St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1901-10-26
DEFEAT OF OBLIVION
Oh. Talmage Cheers Despondent
Christian Workers.


In His Sermon He Shows How Any
one Can BE Widely and Forever
Recollected-Whyw We Should
Be Remembered.
Copyright. 1901. BY Louis Klopsch. N. ~
Washington,
In this discourse DR.. Taimage shows
how anyone can be widely and for
ever recollected and cheers despond-
emit Christian workers; texts, Job "a:
20: He shall be no more remembered"
and Psalms 112: 6: t'The righteous shall
be in everlasting remembrance"
Ut oblivion and its defeats / speak
to-day. There is an old monster that
swallows down everything. It crunches
individuals, families, communities,
states, nations, continents, hemi-
spheres, worlds. Its diet is made up
OF years, of centuries, of ages, of cy-
Giles, OF milleniums, of cons. That mon
ster is called by Noah Webster "Ob;iv-
ion." It is steep down which every
thing rolls. II is a confagration in
which everything is consumed. It is
dirge which sll orchestras play and
. period at which everything stops.
1t is the cemetery of the human race.
1t is the domain of forgetfulness. OBJ
livion! At times it throws shadow
over all of us, and / would not pro-
nounce 1t to-day if did not come
armed in the strength of the eternal
God on your behalf to attack it, to
route it. to demolish it.
Why, just look at the way the fam
Nies Of the earth disappear. For
awhile they are together, inseparab bic,
and then they part, some by marriage
going to establish other homes, and
some leave this life, and century is
long enough to plant family, develop
1t, prosper it and obliterate it. So
the generations vanish. Walk up Penn
sylvania avenue, Washington; Broad
way, New York; State street, Boston;
Chestnut street, Philadelphia; the
Strand, London; Princeton street, Ed
inburgh; Champs Erysee, Paris; Inter
den Linden, Berlin, and you will meet
in this year 1901 not one person who
walked there in the year 1901. What
engulfment! All the ordinary efforts
at perpetuation are dead failures.
Walter Scott's "Old Mortality may go
round with his chisel to recut the faded
spitaphs on tombstones, but Old OBJ
ivion has quicker chisel with which
he can cut out thousands epitaphs
while old Mortality is cutting one cpl
taph. Whole libraries Of biographies
devoured of bookworms or unread Of
the rising generations. All the signs
Of the stores and warehouses of great
firms have changed, unless the grand
sons think that it is an advantage to
keep the old sign up because the name
of the ancestor was more commenda-
tory than the name OF the descendant.
The city Of Rome stands to-day, but
dig down deep enough, and you come to
another Rome, buried, and go down
still farther, and you will find third
Rome. Jerusalem stands To-day, but
dig down deep enough, and you will
find Jerusalem underneath, and go
on and deeper down third Jerusalem.
Alexandria, Egypt, on the top of an
Alexandria, and the second on the
top of the third. Many of the ancient
cities are buried 30 feet deep or 50
feet deep or 100 feet deep. What was
the matter? Any special calamity ?
No. The winds and waves and sands and
flying dust are all undertakers and
gravediggers, and it the world stands
long enough the present Washington
and New York and London will have
on top Of them other Washingtons and
New Yorks and Londons, and only aft
er digging and boring and blasting
will the psychologists of far distant
centuries come down as far as the
highest spires and domes and turrets
of our present American and Euro
pean cities.
Call the roll Of the armies Of Bald
win /. or of Charles Martel or of
Marlborough or of Mithridates or OF
Prince Frederick or of Cortes, and
not one answer will you hear. Stand
them in line and call the roll of the
100000 men in the army of Thebes.
Not one answer. Stand them in line,
the 1,700,O 900 infantry and 100000 cav
airy Of the Assyrian army under
Minus, and call the roll. Not one an
swer. Stand in line the 100000 men
OF Sesostris, the 1900, 900 men of Arta-
xerxes at Cunaxa, the 2,641,0 men
under Xerxes at Thermopylae and
call the long roll. Not one answer
At the opening Of our civil war the
men OF the northern and southern ar
mics were told that if they fell in
battle their names would never be
forgotten by their country. Out OF
the million men who fell in battle OF
died in military hospitals you cannot
call the names Of thousand nor the
names st 500 nor the names OF 1ot
nor the names of 80. Oblivion! Are
the feet OF the dancers who at the
hall Of the duchess of Richmond al
Brussels the night before Waterloo
all still? All still. Are the ears tina,
heard the guns Of Bunker Hill ell
deaf? All deaf. Are the eyes ina,
saw the coronation OF George IL!