Untitled article by A. O. TAIT

Pacific Press Publishing Company · New York · August 7, 1890

FromThe American Sentinel, Vol. 5, No. 31

Chicago Correspondence.

By A. O. TAIT

WHILE the Commissioners of the Columbian Exposition are busying themselves in settling the matter whether the fair shall be on the Lake Front or not, and while they are deciding who is the best man to place at the helm to guide the mammoth undertaking to success, and while the Illinois Legislature is planning for special legislation to give Chicago the legal right to raise, in the way they desire, the necessary funds for the great fair; the clergy and others, in Chicago, are agitating the question thus early as to whether or not the Exposition shall be opened on Sunday.

Dr. Utter, of the Unitarian persuasion, expressed himself recently as very decidedly in favor of opening on Sunday. This drew from the ranks of the Sunday-closing advocates a volley, threatening the divine vengeance if the Nation should add rebellion to impiety, by opening on Sunday an exhibition upon which the gaze of the world was fixed. Dr. Henson, in particular, threatened fearful judgments if the great “American Sabbath” should be so disregarded. He advocated the idea, strongly, that Chicago should be made a model Christian city before the fair comes off, so that the inhabitants of the Old World could see a living example of what Christianity would do for a nation.

As we listened to the reverend gentleman giving utterance to the above thoughts, we could not refrain from soliloquizing. We will suppose the great Exposition on the Lake Front, as proposed; and in our imagination we will behold every door barred against the visitor whose conscience would not condemn him for going on Sunday; the perfect quiet of the ideal Sabbath reigns throughout the entire grounds occupied by the prodigious exhibit; people from every corner of the earth are there; and as they witness the “Sabbath hush” of the fair, the first thought will be, “what good people must dwell in the immediate surroundings of such an enclosure, fortified by all the insignia of outward piety.” And, since the fair cannot be visited on Sunday, the visitor starts through the city to form an acquaintance with some of these good people. Before fairly entering the thronged streets he sees the glittering sign of a saloon, and, perhaps, hears the carousals of debauchery within. While this shakes his exalted ideas of Chicago a little, he is ready to excuse it by thinking

he is fallen into one of the worst places in the city, a little section as yet unreclaimed from its gross corruption, so he passes on.

As he rounds the next corner, another like spectacle of a slum stands out before him; a little later, a gambler allures this unsuspecting innocent into his net, and draws from him his hard-earned money. By this time his eyes are beginning to be opened to the situation, and he secures a copy of the Saturday Daily News, and is perfectly horrified to read its bold attacks on the immoralities of the city. He is dazed as he reads about the crime on every hand, and his sensibilities are fairly paralyzed as he still further reads that the City Council is in connivance with these agents of lawlessness, and that the reputable citizen cannot be stirred to the importance of going to the polls to vote “the rascals out.”

Would such a spectacle make a very favorable impression on the visitor, from the Old World, who had not accepted Christ? And yet, such is the condition of Chicago to-day. With a saloon at every turn; with debauchery and vice on every hand; with the grossest corruptions right in the very council chamber of the great city’s lawmakers; and with public sentiment so sleepy on the subject, that some of the Chicago papers claim that they cannot arouse the people to the gravity of the situation, does it look much as though the whole city could be made a model of primitive Christianity before the opening of the Exposition in 1893?

Perhaps the exigencies of the situation will suggest to some one, the idea of centering all the great evangelists here, to take the city by storm. But Mr. Moody has been working here for a long time, and what he has been able to accomplish would only be like taking a drop from the great ocean of crime. The renowned Messrs. Jones and Small worked here for some time, but did not seem to make any perceptible impression on the wickedness of this modern Sodom. The famous “Boy Preacher,” Harrison, tried his evangelistic skill on the wicked city, and only a few of its swarming inhabitants seemed to know he was here. While we would very seriously question whether any good comes out of the kind of work done by some of the above named gentlemen, it is true that they, together with many evangelists of lesser note, beside the great army of resident ministers, have been working away on Chicago for “Lo! these many years,” and still the great crimes go on.

In the face of all this, is it not the greatest conceivable vagary for a minister to think and talk of having Chicago, in so short a space of time, wholly within the fold of Christ? If it could be done why do not the ministers who believe that way, plan to do it without waiting for the Exposition? If it could be done, is not the minister committing sin who waits for a great fair to move him to action? But, personally, I have as much faith in the idea that Sodom could have been converted, as I have in the conversion of Chicago. But so great is this Sunday-law panacea for all moral ills, that its advocates would say by their actions and words, “Only give us a lever by which we can close the Exposition on Sunday, and Chicago is instantly transformed into a city of saints.”

In regard to some of their plans, to secure such would-be benefits for Chicago, I will speak in another letter.

A. O. TAIT.