The free press. (Poplarville, Miss.) 1890-19??, 1893-10-12

rs has never been seen on any sacred occa-
sion in America.
II Scribonius Cifio, at the cost Of a king
dom, could build the first two vast amphi-
theatres, placing them back to back, hold
ing great audiences for dramatic representa-
ton, and then by wonderful machinery
could turn them round with all their
audiences in them, making the two
auditoriums one amphitheatre, to witness a
gladitorial contest, and Vespasian could con-
struct the Coliseum with its eighty columns
and its triumphs in three orders OF Greek
architecture, and capacity to held bijOOQ
people seated and 1900 standing and all
for purposes of cruelty and sin, cannot our
glorious Christianity rear in honor of our
glorious Christ structure large enough TO
hold so 900 of its worshipers?
If we go cropping now among the ruined
amphitheaters of Verona and Pompeli and
Capua and Puzzuoli and Tarraco, and then
stand transfxed with amazement at their I'M
mense sweep that held from so, 900 to 100 600
spectators gathered for carousal and moral
degradation. could not Christianity afford
one architectural achievement that would
hold and enthrall its 80, 900 Christian disci~
ples2 Do You say no human voice could be
heard throughout such building? All
then you were not present when at the Bos-
ton peace jubilee Parepa easily with her voice
enchanted 50. 900 auditors.
And the time IS near at hand Wnen IN rneO~
logical seminaries, where our young men are
being trained for the ministry, the voice will
be developed. and instead of the mumbling
ministers, who speak with so low tone you
cannot hear unless you lean forward and
hold your hand behind your ear, and then
are able to guess the general DRIFT of the sub
iect and decide quite well whether'it is about
Moses or Paul or some one else-instead of
that YOU will have coming from the theologi-
cal semnares all over the land young min
listers with voice enough to command the at
tention OF an audience of $4,000 people. That
is the reason that the Lord gives US two
lungs instead of one. 1t is the Divine way
of saying physiologically, ''Be heard %
That is the reason that the New Testament
in beginning the account of Chrst's sermon
on the mount describes our Lords plain
articulation and resound Of utterance by say
ing, ''He opened his mouth. =" In that
mighty concert hall and preaching place
which | suggest for this nineteen hundredth
anniversary let music crown our Lord. Bring
all the orchestras. all the oratorios, all the
Philharmonic and Handel and Haydn So
cieties.
Then give us Haydn's oratorio of the
"Creation.' - for our Lord took part in uni
verse building and without him." says
John. twas not as.Ything made that was
made. and HANDLES "Messiah" and
Beethoeen's symphonies" and Mendes-
sohn's elijah the prophet that typified
our Christ and the grandest compositions OF
German and English and American masters,
living or dead All instruments that can
hum or roll or whisper or harp or flute or
clap or trumpet or thunder the praises of the
Lord Joined to all voices that can chant or
MARBLE or precentor multitudinous wor-
shippers. What an arousing when $4,000
Join in "Antioch" or Coronation" or
ariel, rising into halleluiah or subsid-
ing into an almost supernatural amen
Yea, let sculpture stand on pedestals all
around that building-the forms of apostles
and martyrs, men and women, who spoke or
wrought or suffered by headsman's ak or fire.
Where is my favorite of all arts, this art OF
sculpture, that it is not buster for Christ or
that its work is not better appreciated? Let
it come forth at that worlds jubilee OF the
nativity. We want u second Phidias to do
for that new temple what the first Phidias
did for the Parthenon. Let the marble OF
Carrara come to resurrection to celebrate
our Lords resurrection. Let sculptors set
up in that auditorium of Christ's celebration
bas-reef and intaglio descriptive OF the bat
ties won for our holy religion. Where are
the Canovas of the Nineteenth Century?
Where are the American Thorwaldsehs and
Chantreys? Hidden somewhere, / warrant
You.
Let sculpture turn that place into ano Their
Acropolis, but more glorious by as much as
our Christ is stronger than their Hercules,
and has more to do with the sea than their
Neptune, and raises greater harvests than
their Ceres, and raises more music in the
heart of the world than their Apollo. THE
gods of the hedthen are nothing but dumb
idols, but our Lord made the heavens In
marble pure as snow celebrate Ham who
came to make US "whiter than snow" Let
the chisel as we'll as pencil and pen be put
down at the feet Of Jesus.
Yea let painting do its best. The foreign
galleries will loan for such jubilee their
Madonnas their Angeles, their Rubens, their
Raphaels their Christ at the Jordan, or
Christ at the Last Supper, or 'Christ Com
ing to Judgment" or Christ on the Throne
OF Universal Dominion. and our own Morans
will put their pencils into the nineteen hun
dredth anniversary, and our Bierstadts from
sletching ''The Doms of the Yosemite will
come to present the domes of the world con-
quered for Emmanuel.
Added to all this l would have a floral
decoration on scale never equaled. The
fields and open gardens could not furnish it,
for it will be winter. and that season appro-
priately chosen, for it was into the lrosts and
desolations OF winter that Christ immiGrated
when he came to our world. But while the
fields will be bare, the Conservatives and
lighthouses within 200 miles would gladly
keep the sacred coliseum radiant and aro-
matte during all the conversations.
Added to all let there be banquets, not
like the drunken bout at the Metropolitan
Opera House, New York, celebrating the
centennial OF WashingtoI's Inauguration,
where the rivers of wine drowned the So
briefly of SO many senators and governors
and generals. but banquet for the poor, the
feeding of scores of thousands of people of a
world in which the majority OF the inhabi-
tants have never yet had enough to eat. not
banquet at which few favored men and
women of social or political fortune shNll
sit, but such a banquet as Christ ordertd
when He told His servants to Ego out into
the highways and hedges and compel them
to come in Let the mayors of cities and
the governors of States and the President Of
the United States proclaim a whole week OF
legal holiday-at least from Christmas day
to New Years day.
Added to this let there be at that interna
tional moral and religious exposition a
mammoth distribution OF sacred literature.
Let the leading ministers from England
Scotland, Ireland, France, Germany and tht
world take the pulpits of all these cities and
tell what they know OF Him whose birth We
celebrate. AT those convocations let vas
sums OF money be raised for churches, fol
asylums. for schools, for colleges, all o
which institutions were born in the heart o
Christ On that day and in that season
when Christ gave Himself to the world lie