The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1897-11-18

some of you can bear SorroWful teSti-
mony, and at this late hour there is
small chance for a sermon, although |
feel sure that it must be a mighty
small sermon that does not hit a mem
Der of an average chamber of COM
merce somewhere. Then, again, this is
a festive hour and every moment it
seems to be getting more festive, and I
suppose even a preacher must not be
any more edifying than he can help,
and I promise to use my best endeavor
to leave this worshipfu1 company as
ignorant and foolish and festive as 7
find it.
But here is a subject 1.-THE City and
the Church." put into my hands like
a Yale and Princeton football on the
gridiron, and 1 realize mat I have got
to do something with it, and do it
mighty quick. The city, gentlemen, I
need not stop to speak of the city to
you whose hands are on the very lev
erageAof the citys influences and forces
and engines of power.
l need not say that the city is the
chief concern of our time-the supreme
solicitude of our civilization-the prob
lem of municipal reform or the govern
ment and civilization of cities is the
burning question of the hour. Fifty
years ago our dominant mood was one
of high confidence, buoyant and abound
ing hope. Whatever evils might come
to the effete despotisms of the old
world, no harm could be.all the land
of the free and the home of the brave.
The American eagle scared high, and
screamed long and loud. But to-day
we are somewhat sobered IN our mood;
we are not so cheerful, no so wildly
hilarious over the outlook. The Amer
lean eagle does not roost so high, or
scream so loud, and the brow of the op-
timistic American Is "sicklied DER with
the pale cast of thought 1t is the
immense and appalling problem of the
city that is veXing us, my brothers. Its
congested populations, it's foreign, I'M
assimilated citizenship with un-Ameri-
can ideas and social ideals, it's teeming
treasures and it's rnercenary and I'M
scrupulous political methods, its
startling inequalities of fortune and
contrasts of condition: it's growing
power to control legislation and domi
nate the government or the land; it's
disconnected restless, reckless anar-
chistic classes striding on to power; it's
materialized ideals: it's sordid greed;
it's wailing miseries. its ignorance and
animalism, it's lecherous, loathsome ini-
quities that are always burroWing at
the bottom of submerged city popula-
tions-I say the city is the storm CEN
| ter ot our country and our time. The
standing menace of our civilization. We
! believe that these new social problems
| do not battle our wisdom; that these
new social forces do not surpass our
power; that republican institutions are
| adequate to meet all the de-
mands of the twentieth century
| as they are of the nineteenth.
| But in the meantime, anything which
| tends to civilize and Christianize and
spiritualize city populations and pro-
mote honesty, the sobriety the good
| citizenship of the average citizen ought
to be cherished and supported and up
held by every chamber of commerce in
| the landry every lover of his country
| and his kind. And so I come to the
church which against heavy odds and
| adverse winds and tides is trying to
steady and keep afloat the ship of state
and prevent it from being scuttled by
| it's own crew.
If I wanted a text from which to
preach sermon on the function and
value of the church-a text which you
| business men would instantly grasp
and comprehend should go back foul
thousand years to the ancient enact
ment of Israeli "All thy estimations
shall be according to the shekel of the
sanctuary" There was common
shekel in circulation that was much
deprecated and debased. The tendency
then and now is always to drop from
the standard, to chip the coin, to
tighten the pound, to shorten the yard
stick and to shrink the bushel to depose
| the dollar, to sag down from honest
methods and righteous dealings and
conscientious trade to the mercenary
and sordid level of a mercenary and
| sordid world.
| Oh you business men how hard it is
to keep your business geared up to the
| standard! .-...
! Oh you builders, how hard it is to
keep your work plumb and your lines
| true!
| l.