The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-03-19

"Oh. " say people, the church IS a col
lection of hEpOcrites, and II IS losing It's
power and it is fading out from the
world Is it, A bishop of the Meth
odist church told me that that deHOmi-
I nation averages two new churches every
day Of the year There are at least tf-
teen hundred new Christian churches
built in America every year Does that
look as though the church were
fading out, as though il were
a CefunCt institution, Which institution
stands,nearest the hearts of the people of
America to-day: I do not care i'm what
village or IN what city or what Igh Dor
hooi you 60. Which Institution IS IL. Is
, IL the postOmce, IS 10 the hotel is 10
the lecturing hall All you know IL IS
not. You know that the Institution
! which stands nearest TO the
! hearts Of sthe American people is the
/ Christian church. II YOU have ever seen
a church burn down, you nave seen thou
/ sands Of people standing and looking at 1t
/ people who never go into church
! the tears raining down their checks
/ The whole story Is told.
! You may talk about the church being a
/ collection of hypOcrItes, but when the
! diphtheria sweeps your children on,
/ whom do you send for 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 obsequies,
what building do you solicit, Do you say.
Give me the finest room in the hotel 3"
Do you say: Give me that theaterl'
Do you say: Give me place in that
public building where / can lay my dead
for little while until we say prayer
| over ltf' No; you say. Give US the
house of God" And if there is a song to
be sung at the obsequies what do YOU
! ant 80
MarselllaIsc hymnk God save the Queen2
Our own grand national air. No. They
want the hymn with which they sung
their old Christian mother into her last
sleep, or they want sung the Sabbath
school hymn which their little girl sang
the last Sabbath afternoon she was out
before she got that awful sickness which
broke your heart l appeal TO your com
mon sense. You know the most en-
dearing institution on earth, the
most popular institution on earth to-
day, is the Church of the Lord Jesus
Christ.
The infdels say: "Infdelity shows its
successes from the fact that it is every
where accepted, and it can say what it
WILL Why, my friends, inhdelity is not
half so blatant in our day as it was in the
days of our fathers Do you know that
In the days of our fathers there were pro-
nOunced iufidels in public authority and
they could get any political position? Let
a man to-day declare himself antagon-
lStlc to the Christian religion and what
city wants him for mayor, what state
wants him for governor, what nation2
wants him for president or for king.
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.
DO you think that such a scene could
be enacted now as was enacted in the
days OF RObesplerre, when a shameless
woman was elevated as a goddess and
was carried in a golden chair to a catbe-
oral where incense was burned to her and
people bowed down before her as a divine
being, she taking the place of the Bible
and God Almighty, while in the corridor
OF that cathedral were enacted such
scenes Of drunkenness and debaucherv
and obscenity as have never been wiz
messed Do you telieve such a thing
could possibly occur in Christendom to-
day. No, sir. The police, whether of
Paris or New York, would swoop on it. |
know intdelity makes a good deal of talk
in our day. tbs on the principle that if
a man Jump overheard from a Cunard
steamer he makes more excitement than
all the five hundred people that STAY on
the decks. But the fact that he Jumps
OverbOard-dOes that stop the Shin
Does that wreck the five hundred passen
gers? 1t makes great excitement when
man jumps from the lecturing platform.
or from the pulpit, into inhdelity; but
does that keep the Bible and the church
from carrying their millions of passengers
into the skies!
They say, these men, that science is
overcoming religion in our day. They look
through the speCtacles Of the intidel scien-
lists, and they say 1t is impossible that
this book can be true; people are finding
1t out; the Bible has got to go overheard
science is going to throw it overheard "
10 YOU believe that the Bible account of
the origin of life will be overthrow bv
lnhdel scientists who have fifty different
theories about the origin of life? If they
should come up in solid phalanx, all agree
ing on one sentiment and one theory. per
haps Christianity might be damaged but
there are not so many differences of opin-
ion inside the church as outside the
church. People used to say, there are
so many different denominations of
Christians-that shows there is nothing
in religion" ] have to tell YOU that all
denominations agree on the two or three
or four radical doctrines of the Christian
religion. They are unanimous in regard
TO Jesus Christ, and they are unanimous
In regard to the divinity. of the Script
ures. How is it on the other side? All
split up, you cannot find two of them
alike. oh, 1t makes me sick to see these
literary tops going along with COPY of
Darwin under one arm and case of
transhxed grasshoppers and butterflies
under the other arm. telling about the
survival of the fittest,' and Huxiey's
protoplasm, and the uebular hypothesis.
The fact is, that some naturalists, Just as
soon as they find out the difference be
tween the feelers of d wasp ana the horns
of a beetle, begin to patronize the Al
mighty; while Agassiz, glorious ACassiz,
who never made any pretension to being
Christian, puts both his feet on the doe
trine of evolution, and says. ~ see that
many of the naturalists Of our
day are adopting facts which
do not bear observation, or have
not passed under observation These
men warning with each other; Darwin
warning against lamarche. Wallace
warning against Cope, even Herschel &c
nouncing Ferguson They do not agree
about anything. They do not agree on
embryology, do not agree on the grada-
ton of the species. What do they agree
ou2 Herschol writes a whole chapter on
the errors of astronomy La Pace de
clares that the moon was not put in the
right place. He says that if il had been
put four times further from the earth
than it is now there would be more har-
mony in the universe; but Lionville
comes up just in time TO prove that the