Morning journal and courier., 1883-03-08
Free Religious.Association.

481M09TB
 Christ of the GOspel-What is NIystery-I
 Closing Exercises.
 Yesterday afternoon the session of the | National Free Religious association held in | the Church of the Messiah was opened by an essay read by Miss Emily J. Leonard, of Meriden, on s'rhe Union of Church and State in Connecticut The speaker dwelt on the early history of Connecticut, when all had to contribute for the support of the Congregational church, while in the New
 Haven colony to be a voter the person had
 to be church member. A constitutional
 convention was held in 1918, which was sup
 posed to have resulted in 8 severance of the
 union of Church and State. The speaker
 proceeded to review some of the objections
 blestatutes still remaining. That setting forth
 that it was the duty of all men to worship a
 supreme being she did not like, holding it to
 be no part of the States province to point
 out what shall be anyone's religious duty.
 The law intended that no person shall be
 compelled to support church or religion,
 yet as church es and church parsonages below
 S5, 900 in value were by law exempted from
 taxation, every taxpayer virtually paid so
 much for the support of religious organiza-
 tions. Christians and Jews, the law said,
 could unite and form religious organization, but no provision was made for the Church of Humanity or the Ethical Culture society.
 She defied judge in the State to define
 what was meant by the term Christian She thought the statutes relating to blasphemy,
 especially where swearing against God, the Holy Trinity or the Scriptures were concern ed, should be abolished, an offense against divine being not coming under the head of an offenss against the civil law. The present
 Sunday law she claimed had many objectiona- ble features and were founded on 8 union of
 Church and State. The laws against profani-
 ty were not observed and should be abolish
 ed. The oaths administered in courts were,
 she said, disgrace to the statute books and
 should be expunged. She quoted the divine command 'sswear not at all. .' The foregoing were the principal relics of the old union of
 Church and State. She also thought Fast
 and Thanksgiving days 8 relic of the time when there was an established religion.
 MT. Woodward, editor of the I9adec, in an
 address opposed the idea that churches should not be taxed also opposed Fast day and Thanksgiving day in the sense of their being days officially appointed. He was followed by MT. Kimball, the Unitarian pas tor in Hartford, who made an interesting address.
 Last evening at the closing session William
 H. Spencer, of Florence, Mass, read paper
 on ''The Christ of the Gospels and our Moral
 Ideal"
 The speaker believed that there was
 Jesus of history, but the Christ of the Cos pei was largely a picture. But, accepting this semi-mythical being as real historic character, the question the speaker proposes to discuss, was is this Christ of the gospel a perfect beingP He answered the question in the negative. He gave as his reasons: First, that Jesus did not claim to be perfect. Sec ond, the evidence of his moral imperfectness in the gospels. He read seven coments in
 his indictment of the gospel character,
 his racial prejudice. illustrated in Matt.
 xv: 22-28. Second, of class prejudice in Luke xvi: 1929, wherein the rich man, as appears, is condemned, simply | because he is rich and the poor beggar goes to heaven simply because he is poor. Third, of sectarian prejudice as evidenced in his too sweeping condemnation of the whole sect of l the Pharisees, calling them all hypocrites and generation of vipers.n Fourth, the motives to conduct offered generally was hope of reward or fear of pnnishment which belong to the lower motives. Fifth, the ab- sence of temperance teaching in the gospel Sixth, the spirit of submission to authority ] taught in our gospel belongs to @ monarchical
 not republican government. The spirit of | liberty is not found in the New Testament. Seventh, the spirit of inquiry, the love of
 truth for it's own sake, the spirit that follows l it wherever it leads in short the spirit of modern science is not found in the gospels. l af he 1ir1itQ ! and imperfections of the Christ of the gospel l The fact that we can see these limitations | is proof that we have in our mind an idea of
 moral excellence higher than the gospel
 character. This moral ideal we might ] call the Christ of the nineteenth century and l it is better than the Christ of the first. ''No | Christ of the gospels" said the speaker, " is | to me so divine like form as this image in my own mind of what ought to be and do. " l Our moral ideal is not person, but form 1 of thought. Devotion to this upper thought | is the essence of religion in it's higher forms. | Following came an address on Mystery 1 by Frederick A. Hinckley, of Providence, R. I. The speaker said:
 | Mystery wraps us everywhere like cloud. We know not tle stars, we know not what ] constitutes the real miracle of growth, we | know not what it is that gives music, elo | quence or even character their greatest I charm. But all the mysteries of outward nature, all the mysteries of the influence of l music eloquence and character upon human
 nature are not so impenetrable as the mys- | teries of death and birth. I link the two to- | gether for which is the greater no one can | tell. Our life begins in mystery, it contin-
 ues in mystery, it's apparent end is in mys- 1 tery. The power men call God is also 8 mystery. How earnestly humanity has 1 sought to find out the universal. There is nothing more pathetic in history than the manner in which the human mind has over | 1O01y yad l,7Hr1 kA RH1o iko l of a supreme power. And who was ever l able to explain the presence of 1 evil in the world? We know nothing Are we wise enough to know that? We are all breathing, moving, thinking, loving-how, 1 we do not understand. We only know the l fact. And yet to-day there are people who talk as if they knew it all. They have fathomed the unfathomable. They have re- ] vealed the mysteries of the unknown. For | myself I see too much in this great realm which no man has cared to bind on the earthly or the heavenly side. Amid all the de- | termination to define with most astounding I minuteness of detail, which is our inheritance l from a barbarous past, turn trustingly to l the scientific position and say do not know. I remember Goethe said in old age, have been fifty years learning how to read and 1 have not learned yet. remember that after all his achievements in knowledge, Newton
 exclaimed, have only picked up few peb- | bles on the beach of the infinite ocean of truth And I see in the attitude of the
 great poet and the great scientist the spirit l of true religion, humble as little child, with | teachabIe mind and reverent heart standing receptive to that new truth which must ever
 exceed in quality and quantity the old. The sweet comfort for those who mourn; the brightest cheer for the heavy heart, and the 1 final solution of life's doubts and mysteries
 are not to be found in clinging to the old su- perstitions; they are to be found in facing physical and spiritual facts in a reverent,
 scientific spirit. So shall every spot on which
 we tread become an altar and every act of
 our lives prayer.
 A Hartford WOman's Suicide.
 Mrs. Amelia Stoddard, woman divorced from her husband, left the house of her
 father, Jonathan Stoddard, in Hartford af-