4
HENRY H.TVCKKR, Kditor.
SIDE-LIGHTS ON INSPIRATION.
All the editors and many others, are
just at this time writing on the subject
of inspiration. Yielding rather to the
wishes of friends than to any prompt
ing of our own, we contribute a column
or two as our share of the discussion.
An exhaustive treatment of the subject
in the small space at our command, is
impossible; and hence, waving me
thodical procedure, we content our
selves by displaying a few side-lights,
which we hope will, so far as they go,
answer a good purpose.
1. The Greek word theopneustos, which
is translated given by inspiration of
God, means literally God-breathed.
Now the question is much discussed,
whether it was merely the thought
that was God-breathed, leaving the
writers wholly to themselves in the
selection of the words in which this
thought should be expressed, or
whether the words as well as the
thought were under such controlling
influences of the Divine Spirit as to
make them of supreme authority. In
one case we have the word of God—
that is, the revelation of his will and
purposes —communicated to us in the
language of fallible men ; in the other
ease we have not only the word of
God, in its broadest sense, but also the
words of God in a literal sense. Those
who hold to the former theory believe
that while the truth is from God, the
words in which the truth is uttered are
of merely human authority. They
say that the word of God is in the
Scriptures, while yet the Scriptures
themselves are not the word of God,
and are fond of quoting the text, “The
letter killeth but the spirit giveth
life.’’
Now, it appears to us, that so far as
relates to the authoritativeness of the
words of Scripture, it is immaterial
which way the above much-debated
question is decided. If indeed the
very words are inspired, they are, of
course, binding on our consciences.
But suppose they are not inspired, are
they not equally binding? They are
the only words in which the will ’of
God is made known to men ; if He did
not select them, nor control the selec
tion of them, he has adopted them, and
has thus given them the sanction of
his authority. Whoever selected the
words, God uses them in communica
ting his revelations to us, and if they
are good enough for God to use, they
are good enough for us to accept. And
again, whether they come from his
Spirit or not, they certainly come from
his providence; whether God-breathed
or not they are God-given, and if God
given we may be sure that they are the
very words that ought to have been
given, and that there is no deceit in
them, and nothing tending to mis
lead, and that they convey to our
minds all that God intended should be
conveyed, neither more nor less. If
God made a revelation of truth to cer
tain men, and allowed them to express
that truth in such away as to obscure
the meaning or to pervert it, of what
use is that revelation to us? Is it pos
sible that the Spirit ,of God would in
dite a revelation which his providence
annuls? Does God thus work against
himself? Would God mock us and
tantalize us by saying “I give you my
truth, but I give it in such form and
shape that you can never know
whether you have it or not; the truth
which lies behind the words is from
me, but the words are not from me ;
they are from fallible men,some of them
very ignorant men, not skilled ia the
use of words, and peculiarly liable to
err; these words may mislead you;
some of them may be not only badly
chosen but wio igly chosen and may
express what I did not mean, but I am
not responsible for these; the truth as
it comes from me is pure, but as it gets
to you it is impure; after you have
purged it of the errors which men
have combined with it, what is left is
to be depended on.” Such a revela
tion is no revelation. It is as if one
would say to another, “I give you a
valuable possession ; it is in the shape
of a hundred pieces of money ; some of
these pieces are genuine and are of
priceless value, but other pieces are
counterfeit and worthless; you cannot
possibly distinguish between them,
though I know them on sight; if you
use one of the counterfeit pieces you
shall surely die.” How much would a
man be enriched by such a donation?
Yet it would be quite as valuable, as a
revelation of the words of eternal life so
mixed with what might be words of
eternal death, that we cannot know
one kind from the other. We cannot
believe that God would give us his
word encumbered with impossible con
ditions. He who knows what to com
municate knows how to communicate
it; and the words which we have are
those which he intended us to have.
Whether they are God-breathed words
»r not makes no difference. Admit
ting that they are not so, they are just
as authoritative as if they were so; we
have them from the providence of
God, and the Providence of God is God.
If we are told again that the letter
killeth but the spirit giveth life, we
have to ask, Suppose we kill the letter
what becomes of the spirit? It is gone,
THE CHRISTIAN INDEX AND SOUTH-WESTERN BAPTIST: THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 1881.
and there is nothing left of the Scrip
tures but a dead-letter, and we have no
reliable rule of duty, and no guide to
eternal life
2. Whatever may have been the
case with the writers of the sacred
Scriptures, there certainly have been
occ isions when God communicated
his will to men through the mouths of
other men in words which were selected
for this purpose, not by the spokesman,
but by God himself. When Moses
complained that he was slow of speech,
the Lord said unto him “Who hath
made man’s mouth? or who maketh
the dumb, or deaf? or the seeing or
the blind? have not I the Lord. Now
therefore go and I will be with thy
mouth and teach thee what thou shalt
say. And he said Omy Lord send I
pray thee by the hand of him whom
thou wilt send. And the anger of the
Lord was kindled against Moses, and
he said, Is not Aaron the Levite thy
brother? I know that he can speak
well .... And thou shalt speak unto
him and put words into his mouth;
and I will be with thy mouth and with
his mouth, and will teach you what ye
shall do. And he shall be thy spokes
man unto the people; and he shall be
... to thee instead of a mouth, and
thou shalt be be to him instead of
God.” Ex. 4, 11-16. So far as relates
to Moses and Aaron, the passage quoted
is something more than a taper; it is
more like a Drummond-light. No
interpretation that can be put on this
extract can make it mean anything
disc than that the very words were
God-breathed.
Nor did the verbal inspiration cease
with Moses and Aaron. The Lord
afterward said to Moses, “I will raise
them up a prophet from among their
brethren like unto thee, and will put
my words in his mouth, and be shall
speak unto them all that I command
him.” Deut. 18, 18. The prophet
Jeremiah claims the same thing, for
he says, “Then the Lord put forth his
hand and touched my mouth ; and the
Lord said unto me, Behold I have put
my words in thy mouth.” Jer. 1. 9.
In the New Testament we find the
same expressions. Our Lord, speaking
to his disciples, said, “I will give you a
mouth and wisdom.” Lu. 21. 15.
Two things are here promised; one
is wisdom; what is the other?
On another occasion he said,
“Take no thought how or what ye
shall speak, for it shall be given
you in that same hour what ye shall
speak, for it is not ye that speak, but
the Spirit of your Father which
speaketh in you.” Mat. 10. 19. Quo
t bions of like character might be
multiplied.
Now if it was important that the
very words should be God-breathed
w hich Moses spoke but which were not
written, and which were addressed to
Israel only and not to all mankind,
and which related to temporal matters
and not to spiritual, is it not much
more important that those words
should be God-breathed which are
written, and which are meant not for
temporary purposes but for permanent
tfse, and which are intended for the
whole human race? And if the very
words were God-breathed which the
apostles used in their oral addresses,
words which died away with their own
echoes, and which were heard only by
a few scores or a few hundreds of men,
is it not far more important that those
words should be God-breathed, and
more likely that they would be, which
were intended not for the few who
could hear an apostle’s voice, but which
were written for the countless millions
of succeeding generations, and which
should be the only expression of God’s
truth until the end of time? The less
demands the greater. If it was neces
sary that the words in which truth
was conveyed on a small occasion,
should be under the inspiration or
control of infinite wisdom, it is incon
ceivable that it should be less than
necessary, on so stupendous an occa
sion as that, when Almighty God
makes his final revelation to the
whole world. Someof our readers will
recognise what is known as the argu
ment a fortiori.
3. In apostolic times some spoke
with tongues; that is, they spoke in
f ireign languages which they had rtev
er learned, as if they were their own.
In this case the words, the very words
were certainly God-breathed. Now, if
the tongue may be under divine con
trol and supplied with a vocabulary,
when the speaker uses a foreign lan
guage, why may not the pen of a writ
er be under the same control when he
uses his own language? Doubtless
each one of those speakers exhibited
his mental characteristics in his speech.
They were- not mere automatons, they
were human beings, and everything
that came from them was like them,
though God was in it. So the writers
show their idiosyncracies as plainly
when they were inspired as when they
were not. A man does not cease to be
himself when God uses him. His
powers are not changed, they are mere
ly controlled so as to effect the very
purpose, and no other, which God
would accomplish. It is as if a musi
cian were to play first upon a flute and
then upon a cornet; each instrument
wonld give its own sound wholly dif
ferent from the other, but the breath
that makes the sound and the genius
that inspires the music is the same.
Moses, David, Isaiah, James Paul,
Peter, were so many different instru
ments, though not mechanical instru
ments, each with personal peculiarities
of his own, but all were used by the
same God as the media of communicat
ing with men. *
4. Admitting that the words are not
inspired, we are not willing to trust
any one in these latter days to improve
upon them. It is much more likely
that the proper words have been select
ed by those whom God appointed to
convey his truth to us, than that they
could be bettered by the “leaders of
advanced thought" who have prung
up eighteen hundred years after the
last apostle died. The fishermen and
the tent-maker are safer gnides after
all, than those who claim to represent
what is called the “scholarship of the
age.” A few noisy men may make
themselves heard, but they are not
likely to be listened to. What is writ
ten is written, and what we have we
shall keep, and we thank God for it,
for every word of it. We remember
what our brother Paul said; “We
speak not in the words, which man’s
wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy
Ghost teacheth.” 1 Cor. 2.13. Or as
the American revisers have the whole
passage “Which things also we speak
not in words which man’s wisdom
teacheth,but which the Spirit teacheth ;
combining spiritual things with spirit
ual words.” Those who are wise above
what is written and who choose to take
the risk may dispute the apostles’ claim.
INCOMPETENTS.
If all the criticisms that have been
made on the medical treatment of the.
President since he received his wound
were put in print, there would perhaps
be enough of it to fill a dozen large vol
umes. Most of these criticisms are
absurd, and many of them are merci
less. Some of them amount to noth
ing more than this : “If the President
dies, it will be because he has been
butchered by the doctors.” This in
deed appears to be a wide spread,if not a
general sentiment. Yet notone of these
critics has seen the President, and not
one in a hundred of them, ever saw a
gun-shot wound, or knows anything of
medicine or surgery. How does it
happen, that they find themselves com
petent to decide that the physicians in
charge are incompetent? Would it
not be more modest, and more becom
ing, and more proper everyway, for
those who know nothing to say noth
ing? As for ourselves, we know noth
ing of the medical gentlemen referred
to, but we surely are at liberty to pre
sume, that they are men of at least or
dinary capacity, and that their profes
sional knowledge and skill are at least
respectable; and if this be the case, we
may be sure, that the President has
been reasonably well treated. The
probability is that these physicians are
far more than “ordinary” and “respec
table,” and that they would be regard
ed as peers by the ablest of their pro
fession in the world. Now, when men
who know nothing of the facts of the
case, and who are wholly ignorant of
medical science, indulge in wholesale
and ferocious criticism of what has
been done, how ridiculous they make
themselves!
Human nature is always perpetrat
ing some such folly. Judging by what
we often hear, we should suppose tln»t
the members of the faculty of a college,
are the only men in the country who
do not know how to manage its affairs.
Those who have made this business a
specialty, and who have given their
whole lives to it, are overruled forsooth,
by men who have never had the expe
rience of one day, and who have never
studied the subject one hour.
It was just so during the war. Our
ablest generals were not at the head of
the army, but at home, on the street
corners, at the post-office, in the sa
loons, in fact, everywhere except in the
army! We have heard the most truc
ulent criticisms on our ablest soldiers
by men who had never seen a battle,
and who had never even read under
standingly, the details of one.
And coming from great things down
to small, everybody knows how to edit
a newspaper except the editor! Rising
now to the highest of all offices, where
is the man who is not competent to
tell a pastor exactly what he ought to
do? What a pity that all the promi
nent places should be filled by incom
petents! And what a vast amount of
neglected talent there is in private
life! What physicians, what professors,
what soldiers, what editors, what pas
tors! How many inglorious Milton’s
far (alas!) from mute! Is it not time
for each one to contribute his share
toward the improvement of public
manners and morals, by ceasing to
pass harsh judgment on men, concern
ing whose business he knows nothing?
Besides the weekly Baptist Gem,
the weekly lesson papers, and the
monthly, semi-monthly and weekly
Kind Words, we are to have the Kind
Words Quarterly, a help for teachers
and scholars—all edited by Rev. S.
Boykin, issued in the interest of the
Southern Baptist Convention, and pub
lished at Macon, Ga. We commend
them to the brotherhood as worthy of
liberal patronage, for their devotion to
home religion, Baptist doctrine, tem
perance and missions, and hope to see
them coming into general use in our
Georgia Sunday schools. Send for
circulars and specimen numbers, to
brother Boykin, Macon.
—LaGrange Reporter: Rev. J. G.
Goss has recently baptized four persons
at Wehadkee and eleven at Western
church, over the river.
BONDSERVANTS.
We have no disposition to revive
dead issues, and so far as slavery is
concerned,we are glad that it has ceased
to be. But we remember, that in old
times we used to say, that the Greek
word doulos, which in the New Testa
ment is translated servant, ought to
have been translated slave. This pro
position was hotly disputed, and the
world was supplied with avast amount
of literature going to show that slave
was not the proper word by which the
word doulos should be translated, and
that the word servant correctly repre
sented the Greek. In the Revised
Version, wherever the word doulos oc
curs, it is translated (in the margin)
bondservant. Now the words bond
servant and slave are absolute syno
nyms, that is, they both mean precise
ly the same thing. The revisers
avoided the word slave, we must sup
pose, simply because of the bad odor
in which the very word is held, but
they adoped another word which is its
exact equivalent. It was often sneer
ingly asked in former days, “How
would it sound to say, Paul the slave
of Jesus Christ?” It must be confessed
that the sound would not be agreeable
to the ear, but this is simply because
so many horrors have been hung
around the word slave. It sounds
better to say, “Paul, the bondservant of
Jesus Christ;” but the difference is
only in the sound, and not in the
sense. The word servant is a misrep
resentation of the meaning, and yet
this word was adhered to and insisted
on ; and it is probable that a few years
ago, there were some, who if they
could have been convinced that the
word doulos really means slave, would
have renounced the Bible. Now, those
same persons would perhaps be willing
to accept the Bible as the word of God
notwithstanding its use of this offen
sive word. But why now, more than
then? Now, there is no purpose to be
accomplished ; now, there is no occa
sion, on this point at least, to pervert
the Scriptures.
Time has made it all right; and the
revisers, so far as their authority goes,
have settled this question in favor of
those who were ridiculed and malign
ed for declaring that slave is the prop
er translation of doulos. The matter
which gave rise to the old discussion
is happily a thing of the past, but the
unfairness of some of the things that
were said is now fully exposed. We
chronicle this fact, not as already said,
to revive a debate from which no good
can possibly come, but to prepare the
way for a general proposition :
A happy day for the world will it be,
when everybody, regardless of his par
tialities, and prejudices, and of all
consequences, will be willing to take
the word of God exactly as it is written.
What a grand day for Baptists that
will be! And what a disturbance of
the waters! The time will come—is
coming.
GLIMPSES AND HINTS.
—The Presbyterian Church in Canada
holds, in December, examinations on doc
trine and government, for Sunday-school
teachers. The Central Baptist thinks the
idea not a bad one.
—George Macdonald expresses the belief,
“that all insanity has moral as well as phys
ical roots.”
—“A journey is a victory,” says an Ara
bian proverb. We fear thatsome Christians
find spiritual defeat in a vacation tour.
—According to T. M. Coan, the people of
the United States are increasing in wealth
at tbe rate of $2,300,000 a day. Some of us,
however, do not get our percentage of that
increase.
—Freemason street Baptist church, Nor
folk, Va , failed to secure Rev. A. C. Dixon,
of Asheville, N. C., as pastor, and has called
Rev. J. L. Burrows, D. D., of Louisville,
Ky.
—Rev. H. W. Battle, in a letter from
Virginia to the Baptist Record, mentions
the appointment of Rev. N. W- Halcomb
by our Richmond Board as a missionary
to China.
—Rev. J. B. Hartwell. D D., the mission
ary of our Southern Home Board to the
Chinese in California, was married in Bal
timore, Md., August 30th, to Miss Charlotte
E. Norris.
—There seems to be some uncertainty as
to the resignation of Consul Wharton. His
wife's father, Rev. Dr. Irwin, has had no in
ti mation of it in the family correspondence.
—“l'd a great deal rather fight Satan than
a church deacon," said Mr. Moody at his
late Northfield conference of Bible-workers.
Congregationalist deacons must be a power
in the land, and often a power for evil.
—“Satan's gun has kicked himself over,”
was the title of a sensational sermon in
New York not long since. The Enemy, we
fear, had another gun which at least
"winged” the preacher of that sermon.
—Prohibition does prohibit. In 1833
there was in Maine one dram'shop to every
225 inhabitants ; and now there is less than
one to every 1,000. Three in every four
have been abolished, and those that remain
are crippled by the necessity of keeping
their existence secret.
—ln 1785, Benjamin Trumbull mourned
that there had been 430 divorces in Connec-.
ticut within a century ; but in 1864 there
were 426, and then for fifteen years they
averaged 446
—Editor Wayland, in his account of
Moody’s Bible Conference at Northfield,
Mass.’ says: “There were, up to Friday
n00n,240 persons registered as in attendance.
Perhaps half of these were men. I did not
see a single smoker or chewer. I smelt no
tobacco smoke; I saw none of the floods that
are dispersed abroad by the masticator. I
did not feel as lonely as I often do ”
—The 2353 Episcopalians of the diocese of
Fond du Lac raised, last year, $36 664- an
average of sls 57 each. There is something
like “apostolic succession” in that —some
thing,at least, of the liberality characterizing
the apostolic churches.
—Dr. Dutcher, in tbe Evangelical Messen
ger, reports that the sermon he heard Spur
geon preach recently was not one of special
excellency, and ascribes the success of the
preacher to his voices “As it rolled forth in
deep denunciation, it startled his audience
with fear, and in his descriptions of beauty,
its fine vibrations appeared to sparxle and
flash, like the prismatic hues of falling spray.
The magic of nis voice breathes fire into the
tamest sentiment, and clothes an eloquent or
pathetic passage with brilliancy ana beauty
which in vain you endeavor to forget; you
feel the charm and resign yourself to the
influence.”
—Some Sunday-school writer has
ioned a “wordless book" to illustrate the
doctrine df atonement. It has a black page
to represent a heart full es sin, a red page
to represent the saving blood, and a white
page to represent the sinful heart when
the blood has cleansed it. A pretty conceit,
perhaps: but have we not in our literature
too many blank pages in lieu of definite
doctrine ?
—The Western Recorder says that there
were more students matriculated on the first
day of the present session, in the Southern
Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville,
than ever before at the opening of a session.
“We have at this writing not less than sev
enty young men on hand." The professors
are all at their post, with improved health
and in buoyant spirits.
—“The Master has said in regard to a
woman—-and never yet of a man, 'She bath
done what she could.’" This remark of
William M. Baker's carries as little weight
in it, if one should say, the Scriptures
style some men “perfect," but not a single
woman 1
—A writer in the Christian Register says
that Unitarianism is not the rel’gion ot tos
day, largely for lack of what is generally
termed "heart.” Well: give us a Saviour
and a salvation worthy to stir the heart, if
you want the heart to be stirred. If you do
not, let no surprise fall on you, when your
system bears such fruit as the sermon men
tioned by the same writer, “denouncing and
spurning Christ as the author of more evil
than good, because his was a religion of the
heart rather than the head.”
—The main street of Bristol is the State
line between Virginia and Tenne&e ; and of
our church in that town Rev- W. 8. Rog
ers writes to the Alabama Baptist, that, as a
general rule, the members who live in Ten
nessee lean toward the views of Dr. J. R.
Graves, while the members who live in Vir>
ginia lean towotd the views of the Religious
Herald! It is very common in that region
even among Baptists for women to speak
and pray in public.
—A writer in the Lutheran Standard says:
“The Anabaptists and all others who reject
infant baptism and therefore baptize again,
seek salvation in their peculiar mode of
baptism.” This is slander; and the writer
himself refutes it when he says : “They find
no more comfort in being baptized and in
attending the Lord’s supper than in obeying
the ten commandments." That is—they
trust as little to baptism for salvation as to
tbe observance of the law: and this is—they
do not trust to it at all I
—As to hospital-nursing in Germany, it is
performed by Romanist sisters only in pre
vailingly Romisu sections, as Bavaria or the
Rhine cities; while these are superseded by
Protestant deaconesses in Prussia and its
dependencies, in the Grand Duchy of Baden,
in the Bavarian Palatinate and in Thuringia.
All denominations will more and more do
ti is work in proportion as they come to
recognize the mission of secular benefaction
belonging to the church—a mission which
cannot be discharged to the full without
reviving the scriptural “order" of deacon -
esses.
—Moved with fear by Mother Shipton's
prophecy of the end of the world, an Ottawa
man dug an underground cave, and stowed
away two tons of ice, with several weeks’
provision ; arguing that as only the inflam
mable material on the earth would burn, the
fire must be over in a few days, when he
could emerge from his cool retreat and begin
liie anew. As vain as his dream of safety if
t ie prophecy had really come to pass, are
all the expedients by which men hope to
shelter themselves out of Christ from the
consuming fire of the wrath of God against
sin. The sceptic and the formalist may see
in this man their own image.
In Mark 3:29, the Revised New
Testament substitutes “eternal sin” for
the “eternal damnation” of the com
mon version. The Christian Repository
for September says: “ ‘Eternal sin’
does not seem warranted by the Greek.
Tbe words are, aioniou kriseos—eter
nal judgment or condemnation.” But
the Repository forgets that the Greek
text has been amended in this passage,
and the words are aioniou amartematos.
This amendment was made on
the authority of ancient manuscripts,
including the Vatican ; as confirmed
by the Coptic, Armenian, Gothic,
Italic and Vulgate versions. It is ap
proved by Grotius, Bengel, Mill, Rosen
mueller, Lachman, Kuinoel, Griesbach
and Tischendorf. Os course, with this
change of text, “eternal sin” is the
necessary translation. And with what
awfulness and terror it clothes the pas
sage! Better that God should write
the word ‘eternal’ before any other
word than before the word ‘sin.’
A deacon in an Eastern State, whose
name is with held lest he might be an
noyed with too many calls, has author
ized Rev. Dr. Landrum to draw on him
for a thousand dollars for the use of
Mercer University.
Who, at home, will catch the inspi
ration of this example of liberal bene
faction?
Thomson Journal: Ata meeting of
the members of the Baptist church in
this place on Monday night a very im
portant move was considered. There
are five churches in the county, in and
near Thomson, no single one of the
five is able to support a pastor, and it
is proposed to consolidate the five and
form one central church in Thomson,
under the charge of a resident pastor,
have preaching every Sabbath, and
keep up the other churches as preach
ing stations. This can be done and
not disappoint any who could not
come to the central church as there
would be preaching at the other four
churches as often as now. After con
sideration it was decided to appoint a
committee of three from Thomson
church to address a letter to the
churches of Sweetwater, Union, Mar
shall and Pine Grove, asking them to
appoint committees to meet the Thom
son church in conference on the first
Sabbath in September, to consider the
matter. The pastor will be present on
that day and explain the plan and
show its feasibility.
—The Darien Timber Gazette says
that a colored Baptist church, in the
northeastern portion of the city, was
completely demolished by the recent
storm.
GEORGIA BAPTIST NEWS.
A fine revival is in progress at Eu
harlee.
The Baptist church-building in East
man is programing favorably towards
completion.
Conyers Examiner: The baptizing
of Mr. Brittain’s two children, by their
father, Rev. J. M. Brittain, at Coving
ton, last week, was said to be a very
impressive scene.
The protracted meeting which has
been in progress at the First Baptist
church in Conyers for the past week, is
being attended with considerable inter
est. Rev. J. M. Brittain, pastor, from
Covington, has been conducting the
meeting. Judge Stewart preached a
very interesting serman to a large au
dience, on last Tuesday night. He is
one of the most interesting Baptist
ministers we ever heard preach.
—The next General Meeting of the
Fourth District of the Western Associa
tion will be held with the church at
New Hope. Appointed the next gen
eral meeting of this district with the
church at New Hope. E. B. Barrett
is to preach the introductory sermon,
brother H. S. Reese, alternate.
Mount Lebanon requested that the
Western Association convene with the
Mount Lebanon church at Sharpsburg,
1882, which petition was granted.
—Newnan Herald: Rev. J. H. Hall
assisted pastor Van Hoose in a series
of meetings at Greenville last week.
He returned home Monday, the meet
ing having closed Sunday. There
were nineteen additions to the church,
eighteen of whom were baptized by the
pastor last Sunday.
—Montezuma Weekly: A protracted
meeting has been going on for the
past week under the able management
of Rev. Mr. Parrot, pastor, assisted by
Messrs Briggs of Spalding and Rice of
Perry. There were five accessions, all
of whom were baptized on Sunday
last. The concluding sermon, preach
ed by Rev. Mr. Briggs, was a masterly
effort, and showed much learned rea
soning in this eminent theologian.
—The Mt. Vernon Baptist Associa
tion will convene at Tennille, C. R. R.,
on Friday before the first Sunday in
October.
—Our traveling correspondent
writing from Hawkinsville sixth inst.,
says: The Middle Georgia (colored)
Baptist Association convened at this
place on Saturday morning last. The
introductory sermon was preached
Friday night by Rev. J. H. Davis, of
Macon. Rev. T. B. Stewart, of Gris
woldville, was re-elected Moderator,
and Rev. J. A. James, of Forsyth, clerk,
unanimously. Charles Love, of Hawk
insville, was also elected treasurer by
a unanimous vote. The Association
numbers 63 churches, with a member
ship of between eight and nine thous
and. Nearly all the churches were
represented, the attendance of delegates
and visitors was quite large. On Sun
day the crowd numbered thousands,
and yet I never heard of a single case
of disorder. Had it been a political
assembly, of either white or colored,
how different would have been the re
sult. The Association seems to be
thoroughly alive to mission work, the
contributions being quite liberal. They
employ an evangelist to travel in their
own bounds. The Association contrib
uted S4O to the colored female school
in Atlanta. The next session of the
Association will be held with Fifth
Avenue church, Macon, the introduc
tory sermon to be preached by Rev. T.
B. Steward on Friday night before the
first Sunday in September, 1882.
—A Hawkinsville correspondent
writes: The Middle Georgia B-aptist
Association (colored) is now holding
its session here. Rev. Stewart of
Gris wold ville, is the Moderator. Yester
day they held services in the colored
Baptist and Methodist churches, the
court-house and grove. They had
quite a large crowd, in fact, the largest
we have ever seen here. It was esti
mated at from four to six thousand.
The Association embraces sixty
churches with a membership of eight
thousand.
The immense crowd here yesterday
was the most orderly and best behaved
we ever saw. There was nothing bois
terous, and we would not be aware of
the vast crowd except by seeing it. The
excellent behavior of this vast throng
is the subject of favorable comment by
all.
—Columbus Enquirer-Sun: We are
told that a very interesting revival is
now in progress at Bethesda, a Baptist
church near Ellerslie, in Harris county.
The meetings are conducted by Rev.
C. C. Willis, assisted by Rev. C. W.
Buck, of this city. The meeting is con
tinually increasing in interest, and our
informant states that about sixty went
forward Sunday night when an invita
tion for prayer was extended.
We learn that there is also a very
gracious revival now under way at La-
Fayette, Ala. It is a union meeting
of Baptist, Presbyterian and Methodist,
and a large number have attached
themselves to each of the churches.
Twenty-five or thirty were baptized last
Sunday.
—Swainsboro Herald: The protract
ed meeting at the Baptist church has
closed. A great deal of interest was
manifested in the meeting, and doubt
less much good accomplished. There
were fourteen accessions; eleven by
baptism and three by letter. The pas
tor was ably assisted by Rev. G. W.
Smith.
