Orange County observer., 1902-03-20
ART OF FORGETTING.
DR.. TALMAGE'S SUNDAY SERMON.

The Eminent Divine Argues That We
Should Teach Ourselves to Forget
and Help Others. 1
WASHINGTON. D. C.-From the letter
to the Hebrews DR.. Talmage takes text
and illustrates how all offenders may be
emancipated; text. Hebrews VII, II,
''Their sins and their 1nlqultles Will fe-
member no more.
The national flower of the Egyptians is
the heliotrope, of the Assyrians is the
water lily, Of the Hindoos is the marigold,
of the Chinese is the chrysanthemum. We
have no national flower, but there is
hardly any flower more suggestive to
many Of us than the forgetmenot: We all
like to be remembered, and one OF our mis-
fortunes is that there are so many things
we cannot remember. Mnemonics, or the
art of assisting memory, is an important
art. It was first suggested by Slmonldes,
of Ceos. 500 years before Christ. Persons
who had but little power to recall events
or put facts and names and dates in proper
PROFESSIONS have through this art had their
memory REINFORCED to an almost lncredl-
bic extent A good memory is an invalua-
BILE possession. By all means cultivate IT
I had an aged friend VINO, detalnea an
night at a miserable depot in waiting for a
raj r. train fast in the snowbanks, enter
tanned a group of some ten or fifteen cler-
gymen, likewise detained on their way
home from meeting Of presbytery, by
first with piece of chalk drawing out on
the black and sooty walls of the depot the
characters of Walter Scott's 'Marmion"
and then reciting from memory the whole
of that poem of some eighty pages in tine
print. My old friend, through great age,
lost his memory, and when | asked him II
this story Of the railroad depot was true
he said ri do not remember now, but it
was just like me. Let me see," said he to
me- "Have I ever seen you before?
eyes," I said; "you were my guest last
night, and I was with you an hour ago..
What an awful contrast in that man be-
tween the greatest memory ever knew
and no memory at all!
But right along with this art of recol-
lection, which cannot too highly eulogize,
is one quite as important, and yet l never
heard it applauded. mean the art of for
getting. There is a splendid faculty in
that direction that we all need to culti-
vate We might through that process be
ten times happier and more useful than
we now are. We have been told that for
getfulness is a weakness and ought to be
avoided by all possible means. So far
God. It is the very top of omnipotence
that God is able to obliterate part of His
own memory. If we repent of sin and
rightly seek the divine forgiveness, the
record of the misbehavior is not only
crossed off the books, but God actually
lets it pass out OF memory. '"Thelr sins
and their iniquities will I remember no
more" To remember no more is to forget,
and You cannot make anything else out OF
it. Gods power of forgetting is so great
that if two men appeal to Him and the
one man, after life all right, gets the
sins of his heart pardoned and the other
man, after life of abomination, gets par
doned God remembers no more against
one than the other. The entire past of
both the moralist, with his imperfections,
and the prohigate, with his debaucheries,
in the other. Forgotten forever and for
ever. 'sTheir sins and their iniquities will
/ remember no more"
This sublime attribute of forgetfulness
on the part of God you and I need, in our
finite way, to initiate. You will do well to
cast out Of your recollection all wrongs
done you. During the course of ones life
ne is sure to be misrepresented, to be lied
about, to be injured. There are those who
keep these things fresh by frequent rehear
sal. It things have appeared in print, they
keep them in their scrapbook, for they cut
these precious paragraphs out of news
papers or books and at leisure times look
them over, or they have them tied up in
bundles or thrust in pigeonholes, and they
frequently regale themselves and theil
friends by an inspection Of these filings
elites. l have known gentlemen. who car
ried them in their pocketbooks, So that
they could easily get at these irritsations
and they put their right hand in the inside
of their coat pocket over their heart ane
say: Look here! Let he show you some
thing" Scientists catch wasps and hor
nets and poisonous insects and transf1
that is well, but these of whom I speal
catch the wasps and the hornets and pois
onous insects and play with them and pu
them on themselves and on their friend
and see how far the noxious things cal
jump and show how deep they can sting
Have no such scrapbook. Keep nothinI
N your possession that is disagreeable
Tear up. the falsehoods and the slander
and the hypercriticisms
Initiate the Lord in my text and forget
actually forget, sublime1y forget Their
is no happiness for you in any other pla1
OF procedure. You see all around YOU il
the church and out Of the church disposi
tions acerb, malign, cynical, pessimistic
DO you know how these men and wome1
ScI tnaC QlSpOslClon: 1t was by the EN-
balmment Of things pantherine and viper
Gus. They have spent much of their tim
IN calling the roll Of all the rats that hav
nlbbled at their reputation. Their soul i
a cage Of vultures. Everything in them i
sour or imbittered. The milk of huma,
kindness has been curdled. They do no
believe in anybody or anything. If the
see two people whispering they think it i
about themselves. If they see two peopl
laughing, they think it is about them
selves. Where there is one sweet pippil
in their orchard there are fifty crabappIes
They have never been able to forget. The
do not want to forget. They never Wi
forget. Their wretchedness is supreme
for no one can be happy if he carries PEI
petually in mind the mean things tina
have been done him. On the other hanc
you can find here and there a man o
woman for there are not many of them
whose disposition is genial and summer,
Why? Have they always been treate
well? Oh, no. Hard things have been sal
against them. They have been charge
with oficiousness, and their generositie
have been set down to a desire for displa,
and they have many time been the sui
ject OF little tattle, and they have ha
enough small assaults like gnats an
enough great attacks like lions to hay
made them perpetually miserable. If the
would have consented to miserable.
But they have had enough divine phil
sophy to cast off the annoyances, and the