Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page.

*: ‘f . r’ ‘ ■■ ■ figv , 1 < ? ’J ,£ ; , j ‘ JljLuV*- • x. TherMtfll b?'•thjr'r Thre will be more p im* .j: -y No aching head, nor throbbing, care-worn: breast; The sad ones no more mourn, And sweet will be their rest: Thera will be no more pain. There will be no more death; Nojsale disease, no dying farewell spoken. No parting hour nor agony of pain Amidst that band unbroken : There will be no more death. There will be ceaseless praise: There songs undying joyfully ascend In one triumphant hymn, And friend meets long-lost friend . There will bo ceaseless praise. There will be endless joy ; TnCrc golden harps are tuned for evermore; There Jesus is the sun And light of that glad shore : There will be endless joy. For the Index. Fast Day Exercises in Milledge ville, Georgia. SERMOXS BY BISHOP PIERCF. AND DR. B. M. PALMER. The Legislature adjourned from Thursday evening to Saturday morning in deference to the appointment of our Chief Executive. The exercises of the occasion were arranged by a joint Committee from the Senate and H ouse of Representatives. The announce ment of the popular name of Bishop Pierce in connection with the forenoon services had excited great expectation, and at an unusu ally early hour, the audience began to assem ble. The neat, but small house of worship of the Methodist church, was soon crowded to overflowing with the Legislative wisdom of the State, and with the youth, beauty, manhood and age of the Capital and surroun ding country. At the appointed hour the Bishop arose, a man of noble person and bearing, read some appropriate Scriptures, offered a solemn and suitable prayer, and en tered upon his discourse. He made a few striking remarks upon the fitness of the na tion’s assembling on occasions, in solemn supplication and fasting before the God who “works his own will in t ie armies ofHeaven and among the inhabitants of the earth.” r lo encourage the faith of the audience by the assurance that our cause was such a one, upon which the Divine blessing might be consistently asked and bestowed, he remark ed, at some length, and with eloquence and power, upon the fact that our enemies are waging against us an unjust and cruel war. He charged the North with corrupting the word of Gpd by turning its precepts against an institution so abundantly recognized in the Bible, and boldly claimed, lor the South the credit, not only of standing for the de fence of our -rights, hut also for the mainten ance of Scriptural in.sttViif ton& A.Thus -luejen listed on our side of this great struggle the united power of the sacred causes of home and altars. “At the South,’; said he, “the “Bible has been a mount of fire, upon which none dared lay unholy hands, and from whose smoke and flame has gone forth* voice ofGed to tin attentive and trembling fieople.” These remarks, he said, were made, not to exalt our pride, but to encourage our faith in approaching the God of our fathers in behalf of our bleeding country. He then maintained, with bold declaration and forci ble argument, the necessity of conforming our ways, as a nation, to the whole law of God. He evidently considered national sins to be only such violations of God’s law, as are made by the public enactments and or ders of our government. He insisted that when all our laws are made to conform to thejaw of Jehovah, the nation is righteous before the God of providence, despite the transgressions of individuals; and that then and then only will we be authorized to ap pear confidently before the throne of mercy to ask the Divine blessing on our cause. I think he might have been troubled to show that the doom of Sodom and Gomorrah was due wholly to the sins of their governments and not in a great measure, to the wicked ness of their inhabitants. He demanded for God a distinckrecognition in our ■Wamen tal law, not simply as the abstract jjf the Deist, but as the God of Christianity, in character as Father, Son and - ; I. liUS I -7 *r-—=-! s* r: I —r-ja:u-.-■■■■ - ■. : —r fix. Holy Ghost. Descending from generalities, he demanded of the legislature of the State to repeal all laws in conflict with the letter or spirit of the sacred Scriptures. As lia ’! ble to this censure, he denounced all statutes kby which any individuals or corporations are Authorized to violate the Sabbath. He spoke, Tl am glad to say, with solemn warning and i eloquent denunciation against those abomina jble infidel enactments of the legislature by wTiich the Christian master is forbidden, un der pains and penalties, to teach his'* Slaves to read the precious word of God. gnage upon this subject I endorse wLole heart; “if slavery. cannot bear the fight, let the institution perish !” He might have added, as equally and, if possible, more | worthy of bitter denunciation, that high handed infringement upon the rights of the j churches, and audacious insult to the free I and sovereign grace by which God calls whom lie will to the sacred office of ministry, the legislative prohibition upon churches and all others,, against licensing any slave or free persor?“6f color to preach, exhort, or otherwise officiate in public. On the whole the .Bishop’s discourse was able, eloquent and practical. His teachings in regard to the moral rights of the slave to read the Bi ble provoked, I am sorry to say, no small spirit of controversy among the members of the Legislature. At 3 1-2 o’clock, a large, but somewhat smaller, audience asssembled at the same place, to hear the distinguished B. M. Pal mer, D. D., of the Presbyterian church, oi New Orleans. He is a man of medium size and rather ordinary appearance. Even in the opening exercises he gave rich foretastes of the intellectual feast which lie was about to spread before us. He reads with a dis tinct and musical voi?e, but not with the rhetorical correctness and power of our Tuck er. His introductory prayer was elegant in diction, arrangement and utterance, but pain fully long. For the merits hinted at, I have heard nothing superior to it, and have sel dom heard it equalled. His discourse was founded on the 2d and 3d verses of the 4th chapter of Revelations: “Behold a throne was set in heavenand one sat on the throne. And he that sat was to look upon like a Jas per and a Sardine Stone : and there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like uiito-an .emerald.” His exposition of the text- was highly elegant. He deduced from it the doctrine, that while the God of all power, perfect in justice and glorious in holiness, sits upon the throne and sways the universe, he nevertheless governs the world through Jesus Christ, and according to those principles of grace and mercy so beautifully j symbolized by the emerald rainbow. Tlis j application, as he termed it, constituted the burden of his discourse. It consis ted of various suggestions as to the neces sity for the present state of disunion and revolution, and as to the ground*Bf the high confidence which he expressed - in our ulti mate success. He identified the interests of. the Almighty’s church and of republican in stitutions with the welfare of the South,and the perpetuity of slavery ; maintained that the painful experience through which our country is now passflypMs only a discip linary.-agd, in no sense, penal dealing of God with us, but ‘ indicates and ensures to us a future of greatness and glory. He thanked God for tho war, and eloquently ur i ged upon the people that the only and remedy for our present ills is endu rance. He spoke of no national sins. He did not intimate the necessity of humbling ourselves before God, acknowledging our de , pendente upon him and invoking his aid ; ! but treated our success as a matter of un j doubted revelation, for which we must simp |ly wait. This discourse, in my humble judgment, as in that of several more discrim inating and enlightened Christians, fell far ’ short of adaptation to the occasion as one of ! “fasting, humi.iation and prayer.” The speaker enchained a large and crowded au dience for, I suppose, at least two hours, and ; the audience, generally, was enraptured with I the performance. For elegance of diction, I (save the rather frequent repetition of cer tain shining epithets,) for delivery and for ! brilliance both of manner and thought, per haps I never heard it excelled. I do not , think it was characterized either by logic or j spirituality; and some of his views, I think, I would suffer under a discriminating review, i On the whole, Dr. Palmer is an extraordi i NART MAN, ON A POPULAR THEME, giving j utterance in an eloquent style to popular | opinions, supported too often by reasoning ; not satisfactory to all minds. Thus closed i the exercises of the 27th day of March, 1863, j afcotir State capital. VISITOR. ’ Macon, Ga., March 30th, 1808. ■ •.*/ THE PASTOR’S AID: THE CHRISTIAN'S GUIDE: THE SINNER’S PR*END. MACON, GEORGIA, MONDAY, APRIL 6, 1863. —r- -■ • “For the Christian Index. “The Light of the World.” Naturalists tell us that the sun is the most fertile source of light to the world. Before his existence everything was in a state of dark chaos. So before the coming of Christ, everything connected with man’s future ex istence was in comparative obscurity. Man by wisdbm knew not God. Christ brought life and immortality to light.” 1 Tim. 1:10. He is the true light that lighteth every man * that cometh into the world. John 1: 9. Yet Christ himself addressed his disciple * in these words—“Ye are the light of the world.” Mat. 5 : 14. In what sense then are Christians the light of the world ? - Their light cannot be spontaneous, that is ] procccdiug from themselves. For they have j nothing in them different from other men to j produce so great a result as Christ attributes to them. It must proceed then from some other source. Their light emanates from Christ, and is reflected by them on the world, just as the light of the moon is reflected from the sun. , Now for any material to be a perfect re- j Sector, its surface must be smoothe, transpa- ; rent and entirely free from every blemish; j just"as the Daguerrcan Artist will tell you J that he cannot give you a perfect picture I unless his plate is in the finest order. The j slightest spot or blemish will destroy the es- j feet of all his labor. So the Christian, hav- ‘ ing surrender'd a clean heart to Christ, is to submit himself to Him to make whatever im pression IJe pleases. And then he is to re flect that image on the world. ‘lhe image which the true Christian de sires to reflect is Christ himself. He is to exhibit Christ in the prominent features of his divine Master while he was in the flesh. First, then, we notice in Christ a simplicity of purpose, a consistent and persistent aim at all times to and the will of his Father in heaven. It was announced “Lo, I eomc to do thy will ” Ps. 40: 7,8. Nothing de terred him from this object. “My meat is j to do the will of him that, sent me.” John’ 4 : 34. Neither solitude alarmed him, nor multitudes disturbed him. In all places and under all circumstances he went forward in the discharge of every duty. He endured temptation as a tost of his obedience. He accepted the acclamations of the multitudes at Jerusalem, without depression or elation. He attended the wedding at Cana in Galilee ! and provided for the wants of the guests with as inueh composure as he delivered his sermon on the Monnt. lie talked with the woman of Samaria, at Jacob’s Well, with as : much freedom as he disputed with the doc- J tors in the Temple. He was as thougbtiul ! of his mother’s welfare, while hanging on the Cross and bearing the sins of the world, as though he were enjoying the smiles of hea ven on a downy pillow. So you see, chris-! tian, that you are not so responsible to God, j for the position you occupy, as for the itn- j provement you make of that station to re- i fleet the image of Christ. Yours is a poei- ] lion of awful responsibility ; Christ has left the earth and has committed to you the dif fusion of light. The world is in darkness \ in exact proportion to the degree that you ! obscure the image of Christ. That image is j obscured, whenever you repine at God’s pro- i vidence and pretend how much you would do • situated in other conditions. That imiage-is/ darkened whenever you exhibit any unfaitlr fulness to your vows to God; whenever in : your conversation you show that you are more interested in some worldly object than in I the cause of true religion; whenever in your; intercourse with your fellow-men, you show j less regard for their feelings, interest ant eternal welfare than you do to accomplisl your own selfish purposes. * Christian! examine your heart, test yous conduct by the standard we have presented and then ask yourself whether your eye ii : so single that your whole body may becomi j full of light ! Remember Christ’s com| i mand—“Let your light so shine that other* j seeing your good works, may glorify yout Father which is in heaven.” Mat. 5: 16.—1 Recollect what Paul says — “ For me to live is Christ.” Phil. 1: 21. Ask yourself dai ; ly, hourly and as often as opportunity occurs, on bended knees—“Am I becomirg more i conformed to the image of Christ ?” Rom. i 8: 29; and 12: 2. Think what a flood of light would be pour ed on the world, if every Christian perfectly reflected the image of Christ! fit would render the world a very uncomfortable abode for sinners. Heaven would dawn on earth, and we would all become meet for the in heritance of the saints in light and glory. M. For the Christian Index. 3ffy Child. Camp Mercer, Near Savannah, 12th Georgia Battalion. >- j March 25th, 1863. ) Dear Index. —“A Husband” has writ ten about “lsie Wife,” aud “The Wife” has written also about “The Husband”—please allow an humble effort in behalf of the In fant—that gift of heaven; that pledge of Thjfrve and th sacred bonds of matrimony ; | that treasure of the family. Many, very ■ many lovely, interesting and charming fea j tures cluster around ita name. : worthy of contemplation. Behold its inno i cence! its dependence ! its smile! See how | the eyes of the father and mother sparkle | with joy and delight, when first they see a j smile begin to play upon its sweet lips! Are angels there? It is God speaking his love. What makes the infant smile ? Ah, what a thought! Poets have sung its smile andyet there is room for a complete description. — Who can, without smiling, behold a smiling | infant? Witness a friends and rcl ! atives caressing an infant. How natural the • attachment. When the father has to gone | to war and left a wife and chil&behind, how pleasant to wander back in his dreams while ! slumbering in his tent, aud behold his lovely companion and smiling babe. When fur loughs fail, sometimes sweet dreams are our passports to our dear ones at homo. a father: Wny Baptism before Commu nion. The antecedency of baptism before com munion rests not on any formaliy instituted • connection between them, but on the intrin ! sic character of the two rites, and their com , mon relation to the Christian life. Baptism is simply the initiatory rite into , the Christian church, or rather, to speak more ! comprehensively, it is the divinely appoint ed method of declaring'formally our allegi ! ance to Christ. It is the specific st<Jdivinc "'Jy instituted badge of discipleship. Tt is a i strictly transitional institution; the formal act of enlistment under the banners of the great Captain of salvation ; the formal trans fer of our allegiance from the Prince of Darkness to the Prince of Life. Baptism, ! therefore, is an act performed, a rite submit | ted to, once for all. Once done, it is done i forever. The magistrate who has taken the oath of office, has henceforth only to go for ward in the faithful discharge of his duties. The soldiers who has once taken the milita j-y.pSth and signed the papers, henceforth shares the discipline and is part of the or •puiized force. The alien who has once sub mitted to the process of naturalization, is thenceforward a citizen, and isLoimd to the duties and entitled to the privileges of the Government to which Le Ijas sworn allegi ance. So he who has by baptism formally and publicly put on Christ, has done it once for all. Tie is henceforth a recognized mem ber of “the sacramental host of God’s elect/’ he has henceforth his citizenship in the kingdom which is not of this world. In an expressive and solemn symbol lie has wash ed away his sins—put oft* the filth of the flesh, become dead to the world, and risen to anew and spiritual life. Baptism, then, stands at the gateway of the Christian life. The Lord’s Supper is an institution of a very different character. It is not a transi tional rite, but a permanent ordinance of the religious life. It is the banquet ot love to which the believer is from time to time come, to nourish his spiritual graces, to feeS the springs of his religious life, to remind him of the precious Saviour ‘in.whom is ail ; his hone, to send his thoughts back to toe . h'our when his redemption was wrought out in humiliation and agony, and forward to the day when it shall he consummated in glory and triumph. “This do, as often as ye do it, in remembrance of me,” wflffi the lan guage of the Saviour wlicn lie instituted this rite for those who had been for years his disciples. It is, then, an act to he repeat ed as often as convenience, or the exigencies of the Christian life may demand it. The priority of baptism to communion, then, grows-eotout of any arbitrary law, or any express and positive relation between the two ordinances. It grows out of the simple necessity of entering the banqueting hall bc : f ore we con sit down to the feast; out of the fact, that while the supper is strictly an in stitution for professed believers, baptism is simply a profession 0/ belie/, the first formal dedication of faith, the outward act by which the soul passes over from the legions of Sa tan into the army of Immanuel. Those, therefore, who hold to baptism at all, must hold to it as in its nature anterior to commu nion, simpTy because it is in its nature ante rior to all acts of the ‘formal, outward, pro fessed christian life. To come to the com munion table without baptism is to set aside and treat with contempt an expressed and solemn ordinance ot Jesus Christ. To come to it before baptism, is to confound and re verse the order of the to convert thg*twsdom of Ohnsfmto numtin folly, to assume the duties and ‘prerogatives of a spiritual citizen before submitting to the process of spiritual naturalization. A of baptism cannot be too clear ly conceived, nor too frequently- and iiarei* ’ bly presented. Baptism is not regeneration. It is not the means of regeneration. It is not a substitute for regeneration. . But it is the natural, the divinely enjoined step im mediately consequent upon regeneration - the act by which he whom God has transla ted from the bondage of Satan into the glo rious liberty of his kingdom, is at onco to testify his allegiance to the Prince whose service he enters. (Jan there be any doubt upon this point ! “Ife that believeth and is baptized;” “disciple all nations, baptizing them ;” “repent and be baptized”—this uni form language of the New Testament, inter preted and enforced by the uniform practice of the Apostles, leaves us not a shadow of doubt as to the intention of our Lord sis to the place, and the importance of the place, which he assigned to baptism, in the organ ization of his earthly kingdom. It is the one solemn act by which the converted sin ner declares his allegiance to Christ. He •who refuses or ncgloets it, refuses to.ackr nowlcdge himself formally as Christ’s; and whatever be his character, can make no claim to be recognized as a Christian, much less to any of the privileges of that regular l Christian organization whose primary and fundamental condition he has disregarded. To overleap baptism and take one’s seat at the communion table, argues gross ignorance or gross presumption—aiF infract ion of gos pel order wFJuli'no” intelligent church or minister can sanction. We repeat, then, let no one he diverted from the true issue, nor seduced into the at tempt to maintain a mere arbitrary and for mal priority of baptism to communion. Even thus, indeed, the argument is clear enough to the candid mind; but it may be evaded and complicated by side issues. The sim ple position is this —the Lord’s Supper is a strictly Christian ordinance; Baptism, the divinely established, universal, indispensa ble condition and fendge of discipleship. • Sdected. Christmas Evans at a Welsh Association. It was at one of these associations that Christmas Evans, together with other cele brated preachers of the day, had engaged to he present. It was an extra-association, deemed necessary on account of the sad de clension in religion which had taken place in a certain locality, and the meeting was for the express purpose of recalling black sliders to a knowledge of their condition and danger. About, two thousand persons had congregated from far and near, and the day promised to %)%very happy and successful one.. But while the first speaker was pro-, eecding in his address, it became evident that he had no Hold upon the audience : an air of listlessness and inattention was soon observable, for the sermon created no echo in the hearts of* The preacher was a very talented man, but unconvincing manner about him which chil led his warm-hearted hearers. Instead Os throwing himself heart and so# into the ser vice of the day, and uttering words suitable to the occasion, lie centented himself with expressing a, few common-place thoughts, k apd resumed his seat without creating any sensible impression. The second speaker was more tame, and his address more unsui ted to the wants of the people than the first, and the promoters of the meeting began to fear that it would he a lost day. Many per sons had already taken their departure, and others were about to. follow their example. What was to be done? According to the order of service, Mr. Evans had been put down as almost the last no one could sum up the religious proceedings of an association in so forcible and living a way.— But when he saw the state of things, he at once consented to ascend the wagon from which the sermons were delivered. He stood’ forward, yawning and stretching as if he had only that moment awakened from sleep. He gave out no text, hut - commenced talking some,shat after this fashion : TERMS, $3.00 IN ADVANCE^ 50 NOS. IN A VOL. “My friends, I have had a vision, and it concerns you : inethought I was in a beauti ful valley, where there was everything to charm and interest the eye of the beholder (here he gave a vivid description of the love ly vale in which they were then assembled;) but in looking down into this valley, what was my horror at .perceiving it to be full of dry bones. And while musing upon this ‘spectacle of death, I heard a voice saying (here he imitated the tones of the first speak er), ‘Dry bones, live!’ But there was no movement on the part of the bones. Pres ently a second voicc'cried (here his voice re qggjjjedfthat of the second preacher), ‘Dry bones, live 1’ But all was dead and motion less as before. And then inethought that someone said to me, ‘O Christmas, Christ- . mas! what do you say to all this V And I lifted up my hands to heaven, and cried as loud as my voice broken by tears would suf fer me, ‘O, Spirit of the living God, come and breathe upon these dry bones, and they shall live.’ And immediately there was a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone, and the flesh came up upou them, and the skin covered them above, and the breath came into them, and they lived and stood up on their feet, an exceeding great army.” The effect of this introduction —uttered as it waß with'all the dramatic power of which the preacher was capable—upon the assem bled congregation was electrical: there was indeed a shaking; the heart of the multitude was moved, and many were added to the church that day. The people saw that they were the “dry bones” in the valley, and their prayer the whole day was, “Breathe on us, that we may live!” And tho Lord answered and heard. Perseverance. He who allows his application to falter, or shirks his work on frivolous pretexts, is on the sere road to ultimate failure. Let any task be undertaken as a thing not possible to be evaded, and it will soon come to be per formed with alacrity and cheerfulness. The habit of strenuous, continued labor will be come comparatively easy in time, like every other habit. Thus even men with the com monest brains and the most slender powers will accomplish mueh, if they will but apply themselves wholly and indefatigably tQ one thing at a time. Sir Charles Napier, when in India, en countered an army 35,000 Belooches with 2,000 meu, of whom only 400 were Euro peans. He charged them in centre up a high bank, and for three hours the battle was un decided. At las 1; they turned and fled. It is this sort of pluck, tenacity and deter mined perseverance which wins solders’ bat tles, and, indeed, every battle. It is the one neck hearer that wins the race and shows the blood ; the one pull of the oar that proves the heefness of the fellow, as Oxford men say ; it is the one march more that wins the cam paign ; the five minutes more persistent cour age that wins the fight. Though your force be less than another’s, you equal and out master your opponent if you continue it lon ger and concentrate it more. The reply of the Spartan father, who said to his son, when complaining that his sword was too short— “ Add a step to it,” is applicable to every tbingin life. Are we in Earnest ? A little while ago a clergyman said to a young man who never thought of his soul: “My dear young friend, I think you are going to lose your soul! You are putting off the day of salvation-—neglecting all these solemen matters; going on heedlessly, I fear, to the day of your death !” The young man looked up with surprise, and said: “I don’t think so ! And, you must real-* ly pardon me, but I have my doubts wheth er you really think so.” The minister was astonished. He never suspected the young man of skepticism. “How so,” he asked. “Why, my mother belongs to your church. Don’t they all think as you do ?” “Yes, they do.” “ “Well, then, don’t my mother love me ? f And do you think she would never have told me if she thought I was going straight to perdition ?” And there’s iny sister; don’t she believe as you do ?” * “Yes.” 1 Now, then, I know my sister Joves m e.I know she would come and throw her, arnS around my neck, and tell me, ‘Don’t! don't J don’t /’ if she thought I,was going to per^ ditkd” ‘ . A