News and Notes by Editor

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Jun 5, 1884

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 10, No. 22.

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News and Notes.

By Editor

RELIGIOUS.

—What is now called the Soudan, in Africa, is said to be precisely the Ethiopia of the Bible.

—The total number of Methodist annual conferences is ninety-nine, and of mission stations fourteen.

—There were 272 Mormon immigrants landed at New York May 27, accompanied by seventeen returning missionaries.

—According to Rabbi Levy, of this city, May 30 (Decoration Day) was the anniversary of the giving of the law on Mt. Sinai.

—The Cincinnati Commercial Gazette states that out of a population of 280,000 there are in that city less than 14,000 members of evangelical churches.

—The African Methodist Episcopal General Convention at Baltimore has refused to strike from its discipline the admonition against the use of tobacco.

—The Baptist Missionary Union has decided to commence work in the Congo River country, Africa, immediately, expending not less than $30,000 annually.

—The Bethel Mission Church of East Boston, Mass., has been presented with a boat, which will be named the Glad Tidings. This boat will visit vessels in the harbors Sundays, to distribute papers, magazines, and religious periodicals.

—This is the age for supplying the world with the Bible. The beginning of this century it existed in but fifty languages. Now, its truths can be read in 250 dialects and languages. In the world there are more than 1,500 Bible Societies, all organized since 1804.

—The Episcopal bishop of Argyle, during a recent visit to Jerusalem, celebrated the communion at the holy sepulcher. The priests there took him to be a Roman Catholic from his dress and practices, and allowed him to say "mass" at Calvary, presenting him with the candles for that purpose.

—The fraternal delegates from the English Wesleyan Church, attending the General Conference in Philadelphia, expressed great surprise at the Parliamentary customs prevailing in that body. They noticed no hesitation in appealing from the decision of the presiding bishop. One of them remarked: "If our president should rule out the Ten Commandments, no member would think of appealing." Is this what they call the liberty of the gospel?

—At the recent anniversary of Yale Theological Seminary, the new Congregational creed was the subject of discussion by the alumni and ministers present. There were various criticisms upon the creed, but the following from Dr. Todd, upon creeds in general, will serve as a summary. He thought that if there were to be a statement of Congregationalism, it would need to be very long—extending to several hundred thousand articles; for, according to his observation, every individual Congregationalist would need an article to himself.

—The colored enthusiast in Georgia who has worked himself into the belief that he is the Messiah is a good instance of the ease with which any adventurer who thoroughly believes in himself, or has the requisite persuasive power, may gain a following. This Georgia negro is so ignorant that he is sure in the end to be exposed, but if he had only a little more intelligence he might establish a church which would soon be powerful. Mormonism was founded by men who were very ignorant and whose claims to divine guidance were as idle as those of this colored fanatic, yet it has grown more rapidly than many creeds founded on truth and virtue.—S. F. Chronicle.

—Prof. Austin Phelps has an article in a late Independent, occupying nearly a page, on the eternal torment of the wicked. There are two brief quotations in the entire article, one from Swedenborg, and one from the Bible, the latter being this: "Rocks and mountains fall on us." But then of what use would it have been to quote from the Bible, since it teaches just the opposite of the position taken by the Professor. Inasmuch as he started out to prove what he did, we like the article better because it contains no scripture. Bible texts would seem out of place.

—The Central Presbyterian notices that in the new "Teaching of the Apostles" the preference is given to "running water" for baptism, and then says, "It appears to us that an inference can be drawn here." And that lets us into the whole of the argument for sprinkling or pouring. Watch for a chance to draw an inference, even though the ground of that inference may be in an apocryphal work. In this case the inference is that few "running" streams are deep enough to allow of submersion, and, therefore, since the writer of the document "preferred" that kind of water for baptism, immersion could not have been practiced, and consequently we ought not to practice it! Great is the theology of the Pedobaptists! Ancient warriors were exercised in drawing the bow. Modern Christian warriors must be experts in drawing an inference.

—The Sunday evening services in the Reformed Church on the Heights, Brooklyn, N. Y., have been changed to a musical service. The pastor stated as his reason for so doing, that comparatively few attended the evening service, and that those who did attend did so for conscience's sake rather than from real desire. "He believed that there were many members of Christian families that were necessarily detained in the morning, and that many of the young men indulged in a Sunday morning nap; that Sunday evening they were dressed and bound to go somewhere, and he believed in making the service of the church so attractive that they would come there; that many souls had been wafted to heaven on the wings of song." It would seem that this pastor has found a different answer than the one usually given to the question, —

"Must I be carried to the skies On flowery beds of ease?"