It is a long cry back from this day with its numbers and resources to one lone man a hundred years ago, sitting in a little chamber upstairs in the country home of a respectable farmer, a Mr. Welch, on the road between Mt. Pleasant and Washington, Pa.

      This one man was busy with his quill pen writing out "A Declaration and Address," which, when completed, he read to a handful of sympathizers in a rural community.

      We get some idea of progress when we place the decision of these people Sept. 7, 1809, to print and circulate this "Declaration and Address" among a few hundred persons to see what they would think of it, beside the Centennial aims of their historical descendants for the year 1909. "The American Christian Missionary Society: One thousand evangelists in the field, four

C. J. TANNAR.

thousand contributing churches, and $200,000 in the annual offerings. The Christian Woman's Board of Missions: Eighty-five thousand members in auxiliaries and circles, $200,000 for new stations, and $275,000 in regular offerings. The Foreign Christian Missionary Society: Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for new buildings in lands across the sea and $400,000 in offerings from churches, Bible schools and individuals. The Church Extension Board: One million dollars in the Permanent Fund. The Board of Ministerial Relief: Twenty-five thousand dollars in regular offerings and $50,000 in the Permanent Fund. The National Benevolent Association: Two hundred thousand dollars added to the Permanent Fund and the restoration of the apostolic ministry of benevolence. Our educational work: An offering from every Disciple for some college among us; the church for the college, the college for the church, and both for Christ. In a general way: One thousand recruits for the ministry this year; ten thousand organized adult Bible classes in our Bible schools; two hundred thousand trained workers; first place in the world-wide Christian Endeavor movement; $2,000,000 for missions, benevolence and education; the promotion of Christian union by practice; daily worship in every home; God our benefactor and heir.

      A religious body that can put forth such aims, and then by effort come almost up to their realization, must be possessed of large numbers of adherents, great missionary organizations, breadth of vision, wealth, culture and piety.

      Starting with one man a hundred years ago, we now have 11,700 churches, enrolling 1,335,000 members, and ministered to by 6,900 preachers and evangelists. Nine thousand Bible schools enrolling a little short of 1,000,000 pupils. Church property to the value of $30,000,000. Six great national missionary societies, together with many State organizations, which receive as voluntary offerings from our people yearly, $1,500,000. These missionary efforts have now belted the globe with chapels, schools, colleges, asylums, hospitals and homes. Our missionaries stand so far out on the frontier in that land known as the "Roof of the World," that they must needs send a messenger five hundred miles to post a letter or receive the incoming mail. They do not enjoy a daily paper and four deliveries of mail each day.

      We own or control twenty-seven colleges and universities with very creditable buildings, equipment and [422] scholarship. Their $2,000,000 of productive endowment will be multiplied many fold within a few years.

      It is comparatively easy to run lightly over this table of statistics, but how difficult to adequately depict the years of toil, the sacrifice, struggle, hopes deferred, the sweat of blood at times in the herculean task of producing all this from so small a beginning. Only those who have had part in this or in a similar work can possibly get a vision of what lies behind these figures. Like pioneers in a new land, we had to go into the forest and cut down our timber; into the mines and dig out the ore for our iron and steel; into the quarries and hew out blocks of granite, and then with ceaseless toil erect our superstructure from the first foundation-stone. But great as was this task, some greater ones have confronted us. After the converts were made, the congregations organized, the church buildings erected and the signs of material prosperity so visible that no one could doubt them, then quite another and far more difficult work had to be done. We must hold these congregations true to the real work in hand and not allow them to degenerate into merely another sinful division in the great body of God's children. They must be schooled and developed into a great, united host instead of becoming a lawless mob of self-complaisant Pharisees with no special mission beyond standing in the Temple and taking a perpetual invoice of their own good points and their neighbors' sins, and thanking God they were not like other people.

      Here, then, was a new work for us. We must lift up the eyes of our people to the white harvest-fields before them. They must maintain the liberty wherewith Christ had made them free. We must arouse missionary zeal, create a missionary conscience and formulate missionary plans that would embrace the whole world, and then raise the money and secure the men to put them into practice. Still another work was ours, and one than which we have no greater to-day. All plans fail; all works disintegrate; all movements deteriorate without competent leadership. These leaders must be so trained as to catch the spirit of the movement itself. They must breathe a certain air, and move in a certain environment, and drink from certain fountains. Colleges had to be built and equipped. Close the doors of our own colleges to-day and it is only a question of time until the walls of our Zion will begin to crumble and fall into decay. We had to get ready to educate our own preachers, teachers, missionaries, secretaries and their life companions. But with all this said, we now approach the estimate of a very important and very elusive part of our achievements. How, then, shall we compute and place before this audience the real and great work of this religious movement after a century?

      Perhaps we can close this chapter with a familiar illustration drawn from the development of the city of Pittsburg during the same century that has witnessed our growth. Contrast Pittsburg to-day with what she was when Thomas Campbell wrote the "Declaration and Address." Here are some figures from the census report of Wm. B. Irish, Deputy Marshal, in 1810:

      What of Greater Pittsburg to-day? Here is a population of about seven hundred thousand souls and the most wonderful center of manufacturing interests in the United States. Her mills and factories alone employ two hundred and fifty thousand people and turn out an annual product valued at $600,000,000. This is the second city of the United States as to banking capital and [423] surplus. The palatial homes, public buildings, churches and business houses of this city challenge the metropolis of our country.

      The development of Pittsburg has been no greater than that of our religious body. And when we come to the question of which one in its development has meant the most to the wide world in time and for eternity, we have only to weigh out souls against dollars, and character against steel.

      It may well be asked what advancement we have made in this century along the lines of grasping the real need of a divided Christendom; the best plans for meeting this need, and the purposes and ideals which called us into existence? Have we gone beyond the fathers in this matter?

      "Thomas Campbell brought to the supreme task of his life--the writing of the 'Declaration and Address'--incorruptible faith, unconquerable hope, inexhaustible love, the fullness of learning, the poise of reflection and the ripeness of experience. With entire and unconscious effacement of self he sought the glory of Christ and the happiness of mankind. He not only discovered and voiced the necessity and basis of Christian union, but he possessed the spirit of it and lived a hundred years ahead of his time."

      What are we writing to-day superior to these words?

      "Have we not seen congregations broken to pieces, neighborhoods of professing Christians, first thrown into confusion by party contentions, and in the end entirely deprived of gospel ordinances, while large tracts of country remain destitute of a gospel ministry?

      "Why should we deem it a thing incredible that the church of Christ, in this highly favored country, should resume that original unity, peace and purity which belong to its constitution and constitute its glory? Or is there anything that can be justly deemed necessary for this desirable purpose, but to conform to the model and adopt the practices of the primitive church exhibited in the New Testament?

      "Whatever alterations this might produce in any or in all of the churches should, we think, neither be deemed inadmissible nor ineligible. Surely such alterations would be every way for the better unless we should suppose the divinely inspired rule to be faulty or defective.

      "Let us come then firmly and fairly to original ground, and take up things just as the apostles left them, and in this way become disentangled from the accruing embarrassments of intervening ages. We would thus stand upon the same ground on which the church stood in the beginning.

      "Our differences are mostly to-day about the things in which the kingdom of God does not consist. What a pity the kingdom of God should be divided about such things."

      After all the critics have voiced themselves and are silent because of no more breath, what better slogan have we to ring out to-day than this ancient one: "Where the Scriptures speak, we speak, and where the Scriptures are silent, we are silent"?

      The fathers discovered that to state a matter and then to put it into practice were two quite distinct tasks, and the putting into practice was the greater. Here is where progress began, and it is to be hoped it is still going on. The "Declaration and Address" was in some respects in advance of the man who made it. It led him out, at times, an almost unwilling follower. It still leads us on.

      When Thomas Campbell, at the home of Abraham Altars, for the first time fully stated his well-thought-out views, and gathered up in one sentence a simple rule of action in the words, "Where the Scriptures speak, we speak, and where the Scriptures are silent, we are silent," Andrew Munro, a shrewd Scotch Seceder, arose and pointed out to the company one practice which they would be obliged to give up. "If we adopt that as a basis," said Mr. Munro, "there is an end of infant baptism." "Of course," said Mr. Campbell, "if infant baptism be not found in the Scriptures, we can have nothing to do with it." But Mr. Campbell was not ready to give up infant baptism. He took [424] occasion to defend infant baptism as a practice which might be justified, or, at least, be made a matter of forbearance. This, like sprinkling and pouring and immersion, might be left to the individual to determine for himself. This has to be done for the sake of peace and treated as a non-essential. He urged these views upon James Foster, who turned to him and asked with great emphasis, "Father Campbell, how could you, in the absence of any authority in the word of God, baptize a child in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit?" Mr. Campbell was quite confounded at this question. His face colored, and he replied in an offended tone, "Sir, you are the most intractable person I ever met." But later on, as was inevitable, Mr. Campbell saw the full force of his own teachings and followed them out, though many of his sympathizers turned back or went away sorrowful.

      In 1812, two years after the events narrated above, the whole question of baptism, its action, design and subjects, came up for final settlement. This time Alexander Campbell and his Presbyterian wife led out, and Thomas Campbell, his wife and daughter followed. They were all immersed by Elder Luce, a Baptist minister, June 12, 1812. This radical step of the Campbells was reached only after years of study and debate, in which they made as critical an examination of the whole subject as any scholars could at that day, and, indeed, it may be doubted whether anything new has been discovered since then upon this subject. They weighed the testimony, read again their adopted rule of action, "Where the Scriptures speak, we speak, and where the Scriptures are silent, we are silent," and they were immersed because they had to be.

      Alexander Campbell had stipulated with Elder Luce that they should be baptized according to the pattern given in the New Testament. As there was no account of any of the early converts being called upon to give a religious experience or subscribe to elaborate articles of faith, they should now be allowed to declare their faith in Jesus Christ as the only begotten Son of God and their Saviour, and that this faith accompanied by repentance should be sufficient. This was a blow at long-drawn-out doctrinal creeds and all false theories of conversion. The faith that saved was to be a believing on or into Christ.

      It was about 1827, fifteen years after the immersion of the Campbells and their union with the Baptists, that another important step was taken. Walter Scott, acting as an evangelist for certain Baptist churches, himself a careful student of the movement led by Mr. Campbell, began to put into practice the apostolic method of dealing with sinners. He resolved to cut loose from existing plans in revival meetings, preach the gospel in its simplicity, and when believing sinners cried out, "What must we do?" he would answer them as did the inspired Peter on the day of Pentecost, "Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."

      Walter Scott was a man of action as well as conviction. To believe was to do. At New Lisbon, O., he put into practice this novel plan. The Book of Acts was his model. He declared Christ and gave sinners the simple answer of apostolic days. Men were amazed. It created a great, furor in religious circles. Walter Scott was looked upon with suspicion. To some he was a wolf in sheep's clothing. It was thought best in 1828 that Thomas Campbell should visit the scene of Walter Scott's evangelistic work and see for himself what this innovation really was. Mr. Campbell wrote back the following words: "I perceive that theory and practice in religion, as well as in other things, are matters of distinct consideration. We have long known and spoken and published many things correctly concerning the ancient gospel, its simplicity and perfect adaptation to the present state of mankind, but I must confess that in respect to the direct exhibition and application of it for its blessed purpose, I am, at present, for the first time upon [425] the ground where the thing has appeared to be practically exhibited. Mr. Scott has made a bold push to accomplish this."

      In the stormy years, 1822-31, men did not always calmly reason, they sometimes fought. Words were uttered and things were done which the sober afterthought regretted. Out of these years came the separation of the Reformers from the Baptists. The necessity that led to this was regrettable. But the line of cleavage was run and it seemed impossible to avoid it.

      It is difficult for us gathered in Pittsburg to-day to think ourselves back to the time, not far distant, when we as a people had no organized missionary work.

      Some sporadic efforts at organized missionary work can be traced to an early day. In 1827 Walter Scott went out as an evangelist by the authority of the Mahoning Association, in which the Campbells were very prominent. In 1833 the five churches located in Rush and Fayette Counties, Ind., met at Little Flat Rock Church, at the call of Elder John P. Thompson, and co-operated in the sending out of John O'Kane as a missionary to labor in Indiana. In 1842 the State was divided into four missionary districts, and an evangelist appointed to labor in each.

      In 1848 Dr. James T. Barclay offered himself as a missionary to Jerusalem, and was sent.

      In 1849 the American Christian Missionary Society was organized, with Alexander Campbell as its first president.

      Then followed all our other great boards and organizations that are to-day such a power for good. With this organized missionary work, Mr. Campbell was in full accord.

      And what shall I more say, for the time would fail me to speak expressly and separately of the organization, the building and equipment of our great educational institutions, the launching and financing of our publishing companies, and all the other branches of a large and powerful religious body that rejoices as a strong man girded to run a race.

      With these years of toil and growth there has come a breadth of vision; a grasp of our real mission and destiny; an understanding of our plea in its entirety; a catholicity; a poise; a sweet reasonableness which God alone can give after years of development.

      God keep the Disciples of Christ true to their great mission and humble in his sight.

[CCR 422-426]