Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-10-28
OBLIGATORY SERMON,
DELIVERED BY REV. C. P. MASSEY
ON YESTERDAY.
The Unitarian Society Holds Its First
Service in the New Pythian
Castle.

An efficient choir, composed of Miss Emma
FELTON,, Miss Hattie Wheat, Mr.. Richard
Cohn and Mr.. George w. Shannon, with
Miss Gertie Gerrish as organist, and Mr..
Charles A. Neale as special accompanist,
occupied the neat little gallery which has
been tastefully curtained, and rendered the
following selections Quartette, "Venite''
(Buck); quartette, Calvary" rodney:
trio, Soprano tenor and bass, STARS of the
Night Shine Ger Us" (Campana) offer
tory, ANGELS Serenade;" soprano solo,
with flute obligato and quartette, "Guide
Me, o, Thou Great Jehovah"
Rev. G. P. Massey took for his text
l., 5: Now the end of the COM
mandment is charity, out of pure heart,
and good conscience, and of faith un-
feigDed."
Mr.. Massey commenced by saying; II
cannot avoid a feeling that those under
whose direction this house has been
builded, and which we make to-day our
outlook and orstory of a religious worship,
must look upon this initial use
of the ediice by which we dedi-
cate it to the service of Almighty God,
Will Vi U1OkC ludn pdSSlfC
acquiesence. With the passage of the
years and the changes of thought which
have occurred in consequence of the en-
larging knowledge of the world, no feature
of our modern civilization has more dis
tinctly marked, perhaps, the altered opin-
ion of men upon subjects included within
the religious realm Than the magnificent
material foundations possessed by benevo-
lent orders, and the vast constituency
they can claim, taken from the best and
most responsible of our citizens. l have
intimated that it is because of the changes
of thought which have been gradually
taking place that the rise of these magnih-
cent establishments is due, which divide
with the church, SO much of the. ale
glance of mankind towards claims of
brotherhood and intellectual and moral
improvement, and the establishment of a
better order of society, based on equality
and fraternity, and the unimpeded liberty
of each in pursuit of the privileges guaran-
teed to him by the Constitution under
which we live.
But in the transference Of allegiance
from On institution which stands more
particularly for worship, to one which sim
ply elevates the watchwords of benevolence
and mutual sympathy among men, one
does not escape the fact that there are
wants of our nature to which the church
should be especially adapted to minister,
and that there are suggest tons constantly
yelling up in consciousness which the
church should be able to support with as
surances of things that are real and tam
gible in spiritual world. The church, as
the institution which stands distinctively
for the religious sentiment, may not be
able to enforce conviction as to the spirit
ual reality of that to which the sentiment
is thought TO correspond; the very methods
of Interpretation may be regarded as weak
and puerile, and adapted to an order of in
telligence the world has outgrown, but the
sentiment will remain appealing for en-
lightenment as to the reality of that which
it suggests, as long as man looks outward
upon the heavens or inward into the recesses
of his heart. Do as he will, man cannot
escape this drag upon his nature by spirit
ual things. At every moment almost of
his existence he is conscious of the reflex
action which the phenomena of the out
ward universe occasions in him. The emo
tions of awe, of wonder, of terror, of love,
of delight, which it inspires are one and all
but the going out from us of something in
our being to meet the mystery by which
we feel ourselves to be eternally encom
passed.
1.-The depth of these emotions occasioned
by our contact with the natural world IS
finely expressed by William Wordsworth
in his eloquent description of morning in
the mountains. And if this is the common
sentiment expressive of the influence of
natural objects upon our lives, what shall
we say of the teachings of experience which
inspire this sentiment in larger and fuller
measure. Superior minds-minds whose
power in some manifestations of it, some
times seems separated from that of other
men, both in degree and in kind, have
looked with long brooding and reflection
upon the deeper law and hidden meaning
of human life, and have given to the world
what in one and another place, and at one
and another time, has been regarded as
revelation.
such are the minis belonging to such
gifted souls as Moses, and Isaiah, and
Buddha, and Zoroaster, and Mohammed,
and Gschylus, and Jesus of Nazareth.
But it is in our belief that the humblest
among us has the power and faculty of
testing the truth of this revelation by indi-
vidual experience, it is our confidence
that this revelation of seer or sage is but
the vivid description of the brush of the
Eternal against our common lives that ena-
bles US to give credence to it and erect itinto
something which has relation with that
which is real and substantial as anything
which comes within the circle OF our
knowledge in the material world.
mo one here in this house this morning
can say that he has not at times felt the
brush of the garments of the Almighty.
There is not a birth that comes to any
household in the land but what is an
apocalypse of mighty import to every in
mate there. There is not marriage con-
tracted in mutual love and reverent trust
but what becomes a sacrament to two be
lieving hearts, and seal and symbol OF
eternal verities. There is not death which
throws a temporary g DOM athwart our
dwellings, but lifts the horizon of our little
lives and displays them potential with
greatness and majesty of which we had
not dreamed"
The speaker, while speaking with the
utmost sympathy for work which is in
tended to operate upon a purely ethical
plane, strenuously defended his belief in
religion as the inclusive sphere, and re-
ferred TO the comprehensive significance OF
the apostles Injunction that tie end of the
commandment is charity out of a pure
heart and good conscience, and of faith
unfeigned. Here" he said, 1--WE have in
comprehensive statement the two require
ments upon which l have insisted, faith
and works, the sentiments of awe and rev.
erence before the mysterious presence and
power in which we are embosOmed, and
sympathy for our fellows and desire to
tighten something of theweight of suffer-
ing borne by many weary waytsrer on
life's broad highway, listening meanwhile
with plying ear to the sad, sweet music OF
humanity. l need hardly emphasize the
fact that this estimate of religion includes
a pure heart and good conscience, clean
living and high thinking, the practice of
integrity and a disciplined will, which
holds conduct as true to its appointed aim
as the needle to the magnetic pole.
abraham Lincoln is reported to have
said; Whenever find church which
inscribes upon its portals the two rules
Thou shalt love God with all thy heart, and
thou shalt love thy neighbor SIS thyself-
10 that church will l belong. Such sim
pie confession of faith would include every
requirement. and in its comprehensive
sweep would make all mankind brethren
in one common privilege.
"And perhaps L need not say 10 tnls
audience that nothing less than this all-ln,
elusive statement will satisfy the profound
and reyerent intellects of the present Gay
who believe as men never believed before,
because compelled by collateral testimony
they cannot disregard in the unity OF GOD,
in the continuity of nature and IN the
solidarity of man. Such a faith strikes at
once fatal blow at any preconceived idea
of q special revelation ct the belief that