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October 13, igog. THE PRESBYTER]
over, the social and charitable problems of a great
city are always present and urgent. Many are in
want and sick and dependent and wayward. The
appeals for all manner of charitable and beneficent
schemes arc never silent. There is always more right
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iii 11*11in iu nc none man tne l nristian and charitable
people can overtake; and the religious people arc those
who support these schemes most largely.
This magazine writer proceeds to advertise a certain
guild, which is his ideal of the religion the people need,
a social settlement for employment and charity and
all temporal relief and improvement. It is an example,
lie thinks, of a better work than the churches are doing.
But all these schemes, and charities, are the product,
he fails to see, of the religion of Christ. They
are not round where Christ is not known. Like Dr.
Eliot and the Unitarians, he would accept the fruit and
reject the tree that bears the fruit. The substantial
charge of this writer is that the churches are attending
to religion, and he, like many around him, have
no use for that.
OUTSIDER'S VIEWS.
One of the most interesting features of the Calvin
commemoration has been a study of the estimate of
the great Reformer's character and work by representatives
of churches and classes which do not accept
the distinctive theological doctrines which he taught.
Almost all of these representatives have extolled in
110 limited terms the services of John Calvin to humanity.
Especially have they recognized him as the
great organizer of the forces of the Reformation arid
paid tribute to him for his clear declaration of its
principles, for his exaltation of the Word of God, for
his proclamation of a pure and free gospel. The at~r
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uiuuc ui iiic writers ui cnurcncs ouisiae ot tne uaivinistic
fold has been a credit to them, and has signally illustrated,
in most practical form, the substantial unity
of the leading Protestant churches. About the only
quarter from which another, a discordant, note has
sounded, but that from'only a part, not all, has been
in the secular press. The attitude of this part of the
secular press is to be accounted for, however, though
iiwi cxcuseu, on me ground ot its ignorance of the
great work of the great scholar and organizer of the
sixteenth century. It knows only the name of John
Calvin and has heard only a denunciation of his doctrines
or a travesty of his faith. It does not even
know that Calvin was a great leader and organizer of
republican government, that he gave it form and
stability, that he fostered universal education, as well
as the highest forms of literary culture, that he was
the founder of the public school system, and that in
many other ways he was the greatest citizen as well
as the greatest theologian and scholar of his day. It
does not know, either, that of all the theological systems
taught in that day Calvinism is today the most
universally prevalent and that amongst the cultured
and thoughtful of all lands around the entire globe.
It is a significant fact that the church is not en\
gaged so much in the defence and advocacy 6f misV
sions as in the prosecution of them. The day is
\l)ast f?r proving the urgency of the call. The day
wias come for the work itself.
/
:an of the south. 3
the home of the soul.
The Rev. Charles Wagner, of the "Simple Life," calls
his church in Paris, "The Home of the Soul," a place
for religious rest and health and culture. His latest
book bears the same title. It is a true and beautiful
name for the sanctuary in which one worships.
To the school one goes for mental education and
training, that there may be preparation for the duties
of life. To the hospital one is borne that bodily
health may be secured and injuries repaired. To the
home one comes back for rest and comfort, for love
and happiness. But school and hospital and home,
however consecrated and happy, do not embrace all of
our wants or cover the needs and aspirations of the
whole of our hpinir Wp mav Vnoil Uocn ? "1,
them efficiently and in highest value, and yet not attain
our peace, our manhood or any fitness or hope for
a better life beyond. Where shall the soul find its
school, its hospital and its home?
The House of God, the sanctuary where one worships
God in His own appointed way, is the Home of
the Soul. lie who knows perfectly the whole nature
He has given to man, knows its wants and how to supply
them, its sickness and how to heal it, its perplexities,
and how to solve them, its longings and how to
satisfy them. He has made the assembly of His
people and the ordinances of His stated worship to
he the means of the srrace that we need.
It is in the direct and personal approach to God
in His house that the squI finds its cure, its rest and
its hope and joy. Out of the world, up from its turmoil
and evil and care, we go up on our Mount Zion
and present ourselves before the God of all grace, and
make bare the soul within, hiding nothing that the
whole spiritual being may be uncovered before the
life and light ami love of the unseen presence of its
Maker and Father and Redeemer. We lay our burdens
down at His feet. We make petition for our
need. We give Him thanks for His mercies. W'e
wait before Him for His peace. Messages of His
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limn unu iuiiic lu us Hum nis wuru, hhu intelligently,
truthfully, we feed upon the bread of life,
and drink again of the living water.
The sanctuary is not for social entertainment, nor
for occasional aesthetic diversion, nor for the discussion
of themes that belong to the world and its order
and well being. It is ordered and designed for the
'real man, though spiritual and immortal. It is school
and hospital and home for the soul which can never
die. And in it the soul finds the light and the love
from God, without which it can find no joy nor rest.
The church where we trulv worshin is the Home i?f the
Soul.
?
The great error of organizationists is that they seem
to think that organization gives vitality. Organization
is, in its last analysis, but a mustering of forces. An %
organization made of lifeless elements can not be made
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speedy failure. It is only as living component parts
are brought together that the organic body lives. Dependence
upon organization to secure permanent results
is sure to disappoint. The power back of the
organization is the thing needful.