The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-12-06
The Sunday Journal has the largest and
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THE TWO EXTREMES.


Said Sir Walter Scott, as he saw the old
Iron Church burning, 'Eh! but many weary
sermon have heard in yon old church" The
stern faith of the Scotch Calvinst was well
adapted to develop the iron virtues required
by the times in which it was dominant; but it
was dreary faith, nevertheless, and ill-suited
to a condition that developed the graces and
amenities of society. When it was no longer
necessary to fight persecution with persever-
ance and an intolerant law with bigoted
Faith, the hard teachings and harder practices
of Calvinism became uncongenial and repuls-
i've. Not because there was less real religion
among men or less earnest devotion to the
service of God but because change of feel
ing came with a change of condition, and
when society began to cultivate literature and
Ihe arts, and to find enjoyment in SOCIAL
intercourse and the exhibition of taste and
refinement, the religious practices of a pre-
yious condition were found as ill-fitting as
the wide-legged boots and the big hats. 1t
was no longer grim satisfaction to sit three
hours under sermon subtilized into forty
"heads' and five applications, or to make
Sunday a day of positive pain by restraint
and self-denial that was denial Of no evil
and no influence that could cause evil. Sir
Walter Scott only gave utterance to this SEN
timent of antipathy to the old exacting, harsh
religion that worked wholly by fear and re-
preston and the curses of the law, and not
at all by love, and kindness, and pleasant as
sociations. Sermons had become "weary,"
and the obseryances they were fitted to had
become weary and dreary, and were tending
to repel the better classes Of society from re-
hgious connections. Such faith would have
few followers in this day and land
At the opposite pole of the religious world
we find condition of society that is as little
likely to meet the approval of genuine religion
or judcious culture. We see it in cities, here
and abroad, where theaters are opened on
Sunday, and saloons do their best business at
church tme where all the amusements and
games of the week are given an added zest
and larger attendance on that day, and such
occupations as can profit by the business of
the day are prosecuted with as close an indus
try as any other day. It is not because
Sunday is made sacred by any divine sanction
that there is measure of dissertation in
such disregard of it, but because the
great majority of community holds the
day sacred to rest and worship, and experience
has proved that such consideration and OBJ
servance is wholesome influence for health
and morals. A day of restraint on self-indul-
gence, of attention to higher duties than
those of the store or the shop, or the office, is
a needed day in all civilized communities,
whether it be set apart by law or not, and
when set apart by law or custom its disregard
is menace Of evil always and source of evil
often. Wherefore we are by no means dis
posed to accept the assurance of Rev. w. II.
Mofett, our consul at Athens, that the weeks
amusements can be proftably renewed on
Sunday. He says:
'The churches here are open on Sunday
forenoons, many at hours when good people
are fast asleep, and in the afternoons and
evenings the people enjoy themselves. They
have their family parties, their harmless en-
joyments, their music and dancing and their
evening concerts. DO sincerely believe that
they can go to their nights rest with a more
devout and thankful spirit and with more
lively gratitude to the good Father of ALL than
If the day had been turned into a continual
ton OF the old Jewish Sabbath, filled up with
services at all hours, Sunday schools, class
meetings, temperance speeches, ETC., ad
nauseam, until the children, at least, get to
dread Sunday as the dreariest of all the week"
1t is not necessary to moral community to
fill up Sunday with sermons, Sunday schools
class meetings and temperance speeches, ad
nauseum, to make the day subserve a moral
purpose. Much more good is to be done by
filling good part of it with pleasant family
and neighborly gatherings for intelligent con-
yersation and home entertainments, and max
ing it especially day in some sort sacred to
home and home pleasures. The old Calvin
istic idea that Sunday is to
be made dreary to childhood and ma
turity by press of observances
and exercises with which the spirit Of this gen.
Grafton has little sympathy, seems to possess
Mr. Moffett, and he cries out against it for the
fascinating freedom of Greek life. He is as