AN INCIDENT WITH A MORAL.
By S. S. Teacher
Dr. Trumbull, in The Sunday School Times, lately treated his readers to a racy sketch of a notable Sunday-school gathering that was held a little more than twenty years ago. We make an extract which is eminently suggestive, premising that the meeting referred to was held in Plymouth church in the city of Brooklyn. “It was on the last evening of the convention that an incident occurred which is especially worthy of a recall. The Rev. Dr. Stephen H. Tyng, and the Rev. Henry Ward Beecher were announced as the chief speakers of the evening. The church was again crowded with attentive listeners. Dr. Tyng was late in arriving, and Mr. Beecher, who had planned to speak after him, was necessitated to take the lead. In his opening he magnified the mission of the Sunday-school teacher, saying that the longer he lived the more he valued those sermons preached where one man was the minister, and one man was the congregation—where the preaching was face to face, and eye to eye; where there could be no doubt about who was intended by the truth declared. But Mr. Beecher added the frank admission, that his own pulpit duties quite shut him out from an active participation in Sunday-school work, and that he was compelled to leave the care of the younger portion of his charge to the good teachers of his church school, while his energies were devoted to the older ones. Then he went on to emphasize the spirit which should actuate the Sunday-school teacher in his work. It was after Mr. Beecher’s opening remarks that Dr. Tyng came in, and took a seat upon the platform behind him. Of course he had not heard the first part of the address, but he listened attentively to the remainder. When he came forward to speak, the Doctor referred in highly eulogistic terms to him whom he followed. In his stately and graceful way he expressed his admiration of the genius and eloquence of the pastor of that church, which had now been displayed in the touching of every point of the circumference of the subject of the evening’s discourse, and had actually filled up the entire disc within, so as to leave literally nothing for one who should come after him, but to repeat in a less effective manner some truth which he had presented. Then Dr. Tyng proceeded to tell of his own appreciation of work for the young in contrast with work for the old. In all his ministry, he said, he had never hesitated, when the choice must be made between one child and two adults, to take the child. ‘It seems to me,’ said the Doctor, ‘that the devil would never ask anything more of a minister than to have him look upon his mission as chiefly to the grown-up members of his congregation, while somebody else was to look after the children.’ The pathos of this thrust at the confessed position of Mr. Beecher was instantly recognized by the audience, and a broad smile was on every face. Dr. Tyng saw that he had struck a responsive chord; and, having no idea of the true source of merriment, he followed up his advantage with his accustomed vigor. Pointing down to the entrance door before him, he hissed out his satirical sentences with that peculiar intensity of his: ‘I can see the devil standing at that door, and saying to the minister on this platform, “Now you just stand there and fire away at the old folks, and I’ll stand here and steal away the little ones—as the Indians catch ducks, swimming under them, catching them by the legs, and pulling them under.”’ By this time the whole audience was convulsed with laughter, and a serious face was hardly to be seen until the Doctor had finished his really eloquent address.” Dr. Stephen H. Tyng and his noble church have made a record scarcely surpassed for purity and power in all the annals of American Christianity. As for the record of the other church and pastor referred to in the extract, we do not presume to pronounce a judgment, but we cannot for a moment doubt that if more attention had been given to the children, even though somewhat less had been bestowed upon the older members of the church and congregation, the public would have been spared some things that have made the ungodly wag their heads. We warn all pastors and churches to care first of all for the children of their charge, if they do not wish to come to grief.—S. S. Teacher.