10 years of age by Daniel Webster.  But a few years change the most of the occupants of high positions.  How rapidly the wheel turns.  Call the roll of Jefferson’s Cabinet?  Dead!  Call the roll of Madison’s Cabinet?  Dead!  Call the roll of Monroe’s Cabinet?  Dead!  Call the roll of Pierce’s Cabinet?  Dead!  Call the roll of Abraham Lincoln’s Cabinet?  Dead!  The Congressional burying ground in the city of Washington had then 170 cenotaphs raised in honour of members.

While I was in Chicago, in the spring of 1892, there came about an almost national discussion as to whether the World’s Fair should be kept open on Sunday.  Nearly all the ministers foresaw empty churches if the fair were kept open.

In spite of the personal malice against me of one of the great editors of New York, the people did not seem to lose their confidence in the Christian spirit.  Both Dr. Parkhurst and myself were the targets of this brilliant man’s sarcasm and satire at this time, but neither of us were demoralised or injured in the course of our separate ways of duty.

In the summer of 1892 the working plans of what the newspapers generously called my vacation took me to Europe on a tour of Great Britain and Ireland, including a visit to Russia, to await the arrival of a ship-load of food sent by the religious weekly of which I was editor.  Some criticism was made of the way I worked instead of rested in vacation time.

Someone asked me if I believed in dreams.  I said, no; I believed in sleep, but not in dreams.  The Lord, in olden times, revealed Himself in dreams, but I do not think He does so often now.  When I was at school we parsed from “Young’s Night Thoughts,” but I had no very pleasant memories of that book.  I had noticed that dreamers are often the prey of consumption.  It seems to have a fondness for exquisite natures—­dreamy, spiritual, a foe of the finest part of the human family.  There was Henry Kirke White, the author of that famous hymn, “When Marshalled on the Nightly Plains,” who, dying of consumption, wrote it with two feet in the grave, and recited it with power when he could not move from his chair.

We sailed on the “New York,” June 15, 1892, for Europe.  This preaching tour in England was urged upon me by ties of friendship, made years before, by the increased audiences I had already gained through my public sermons, and of my own hearty desire to see them all face to face.  My first sermon in London was given on June 25, 1892, in the City Temple, by invitation of that great English preacher, Dr. Joseph Parker.  When my sermon was over, Dr. Parker said to his congregation:—­

“I thank God for Dr. Talmage’s life and ministry, and I despise the man who cannot appreciate his services to Christianity.  May he preach in this pulpit again!”