How God Led the Leaders in the Centennial Exhibition
It is not merely help and guidance to an individual child of God that God gives in response to faith-filled prayer. If two or more are agreed as to what together they need in God’s service, they may have confidence that he will hear and respond to them according to their need and their faith. And if God’s children unitedly pray to him in behalf of a cause which in any true sense represents his interests or his honor, they may be sure that God is more interested in the object of their prayer than they are. An illustration of such a struggle as this, where I was privileged to know much of it, and, indeed, in which I had a certain part, is worthy of mention in this series of testimonies.
When the “United States Centennial 121
- — “WMlusteative Answers to Br ct Celebration and Exhibition of 1876,”
Philadelphia, was arranged for, it was the first exhibition of really an international —
character that had been undertaken by this new nation of ours, and many an important practical question had necessarily to be
met for the first time by those responsible
for its management. One of these questions was the Sunday question. This grew to unexpected importance as the months progressed, and it finally became a center of moral and spiritual conflict.
Until that time, six days had, in this country, been counted an ordinary week’s work. Places of amusement or of exhibition were “open every day in the week, Sundays excepted.” This was taken as a matter of course. The first regulations decided on by the Centennial Commission, of representative men from every state and territory, appointed by Congress, were framed, two years before the exhibition, with the usual exception. But as the time
for the opening drew near, there was a 122
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How God Led the Leaders
movement to secure the letting down of the bars that would close the great exhibition one day in seven.
Money-making was the main thing at the bottom of the Sunday-opening advocacy, whatever nominal plea was put forth by its representatives. Railroad companies coming into Philadelphia had millions at stake in the question at issue. Various other parties, whose larger or lesser gains were involved, were ready to aid any organized movement to induce the Centennial Commission to reverse its announced decision.
Of course, it would never do for these workers to say that it was a mere matter of dollars and cents that prompted their zeal, It sounded much better to talk of the interests of the working classes, who could come into Philadelphia on Sunday as on no other day in the week to receive good impressions in that great international educating agency now available only for a
season. Thus in one way and another, a 123
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powerful, unscrupulous, and determined organization to effect the change was secured, and its work began to be felt.
There are always some in the community who are ready to work on the wrong side because it is wrong. Then there are men who will join with the evil-disposed, or will wish them success, because “hey can make money through the triumph of evil. Moreover, there are more or less social cranks, and weak-minded ministers, and other professed Christians, who can be drawn into the support of almost any measure — good or bad — to which a determined man urges them. Hence it is not to be wondered at that, at this time, petitions in favor of the Sunday opening of the exhibition were presented to the Centennial Commission signed by a great many bad men who would do wrong for its own sake; by a great many others who would do wrong when they were paid for it; by many flabby-minded men who had no positive
opinions to adhere to with or without pay; 124
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and also, doubtless, by some conscientious but misguided men. As to the other side of the question, there was little need of petitions. Public sentiment on the involved issue was well understood. The better portion of the community was largely in favor of Sunday closing.
It was shrewdly planned, by the friends of Sunday opening, to secure by various means a majority of the Centennial Commission to favor rescinding the earlier vote for Sunday closing, and then to bring the matter up for decision, and press for an immediate vote, just before the opening day of the great exhibition. Once opened on Sundays with the approval of the Commission, it would be practically impossible to close it again. When the members came together just before the first of May, they found, on mutually conferring, that apparently a decided majority would vote for reversing the previous action. Then came a time of anxiety for
the friends of Sabbath observance.
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I was so circumstanced at this to know much of the movements of bo’
sides. On the day before the vote was to be taken, my old commander and friend, the President of the Commission, told me of the situation as he saw it. He said modestly: “I know, Chaplain, that you have more faith than I have that God gives special help in an emergency in answer to special prayer. So I want you to pray to-night for God’s help in this contest.” That very utterance showed this leader’s faith. It was in itself the prayer, “Lord, I believe; help thou mine unberere
As we two were talking together at that time, an earnest and hard-working advocate of Sunday opening, a member of the Commission, came up, and said exultingly: “It’s no use. We’ve got you, You’ll find that out to-morrow.” And, on the face of it, it looked so,
Before going home, I went to my office,
and stated the case to my associate in 126
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editorial work, the Rev: Dr. George A. Peltz, a man of faith and prayer, and asked him to pray earnestly that night that God would help in this crisis. And there were godly members of the Commission who were praying the same prayer that night. When, on my knees that evening, I essayed to pray for God’s help, my words strangely seemed to come back to me. It was as though God said, “There is no necessity for your prayers. I need not to be entreated of you. Stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord!” It was a peculiar experience. I have never had anything just like it. Yet with it came the conviction that all was right. I realized that God was working.
Going to my office in the morning, I found my associate there, and, without speaking of what had happened to me, I asked him if he had remembered his promise of prayer. “Yes, indeed,” he said, “and there was a singular occurrence
as I attempted to pray.” Then he told of 127
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his experience as almost identical with mine. He was confident, he said, that the Lord had taken this matter in hand.
The Commission met in Parlor C of the Continental Hotel. When I met its president there that day, he said to me: “Chaplain, there is a remarkable change here since last night. They are not so sure as they were of carrying their point. I doubt if they will.”
Then I met Mr. George H. Corliss, of Rhode Island, whose mammoth engine was one of the wonders of the exhibition, and the motive-power of all its machinery. He, himself a devout and earnest Christian, was to present the majority report in renewed favor of Sunday closing. We had already talked this matter over together, and had, only the day before, spoken to each other of the evident majority in favor of the proposed change. He now spoke of the remarkable change that had come over several of the members since the day before,
and he said he believed that the vote would 128
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be different from what had seemed probable twenty-four hours earlier.
After the other business of the day was completed, the two reports on Sunday opening were presented, and discussion began. Mr. Corliss declared that, while he had enjoyed his work for the exhibition, and had fondly hoped for the success of the undertaking, if the exhibition was not to be closed on Sunday nothing was left of his best hopes but ashes, and he could only wish that all he had done for the Centennial was utterly blotted out.
Professor Campbell of Indiana, secretary of the Commission, reminded the Commissioners that state fairs throughout the country were uniformly closed on Sunday. He was sure, moreover, that if the Centennial Exhibition were open on Sunday, the slums of New York and Baltimore, and other cities, would be emptied into Philadelphia on that day, so that this city would be overrun with the viler classes in those
communities.
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Mp favor ey the ak ANN ain
that the exhibition should be opened 0 o ‘Sundays, it was said that the laboring
classes needed and desired it; that the =
exhibition itself was not like a place of
amusement, but rather like a public library or art gallery, and that its influence would be ennobling on all who attended it; more- over, that anyhow it would pay. In favor of this report there were earnest words from at least one member of the Commission, who was honestly a believer in the Sunday opening on its merits. There was also more or less talk about “bigotry,” and “intolerance,” and “Puritanism,” with the ordinary measure of sentimentalism concerning “the true and the beautiful.” Of course, there was no such earnestness in favor of the Sunday opening as there was against it; for there was a lack, on that side, of the moral conviction which gives a man power in advocacy of the right.
General Hawley, of Connecticut, left the 130
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chair — as President of the Commission — to speak in favor of an observance of the American Sabbath. He insisted that the Commission was already pledged to that course by its previous action and utterances, and that it could not with honor, at this late day, reverse its decision. He believed that no American Congress was ever freighted with weightier responsibilities for the welfare of the American people than was this Commission in now considering the Sunday question. If the doors of the Centennial Exhibition were thrown open on Sunday, one of the safeguards of our nation would be thereby practically broken down. That step would prove the beginning of the end of our American Sabbath observance, and for a century to come men would point to this day’s work in justification of a disregard of the traditions and customs of the nation in honoring the Christian Sabbath. Such a responsibility he was not willing to assume. He asked who of the Commission would dare to do so, 131
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General Hawley spoke with earnestness in favor of the observance of one day in seven, not merely as a religious duty, but as a necessity of man’s physical and moral welfare. He said that if any people were to start in this world all by themselves, without any written or traditional law for their guidance, he believed that they would find, by experiment, that in the long run they could do more work and better in six days of a week than in seven. For the sake of the workingmen inside of the exhibition and outside, he wanted it closed on Sundays.
Colonel Holliday, afterwards Governor Holliday, of Virginia, a gallant Confederate officer, who had lost his right arm in the war, spoke eloquently in support of the views expressed by General Hawley. He asked if those men who talked of “the true and the beautiful” were unwilling to give one day to the contemplation of the true after giving six days to the study of the
beautiful. Turning to Mr. Corliss, he said: 132
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“That magnificent engine of yours, sir, is indeed a thing of beauty. Each mighty revolution made by it as it puts and keeps in motion for six days in the week the varied machinery which covers more than fifteen acres of space, is beautiful beyond a question. But is there any ¢ruth in it? No, sir! Not unless, on the seventh day, that mighty engine stands silent before Almighty God.”
Then came earnest words from Governor McCormick of Arizona. Those who remembered his activity twenty years before in Young Men’s Christian Association work in New York City, or who recalled his brilliant address before the Third National Sunday-school Convention at Jayne’s Hall, in Philadelphia, in 1859, were not surprised that he also pleaded eloquently for the wise and sacred observance of the Christian Sabbath.
When a friend of Sunday opening sneered at the others as “narrow-minded
Puritans,” a member of the Commission, 133
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whose position had not been known, called out, “I’m on that side, but don’t call me a Puritan. In politics, I’m an old line Democrat; in religion, I’m a Universalist. There’s not much Puritanism in me.”
“Then you don’t believe in any hell,” said one.
“I believe you’ll have a hell here in Philadelphia, if you open those exhibition gates Sundays,” was the earnest and startling response.
The feeling had by this time reached a rare degree of intensity for any deliberative body. Members of the Commission who had thought lightly of the whole matter at first, or had been positively in favor of the Sunday opening, realized that a momentous issue was presented, and that they must accept the responsibility of acting for or against the right. There were loud calls of “Question! Question!” by those who were ready to finally record themselves.
At this moment an impressive incident
occurred. Mr. Haynes, of Nevada, rose, 134
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and said: “Mr. President, before the question is taken, I wish to say a word. I feel like a returned prodigal, and I want to make a confession. More than twenty years ago, I went out from an Eastern home to the Far West. I have lived since then beyond the Rocky Mountains, where we hardly have a Sabbath, and where other than the best moral influences are all about us. But, as I have listened here this afternoon, old memories have come back to me.” Here the speaker struggled with strong emotion, and he continued with choking voice: “All these truths were familiar to me long ago, and it seems to me again to-day that I hear them repeated as I used to listen to them from the lips of my sainted mother, as, every evening, I kneeled by her side in prayer. I want to give my vote in favor of observing the Christian Sabbath.”
The effect of this remarkable speech was overpowering. It seemed to represent the
uplifting of the whole Commission in moral 135
thei: names Chee in ears of ‘Sunda ‘oes closing when the vote was called. Even
the member of the Commission, who had
been counted a representative of the largest:
monied interests pressing for the change, voted in favor of the report of Mr. Corliss. The vote stood twenty-seven for closing
to nine for opening; and so the question was settled — and settled right. God had
led the leaders. God be praised for this result!
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