Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-02-23
FLEXIBLE RELIGION.
People Can do Things in Washington
They Dare Not do at Home.
LAxITY SANCTIONED BY PASTORS.
A Visit to the Church Where the Father of
His Country Attended.
OTHER JOTTINGS FROM THE CAPITAL
rrRoM A STAFF CORRESPONDENCE

| WASHINGTON, feDruary A.-MOsL VS.
itors to Washington make it point to go
to the Church OF the Covenant, or "the
Church of the Government" as someone
wittiIy calls it. where President Harrison,
the Blaine family, and other notables at
tend uDon the means of grace, when they
feel like it-which, as runor has it, is not
so often as might be supposed by good
Presbyterians. The fact is, that life in this
beautiful city of parks and palaces is such
constant rush OF official and social bust
ness through the secular six days of the
week, that Sunday is hailed as veritable
| day of rest, and church going is not held to
be the primal duty of all. as was once the
ommandment-with dire penalties attached
| by the ancient fathers. That there is much
excuse for the laxity and Indifference so
plainly manifested was frankly admitted by
| Rev. DR.. Rankin at recent Conference of
the Congregationalists in this city. Such
were the restlessness and uncertainties of
| politics, he said, that men cannot always
lead -peaceable lives here in all godliness
| and honesty. Moreover, he averred, that
society usages may be excusable in a capi-
| tai city for which there would not be the
same argument or excuse anywhere else"
The point of his remarks was to the effect
that Presbyterian deacons and distinguished
Methodists and prominent Sunday school
workers could in Washington go to balls,
] receptions and enjoy other worldly pleas
| ures without reproach while at home they
would be indecorous and sinful. With his
premises admitted. it is quite easy to un-
| derstand that pious scruples as TO church
going and keeping the Sabbath day holy by
shutting the shutters and enjoying chap
ter from Baxter" Saints Rest of Sunday
afternoon may be waived by authority of
''the cloth" and the pleasures of Washing
ton be INDUCED in without the censure that
would tall upon such goings on at home.
GEORGE WASHINGTON CHURCH.
We did not follow the crowd last Sunday
bv going to the "Church of the Govern
ment," but instead took a wicked Sunday
train down to Alexandria to visit the old
church of which George Washington was
vestrvman, and which he attended when not
with the army in the field or in New York.
Alexandria is a dead old town-located a
few miles from Washington-which in the
last century was looked upon as a thriving
commercial city with eminent possibilities
of greatness. What came over the spirit of
its dream of grandeur and nipped its buds
of boom and amplitude of commercial i'm
portance we do not know-unless it was the
war-but the decay and dilapidation are
manifest, particularly at the wharves, where
everything seems moldly and musty, and
gives plain token of shiftlessness
and want of enterprise. Christ Church,
which was built in 1865, is the one
object of interest to the pilgrim and stran-
ger. The church is quaint and old FASH
ioned, with good deal about it of Puritan
squareness and simplicity. The windows
are not of the cathedral pattern or enriched
with jeWeled glass or pictures of medieval
saints, but are of common square panes,
the most striking thing about them being
the lavish use Of putty. Washfngton's pew
is in the side aisle, and is square, with
seats on three sides. A brass plate with the
inscription of ''Washilgton" marks the
spot where on Sundays and holy days the
immortal George and his Martha confessed
themselves miserable sinners" and ad-
mitted they had done the things they ought
not to have done and left undone those
which they ought to have done, and that
there was no health in them.
ENTITLED TO SYMPATHY.
We sat in the end of the pew, which BY
decree OF custom and the proper order Of
things is assigned to the head of the family,
and, if the cushion was as hard and lumpy
and uncomfortable when the Father Of His
Country was squared up in that corner as it |
was to US, he is entitled to the sympathy of |
remotest generations for his zeal and devo- |
ton in church going. The pulpit is one of |
the old-fashioned kind, with flight of |
steps leading up to it on both sides. Under |
view OF the occupant no one could sleep |
without observation, and it would not sur |
prise us to learn that George and !
Martha had many a time counted the |
diamond panes up and down and |
across, and down the middle in the endeavor
to keep themselves awake during somno-
lent sermon. Near the Washington pew is
a stout brass clamped box with an inscrip-
ton to the effect that contributions are de-
sired to keep this ancient and interesting
church in good repair. eve may say in
passing that the ragged cushions in Wash
ington's pew are in sad need of something
to save them from utter dilapidation and an
nihilatiOn.) On the wall upon the left of
the pulpit is marble tablet inscribed to
the memory of George Washington; upon
the right, as If entitled 10 equal honor, is
another to the immortal memory of Robert
Edmund Lee-the sublimest traitor OF the
Rebellion. "Both were patriots, both were
rebels. both were eminent as leaders of
Americans, and both are held in holy re-
membrance BY their countrymen," said a
Virginian who saw in the JEFF Davis Con-
federacy the uprising of noble and chival-
rous people.
THE SENTIMENTS INSPIRED.
These remarks show that the spirit of re-
bellion, disunion and disloyalty still holds
sway and fires the Southern heart, and that
it is nourished in the church, where of all
other places it should be dead and buried.
The wonder is that tablet sacred to the
of JEFF Davis has not been placed
over and above those to Washington and
Lee. With thoughts of the thousands of
patriots who had sacrificed their lives to
preserve the Union lying near at hand in
their graves upon the sunny slopes of Ar
lington and other hallowed spots through
out the country it was with difficulty that
we could turn our mind to a consideration
of sermon upon "Mary and Martha"
Waves of memory and thoughts of battle,
murder and of sudden death flowed over the
barren waste of that dry discourse as our
eyes rested upon the name of Lee
at the right of the pulpit; but as
our attention rallied and we inclined
our ears unto the white-gowned preacher, we
strange as it may seem, that the
learned divine had no flowing need of praise
for Martha-the noted housekeeper-but
that instead, Mary, who loved to dream,
and dawdle, and think, and fix her thoughts
upon the secret of the skies rather than on
the making of pies, was most eulogized and
and commended. The point OF the sermon
really seemed to be that perfect housekeep-
ing was rather more blamewolthy than not,
and that the first duty of women was to seek,
and reach for the better part and have
good time over it.
The churchyard is an interesting spot, filled
as it is, with the recoros of former genera
tion. As we wandered around before the
- I