Evening capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1888-1893, 1892-05-16

But sometimes silence is a crime aud the
direct result Of the baleful influence OF
the dumb devil of our text There Is
hardly man or woman in this house
today who has not been present on some
occasion when the Christian religion be-
came target for raillery. Perhaps it
was over in the store some day when
there was not much going on and the
clerks were in group, or 1t was in the
factory at the noon spell, or it was out
on the farm under the trees while you
were resting, or it was in the clubroom,
or it was in social circle, or it was in
the street on the way home from busi-
ness. or it was on some occasion which
YOU remember without my describing it.
some one got the laugh on the Bible
and caricatured the profession OF re-
ligion as hypocrisy, or made a pun out
of something that Christ said The
laugh started and you Joined in, and not
one word of protest did you utter What
kept you silent? Modesty? No. In
capacity to answer No. Lack Of OPP
portunity? No. 1t was a blow on both
your lips by the wing of the dumb devil
IF some one should malign your father
or mother or wife or husband or child
you would flush up quick, and either
with an indignant word or doubled up
fist make response. An yet here is our
Christian religion, which has done so
much for you and so much for the world
that it will take all eternity to celebrate
it, and yet when it was attacked you
did not so much as say: IL differ, OBJ
1 20 hot -
There is another side to this.
You Christian people ought III such
times as these to go armed, not with
earthly weapons, but with the sword of
the Spirit You ought to have four or
five questions with which you could
confound any man who attacks Chris
tianity man ninety years old was
telling me few days ago how he put to
fight a sccffer My aged friend said to
the skeptic, Did you ever read the his
tory of Joseph in the Bible? "Yes,"
said the man; ''it is fine story, and as
interesting a story as | ever read"
well, now" said my old friend, sup
pose that account of Joseph stopped half
way? oh" said the man, "then it
would not be entertaining. well,
now" said my friend, 1--WE have in this
world only half of everything, and do
you not think that when we hear the
last half things may be consistent, and
that then we may find that God was
light?'
LOAD UP WITH INTERROGATION POINTS.
Oh, friends, better load up with a few
Interrogation points You cannot afford
to be silent when God and the Bible
and the things of eternity are assailed.
Your silence gives consent to the bonn
bardment of your fathers house. You
allow slur to be cast on your mothers
dying pillow. In behalf of the Christ,
who for you went through the agonies
of assassination on the rocky bluff hack
of Jerusalem, you dared not face a sick
ly joke. Better load up with few ques-
tions so that next time you will be ready.
Say to the scoffer: "My dear sir, will
you tell me what makes the difference
between the condition Of woman in
China and the United States? What do
you think of the sermon on the mount?
How do you like the golden rule laid
down in the Scriptures? Are you in
favor Of the ten commandments? In
your large and extensive reading have
you come across a lovelier character
than Jesus Christ? Will you please to
name the triumphant deathbeds of in
fidels and atheists? How do you account
for the fact that among the out and
out believers in Christianity were such
persons us Benjamin Franklin, John
Ruskin, Thomas Carlyle, Babington
Macaulay, William Penn, Walter Scott,
Charles Kingsley, Horace Bushnell,
James A. Garfield, Robert E. Lee, Stone
wall jackson, Admiral Foote, Admiral
Farragut, Ulysses s. Grant, John Mil
ton, William Shakespeare, Chief Justice
Marshall, John Adams, Daniel Webster,
George Washington How do you ac-
count for their fondness for the Christian
religion2 Among the innumerable col
leges and universities of the earth will
you name me three started by infidels
and now supported by infidels? Down
in your heart are you really happy in
the position you occupy antagonistic to
the Christian religion? When do you
have the most rapturous views of the
next world?
Go at him with few such questions
and he win get so red in the face as to
suggest apoplexy, and he will look at
his watch and say he has an engagement
and must go You will put him in a
sweat that will beat Turkish bath
You will put him ON rout compared
with which our troops at Bull Run made
no time at all Arm yourself, not with
arguments but Interrogation points, and
promise you victory, Shall such a
man as you, shall such woman as you
surrender to one of the meanest spirits
that ever smoked up from the pit--the
dumb devi! spoken of in the text?
But then there are occasions when
this particular spirit that Christ exer-
cised when he said, ii charge thee to
come out of him. takes people by the
wholesale. In the most responsive reli-
gious audience have you noticed how
many people never sing mt ALP They
have book, and they have avoice, and
they know how TO read. They know
many Of the tunes, and yet are silent
while the great raptures of music pass
by, Among those who sing not one out
of a hundred sings loud enough to hear
his own Voice. They hum it. They give
a sort of religious grunt. They make
the lips so, but ii is inaudible. With a
voice strong enough TO stop street car
one block away, all they can afford in
the praise of God is about half whis-
| per. With enough sopranos. enough