The people's recorder. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1893-1925, 1901-12-21
STEADILY IMPROVES
DR.. TALMAGE'S SUNDAY SERMON.
Argues That the World Grows Better,
Day BY Day Many Opportunities!
For Improvement.

For Improvement.
WASHINGTON, D. Gin this discourse
DR.. Talraage recites some great evonts aud
shows that the world is advancing in the
right direction; text, Joel ii, 80, x will
show wonders in the heavens and in the
earth"
DR.. Cumming and good man
would have told us the exact time of the
fu!iiilment OF this prophecy. As stepped
into his study in London on my arrival
from PARIS Just after the french had sur
rendered at Sedun the good doctor said to
France. People laughsd at nc because I
talked about the seven horns and the walls,
but T forcsaw all this from the book of
Daniel and the book Of Revelation. Not
taking any sucl responsibility in the in
depreciation, of The passage, I simply as
many things in our tilae.
Our eyes dilute and our heart quickens
in its pulsations as we read OF events in
the third century, the sixth century, the
but there wSre more far-reaching events
crowded into She nineteenth century than
into any ot.er, and the last twenty years
eclipse any preceding twenty. We read in
the cniiy newspapers. Of events announced
IL one paragraph and without any special
emphasis-event which Herodotus,
.JoseDhus, Xcnophon. a Cibbon, would
have taken whole chapters OF whole vol
umes to elaborate. Looking out upon our
time, we, we must cry out in the words of the
text. Wonders in the heavens and in the
earth"
| propose, to show You that the time in
which we live is wonderful for disaster
and wonderful for blessing, for there nluct
m bS Lights Lights and dI. shades in this picture as in
wonderful for disaster? Our world has
had Il rough time since by the hand OF
Cod it was bowlcd out into space. 1t is
an cpi,eptic carth-convulsion after convul-
sion; frosts pounding ii with :ledge ham
furnaces seven times heated. It is q won
der 20 nc it has lasted SO long Nfescors
1hoo::ag h,y OH this side aud grazing it and
mc.cors shooting by Oh the other side and
safety. NNhole fleets and ravies and argo.
E5osics and flotillas OF worlds sweeping all
about us. Our earth like a tichins smack
off the banks Of Newfoundland, whi'e the
M:lestic and the st. Paul and the Kaiser
Mnheim der Crosse rush by. ,B:sides
IN its internal machinery. and ever and
anon the. furnaces have burst, and the
walking teaml of the mountains have
broken, md the islands have shipped q
sea, and the great hulk OF the world has
been Jared with accidents that ever and
anon threatened immediate demolition.
But 1t seems to lis as il the last hundred
years were especially characterized by dis.
as;cr-vo;canic, occanic, epidemic. I say
volcanic because all earthquake is only q
Cotooa:,i and Vcsuyius stop breathing. let
the foundations OF the earth beware! Sew
cn thousand earthquakes in two centuries
recorded in the catalogue of the British as
ancient Antioch, and amid Tie SO @ eadors rs
OF. his reception Is met by an earihnualsc,
thur near.v destroys the emperor's life. ;
Lisbon, fair: and beautiful. atSl O'Clock
on the c. lst st Of November, !755, in six min
:Srira q them, '.For that region as It Hi'V Was
.the last Judgment; nothing wanting but
trrmnct!" Europe and America feeling
the throh-l530 chmncys in Boston party
or. fully destroyed!
But the disasters of other tirles have
:h1d their counterpart in later times. In
earthquake. in 1882 in Chile 100000 square
miles of land by volcanic force uphcaved
to four and seven feet Of permanent e!e-
:vatio7. in 1854 Japan felt the geological
'agon:: Nap.es shaken in 1857, Mexico in
1858; Mendoza. the capital of The Argentine
Republic, in 1851; Manila terrorizcd in
1853; the Hawaiian Islands by such force
.upliftcd and let down III 1871; Nevada
shaken in 1871, Antioch in 1872: Ca.ifor-
;n,a 3us, in 1872, San Salvador in 1878, While
CHA, an island of the Mediterranean, a
beautiful Italian watering place, vineyard
clad, surrounded by all natural charm and
historical renliniscencc; yonder Capri the
Summer resort of the Roman emp,rors:
..yonder Naples. the paradise OF art-this
.6eautiful is.ard suddenly toppled into the
trough Of the earth. 5000 merrymakers
:perishine,. and some Of them 10 far down
beneath the reach of human obseouies that
i1t Elay be said of many e. one OF them. as
at v-::s said of Moses, "The Lord buried
aim Italy, all Europe weeping, all Chris
'tcndom weeping where there were hearts
to sympathiEe and Christians to pray. But
,whi.c. the nations were measuring that
magnitude of disaster. measuring IL lot
wish golden rod like that with. which the
angel measured heaven. but with the black
rule of feath, Java, OF the Indian archi.
,pe.aso, the rost fertile island OF all the
earth, Ia caught in the grip of the earth.
quake, and mountain after mountain goes
down, and city after city until that island,
which produces the best beverage of all
;the world: produced the ghast!iest catas,
;trophe. One hundred thousand people
dying, dead! Coming nearer homc, on
:Auglht 81. 1885. the great earthquake
which prostcated one-haif of Charleston,
is. C..
. But look at the disasters cycionic. At
ithc mouth of the Canges are three islands,
Ithe lIattiah, the Sundeep and the Dakin
lShaEazpore. In the midnight of October,
ylS77, on all those three islands the cry
was, 'T, ,e watcrs!" A cyclone arose and
tro].ed the sea over those three islands,
s<1f f1d Nf< vat.