T. De Witt Talmage, his life and work

Front matter

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Introduction

BY

Rev. Frank DeWitt Talmscge, D.D.

HEN a great man dies, the pens of many writers are immediately dipped into the ink-wells to write his biography. The publishing houses oil their presses and push through their copies. The market is filled with the different productions. Most of these biographies will be advertised by literary pirates. A publishing house will sharpen its scissors, paste together a mass of facts which have been cut from the daily newspapers, join together the connecting links with statements sometimes true, oftener false. The public is then supposed to come and trade at its stand. Hardly were my father's lips closed in death when the daily newspapers had announcements from at least six different publishing house that a life of T. De Witt Talmage was about to be published. Agents were wanted to sell the same

Some of Doctor Talmage's nearest friends came together and decided to send forth a book as a message of love, which would state the true facts in reference to his life : a book which the readers of Doctor Talmage's sermons could understand and appreciate. The result of that undertaking will be found within the covers of this volume.

A TASK OF LOVE

Asked to write an introduction to this biographical edition, I comply gladly. The editors of this book have known my father intimately and two of them have been identified with him for many years, as editorial associates, on The Christian Herald. They not only worked with but they loved my father. Nothing has gone into this book except the material they personally have furnished or passed upon. Theirs has been a task of love.

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INTRODUCTION

The public and private life of a great man can never be entirely separated. If we love to read the sermons which Doctor Talmage preached, we also want to peep into the study where they were written. We want to see the farmhouse where once played the boy who afterwards became the greatest preacher of his day. We want to find out the characteristics which made his wonderful career possible. All these facts can be found upon the written pages of this volume.

The first two chapters are to me of especial interest. A plain, genealogical table may not mean much to some, but to others it implies everything. Oliver Wendell Holmes once said that the preparations for the ultimate success of •every child ought to begin at least one hundred years before it was born. Such a preparation is found in my father's life. His mind and body were not the result of a mere haphazard chance. He came from good stock. There was royal blood in his veins. Not the blood of a petty king or queen, whose -only claim to earthly fame was due to the fact that they once wore a royal ■crown; but all his ancestors were true, godly men and women, who were the sons and daughters of the Lord God Almighty. There is no more beautiful -filial testimony in literature than that which Dr. Talmage gives here in reference to his consecrated father and mother. No parents can open the first leaves of this book without realizing that their lives must be perpetuated, for better or for worse, in the lives of their children.

PREACHING TO THE WHOLE WORLD

One of the most helpful results of this book is the proof that God hath made of one blood all peoples who dwell upon the face of the earth. The human heart is the same everywhere. In the palace, we find the tear glittering upon the eyelid, as surely as we hear the sob in the poor man's hut. Without any doubt, the great work of my father's life was the weekly publication of his printed sermons. Those sermons were eagerly read by the rich and the poor alike. The steamer carried them across the sea. They were found in the miner's cabin as well as in the merchant's home. As a result of this weekly publication, when my father started upon his travels, we find him known and welcomed everywhere. This book opens for us the door by which we can enter the throne-room and find out that princes and princesses live the same kind of a family life as do we. As the book leads us everywhere in Dr. Talmage's travels, it also tells us that the plain minister of the Gospel can have

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INTRODUCTION

the world for an audience, because the human heart is the same everywhere — the same sinful, sorrowing, aching, dying heart.

This book teaches how much a man may accomplish if he will only change his line of work — only vary his daily occupations. Mr. Gladstone was once asked how he could accomplish so much and yet live. He answered his questioner in Yankee fashion, by asking him another question : " Do you know why the stage horses, traveling a certain road, near London, die much sooner than horses traveling another kind of road? Because the first road is a perfectly level road. The stage horses there are compelled to use the same set of muscles and therefore they soon wear out." One day Mr. Gladstone was delivering an address in Parliament ; the next, he was presiding at a Cabinet meeting ; the next, translating Homer ; the next, writing a magazine article upon some theological discussion ; the next, with ax, he was felling the huge oak at Hawarden. Change of occupation brings into play a new set of physical and mental muscles. Stand for awhile and it rests you to sit. Be seated for awhile and it relieves you to lie down. Rest in bed for awhile and it invigorates you to walk. Recreation does not necessarily imply the opportunity to loaf. Rest can often come from change of work. This book proves that Dr. Talmage was one of the busiest men that ever lived. It also shows him in many different occupations. He never lived in a routine. One day we find him in the pulpit : the next, as an editor ; the next, as raising money for famine-struck India ; the next, on a journey to Russia, to distribute breadstuffs which had been raised by The Christian Herald for starving peasants ; the next, as a lecturer; the next, as an evangelist. The musical instrument of his life had a thousand; strings instead of one string. All the different notes which were sounded by him blend into a harmony of sweetest music.

AN INDISPENSABLE BOOK

This book ought to be placed upon the library shelf of every theological student in the land. It may be an impossibility to change the habits of an old minister. It is possible for this book to mould the theological student's life into years of future usefulness. From the first word of the first line on the first page, to the last word of the last line on the last page, it emphasizes the truth that the great lesson of Dr. Talmage's life was to preach his beliefs and 1 not his doubts. It is a very easy matter to become a skeptic ; scientific mysteries as well as theological mysteries are piled around every one as high as

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the Himalayas. It does not take a very large finger, placed en the eyelid, to shut out the light of the sun. It does not take many sermons, revelling in doubts, to destroy the spiritual belief of any congregation. I fear there is too much infidelity lurking behind the modern pulpits. The worst enemies ol Jesus Christ are not those found without, but those who are entrenched within the four walls of the church edifices. This book rings true. It portrays Dr. Talmage as a believer ; it proves him to be a student of the Bible, it opens his study door to find him with the " Word of God " in his hand which he is not afraid to accept in its entirety.

THE MINISTERIAL "DEAD-LINE"

This book ought to be also welcomed by the great church, because it shows that an aged minister's last days can be his most useful days. Church congregations have their fads, as well as individuals. There is a fashion to-day of talking about the " dead-line " in the Christian ministry. Some congregations claim that when a minister has passed the fiftieth mile-stone, he has passed the "dead-line" of his usefulness, and ought to retire. Some congregations place the "dead-line" at even a younger age. All over the land, we find that there is a tendency, almost amounting to a fashion, for the few to prefer a youthful, untried preacher in the pulpit, instead of a matured man. My father's life proves that such a theory may be wrong ; and if a minister does his duty, and ceases not to be a close and diligent student, the theory is wrong.

My father's influence was cumulative. He did not spring into sight suddenly as a meteor. His life influence was like the rising sun. His twilight was even more glorious than his mid-noon. His mind was always reaching out to investigate new fields of knowledge. The arrow of death felled him when he was preaching in the far-off" capital of Mexico. Hundreds of his sermons have been published and are preserved for the reader in permanent form. This biography is the only book which has been written up to date, by men who were conversant with the inner thoughts and writings of Dr. Talmage's life.

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