Great  NSed  of  the  Country  Church 
Country  People  Need  “Vision” 
By  Walter  H.  Main 
Roprtntcd  from  The  TTtica  Saturday  Globe 
Lost  Vision. — You  cannot  walk 
through  the  country  now,  after  an  ab¬ 
sence  of  two  decades,  without  being  im¬ 
pressed  with  the  paucity  of  life.  Not 
only  are  fewer  folks  visible,  but  those 
you  meet  are  not  the  same  sort  that  used 
to  inhabit  the  country.  What’s  the  mat¬ 
ter  ? 
“Where  there  is  no  vision,”  says  Holy 
Writ,  “the  people  perish.” 
The  “vision”  has  left  the  countryside. 
It  has  pretty  much  departed  from  the 
city.  too.  The  city  never  has  had  over¬ 
much  except  what  it  got  from  the  country. 
Wheu  the  springs  dry  up,  the  riverbeds 
get  empty.  Axul  the  springs  are  drying 
up  rapidly.  For  no  people’s  benefit  has 
so  much  been  done  by  the  government  as 
for  the  farmers.  The  nation  must  eat 
and  the  farmers  are  the  men  who  can  feed 
it.  Prices  arc  higher  than  ever,  yet  eoiiu- 
the  haircloth  sofa,  the  homely  rag  rugs, 
the  simple  life,  and  the  daily  Worship  was 
brought  back  to  their  minds.  There  is 
something  away  hack  in  their  lives  that 
this  age  does  not  afford.  There  is  some¬ 
thing  different  about  it.  I've  been  in 
farm  homes  where  the  breakfast  table 
was  pushed  aside,  and  the  Bible  was 
brought  out.  and  the  household  from 
patriarch  to  smallest  child,  including  the 
help,  knelt  on  the  yellow  bare  floor  for 
daily  devotions.  There  might  be  indica¬ 
tion  of  rain,  and  the  liay  might  be  endan¬ 
gered  ;  work  everywhere  might  be  press¬ 
ing.  hut  in  that  bouse  there  was  some¬ 
thing  more  important  than  work.  There 
were  hours  enough  for  labor.  Toil  was 
not  the  only  and  supremest  thing  in  their 
lives.  And  that  other  thing,  that  super¬ 
nal  thing  which  in  Holy  Writ  is  called  the 
“vision,”  was  that  which  differentiated 
A  Typical  Church  in  an  Eastern  Rural  Community 
try  life  is  thin.  Good  roads  make  mar¬ 
keting  easy,  yet  scores  of  houses  along 
country  roads  stare  at  you  with  empty 
windows.  Telephones  and  mail  delivery 
make  rural  life  hardly  more  isolated  than 
urban  life ;  yet  folks  are  discontented. 
But  we  are  missing  the  mark  in  all  this. 
What’s  the  matter? 
The  people  have  lost  the  “vision.” 
What’s  the  “vision”? 
Wn at  Is  Tmc  “Vision”? — Well,  it’s 
hard  to  say.  Nobody  could  define  it ;  it  is 
a  something  you  can  feel,  but  not  see ;  it 
is  something  you  can  be  conscious  of,  yet 
not  he  able  to  describe.  You  may  as  well 
attempt  to  describe  the  warming  power  of 
returning  Spring,  or  the  glories  of  the 
reddening  leaves  on  the  Autumn  hillside, 
as  try  to  tell  what  the  “vision"  is.  If  we 
should  attempt  to  tell  you  what  it.  is,  we 
should  be  set  down  as  narrow,  conser¬ 
vative,  perhaps  l  igoted.  Let  us  tell  just, 
a  symptom  of  the  “vision.”  one  indica¬ 
tion  of  its  absence*  The  country  church 
is  dead,  or  dying,  the  same  country 
church  which  has  been  the  spring  umlo- 
filed  from  which  lias  flowed  the  life  blood 
of  the  city  this  half  century.  Since  the 
Civil  War  it  has  poured  out  its  life  to 
nourish  the  cities.  Take  the  middle-aged 
and  elderly  men  who  have  built  the  cities, 
the  men  who  are  the  heads  of  great  con¬ 
cerns ;  inquire  into  their  past  and  you 
will  find  a  large  proportion  of  country- 
bred  hoys,  like  the  hoy  in  the  picture  you 
remember  so  well,  the  boy  who  stands 
with  hat  in  hand,  his  mother's  hands  upon 
his  shoulders,  while  the  horse  is  waiting 
at  the  gate  to  take  him  the  first  stage  of 
his  journey  to  the  city. 
Tins  Depth  op  Like. — Life  looks  thin 
and  bare  to  you  in  that  picture.  Tko 
people  in  it  look  narrow,  poor  and  hard- 
worked.  But  there  is  a  richness  of  life, 
a  depth  to  that  simple  home  which  elderly 
men  of  to-day  know  and  do  not  talk  about 
commonly.  Yet  I’ve  seen  hard-headed 
men  of  affairs  shed  tears  and  have  heard 
them  sob  unabashed  when  the  vision  of 
them  from  beasts  of  burden,  from  bowed 
and  decrepit  peasants,  from  being  a  race 
of  “Men  with  the  Hoe.”  It  was  because 
they  had  the  “vision”  that  they  were  the 
up-standing  men  they  were,  and  their 
hoys,  bred  to  the  stern  ethical  standards 
of  their  sires,  became  the  hone  and  sinew 
of  the  cities. 
Men  of  The  Past. — Those  were  God¬ 
fearing  men  who  could  go  out  and  swing 
a  scythe  from  early  morn  until  the  din¬ 
ner  horn  sounded  ;  who  raised  good  crops 
and  plenty  of  them;  who  would  always 
extend  a  helping  hand  to  a  neighbor; 
whose  board  was  open  to  any  chance 
wayfarer,  and  Sunday  morning  found 
them  jogging  off  to  church,  leaving  the 
farm  deserted.  You  might  call  it  a  bleak 
life  they  led  ;  hut  it  made  men.  It  may 
have  been  bleak,  hut  50  years  ago  that 
bleak  life  made  a  richer  country  than  you 
will  find  to-day.  There  are  thinly  peopled 
sections  today  which  50  years  ago  were 
thriving;  there  are  empty  houses  to-day 
which  were  teeming  with  life  then.  To 
he  sure,  the  call  of  the  city  has  been  in¬ 
sistent  and  alluring;  but  that  cannot 
alone  account  for  the  thinness  of  country 
life  to-day.  New  patent  washing  machines, 
all  the  farm  machinery  that  modern  inven¬ 
tion  can  produce,  all  the  inducements  that 
agricultural  departments  can  offer,  high 
wages  and  big  prices  which  the  cities 
offer  cannot  repeople  this  land.  Exhor¬ 
tations  fail  to  populate  the  farms.  And 
the  church  sheds  are  falling  into  ruins, 
where  years  ago  scores  of  teams  stamped 
and  switched  their  tails  to  kill  flies. 
Churchyards  are  overgrown  with  weeds; 
church  window  blinds  are  closed ;  the 
steps  are  sagging  hut  not  from  much  use; 
the  hell  no  longer  tinkles  clear  in  the  Sab¬ 
bath  air  across  the  valley. 
Problems  of  Life- Where  the  coun¬ 
try  church  thrives,  there  you  will  find  the 
farms  thriving.  There  is  no  difficulty 
about  crops  in  such  sections.  Even  with¬ 
out  government  aid,  the  folks  manage  to 
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