The Crucifixion of Philip Strong

he was able to preach. During those six weeks his attention was called to a subject which he felt ought to be made the theme of one of his talks on Christ and Mo

ies" than on any other day in the week, and the plain cause of it was the abuse of the day before. In the summer time baseball games were played in Milton on Sunday. In the fall and winter very many people spent their evenings in card-playing or aimlessly strolling up and down the main street. These facts came to Philip's knowledge gradually, and he was not long in making up his mind th

ait a little before he spoke again. The whiskey power was not the only bad thing in Milton that needed to be attacked. There were other things which must be said. And so Philip limped into his pulpit the third Sunday of the month and preached on a general theme, to the disappointment of a great crowd, almost as large as the last one he had faced. And yet his very appearance was a sermon in itself against the institution he had held up to public condemnation on that

ng nothing to stop the evil. All the ministers complained of the difficulty of getting an evening congregation. Yet hundreds of young people walked past all the churches every Sunday night, bent on pleasure, going to the theatres or concerts or parties, which seemed to have no trouble in attracting the c

noted Sunday for them, he quivered with the earnestness and thrill which always came to a sensitive man when

e Sabbath was made for man," and at on

ys regarding, not simply our own ease and comfort, but also the same right to rest on the part of the remainder of the community. Under the head of Worship may be gathered all those facts which, either through distinct religious

at markets every Sunday morning. What is the one reason why these places are open this very minute while I am speaking? There is only one reason-so that the owners of the places may sell their goods and make money. They are not satisfied with what they ca

his church I passed more than half a dozen of these sections of hell, wide open to any poor sinning soul that might be enticed therein. Citizens of Milton, where does the responsibility rest for this violation of law? Does it res

ch members encourage all these places by purchasing of them on the Lord's Day? I have been told by one of these fruit dealers with whom I have talked lately that among his best customers on Sunday are some of the most respected members of this church. It has also been told me that in the summer time the heaviest patronage of the Sunday ice-cream business

s intolerable bigotry and puritanical narrowness! This is not the attitude Christ would take on this question

days. It is his merciful thoughtfulness for the race which has created this special day for men. Is it too much to ask that on this one day men think of something else besides politics, stocks, business, amusement? Is God grudging the man the pleasure of life when here He gives the man six days for labor and then asks for only one day specially set apart for him? The objection to very many thing

per, because it forces upon the thought of the community the very same things which have been crowding in upon it all the week, and in doing this necessarily distracts the man, and makes the elevation of his spiritual nature exceedingly doubtful or difficult. I defy any preacher in this town to make much impression on the average man who has come to church saturated through and through with forty pages of Sunday newspaper; that is, supposing the man who has read that much is in a frame of mind to go to church. But that is not the point. It is not a question of press versus pulpit. The press and the pulpit are units of our modern life which ought to work hand in hand. And the mere matter of church attendance might not count, if it was a question with the average man whether he would go to church and hear a dull sermon or stay at home and read an interesting newspaper. That is not the point. The

day to the workingman of the world, and that all unnecessary carrying of passengers or merchandise should stop, so as to give all men, if possible, every seven days, one whole day of rest and communion with something better than the things that perish with the using. He would say that the Church and the church-member and the Christian everywhere should do all in his power to make the day a glad, powerful, useful, restful, anticipated twenty-four hours, looked forward to with p

or countenance places or spectacles of amusement, to engage in card parties at their homes, to fill their thoughts full of the ordinary affairs of business or the events of the world. He would say that it was the Christian's duty and privilege in this age to elevate the uses of this day so that everything done and said should tend to lift the race higher, and make it better acquainted with the nature of God and its own eterna

this morning. May God forgive whatever has been spok

he parks where the baseball games had been played. Other persons in the congregation felt more or less hurt by the plain way Philip had spoken, especially the members who took and read the Sunday paper. They went away feeling that, while much that he said was

tive temper. Nevertheless, he went on with his church work, studying the problem of the town, endearing himself to very many in and out of his church by his manly, courageous life, and feeling the heart-ache grow in him as the

t its mark on Philip's work in Milton and became a part of its web an

-room, where she was in the habit of reading and sewing, he walked on into the small sewing-room, where she sometimes sat at special work, thinki

stairs a little whil

ise her he noticed two pieces of paper, one of them addressed to "The Preacher," and the other to "The Preacher's Wife." They were anonymous scrawls, threatening t