Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1906-07-06
NEW ENGLAND BEING PAcANizED
Rev. Or. S. M. crothers, Formerly Of Brat
tIeboro. In Address In London Puts
Blame on Secularism.

A recent cable despatch from London
said: Rev. Samuel Crothers of Cambridge.
Mass, has been the subject of much
notice on account of an address he de-
livered a few days ago at a meeting of
the British and Foreign Unitarian AS
ISOLATION. He said:
American civiliza ton has evolved men
from whom Americans turn back af-
frighted. America does not keep these
men, however. they come to England
to spend their money.
1.-THE hardest thing in America is to
bring to a man the conviction Of sin.
The Americans are unreasoning optimlsts
A preacher might stand at the street
corner and cry, Repent. repent. for the
kingdom of heaven is at hand;" and the
comment OF the good natured prosperous
citizen would be. I guess that's all right
the kingdom of heaven is coming, sure
enough and l guess we're it But II one
urged on him that II he did not repent
the kingdom of heaven would not be at
hand. he would only smile and say. Tn
all right, let the other fellow repent"
To believers in ecclesiasticism. he said,
America stood today as a horrible ex-
ample OF the results of secularism. In
New England there were country COM
munities that had relapsed into paganism,
and were standing examples Of the futility
Of mere little sectarian communities. That
region was a place where there stood no
one great church with sacred assocla-
tions, only a few little meeting houses,
scarcely attended by the people.
one of the serious problems in Amer
lea today was this growing paganism of
country communities. There was no re-
ligious teaching. sectarian or otherwise,
in American schools. and religious people
there had begun to ask: Are you NOT
educating the new generation Of men
intellectually without educating them
morally, making them keen and quick TO
achieve and ambitious, but not giving
them the guidance they needed for a true
citizenship" That was another of the
great and terrible problems of Amer
lean life.
thoughtful American would admit
that their liberty. which had been
preached for generations, mad produced
lawlessness. and that materialism was
growing. Yet while he admitted the
evils, he would say: your old remedies
are absolutely impossible TO us" The cry
of the Americans of today is not Less
liberty" but. more ordered liberty"
America was now passing through one
of the greatest moral and religious crises
since the great movement for the aboi-
ton of slavery. II American politics
were corrupt, the people were not indif-
ferent to it, and those who We're working
in tine cause of morals and religion had
sense of final victory thar had not pos
sessed them for generations. The two
most popular preachers In America were
Andrew Carnegie and Theodore Roosevelt
They appealed To the masterful elements
in young men. Carnegie had said: Get
rich and then bestow your wealth for the
good of the community" President Roose-
welt had urged: "Give yourself to the
public service, disinterestedly. honestly
America needed a generation of fearless
men who could neither be bribed MOI
threatened. Today the United States
were repentng that sin OF materialism OF
which they had in the past generation
been guilty, and were seeing the necessity
for finer and higher ideals.