Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1891-06-17
Want Of Earnest Convictions,

| nhut LdFutbt VUuflCtIUUSs
Ths proposed revision of religious ere eds
and the disputes concerning the standard
of orthodoxy will lead we trust to one most
desirable result. The prevailing tendency
of the public mind for the last few years
has not been so much toward heresy as in
the direction of practical infdeity. We
have traced it, especially in the older
States, to the neglect of the religious train
ing OF the young. When the Bible as q
text book OF morals and the catechism as a
system OF theology were withdrawn from
the public schools, as they must of pecss
slty be when these are supported by the
State and the latter is made up of diverse
communities, there was nothing that took
their place in the culture of children. Tt G
Saturday evening lessons in the househo d
were suspended, for these hours were o
longer sacred as they were whsn lie fifst
day OF the week began at sundowD t,n ii e
seventh day.
TIE t,0. day -echcol j; IVES hepe. w,.nid
take tho place OF both the household gath
eripg aud the catechetical teaching in the
weekday school-room. At first this was
realized to some extent, but in many places
| the Sunday school itself was given up to
the mere amusemept of the pupils, and
direct practical teaching of religious truth
was made matter of secondary Importance.
Even where thesinging of doggerel hymns,
the magic lantern exhibitions, and the task
of collecting funds for various charitable
undertakings did not wholly interfere with
tie incubation Of Bible truths, the time
given to this important work has been
altogether too brief to make any very last
ing impression on the youthful mind. With
a whole week of studies 80 carefully
secularized that all the relations of man to
his Creator are wholly ignored, a single
half hour of Bible study on Sunday sand
| wiched between two parts of a programme
having very little of a sacred character will
not supply the pupil with large amount
| of religious culture.
| The result has been a growing indiffer-
ence to sacred things. The people are not
atheists, but there is on the part of many
an absence of faith in the unseen and the
supernatural; and out of this has grown a
want of moral earnestness, the lack of
which leads to the tolerance Of evil. We
shall see this more clearly if we take any
question that is brought before the public
and note the method of its discussion and
the effect of the argument. AS far as the
impression to be produced is concerned, no
one who has not positive convictions of his
own can cay anything worth hearing. But
when each side has presented its case how
Indifferent are the mass of the people to
the issue if it is simply a moral question
having no direct bearing on their material
interests.
Great breaches of trust like that now re-
vealed in Philadelphia, or more serious
crimes involving bloodshed and the loss of
life, committed in various parts of the
country, do not produce the shock they are
so we'll fitted to give to those whose moral
fibre is in healthy condition. There is
great deal said about the &C ivity of mind
and body supposed to be a special chsrac-
teristic OF Americans. They are always at
fever heat, SO foreigners say, and they not
only bolt their food without the proper
masticatiop, but they transact all their
business affairs at the same rate of speed.
They are represented as restless and ex-
citable and ready to jump at conclusions
without due investigation.
All this may be true, and still there may
be want of downright earnestness in per-
sonal convictions. No thoughtful man CAP
agree with the fippant assertion SO often
quoted, that '.modes of faith" are of little
account except with graceless zealots. The
poet himself refutes his own theory in the
line that follows, for be says that his faith
cannot be wrong "whose life is in the
right" This makes right faith absolutely
essential to right living; for if righteous
life is proof positive of right faith, then
only through a right faith can good life
be reached. Careful observation will prove
to any student of the times need of some
thing more than mere orthodoxy of creed
The man who nominally holds to the letter
OF all the articles to which his church sub
scribes, but is not moved by this adherence
to a conformity thereto in his life, might as
well be an infdel as far as the works that
spring from living faith are concerned.
A man with one right idea who clings to
it and controls his life by it will do more
for the world than ope who eau recite all
the cateehism without a word Of dissent,
but is indifferent to the demands which
such creed must make for a complete
conservation to life of unselfish service
when il isys hold Of the heart and controls
the will. Mere intellectual assent to an
orthodox creed is assumed by many in our
day to be all that is essential to religious
character. But it is not even respectable
counterfeit of genuine godliness. 1t does
not go as far as the sounding brass and the
tinkling cymbai that make a clatter and
pretense of right living. 1t is as dead for
all practical uses as an inscribed tablet on
the senseless marble. 1t is faultless in
form, but with no vital power.-New York
Journal Of Commerce.