The Prophet’s Warning to Watchmen
By Editor
Says the prophet Isaiah [chap. lvi, 10], "His watchman are blind: they are all ignorant, they are all dumb dogs, they cannot bark ; sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber. Yea, they are greedy dogs which can never have enough, and they are shepherds that cannot understand: they all look to their own way, every one for his gain from his quarter." We might apply this language to a class of Jews living in the days of the prophet, and nobody would be disturbed. But when we apply it at a later time and nearer home, we are accused of being uncharitable and severe. The prophet has, nevertheless, used that language in describing a class of professed watchmen; and it is evidently a description of a class which is to be especially manifested about the time when the call is made to the supper of the great God, in the beginning of the day of the Lord. Compare verse 9, with Rev. xix, 17-21. We would be as loth as any one to apply this description where it is not merited; and we have only to say, Let those who would avoid an application of it to themselves, so live that it will not fit them. We were reminded of the above words of the prophet, especially that portion which we have italicised, by the following language of J. W. Hunnicutt, a preacher of the gospel, which we clip from an exchange: "We venture the assertion that there is as much ambition among the clergy of this generation, and of this country, to aspire to high offices, and posts of honor and distinction, in their respective churches, as there is among politicians; and that there is as much secret plotting, wire-working, and clerical log-rolling, to work one party out, or keep it down, and to exalt another party to power, as there is among politicians, is a fact which we presume no man of general intelligence will call in question." Says the Methodist, when speaking of the ball given in New York to the Prince of Wales:— "Ministers of the gospel of several different denominations, men who ought to be the nearest representatives of the Saviour of sinners, were there, as if to give the sanction of Christ's authority to the most monstrous earthly vanity. What now becomes of wholesome Christian discipline? What becomes of the line so clearly drawn by Christ between the church and the world? What of his command to deny ourselves of all ungodliness and worldly lust, and live soberly, righteously and godly in this evil world? May the Holy Spirit himself intervene to restore the broken bulwarks of sacred discipline, and to trace again the fading line between the aggressive world and the invaded church." Abundance of such facts may even now be gathered; and they are becoming more and more numerous, as every observer of the signs of the times can readily testify.