The New York Herald Newspaper, May 6, 1872, Page 4

4 RELIGIOUS. May Sunday Ministrations in the- Pulpits of the Churches of the City and Neighborhood. ae ULES Sermons by Prominent Metho- dist Preachers. Morley Punshon at St. Paul's Methodist Chureh---Discourse on Freedom from Sin. —_——- DR. NEWMAN ON A HOLY LIFE. panueneen The Limitations of Human Know- ledge Described by Dr. Fowler. A Characteristic Sermon by Henry Ward Beecher, iets etal Father Gavazzi on Justification by Faith. ioe Interesting Conference Services at the Brook- lyn Academy of Music—Sermon by the Rev. E. 0, Hason, of Detroit, on the Loss of the Soul. Father McCready on the Maternity | of the Blessed Virgin. eee What Mr. Frothingham Knows About | the Conscience. HEROISM DESCRIB - ED BY MR. HEPWORTH, + Bishop Bayley on the Opposition of the | Chureh and the World. | WILLETT STREET METHODIST EPISCOPAL OHUR Discourse by Rev. Dr. Daily, Presiding Elder of Loutsiana—Christ, the Conquer= ing Hero—The Suffering Tribulation, Salvation and Glory of the Babe of Mary—The Army Corps in the Chris- | tian Church, The pulpit of the Willett street Methodist Epis- vopal church was yesterday filled by Rev. Dr. Daily, a delegate to the General Conference and Presiding Elder of Louisiana, who preached an | eloquent discourse upon the suffering, lowliness ‘The earnest old elder took for sli and glory of Jesus, his text Isaiah, Is Who is this that cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Boz * this that ts giorious in his Apparel, travelling in the greatness of his strength? 1 that speak inl righteousness, inighty to save. Dr. Daily, in opening, spoke of the Prophet Isaiah as the evangelist who had a better view of the lat- ter-dauy glory of the Christian Church than any other, and whose imagery is unexcelled by any in- spired writer. Isaiah saw a conquering hero com- | ing towards him; he looks out and his attention is | attracted, and he cries out, “Who is this conqueror from Edom travelling in the greatness of his strength: and he hears the response, “It is I that | speak in righteousness, mighty to save.” Edom and Bozrah are significant. They are not to be con- | sidered arbitrary names. The former signified red | earth ; so the question is, Who is this that COMETH UP FROM RED EARTH ? Bozrah signifies the place of tribulation and sore distress, Applying these terms to the hero of the text, it conveys an idea of the condescension of Jesus Christ. Christ delivered the world through | the red earth and scenes of tribulation and sore distress. He in whom all things are created—the | God of adoring angels—condescends to come all the way to Edom, and though He made the world, sprinkled the heavens with stars and guided the winds in their listing, He descends from His lofty estate and becomes the babe of Mary, in the man- ger. What physical condescension for Christ, who tabernacles with men! His moral condescension is also exemplified in His life. He becomes man, and sorrows like unto man, humbled to and obedient unto death—even the cross. He who was wor- shipped by seraphiin. and cherubim, He also was hungry and thirsty, though He owned the cattle upon @ thousand hills, marshalied the planets of the world in their course, numbered the stars, took upon Himself the form of man, consented to be cficified asa malefactor, and atter leaving all His sorrows and sufferings, He comes up from Bozrah as a conquering hero, who has triumphed over death and hell. How does He come? How comes THIS SON OF A CARPENTER, who is houseless and homeless? He comes travel- ting in the greatness of His strength, There is vigor in His tread. He comes like a hero who has met the enemy on the battlefield, and in the greatness -of his strength—which is absolute power. He comes! He comes in omnipotent power from the red earth, and the place of distress. Our Christ, your Christ, my Christ, is not like a wordly hero, but the omnipotent Jehovah, who JEWELLED THE HEAVENS WITH STARS, who carpeted the world in green; the arm of Jesus | set the stare, the fingers of this hero wove the = carpets that cover the earth. He also comes physical and moral strength. He has fortitude and love, and it requires these to enable Hin to come from Edom and Bozrah. When sweating blood in Gethsemane He cries, “Father, if it be pos- sible, let this cup pass from Me"—if the world can be saved without it. See the triumph of His love. “Nevertheless, not My will, but Thy will be done.’ It took fortitude to do that; to pay the debt on the cross that man’s atonement might be complete, The minister passed to the consideration of the relative strength of this hero, Washington alone would have accomplished nothing by crossing and recrossing the Delaware. It was the boys at his back with rifle and canteen that gave him relative strength. So Christ has relative strength. He has | friends at His back that came up with Bozrah, and they form THAT ARMY OF THE HEAVY! that the Revelator saw—the soldie horses and clothed in white linen. ceeded to show that God never saves y man himself. God could send an ange) to preach the Word, and put to flight the legions of the devil; but He has chosen to make every Church member # preacher. He saves manby man, The Doctor vividly pictured the terror of Wellington when he saw the French mowing down his columns, and anxiously waited for the squadrons of Blucher to come to his aid; and then, drawing @ paraile! be- tween that battle and THE BATTLE CHRIST 18 WAGING against sin, said:—When you think of the agencies at work for the must not forget the army corps in Aro are following Christ. Those corps not only include the clergy, but the layman and the Sunday schools. When the final conflict comes and He is proclaimed the hero of the world, it will be THE BLUCHERS OF THE CHUROT whose squadrons will aid in the victory. Who come with dyed garments? The answer “it is I lg bd of Christ, who 1s the God of the Revelations.” Thi Bible is the revelation of that hero that Isaiah saw atness of His strength. He is mighty to save; Hie tae been all the way to Edom aot Bozrah; He has got a ne te for saving and Him from the Church that coming in the has entered heaven for us; He has been to the front of battle; has received the scars, as shown on His dyed vestments, But even when YOU LAY AT HELL'S DARK DOOR Jesus reached out His hand and said, “Give Me am heart,” you iocked up and said, ‘Not 80, rd; 1am too unworthy.” But Jesus smiled upon Sie and your chains fell off and you were saved. Highteen hundred years ago John saw the trophies of Christ's salvation collected in heaven dresged in white robes, and they are crowding, CROWDING T#ROUGH THE GATES OF ZION still, Christ says, am He that liveth, I was dead, but am alive forever more, and I have got the keys ot death and hell.” Brethren, rt Member death can’t lock youin. The grave is but the gate to end ess biiss. The door is unlocked, evangelization of the world, you | | Ft, net Amey ete De ee ee NEW YOKK HERALD, MUNDAY, MAY 6, 1872—TRLPLE SHEKT. have been thrown away. He is our hero, He is disappearing heavenwat You look up and YOU SEE AN ANGEL'S WINGS FLUTTERING im the azure blue; you see in the cloud that sur- reands Him a hand that waves ea The cloud rola above still, and as it surges along past the peace shouts, “I am Te that liveth; was ena, tut I am alive forever more.” That is the volce of our conquering hero, seen by Isaiah. Brethren, my strange friends, Inever owned a plot of land fn my life; 1 have never owned a house {| 4 99914, gall ny own; Tam so far advanced in life Tdo not expe to be the possessor of an earthly house. But in the metropolis above, into which Christ has passed, in the cloud, I MAVE A Lor; there there awaits me a house ; it is fully furnished; there is no mortgage upon it; my titic, I hope, is perfect; it is in a good neighborhood; it is Supplied with all necessary conveniences for a child of God. I hope to prove a worthy Occupant; I hope to find you all fellow tenants in that city that Jesus has preparcd for those who love Him, My strange riends, here’s my heart, here’s my hand, May we meet in that better life, and may God speed you all on your Christian journey. CHURCH OF THE DISCIPLES. Sermon by Rev. George Hepworth on Heroism. Mr. Hepworth took his text yesterday morning from St. Luke, xxitL., 34—“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” He said—My friends, what text could better introduce a sermon on hero- ism? It indicates an act which stands alone. The whole sketch of history from the very beginning of things does not present anything that can equal it. Christ dies for His enemies, and, even while they ridicule His mortal agony, He forgets Himself and prays that they may be forgiven. It is some- thing quite inconceivable to us. It towers far above our conception of possible things. Yet it is that very act which draws us all 80 closely to Christ, which makes us first wonder, then admire, and then worship, Through it He takes His place upon the throne of our affections, and, with His mild Sceptre, rules our lives. Kver sinco that cloudy Friday afternoon whon the Jews trembled because THE RARTH SHOOK BENRATH their fect, and the veil of the Temple was rent in twain, the Cross has been the symbol of victory, and not of defeat. The dying kiss it with reverent and yet with hopeful lips, while the Tempter flees in dismay when we hold it before his bold face, Now, there are two very dierent kinds of hero- ism, Let us look at them pretty sharply. First, there is a kind, the impelling or motive power of which fs selfishness, Even this isso admirable that we often envy the possessor. We take great pride in the achievements of human energy when, driven by ambition, they strain themselves to the utmost. Who has not followed Alexander in his conquests, dropping A SYMPATHETIO TEAR at every step, and throwing our hats in air at every victory? He did so much more than we can or dare to do that we instinctively bay him with our ap- lause, Who does not stand still with wonder when Napoleon stands on the bridge of Lodi, and first dreams of being the first in all the empire, and then follow him over bloody fields and high mountains until he is seated upon the throne, his ambition still unsatistied? Yet if you ask for the motive whioh impelled these men to brave 80 many dan- gers, to undergo such hardships, you will find it to be as base and unworthy as that which throbs in the bosom of the pettiest thief in this city. All they cared for was the applause of the world, that whén the world was clapping its hands they might rasp whatever they wanted, no matter to whom {t longed. But there is another kind of heroism, and one more elevated and worthy of our admira- tlon, IT 18 SO RARE that we find it diMcult to do justice to it; appears to forget self, and, instead of becoming great that others may look small, it becomes mean and hum- ble that others may learn how to be great. You say this is inconceivable. Well, so it is, well nigh. You say no manly human being could clothe himself with such mottves or act In such fashion. Perhaps not. But that was the heroism of Christ, neverthe- less, What He did He did not for Himself, but for others, Even what He did it was for the benefit of | others. And these were not His friends either. | They were, on the one hand, utter strangers to Him, or else, on the other hand, His bitterest ene- | mies, So Christ stands alone; and, as time goes on, He stands there still alone, like some monu- ment by Which generations guide their steps over the weary desert, untouched by time— unbroken by summer heats or wintry frosts. But that same clement of heroism is in us. What- ever quality of character rouses our envy or admi- ration, that quulity we ourselves possess, The ower to appreciate proves possession. We, too, have the ability to endure, and yet be glad to go through the darkness and to carry the light within us. LIFE 18 A STERN FACT. There are rough experiences to pass through, graves to be walked over, misfortunes and tempta- tions to be me Every one knows this, and has thought about it. Now, in what way ure we to | act? Are we todo as soldiers do in a panic—ran trom the feld? But wherever we go, that is the Held. Are we to skulk behind fences and stone walls, or are we to face the dimMiculty bravely and find out how to overcome it? The old stoics suf- ie , and, biting their lips, uttered no word. We ido that, An atheist in the time of Louis XVI. ‘drank his jailer’s health, made puns on the way to the scaffold, and, tripping up the steps, put’ his head under the fatal knife, without so much as say- ing goodby. He was a fool. 13 THERE ANY SECRET which we can learn ? Yes. If you will listen at the foot of the cross you will hear it as it comes from those divine lips. "He says:—“I am the way out; Lam the ‘Truth about it; Iam the Life of it all."’ What does he mean? Only this—that the truth He has taught makes one brave, Believe in your heavenly Father Just as you believe in your earthly father; know that His providence works in all things and over- rules all things; feel that you can be led through no darker places than Christ hath Himself trodden, and in so doing you cover yourself as with a panoply. Go into the battle of life, clothed upon with these truths, and you have nothing to fear; you can doa soldier's work here, and you shall go to the soldiers’ home in heaven, EIGHTEENTH STREET METHODIST CHURCH. Sermon by Rev. Charles A. Holmes, D. D., | of Pittsburg, on Grace and Faith. There was an average attendance yesterday at | the Methodist Episcopal church in Eighteenth street, near Eighth avenue, to listen to asermon by a stranger, the Rev. Dr. Charles A. Holines, of Pitts- burg. The subject was the redeeming power of grace acting through faith, and the text was from | Paul’s epistle to the Ephesians ti., 6, 8:— And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. for by grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God, Previous to the sermon an opening anthem— “If Thou, O Lord, should mark"’—was sung by the | full choir, and the organist, Mr. Atwood, played an offertory, The Rev. Dr. Holmes said:—If man was not lost in original sin the word salvation is one wicked interpolation from beginning to end— the Holy Gospel one sham from beginning to end. If we were not lost there was no need for our Heavenly Father to send Christ to us, and it was a wicked sacrifice from the starting point. But that coming of our Lord was timely, was needed and was a grand beneficence to mankind. We were lost, and we may be saved. In the great relapse from the perfection in which we came into being— in the agony which we endured—when, at the mo- ment when we ie most wretched, Christ came to us from the Father and we were no longer without hope. Whereas by the disobedience of one many were made sin- ners, 8o by the obedience of One many were made whole, By that coming we may be saved, and in Christ we are new creatures. Old things have passed away and we are made new. That man is of good assured who trusts in God; for in Him we havea house not made with hands, Though risen from such depths, though cleansed from such un- cleanliness, E18 NO ROOM for self-boasting, occasion for self-gratulation, no basis for self-confidence. There is no world con- quered by our devotion or our purity, or our worth. It was through His wisdom and His power that we obtained the boon of redemption. He supplements our deficiencies, and raises the low, and lifts us, by faith, to final salvation. God so loved the | world that He gave His *, begotten Son to raise us to a new life. ‘These words “by grace are ye saved through faith’ | | remind us that we were indeed lost, but give us the promise of salvation, In its primary signifl- fore us sea and storms ‘and the possibility of shi; wreck, But when the battle is fou; me and Seve: tory is won—when the voyage of life is at an end— moving grandly up the broad bay with fall sail— then we shall in the beautiful spring morning of ‘the future know what it 1s to be saved. ‘This is the faith in the all-cleansing blood by which sinners Shall be saved, PATHER GAVAZZL Sermonen Justification by Faith. Father Gavagai preached again yesterday morn- ing in the Fourteenth street Presbyterian Church, between Fifth @nd Sixth avenues, There was a large congregation, who seemed to listen with an interest ‘not wholly unmixed with curiosity. The Father indulged in his usual vehement gesticula- tions, and was, if anything, a Uttle less intelligible in his pronunciation, and a little more involved in his grammar than in hia former addresses. He took for the subject of his discourse “Justification by Faitli.” He declared that salvation could not possibly be attained by good works. The Gospel Seheme of salvation was plainly expressed in St. John—“Except a man be born again he cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven.” Here there were two births alluded to, the first of which was known a8 generation, the second as regeneration. The firat was the material birth of the body; the second was the spiritual birth of the soul, And as the first birth required the intervention of a father out- side the body, #0 the sion birth required the intervention of a parent outside of the soul—that was Ohrist Jesus, And how, therefore, could the soul be saved by works done in the body? There was but one sure at of salvation, and that was faith in rist, which was more holy, more sure and more abundant than justification by works could be sup- posed to be, even by those who held it as a sound doctrine. The Father then went qn to state, from his reminiscences of the coi ional while stilt! a priest, how faint and doubtful was the belief by Catholics themselves in the eMcacy of works, in spite of the influence of the teachings of their spirit- ual instructors. The Father went on to show that as the physical body bore the impress of the phy- sical father, so, too, was the soul fashioned in the image of its parent—God.s How hard it was to begin to comprehend the Trinity—the three Persons in one Deity! Yet in our own souls there was the image of this mysterious union. There was the intellect, the will, and the memory; the intellect the peru of the will, and the Holy Ghost proceeding om the intellect and the wi Thus we have in our spiritual natures the stamp of our divine parent- age. Father Gavazai also declaimed against the arrogant assumption of sects and churches to confine the redeeming power of the Saviour’s blood within narrow limits. Roman Catholics claimed that all outside their own communion would be damned; so did Greek Catholics and Eng- lish Catholics, and Lutherans, and even smaller and numerically more inconsiderable bodies. What presumption! All who believed in the Lord Jesus would be justified by their faith. Yet, still, works were not to be whol Wy ignored. Any man who had faith could not help d olng good works; good works were the necessary and Inevitable fruit of a saving faith. But by faith, and not by works, were we jus- tifled and saved, 8T. STEPHEN'S ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH. Sermon by the Rev. Father McCready— The Maternity of the Blessed Virgin. High mass was said at St. Stephen’s church yes- terday morning by the Rev. Father Hekie, After the first gospel the Rev. Father McCready preached on the maternity of the Blessed Virgin. The Church sets apart many festivals in honor of the mother of God. But so affectionately is Mary enshrined in the hearts of the faithful that there is an especial honor demanded for her, and Catholic devotion chooses THE FAIREST MONTH IN THE YEAR as tbat in which a series of the sweetest prayers should invoke her intercession. This month, which the Church dedicates for fuller expression of the Tespect and veneration felt by her children for the mother of her holy spouse, is emblematic in its bright skies of the unsullied purity of Mary's sin- less soul, and figurative in its occasional showers of the plentiful blessings showered down on her who was full of grace. The flowers, springing forth at Nature's bidding to meet the genial sun that had warmed them into new life, are a lively represen- tation of her who, as the “lily of Israel," the “rose bud of Jericho,” arose singly and alone from the cold grasp of the primeval stain to thank the God who “had regard to the humility of His handmaid.” In this bree pete souls, children of the Church, loved ones of Mary, weave chaplets of flowers and bring them as meet offerings to the heavenly queen—as a tribute to THE QUEEN OF MAY. All over the world, in vast cathedral as well as rustic chapel, during this sweet month pens rise unchecked from grateful lips and pure hearts to the Mother of Love, to God's own mother and ours, What, then, it may be asked, is the foundation of all this honor and devotion to the Virgin? We an- swer that it all depends on the one sole, all-suf™m- clent basis of the divine maternity, for the plain, simple reason that Mary is the mother of God. This is, indeed, the grand source from which all those feasts of devotion radiate—the fountain from which they all flow. It is strange that non-Catholics | ‘rors on this point. They would not deny, if asked, that Mary is the mother of God, but they eagerly d the consequences of that admission. They profess themselves to be faithful subjects of the King of Heaven, but they re- Tuse to “HONOR HER WHOM THE KING HONORETH.’? On this subject the humblest Catholic peasant would seem to be a deeper theologian tlran the most enlightened Protestans divine. The Protest- ant theory seeks to honor God and to exclude any honor to the Virgin because it would detract from the honor to God. But the Seribes and Pharisees traduced the Son of God in this same sort of zeal, the Jews crucified the Son of ‘God apparently with the same sort of zeal, and Saul persecuted the early Christians in a similar spirit. The truth is, the more we honor the creature the more we honor the Creator. Man is but finite, whereas God is eternal, a made the creature to “His own image and likeness."" TRE BOND OF MATERNITY between Jesus and Mary cannot be destroyed. Dishonor the mother and you dishonor the Son. The angel declared Mary to be full of grace, and after- ward she herself prophesied, in the fulness of her heart, “Behold, all generations shall call me blessed!’ It needs but reflection to see Feet that the mother of God should be worshipped with all worship except the supreme worship ae to God alone. The Catholic doctrine may be sammed Ze brief. As in the case of ordinary mothers, Mary is the mother of the person born of her; but that person is the second person of the hely and adorable Trinity, and therefore God, consequently Mary is the mother of God. The laws of God are uniform, He does not make one law for us and another for Himself, He has made it a law of our nature and.has inculcated it by a special command- ment to HONOR OUR PARENTS, and so far from being displeased with any one for honoring them we consider that the honor given + to our parents redounds in honor to ourselves. To this rule of our nature, to this law so natural to the human heart, our divine Lord is no exception. So far, then, from being displeased with the homage which we pay this mother, she is rather pleased with those who offer it. It is not for us to put bounds to the Virgin's power; we only know that it is not infinite, But we also know and believe that she who induced her Son to work His first miracle at the marriage feast of Cana, that she to whom THAT SON WAS SUBJECT, in their humble home still exerts. an influence sufficient to make Him work wonders yet for those in whose behalf she may be asked. to supplicate Him, And the tender heart of Jesus will not per- mit Him to turn a deaf ear to that fond mother’s prayer whose devotedness to Him in the child's years of His mortal life, whose unobtrusive antici- ation of His every want and wish in the quiet | interval before His public ministry, and whose united sacrifice with His, were fully known and ap- preciated only by Him and the other persons of the Godhead. Let us then again thank our loving Lord for giving us such a mother. Let us evince our love for her vy imitating those virtues by which she merited to become the mother of God, particularly her unspotted purity, her nnatected lowliness of soul, and her abandonment to the will of God. | ‘Thus we shall merit her protec care in time, | and have a holy confidence of enjoying with our blessed mother one of the many mansions of our Heavenly Father throughout eternity. WASHINGTON SQUARE METHODIST EPISCOPAL. F OHUROH. Sermon by the Rev. Joseph McKay, Delegate from the Irish Wesleyan Con- ference=—Peter’s Denial of Our Lord, aud cance this word faith has its widest acceptation ; but it has manifold significations, There 1s a past faith in the works done, a future faith in reference to | immortality and a Christian faith leading us to | lace a hope for redemption in the power of inapir: jon and the mercy of Christ. Through faith a we saved this morning, taking the gospel evidence attonement of Christ. But though we are saved through faith, not for a moment do we suppose we are saved by faith. ce is the nt; faith eo d, race is the Givers faith “Rijoices, but at the feet of grace lays fown its crown. Paul, in his Epistle to the Ephesians, said he went among them by the grace of God preaching faith. “By grace you are saved through faith, not by works, lest any man should boast.” Sin is for- ven, its bondage broken, its burden gone. We ur own efforts. In due time the Son of God pr, ‘us from the depths 6f our sin, and by the power of mercy and eet lifted us from the vale of sorrow and suffering. We have entered the King's service—received our ne put on our All you have got todo is to push it open, The keys armor, The battle is atill before ua, ‘here are be- of our faith in Christ and ourselves and the gospel | the service. | Joseph Me | above text, will be found below : have the sweet hope of eternal happiness, but not | its Lesson. The morning service at the Washington square Methodist Episcopal church, tn Fourth street, near Fifth avenue, yesterday, was wellattended. Beauty, fashion and music added their charms to those of ‘The sermon was preached by the Rev. ay, delegate from the Irish Wesleyan Conference, who chose for his text Matthew xxvi., o—“And he went ont and wept bitterly.” The gist of Dr. McKay's sermon, founded on the THE SERMON. | ‘These words, dearly beloved brethren, relative to the sorrow and contrition of St, Peter after having | thrice denied our Lord, are sufficient to prove to us the deepneas of his sorrow and the contriteness | of his contrition, He who had but a short while before had said said that, though every one should deny Christ, he wonld not, was now the only one who bad openly disclaimed any knowledge of our Lord. He not only deniod him, but he took an oath that he did pol know him. Is it le that Peter could have for ten the draught of fishes, his walk over the water's surface, and the ration on the mount? No; we can hardly lieve that he forgot those miracles, and yet he denied God “three times ere the cock crew. When Peter—who had seen the miracles of Christ—became a denyer of his Master, how can it be expected that we, who have nothing but our faith to me ug, can never deny our Lord? The secret of Peter's fall will be found in the fact that Peter was a vei set pos sessed man, and the more we study his disposition the more convinced we become of this fact. If we had not hia life to study, his words at the supper table would have been sufficient to convince us of his di tion. Thor be scandalized in Thee, O Lord, I will not.” These words are the words of @ man who has a sarak estimation of him. self. ae cut himself from all the Apostles, and con- sidered himself the strongest of them all. We can- not fuil to see that God permitted Peter 0 PALL, TO TRACK UB @ lesson which we should never forget, and that lesson is that we should not have faith in ourselves, butin God and His meroy. When our Lord was brought to be crucified Peter followed, not imme- diately behind, but afar off; his heart wag heavy at havingMenied his Master. Now, all ofus who have be- trayed Christ have not totally abandoned Him, but follow in the far distance after Him, and when we begin to consider what a curse we have brought on ourselves by our infidelity, and begin to grow sorry for the same, the distance between God and us gradi decreases. It is like the prodi- gal son coming from afar of to his wronged father; although they are & dis- tance from one another, there is no space between them; the contrition of the Son and the fraternal forgiveness of the Father draw them tn spirit to- ward one another, There are two of 18, the partial and radical. The partial infidel does not believe in the divinity of Chi and the radical in- fidel does not believe in him at all; the one is almost as bad as the other, when wo call to mind the words of Christ himself, who has said, ‘He who denies me shail I also deny before My Father who is in heaven.” Let all who have not only denied Christ, but broken his commandments, do as Peter did—weep bitterly for their sin, and be, like Peter, Bphaadini las the good graces of their Master and eir God, BREVOORT HALL. Miracles Out of Vogue and No Longer Necessary to Prove Christianity—Ser- mon by Rev Henry Powers. Notwithstanding the pleasant weather yesterday there was but a scanty attendance at Brevoort Hall, in Fifty-fourth street, between Third and Lexington avenues, The prefatory exercises, as usual, con- sisted of prayer, reading the Bible and singing. The last, however, scarcely deserved the name, it was 80 poor. The organist tried to do double duty— to play the organ and sing through his nose. After these lacerations were gone through the Rev. Henry Powers, late of Elm place church, Brooklyn, who by invitation has taken charge of this church, com- menced his sermon, choosing for his text Mark xvi., 19—‘‘And these signs shall follow those that believe.” That these signs did follow, he began, you saw in the second lesson. They followed in the healing of the sick, in the casting out of devils. Do these signs now follow them that believe? No. Had we lived eighteen hundred years ago we should not have believed that miracles would stop. They did, however, as soon as Christianity got a footing in many lands—when It had too large and firm a root to be eradicated. Miracles have ceased in the Chris- tian Church, We still hear occasionally of them; but they are invarlably the effect of some physical cause, There is nothing wanting to convince man of Christianity. It has already been proved, already passed through every crucible of DOUBT AND SCEPTICISM. Persons do not reflect on all the wonder of a miracle. But yet they think the worker must be very deeply imbued with religion. Not so; the power of awakening miracles did not awaken the soul. It did not raise it more than any ordinat | ald or talent. The frequency of the miracles too! ‘rom them their appearance of wonder. Miracles were necessary to the establishment of Christianity. The Cac ofthe apostles might move, but it required the miracles to bring full conviction—that conviction which would suffer death rather than recant. Our Lord chose the best means for the con- version of the world. - For several years the miractes were continued; they then ceased—ceascd forever. Though they have ceased, the gospel never will. Preaching is now sufficient. Signs shall yet follow those that believe, not in a physical, but moral sense. We shall find what is not literally @ miracie is yet full of INTRINSIO TRUTH. He went on to illustrate this by the story of Mr. Patterson, @ wealthy Englishman, who left fortune, friends and home to convert the savages of Polyne- sia. He accustomed himself to hardships, learned to swim, prepared himself for his post and de- parted. ie benighted heathens crowd around him; he preaches the true Gospel, and they believe. But in the midst of his labor some villains propose to take advantage of the confidence reposed in him to steal some of the natives. Accordingly they get @ vessel like his, emtice the artiess islanders on board and bear them away to slavery. For this atrocious crime the innocent missionary is mur- dered. For all this unhappy termination of his life no arithmetic can compute the amount of good he performed. Did the WICKED TRIUMPH OVER GOOD? The attention of the British nation was thus called to the question of buying and selling human- ity. Slavery was abolished. The speaker next in- stanced a man who had acquired forty languages and dialects. Neither of them, the man of lan- guages nor Mr. Patterson, was particularly endowed. They were strong because they had con- secrated themselves in His name. In some of the Eastern countries serpents are very numerous; poisoning abounds. Before the advent of Christianity they were almost always fatal. Christianity first healed by miracles; it now heals by the light of science. No one mentions without a feeling of reverence the name of Florence Nightingale. She ministered to the body of the sick, to the soul of the dying. Thou- sands died blessing her. If she were about the first she re thank heaven, not the last. What thousands of MINISTERING ANGELS accompanied the armies in the late Franco-Prus- sian war. ‘These actions were not sustained by miracles—the actors gave themselves in the name of Christ. It was the Christians that inaugurated this system. Heathen armies go to war, but no Florence Nightingales follow. Man is left to suifer; man is left tadie. But as there are healers — the Christians, so there are de- stroyers. We heard the other day of a woman in Connecticut who poisoned her husband. Who does not look on her with horror! These cases-are rare, however, and when they do occur the greatest skill is brought against them. In this day men are not satisfied with bringing the gospel to the soul; they bring ease and comfort to the body. They preach the spirit of God not only by words, but by actions. ST, PAUL'S CHUROH. Rev. Morley Punshon om Freedom from Sin. St Paul's church, on the corner of Fourth avenue and Twenty-second street, was filled to overflow- ng last evening to hear the celebrated English divine, Rev. Morley Punshon, That gentleman not only preached the sermon, but conducted the or- dinary exercises of the evening, giving out the hymns, reading a chapter and making the introduc- tory prayer. In his prayer he asked the blessings of God on this nation, on the administration, on the mother country, and on the pending Alabama claims negotiations. ‘Let Thy spirit descend,” he said, “upon the complications that imperil the harmony of nations, and let them be the blessed means of perpetuating Thine own hallowed law— Peace on earth and good will to men,’ '? Mr. Punshon is a robust Englishman, with broad shoulders, high forehead and a remarkably clear voice. He has a free style in delivery, and his sermon was full of vigorous thought and apt figures, He took his text from St. Paul to the Romans, vi., 22—'But now being made free from sin, and be- come servants to God, ye have your fruit unto. holiness, and the end everlasting life.” “The text,” said the preacher, “bears somewhat the semblance of & parodex. Freemen, and servants, How can ye be freemen and servants? or, rather, the rade, idea of freedom is ish to doa certain action, and nothing hinders me; I wish to gratify a certain desire, no earthly power or law forbids me; I am free. That is the rude idea of freedom; but such freedom isthe worst and most slavish bondage. It is the oe of that hardest of masters, the passions. ¢, being free, Bre servants of the most despotic master ye coula find, But there are other masters just as despotic. See the lark at early dawn winging his way throngh the blue ether heavenward until he becomes invisible and is nothing but a song in the heawens; how free is he, rejoicing in the strength of his wing and the wide sweep of earth and air spread oat about himt Is he free? The strong tie of parental love draws him down, down, down to where in the dewy grass, in asecure spot, his mate and her fledgings nestle. Tho emigrant, hewing his way in the alinost unexplored wilda, cutting him a home with his axe, winning his subsistence with his rife, reigning almost supreme over the wide lands that he has possessed—is he free ? A sense of longing, of ho} ping, of homesickness, comes ever him and binds him with the fetters of a de: to the dear old copse where his old hamestead ta, and where his boyhood's feet have played. Here, then, is the service that ye take upom you when you are made free—a service of love. Have you never heard the story how, in the accursed days of slavery, a master put into the hands of hia slave papers of manumis- sion, and, in the firat flush of joy at his freedam, the new freeman ey his whole life to servitude ? It is no slavery to be the servants of God; for ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlast- i ike. It ia the highest freedom—the very rapture of iverty.”” The reverend gentleman continued at 7 —_—-- some le! explain'og the meaning of the text, and ended by De aameing the benediction. LYRIC HALL. Educating the Conscience—Discourse by Rev. O. B, Frothingham. At the services yesterday morning at Lyric Hall, on Sixth avenue, near Forty-second street, there was the usual large congregation. After the cus- tomary preparatory services Rev. 0, B. Frothing- ham preached, his subject being “Education of the Consclence” and his text the words of St. Paul, “Herein do I exercise myself to always have a con- sclence void of offence toward God and toward men.” The discourse was a continuation of that upon the same text on the Previous Sunday, the subject then being, as will be remembered, “The Integrity of Conscience.” After defining the mean- ing of exercise, as used in the text, he said that the SYMPHONY OF THE CONSCIENCE came rolling up in ® grand accord from the re- motest portions of the globe. From the ruins of ancient Thebes, from the temples of classic Rome, from all that is ancient as well as modern comes the game universal symphony. Was conscience a moral principle or is it the result of a law? He be- sideration was that referring to property. There was the OONSOIRNOR OF PROPERTY, There is @ complete network of rulers in this re- art The third consideration referred to the sanc- ‘ity of the family relation, The man who tries to break up the family relation is cursed. This 8 the corner stone of social life. The principle un- derlying all these considerations was the same. There could be no society founded on violence or fraud. When society attains its | diaped perfection con- science attains its highest perfection, They have worked themselves up to THR GRAND POINT : of allegiance to one another, Society is mixed in New York. We have all the elements; we have here Thebes and here Ninevah. After quoting John Randolph and Lord Macaulay on this point he defined the various rate of socl- ety—the leaders, the fighters, the vast hosts of court followers—the last representa- tives of the barbarous ages—the last men who would illage the dead and rob the dying soldiers, New Vor is full of such men. Some occupy high places, Some are judges; they are cannibals, Bedouins, Have all these classes the .same conscience? No; moral sense is earned by simple conformity to social facts—facts between man and man. The ABERRATIONS OF CONSCIENCE arise from the fact that men have been educated not upon facts but theories. He referred to the soul of the Indian conscience causing the widowed wife to burn herself upon the funeral pyre of her husband, If a woman would do this she would enjoy the felicities of Paradise in the companionship of her husband thirty-five millions of years. So dee; seated was this conscience that it took the Englis! government, with all the stringency of its laws, a generation to uproot the custom, This was con- science based on mere a not on fact. So if people drowned themselves in the sacred waters of | the Ganges ; so with the inquisitors in the burning of heretics. Both were founded on foolish fic- tions. Pious people brought negroes from Africa to save them from perdition. The managers of THE YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION are another example, They will not allow a literary publication in their rooms because the leading article is.-written by Herbert Spencer in opposition to the Evangelical religion. No one can be an officer of the organization unless he is a member of the Evangelical Church, They act up to their con- science. What is their conscience based on? It is: based on fancy. There is not a square inch of fact init. They believe that those who do not believe as they do will goto heil, What can be more chi- merical? The CONSCIENCE OF NEW YORKERS is made uP. from the facts and’ relations of ein in New York. Consclence is based on the fact of relationship. Underlying this is the whole roblem. Stick to this and you have mastered all. le enforced this idea Ha copious and cogent tllus- trations, showing all the various relations in s0- ciety between man and man, and wherein the con- science in each could be educated to a high and per- fect standard. He urged, in conclusion, that con+ science was simply faithf{l allegiance to the bond, making men, in all the relations of life, true, honest, loyal, upright and good, and that to have a con- science void of offence toward one’s neighbor is to have a conscience void of offence toward God, or, in other words, that if we obey the Golden Rule that there will be no trouble about conscience, BROOKLYN CHURCHES. PLYMOUTH CHUROE. The Memorable Sunday of the Plymouth Church Year—Admission of New Meme bers—Sermon on the Characteristics of Christian Unity—The Creed that Will Unite All Men on the Globe=—A Large Communion Service, Acombination of circumstances contributed to the filling of Plymouth church yesterday morning with a crowd of worshippers, 80 dense and so impor- tunate of admission as to somewhat interfere with the feeling that worship is a serene delight and the unruttied frame of mind that goes a long way to- wards the peace that is so oft described as heavenly, These circumstances were as follows:—One hun- dred and twenty-five new members were to be pub- licly admitted to the church, and each of these was accompanied by a cluster of friends, who were desirous of being near them on so interesting an oceasion, There were also among the strangers waiting at the gates so many faces that bore the never-to-be-mistaken Methodist stamp that it was evident the General Conference had unofficially sent a delegation of its preachers and laymen to get all the good they could by, hearing Mr. Beecher. Two gentlemen, evidently belonging to the Metho- dist Zion, were urging upon the usher the need there was for their getting good seats, because they were “all the way from Illinois, andi can only hear Mr, Beecher once in our lifetime.’ The gentlemanly usher had regard unto their request, and they were accommodated with excellent seats for hearing and seeing. The formal admission of the members to the church occupied a long time, inasmuch ag an unusually large number received the ordi- nance of baptism by sprinkling. At the conclusion of the public service the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper was administered; and as Mr. Beecher gave hus usual catholic invitation, nearly every pew in the house was occupied, including the floor and the galleries. Mr. Beecher’s subject was “The Charace. teristics of Christian Unity,” and his text was ge- lected from the twelfth chapter of St. Paul’s Epistle to the Hebrews, the twenty-second to the twenty- fourth verses:—“But Md are come unte Mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of a4 to the general assembly and ehurch of the first-born, which are written in heaven, and to God, the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus, the Mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel.” ‘To appreciate fully the ex- hortations and, teachings of the New Testament writers it Is necessary for us to put ourselves back, as it were’ (said Mr. Beecher at the outset of his discourse), “to the time of the Jewish economy, and endeavor to realize their devotion.to the outward ritual service of the Temple, and what it meant to. be a Jew and. what it cost to be @ Christian,” A sketch of the life of A DEVOUT JEW was then sketched; and side f. 4 side with it, the simplicity, the invisibility and che spirituainess of the Christion faith. In accepting Christianity, it was shown that the Jew seemed to think he was left alone, cast of his nationality, and renounced the fathers of his fuith, It is to correct this, said Mr. Beecher, that the eleventh and twelfth chapters of the Hebrews seem to be written, and the twelfth chapter is a manut of comsola- tion; it over In blessedness; if it had been put to music it vould have out-topped Beethoven's symphonies, Selections frem the eleventh and twelfth chapters were read. It 4 as if Paul said, “Call the roll; see how great an noble in yeur ancestry; how they by hh id trusted t9 & God whom ye now behold.” Ye are ed confined to narrow limisations, as they were; at velong not to a bates 4 ring nor toa wea ay eae ;ye are free, for Christ has eenter To be a Christian in those early Lh ‘arennt upon an eternity of glory. ‘Terough Scha i belief in the invisible, through tl pe useicee rhe top of the brain instead of the bottom, amuleter one with those who had # brighter, fis a nd 4 faith when Christianity came. It is ante 4 “1 meaning in all tant trae in Christian! a ‘3 ha that is universal, that 1 will speak abou! this morning. The unity of men in nations, in in States, in neighborhoods, was referred vo, and also their unit in a common origin; they come from the earth, and bear the dust mark npon them; they were united in their common liability to tempta- tion, in a common struggle, by the endeavors which men make to bring the body into subjection to the spirit, ‘Tet me gee,” said the preacher, “the man Says he haa had no struggle; let him rise up; I know his name before I see i 1S. & BASTARD; HE God has named him.” “if ye have bad no chastise- ment Lo Ste not sons. | Every comes tumbling over threshold of care when they come into the ba. i. wee sno exception. Shakspeare’s chil- woe e had aug, must have come to the same inheritance of cate that he did. Everybody bears the mark of toil and care, Some people are very anxious about their ancestors, and some of them say, ‘Oh, if could but trace my pedigree to the Earl of Dadiey!’ Well, Darwin Suggests that we should trace our lineage the other way. We are not 80 anxious about di that in many respects ewe anion. (Laughter.) ‘The points in which we are the most like each other are more in that the other; we are indeed of the eart! All men are united, too, on the essentiny kere ot Christian anhood. It is said that you cam never unite men on any one creed. I say that by and by get men, there will be a creed that you cannot. from being disunited upon. is in the chapter of Galatians. I might pe ay 4 the Apostles’ Creed; it is not the Nicene Creed; it isnot that Chinese abomination, the At freed, This is Gaetan it ¢ spirit ts love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentlen good hess, faith, meekness, temperance.’ I Geclnre that lobe has that for his ideal, . Mem every mau on els don’t know what they believe about churches, for the best of all reasons, because churches them- selves don’t know.” Mr. Beecher here put to an eved it was the latter. He believed in the law of | ideal, rough, plain-spoken, evolution, He believed that the race began at the through a cat SENSE MAN s ‘ ‘egory as to what he believed in. He en pape tat epee grown to its present state. | helteved in nothing: AML, be Cnaumte tie menther's” ‘go from a savage state they | love, gentleness, to to long saffering, begin to accommodate themselves to one another, | 1nd ‘hese he id ‘betfeve tn with heaccieose iow, Before books were written men worked through | herte ore crults of the spirit—the common. pro- perty of mankind. Do think men would con- storm and fire and water. In all s0- together to . “the sun out of the cloty three things must be secured:—First was | heavens—the sduroo of all their it and life. In savage state every man is asiayer. Society | comfort? But if o%.. put a hideous Pde this down. There ta a tacit agreement that } orystal in the heavens; if you ed an ictele there f the preservation of your iife you must preserve | and call it God, I don’t wonder that men are infidels the lives of others. In semit- lc times, or now | and athetsts. ure a good Armenians on the borders, when men around with bowie | here; you cannot anticipate what my fe ling toward knives, there is loose conscience. No odds are | youis. There are some Episcopalians here; how taken. There is no shooting in the dark. Here it | should like to give a slap at your bishops!’ There is different, Everybody feels safe. The next con- | are some Unitarlans here; how I could show the pavers of your faith! There are some Universal- ists here; how I might show what they think about the good-naturedness of God! But su) you were to go to a horticultural show and there was a long table of fruit—there were different compart- ments on the table—and you came to one of compartments, and you overheard a man say to the judges as they looked at it, “My fruit was raised on ground that can be traced as far back as the flood.” Another man ‘3, “Mine was raised under glass; this is church fruit.” Another. says, “This was raised under certain ordi- hances and rules.” You came at length to a cluster of fruit, and you looked at it and ad- mired it, and you say to the grower, “Why, where did yan get these fine pears from?” He answers, “L got them from the cena they grew wild; I took them into my garden, an thave cultivated all the fruit I have ‘in this way, and -you see what it is.’? The judges say, “Why, you have the best fruitin the show.” All the others cry out, “Why, you're not going to give that man the prize! Why, his frait is not grown as ours is; it is wild fruit!” ‘You hear the judges say, “The order of this show is, ‘by their fruits ri shall know them.’” The sermon, which was of remarkable excellence, was concluded by & reference to the unity in suffering to the fact.that we are all under eng ats convoy, under the convo} of God, and under the convoy of that name which above every other name. TALMAGE'S TABERNACLE. The Necessity, Beauty and Power of Holiness—Sermon by Rev. Dr. Newman. “Without holiness no man shall see the Lord." Such were the words upon which Rev. Dr. J. P. Newman, chaplain to Congress, discoursed for one hour yestesday morning to an audience of 3,000 people gatlrered in Mr. Talmage’s tabernacle, in Schermerhorn street. Character, he said, is the condition for everlasting life. God is no respecter of persons, and if we accept this statement a8 a fact we must look behind and within the person for the conditions of everlast- ing happiness. This condition cannot inhere in humaw physique. The beautiful Circassian, the dusky African, the dwarfed Esquimaux, the large- framed Patagonian, the filthy Digger Indian of the Sierras and the dainty American are physiologi- cally identical in the structure of the body. It cannot inhere in mental capacity or in intellectual culture. The mind of the savage and of the philos- opher are identical in structure. The difference is in culture, which is accidental and incidental. This condition cannot inhere in social conditions, in education, in wealth, in reason, &c. All these are a3 fragile as flowers;.as transient as aday. We are, therefore, justified in saying that CHARACTKR 18 THE FITNESS FOR ETERNAL LIVE; it is the aggregate of one's self. And herein is seen the wisdom. of God in selecting character as the test of fitness for heaven. Nothing is so uni- versal or enduring a8 character. It is immortal, and this thought is suggested by the text and con- texts. The Apostle groups together the character of the ancient worthies—the great cloud of wit- nesses by whom we are encompassed—and then comes «lown to chastisement, which he declares ia designed to produce ia us holiness. The Doctor then explained the expression “See the Lord,’’ and continued, saying that three things are important to consider in this connection—namély, the neces- sity for, the power and the joy of holiness. It isan inherent right of governments to pre- scribe laws for the conduct of subjects. Law ts the governmental expression of how acts shall be done. Natural law causes rays of light to fall in straight lines, the flower to open its petals to the sun and grass and bud to prepare themselves to receive the gentie showers and the sunshine. This natural law was next compared with the civil, and both with the moral, and tne Doctor declared that this right to prescribe conduct inhered somewhere in governments, To destroy this right is to give loose reins to passion and appetite. And if we ad- mit this right to civil governments shall we deny to. the divine government? Law is but the expression of legislative will, and the moral law is the expression of the divine will, which declares how you and I, suid the speaker, shall act in this world. The term holiness implies absence of sin, purity of character, obedience to that law which is holy, just and good. But the term when pees to the Creator has a dif- ferent meaning from that which attaches to it when oe to the creature. The Doctor here explained the difference of meaning. In reference to God it. does not imply conformity to law, for who is Je- hovah’sf lawmaker? There is no such law in this case as that which causes the sun to shine or the fire to:burn. In the “ign oe it is that which is. essential and immutable. In man it implies motive the embodiment of the divine motive—and Jesus Christ as.a teacher came to show us the beauty of a holy iife, but. He went back. of the motive and declared that BLESSED ARE THE PURE IN. MRART. This is a description, not of a motive, but of a. state of the heart in which the will at all tim whether passive or active, shall be-in a condition ot obedience to.the divine commands; the conscience, the affections and the passions alse In a like state. He who is thus pure is never surprised. The Doctor said he had among his curiosities two bottles of water from.Jordan—one filled apd the other not. Though coming from the same river, one is clearand beautiful, while the other is mudsly and dark. They represent two classes of. men—one whose nature is filtered by the aa a grace of Christ, and the other in whom the cor- ruption. of nature still remains. If the one is. shaken he remains pure,but if the other is disturbed,, be It ever so little, the mud which les at the bottom will rise ap and blacken his entire char- When he (Dr. Newman) was in Greenland, a year ago, he saw an immense Iceberg Moat majestically against the current toward the sun.. When. he inquired into the phitosophy of it he found. that {ts base went deep down into the ocean andi met acurrent which was stronger than the surface. current and hastened it, onward toward the tropics. The currents of lise are against us, bub happy is the man whose base is so deepdown; that the currents of grace shall watt him onward to- ward the warm clime of God’s presence. The dominion of sin is distroyed by grace, but grace 18 not omnipotent. Time also, necessary to break the dominion of habits wi required years to form. This holiness of heart rests upon two thi command and, fitness. The Doctor cited Scripture texts to snstain this propo- sition, and gave tlustrations of God's purity and severity toward sin and. the recognition of charac- ter. This purity can. be attained not by rites and ceremonies, but by the blood of Jesus Christ, which cleanseth “from all sin. The man, who has. this, everything he does.is acceptable to God—his laugh- ter just as much. as his prayer. The Doctor next showed the difference between adevout life and a holy life. The Mohammedan lives a devent life and es pilgrima; moment to. Mecca, but he is ready at an: > amd to murder. Tye Papist A devout, but he, too, is reeay for @ spree. Away, then, said he, with that holiness which consists in creeds and garments and ceremonies, and give us rather sanctified motives and holy ives. In regard to fitness the docter showed that man was designed for COMPANIONSHIP WITH GOD, for moral frienttship with the Deity. But identity of purpose, harmony of wit, community of motive are needed, ‘There is, therefore, a fitness. As the eye of the eagle is designed for the sun, and the eye of the ow! for the darkness, $0 is man designed companionship with God, The Doctor next illustrated holiness as an ele- ment of power, and gave instances of moral hero- ism drawn from the lives of Polycarp, Ignatias, Luther and others, The power to overcome evil Is Personal purity. Some men have it to sucha de- ree that nothing aifects them, Virtue is repro ductive, God never does a thing on a stingy but on the most broad, liberal and generous prin- ciples, Illustrations of the power af holiness over the human soul were from the life and death of Lady Jane Grey, John Wi aad others. The groat want of the Church ts personal Chrwuisn vurity, The Doatar closed hid