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6 LIFE’S BRIGHT SIDE. DR. TALMAGE SEES SUNSHINE ON EVERY CLOUD. God'« terming AffllrHon* on I’M Are Inflvrncfß For Gootl- (irnndenr of Character Im Achieved by C<»n«(uer ; IDK EMI. ICopyriffht, 18S8, by Atnerfcan Press Asso cfatHn.J Washington, Dec. 4.—ln thia discourae Dr. Talmage takes an optimistic view of many things that are usually accounted as Inexplicable in human experience and shows us that even trouble and affliction may not be wholly without their brighter side; tert, Psalm xlix, 4, “I will open my dark saying upon the harp.” The world is full of the inexplicable, the impassable, the unfathomable, the insur mountable. We cannot go three? steps in any direction without coming up against a hard wall of mystery, riddles, paradoxes, profundities, labyrinths, problems that we cannot solve, hieroglyphics that we crfnnot decipher, anagrams we cannot spell out, sphinxes that will not speak. For that reason David in my text projwaed to take up some of these somber and dark things and try to set them to sweet music. “I will open my dark sayings on a harp.” So I look off upon society and find people in unhappy conjunction of circumstances, and they do not know what it means, and they have a right to ask: Why is this? Why is that? And I think I will be doing a good jgork by trying to explain some of these strange things and make you more content with your lot, and I shall only be answering questions that have often been asked me or that we have all asked our selves while I try to set these mysteries to jsusio and open my dark sayings on a harp. Why Are the Vsefvl Taken? Interrogation the first: Why does God take out of this world those who are use ful.-and whom we cannot spare and leave alive end in good health so many who are only nuisance to the world? I thought I would begin with the very toughest of all the seeming iriserutables. Many of the most useful men and women die at 30 or 40 years of nge, while you often find use less people alive at €0 and 70 and 80. John Careless wrote to Bradford, who was soon to bo put to death, saying, ‘‘Why doth God suffer me and such other caterpillars to live that can do nothing but consume the alms of thechurch and take away so many worthy workmen in the Lord's vineyard?” Similar questions are often asked. Here are two men. The one is a npble character and a Christian man. lie chooses for fl lifetime companion one who lias been ten derly reared, and she is worthy of him and he is worthy of her. As merchant or farm* et or professional man or mechanic or ar tist he toils to educate and rear his chil dren. Ho is succeeding, but he has not yet established for his family a full com petency. He seems indispensable to that but one dav. before he has paid I the intiHguge oh Klw house, ho is com ing holbh thfough a strong northeast wind, and a chill strikes through him, and four days of pneumonia end his earthly career, and the wife and children go into a strug gle for shelter and food. His next door neighbor is a man who, though strong and well, lets his wife support him. He is > around at the grocery store or some gen eral loafing place in the evenings, while his wife sews. His boys are imitating his example and lounge and swagger and •wear. All the use that man is in that house is to rave because the coffee is cold when he comes to a,' late breakfast or to say cutting things about his wife’s looks, when he furnishes nothing for her ward robe. The best thing that could,happen to that family would bo that man’s funeral, but he declines to die. He lives on and on and on. So we have all noticed that many of the useful are early cut off, while the parasites have great vital tenacity. I take up this dark saying on my harp and give three or four thrums on the string in tho way of surmising and hopeful guess. Perhaps the useful man was taken out of the world because he and his family were so constructed that they could not have endured some great prosperity that might have beeu just ahead, and they all together might have gone down in the vortex of worldliness which every year swallows up 10,000 households. And so he went while he was humble and conse crated, and they were by the severities of life kept close to Christ and fitted for use fulness here and high seats in heaven, and when they meet at last before the throne they will acknowledge that, though the furnace was hot, it purified them and pre pared them for an eternal career of glory and reward for which no other kind of life ■ could have fitted them. On the other j hand, the useless man lived on to 50 or 00 ' or 70 years because al! the ease he ever can have ho must have in this world, and you ■ ought not therefore begrudge him his [ earthly longevity. In all the ages there j has not a single loafer ever entered heaven. ! There.is no place for him there to hang around. Not even in the temples, for they are full of vigorous, alert and raptur ous worship. If the good and useful go early, rejoice for them that they have so soon got through with human life, which at best is a struggle. Amt if the useless and the bad stay rejoice that they may be cut in the world's fresh air a good many years before their final incarceration. Trotiblew of the Good. Interrogation tho second: Why do good i people have so much trouble, sickness, bankruptcy, persecution, the three black vultures sometimes putting their fierce beaks into one set of jangled nerves? I think now of a good friend I once had. ’He was h consecrated Christian man, an rider tn the church, and as polished a T'hristian gentleman as evet walked Broadway. First his general health gave j out, and he hobbled around on a cane, an old man at 40. After awhile paralysis ; struck him. Having by poor health been j compelled suddenly to quit busin ass, he lost what property he had. Then his beau- J Aiful daughter died; then a son became hopelessly detaented. Another son, splen did of mind and commanding of presence, resolved that he would take care of his fa ther's household, but under the swoop of yellow fever at Fernandina, Fla., he sud denly expired. So you know good men and women who have had enough troubles, you think, to crush 50 people. No world ly philosophy could take such a trouble •nd set it to music or play it on violin or fiute, but I dare to open that dark saying qn a gospel harp. You wonder that very consecrated peo ple have trouble? Did you ever know any very consecrated man or woman who had not had great trouble? Never! It was through their troubles sanctified that they were made very good. If you find any where in this city a man who has now and always has had perfect health and never lost a child, and has always beeu popular, and never had business struggle or mis lortune, who is distinguished fcr good ness. pull your wire for a telegraph mes senger boy and send me word, and I ill drop everything and go right away to look at him.. There never has been a man like that and never will be. Who are those ar rogant, self conceited creatures who move about without sympathy for others and who think more of a St. Bernard dog, or an Alderney cow, ora Southdown sheep, ora Berkshire pig than of a man? They never had any trouble, or the trouble was n?ver sanctified. Who arc those men who listen with moist eye as you tell them of suffering, and who have a pathos in their voice, and a kindness in their manner, and 1 an excuse or an alleviation for these gone astray? They are the men who have grad uated at the Royal Academy of Trouble, and they have the diploma written in wrin kles on their own countenances. My! my! What heartaches they had! What tears they have wept! What injustice they have suffered! Tho mightiest influence for purification and salvation is trouble. No diamond fit for a crown until it is cut. "No wheat fit for bread till it is ground. There are only three things that can break off a chain—a hammer, a file or a fire— and trouble is all three of them. The greatest writers, orators and reformers get much of their force from trouble. What gave to Washington Irving that exquisite tenderness and pathos which will make his books favorites while the English lan guage continues to be written and spoken? An early heartbreak that he never once mentioned, and when, 30 years after the death of Matilda Hoffman, who was to have been his bride, her father picked up a piece of embroidery and said, ‘‘That is a piece of poor Matilda’s workmanship,” Washington Irving sank from hilarity in to silence and walked away. Out of that lifetime grief the great author dipped his pen’s mightiest re-enforcement. Calvin’s “Institutes of Religion,” than which a more wonderful book was never written by human hand, was begun by the author at 25 years of age because of the persecu tion by Francis, king of France. Faraday toiled for all time on a salary of £BO a year and candles. As every brick of the wall of Babylon was stamped with the letter N, standing for Nebuchadnezzar, so every part of the temple of Christian achieve ment is stamped with the letter T, stand ing for trouble. All Im For the Best. When in England a man is honored with knighthood, he is struck with the flat of the sword. But those who have come to knighthood in tho kingdom of God were first struck, not with the flat of the sword, but with the keen edge of tho scimeter. To build his magnificence of character, Paul could not have spared one lash, one prison, one stoning, one anathema, one poisonous viper from the hand, one ship wreck. What is true of individuals is true of nations. Tho horrors of thcvAmerican Revolution gave this country this side of the Mississippi river to independence, and the conflict between England and France gave the most of this country west of the Mississippi to the United States. France owned it, but Napoleon, fearing that Eng land would take it, prftotlcally made a present to the United states, for he receiv ed onlv 115,000,000 for Louisiana, Mis souri, Arkansas, Kansas, Nebraska, lowa, Minnesota, Colorado. Dakota, Montana, Wyoming and the Indian Territory. Out of the fire of th© American Revolution camo this Country east of the Mississippi, out of the European war came that west of the Mississippi river. The British em pire rose to its present overtowering gran deur through gunpowder plot, and Guy Fawkes’ conspiracy, and Northampton in surrection, and Walter Raleigh’s behead ing, and Bacon’s bribery, and Cromwell’s dissolution of parliament, and the battles of Edge Hill, and the vicissitudes of cen turies. So the earth itself, before it could become an appropriate and beautiful resi dence for the human family, had, accord ing to geology, to be washed by universal deluge and scorched and made incandes cent by universal fires, and pounded by sledge hammer of icebergs, and wrenched by earthquakes that split continents, and shaken by volcanoes that tossed mountains and passed through tho catastrophes of thousands of years before Paradise became possible, and the groves could shako out their green banners, and the first garden pour its carnage of color between the Gihon and the Hiddekel, Trouble a good thing for the roots, a good thing for na tions as well as a good thing for individ uals. So when you push against me with a sharp interrogation point, Why do the good suffer? I open the dark saying on a harp and, though I can neither play an organ or cornet or hautboy or bugle or clarinet, I have taken some lessons in the gospel harp, and if you would like to hear me I will play you these: “All things work together for good to those who love God.” “Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous nevertheless after ward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exer cised thereby.” “Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morn ing.” What a sweet thing is a harp, and I wonder not that in Wales, the country of my ancestors, the harp lias become the national instrument, and that they have festivals where great prizes are offered in the competition between harp and harp, or that weird Sebastian Erard was much of j his time bent over thischorded and vibrat- I ing triangle and was not satisfied until he 1 had given it a compass of six octaves, from I E to E with all the semitones, or that I when King Saul was demented the son of Jesse came before him and, putting his fingers among the charmed strings of the harp, played the devil out of the crazed monarch, or that in heaven there shall be harpers harping with their harps. So you will not blame me for opening the dark saying on the gospel harp: Your harps, ye trembling saints, Down from the willows take; Loud to the praise of love divine Bid every string awake! Conquering Evil. Interrogation third: Why did the good God let sin or trouble come into the world when he might have kept them out? My reply is. Ho had a good reason. He had reasons that he has never given us. He had reasons which he could no more make us understand in our finite state than the father, sterling out on some great and elaborate enterprise, could make the 2- year-old child in its armed chair compre hend it. One was to demonstrate what grandeur of character may be achieved on earth by conquering evil. Had there been no evil to conquer and no trouble to con sole, then this universe would never have known an Abraham or a Moses, or a Joshua, or an Ezekiel, or a Paul, or a Chirst, or a Washington, or a John Mil ton, or a John Howard, and 1,000,000 vic tories which have been gained by the con secrated spirits of all ages would never have been gained. Had there been no bat tle there would have been no victory. Nine-tenths of the anthems of heaven would never have been sung. Heaven could never have been a thousandth part of the heaven that it is. I will not say • that 1 am glad that sin and sorrow did j enter, but I do say that I am glad that i after God has given all his reasons to an ’ assembled universe he will be more honor- ed than if sin and sorrow had never enter ed, and that the unfallen celestials will be outdone and will put down their trump<?ts to listen, an 1 it will ba in heaven, when those who have conquered sin and sorrow MACON NEWS MONDAY EVENING, DECEMBER 5 iSO. shall enter, as it would be in a small sing ing school on earth if Thai berg and Gott schalk and Wagner and Beethoven and Rheinberger and Schumann should all at once enter. The immortals that have been chanting 10,000 years before the throne will say as they close their librettos, I “Oh, if we could only sing like that!” J But God will say to those who have never fallen and consequently have not been re- f deemed: “You must be silent now. You have not the qualification for this an them.” So they sit with closed lips and folded hands, and sinners saved by grace take up the harmony, for the Bible says . “no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty and four thousand which were redeemed from the earth.” A great prima donna, who can now do anything with her voice, told mo that when she first started in music her teacher i in Berlin told her she could be a good j singer, but a certain note she could never | reach. “And then,” she said, “I went to work and studied and practiced for years until I did reach it.” But the song of the singer redeemed, the Bible says, the exalt ed harmonists who have never sinned could not reach and never will reach. Would you like to hear me in a very poor way play a snatch of that tune? I can give ' you only one bar of the music on this gos pel harp,/‘Unto him that hath loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood and hath made us kings and priests unto God and the Lamb, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.” But before leaving this interrogatory, Why God let sin come into the world? let me say that great battles seem to be noth ing but suffering and outrage at the time of their occurrence, yet after they have been a long while past we can see that it was better for them to have been fought— namely, Salamis, Inkerman, Toulouse, Arbela, Agincourt, Trafalgar, Blenheim, Lexington, Sedan. So now that the great battles against sin and suffering are going on we can see mostly that which is de plorable. But 20,000 years from now, standing in glory, we shall appreciate that heaven is better off than if the battle of this world’s sin and suffering had never been projected. Favorites Disciplined. But now I come nearer home and put a ! dark saying on the gospel harp, a style of question that is asked a million times ev ery year. Interrogation the fourth: Why do I have it so hard while others have it so easy? Or, Why doT have so much diffi culty in getting a Jmdihopd while others go around with a fuli porteinonnaie? Or, Why must I wear these plain clothes while others have to push hard to get their ward robes closed, so crowded are they with brilliant attire? Or, Why should I have to work so hard while others have 365 holi days every year? They are all practically one question. I answer them by saying it is because the Lord has his favorites, and he puts extra discipline upon you and ex tra trial because he has for you extra glory, extra enthronement and extra felicities. That is no guess of mine, but a divine fays so: “Whom the Lord loveth he ohas teneth/; “Well,” says some one, “I would rather have a little less in heaven and a little more here. Discount my heavenly robe 10 per cent and let me now put it on a fur lined overcoat; put me in a less gor geous room of the house of many mansions and let me have a house here in a better neighborhood.” No, no; God is not going to rob heaven, which is to be your resi dence for nine hundred quadrillion of years, to fix up your earthly abode, which you will occupy at most for less than a j century, and where you may perhaps stay ' only ten years longer, or only one year, or j perhaps a month more. Now, you had bet ter cheerfully let God have his way, for, you see, he has been taking care of folks for near 0,000 years and knows how to do it and can see what is best for you better than you can yourself. Don’t think you are too insignificant to be divinely cared for. It was said that Diana, the goddess, could not be present to keep her temple at Ephesus from burning because she was at tending upon the birth of him who was to be Alexander the Great. But I tell you that your God and my God is so great in small things as well as large things, that ho could attend the cradle of a babe and at the same time the burning of a world. And God will make it all right with you, and there is one song that you will sing every hour your first ten years in heaven, and the refrain of that song will be, “I am so glad God did not let me have it my own way!” Your case will be all fixed up in heaven, and there will be such a reversal of conditions that we can hard ly find each other for some time. Some of us who have lived in first rate houses here and in first rate neighborhoods will be found, because of our lukewarmness of earthly service, living on one of the back streets of the celestial city, and clear down at the end of it at No. 808 or 909 or 1505, while some who had unattractive earthly abodes, and a cramped one at that, will in the heavenly city be in a house fronting the royal plaza, right by the imperial fountain or on the heights overlooking the river of life, the chariots of salvation halting at your door, while those visit you who are more than conquerors, and those who are kings and queens unto God for ever. You, my brother, and you, my sister, who have it so hard here, will have it so fine and grand there that you will hardly know yourself and will feel disposed to dispute your own identity, and the first time I see you there I will cry out, “Didn’t I tell you so when you sat down there in the pew and looked incredulous because you thought it too good to be true?” And you will answer. ‘ You w6re right; the half was not told me I” Sol open your dark saying of despondency and complaint on my gospel harp and give you just one bar T)f music, for I do not pretend to be much of a player. “The Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall lead them to liv ing fountains of water, and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.” But, I must confess, I am a little perplexed how some of you good Christians are going to get through the gate, because there will be so many there to greet you, and they will all want to shake hands at once and will all want the first kiss. They will have heard that you are coming, and they will all press around to welcome you and will want you to say whether you know them after being so long parted. Adjourned, to Eternity. Amid the tussle and romp of reunion I tell you whose hand of welcome you had better first clasp and whose cheek is en titled to the first kiss. It is the hand and the cheek of him without whom you would never have got there at all, the Lord Jesus, ‘ the darling of the skies, as he cries out, , “I have loved thee with an everlasting love, and the fires could not burn it, and the floods could not drown it.” Then you, • my dear people, having no more use for ; my poor harp on which I used to open your dark sayings, and whose chords some- I times snapped, despoiling the symphony, i you will take down your own harps from the willows that grow Ly the eternal water courses and play together these celestial airs, some of the names of which are en titled “The King In His Beauty,” “The Land That Was Far Off.” And as the last dark curtain of mystery is forever lift- ed it will be as though all the oratorioe that were ever heard had been rolled into one, and “Israel In Egypt,” and “Jeph i thah’s Daughter,” and Beethoven’s ‘‘Over ture In C,” and Ritter’s first “Sonata In I D Minor,” and the “Creation,” and the “Messiah” had been blown from the lips ] of one trumpet or been invoked by the sweep of one bow or had dropped from the ' vibrating chords of one harp. But here I must slow up lest in trying i to solve mysteries I add to the mystery that we have already wondered at —name- ly, why preachers should keep on after all the hearers are tired. So I gather, up into one great, armful all the whys and hows and wherefores of your life and mine I which we have not had time or the ability to answer and write on them the words, “Adjourned to Eternity.” I rejoice that we do not understand all things now, for if we did what would we learn in heaven? If we knew it all down here in the fresh man and sophomore class, what would be the use of our going up to stand amid the juniors and the seniors? If we could put down one leg of the compass and with the other sweep a circle clear around all the inscrutable?, if we could lift our little steelyards and weigh the throne of the Omnipotent, if we could with our seven day clock measure eternity, what w’ould be left for heavenly revelation? So I move that we cheerfully adjourn what is now beyond our comprehension, and as, accord ing to Rollin, the historian, Alexander the Great, having obtained the gold casket in which Darius had kept his rare per fume, used that aromatic casket thereafter to keep his favorite copy of Homer in and called the book therefore the “Edition of the Casket, ” and at night put the casket and his sword under Lis pillow, so I put this day into the perfumed casket of your richest affections and hopes this promise, worth more than anything Homer ever wrote or sword ever conquered, “What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter, ” and that I call the “Edi tion Celestial.” His Life Was Saved. Mr. U. E. Lilly, a prominent citizen of Hjannibal, Mo., lately had a wonderful de liverance from a frightful death. In tell ing! of 'it he says: “I was taken with ty phoid fever, ithat' tran into pneumonia. My lungs became hardened. I was so waaty’l couldn’t even sit up in bed. Noth helpedl me. I expected to soon die of dohisumption, when I heard of Dr. King’s New Discovery. Nine bottles gave great rel|idf. I continued to use it, and now am wtell and strong, I can’t say too much in its praise.” This marvellous medicine is the surest and quickest cure in the world fo'r lai throat and lung troubles. Regular sizes 5 cents and SI.OO. Trial bottles free at H. J. Lamar & Sons’ Drug Store; every bottle guaranteed, Star Clothing Co. Dave Wachtel, Mgr. Come With Your Wife Today if you can; but come and select your Fall Suit and Overcoat. You can do it more profitably of us. And more to your satisfaction than in any other store in Macon. Real Clay Worst ed Suits, Cutaways and Sacks, Fancy Trousers, Covert Cloth Overcoats, any shade. Our own superb make. Silk lin ings. Do You Know Dear Public, You’re slippery? Not you, sir. Oh, no, nor you, nor any one in par ticular. But the very day after we say to you that we have everything worn by boy or man. In comes a man asks where's a good place to buy Hats, Cloth ing and Furnishings. When told they.’re here says, “If yotir Hats, etc., are as good, as your Over coats let’s see them. Now this week we’re going to tell you and show you as hard as we can that we keep Hats—the good sort, just like our Clothing. We’ll say just what is good for you to know. AT RETAIL W, Wool Blankets At Manufacturers’ Cost. RidiculDuslu Hot LOW Stuff! For Cold Days, Mackintoshes - Mackintoshes Almost at your own price. Never has such an opportunity been offered in Macon. Remember, we are selling these at retail. ,J. R. FRIED & CO., Cherry Street. $5.00 for $3.50 This is literally what the MIX SHOE CO. is giving you in Men’s Shoes. The advertisement speaks the truth; it is no catch; we are selling out. Mix Shoe Co. • * 107 Cotton Avenue. Wb hib Better Prepared Than Ever To take care of the building trade of Macon and tributary points. Our facilities for prompt ly filling orders are unexcelled. If you are go ing to build a house it will save you money to see us before buying your material. If you desire to build by contract, we are contractors and builders and take any house, large or small by contract. Macon, Sash, Door and Lumber Co. Office, Fourth Street, Phone 416. Factory Enterprise, South Macon, Phone 404 _ Beauty-Loving people go into raptures over our latest de.- signs in parlor and sitting-room furniture. ■^/7/1 _n| They have as good cause for delight on LI seeing our bedroom suites or, for the mat- C ” ier that, any of our high-grade furni- / ture, whether it be for parlor, dining- f \ room, bed-room, hall or drawing room. yy__lt-ii'yA Mjh UK There is excellence m every department. Lwj The Wood-Peavy ¥_/ urniture Co. Jf A X We Don’t Hold You Up, | But if you want the right /1 * /JwWfe ! w I kind of Diamonds, Watches , and Jewelry this is the place t it IP? / to buy. Call and see our j Chrismas Goods. The hand- ' somest selection in the city, j J. H. & W. W. WILLIAMS, 352 Second Street. C. H. & D. TO MICHIGAN. 3 Trains Daily. Finest Trains in Ohio. Fastest Trains inJOhio. Michigan and the Great Lakes constantly growing in popularity Everybody will be there this summer. For information inquire of your nearest ticket agent. D. G. EDWARDS, Passenger Tiaffic Manager, Cincinnati,*O.