The daily morning journal and courier., 1896-06-03
SEVENTIETH ANNIVERSARY
Continued from First Page,)

 handkerchiefs, to imagine that we have brought in the kingdom, This habit grows on us. It is fostered by the news- papers, the hotels, the facility of travel and the modern love of change and publicity. It would i'll become me un- duly to disparage such gatherings. But may we not overrate their moral effect? There is often too much of the picnic about them. A mob itself, even a re- ligious mob, seldom profoundly inn presses.
 Connected with this herding instinct and it's craze for contact and ubiquity, is the lst for entertainment which has infected our Congregational Christian ity. It shows itself in craving for ex travagant music, for meaningless lit urgical establishment, for the estab- lishment of the church kitchen with it's accessories oe games and fairs. It re- veals itself in the advent of the stereop- ticon in the pulpit and in the somewhat exaggerated demand that the church shall become "institutionaP'-tha is, do everything that the workshop, club and amusement hall can do.
 Again philanthropy in the Christian community is now in some directions so overworked that 1t has become dis eased, fabby, sentimental and perni- cious.
 This false philanthropy creates a sentiment in which crime f1ourishes. It leads silly people to make a hero of the bank robber, highwayman and mur- derer, and, aided by sensational news papers, to pamper with fattery and flowers the vampires of society.
 Religion and the ministers of religion are resposible for no small share of this nonsense. They often forget their office. They should preach from tce Old Testament as well as the New. They are to be the conservators and directors for the people of deter mined and righteous indignation against wrongdoing.
 We must get beyond the michievous idea that the sole object of our society is to plant new churches and sustain missionaries in them. It is quits as much to rouse old churches, to drag out their hidden energies, and to set afiame with prophetic zeal the ministers who preach in them. We must revise our imperfect conception that our society is chiefly an agency for evangelizing the ungodly west, the moral Restitution of which is sometimes painted in such vivid colors as to provoke reply and re- sentiment. This is all a mistake. We cannot sustain Christ's cause by mag nifying the mote in the western eye and forget that it is there largely be- cause of the beam that is in the eastern eye. If the west needs the prophetic word, the east needs 1t not one whit the less If a struggling little school in Utah needs it, the great university in New England needs it, too. In point of fact, of the 2,000 missionaries under our commission last year about one-quar- ter were in New England, and one-half were east of the Mississippi and north of the Ohio. Were they not needed?
 Home Missions! Say to the rich at the east that it is not merely for the sake of the destitute at the west that we ask for few of the chips and shaw ings of their wealth, but it is for their own sake also, lest their riches drown them in destruction and perdition. Say to the cultured young men and women of our colleges that it is not alone for the sake of the ignorant that we ask for the free consecration of their rare gifts on the altar of Christ, but for their own sakes also, lest in their pride and vanity they miss their object and perish from His presence at the last. Say to the cities that it is not chiefly for the country that we beg their as- sistance but for their own sakes, lest surfeited and unfruitful they become like Babylon.
 Home Missions! The minister who breaches to his rich, fashionable, self satisfied congregation at the east and warns them of the perils of unconse- crated wealth until he forces them for very shame of themselves, and for the love of Jesus to make that wealth prophecy, is as true Home Missionary as the man who exhorts cowboys and miners at the west to amend their lives and become Christians.
 Your sons and your daughters shall prophecy" Fulfill for us, o Holy Ghost, this ancient promise till from east to west and west to east the Dentecostal flame shall run, reviving, kindling, con- secrating us all as Thy witnesses.
 REV. DIR. MERRIMAN'S SERMON.
 pr. Merriman preached a very pow erful discourse, full of vital comment and suggestion He preached from Acts 2-17: Your sons and your daugh- ters shall prophecy" He said in part: It is significant that our society should hold it's first meeting in New England on this, it's three score and tenth birth day It is even more significant that it should meet beneath the shadow of a great university which has aways given 1t loyal support and inspiration, It seems appropriate that my message should be to emphasize the prophetic function of missions.
 The priest and the politician are al- ways seeking to get the prophet under their thumb. History is in large part the record of their success-the success of the machine first using for it's own ends, and finally endeavoring to SUD- press the prophet.
 Because of their geographical isola- tion the prophetic gift of our fathers got scanty room for century or two, and so recoiled upon itself in the devel- opment of fantastical theologies, and just to relieve itself created one or two splendid heresies Yet this theologic era was only the storing up of energy It was really the heat of missionary l zeal which was in the Congregational J bones. When the child of the Puritan and Pilgrim realized that he was the possessor of a continent and a citizen of a world, then the prophetic genius be-