APPEAL TO THE YOUNG MEMBERS OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH.
"I have written unto you, young men, because ye are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one." I John ii, 14.
Before we part, will our young Christian reader "suffer the word of exhortation?" I am not unmindful of the situation in which you are placed. You have associates, intelligent, agreeable in manners, and not immoral, who argue stoutly in defense of their thoughtless pleasures. Your conscience resists, and yet you feel the effect of their solicitations. You are sometimes almost ready to wish that your parents, your pastor, your class-leader, and your own conscience would consent to your yielding, that you might escape the pressure and feel no conflict between duty and the wishes of your gay companions. Let me call your attention to certain considerations, which I trust will have the effect to strengthen you for the right.
1. Frivolous and doubtful amusements have always been condemned by the Discipline of our Church.
Our General Rules do not indeed name dancing, the theater, and the rest. Had they done this, it might have been argued that the Discipline allows every folly not specified in the list. Our fathers in the Church were too wise thus to attempt to war against an evil which assumes a thousand Protean forms. They announce a broad principle, which condemns all "such diversions as can not be used in the name of the Lord Jesus." Do you profess to be in doubt as to the true intent and meaning of the Rule? If you do, look at the past history of the Church. Which of the founders of Methodism favored dancing? Did John Wesley? Did Fletcher or Clarke? Which of them favored the theater or the horse-race? Did Hedding, or Fisk, or Olin? I challenge the apologists for dancing, theaters, and races to show that a single one of the multitude of holy men and women who have a name in our annals ever practiced or approved such diversions. On the contrary, there arise from their honored graves a great cloud of witnesses against them. The devoted servants of God, who shine as stars in our firmament, and whose names are "as ointment poured forth," condemned, feared, abhorred them as utterly at war with the life which they were living and the work which they were doing. Nor were these the views of ignorant, morose, narrow-minded people, soured by disappointment, or disabled by age or disease, but of intelligent, happy men and women, who served the Lord with glad hearts and went about with smiling faces.
Our Church traditions are unanimous in regard to these things. The testimony which they bear is uniform and strong. Our Bishops and pastors are now unanimous in their judgment. Within the past year, Conference after Conference has spoken in resolutions and pastoral addresses, warning our young people on this subject. If, therefore, a young man here and there among us finds that the practices into which he has fallen are at variance with the deliberate judgment of the Wesleys, the Clarkes, the Asburys, and the Heddings of the past, and all the Bishops and pastors of the present day, I respectfully suggest that he will not be liable to be convicted of excessive modesty if he should begin to suspect that his ideas on the subject are wrong, nor of excessive caution if he should conclude to refrain from indulgence till he is better assured that it is right and safe. Surely no one will count it a light thing to disregard the teachings of a century of spiritual power and progress, nor to turn a careless ear to the kind and faithful counsels of those who now watch for souls.
2. Every member of the Methodist Episcopal Church is bound by a solemn pledge to abstain from all questionable diversions, such as those already named.
In the form given in the Ritual for the reception of persons into the Church after probation, the fourth question is in the following words:
"Will you be cheerfully governed by the Rules of the Methodist Episcopal Church, hold sacred the ordinances of God, and endeavor, as much as in you lies, to promote the welfare of your brethren and the advancement of the Redeemer's kingdom?"
To this question, so full of meaning, each candidate for reception must answer, before God and his Church, "I will." (Discipline, page 156.)
Every member of the Church, therefore, solemnly promises before God and the people of God to be cheerfully governed by the Rules of the Church. One of these Rules calls upon you to avoid "such diversions as can not be used in the name of the Lord Jesus." That Rule has always been understood to condemn balls and dancing, theaters, attendance at horse-races, and the whole list of corrupting amusements. The logical chain, then, is complete. Every member of the Church is bound, in the most solemn manner, by his or her own pledge, fully and publicly given, to abstain from balls, dancing, theater-going, and the rest.
Can you, for one moment, harbor the thought of repudiating so solemn an obligation? The Psalmist inquires, "Lord, who shall abide in thy tabernacle? Who shall dwell in thy holy hill?" And he thus answers his own question: "He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not." God honors those who are faithful to their word. He delights in the man who keeps his promise, even when it is against his own temporal interests to abide by it. If God counts it a dishonorable and wrong thing for a man to repudiate a pledge given to his fellow-man, what will he think of those who repudiate a solemn public pledge made to him? If God honors the integrity of the man who keeps his word when his interests seem to call upon him to violate it, what will he say of those who violate their word when all their interests, both temporal and eternal, call upon them to keep it?
3. When the young people connected with the Church are drawn into frivolous diversions, it is a sorrow of heart to the pastor and to all devoted Christians.
Will it be replied that these faithful friends of years are so narrow and antiquated in their notions, that no one need care what they think or how they feel? The matter can not be disposed of thus lightly. It is not a small thing for a few young men and women, before whom real life lies yet untried, to set up their opinions, and blindly adhere to them, in opposition to the solemn judgment of the whole body of the ministry. It is not a small thing to wound, deeply and wantonly, those whose acknowledged consistency and holy lives are the joy and crown of the Church, and one of the main elements of its strength in the community. It is by these, and such as they, and God working through them, that we have Bibles and Sabbaths, and law and order, and civilization itself—all that exalts a Christian country above a heathen land. These devoted followers of Christ love his Church and his people. Some of them have been long in the way. They feel that they are approaching the gates of the city which hath foundations, and they are expecting daily the shadowy messenger that shall bid them enter. Looking to the younger members of the Church to supply the places which they will soon leave vacant, they may well be troubled, and shed their tears over the gloomy future, when they see youthful professors of religion given to vain and trifling pleasures and frivolous pursuits, trying to break down the discipline of the Church, and strip Methodism of its beauty and its power, and wrest from its hands the spiritual weapons with which a thousand victories have been won.
4. When young Church members become giddy and fond of worldly pleasure, the unconverted are encouraged to go on in their sins.
They who are yet unsaved hear the ways of wisdom described as ways of pleasantness and peace, but they know not how to understand the declaration. They confess that it is good to have a hope of eternal life, just as it is good to have a life-preserver about you when you are going to make a sea-voyage. Still, to them piety is a mystery. The deep joy of devotion, the glow and the rapture of praise, the blessedness of communion with God they can not comprehend. They listen, and wonder, and sometimes doubt and do not know what to think. But when they find that young members of the Church are just as eager as themselves after questionable pleasures, they conclude that these roseate pictures of the happiness of the Christian are, to say the least, overdone. When they see the flock trying the fence on all sides of the fold, and stretching their heads through every opening, to nibble at the weeds outside, they begin to suspect that the pasture within is not as rich as it is represented. Thus the inconsistent conduct of professed Christians who plunge into worldly amusements harms souls and injures a holy cause.
And sinners, too, are inconsistent with themselves. Now they argue that religion is all delusion, because, as they say, its professors are no better than other people; now they insist that their soulless pursuits must be right, because even members of the Church indulge in them. Thus they seek to justify their follies and their sins by the example of worldly Church members. Moreover, they will endeavor to make a little in you justify a great deal in them. Tell a sinner that he is not wise in attending balls, and he will twit you with the parlor dancing at some well-known professor's house. Warn him against the theater, and he will ask you to point out the moral difference between that and the play at the museum. Tell him that the gambling den is a dangerous place for young men, and he will remark, with a significant look, that living away from home he can not play cards in his father's house, as some do. And what professors of religion do occasionally, the unconverted, on the strength of their example, will claim the right to do constantly and habitually. Thus the thoughtless conduct of Church members is made to increase the perils which environ the unsaved, and to hedge up the only way of life. To incur, or even risk, consequences like these for the sake of a momentary excitement, is certainly to do the devil's work for low wages.
5. If you indulge in diversions which are thus under condemnation, it can not fail to lessen your religious enjoyment and mar your usefulness.
You may seem to yourself to be confident that your course is right, but the consciousness that others, whose judgment you must respect, believe it to be wrong, brings a cloud over you. The fact that you are doing what they condemn will haunt you in church, at the prayer-meeting, and every-where. The fact that you do this, not under any plea of necessity, but for mere pastime and momentary pleasure, will not mend matters. However kind and considerate the older members of the Church may be in their allusions to your course, you feel that you have not their confidence fully. This will trouble you, perhaps irritate you. You fancy that you are looked upon coldly. You detect little instances of neglect. You imagine that certain expressions in sermons of your pastor or the prayers of your brethren were meant for you. Things get worse the longer you brood over them. You are tempted first to stay away from the sacrament, and then to neglect the other means of grace. Some well-meaning but clumsy brother pounces upon you at a most untimely moment, administers a scathing rebuke, and goes on his way happy, blessing the Lord that there is one Christian left who has the courage to do his duty. Now you are really angry. You are ready to imagine that all the rest of the Church would talk the same way if they should speak their minds. Thus, little by little, you veer from your Christian course, the mists gather around you, the stars disappear, you fall into adverse currents, and, it may be, finally strike upon the rocks, and make shipwreck of faith and a good conscience.
Will you say that the evils depicted flow not from your conduct, but from the censoriousness of the Church? If all were silent, the result would not be materially different. The Methodist Episcopal Church is immovable in her position in regard to these things. If you violate her Discipline, you can not shut out the thought that you are an unfaithful, disloyal member of her communion. This alone will suffice to bring a chill and a blight upon you. The world, too, see that you are not in accord with your brethren—not at home in the place which you occupy—and this encourages them to ply their arts to lead you still further. If you resist, they remind you of your own past conduct, and inquire, perhaps with a sneer, whence comes this sudden tenderness of conscience. If others rebuke them, they refer to you, with another sneer, as their exemplars. Surely, the poor pleasure which springs from questionable diversions is bought at too high a price when it costs us our consistency, the warm fellowship of Christian people, peace of conscience, and the power to do good.
6. In morals compromises are not only treason to truth and righteousness, but compromised positions are of all the hardest to defend in argument and maintain in practice.
You have acquaintances, intelligent and agreeable, but gay and inconsiderate, who are unwearied in their efforts to draw you into their circle. Their importunities are urgent, and it taxes all your powers of resistance to withstand them. You grow weary of the conflict between duty and inclination, and wish for rest. The thought occurs to you that if you go a little way with your tempters they will be satisfied, and no great harm will be done.
You reason amiss. To compromise with wrong is never the end of conflict. You must conquer a peace. If you do not mean to make a complete surrender to the world, the flesh, and the devil, there must be a point where the line is drawn, and the stand taken. Where will you place the line? Will you try to draw it half way between right and wrong? If you do you will abandon a strong position for a weak one. If you yield in regard to dancing in private parties, you will be invited, in due time, to attend a ball. If you go to see some "moral drama" performed at the museum, you will be urged to attend the theater. And the assault made on your halfway position will be just as strong, the conflict just as painful, and to refuse just as hard as you now find it. The place of undoubted right is at once the safest to occupy and the easiest to maintain, and it is bad generalship to try to intrench at any other point. And to parley with the enemy is the next thing to a surrender.
Fight it out, then, on this line. Life is brief, and close beyond it lie heaven and hell. If you take one single step in the direction of danger and ruin in search of fleeting pleasures, will you think, ten thousand ages hence, that in this you were wise? The foolish diversions in which you are now importuned to join war with health, waste time, squander money, mar Christian reputation, dissipate serious thought, hinder usefulness, attack every temporal and every eternal interest. Can you persuade yourself that it is right for you, for the sake of an hour's feverish excitement, to tarnish your religious example, grieve your fellow-believers, lay a burden upon your pastor's heart, wantonly throw away your power to do good, and give new courage to the wicked?
Will you still try to apologize for questionable pleasures? The entire board of Bishops, the General Conference, your pastors, without an exception, all the deeply pious men and women of the Church, believe that dancing, card-playing, going to the theater and the races are unwise, inexpedient, hurtful to the spiritual interests of those who engage in them, and damaging to the moral power of the Church of God. Nor do they stand alone in this solemn judgment. The most intelligent and devoted Christians in the various Churches around us share these convictions. Will you set yourself in array against whole Conferences, Councils, and General Assemblies? And if you deem yourself equal in judgment to all combined, let me ask you another question: Is your conclusion as safe as theirs? They think it dangerous to dance, play cards, and attend the theater. Are you equally confident that it is dangerous not to dance, not to play cards, not to attend the theater? Is abstinence as perilous as indulgence? They fear that God will not hold you guiltless if you venture into these frivolities. Are you as fully persuaded that God will condemn you if you do not venture into them? The danger is all on one side. Beware how you venture where there is cause for hesitation. Remember, "he that doubteth," and yet goes on when he might safely stop, "is damned."
