The Toledo chronicle. [volume] (Toledo, Tama County, Iowa) 1873-1924, 1874-07-16
The Camp Meeting Season.

At this season of the year the religious
portion of the community bctakes Itself TO
woods and the sea as naturally as the
worldly, and it may be questioned Whcth-
er worship is not crowding barren,
pleasure seeking fashion by the happy
association Of natures beauties with rev
ercnce for natures God. The canvas
walls of the camp meeting CLEAN among
the trees in the most picturesque spots on
the continent The voice Of devotion is
from the shady groves which border our
Western Lakes to the cliffs and sandbanks
of the Atlantic coast. In the East the
camp meeting season has already com
mcnced, and soon the tented fields OF
exhortation and prayer will be raising in
all parts of the Country. Even wicked
Long Branch will again catch the echo Of
HYMNS and Of shouts of G. aculatory prayer
from the ncighboring Ocean Grove. Sing
Sing has long been known as widely for its
camp meeting as for its prison, and New
England has actually built in Martla's
Vineyard summer city on a foundation
of religious services. Tents no longer
contain these ardent worshipcrs. The
camp OF a few years ago has become Il
town. Houses range along well-watered
streets, municipal governments are formed
by harmless union OF church and state f;
and Of the score Of incorporated camp
meeting associations that rule over sum
mcr communities, there is not one but
finds its real estate rising in value on its
hands Each succeeding season brings q
new population to settle amid the quiet of
its inclosure, and TO build around its cen
trail preaching stand.
Massachusetts has taken the lead this
year, and New York will follow in the in
ternational camp meeting at Round Lake,
which will, perhaps, be the feature Of the
season in this direction beginning the Sth
of July and extending through two weeks.
AS this year will constitute the seventy
first anniversary of the birth Of this system
Of conducting religious exercises, the
camp meetings will be even more numer-
Gus than usual, and we should not be
surprised if the tentlife of the Mcthodists
and some other denominations were to
continue until far into September.
Outdoor religion has become SO efficient
and attractive, that it will grow in popu-
larity as long as the lumberlnen can be
kept from utter destruction of Gods first
temples" There are no more attractive
spots for religious services than the
groves, the forests and the high, breezy
bluffs near the lake or the sea. Religion
ought to be broad, liberal, and healthy
under such conditions and influences.
There is no chance for the spiritual gan
creme of an ill-ventilated study to operate
here, and the cool breezes of sea, lake,
and forest, are refreshing and vivifying
substitutes for the somnolent forces
of church in midsummer. The fields
and the woods are the best illustrations
of religious truth, and the revivaiist
-. \; -hav, h,
them for his heaviest campaigns. But
there is so much in these gatherings to
attract the quietly disposed, that their
growing popularity is in no manner
strange They eliminate the dissipation
ofthe watering place and retain all its free
and airy flavor The daily preaching ser
vice is an innOcuous substitute for the
horse-race; the evening prayer meeting
for the ballroom hop. The excitement OF
the revival season-with its shouts, its
frenzy, and its hysterics-may well be
thought better choice than the feverish
play of the clubhouse and OF the two
classes Of summer enjoyment, 1t is evil
dent that the camp meeting, with its SER
mons and its love-feasts, its early hours
and its quite life, is gaining in favor upon
the whirling gayety Of the fashionable
hotels by whose side its tents are often
pitched While our camp meetings are
taking on more and more of the manner
Of the secular summer resort, they are yet
distinguished by prevailing religious
earnestness that gives them distinct
coloring and while Irritation and croquet
may invade their shady precincts, there is
that in the atmosphere of sincere devotion,
in the continuous mingling of prayer and
praise with the sound of the surf and the
rustling Of the trees which preserves
intact the character of this most pleasing
form of religious servicc.-Intcr Ocean.