Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-01-12
TOOK UP THE GAGE.
Rev. DR.. J. G. Townsend Defends bis
Church From a Severe Attack
MADE on II BY MAJOR WHITTLE.
Rev. Z. E. DonehOo Also Replies to Some
Criticism of Himself.
OTHER PULPIT TOPICS OF YESTERDAY

Conscience; Its Origin and Growth, was
the subject of the sermon of Rev. j. G.
Townsend, D. D., of the Unitarian Church.
during the course of which DIR. Townsend
said: Conscience is not distinct faculty.
1t does not come to us from mysterious
sources. 1t has no supernatural origin, but
grows as naturally as flower.
"Of this we are sure-there is right and
wrong Right cannot become wrong, or
wrong right The waters of an infinite sea
roll between those two shores. Right is
obedience to the Immutable order of nature,
and man, having in large degree the
capability of education, discovers the fine
but immutable lines of moral order and
beauty. They were not revealed; he dis
covered ethics Just as he discovered science,
art, music. Mans greatest discovery was
the finding of the great moral laws. He is
the Columbus OF ethics. How did he dis
cover these laws? By myriad experiences,
BY trial, by thought. by being pupil in
the severe school of natural facts.
But as man discovered these laws one by
one, there came corresponding change in
his nature. As he became intelligent and
saw the right, there grew the desire to do it
Out OF this dim, feeble, often tickle desire.
there blossomed in some minds the moral
ought-what Kant called the categorical
imperative. These men transmitted this
feeling of the moral ought to their children.
1t came in time to be tie heritage of human
ity, the noblest gift that has cpme down
from the past.
Conscience Not Always the Best Guide.
Conscience, then, is not a mysterious
faculty: 1t is the mind acting NOR
ally. 1t is not infallible, for conscience
has told men TO commit the worst
OF crimes. The conscientious John
Calvin burned Servetus. Conscience
impels, but reason shows the way. In the
relations of lite, reason teaches us how to
comfort ourselves. Conscience SAYS go, but
reason must find the path ior us. This
moral ought in US is tine basis not only of
religion, but of literature and art. Ii we
were TO take the moral element out of
Homer, Sophocles Dante, Angelo, Shakes
peare, Milton, We would draw out their
Coldenest thread. The moral ought should
be our most sacred possession, because it cor
rects Us through the education and expert
euce Of unuumbered souls. Conscience be-
comes sensitive, delicate, keen, by use. Not
used. il would, like an unused hand, grow
attenuated, shriveled, paralyzed. But
when used, conscience, like sensitive
finger, feels its way along the fine lines of
honor purity and truth. Conscience then
becomes, indeed, the voice OF God in the
soul, the eye o; God on the breast"
Considerable interest has been aroused by
the announcement of DIR. Townsend's "topic'
for the morning. 1t was "Major WhittIe
and his attack on Unitarianism." DIR.
Townsend, in treating OF this attack, said:
A Defense of Unitarian Doctrines.
Dropping into the Second q. z. Church
of Allegheny last Monday evening to hear
NJ aiOr Whittle, l was surprised to hear him
lIiake an attack on Unitarianism, and more
surprised at some of his utterances. He
said that the Unitarian view of Jesus was
very pretty, but entirely untrue This is
simply a question of Interpretation. We
think the tender, loving Jesus of our faith
was the Jesus who lived and taught in
Jerusalem ], 800 years ago. We think that
Jesus was human, like ourselves, but of
larger spiritual genius He was natures
illustrious success, the sweetest flower that
ever bloomed in the garden of humanity
but what surprised me most was the
declaration of Major Whittle that to reject
Christ was a greater sin than lying, steal
ing, murder, or any other crime. But
thousands OF men and women, white of soul
and pure of lille beautiful shafts of polished
marble, such as Emerson, Parker, Claiming,
Dorothea Dix, do reject the theoiogic Christ.
Are they, then, worse than the liar, the
THE, the ibertine? Is not such preaching
damaging? Does it not milk Christianity of
its real beauty and truth? Does it not cut
tie line threads of morality which hold
society in safety"