The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1863-10-17

! churches. Noah, Abraham, Moses. John,
the Master, Paul on Mars Hill and by the
river sides, the Covanenters and Pilgrims,
/ Wesley and Whitefeld, all chose hili-sides
and valleys for their temples. Thus it is
( here. The tents are on or near the edge Of
a ridge that surrounds a shallow hollow
Al the bottom of the bowl, or saucer, as
bowl conveys an idea of to great steepness
! of sides, stands the pulpit, a rustic structure,
not without grace in itself, as we'll as in its
communications.
From this ascend rows of seats for the
thousands of spectators. Behind it rises
the other semicircle, occupied on crowded
days with the overlooking thousands whom
the seats will not accommodate. They re-
cline on the shaded earth, and engage, like
the lessfOrtunate occupants of the benches,
/ in Christian worship.
Around these gentle slopes, crowded
with the floating or resting thousands. stand
the white inclosing dwellings-behind, be-
fore. and above which tower everywhere the
living pillars and shadowy roof of the mag
niicent temple.
am not going to weary you with de-
Tense of this institution. If anybody dis
likes it. let them; tits none of my business.
|
say, with all Difference and courtesy, is none
of their business. I could give them a rec
ipe by which they too would enjoy it, but
they would not take it. 1t is simply this
Come and try it week as a member of the
family, and not a guest. They will undoubt-
eddy fancy that this will degrade rather than
elevate them. So the factitiously exalted
ever esteem real exhaltation. Democratic
equality to an Englishman. color equality
to an American. Christian life to a sinner,
are specimens of the experiences that stited
souls fancy beneath, but are really above
them.
So some of these strollers-by look on us
laugh to see them peer into this tent and
carefully study us up and down as though
the tent was a wigwam-these ladies quiet
~ reading their Bible, or softly talking, or
sweetly singing. brown, bedizened damsels
or witEered beldames plying their basket
braiding your own" lounger, cool
ly driving his pencil, becomes to their Polo
MUS eyes the lazy lord of the aboriginal
palace, whose smoking pipe this currens
calanaws is very like.
Things are not what they SEEM good
friends. These gentlemen and ladies are as
much like you as you are like yourself, and
they are enjoying just what you would if you
would get out of the ruts of conventional
worship, and try to serve God in ways that
shall make you think less of forms and more
Of the spirit. Your style Of worship is as
ridiculous to a Roman or a Greek Christian
as this to you. Which is the best? No
one. All are best that lead the soul nearest
to its Savior, stripped entirely of all false
and tawdry ceremony. [ could ask, why
not thus revive the experiences of our faith
ers in every branch of the chuI Oh of Christ,
from the days of Abraham till now, as the
Israelites did theirs in the Feast OF Taber-
| nacles? But | am in no mood for disputa
Iion. If you should say it is only picnic
sweetened with religion, shall thank God
for the picnic and the sweetening. Picnics
are not harmful; religion is not. Why are
they if put together? If you should say,
wherefore is this waste Of thousands of dol
lars? why was it not given to the poor? I
will not suggest who first proposed that
question, sAeither care 1 to reply, that the
poor are among the chief recipients of this
expenditure. The rich have their NewporLs
and Nahants, White Hills ard foreign shores
for their summer play grounds; the poor
| have camp meetings. Just below here is a
camp by the sea shore of Boston ladies
and gentlemen. Everybody commends their
! good sense. Yet shall not these Christians
enjoy like privileges with religion adjoined
without censure? Poor and rich here meet
and mingle, as seldom in the church, and
never at costly watering places. You may
say that they are getting so popular that the
worldly is overwhelming the religious ele-
ment. So it may be in your grand church,
my brother. IL your church as unworldly
as when it was a poor and prosecuted band
Of pilgrims. Covenanters, Lutherans, Epis-
copalians. Baptists, or Methodists-in g
word, Christians ? for every Christian
church thus began to live Popularity al
ways 'mperils piety; the church must not
let the reins slip from the grasp of hel
guide on this or any other path of duty
/ All the warnings of friends or foes must be
honestly welcomed, or be carefully noted,
and by especial vigor of faith and works be
avoided. God is as willing to appear in th'
temple as in the tabernacle, providing We
think as little of it. If we take pride IL
either. he will abandon both it ard US. Blu
we beg pardon for this seeming argument
We only meant to describe, not defend.
The charms of the spot to those who
abide in it are beyond description. TIL,
great congregation swayed like the trees By
the wind; the solemn declarations of DIVINE
Justice and mercy; the wood notes wild tina
fill the majestic temple with their waves o
praise and specification; the strong cries AM
tears that make angels rejoice; the exaltius
shouts that awake responses in the uppe
sanctuary-lhese, to one to the manner borI
or trained. are full of chaste, holy, spiritua
delights.
But his chief pleasure was in the crowd
less seelusion of Christian fellowship. Ii
the family aud familiar service of the tentt