The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-10-08
 DIR. TALMAGE'S SERMON.

os ANGELES, CAL. October I'm

K
 the story of beautiful Queen E,s- 1 ther, whose courage and patriotism saved her race from destruction, the preacher finds a noble lesson for the wo- men of today. The text is Esther iv, 16. If l perish, I perish"
 Have you ever read the blood eurdling story of the massacre of St. Bartholo- new? No. Then perhaps you have seen copies of the great masterpieces of the Venetian artist Tintoretto. and of Peter Paul Rubens. entitled, "The Massacre of The Innocents." From these two thrilling pictures you gain an idea of what that most awful tragedy in France, known as the massacre of St. Bartholomew, must have been like. In those pictures you can see the frantic eyes of tho mothers watch ing the murderers of their children com ing nearer and nearer to their prey. Y ou can see some of these mothers on their knees trying to shield their babies With their arms. Or you can see them with their hands cutchng the murderous blades to ward them off from their child ren, though the keen edge cuts their hands to the bone. Or you can see some of those mothers running away In the distance with their babies in their arms praying. frenzed and helpless looks of these agonlzed mothers you can see. Herod's butchers driving in a sword here, striking down baby there, ripping open the tender body of a beautiful infant be- yond. tossing up a child farther on as a trickster might toss card and catch ing it upon the edge of sharp pointed Eoif done as nonchalantly and unconcernedly and with as much diabolical abandon as was shown by the agents of Mana Sa- hib, who entered the Cawnpur slaughter house during the Indian mutiny of 1851 and with their knives hacked into pieces the women and children until the mur- derers literally waded in blood.
 The Crime of Herod.
 Yes the pictures of Tintoretto and Ru- bens painted of that massacre send a shudder through everyone who looks at them. But, horrible as that tragedy was, it has been eclipsed more than once in the worlds history. Far greater in cruel- ty and the number of victims was that tragedy conceived by the queen mother Catherine de Medici and carried out by the order of her royal son, King Charles TX of France. Herod, although he was an inhuman monster and capable of any
 
 two years and under living in and about Bethlehem of Judea, and the number of his victims must have beenf Comparatively small. On the other hand, between twenty and thirty thousand Huguenots in one night fell in the massacre of St. Bartholo- new. Old and young, rich and poor, un- known peasant and illustrous Admiral Coligny, sucking babes and gray-haired men. weltered in their lifes blood on that awful night. Then this slaughter was not restricted in it's area to the French capital It's bloody work spread through the provinces. With one blow the catholic dictator Queen Catherine, tried to de- stroy all enemies of the Catholic church forever. No wonder King Charles on ac- count of this crime, died. as did Ming Richard, in the agonies of remorse.
 What the St. Bartholomew slaughter was to France the intended massacre of the Hebrews was to be to the Per sian kingdom of 474 B. c. A corrupt pre- mier of a corrupt king in order to triumph over a Hebrew, Mordecai by name, plotted to exterminate all the Jews who uld not return to the Holy Land after the cap tivity was over and when Nehemiah was allowed to return home to build the -Je- rusalem walls. The day of the massacre had been set. The couriers of the king had gone to the provinces and carried everywhere the orders for the wholesale butchery. All the executioners' swords had been sharpened But Haman, the prime minister, schemed without know ing that the beloved queen of King Ahaseurus was daughter of the despised Hebrews. When Esther the queen, heard of what the premier. Haman, was to do by the command of the king. she said to her foster-father Mordecai: 'I will go unto the king and plead for my people. This, I know, Is not according to the law, but I will do all l can to save them" Then she uttered these dramatic words of my text, If l perish, I perish"