Orange County observer. [volume] (Hillsborough, N.C.) 1880-1918, 1901-02-28
Dr.TALMAGE SERMON
rHE GREAT DIVINES ELOQUENT
MESSAQB.

mESSAuHa
Subject: Speak For the Right-Diabolical
Agencies Active-Silence is Not Gold
en- While There Are Evils - Be Ready
When Christianity is Assailed.
copyright 1901
WASHINGTON. d. C.-In this discourse
DIR. Talmage calls for more demonstra-
tive religion and hearty speaking out
on the right side OF everything; text,
Mark tx, 25, "Thou dumb and deaf spirit,
l charge thee, come out OF him.
Here was case OF great domestic an
guish. The son of the household was pos
sessed of an evil spirit, which among other
things paralyzed his tongue and made him
speechless. When the influence was on
the patient he could not say a word-ar-
captured this member of the household
was a dumb spirit-so called by Christ--a
spirit abroad to-day and as lively and po-
tent as in New Testament times. Yet, in
all the realms OF sernonology I cannot
Ind a discourse concerning this devil
which Christ charged upon in my text,
saving, Come out OF him.
There has been much destructive super
sfition abroad in the world concerning
possession Of evil spirits. Under the form
of belief in witchcraft this delusion swept
the continents. Persons were supposed to
be possessed with some evil spirit which
made them able to destroy others. In the
sixteenth century in Geneva 1900 persons
were burned to death as witches Under
one judge, in Lorraine. 900 persons were
burned to death as witches. In one neigh
borhood Of France 1000 persons were
burned. In two centuries 100000 persons
were slain as witches. So mighty was the
delusioa that it included among it's vic
Tins some of the greatest intellects of all
time. such as Chief Justice Matthew Hale
and Sir Edward Coke, and such renowned
ministers OF religion as Cotton Mather,
one Of whose books Benjamin Franklin
said shaped his Hfe-and Richard Baxter
and Archbishop Cranmer and Martin
Luther, and among writers and philoso-
become the laughing stock of all sensible
people counted it's disciples among the
wisest and best people of Sweden, Ger
many, England, France, Spain and New
England. But while we reject witchcraft,
any man who believes the Bible must be-
heve that there are 6iabolical agencies
abroad in the world While there are
fernal spirits to hinder, to poison and to
destroy. Christ was speaking to a spirit
ual existence when standing before the
afflicted one Of the text He said, Thou
dumb and deaf spirit, come out Of him.
Against this dumb devil of the text I
VI.
this agent Of evil has put his blight on
those. who. by omission of the vocal or
gans have had the golden gates of speech
bolted and barred. Among those who
have never spoken word are the most
gracious and lovely and talented souls
that were ever incarnated. The chaplains
Of the asylurns for the dumb can tell you
called the name of father or mother or
child, and many Of the most devout and
prayerful souls will never in this world
speak the name of God or Christ.
Many deaf mute have I seen with the
angel of intelligence seated at the window
OF the eye. who never came forth from the
door of the mouth. What miracle Of
man. OF New Hampshire, not only without
faculty of speech, but without hearing
and without sight, all these faculties re-
moved by sickness when two years of age,
yet becoming wonder at needlework, at
the piano, at the sewing machine and an
intelligent student Of the Scriptures and
confounding philosophers who came from
nomenon. Thanks to Christianity for
what it has done for the amehoration of
the condition of the deaf and the dumb.
Back in the ages they were put to death
as having no right, with such paucity Of
equipment, to live, and for centuries they
were ciassed among the idiotic and unsafe.
But in the sixteenth century came Pedro
Ponce, the Spanish monk, and in the sew
enteenth century came Juan Pablo Bonet,
another Spanish monk, with dactylology,
or the finger alphabet, and in our own
Drs. Mitchell and Ackerly and Peet and
Gallaudet, who have given to uncounted
thousands of those whose tongues were
forever silent the power to spell out on
the air by manual alphabet their
thoughts about this world and their hopes
for the next. We rejoice in the brilliant
inventions in behalf of those who were
born dumb
One of the most impressive audiences
ever addressed was in the Far West, an
audience of about 900 persons, who had
never heard sound or spoken word, an
interpreter standing beside. me while
dience on two advantages they had over
the most Of us-the one that they escaped
hearing great many disagreeable things
and on the other fact that they escaped
saying things they were sorry for after
ward.
Yet after all the alleviations of a
shackled tongue is an appalling limitation
But we are not this morning speaking OF
congenial mutes. We mean those who are
born with all the faculties of vocalization
and vet have been struck by the evil one
mentioned in the text-the dumb devil
to whom Christ called when He said
'9Thou dumb and deaf spirit, I charge
thee, come out of him.
There has been apotheosization of 81
lence Some one has said silence is gold
en-, and sometimes the greatest triumph
is to keep your mouth shut But some
times silence is a crime, and the direct
result of the baleful influence of the dumb
devil of our text. There is hardly man
or woman who has not been present on
some occasion when the Christian religion
became target for raillery. Perhaps il
was over in the store some day when there
was not much going on and the clerks
were in d group, or it was in the factory
at the noon spell, or it was out on the
farm under the trees while you were rest.
ing, or it was in the clubroom. or it was
in social circle, or it was in the street on
the way home from business, or it was on
some occasion which you remember with.
out my describing it. Some one got the
laugh on the Bible and caricatured the
profession of religion as hypocrisy or
made pun out of something that Christ
said The laugh started. and you joined
in, and not one word of protest did you
utter What kept you silent? Modesty
No. Incapacity to answer? No. Lack Of
opportunity? No It was a blow on both
your lips by the wing of the dumb devil
If some one should malign your father OF
mother or wife or husband or child. you