Connecticut western news., 1894-03-22

has 100, 900 circulation. And if this book has more copies abroad in the world, if there are five times as many Bibles abroad as any other book, does not that show you that the most popular book on the planet today is the word of God?
 "Oh," say people, "'the church is col lection of hypocrites, and it is losing its power, and it is fading out from the world" Is it, A bishop of the Metho- dist church told me that that denomina- ton averages two new churches every day of the year. There are at least 500 new Christian churches built in America every year. Does that look as though the church were fading out, as though it were defunct institution? Which in- stitution stands nearest the hearts of the people of America today? do not care in what village, or in what city, or what neighborhood you go. Which institution Is it? Is it the postoffice? Is it the ho- tel2 Is it the featuring hall? An, you know it is not. You know that the in stitution which stands nearest to the hearts of the American people is the Christian church. If you have ever seen a church burn down, you have seen thousands of people standing and look ing at it-people who never go into a church-the tears raining down their cheeks. The whole story is told.
 AN UNPOPULAR BELIEF.
 You may talk about the church being a collection of hypocrites, but when the diphtheria sweeps your children oil whom do you send forp The postmaster, the attorney general, the hotel keeper, alderman? No, you send for minister of this Bible religion. And if you have not room in your house for the obse- quies, what building do you solicit? Do you say, "Give me the finest room In the hotel9' Do you say, "Giye me that theaterw Do you say: "Give me a place in that public building, where I can lay my dead for little while until we say a prayer over itY' No. You say, "Give us the house of God"
 And if there is song to be sung at the obsequies, what do you want? What does anybody want? "The Marseillaise' hymn. "God Save the Queen?" Our own grand national air? No. They want the hymn with which they sang their old Christian mother into her last sleep, ol they want sung the Sabbath school hymn which their little girl sang the last Sab bath afternoon she was out before she got that awful sickness which broke your heart. I Iappeal to your common sense, You know the most endearing institu. tion on earth, the most popular institu- tion on earth today, is the church of the Lord Jesus Christ.
 The infidels say, "Infdelity shows its successes from the fact that it is every. where accepted, and it can say what ii will" Why, my friends, infidelity is not half so blatant in our days as it was in the days of our fathers. Do you know that in the daysof our fathers there were pronounced infidels in public authority and they could get any political positionl Let man today declare himself antag' onistic to the Christian religion, and what city wants him for mayor, what state wants him for governor. what na. tion wants him for president or for kingi Let man openly proclaim himself the enemy of our glorious Christianity, and he cannot get majority of votes in any state, in any city, in any county, in any ward of America.
 RELIGION IS SCIENCE.
 Do you think that such 8 scene could be enacted now as was enacted in the days of Robespierre, when a shameless woman was elevated as a goddess and was carried in golden chair to cathe- dral, where incense was burned to hen and people bowed down before her as 6 divine being, she taking the place of the Bible and God Almighty, while in ths corridor of that cathedral were enacted such scenes of drunkenness and debauch cry and obscenity as have never beer witnessed? Do you believe such thing could possibly occur in Christendom to day? No, sirls The police, whether oi Paris or New York, would swoop on it.
 Iknow infidelty makes good deal oi talk in our day. It is on the principle that if man jump overheard from { Cunard steamer he makes more excite ment than all the 500 people that stay or the decks. But the fact that he jumps overboard-does that stop the ship? Does that wreck the 300 passengers? Itmakes great excitement when 8 man jumps from the featuring platform or from ths pulpit into infidelity, but does that keeI the Bible and the church from carrying their millions of passengers into tht skies?
 They say, these men, that science il overcoming religion in our day. They look through the spectacles of the infide scientists, and they say: Ut is impossi ble that this book can be true. Peopl' are finding it out. The Bible has got t. go overheard. Science is going to throw 1t overheard" Do you believe that th' Bible account of the origin of life vii be overthrown by infidel scientists wh have 50 different theories about the or igin of lifep If they should come up in sol i'd phalanx, all agreeing upon one senti ment and one theory, perhaps Christiani ty might be damaged, but there are no 30 many differences of opinion inside tn church as outside the church.
 THE FITTEST SURVIVES.
 People used to say, ''There are so man different denominations of Christians that shows there is nothing in religion. I have to tell you that all denomination agree on the two or three or four radios doctrines of the Christian religion. The are unanimous in regard to Jesus Christ and they are unanimous in regard to tn divinity of the Scriptures. How is it O the other side2 All split up-you canno | find two of them alike. Oh, it makes m sick to see these literary fops going alon with copy of Darwin under one arr and case of transfixed grasshoppers an
 butterflies under the other arm, tellin about the survival of the fittest," an Huxley's protoplasm, and the nebula hypothesis.
 The fact is that some naturalists jus as soon as they find out the differenc between the feelers of wasp and th horns of beetle begin to patronize th Almighty, while Agassiz, glorious Aga. sig, who never made any pretension
 being Christian, puts both his feet o
 the doctrine of evolution and says, q
 see that many of the naturalists of ou day are adopting facts which do not bes I IL L I ! |