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VOL. 59.
Table of Contents.
First Page—Alabama Department: Nehemi
ah; Annual Calls; Then and Now; The
Religious Press.
Second Page—Correspondence: To the Re
hoboth Association ; Shorter College; The
Penfield Revival. 1853; Missionary Insti
tnte, Dalton; Mercer University Notes.
The Sunday-school—Lesson For April 3d
—Following Jesus. Missionary Departs
menu Receipts of Mission Board, etc.
Third Page— Children’s Corner: Bible Ex-
Slorations; Enigmas; Poetry ; Tow and
[illy; etc.
Fourth Page—Editorials: A Linguistic
Bleesing; Death of the Czar; Polygamy;
Georgia Baptist News.
Fifth Page—Secular Editorials: News Para
graphs ; Parnellism ; Literary Notes and
Comments; Four Years—poetry—Charles
W. Hubner; Georgia News.
Sixth Page—The Household: After the
Feait—Poetry; Sketches of Foreign Coun
tries. Miscellaneous. Obituaries.
Seventh Page—The Farmer’s Index: The
Effect of Emancipation on Cotton Produc
tion ; Corn, etc. Success in Business.
Eighth Page—Florida Department: Chips
and Splinters; Christmas and New Year's
Treatment; Another Response, etc.; By
Taking Thought, etc.
Alabama Department.
BY SAMUEL HENDERSON.
NEHEMIAH.
Os all the characters that figure in
Old Testament history, next to Moses
and Elijah, Nehemiah has interested us
most. In this we only speak for one.
Others may differ with us. To our
mind, he presents the rarest combina
tion of courage, patriotism, statesman
ship, and piety that we ever see asso
ciated in one man. It was his destiny
to live in evil times. Reared under the
withering influence of Babylonish
bondage, accustomed through his whole
life to hear his religion made the butt
of popular ridicule, and seeing his
Jewish brethren taunted by their mas
ters, “sing us one of the songs of Zion,”
we may well suppose that he had en
ough to test the integrity of any man’s
piety, as well as to develop the granite
of manhood in any character. Let us
suppose his resignation of “cup-bearer”
to the king of Babylon accepted, with
the royal permission to return to Jer
usalem with such of his brethren as
chose to accompany him—let us sup
pose him as having arrived at his des
tination—let us imagine the vast work
before him, his scanty means, surround
ed by enemies watching every move
ment, misrepreseting all his motives,
first ridiculing his efforts, then cajoling
him with flattery, then threatening
to report him to the great king of Bab
ylon with treasonable purposes —sup-
pose all this, and much more of like
import, and we may form some con
ception of the sagacity, the firmness,
the persistency, and the piety of one,
who never abated a single effort, nor
lost a single day from the hour he
commenced until he completed his
task.
The first thing that Nehemiah did on
arriving at Jerusalem was to survey the
ruins of the city, to take in the situa
tion as we would say, and thus “count
up the cost,” before he commenced to
build. There is something of moral
sublimity in the character of this man,
as without telling “to Jews, nor to the
priests, nor to the nobles, nor to the
rulers” what his God “put it into his
heart to do at Jerusalem,” he pursued
his solitary way upon his beast at night,
viewing the desolations, and when his
beast could not go, alighting to pursue
his observations on foot. He kept his
own counsels, formed his own plans,
organized his own agencies, superin
t tending the minutest details of the
work, God only being his counsellor.
Perhaps the annals of human industry
never recorded an enterprize so vast,
so arduous, and so embarrassing, that
was completed with such meagre re
sources and in so short a time. What
wonderful skill he displayed in inter
esting the whole population in the
work. Associating the public with the
private interest of every family, he ar
ranged that each head of a family
should repair that part of the wall
“over against his own house,” even
down to Meshulam, who seemed have
been a young man, only occupying a
SOUTH-WESTERN BAPTIST. )
or Alabama. j
“chamber.” Thus, when one part of
the wall was finished, all was finished ;
and the whole work was completed in
fifty and two days.”
And then what skill he displayed in
foiling the machinations of his adver
saries—the Sanballets, the Tobiahs, the
Gesheons —in all their efforts to hinder
the work. One while they would rid
icule their work, saying that even “if
a fox go up, he shall break down their
stone wall.” Then they would craftily
assume a patronizing air, and propose
to Nehemiah to meet and counsel with
them “in some one of the villages in
the plain of One,” sending “four times
after this sort” to the sturdy reformer.
But he had already taken counsel of
bis God, and he needed none of the
wisdom they could impart; for, said
the sagacious builder, “they thought to
do me mischief.” Foiled in this, they
next trumped up a rumor among the
heathen, charging Nehemiah with
treasonable purposes, and threatening
to report him to the • king of Babylon.
To this the good man responded, with
that honest bluntness that always calls
things by the right names, “There are
no such things done as thou sayest,
but thou feignest them out of thine
own hear t,” and went on with the work.
The truth is, Nehemiah did not belong
to the faint-hearted tribe, who always
“see a lion in the way.” As difficulties
rose, he rose with them, so that his
very embarrassments inspired wisdom
in his plans, courage to his heart, and
strength to his arm. And then, to one
of his own brethren, who begged him
to take counsel of his fears, and shut
himself up “in the house of the Lord,”
lest they should slay him in the night
he answered, “Should such a man as I
flee?” The good man knew full well,
that if he, whom the Lord had sent to
project and carry to completion this
grand and glorious undertaking, should
show the least symptom of cowardice
in the presence of any danger, it would
recoil against the whole enterprise.
One great man, such as Nehemiah,
with the fear of God in his heart, can
chase a thousand such cunning ver
min as the Sanballets, Tobiahs, and
the like, who sought to do him mis
chief. How often have we seen a few
manly words and courageous actions
banish from the field whole troops of
carping time-servers. Such men, in
critical conditions, have often re
deemed situations from perils which
threatened utter and hopeless ruin.
One Samson, or one David, is worth
ten thousand common men, when some
sharp corner is to be turned in the af
fairs of a nation. Luther, with his
great heart, and protected with God’s
invisible shield is more then a match
for the assembled wisdom of Europe at
the “Diet of Worms.” One blow from
his stalwart arm, dealt upon the dig
nitaries assembled around the great
Emperor Charles the Fifth, sent them
reeling from the contest, investing his
single name with more potency apd
grandeur than all the Popes and Car
dinals, kings and nobles, principalities
and powers that were there represented.
Such men, like Esther, appear to have
“Come to the kingdom for such a
time.”
What would human nature be with
out such men at occasional intervals,
to redeem its character and destiny
from a fate too ignoble to figure in his
tory? They are the lights of history,
lapping each other along the track of
time, so as to preserve a kind of con
tinuity and harmony in its events.
They are only true nobility in the
world, bearing the patents that ennoble
them directly from the court ofHeaven
and the homage they inspire is noth
ing more than the spontaneous tribute
we all instinctively pay to the royal
gifts of the “King of Kings;” and he
who pays no such tribute to such worth
is something more, or something less
than man. For whether they figure
in our religious, civil, or literary his
tory, the century or the nation that
(fives to the world one such man, will
purchase to itself an imperishable
name.
We only add that Nehemiah’s char
acter is a compound of godliness and
patriotism, the two grandest traits to
which human nature ever aspired. He
worked for his God, and then for his
country. What he said, he did; and
what he did stands out upon the page
of even sacred history as one of its
brightest and most stirring chapters.
THE FRANKLIN STEAM PRUTTING HOUSE.
ATLANTA, GEORGIA, THURSDAY, MARCH 24, 188 I,
ANNUAL CALLS.
We have been greatly interested in
the reminiscences of an “Old Time
Baptist Preacher” in that spicy and
able journal, the Baptist Courier, of
SouthCarolina. But the half serious,half
humorous caricature of “annual calls”
in the issue of Jan. 27th we have en
joyed with more than common zest.
The venerable writer congratulates
his younger preaching brethren that
in South Carolina “they know nothing”
of those annual calls. We only wish
we could congratulate our Alabama
pastors for a like reformation. How
it originated and why it is kept up so
extensively, would puzzle the famous
legal firm of “I. Ketchum <fc U. Cheat
em” to discover. The most stupid and
reckless would scarcely affirm that the
Bible gives the slightest encouragement
to a policy so unwise and so disastrous
to the permanent advancement of the
cause of Christ.
It has always seemed to us that of
all things in the world next to the
marriage relation the pastoral relation
ought to be the most permanent. Cer
tainly, the great Head of the Church
would not commit His best earthly
gifts, His pastors, to the caprices of
annual calls, thus lowering the dignity
of the highest office on earth to the
status of the least civil office. The
evils of this policy are many and dis
astrous. We only mention a few by
way of illustration.
First, those annual calls imply a
measure of distrust wholly incompat
ible with the ingenuous frankness and
candor of Christian intercourse. Its
language is, in plain English, *we will
try you a year— will sample you ; and if
you suit us, we’ll call you again. At
the end of every year you must run
the gauntlet of a new election, and
thus give every discontented spirit
among us an opportunity to spot you.’
Thus the poor man finds himself the
target of every missile he has drawn
upon himself by his very integrity to
truth. Members will go to conference
to vote against him who will not come
to hear him preach, at least not more
frequently, than will barely preserve
their membership.
Secondly, it offers a temptation to
ministers (for they are but men), to
resort to very questionable measures to
overreach each other in electioneering
for these calls. We should not be sur
prised if our readers could call up in
stances of this kind humiliating to a
degree. Thus there are engendered
jealousies, heart-burnings, nay, we had
almost written animosities, where the
utmost confidence and the sincerest
affection should be cherished.
Tnirdly, it dwarfs the mind of the
minister, by depriving him of the stim
ulant to improvement which a perm
anent pastorate only can inspire, and
subjecting him to the uncertitude of
caprice and taction. Knowing the
feb;e tenure by which he holds his
position, he abandons himself to that
kind of indolence which only locks to
the mental resources for a single year
—like “a tenant at will," who never
seeks to improve a farm beyond the
rental period. He has no time to grow
into the confidence of his temporary
charge. His heart has no time to send
out its tendrils to objects which would
call out its sweetest sympathies and
most anxious solicitudes.
Fourthly, it inspires in the churches
“itching ears,” ever clamorous for some
thing new. Having dwarfed the char
acter of their ministeis by this unwise
policy, they make their own folly the
pretext for a change on the plea that
the present incumbent has failed to in
terest the people, and that a new one
will enlarge their congregation. And
thus the process goes on, until there
are about as many parties in the chur
ches as there are ministers in the sur
rounding country.
We could go on detailing other evils,
but perhaps it is a bootless task. Let
us add in conclusion that our best
churches and best pastors are developed
under indefinite pastorships—pastor
ships that continue so long as the mut
ual interest and esteem of each for the
other demands. It may be wise for a
pastor, preaching to a church on an
indefinite call, to give his people an
opportunity at occasional intervals of
years, to express their regard for him
by a recall, or, if need be, to call an
other minister. At least, it would fur-
nish an opportunity to “exchange re
ceipts,”. to use a commercial phrase,
and “open new books.” We have known
good come of this, even among some
of our worthiest pastors and churches.
But even this expedient may not be
resorted to for trivial causes.
THEN TniFnOW.
While all changes are not improve
ments, Still there can be no improve
ments without changes. For instance,
in the style, matter, pith and length
of our average sermons, there is a
manifest improvement in contrast with
former years. It was not uncommon
in our boyhood to hear two and three
sermons straight along of an hour and
a half each, and the people listened with
unflaggjng interest.We remember while
in our to have gone six or eight
miles on a cold December Sunday,
while the snow was over six inches
deep, and sat from about eleven o’clock
till three in an old brick meeting
house, without one particle of fire, and
heard a sermon on the Prodigal Son of
about four hours duration. The last
general division of the sermon was
“sixteenthly.” On that occasion, our
interest did flag in the sermon, though
not in the charming young lady we
had the honor to escort to the church.
Now, a sensible man can condense into
a forty or fifty minutes sermon more
solid u-atter than was contained in
twent;-"i>v)h sermons as we heard on
that cold December Sabbath. A great
and good minister once said to us that
he graduated the length of his sermons
to the interest of the congregation. If,
in casting his eye over the assembly,
he saw the people leaning to him, he
would go on—if they became listless
and indifferent, he would stop no mat
te/ at what point in his discourse.
When we cease to interest, we should
cease to speak.
The Religious Press.
A stringent temperance law, designed to
give effect to the constitutional amendment
adopted in Kansas, has passed the Legisla
ture. Under this law only druggists can sell
intoxicating liquors, and they must give
good and sufficient bonds that they will sell
it only for "medical, mechanical and scien
tific purposes.” All evasions of the law by
giving liquor away to customers are to be
construed as selling, and all clubs for pro
curing liquorsand dividiug among the mem
bers are treated the same as places of com
mon sale. All places where intoxicating
liquors ere sold tire declared a common nuis
ance, and the proper officers are required to
close them. It is made the duty of sheriffs,
constables, and county attorneys to enforce
the provisions of this act, and they render
themselves liable to punishment if they neg
lect to do so.
The bill was passed by a large majority.
In the House the vote stood 100 to 29; in the
Senate, 29 to 9. In order to take no unfair
advantage of those who have invested in the
liquor business under the old law, the new
law does not take effect until the first of
May. An association of citizens has been
formed, with branches throughout the State,
to see that the law is effectually executed.
In Albany, Georgia, a club was form
ed called the “Glee Club,” which, in
order to evade the law, acted on the
following resolutions, passed by the
club:
1. Resolved, That this club, and we, the
members thereof, knowing that it is in strict
violation of the city, as well as State laws, for
any dealer in spirituous or fermented liquors
to sell on the Sabbath day, and not wishing
to violate the laws in any part or sentence,
nor to cause others to do so, and knowing
that every laboring man or others who are
in the habit of taking social drinks during
the week, wants and needs it on the Sab
bath.
Resolved, 2 That, in order to comply with
the laws in every particular, we agree to pay
the sums opposite our respective names to a
treasurer, to be chosen by the club ou or be
fore the Saturday preceding each Sabbath,
for the purpose of purchasing the liquor nec
essary for the use of the club the following
Sabbath.
The man who dispensed the liquor
under these resolutions was named Mi
nor. He was put on trial in the Coun
ty Court for keeping open a tippling
house on the Sabbath, and also for re
tailing without license. He was con
victed in each case. He petitioned for
a writ of certiorari, which was refused.
He excepted, and the case went to the
Supreme Court. The judgment of the
Court below was affirmed, Bleckley J.
delivering the opinion. See 63 Geor
gia Reports, p. 318; Minor vs. The
State of Georgia.
Now and then a very pleasing episode
occurs which shows at once the oneness of
the American people and the failure of the
"bloody shirt” to keep the North and South
apart. At the recent Mardi Gras festival in
New Orleans, Massachusetts and New York
j THE CHRISTIAN HERALD,
( of Tennbbbee.
regiments of militia were present and were
the lions of the occasion. Within about a
year a New Orleans regiment was enthusias
tically entertained in Boston. Harper’s
Weekly has a cartoon representing a New
York and a New Orleans militiaman shaking
hands, while "Unc’e Sam” smilingly looks
on and exclaims, “Ah, dear boys, this is
better than quarreling. I’m proud of you
both. It needed but this to complete my
happiness," and "Liberty” writes on a screen,
"No North I No South ! but the Union.”
One morning early, without any one
knowing they were going to do it a Massa
chusetts regiment marched out to the ceme
tery, formed around the monument to the
Confederate dead and sang “Rock of Ages,”
and “The Sweet By and By.”
Strange that the military spirit is also the
most ardent peace spirit, but it seems to be
so.—Central Baptist.
All right; glad to see it; but we fear
that when the next Presidential cam
paign comes around, the ensanguined
garment will flutter in every breeze.
Nothing is to be gained by displaying
it now. Still, our hope is that this folly
and sin will gradually disappear.
Fiohtino the Snow.—The Northwestern
Railway Company hasspent over three hun
dred thousand dollars in the tight against
snow, since October last. Thirty-four im*
mense snow plows have had plenty of work,
and these have been “backed up” tremen
dously by from two to six locomotives each.
The might of these plows and the great pow
er of a snow drift may be estimated from
the facts that one plow weighing forty-eight
thousand pounds, ballasted by eighty thou
sand pounds of railway iron and driven by
six locomotives, attacked a snow-choked
cutting,—but was defeated! The drift was
fifty-two feet high. When the workmen,
after the tremendous charge, caught a
glimpse of the immense plow, they found
that it with all its one hundred and twenty
eight thousand pounds bad been repelled as
if it were a feather, and that it had rolled
disconsolately over the drift and had lodged
against some forest trees where it proposes
to remain until summer.—Observer
Just see what snow-flakes can do!
Suppose that each of these flakes had
been endowed with moral responsibil
ity, and that one of them had said, “It
is not much that I can do in this bus
iness ; neither my presence nor my ab
sence will be perceived, so I will with
draw from the enterprise.” The en
terprise would have gone on just the
same, but so much the worse for the
snow-flake; it would have had none
of the glory. The way of the Lord will
certainly be prepared, and his paths
will certainly be made straight, wheth
er you, individual reader, take part in
the work or not. The Lord does not
depend on you for the carrying out of
his designs, but you depend on him,
and what will you say when you are
arraigned on a charge of disobedience
of orders? Will you say, “Lord I know
thee, that thou art a hard man, reap
ing where thow hast not sown, opera
ting in ways not known to men, and I
was afraid of interfering with thy work,
and I could have done but little at
best, and I thought the safest plan was
to disobey!”
Moral Wricks.—The world seems very
anxious to count them, and to make the
worst out of them. They are all brought to
the front in these days of’‘news,” while the
general current of quiet, persistent virtue re
mains unnoticed: Thousands may keep the
faith, or rather, be kept by it; but let any
one falter, or fall by the way, and he gets a
notoriety which seems to costa blight upon
the whole Christian church. There is a
morbid curiosity at least, which dwells upon
and exaggerates such things.
. And yet if we consider the weakness of
human nature, and the force of temptation
which comes in as a flood, the real or appar
ent defections are comparatively few. Scan
dals are demoralizing, and excite undue sus
picions, and this is the terror of evil-doing
on the one hand, and evil-thinking on the
other. God help the man who gloats over
such things, even though be stands outside
ot the church of Christ; and God have espe
cial mercy on the man, who though he
stands within the church, secretly chuckles
over them, because the victim of popular,
disfavor right or wrong, happens to be one
whose overthrow he would like to see ac
complished.—Messenger.
“Thousands may keep the faith, or
rather be kept by it." There is a ring
of gospel music in that last expression.
The Tablet, a Roman Cathoic organ, says
ot the Ritualists: “They are doing our work
for us, and as time goes on they will do it
more effectually.”
Is the Baptist brotherhood entirely
free from ritualism? It may be well
to inquire into this. Os course no Bap
tist will acknowledge it, but the thing
is very insidious, human nature is very
prone to it, and some may be nursing
the germ within them, when they are
not aware of it. The letter killeth,
but the spirit giveth life.
A bill has been laid before the Legists*
ture of Illinois providing that no person ads
dieted to the use of intoxicating liquors
shall be eligible to any State or municipal
office. The bill proposes that proof of the
habit will consist in the affidavit of ten elec
tors filed with the Secretary of State. What-
j ever may be the fate of this bill, respectable
people should insist by their own personal
influence at the polls, that only men of
temperate habits be entrusted with posi
tions of responsibility. A drunkard is an
unfit person upon whom to bestow a public
trust of any kind, and yet wo know a great
many Christian people who will throw their
influence for good away on some drunken
candidate. If private business interests res
quire soberness, much more should the
State and city insist that those who direct
their public interest be free from habits of
intemperance.—Evangelist.
The Index could point to several
men who are habitual drunkards and
who are known to be such wherever
they are known at all, but who never
theless have held important political
stations. The fact speaks not well ei
ther for the intelligence or for the
morality of their constituents. No
Christian man ought by his vote to put
power in the hands of drunkards nor
to make drunkenness respectable.
Professor Phelps, of Andover Mass, is
reported to have said that our defective
laws of divorce are doing tenfold more to
corrupt the nation’s social life than Mor
monism. If professor Phelps said this,
there would certainly seem some occasion
for the utterance. And if it be true, our di
vorce laws must be in an awful condition.
It becomes the duty of all pure-minded men,
within and outside of legislatures, to move
quickly and unitedly to correct toe alarm
ing evil. Why could not the good women
who are demanding suffrage try to help on
this cause? Perhaps they desire suffrage
that they may vote against divorce. Men
who are clamoring to “put God into the
Constitution” might try to put him first into
divorce laws.—Watch Toweb.
There has been a great stir among
the Northern people of late on this
subject and it is high time. We
are glad of it, partly because we wish
to see the evil abated, and partly be
cause those who are engaged in correc
ting their own errors are less likely to
annoy other people by twitting them
with theirs.
There are many who are engaged in the
Master's work and do not meet with the
success they had wished. Some of them are
in small places with a limited field, others
in the midst of a great population. We may
or may not be responsible for our lack of
success. If we are faithful and earnest, and
simply desire to glorify the Master, it is not
ours to sit in judgment or to grow discour
aged. We have the assurance that such la
bor is notin vain. We do not see the fruit,
but there is nothing to hinder us from bear
ing the voice and reading the words of bles
sed assurance from the Lord.
It is very seldom if ever that the
soldier in battle sees the effect of his
fire, but it is his duty to keep on shoot
ing nevertheless. It is not what he
does that wins the day, it is what the
army does, and he is part of that army,
and every part must do its share.
The Freeman’s Journal, a leading
Roman Catholic organ in this country,
has the following:
The reading of the Bible by undirected and
uninstructed people, young and old, has
made more unbelievers and scoffers than the
reading of "The Age of Reason." Anybody
who knows the ways of public schools and
“Sabbath" schools can easily remember the
unholy uses to which the Sacred Book has
been put. Boys and girls often "know their
Bible" too well, and use it to their own dam
nation.
And yet the charge that the Roman
Catholic Church is opposed to the free
circulation of the Bible, is frequently
met with indignant denial.
The Congreoationalist tells the following
story: “On one occasion it was announced
in the English Bpiscopal church at Yoko
hama, Japan, that a certain time a special
service of prayer for missions would be held.
Borne care was taken to circulate the news,
and a number of others assembled besides
the usual attendants. The service was be
gun and carried on as usual, but when the
point had been reached at which it was to
assume its special character, the rector arose
and stated that to his great regret it would
be impossible to pray for missions that day
because the prayers bad not arrived! The
Bishop of London had failed lo mail them
in sufficient season, and the service bad to
be concluded in the usual form.”
All the theatres of Chicago are open
every Sunday evening in defiance of
law.
-Our readers are aware that the office
of the Baptist fyinwr, published at
Cumming, of which our bro
ther J. M. Wood was editor, was con
sumed by fire a few weeks ago. We
learn from brother Wood that he has ar
ranged to resume the publication of
bis paper tHe first week in April.
Hig office will be in Gajnesville, Ga.
—The Baptist and Mtthodist Sun*
day-schools in Summerville have been
blended introne. The school meets
at the Methodist church. They have
recently purchased a new organ.
NO. 12.
