The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1886-06-07

as preached to you, l don't see why Won should be
mealy -mouthed about it. or sit there like old
some sentiments later on that, per-
won't be hard on Us. You will
be the sufferers" The audience took Mr.. Small
at bis word, and after this the applause was
frequent
The speaker, beginning his sermon proper.
took as his text part of the sixteenth chapter
of Matthew, thirtieth verse: "Oh, We hypocrites
ye can discern the face of the sky, but can not
discern the signs Of the timesl' The speaker.
continuing, said: '.When I lived on plantation
in the South my old nanny could tell by the
pigs carving shucks in their mouths that 1t was
going to get cold. My old uncle could tell
from hearing the raincrow when 1t was
weather bureau. and We do not rely on these
signs, but the Sadducees and Pharisees relied on
them, and were very skillful in noting them.
Jesus took advantage OF this. lie was tne moel
accomplished critic of human motives OF that on
any other time. He called them hypocrites, and
asked them if that were not the time of all times
when something ought to happen, when the
Christ ought to come. He said to them that
with oil their profound knowledge they ought to
be looking for the elimination, for Him who full
filled the prophesies and all the requirements OF
the times. Christ was not only a consum-
mate critic, but was man who could
puncture all the shams of the time. Those who
wrote the gospels tried to preserve the intensity
of the language used by Christ We say we
don't like slang. 1t does not suit our super.
cultured condition, we say Christ used word
which, in His day, was as slangy as anything we
use. He applied to those Jews, with their hyper
religion an epithet that was very offensive
to them. He called them hypocrites.
The word has been dignihed in
modern times by its universal applica-
tion. We have so many hypocrites nowadays,
so much company to whom the term is APP
piled, that we don't feel ashamed of it. Laugh
fer Ua mr. a
came to him putting on their airs. He called
some Of them vipers. If you call a man a viper
now. he don't care much, but if you call him
snake, he gets very mad. Jesus talked about
swine But you mustn't talk about
hogs or snakes in the pulpit to-day. You must
say vipers and swine. Laughter. I would rath-
er be hog than hypocrite. hog is hog
because he can't help himself; but hypocrite is
such because he wants to be. The word hypo-
critic is a strong epithet, and it is wonder they
did not keep it out of the revised version
Laughter They banded epithets in those
days. They spoke of Moses as this fellow
Ii you spoke OF a preacher as a fellow ii
would be q very serious affair. They used epi-
thets to Christ and He used epithets to them.
Christ is the same yesterday, to day and
forever. If He were here to-day some
of you would have to hustle yourselves in q
lively fashion. He'd follow you with a whip Of
thorns and revise the church rules. He'd 60
into your temples and run out the money chang
ers. It's happy thing for some of you that
Christ isn't here. He saw that those people
were hypocrites, whited sepulchers filed with
the old landmarks, and were easing
and pluming themselves in the belief
that they were doing Gods work.
Already he saw Calvary and the cross, and him
self nailed to it. He saw that all things were
c0nspiring to reach that event; that when man
came teaching Gods religion and showing their
hypocrisy-their scoundrelism before God-thas
would be his fate among that age and people.
Suppose now, we leave out the word hypo-
critic to suit the fastidious, and merely say.
What are we to consider today What
manner of an age do we live in? Whittier are
we tending9 What must we do to get our peo-
pie into the barbors Of eternity. The world is
filed to-day with assumptions and interpreta-
tons of the life and teachings of Christ contrary
to what he taught. People begin to believe that
they have probed it to the bottom, and that they
are living in the state that is just right We
are living in state that is a semiheathen para
mour of the hypocrisy of old. There are men
who to-day would rather be considered orthodox
in creeds than Chrisr-like in lives; men who
would put the ratchet upon the wheels OF any
teaching different from their own men who
would have you taught they teach, or not
taught at all. What mean these lurid scenes
in the morning skies in the social, business and
political world! Why is the business world In
fermentg Why are men in antagonismY Why
do we see in the East and In the West the
flashing of discontent9 Why are tho
Drawn and muscle of the land put
in antagonism with It's capitaf The political
economist fails to find any great underlying
principle that ought to bring them into antagon-
ism. There must then be some remedy and
we must discover it. Why do we have section
arrayed against section, party against party2
Why is it that the integrity and character Of
men in responsible positions count for nothing.
that they are compelled to give bonda
Why is it that in the midst of
culture you must, in voting choose
between two evils in the shape of candidates.
No honest man to-day can look at the troubles
in the business political and social worlds and
not say there is something fatally wrong in tho
methods of things. something that must be
remedied if we are to have prosperity and con-
tentment.
Go to Washington and you will not find on the
calendar of either House measure that even
claims to be a remedy for the present troubles.
Go to the press of the country, and in the ed-
torial rooms you will find more knowledge COM
pressed into small packages than in any other
place in the world. Go to the newspaper Offices
and you will find little men who think that what
they don't know wouldn't fill a yellow-backed
primer for Adam. Laughter They know
all about religion, all about political
economy, to its profoundest depths
see where they will lead you to. You woulS
wind up in saloon in nine cases out of ten. /
know, for I've been there myself Laughter.
Yet take the greatest journals. with all their
knowledge, with all their marshaling Of the
facts OF history. and you find no solution. Go,
then, to the pulpits If you ought to find it
anywhere you should find il there. Too
many pulpits are found running away
into the transcendental or the rhetorical
A laborer or a capitalist might 60 into every
church between the oceans without finding any
suggestion that would remedy the trouble of tho
time. If the preachers were doing what they
should we would not be cropping in darkness for
the solution of our troubles today. 1t looks as
il there were a great popular strike against
the churches and religion and that
the people were boycotting churches and
preachers. What inducement has O man
who is weighted down with the troublous ques-
tons Of the day. to 90 into church, He would
know no more when he came out than when he
went in, except that the preacher had got off
something fine. with nothing in it. tLaughter.l
The expression, christian statesman" has
fallan into s.innocno,1s dasuafudan II Is laughAd