The Star. MONDAY, JULY 23, 1883.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4751, 23 July 1883, Page 2

The Star. MONDAY, JULY 23, 1883.

Thbbb are, it appears, some few people, of highly refined taßtee, and endowed with extremely susceptible ncrvouo systems, who ohjecfc to the Salvation Array Binging in the streets. For our own part, wo infinitely prefer it to hearing semi»drunken men howling out Bacchanalian songs. There can be no doubt that the Salvationists— and the Blue Bibbon Army— are doing an immense amount of good. Of course tbero arc cumbers of people who objeot that this will not be permanent, and declare that when the first excitement is over the "reformed" will fall back into their old habits. History, however, will not support this view of great religious

movements. To go baofc no farther than the middle ef the ?a?t oantury, thore never wai • period in the history of England when reli« gion and morality were at a lower ebb. The aristocracy wero vioious and self-indulgent to an extent whioh would not be tolerated at the present day; they thought of nothing but plundering tbe people and amuaing tbemselTes ; they caved nothing for those whom they regarded as their inferiors in rant; whilst the middle and lower clasiea were ignorant and brutalieed to an inorcdible extent. Kren the national spirit had do deteriorated that patriotism had beoomo a word to sneer at, and philanthropy wub unknown. The Church of England had become a hire of drones, and the diGrenticg bodies had neither spirit nor energy left. It was just at this epoob, when the moral atmosphere was ■o dark and drear, that John Wesley's mission began. A clergy man of the Church of England, a graduato of Oxford, a Fellow of Balliol, he did not attempt to preach to fashionable congregations, bat went out into the highways and the streets of the citier, proclaiming his message of purity and peace to the poorest, the most ignorant, the most degraded of his fellow- countryman. He met with much persecution, he bad to bear much obloquy, but the moremoiit pro* grcßsed ; and cf its cucoecs there ca» be no doubt— it is a matttr :>f hi«« tory. Of the vaot reformation effected by Methodism in the felings and habits of tbe people there can be no question ; nor has the permanence of its effeots on tho lives of the majority of those who wore influenced by it ever been doubted. Some, duo only a minority, relapued into their old ways. So, no doubt, it will be with the Ealvaticr.iets of the present day. They appeal to muoh the same class, and to exaotly the same feelings of human nature. They supply a want whioh our highly T.Bpectable churches, with their sometimes county attendance of decorous worshippers, do not attempt to supply. And until they become ac tnme and as respeotable as the recognised religious bodies, we have bo, doubt their work will progress. 'Arry may sneer, and publicans may rage, and educated people may be horror* struok at the murderous usage of tbo Q.ueen'a English, but in spite of all theso obstacles the movement will go en and increase, as htrgosit continues to supply such a glaring defect in the operations of the established roligious bodies. One thing, however, we must protest egainst, and that is — bresß bands, on a Sunday morning parading the streets. This is such an outrage on all our notions of an English Sunday morning, that we think the municipal authorities ought to interfere and prevent it. The spirit that, pervades George Herbert's poem ought to be preserved to us.