GUTTER DERVISHES.

Inangahua Times, Volume VII, Issue 1199, 24 November 1882, Page 2

GUTTER DERVISHES.

; (The World.) ' We have, not hitherto made any direct comments upon the Salvation Army r.nd their doings, because we preferred not to deal with the subject till- adequate d:tta for an opinion oa the nature and results of Mr Booth's enterprise were forthcoming. That period has now arrived ; and the public ought not any longer to tolerate the soaudal to d-eeucy and religion coustij tuted by the Sahvuioi isfc posters, that stare out at us from a hundred hoardings. The warily, with its profane parodies of the ' Hues in the bills of the daily press — such as the 'Bombardment of the Forts of Beelzebub,' and the ' storming of Satan's stronghold, — is a comparatively harmless sort of buffoonery which draws a vulgar laugh from the street rowdy, but which makes the judicious grieve. Mr Booth's placards are of an altogether different order, and are calculated directly to bring religion into something worse than contempt. If obscene announcements are not allowed to offend the public eye at street corners, it' is hard to see why these blasphemousproc tarnations shoal d be suffered a larger license. Here is one of them : ivi outlay, at 2.30, in Barracks: Yankee Lass will sing and talk for Jesus, with other oificers ; 6.30, Soldiers meet at Barracks for Parade in Full Uniform: Red Handkerchiefs, White aprons and Jackets. Great Doi - gs all the wekk ; Tfrms of Peace givi nto all Keb ls Of our King. By Male and Female Warriors. The Army Doctor will attend to the Wounded. By Order of King Jesus and Mayor Cad man. Many persons, who have no symj pathy with the Salvationists and their | doings, have hesitated to condemn ! them on tho ground that they were, !or might be, doing good among the j dregs of the population, it was piti- , able that men and women, young and old, should ukucli through the streets of to\yns, ami should degrade the ' highest and holiest of names by their frenzied antics. liui» if these exhibi- , tioris kept druukarcis out, or gin-shops, I and tamed the- brutal passions of pro- | fessioiui: wife-beaters, Choy were not to be lightly spoken ot When it was | said that the proceedings of the Salvatioiikte were abhorrent to good taste, we were rem aided that they were not intended tor the edification of the upper classes, but for the spiritual instruct on and improvement of the lower ; that to these there was nothing irreverent in Mr Booth's antics; and that jus c as knowledge must be made easy for young people, so religion must be made vulgar for the mob. It was the boast of Socrates that he brought philosophy down tioin the gods to men ; it isthe boast of the Salvationists to have degraded spiritual faith from the shrine to the gutter.