Sunday-Law Meetings in Fresno.
By N. J. BOWERS
FRESNO, CAL., August 26, 1889. EDITOR SENTINEL: Thinking you would like to hear something in reference to Mr. Crafts’ work here, I will send you a few items. Well, he has come and gone. He had two meetings, the first at 8 o’clock, Thursday evening, in the Baptist Church, the other at 3 in the afternoon, Friday, at the same place. The address Thursday, occupied just an hour and a half. It was the same, I suppose, as he gives everywhere. He appears to have it learned by heart. He paid his usual respects to the AMERICAN SENTINEL, and while claiming that it did not much interfere with his work yet we noticed that he spent no little time trying to counteract its influence in the minds of those present. I should suppose in the three hours, or nearly, covered by both the addresses, he spent about a third of the time noticing the SENTINEL and Seventh-day Adventists. He did not have much to say about the Seventh-day Baptists, mostly about Adventists. Although trying to be pleasant and courteous, there was a vein of ill-disguised spite, and a spirit of retaliation running through his talk on this subject. It evidently makes him ill-tempered to have his work opposed. He can and does pour out the vials of his wrath upon his opponents, and we who understand this movement know full well what he and his associates will do when they get the power. His meetings here and the spirit he has displayed in them have confirmed all our views of what is really behind and in this whole movement—an intolerant thirst for power, and determination to crush out all opposition. When the vote was put it was against him. More being against the Sunday law than for it. He remarked that the large opposing vote was due to the Adventists, who were no doubt present in full force; that he could “tell them by their looks,” etc. He was evidently not well pleased, and whether it was another “surprise party” to him I cannot say, but it was evident he was not pleased, and the local clergy seemed chagrined. Possibly there were four hundred present at the first meeting. The vote on each side was not counted. If it had been, the “noes” would have had it by a nice little majority. The meetings, as regards attendance and enthusiasm, were a flat failure. His points received but faint applause in the audience. There are eight organized churches here, not counting the Catholics or Adventists. I believe the colored people have two small societies, but I did not see a colored person present. The average membership of these eight societies can, I think, be safely put at four or five hundred. It is safe to say that not more than two hundred of them were present at the largest meeting; so even the churches were poorly represented, so little interest do they take in the work. Two at least of the resident pastors were not present at all, or if so did not “take a front seat.” They may have been out of town. Whether a local union was organized or not I have not been able to learn, but I suppose such was the case. Several sermons have since been preached on the Sunday question, so the preachers, some of them at least, are stirred up. Well, let the good work go on. Send out the light and the truth, that all men may know the iniquity that lies in the American Sabbath Union’s work. The second meeting was devoted to answering written questions. About twenty, I should think, were handed in. He had much to say at this meeting also against the SENTINEL and its methods, calling on the Seventh-day Adventists to repudiate it, and telling them that they were being deceived by it, etc., etc. None of the city papers spoke approvingly of Mr. Crafts’ work. They passed it by in silence, as far as I have seen. The two dailies, however, spoke well of Professor Jones’ open air address Wednesday evening.