The weekly democratic statesman. [volume] (Austin, Tex.) 1871-1883, 1882-12-28

lOl GuClI SOOu.
Meanwhile this heresy business is
beginning to grow alarming, as it may
become epidemic. What is it that
every now and then stirs up his odium
theologicum Is it an indirect result
of the social and political and moral
license allowed here? Does it come
from the freedom and boldneSS of
thought and the wide latitude allow
ed to clergymen by their flocks? Or
Is it something in the air-some theo-
logical malaria floating about? What
denomination is to suffer next? Who
is to be the next hereto?
How Mr.. Swing Swung Col. Bob.
In the course of remarks on 1.-The
Preacher and his Enemy" Mr.. Swing
said that man witty and eloquent
and bold seems to have entered upon
lifelong warfare against the clergy
of whatever name. He passes from
city to city and from town to town,
not with Coughs eloquence against
intemperance, not with the old elo-
quence of Everett upon the character
of Washington, not with the silver
speech of Wendell Phillips upon the
arts or the heroism of L'Ouverture,
not with the useful lessons of Greeley
upon the economies of life, but with
interminable complaints against all
the tenets and teachers of religion.
If this public speaker attempted to
point out the oddities of a Talmage
and would make subject of "Talma-
gian Theology" the field always
proved too small for his rhetoric, and
q
centric preacher he quickly
passed to the entire religion
of the human race. Let his sentences
begin as they may they hasten to form
general protest against all ideas and
religion. He is less kind than Thomas
Poine and less broad and less learned
than Voltaire. He has none of the
outbranching of mind and sentiment
which helped ornament Bolingbroke
and Hume and Gibbon. He masses
all his forces into the one purpose. of
being an enemy of the common preach
er. If any one shall deny him breadth
of learning or feeling, he must give
him the credit of having power of
concentration. Like a sun-glass, he
throws what rays he has upon one
point, and thus makes his words carry
the most possible smoke and heat.
Thus has he made himself into an
enemy of the preacher-frst and last
and always an enemy.
There were errors and follies in the
church which called for an acute and
searching review from some critic
who should stand outside the temple.
And could any one have risen up
against the errors of Calvanism and
against many almost disgraceful theo-
ries as to the character of God, he
would have done all religion valu-
able service; but general and per-
sistent attack upon the whole theory
of church and ministry does not
seem to possess single element OF the
true or the beautiful or the good
Such attack is not eloquence, but only
fault-fnding upon scale so large as
to make a complaining mind seem to
be philosopher.
Who then is this average preacher
who is now attacked by a popular
enemy? He is hard-working man,
who, upon small pay, has toiled hard
| in the past and who is toiling hard in
the present-for what ?-always for
the happiness of society. There may
have been centuries in which the
world held so little truth and wisdom
| that the preachers had not much OF
value to give to the pOpulace, but if
one will estimate this toiler by the
Protestant work in the last two cen
| turies alone he will find that no other
laborer has done so much for the null
titude and for so small a reward in
gold If you should investigate that
notorious high church, St. Albans of
London, in which perhaps your plain
taste would be offended by gaudy
colors and excessive external forms,
you would find that its clergy and
money are not educating hundreds but
thousands of the poor, and have done
those noble deeds so many years that
could all those thus led from sin and
ignorance to virtue and light be as
sembled now in one multitude, inf
deity looking upon the scene would
bow its head in shame that its elo.
quence could not point to any similar
spectacle. Brought thus into com.
parison, infidelity would hasten to teal
| its rhetorical laurels from its unWor.
| thy temples. But the moral good
springing up around the church at st
Albans is only a single rose plucked
from christian world which has TO-.
600 fields where such lowered leaves
are seen. But the new, impetuouS
enemy of the pastor cannot see living
facts, but only old abstract ideas; anC
while chasing after these he tram
Piles under careless foot the richest hui
manities of our globe. One can
! find in the book stores the
! biography of a single pastor
( whose work, limited thus to one SOU
and by that span of time that lies be
tween the morning and the night Of
life, brought more good to a country
than could have come to it by any
| other profession than that of the com
mon pastor. The beautiful California
was the scene of this mans labors, anC
the days of gamblers and murdererS
were at the time of that drama which
I would have been thrilling if the
human crowd were just enough to the
sublime in human life. This preacher
began his work when he could FIND
only about a score of Christians
in that city which has since become
the Golden Gate. So homeless was hi
in the outset that he sought shelter a
night in the same dens with gambler!
for all public places were dens of sin
and crime. He saw men fall in fights
and in murder. He took up his
abode in q society unblessed with
the presence of woman or child
and denied, as it seemed, the presence
of even a compassionate God. Out ol
such gold-mad multitude this mar
brought forth the finer qualities o1
the human heart; he gathered up the
memory of better days, of piou'
homes, of long absent mothers anC
sisters and wives, and compelled the
hymns of religion to displace many al
oath, and the simple little church tt
arise where only the eye had seen thu
haunt of the gambler. And yet the
deeds of that one faithful preacher
have been repeated in all parts of the
states and empires which now com
pose the wide outlines of civilization
You do not even ask whether he wa.
a Methodist or Baptist or a Calvin
ist or an Episeopalian, because yol
know so well that the picture herr
painted can be found over and owe
again in the history of any Christian
sect.
Religion VS.. Infidelity.
H-11 - =. e q