The Birmingham age-herald., 1902-07-06
Dr. Talmage's Sermon.
BY REV. FRANK DE WITT rALMAee. D. D.

Chicago. June 2s-Reversing the usual course Rev. P. Dewitt Talmage in 'nis sermon on the approaching natonai anniversary, takes look forward Ihe text is Matthew Kill. ss ''rhe field Is the werld."
 Every republic has a Fourth of July. II has an annual holiday, set apart TOT living over again the scenes Of Its strug- gle for independence. It has a birthday celebration for banquets, fireworks, orato- .rieal pyroteehnics and for the arousement Of patriotic enthusiasm.
 The French republics Fourth of July is celebrated on the 14th of July This is the anniversary when the grim fortress of prison for state criminals was razed to the ground The Bastille was to the French what the Tower of London was to the British. It represented ato all the common people the tyranies of despotic throne. It represented to them. the place where men and women, to please a royal whim, might be lodged for little while on their way to quench with their life s. blood the unsuitable thirst of the heads mans ak So on the 14th day of July every car and wago is stopped in the .Parisian capital. Then the young men and maidens decked in holiday attire, turn the broad boulevard of the champs Elysees into ballroom Then Tn the French cities can be heard the sonse or the merrymakers and the music from the different bands playing up and down al- most every street The Brazilian repub- lies Fourth of July is celebrated on the a6th day of November, the anniversary zk of the time when Dom Pedro's empire Kwas overthrown and the exiled imperial j family had to sail away from the waters ] of the Amazon. One of the first acts of the Cuban congress which assembled after the American soldiers had been withdrawn was to appoint a national holiday to commemorate the day on. which the Cuban republic had gained her inde- pendence So the people of the United States government should hold sacred the day on which Jefferson and Adams and Franklin and Sherman and John Han cock and Samuel Adams signed the mem orable document which made the God dess of Liberty a full grown queen.
 But there Is an unwise as well as wise way of celebrating the modern Fourth of July. The first way is to glori- fy the past, as though our forefathers had won all the American victories that can ever be won. The other way is to take national retrospect for the pur- pose of rousing our ambitions to go ahead and win the further victories that must be won in order to fulhll America's mis- sion, and if any minister tries the latter wGy he cannot take in the full sweep of Americas future influence and work un- less he discusses them from worldwide standpoint. He must attune his Fourth of July sermon to a worlds theme, as Phillip Brooks, the most beloved man of New England in his day. keyed his min- istry to an international tone when from a European city he sent to a friend at home letter which read like this: Dear Harry-I wish you might do as do ev- cry year. I wish you would annually spend two months abroad in travel. Such a vacation teaches you the immensity of Gods providences and how small are the circumscriptions of our individual lives and how small even the Episcopalian church appears to be when it is focused from across the seas" So the purpose of this Fourth of July sermon is to try to discuss the worldwide influence of Ameri- ca's future mission rather than to spend our time eulogizing what has been done at Bunker Hill Saratoga, Brandywine Valley Forge and Yorktown. The field of Americas future usefulness Is not to be limited by the Atlantic on the one side and the Golden Gate of the Pacific on the other. It is to be as wide as the five continents, as ample as the two hem ispheres. It is to take in all the mainlands as well as the isles of the seas.
 Amerlca's Greatest Mission.
 Emphatically the most important of all Americas futdre missions is the spread ing of the gospel until it shall be preach ed in all the world for witness unto all nations" The Bible does not state that the millennial day shall come gradually, as the sunrise first tips the eastern hills with light making 1t appear as though the underbrush upon the tops of the moun- tains had been set afire by some careless campers. It does not state that the mill lennial day shall come as when the dawn in the beginning shoots its long, slender bars of yellow gold across the heavens. It does not state that the glory of the Lord shall cover the sea, as the flood tide gradually ereeps up the beach. But the Bible does teach that when the gospel of Jesus Christ shall be proclaimed in every town, village and city of every nation: when it shall be proclaimed in the moun- tain log hut and in the ships cabin; when 1t shall be proclaimed under the shadow of every legislative hall and by the camp fire of every heather tribe; when it shall 'be proclaimed in all the world for wit ness unto all nations, then shall the end come" Then the millennial day shall be flooded with light even as a darkened :. hall is instantly illuminated when the many different electric lights flash out at the touch of a single button. Then the millennial day shall be full of brillan- cy, as the blackness of midnight was changed into the brightness of midnoon when God spake at the morning of crea-