PERFECT LOVE RELIGIONISTS.

Southland Times, Issue 1069, 7 December 1868, Page 3

PERFECT LOVE RELIGIONISTS.

■» The American Correspondent of the ' Otago Daily Times' has furnished that j journal with the following particulars of a recent great Camp Meeting of one of those singular bodies of religionists which flourish so remarkable a manner in American soil : — A great national camp meeting of the Perfect Love Religionists has taken place in Pennsylvania, The meeting was held in the open air, and it is estimated that 25,000 of the Faithful were present. These Perfect Love Religionists appear to regard everything as a blessing — misfortune is good fortune, and ruin, disaster, disease, are things to be desired and to be thankful for. To be a Perfect Love Eeligionist you must be above all human passions, and superior to all human impulses. Thanksgivings are offered up for every calamity, and the greater the calamity the more ardent are the thanks for it. If you are cheated in business -you must bless the man who robs you ; if you neighbor sets fire to your house, you must bless him for the villany ; if a stranger desires your money, you must give it to him, and thank him for relieving you of it; if you are slandered you must pray for the slanderer, and smile upon him with Perfect Love ; if the wife of your bosom plays you false, you mnst go upon your knees, and offer up praise for the male mortal who is implicated. If you do not do these things you do not practise the doctrine of entire sanctification, and you are not a Perfect Lovite. If the prayers of the Perfect Lovites are heard as surely they must be, everybody will be saved, for nothing in the world is wrong. Nothing is past praying for, and even the little bugs and fleas which nip them in their beds are praiseworthy little insects j and' desire to be blessed. " Oh, sisters," exhorts one man looking round upon the multitude, upon the mass of human frailty which clusters about him, " Oh, ( sisters, if you want to get along well at home, get a plenty of religion. Oh ! what an antidote is this perfect love to take away all envy, jealousy, anger ! Oh ! let us have religion to-day, by the Grace of G-od." .Response " from inspired frailty : " Amen! " Then another speaker, an Irishman, starts up and says, '• I've known the time when I was knocked down and kicked for the Lord, and I never felt happier anywhere. Hallelujah ! Chorus of frail flesh: "Hallelujah!" A German women says : " I married my first husband in Mount Joy, and I've lived at Mannheim, and now I've come five miles to meet the people of the Lord from all parts of the world." Chorus of voices : " Hallelujah !" Gernion woman : I want to plunge myself in to purple flood. Singing — We're going home, we're going home, we're going home to die no more 3 To die no more ! To die no more !

We're going home to die no more ! A pale looking man saya, " Where I work, money is hard to get ; it is very tight , and it seemed as if there were difficulties in the way of my coming here. The Sunday morning before the campmeeting, I had but fife dollars. At one of my poorest appointments, however, one of the brethren handed me more than I received for the whole year, from that appointment ; still I had only half enough to pay my expenses here. But I still looked towards coming ; and a brother came up to me and said, ' Here, you will want a little money;' and he showed me enough to pay all my expenses. Last night, the. Lord gave me the evidence that my soul was purified, sanctified;, and,, oh! I bless .him this morning for full and complete salvation-:- ..,.- My grief a burden long Has been, Because I was not saved from sin, But we're going home, we're going home," we're going home to die no more ! ;• . . - - - "I want to say," announces another, i " that if there is any brother here who is j seeking holiness, and who has not the means to pay, let hi ai give me the word, and I will see that he has the means. If I hav'nt it in my own pocket, I have it here on the ground* JJet anyone who

seeks for holiness, and wants help, send word to Sister Gardiner's tent. 1 have been living these twenty-six years in perfect love, not always in the full light ; sometimes it has been twilight with me." Then a young woman screams out some unintelligible words, and crying, " Oh,. glory ! oh, glory !" springs from her seat, and embraces another womsta near, after which she sinks upon the ground, and closes her eyes and moans " Oh,, glory! Oh, glory!" a dozen times. These, and such like manifestations continue for two or three hours, and then the meeting closes.