The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1882-01-27
Communicated !
Bishcp Wnyman's Lecture.

MR. EplroR: When I saw in the COLUMBIAN
that Bishop Wayman of the a. VI. i. Church
was going to deliver lecture in Blooms
burg, upon the attacks on the Bible and the
Christian religion by Col. II. G.. lngersolls
would not have been more surprised to
have heard of proposition from some down
east Yankee to the Oregon navigation COM
pany to tunnel the Pacific Ocean, for a COM
mon highway between Asia and America.
At the appointed time Iresolvcd to make my
way to the scene, a distance of nearly three
miles through snow and slush. must con-
fess, however, that had some misgiving az
to the success of the lecture. OF course
knew Bishop Wayman's ability as pulpit
orator, and had heard him make mastery eff
forts at more youthful periods of his life. | had
no doubts of his ability to make an able de-
fense of the Bible and Christianity, based |
upon his honest conviction of right, taking |
into consideration the fact of Col. Ingersolrs |
being "A logicon of the first order, attempt |
ing to rerire theory that had long since been |
exploded by the advance ideas of Christian |
civilization, having thoroughly contemplated |
and that it would require more than the |
thcologians of the present day to unsay |
what he, Col. lngersoll, had said. | am glad |
to hear it expressed by those more compe- |
tent TO Judge than myself that the lecture |
was success The Bishop did not choose |
to combat Col. Ingcrsoll on his attacks |
against the Bible from IA high theological
Of I;u tlo
through was cmbellished with richness Of
thought, subimity of conception, and
practical simplicity of wisdom. He proved |
the entire truth of the Bible, as given to us by
Moses and the prophets, by our daily obser
vation, which does not need the aid of phil
osophcrs to solve. The Bishop gave the neg
atiyc expression to the oft repeated assertion
that the Bible was false and totally un-
worthy Of credit and confidence and that the
light of nature, reason and philosophy fur
nish man with n more perfect rule OF con-
duct and that Moses and that prophets who
wrote, as also the men who translated the
Bible were totally ignorant of the work in
which they were engaged. Col lngcrsoll
asserted that Moses comprehendcd the as-
tronomy of the universe in four words when
he said that in six days God created the
| heavens and the earth and all things therein.
| The inference we may draw from this fact is
| that the Almighty knew what he was about
when He selected Moses to do this great
work. AS it might have been a serious mis-
| fortune to Moses to have been endowed with
| the gift of CAB, that so many of us are at the
present day. From the very fact Moses
| complained at one time of being slow of
| speech, when the Lord commanded him to
| make Aaron his spokesman. Had Moses at
| tempted to convince the Israclitcs by argu-
| mcnt that God the Almighty was able to wall
| the Red Sea and cause the waters Of Iloreb
to gush FORTH it might have aroused the sus-
pcon of trick or Moses, as there were ma
| gcans in those days capable of working
| wonders by magic art. lie Iemcrely said "stand
| still and see the salvation of God" The small
| store of language possessed by Moses, from
| which Col. Ingersoll assumes him to have
| been ignorant, was suffic lent for the purpose
of the Almighty if not for philosophers and
| scientists of the present day. We may infer
| from the manner in which Moses spoke of the
| sun, moon and stars, that he regarded this
| earth as the great central figure and those
| celestial bodies as mere auXiliares to it.
| Even taking this view, it would seem that
Moses understood the astronom of the uni
verse sufficiently for all practical purposes
rs he was able to set forth the Office they
performed toward this earth. 1t WAS not
necessary for the human family to be en-
| lightened in those days as to the relative
position of the earth to the other planets, any
more so than fort child who had just learned
the multiplication table to commence. work
ing problems in trigonomitry, We are not to
infer that the six days spoken of by Moses
were of the Julian period it matters not to
| us whether it was six hundred or six
| thousand years. it merely signifies period
| to labor with an interval for rest, for the
benefit of the organic nature of man. View,
ing the Bible from moral stand point we
must take into consideration the fact of man
having fallen from the original state in which
lie was plac ed by the Creator. Although
there were many things in the Bible tha
were done by the command of the Almighty
which seem to be at variance with the stand
ard of Christian morality as in the case o
Saul in his conquest against Amelek in th'
valley of Gilgal, whereas the Almighty
caused his kingdom to depart from him TO
sparing the life of Agag and commanding
Samuel to slay Agag with his own hand. A
also the case of David in taking Abigail tn
wife of Mabel the Carmclitc in connection
with the wife of Uriah. All these thing
were necessary as mankind were undergoing
gressions. OF course Mr., lngersol claim
: that there were no such transgressions an
) that mankind never fell from the state /
which they were placed by the Creator an
hence there was no such thing as retrbutio
and if there was, why did not the OmnipC
tent endow man with an infallibe nature :
that he could not err The nfallible natul
with which man might have been endowc
by God is part of his creation .best know
to Himself and not to mankind The
things are not necessary for mankind
know, any more than the tree to be consciol
of the influence by which ii is made to gro
), and put forth its buds and yield its fruit
we had a Witch of Endor to-day capable
resurrecing Moses and the prophets al
placing them on witness stand, Mr. lngC
soil would be compelled as lawyer TO a
nit their testimony on its merits, as tn
&c were true in all things in which the hum
e family are competent to judge 1t wor
N not be necessary to tell the most ignora
~ Esquimau, New Xealandcr or HottCntot Il