The Salvation Army.

Thames Star, Volume XIV, Issue 4418, 2 March 1883, Page 4

The Salvation Army.

The*s£&s? .article .in the Victorian Eeview on the "Salvation Army" in Adelaide,]; :by, = Julian : Thomas, better known by his, worn de plnmt^ .The Vaga- -^ bdri'di" f will WK^ead with interest at the present timei'fbiiSng to the fact that the Salvation Army, baa invaded -. Sydney as well as Melbourne, and threatens all classes fKopfcMgto refuse to surrender 'it dißbfetlo#wn9|f?rae pains and penalties which a spiritual) court-martial can inflict. Mr Thom«Sj-does«not regard the proceedings .6V thV'army- in Adelaide as very : meritorious, for he says: " The Salvation Army does not hold its parades in any of .-the lanes and alleys where"vise festers. Neither the Magdalene nor the thief penitent or impenitent is here to-night. The andidnce is cotaposed of'Hhe regular habitues, whose morbid vanity is flattered by a chance of giving a prayer or address, setting forth how-ihey are • Bafe in Jesus,' •.have, as one man said, ' got a front seat booked in . Paradise.'' These generally bare some spicy anecdotes of their old comrades to narrate. Thus one man has - .twice: repeated the story,of himself and j, v^tjiates,,6ne of whoa got. bung and the "otter drowned, while he is saved to be a soldier. Secondly, there is a great proportion of idlers like myself. Thirdly, young men and women, and boys and girls who make this a meeting place, who aing all the songs, laugh during the prayers, and pair off together before the performance is over; the girl's answer to her mother when she goes home late being :;'that she was at the barracks. I speak ' but'what I have seen. : The utter lack of .decency at these meetings, men with their arms, around girls', waists, laughing and ' love-making, the jokes interchanged—all this one might anticipate in a picnic of ■ Sydney larrikins, but during a presumed - religions service-it was disgusting." So " it was, but then let justice be done even '! though the heavens should fall; it was not the soldiers who made love and courted, but the, visitors, who converted the barrack's into a place of assignation. For this the army cannot with justice be ■»; blamed. Mr Thomas maintains that the cause of religion will never be advanced • in the colonies by bringing it down to -' suit the depraved tastes of vice and ignorance;— Town and Country Journal.