The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1869-08-10
For the Register.
Camp Meetings How shall they provo more
Effective


That camp meetings, or grove meetings,
jealousy conducted and continued for a
suitable period are promotive of great
good, in the quickcning Of believers and
the awakening and conversion of sinners,
no one can doubt, at all conversant with
their character and history. The day of
judgment will doubtless reveal that humid
reds of thousands of souls, have directly
been saved through the agency of camp
meetings, that otherwise would have been
lost.
But to careful observers these state
ments are mere truisms and need only to
be stated to be acknowledged.
The matter now to be dealt with, is
the correction Of Il growing evil, viz: the
time or rather lack of time this great re-
ligous feast occupies
1t is becoming prevalent idea, that
grove meeting must commence on Monday
and close on Saturday morning, thus vir-
tually limiting the active period of reigi-
Gus work, to about four days.
For few years past, this has been the
usual practice within the range Of our
observation AS Il consequence, we have
but few conversions and the effort ac-
companied with much cost and painstak-
ing Is comparatively a il Hure
Now we protest most strongly against
this brevity. We believe it to be a
solemn and binding obligation on the
church, to continue these meetings about
twice the length of time mentioned above
1t requires at least several days to put
our religious forces under sound drill and
fighting trim. 1t is utterly inconsistent
to suppose that a large religious force
taken at once from the absorbing and
active duties of the farm, the shop and
the counting house, can be rendered as
effective in assauting the kingdom of
darkness, during the first four or five days,
as they can during the succeeding four
or five days. Icebergs can be melted but
not in moment; SHOWS and frost yield
to solar influence, but time is requisite.
Men-religious men and women, do be-
come chilled, frost permeates the affec-
tons and like the earth, at times too far
removed from the sun, they are morally
too far removed from the great sun Of
Righteousness to be efficient, in warning
and Illuminating sinners. They must
first be reclad in divine panoply.
These facts apply also with great force
to the sinner. He cannot be routed from
his strongholds in a moment. Entrenched
in sin welded to vile habit, allied and
joined hand in hand with rude and wick
ed associates, it requires time and more
time than is comprised within a period of
four days to ply him with gospel truths
and thoroughly arouse, awaken, and move
him to action and bring him over to sound
conversion and plant his feet on the Rock
of Ages. With few exceptions this is
sadly true. In few instances the sinner
less hardened and less obstinate yields,
and is brought into the liberty of the sons
Of God during these four days meetings +;
but alas what meagre reports, how small
the number converted. o how have we
been panied Of late, in reading the
reports Of Camp Meetings to mark the
poverty Of the rcsuts-thc almost entire
lack Of any respectable number of CONVEX
sionS.
Now what is the cause of this dcarth L?
1t is to be found, we verify believe,
mainly in the fact, that Just at that point
Of time in the progress Of the meeting
when sinners begin to weep and feel and
pray-when believers begin to obtain due
access to the mercy seat and to put on
strength, all conqucring Strength-the
time comes to halt, and the word is given
to strike our tents and dsband our forces
Scores of sinners are almost persuaded to
be Christians believers are now girded
for the spiritual conhict-ministcrs are
diyinely clad with supernatural power, and
the church is becoming marshaled and
equipped with a holy zeal that renders it
mighty through God in sappmg and pull
ing down the Strong-hods of Satan But
alas ! the sad hour has arrived when all
this array of united strength must be dis
banded and scattered, and the scores ready
to be garnered and folded, are sent away
in their tears, unconverted and unsaved
only to lapse into condition where
"the last state is worse than the first"
What can be done to remedy this giant
evil-this want ofheavenly wisdom-this
great lack of skill in the work of saving
souls, and echo answers-what can be
done?
To the question How can comp-meet-
ings be rendered grand success in the
conversion of sinners, and the poverty
of results now so apparent be avoided 4?
We reply; Let the call for camp-meetings
be early, say as early as the 25th of Au-
gnst, or the LIST of september, when the
weather is mild and inviting. Let the
call be for ten days, at least. We affirm
that it is morally and physically impossi-
BILE to secure large and desirable results,
in less than about that time. 1t is against
every principle of natural law, to expect
to reap on the next day after the seed is
cast into the soil. 1t must be watered
and warmed by rain and sun, ere it vege-
tates and begins new life. so it is
against ever principle of mental philoso-
ply, to calculate that the work of a sin
ner's conversion, from the service of the
adversary to that of his Redeemer, can be
commenced, carried on from step to step,
and finally comsumated, in a moment. 1t
requires time to produce the mental changes
necessary to this great result.
We give an instance in point. At a
camp-meeting on Burlington District,
few years since, the meeting was wisely
protracted from Saturday to Monday
morning, resulting in an addition of seven
ty five to the very few converted previous
to Saturday morning,
We think it will be found almost uni
versally true, that the last two or three
days of Il camp-meeting,are productive of
double or treble the results OF thefrst
four or five. In fact, (other things being
equal it cannot well be otherwise. 1t
is absurd and contrary TO all mental and