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The American Sentinel, Vol. 5, No. 39

WE have often said that the great underlying motive of the Sunday-law agitators
Earlier text: Religious Liberty and Polygamy.

THE SENTINEL LIBRARY

A Semi-monthly Publication
Devoted to the defense of

AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS

And the Preservation of the

UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION AS IT IS.

TERMS, 75 CENTS PER YEAR.
The following numbers are now ready, and will be sent to any address post-paid on receipt of price:—
No. 1 The National Reformed Constitution. Price, 3 cents.
No. 2 Religious Liberty. Price, 1 cent.
No. 3 Evils of Religious Legislation. Price, 1 cent.
No. 4 The Blair Sunday Rest Bill. Price, 7 cents.
No. 5 The Blair Educational Amendment. Price, 3 cents.
No. 6 Purity of National Religion. Price, 1 cent.
No. 7 National Reform and Rights of Conscience. Price, 2 cents.
No. 8 The American Papacy. Price, 2 cents.
No. 9 The Salem Witchcraft. Price, 1 cent.
No. 10 National Reform is Church and State. Price, 2 cents.
No. 11 What Think Ye of Christ? Price, 1 cent.
No. 12 Bold and Base Avowal. Price, 2 cents.
No. 13 The National Reform Movement an Absurdity. Price, 2 cents.
No. 14 The Republic of Israel. Price, 1 cent.
No. 15 National Reformed Presbyterianism. Price, 4 cents.
No. 16 A Lutheran View of the National Reform Movement. Price, 3 cents.
No. 17 Religion and the Public Schools. Price, 4 cents.
No. 18 The National Sunday Law. Price, 25 cents.
No. 19 Rev. W. F. Crafts Against the Editors of The American Sentinel. Price, 10 cents.
No. 20 Romanism and Civil Liberty. Price, 4 cents.
No. 21 Why We Oppose Religious Legislation. Price, 3 cents.
No. 22 The American Sabbath Union and Human Rights. Price, 1 cent.
No. 23 A Civil Sunday Holiday. Price, 1 cent.
No. 24 Blair's Sunday Rest Bill and Joint Resolution, introduced December 9, 1889. (Exact copies, with notes). Price, 1 cent.
No. 25 Civil Government and the Decalogue. Price, 1 cent.
No. 26 National Reform Success Means Religious Persecution. Price, 1 cent.
No. 28 A Religious Political Movement. Price, 1 cent.
No. 29 Arguments on the Breckinridge Sunday Bill. The Object and Price of Exemption Clauses. Price, 10 cents.
No. 30 A Civil Sabbath. What It Amounts to. Price, 1 cent.
No. 31 Union of Church and State. What Constitutes Such a Union? Price, 1c.
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REV. JAMES MCCOSH, D. D., LL. D., ex-President of Princeton College, in discussing the question of the revision of the “Confession of Faith,” says:—
There are some ministers and elders who have been speaking very unadvisedly as to revision, and leaving the impression that they are ready to abandon some of the essential truths of religion on which the hopes of Christians depend. They are persons who have not been trained in the severer truths of the Word (we are to “behold both the goodness and severity of God”). A few of them have come from other denominations, where they were not taught the sovereignty of God. The greater number have received their higher training in Germany under professors elected, not by the Church but by the State; in other words, by politicians, and have no fixed faith in the inspiration of Scripture.
This is not a very good testimonial to the benefits of State religion, nor to State teaching of religion; but it is fully justified by the facts. Germany has long been noted for its infidelity; and, as Dr. McCosh intimates, it is unquestionably due to the fact that its ministers of religion are for the most part trained in colleges supported by the State, and presided over by men selected, not because of their piety, but through political favoritism. A similar state of affairs would produce like results in this country.
THE Christian Statesman has an editorial note, which says:—
We have never seen the Hebrew theocracy fully and correctly discussed. Foolish and incorrect ideas on the subject pervade our literature, and are heard continually on the platform, and even in the pulpit.
This is quite an acknowledgment. We have long known that National Reform literature was pervaded by foolish and incorrect ideas of a theocracy, but we had scarcely looked for such a frank acknowledgment of this fact from the Christian Statesman. What is said of the platform and pulpit is no doubt equally true; we are well aware that National Reform speakers are very prone to “foolish and incorrect ideas,” and not only so, but they have a fondness for parading them before the public.
NOTE.—Any one receiving the AMERICAN SENTINEL without having ordered it may know that it is sent to him by some friend, unless plainly marked "Sample copy." It is our invariable rule to send out no papers without pay in advance, except by special arrangement, therefore, those who have not ordered the SENTINEL need have no fears that they will be asked to pay for it simply because they take it from the post-office.
THE Mayor of Altoona, Pennsylvania, has caused the cigar stores and ice-cream saloons in that city to be closed on Sunday, and expects to keep them closed. Persons who wish ice cream for Sunday, will have to eat it the day before.
On the 23d ult., the World's Fair Commission referred to a committee, a resolution offered by Commissioner Rush Strong, of Tennessee, declaring that, “as a Sabbath-keeping nation, and being desirous of following in the channel of all great American Expositions, the Commission is opposed to opening, or keeping open, the Exposition on Sunday.”
This is supposed to mean that definite action on the question will not be taken for two years, or just before the opening of the Fair.
THE Truth Seeker thinks that clergymen should not be disfranchised as they are under the new regime in Brazil. It says:—
It is not right, though it may be expedient considering the character of the clergy and their proneness to maneuver for the aggrandizement of the Church. Ministers should be treated the same as other men. . . . Give them freedom and suffrage, treat them as though they were not dependents, and they will come out all right in time.
Government should be purely secular, and should give itself not the least concern about the religion or religious calling of its subjects.
FELIX R. BRUNOT, President of the National Reform Association, has issued a call for a conference on “the Christian principles of civil government,” “to be held in Nashville, Tennessee, on, or about, the 15th of February next.” The conference should also consider the Christian principles of the Golden Rule. A conscientious study of that matchless Rule, in Nashville, might lead to a repeal of the wicked and oppressive Sunday law which now disgraces the State of Tennessee.
SOME time ago the whole plea for the closing of the proposed World's Fair was made on the ground of morals; now the spectacle is presented of ministers and churches uniting as one man to secure Sunday closing in order that the employes may rest! It seems just a little strange, however, that the religious element of this country is never concerned about the welfare of the workingman except in the matter of Sunday observance. Can it be that Sunday rest is the only thing to be desired by the toiling masses
At a meeting of the Executive Committee of the National Reform Association, held in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, September 5, this, among other recommendations, was adopted:—
That we resume the circulation of petitions to Congress for the Christian amendment to the Constitution of the United States, and that a hearing be secured, if possible, on this subject before the Judiciary Committees of the Senate and House.
The Secretary was also instructed to prepare, and forward to both houses of Congress, a memorial praying for a constitutional amendment forbidding sectarian instruction in the public schools, but providing that it shall not be so construed as to exclude the use of the Bible in such schools.
THAT the present demand for Sunday laws is largely to supply a lack on the part of those who profess to revere that day, is shown by the following editorial note in the New York Observer:—
For all this breaking down of Sabbath sentiment the religious people of this country are to blame. It is not the reaction from Puritanism. It is the self-indulgence of nominal Christians that makes them powerless to support by their words and actions the national Sunday.
Just so; “nominal Christians” are so given to self-indulgence that they set a bad example; therefore an appeal is made to civil law to bolster up a tottering morality which, at best, is only skin deep.
Dr. JOHN HALL, writing from England, to the New York Mail and Express, devotes considerable space in his letter to the consideration of the agitation of the question of the relations of Church and State, now going on in the Old World. Dr. Hall says:—
To an extraordinary degree the questions of the relations of the Church and State are now occupying the European mind. Not in Great Britain only, but in Germany and other sections in which intellectual activity is found, there is, on many grounds, deep dissent from the view of Milton that the Church of Christ is not strong enough to stand unless buttressed by temporal power and civil resources. In some cases the stir is on the ground of taxation without benefit; in some it is on the ground of taxation without representation; in some it is based on direct dislike to the cause of religion, and in some it is unhappily the outcome of religious discussion. “The Welsh Nonconformist ministers are becoming political preachers,” say the clergy who are for establishment. “Well” they reply, “the bishops and rectors have always been political nominees; they have no right to criticise us.”
Dr. Hall continues for a third of a column to describe the agitation and recrimination upon Church and State questions now going on in England. At the present rate of increase in the general attention paid to this subject, how long will it be before the relations of religion and government will be the all-absorbing political issue of the world?

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The American Sentinel · October 2, 1890