The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1897-04-03
NEW WORK IN OLD FIELDS.
A PARABLE Blythe EDITOR KNOWS
WHO.

anu luQuobilOuos DuI uOO Utility uO
farm which he had owned and worked
for some fifteen years had not i'm
proved in appearance and in some
respects it had deteriorated. John
had made some improvements in the
way of new buildings, but at the end
of fifteen years he was in debt. What
was worse was that he was in debt
for things that added nothing to the
productiveness of his farm. There
was a corner field of some five or
eight acres, bounded on two sides by
highways, that was persistently nom
productive. The soil was a rather
heavyclay, the field was low and level,
and wet seasons and dry we're alike
unfavorable to it's successful cultiva-
ton. In wet seasons the pillow injured
the soil and in dry the soil injured the
pillow. John tried to seed down those
acres but the grass seed failed to
catch, and so the field was kept un-
der the pillow year after year, yielding
usually just about enough each sea-
son to show the passer by what had
been intended, whether corn or oats,
barley or fax, but not enough to re-
munerate the farmer for his time, la
Dor, and seed. Finally it grew to be
common saying among his neigh
bors: John Smith is trying once
more to cheat the Lord out of crop
on that corner field"
This was their quaint way of ex-
pressing the prevalent conviction that
he was again and again performing
the labor necessary to the raising of
crop. while ignoring certain laws
and facts which blocked his way to
the success which he seemed to hope
might, by some incalculable good
fortune, reward and crown his Ia
bors. But the laws of nature were
persistent even to stubbornness; and
SO it never happened that in any Civ
en- year he made gratifying success
in cultivating that particular field.
Finally, John sold few acres of
woodland for enough money to pay
his debts, and gave the management
of the farm into the hands of his
son.
The young man had ideas, and he
had energy and courage. He be-
lieved that natures laws might be
made ones friends and helpers, in
stead of being permitted to hinder
and obstruct. The first year he prac-
tically raised that cornerfeld two feet;
by taking the water, in under drains,
two feet further from the surface. He
studied the composition and the
needs of the soil, he enriched it with
proper fertilizers, and encouraged it
with careful cultivation; and though
it did not respond fully to his atten-
tions the first season, yet in few
years the soil became friable and
productive, and thereafter never
failed to give the young man what he
asked. In time, the whole farm took
on an improved appearance; the
woodland was repurchased; then an
other farm was added, and Smith the
younger was happy and prosper
Gus man.
AS denomination we are anxious,
not merely to live, but to grow; to
lay farm to farm; to extend our de-
nominational borders, and the infu-
ence of our cheering and hopeful
faith. The desire is legitimate-the
ambition is laudable. But the means
to accomplish our object must be de-
rived from the old farm-from what
we already have. If it is already
yielding us all that it is capable of
producing, than it only remains for
us to work on patiently, curbing our
ambitions, and moderating our de-
sires until we can be content with ex-
ceedingly small gains, or even to
6 hold our own"
While Universalists are as gener-
GUS as other people when rightly
appealed to in Behalf of their church
and its enterprises, they do Lot give
as generally, as regularly, nor as sys-
tematically as the people of some of
our sister churches.
Our General Convention seems,
somehow, too far away from the peo-
pie, too foreign; and when it tries to
move the local parish with it's long
lever, and with the parish minister
for fulcrum, it has, too often, but
an uncertain leverage. Either the
ground is soft and the fulcrum sinks
out of sight, or the fulcrum is slip
perry and as soon as any pressure is
brought to bear upon it, it gets out
of place and needs readjustment.
As result, we have too many par
ishes that are like the cornfield in the
parable, habitually non productive,
and waiting for a wiser and more
generous husbandry.