VOICES from the PULPIT. SERMONS Delivered on Sunday.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 275, 20 November 1899, Page 2

VOICES from the PULPIT. SERMONS Delivered on Sunday.

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-:QUEEN-STKEET on SATURDAY

NIGHT."

At Knox Church, Parnell, on Sunday evening, the Rev. H. Kelly preached on the above subject, taking for !his text Jeremiah vii. 17, viz., "Seest thou not what they do in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusa-

lem?"

Following- the example of the old prophets, whose duty it was to move about among the people, in imagination to-night I bid you walk with me in Queen-street on Saturday night. "Know ye not what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?" for if ye know not well you ought to know. They tell us that we Christian men, and more especially Christian ministers, don't know, the world in that strange sphere known as Bohemia. They smile upon us as innocents and simpletons and say we don't know what they do in the city and in the street. Well, it may be; it may be we do take blame to ourselves if we don't know. We walk Queenstreet, therefore, and it is Saturday night, and the first thing we see in the street is the extraordinary strength of the gregarious instinct in man. Gome aside with me, step back from the corner, stand in this quieter street, and take out your watch, and count carefully the soul_s passing to and fro within five minutes, and 10, in one part of the street you count 320 souls passing along. There is a river flowing both ways in the same broad current. They are all going to Eternity. In 100 years that river you stood and watched last night, that river of human souls, will be in Eternity, and they shall 'have seen God's face. Stand aside and look and ponder. What brings them there? Is it the bright light of the shop windows? Is it the sense of comradeship? What is it? Business? pleasure? relaxation? What is it that makes these hundreds and thousands of men and women, young and old, traverse Queen - street from end to end for 'hours of a. Saturday night? It is the instinct for fellowship. God Almighty has said "it is not good for a man to be alone." Stand in Queen-street on Saturday night and you will see the ■most powerful comment on that text to be seen in the world. Men need and seek fellowship. Like seeks like. And as we walk up Queen-street another feature meets our gaze. What is it? It is surely this—the high standard of material comfort to be found in the colonies compared with some of the principal cities of the Old Country. Mr Kelly then drew a vivid picture of the squalor and poverty and destitution so marked in these cities contrasting it with our own. "There is no company under the sun wihere men and women in the mass are better fed and clothed than in this youngcolony. Surely there is room for gratitude to God. Surely our sympathies go out to cmr brethren in the Old World, our poor brothers and sisters who don't know where next morning's breakfast is to come from. Walk up Queen-street and another feature strikes us—the inconsistency of modern 'civilisation. What do you see? The shop windows glaring, flaming, brilliant. What do you see inside these shops? Numbers of young men and young women toiling on. till 10 or 11 and often nearly 12 o'clock at night. ■Well, why are fhese toiling on while thousands of workers out there are enjoying their liberty? If you walk Queen-street with your eyes and your minds open you will find that I am to blame, and all of us are to blame, who are mean enough to agitate for an eight hours' day for everybody except shopkeepers. It is.awful mean of us. .It is tremendously selfish. It is one of the abominatio_is and inconsistencies of our modern democracy. Surely all of us can do our business earlier, and.thus make our less favoured brothers' and sisters' lot easier and lighter. Then, again, there is something else strikes you as you walk up Queen-street. It is the heedlessness of vice. Here and there leaning.against verandah po^ts and lamp posts a little group of men; some, very likely all of them, are smoking, and as you pass, not listening particularly, but you canhot help hearing the offensive profanity indulged in. What is the meaning of it? If a man feels disposed to cursing and swearing let him do it inwardly, let him not pollute the atmosphere with it, let him consume his own smoke. There are little children passing by, and these things fall upon their ears. Oh, the heedlessness of vice. No man has any right to pollute the moral atmosphere any more than he has a right to pollute the physical atmosphere. A Bill recently before Parliament in the Old Country is the Shop Assistants' Seats Bill, which I think we should strive to secure for shop assistants in New Zealand, enabling them to sit at the counter when they are not engaged attending upon customers. Surely the soul of Christianity is to consider one another. But let us walk a little farther up Queen-street- and what do you find? You find the fruits of parental neglect. I am going towards the top of Queen-street about half-past ten o'clock and I meet a little boy five years old and two little girls not more than seven years of age. I question them where they have been at that- time of uight, and what they have been doing.. Is it not a shame and'a disgrace that children of such tender years and at that time of night should 'be alone? I go down the street and .what do I see? Crowds of little fellows—boys coming to a very critical stage of life—around a hotel door, or around the Opera House. , I see them after ten o'clock at night. We hear a great deal about the Curfew Act. We always hear a great deal about things before we_see them. I hope that this Act shall cease to be talked about and become a reality: "That whoever allows his or her children out in the streets after certain hOurs shall be liable to 'fine or imprisonment." I

saw young girls, little girls, unattended and unprotected iv Queen-street last night up till very late. Where in the name of God are these children's parents? What in the name of God are they think ing about? You say there is only special danger in regard to the girls. Oh but there is also special danger in regard to the boys. I see the boys in greater numbers. Let us remember that in our anxiety over the girls we don't forget the boys. Next I see the presence and power of the demon drink. Eleven o'clock strikes and I see a stream of people pouring out at the side door of an hotel, and I observe that the majority of them are young* men. I wait till about half-past eleven and I see large numbers of young men drunk. I mention the matter to Christian friends and they smile at me, and seem to treat the question in a very callous and indifferent spirit, and tell me of cases in their knowledge far worse that that. My dear friends how long is this to go on? If we say behold we know it not we lie. I see the prophecy in Queen-street of a new social order-—a man sweeping the streets at half-past 11 o'clock on Saturday night. That is to me a luminous prophecy of the new order. Surely the day is not far distant when men will be more anxious in a body to sweep away the moral dirt than they are to sweep away the physical. But I saw no body of men out to attend to the careless and seamy side of life except the little companies of brave Christian men and women who preach at the street corners. Had I strength I would preach at their sides every night with them. These are the men who after God's fashion are seeking to sweep the moral streets of our great city. Let me remind you: "When Christ came near the city He wept over it." It is when you come near the city that you feel disposed to weep over it. Ask the many good Christians what do they do?' You sit in your arm-chairs and you hear about these things from a far distance, any. you say, Oh,'it's nothing! You must go near the city if ever you are to weep over it. You will need to go nearer than your arm-chair, nearer evdn than! the omnibus takes you; even when no omnibus runs at all. Brethren, a great work remains to be done. The first thingis that you come under the banner of Christ. Come now and say to Him: I will enlist under Thy banner and fight Thy battles; put my name down. Thou didst die for me, I will live for Thee for ever and for ever, and may His grace so enable us.