The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1898-03-29
WILMINGTON. n. c.
RELIGIOUS EDITORIALS FOR
SUNDAY

Eaty recently an address in which he
axraigned with directness and force
the Christian Science principles, and
-xfdsculed them as illogical. They are
~unscriptural and absurd, we may add
Dr. Easton will deliver a series upon
.ehe ratter-day quasi-religious fads and
faalies. The last half of this century
has been particularly marked with nu-
rnerous new things that are antago-
MYSTIC to Christianity. They are so ex-
&raorcinary and yet 50 baseless that the
wonder is that well-balanced minds
fairly cultured and informed, can toll
crate them at all, much less receive
them or any one or part of them as
~reasonabl and comforting. DR.. Eas-
ton discussed Christian Science as set
forth by a Boston woman Chow like that
city of ''isms'' and fanaticisms gener-
nIIy) named Mrs. Eddy, in her many
writings. He of course appealed 10 the
Book-GOd's Book-in his critical at
tack upon this Eddy-ing Boston ignis
fatus. The Post says he challenged
her conclusions, turned the search
6ISD VI IcdSOH upOl IEe ueuuCUlOIlS,
and with the full force of his eloquence
held the whole doctrine up to ridicule
as Illogical, c~ontradicted by it's own
teachings, anti-common sense, and
~antiIChrist." If his misleading and
dangerous system could generally pre-
vail the Bible and it's eternal truths,
and the whole system of Christian
ethics and human morality would dis
appear. DIR. EastGn has made a spe-
cial study of Eddyism and he says
that her Christian Science"-so-called
did not believe in a personal Christ,
a personal God, or a personal man,
and a nc claim to be called Chris
fIan. The doctrine, he held, to be one
OF the most subtle foes al present as
sailing the citadel of faith. In denying
Christ it denied all faith in the incarna-
ton, and took away the ladder between
earth and heaven. He declared the
faith to be neither Christian nor
sSscience, but rather anti-Christia and
: a delusion, not truth, but error, not of
God, blu of Satan, a system of spiri-
tual malpractice, a mixture of Theoso-
ply, Esotric Buddhism, Kabalism, and
&Baatheism, which %alienates it's subjects
From the simple faith of the Gospel
into a vague, dreamy, and transcenden-
tai misbelief." In this Open-faced
nineteenth century, during which
schools of all kinds have greatly null
.tfplied and more works are published
chan the world ever knew before in
its teeming centuries, people not with
out some p~retentions to culture n
Intelligence have gone to the Oriental
countries in search of light to tighten
Cnan's earthly pathway and on through
the dark caverns that lie Beyond this
mortal sphere. The old exploded myths
and cast-off religions are studied and
snto them the attempt is made to
breathe the life of 1.-The end of the
world" However obscure and fatu-
Gus, phantasmal and foolish these OBJ
solete religions may be or seem to be,
these nineteenth century teachers of
Eads and fallacies, of isms and false
doctrines, are striving to reproduce
them in modern thought and life, and
10 enlist followers in behalf Of all that
is opposed to God and Divine Truth.
DR.. EastCn contended that Theosophy
and Christian Science-sO-called-
would break down morality. He said:
IF evil is not sin, if matter and the
mortal or nothing but a belief and IL
Fusion, if there be no God or devil, and
ST the body is only a phantom, and
the flesh only a shadow, it is logically
certain that some time practical sin
H,ers will take refuge under such a sys-
tenn and insist that the sin of the body
and transgressions Of the flesh are only
phantOmS.
-'Such a doctrine would be to break
down ali the guardians of morality and
social purity, lead to u~nchaStity and
corruption of morals. He did not argue
xhat the disciples Of Christian Science
were immoral persons, but their doc
-xrine was such as to break down the
xnora.Nty of the home and the publ
To destroy the ethical reality of evil
would be to induce men to violate the
<Vhole decalogue and Justify transgTes-
sions of moral law by the doctrine that
there is no such being as the God of
the Bible to hold them accountable
These new religious fancies and be-
xzlilipg theories and systems may have
peen foreseen and characterized-in the
book of Jude, where it is said: Clouds
they are without waiter, carried about
of winds; trees whose fruit withereth
without fruit, twice dead, plucked VI
by the roots; raging waves Of the sea
~goaming out of their own shame: wan
dsring stars to whom is reserved the
s~,saSSSness of darkness forever"
Whenever q person is so moved a.