New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1880-07-25
TIM cOUTNG CAMP MEETINGS.

The camp-meeting season has fairly begun.
| At Sea Cliff the attendance was unusually
large the Tabernacle was crowded and hun
dreds of tents we're erected by devout Metho-
dlsts. Reports from this favorite camp on Long
| Island bring accounts of the delight of the
"yOung people at meeting again on this beauti-
full beach, the Hrich satins and exquisite
bonnets of the fashiOnaby dressed women
@who thronged the services" the expected out
@pouring of the Spirit" and the probability
that the number of conversions will surpass
| those of any other year."
The season cannot be said to be at its height
until the opening of the great religious camps
at Ocean Grove and Chautauqua-the present
educational conference at Chautauqua being
of purely a secular CHI .cter. When the
camp at Ocean Gro, With numberless
other smaller but similar ones throughout
the country, are fully under way, the crowds
of elegantly dressed women, the sports of the
young people, the inflammatOIy appeals to the
| Holy Spirit, and the expected conversions, will
| be increased from hundreds to thousands.
Does this read like blasphemy2 The text Is not
| The TmBUNE's. 1t is the simple report OF the
daily doings at these camps, and it accurately
reflects theiI spiIit-a mixture of fun, delight
! full outdoor life, very cafnal pOmps and
vanities and the most exalted devotion. Every
year since these enormous gatherings Tor pur-
poses of amusement and conversion became
fashionable, The TRIBUNE has uttered its warn
ing against them. In the interests of religion,
| 1t is desirable that the camp meeting as usually
conducted should be reformed.
The leading Methodist managers Of these
meetings are, as rule, men of real piety and
sound common sense. Their first idea In the
matter was rational enough-that God could
be worshipped out of doors as well as, if not bet
ter than in a church, with sincere fervor and
dev otlon and that the meeting of cody,
earnest people by the sea or in the mountains
in the Summer for such worship would be an
altogether right aud pleasant thing. There
certainly is no reason why Nature and her
lessons should be abandoned to the wicked
and evil doors. But the same piety and COM
mon sense which led these managers to plan
the assemblages ought to teach them the great
difficulty of conducting them with sincerity
and reverence. The difficulty is so great that
in many instances, considered as religious meet
ings, they are enormous failures and calculated
to bring Christianity into the worst disrepute.
The chief obstacle in the way of the pOus
managers Is that the camp meeting grounds
are usually in the hands of a jOint-stock
corporation, who are more interested in "mak-
"ing the thing gO' and getting their money
back with q hundred per cent than in winning
souls to Jesus. They use all means to make the
camp place of popular resort. IL is crowded not
only with the pleasure seeking, careless classes
but the scum of the cities, who invariably
follow the crowd. Over this multifariOus
throng who might pass muster as
ordinary citizens of an ordinary town, the
ministers erect the banner of the Cross, set
strict church rules, put hymns in1O all their
mouths /; in word, turn the whole assemblage
into one vast prayer and praise meeting. The
consequence If that the most sacred names and
truths are banded about, hackneyed as gutter
gossip.
With all respect for the devOut min
listers who lead in these meetings. we
must add that their spirit and manner conduce
to this end. Their souls probably are per-
petually in a condition of rapt devotion, but
the souls of their audiences assuredly are not.
The most of these elegantly dressed women "
or owners of handsome cottages have come
down, not to be converted, but to have q good
time" The minister assumes mat there IS an
Outpouring of the Spirit from the beginning
Instead of leading their minds gradually to
soberer and more devout moods, his exalted
paroxysmal strains might suit the temper of
the thousands who cried out on the day of
Pentecost, in agony, "What shall we do to be
saved " There is too often room to doubt
whether the revivalist himself feels the awful
meaning of these exalted Outcries A man
cannot go out from his beef and pudding and
rise at call into the rapture of Isaiah and
John. But these are the things he came TO say. |
aud he says them. The consequence is that he |
does not lift his hearers or himself from the |
ground, but he does bring God down to it, he |
makes Of Christ and of HIS salvation stale |
catchwoIds. The humblest Christian, who is
used to approach his Saviour with profound |
Tenderness and awe, must protest against the |
blasphemous familiarity with which sacred |
truths are banded about in these places.
We wish to be distinctly understood. |
THE TRIBUNE has nothing but val for
the first purpose of these religious camps. |
But we insist that managers and ministers |
should recognize the fact that it Is no longer |
their dominant purpose. The well to do |
MethOdists, in their Publications at Ocean |
Grove or Sea Cliff, are not seeking God in |
q the same way as did their fathers in the DAYS
of Wesley Nobody could doubt the sincerity
of the poor ooal-heavers the rabble OF the
duchesses who followed Venn or Whitefeld.
Let the managers and ministers oil the camps
now appreciate the change and use all their
discretion III dealing with these enormous
assemblages of people who are set to woislip