New-York daily tribune., 1858-03-06

1
ing the religious revival now in progress, the
churches especially in the Northern States, seemed
| generally to have come to stand.st In many
parts of the country, formerly the most religious,
| they even seemed to be dwindlng away. This
condition of thipgs was tauDtingy pointed out By
The OJSerrer, Heroid Journal Of Commerce, and
other advocates of slavehOlding Christianity, as
proof that Northern ministers and church men,
bers in allowing their attention to be drawn off
from theological dogmas to great social questions,
had been guity-at least in a religious point of
view-Of most serious error. They alleged that
the preaching of politics, as those Journals chose
to call it, had set a fatal stumbling block in the
progress Of personal and vital religion. They
urged repeatedly and with much JUNCTION that until
ministers and churches ceased to agitate the Slavery
question: or to intermeddle in any way with pol
itics it would be in vain to expect that season Of
spiritual refreshing or of reedifcatiOn for the dap
idated churches could ever return
To all these maledctOns heaped upon the heads
of so-called political ministers; to all these exhor-
tations addressed to the churches to let politics, and
slsvebOldng, and such worldly questions alone,
and to restrict themselves entirely to points of dog
matte theology; to all representations of pro-
tracted and increasing spiritual Decline only to be
arrested by church members withdrawing them
selves within the four walls of their respective
churches, and there in light din as well as reli-
giOus with doors shut and windows closed, and all
the noise and turmoil of the external world care
fully excluded, giving themselves up to sleep and
meditatiOn-to this entire theory of conservative
Christianity as it cas itself as to the causes and
cure of past spiritual decline, what is at this mo-
meDt going on everywhere around US affords
complete and most overwhelming refutatOn.
Simultaneously with the deep interest felt and ex-
pressed by the great body of the religious men OF
the North in the attempt TO save Kansas from the
evils and horrors of Slavery and in the midst of
renewed efforts on the part of The ObSerrer, Inc
Herald, The Journalof Commerce, The Washington
Union, and other affiliated prints, to bring Odum
and contempt upon the intermixture of religion and
politics. we see revival breaking out and extend
ing over the country quite unprecedented in its
character, and which promises to restore to the
churches all they have lost, and much more than all
they have lost during the past years of decrepitude
and decline.
But not only does the revival now going on
completely overturn the theories as to the recent
spiritual dearth promulgated by The Obscrrer, The
Hcrdld and The Journal Of Commerce-it suggests
al explanation Of that dearth to which We beg leave
to call the particular attention of the former print
for as to The Herald and Journal of Commerce, we
must be pardoned the suspicion that their interest
LIZ Ill
aud that, provided church members can be
persuaded to yield up to the worlds people as re-
presented by Tammany Hall and Mr.. Buchanan, the
exclusive control of secular affairs it is with all
their pious professions, but secondary consdera.
tiOn with them whether that course would or
would not rebound to the edfcation of the
church.
Let us remind The Observer, thes, that twenty
| five years ago. when the discussion of the
| Slavery question was revived smODg U.s. it
| was at first almost entirely as question
| Of religion and conscience. Like the temper
ance reform, it was one of the results Of an
active religious revival which had extended through
several previous years. The main doctrine
preached the basis of that revival had been the
necessary "f Immediate repentance, and OF tue ln-
slant and entire abandonment of easily besetting
SINS. This same idea, spplied specifically to the
great pationsl sins of Intempersnce and Slavery,
led to the doctrine Of total abstinence on the one
hard' and of immediate emancipation on the other.
At first, the churches favored this Auti-Slayery
movement; and II was fully in their power to have
placed themselves at the head of il, AMI to hare
tempered the management of it by discretion and
moderation, though without any sacrifice of firm.
ness or perseverance But the violent cry of in.
| dgnatiCu raised at the South, and reschoed by
Northern politicians and merchants engaged 10 the
Southern trade, sgaI tie fee discussion Ct tbi.