Milford chronicle., 1901-03-08

highest CHRISTIAN cOufIesleS 10 Lhe repre-
sentatives of journalism. Give them
easy chairs and plenty Of room when
they como to report occasions. For the
most part they are gentlemen Of educa-
ton and refinement graduates of col
leges. with families to support by their |
literary craft, many of them weary with /
the push of a business that is precariOus I
and huctuating, each one of them the |
avenue of information to thousands Of |
readers. their impression OF the services |
to be the impression adopted by multi
tudcs. They are connecting links be-
tween a sermon, or a song, or prayer. |
and this great population that tramp up
and down the streets day by day and !
year by year with their sorrows uncom-
fortcd and their sins unpardoned. Oh,
the hundreds of thousands of people in
our cities who never attend churches!
Our cities are not so much preached to
by ministers of religion as by reporters
Put all journalists into our prayers and
sermons OF all the hundred thousand
sermons preached today there will not be
three preached to journalists and proba-
bly, not one. OF all the prayers offered
for classes of men innumerable the pray
ers offered for the most potential class
will be so few and rare that they will be
thought a preachers idiOsyncrasy. There
are mary journalists in our church mem
berships, but this world will never be
brought to God until some revival of re-
, ligion sweeps over the land and takes
into the kingdom of God all editors, re-
/ pOrters. compOsitOrs, pressmen and news
/ boys. And if you have not faith enough
/ to pray for that and toll for that you had
better get out of our ranks and join the
other side. for you are the uRbelievers
who make the wheels OF the Lords char
lot drag heavily. The great final battle
between truth and error, the Arranged
don, / think. will not be fought with
swords and shells and guns, but with
pens-uuill pens. steel pens. gold pens,
fountain pens, and before that the pens
must be converted The most divlncly
honored weapon Of the past mas been the
pen. and the most divinely hOnored weap-
on of the future will be the pen; prOph-
cts pen and evangelist pen and apos-
ties pen. followed by editors pen AMI
authors pen and reporters pen. God
save the pen! The wings of the Apoc-
alyptic angel will be the printed page.
The printing press will roll ahead Of
Christ's chariot 10 clear the way.
"But." some one might ask, ''would you
make Sunday newspapers also a re-ep
f0rcementy' | have learned 10 take
things as they are. ] would like to see
the much scoffed at old Puritan Sabbaths
come back again. ] do not think the
modern Sunday will turn out any better
men and women than We're your grand
. fathers and grGndmOthers under the cd
fashioned Sunday. To say nothing OF
other results, Sunday newspapers are
I Tors
? D-essmen. Every man. woman and child
is entitled to "a hours Of nothing to do
If the newspapers put on another set OF
p hands, that does not relieve the editoria
b and reportoria room of its cares and
I responsibilities. Oar literary men die
: fast enough without killing them witt
Sunday work.
God and the Printing Press.
All things are possible with God, anC
' my faith is up until nothing in the wa!
= of religious victory would surprise me
> Al the newspaper printing presses Of tn
: earth are going to be the Lords, and tele
: graph and telephone and type will ye
: announce nations born in day.. Th
: first book ever printed was the Bible, b
= Faust and his sOn-in-law, Schoetfer, i
: AGO. and that conservation of type to tn
=, Holy Scriptures was prophecy of tn
x great mission of printing for the evange
% ization Of ali the nations. The father G
, the American printing press was clel
= gyman. Rev. Jesse Glover. and that wa
n a prophecy of the religious use that th
!, gospel ministry in this country were
+ make of the types.
n Again. we shall see the secular pres
- rs a mightier reinforcement Of reiigio
b, ,l,ft Nv ara.1ti OfTf
., utterances more interesting and spirite
/, and then the press will reproduce Their
On the way to church some 80 yea
-, ago a journalist said thing that b;
=, kept me ever since thinking, "Are Sc
=. going to give us airy points today
- "What do you mean?" ! asked.
~, said. Il mean by that anything that W
nj be striking enough to be remembered
-, Then ! said to myself, "What right ha'
~, we in the pulpits and Sunday schools
~ take the time of the people if we fha
49,, nothing to say that is memorabilia Dav
- did not lave any dificulty-in remembC
ing Nathan's thrust. "ThOu art
man." nor Felix in remembering PaH
he point blank utterance on righteousne:
Nv temperance and judgment to come, Il
ON the English king any difficulty in
ost membering what the court preacher 50
in when. during the sermon against s
IT, the preacher threw his handkerchief in
ten the kings pew to indicate whom
ed meant.
ted The tendency of criticism in the tn
ay logical seminaries is to file off from c
be Young men all the sharp points and ma
my them too smooth for any kind of exc
ing ton. What we want, all of us, is M
sou In 1s1t
10 thing in the right way, the press will
'eet glad to echo and re-echO it. Sumo
,or. school teachers. reformers, young n
red and old men in the ministry, what we
and want if we are to make the printing pr
of an ally in Christian work is that VIII
lag the reporter spoken of suggested-poil
tie sharp points, memorable points. Blu
re- the thing be dead when uttered by liv
lice, voice it will be q hundredfold more d
as when it is laid out in cold type.
der The Church and the Press.
ivcd Now, as you all have something ia
lper with the newspaper press, either in i
gOs- ing paper or in reading it, either as
min ducers or patrons, either as sellers
and purchasers of the printed sheet, prol
to ON this Lords day treaty to be sig
D as between the church and the prin
o,,,;5 press, a treaty to be ratified by mill
p ~ of good people if we rightly fashion
and treaty promising that we will help
sSi,- other in our work of trying to illuI
,,o1. and felicitate the world, we by voice,
~ l. by pen, we by speaking only that W
1vaat is worth printing, you by printing
- that which is fit to speak. You hell
MOO. and we will help you. Side by sid
,,,itb these two potent agencies until the
:. IN ment day, when we must both be
:. 81 tinized for our work, healthful or
-: ing. The two worst off men in that
'iie'- will be the minister of religion and
editor if they wasted their OppOrtu
Both of us are the engineers of Ion
~ press trains of influence, and we vii
VI - ~ them into depot of light or tumble
off the entertainments.
a d What a useful life and what glO
npio' departure was that of the most ia
lsses. of all American printers, Benz
. Van Franklin, whom infdels in the penu
peo their resources have often fraudul
l"It claimed as their own, but the pi
hu Is who moved that the Philadelphia co
icy az ton be opened with prayer, the resOl
niol lost because a majority thought p
ise VI unnecessary, and who wrote at the
tne!r he was viciously attacked, my rule
J. thelT 20 straight forward in doing whG
itorlai pears to me to be right, leaving thu
aVaI sequences to Providence" and who
oehah this Quaint epitaDh showing bis he