The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1897-12-27
The Rev. Robert K. Wick
Continues His Sermons
on the Irr6ligious
Spirit Of the Age.
HOW VICE MAY BE LEsSENED
The Preacher Thinks the Church
Alone Can Accomplish the Great
Result-0ther Churches.

Men Don't Go to Church. last evening,
in the Wayne Street Reformed Church.
His remarks were based on the question:.
What can the churches do to lessen the
amount of vice and crime?'
That the churches can do a great deal
more than they are doing" said Mr..
Wick, TO make this world a pleasant
place to live in must be plain to every
one who has in mind the immense amount
of sin and suffering there is in it and
a proper conception of the possibilities
of the churches as a reformative agency.
9Th problem is:-'How can it best be
made to do this great work? This has
been such a puzzle to me that I concluded
to ask friends to help me solve it. /
took two hundred men into my counsels.
That some of them were as greatly puz-
zled as myself over this problem was
very evident from the way that they re-
piled to my question.
"a lawyer said, / don't know, beyond
What they are doing and an eminent
jurist frankly confessed hat he was
equally in the dark, for he wrote, Your
questions are beyond me-. I have thought
much on some of them without being
able to reach a conclusion.
There We're others, however, and many
of them, who had al idea that they knew
how the problem offered tonight and all
the Others should be solved. They were
not unanimous, however, as to the meth
cd. Some seemed to think that the
church should resolve itself into a great
crusading host under the leadership of
men like Charles H. P~arkhurst, and make
it the business of its members to purify
the world by political action. Keep be-
fore each man his duty as a citizen
writes a lawyer. Initiate Parkhurst,'
says a doctor. Urge taeir member to
attend the primaries and be good citizens
as well as good churchmen,' advises a
banker. Let them vote as they pray
suggests a manufacturer, while an insur-
anee agent sets forth the spirit of sons
twenty of my correspondents when he
says. Let the churches of city, county
and State unite in an organized effort
to choose delegates who will attend con-
ventions which have the lessening of
vice and crime as their one object There
is a great deal of sense in what these
men. say. The world is just what the
people make it. We elect the legislators,
they make the laws. We choose the men
on whom devolye the execution of the
laws.
1T is consequently the Christians duty
to insure the election of good men as
lawmakers and executive officers. This
can only be lone by the Christian being
loyal to Christ and conscience at the pri-
mary and at the ballot box. Principle
always come before party. 1t is to
be feared that this is not always the
case. One of my advisers evidently
thought so, for he sent me this little
ditty:-
Along in November, when chill was the
weather.
Two ballots were cast in a box to-
They nestled up close, like brother to
brother,
You couldn't tell one of the votes
from the other
'Then he goes on to show that both
were rum votes, yet one was cast by a
brewer and the other by a Sunday-school
man. inconsistency like this will never
bring the New Jerusalem down out of
Heaven and establish it on earth.
Many of those who replied to my ques-
tion said that the Church would never do
it's full share in destroying vice and crime
until its members became fired with a
realization of their responsibilities as
Christians. Let them become more COM
pletely embodied and living incarnations
of what they profess to believe writes a
minister. Let them do more work for
the Master and less for self and the
world says a merchant. They must
have more of Christ n less of self, de-
clares a banker. Pastor and people must
be more united in every honest effort for
good, and they must give full support to
all means employed in benefiting the
young. and Christians must practice more
Christian living , maintains n nanI1faa-
turer, and a doctor sums up the whole
matter by insisting that each member
must faithfully and earnestly discharge
life's duties, not only to himself, but. by
word and counsel, to those who are about
HIM
Life this side Of the grave is an ear
consideration, feryent prayer and sincere
work.
Thirty persons who answered my ques-
ton had this idea in their minds, for they
said:-'Let the Church be aggressive. Let
it make itself felt as the greatest power
for good in the. world There are two
ways in which this can be done. One is
based on the idea of the mar who said
an ounce of prevention is worth a pound
of cure. The Church must. be made not
opened one day in the week and closed the
rest, but a centre of work and influence
all the week.. a place where young and
as in worship; a place where gymnastics.
music, typewriting and a dozen other use
ful things are taught
In other words. let it be a competitor
of the saloon and the gambling resort and
the concert hall and the many other traps
the evil one sets for the unwary feet of
the coming generation.
"As a doctor puts it, Make the churches
more attractive than the haunts of vice
and crime An educator said the same
thing in other words. So did a banker.
He advised that every church should have
a branch for amusements like that estab-
1ished by the Congregational Tabernacle.
where there Is a gymnasium. a oWling
alley and a public bath. | believe thai
every church should have a roof garden.
an assembly hall and other desirable fea,
lures that will amuse as we'll as instruct.
After that it should seek to carry Chris
tianity into the haunts of sin.
"An eminent lawyer says:-sThe minis
tiers should be compelled to preach Christ
for Christ is the perfection of REFORM He
is correct. The Gospel is the hope Of the
world. When it has once entered a
| mans heart and it's truth has taken root
there, vice has no attraction for him and
crime is abhorrent. Let it be universally
preached and practiced. and police boards
will be abolished, jails closed and peniten-
tiaries left without tenants. Gibbets will
fall into decay.
1.-THE Gospel makes Christians. and true
neither do they have any use for a
prison."
The sixth and last sermon of the series
will be delivered next Sunday night.
KNOCKED DOWN BY A HUMAN HOG