The Richmond palladium. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1855-1875, 1875-05-05

sympathy and effort, new methods
should either be devised or older
methods revived. as the needs OF
the situation may seem to suggest.
There are, really, very few single
methods which can be made effec-
tive Tor very long period. People
tire OF sameness, especially In any
thing which is at all sensational in
its nature The crusade of the
Winter of 1873 and 1874, however
good and wholesome it night have
proved intrinsically and in its re-
suits, was in high degree exciting,
and stirred the foundations of SO
ciety. It was not in the nature of
things that such feature should
become permanent. When it be
came story that was once told,
the masses of the people had no
further use for it. The immense
mass meetings and the extraordi-
nary demonstrations became events
of the past and went into history
Is there any less real virtue in
the people? BY no means! Is
there now any less determination
among the masses of men and wo
men to destroy the liquor trafficl
We believe there is not! Are liquor
sellers and their dannable business
in any better repute to day than
they were year ago? Not at all.
The man who poisons his neighbor
at ten cents dose is as certainly a
social outcast this year as he was
last.
Still, we have no great Temper
anee mass meetings! All efforts
to gather the people in multitudes,
in either local or State Temperance
conventions, are failures; and all
attempts to organize Temperance
men and women-and good citi-
zens-for effective work seem to
be fruitless.
Is, then, all lost2
No. Nothing is lost! We must
have a new method of work-or,
still better, we must revive an old
method. That must be done now
which should have been done years
ago. and which, had it been done
faithfully, would have forestalled
the Crusade movement that pre-
vailed last winter. The Christian
people of communicative mem
bers of the Churches-mustu under
take the work of reform, and of q
more thorough and complete style
| of reform that has ever been at
tempted by any merely secular
organization! Christians are the
salt of the earth. Let them &C.
quire and exhibit SAVIOR! They are
the light of the world. Let them
take tine ''busheI' from over the
blaze SO that it can be seen! If
there is anything at all i'll Christi
anity--if it is genuine, and true,
and effective-and not a fable, a
falsehood and a fraud-it is an
agency adequate for the removal of
all that wrong : socially, politically
and In all other respects-in COM
munity. It is incomparably be-
You'd all other reformatory agen-
cies in its capacity and possibii-
ties. While one secular society
aims to destroy intoxication, and
another cruelty to animals. and
another gambling, and another
something else-the Church should
step forward and try to destroy all
at once by changing men, totally,
in heart and in life and transform
ing them into new creatures!
1t is true there would be no nov
city in this except in it's present
application to the needs of society
1t is an old story, There were no
temperance societies in Palestine
Christ furnished something better
There were no Anti Cruelty to
Animals organizations in Judea
eighteen hundred years ago. There
was no place in the hearts and
lives of the followers of the Divine
Man for cruelty to anything that
was animate. What society need
ed then was Christianity. What
men and women and children need
ed then was purity of heart-new
and transformed natures-inspired
and vivifed by the grace of Christ.
These phrases represent the need
of the hour. This is especially and
conspicuously the time when the
Church should make a forward
movement. and prosecute q work
which shall be effective and perma-
nent. All really great and lasting
moral and social revolutions have
been brought about through the
efforts of the followers of Jesus of
Nazareth. It was by this sign and
power of the cross that Martin
Luther and John Knox and Oliver
Cromwell and Jonathan Edwards
st,bdued spiritual kingdoms and
brought about moral and social
revolutions such as have never
been equalled in power or whole
some results in the history of the
world. But ministers of the Cos
pei, however able and active, can
not alone do this work, and they
ought not to try to do it alone.
What Dwight, l.. Moody. and
George H. Stewart, and William
E. Dodge and John Y. Farwell,
and Major Whittle, and thousand
of other laymen-in all Christian
lands-are trying to do-all Chris
tan men ought to try to do, and
could do if they would try.
And what Miss Smiley is trying
to do hundred thousand women
in America and Europe-equally
gifted, in mental and spiritual &C
quirements-ought to try to do.