The free press. (Poplarville, Miss.) 1890-19??, 1901-04-04


! with that which was ephermeral. Oh, it
| Is easy to talk against reyivals.
A man said to Mr.. Dawson: "I like
| your sermons very much, but the after
meetings l despise. When the prayer
meeting begins, 1 always go up in the
| gusted." well" said Mr.. Dawson, "the
| reason is you go on the top of your neigh
| boris house and look down his chimney
| to examine his fire, and of course you
| only get the smoke in your eyes. Why
don't you come in the door and sit down
| and warm"
Oh, ! am afraid to say anything against
revivals of religion or against anything
that looks like them, because ] think it
may be a sin against the Holy Ghost, and
you know the Bible says that a sin
against the Holy Ghost shall never be
forgiven neither in this world nor the
world to come. Now, if you are painter.
and l speak against your pictures, do |
not speak against you? il you are an
architect and | speak against building
you put up. do not speak against you?
Il revival be the work of the Holy
Ghost and / speak against that revival,
do | not speak against the Holy. Ghost?
And whose speaketh against the Holy
Ghost, says the Bible, he shall never be
forgiven neither in this world nor in the
world to come. | think sometimes peo-
pie have made a fatal mistake in this di-
rection-
Many Of you know the history Of Aaron
Burr. He was one of the most brilliant
men of his day. | suppose this country
never produced a stronger intellect He
was capable of doing anything good and
great for his country or for the church of
God had he been rightly disposed, but
his name is associated with treason
against the United States government,
| which he tried to overthrow, and with
lihertinism and immortality. Do you know
where Aaron Burr started on the down
ward road? 1t was when he was in col
| lege and he became anxious about his
soul and was about to put himself under
| the influences of a revival, and minister
| of religion said; Don't go there, Aaron;
| don't go there. That's a place of wildfre
and great excitement. No religion about
that. Don't go there, He tarried away.
| this world and his everlasting ruin in
the world to come? Was it, the minister
| who warned him against that revival?
| When / speak of excitement in revivals,
do not mean temporary arrangement OF
| the nerves, | do not mean the absurd
| things of which we have read as trans
| piring sometimes in the church of Christ,
| but [ mean an intelligent, intense, all alb
sorbing agitation of body, mind and soul
in the work of spiritual escape and spirit
| ual rescue.
Now I come to the real, genuine cause
coldness of the objector. 1t is the secret
and hidden but unmistallable cause in
| every case, low state OF religion IN the
heart. Wide awake, consecrated, Useful
| Christians are never afraid OF revivals;
| 1t is the spiritually dead who are afraid
! Of having their sepulcher nolested. The
chief agents of the devil during great
| awakening are always uuconverted pro-
| fessors OF religion.
| As soon as Christs work begins they be-
| gin to gossip against it and take pail Of
water and try to put out this spark OF
religious influence. and they try to put out
another spark. Do they succeed? As well
when Chicago was on ire might some one
| have gone out with a garden water pot
trying to extinguish it. The difficulty is
that when revival begins in church it
begins at so many points that while you
| have doused one anxious soul with pail
of cold water there are 500 other ANXIOUS
souls on fire.
Oh, how much better it would be to lay
hold of the chariot of Christ's gospel and
help pull it on rather than fling our
selves in front of the Wheels, trying to
| block their progress. We will not stop
the chariot, but we ourselves will be
Aroused pulpits will make aroused
pews; pulpits aHame will make pews
afame. Everybody believes in a revival
in trade, everybody likes revival in lit
yet great multitude cannot understand
a revival in matters of religion. Depend
upon it, where you find a man antagon-
istic to reyivals, whether he be in pulpit
or pew, he needs to be regenerated by
| the grace OF God.
could prove to demonstration that
| without revivals this world will never
be converted and that in 100 or POO years
| without revvals Christianity will be prac-
tically extinct. It is matter of astound-
ing arithmetic. In each OF our modern
generations there are at least 10000
worlds population and then have only lO0,:
900 or 100000 converted every year, and
how long before the world will be saved?
Never-absolutely never!
During our Civil War the President of
the United States made proclamation for
$4,000 troops. Some of you remember
the big stir But the King of the universe
to-day asks for 1900 900 more troops
than are enlisted, and we want 1t done
softly, imperceptibly, no excitement, one
by one. You are a dry goods merchant
on large scale, and l am merchant on
to buy a thousand yards OF cloth DO you
say: '"Thanll you. I'll sell you thou
sand yards of cloth, but I'll sell you TWEEN,
ty yards to-day and twenty tomorrow, and
twenty the next day, and, II 1T takes me
six months I'll sell you the whole thou
sand yards; you will want as long as that
to examine the goods, and I'll want as
long as that to examine the credit, and,
besides, that, thousand yards Of cloth
are too much to sell all at once?" No, you
| do not say that You take me into the
counting room, and in ten minutes the
whole transaction is consummated. The
| fact is, we cannot afford to be fools IN any
| thing but religion.
| That very merchant who on Saturday
afternoon sold me the thousand yards
| of cloth at one stroke the next Sabbath
in church will stroke his beard and Won
der whether it would not be better for a
thousand souls to come Struggling along
for ten years instead of boiling in at one
service.
We talk a good deal about the good
times that are coming and about the
worlds redemption. How long before
they will come? There is a man who says
500 years; here is a man who says 200
| years; here is some one more confident
who says in fifty years. What, fifty
| years? Do you propose to let two genera
lions pass off TIE stage before the world
is converted? Suppose by prolongation OF
human life at the end Of the next fifty
years you should walk the length OF
Pennsylvania avenue, Washington, or the
length OF Broadway, New York-in all
| 1 G.,