The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-01-23

Century Educational Movement of the
Methodist Church.
This was the first session of the meet
ing of the Methodist ministers of this
district, who have been called together
by Presiding Elder Gibbs. for the pur-
pose of discussing and furthering the
plans of the church's movement.
There will be a business session this
morning beginning at $50 o'clock and
tonight at 1870 O'clock, in the Sunday
school room. there will be an address on
missions by Rev. A. A McCullen, of
Oxford.
DR.. Kilgo in his address last night
spoke of the achievements of the past
century and the possibilities of the new
one. He particularly pointed out the
achievements of the Methodist church in
the past hundred years and impressed on
the mind Of his hearers the responsible
ties that must come TO them with the
new century.
There may be others here of other
denominations who may claim share IN
the work I'm about to speak of. If so,
l want to say to you, you may just
strike out the word Methodist wherever
/ use it and insert the name of your own
denominations. I'll accept the amend
ment. But tonight I'm talking 10
Mcthodists and its Methodist money I'm
after. and l can't get it with an amended
resolution.
I'm the first place the Methodist
church has been the pioneer church
among the masses. 1t may seem an ex-
aggeration, but l state only the fact
when / say the churches that have had
a peculiar genius i'm handling the masses
have been the sole factor in saving the
world.
r"First and last the most dangerous
thing in the world is liberty. The most
daring thing ever written was the
American constitution. When You think
of the vast amount of ignorance turned
loose at once you will realize the truth
eof the assertion. And what has saved
America from being nation of cut
threats and anarchists, but the churches
which have been built among them-in
the woods and among the mountains!
When / remember this / bless God for
having peculiarly called and commission
ed this great denomination for this work.
"Do YOU know that God never allowed
civil movement to be born that he
didn't send some great preacher for that
era? When men were preparing TINS
nation for freedom God was preparing
John Wesley to preach to it. Liberty Is
essentially spiritual. You can't down it.
once it is established, with all the pro-
iectiles that have ever been forged, and
YOU can't create it with all the iron that
has ever been dug from the earth. You
can't preach to man that he's free In
Gods sight-free to go in and out be-
fore his Maker-and then make him be-
heve he's got no right at the political
ballot box. He'll wear no mans
shackles'
nr. Kilgo went ON to say that the
Methodist church by its teachings and
example had kept the nation from being
"a nation of consummate loafers."
"Then the Methodist church has had
great deal to do with raising the tone
of the social life of the country. Re-
Hgion is a most respectable sort of thing
ANYHOW. We folks had mighty bad
social start. but we've done mighty well.
We don't boast any noble ancestry.
And [ want to say right here l never
see little fellow trying to trace his FAM
| ily back to some half crazy, idiOtic no.
II,
most conglomerate mixture of pity and
contempt. He's hunting among the dead
| for something noble to supply a de-
| fciency of it among the living. He's an
object of pity. There's no blood of the
nobility in you or me, if your ancestors
came over here while this country was
being settled. They came for that very
reason. They were tired of scrubblnS
and cooking, chopping wood and carrying
| hOds, driving wagons and sweeping
chimneys-they were tired of being
hewers of wood and drawers of water
for the nobility, and so they came here.
And right there the Methodist church
| began its work of lifting us UP, ana
| what has it done? Once we met IN
barns and under trees, in our shirt
| sleeyes-not even the luxury of suspend
ers could be afforded. Now here are
| folks wearing cuffs and standing collars;
hair carefully brushed, some of 1t parted
in the middle; with diamond rings and
brooches, and silks and laces; we have
steepes and choirs and organs and quar-
tettes and solos, and all that sort of
thing. Oh. we've come long way
these hundred years. And it will do us
no harm to look back now and then at
the hole from which we've been dug"
This brought the speaker to the sub
| iect of education. He introduced it by
| saving that the strategic point of all
history is higher education.
God is always starting great move
ments from that point and today the
great impregnable strength and life of
| America is her universities
| First among these he placed Harvard,
| saving that institution "settles and fixes