Democratic messenger. [volume] (Snow Hill, Md.) 1869-1973, 1902-03-15
THE ART OF FORGETTING
DR.. TaImage Illustrates How All Offend
ers May Be Emancipated.
How to Be Happy = Allow Other TO Forget
Come lnto Mercy and
Pardon.

WASHINGTON, ID. C.-From the letter
to the Hebrews DR.. Talmage takes a text
and illustrates how all offenders may be
emancipated; text, Hebrews viii, l.,
Their sins and their iniquities viii re-
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 .orgctmenot. We all
like 70 be remembered, and one OF cur mis-
fortunes is that there are so many things
we cannot remember. Mnemonics, or the
art of assisting memory, Is an important
art. II was first suggested by Simonides,
of Coos, 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 incrcdi-
bic extent. A good memory is an invalua-
pie possession. by all means cultivate It;
had an aged friend who, detained all
night at a miserable depot in waiting for a
rail train fast in the snowbanks, enter
tanned group OF some ten or fifteen cler-
gymen, likewise detained on their way
home from a meeting of presbytery, by
first with piece of chalk drawing out on
the black and sooty walls OF the depot the
and then feciting from memory the whole
of that poem of some eighty pages in fine
print. My old friend, through great age.
lost his memory, and when l asked him II
this story OF the railroad depot was true
he said, 81 do not remember now, but it
was just like me. Let me see" said he TO
me. Have | ever seen You before!
yes" l said; ''you were my guest last
night, and / was with you an hour ago."
What an awful contrast in that man be-
tween the greatest memory / ever knew
and no memory at ALI
But right along with this art of recol-
lection, which cannot too highly eulogize,
Is one quite as important, and yet / never
heard it applauded. mean the art of for
getting. There is q splendid faculty in
that direction that we ali need to cuiti-
vate. We might through that process be
ten times happier and more useful than
we now are. We have been told that for
eetfulnsss is weakness and ought to be
avoided by all possible means. So far
from 4 weakness, my text ascribes it TO
God. It is the very top of omnipotencc
that God is able to obliterate part OF His
own memory. Ii we repent of sin and
rightly seek the divine forgiveness, the
record of the misbehavior is not only
crossed of the books, but God actually
lets it pass out of memory. Their sins
and their iniquities will 1 remember no
more. To remember no more Is TO forget,
and yon cannot make anything else ont OF
1t. Gods power of forgetting is so great
that il two men appeal to Him and the
one man, after a life all right, gets the
sins of his heart pardoned and the other
man, after n life of abomination, gets par
doned God remembers no more against
one than the other. The entire past os
both the moraiiss, with his imperfections,
and the prohigate. with his debaucheries,
Is as much obliterated in the one case as
IN the other. Forgotten forever and for
ever. Their sins and their iniquities will
j remember no more"
} This sublime attribute Of forgetfulness
on the part OF God you and 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, 10 be lied
keep these things fresh by frequent rehear-
sal. II 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 regaie themselves and their
friends by an inspection of these filings,
these sarcasms, these falsehoods, these cru
elites. l have known gentlemen who car
f1ed them in their pocketbooks, so that
they could easily get at these irritations,
and they put their right hand in the inside
OF their coat pocket over their heart and
say: Look here! Let he show you some
thing. Scientists catch wasps and hor-
nets and poisonous insects and transix
them in curiosity bureaus for study, and
that Is well, but these of whom 1 speak
catch the wasps and the hornets and pois-
cnous insects and play with them and put
them on themselves and on their friends
and see how far the noxious things can
hox -.
Have no such scrapbook. Keep nothing
IN your possession that is disagrccable.
Tear up the falsehoods and the SANDERS
and the hypercriticisms.
Initiate the Lord in my text and forget,
actually forget, sublimely forget. There
Is TO happiness for you in any other plan
or procedure. on see all around you in
the church and out OF the church DISPOSE
lions acerb, mahgn. cynical, pessimistic.
DO you know how these men and women
got that disposition: 1t was by the EN-
balirment OF things pantherine and viper
Gus. They have spent much OF their time
N calling the roll OF al the rats that have
nibbled at their reputation. Their soul is
q cage OF vultures. Everything in them is
sour or imbittered. The milk of human
kindness has been curdled. They do not
believe IN anybody or anything. If they
see two people whispering they think it Is
about themselves. If they see two people
selves. Where there Is one sweet pippin
in their orchard there are fifty crabapples
They have never been able to forget. They
do not want to forget. They never will
forget. Their wretchcdncss is supreme,
for no one can be happy if he carries per.
petually IN mind the mean things that
have been done him. On the other hand
you can find here and there a man or
woman flor there are not many of them)
whose disposition is genial and summary.
Why! Have they always been treated
well. Oh, no. Hard things have been said
against them. They have been charged
with ofiiciousness, and their generositics
have been set down TO desire Tor display,
and they have many time been the sub.
ject of little tattle, and they have had
enough small assaults like gnats and
enough great attacks like lions to have
made them perpctually miserable. If they
ssEoug have consented to miserable
But they have had enough divine philo-
sophy to east off the annoyances. aid they
have kept themselves in the sunlight OF
Gods favor and have realized that these
oppositions and hindrances are a part of
mighty discipline by which they are to be
prepared for usefulness and heaven. The
secret of il all is they have, by the help
of the Eternal God, learned hsw TO forget.
Another practical thought: When our