The Rhode Island Republican

No. 51

[From the Providence City Gazette.]

ACCIDENT.

We are very much abashed to learn—and sorry are we that a sense of duty compels us to state the fact—that a clergyman attached to the ancient and orthodox order of the Baptists, has, by accident, not design, had the misfortune to increase the multitude of his flock, by adding to it a little innocent brother or sister—we do not know which—'tho which' as St. Paul says, came disreputably and dishonorably into this breathing world, and very much in contradistinction to the wishes of its 'pious' father. Before we go one inch further, it is proper to assert, lest our own good parent church be scandalized, that the father and the offspring are residents of another State, and are not of the 'elect' of Rhode-Island. By this sad accident, the church is scandalized, and we as a baptist by birth and adoption are mortified. Such accidents will now and then happen, however, and it will not avail us if we weep over them till doomsday. We, who entertain the most profound regard for our mother church, had hoped most devoutly that the good people of the Baptist denomination would not be thus outraged; but the affliction has fallen on us, and let us make the best of an honorable effort to wipe away the stain.

The odium which has been cast upon the escutcheon of the church, by the aberrative of this frail brother and unfortunate sister, must be wiped away! The thing must be accomplished; and, how shall it be done? By hushing up the matter, as was the case with the city parson who dealt in 'buttons' or, as it was in the case of the Reverend Eph'm K. Avery! No, no! Let not that kind of mistaken policy be pursued any longer; but, on the contrary, let every good member of the church employ himself, to ferret out and expose the delinquencies of the offender, and bring him to the punishment which, if he be guilty, he so richly merits! This matter of 'hushing up' the delinquencies of clergymen, should be discarded. It will not answer to follow it any longer; and the welfare of the church and the success of the gospel of the cross, demand that all rapscallions should be punished. We would punish them with undoubted severity—we would not suffer one of the offenders to escape. The church has suffered much, and very justly, by attempting to screen her offenders from the odium of the world and the penalties of the law, and will she not profit by past history and example?—As matters of this kind have been managed in times 'agone.' they have only had a direct tendency to increase the catalogue of crime; for clergymen have been made to believe, that they can violate the laws of the land, and the decencies of society, with impunity; and thus emboldened, they have been left to commit almost any kind of excess, if it but pleased them to do so.

In the case of the offending brother—now before us. we, who profess, with equal zeal and sincerity, to be advocates of the purity of the American Baptist church, hope that no 'hushing' will be had; on the contrary, if the guilt of the offender be proved—and of that there can be no doubt—let every member of the faith and order, unite and blow his infamous fame to the four quarters of the world. Let him be known and marked as an apostate to God and the church—let his infamy be recorded as indelibly in the archives of hell as the purity of the saints is on the tablets of high heaven—and, let him not escape the vengeance of that society whose good name he has reproached. His offences are rank and naked, and abominable—and let them be not forgotten till they are punished. If an attempt is made to hush up the matter, the church will be scandalized; but, if the 'fathers' surrender him to the laws, and to the just indignation of an outraged society, they will gain the confidence of the world, and give assurance, that they are not disposed to screen the guilty. If the 'brother' has got a beam in his own eye, it is time that he were denied the privilege of attempting to cast the mote out of the eye of the congregation of the church. We close, by re-expressing the hope that no 'hush money' will be paid, and that no good man will unite in an effort to palm a guilty and an abandoned apostate upon virtuous society.