The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1872-12-07 00:00:00

The following Ls the summary of what Sergeant
Bates said, as far as could be collected, at the Guild-
hall :

•
" Englishmen—l have only a word or tub to say to you. I
asserted in America that the people of England were friendly
to us in America as a nation. My friends maintained the
contrary. I repeated my assertion, and said I would carry
the flag of our country from one end of England to the
other, and could do so without its being treated anyhow but
with respect. Parties said they would bet me so much I
was wrong, and I accepted the eager; for I will tell you
fairly, my first thought was to win the thousand dollars for
my wife and children. But I saw that if I conducted
the affair properly, it might result in good, and I
determined that I would carry it through purely on
patriotic principles, and if good did not result it should
not be my Wilt. The press haii asserted that this is
merely a Yankee jest, but as far as I am concerned it is
no Yankee jest I have had a wonderful reception I have
met a cross look from some persons, but I am gratified by
my reception. As a nation my countrymen have been waters-
ire the tour of my flag with great interest, and therefore I
I am satisfied that my assertion was right. I have only one or
I two more words to say. I determined in the first instance to
withdraw the bet, awl make the tour purely on principle.
As one of the most humble citizens of my country, allow
me to thank you for the way in which you have received me,
and in the name of my country allow me to thank you for
the way in which you have received the nag of America."

CHURCH HISTORY IN ST. kUL'S
CATHEDRAL
On Tuesday evening the Rev. Canon Lightfoot de-
livered, in St. Paul's Cathedral, the third and con-
cluding lecture on 'Christian Life in the Second and
Third Centuries."
The subject of the lecture was the Christian life
withinthe Christian body, and more especially Chri tian
worship as the soul of that life. To the careless heathen
bystander thisinner life of the Christian was strangely
anomalous find perplexing. Such Oimpses as he
might accidentally obtain revealed a state of
things of which he had no experience. and to
which he could attach no meaLing. He found
nothing on which the eye or the hand could
fasden. There were no extemfil emblems and no
. . . , .

imposing rites, without which religion seemed to him
to be an impossibility. Again and again the heathen
antagonists of Christianity gave expressions to their
surprise in the same taunting language, "You have no
images, no altars, no temples." The principal squares
and streets of Rome and Athens were lined with
sanctuaries and dotted with altars; public thorough-
fares and private houses were thronged with statues
of gods and demi-gods ; the language of the common
people bristled with invocations of deities ; the air
reeked from time to time with the fat of victims or
the fumes of incense. When Caligula ascended the Im.
al throne, the festivities extended over three whale
months, and 160,000 victims were sacrificed in Ronne
alone. When during the reign of M. Aurelius a deadly
pestilence broke out the Emperor snmnnir,onenl to the
metropolis the priests of all religions, national and
foreicn, and the city was given over to lustrations,
sacrifices, awl rites of every kind and every country.
To all this the bald simplicity of Christian worship
stood in m irked contrast. A silent, mysterious, ga-
thering at stated times in some obscure private
dwelling seemed to exhaust the religi n of this
' anomalous sect. The inference of the heathen,
thoMffi strangely at fault, was not altogether unna-
tural. These Christians, he supp sect, were Atheists.
Under cover of religion they were hatching some vile
conspiracy. He had stumbled on another of those
secret clubs, those illegal associations which his jealous
prispicions were ever on the watch to detect. Tins strange
-eonception he persistently maintained. Atheism
wus the indictment brought against FL Clemens, the
no :in of Domitian, when he was condemned to death
to - his adhesion to the new faith. "Away with the
A* heists" was the common war-cry of the per-
ils entor. To all raptor ations the heathen had a
re dy answer, "Show us your God." From these
,ions it is evident that during the early cen-
t: the ritual of the Christians was very simple.
e point at least seems clear, that they were not
yni in the habit of erecting buildings devoted
so ely to Divine worship. This, however, was not
a principle of their faith. but rather a neces-
sity of their pesition. As a corporation they
not recognized by the law. It was there-
for impossible for them to hold corporate property.
:cover, common prudence would deter them from
any display which might arouse the fury of the
populace or invite the repression of the Magistrates.
Hi-nice there was not, as far as he was aware, any
explicit notice of a church ereeted either at Rome or in
the Provinces before the close of the second century.
Beyond the limits of the Empire the case would be sit'
Is- .-nt Meanwhile, in the metropolis and in the great
ci • ies the meetings for public worship would be hell in
a ummedions room attached to the residence of some
privateChriatian. Butwhen the tint quarterof the third
century had run oust their condition woe very much
improved. The favour which Alexander Severus showed
towards them could not fail to produce an immediate
effect. The answer of the Emperor when a dispute
arose between theChristiansand the licensed victuallers
about the possession of • certain piece of ground in
Rome was well known. "It was better," he said,
"that God should be worshipped in the place in what-
ever manner than that it should be given over to the
victuallers." About the year 260 the Emperor Gal-
Benue issued a rescript prohibiting any interference
with the Christians, and expressly restoring to them
their "places of worship." By this rescript all ob-
stacles to the multiplication of churches were altogether
removed.
Contrasting this state of things with what we saw
arotind us in the present age, we might be led to ask
If these latter forms of worship were a perversion of
the simplicity of the Gospel, and if we had entirely
departed from the principles of primitive Christianity
in the elaborate development of our architecture,
I our music, our ritual? A moment's reflection would
check the hasty interference which we might be tempted
to draw from the contrast. This feature in early
Christianity was not a deliberate choice, but an enforced
abstention. He would further urge that it was also a
necessary discipline, a provident:al design in the slus
cation of the Church. 'lhe heathen did not understand
religion.es a moral and spiritual influence. His only
conception of it was an elaborate system of sacrifices,
Instrations, auspices, a multiplication of shrines and of
deities. It WWI necessary hie the future of the Church
that the Christian should break once for all with the
spirit of Paganism. By the stern teaching of an impe-
rious necessity he was weaned from this false and low
conception of religion. Much that would have been
injurious then was 1111thll—it might almost be said
was indispensable now. Af 'Sr illustrating this point,
and giving Borne account of the ritual which sufficed
before church building began, Dr. Lightfoot concluded
by giving an exceedingly interesting description of the
Roman catacombs—the Cemetery of the Christians
and of the necropolis of the heathens—the Appian
Way.

A correspondent of the Leicester Journal calls
attention to • remerkable fact, If it he a fact, that the
majority of Churchmen he that town are buried in the Un-
consecrated portion of the cemetery.