Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1901-03-21
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
PRIN TER'S INK THE SUBJECT
LAST SUNDAY.
Good Influence of Newspapers and Books
The Public Conscience Is Easily
Awakened - Letter writin: Cool
Habit for the Young.

VSopyrlght, 1901, by Louis klopSch, n. -
Washington, March lin a new
way and from peculiar text DR.. Tai
mage discourses of good influences
brought to bear for the worlds i'm
provement The text is Ezekiel tx. 2,
And one man among them was cloth
ed with linen. with a writer's inkhorn
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
full angels, destroying angels, each with
a sword, but in my text he sees mer-
ciful angel with an inkhorn. The re-
ceptacle 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 today
speak of the power for good or evil in
the inkstand. 1t is upon your tables,
holding black or blue or red liquid.
1t is fortress, an armory gateway,
a ransom or a demolition. You mis-
take says some one; ut is the pen
that has the power" No, my friend.
What is the influence of a dry pen?
Pass -
and it leaves no mark. 1t expresses
no opinion. 1t gives no warning. 1t
spreads no intelligence. 1t is the liquid
which the pen dips out of the inkstand
that does the work. Here and there a
celebrated pen, with which a Declara-
ton Of Independence or a Magma
Charta or treaty was signed has been
kept in literary museum or national
archives, but for the most part the
pens, whether, as Of old, made out of
reed or later of wing of bird or still
later of metallic substance, have dis
appeared, while the liquid which the
pens took from the inkstand remains
in scrolls which, if put together, would
be large enough to enwrap the round
world. For practical, for moral. for re-
ligious, for eternal purposes. speak
of the mission OF the writer's ink
horn"
Writing to Old Folks at Home.
o ye who have with recent years set
up homes of your own, out of the new
home inkstand write often to the old
FOLKS 10 thav hn Sti1l li,yip.I
means more to them than to us, who
are amid the activities of life and to
whom postal correspondence is more
than we can manage. They await the
coming of the letter. Undertake no
great thing in life without their ad-
vice. Old people for counsel; young
people for action. Even though through
decadence they may be incompetent to
give valuable opinions on important
affairs, compliment them by asking
their counsel. 1t will do them good. II
will make their last days exhilarant.
Make that home inkstand a source OF
rejuvenescence to those who are near
the terminus of the earthly journey.
Domestic correspondence is not at
tended to at once. The newspaper,
joining with the telegraph, bears the
tidings OF all the neighborhood, but
swiftest revolving wheel of modern
printing press and quickest flash along
the electric wires can never do the
sympathetic work OF the home ink
stand. AS the merciful angel of my
text appeared before the brazen altar
with the inkhorn at his side in Eze-
kiel's vision, so let the angel of filial
kindness appear at the affairs of the
old homestead