The age-herald., 1902-03-30


 Washington. March 23.-From process familiar to the farmer Dr. Talmage ora"s lessons of consolation and encourage ment for people in sorrow and adVersl.S'
 The text is Isaiah xxviii Zh 2S: for tne
 6tches are not thrashed with a thrash ,ng instrument. neither is cart wheel turned about upon the cummin. but the
 e+obos are beaten out with staff and the
 onmmin with a rod. Bread corn is bruised
 beeause he will not ever be thrashing
 it."
 nT,seortnnes of various kinde come up-
 on various people. and in all times the
 great need of ninety-nine people out of
 hundred is solace. Look, then, to this neg
 lected allegory of my text
 There are three kinds of seed mention
 ed-itches. cummin and corn. Of the lest
 we all know. But it may be well to state
 that the fitches and the cummin were
 small seeds, like the caraway or the
 chickpea. When these grains or herbs
 were to be thrashed, they were thrown
 on the foor and the workmen would
 come around with staff or rod or fail and
 beat them until the seed would be sep
 arated, but when the corn was to be
 thrashed that was thrown on the floor,
 and the men would fasten horses or oxen
 to a oart with Iron dented wheels; that
 cart would be drawn around the thrash
 ing floor, and so the work would be ac-
 compiished. Different kinds of thrash
 ing for different products. "The htches
 are not thrashed with a thrashing in-
 strument neither is a cart wheel turn
 ed about upon the cummin but the titches
 are beaten out with a staff and the cum
 min with a rod. Bread corn is bruised
 because he will not ever be thrashlng it."
 The great thought that the text press
 ed upon our souls is that we all go
 through some kind of thrashng process.
 The fact that you may be devoting your
 life to honorable and noble purposes will
 not wirs you any escape. Wilberforce, the
 ChristiNn emancipator, was in his day de-
 risively called Doctor Cantwell' Thom-
 as Babington Macaulay, the advocate of
 all that was good, long before he became
 the most conspicuous historian of his
 day was caricatured In one of the quar-
 terly reviews as "Babbletongue Macau-
 lay." Norman Mcleod, the great friend of
 the Scotch poor, was industriously ma
 ligned in all quarters, although on the
 day when he was carried out to his burial a workman SUOOQ aIQ lOOhSu db ILe AuA-
 eral procession and said, ''1f he had done
 nothing for anybody more than he has
 done for me, e would shine as the stars
 forever and ever" All the small wits
 of London had their fling at John Wesley the father of Methodism If such men could not escape the maligning of the world, neither can you expect to get rid of the sharp, keen stroke of the tribulum. All who will live godly in Christ Jesus
 must suffer persecution. Besides that, there are the siclnesses and the bank ruptcies and the irritations and the dis appointments which are ever putting a cup of a1oes to your lip. Those wrin-
 kles on your face are hieroglyphics which if deciphered. would make out thrill ing story of trouble. The footstep of the rabbit is seen the next morning on the snow, and on the white hairs of the aged are the footprints showing where swift trouble alighted.
 Troubles Come Unexpectedly. Even amid the joys and hilarities of life trouble will sometimes break in. As when | the people were assembled in the Charles | town theater during the Revolutionary | war, and while they were witnessing a 1 farce and the audience was in great grat- ulation the guns of an advancing army | were heard and the audience broke up | In wild panic and ran for their lives, so oftentimes while you are seated amid joys and festivities of this world you hear the cannonade of some great dis aster. All the fltches and the cummin and
 the corn must come down on the thrash ing floor and be pounded. My subject. in the first place, teaches us that 1t Is no compliment to us if we escape great tri u. The fitches and the cumrnin on one
 thrashing floor might look over to the corn on another thrashing floor and say: Look at that poor. miserable, bruised corni We have only been a little pound ed but that has been almost destroyed"
 Well, the corn, if it had lips, would an- swer and say: Do you know the req son you have not been as much pounded as l have? It is because you are not of
 so much worth as I am. If you were you
 would be as severely run over" Yet there are men who suppose they are the Lord s favorites simply because their barns are full and their bank account is flush and there are no funerals in the house. It may be because they are ftches and cummin, while down at the end of the lane the poor widow may be the Lords s corn. You are but little pounded be- cause you are but little worth and she bruised and ground because she Is the b9st part of the harvest. The heft of the ti,rashing machine Is according to the value of the grain. If you have not been much thrashed in life, perhaps there is not much to thrash! If you have not been much shaken of trouble perhaps
 it is because there Is going to be a very small yield. When there are plenty of blackberries, the gatherers go out with large baskets. but when the drought has almost consumed the fruit then a quart 5 measure will do as well. It took the ven- omous snake on Paurs hand. and the pounding of him with stones until he was taken up for dead, and the tanning against him of prison gates, and the | Ephesian vociferaton, and the ankles l skinned by the painful stocks, and the | laundering of the Alexandrian corn ship, | and the beheading stroke of the Roman | sheriff to bring Paul to his proper de- | velopment It was not because Robert | Moffat and Lady Rachel Russel and l Frederick Oberlin were worse than other | people that they had to suffer. It was | because they were better and God want | ed to make them best. By the careful ness of the thrashing you may always
 conclude the value of the grain.
 Helps Us Bear Burdens. s. Next, my text teaches us that God | proportions our trials to what we can oear-the staff for the fitches, the rod I for the CIiurniO ba iran