LAYTOUOUTnHEnRASKA MONDAV. AUGUST 27. 1888.
IIEKALD: V
RESULTS MAY DEPEND CN
6MALL EVENTS.
Tbcro Aro No lotlffolfltfUiCM la Oar XJroa.
7b C'iul. tl Accidental, Are 1'itrts
of a ;rrt I'lun TJi Omnlprrarnce of
Mnttivr'a I'rsjum.
Gp.imsbv, Can., Aug. 20. The Ilev.
T. Do Witt Tahnage, D.D., of iSrooklyn,
preached on tho camp ground at this
place today. All Canada is represented
in tlio ifimifimo throncm a.sctiiMcd. Ir.
Tahnage has preached at Grimsby many
mriimi'is. This closes hi Bummer al
wncc. Ho has preached, lectured and
visited in thirteen ttatcs of tlio Union
this MimnxT. his audiences iiumlx-ring
ten and fifteen thousand eople. Tlio
subject of his wrmon hero to-day was
'(Jreat Kiwult May I-jk-ikI on Small
Events." Dr. Tahnage took for his text:
Through a windotv, in a basket, was I
ha down l.y tho wall." II Cor. ii, 'M.
Ilo Kiid:
Damascus is a city of white and glisten
ing architecture nometimes called "the
eye of the east,' sometimes called "a
tarl surrounded ly emeralds," at ono
ft ne ditiiiguishc-d for swords of tho
best material ralletl Damascus blades,
and upholstery of richest fabric called
damasks. A horseman by the namo of
I'aul, riding toward this city, had been
thrown from tho huddle. The horse had
replied under a Hash from tho sky,
which at tho same time was no bright it
blinded tho rider for many days, and I
think so icmiaijently injured his eye
night that this defect of vision liecame
the thorn in tho ll.h ho afterwards
speaks of. He started from Damascus
to butcher Christians, but after that hard
fall from his horso ho was a changed
man and preached Christ in Damascus
till the city was bhaken to its foundation.
Tho mayor gives authority for his ar-
rest, and "the popular cry is "Kill hiuit
' Kill hint!" Tho city is surrounded by a
high wall, and the gates are watched by
the iolico lest tho Cilician preacher
escaix'. Many of tho houses aro built on
1 tho wall, and their lalconies projected
clear over and hovered alovo the gardens
outside. It was customary to lower
baskets out of these balconies and pull up
fruits and llowers from the gardens. To
this day visitors at tho monastery of
Mount Sinai aro lifted ami let down in
baskets. lVu-ctives prowled around from
house to house looking for l'aul, but his
friends hid him now in ono place, now in
" another. Ho is no coward, as fifty inei
ccnU in his life demonstrate. Hut he
feels his work is not done yet, and so he
evades assassination. "Is that preacher
here?" the foaming mob shout at ono
house door. "Is that fanatic here?" the
liolico shout at another house door,
tiometlme on the street incognito ho
passes through a cloud of clenched fists,
and sometimes ho secretes himself on tho
Jiousetop. At last the infuriate popu
lace get on sure track of him. They
Jiavo positive evidenco tliat he is in the
house of ono of the Christians, the bid
cony of whoeo home reaches over the
'Tr..v ho in! Hero he is!" The
vociferation and blasphemy and howl
ing of the pursuers are nt tho front
door. They break in. "Fetch out
that Gosic!izer, and let us hang his head
,011 tho city gate. Where is he?" The
.'emergency was terrible. Providentially
there was a good stout basket in the
house. I'aul- friends fasten a rope tc
the basket. l'aul stops into it. The
basket is lifted to the edge of the balcony
tho wall, and then while l'aul Jiolds
on to tho rojHj with both hands his
friends lower away, carefully and cau
tiouslv, slowly but surely, further down
and further down, until the basket
strikes the earth and the ppostlo steis
out, and afoot and alone starts on that
famous missionary tour, tho story of
which has astonished earth and heaven.
Appropriate entry in Paul's diary of
travels: "Through a window, in u bas
ket, was I let down by the wall."
Observe, first, on what a slender tenure
great results hang. Tlio rii-muker who
twisted that cord fastened to that lower
ing liaskct never knew how much would
depend "on the strength of it How if it
had been broken and the apostle's life liad
been dashed out? What would have be
come of the Christian church ? AU that
magnificent missionary work in Pam
T.hili.i. Cmividocia. Galatia, Macedonia
. -"could never have been accomplished.
Alibis writings that make up so indis-
reusable and enchanting a pan or jn
New Testament would never have been
" written. The story of resurrection would
never have been so gloriously told as ho
told it. That examplo of heroic
and triumphant endurance at Phiiippi,
in the Mediterranean euroclydon, under
flagellation and at his beheading would
not have kindled the courage of ten
thousand martyrdoms. But that rope
holding that basket, how much depended
on it! So again and again great results
have hung on what seemed slender cir
cumstances. " Did ever ship of many thousand tons
crossing the 6ea have such important pas
senger as had once a boat of leave?, from
taflrail to stern only three or four feet,
the vessel made waterproof by a coat of
bitumen and floating on tho Nile with
the infant lawgiver of the Jews
on board? What if some crocodile
ifixSild crunch it? What if somo of
" - the cattle wading in for a drink . slioul J
6ink it? Vessels of war sometimes carry
forty guns looking through the port
holes ready to open battle. But that tiny
craft on "the Kile seems to bo armed
with all the guns of thunder that bom
barded Sinai at the law giving. On how
fragile craft sailed how much of his
torical importance!
The parsonage at Epworth, England,
13 on liro in the night, and the father
rushed through the hallway for the res
cue" of his children, Seven children are
out and safe on tho ground, but one re
mains in the consuming building. That
one wakes, and, finding his bed on fire
nd tho building crumbling, comes to
Nie window, and two j-easants mako a
ladder of their bodies, one peasant stand
ing on the shoulder of the other, and
down tho human ladder the boy descends
Jolin Wesley. If you would know how
much depended oit that ladder of pcas
4 ants ask the millions of Methodists oa
both 6ides of tho sea. As their wiisicn
Nations all around the world. Atk
' :ir hundreds of thousands already
-ded to join their founder, who
would hare perched but for the living
stairs of peasants' e boulders.
An English ship stopjied at Titcairn
Ldand, and right in tho midst of sur
rounding cannibalism and squalor, the
passengers discovered a Christian colony
of churches and schools and lieautiful
homes and highest stylo of religion and
civilization. For fifty yearn no mission
ary and no Christian influence hail landed
there. Why this oasis of light amid a
desert of heathendom? Sixty years lie
foro a ship had met disaster, and ono of
tho sailors, unable to save anything else,
went to his trunk and took -out a Bible
which his mother had placed there, and
swam ashore, the Bible held in his teeth.
Tho liook was read on all sides until the
rough and vicious imputation were
tvangeliwd, and a church was
started, and an enlightened common
wealth established, and tho world's his
tory has no more brilliant page than that
which tells of the transformation of a
nation by ono lxiok. It did not seem of
much imNrtance whether tho sailor
continued to hold the lHk in his teeth
or let it fall in tho breakers, but upon
what small circumstances deiendd
what mighty results!
Practical inference: There are no in
significances in our lives. The minutest
thing is part of a kjugnitude. Infinity
is made up of infinitesimals. Great
things an aggregation of small things.
Bethlehem manger pulling on a t.tar in
tho eastern sky. One look in a drenched
sailor's mouth tho evangelization of a
multitude. One boat of papyrus on the
Nile freighted with events for all ages.
The fate of Christendom in a basket let
down from a window on the wall. What
you do, do well. If you make a rope
make it strong and true, for you know
not how much may depend on your
workmanship. If you fashion a boat
let it Iks waterproof, for you know not
who may sail in it. If you put a Bible in
the trunk of your 1-oy as ho goes from
home, let it be heard in your prayers, for
it may have a mission as far reaching as
the ImxjIc which the sailor carried in his
teeth to tho Pitcaim lieaeh. Tho plain
est man's life is an island between two
eternities eternity past rippling against
his shoulders, eternity to coino touching
his brow. The casual, the accidental,
that which merely hapiens so, are parts
of a great plan, and tho rope that lets
tho fugitive aistle from the Damascus
wall is the cable that holds to its mooring
the ship of the church iu tho northeast
storm of the centuries.
Again, notve unrecognized and unre
corded ser-. ices. Who spun the rope?
Who tied 'c to the basket? Who steadied
th :"u.uriou3 preacher as ho stepped into
it; Who relaxed not a muscle of tho
arm or dismissed an anxious look from
his face until tho basket touched the
ground and discharged its magnificent
cargo? Not one of their names has
come to us, but there was no work
don that day in Damascus or in
all tho earih ' compare. with the im
portance of their work. What if
they had in the agitation tied a knot
that could slip? "What if - the sound of a
mob at the door had led them to suyi
"l'aul must take care of himself, and we
will tako caro of ourselves." No, no!
They hell the ic.jm5, and in doing so did
more for the Christian church than any
thousand of us will ever accomplish.
But God knows and ha3 made eternal
recotd of iheir undertaking. And they
know. How exultant ttiey n.udt hare
felt when they read his letters to the
poiunns, to the Corinthians, to the Gala
tlans, to tJie Ephe-sians, to the Fhilippi
nns. to the Colutssians, to the Thessjlohi
ans, to Timothy, to Titus, to Philemon,
to tho Hebrews, and when they heard
how ho walked out of prison with the
earthquake unlocking tho dxr for
him, and took command of tho Alexan
drian corn shin when tho sailors wero
nearly scared to death, aud preached a
sermon that nearly shook Felix oil his
judgment seat. I hear the men and wo
men who helped him down through ttits
window and over the wall talking in
private over the matter, and saying:
'How glad I am that we effected that
rescue! In coming times otloi3 may
get the glory of Paul's work, but
no one shall rob us of the satisfaction of
knowing that we held the rope."
There are said to Lo alxwc sixty-nine
thousand ministers of religion in this
country, Ahout fifty thousand I war
rant came from early homes which had
to struggle for tho necessaries of lifo.
The sons of rich bankers am mer
chants generally become bankers and
merchants. The most of those who be
come ministers are the eons of those who
had ten iflo struggle to get their- every
day bread. Tho collegiate and theolog
ical education of that son took every
luxury from the parental table for eight
yqars, The other children were moro
scantily appareled. The son nt college
every little while got a bundle from
home. In it were the socks that mother
!i:ul knit, sitting up late at night, her
&j;;ht not as good a3 onoo it was.
And there also were some delicacies
from the sister's hand for the voracious
sppctiie of a hungry student. The father
swung the heavv cradle through the
j wheat, the sweat rolling from his chin
bedewing every step of the way, and then
sitting down under tho cherry tree at
noon thinking to himself: "I am tear
fully tired, but it will pay if I can once
see that boy through college, and if I can
know that he will bo preaching tho
Gosptl after I am dead." The younger
children want to know why they can't
have this ajd that as others do, and the
mother says; "Be patient, my children,
until your" brother graduates, and then
you shall have more luxuries, but we
must fc?e that boy through."
The years go by and the son has been
rrduined and is preaching the glorious
Go.- cl, and a great revival conies, and.
soul j by score3 and hundreds accept the
Gospel from tho lips cf that young
preacher, and father and mother, quite
old now, are visiting the son at the vil
lage parsonage, and at the close cf a
Sabbath of mighty blessing father and
mother retire to their room, the son
lasting the way and asking them if he
couM do anything to make them more
comfortable, saving if they want any
thing in the night just to knock on the j
wall. And then all alotie father and
mc-tlu r talk over the gracious influences j
cf the day and say: Well, it was worth
all we went through to educate that boy. I
It was a hard pull, but we held on till j
the work was done. The world may ;
i.ot know it, but, mother, we held the
rope, didn't wef" And the voice, treni- i
tdous with joyful emotion, reniionds:
"Yes, father; wo held the rope. I feel
my work is done. Now, Lord, lettest
thou thy servant depart in iieace, for
mine eyes liave seen thy salvation.'
"IVhaw P nays the father, "I never felt
eo much like living iu my life as now. I
want to see what that fellow is going on
to do, he has lieguii so well."
Something occurs to nic quite personal.
I was tho youngest of a large family of
children. My parents were neither rich
nor pior; four of the sons wanted col
legiate education, and four obtained it,
tint not without great homo struggle.
Wo never heard tho old ieopIe say once
that they wero denying themselves to
elfect this, but I re.uemlier now that my
parents always looked tired. I don't
think that they ever got rested until they
lay down in the Sonimervillo cemetery.
Mother would sit down iu tho evening,
ami say: "Well, I don't known what
makes nio feel so tired!" Father would
fall immediately to sleep, seated
by tho evening stand, overcome with
the days's fatigues. One of the four
brothers, after preaching tho Gospel for
about fifty years, entered upon his
heavenly rest. Another of the four is
now 011 the other side tho earth, a mis
sionary of tho cross. Two of us are iu
this land in the holy ministry, and I
think all of us are willing to acknowl
edge our obligation to tho o'il folks at
home. Al mt twenty-two years ago tho
one, and about twenty-four years ago
the other, put down the burdens of this
life, but they still hold the rope.
O men and women here assembled,
you brag sometimes how you have fought
jour way in the world, but I think there
have leen helpful infiiiences that you
have never fully acknowledged. lias
there not been some influence in your
early or present homo that tho world
cannot see? Does there not reach to you
from among tho Canadian hiils, or west
ern prairie, or from southern plantation,
or from English or Scottish or Irish home
a cord of inlhience that has kept you
right when you would have gone astray,
and which, after you hail made a
crooked track, recalled you? Tho rope
may be as long as thirty years, or
five hundred miles long,, or three
thousand miles long, but hands that
went out of mortal sight long ago still
hold the rope: You want a very swift
horse, and you need to rowel him with
sharpest npiu, and to let tho reins lie
loose mum the neck, and to givo a shout
to a racer, if you are going to ride out of
reach of your mother's prayers. Why,
a ship crossing the Atlantic in seven
days can't sail away from that! A sailor
finds them on tho lookout as he takes his
place, and finds them on the mast as he
climbs the ratlines to disentangle a rope
in the tenipesf-, and finds them swing
ing on tho bammoi k when ho turns in.
Why not be frank and acknowledge it
tho "most of us would long ago have been
dashed lo pieces had not gracious and
loving hands steadily and lovingly and
mightily held the rope.
But there must como a time when we
shall find out who these Damascene were
who lowered Paul in tho basket, and
greet, them and all those who have ren
dered to God snd the world unrecognized
and unrecorded services. That is going
to bo tine of !o glad excitements of
heaven tho hunting up and picking out
of those who did good on earth and got no
credit for it. Hero the church has been
going on nineteen centuries, and this is
probably the first sermon ever recogniz
ing tho services of the people in that
Damascus balcony. Charles Q, Finnoy
said u uyii'" Christian: "Give my love
to St. Paul w,..n you meet him." When
you and I meet him, as wo will, I shall
ask him to introduce me to those people
who got him put of the Damascene peril.
Wo go into long sermon to prove that
we will bo able to recognize people in
heaven, when there is one reason we fail
to present, and that is lietter than
God will introduce us. Wi shall have
them all pointed out You would not be
guilts of the impoliteness of having
friends in your parlor not introduced,
and celestial politeness will do.ma.nd that
wo be maijd acquainted with all the
heavenly household. What rehearsal of
old times and recital of stirring reminis
cences. If others fail to give in
troduction, God will take us through,
and before our first twenty-four
hours in heaven if it were cal
culated by earthly time pieces
have passed, we shall meet and talk
with more heavenly celebrities than in
our entire mortal state we met with
earthly celebrities. Many who made
great noise of usefulness will hit on the
last peat by the front door of the heavenly
temple, while right up within arm's
reach of the heavenly throne will be
many who, though they could not preach
themselves or do great exploits for God,
nevertheless held the rope.
Come, let us go right up and accost
those on this circle of heavenly thrones.
Surely they must have killed, in battle a
million pien, Surely they must have
been buried with all the cathedrals
sounding a dirge and all the towers of
all the cities tolling tho national grief.
Who art thou, mighty one of heaven?
"I lived by choice the unmarried daugh
ter in an humble home that I might take
caro of niy parents in their old age, and
I endured without complaints all their
querulousuess and administered to all
their wants for twenty years."
Let us pass on round the circle of
thrones. Who art thou, mighty one of
heaven? "I was for tliirty years a Chris
tian invalid, and suffered all the while,
occasionally writing a note of sympathy
for those worso off than I, and was gen
eral confidant of all those who had
trouble, and onco in a while I was strong
enough to make a garment for that poor
family in the back lane." Pass on to
another throne. Yv'ho art thou, mighty
one of heaven? "I was the mother who
raised a whole family of children for God,
and they are out in the world Christian
merchants, Christian mechanics, Chris
tian wives, and J have had full reward
of all my toil. " Lotus pass on in the
circle of thrones. "I had a Sabbath
school class, and they wero always on my
heart, and they all entered the kingdom
of God, and I am waiting for their ar
rivr.l." But who art thou, the mighty one of
heaven 011 this other throne? "In time of
bitter persecution I owned a house iu
Damascus, a house ou tho wall. A man
who preached Christ was hounded from
street to street, and I hid him from the
assassins, and when I found them break
ing in my houso and I could no longer
keep him safely, I advised him to flea
for his life, aud a basket was let down
over the wall with the in al treat el man in
it, and I was ono who heled hold tho
rope." And I said: "Is tliat all?" and
ho answered, "That is all." And while
I was lost in amazement, 1 heard a
strong voice that sounded as though it
might onco have been hoarse from
many exposures and triumphant
as though it might have be
longed to ono of tho martyrs, and it
said: "Not many mighty, not many no
ble are called, but God hath chosen tho
weak things of tho world to confound
tho things whih are mighty, and hase
things of tho world and things which aro
despised hath God chosen, yea, and
things which are not to bring to naught
things which are, that no llesh should
glory in his presence." And I looked
to see from whence the voice came, and
lo! it was tho very one who had said:
"Through a window, in a basket, was I
let down by tho wall."
Henceforth think of nothing as insig
nificant. A little thing may decide your
all. A Cunarder put out from England
for New York. It was well equipped,
but in putting up a stove in the pilot
liox a nail was driven too near the com
pass. You know how that nail would
all'ect the conqiass. The ship's officer,
deceived by that distracted compass, put
the ship two hundred miles off her right
course, and suddenly tho man on tho
lookout cried, "Laud ho!" and the ship
was halted within a few yards of her
demolition on Nantucket shoals. A six
penny nail came near wrecking a Cu
narder. Small iojkm bold mi;;;'.!y d. s
tinies.
A minister seated in Boston at his table,
lacking a word puts his hand behind his
head and tilts back his chair to think, and
the ceiling falls and crushes the table and
would have crushed him. A minister in
Jamaica at night by t he light of an in
sect, called tlio candle fly, is kept from
stepping over a precipice a hundred feet.
F. W. Koljertson, the celebrated English
clergyman, said that he entered tho
ministry from a train of circum
stances started by tho barking of
a dog. Had tho wind blown one way
on a certain day the Spanish Inquisi
tion would have been established in Eng
land; but it blew the other way, and
that dropped tho accursed institution
with 75,000 tons of shipping to the bot
tom of the sea or flung tlio splintered,
logs on tho rocks.
Nothing unimportant in your life or
mine. Three noughts placed on the right
side of the figure ono makes a thousand,
and six noughts on tho right side of the
figure one a million, and our nothingness
placed on tho right side may lie augmen
tation illimitable. All the ages of time
and eternity affected by the basket let
down from a Damascus baleonv.
HITHER AND THITHER.
The hardest of all church debts to get
rid of is tho spiritual mortgage held by
some powerful and mean predecessor.
An infirmary for dumb animals is to
be established in Philadelphia. The pur
pose of the organization is the mainte
nance of a society for the care of ill, aged
and injured animals.
One of tho curiosities on exhibition at
tho Cincinnati centennial is a petrified
watermelon, which was found near the
quarries of the Southern Granite com
pany, at Lithonia, Ga.
At an Italian wedding tho other day
ono of the gifts presented to the bride
was a necklace representing tho nation:J.
tri-color, composed alternately of k.te,
diamonds, rubied und emeralds.
A Tennessee negro has been selling
largo numbers of common glass marbles
to negroes as a protection against light
ning. He says there would be lots of
money i (he business if he could only
get out of jail.'
The Ukraine national committee have
issued a proclamation "complaining of
Russian oppression exercised upon a
people of 2-j, 000,000, and denouncing tho
Great Russians as orthodox Tartars and
mere pretenders to Slavonic name."
A council on tubercular diseases ha3
just sat in Paris. There M ere represen
tatives from nearly every European coun
try except Germany. The invited Ger
man doctors are said to have sent very
"unparliamentary" refusals.
Workmen in a gravel bed on the West
ern railway of Alabama recently came
upon the skeleton of what they think
was an Indian princess. On it was found,
a silver coronet, silver bracelets, a neck
lace made of silver buckles, tied together
with a silk ribbon, and a peculiar knife
with a saber blade.
Tho length of pipe laid m Paris for the
distribution of power by compressed air
already exceeds thirty miles. The com
pressing engines are of 3,000 horsepower,
and about 8,000,000 cubic feet of air are
compressed daily to a pressure of eighty
pounds per square inch, at an expendi
ture of fifty tons of coal.
The Pittsburg Steel Casting company
have produced a cast steel shell, the first
aver made in the world. Steel shells
bave been made in England, but they
svere cut from a forged ingot and then
bored, necessarily making them very ex
pensive. The company has received an
experimental order for 500 shells.
Fall River has one conscientious citizen,
lie has a mare for " sale, and instead of
telling the public that the animal is kind
and gentle, suitable for ladies to drive
and a household pet, he states frankly
that her disposition is so sour that she
hates herself, and that he would recom
mend the creature to nobody unaccus
tomed to horses.
A baker in Bloomsbury, England,
6ued a man for $12.50 for bread fur
nished. The man entered a counter
claim for $45 for the value of a dog. The
evidence was tliat the baker's boy leav
ing bread left the gate of the customer
open, and the dog ran out and was lost.
The court held that if the man could not
tako care of the dog himself he ought not
to expect the baker's boy to do it, and
judgment was for the baker.
"o Ketter Tliau liefore.
Whoever would five Us life over again
that he mitrht live a better life would da
i well to remember that he would do no
j better than he is now doing. If you
j want to begin over again begin now, and
' don't tliink to order a new cradla and
' begin being a baby over again. Cliru
V tiaa at Work, '
The Plattsmouth Herald
Is enjoying a
DAILT A.ITD WEEKLY
EDITIONS.
The
Tear
Will be one liming which the Piibjccl t
national interest :ml importance will he
strongly aitaleil und the election of si
President will take place. 'Ihe people of
Cas.s County who would like to learn .f
Political, Commercial
and Social Transactions
of this year and would keep apace with
the times should
Foi:
Daily or Weekly Herald.
Now while we have the suhjeet he fore the
people we will venture to speak ol our
Which is first-class in all respects and
from which our joh printers are turning
ont much satisfactory work.
PLATTSMOUTH,
Bom in both its
1888
KITH KR TIIK
"VIP Ml
Lo
111
M
NEBRASKA,
'.
i
I 1
