Dayton daily empire. [volume] (Dayton [Ohio]) 1850-1865, 1859-12-27

the case, II was unreasonable; IL was mis-,
chieyousi II was wicked, II was dangerous to
the church and TO the union Of the States.
The action Of the General Conference was
the cnlmination ofyears ofviolent and senseI
less clamor against slavery by the northern
ministry and tho membership who could
be worked on by the fanatics who claimed
that the church must be absolved at every
risk, from the membership Of those who
held slaves And we repeat that the action
Of the General Conference (at New York,
Mr.. HGris,) in 1874, on the slavery ques-
tion, and in preparing "plan of separation" /"
was the 6rst move toward the dissolution Of
the Union, from respectable source that
"iatal step" prepared the way for the seri-
Gus and misohievous discussions about tho
feasibility Of two separate confederacies in
the place Of one.
We have already made this article longor
than we intended, and we have not said all
we desired There are two or three points
in the communication of the Journals corr
respondent which we ought to notice. He
says the article in tho Empire which aflict.
cd him 80 sorely evidently emanated from
either an avowed enemy or pseudo friend,
who, to promote party or isvorite meas-
ure, scruples not to stab the church" &o.-
He is totally at fault The article was writ
ten by the editor of this paper, who did not
| 70 ahn tkg dUa
ton or its publication; il was written by the
same hand thatpenned the rebuko to certain
"fire eaters" who attempted to break up the
'Laymen's Association" in this city, last
fall, performance which our clerical in
quisitor seems to have relished. The fire
eaters now, since we must speak Of them
were principally composed Of that style of
men who seem to think that ministers are
"without SIM and incapable of doing any
wrong act They got up tho"sccne" in the
convention by Notwithstanding and giving
the lie to those who believe the church
would be more efficient by the preachers
attending exclusively to the work Of the holy
ministry, and the membership to the business
of the church. The alluson to the member
ship, in contradistinctiou to the ministry,
was necessary in our previous article, for
we seriously believe that if the lalty had
had voice in the General Conference, the
separation would not have taken place.
The membership have tho good of souls
equally at heart with the ministry; and then,
in matters concerning the temporal veal,
they have every thing at stake
Tho ministry are a migratory folk; they
seldom vote twice at any place, while many
of them never vote at all; few own property;
and it is not reasonable that in matters Of
grave import they would move with the
same caution, or act with the Same discre-
ton as men whose all in life depends upf
on word or q vote.
We are not o member of the M e,
church; we are not her enemy nor are we a
psuedo friend We are, however, her wellI
wisher. The glibness with which Harris
handles epithets and coarse insinuations
indicates that he is as much at homo in
their use as be is with the Sword of the
Spirit" and it is only another evidence that
the ministry would be better engaged ex-
clusively upon the "work which they are
called to do, leaving the membership 10
attend to the temporal affairs Of the church,
"the world, the aesh and the devil" We
are not yet done, but will improve an early
occasion to refer to the subject again.