The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1902-01-22
DIR. TALMAGES SERMON
SUNDAYS DISCOURSE BY THE NOTED
DIVINE.
Subject: Grasp Present Opportunities - A
Prediction That the New Year Will
Be One Of the Greatest OF ALI Time -
Prepare For the Future.

mage QrSC ulSCUuloe lOE Gue ueW yedL uS
speaks words of encouragement to- all the
xii, 2, This month shall be unto you the
beginning of months; it shall be the first
month of the year to you"
The last month of the old year has
passed out of sight, and the first month of
the new years has arrived. The midnight
gate last Wednesday opened and January
entered. She deserves better name, for
she is called after Janus, the heather
deity who, they supposed, presided over
doors, and 80 might be expected to preside
at the opening of the year This month
was of old called the wolf month because,
through the severity of its weather, the
hungry wolves came down seeking food
and devouring human life. In the missals
ed as attired in white, suggestive of the
snow, and blowing the fingers, as though
suffering from the cold, and having bun.
die of wood under the arm, suggestive OF
the warmth that must be kindled.
Yes, January is the open door Of the
year, and through that door will come
what long professions, some of them bear
ing palm leaves and some myrtle, others
with garlands of wheat and others with
cypress and mistletoe. They are coming,
and nothing can keep them back..-the
events of twelvemonth. 1t will, think,
be one of the greatest years of all time.
1t will abound with blessing and disaster.
National and international controversies
of momentous import will be settled. Year
of coronation and dethronement, year that
will settle Cuban and Porto Rican and
Philippine and South African and Chinese
destinies. The tamest year for many a
decade past has dug its millions. of graves
and reared its millions Of marriage. affairs.
We can expect greater events in this
year than ever before, for the worlds pop
ulation has so vastly increased there are
so many more than in any other year to
laugh and weep and triumph and perish.
The mightier wheels of mechanism have
such wider sweep. The fires are kindled
in furnaces not seven times but seventy
through the air and sailing the seas and
tunneling the mountains will make unpre-
cedented demonstration.
Would to God that before the now open
ing year has closed the earth might cease
to tremble with the last cannonade and
the heavens cease to be lighted up with any
more conhagration of homesteads and the
foundries that make swords be turned
into blacksmith shops for making ~plow-
shares.
The front door ola stupendous year has
opened. Before many of you there will be
twelve months of opportunity for making
the world better or worse, happier or more
year that will indicate the speedy redemp.
tion of the hemisphere. Would to God
that this might be the year in which the
three great instruments now chiefly used
for secular purposes might be put to their
mightiest use in the worlds evangelical
ton - the telegraph, the telephone, the
phonograph. Electricity has such potent
tongue, such strong arm, such swift wing,
such lightning foot, that it occurs to me
that it may be the angel that st. John saw
| and heard in apocalyptic vision when he
started back and cried out, II saw anoth-
er angel flying in the midst of heaven hav-
ing the everlasting gospel to preach unto
them that dwell on the earth and to every
nation and kindred and tongue and peo-
ple."
They were tongues of fire that sat on
the heads of the disciples at the Penteeost,
and why not the world called to God by
tongue Of electric fire? Prepare your bat
teries and make ready to put upon the
wires the world wide message of whose
ever will" e
Furthermore, this month of January
has the greatest height and depth of cold.
The rivers are bound in crystal chains.
The fountains. that made highest leap in
the summer parks now toss not one jet,
for every drop would be q frozen tear.
The sleds craunch through the hard snow;
Warmest attire the wardrobe can afford
is put on that we may defend ourselves
against the fury Of the elements. Hardest
of all the months for the poor, let it be
the season of greatest generosity on the
part of the prosperous. How much scut-
tie of coal or pair of shoes or coat or a
shawl may do in assuagement of suffering
between the lst of January and the. lst OF
February God only knows. Seated by. our
warm registers or wrapped in furs which
make US independent of the cutting Janu-
ary blast, let us not forget the freless
hearth and the thin garments and the
hacking cough and the. rheumatic twinge
of those who through destitution find Life
in winter an agony. Suppose each one OF
US take under charge one poverty. y.strlcken
household or one disabled man, or one in.
such charity, though the wind may be
bowling and the night tempestuous,. I
should not wonder if we could hear voice
that was heard on Galilee and at the gates
of Main and by the pool of Bethesda say
ing, "Inasmuch as ye did it to them, ye
did it to Me-"
Oh, the might Of the cold! The arctic
and antarctic invading the temperate zone!
The victories of the frost-as when the
Thames in 1905 became firm as any bridge
and the inhabitants crossed and recrossed
on the ice and booths and places of tenn
porary amusement were built on the hard
ened surface; as when many years ago
New York Harbor was paved with ice 80
that the people passed on foot to the ad-
joining islands. But the full story of the
cold will never be known. The lips which
would have told it were frozen and the
fingers that would have written it were
benumbed. Only here and there fact ap-
pears. In 1891 the cold was so terrific that
the wolves entered Vienna. In 1853 it was
so cold that wine was cut with hatchets
and distributed among the soldiers. In
1884 a whole forest was killed by the cold
at Ravenna. In 1888 the Black Sea was was
frozen over, As we 60 further back the
frosts are mightier, but as we come fur.
ther down the frosts lessen.
The worst seventies have been halted:
and the SHOWS have lost their depths, and
the thermometers announce less terrific
falls of temperature, and the time will
come when the year will be one long sum
mer Of foliage and bloom. While the
worlds normal condition will be reformed
the worst climates will be corrected. You
could not have o millennium with Jan
uary blast possible.
Do not read your almanac backward
Do not 20 out and ask the trees hung with
icicles BY January storm whether they
will ever again blossom in May and leaf
in June. We are moving toward the
worlds redemption. The frozen tears will
melt, the river of gladness will resume its
flow, the crocus will come up at the edge
of the snowbank, the morning star will
open the door for the day, and the armies
the world.
The January of frost will be abolished
and. the balm and radiance of a divine at
mosphere will fill the nations. # you dc