Page:Famous Living Americans, with Portraits.djvu/141

 122 FAMOUS LIVING AMERICANS their enthusiastic support of the church, and enlist their hearty service. After twenty-five years he wrote of his ex- perience, as follows : ^ ' ' Its founder was one of the youngest and humblest pastors in the state of Maine, and its charter members were average boys and girls such as can be found in any New England church. The pastor was feeling about, in his youth and inex- perience, for some way of training these boys and girls in Christian service, if haply he might find it. He tried many ex- periments, ran up many blind alleys, knocked at many closed doors ; made many experiments along literary, musical and de- bating society lines ; did not despise the seductive ice cream festival or the succulent oyster as a means of interesting the youth in things religious ; but at last made the discovery that nothing but religion really appealed to the religious nature of young people ; that a prayer meeting could be made more in- teresting than a debating society, and that what young men and women really desired, though they did not always know it themselves, was to do something for the church rather than have the church do something for them. doubtless every wise man had discovered before him, he set to work on new lines, made the prayer meeting, and not the pink tea, the central feature of the Society, and service, not enter- tainment its watchword.'^ As Dr. Clark intimates, he discovered not a new truth, but an old one, which he applied to the practical problem of young people *s service. At the time he organized the new society he did not dream of the great growth before the Christian En- deavor movement. He had grappled with the problem in his own congregation and found a solution. Others having the same problem gladly welcomed the efficient Society of Chris- tian Endeavor into their church life. In a certain sense Dr. Clark interpreted the religious life of his own age, rather than turned its current into new channels. He saw this clearly, for he writes : young people was felt everywhere. Pastors and people were thinking and talking and praying about this perennial sub- ject — *How shall we attract and hold our young people?* 1 A Quarter Century of Christian Endeavor. Outlook 82 : 80-86.
 * As soon as he discovered for himself this old truth, which
 * 'The desire for a larger and more fruitful work among