The Christian index. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1892-current, August 20, 1896, Image 1

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ESTABLISHED 1821. TheChristianlndex Publtahei Every Thursday By BEJLJL, «Sk VAN Address Christian Index, Atlanta,|G a Organ of the Baptist Denomination in Georgia. Subscription Prick: One copy, one year (2.00 One copy, six months I.M About Our Advertisers.—We propose hereafter to very carefully Investigate our advertisers. We shall exerclseevery care to allow only reliable parties to use our col umns. Obituaries.—One hundred words free of oharge. For each extra word, one cent per word, cash with copy. To Correspondents—Do not use abbrevi ations; be extra careful In writing proper names; write with Ink, on one side of paper. Do not write copy intended for the editor and business Items on same sheet. Leave Off personalities, condense. Business.—Write all names, and post Offices distinctly. In ordering a change give the old as well as the new address. The date Os label Indicates the time your subscription sxplres. If you do not wish It continued, or der It stopped a week before. We consider each subscriber permanent until he orders his paper discontinued. When you order It stopped pay up to date. Remittances by registered letter, money order, postal note In the Littles. To have to do with nothing but the true, 1 he good, the eternal— md these, not alone In the main current of the general life, But srnallexperlences of every day To learn not only by a comet’s rush. But a rose's birth—not by the grandeur, God, But by the comfort, Christ. —Browning. The Dried-Up Springs ot Life. ‘•These ate springs without water.” 2 Peter 2-1" (Revised Version). This is Peter’s characteriza tion of certain people who live for the senses, and are devoted to the pleasures of a worldly life. It is a very striking picture. To appreciate it one must have lived or traveled some time i n a moun tainous or hilly country, where the treasures of the snow are gathered in the great reservoirs of the mountains, and, when the springtime comes, and the sun is high in the heavens, and the days are long, the snow melting on the long mountain slopes finds its way down through the tis sures in the rocks, and, follow ing underground channels, comes out down the mountain-sides and among the foot-hills in bubbling springs of pure water. I was born among the hills, and on my father's farm in my childhood there were a number of these springs. Some of them were ever-living. Summer or winter seemed to make no difference to them. In hot or cold they poured forth their full, fresh tide of cooi, sweet wavfer *rrom some great reservoir so inexhaustible and so protected that it could not be reached by the cold or checked by heat. But on the same farm there were other springs that, when the warm rains came in the early springtime, gushed forth an abundance of water. A stranger passing through the country might have thought that these were the most valuable springs on the farm; but later in the season these fountains which did not draw their water from any channel from the mountains, but from some little local water shed among the hills about them, gradually narrowed their output until by the time the hot days of July had come they were dried up entirely, and the channel where the promising stream had run in April was dry and bare. This is the picture which Peter sets before us as a portrait of the man or woman who, instead of drawing hope, and courage, and strength from the high hills of righteousness and the lofty reservoirs of the Bible and prayer, depends upon the local watershed of the earth. Tell me the source from whence you get your strength and pleasures, and I will tell you how long they will endure and when your spring will run dry. Let us inquire for a moment what are some of the springs of life that are necessarily tempo rary, and must in the naiure of things soon dry up, and refuse to give us joy and peace. The first is youth. It is a spring, a source of pleasure and joy to every one who makes the journey of life. There is a cer tain hopefulness, an elasticity, an abounding optimism about youth, which finds joy of some sort in almost everything. It is a period when it is delightful simply to be alive, to breathe the air, to look upon the trees and the sky, to scent the flowers, to sleep, to dream, to grow, to peer toward the mysterious fu ture and wonder concerning the hidden possibilities of this new developing life. Yes, youth is a spring, a fountain of joy and pleasure. I speak of mere physi cal youth; the fact that life is yet to be lived and that one may make it what he will. But de lightful and glorious as this fountain is, it is certain that it comes from the local watershed of life and will soon have poured all the waters from its slender reservoir. Its springtime has already passed for most of us, and for many it has passed alto gether. Youth is a spring that will dry up for every one. THE CHRISTIAN INDEX. Health is a spring of joy and strength, a natural source of gladness and delight. To stand out in the broad sunlight of God’s day and feel that your physical and intellectual manhood is strong and complete, that all the organs and faculties of body and mind work harmoniously to gether, and that you have in all its wholesome roundness the power to do among your fellows what a man or woman can do, is a bountiful source of joy and de light and a cause for profound thanksgiving to God on the part of every one that possesses it. But this, too. is a spring that will dry up. No man’s body is so per fect but that it may be wounded and mangled by some accident or misfortune before to morrow night. No woman’s figure is so graceful or features so beautiful but sickness may distort the one and blight the other with scarce ly a moment’s warning. Disease lurks in the very air we breathe and waits for us morning and night, and soon the strongest arm must tremble and the most giant like form recline in weak ness and lose the grace and beauty of health. Yes, our health and strength and beauty are springs that will dry up. Another great fountain of joy and delight is human friendship. God has given us wondrous power of comforting and making glad each other by kindly fellow ship. And many a person who has not much strength or beauty and has passed beyond the vigor and enthusiasm of youth, still counts himself firm in an im pregnable fortress because of the friendships that gird him about. And yet all friendships that are of this world alone are perisha ble springs. It is not only that we have to run the risk of the frailties of human nature and take the chance that some cruel misunderstanding shall separate us from the love of our friends; but they, too, are subject to all the laws of weakness, and sor row, and affliction, and death that threaten, and many times within a single year a soul that looked upon strong friends like bulwarks on every side, has seen them vanish away like mists be fore the morning sun, until they stood friendless and alone. Yes, friendship is a spring that will dry up if it has no higher source than earth. But, somebody says, you have left out one source of joy and pleasure —What of riches? Alas ! that, too, is a spring that will dry up. But you argue with me that money will purchase ser vants to care for you when you are weak; it will ministerto your taste, and give you power to sur round yourself with many pro tections and shelters; and all that is indeed true. But mi ney can not keep alive in you the vigor and enthusiasm and power of en joyment of youth. Wilberforce, in speaking of the Richmond villa, belonging to the Duke of Queensbury, whose wealth was many millions of dollars, says that once on dining with the Duke in company with a party of celebrated guests, although the dinner was sumptuous, the views from the villa most enchanting, and the Thames was in all its glory, the Duke looked on with indifference. In reply to Wilber force, who, then a young man, had made some appreciative re marks on the beauty of the scenery, the Duke protested al most angrily, “What is there to make so much of in the Thames? lam quite tired of it. There it goes—flow, flow, flow, always the same.” All his wealth could not keep for that sensual old man the bright appreciation of nature, and of beauty everywhere, which had been the natural in heritance of his youth. Money can not bribe disease to stay away, and it can, after all, do little to stay its ravages. Money can not keep our friends alive, it can not stay the coming of the white horse and its rider. It is proverbial that shrouds are with out pockets, and Scriptural that we brought nothing with us into this world and we can take noth ing out of it. Count them over, the great sources of joy and pleasure for the worldling: youth, health, money, friends. They are all there; everything that the worldly man can know is grouped under some one of these four, and there is a limit to the reser voir which each of these springs draws upon, and they shall ail dry up, and leave the soul that trusts to them naked and bare, bankrupt and hopeless at the last. Ah ! you say, it is a sad ser mon you are preaching to us. I wish I had stayed at home. But I thank God you may give it a bright side if you will, for there are possible to the human soul springs that draw upon the higher watershed of the hills of God, whose streams flow on with ever abounding fulness through (SUBSCRIPTION, PeiY ..•2.00.1 ITO MINISTERS, • ... 1.00. f youth and manhood and old age; streams that are only sweetened by affliction and weakness, that can not be frozen up by poverty, nor scorched and dried out by any lack of human fellowship Jesus said to the woman at the well of Sychar that she had been drink ing of that well only to thirst again, but he was able to give her living water which should be within her soul a fountain springing up unto everlasting life. Paul, in the thirteenth chapter of his first letter to the Corin thians, said that there are some springs that abide, “but now,” he says, “abideth faith, hope, love, these three; and the great est of these is love.” The Psalm ist says, in a grateful tribute to God, “All my springs are in thee.” I call you from the low lands of worldliness, where all the springs of life shall dry up, up to the treasures of the high lands where there are streams of joy that shall flow forever. — The Fisherman and His Friends. — Banks. For the Index. President James P. Boyce on Church Historians and Baptist Succession. I have been reading, with in tense interest,for the second time extracts from the inaugural ad dress of Dr Boyce, which was delivered at the completion of his first session as theological Brofessor in Furman University. T. Broadus, in his Memoir of Boyce, pronounces it a very re markable production, and says: “Its ideas entered into the con stitution, and chiefly determined the peculiarities of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.” This address is entitled, “Three Changes in Theological Institu tions. ” In giving his reasons for promoting theological scholar ship in our country, and among our own people,Dr. Boyce makes use of language which plainly declares that Baptists were very far from receiving justice at the hands of others. He regards the past history of Baptists as a mat ter of vital importance, and de clares that an obligation rests upon them to maintain the truth in such matters. But let him speak: “The history of religious literature and of Christian schol arship has been a history of Bap tist wrongs. We have been over looked, ridiculed, and defamed. Critics have committed the gross est pervasions,violated the plain est rules of criticism,and omitted points which could not have been developed without benefit to us. Historians who have professed to write the history of the church have either utterly ignored the presence of those of our faith, or classed them among fanatics and heretics; or,if forced to acknowl edge the presence of our princi ples and practice among the ear liest churches,have adopted such false theories as to church power, and the development and growth of the truth, and principles of Scripture, that by all, save their most discerning readers, our pre tensions to an early origin and a continuous existence have been rejected.” It will be seen from this extract that Dr. Boyce had a very poor opinion of church historians so far as their fairness toward the Baptists is concerned. But Dr. Boyce refers to the early origin of Baptists, and speaks of their continued existence in such a way as to make the impression that he believed that the Lord has had in the world, ever since New Testament times, a people who have held to the principles and practice which are to day held by Baptists. I suppose he means not only the independence of the churches,a converted mem bership, and believer’s baptism, but baptism by immersion, and immersion only. I shall not un dertake to say whether we are to infer, from the language of Dr. Boyce, that he believed that it was possible to trace historically this continued existence or not It is certainly true, it seems to me, that he believed that it ex isted, and had historians been fair it might have been traced. We have heard a great deal said recently because some of our brethren have been greitly disturbed about the past history of our denomination. They have been ridiculed for being so fool ish, and we have had expressions like this: “What difference does it make,Baptists are not founded on history, but they go back to the New Testament as the foun dation for what they believe and teach?” A brother, in the Reli gious Herald, used pretty hard names, calling his brethren who believe in Baptist history, and who were greatly concerned about it, “Romanized Baptist?” I think the article unworthy of him, and especially is the spirit manifested toward those who are not pleased to agree with him to be condemned. Let us hear Dr. Boyce on this subject and see if he was a “Romanized Baptist,” and if be had no concern about the history of our people. We ATLANTA, GA., THURSDAY, AUGUST 20. 1896. shall find that he upbraids us for having too little interest in such matters. He says: “The Bap tists in the past have been en tirely too indifferent to the posi tion they occupy. They have depended too much upon the known strength of their princi ples, and the ease with which from Scripture they could defend them. They have therefore neg lected many of those means which extensive learning affords, and which have been used to great advantage in the support of other opinions. It is needless to say, gentlemen, that we can no longer consent to occupy this position. We owe a charge to ourselves—- as Christians, bound to show an adequate reason for the differ ences between us and others; as men of even moderate scholar ship, that it may appear that we have not made the gross errors in philology and criticism which we must have made if we be not right; as the successors of a glo rious spiritual ancestry,illustrat ed by heroic martyrdom, by the profession of noole principles,by the maintenance of true doctrines; as the church of Christ which he has ever preserved as the witness for his truth by which he has il lustrated his wonderful ways and shown that his promises are sure and steadfast. Nay, we owe it to Christ himself,whose truth we hold so distinctly as to separate us from all others of his believ ing people; to whom we look confidently to make these princi ples triumphant; for whose sake, on their account, men have ever been found among us willing to submit to banishment, imprison ment and martyrdom; and for whose sake, in defense of the same truth, we are willing now to bear the scorn and reproach, not of the world only,but even of those who love our Lord Jesus Christ.” I conclude from these extracts that Dr. Boyce believed that Baptists are the successors of a glorious spiritual ancestry, and that if church historians had been fair to the Baptists it would not have been a difficult matter to trace this ancestry through the centuries,and I conclude further, that had historians been fair to us, possibly Dr. Whitsitt would never have discovered Baptists in England who practiced sprink ling for baptism. t G. y. Gardner. Fort Valley, Aug., 1H96. For the Index. . Money’s Nigger. BY REV. H R BERNARD. Nigger is a genuine English word. It means a derision—a depreciation—according to Web ster. For a man to own a man has been, and is now, considered in most localities and by most re ligious people as a monstrous proposition. The truth is, we look with horror on all forms of the servile. The genius and es sence of religion is found in the brotherhood of man—and Father hood of God. As bad as it may be considered to have once been a negro slave, it is infinitely worse to be money’s nigger. Many a negro slave in this South land of ours, notwithstanding his slavery, had faith in God, lived and died in that faith and went home to glory. But can a man live and die money’s nigger and go 'anywhere except to hell? What do Christians say who have open Bibles and read the Scrip tures? The men and women who have done the great and good things promotive of God’s king dom, and consequently of every precious interest, have never been money’s niggers. God’s people have always been a free people. God was Abram’s friend. He would not destroy the wicked cities without first conferring with him about it. He honored Abram signally on one occasion, notwithstanding he was to blame, by allowing him to pray for a certain king. Abram was not money’s nigger. When his ser vants and Lot’s servants disputed about.the fertile lands, Abram, being free,went to the mountains, surrendering all to Lot. One of money’s niggers would not have done that. Nehemiah in building the wall was a freeman, and set tie people a good example by his open-handed liberality when oc casion offered. Notwithstanding David’s sins he was an illustrious character. He was a faithful friend, a magnanimous enemy, a wise ruler, a courageous soldier, a skillful general, an affectionate father, a sweet poet and a divine musician. David is a good wit ness for God and religion. He has done great service, but in nothing more than in testimony as to money. David was a freeman. He was never at any time mon ey’s nigger. When the issue was raised he was equal to the occa sion, and said I will not have a place or house of worship that costs nothing—like Abram who said to the children of Heth, when they offered the burial place free of cost, “I will pay you in current money with the merchants what it is worth. ’ Our Savior made a whip of small cords and with it drove a gang of money's niggers from the temple. The young man whom the Savior loved, but who went away sorrowful, was mon ey’s nigger. It was to money’s nigger that God said: “Thou fool.” Remember, too, that God killed this man —this nigger. The man simply acknowledged his servitude —spoke of the supe riority of money, that was all. Oh, the shame! Oh, the ruin! of this slavery, this bondage to money. Money is a cruel master; under his lash we are compelled to stoop so low! Money teaches his slaves some speeches —great pieces of oratory they are. Here is one: It is the great can't spare it speech. How thoroughly he has drilled his subjects on an other: “Charity begins at home,” and then another —this is his re ligious declamation: “He that provideth not for his own house hold,” etc. He can lean on that one. Amidst money’s niggers there are orators and orators. And then these niggers are all more or less given to tricks. Here is one for illustration : Bro. Gibson, we will say, appeals to a nigger that belongs to about $200,000, and asks for SI,OOO to put in Mercer’s endowment. Now just listen to the nigger: “Well, yes, I want to do something, but I want the church to act, you know; and 1 would like for my gift to go in to stimulate the oth ers. Just as soon as they are all ready, I hope to do something.” Wants to wait until all get “ready.” Wants everybody to do his part, and is waiting for what he hopes and prays may never come to pass. Another nigger that does not belong to quite so much money wants to wait until that first nigger,whom the world ignorantly calls rich, gives as much as he—the second nigger—thinks is right. Until then he will do nothing. He knows the first nigger will never come up to the standard he has set for him. He is safe under the argument until that time, and that generally makes him safe for all time. Tricky! Why a circus mule is an innocent babe com pared with one of these niggers, of whom the preachers and the deacons and society and the church are all afraid because he belongs to a few thousand dol lars. Hard! Slate is pliable by the side of him. Pour water on slate, it runs off. Pour a conclu sive, Scriptural argument on a nigger, showing that according to the Bible he ought to give one tenth of his income to religion, and it runs off. Can never soak in. He is a nigger. Money’s own dear nigger. Some niggers belong to a great deal of money —some to less Some are in one business; some in another. Some sell whisky; some even preach. I mean preach around about the Gospel. Preach the Gospel— never. He will preach Christ on the cross, but he will not quote the passages of the Sermon on the Mount that refers to the money question. He will preach Christ on Calvary, but notion the other Mount. He will preach and say nothing about missions—is afraid that this would interfere with his little salary. Look in the glass, fellow, and see how black you are. Do you know yourself? Let me introduce you: Ladies and gentlemen, brethren and sisters, this black man is one of money’s nigger preachers. Taken all in all, money's nig ger is a hard case—more nearly hopeless than any other man, both as to time and eternity. I do not know of what use he is. Perhaps he makes sure the gio rious doctrine of election. Some times he is liberated made white, and by the grace of God is saved. And yet there are some things you can’t—God cannot —do for him here. I speak it reve rently. Take Jacob. When be was born I think he was black, and for some time his color did not improve. If there ever was a slave to money Jacob was one. I think money must have been very proud of him—he was so servile, so obedient, so subser vient. He did a great deal for money, but money in the end let him die in a borrowed home—a dependent. After a long service in the interest of money he was forced to say that his days had been “evil.” God cannot do the best things here for even a con verted man who has persisted for years previous in being mon ey’s nigger. Service to money is founded on love of money, and you know this is the root of all evil. I will not attempt byway of detail to give in illustration the mean things I have seen money’s niggers do. They re tard and impede the Gospel. They are in the way as church members. Think ot it! What do we need to-day? We have the open;Bible—access to all nations —men and women equipped and ready to go and “door die.” We have wise leaders, electrical ap pliances, the printing press, cheap means of transportation— everything—everything—to op erate the. Gospel, except money. The niggers have that, and the most of us, I am sorry to say,are niggers. Niggers in a hopeless state humanly speaking. Nig gers bound to money and “a feared of the perlice,” too. Mer cer University stands in the mid dle of Georgia with more power for good enveloped in it than any property we own or any enter prise -we foster, with a constit uency of 163,000 —shall I say it’s white Baptists? I say white Baptists. Are all white? Are we all free? Mercer University is starving, dying, and has been for three years in some departments, for want of that which the money—sloo,oo0— would supply. There is plenty of money. No lack of money. The money after all can be had Why do we not have it? The answer is simple: Money that we once owned “has turned the tables on us,” and now owns too many of us. Too many of us are money’s niggers. When shall we be delivered? Who will lead us out of bondage? Must we mis erably perish? Reader, are you black or white, a freeman or nig ger—which? For the Ineex. W. L. Kilpatrick. BY S. BOYKIN. In common with all Georgia Baptists, I was greatly shocked and pained by the sudden death of Dr. W. L. Kilpatrick. No no bler Christian spirit, no more ef fective worker, no truer type and model of the high-toned, useful and lovely Christian has graced the annals of Georgia Baptist history. It is very doubtful if the generation now passing away numbers one who has done more good in the Baptist cause in Georgia than he. He stands forth as the ideal, and the beau ideal of a true Christian. He was one of the few left among us who really bind the present with those days when “there were giants in the land,” and great is the pity that he was not allowed to complete those reminiscences that would have been invaluable. For, with all matters of Georgia Baptist history, for the last half century, he has been intimately associated, and no one has done more than he to uphold the dig nity and honor of our denomina tion. Not only has a great man in Israel fallen, but, what is bet ter, a good man—one whose name will not only shine in Baptist an nals, but will be enshrined in many—very many—hearts by words and deeds of Christian charity and loving kindness. His true epitaph will be, “Well done, good and faithful servant!” Though many names will shine bright in Georgia Baptist his tory, none will shine brighter than his; and his memory will give sweet fragrance to his own day and generation. Nashville, Tenn. Journal and Messenger: “If Baptist church succession from the time of Christ till now can not be proved by the word of God, then no one is under obliga tion to hold or teach it.” So says the American Baptist Flag, and says truly. And, inasmuch as such succession cannot be proved by the Word of God, it is just as true that no one should teach it, and that he who teaches it is per verting the truth of God. Let it be understood that there is a wide distinction to be made between “Baptist succession ” and “Bap tist church succession”. That there have been Baptists in all ages—that is, people holding the essential doctrines of the faith as Baptists hold them—is a general ly received view among us; but that there has been a succession of organized churches, essential ly Baptist, each deriving its life from another Baptist church,and so tracing its lineage back to Christ and the apostles, is what few really intelligent Baptists believe, and what neiiher the Word of God requires nor history ustifies. The Biblical Recorder: A Bap tist preacher must be poor. We make proposition general, for we do not know even one who is rich. He must be poor for more reasons than one, though were there only one, and that were Christ’s advice to the young man who would follow him, that were sufficient. Christ gave life, and more than life, that the Gos pel might be given to men; and his immediate followers gave, first, lheirall, and, in the provi dence of God, were finally re quired to lay down their lives in | martyrdom. VOL. 76-NO. 34 For the Index Reminiscences of Georgia Baptists BY S. G. HILLYER, D.D. In giving these reminiscences, let me say, once for all, I shall not limit myself only to such things as I can personally re member. I shall feel at liberty to speak of what I have found in our records, or have learned from what I know to be reliable tradition. List week I spoke of the limited advantages of education which were accessible to the peo ple of Georgia a hundred years ago. The want of these ad vantages our Baptist brethren suffered in common with their fellow citizens. But the Baptists, I told you, in spite of their hum ble learning, with the Bible as their only text book, were sound in the faith. I spoke also of their earnest fellowship and how it gave a charm to their social life. In the year 1771, Rev. Daniel Marshall, an ordained Baptist minister, originally from Con necticut, came into Georgia and settled on Kiokee creek, in what is now Columbia county. He was not very learned, but he was a man of excellent sense, of deep piety, and a good preacher. He soon gathered the few Baptists in his neighborhood to his meet ings, and in the spring of 1772, he organized them, with some others whom he had baptized, into a church, called after the name of the creek near which the meeting-house was built, the Kiokee church. This was the first Baptist church ever or ganized in Georgia. In June, 1771, six months after Mr. D. Marshall settled near Kiokee creek, another missionary entered the State. This was Mr. Edmond Botsford, who was a native of England. He came into Georgia, however, from South Carolina. He was only a licensed preacher. As such, he had traveled and preached quite acceptably in Carolina, and among other places, at Euhaw, a church on the Carolina side of the river about 25 miles below Augusta. On the Georgia side of the Sa vannah river there was a group of Baptists who had associated into a society and had been rec ognized by the Euhaw church as a branch. These brethren in vited the young licentiate to come over and preach for them. This he did. The brethren were so much pleased with him that they persuaded him to remain with them for at least a year. Not long afterwards he was or dained by the church in Charles ton and returned to his Georgia flock fully clothed with the func tions of a Bap ist minister. His people built a log house for their religious services, which was long known as Botsford’s meeting-house. A church was soon organized, certainly not later than 1773. It is believed to have been the second Baptist church organized in Georgia. Marshall and Botsford knew each other and worked harmo niously. They were about forty five miles apart, one in Colum bia county and the other in Burke. But neither limited his labors to one locality. They were practically missionaries. They preached far and wide, es pecially in middle and upper Georgia, as far as the white set tlements extended. In this work they were aided by a few licensed preachers. Now, foot up the account. In 1773,in the colony of Georgia we find the Baptist denomination represented by two churches, two ordained ministers, perhaps half a dozen licensed preachers, and less than 200 Baptists in all the colony. How stands the account to day? Without aiming to be exact, for I have not the recent statistics before me, it may be safely as sumed that the Baptist denomi nation in Georgia is to day repre sented by about 1,200 ordained ministers, by 1,600 organized churches, and, including the col ored people, by at least 300,000 communicants. This is nearly one-fifth the population of the Gee rgia of 1890. To what is this amazing growth to be attributed? First of all, let us gratefully acknowledge that it was due to the spirit of Christ that was with his people, and, especially, with his ministering servants. The Spirit gave to the little band of ministers, already mentioned, an earnest faith and a self-sacrific ing zeal in the Master’s cause. It has already been noticed that Marshall and Botsford did not confine themselves to one locality. They preached throughout the country as they could find oppor tunity to do so. And their suc cessors followed their example. We cannot fail to discern among our early ministers a genuin*