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10 (324) THE
MAGNANIMOUS ATLANTA.
Our Presbyterians of Atlanta have broken all
records in the extent and breadth of their proffered
hospitality. As stated in a communication
in our last week's issue, they have resolved to
invite four Presbyteriau denominations, having
churches in Atlanta, to appoint their Assembly
meetings for 1913, to be held simultaneously in
that city. This is called by one of our exchanges,
a sample of Southern hospitality. We are rather
disposed to regard it as a unique product of
Atlanta ozone turned into ecclesiastical channels.
All honor to the gallant and magnanimous spirit
of "the largest Presbyterian city of the South."
Whatever the several Assemblies may decide, the
open door policy of Atlanta will not be forgotten.
Our correspondent was evidently solicitous to
impress his readers that "this is no subtle effort
to spring Organic Union," and that among the
rest, "our U. S. A. brethren need not fear that
we are trying.to ensnare them." To this little
caution which may serve to supply the humor
of the illuminating and ebuleut communication,
we heartily subscribe; for there are many insuperable
barriers to our absorption of the great
Presbyterian fraternity to the north of us. For
example, they would be quite unwilling to turn
over their central agencies, their boards and
foundations and other building equipments to our
tender mercies. Imagine transferring their centers
of administration and control from New
Yoork, Philadelphia and Chicago, to Atlanta,
Nashville and Richmond. The thing is barely
thinkable. As well might we think of abandoning
our executive agencies and our cherished
endowments to a foreign administration.
Also, sentiment, so lofty as to be sacred, mu.;
be allowed unchallenged sway in its legitimate
realm. Our Northern sister has grown from a
little maid to her present formidable and imposing
proportions. Let this be duly credited to
her diligence and diplomacy, or to preserve the
figure, let it be credited to an ever ready appetite,
a digestion that assimilates all varieties of
substantials. and an excentional craviner for mair
nitude. She is entitled to go on growing, according
to her own exclusive processes, preserving
her distinctive character and independence,
for these are the product of her own genius and
prowess and are stamped with a uniqueness that
is veritably a part of herself. As well might
it be suggested that our own Church abandon
the memory of her past service and testimony
and forsake the principles for which she endured
and wrought and triumphed in the years that
are gone; as well scorn the name and smite the
tombs of the men of an earlier day who gave
all. that they might perpetuate to their children's
children a witness-bearing Church.
Moreover the effort to ensnare our U. S. A.
brethren would be preposterous because of their
ex-Cumberland contingent who would regard our
inflexible Calvinism as intolerably out of harmony
with their elastic and pliable views. The
aforesaid contingent would constitute the principle
U. S. A. element in immediate contact with
our ensnaring forces. They have performed the
remarkable feat of assimilating two conflicting
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authority in the U. S. A. Church. A suggestion
that they now dissimilate would be embarrassing
in the extreme. They would require a
flexible and adjustable document with wide margins
before they could be expected to subscribe
cheerfully to our articles of absorption. As well
expect ourselves cordially consent to be ensnared
by a body which includes in its official
fellowship Calvinism and semi-Arminianism,
Higher Criticism and Unitarianisra, besides other
bewildering beliefs in minor proportions. The
IL
PRESBYTERIAN OF THE S
hope of ensnaring would be from the beginning,
but an empty dream.
IIow empty and illusive would be our scheme
to ensnare when it is remembered that leading
Divinity schools and pulpits of our U. S. A.
brethren are graced by representatives of the
"mast scholarly deductions" and "assured results"
f)f " TTiffViar Ppifinipm " T/> *-V.
vtiuvioiu. A u iai\u must"
institutions and men of "advanced learning" in
hand and talk about "ordination vows" would
disturb their equanimity, shock their sensibilities,
and upset their dignity, and might altogether
do violence to the accustomed ecclesiastical
serenity of ourselves and all our dependencies.
With such unpropitious consequences in prospect,
sound discretion would forbid serious consideration.
As well might it be supposed that
ourselves would be complacently ensnared into
another communion in which we would be responsible
and accountable for the "assured results
of advanced scholarship" as known to be represented
bv leading divines and educators in that
communion. What a herculean task we would
be constrained, by conscientious conviction, to
assume in proposing to eject these men from
their pwlpsinsticnl fnrl>?ooo *V.~ ? L: ?
viw ju hi luc acanunug,
favorless temperature of the cold, cold world!
No, no; let us beware of the adventurous
policy of territorial expansion and let lis perpetuate
the more modern and more responsive
principle of conservation. "Surely, in vain is
the net spread in the sight of any bird."
THE OPENING OF THE EYES.
On the road to Emmaus the disciples were
downcast because their eyes were holden, they
despaired, but when the veil was removed they
saw not only Jesus but that their affliction was
a work of glory for the world. They caught a
vision of the meaning of the incarnation, and
their after life was one earnest endeavor to make
a blind world see the vision that had changed
their sorrow into joy. So having our spiritual
senses quickened, we can see Jesus walking on
the billows of every storm and hear his voice on
the blast of every tempest, "It is I, be not
afraid."
Sooner or later, every man, and especially
every young man, will pass through his season
of doubt, when he questions eternal things, when
skepticism and agnosticism make their assaults,
when he would bring the Almighty and his wondrous
acts before the bar of a fallible reason.
It is then that he needs to have his eyes opened
to see that God has a reason and a purpose far
above our grasp and that in his own counsels
he is working an exceeding weight of glory from
events and experiences which to us seem turned
upside down; when so-called mistakes of Moses
obscure the eternal truths of God, when hard
sayings of Christ obscure his sweetest message,
when there is courage without knowledge and
knowledge without temperance, when nothing is
too sacred to be criticized and no truth so profound
but that he thinks he is the master of it.
In such seasons of doubt we need to discern
God's will and to walk by faith; doing that will
f.'ii a 11 * *
lHiuuuuy tnougn we cannot know the reason
for it. To such a promise is given that doing
his will they shall know of the doctrine. "We
need to see, beyond the Greek root or Hebrew
idiom, the pen of Jehovah, and to trace the footsteps
of the Almighty, the evidence of a Father's
care and a Saviour's love.
There is a great need that our eyes be opened
to perceive the beauties of the spiritual world.
The birds of the night whose eyes are accustomed
only to the darkness can see nothing to desire
in the light of the sun; they love the darkness,
because their works are done in darkness. The
OUTH [March 6, 1912
natural man perceives not the things of the
Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto
him; neither can we know them, because they
are spiritually discerned. Men do not value
religion because they cannot see or appreciate
its exceeding beauty. They are inclined to the
material and fail to see the designs and will of
God fts he has revealed them. It is because the
spiritual eye is not trained to appreciate. Consider
the different thoughts in different men as
they look upon some beautiful landscape. One
man can see the wealth of gold and mineral hidden
beneath the hills; another can see the com
mercial value and with the imagination can picture
a growing city where man's foot has never
trod; the farmer can see field? of waving corn,
and the artist can see the blending of the colors,
the shadows and perspective.
So our eyes can be trained to see the beauty
and harmony and grandeur and love of God in
his plans for the human race. We may be able
to see God in everything. It will add immeasurably
to the happiness and usefulness of the
life to see in it God's meaning and God's thought
concerning us. We may look upon the life as a
period of time in which we are to eat and drink
and suffer and die, or we may look upon it as a
part of God's great plan. Wordsworth expresses
the attitude of many:
"A primrose on the river's trim,
a yellow primrose 'tivas to him,
'Tivas that, and nothing more."
Others see "sermons in stones, hooks in running
brooks, and God in everything."
It it well to pray that we may have our eyes
opened to see ourselves. The young man with
his self-sufficiency, his strong faith in himself,
and his woeful inexperience, is apt to think of
himself more highly than he ought to think. His
strong muscles, the red blood coursing strongly
in his veins, remove far from him any feeling
of weakness, and advice and admonition are apt
to fall upon unheeding ears. Could he only see
his need and see the source of all true strength,
he would be less likely to succumb to failure
or be taken unaware by mistakes.
"STICK TO THE PLAN!"
A writer in one of our Church papers, discussing
the "Assembly's Plan," mo^t justly ar?rues
and nrcres thnt "flip AeoomKlv'a Pi?? .?;n
0 o W?WMW Ai.uuv.ijwijf O X iau YV Illy
if worked, lift any church, anywhere, out of the
mud financially, but if not worked will be as
useless as a mowing machine left in the field of
hay with the mules unhitched." He then urges
that every pastor, session, Presbytery, Synod
"stick to the plan."
The great trouble with us is that we are spending
too much time in devising and too little in
steadily carrying out some of the fine devices
we have fallen upon. We are forever pulling
up the tender plant to see if it is sending out
its rootlets. We are so enamoured of novelty
making that we give assent to every specious
proposition that comes along, and before the old
method has had time to do anvthinsr we turn tn
some new suggestion and put it into effect, only
to be laid aside in its turn. So far as there is
any crisis just now in our Church's financial
affairs it may be due to the condition of transition.
There will ce'tainly be no remedy for it
in turning back or in seeking for the present to
devise some other,. It will take a little time to
adjust ourselves to the new system, and some
of the canses of beneficence may receive their
contributions at present a little more slowly, but
all who have thoroughly investigated the new
plan unite in regarding as the most hopeful we
have ever had. Let us at least stick to it until
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it has had a fair trial, and then retract it if wo
have to do so. >
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