Year: 1876

Moody and sankey in New YOrk-Are


The eyangelists Moody and Sankey will
open their New York meetings at the Hip
podrome tomorrow evening. We have as
much information about what they propose
to do as though it were a new opera on the
opening of new dramatic season. The
place selected is the scene of two or three
great successes" in the show business. 1t
has been, to use a cant phrase ''recon-
structed" and purified. The beer saloons
have been turned into 'rooms of inquiry.
Bands of earnest evangelists have taken the
place of the ushers who were won't to swing
trays of beer from box to box. Grave
clergymen will occupy the platform where
Patrick Sarsfeld Gilmore held his summers
reign, and instead of the music of Strauss or
the perplexing strains of Wagner, which
Patrick Sarsield was wont TO render more
and more perplexing, we shall have the clear
and animated notes of Sankey. We are to
have a winter campaign against the devil
which bids fair to be the most extraordinary
ever known in New York


The leaders of this campaign come
crowned with laurels. Moody and Sankey
have made a stand-up fight against the devil
in many lands and thus far, so far as we can
understand the bulletins of the strife, they
have whipped him every time. In London
and Glasgow, in Liverpool and Manchester,
their achievements were marvellous. Alone
in mighty London these two evangelists,
aliens to the land, without the aid of any
denomination or religious organization, be-
gan TO speak the word that was in them.
There were some that Knocked and others
that called it a speculation, and others held
that it was so irregular, so much apart from
the ordinary channels of religious effort, that
it could only live like summer cloud and
pass away after few days wonder But the
word they spoke brought thousands and tens
of thousands, and there were 'revivals" and
manifestations Of grace and the outpouring
of the Holy Spirit. The songs which Mr.
Sankey sang are now the everyday ditties of
England. Tommy Dodd" and other irrev-
erent rhymes have given place to 'Hold the
Fort" or 'Only an Armor Bearer" The
movement became national The leading
newspapers treated it as an unusual phenom-
enon. Lords and ladies graced the platform
with their presence. 1t became the subject of
Parliamentary inquiry, and when it was over
the two evangelists left England with world
wide fame and were honored on their return
as men who had done honor to their native
land abroad. In Brooklyn their success was
repeated, and in Philadelphia there has been,
according to Mr.. Stuart, a ripe harvest of
souls. The steady old Quaker City seems to
have gone into religious experiences with
centennial fervor, and there has been such
an awakening as has not been seen since the
old bell in Independence Hall rang out lib
erty to all the land and to the inhabitants
thereof.


If Moody and Sankey mean to reach the
devil and overthrow him in New York they
must not act with mealy mouths or buttered
fingers. They must strike home. Wherever
his influence is felt it must be assailed. The
time has come to tear up root and branch and
burn as in stubble fire all remnants of sin
and hypocrisy. If these evangelists mean to
give us merely minstrel show, eloquent
talk, sweet singing and no more, the Hippo
drome might as well be thrown open to Bar
NUNS elephants and Gilmore's fddlers and
beer carriers for all the real Christian good
that will result The good men who surround
Moody and Sankey and hold up their
hands hope for better things For our own
part we give them a sincere welcome. We
might, if we INDUCED a carping spirit, find
much to criticise-superfciali frivolity, a
belittling of sacred things. We might even
plead for the old faith and the old creeds, the
precepts of many centuries. We might wish
for the solemn and accustomed ways, and
fear that this new flame, which burns so
fiercely, will burn into ashes and smoke
But in Moody and Sankey we see earnest
men trying in their own way to do good.
Around them are divines and laymen who
are worthy of all honor, and whose example
we can only view with respect. Our hope is
that Moody and Sankey may have strength
and opportunity for abundant good, and that
their work will not be for a day but for all
time.