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4 THE PRESBYTERS
correct English, or a confession on the par; of the
writer, in that it inricates that he cannot write good
English. Emphasis can be accomplished by better
means than italicizing. Good, clear writing should do
it with more thoroughness than any slanting n iter-: or
underscoring marks.
Tltorn Je i ? -1 * 1 '
.. .._.y .a ... l.ijcs a uownrignt impertinence in
the organizations and schemes to develop ce.cam lines
of church activity and life. Some pastors are beginning
to resent the "butting in" of all kinds of advisers.
Faithful pastors usually know their own people much
better than outsiders know them, and are conscientiously
and successfully doing their work without following
the devices that outsiders are with so much assurance
thrusting upon them. Advice giving is a very
cheap kind of Christian work, and there is danger that
we may employ too many men to engage in the business.
THE FEDERAL COUNCIL.
A study of the results of the recent Federal Council
shows very little to warrant all the sentiment and ex
pectation that revolved about that great gathering. It
was an assembly of choice men, full of zeal, eminent in
the councils of their several churches, capable of doing
whatever was possible to be done in such a body. The
spirit characterizing the meeting was perfect, in its
breadth, charity, wisdom, adaptability. The prestige of
thirty-four denominations sustained the accordant principles
and the declarations of their chosen representatives.
And yet, what came out of it? Nothing that
would bind, of course. That was not looked for. No
legislative or administrative power was given to the
body by any of its constituent parts. The effect was to
be only moral, the power of the truth and of united
testimony, together with the force of any new truth that
might be discovered if such were possible. But did the
Council contribute anything of this kind that had not
beeji given before? Did it offer anything new to stimulate
the mind and heart of the Church at large?
So far as one can see, the crief feature of the conference
was the bearing of its discussions and papers, and
in a certain sense the testimony of its constituent
churches upon the social side of the Church and nr religion.
The Church and the labor problem, the Church
and the immigrants, the Church and modern industry,
the Church and international relations, war, peace, and
the like, the Church and temperance, Sunday observance,
family life and education, were the leading topics.
The great function of the Church as a witness for Christ
the Mediator, as God's agent in the world to call men
to repentance, as the body of God's elect organized to
edify the saints and propagate the faith, seemed to be
in the background. Naturally on certain phases of this
all could not agree, and it was needful to consider only
topics upon which the divergence of doctrine would not
appear. And this is at once the danger and the trouble
with all such gatherings. Much of principle and of
duty must be sunk from sight" in order to make what is
1
iN OF THE SOUTH. January 13, 1909.
,1
left of any special value. The sacrifice must be made
to secure such a convention and unity in. its action, but
the price is a very heavy one for the recompense received.
It is never wise to obscure the great principle of witness
bearing. Least of all should the Church lend herself
to any devices, 110 matter how grand and multitudinous
and brotherly thev mav aoDear. which take hr>r
off that safe ground. The world will hearken to her
in her divine message only so long as it recognizes her
as devoting herself to that message. Her relation to
the world as a benefactor of the world in its social, industrial,
governmental, literary and other conditions is
only incidental, gloriously happy and surely resultant,
but still only incidental to her relation to it as the proclaimer
of a way of life to the guilty and condemned, as
the bride of Christ commissioned of her Lord to offer to
all who will believe a means of attaining to the best
of the life that now is and of that which is to come
through their acceptance of a crucified Redeemer. Let
her adhere to this mission and duty, and the rest will
come of itself.
NOTES IN PASSING.
By Bert.
A happy New Year to all my readers. To many
thousands of our fellow citizens this is not going to be
a new year, but the same old year with a new number.
A new suit of clothes does not make a new man, neither
does a change of number make a new year. Many, sad
to say, will foist upon this present year all the sins and
follies of the year just passed accentuated by the growing
strength of confirmed habit, and at the end of the
year, looking back upon t^ie evils they have brought
upon themselves, will call the year by hard names as if
it wpre to lilomn Tf I" 1? ' 1 1 -
vw xi wins la iu uv; uiuccu a new year, it
will take more than the substitution of 9 for 8 to make
it so. A really new year is one marked by the birth of
new motives, the diligent prosecution of new ideals, the
bringing into play of new spiritual powers undreamed
of heretofore, the earnest forward pushing of*the whole
man into the thick of the fight for truth and righteousness.
A new year begins any time. Not the birth of a
month, but the birth of a soul marks an opening year;
and yet there is something in the coming of the first of
January that seems to set that date out as a fit and
nrnnnr timn fsw o ~x? 1 T
t?.^1 a lung, stujuy sicp iorwaru. Let us take
it.
Whether or not this is to be a happy year will depend
not upon our outward, but upon our inward experiences,
Nothing can shake the happiness of the soul which
trusts in God. But as the beacon shines the clearer the
darker the night, so his blessedness becomes the more
apparent in the stress of life. If you would be sure of
a happy new year, my friends, let the love of God fill
and inspire you. Cultivate the things of first importance.
Refuse to be discouraged. Remember that above
the clouds the Sun is alwavs shinintr anH will k?-*?otr
J - _ " 114 M4VW"
through the thickest of them always at the very moment
of your greatest need.