Quotable

A very great portion of modern revivalism has been more a curse than a blessing, because it has led thousands to a kind of peace before they have known their misery; restoring the prodigal to the Father's house, and never making him say, Father, I have sinned." How can he be healed who is not sick or he be satisfied with the bread of life who is not hungry? The old-fashioned sense of sin is despised....Everything in the age is shallow....The consequence is that men leap into religion, and then leap out again. Unhumbled they came to the church, unhumbled they remained in it, and unhumbled they go from it.

   C. H. Spurgeon, 1882

American Prostestantism is characterized by a peculiar evil which I may describe by the term "spurious revivalism." The common mischief resulting from all its forms is the over-hasty reception into the communion of the churches of multitudes of persons whom time proves to have experienced no spiritual change. In most cases, these mischievous accessions are brought about by sensational human expedients. It is an unpopular thing for a minister of the gospel to bear this witness. But it is true. And my regard for that account which I must soon render at a more awful bar than that of arrogant public opinion demands its utterance.

   R. L. Dabney, 1892