MOSS-GROWN MINISTERS.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 969, 9 November 1910, Page 7

MOSS-GROWN MINISTERS.

CANON HOLLAND ON ROLLING- '• ! STONES. ] In "The Commonwealth" for Septem- ' ber Canon Scott Holland objects to the ~j hypnotising of our reason by the pro- •! verb, "A rolling stone gathers no moss." '.! Ho objects to moss. It is "a dank; ; damp, nasty fungoid affair," and is "a ] signal of decadence, of impotence, of '"i stagnation, of dull, motionless, stupid ■'. indifference." "Wo ought to fear moss i like the devil." Thoreforc, he counsels, j "801 l ' onl For goodness sake, keep • rolling, or you will be caught and snar- ,' ed, and beaten." Eolling stones are ! the saints of our salvation, in Church i and State. Ah 1 How wo pine for a few ' more rolling stones in tho ministry. of ■ the Church: There tho poor old grey i things ,sit, snug in country vicarages/ I or sad in. heart-breaking slums. ' They i never move. And, over them, the heavy moss swarms—the moss of sloth, ■ ■'! or the moss of routine, or tho moss of ' despair. All tlib grit in them goes. : All tho sparkle dies away. Tho stupid j fungus growth blots out their hone ' Moss gainers' in clumps. Moss ob- '! scurcs, obliterates, swamps, blinds •■ ■ I ihero is no shnrp odgo left. . . Th»v ' : should have- been kept rolling. As soon : as ten years in a Cure had passed, tho ! Jipiscopal eyes should have watched for 1 tho "first signs of moss; and as soon as " ! they were detected, hould have insisted on u roll." . ;