not to what are sometimes called the
Household gods," but to the one and
the only God who "setteth the solitary
in families" Dip out of it solace for
parents on the descending grade of
years and encouragement for those
who are climbing the sleeps.
Furthermore, the inkstand of the
business man has its mission. Be
tween now and the hour of your de-
sional man, there will not be a day
when you cannot dip from the ink
horn a message that will influence
temporal and eternal destiny. There
is a rash young man running into
wild speculation, and with as much
ink as you can put on the pen at
one time you may save him from the
Niagara rapids of ruined life. On
the next street there is young man
started in business who, through lack
of patronage or mistake in purchase
of goods or want of adaptation, is on
the brink of collapse. One line of ink |
from your pen will save him from
being an underling all his life and |
start him on a career that will win |
him a fortune which will enable him |
to become an endower of libraries, an |
opener of art galleries and builder of |
churches.
Furthermore, great are the re-
sponsibilities of the authors inkhorn. |
All the people, or nearly all the |
people, read, and that which they !
read decides their morals or inn
their prosperity or failure,
their faith or their unbelief, their |
purity or corruption, their heaven |
or hell. Show me any mans library, |
great or small, and after examining |
the books, finding those with leaves
uncut, but displayed for sake of the |
and those worn with fire.
Iuent perusal, and, without ever see
ing the man or knowing his name,
will tell you his likes and his dis
likes; his morals, good or bad or in
his qualification for busi-
ness or artistic or professional or
life. The best index to
any mans character is the book he
prefers above all others. Oh. the /
power of book for good or evil!
Abraham Lincoln in early life read
Paine's age of Reason" and it so
him that he wrote an es-
say against Christianity, but after
ward some Christian books came into
his hands and gloriously changed his
mind and made MIN a most ardent
friend of the Bible and a man of
prayer. A letter in Mr.. Lincoln's own
is in my house, the let
.er in response to some resolutions
passed by a Methodist conference,
saying: "In response to your ad-
lress. allow me to attest the se-