Virginia citizen. (Irvington, Va.) 1891-1921, 1903-12-04
TALMAGE
SERMON
BY Rev.
FRANK DE WITT TALMACE. DID,.
Pastor Of Jefferson Park Presby-
terrain Church. Chicago


land monnrchs draws an eloquent les
son that is rich in natural beauty and
full of spiritual helpfulness. The text
Is Ecclesiastes II. 3, 'In the place where
the tree falleth there il shall be-
Every intelligent student has been
impressed with the memorable Sc
quences of natural causes. If man
should allow his rowboat to be pushed
out into the middle OF the roaring.
rushing river which filings itself over
Niagara falls, no human power on
earth could save him. Why? The hu-
man arm Is not powerful enough to
stem that awful current. The onsweep-
ing rush of death is stronger than the
would be rescuer's viii. IL 81 man
standing upon the top of the ElGel
tower in Paris should leap from its
summit, his body would be whirled
round and round until it WAS at last
dashed into n mangled heap OF I'M
recognizable flesh when it struck the
earth below. Why? The attraction OF
gravitation which dragged thar body
down could not be overcCm' Ivy the
vibrating arm as ii is 10y the wings OF
bird, which. launched from such Il
height, could arrest its fan in midair
and fly higher and higher until II dis
appeared into tho blue sky of the hcav-
ems dome. There Is M inevitable Sc
quence in natures laws. There is 4
natural sequence in spiritual laws. IL
n man plants the right seed for a spir-
itual harvest. he will reap a spiritual
harvest. II he plants sinful seeds, he
shall reap a sinful harvest. Further
more, by the same kind of reasoning.
after a mans earthly LIES work is
done. whether it be well or badly done.
it is done forever. 1t is like a tree
which has fallen to the north or to the
south. IN the place where the tree
falleth there it shall be-"
The study of Trees.
am going to use for my pulpit the
trunk OF fallen tree upon which we
have rested in our wanderings through
the woods. l do not care whether this
tree lies upon the steep mountain side
covered with moss and creeping ivy,
whether il spans some brook or wheth-
er IL lies ut the foot of u great precipice
over which ii has tumbled. The only
thing do care about is that this trunk
should have fallen of its own accord.
BY that | mean it has not been cut
down by woodman's AK. When we
study the laws of nature as symbols of
the spiritual life we must study them
In their simplicity We must study
them as nature was studied by King
Solomon, who evidently spent as much
time roaming over the Judean hills as
he did in the Jerusalem palace.
A tree may live to be very old: but,
inter all. there must come Il time when
the trees life shall cease to exist.
Then. after ii totters and falls, it is al
ways dead tree. What has been done
by that tree has been done forever
Some trees have been known TO live
loo, 600, 1000 and some are even sup
posed TO have lived 5000 years. DR..
Adamson has declared that the baobab
tree Of Africa sometimes lives to be
5000 years old. The explorer De Can
dole has estimated that the Taxdium
distichum lives even TO a greater age
than that. \ trees age can be esti-
mated by saving the trunk i'm two and
counting the rings that are found IN
the wood, every ring representing a
year. But. though the tree may live
5000 years or even longer, there comes
time when that tree must fall. Then
fallen tree is always Il dead tree. So
there must como time when a mans
earthly life is done, and II Is done for.
ever. in the place where the tree
falleth there it shall be-"
4 Startling Thought.
Is 1t not . startling thought that aft
or mans heart once ceases to beat he
cannot change anything in his past
life? Is it not n startli!E thought that
a man who is president Of the United
States. with an army and navy auI
fifty millions Of people back Of hlia. ~
Abraham Lincoln had, can within
few hours be Il cold corpse and unable
to utter a word? One night sitting in
Ford's theater: short time aftcrward
With Edwin Stanton bending over him
and saying HE is gone: we must leave
his work TO be judged by the CEN
turiesP' is Ii not an erwhclming fact
that man with all the mental powers
or Gladstone cannot arrange his pa
pers after he is once dead. but had 10
leave them all TO his literary executorp
Oh, how often we have heard this son
tence IN house where there has lately
been sad funeral: IF could only
bring him back for few moments 10
nsk him what he would like ME to do
about this matteri'' But the fallen tree
is dead tree. What that tree has
done is done forever and can never be
undone. What has been left undone is
left undone forever
A dying mans last gasp is even more
significant and overwhelming than n
newborn baby's first cry. One is the
rising. the other the setting. sun. The
one Is the first word of a story which
Is about to be told and may be told
well; the other is the last word of the
iast sentence Of the last page. when
the story Is ended. One is the reveille
sounding the call to arms; the other is
q tattoo beaten upon muffied drum
by the side OF IN open grave. One Is
dhe spring blossom, the other a failing
snowflake. One is birds note sung
among the growing leaves; the other is
The swapping OF trunk when the old
tree Is about to make its last plunge
and 20 down with n crash.
Living man may once have been as
strong as the great tree for whose life
George p. Morris pleaded with elo-
quent verse, but when the human being
as dead he cannot even lift himself into
the coffin which may have been made
from the tree trunk which his own
hands hewed down. He cannot even
walk out to his own grave. but has to-
be carried there like a helpless log be-
Ing dragged TO the dam. One second
after the pulse has ceased TO beat he
cannot raise his little finger one inch
or change one word in his last will and
testament any more than a fallen tree
trunk, II it had the power OF thought,
could lift itself and stand upon the
ragged stump which the buried roots
are still anchoring In the ground and
live Its life over again. Choice may be
given to the living man-choice to live
right or wrong; choice to reach after
the higher or the lower life-but the
time Will come when man, like the