SUNDAY CIRCLE.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 15892, 11 October 1913, Page 7

SUNDAY CIRCLE.

DEVOTIONAL. " Love as Brethren." " And Joseph said unto (them, See that ye fall not out by the way."—Gen. xlv, 24. Fall not out upon the way; Short it is, and soon will end; Hotter far to fly the fray Than to lose the friend. If thy brother seemeth slow, Jeer not, but thy quickness slack; Rather than divided go, Keep the wearier track. Teach each other as ye walk, How to sing the angels' song; Fill the time with homeward talk, Then 'twill not bo long. Gently deal with those who roam, Silent as to wanderings past; So, together at your home, All arrive at last. —Lord Kinloch. Supplication. Eternal God, before whom our age is as nothing, and a thousand years are but as yesterday when it in past, enable us to trust Thee through all the changing scenes of life. Bless our aged ones, whom Thou art bringing near to the closo of life's day and conflict. Grant them light and lovo at eventide. As they look back on the years that are gone, may they be able to confess that goodness and mercy have followed them every step of the way. As they look forward to the future, do. Thou fill them with tho great assuTaneo that nothing in life or death can separate them from Thy love in Christ Jesus our Lord. Help them to interpret somewhat of their experience to those wno are younger, to declare Thy strength unto the next generation. Thy might to every one that is to come. "Vlay they hopo continually and praise Thee yet more, because their eyes have seen Thy salvation.—Amen.

Reading: Isaiah xlvi. Grow old along with me! Tiio best is yet to be, The last of life, for which the first was made: Our times are in His hand Who saith, "A wholo I planned. Youth shows but half; trust God; see all nor be afraid." Robert Browning. Theso eighty-six yeire I have servo Him; and He ha 6 never dono me wrong. He is my King and my Saviour, how couid I blaspheme Him?— St. Polycarp of Smyrna -' A littlo after he strove to 6peak, but could not. Finding thjy could not understand- him, lie paused a little, and than, with all the remaining strength he had cried out, " Tho be6t of all is, God is with us." And soon after, lifting up his dying arm in token of victory, and raising his feeblo voice with a holy triumph not to bo expressed, ho again repeated -the heartreviving words, "The best of all is, God is with us."—Appendix to John Wesley's Journal. You may sit quietly on the shore—perhaps for years —lookint; across to the land on the other side shining in (lie Eternal Light; and you will tr':l us vrhat you see.— 1 Dr Dale Verse for Meditation (41. And even to your old age, I am He,, and even to hoar ha ire will I carry you. I have made, and 1 will hear; even I will carry and will deliver you. Meditation. CONSCIENCE AND EVOLUTION. . And then we ask: What is conscience! And in answer to this - question you will find learned men giving various and profound replies. Ono will toll us that it is the result of evolution. But, after all, what is evolution? Evolution is only a longer namo which describes the ordered growth of organism. It is the faded recollection, says another, of our forefathers of the savage condition of their early life; it is the survival of a continual tear in which our remote tribal ancestors lived. And yet we know that physical feur is an entirely different type of thing from this perception of right and wrong which we call conscience. Do we, in our. heart of hearts, believe that it makes the least dinerencc by what process this supreme faculty of our nature acquired its position and its potency within us? There may well, indeed, have been evolution in tho development of our moral faculties, as well a$ m our physical structure. But after all our knowledge of the earlier stages in the development of the eye does not much affect what we consider about the power and use of vision. The point which it is for you and mo to recognise, and to reflect upon is this: that conscience is there, present in man, active and imperious, and it has been present in man trom tho very beginnings of man's' history. We have no reason to suppose, or to assume, that its origin is fortuitous. There is nothing accidental in Nature, whether Nature bo physical, moral, or spiritual. From the first days of man's appearancc in tho world there seems to have been with him, alive and -working, this " conscience "—this knowledgo that there is a moral lajv, and that he ought to obey it— consciousness of a-n element oi freedom, by which he is able to obey or disobey it—this knowledge of the possession of a power to discern between what is and what ought to be, and of the claim of what you and I call "duty " upon his better nature. —Herbert EuwarU Ryle, D.D , Dcau of Westminster.

Exiiohtatiox. THE CEIIIKT A .si) I'IiILANTUROPT.

This lite is picparatory; a heavenly existence uwait6 all tne weary and heavy-laden. And 'between tuat wond and this there must be some similarity. Tlie contrast between tho earthy and tne heavenly lot must not be too paiulul. Aiid where it i 3 too pamful all L'nr,etians will try to change it. They cannot eudui'o to think that liod si cinluren should starve and Ireezu. They are of mdro value to Hun than aught eise the world contains, and we must not .permit them to die in rotten tenements or drudge and sicken amid conditions which starve the mind and turn the heart to stone. And so, when women and children are overworked, when men's wages are bo small that they cannot live in decency, when they work or livo whore pestilence walketh iu darkness and destruction cometh at noonday," the Christian man bares his arm to strike m their behalf. The right of the capitalist to mako money on his investments must not, and shall not, override tho greater rights of the* 60ul. Tho laws of property must not, .and shall not, come before that other greater law which gives every man a right to life, liberty, and happiness for himself and his family. And I desire to say as emphatically as I can that the church people whom 1 know are not one whit behind/the non-church people in their interest in men and their zeal to benefit them. Indeed,, my experience justifies me in claiming that their interest is deeper, their zeal more sustained, as their motive is stronger. —F. A. Gilmore (U.S.A.).

ABOUT PEOPLE. Many readers will learn with regret that Mr Herbert Booth, in tho midst of his ovnngclistic toUr in South Africa, has experienced a severe breakdown. For some timo he lay in Kimberley Hospital suffering from rheumatic fever, following an attack of influenza. All engagements, including those at Johannesburg and Pretoria, were of necessity cancelled—bcinpj the first mission engagements he had missed for 12 years. Mr Booth writes, under dato August 4: "My limbs are stili full of pain, but [ can move a little."

' Mr Harold Begbio has undertaken the official life of tho late General Booth, and the work is expected to appear, in two volumes about a year hence. Mr Begbio and the General struck up a friendship on a motor tour, and tho journalist had many opportunities of studying the personality of tno revivalist. The War Cry, in announcing that Mr Bcgbie lias undertaken to bo the biographer of tho founder of the Salvation Army, states that Mr Begbio " has been in trade, been .1 farmer, and a journalist before lie became an author. Ono writer has described him as giving the impression of the young healthy-blooded country squire, with a gieat love of fun. But ho is a serious man as well. On the wall in Mr Begbie's study is a Latin motto which he has taken for his own. It runs: 'Vita sine littcris uomiius, Sino Ohristo mors est,' which means, ' tiife without books is sleep, without Christ it is death.' The morning hours are always spent at his desk, but the couple of hours after tea is what ho calls his 'great time,' when the pen runs smoothly."

EELLQIOD3 READING MR THE HOMB

' I suppose there nro oven ministers here in whcso churches there may be elders and members of the boards of trustees to whom they have never spoken a pereonal word for Christ.' That afternoon, on the train, a young minister said: 'When you threw out your hand to-day, you ohanced to point at me; but your words were not chance words. They reached my heart. In my church there aro five trustees to whom I have never spoken about Christ; and I am going back home resolved never to mount the pulpit steps again un s, 0 spoken a pereonal word to them.' "

That there should be at the present time baout 128 ruined churches in the county of Norfolk alone is (remarks tho Gu&ku<wi) 11 somewhat melancholy reflection. Tha'. at any rate, is tho number us calculated by. Dr J. Charles Cox—no mean authority onjinattere ecckeio'.ogical. The attention of tho public has been called once again to the matter, this time by Dr Lyttehxxn, who, preaching recently on behalf of the restotion of Overstrand Church, made a reference to the large number of ruined churches in the county. Kelly's Directory once reckoned them at about 70, but Dr Cox has given tho nigher figure quoted above. From the artistio point of view ecclesiastical ruins may ae picturesque'enough, but they tell a eorry I alo of neglect which shouid furnish an ob-ject-lceson to all those upon whom falls the stewardship of our ancient places of worship. 'It wa6 in this connection that the Head Master of Eton sought to impress upon church people generally their responsibility in the matter.

The decision of tho Methodists of Vancouver to have a missionary moving picture theatre of their own, controlled by -a'.company with a capital of 100 f ooodol, and'with a registered office at Toronto, is.(says' the Methodist Times) exciting interesting comment and soma prophetic outbursts from the Canadian press. The next development, it is predicted, is that individual churches all over the clominion will secure moving picture raaohines of their own, The chief difficulty hitherto has been that of procuring suitable films. A Methodist olhoial is, says tho livening Standard, to come to England iorthwith to negotiate with film manulaeturers and missionary societies sd' as to obtain a continuous bci'vico of fiims for the . ancouver and other theatres and churchcs. .t'Jien Methodism has thus establisned its jnain of theatres, it will require a lorce oi machinemen in heathen lauds taking exclusive pictures, anil so, as ti'.e journal in question says, "Soon 'li'om Ureeniaiiubicy mountains and India's ooral strand' will bo heard tho whirr of the ' movie' machine.''

Tho Orange Street Congregational Churoli, Leicester square, London—originally Leicester Jj'ielas Onapei—wnicu ,naa Gtood ior W yeans, is now about to close its doors. The church was built by tne iriugucnots seeking re-iuge from l'rauce at too tipie of the revocation of the LUict of Nant«s. It lias been euccessiveiy in tho hands of tne Huguenots and jipiecopalians, ynd now of tho Uongregationansts. iviaiiy notable preachere have occupied its puipit, amongst others, Toplady, who wroio "itook oi Ages" dilnng ids uiini6try. and who died a, few days after preaching his fareweli eoi nion. The last services were held on tho last Sunday in August, when Kcv. Isaac Hart-ill .preached. Jb'roni that date the services are to be held in Newton House (formerly Sir leaac Newton's house), whilo the old buildings are being pulled down to make way for u. new church. An appeal is to bo mado for funds to assist in the rebuilding.

' The prospects of evangelism are indeed bright (comments tho Life of Faith), when we consider the earnest way in which Scotland is preparing for the Chapman-Alex-ander mi6sion. Since the time of Moody no preparations have been more careful, more united, or more expectant. All the churches are eager for a revival, und nil the ministers are keen ,to co-operate with Dr Chapman, who is a trusted and honoured minifiter of the Presbyterian Church in America. But we wish the Episcopal Church could have taken a more prominent part in the arrangements. In Edinburgh, whale giving tlie mission an unofficial kind of blessing, tho Episcopal Clnitch is standing aloof from definite participation. Surely in a great campaign for souls we can afford to set aside our particular ecclesiastical' preferences; and surely we do not imagine that souls can : only enter the kingdom through the gateway of. a particular church. We hope that even yet I)r Walpole will see his way clear ,to join officially with the leaders of the othei 1 churches, and take a definite part in the Such action would serve as a powerful stimulus to the clergy of his diocese, and would round off the preparations in a most satisfactory maimer.

INCONSISTENT CHRISTIANS. CANON NEWBOLT AND THE MODERN SALOME. Preaching at St. Paul's Cathedral on a recent Sunday afternoon, Canon New bolt uttered a strong indictment of the inconsistency of many protecting Christians. It was hard, he said, in the faco of the opposition and criticism of tho present day to have to apologise for the hall-hearted, insincere Christian. Seldom, if ever, had wo needed consistent Christians as we did now, " From time to time," continued the Canon, " there creep into tho newspapers complaints as to certain evils which flourish unrebuked on tho apathy and oowardico of those who might perfectly weir repress them if they wero consistent Christians. Would such a thing as tho indecent danco disgrace our civilisation for a moment if only some of those who profess to bo Christians were to say, 'I will not allow my daughter to bo turned into a Salome, even though Herod give me half the kingdom and admit mo to a much coveted society which persuades itself that iirnnsdesty is artistic, and that anything is permissible, in society which relieves the intolerable monotony of its pleaeureo.' So with booli6. We all know the bitter cry that goes forth'regarding tho character of tho books that find their way to the drawing-room tables. Ail age whioh is tired of our marriage service, and which is always calling upon us to cut up our Prayer-book, welcomes at the tamo time the sex problem dressed up in all the ,nau6eou6 unreserve of the society novel! Does anyono pretend it would be possible if Christians were consistent 1 These books are published because people read them, and people read thorn' because they like to read them, and they like to rend them because their religion is a poor and maimed thing." A few more consistent, God-fearing lives, the Canon warmly declared, would save England from the deadly peril of a Godless materialism. .... .

LOVE AND IMMORTALITY.

REV. E. W. LEWIS ON THE BRONTE LETTERS. The ,Rev. E. W. Lewis, preaching at King's Weigh House, London, on the subject of love and immortality,, based an interesting sermon on tho recently published letters of Charlotte Bronte. 'Tho tender love-passion which thoso letters revealed; he said, conveycd a hint—no more than a hint, and t'liat only for vthoso who were ready to take it—of the truth that it was love alone which conferred immortality. Their recipient probably thought that if his name lived in the future it would be on account of his intellectual attainments and the distinction with which he had invested his professorship, It would have been a revelation to him to learn that his name would be dragged out of obscurity by the unrequited and unvalued affection of his girlish pupil.

It, was tho existence of love, Mr Lewis went 011, which made pereonal immortality appear credible. Thought might be immortal, but it was not necessarily personal. One could con,ceive of one's thoughts germinating and blossoming in other minds after oneself had ceased to be. But ono could not eo conceive of love. Love ivas always personal, and nothing else. It wns tho " I Am" of God. And, outspanning our mortal lives as it did, it involved immortality for itself and for us. The one who truly knew the rapture and radiance of that which was at tho most intimate focus of human comradeship; and the lover of humanity, self-forgetful and abandoned; and tho saint, paesing into the joy of his Lord; and the youth, with upturned face and eager eyes, heedless of every allurement, as he reached forth to'hia ideal; and the lover of Nature feelinsr himself possessed of. the very life that rolled through all things—these all stood on tho threshold of that City which had many gato6. Position and reputation, porsonal pain and achievement, added Mr Lewis, did not gunfuntcc continuance of life. It was only love which made it plain that lifo had no end, for itself was tho end,