St. Tammany farmer., 1901-08-17
SIN IN HIGH PLACES.
Tendency to Excuse Brilliant Faults
Because They Are Brilliant.

Tendency to Excuse Brilliant Faults
Because They Are Brilliant.
DR.. Talmage Says the Same Law
Ought to BE Applied to the High
as to the Low-The Sacred
ness of Life.
copyright. 1901, by Louis Klopsch. n. ~
Washington.
In this discourse DR.. Talmage shows
that there is tendency to excuse bril-
liant faults because they are brilliant,
when the same law of right and wrong
ought to be applied to high places and
low: text, Daniel ABB: 'The same
hour was the thing fulfilled upon Neb-
| uchadnezzar, and he was driven from
| men and did eat grass as oxen.
Here is the mightiest of the BABY
| lonish kings. Look at him. He did
more for the grandeur of the capltal
than did all his predecessors or sue
cessors. Hanging gardens, reservoirs
aqueducts, palaces, all of his own plan
ming. The bricks that are brought up
| to-day from the ruins of Babylon have
| his name on them, Nebuchadnezzar,
son of fNabopolassor, king of Babylon.
He was great conqueror. he
stretched forth his spear toward na-
ton, and it surrendered. But he plum
| dered the temple of the true God. he
lifted an idol, Bel Merodach, and COM
| PEELED the people to bow down before
it, and if they refused they must go
| through the redhot furnace or De
| crunched by~1ion or ioness. So God
pulled him down.
He was smitten with what physicians
call lycanthropy and fancied that he
| was a wild beast, and he went out and
pastured amid the cattle. God did not
| excuse him because he had committed
the sin in high places or because the
| transgression was wide resounding.
| He measured Nebuchadnezzar in high
humblest captive.
But in our time, you know as well as
I, that there is disposition to put a
halo around iniquity if it is committed
in conspicuous place and if it is wide re-
sounding and of large proportions.
Ever and anon there has been an cpl
demic of crime in high places. and
there is not state or city and hardly
village which has not been called to
look upon astounding forgery or an b.
sconding bank cashier or president or
the wasting of trust fund or swindling
mortgages. I propose in carrying out
the suggestion of my text, as far as
| can, to scatter the fascinations around
iniquity and show you that sin is sin
and wrong is wrong whether in high
place or low place and that it will be
dealt with by that God who dealt with
impalaced Nebuchadnezzar.
All who preach feel that two kinds OF
| sermons are necessary, the one on the
faith of the Gospel, and the other on
the morality of the Gospel. and the
| one is just as important as the other,
| for you know that in this land to-day
| there are hundreds of meh hiding be-
hind the communion tables and in
churches of Jesus Christ who have no
business to be there as professors OF
| religion. They expect to be all right
with God, although they are all wrong
with man. And, while I want you to
understand that by the deeds of the
law no flesh living can be justified and
q mere honest life cannot enter us into
Heaven, / want you as plainly to un-
derstand that unless the life is right
the heart is not right. Grace in the
heart and grace in the life; so we must
| preach some times the faith of the
Gospel and sometimes the morality ol
the Gospel.
It seems to me there has not been a
time in the last so years when this lat
| ter truth needed more thoroughly to
be presented in the American churches
It needs to be presented to-day. r
A missionary in the islands Of the
Pacific preached one Sabbath on hon
esty and dishonesty, and on Monday he
found his yard full of all styles OF
| goods, which the natives had brought
| He could not understand it until ma
tive told him: "Our gods permit us to
purloin goods, but the God you told us
about yesterday, the God of Heaven
and earth, it seems, is against these
practices, and so we brought all the
! goods that do not belong to US, and
they are in the yard, and we want you
to help US distribute them among their
rightful owners" And if in all the pull
pits of the United States to-day rous.
ing sermons could be preached on hon
/ esty and the evils of dishonesty and the
sermons were blessed of God and ar
\ rangements could be made by which all
the goods which have been improperly
taken from one man and appropriated
by another man should be put in the
city halls of the country there is not a
city hall in the United States that
would not be crowded from cellar to
cupola. Faith of the Gospel; that we
must preach and we do preach. Moral
ity of the Gospel we must just as GER
tainly proclaim.
Now, look abroad and see the fasci.
| nations that are thrown around differ
ent styles Of crime. The question that
every man and woman has been asked
has been: Should crime be excused
because it is on large scale? Is in.
iauity guilty and to be pursued OF the