The Topeka Daily Capital, vol. 11
May 21, 1889
“The Camp Meeting. The Evil Effect of Sunday Laws” The Topeka Daily Capital, 11, 120, p. 5.
THE THIRD SABBATH IN CAMP—AN INTERESTIN KINDERGARTEN
The End of the Storm and a Sunshiny Sabbath—The Swollen Marais de Cygene—Campers Occupy all Vacant Rooms—Another Supply of Tents Telegraphed for—Several Hundred People Expected this Week—The Main Meeting to Begin To-day—The Sermons and Lectures Resume and a Fair Attendance from Ottawa—Report of the Sabbath School—Another Storm at Night but Fair Weather Sunday
Special Correspondence of the CAPITAL.
CAMP MEETING, OTTAWA, Kan., May 20.— The dark clouds broke away during the night and the sun came out clearly Saturday. By noon it was comfortably warm again; the mud dried up and the water disappeared rapidly so that the picnickers ate their dinner seated on the grass of the lawn, but the swollen stream, the Marais de Cygene, (which has risen over seven feet in twenty-four hours) carrying on its bosom the logs and debris captured by its overflowing waters is still a reminder of the fierce storm that has passed. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.1
A very large number of new faces are met with and it is estimated that there are 400 in camp now. All the tents are full and all the vacant room in the neighborhood has been rented and is now occupied. A telegram has been sent to Kansas City for an extra supply of family tents. It is feared that it will not be possible to pitch them in time for the newcomers that are expected to pour in this week, the general camp meeting beginning on May 21. The camp grocery man has opened up his stock of goods and expects to supply all the campers who “keep house.” Tea, coffee, tobacco and pork, however, he does not keep, there being no demand for such articles among Seventh Day Adventists. Elder Olsen preached the morning sermon, Mrs. E. G White addressed the afternoon meeting and Elder A. T. Jones lectured in the evening. Mr. C. H. Parsons, vice president of the Kansas Sabbath School association and his mother arrived from Topeka Friday last and will remain to the close of the meeting. The youth’s meeting will be at 5 and 10:30 a. m., hereafter. At the Sabbath meeting thirty-six testimonies were born in thirty minutes. A heavy rain with hail came in the evening and services were suspended until its dose. Sunday was clear and warm. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.2
The third Sabbath school held in connection with the campmeeting, was in point of numbers attending, in scholarship, and in interest, in advance of the others. The total attendance was 350. There were fifty-four classes formed, of which six belonged to the intermediate and primary department with twenty-three scholars, none kindergarten with fifty-five scholars and thirty-nine seniors with 272 scholars. The donations were $1053 against $8.31 last Sabbath. The superintendent was Elder S. J. Rossean, president of the Kansas Sabbath school association, with C. H. Parsons, vice president, as assistant, and the following corps of division superintendents: J. A. Morrow, O. S. Ferran, P. P. Wilcox, Emma Rossean, with fifty-four teachers, and Miss Lucy M. Olds, secretary and treasurer of the Kansas Sabbath school association as the superintendent in charge of the kindergarten. The review of the senior division was conducted by Elder W. N. Hyatt, president of Nebraska Sabbath school association; the intermediate by Elder W. S. Cruzan, president of Texas Sabbath school association; and the primary by Mrs. C. P. Haskell, of Denver, Colorado. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.3
This last review was extremely interesting. The lesson was upon the flood, particularly the building of the ark, and its occupation, etc., and, as noticed in the CAPITAL for the 16th, the ladies of the Sabbath school association connected with kindergarten work led by Miss L. M. Olds had been busy throughout the week making new sets of pasteboard animals, birds, etc., in pairs or sevens according to whether they were “clean or unclean.” A herculean task well accomplished. The marvelously and wonderfully formed beasts and birds, as they stood up in their allotted places in the black arks that nearly covered the surface of the Lilliputian tables no doubt were gazed upon with feelings of admiration by the little ones who, seated in their diminutive chairs around the table, listened with solemn awe and interest to the wonderful story of God’s dealing with unrepentant sinners, and justification of the righteous. In the review of the day’s lesson Mrs. Haskell briefly outlined the lesson of the previous Sabbath, the Bible account of Enoch, the righteous one whom God took to himself, not letting him taste of death, as an introduction, and passing rapidly to the story of the building of the ark and the collection of the birds and beasts, and their entry into the huge vessel accompanied by Noah and the other seven, dosing out the coming of the angel who shut the door. The animated faces of the little ones arid the quick response to questions asked, showed the attention paid to the instruction given by the patient teachers, and interest excited by the story as told by Mrs. Haskell. It is hoped that the workers who pre-pared the articles needed for this lesson felt repaid for all their toil by the impressions made upon these young and tender minds. There were over thirty teachers, superintendents and other workers in Sabbath school, who occupied seats in the rostrum specially provided for them, who came purposely to study the methods adopted, all of whom seemed to gain valuable hints and instruction in reference to and their application to kindergarten work. It is with no slight satisfaction that we notice among teachers the growing interest in Sabbath school work for the children and youth, and the earnest desire manifested to improve in methods of teaching and range of subjects for study. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.4
THE EVIL EFFECT OF SUNDAY LAWS
(A. T. Jones)
We will present tonight the subject of Sunday laws, and learn if there is any good basis for them—tonight taking up the civil side of the question. It is claimed that one day of rest is for the public good, and for that purpose it would be right for states to legislate upon it. But this is a mistake. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.5
First, to compel men to do no work is to force them to be idle, and, kept up continuously, enforces a great deal of idleness, and this is the root of untold evil, being a proverb in many languages that “Satan finds some mischief for idle hands to do.” Idle men will always find something to employ themselves about in place of their lawful occupation. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.6
The knights of Satan are complaining greatly against employing prisoners for manufacturing purposes because they say it tends to degrade and bring down the price of free labor, and in some places, New York, for instance, they are powerful enough, and have induced the legislature to prohibit this class of labor. I read from the New York Independent the following, as showing the result of this action. I read from its issue of April 18,1889, the statement of Warden Dunston of Auburn prison: “The enforced idleness of the convicted criminal demoralizes his mental and wrecks his physical system.” Warden Fuller of Clinton prison says: “To avoid the debilitating effects, mental, moral and physical, that are the sequel to the confinement of prisoners in their cells without occupation, and in answer to the personal appeal of the men for work, I have made for them such employment as I could.” Warden Brush of Sing Sing says; “Idleness in a prison is horrible to contemplate, especially to prison officials, who understand fully its consequences, the prisoners soon become restless, unhappy and miserable. Time with them passes slowly; their bodies soon become unhealthy, and the mind must become diseased. In fact, nothing but disease, insanity and death can be expected from this condition.” Physician Barber of Sing Sing prison says: “Confinement in their cells five-sixths of their time in almost solitary idleness appears to be forcing them back upon themselves—a prey to the baneful influences of impure thoughts, corrupt conversation, disgusting personal habits, physical and mental prostration, and moral degradation.” General Superintendent of Prisons Lathrop says: “Idleness is the bane of a prison, whose malign influence no prison administration, however humane, ingenious and energetic, has ever been able to overcome.” Further, I have a letter from the warden of Sing Sing prison in which he says: “In my experience nothing can be so bad in a prison as idleness. I consider it a crime on the part of the state against the prisoners, great wrong to the taxpayer and to society. It is a crime against the prisoner as it totally unfits him for life in the world upon his discharge. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.7
Industry in a prison means that when a prisoner is discharged he has for capital good health, sound mind, trained muscles, habits of industry, and a trade. And more than this, he has the knowledge that he can earn a living for himself and family. On the contrary, if he is kept in idleness in prison, he must go out a wreck of a man both physically and mentally, with no good habits and no ability to earn a living.” It is of course worse in a prison than elsewhere, yet the effect of idleness anywhere is the same; they will find some kind of employment for the mind and body—so the entire people, if idle, will do. Another illustration is the degradation of the monks of the fourth century, who worked as little as possible. To read of the vice, lasciviousness and degradation of these men is enough to convince anyone of the evils of enforced idleness. Now it is well known that Sunday is the worst day of the week for wickedness, crime and drunkenness, worse than all the rest of the week put together. These who are working for a Sunday law claim this is because the saloon is open, but is it a fact that saloons are open as freely on Sunday as on other days? No. Why then is it that more wickedness is committed on Sunday? Is it not because more men are idle on Sunday than on any other day? That it is not the saloon is apparent, but that it is because idleness prevails among a greater number is conclusive. I read now from Dr. Craft’s work “The Sabbath for Man.” “That nearly half the drinking and three-fourths of the drunkenness of this country takes place on Saturday evening and Sunday is too notorious to need proof or illustration.” That is the time for compulsory idleness. It is not then the opening of the public houses but the increased idlenesss. I read now from Prof. Swing in regard to Chicago: “To have twenty-five hundred saloons open on any day of idleness is not only to rob the day of its prime quality, of its physical and mental use, but it is to transform the day into a positive evil. It is no advantage to common people to have a day of rest from common labor if the day is to bring an unusual outlay of money and an inflammation of the passions.” TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.8
“How are they going to prevent the outlay of money and the inflaming of the passions, then, if they compel them to be idle? If the stores are closed, and the manufactories are closed, and the spade and the pick are put aside for twenty-four hours, only that glasses and bottles may rattle, and cards be shuffled, and dice cast, and hard earned money be wasted, then it would be better that industry should rule all the seven days of the week.” Precisely. How then are they going to cut off the card playing? A man can gamble at home as well as in a saloon. The man that has gambling in his mind will do so. “Regular labor all through the year would not injure a laboring man half as much as he would be injured by fifty-two days in the beer shop. A day which shuts a factory and opens a saloon is an absurdity. What a sweet day that must be when it is an open question whether those who are to enjoy it will live over it! A broken bead is more probable than a saved soul.” This has always been the case from inception of the first Sunday law and will always be so where men are compelled to be idle. “Statistics show that in Germany, where Sunday liquor-selling is open and untrammeled, fifty-three percent of the crimes are committed between Saturday and Monday morning. Many a poor German woman dreads to have Sunday come. Her husband who has worked hard and kept sober through the week finds it a much more perilous affair on his weekly respite, and returns home from his Sunday recreation in no favorable mood for domestic peace.” Then don’t you see that the tendency of all Sunday laws is evil and always must be so? Speaking of England, the author quotes one of the Homilies: “It doth too evidently appear that God is more dishonored and the devil better served on the Sunday than upon all of the days of the week besides.” Similar testimony Dr. Crafts says, is given by judges, chaplains and others of the effect of the Sunday liquor traffic in the United States. The records of the Brooklyn police courts showed that on Sunday there were twice as many arrests for drunkenness and disorderly conduct as on any other day of the week. Almost any Monday morning he (Judge Reynolds) was waited upon by the wives of laborers who had been arrested for Sunday sprees, and asked to use his influence in their favor. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.9
If there were prohibition laws there would not be as much of this, but the evils of enforced idleness would be apparent anywhere. In the face of all this evidence I appeal to any honest, fair minded man if it would not be better to allow men to follow their honest callings than to subject them to all the evils and temptations of an idle Sunday? “Sunday liquor selling,” says Dr. Crafts, “Is the pirate of commercial life, preying upon all other trades and interests. On Sunday it robs the church and the home of the presence of fathers and brothers.” TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.10
Dr. Crafts cited London as the best evidence of good from an enforced Sunday observance, and Senator Payne of Ohio, at the hearing before the committee having charge of the Sunday rest bill, asked him this question: “Have you seen the statement lately made by authority that London on Sunday is the most immoral and dissipated city in the world?” And Dr. Crafts replied: “That is due to liquor drinking, not to the fact that mails are closed.” Now these men go about to reform this state of things by creating more idleness. Is it not plain that no state can afford to have Sunday laws, and enforce them? “Why,” says one, “is not a town better that keeps Sunday than one which does not?” Yes, but is it the religion that town has, or the Sunday that makes the difference? Is there any religion in a Sunday? Is it not the respect the people have in their hearts that makes the difference? Further than all this, a man can on Sunday hire a livery team and race over the streets, get drunk, and do what he will, if he does not become too noisy or unruly, and go free, but an honest man who follows his daily occupation is arrested and fined. What does this do? It puts a premium on crime, does it not? Well then, no state can afford to declare as crimes any honest labor, and put premiums on crime. No Sunday laws then can be beneficial. But does not this argument reflect upon the Almighty in appointing a day of rest? No: God’s purpose was that man might worship Him. It is this religious sanction that He has put upon it that forever tends to preserve it from becoming a day of idleness. God has established it as a memorial of Him, and to call man’s mind to Him. It is to be kept holy not civily. Further, man’s physical needs are not considered in it at all. We are to work six days because God did so, and rest the seventh day because He did; not for us to rest because it may endanger our health, but we work and rest because the Lord did so, and not because man needs “one day in seven for physical rest.” TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.11
Man’s spiritual needs are all that are considered in the commandment. But when a state forces men to rest on Sunday, not being able to attach to the day the sanction that God attaches to his Sabbath it becomes simply a day of idleness and wickedness. Dr. Crafts said to the Knights of Labor in Indianapolis, in reply to the question: “Could not this weekly rest day be secured without reference to religion?” “A weekly day of rest has never been permanently secured in any land except on the basis of religious obligation.” Joseph Cook says: “You will in vain enforce the day of rest unless you enforce also the worship.” Dr. Crafts says: “I have received written answers from about one hundred and fifty persons, many of them manufacturers, to the following question: ‘In your observation of clerks, mechanics and other employees, which class are in the best physical and mental condition for the renewal of business on Monday mornings, those who are church goers, or those who spend the Sabbaths in picnics, and other pleasures?” The answer is, ‘church goers.’ The church goers are worth 25 per cent more on an average. The Sabbath observers and church goers, whether laborers, mechanics, merchants, or professional men are in better condition to enter upon work on Monday morning than those who spent Sunday in pleasures of even a comparatively innocent kind. Church goers can be recognized in a crowd—clean, healthy, prosperous.” Now if Sunday laws are defensible for health, then only those who go to church get the benefit. Now if this proves anything, it proves the right to force a man to go to church. So then all their arguments go to prove that worship and religion must go with the Sunday law or it becomes a worse day than any other. What will come then? The state will furnish to the church the power to compel men to worship to save them from the effects of idleness. This is exactly what happened in the fourth century, and here comes in another source of evil. It multiplies hypocrites and gets the people into a habit of meanness and dishonesty, so that every way they turn, every step they take only increases the wickedness, and must eventually bring on a train of calamity they little dream of. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.12
“The Camp Meeting. The Last Lecture on Church Organization” The Topeka Daily Capital, 11, 120, p. 5.
THE LAST LECTURE ON CHURCH ORGANIZATION
(BY A. T. JONES)
In closing my lectures on church organization I wish to give some final texts on the duties of deacons, Romans 16:1, the word “servant” is deaconesses—a deacon being the servant of the church, Acts 6:1-4. This refers to Acts 4:32-37. These seven (Acts 6) are not here plainly called deacons, but they were really the first deacons ever chosen, the contest showing that they were selected to attend to the details of the church wants, temporal affairs, and to relieve the elders. The root of the Greek word means or signifies “made dusty by running”—so continuously doing errands that he gets covered by dust. He looks out for the Lord’s supper, the robes for baptism, etc.; looks after the poor and takes charge of the poor funds, but he does not baptize, that being a part of the duty of the minister. As to administering the ordinances, that is, taking charge, it is customary for the elder to have charge, but in handing out the emblems, the deacons assist, as in the ordinance of the Lord’s supper. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.13
Another part of church order I wish to notice: Matthew 18:15-18, “If thy brother trespass against thee, go and tell him.” Is not that a plain statement? Tell who? Him. What further? Alone. Have we been doing this? Have we not been telling other people? Yes, and that is what makes all the church trouble. We have no right to tell a fault to anyone but the brother and, as a last resort, the church. If this scripture was followed there could be no ordinary church trial. That scripture was put there to be obeyed, now let us decide to do so hereafter, and that we will never speak of a brother’s fault except to him, and that twice before carrying it before the church What do we tell it to him for? To condemn him? No, to recover him. If he trespass against me, who is hurt? Is it not I? But who is sinning? Is it not he, and is not he the one that is to be saved from the error of his way? We are to tell him to recover him from his fault, and this is the sole object, Galatians 6:1. Who is to restore him? “Ye which are spiritual.” Then what is to be done first? To see if I am spiritual, whether I have the mind of God or not, and further by the time I go to the Lord I may find out the fault is on my side and I may not have to go to the brother at all, till, if after this, I find the brother is wrong, then I go, in the spirit of meekness, which is Christ’s spirit. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.14
When he shows a person his fault, it is to save him, and that is all the purpose anyone should have in telling another his fault, “considering thyself also lest thou also be tempted.” There is no room then to go to a brother to find fault with him. Remember, too, we must always make a distinction between the sinner and the sin. “Hate the sin with all the heart, but the sinner love.” Who can hate sin more than the Lord, yet who loves the sinner more? If we despise the sinner for his sin the Lord will leave us some day to fight the same sin in our own strength and learn our own weakness. Now after telling a brother his fault and he will not hear thee, take with thee one or two more. What for? That they may be witnesses, as the matter may come before the church, and “every word must be established,” and that by witnesses you can show that the word of the Lord has been followed. What was the idea throughout? To get the brother to see his fault. Now the brethren taken are not to know for what purpose they are called. If I tell it first to them, I give it a coloring of my own. Now these witnesses hear me speak it again to him, and if neither he or they can see it in my light, it is time for me to stop, but if they try to have him see it as I do, and he will not, then let the church hear the matter, and if then he still refuse, “then let him be to thee as a heathen and a publican”—not to cast him off forever, but to work for him as you would for any other heathen. Paul speaks of this in Titus 3:10—a heretic being “one who chose for himself.” If then a brother withstands you and your witnesses, and the church, to choose for himself and is a heretic, “being condemned of himself,“—not by the church or the brother—all these striving to save, not to condemn him. Now, Matthew 18:18, then, and then only is that text fulfilled, having been done in accordance with the Lord’s word it becomes the action of the Lord and is accepted in heaven. If a brother trespass against the church—breaking the Sabbath, for instance—it is the place of the elder to restore such an one, and not for the church to rebuke openly (read Matthew 18:15-17), and the duties of an elder given in a previous lecture, going with witnesses the second time if necessary, and finally bringing it before the church, if nothing else can be done. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.15
Now, about speaking to only those who commit the fault. (1) When a brother has committed a fault and he is restored, remember that is to be the last of it. It is not to be told to another afterwards. The Saviour has forbidden us telling anyone but him at any time. Now, Matthew 5:22-24, so there is a check upon him also, and he cannot be at peace until he hears the brother. He must stop and go and be reconciled to his brother. Now, read Psalm 15:1-3; margin also—We are not to receive a reproach against a brother. Exodus 23:1—“shalt not receive a false report,” the Hebrew version reads. What is a false report? The telling of what we do not know, personally, to be true, even though it may be true. To repeat such a thing is the same as to tell a lie. We are not to indulge in hearsay, so no story can go beyond the one who tells it without bearing false witness, and the breaking of the Ninth commandment. Leviticus 19:16—Who is a tale bearer? Read Proverbs 12:13— TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.16
And you will always know. Never meddle with such an one; a faithful man covers it over and tries to stop its mischief. So Proverbs 20:19—“Can you keep a secret?” say they. Answer then, “Yes, can you?” If it is a secret I have no right to confide it to any one, to betray what is told in confidence is treachery. Why do we tell one brother of his fault and he alone? Leviticus 19:17 and the margin. The same is in Matthew 18. It is done to save him from his sin, but if I refuse to go to him and he continues in his evil way, then I become partaker of his sin. Cain said “Am I my brother’s keeper?” Yes, brethren, we are helpers of one another. Now again, “Take heed how ye hear.” It is next to impossible to listen to a statement and be able to repeat it as we hear it. It will receive the cast of each mind through which it passes, so we should heed what is said, that we have to repeat, or else we will convey a different impression from what the narrator intended. Then again, remember what was told you in a previous lecture, “receive not an accusation against an elder,” 1 Timothy 5:19-21. And why this solemn charge—2 Peter 2:9-11? Chiefly because there are those who despise government, and speak evil dignities, and in doing this they put themselves above the angels, and become as Satan who accuses the brethren day and night. But why bring Christ in here? Read Jude 6. Well then in doing so we put ourselves above Christ. Now, James 4:11, in doing this we start where Satan did, and that is where we will go if we continue this work. TDC May 21, 1889, page 5.17