The Seventh-day Baptists.
By Uriah Smith
UNDER the caption, Visit to Alfred Center, N. Y., Elder Uriah Smith, reports his visit to the S. D. Baptist General Conference as follows:— In company with Bro. Canright we left the Flint, Mich., camp-ground, Sept. 21, to look after some matters which called for our presence together in Western New York. Bro. C. being the regularly appointed delegate from our General Conference to the S. D. Baptist General Conference, as the alternate of Bro. White, who found it impossible to attend to this appointment and meet other imperative obligations, we had the pleasure of accompanying Bro. C. to this Conference, which was held in Alfred Center, N. Y., Sept. 22–26. In this sketch we shall speak simply of our observations and impressions as a visitor, leaving Bro. Canright to make such report as his position as delegate may require. This being our first visit to Alfred Center, we cannot forbear saying a word about the place. Nestled high among the hills of Allegany Co. the situation is romantic, and to one like ourself, reared in New Hampshire, with a love of its mountains, hills, and valleys, born and bred within us, it is very pleasant and beautiful. The real estate, not only of the village, but of nearly if not quite the entire township and adjoining neighborhoods, is in the hands of S. D. Baptists. For thirty-seven years no liquor has been sold in the place. No billiard tables, saloons, low places of resort, or other disreputable attractions, here present themselves to the young. This fact, in connection with the quiet and retirement here to be found, renders the place peculiarly well fitted for the location of Alfred University, the leading school among the S. D. Baptists, which has so long been in successful operation here. The buildings of the University consist of a three-story brick building with basement capable of accommodating eighty students or more with rooms and board, a separate building for the primary department, a building erected and fitted up for a gymnasium, an observatory, and the chapel building containing lecture room, recitation rooms, reading room, and library, and rooms for the literary societies. They are about erecting another building, a Memorial Hall, in honor of President Kenyon, the founder of this institution, to be in the form of a Greek cross, sixty-six feet each way, three stories in hight. If carried out according to the plans and specifications, this will add greatly to the facilities of the University, and be a noble ornament to the University grounds, and to the place. Ground is already broken for this building, and subscriptions for it were freely taken at this Conference. The present attendance is a little over two hundred. At the solicitation of Eld. N. V. Hull, the delegate to our late General Conference, we made it our home with him. Here we shared the most ample and generous hospitality, and had the pleasure of sitting for a while in the editorial chair of the Sabbath Recorder. At this place we were happy to meet, for the first time, Eld. V. Hull, of Iowa, and others prominent among them, whom we have never before met, and to renew acquaintance with still others pleasantly begun at their Conference in Illinois four years ago. The attendance by delegate at this Conference was quite full, the meeting being as large as any ever held by them, and larger than any other but one. Their house of worship, fifty-five by eighty, is capable of comfortably seating a thousand persons. This was filled to its utmost capacity on the Sabbath, and there being more present than could possibly gain admittance, another meeting was held in the University chapel. Twelve hundred persons in all were present. Eld. A. H. Lewis presided over the business sessions of the Conference. The questions that arose were often complicated, and the duties of his office trying and arduous. But he discharged them all with marked ability and success. In connection with the Conference the usual meetings of the Missionary Society, the Tract Society, and the Educational Society, were held. Many interesting items pertaining to their operations might be given had we space. We were happy to note quite an active element of opposition to the practice of tobacco-using. One of their leading ministers subscribed $10 to one of their denominational enterprises to keep it from the hands of his boys, he said, who by some unhallowed influences had been seduced into the evil practice of using tobacco. Another item of interest to us was the presence of Eld. L. Andrews, now in his seventy-ninth year, who was the pastor of the church to which Wm. Miller belonged while engaged in the study of the prophecies and commencing the great movement in reference to the second advent of Christ. Eld. A. was therefore conversant with the arguments on the question at that time, and is still very naturally interested in subjects of a prophetic nature. He stated before the Conference his belief that the prophetic periods had ended, and that the 1335 days, terminating about 1844, marked the era of the great awakening on the Sabbath question of the past thirty years. While our S. D. Baptist brethren believe we hold some unwarrantable and perhaps dangerous views, we think we discovered at this meeting the evil tendency of one of the cardinal doctrines of their religious creed, on this wise: An essay was presented on the subject of the state of the dead. In defending the common view of the state of man in death, the essayist in conclusion denied the doctrine of the literal resurrection of the body. We were glad to hear a vigorous protest against such a view in the subsequent discussion of the essay, but we could not help querying why it was not a natural and legitimate conclusion from the position taken in the first part of his essay, which he held in common with most of his brethren. For, if the soul is immortal, and capable of a higher and more intensified being after the death of the body than before, what need is there of the resurrection of the body, and what consistency in that doctrine? The doctrine of the immortality of the soul destroys the doctrine of the resurrection of the body by rendering such an event unnecessary and therefore unscriptural. And the necessity of the resurrection of the body once established the immortality of the soul is disproved; for Paul expressly states that there is no other avenue to the future life except through the resurrection of the body. 1 Cor. 15. The subject is destined to be still further agitated, and we shall be sorry to see that principle of interpretation which would lead to a denial of the resurrection of the body find any countenance among them. By invitation, Eld. Canright spoke to a full house on Thursday evening taking, for his subject the scriptural relation of Faith and Works. He was subsequently requested by vote of the Conference to write it out for publication in the Sabbath Recorder. On Sunday, when the subject of future labors was under consideration, a good deal of enthusiasm was manifested in devising ways and means for the prosecution of their work. Bro. Canright was called out on the subject of tent labor, to explain the method of tent operation and its advantages, which he did quite fully. They have come to look upon this kind of labor with such favor that they voted to procure a tent and put it into the field properly manned next season. May much success attend them in this step. We were made very welcome while among them. The expressions of confidence and friendship could scarcely have been more cordial. We do not say that this is the feeling of all, some evidence to the contrary appearing on the part of a few. But we think we can safely say that generally the feeling on the part of that body toward S. D. Adventists is friendly—a feeling which our people everywhere, as a matter of courtesy and duty, would do well in all proper ways to reciprocate. The next S. D. Baptist General Conference is appointed to be held with the church in Walworth, Wis., commencing fourth day preceding the last Sabbath in September, 1876. Eld. Whitford, President of Milton, Wis., College is appointed their delegate to our next General Conference.