PLAIN SPEAKING

Manawatu Standard, Volume IX, Issue 147, 27 May 1885, Page 2

PLAIN SPEAKING

Dr J. Cameron Leks, m a vigorous article m St. Gileses Parish Mai/azine on . the " lapsed masses" attributes not a little of the cause to the Church. Men will rather preach Sunday after Sunday, he says, to empty benches than adopt any new method by which it is possible they may be filled, and will then go to the Presbytery and speak pitifully of the " lapsed masses,"" meaning the people who don't come to listen to their prelections. The idea that the same Church service — the old precentor and long-winded sermons, and dreary, chilly surroundings — which suits the west of the Lewis or Skye, ought to be inflicted on every part of Scotland, is about played out also, though it has many sapient supporters still. The idea that a young man, after seven years 1 study at college and hall, is thereby fitted for his study and work, is really becoming too absurd. He knows everything but what he should know most about — that is, a knowledge of men> He is turned out of the divinity hall really to begin to learn ;his work, but when he gets into a pulpit he flounders about m pitiful helplessness. By-and-by, if he has common sense, he casts his college shell, forgets most that he learned, and takes a line for himself; if he has not common sense, he remains a stick to the end of the chapter.