Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1903-08-31
TALMAGE
SERMON
BY Rev.
FRANK DE WITT TALMAGE. DID,.
Pastor Of Jefferson Park Presby-
terrain Church. Chicago

truthfulness in all the relations Of
nfe-in business, I'm politics. I'm our So
cial intercourse and our religion. His
text is Acts V. s: Tell me whether We
sold the land for so much? And she
said. Yea. for so much"
Morbid curiosity is TO the eye what
gossip is 10 the ear. The grewsome,
the hideous. the diseased, the appall-
Ing. are objects at which some of US
never tire OF looking. Let poor work
man tumble from a scaffolding and
have his brains despatched upon the
city pavements below or let a helpless
washerwoman, staggering under her
load OF clothes, be crushed by the
truckmaH's wheel or q drunken human
brute be battered by policeman's club
and the crowds will collect as rapidly
as do carrion eating birds at the scent
OF carcass. All day long a steady
stream Of sightseers passes in and out
of the Partisan morgue. The more
bloated and deformed the corpses the
stronger the fascination and the bigger
the crowd.
Such is the scene of my text. There
Is great excitement In Jerusalem. The
agitation is spreading everywhere. AS
the people are rushing along toward a
common center some bystander asks q
runner, What is the matter" Why"
answers he, haven't you heard the
newsl You know Ananias, who used
20 live next door TO me? He was my
dearest neighbor. Well, Peter was
preaching this morning near the tenn
pie. He took up a collection for the
poor. Ananias came forward and laid
his contribution at the feet Of the
apostle and pretended that he had CIV
en- all his money to the church. He
wanted to appear well before his fellow
church members. But Ananias told a
falsehood. He had not given all, as he
had pledged himself to do, but had
kept back part of the money for his
own use. Then Peter raised his finger
toward heaven and said, 'Ananias, thou
hast not lied uni men, but unto God
Immediately Ananias clutched at his
heart. He gave one shrek and dropped
dead. Come on; let us go up and see
what is next going to happen"
Lies Cannot he Clothed In white.
These two men rush on toward the
temple. They come to the outskirts Of
great throng. There the multitudes
are crowding and pushing and jostling
their neighbors and trying to get near
to the speaker. Suddenly the cry Is
raised, make way, make wayr' The
sea of human faces surges to the right
and to the left. Every head uncovers
The murmur of many voices is hushed
TO the silence of the tomb. Slowly and
solemnly down through the open path
way come the pallbearers, carrying be-
tween them a shrouded form. For,
"the young men arose, wound him up
and carried him out aud buried him."
Hardly had the noise of the shutting
feet ceased when a newcomer, a wom-
an, began to elbow her way through
the crowd. She asks the people as she
pushes along: What is the matter? Is
any one hurtG" No one answers. They
pretend they do not hear her. but they
do. AS soon as she passes along many
an eye Is moist, many a lip quivers.
"God pity her! God pity herr This
Is Sapphire, the wife of the dead per-
jurer. She is her husbands confed-
crate In the premeditated lie. AS soon
as Peter sees her he points to the pile
OF silver and gold and says unto her
woman. tell me whether We sold the
land for so muchT' And she says
"Yea, for so much" Quick as a fash
the lightning of Gods wrath struck
"Then fell she down straightway al
bis feet and yielded up the ghost, and
the young men came in and found hel
dead. and. carrying her forth, buried
her by her husband" Such is the Bib
ncal description of two capital punish
ments. The record stands there on the
sacred page as a perpetual warning
against falsehood. an object lesson, ter
rible and exemplary, of the divine atti
tude toward all kinds of lies and un
truths and prevarications and inten
tional distortions and misrepresenta
tons. wherever they may be found.
To catalogue some Of the equivoca
lions by which the Ananiases and tn
Sapphiras Of the present day perver
the truth is the purpose of this sermon
we NOuid HAONt Nhul OuSAAtSo iiSS oh
social lies and political lies and pal
entail lies and church lies can never
clothed in white and called whit
lies" Every falsehood is covered wit
the black pail of death-black as tn
darkness of the bottomless pit. W
would try to do this because there is
theory abroad that some lies are inn,
cent and respectable and that there
no harm II their black garments han
In the wardrobes OF honest men.
Business Falsehoods.
Falsehoods in the business worlC
They nest and thrive especially we
In the haunts Of barter and gain. The
greet you at the opened doors of OF
large department stores. They pi
torialize themselves in circulars ar
newspaper advertisements which a
kaDt hroodcosf oxar tho cities and CON