{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_36757/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_36757","id":"gutenberg_36757","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/36757","summary":null,"tags":["Category: History - Modern (1750+)","Category: History - Warfare","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","World War, 1914-1918","World War, 1914-1918 -- Religious aspects"],"text":"</pre>\n\n\n\nProduced by Chris Pinfield, Dave Kline and the Online\nDistributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This\nfile was produced from images generously made available\nby The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n  RELIGION AND THE WAR\n\n\n\n\n  RELIGION AND THE WAR\n\n  BY MEMBERS OF THE FACULTY OF THE\n  SCHOOL OF RELIGION, YALE UNIVERSITY\n\n  EDITED BY\n\n  E. HERSHEY SNEATH, PH.D., LL.D.\n\n  [Illustration]\n\n  NEW HAVEN\n  YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS\n  LONDON: HUMPHREY MILFORD\n  OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS\n  MDCCCCXVIII\n\n  COPYRIGHT, 1918, BY\n  YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS\n\n\n\n\n  PUBLISHED ON THE FOUNDATION\n  ESTABLISHED IN MEMORY OF\n\n  JAMES WESLEY COOPER\n\n  OF THE CLASS OF 1865, YALE COLLEGE\n\n\nThe present volume is the second work published by the Yale University\nPress on the James Wesley Cooper Memorial Publication Fund. This\nFoundation was established March 30, 1918, by a gift to Yale\nUniversity from Mrs. Ellen H. Cooper in memory of her husband, Rev.\nJames Wesley Cooper, D.D., who was born in New Haven, Connecticut,\nOctober 6, 1842, and died in New York City, March 16, 1916. Dr. Cooper\nwas a member of the Class of 1865, Yale College, and for twenty-five\nyears pastor of the South Congregational Church of New Britain,\nConnecticut. For thirty years he was a corporate member of the\nAmerican Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions and from 1885\nuntil the time of his death was a Fellow of Yale University, serving\non the Corporation as one of the Successors of the Original Trustees.\n\n  Not in dumb resignation,\n    We lift our hands on high;\n  Not like the nerveless fatalist,\n    Content to do and die.\n  Our faith springs like the eagle's,\n    That soars to meet the sun,\n  And cries exulting unto Thee,\n    \"O Lord, Thy will be done.\"\n\n  When tyrant feet are trampling\n    Upon the common weal,\n  Thou dost not bid us bend and writhe\n    Beneath the iron heel;\n  In Thy name we assert our right\n    By sword, or tongue, or pen,\n  And e'en the headsman's axe may flash\n    Thy message unto men.\n\n  Thy will,--it bids the weak be strong;\n    It bids the strong be just:\n  No lip to fawn, no hand to beg,\n    No brow to seek the dust.\n  Wherever man oppresses man\n    Beneath the liberal sun,\n  O Lord, be there, Thine arm made bare,\n    Thy righteous will be done.\n\n      --JOHN HAY.\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\n\nReligious interests are quite as much involved in the world war as\nsocial and political interests. The moral and spiritual issues are\ntremendous, and the problems that arise concerning \"the mighty hopes\nthat make us men,\"--hopes that relate to the Kingdom of God on\nearth,--are such as not only to perplex our most earnest faith, but\nalso to challenge our most consecrated purpose. It is the sincere hope\nof those who have contributed to this volume that it may prove helpful\nin the solution of some of these problems.\n\n  E. H. S.\n\n  Yale University,\n    August 21, 1918\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\n                                                            PAGE\n\n    I. Moral and Spiritual Forces in the War                  11\n         Charles Reynolds Brown, D.D., LL.D., Dean of\n         the School of Religion and Pastor of the University\n         Church\n\n   II. God and History                                        22\n         Douglas Clyde Macintosh, Ph.D., Professor of\n         Theology\n\n  III. The Christian Hope in Times of War                     33\n         Frank Chamberlin Porter, Ph.D., Professor of\n         Biblical Theology\n\n   IV. Non-Resistance: Christian or Pagan?                    59\n         Benjamin Wisner Bacon, D.D., Litt.D., LL.D.,\n         Professor of New Testament Criticism and\n         Interpretation\n\n    V. The Ministry and the War                               82\n         Henry Hallam Tweedy, M.A., Professor of Practical\n         Theology\n\n   VI. The Effect of the War upon Religious Education        105\n         Luther Allan Weigle, Ph.D., D.D., Professor of\n         Christian Nurture\n\n  VII. Foreign Missions and the War, Today and Tomorrow      122\n         Harlan P. Beach, D.D., F.R.G.S., Professor of the\n         Theory and Practice of Missions\n\n VIII. The War and Social Work                               141\n         William Bacon Bailey, Ph.D., Professor of\n         Practical Philanthropy\n\n   IX. The War and Church Unity                              151\n         Williston Walker, Ph.D., D.D., Professor of\n         Ecclesiastical History\n\n    X. The Religious Basis of World Re-Organization          161\n         E. Hershey Sneath, Ph.D., LL.D., Professor of\n         the Philosophy of Religion and Religious Education\n\n\n\n\nI\n\nMORAL AND SPIRITUAL FORCES IN THE WAR\n\nCHARLES REYNOLDS BROWN\n\n\nIn one of our more thoughtful magazines we were favored last February\nwith an article entitled, \"Peter Sat by the Fire Warming Himself.\" It\nwas a bitter, undiscriminating arraignment of the ministers and\nchurches of the United States for their alleged lack of intelligent,\nsympathetic interest in the war. It was written by an Englishman who\nfor several years has been vacillating between the ministry and\nsecular journalism, but is now the pastor of a small church in\nnorthern New York. The vigor of his literary style in trenchant\ncriticism was matched by an equally vigorous disregard for many of the\nplain facts in the case. His tone, however, was loud and confident, so\nthat the article secured for itself a wide reading.\n\n\"What became of the spiritual leaders of America during those\nthirty-two months when Europe and parts of Asia were passing through\nGehenna?\" the writer of this article asked in scornful fashion. And\nthen after listing the enormities of the mad military caste which\nheads up at Potsdam, he asked the clergymen of the United States, \"Why\nwere you so scrupulously neutral, so benignly dumb?\" His main\ncontention was to the effect that the religious leaders of this\ncountry had been altogether negligent of their duty in the present\nworld struggle, and that the churches were small potatoes and few in a\nhill.\n\nIt has been regarded as very good form in certain quarters to cast\naspersion upon the ministers of the Gospel. When the war came men\nbegan to ask, sometimes with a sneer, and sometimes with a look of\npain, \"Why did not Christianity prevent the war?\" It never seemed to\noccur to anyone to ask, \"Why did not Science prevent the war?\" No one\nsupposed that Science would or could. It was the most scientific\nnation on earth which brought on the war.\n\nIt never occurred to anyone to ask, \"Why did not Big Business, or the\nNewspapers, or the Universities prevent the war?\" No one supposed that\ncommerce or the press or education could avert such disasters. These\nuseful forms of social energy are not strong enough. They do not go\ndeep enough in their hold upon the lives of men to curb those forces\nof evil which let loose upon the world this frightful war. It was a\nmagnificent tribute which men paid to the might of spiritual forces\nwhen they asked, sometimes wistfully, and sometimes scornfully, \"Why\ndid not Christianity prevent the war?\"\n\nThe terrible events of the last four years have taught the world a few\nlessons which it will not soon forget. They have shown us the utter\nimpotence of certain forces in which some shortsighted people were\ninclined to put their whole trust: The little toy gods of the\nAmorites--Evolution, with a capital E, not as the designation of a\nmethod which all intelligent people recognize, but as a kind of\nhome-made deity operating on its own behalf! The Zeitgeist, the Spirit\nof the Age, all in capitals! The \"Cosmic Urge,\" whatever that\npretentious phrase may mean in the mouths of those who use it in\ngrandiloquent fashion! The \"Stream of Progress,\" the idea that there\nare certain resident forces in the physical order itself which make\ninevitably for human well-being and advance quite apart from any\nthought of God!\n\nAll these have shown themselves no more able to safeguard the welfare\nof society than so many stone images. They broke down utterly in the\npresence of those forces of evil which now menace the very fabric of\ncivilization. The forces of self-interest unhallowed and undirected by\nany finer forms of spiritual energy have covered a whole continent\nwith grief and pain. They have written a most impressive commentary\nupon that word of the ancient prophet, \"The wicked shall be turned\ninto hell, and all the nations that forget God.\" Men are saying on all\nsides that unless hope is to be found in religion, in the action of\nthe spirit of the Living God upon the lives of men, then hope there is\nnone. What other guarantee have we that the greed and the lust, the\nhatred and the ambition of wrong-hearted men may not again wreck the\nhopes of the race!\n\nBut still that question presses for an answer--Why did not these\nspiritual forces for which Christianity stands prevent the war? I have\nmy own idea about that. It was because we did not have enough of\nChristianity on hand in those fateful summer days of 1914, and what we\nhad was not always of the right sort. In certain countries the\nchurches had been emphasizing the personal and private virtues of\nsobriety, chastity, kindliness and the like; they had been preparing\nthe souls of men for residence in a blessed Hereafter. But they had\nnot given adequate attention to the organized life of men in political\nand economic relations. They had not sufficiently exalted the\nweightier matters of justice, mercy and truth in the social organism.\nThese things they ought to have done, and not to have left the other\nundone.\n\nThe founder of our faith in the first public address he gave there in\nthe synagogue at Nazareth struck the social note clearly and firmly.\n\"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he hath anointed me to\npreach good tidings to the poor. He hath sent me to bind up the\nbroken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, to set at\nliberty them that are bruised, and to proclaim\"--in all the high\nplaces of the organized life of the race--\"the acceptable year of the\nLord.\"\n\nThis was the platform on which he stood. This indicated the spirit and\nmethod of his mission. Organized and corporate righteousness was to be\nan essential element in the Gospel of the Son of God. The leaders of\nour Christian faith should have been voicing that same demand for\nsocial righteousness all the way from Berlin to Bagdad, and from\nLondon to the uttermost parts of the earth. The only Christianity\nwhich can avert similar disaster in the future is that Christianity\nwhich, like the Apostles of old, goes everywhere, preaching and\npractising the Gospel of the Kingdom, the sway and rule of the Divine\nSpirit in all the affairs of men.\n\nIt was highly significant, however, that the one nation in Europe\nwhich had gone farthest toward an atheistic materialism, toward a\nphilosophy of force, a complete reliance upon physical efficiency and\nmental cleverness quite apart from any moral considerations, toward a\nflat indifference to all those manifestations of the religious spirit\nwhich are found in public worship, in missionary effort, and in the\ncultivation of a humble, devout spirit--it was the nation which had\ngone farthest in that direction which did more than any other nation\nto bring on the war.\n\nAnd, conversely, it was that nation which had gone farther than any\nother nation in Europe toward making the religion of Jesus Christ a\npower for good in public and in private life which did more than any\nother single nation in those fateful July days to avert the war, and\nwhen war came it was that same nation which did more than any other\nnation to resist the encroachments of lawlessness and crime as we have\nseen them in Belgium and in northern France. We have had abundant\nreason to thank God for the Christianity there was in the lives of\nsuch men as Herbert H. Asquith, Arthur J. Balfour, and David Lloyd\nGeorge, and in the lives of the brave men and women who have nobly\nsustained them in their righteous contention. We could only have\nwished that the world had been possessed of a hundred times as much of\nthat sort of Christianity; that would have prevented the war.\n\nAnd when war came these spiritual forces still had something to say\nfor themselves. Christianity had been pressing home upon the hearts of\nmen those more vital principles until nine-tenths of all the earth was\nashamed of the war. Not a single nation was willing to stand up and\naccept responsibility for bringing it on--not even Germany. That\nmilitary caste in Potsdam has tried by all manner of intellectual\nshuffling to save its face by seeking to make it appear to its own\npeople that the war was one of self-defense thrust upon them by\nunscrupulous enemies. The claim was so absurd that the whole world\nlaughed it to scorn, even before the striking revelations were made by\nPrince Lichnowsky, the German ambassador at London in the summer of\n1914. The effort did, however, serve to make plain the fact that the\nGerman Government has not entirely lost the power of being ashamed of\nitself.\n\nOne hundred years ago it was not so. The Napoleonic wars dragged out\ntheir weary length for twenty-two sad years, but it never occurred to\nNapoleon or to France to apologize for those wars which were, for the\nmost part, frankly wars of aggression and conquest. War was taken as a\nmatter of course. It was costly, irrational, inhuman, then as it is\nnow, but it did not have arrayed against it the moral sense of the\nrace as that moral sense has come to be arrayed against this method of\nsettling international difficulties in this twentieth century. In\nthese days war is looked upon by all right-minded nations as the\ndevil's own business, only to be accepted by right-minded nations as a\nlast dire necessity when thrust upon them by governments which scruple\nnot at either honor or right. It is something for the spiritual forces\nof earth to have accomplished that.\n\nMoreover, when the war came never before in all its history had the\nworld seen so much done in the way of humane service. It has been done\nto relieve the pain of wounded soldiers and to meet the necessities of\nthose helpless people whose homes have been destroyed by the ravages\nof war. It has all been done in the name of the Red Cross--the name is\nsignificant, as is the spirit behind it. It is the flowering out, not\nof Buddhism or Mohammedanism, not of some fancy brand of atheism or\nsome philosophy of force--men do not gather grapes of thorns nor figs\nfrom thistles. It is the flowering out of the religion of him who died\nfor men upon a cross.\n\nThe people of this country alone came forward and in a single week by\nvoluntary contributions gave one hundred millions of dollars for this\nhumane service. Then within less than a year the same people\ncontributed a further fund of one hundred and seventy millions of\ndollars for the relief of wounded soldiers and for the relief of\nstricken people in Belgium and Poland, in Serbia and Armenia, whose\nnames we do not know, whose languages we cannot speak, but whose\nsufferings we have made our own in warmest sympathy. It was the\nresponse of a nation to the words of its Master--\"I was hungry and ye\nfed me. I was naked and ye clothed me. I was sick and in prison and ye\nvisited me. I was a stranger and ye took me in.\" It is something for\nthe spiritual forces to have thus enthroned the spirit of humane\nservice in the hearts of men.\n\nMore than that, never before in military history has so much been done\nto safeguard the moral welfare of the young men who have been called\nto the colors. The officers of our own army and of those armies with\nwhom we are allied have by personal example and by public utterance\nstruck a clear, firm note for sobriety and clean living, which cannot\nbe matched in the history of any other war.\n\nThe Young Men's Christian Association by its work for the soldiers has\nleaped at a bound into a place of national and international\nsignificance. And the Young Men's Christian Association is simply the\nChristian church functioning in a particular way. Its honored head,\nJohn R. Mott, was converted in and is now a member of the Methodist\nEpiscopal Church. Its secretaries and other workers are drawn, all of\nthem, from the membership of our churches. And the money which makes\npossible its world-wide activities is given mainly by the people of\nthe churches. The people of this country were asked for thirty-five\nmillions of dollars, and in a single week they oversubscribed the\nrequest, giving fifty millions of dollars to carry on this fine form\nof Christian effort. It was the act of a nation saying to the young\nmen under arms, \"Fight your good fight but keep your faith, and finish\nyour course with honor, that there may be laid up for every man of you\na crown of rejoicing.\"\n\nAnd more than that, the spiritual forces at work in this broad land\nhave kept the motives of our country high and fine. We have not\nentered into this war with any selfish desire for conquest--as God\nknows our hearts, we do not covet an acre of territory belonging to\nany other power on earth. We have not entered this war with any sordid\ndesire for material gain. We were already becoming disgracefully rich\nin the manufacture of munitions and in furnishing supplies to the\nbelligerent nations. If they could have fought it through without our\nhelp, it would have been money in our purse to have stayed out--as it\nis, it will cost us no one can say how many billions of dollars. We\nhave not entered this war in any spirit of touchiness because our\nnational honor has been offended--it has been offended most\ngrievously, but we are too strong and too sane to plunge a whole\ncountry into war for that.\n\nWe are not undertaking to punish Germany, greatly as we believe the\npresent government of Germany needs punishing. We remember who it was\nwho said, \"Vengeance is mine. I will repay, saith the Lord,\" and we\nare content to leave the matter of penalty in his powerful hands. We\nare not undertaking to dictate to the German people what sort of\ngovernment they should have. We are willing they should have any sort\nof government they like, so long as they keep it for home consumption.\nWe believe here that all governments derive their just powers from the\nconsent of the governed. We confess to a frank preference for the\nmethods of democracy, and we could wish no happier lot for any land\nthan to live under the reign of the common people. We like to remember\nthat in the year of our Lord 1815, Great Britain and her Allies put a\ncertain island on the map--they put the island of St. Helena on the\nmap by banishing to that island the disturber of the peace of Europe.\nAnd if in the year of our Lord 1919 the United States and her Allies\nshould in similar fashion put some other island on the map by\nbanishing to that island the present disturber of the peace of Europe,\nnine-tenths of all the human race would rise up and thank God.\n\nWe entered upon this war because we were not willing to stand by and\nallow other nations to be crippled and broken in the resistance they\nwere offering to lawlessness and crime, and in the defense they were\nmaking for those principles of justice and freedom which are the glory\nof our own national history. And so we have come forward to do our\npart and to fill up that which is lacking in the sacrifices which\nother nations have been making for the sake of principle.\n\nAs I move about among my fellow citizens, north, south, east and west,\nthese are the questions which I find engaging their minds: Is might to\nbe allowed to usurp the place of right, or are we here to see to it\nthat in the long run right is the only might? Is international good\nfaith only an empty phrase, or is it a magnificent reality in the\nmoral world to be upheld at any cost? Is that body of usages and\nagreements slowly built up by centuries of effort, which constitutes\nour international law, to be trampled under foot by any nation for the\nsake of some immediate advantage, or is it meant to be obeyed? Is the\nwhole world to be permanently at the mercy of any military caste which\nmay undertake to impose its will upon the rest of mankind by the\npractice of frightfulness, or is there possible some such World League\nof Nations as shall have both the mind and the power to keep the peace\nand good order of the world?\n\nThese are moral questions. They are religious questions, where there\nis a will of God to be ascertained and realized. And because our\npeople have vision for the full recognition of the place spiritual\nforces have in the making of history, this struggle enlists the\ncomplete moral support of the nation.\n\nIt was the moral idealism of the war which brought Great Britain and\nall her distant colonies promptly into line the moment the moral\nquality of the German Government stood revealed in all its hideousness\nby its outrage upon Belgium. It was the moral passion of Britain which\nenabled her to raise by voluntary enlistment an army of more than five\nmillions of men.\n\nIt was the moral idealism of the war which brought all sections of our\nown country strongly to the support of the President when the fact was\nmade plain that it was a fight for the right of free peoples to live\nand move and have their being in honor. It was the moral idealism of\nthe war which brought the choicest youth of our land, the sons of good\nfortune and the sons of toil, the young men of the colleges and the\nyoung men less privileged, to stand shoulder to shoulder in this\nstruggle for righteousness. We have seen it on the Campus here at\nYale, as other men have seen it in all the colleges and universities\nof the land. The spirit of our youth has been nobly expressed in those\nlines on \"The Spires of Oxford\":\n\n  I saw the spires of Oxford\n  As I was passing by,\n  The gray spires of Oxford\n  Against the pearl-gray sky;\n  My heart was with the Oxford men\n  Who went abroad to die.\n\n  The years go fast in Oxford,\n  The golden years and gay.\n  The hoary colleges look down\n  On careless boys at play;\n  But when the bugles sounded war\n  They put their games away.\n\n  They left the peaceful river,\n  The cricket field, the quad,\n  The shaven lawns of Oxford\n  To seek a bloody sod;\n  They gave their merry youth away\n  For country and for God.\n\n  God rest you happy, gentlemen,\n  Who laid your good lives down,\n  Who took the khaki and the gun\n  Instead of cap and gown.\n  God bring you to a fairer place\n  Than even Oxford town.\n\nIt was a great Christian statesman, it was William Ewart Gladstone,\nprime minister of Great Britain, who said more than thirty years ago,\n\"The greatest triumph of the twentieth century will be the\nenthronement of the idea of public right as the governing idea in the\naffairs of Europe.\" We are here this day to assist with the last ounce\nof our strength and with the full might of our moral purpose in the\nenthronement and the coronation of that idea of public right as the\ngoverning idea in the affairs of the whole world.\n\nThe moral values which are at stake in all this national and\ninternational action have been made so clear in the fierce red light\nwhich has beat upon the world that the very conscience of the country\nhas put on khaki. The moral sense of the whole nation has become\nmilitant. The brave men and women of this land are working and\nfighting for human betterment with their eyes upon that social order\nwhich hath foundations whose builder and maker is God. And because we\nfeel that our cause is just, we feel in our arms and in our hearts,\neach man of us, the strength of ten.\n\nMay we not believe that this country, strong and brave, generous and\nhopeful, is called of God to be in its own way a Messianic nation in\nwhose mighty unfolding life all the nations of the earth may be\nblessed? Hear these words of an ancient prophet and make them your\nown! \"What people has God so nigh unto them as the Lord our God is in\nall things that we call upon Him for? Has God assayed to take him a\nnation from the midst of another nation by signs, by wonders and by\nwar, as the Lord hath done for you? Did ever a people hear the Voice\nof God speaking out of the midst of the fire as thou hast heard? What\nnation has statutes and judgments so righteous as the law which I set\nbefore you this day? Keep therefore and do them, for this is your\nwisdom and your understanding among the nations.\"\n\nIt is for this country to keep its motives high and fine, to set its\naffections upon those principles of action which are above the dead\nlevel of self-interest, and to so bear itself in the service of the\nhigher civilization that in its purposes and methods all the nations\nof the earth may be blessed.\n\n  O beautiful my country, ours once more,\n  What were our lives without thee,\n  What all our lives to save thee!\n  We reek not what we give thee,\n  We will not dare to doubt thee,\n  But ask whatever else and we will dare.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\nGOD AND HISTORY\n\nDOUGLAS CLYDE MACINTOSH\n\n\nMost urgent among the religious problems of the day is the question as\nto the relation of God to the events of current history. As was to be\nexpected, many erroneous notions are prevalent concerning divine\nprovidence and the present war. Some of these errors are owing to\nintellectual confusion; others, however, impress one as due to an\nalmost wilful perversion of the impulses of religious faith. In any\ncase, most conspicuous among the erroneous doctrines of the day with\nreference to divine providence is that voiced by the German Emperor,\nin speaking of the Teutonic triumph over disorganized Russia. His\nwords are reported as follows: \"The complete victory fills me with\ngratitude. It permits us to live again one of those great moments in\nwhich we can reverently admire God's hand in history. What turn events\nhave taken is by the disposition of God.\" One could scarcely be blamed\nfor inferring that the Kaiser imagines, or affects to believe, that\nthe Almighty has entered into a favored-nation treaty of some sort\nwith Germany. But even this would seem to fall short of what is\nclaimed. We quote further from the same theological authority. \"The\nyear 1917 with its great battles has proved,\" he asserts, with almost\nincredible simple-mindedness, \"that the German people has in the Lord\nof Creation above an unconditional and avowed ally on whom it can\nabsolutely rely.\" This curious reversion to religious tribalism in the\ncase of the German Emperor is not without its parallel in the belief\nof his subjects. Assiduously taught, as they have been, that they are\nfighting a justified defensive war, and praying, as they have been,\nfor victory over their enemies, their conviction has come to be,\npretty generally, what a German-American in the early days of the war\nexpressed in these words, \"If Germany doesn't win this war, there is\nno God!\" Well, in view of what the world knows as to the causation and\nthe conduct of this war on the part of Germany, the only answer so\npreposterous a doctrine deserves is that given by ex-President Taft,\n\"Germany has mistaken the devil for God!\"\n\nBut the Germans are not the only ones who are cherishing mistaken\nnotions as to the providence of God in human affairs. We and our\nAllies reject the idea of a national God, and any notion of the \"Lord\nof Creation\" being our \"unconditional ally.\" The morally perfect God\nis too just and impartial to have any favorites among the nations,\nwhether Jewish, or German, or British, or American. Might does not\nmake right, we know; and no more is might an infallible index to God's\nwill. God is not necessarily \"on the side of the heaviest battalions.\"\nOn the contrary, the true God, as the God of righteousness, must be,\nwe feel sure, on the side of right and justice, whichever side that\nmay be. Being confident, therefore, of the justice of our cause, we\nfeel that we have the best of reasons for believing that we are\nfighting on the side of God, as well as for the true well-being of\nhumanity.\n\nSo far, good; but many among us proceed to put two and two together\nand find that they make five. If we are on the side of human rights\nand the will of God, and if God is sufficient for our religious needs,\nis it not clear that we may be absolutely certain of winning the war,\nwhatever temporary reverses may have to be encountered? Moreover,\nespecially since we have had our days of prayer for victory, are we\nnot entitled to sing,\n\n  Then conquer we must, for our cause it is just,\n  And this be our motto, \"In God is our trust\"?\n\nIndeed, so satisfied are we with the logic of our position that\nmultitudes of us would agree with the sentiment expressed by a\nBritish-American in the early days of the war, \"If Germany wins this\nwar, there is no God.\"\n\nBut there are reasons for doubting the correctness of this view. Right\nmakes God's will, surely enough; but is it certain that the side whose\ncause is just will win the war, simply because it is the side of right\nand of God? Ultimately, we may be sure, right must prevail, for wrong\nis not the sort of thing that can permanently succeed; it contains\nwithin itself the germs of its own ultimate destruction. But nothing\nin history can be surer than that this ultimate judgment upon evil\ndoes not necessarily involve the defeat of all unjustified military\nundertakings. The side with the greater moral justification has not\nalways won its battles, nor even its wars. It is not enough to have\njustice on our side; we must use our might on the side of right. Right\nhas to be worked for, and sometimes it has to be fought for. That is\nthe kind of world that--not unfortunately for our development,\nprobably--we are living in. And the fighting is no sham battle. Its\nissue is not predetermined. It is being decided while the fighting is\ngoing on.\n\nMoreover, with reference to prayer as a military factor, it is only\nfair to note that in the present war many sincere and believing\nprayers for victory have been offered on both sides. It is not\nintended to deny that religion of a certain sort is an important\nmilitary factor; sincere and believing prayer for a cause that is\nregarded as sacred and just undoubtedly helps morale, both in the army\nand throughout the nation. But it is a factor which in this war has\noperated on both sides. Man has the capacity for misusing not only\nphysical, but even spiritual forces. But, on the other hand, when\nprayer and religious faith encourage an easy-going attitude, and are\nthus made to some extent a substitute for effort, such prayer and\nfaith cannot but prove a serious military hindrance, no matter how\njust the cause may be that they are designed to support. They may even\nconceivably make enough of a difference on the wrong side to lead to\nthe defeat of righteousness.\n\nThese notions as to God's providence in war, which we have criticized\nas manifestly mistaken and dangerously misleading, are symptomatic of\nconfused and muddy thinking on the whole subject of the providence of\nGod in human history. How does God secure his adequate providential\ncontrol of the course of history? One theory is that he has secured it\nby having absolutely predetermined from the beginning all events of\nnature and history, so that all process is the simple unfolding of\nwhat has been eternally decreed. There are the strongest ethical and\nreligious reasons for refusing to accept this unproved and unprovable\ndogma. On the one hand, it would mean that man's consciousness of free\nagency and moral responsibility would have to be regarded as quite\nillusory, since what has been decided and made inevitable before man's\nlife began cannot have been originated by man himself. On the other\nhand, this predestination doctrine would mean that God should be\nregarded as the real and responsible cause of all evil, including what\nwe call human sin. No such God would be moral enough to be trustworthy\nor deserving of human adoration.\n\nAnother theory as to how God secures his adequate providential control\nof the course of events is that it is by various sorts of arbitrary or\nunconditioned interventions in external nature, as well as in human\nlife, in order to realize the ends he may desire to accomplish from\ntime to time. It has often been suggested, for instance, that a\nmiracle of this sort took place at the Marne, preventing the German\nentry into Paris. But this theory is open to the objection that it\nraises three unanswerable questions. In the first place, how can we be\nsure that such interventions have taken place, particularly in the\nexternal world? How do you suppose it will ever be established\nsufficiently for confident rational belief, that only by special\nmiracle were the German armies turned back from Paris in 1914? In the\nsecond place, if such special miraculous interventions do take place\nfor the sake of preventing evil, why do they not take place oftener,\nespecially in these times of unprecedented disaster to human life? A\nmiracle like that of the Marne, such as would have turned the Turks\nback from the helpless Armenians, would have been much appreciated.\nBut, for a third question, if such miracles were to take place as\noften as this theory of providence would seem to call for, what would\nbecome of the order of nature, and how could man learn what to expect,\nor how to adjust himself to his environment?\n\nAs against these theories of absolute predetermination and arbitrary\nintervention, we may point out that God secures his adequate\nprovidential control of the course of history in two principal ways,\nviz., by _enough_ predetermination of events to give man a\ndependable universe to live in and learn from, and by _enough_\nintervention to admit of a response to man's need of the religious\nexperience of salvation, that is, of being inwardly or spiritually\nprepared to meet in the right way and with triumphant spirit the very\nworst that the future may bring. The predetermined order of the laws\nof nature and mind exhibits the _general providence_ of God. By\nmeans of this order, or in the light of consequences, God is teaching\nman both science and morality, that is, how to adapt means to the\nrealization of ends, and what ideals and principles of action must be\nemployed if the most desirable results are to be obtained. The\n\"intervention enough\" of which we spoke--if indeed it is to be called\nintervention--or, in other words, the response of the divine Reality\nto the right religious attitude on the part of man, is an exhibition\nof the _special providence_ of God. When one has found the right\nrelation to God and gained access to the divine power for the inner\nlife, one is virtually prepared for whatever can happen to him. But,\nas we have indicated, his preparedness is primarily inner, spiritual.\nHe is in a position to meet danger with moral courage, to gain the\nvictory over temptation; to make the most of opportunities for\nservice; to endure hardship, pain and privation, as a good soldier,\nwith patience and cheerfulness; to face death--his own or that of\nothers--and whatever there may be after death, with faith and\nequanimity.\n\nThere are two possible ways, then, in which God may exercise his\nprovidence in the events of human history. There is his shorter and\npreferred method, and his longer and more roundabout method. If the\nindividuals concerned come into the right relation to God, there is\nthe best possible guarantee that they will be made ready for all there\nmay be for them to do and to experience, and thus conditions will be\nmost favorable for the speedy realization of the will of God. But if\nthis shorter, preferred method cannot be employed, because men fail to\nrise to the occasion as they might if they would rightly relate\nthemselves to God, the divine providence will still be exercised,\nalthough necessarily in the less desirable, more roundabout way. God\nwill let man choose the wrong way, through thoughtlessness or\nwilfulness, and then let him take the bitter consequences of failure,\nthat he may finally learn to guard against similar mistakes and faults\nin the future.\n\nLet us now return to the more particular question of the relation of\nthe providence of God to the present war. Before discussing again the\nquestion with which we started, viz., as to the final outcome of the\nconflict, we may deal with some other aspects of the problem. In the\nlight of what has been said of the two possible methods of divine\nprovidence, it may be denied that the war was providentially caused by\nGod in order to curb other evils, such as softness and idleness, or\nthe selfish pursuit of wealth and pleasure, or drunkenness and vice,\nor thoughtlessness and irreligion. It is true enough that in the face\nof war conditions some of these evils have been decreased, and the\nmartial qualities of self-sacrificing courage and fortitude have been\nstimulated. But it is notoriously true that the advent of war\nintroduces a host of evils, in some cases necessarily, in others\nalmost as inevitably. Drunkenness tends to increase greatly, unless\nstern measures are taken for its repression. Vice, with the resulting\ntransmissible diseases, ordinarily becomes much more prevalent.\nHatred, cruelty, and even the most fiendish brutality are given ample\nopportunity to develop, and in many instances they become relatively\nfixed attitudes and attributes of character. So far from the\nbiologically fittest tending to survive, under modern war conditions\nthese are the very ones who, for the most part and to the incalculable\ndetriment of the future of the race, are killed off, even granting\nthat of those who are \"fit\" enough to get to the front, the weakest\nare those who have the poorest chance of survival. And finally, when\nthe stress of war conditions becomes acute, innumerable enterprises\nfor social betterment are constrained to be given up, at least for the\ntime being. In view, then, of all this, not to dwell upon the\nunspeakable suffering, physical and mental, on the part not only of\ncombatants, but of noncombatants as well, and considering the merely\nproblematical nature of the good to which the crisis involved in a\nstate of war may prove a stimulus, it must be regarded as incredible\nthat a God good enough and wise enough to be worthy of absolute\ndependence and worship could have ordered so stupendous a catastrophe\nas a possible means of human salvation. Neither is it reasonable to\nsuppose that God is prolonging the war, in order that some social\nevils, such as drunkenness, may be eradicated before victory is\nfinally secured. This might, perhaps, be the outcome, if the war were\ngreatly prolonged; but it could not be at all certain beforehand that\nany such improvement would be permanent enough to offset the evils\ninvolved in the continuation of the war. We cannot suppose anyone who\nwas wise enough and good enough to be God would be so far below our\nbest human standards as to will either the existence or the\ncontinuation of the war as a whole, with all its attendant evils, in\norder that final good might abound. Any God who might be thought of as\ndoing so would be a false God; his condemnation would be just.\n\nUnderstanding, then, that in so far as human hatred, selfishness and\nstupidity have been factors in leading to the war, it has been\noriginated, not by the will or in the providence of God, but against\nhis will and providence; understanding also that in so far as it has\nbeen prolonged by human inefficiency or stupidity, or by the\nefficiency of evil wills, or of wills in the service of wrong, its\ncontinuation has not been in accordance with but in opposition to his\nwill and providence, let us turn to the more positive aspect of the\ndivine providence in connection with the war. It may be said to begin\nwith, that in so far as going into this war has been correctly judged\nby any party to it to be the necessary alternative to national\nperfidy, or ignoble servitude, or any other evil greater than those\ninvolved in passing through the ordeal of war, and in so far as the\ntask has been accepted as a solemn duty and entered upon in brave and\nself-sacrificing spirit, the act of going to war is to be regarded as\nin accord with the will of God. Indeed, if we may regard the divine\nspirit as immanent where we find the divine qualities present in human\nlife, we may go further and say that such righteous participation in\nthe war is the work of God within the soul of man, fighting against\nthe forces of evil. Moreover, in so far as the war is prolonged by the\nfortitude of men of good intentions and their fidelity to a just\ncause, the war may similarly be said to be prolonged in accord with\nthe will and even by the work of God in and through the good will and\nwork of men.\n\nBut of providence in relation to the war as a whole, it can only be\nsaid that man's evil choice has compelled God to use the long,\nroundabout method. It is the second best method, although the best\npossible under the circumstances. The sinful choices of men and\nnations were not, of course, divinely predetermined. What has been\ndivinely predetermined, we may well believe, is the law-abiding order\nof nature and of individual and social mind, according to which the\ndisasters and sufferings incidental to war are the inevitable\nconsequences of certain forms of individual and corporate wrong doing.\nIn this roundabout way certain reforms may be providentially forced\nupon the nations by the war. The evil consequences of certain former\nevils tend to be more acutely felt under the strain and stress of\nsevere and prolonged warfare. Let us suppose that in order to win the\nwar we and our Allies may yet find it necessary to take drastic steps\nto eradicate drunkenness with its attendant evils, or even to prohibit\nthe waste of food-stuffs and fuel involved in the manufacture of\nalcoholic beverages. This would not mean that the war had been\ndivinely caused in order to realize this end, but only that it was and\nalways is the divine will that man should learn the lessons of the law\nof consequences, which lessons are in some instances more readily\nlearned in time of war.\n\nBut what God is teaching most directly through the law of consequences\nin connection with the war is the necessity of correcting certain\nimmoral international relations. He is teaching the nations through\nbitter experience how imperative are international righteousness and\nsome practicable and adequately democratic scheme of world-government.\n\nBut we must not close our eyes to the possibility that through our\nfailure to do our part, God may be forced to take the long, sad,\nroundabout way of exercising his providence in connection with the\nend, as he had to in the beginning of the war. What we must wake up to\nis this, that _in spite of the justice of our cause, in spite of its\nbeing the cause of humanity and in essential accord with the will of\nGod, and in spite of our days of prayer and our optimistic religious\nfaith_, GERMANY MAY WIN THIS WAR! If our consciousness of\nbeing right and our religious optimism make us so complacent that we\nshall fail to exert our utmost strength on behalf of our righteous\ncause, they may be the very factors that will turn the tide of war\nagainst us. We have resources enough for the winning of victory. If we\nfail it will be a moral failure. If we fail to rise to the moral\ndemands of this great occasion, God may have to let us fail to win the\nwar and then learn what we can from the bitter consequences of this\nfailure. We and future generations may have to learn through tragic\nexperience how imperative it is that right be not left to enforce\nitself, but that we devote our full might to the cause of right, and\nthat before it is too late.\n\nAt the time of writing these words--in the early days of May,\n1918--it seems not yet too late, however critical the situation,\nfor the winning of victory for the cause of liberty and justice.\nBut the surest way of providing for success would be for all who\nrecognize the right so to surrender themselves to the will of God\nfor self-sacrificing service, and so to depend upon the indwelling\npower of God for inner preparedness for whatever may have to be\nfaced and whatever may have to be done, that their whole might may\nbe made use of in this warfare for the right. Our primary need is\n_morale_--morale in the government, morale in the shipyards,\nmorale in the munitions factories, morale among all our people in\ntheir business and home life, as well as fighting spirit in our\narmy and navy abroad. Enough religion of the right sort may make\nenough difference in morale to make all the difference between\ndefeat and victory as the outcome of this war. And if in this way\nvictory for the right should come as a result of religion, it would\nbe not only a crowning example of the short and preferred method of\ndivine providence; it would be, literally speaking, victory by the\nGrace of God.\n\nIn any case, the situation for the Western Allies is such that neither\nfaith without works nor works without faith can accomplish what waits\nto be done. There must be, if we would win, faith and works together.\n\nBefore leaving this topic of God and history, a word may be said on\nthe question of what, on this interpretation of providence, we may\nexpect to be the final outcome of this war for the future of the race.\nWill the result be more harm than good, or more good than harm? It is\nvery certain that the war will need to be the occasion of an immense\namount of good to balance up to the race the evils that have been\ninvolved in it thus far and that will be involved in its prolongation.\nMuch possible evil will be avoided if the immoral Prussian\nmilitaristic ideal is finally crushed. Moreover, there will be the\ntendency for humanity to learn, at least temporarily and as an\nintellectual conviction, the undesirability of war and of the\nconditions that make for war. But attention and moral effort will be\nnecessary to retain this lesson with sufficient impressiveness, and to\nput it into effect, and the best power of thought will be needed to\ndetermine just how this putting it into effect may be most fully and\nlastingly secured. There seems real danger that the human race on\nearth will be permanently poorer and worse off, spiritually and\nsocially as well as biologically and economically, as a result of this\nnearest approach to racial suicide. Undoubtedly it will be so, if the\nnations fail to learn and to put into effect the lesson of the\nnecessity of international righteousness and a just and efficient\nsystem of world-government.\n\nIt is perhaps still possible for the race to learn enough from this\nperiod of strife and carnage for the resultant good to out-balance the\ntotal evil. But even then no one would have the right to credit the\nwar with having been the means of greater good than _could_ have\nbeen accomplished without it. All its moral evil at any rate will be\nregrettable forever. And the only possible way of guaranteeing\nbeforehand greater good than evil as an outcome of the war, even\nsupposing the side of justice and liberty to be victorious, will be\nfor individuals and groups so to relate themselves to truth, to right\nand to God that flagrantly immoral international relations will become\npractically impossible. The only safety of the race lies in an\nessentially Christian international morality, and the only adequate\nguarantee of this is an essentially Christian personal religion. The\nonly failure of essential Christianity of which the war may fairly be\nregarded as evidence was its failure to be given an adequate trial;\nwhich means, of course, not a failure of Christianity as an ethical or\nas a religious system, but a failure of the human will to be\nadequately Christian.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\nTHE CHRISTIAN HOPE IN TIMES OF WAR\n\nFRANK CHAMBERLIN PORTER\n\n\nOf Paul's three things that abide, hope is the one of which we are now\nmost conscious of our need. Never before in our experience has hope\nbeen so much the center of our inner life and the heart of our\nreligion. Our mood alternates between hope and depression, hope and\nfear; and we look to our religion to make hope strong, and turn to our\nsacred book to seek secure grounds and satisfying expressions for our\nhope. We hope for the winning of the war. We hope for the safety and\nthe home-coming of those we love. We hope for a new world-order\norganized to make war impossible, inspired by a spirit of cooperation\nand good will between classes and between nations. We hope as never\nbefore for an assured and abundant life after death. We put these\nhopes in some relation to each other, weighing one against another,\nsubordinating one to another. And when we seek their right\nrelationship and look for their ultimate grounds, we ask what\nChristianity has to say and to do about them. What is Christian in\nthese hopes that are filling the mind and heart of the world? The\nimportance of this question is very great. The future of the world\ndepends on the truth and the strength of the hopes that now inspire\nand direct men's purposes and efforts. The future of the Christian\nreligion turns in no small measure on its ability now to keep the hope\nof mankind high and pure, free from self-seeking and from material\ninterests, and true to the ultimate reality of things, and to give\nthis hope confidence and prevailing strength.\n\nChristians are not at one over the question what, as Christians, they\nhave a right to hope for. Most evidently is this the case between us\nand our enemy. We differ in things hoped for; and it is perhaps not\ntoo much to say that the truth of our hope and the strength of our\nhope constitute and measure our spiritual equipment for the winning of\nthe war. The Germans are fighting for their hope of national expansion\nand domination, for their dream of a new world empire of the chosen\nand fit people of God. We cannot question the strength of this hope of\ntheirs, and its powerful influence toward bringing itself to\nrealization. We and our Allies are resisting these nationalistic and\narrogant hopes, and are appealing to the contrary hope of an inclusive\nhuman brotherhood, in which good will shall prevail between nations,\nand hence right and peace. The hope that is truer, more in accordance\nwith the nature of things, the nature of man, the will of God, and the\nhope that is most deeply felt and most loyally served, with most\nconviction and most sacrifice, will prevail in the end. That is the\nhope that will come true. Ours is inevitably a religious hope, for it\nis universal in range, big as the world, and needs not only every\npower of ours but the Power not ourselves to bring it about. It is for\nevery one who holds it intensely, in a real sense, a hope in God and a\nhope for God. But is it certain that it is also a Christian hope, a\nhope in Christ and a hope for Christ?\n\nThere are, not only between us and our enemy, but among ourselves,\nradical differences as to what a Christian should hope for in the\npresent world crisis. There are those who search the Scriptures for\npredictions of the Kaiser and his overthrow, and see in the\nanti-Christian philosophy and in the anti-Christian arrogance and\ncruelty of his militaristic state, a sign that the end of this evil\nworld-age is near, and that Christ will come quickly and set up his\nreign on earth. And there are those to whom such literalism in the use\nof Scripture and such externality in the hope for Christ's coming are\nintellectually impossible and untrue, and religiously harmful. To them\nthe meaning of the Bible is to be found in the tendency and spirit of\nits teachings, and their hope is for the presence and rule of the\nspirit of Christ and the dominance of his principles in the common\nlife of humanity. This involves a radical difference in the hope of\nChristians for a new world, a new human society, and in the ways in\nwhich this hope will affect their motives and efforts. There are also\ndeep-going differences in regard to the hope for a life after death.\nThat many are looking eagerly for material, \"scientific\" proof through\nphysical communications from the dead, while many, on the other hand,\nare feeling that immortality belongs to the race and not to the\nindividual, and that the sacrifice of the young and the strong finds\nits only and sufficient end and justification in the new humanity they\ndie to create, indicates that Christ has not yet brought life and\nimmortality to clear light for humanity. Such differences are not to\nbe desired. If Christianity is to be the religion of the present eager\nand pressing hopes of mankind and give these hopes elevation, truth,\nand victorious endurance and enthusiasm, Christians should be clear\nand united in the contents and character of their hope.\n\nAmong these hopes of mankind there can be no doubt which one has the\nfirst place in the minds of the intellectual leaders and the actual\nrulers of the allied nations. Never before has a truly prophetic note\nbeen so clearly sounded by leading men of affairs, and by the press\nand the leaders of public opinion, as well as by the poets and\npreachers to whom prophecy naturally belongs. From all sides we have\nexpressions of a hope which four years ago was judged to be the dream\nof impractical idealists, the hope for a new order of human life, in\nwhich good will and mutual cooperation shall take the place of\nsuspicion and competitive struggle. We need not be blind to whatever\nmotives of self-interest may have entered into the action of this or\nthat one of our Allies in undertaking the war. The outstanding fact\nremains that while the German Government appeals to the self-assertion\nof the German State and seeks its aggrandizement through force at the\nexpense of its neighbors, the allied governments appeal to national\nself-sacrifice for the sake of international redemption. It is to this\nappeal on behalf of the rights, the freedom, the happiness of mankind,\nthat our soldiers respond; for humanity, not for national gain, that\nour peoples are prepared to give and to suffer. This hope takes\nconcrete form in the word Democracy, and in the idea of a League or\nFederation of free, democratic nations, bound together for the defense\nof human rights, for cooperation in all that concerns human welfare\nand progress, and the repression of every attack upon the peace of the\nworld. So viewed the war becomes definitely a war to end war, and as\nsuch it is engaged in and supported by peace-loving peoples, against\nthe nation that glorifies war and would perpetuate it.\n\nIs this great hope Christian? Is Christianity the religion which a\nhope so high and so difficult needs if it is to keep its height amid\nthe many influences that tend to lower it, and if it is to prove\npossible and become actual in spite of powerful forces that work\nagainst it? It is not self-evident that Christianity will prove equal\nto this which is clearly the greatest task that the present imposes\nupon it. There are many who doubt its adequacy; many who see that it\nhas brought division and warfare, and think it unfitted to create\nunity; many who see that it has withdrawn from the world, and think it\nunadapted to provide the moral principles and spiritual energies of\nthe new social and political world-order. It is for us who believe in\nthe sufficiency of Christ to prove that he alone provides those\nreligious and moral principles and forces without which no democracy,\nstill less any federation of democracies, can stand.\n\nThe ideal of human brotherhood which the war has revealed as the\ndeepest desire and faith of men and has put before us as a goal that\nwe must now set out to reach is of course old in its beginnings, and\nfor a generation it has been taking ever stronger hold on the minds of\nmen. Prophetic utterances of this ideal could be quoted in abundance.\nA striking example is a saying of Alexander Dumas in 1893: \"I believe\nour world is about to begin to realize the words 'Love one another,'\nwithout, however, being concerned whether a man or a God uttered\nthem.... Mankind, which does nothing moderately, is about to be seized\nwith a frenzy, a madness, of love.\" And Tolstoy's comment on this at\nthe time of the Russian revolution, in 1905: \"I believe that this\nthought, however strange the expression, 'seized with a frenzy of\nlove,' may seem, is perfectly true and is felt more or less clearly by\nall men of our day. A time must come when love, which forms the\nfundamental essence of the soul, will take the place natural to it in\nthe life of mankind, and will become the chief basis of the relations\nbetween man and man. That time is coming; it is at hand.\"\n\nThe world war seems like a violent contradiction of the truth of such\nprophecies. It seems for the time to have made love inadequate as a\nsumming up of morals and religion. We almost feel that the Sermon on\nthe Mount must be kept in reserve for other times. The war has made\nlove itself a hope. We renounce it for a time that we may resist a\npower that threatens to destroy it altogether and put selfishness and\ncruelty on the throne of the world. But the war has not in fact\ndisproved the faith that God is love and that love is the supreme law\nand power among men. It has made mankind more conscious of its ideal\nof community and fellowship, and seems to be carrying us faster toward\nthe realization of human brotherhood than peace and prosperity were\ndoing. The greatest and most widely approved sentences of President\nWilson's war papers are those that give expression to \"what the\nthinking peoples of the world desire, with their longing hope for\njustice and for social freedom and opportunity.\" On the anniversary of\nour entering the war, Gilbert Murray declared that England needed our\nhelp in battle, but even more in upholding their true faith.\n\"Americans instinctively believe ... in freedom, peace, democracy,\narbitration, and international good will.... When the war is over\nthere will be a world to rebuild, and the only principles on which to\nrebuild it are these principles.\" Germany denies the truth of these\nprinciples, but in doing so it denies human nature and derives from\nphysical nature a state-ethics of struggle and the survival of the\nstrong. It denies the prophet of Galilee, and looks for its example to\nRome. Sometimes it has seemed as if the German denial of humanity and\naffirmation of material and brute force were in danger of justifying\nitself by the only test they admit, that of physical success. Where\ncan we look for help toward a living faith in liberty and brotherhood\nover against the powerful demonstration we are offered of faith in\nmaterial force and in the progress of nations through aggression and\ntyranny? We must look no doubt first of all to our own souls and\noppose to the faith in physical and animal nature a faith in human\nnature and in the truth of its best instincts and ideals; and then to\nthose who know best and most worthily express the human soul and the\nreality of its spiritual possessions. Not from the Bible alone, and\nnot only from Christ are such reassuring testimonies to be gained; and\nwe are not renouncing the unique value of the Christian religion when\nwe find that the faith and hope which it teaches are the faith and the\nhope of the universal heart of man.\n\nThe poet laureate of England made his special contribution to his\nnation's needs in time of war in the anthology, \"The Spirit of Man.\"\n\"Our country,\" he says, \"is called of God to stand for the truth of\nman's hope.\" \"Truly it is the hope of man's great desire, the desire\nfor brotherhood and universal peace to men of good will, that is at\nstake in this struggle.\" From the miseries and slaughter and hate of\nwar, \"we can turn,\" he says, \"to seek comfort only in the quiet\nconfidence of our souls; and we look instinctively to the seers and\npoets of mankind, whose sayings are the oracles and prophecies of\nloveliness and loving kindness.\" They help us gain the conviction our\ntime most needs, \"that spirituality is the basis and foundation of\nhuman life,\" that \"man is a spiritual being, and the proper work of\nhis mind is to interpret the world according to his higher nature, and\nto conquer the material aspects of the world so as to bring them into\nsubmission to the spirit.\"\n\nBut the Bible also is a witness to just these convictions and contains\nprophecies of just such hopes. Bridges includes very few citations\nfrom the Bible, chiefly because it is so well known, but also because\n\"this familiarity implies deep-rooted associations, which would be\nlikely to distort the context.\" Alas, for these associations, for the\ninterpretations that confuse and the prejudices that blind the readers\nof the greatest literature of spirituality and of hope which the world\ncontains. In spite of this, the Bible will be looked to by multitudes\nfor guidance and support in those hopes on which the future turns,\nwhile the poet's fine work will be prized by few. It is only too\npossible to fail to find in the Bible its testimony to that \"hope of\nman's great desire of brotherhood and peace\" which constitutes the\nmost living religion of our time; and this failure will mean loss to\nthe hope itself of its most powerful support, and loss to the\nChristian religion of contact and sympathy with the most urgent\nspiritual need and aspiration of men today.\n\nThe Bible does contain various and contradictory hopes, and can\nencourage expectations that are not in accordance with the best\nconscience of our age, nor with our knowledge of the way in which\nhuman progress is achieved. But there is nothing more instructive than\nthe relation of these different hopes to each other as the historian\nunderstands them and there is nothing more worthy and inspiring than\nthe language in which the most spiritual and the most universal of\nthese hopes are expressed.\n\nThe original hope of the religion of Israel was that involved in the\nunique and exclusive relation between the nation Israel and Yahweh,\nits God. It was the hope of Israel's prosperity and power through the\ncertain favor of Yahweh, and his intervening help in times of danger,\nmost of all his help in the nation's wars. These were \"the Wars of\nYahweh.\" Both the strength and the defect of the Old Testament\nreligion lie in this fundamental faith, the peculiarity and\nexclusiveness of the relation between Israel and its God. It inspired\nits early victories and created the kingdom of David. It sustained the\nnation amid calamities and enabled it to maintain itself when other\nsmall nations disappeared before the great world empires, and while\nthese also came and passed. It was a natural and not unreasonable\nfaith for its time, so long as Yahweh was only Israel's national God,\neven though he was believed to be better and stronger than the gods of\nother nations and destined to triumph over them; but when Israel's God\nwas believed to be the one and only God of all the world the doctrine\nof Israel as his peculiar people must either lead to false claims and\nhave bad effects upon temper and conduct, or else be reinterpreted and\nradically changed. Nothing can be more instructive as to the nature of\nreligious hope than to follow out two main lines of development by\nwhich an adjustment was attempted between this primitive nationalism\nand the later, larger thought of God and the world.\n\nThe great prophets before the exile, Amos, Hosea, Isaiah, Jeremiah,\nand after exile Deutero-Isaiah, were those through whom the faith was\nattained that Yahweh is the one and only God; and the modification of\nthe national exclusiveness of Israel which they made was in the\ndirection of its complete subordination to ethical and spiritual\nideals. The one God of all was the God of righteousness, and of Israel\nonly on the condition and for the end of righteousness. But an ethical\nin place of a national relation to God meant, if it was carried\nthrough consistently, a universal relation of God to all men as\nindividuals, instead of a peculiar relation to one favored nation.\nConsistency was not reached, yet glimpses, sometimes clear momentary\nvisions, of this individual, universal, ethical religion are to be\nfound in the great prophets; and in them the Old Testament religion\nreaches its height. It is the prophetic denial of national claims and\nhopes, not the older and always prevalent assertion of them, that\nconstitutes the reality and truth of the Old Testament hope. It is\nhope for Yahweh and his righteousness, not for Israel and its glory.\nIt finds its highest expression in such predictions as Isaiah's\npromise of security to the humble and believing; and Jeremiah's\nexpectation of the time when no special revelation will make known the\nwill of God to a chosen few, but when everyone will have his own\ninward knowledge of God; and Ezekiel's belief that the new inward\nnature which every man requires if he is to do that will of God which\nhe knows, will be achieved not only by his own free moral choice\n(18:31), but also by the divine spirit, the transforming presence and\npower of God (36:26, 27); and in Deutero-Isaiah's interpretation of\nthe peculiar relation of Israel to the one God of all the world as\nthat of Yahweh's Servant, his prophet to all nations, who brings light\nto the heathen and deliverance from bondage, and who effects this\nministry even through his own shame and suffering for others' sins.\n\nBut there was a second still later way of adjusting the original\nnationalism of Israel's faith and hope to monotheism and the\nconception of a unity in nature and history; and this proved easier\nand more popular than the other. In late prophecy and apocalypse the\nhope of Israel's national and worldly prosperity and power takes on an\nunearthly character. Instead of righteousness and spirituality as in\nthe earlier prophets, transcendence and heavenliness interpret or\ndisplace the primitive hope. The heavenly region to which apocalyptic\nprophecy transferred Israel's hope was a refinement of the physical,\nbut it was still essentially physical, a region whose riches could be\nas sensibly enjoyed and as selfishly desired as the palace and throne\nof an earthly kingdom. The heavenly powers by which this hope was to\nbe realized were divine, yet they were essentially material forces.\nThe prophetic hopes at their highest rest on human nature at its\nhighest, on the conscience and reason of man recognized as the will\nand thought of God. But the apocalyptic hope, though it strains\nlanguage to magnify the contrast between its two worlds, the earthly\nand the heavenly, the present and the future, does not succeed in\nmaking them really different. Supernaturalism always fails to find the\nreal difference between man and God and so the way in which the\ndifference is to be overcome. This supernaturalism of the apocalypse\nis seen also in the ways in which the hope is revealed. The seer\ninterprets in literal or artful ways the language of prophetic\nscriptures regarded as divine oracles, or he is translated in ecstasy\nto heaven and shown the secrets of the upper world and the future. The\ncoming of this new heavenly world men may pray for, and the time of\nits coming they may seek to discover from sacred writings and\ntraditions and from the signs of the times, but only divine powers can\nbring this evil world to an end, and only from heaven where they\nalready are can descend, in heaven's own time and way, the scenery and\nthe actors in the last great drama of history. There is in this hope\nno strong ethical appeal, no prevailing sense that in the inward\nregion of the heart and in its instincts and desires and wills, God's\npresence is to be found and his work for man experienced. Moreover\nthis hope for a new heavenly world means no hope for the present\nworld. It is evil and must grow more evil until God intervenes to\ndestroy it and brings down from heaven the realm of good. To renounce\nthe world and withdraw from it is the course of wisdom and holiness.\nAs a way of adjusting Israel's national hope to monotheism it is not\ncomparable with the prophetic way of ethics and inwardness. It is\nstill Israel, or the true Israel, that is to inherit the world to\ncome; and at its coming the world empire must first of all be\noverthrown, for the new kingdom, heavenly and supernatural though it\nis, is enough like the kingdom of Greece or of Rome to require its\nfall and to take its place. The apocalyptic hope is the end of Old\nTestament prophecy, but not its height. It was no doubt in some sense\nfitted for its times, hard times, always, when the evils of life\nseemed irremediable. It knew the need of divine help, and it\nencouraged endurance and fidelity even to death. But it was not\ngrounded in the nature of men, and it was mistaken in its conception\nof the nature of the world. It never quite escapes this inherent\nfalseness and confusion in its fundamental assumptions.\n\nIt cannot be hard to pass judgment on the relative value of these\nthree main hopes of the Old Testament. The primitive hope for God's\nspecial favor to his own peculiar people who are destined to have\ndominion over all others would have seemed, before the war, safely\noutgrown by humanity. If the world still needed a demonstration of the\ndanger and falsity of any nation's belief in its peculiar excellence\nand in its exclusive right and destiny to rule, and the intolerable\nmorals and preposterous religion that finally result from such claims,\nthe aggressors in the present war have supplied it, and the rest of\nthe world is united in the resolve that no further demonstration of\nthis hope be undertaken. The early histories of the Old Testament and\nparts of its laws, its psalms and even its prophecies, contain\nexpressions of just this belief in a peculiar people, for whom God\nmade the world, and to whom the right belongs, secured by the divine\nfavor and promise, to rule over all other nations. Some of the\ninferences and consequences of this faith that now shock the world,\nsomething of the hatred and the cruelty toward foreign peoples, the\nexaltation of vengeance, the arrogance and the inhumanity, find\nunreserved expression in this literature. But the meaning of the Old\nTestament is to be found in the denial and overcoming of this doctrine\nand of its results.\n\nIn regard to the two ways in which this denial and correction were\nchiefly undertaken, there can be no question where the greater value\nand truth are to be found. The prophet's criticism of the national\nhope and reinterpretation of it as the hope for righteousness really\nstruck at the heart of the materialism and selfishness of the\npopular national hope, its false pride and its denial of trust and\nof good will toward mankind. But the apocalyptic modification of the\nolder hope, though it fitted it for a wider view of the world and of\nhistory and a deeper experience of the power of evil, did not\ncorrect those moral and spiritual faults which were inherent in the\nolder hope. There is no generosity, no faith in human nature, no\nsense of the present prevailing rule of God and power of good, no\nthought of the \"secret of inwardness\" and \"the method of\nself-renouncement,\" in the religion of the apocalypse. The righteous\nkernel of Judaism, the holy few who feared the Lord, expected an\ninvasion of divine forces on their behalf, the destruction of their\noppressors and their own elevation to angel-like natures and\nGod-like authority and blessedness. It could hardly be expected that\nthey would exhibit Isaiah's virtue of humility, or Jeremiah's of\ninwardness and satisfaction in the communion of the soul with God,\nor Deutero-Isaiah's impulse to turn their present lowliness to\ngreatness by ministry to those who persecuted them and even by death\nfor others' transgressions. The greatest of the apocalypses are no\ndoubt the canonical ones, Daniel and Revelation; and they are great\nin their confidence in the divine government of the world, and in\nits final vindication, and in their assertion of the martyr virtues.\nBut they do not believe in man, and in God in man, though their\nbelief in a God above is heroic. They do not hope for the world, or\nfind God in the world; nor do they feel that they are in any sense\nresponsible for the evil of the world and for its salvation from\nevil. Righteousness and blessedness belong only to heaven, and can\ncome only from heaven to earth, and only by an act of God which will\nbring the present world to a sudden end. The faults of materialism\nand of self-interest which belong to the naive nationalism of\nIsrael's beginnings are still present in the conscious and\nsophisticated other-worldliness of the apocalyptic hopes, and reveal\nthe inner untruth of a supernaturalism which reckons in terms of\nplace and time, and looks above and ahead instead of about and\nwithin for the Kingdom of God.\n\nThe post-canonical apocalypses of Judaism fall within the period\nbeginning with the attempt of Antiochus IV to make the Jews Greeks,\nand the successful resistance of the Maccabees and their establishment\nof an independent Jewish kingdom, and ending with the Jewish-Roman\nwars, the destruction of Jerusalem and the suppression by Hadrian of\nthe final Messianic, political uprising under Bar Cochba; that is,\nfrom 108 B. C. to 135 A. D. It is of the highest importance to note\nthat Christianity took its rise in the midst of this period, and that\nthe apocalyptic hopes which these events encouraged and which in turn\npartly shaped the events, formed the immediate environment and\ninheritance of the new religion. The question as to the nature of the\nhope of the New Testament becomes therefore largely the question of\nthe place which Jewish apocalyptical expectations had in the new\nreligion and in the mind of its founder.\n\nThere are three elements in the hope of the New Testament which are\nfound in the later Jewish apocalypses, but not in the Old Testament:\n1. The coming of the Son of Man as judge of men and angels at the last\nday, which is always thought to be near at hand. 2. The reign on earth\nof Messiah and his saints, the living and the risen dead, for a\ncertain period, during which they will overcome all the powers of\nevil. 3. The immortality of the spirit, the transformation of the\nrighteous into angelic natures, fitting them to be companions of\nheavenly beings in the final consummation. For our understanding of\nthese hopes and for our decision as to their truth and value it is\nnecessary to look at them as they arise in Jewish writings and not\nonly in their appearance in the New Testament.\n\nThe Son of Man appears first in Daniel, but there he is not an\nindividual, but the symbol of a nation, \"the people of the saints of\nthe Most High\"; and the vision pictures Israel as coming on a cloud,\nnot from heaven, but to God, to receive from him authority to rule\nover the world. It is first in a part of the Book of Enoch, the\n\"Parables,\" chapters 37-71, dating probably from the reign of Herod,\nthat Daniel's \"Son of Man\" becomes an individual. It is important to\nunderstand the religion of this writer in order to appreciate the\nsignificance of this heavenly Messiah. His religion consists in faith\nin the reality of a spiritual world which is destined to displace the\npresent world and to be the blessed abode of the righteous. God is\n\"the Lord of Spirits,\" and the voice of Isaiah's seraphim becomes,\n\"Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of Spirits: he filleth the earth with\nspirits.\" The sin of the kings and mighty of the earth is that they\ndeny the Lord of Spirits and the hidden dwelling places of the\nrighteous. This is a religion of faith in heaven and its God and its\nangelic inhabitants, and in the destiny of the righteous soon to share\nits beauty and blessedness. Among those whom Enoch sees there, one is\nabove all significant for man. He has the appearance of a man, with a\nface of graciousness and beauty, like an angel's. He is described as\nthe Son of Man to whom righteousness and wisdom belong. He has existed\nfrom before the creation, and has been revealed to the righteous.\nFaith in him and hope for his coming have sustained the righteous in\ntimes of trouble, and by faith in him and in the Lord of Spirits and\nthe heavenly dwelling places, they \"have hated and despised the world\nof unrighteousness and have hated all its works and ways.\" Here is a\nreligion of pure other-worldliness. The calling of this heavenly Son\nof Man is to be the judge of the world at the last day. He will then\n\"sit on the throne of his glory,\" will \"choose the righteous and holy\"\nfrom among the risen dead, will condemn and send away to destruction\nthe kings and mighty of the earth, who because of their unbelief in\nthe unseen world have been proud and worldly and unjust. The righteous\nwill dwell in the new heaven and earth, with the Lord of Spirits over\nthem and the Son of Man as their companion, having been clothed with\ngarments of glory and immortal life. The likeness between this\nreligion and the apocalyptic type of New Testament Christianity is\nstriking. But it is not Christian because it is without Jesus himself.\nThis Son of Man has not already come and lived among men. The\nrighteous have not learned of him that God is in this world as well as\nin the other, that he is a God of human beings, even the lowliest, and\nof birds and grass, of rain and growth. They have not learned that\ngood is already stronger than evil; least of all do they know the\ngreatest thing, that love is supreme, and that not by hating the world\nand its ways but by the ministry of love is the new world to be\nbrought in. The religion of Enoch presents in pure and simple form, in\npre-Christian Judaism, just that religion of dualism and pessimism, of\ndespair of the present and the renunciation of effort to better the\nworld, of strained expectation of divine intervention, which\nsometimes, and even now in some quarters, claims to be the only true\nChristianity. It is, in fact, Christianity with Christ left out.\n\nThe second element which the apocalypses add to the hope of the Old\nTestament and which the New Testament Apocalypse adopts, is the\nconception of a millennial earthly kingdom. This appears in probably\nan earlier part of Enoch, chapters 91-104. In a short Apocalypse of\nWeeks, after seven weeks of world-history up to the writer's present,\nan eighth week is predicted, in which the righteous shall wield the\nsword against their oppressors and establish the Messianic kingdom;\nthen a ninth week in which the preaching of judgment to come will\nconvert all men to righteousness; finally, a tenth week of final\njudgment against all angelic powers of evil, ending with a new heaven\nand an eternity of blessedness.\n\nIt is not only the fact that here and elsewhere these two hopes are\nproved to be Jewish, not Christian, in origin, that influences our\njudgment on them when they reappear in the New Testament; it is also\nthe understanding of them which their Jewish form makes possible. They\nare two forms of adjusting the old national and earthly hope of Israel\nto a new, more universal and transcendent form of faith and hope. In\nthe religion of the \"Parables\" of Enoch the transcendent practically\ntransforms and displaces the earthly. In the millennial scheme, the\nheavenly follows the earthly in time. Resurrection enables some of the\ndead to have part in the earthly, while translation into angel-like,\nimmortal natures fits men for the final heavenly life. The\nunderstanding of the origin and purpose of these hopes makes it\nunnatural and irrational to regard them as literal disclosures of the\nunseen world and of future events.\n\nThe third hope which Judaism added to what its sacred scriptures\ncontained was the hope for immortality of the spirit. It happens that\nthis also appears earliest in Judaism in the Book of Enoch (especially\nchapters 102-104). Enoch solemnly assures his readers that he has seen\nit written in heavenly books that joy and glory are prepared for the\nspirits of those who have died in righteousness. This is not a\nresurrection of the body to enable one to have a share in the earthly\nkingdom, but a transformation which fits men for the realm of spirits.\n\nWhen we turn in the light of the older hopes to the New Testament and\nask what are the hopes that belong properly to Christianity, and how\nare they related to the present hopes of the world, we meet the\nproblem presented by the importance of properly apocalyptical\nexpectations in the first Christian community. The case is something\nlike that which meets us in the Old Testament, and we have here no\nless than there to distinguish and to choose. The hope of the early\nChristian community was no doubt first of all for the physical coming\nof Christ and the establishment of his kingdom; but there developed\nalso within the New Testament period two movements away from this, one\nin an ethical and spiritual direction, and the other toward emphasis\non the individual life after death. The first of these is more\ncharacteristic of the New Testament religion than the other. It is the\ntendency of Paul to emphasize the present inward experience of Christ,\nand the transforming power of his spirit more than the hope of his\ncoming, though he receives this from primitive Christianity and does\nnot doubt its literal and early fulfilment. It is, I believe, beyond\nquestion that Paul's Christian hope is chiefly, as Royce has argued,\nthe hope for a new humanity created by the spirit of Christ, which is\nthe spirit of love. This is in a measure already experienced. Christ\ndwells in the Christian and makes him a center and source of love. His\nspirit breaks down barriers and ends divisions. Unity and peace are\nits effects. Through this one, present spirit of Christ each man\nbecomes a distinct but essential member of the new body; and Paul's\ngreatest hope is for the completion of this unification of man in\nmutual helpfulness and brotherhood. Paul attests also the other\ntendency away from the outward future coming of Christ to the hope for\na life with Christ and like Christ's after death. This eternal life\nwith Christ is also experienced by Paul as in some real sense present.\nThe indwelling spirit of Christ is already transforming the Christian\ninto his own immortal nature. In the Johannine writings these two\ntendencies of hope away from the apocalyptic toward the spiritual go\nstill further. The Christ in whom the Christian now abides creates a\ndistinctive unity among his disciples, a love one to another which the\nworld has not known; and at the same time the experience of this\npresent Christ is already the possession of eternal life. According to\nthis which we might call the prophetic in distinction from the\napocalyptic hope of the New Testament the new world of human unity in\nlove and cooperation is to be brought about not only by the present\nspirit of Christ, but also by the moral choice and endeavor of man. It\nis through human love that the divine love works, and the rule of God\nis present so far as men overcome evil and create good. And even the\nimmortal life is not solely a hope in God, but is to be attained by\neach soul here and now through its choice of the will of God and in\nthe degree of its moral oneness with God.\n\nThat which most concerns us is no doubt the question which of these\nhopes, the eschatological or the ethical and inward, was held and\ntaught by Christ. My own conviction is that the new and distinct hope,\nthe spiritual, belongs to him and proceeds from him, and not the\nfamiliar Jewish apocalyptic. Two opinions stand in the way of this\njudgment; two opposite types of literalism in Biblical interpretation.\nDogmatic literalism accepts scripture throughout, and refuses to\ndistinguish between higher and lower, between truth and error, in what\nis written. In regard to hope, this view leads to great stress on\nprediction and fulfilment. The assumption is that the Biblical\npredictions that have not been fulfilled will come to pass in the\nfuture. This is precisely a fundamental assumption of the apocalypse.\nIt is solely upon this conception of scripture that many devout\nChristians rest their expectations of the outward coming of Christ and\nhis thousand-year reign on earth, just as the same idea of Biblical\npredictions leads orthodox Jews to expect that Jerusalem will be the\ncapital and Israel the ruling nation of the world. This literalism\nstands in the way of the world's present acceptance of Christianity as\nthe religion of its highest hopes.\n\nBut there is a like danger in the opposite literalism of the\nhistorian. We have already seen how the history of Jewish hopes makes\nthe literal acceptance of similar New Testament hopes unnatural if not\nimpossible. The literalism of the historian is, of course, to us true\nand immediately helpful in liberating us from bondage to the letter of\nan ancient book. It leaves us free to apply our own reason and\nconscience and experience to the interpretation of our own life and\ntimes. It turns us back upon our own souls, upon our faith, our\ndesire, our will, to unveil and shape the future. But the historian is\nin danger of doing less than justice to the ethical and spiritual\ncontents of the hopes of the Bible because of his very love of truth\nand willingness to sacrifice his wishes to it. The unpardonable sin to\nhim is the modernizing of an ancient writing because of reverence for\nit, and the effort to find in it what he likes rather than things\noutgrown and unwelcome. This conscientious fear, I cannot but believe,\nhas resulted in a one-sided interpretation of the New Testament,\nespecially the teachings of Jesus and of Paul, as essentially\napocalyptic in contents and spirit, and a hesitation to recognize the\nessentially inward, rational and ethical quality, the prophetic\ncharacter of the New Testament as a whole, and to make due allowance\nfor the ease and naturalness with which the current apocalyptic ideas\nof early Jewish Christians could persist and be applied to Jesus and\nattributed to him.\n\nThis problem over which New Testament scholars are divided into two\ngroups or tendencies is of course much too complicated to discuss\nhere. But it is necessary at least to point out that there is a danger\nin the historian's anxiety to be without prejudice, and to view the\npast as past. The greatness of great men and great books is to be\nfound in the eternal meaning, not in the mere form, of what they say.\nHistorians no less than other men have the right and duty to ask in\nwhat direction an ancient teacher is looking, toward what goal the\nmovement of his mind is tending, what final effects he produced, what\ntherefore he would think and say if he lived in our time. We are told\nthat it is unhistorical to seek in the New Testament for \"the modern\nliberal Christ\"; but it is not unhistorical to look for the human\nbeneath the Jewish, the eternal and universal within the temporary and\nlimited. The mind of Christ, his manner and mood, his quality, his\nspirit, is not less a historical reality than his literal words. This\nis of course true also of Paul, and, in his measure, of every man.\n\nThere can be no doubt that like the great prophets before him Jesus\nwas chiefly a critic and corrector of the hopes of his time. He did\nnot approve the national hopes that had been kindled by the Maccabean\nkingdom and were soon to issue in the suicidal revolt against Rome.\nWhether Jesus expected the speedy coming of the Son of Man and the end\nof the world, and whether he identified himself with this transcendent\nMessiah-Judge, are questions made difficult, not by our wishes, but by\nthe nature of the evidence. My own inclination is, at this point, to\nattribute more to the influence of Jewish expectations on the gospel\ntraditions than to Jesus' own words. What seems to me certain is that\nthe bearing of the teaching of Jesus was in the direction of the\nspiritual hopes of Paul and John rather than the apocalyptic hopes\nwhich they still held in common with the first disciples.\n\nIt is the fundamental principle of the apocalyptic hope that God made\nnot one world but two (II Esdras 7:50). This world must end and\nthe other world must come if evil is to end and good prevail. But\nJesus believed that this world is already God's world, and that in it\ngood is already stronger than evil. The Kingdom of God is indeed still\nto come, but it is already within. It is already upon us when by the\nspirit of God evil is cast out. It has been said that it was the\nGreeks who believed in one world in contrast to the Jews who believed\nin two; and that Poseidonius, the Platonic Stoic, an oriental, of the\ncentury before Christ, wrote to make men at home in the universe. But\nit is surely not a mistake to say that Jesus felt at home in the world\nand meant to make others at home. This is precisely the meaning of the\nword Father, of which Paul testifies that Jesus' use was to a Jew new,\nand that it meant freedom from mental bondage and fear. Poseidonius\nmade men feel at home in the universe by denying the existence of\nevil, which is of course one way of making one world out of two; Jesus\nby affirming the reality of a goodness in God and in man capable of\nconquering evil. That God is Father, the Father of all men, even, and\nespecially, of sinners, is not the basis of an apocalyptic hope. Jesus\ndid not chiefly foretell the end of the world through the catastrophic\nintervention of God or of the Son of Man. He did chiefly teach that\nthe power not ourselves is fatherly, that it is human, that we can\ntrust our own souls at their best to teach us the nature of God, that\nour highest human values are the ultimate realities of the universe.\nJesus found that the chief fears and hopes of men were concerned with\nbodily welfare and possessions and with power over others. Mammon and\ndominion were the false gods men worshipped. Wealth and power seem now\nthe objects of the hope and the religious devotion of the Central\nPowers. Jesus declared that it is the heathen who are anxious about\nfood and raiment. It is the heathen who lord it over their fellow men.\nNot so was it to be among his disciples. Since the Father knows our\nneeds and wills to give good things, since the outer world belongs to\nhim and since the things of the soul are of the greater value, we men\nare free to put first things first, to seek God's Kingdom and\nrighteousness. And since God's rule consists in love and in doing\ngood, without reserve or regard for deserts or for returns, the only\nreal rulership among men also must be the renunciation of rulership\nfor the sake of ministry. Not to be masters over others, not to be\nstrong by making others weak, but to serve and to give is the divine\nplan, the real nature of things. This is not what the war lords learn\nfrom physical and animal nature as to the way to success and primacy,\nbut it is true to that human nature to which they do violence. The\nChristian hope is therefore not for material possessions nor for\nauthority and power; it is that spiritual realities shall vindicate\nand make effectual their preeminence, and shall master matter and all\noutward things for their own ends; and that unselfish love shall\nmeasure greatness among men and shall destroy hatred and fear and\ncreate a human family.\n\nIf this, according to Christ, is the Christian hope, then Christianity\nis certainly the religion for the present hope of the world. The hope\nof a league of free nations, of a federated world in which democracy\nis safe, is clearly seen by those who see best what it involves and\nwhat obstacles stand in its way to be first of all the hope for a new\nspirit among men, a new inward temper, a new will; it is also seen to\nbe something universal in its range. Not again one league against\nanother, but a league that at least aims at being inclusive of\nhumanity. Spirituality and universality, inwardness and good-will,\nbelong to the hope that is now inspiring the nations; and these are\njust the marks of the religion of Christ; they are what Matthew Arnold\ncalled the method of inwardness and the secret of self-renouncement,\ncontrolled by the mildness and sweet reasonableness of Christ;\nreverence for the soul, meaning both the preeminent worth of every\nindividual and the primacy in each of the things of the soul; and\namong these the chief greatness and God-likeness of love. However one\nattempts to sum up the religion of Jesus it is sure to mean in the end\nthe same two things which the world now sees to be its great needs and\nthe ground and heart of its hope.\n\nIt would be tragic indeed if Christianity should lose its supreme\nopportunity by failing to lead and inspire this newly emerging and\nChrist-like hope of men. It can fail if it confuses itself in the\ndetails of Biblical predictions, if it becomes involved in apocalyptic\nfancies. It can fail if in reaction against these and under the\ninfluence of an equally literalistic criticism men turn from the Bible\naltogether as a book of the past.\n\nThe men of our time are shaping the hope of a united and friendly\nhuman family of free peoples, united not only against war but for all\nkinds of mutual help and cooperative progress; and the Bible, the\nprophets of the Old Testament, Jesus and Paul in the New, are the\nchief creative sources of just such hopes. These hopes must have\nreligion beneath them if they are to endure and be realized in spite\nof their powerful foes, the fears and hatreds which materialism and\nselfishness create. And Christianity is the only religion which has\nthe quality and the right to meet this need.\n\nThe Christian hope is also the hope of immortality; and just now the\nreality and power of this hope are put to the test. Paul, who knew how\nfar Judaism had gone toward faith in the eternal life of the spirit,\ntestifies that it was only as a Christian and because of Christ that\nthis hope had become to him a certainty, almost a present experience.\nThe nature of God as Christ knew him, and the nature of man's sonship\nto God, carry immortality with them as an inward and immediate\nassurance. God is not the God of the dead, but of the living. Here\nagain the Christian religion has an opportunity and an obligation in\ntimes of war. Men are seeking assurance of life to come for those who\nhave given their lives for human right and liberty. It is not to be\ndesired that this pressing religious need of our day should turn to\nphysical evidences, to messages from the dead through abnormal\nexperiences and dubious agencies. The Christian faith in immortality\nis to be experienced as faith in the God who loves as a father, and\nwho gives as love must give his best to his children. If God is love,\nthen our love does not deceive us. If God is spirit, then our spirits\nare from God and will return to him. If the soul, the person, is of\nsupreme worth and reality, then it will not be involved in the body's\ndestruction, nor lost as a drop in the ocean or as a breath in the\nwind, either in the divine being from whom it came, or in the human\nrace, \"the beloved community,\" to which its service is given.\n\nIt is perhaps in the relation to each other of the hope for a new\nhuman brotherhood and the hope for the life of the soul with God, that\nthe distinction and preeminence of the religion of Jesus come most\nclearly to light. He feels no need of sacrificing one to the other,\nbut holds his hope for this world and the oneness of men in love side\nby side with the hope for the other world. He does call upon\nindividuals to give their lives in ministry to others, but in the\nlosing of life he declares that life is gained. Paradoxes express his\nfaith and insight, and the nature of love in God and in man brings\nwith it the key to the solution of the paradox.\n\nThe Christian hopes for a new human brotherhood on earth and for the\nimmortality of the individual are involved, and their principles\ngiven, in the simple and profound sayings of Jesus, and no other\ntestimony as to their nature and certainty can be compared with his.\nTo no other words is the response of our own spirits so instant and\nsure. Blessed are the poor in spirit, the meek, the merciful, the pure\nin heart: theirs is the kingdom of heaven; they shall see God. Love\nyour enemies, that ye may be sons of your Father. Ye shall be perfect\nas your heavenly Father is perfect. Lay not up for yourselves\ntreasures upon earth. Ye cannot serve God and mammon. Be not anxious\nfor your life what ye shall eat or what ye shall drink, nor yet for\nyour body what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than food and the\nbody than raiment? Behold the birds of the heaven ... Are not ye of\nmuch more value than they? Your Father knoweth that ye have need of\nall these things. But seek ye his kingdom and righteousness. Be not\nafraid of them that kill the body. The very hairs of your head are all\nnumbered. Fear not therefore. If ye being evil know how to give good\ngifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father give good\nthings to them that ask him. All things whatsoever ye would that men\nshould do unto you, even so do ye also unto them. Not every one that\nsaith unto me, Lord ... but he that doeth the will of my Father.\nFreely ye have received, freely give. It is more blessed to give than\nto receive. He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth\nhis life for my sake shall find it. I thank thee, Father ... that thou\nhast hid these things from the wise ... and revealed them unto babes.\nExcept ye turn and become as little children ye shall in no wise enter\ninto the kingdom of heaven. Forbid them not ... for to such belongeth\nthe kingdom of heaven. What shall a man be profited if he shall gain\nthe whole world and forfeit his life? It is hard for the rich man to\nenter into the kingdom of God. Keep yourselves from all covetousness:\nfor a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which\nhe possesseth. The rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, ... but\nwhosoever would be great among you shall be your minister; and\nwhosoever would be first among you shall be your servant. Render unto\nCaesar the things that are Caesar's and unto God the things that are\nGod's. Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of the least of these my\nbrethren ye did it unto me. Nevertheless not as I will, but as thou\nwilt. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.\n\nHere is the Christian hope; here its grounds and motives; here rather\nthan in apocalyptic foretellings of the coming of the Son of Man and\nthe near end of the world. Here is an anthology of testimonies to the\nfaith which a world at war to end war most needs, that man is a\nspiritual being and that his proper work is \"to interpret the world\naccording to his higher nature,\" and to bring the material aspects of\nthe world into subjection to the spirit. Other \"oracles and prophecies\nof loveliness and loving-kindness\" in the Bible and in the world's\nliterature have their abiding worth, but no other of \"the seers and\npoets of mankind\" reach humanity so widely and none so deeply.\n\nCertain marks and tests of the Christian hope come clearly into view\nin these characteristic sayings of Jesus. It is a hope not imposed\nupon the mind by the outward authority of a book or even of Christ\nhimself, but one that appeals to conscience. Our spirit answers to it,\nand our answer is not only the consent of the mind but the disclosure\nof character and the choice of the will. It is a hope for which we\ncannot merely wait, for we are ourselves challenged to bring it to\nrealization. The Christian hope is fundamentally inward, and is always\nin part already experienced. Paul and John knew the mind of Christ in\nthis striking quality of it better than later generations. The spirit\nof God is already a love that creates unity and fellowship among men;\nand it is already the presence and power of divine and eternal life.\nThe Christian hope unites the community and the individual, and\ncontains the clue to the mystery that now obscures our minds. We know\nthat the ruthless sacrifice of individuals for the abstract idol\ncalled the State is a denial of Christ's reverence for the human\npersonality. But we know also that the devotion of the soldier's life\nto the cause of human liberty and right, to the destruction of the\nidol of nationality and the creation of the ideal brotherhood of man,\nis in accordance with that giving of life for many which Jesus taught,\nand is that loss which is the true finding of life. The Christian hope\nis too inward and too secure to depend on outward success. The\ndoctrine of physical force is judged by physical success, but not the\ndoctrine of love. Yet though superior to outward fortune, the hope of\nChrist is certain of ultimate vindication, because it is hope in God.\nIt is a hope according to Christ, and for Christ's coming as the\nruling spirit in the life of humanity. But if it is a hope for Christ,\nif it is Christ's hope for the coming Kingdom of God, it is a hope for\nradical change, and for the sacrifice of our prejudices and customs,\nour personal wishes and our material advantage.\n\nThe hope for a new world-order which is the most significant spiritual\nevent of our age, requires religion if it is to maintain itself and\nwork powerfully for its own realization. For it is the hope for a\npurified human nature as well as for a changed human organization.\nChristianity is the chief source of this hope, and is summoned to\nprove itself equal to the task of keeping the hope high and giving it\ninward energy and resource. But it will require boldness of faith and\nthe spirit of sacrifice, a sense of the excellence and worth of\nspiritual things, and willingness to trust our own souls and the souls\nof our fellow men, to trust ourselves to the instincts and ways of a\nChrist-like love, if the Christian hope is to prove able to create a\nnew world.\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\nNON-RESISTANCE: CHRISTIAN OR PAGAN?\n\nBENJAMIN WISNER BACON\n\n\nAll forms of peace propaganda are at present justly and properly\nrepressed by the Government as a war measure. This has served in some\ndegree to silence the voice of the pacifist, but manifestly it cannot\nserve to quiet the disturbed feeling in the minds of many Christians,\nthat to engage in war under any conditions is to come short of the\nidealism of Jesus. Forcible measures produce the reverse effect, if\nany.\n\nNon-resistance, under some circumstances and conditions if not under\nall, is a duty which Jesus undeniably taught. Moreover, his conduct\nwas fully in accord with his principles; otherwise his following could\nnot have maintained their unparalleled loyalty to him. The manifest\ninconsistency between these non-resistance sayings (taken by\nthemselves) and the method advocated and used by our Government in\ndefence of democracy and righteousness remains ever present. The grave\nextent of its inroads upon the national morale may be judged by the\ncirculation attained by a typical pacifistic book, whose principal\nbasis of argument is nothing else than these non-resistance sayings,\nand which if it does not attempt to square them in all cases with the\nconduct of Jesus, but rather accords to Buddha, Confucius, and Lao-tse\nthe merit of greater consistency, nevertheless owes all its real\neffect to the fact that its author speaks as a well-known and\nauthorized exponent of Christian teaching, and leaves in his readers'\nminds the conviction not of the alleged inconsistency, but of an\nabsolute and unqualified doctrine of non-resistance as supported by\nboth the teaching and the conduct of Jesus.\n\nThe single year 1915-1916 witnessed the appearance of no less than\nfive successive editions of the book entitled \"New Wars for Old,\" by\nRev. John Haynes Holmes, and its propaganda of absolute and\nunconditional non-resistance was certainly not without effect in the\nmilitary cantonments, if not among the public at large where its\ninfluence is less easy to trace. Recently the Government itself has\ngiven public and official warning against this type of pacifistic\npropaganda; and there is only too much reason to believe that (quite\nwithout the intention or knowledge of its authors) those eminent\npacifists, the Potsdam conspirators, have made large financial\ncontributions to its success.\n\n\"New Wars for Old\" may be taken as representative. It is the best\nexample of its type. It seems to be the most effective. At all events,\nit gives concrete and tangible form to that interpretation of the\nteaching of Jesus which we regard as misleading and dangerous; it may\ntherefore well form our starting-point toward the attainment of\nanother interpretation, truer at once to historical fact and to the\nethical sense of the religious-minded. Recognizing the need for\nmeeting present conditions of the public mind by other than merely\nrepressive measures we may frankly face the question raised in Dr.\nHolmes' book, whether the doctrine of absolute and unqualified\nnon-resistance, traced by him to more than one revered teacher of\npre-Christian paganism, is indeed identical with that of Jesus; or\nwhether, with Israel's Messianic hope, some new factor enters in, to\ndifferentiate the Biblical ideal.\n\nIsaiah and Jesus are for this champion of pacifism--and doubtless for\nothers--the two supreme \"exemplars of non-resistance,\" and the\neloquence with which his thesis is maintained might well win an assent\nwhich would not be granted were account taken of his authority to\npronounce upon questions of historical criticism. However, few\nAmericans, competent to form a moral judgment of their own, will hold\nin light esteem the authority of Isaiah and Jesus. We therefore accept\nthe exemplars at the risk of seeing our native hue of resolution all\nsicklied o'er with this pale cast of thought. But is their teaching\njustly and fairly interpreted? That is the question to which we now\naddress ourselves.\n\n\nI\n\n\"'RESIST not evil,' means never resist, never oppose\nviolence.\" Such is the motto, quoted from Tolstoy, with which our\npropagandist heads his pages. As he cites no other scholar, critic,\nor interpreter of the Sermon on the Mount, in support of this\ndeclaration of the meaning, the inference is perhaps allowable that\nthe reader is expected to endow Tolstoy with a credit for scientific\nattainments in the difficult field of historical criticism and\ninterpretation equally great with that which all men gladly accord to\nhis noble disposition and sincere humanity. Whether authority as\nconvincing can be cited for the contention that Buddha and Lao-tse\ntaught the same doctrine of absolute non-resistance we are not\ncompetent to say. It seems at least to be beautifully expressed in the\nsaying quoted from Buddha:\n\n  With mercy and forbearance shalt thou disarm every foe. For want of\n  fuel the fire expires: mercy and forbearance bring violence to\n  naught.\n\nWhat Christian will deny the Christ-likeness of this teaching? What\nreader of the Old Testament will not hasten to add with Paul from\nJewish \"wisdom\":\n\n  If thine enemy hunger feed him, if he thirst give him drink; for by\n  so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire upon his head.[1]\n\nIf, indeed, the duty in question be that of _forbearance_, all\ngreat religious teachers, whether of Christian or pre-Christian times,\nwill be at one. \"Hymns of hate\" are unknown to the ritual of any\nreligion, unless it be the ultra-modern of Prussian militarism. One\nmust go to Nietzsche before attaining to the gospel that it is\nvirtuous to have a giant's strength and use it like a giant. Teachers\nsuch as Buddha and Lao-tse may well have added to the well-nigh\nuniversal religious tenet of mercy, forgiveness, forbearance, the\nfurther doctrine of consistent, unqualified non-resistance. We accept\nit for the obvious reason that their systems of thought, which are\nphilosophies rather than religions, contain (so far as the present\nwriter is aware) no principle of active, but only of passive\nobligation. The chief end of man is for them not to achieve, in loyal\nservice to the Creator's ideal, but to abstain and refrain, to put the\nbrakes on life, and to teach others to do the like. According to the\nauthor of \"New Wars for Old,\" Buddha and Lao-tse lived up to their\ngospel of non-resistance. Contrariwise, \"The Nazarene had his\ninconsistent moments like the rest of us,\" and showed it at this\npoint. Our propagandist is too honest to palter with the quibble of\nAdin Ballou, who in his \"Christian Non-Resistance\" argues that Jesus\nin cleansing the temple may have driven the money-changers from the\ncourtyard, but that there is no evidence that he struck any one of\nthem. With such apologetic special pleading he has no patience,\npreferring to give the act of Jesus its full weight in the following\nstraightforward words:\n\n  What we have here is a well-authenticated violation of the principle\n  of non-resistance--and why not accept it as such? The episode is\n  chiefly remarkable in the life of the Nazarene, not for anything\n  which it teaches in itself, but for its inconsistency with the rest\n  of his career. Never at any other time, so far as we know, did he\n  precipitate riot or himself assault his enemies. But this time he\n  did--this time he failed to live up to the inordinately exacting\n  demands of his own gospel of brotherhood. Nor is the circumstance at\n  all difficult to understand! Jesus came to Jerusalem tired, worn,\n  hunted. He knew that he walked straight into the arms of his\n  enemies, and undoubtedly therefore straight to his own death. Weary,\n  desperate, confused, he came to the temple to pray--and here, right\n  before the altars of his God, were the money-changers--here in the\n  sacred places, the type and symbol of that commercialized religion\n  which he most abhorred, and which he knew was certain in the end to\n  destroy him. What wonder that a mighty flood of anger surged up in\n  his soul, and for the moment overwhelmed him.\n\nIn short, the weary Jesus was so irritated by the unexpected (?) sight\nof the traders, that he threw to the winds not only his principles,\nbut the dictates of the most ordinary prudence, giving his enemies not\nonly their desired opportunity, but provoking the issue at just the\npoint where he himself had been betrayed into the violation of his own\nteaching. Verily, great is the insight of the modern psychologist. To\nthe observer of the phenomena of petulance an incident like the\ncleansing of the temple is \"easy to understand.\" The scientific\nimagination required is easily attained. One acquires it by observing\nthe irritability of tired children. How needless, then, to inform\noneself as to the historical conditions which made this great symbolic\nact of the Galilean prophet full of meaning to every patriot Jew that\nwitnessed it. How needless to raise the question why every one of our\nfour evangelists should report the act and give it the prominence they\ndo. For our evangelists record it reluctantly, minimizing its\npolitical significance and its insurrectionary flavor. They naturally\ndisliked to give color of justice to Pilate's judicial murder, and to\nJewish denunciations of the new religion as a rebellion against\nestablished authority.\n\nLet us then take as our point of departure this admitted\n\"inconsistency.\" It is not historical interpretation, but the\nsubjective variety sometimes self-designated \"psychological\" which\nfinds it \"easy\" to set aside the representation of the oldest and most\nreliable of our sources, that Jesus was _not_ \"weary, desperate,\nconfused,\" and was not in the least taken unawares, when he drove the\ntraders from the temple; but that he planned his _coup de main_\nwith careful deliberation. The evening _before_, says Mark, \"he\nentered the temple and looked round upon all things.\" Jesus was not\nunaware of the conditions he would find, for they were an abuse as\nnotorious as hateful to every right-minded Israelite. This even the\nTalmud attests. He was not a hunted fugitive seeking asylum at the\naltar. On the contrary; for weeks past he had set his face steadfastly\nto go to Jerusalem and there lift up the standard of the Son of David.\nThe initiative was his. He had planned a new campaign for his ideal,\nthe Kingdom of God, a campaign no longer of mere teaching but of\naction, and he was now carrying it to the very seat of hostile power.\nLong since, probably before he left Galilee, he had planned this very\nact, a challenge to the corrupt priestly control of his Father's\nhouse, an act as full of meaning and as deliberate as Luther's nailing\nof his theses to the church doors of Wittenberg.\n\nAnd when the blow had been struck Jesus stood courageously by it. He\nmet the inevitable demand of the hierocracy, \"By what authority doest\nthou these things?\" with a counter demand. Whence had the Baptist\nauthority to inaugurate his prophetic reform, making ready for Jehovah\na purified people prepared for his coming? The Sanhedrin evaded this\ncounter demand, and answered only (as Jesus had foreseen they would)\nby secret denunciation of him to Pilate. But Pilate understood the\ncase. We have the Roman governor's official interpretation of its\nsignificance in a certain superscription written aloft in Hebrew and\nGreek and Latin on the gibbet of an insurrectionist. This, too, Jesus\nseems to have foreseen.\n\nAll this was not a mere \"episode.\" It was the culminating effort and\ncrisis of Jesus' career, and richly rewards a just understanding. We\nare told that it was \"inconsistent with the rest of Jesus' career.\"\nHis mission, we infer, was to be a rabbi. His attempt at active\nleadership in achieving the Kingdom he preached was an unfortunate\naberration. He should not have tried to be \"the Christ,\" and thereby\nincurred a needless martyrdom. The cross is still a stumblingblock.\n\nStrange that the evangelists who omit so much, who would have so\nstrong a motive for omitting this particular \"inconsistency\" no less\nfor their Master's good name than for the safety of the Church,\nshould one and all record it. The disposition to minimize everything\nsavoring of political action on Jesus' part is very marked in all\nour evangelists, for obvious reasons. To the evidences of this\nbelong, for example, Mark's denial, and the fourth evangelist's\nexplanation, of the saying about destroying the temple, together\nwith the latter's description of the whip \"of small cords\" as Jesus'\nonly weapon in the purging of the temple.[2] Are we then to admit\nthe \"inconsistency\"--not casual and incidental, as conceived in this\npacifistic interpretation, but deliberate and flagrant? Or may we\nperhaps now raise the question whether the \"inconsistency\" is not\nrather chargeable to the interpreter's account?\n\nThe interpretation with which we are dealing makes the teaching of\nJesus regarding the use of force identical with the non-resistance\ndoctrine of Buddha and Lao-tse. On the other hand, it very justly\nrelates it to that of the great prophet of the Davidic kingdom of\nrighteousness and peace, Isaiah, the son of Amoz. From the point of\nview of the historical critic the relation of Jesus' teaching to that\nof Isaiah is absolutely sound. But the effect of this relation is\nfatal to its identification with the non-resistance doctrine of Buddha\nand Lao-tse.\n\nApart from the circumstances which for the time being made\nnon-resistance, or rather mere passive resistance, the policy of true\nstatesmanship alike against Assyrian and against Roman domination,\nIsaiah and Jesus stood together upon the most fundamental point of\nall, unqualified, unlimited loyalty to the God of Righteousness and to\nhis sovereignty upon earth. Their pacifism differs from that of\nLao-tse and of Buddha in the important respect of having a pronounced\ntheistic basis. Buddha and Lao-tse can preach consistently a doctrine\nof absolute non-resistance because their systems are destitute of the\nsocial ideal of Israel's religion, and indeed ignore the very\nexistence of a \"Power not ourselves that makes for Righteousness.\"\nContrariwise with the great prophets of the Kingdom of God. Whether of\nthe Christian or pre-Christian dispensation, so far as they advocate\nnon-resistance it cannot be unlimited, _because their religious aim\nis not merely individual but social_.\n\nThe non-resistance of Isaiah and of Jesus is not self-centered but\nGod-centered. It is bound to consider what is expedient for others,\nfor the weak and dependent, as well as for the individual, and for the\npresent time. It seeks the welfare of the world and of generations to\ncome. It is always subsidiary to the paramount interest of the Kingdom\nof God.\n\nJust because it regards non-resistance not as an end in itself but\nonly as one of the divinest means to an end, Biblical pacifism can\nhold before men's eyes the moving figure of the martyred Servant, dumb\nas the lamb in the shearer's hands, while it can in the same breath\ncommend the men of violence that take the Kingdom of Heaven by force.\nChristian or pre-Christian, it rests upon the foundation of utter,\nabsolute loyalty to a world-wide Republic of God, a cosmic sovereignty\nof righteousness, and having this social aim for its religious ideal\nit can and does nourish to the highest pitch of devotion the heroic\nvirtues of patriotism, of service and of sacrifice. The summons to the\nstandard (not men's but God's) is ever the same. The weapon may be the\nsword or the cross, as the times require. Under mere self-centered\nphilosophies such as those of Buddha and Lao-tse the contrary is true.\nNotoriously, where these control patriotism and all its heroic virtues\ntend to dwindle, approaching often the verge of extinction.\n\nThe pacifism (not non-resistance) of Isaiah hardly requires\nelucidation. Two or three very familiar quotations will suffice. There\nis, for example, the prophet's vision of a universal peace based on\ninternational law. This vision of the world's willing acceptance of\nthe sovereignty of Jehovah's justice Isaiah shares with his\ncontemporary, Micah, both prophets seeming to choose it as a text from\nsome forgotten earlier pacifist.\n\n  It shall come to pass in the latter days\n  That the mountain of Jehovah's house shall be\n    established at the head of mountains,\n  And shall be exalted above the hills,\n  And all nations shall flow unto it.\n\n  And many peoples shall go and say, Come, let us\n    go up to the mountain of Jehovah,\n  To the house of the God of Jacob,\n  And he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk\n    in his paths.\n  For out of Zion shall go forth law, and the word of\n    Jehovah from Jerusalem.\n\n  And he shall judge between the nations, and will\n    be arbiter for many peoples;\n  And they shall beat their swords into plow-shares,\n    and their spears into pruning-hooks.\n  Nation shall not lift up sword against nation,\n  Neither shall they learn war any more.\n\nManifestly the ideal of an international tribunal as the basis of a\nLeague of Peace is not so novel as some modern statesmanship seems to\nconceive.\n\nBut the consistent, thoroughgoing advocate of non-resistance rejects\neven the coercion of magisterial and police constraint. To Russian\nidealism restraint of the individual as well as the national criminal\nis tainted with the same poison of violence. Since Isaiah is the\nexemplar of non-resistance he should be permitted again to speak for\nhimself. His words seem to have a singular applicability to the land\nwhich is now testing to the limit the theory of Proudhon, the\nindividualist of individualists, the gospel of anarchism:\n\n  For behold the Lord, Jehovah of Hosts, doth take away from\n    Jerusalem and from Judah stay and staff,\n  The whole stay of bread and the whole stay of water,\n  The mighty man, and the man of war;\n  The judge and the prophet, the diviner and the elder;\n  The captain of fifty and the honorable man and the counsellor ...\n  And I will give children to be their princes,\n  And with childishness shall they rule over them,\n  And the people shall be oppressed every one by another, and\n    every one by his neighbor:\n  The child shall be arrogant against the old man, and the base\n    against the honorable.\n\nBut Isaiah, too, expects deliverance from these miseries of foreign\nservitude and domestic anarchy. He looks for the dawn of a just and\nlasting peace; only the means of its attainment seem strange for an\n\"exemplar of non-resistance.\"\n\n  The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light;\n  They that dwelt in the land of the shadow of death, upon them\n    hath the light shined.\n  Thou hast multiplied the nation and increased their joy,\n  They joy before thee according to the rejoicing at harvest-time,\n  As men rejoice when they divide the spoil.\n  For the yoke of (Israel's) burden, and the rod laid to his shoulder,\n  The staff of his oppressor, thou hast broken as in the day of\n    Midian.\n\n  For all the armor of the armed man in the tumult\n  And the garments rolled in blood shall be for burning, for fuel\n    of fire.\n  For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given,\n  And the government shall be upon his shoulder:\n  And his name shall be called: Wonderful-counsellor;\n  The-Mighty-God-the-Everlasting (my)-Father;\n  The Prince of Peace.\n\n  Of the increase of his government and of peace there shall be\n    no end.\n  Upon the throne of David and upon his kingdom,\n  To establish it, and to uphold it with justice and with\n    righteousness from henceforth even forever.\n  The zeal of Jehovah of Hosts will perform this.\n\nEven with the devout restraint of the closing line it must be admitted\nthat these verses have a somewhat martial ring.\n\nDoubtless the pacifist will emphasize the line, \"The zeal of Jehovah\nof Hosts will perform this,\" taking here the view of the Pharisees,\nwho in contrast with the fanatical nationalism of the Zealots opposed\nthe aggressive militarism of the later Maccabees with a doctrine of\nquietism. Their cry was, \"Leave all to God.\" Against the Zealot they\nappealed to the proverb: \"They that take the sword shall perish by the\nsword,\" from which the inference is plain that if the aim be never to\nlose one's life one should never take weapons. But perhaps Isaiah the\n\"non-resistant\" is entitled to one more chance to prove himself not a\nPharisee, even when he expects \"the zeal of Jehovah of Hosts\" to win\nthe victory of peace. Fortunately he tells us _how_ he expects\nthe zeal of Jehovah to operate, in the doom he pronounces upon\n\"drunkard\" Samaria, the city whose luxuriant mountain-top was crowned\nwith mingled towers and olive groves, like the fading wreaths upon the\nheads of drunken revellers. In contrast to Samaria's fate Isaiah has\nthis promise for the temple-crowned hill of Zion, shadowed under its\naltar smoke:\n\n  In that day will Jehovah of Hosts become a crown of glory\n  And a diadem of beauty unto the residue of his people,\n  _A spirit of justice to him that sitteth in judgment,\n  And a spirit of strength to them that turn back the battle at the\n    gate_.[3]\n\n\nII\n\nIt should hardly be necessary to explain that Jesus in deliberately\ngiving up the career of purely non-political preacher, teacher, and\nhealer, to assume the career of _Christ_ and Son of David, fully\nconscious as he was of all the dangers it implied, was neither\nignorant of the Isaian ideal, nor out of sympathy with it. When he\nrode into Jerusalem accepting the acclamation: \"Blessed be the kingdom\nthat cometh, the kingdom of our father David,\" he was not betraying\nthe national hope; he was lifting it toward ultimate realization at\nthe cost of Calvary.\n\nIt is true that he avoided suicidal collision with Roman authority on\nthe one side, as prudently as he forestalled the sweeping off of his\nfollowing into the insane fanaticism of the Zealot nationalists on the\nother. The prophet's method of a symbolic purifying of the temple was\nexactly suited to this purpose. In the temple Roman authority\nexplicitly renounced control. The policing of this combined fortress,\nsanctuary, and treasure house was left, even to the power of life and\ndeath, in the hands of the Sadducean hierocracy. It was administered\nby a numerous and efficient Levite police commanded by a \"captain of\nthe temple.\" On the other hand, Sadducean control was notoriously and\ninfamously corrupt. The abuses by which (with their connivance) money\nwas extorted from the worshippers made it so hateful that a worthy\nreformer might be sure of popular support strong enough to cow \"the\nhissing brood of Annas\" into an interval of \"fear of the people.\" And\nthe reform might even be accomplished without unchaining the red\nfool-fury of the Zealot mob, if it was seen to be the work of a\nprophet, by authority \"from heaven\" and not \"of men,\" consistent, even\nif regarded as a messianic act, with the course of one who had come\n\"meek and lowly and having salvation, riding upon an ass, and on a\ncolt the foal of an ass.\"\n\nIt is of vital importance to a historical appreciation of Jesus' sense\nof his mission to realize fully and adequately what he meant by this\none public overt act of his career; for by it he signalized to all\nIsrael assembled at the Passover his purpose to achieve a national\ndeliverance such as the feast commemorated. From it every loyal\nIsraelite might infer that the hope of \"the kingdom of David\" was now\nabout to be realized. Jesus thus entered deliberately upon the stormy\nand dangerous seas of messianistic agitation, as a claimant to\nleadership in the achievement of the national hope.\n\nTo herald such a reform as Jesus proposed, reviving the national\nideal, the purification of the temple was a symbolic act worthy of the\ngreatest of prophets. It was exactly fitted to raise and define the\nissues at stake. It would convey just the right impression to the\nmultitude, whose attention could be reached by this time-honored\nmethod, and by this method alone. It was also free from the worst\ndangers of messianistic agitation. It would avoid on the one hand the\nScylla of needless collision with Roman authority, and on the other\nthe Charybdis of Zealot turbulence. The calm and fearless \"authority\nfrom heaven\" with which it was effected overawed resistance, so that\neven while asserted _by force_ it attained its result with the\nshedding of no other blood than the Messenger's own.\n\nTo show the exact meaning to contemporary Jewish minds of this act of\nthe Prophet of Nazareth we must recall not merely the Isaian ideal of\nthe \"Davidic\" reign as a universal kingdom of righteousness and peace\nbased on divine law going forth from Zion, but also the later\napocalyptic hopes. We must remember that all expectation in Jesus'\ntime was focussed on the prophecies of Malachi, which made the\npurified temple the scene of Jehovah's visitation of his people, after\nthey should have been brought to a \"great repentance\" by the coming of\nElias. A rabbinic parable of the period will give us the point of\nview. It is an answer to the reproach so bitterly resented by Isaiah,\n\"Israel is a wife forsaken,\" and is based on Malachi 1:6-14, and\n3:1-12 interpreting the designation \"Tent of Witness\" applied to the\ntabernacle in Exodus 38:21:\n\n  A king was angry with his wife and forsook her. The neighbors\n  declared, \"He will not return\" (cf. Isa. 49:14). Then the king sent\n  word to her (Mal. 1:10 ff): \"Cleanse my palace, and on such and\n  such a day I will return to thee.\" He came and was reconciled to\n  her. Therefore is the sanctuary called the Tent of \"Witness\"--a\n  witness to the Gentiles that God is no longer wroth.[4]\n\nJesus' act was the assertion of authority \"from heaven\" to make\nJehovah's will supreme upon earth, beginning at his own sanctuary. It\nwas effected by direct appeal to the conscience of the masses, which\nto the extent of their understanding responded overwhelmingly. Jesus\ndid not expect his act to be more than \"a witness to the peoples.\" But\non the other hand, for the time being at least, he sacrificed no life\nsave his own. One close parallel could be cited from modern times if\nthe demonstration could be freed from its unfortunate association with\nreally fanatical revolt and real intention to provoke a servile\ninsurrection. In keeping his demonstration in the temple free from\nentangling alliance with Zealot nationalism, Jesus showed a moderation\nand foresight which were unfortunately lacking to the demonstration of\nJohn Brown at Harpers Ferry; otherwise the two have many points of\naffinity. It was while the governor of Virginia was still hesitating\nto sign the death warrant of the champion of negro emancipation, long\nbefore his martyr spirit marched on before great armies of liberation,\nthat Ralph Waldo Emerson, once himself a non-resistant pacifist, wrote\nin his journal:\n\n  If John Brown shall suffer, he will make the gallows glorious like\n  the cross.\n\n\nIII\n\nThat Jesus intended to raise the standard of David by his public act\nat the Passover is certain. His pacifism was of the type of Micah's\nand Isaiah's. That he meant the act to convey a religious sense\ndifferentiating it from the merely political ideal of the Zealots is\nalso certain. His doctrine of reliance on spiritual methods in the\npursuit of the God-given aim exalts forbearance _as a means_ in\nterms not less noble than the foremost champions of non-resistance. We\nmay question whether he actually counted upon his own only too\nprobable fate of crucifixion at Roman hands as destined to serve the\nprecise end which it actually has subserved in human history. Those\nwho see it with the wisdom of retrospect know that it has furnished to\nall devotees of Israel's ideal of the Kingdom of God, in all races,\nunto all successive generations, a rallying point and a symbol of\nfinal victory. But Jesus was looking forward with the eye of faith,\nnot backward with the eye of knowledge. He believed that even through\ndeath God would give victory to those who sacrificed life and all to\nhis kingdom's cause, and that it would be given ere their generation\nhad passed into oblivion. How much further than this his prophetic\ninsight into the ways of God with men extended is a question which\nwill be variously answered in accordance with varying views of his\npersonality. It need be no matter of surprise, however, to any\ndiscerning mind, that the fourth evangelist should also look backward\nat the significance of the cross, interpreting it in the light of its\nactual results. The fourth evangelist is the successor of Paul at\nEphesus. Like Paul he naturally emphasizes its effect in\n\"reconciliation,\" a twofold atonement, \"breaking down the enmity\"\nbetween man and God, and also that between man and man; and the great\nbarrier of Paul's experience was that erected by the Mosaic law\nbetween Jew and Gentile. By the cross, says Paul to the Ephesians,\nChrist who is \"our peace\"[5]\n\n  made both one, and brake down the middle wall of partition, having\n  abolished in his flesh the enmity; even the law of commandments\n  contained in ordinances, that he might create in himself of the\n  twain one new man, so making peace; and might reconcile them both in\n  one body unto God through the cross, having slain the enmity\n  thereby.\n\nNo wonder Paul thinks of God as \"the God of peace,\" the gospel as \"the\ngospel of peace\" and Christ as \"our peace\" proclaimed to the nations\nnear and far.\n\nThat is the pacifism of Christianity. No wonder Paul's great successor\nat Ephesus compares this healing and reconciling cross to the token of\nforgiveness and faith which Moses lifted up in the wilderness, and\nrepeatedly presents as its divinely appointed aim the \"gathering into\none the children of God that are scattered abroad\" (John 11:51-52).\n\nThe fourth evangelist devotes the closing section of his story of the\npublic ministry to this great question, Why Jesus came forward as the\nChrist? The scene he chooses is Jerusalem at the Feast of Dedication,\nthat festival which commemorated the death and resurrection of the\nMaccabean martyrs who had given their lives for the national ideal.\nThe story begins with the Jews' demand of Jesus that he \"tell them\nplainly\" whether he is the Christ. It ends with the mystical utterance\nof the high priest:\n\n  that Jesus should die for the nation, and not for that nation only,\n  but that he might gather together into one the children of God which\n  are scattered abroad.\n\nTo show what alternative lay before him we are told of a delegation of\nGreeks who wait upon Jesus, apparently to invite him to \"go to the\nGentiles and teach them,\" but who receive as their answer, after a\nmomentary soul-conflict paralleling the scene of Gethsemane, that\nJesus \"must be lifted up,\" and thus through his martyr death \"will\ndraw all men unto him.\" The central scene of the raising of Lazarus is\nof course directed to the resurrection theme appropriate to this\nfeast, the theme of the Christ who as Messenger of God brings life and\nimmortality to light. But the whole section rests back on an opening\nparable, that of the Good Shepherd who lays down his life for the\nsheep (John 10:11-18). Our concern is with this parable; for it is\nnot an invention of the fourth evangelist, but an authentic comparison\nof Jesus attested by the preceding evangelists,[6] and merely\ndeveloped in the later interpretative gospel along the lines of the\noriginal prophecy,[7] and with special reference to the cross as a\ntoken of unity in estranged and warring humanity evoked by loyalty to\na common higher ideal.\n\nIn the parable of the Good Shepherd, as elsewhere, the fourth\nevangelist shows that his view of the tragedy of Calvary is determined\nby its actual result. The function of the Shepherd is to gather a\nflock now scattered, and which includes \"other sheep that are not of\nthis fold.\" The aim is \"that there may be one flock; one Shepherd,\" an\naim suggested by Paul. But primarily the parable is simply an\nadaptation of Ezekiel's famous indictment of the hireling shepherds of\nIsrael, who had first exploited Jehovah's flock, and then abandoned it\nto the ravening of wild beasts. Because of this, the prophet declares,\nJehovah himself will seek out the scattered and bleeding remnant and\nwill set up over them a worthy shepherd, the son of David.\n\nThe special application made by the fourth evangelist is to the\ngathering of a flock already scattered, bleeding, and torn of beasts,\nbecause of the faithlessness of hireling shepherds. Such was in truth\nthe task imposed by the conditions of the time. Such was in the\nexperience of Paul and his generation the actual effect of the cross.\nBut primarily and in Jesus' mind it was simply the token of the last\nsupreme measure of devotion which he, and all who would follow him,\nmust be prepared to pay in loyalty to the Kingdom of God. Its\ncomparison is purely and simply a contrast between two types of\nleadership. On the one side is he who lays down his life in defence of\nthe helpless, be it in conflict, as when David the shepherd lad with\nsling and stone rescued his sheep \"out of the paw of the lion and the\nbear,\" or be it in search for the lost lamb upon the mountainside. On\nthe other side is he who \"when he seeth the wolf coming leaveth the\nsheep and fleeth.\" The special need of the time, that which appealed\nto Jesus as the supreme need of those to whom he was sent, was his\npeople's need of a standard and leadership, rescue of the scattered\nand lost.\n\n  When he saw the multitude he had compassion on them because they\n  were distressed and scattered as sheep that have no shepherd.\n\nHe gave them the needed rallying point, a sign in which afterward they\nshould conquer. He also gave them the needed leadership. The former\nwas the need of the first age of the Church. The second need is ours;\nfor defence of the flock is as much a shepherd's task as seeking out\nthe lost. They who abandon it in the face of wolfish attack need\nexpect no approval from the Son of David.\n\n\nIV\n\nThere is a certain magnificence of logical consistency in the\nnon-resistance doctrine of the pacifist who chooses the Empire of\nChina (!) as the example of its perfect work in the field of\ninternational relations.[8] With the blessed example of the Celestial\nKingdom before us we are asked:\n\n  What did it avail Belgium to marshal her armies and hold her forts\n  against the irresistible advance of the German legions?[9]\n\nThe question has an extraordinary resemblance to that addressed by the\nKaiser to King Albert in _Punch's_ famous cartoon: \"Don't you see\nthat Belgium has lost everything?\" And Albert's answer is taken from\nChrist's own lips: \"She has not lost her soul.\" The Celestial Empire\non the other hand seems to this champion of the pacifism of Lao-tse to\nhave practically realized the blessings of the Kingdom of Heaven.\nPeacefully non-resistant under the corrupt domination of its Manchu\nconquerors it had attained the climax of earthly felicity. It had a\nname to live, and was dead.\n\n  The Chinese and the Quakers, each in their own way, are finished\n  products. What they are is all they ever can be. Which means from\n  the standpoint of national idealism, that non-resistance is the\n  \"saving element.\"[10]\n\nThis eulogy of China, however, was written before the new Republic of\nChina, stirring the long dormant instincts of Chinese patriotism, had\nroused to new hopes and visions of world achievement the body that had\nbecome as one dead, insomuch that the more part said, He is dead. But\nnon-resistant pacifism is ever rich in paradox. Today China herself,\nso long inert, blessed for so many centuries with all the felicity of\nsubmission, has thrown off the Manchu yoke of domination. And in the\nfirst surge of new-found strength she declares war against Attila and\nhis Huns, and in the declaration itself avows that she is \"fighting to\nestablish peace.\" To such inconsistency does non-resistance seem fated\nas soon as life triumphs over death, as soon as the Christian gospel\nof a world kingdom of righteousness and peace triumphs over Buddha's\npessimistic obliteration of desire and hope together in the gray\n_nirvana_ of extinction. \"Eternal life\" through death-defying\nloyalty to a divine ideal begins at last to seem preferable, even in\nChina, to mere indefinite \"survival.\"\n\nNot Quakerdom itself seems able to maintain consistency with its\nnon-resistant ideals. Alas,\n\n  they were abandoned by those who could not and would not see the\n  connection between these principles and the uninterrupted peace\n  which had long blessed the Pennsylvania colony.\n\nBecoming itself directly responsible for the order and security\nhitherto guaranteed by the sovereign British power the Quaker\ncommonwealth followed the example of its neighbor states and girt on\nthe sword.[11] For this, doubtless, we may hold the influx of alien\nimmigrants more responsible than the genuine followers of Fox and\nPenn. But it must at least be admitted that Quaker leaven showed\nlittle power to work, so far as the doctrine and policy of\nnon-resistance are concerned.\n\nInconsistencies such as these on the part of the greatest modern\nexemplars of non-resistance are saddening to its champions, but there\nremains ever a more ethereal realm, where philosophy can build without\nfear of the stern realities of life, the limbo of utopias.\n\n\nV\n\nJesus, too, they tell us, though greatest of all non-resistants, was\nalso \"inconsistent.\" Was he, then, inconsistent with himself? Or was\nhis pacifism the active pacifism of those who give their lives for\njust and lasting peace, the peace that is real and not mere\ndevastation, not destruction and tyranny miscalled _Kultur_; not\nmight triumphant over right and unashamed; but a peace that endures\nbecause justice and right have been enthroned?\n\nJesus closed his public teaching with the doctrine that all religion,\nall duty to God and man, is summed up in the two commandments:\nUnreserved, unqualified, unfaltering devotion to the One God of\nRighteousness and Truth; unselfish devotion to the common weal of man.\nOne who in obedience to this law of love took up the succession of\nMoses, David and the prophets, raising the standard of God's real\nsovereignty on earth, and paying to it the last full measure of his\nown devotion, has not deserved the accusation of inconsistency. Jesus\nwas sublimely consistent. That interpretation of his words which\nrefuses the witness of his heroic deeds to their true meaning is\nguilty of the inconsistency.\n\nIt is true, as Tolstoy finely says, that Jesus' noble depiction in the\nSermon on the Mount of the forbearance of God as the standard of the\nhigher righteousness means that we should \"never do anything\n_contrary to the law of love_.\" But by what right does the great\nRussian pacifist (or any other who claims for his theory the authority\nof Jesus) omit from that law of love its \"first and great\ncommandment\"? How can we ignore the demand of supreme and unqualified\ndevotion to the God of Righteousness, whose kingdom of righteous peace\nJesus gave his life to establish, and limit our obedience to\nacquiescence in the demands of men, be they righteous or the reverse?\nThe second commandment of the Law of Love is dependent on the first,\nand in separation from it will assuredly be misconstrued. Equal love\nof neighbor can be no requirement of _religion_, save as it\ndepends on the prior obligation of supreme devotion to a common\nFather, whose forbearing, forgiving love extends equally to all.\nImitation of that Father's goodness and forbearance, overcoming the\nevil of the world with good, is the one teaching, the comprehensive,\nunifying principle, of the Sermon on the Mount. But the God whose\ngoodness this great discourse sets up as the standard of the\nrighteousness of all \"sons and daughters of the Highest\" is not a\n_non-resistant_ God. It is the just and merciful God depicted in\nthose Scriptures wherein Jesus read his beneficent will and purpose\nfor the world.\n\nIt is not enough for the Christian merely \"to do nothing contrary to\nthe law of love\"; he must actively toil and suffer in its service,\nfighting to the death. His personal enemy he may and must forgive.\nEnemies have thus been won to the kingdom. The enemy of the weak and\ndefenceless brother he must resist. The enemy of God's kingdom he must\nfight to the death. It is true that this foe of God is no human or\nvisible foe. Our wrestling is not against flesh and blood; it is\nagainst the principalities and powers of darkness in the heavenly\nplaces. But we do not beat the air. This power of darkness finds\nincarnation in human form at least as readily as the Power of light.\nHe fights with real and concrete weapons, and this reality is the\nultimate test. For the foe who thus incarnates the evil power the\nChristian has no hatred as brother-man; only as agent of the evil\npower. The hatred ceases when the man renounces the evil allegiance.\nHence the paradox of love that may necessitate a blow. Self-deception\nis here all too easy, but absolutely selfless devotion may be trusted\neven here not to substitute its own cause for God's.\n\nThe very paragraph from which the non-resistants draw their doctrine\nhas this conclusion:\n\n  Wherefore seek ye _first_ the kingdom of God and his righteousness,\n  and all these (outward blessings) shall be added unto you.\n\nIt is because Jesus sought _first_ the kingdom, which means\nrighteousness, peace and good will among men, sovereignty of right\nover might, overthrow of the powers of darkness which claim as their\nown the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them, that he could\nteach as the best means to its attainment forbearance and\nloving-kindness to the limit. For a limit there is--the _divine_\nlimit of the welfare of all. Loyalty to this ideal led Jesus to crown\nhis sublime teaching with action sublimer still. When the scenes of\nhis earlier ministry were closed, he left the quiet paths of teacher\nand healer in Galilee to tread the martyr's road, and to set up in his\nown cross an ensign to rally the scattered and bleeding flock of God.\nBecause he sought \"first the kingdom of God\" Jesus held back his\ndisciples from the bloody and disastrous path of Zealot fanaticism,\nand bade Peter return his futile sword to its sheath. For the same\nreason and no other he depicted to his disciples the Good Shepherd\nlaying down his life in defence of the flock, and poured scorn upon\nthe hireling who \"when he seeth the wolf coming, leaveth the sheep and\nfleeth.\" It is for the same reason and no other that he also warned\nthem of days to come when it should be the duty of the disciple\nunprovided with a sword to \"sell his garment and buy one,\" days when\nonly he that endured unto the end, fighting to the death against the\npowers of darkness, should be saved.\n\nJesus teaches _unlimited_ non-resistance where only personal and\nselfish interests are at stake; but resistance unto blood for the sake\nof the Kingdom of God and his righteousness. In this he _is_\ninconsistent with non-resistant pacifism that can see no difference\nbetween this doctrine and that of Buddha or Lao-tse. Jesus even\nreverses that Bolshevist pacifism that to save its own skin throws to\nthe Turkish-Teuton wolves the bleeding remnant of the earliest\nhistoric flock of Christ. He approves rather shepherds that give their\nlives fighting in defence of their helpless charge. He _is_\ninconsistent with the theories and philosophies of non-resistance; but\nhe is consistent, sublimely consistent, with his own gospel of the\nsovereignty of God.\n\nThe rule of truly Christian pacifism is not hard to understand when we\napproach it from the standpoint of those who after the precept and\nexample of Jesus seek _first_ the Kingdom of God. Men of this\ntype are ready like \"all the saints who nobly fought of old\" to lose\ntheir lives in this high cause, that they may save them unto life\neternal. For individuals and for nations the rule is the same: \"In\nthine own cause strike never, not even in self-defence; in God's cause\nstrike when he bids thee strike and cease not, come victory or death.\"\nThere is, no doubt, an easy self-delusion, prone to identify its own\ncause with God's. But against this blasphemous egotism human history\nhenceforth will ever set up the abhorrent warning of a certain\nimperial attitudinizer whom we do not need to name. There is a time\nfor forbearance, patience, longsuffering, up to the limit of the\nforbearance of that God who seeks only the good of all, and who seeks\nit in wisdom and justice as well as in forbearance. The time is _up\nto that limit_, and not beyond it. If the enemy can be won, win\nhim. Turn the other cheek, surrender tunic along with cloak. But\nforbearance is not meant to play into the hands of the evil power.\nThere is also a time when it only gluts the ravenous maw of inhuman,\nsoulless tyranny, a time when incarnate evil sits in the very temple\nof God, setting itself forth as God, a time when the law of violence\nis openly avowed and exalted above the law of mercy and right, a time\nof the beast and the false prophet, threatening to turn civilization\nback again to the age of Lamech and Tubal-cain. That is a time to\nremember also the commandment, \"Let him that hath no sword sell his\ncloak and buy one,\" and the promise: \"He that overcometh, I will give\nto him to sit down with me on my throne, as I also overcame, and sat\ndown with my Father on his throne.\"\n\n[1] Rom. 12:20, citing Prov. 25:21-22.\n\n[2] See below as to the fourth evangelist's explanation of Jesus'\nclaim to be the Davidic Shepherd of Israel only in the sense of\nuniting the scattered flock of God.\n\n[3] The citations are all from the unquestioned writings of the First\nIsaiah, Isa. 2:2-4; 3:1-5; 9:2-7 and 28:1-6. The rendering is made\nindependently from the Hebrew.\n\n[4] Mal. 3:1-4; 4:1-6.\n\n[5] Paul is elaborating Isa. 57:19.\n\n[6] Mk. 6:34; 14:27 and parallels.\n\n[7] Ezek. 34.\n\n[8] \"New Wars for Old,\" pp. 252-258.\n\n[9] _Ibid._ p. 223.\n\n[10] _Ibid._ p. 258.\n\n[11] \"New Wars for Old,\" p. 241.\n\n\n\n\nV\n\nTHE MINISTRY AND THE WAR\n\nHENRY HALLAM TWEEDY\n\n\nWhen the greatest crime in all history was perpetrated and the\nworld-war began, it was natural and necessary that the ministry of all\nlands should buckle on the Christian armor and take its place in the\nfighting ranks. Thousands volunteered as chaplains and Y. M. C. A.\nworkers. Thousands more--two thousand at one time in Canada\nalone--equally eager to don the khaki and endure their share of the\nhardships, waited impatiently until a door could be opened for them to\ngo. In the training camps and in the trenches, in hut and in hospital,\nthese men found new parishes and pulpits, ministering in a multitude\nof ways, and finding opportunities for Christ-like service in the\nsoldier's every need. They did more than preach sermons, hold Bible\nclasses, and act as spiritual comforters and advisers. To them, as to\nDonald Hankey's \"beloved captain,\" no task was too petty or too\nmenial, no lowly service beneath them, if it lightened the burdens or\nadded to the comfort and efficiency of the fighters. At all times and\neverywhere, in all ways and by all means, they strove to represent the\nMaster, who cared for bodies as well as for souls, for the resting\ntimes and food and tired feet as well as for the thoughts and motives\nand ambitions of his disciples. They were the ambassadors of the\nPrince of Peace and the army's public friends.\n\nAll this was only what might have been expected. The arresting fact\nwas to find these prophets of peace, with comparatively few\nexceptions, proclaiming the righteousness of our participation in the\nwar. In 1915 when the _Continent_, of Chicago, sent out a\nquestionnaire among the Presbyterian ministers of the country, an\noverwhelming majority declared themselves in favor of preparedness. A\nvote in Brooklyn, embracing ministers in something like twenty\ndenominations, showed one hundred and fifty-one in favor of\npreparedness, while six qualified their approval and only fourteen\nwere opposed. These are indications of the trend of thought among the\nministers of America; and though they may not give direct and\nunimpeachable evidence of how these men would have viewed the entrance\nof the United States into the European _debacle_, it would seem\nto be a legitimate inference that their attitude would be the same.\nWhen a nation, patient and forbearing until her enemies scoffed and\nher friends grieved, found herself compelled to defend her\nunquestioned rights against lawless and brutal pirates, minds which\napproved of preparedness for war would naturally, almost inevitably,\napprove of war. Nor was it our rights only. We entered the struggle\nnot through pride or greed or hatred, but as the champion of\ninternational law, righteousness, liberty, democracy, and a world\npeace that shall be abiding and just for all.\n\nTo the few pacifists among the clergy all this seems quite\nunnecessary. Why should not America walk in the footsteps of Jesus,\nset her face steadfastly toward her Jerusalem, and for the world's\nsalvation suffer Germany and Austria and Turkey to drive the spikes\nthrough her hands? Why not permit the Central Powers to seize and\npossess our country, even though they dealt with those of us, who\ncould not and would not submit to the ethics of Nietzsche and the\ndiplomacy of Bernhardi and the rule of von Hindenburg, as they treated\nthe fathers and mothers and little children of Armenia and Belgium and\nPoland? \"Resist not evil!\" The cure of Christ's time is the cure of\nour time! The age of Judas and of Pilate, of the scribes and brutal\nRoman soldiers, has never passed.\n\nThis is not the place to attempt to settle the dispute between the\nchampions of peace at any price and those of a war which, rightly or\nwrongly, they regard as righteous and unavoidable. It certainly will\nnever be decided by calling all pacifists cowards and slackers, and\nall defenders of the course pursued by President Wilson, the son of a\nclergyman, exponents of Prussian militarism. The plain fact is that\nthere is no path open to us which presents no moral difficulties. It\nis not a choice between absolute right and absolute wrong, but between\nthe preponderance of right and the preponderance of wrong. As some one\nhas phrased it, \"War is a moral enterprise, if it redeems a state from\na condition worse than war\"; and that--so it seemed to thousands of\nethical and religious teachers--was the situation in America. To have\nwatched the violation of Belgium, the massacre of Armenia, the\ndestruction of England, France and Italy, the absorption of Russia,\nand ultimately the forging of the chains of our own servitude, without\nstriking a blow to protect the world against the unspeakable barbarism\nof a megalomaniac would have been ethical madness. Granting the\nculprit's sanity, it would have been a kind of religious paranoia not\nto bring the international butcher and brigand to terms. The man who\nstands by, while a thug robs his neighbor's house and murders the wife\nand children, practically cooperates with the criminal. If he is a\nsaint, he is a saintly Raffles. Though he never strike a blow, he\nbears the mark of Cain. Leaders like the Rev. Charles A. Eaton, D.D.,\nof the Madison Avenue Baptist Church in New York City, have ventured\nto characterize our participation in the struggle as \"our Christian\nduty.\" Many even of our Quakers vigorously champion it. Mr. John L.\nCarver, the head of the Friends' School in New York and Brooklyn,\nwrites: \"First and last, let us have no compromise or suggestion of\ncompromise as to the justice of the American cause--no admixture of\nfalse pacifism in relation to one of the few absolutely just and\nunavoidable wars that the world has ever seen, unmarred by fanaticism,\nmistaken hatred, or lust of gain. Let us permit no confusion of ideas\nbetween old time wars of aggression or revenge, and this present war\nof unselfish sacrifice to save humanity from the reign of the beast.\"\nWith this it is safe to say the great majority of Christians, lay and\nclerical, heartily agree. War is always bad; but there are situations\nwhen to decline to give battle, permitting the foe to work his immoral\nwill, is not only still more terrible in its cost but more awful in\nits moral degradation. To kill is always an evil; but it is less of an\nevil, both for society and for the evil doer, than to permit a band of\ndeluded assassins to run amuck in the ranks of civilization and to\npractice their marksmanship on the gentlest of women and the noblest\nof men. Almost to a man the leaders of thought in the allied\ncountries, with unwilling minds and breaking hearts, have reached this\ndecision. Rightly or wrongly, it is the answer which has come to their\nagonized petition, \"Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?\"\n\nBut there is a still more striking fact. Not only are our ministers\nlike Sir George Adam Smith in khaki and Dr. Henry Van Dyke in the\nuniform of the navy, toiling as spiritual specialists for our soldiers\nand sailors. Not only are teachers like Principal Forsyth and\nex-President Taft proclaiming our moral duty and legal right to\nparticipate in the greatest and most terrible of wars. After careful\ndeliberation an ever-increasing number of ministers, especially among\nthose of draft age, both in the pastorate and in the seminary, have\ngiven up their distinctive work, donned the uniform of the soldier,\nand sailed for the trenches of France. To some minds this seems\nincredible folly, a species of ministerial madness. War is so tigerish\nin its ruthlessness, so demoniacal in its treatment of ethical\nprinciples, so un-Christian in matter and in method, that it appears\nimpossible to characterize any participation as righteous. It is, no\ndoubt, the minister's duty to play the role of Good Samaritan when,\nwith nations as his victims, the modern Hun repeats the parable. But\ncan he still bear the title of minister if he joins the police force\nand attempts, even at the cost of killing the robbers, to clean up the\nJericho road?\n\nThe answer of these men has been an enthusiastic affirmative. To them\ntheir clerical exemption was something more than what Dean Shailer\nMathews called it, \"an insult or a challenge.\" No doubt there were\ngood reasons why certain trained specialists, and themselves among\nthem, should be set to work with tools other than bayonets. The\nphysician, the engineer, the munitions expert, the ship-builder and\nthe chaplain will all have their part in the triumph. Mr. Hoover, Mr.\nSchwab and the Archbishop of York will do more in their present\npositions than they could behind a machine gun or in an aeroplane.\nThey, and millions of men and women in lowly stations, can fight at\nhome for peace and for freedom; and when the burden is heaviest and\nthe strain almost unendurable, call cheerily, as Harry Lauder did to\nthe Scotch Highlander: \"No, man, I'm no tired! If you can die fighting\nfor me, I can die working for you!\"\n\nBut this patent plea did not satisfy some militant ministers. Their\nreligion as well as their patriotism carried them beyond Dean Mathews'\ninterpretation of the phrase. Grant that their exemption is an insult\nif it \"implies that ministers are not as ready to serve their country\nas any other citizens, that they are slackers, or that they are so\neffeminate that they would not make good soldiers; that if they go\nabout their work with no increase of labor or of sacrifice, making an\nexcuse out of their holy calling, they accept their exemption as an\ninsult to their calling.\" Grant that, if this is not true, it comes to\nthem as a great challenge to do and to dare as much in their spiritual\nwork as the soldier does in his, toiling to the limit of costly\nsacrifice, possibly to overwork and to death. They are quite ready to\nburn out, and that quickly, when the age demands the heat and light of\ntheir lives. But there was still in their hearts a service\nunexpressed, an intense desire ungratified. One hears the call in the\nfollowing letter from a minister, who is now a lieutenant with a\nCanadian regiment in France:\n\n\"I expect to go to the front in Europe in the near future,\" he\nwrote to the editor of the _Outlook_. \"For six years I was a\nPresbyterian minister, although a Canadian, in the Presbyterian\nChurch of the United States. When the cause of liberty and the\nideals of democracy were at stake, I could not withstand the\n'call'--not so much of my country as of civilization--any longer. I\nresigned my charge and came to Nova Scotia, my boyhood home. It\nseems strange, but true nevertheless, that today I am a happy man.\nI hate war and know something about it--I served through the South\nAfrican War and saw its results--but there are things worse than\nwar. I am going, as I find many of my comrades going, not because\nwe hate the German people, but because we believe that Prussian\nmilitarism would be an intolerable system for the world to live\nunder.\"\n\n\"Is this a psychological and moral paradox?\" comments the editor. \"We\nthink not. Every man who really grasps the meaning of the words\nrighteousness, justice and peace, and their true relations, will\nunderstand the state of mind of this Canadian clergyman.\" It is the\ndecision of one who loves and honors the calling of the ministry, and\nyet feels that in this crisis there is a place where he, whatever may\nbe true of his fellows, is more greatly needed. It is the confession\nof faith on the part of a Christian who knows war and hates it, and\nyet is happy to make it because he loves peace, and believes, rightly\nor wrongly, that if the world is to possess it in our time, it must be\nwon with the sword. It is the deed of a brother of all men who\ndeclines to be limited by his cloth, who cannot preach to the soldier\nwithout drinking the soldier's cup and being baptized with his baptism\nof mud and of blood. It is the spirit of a true Christian preacher,\nwho cannot urge Christian laymen to \"go over the top\" unless at least\nsome Christian ministers go with them. It is the jubilant response to\nthe call of the heroic, the comradeship which knows no secular and no\nsacred, and which covets the most intimate fellowship in the life and\nsufferings of brave men.\n\nThe same attitude is being increasingly taken by the peace-loving\nFriends. \"The young Quaker of the present day,\" writes one of them,\n\"is so true to his inheritance--that of being allowed to act as his\nconscience dictates--that there are already many in the service, and\nthat, too, with the fervent cooperation of their Quaker parents....\nWhen one of these young Friends--now a trusted officer in the American\ninfantry, who enlisted before war was declared by our Government--was\nchallenged by a Quaker friend, he promptly replied: 'I am showing my\nregard for my Quaker ancestry and training in the fact that I cannot\nand will not allow war to stalk upon the earth unchecked. Only by\nmeeting the Devil face to face can we hope to crush him.'\"\n\nSir George Adam Smith in an American address stated that in Scotland\n90 per cent of the ministers' sons of military age entered the army\nbefore conscription. Would it be strange if some fathers decided to go\nwith them? He also said that of the sixty thousand Catholic priests\nengaged in war work in France, twenty-five thousand are fighting in\nthe ranks. Some Chinese missionaries are serving behind the lines as\nofficers of detachments of Chinese artisans and laborers. Other\nmissionaries, however, and sons of missionaries are reported to have\ngone directly into military service. Our country's Roll of Honor\ncontains the names of men like Captain Jewett Williams, an Episcopal\nrector and the son-in-law of Dr. David J. Barrows, Chancellor of the\nUniversity of Georgia, who declined a chaplaincy, trained at Fort\nOglethorpe, and was killed in action. Of recent graduates and members\nof the Yale School of Religion, forty-four are now in khaki. Of these\nnineteen are chaplains and Y. M. C. A. workers, while eighteen are in\nthe regular army, one each in the British and Canadian armies, two in\nthe Ambulance Corps, one in aviation and one in the navy. Already the\nSchool Roll of Honor bears one name, that of a young Englishman of\nrare promise, who died in the hospital from wounds received on the\nbattlefields of France.\n\nThese men are following in the footsteps of ministers of other\ngenerations. Yale's records show that there is scarcely a campaign of\nnote, or an important battle in American history, in which her sons\namong the clergy did not share the hardships and dangers of the\nsoldier's lot. Besides the more than one hundred and thirty who served\nas chaplains, in the thick of the fight as well as in camp and\nhospital, are those who fought shoulder to shoulder with their\nparishioners. When the news of the approach of the enemy reached\nThomas Brockway (1768) during service, he dismissed his congregation,\nshouldered his long gun, and marched away. Of John Cleaveland (1745)\nit is said that he preached all the men of his parish into the army\nand then went himself. They helped to take Louisburg in the campaign\nagainst Cape Breton Island. They marched in the Crown Point\nExpedition, fought at Ticonderoga, and shared with Wolfe the hardships\nof the campaign against Quebec. The record of the Revolutionary days\nis a stirring one. Edmund Foster (1778) joined the Minute Men on the\nsounding of the alarm in Lexington. Ebenezer Mosely (1763) enlisted in\nIsrael Putnam's regiment, and with Joseph Badger (1785), who served\nwith General Arnold in Canada, fought at the Battle of Bunker Hill.\nThey were in the ranks at Germantown and at Monmouth. Samuel Eells\n(1765) was elected the captain of a company formed among his\nparishioners to aid General Washington, who was then retreating\nthrough New Jersey. Elisha Scott Williams (1775) crossed the Delaware\nin the boat with Washington, and is so depicted in Trumbull's\npainting. He also fought at the battles of White Plains, Trenton and\nPrinceton, and shared with William Stone (1785) and Benjamin Wooster\n(1790) the hardships and sufferings at Valley Forge. Levi Lankton\n(1777) was present at Burgoyne's surrender.\n\nIn the Civil War this record is repeated. The ministers of Yale\nfought at Bull Run, South Mountain, Antietam, Fredericksburg,\nChancellorsville, Gettysburg, the Wilderness, Spottsylvania and Cold\nHarbor. They rode with Sheridan's cavalry in the Army of the Potomac;\nthey marched with General Sherman to the sea. Several, like Erastus\nBlakeslee (1863), well known for his services to the work of the\nSunday school, rose to the rank of general. Moses Smith (1852)\nentered in 1865 with the first troops into Richmond, while Samuel W.\nEaton (1842), after fighting in some of the hardest battles, was\npresent at Appomattox Court House on the surrender of General Lee.\n\nIn all this there is no thought of glorifying war, or of haloing the\nhead of the minister who lays down his Bible to take up his bayonet.\nQuite the contrary. These fighting chaplains condemned war and hated\nit. They never proclaimed that organized slaughter was a sane method\nof settling international disputes or ethical questions. They would\nhave marched to their own Calvaries gladly if this would have saved\nthem from the horror of the task of the soldier and at the same time\nhelped to bring in the Kingdom of God. But to their minds there was a\ntime when a Christian ought to put up his sword, and another when his\nduty was to buy one. Devilishness is not usually overcome by allowing\nthe Devil to have his way. If the powers of evil attempt by force to\noverthrow righteousness, righteousness may well by force oppose and\nthwart them; not that it may escape martyrdom, or vent its anger, but\nwith the clear purpose of rescuing the evil doer from his devastating\ndelusion, and of saving the most precious treasures of civilization\nfrom the axe of a vandalism, which can and ought to be restrained. The\nthought finds a crude but characteristic expression in Kipling's poem\nof Mulholland, the coarse sailor, who, in fulfilment of the vow made\nduring a storm on the cattle-ship, goes back to preach religion to the\nbrutal and unsympathetic crew:\n\n  I didn't want to do it, for I knew what I should get,\n  An' I wanted to preach religion, handsome an' out of the wet;\n  But the Word of the Lord were lain on me, and I done what I was set.\n\n  I have been smit and bruised, as warned would be the case,\n  An' turned my cheek to the smiter, exactly as Scripture says;\n  But following that, I knocked him down an' led him up to grace.\n\n  An' we have preaching on Sundays whenever the sea is calm,\n  An' I use no knife nor pistol, an' I never take no harm;\n  For the Lord abideth back of me to guide my fighting arm.\n\nIt is devoutly to be wished that it was never necessary for the\npreacher to use knife or pistol; but at present apparently there is no\nother means by which the smiter may be knocked down.\n\nThis teaching is what might be called, in Dr. Van Dyke's phrase,\n\"Fighting for Peace.\" It is the kind of militant pacifism which Paul\nhints at. \"If it be possible, as much as in you lieth, be at peace\nwith all men.\" Sometimes it is not possible. It is neither wise nor\nsaintly to attempt to negotiate with a tiger. It would be something\nworse than folly to allow the I. W. W. to dictate the economic policy\nof our country, or to suffer philosophical and practical anarchism to\nwork its will with the law and order of the world. War as mere war\ndeserves all the vitriolic epithets which have been heaped upon it. It\nis the scourge of scourges, the father of piracy and of murder, the\nmother of havoc, desolation and woe. It stands clearly revealed as \"a\nmonstrous crime, man's crowning imbecility and folly.\" But when\nthrough war the attempt is made to tear down law, overthrow justice\nand shackle the world's liberty, shall not war be met by war in order\nto preserve these priceless possessions, and perchance end all wars by\nrendering its mad champions powerless? No minister can be called\nChristian who does not hate war. But most of them hate still more the\nsinking of the Lusitania, the rape of Belgium, the massacre of the\npeaceful people of Armenia. They cannot with clear conscience sit\nstill and watch the fulfilment of the plot of \"the Potsdam gang\"\nwithout striking a blow. Peace proposals from the successful marauders\nsound to them too much like Dr. Van Dyke's imaginary conversation\nbetween an outraged householder and his triumphant pacifistic burglar.\nIt is not a question of Christ or Caesar. There is something of the\nSermon on the Mount in pacifist and militarist alike. But in the\nchoice our ministers in the army have registered their vote for what\nseems to be by far the lesser of two evils. They with their fellows\nhave chosen to tread the new Via Sacra, as the road is now called\nwhich made the salvation of Verdun possible; and today they stand\nfacing the forces of autocracy, greed and military oppression,\nuttering that great battle cry which broke from the heart of France,\n\"They shall not pass!\"\n\nWhatever the verdict of history upon this decision of brave men in the\nministry, certain effects of the war upon them and upon their work are\nsure. These again are both good and evil. On the debit side of the\nledger will be the loss of many in whose future service lay much of\nthe hope and strength of the church. A large proportion of the best\nmen, who were looking forward to the ministry, are in the training\ncamps and trenches. Some may now be diverted to other callings; some\nwill never come back. Their vacant places in the ranks will be\nsaddening and for a time crippling. Great tasks which might have been\ndone must needs be left undone. New Elishas will wear the prophet's\nmantle; but the memory of many a vanished face will waken the old cry\nupon their lips: \"My father, my father, the chariots of Israel and the\nhorsemen thereof!\" If the church does not begrudge them, it will mourn\nthem among its multitude of sons who\n\n      laid the world away; poured out the red,\n  Sweet wine of youth: gave up the years to be\n  Of work and joy, and that unhoped serene\n  That men call age; and those who would have been\n  Their sons they gave--their immortality.\n\nA second regrettable result in the minds of some will be the\ndiscrediting of the ministry. There have been too many un-Christian\nutterances from the pulpits of all lands, though we are naturally\nespecially sensitive to those \"made in Germany\"; too many petty,\nsuperstitious prayers addressed to tribal deities as little like the\nGod of Jesus as Moloch and Mars; too reckless dealing with \"high\nliterary explosives\" on the part of preachers possessing neither the\nwisdom of Solomon nor the restraint of Paul; too flamboyantly\npatriotic utterances from orators who apparently forgot their\nobligations as citizens of heaven and makers of a new world. So far as\nthe writer knows, there have been no blasphemies from the pulpits of\nthe Allies equal to the saying of Pastor W. Lehmann: \"The German soul\nis God's soul; it shall and will rule over mankind\"; or that still\nmore brutal and unblushing pronouncement of Pastor D. Baumgarten:\n\"Whoever cannot prevail upon himself to approve from the bottom of his\nheart the sinking of the 'Lusitania,' whoever cannot conquer his sense\nof the gigantic cruelty to unnumbered innocent victims, and give\nhimself up to the honest delight at the victorious exploit of German\ndefensive power--him we judge to be no true German.\" But if none have\ndescended to these depths of theological blindness and ethical\nmadness, there has been a certain kinship with the spirit of the\nimprecatory psalms, used as convenient and refreshing outlets for\npent-up tempers, together with more or less pagan treatment of ethical\nand religious questions, camouflaged with felicitous phrases, which\nlulled the listener with the assurance that the preacher was quoting\nfrom the Litany. All this has not redounded to the respect of the\nthoughtful for the pulpit, or for the leadership of men supposed to be\nspecialists in the rules of right and teachers of the counsels of a\nfatherly God.\n\nFurthermore, while the mass of Christian unity and cooperation has\nbeen unprecedented, there have been here and there expressions of\ndenominational rivalries. It is not an inspiring spectacle when a\nfew--and fortunately only a few--bigoted denominationalists are seen\nstorming certain camps, not because the religious welfare of the\nsoldiers is not being amply cared for, but because the accredited\npurveyor of their ecclesiastical shibboleth is not teaching his patois\nand peddling his wares. Neither our best laymen nor our wisest\nreligious leaders have either patience or sympathy with modern\ndenominational Pharisees. They recognize temperamental, psychological\nand national differences among fellow Christians, and are content that\nQuaker and High Churchman, shouting Methodist and dignified Scotch\nPresbyterian, Salvation Army lassie and devout Romanist should choose\ntheir own liturgy and polity, and go to heaven each in his own way.\nBut to their minds, in everyday life usually and in camp life always,\nsectarian squabbling and doctrinal hair-splitting are merely rocks of\nstumbling and stones of offense; and whenever they witness, especially\nin war time, such wrangling in the porch of the sanctuary, they\ndiscount the utterances and even the calling of the minister, and,\ninstead of entering the edifice and joining in the service, pass by on\nthe other side.\n\nStill more damning will be the accusation, made even by loyal sons\nof the church's own household, that not only has the ministry failed\nto prevent war, but that it neglected to mass its forces and measure\nits might in the great task. To reply to the charge in its\nundiscriminating, blunderbuss form is easy. Many ministers gave up\ntheir lives to the cause, notably in the various forms of the peace\nmovement. Others proclaimed and urged a cure, which the laity\ndeclined to put into operation and the governments ignored. The\nprevention of war should have been the work of the educator, the\nlawyer, the scientist, the promoters of commerce and the prophets of\ninternational socialism as well as of the minister. If he is\nblameworthy, so are they. Men who love to sit in the seat of the\nscornful and jeer at Christianity should enlarge the scope of their\nhumor. If, as G. K. Chesterton puts it, \"Christianity has not been\ntried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried,\"\nit is equally true that the ministry has not been trusted and found\nincompetent; it has been the herald of an unwelcome message and\nignored. No one class in the community could work the miracle of a\nworld-peace; it could be wrought only through the faith and works of\nall. To attribute to the ministers the failure to achieve it is in\npart fair; some of them are guilty. As Dean Hodges said of the\nmuch-discussed article, \"Peter Sat by the Fire Warming Himself,\" the\ncharges are richly deserved by those by whom they are deserved. In\npart, however, it is manifestly unfair; multitudes honestly tried.\nIn part it is one of the greatest compliments ever paid them; for it\nsuggests their power, acknowledges their leadership, and honors\ntheir task as the constructive statesmen of the world. No one ever\nbefore hinted that the clergy ought to have stopped the wars of\nCharlemagne or of Napoleon. During the Civil War neither the\nconflict nor the cause was laid at the minister's door. But in our\nday many clamor for priests after the order of Joshua as well as of\nMoses, men at the head of great bodies of Christian soldiers, who\nshall participate vigorously in domestic politics and international\nrelations, until they actually bring in the reign of righteousness\nand of love and truth among men. As ministers we accept the\ncompliment while we confess our sins and shortcomings. The burthen\nof having done the things we ought not to have done and of having\nleft undone the things which we ought to have done is one that we\ncarry shamefacedly but not exclusively. It is shared by all mankind.\n\nBut if the war kills some and discredits others, the credit page in\nthe ledger looms large. The experiences and tasks of the present can\nhardly fail to make the manliest among us still more virile and\nvigorous. They will purge the leaders in every profession of all\nsoftness and sentimentalism, and lift them above a great danger in\npeace times, that of living a\n\n  ghastly, smooth life, dead at heart.\n\nNo sane and unprejudiced mind, possessing first-hand knowledge of the\nministry, accepts as a representative of the profession the clergyman\nof the stage comedy and the popular novel. He may be a \"sport,\" in the\nbiological sense; but it would be equally easy to find as ludicrous\nand despicable examples in law, medicine or business. So far as the\naverage, normal type is concerned, this popular clerical clown is a\nwretched caricature, possessing humor because endowed with the\nexaggeration and distortion of a political cartoon. But removing all\nsuch weaklings from the discussion, and granting that there are no\nmore lax fellows, lolling through life, in the ministry than in any\nother profession, there is, as Donald Hankey points out, a certain\ndirectness and sternness in camp and military life which is singularly\ninvigorating and even Christ-like. It stiffens a man's back to\nshoulder heavy burdens, trains the eye to face steadily and without\nflinching disagreeable and terrifying duties. It tenses muscles with\ngreat and glorious resolves. It girds up the loins for a race the\nissues of which are life and death, throttles any idea of sneaking\nsinuously through the world avoiding large and costly obligations, and\nat the end of the day's labor demands visible and tangible results. If\nany minister was in danger of becoming what Horace Greeley called \"a\npretty man,\" or what Holmes described as \"a wailing poitrinaire,\" his\nexperience as chaplain and as soldier will effectually cure him. We\nshould have more prophets after the order of Amos as well as of Hosea\nwhen the men who have been under fire come home.\n\nSuch men will increasingly merit and possess the respect of laymen and\nof soldiers. Their lives have been knit together in the fellowship of\nsuffering. Their bodies are inured to the same hardships, their faces\nlined with the same grim marks of dangers laughed at and of conquered\npain. In the democracy of the trenches the sons of the Pilgrims and\nthe immigrant sons of the slums have come to know and to understand\none another. The pagan, illiterate dock-hand has fought shoulder to\nshoulder with the teacher of religion, trained in the first\nuniversities of our own and other lands. When such laymen attend plays\nlike \"The Hypocrites\" or read novels like \"The Pastor's Wife,\" they\nwill never be persuaded that the clerical cartoons represent reality.\nEach will recall days in the dugouts and nights in the hospitals, when\nthey came to know a different type of minister, a \"beloved captain,\"\nwho marched through the mire with song and laughter, and crept with\nthem through the darkness and shadow of death in No Man's Land. An\nalmost irresistible attraction will draw them to the churches of such\nministers. To their leadership they will be inclined to render\nobedience; to their messages they will listen with respect. No\nscoffing jests at the minister will be allowed to go by them\nunchallenged. For the first time in their lives they have been brought\ninto touch with the preachers of religion, and their hearts have\nburned within them while they talked with these disciples of Jesus by\nthe way.\n\nFurthermore, they will seek them out in the intercourse of ordinary\nfellowship. For the ministers have shown themselves friendly,\napproachable--no wan ascetics, no unhuman monks or superstitious\nother-worldlings, but jolly good fellows in camp life, sane and\nwholesome counsellors in times of perplexity, comforters in the hours\nof sorrow, efficient and tireless fellow workers; in brief, the best\ntype of men among men. With such a minister there will be no social\nuneasiness, no camouflaged conversation during a pastoral visit or\nupon his entrance into the club. When he opens the front door, the\nfather will not be so apt to call, \"Mother, the dominie has come to\nsee you!\" It will be no longer the pastor who wishes to meet and to\nknow the male parishioner; the male parishioner will be equally eager\nto meet and to know the pastor. One soldier phrased the difference in\nthis way: \"Well, sir, I like our services out here, and the church is\nall right; but our parson at home, sir--! You couldn't go to church or\nhave anything to do with him!\" All this will come to the minister as a\nreward for having realized the picture as painted by an English\nchaplain. \"I like to think of the parish priest as fulfilling the\nShakespearean stage direction--'Scene: a public place. Enter First\nCitizen';--for his ministry should mostly be spent neither in church\nnor in the homes of the faithful, but in public places; and he should\nbe the First Citizen of his parish, sufficiently well known to all to\nbe absolutely at home with each.... And so the word 'parson' will\nrevert to its old proud meaning of 'persona,' and the priest will take\nin his parish a position analogous to that of the best chaplains in\nthe army.\" That is the gift which true ministers have always coveted.\nMany have already won it, turning from the fascination of their\nstudies \"to waste time wisely in the market-place, gossiping like\nSocrates with all comers.\" After the war many more will possess it,\nhaving gladly paid the price.\n\nTo the spiritual practitioner, moreover, will have come increased\nskill in that most difficult of all arts, personal work. He will have\nhad daily hospital training in ministering to the souls of men. He\nwill speak their language, even their lingo, rather than what is to\nmultitudes the unintelligible patois of the seminary Canaan. He will\nknow not only his own theories but their difficulties and experiences\nin regard to a belief in immortality and the practice of prayer. Like\nJesus at the well, he will have learned the method and value of\ngaining a point of contact in teaching. Formerly it was easy to\ndiscourse from the pulpit concerning the being and nature of God and\nto champion theories of the atonement. The prophet of the regiment\nwill have learned what is far more difficult and more necessary--to\npersuade a man to follow the teaching and to practice the friendship\nof Jesus. That is his task, and he will have become efficient in its\naccomplishment--so to bring modern prodigals to themselves that they\nloathe the far country, and arise, and go home to their Father's\nhouse.\n\nAnother gain will be that of a deeper appreciation of denominational\ncooperation and an enlarged scope for the practice of it. Sectarian\nrivalries and ecclesiastical trivialities vanish in the trenches.\nMan-made walls between Christian brethren are crumbling. Petty\npartisanship becomes first ridiculous and then wicked in the light of\nthe universal church's ambition. \"We need a standard so universal,\"\nwrites H. G. Wells, \"that the plate-layer may say to the barrister or\nthe duchess, or the Red Indian to the Limehouse sailor, or the Anzac\nsoldier to the Sinn Feiner or the Chinaman, 'What are we two doing for\nit?' And to fill the place of that 'It' no other idea is great enough\nor commanding enough, but only the world Kingdom of God.\" The same\nbuildings are now serving congregations of Jews, Protestants and\nRomanists. Instant calls come when rabbis, priests, rectors, and\nrepresentatives of every hue in the rainbow of Protestantism minister\nto men of other creeds and of no creed. Partisan politics in the field\nof pure religion are seen to be essentially irreligious; and chaplains\nof every ilk and kirk are working together like \"Bill\" and \"Alf,\" two\ncockney soldiers, one of whom had lost a right arm and the other a\nleft. They always sat side by side at the C. C. S. concerts \"so as we\ncan have a clap,\" as \"Alf\" put it. \"Bill puts 'is 'and out, an' I\nsmacks it with mine.\" Such men cannot come home and take part in the\nheresy trials and ecclesiastical hecklings of men whom at heart they\nrecognize as Christian brethren. It is perfectly safe to prophesy that\nthere will be more of church unity, and possibly more of uniformity,\nso far as this is desirable, when these apostles of hundreds of\nchurches come home from the war.\n\nWith this enlarged cooperation will come also an enlarged ambition.\nThe pastor who has been plodding along the familiar ways of an\nuninspiring parish will never be content to suffer his people to\ntravel in the old ruts or to countenance out-worn and inefficient\nmethods. That way, he now knows, lies ministerial melancholia and the\npresent situation, something far worse than Lear's madness. His task,\nand that of his people, is nothing less than to transform their\nportion of the world into heaven. Singing and praying about it are\ngood and necessary; but in the words of the old negro spiritual, it is\nperfectly patent that \"Eberybody talks 'bout heaben ain't a-gwine\ndah,\" and the work of the church is to see to it that they go. Some of\nthe strongest and most venturesome among the clergy, unwilling to turn\nback to the safe life after the thrill of the trenches, will seek\nadventure in pioneer work in our own land and abroad. Home missions\nwill come as a challenge to men inured to danger and hardship. Foreign\nmissions will have a new and poignant meaning for all the world. We\nknew before that the bubonic plague in Calcutta was a menace to San\nFrancisco; we know now that the cult of militarism in a single group\nin Germany can crucify mankind. No chaplain will ever settle down into\na parish as if it were a \"pent-up Utica.\" No cultivation of individual\npiety will atone for the failure to Christianize society, leaven\nindustry with the principles of Jesus, and convert from its\nMachiavellian heathendom and Bismarckian brutality the diplomacy of\nthe old-time state. Nothing less than the ambition to take the world\nand its kingdoms for Christ can ever satisfy his soldiers; not, like\nthe Central Powers, in order that they may be enslaved and exploited,\nbut that they may know the fullness of joy and of freedom, and possess\nthe true riches of that divine life which is life indeed.\n\nAlmost of necessity the experience at the front will simplify and\nvitalize the minister's message. For many all discussion of the future\nof unbaptized infants, and premillenialism, and the verbal inspiration\nof the Pentateuch had long ago lost interest. In the minds of others,\nmatters regarded by some earnest Christians as of vital importance,\nlike the Virgin Birth and the physical resurrection of Jesus, had\nceased to function. To them Jesus would still be the unique Son of\nGod, the divine Saviour of the world, whatever the method of his human\ngeneration; and he would still be alive, their unseen friend and\npresent helper, whether or not his body had remained in the tomb.\nBelief or disbelief in such articles of faith would never transform a\ndemon into a saint or a saint into a demon. Even to those accepting\nthem, they had no visible effect upon character or upon the course of\nordinary daily life. No soldiers ever asked about such scholastic\nproblems as they faced going over the top on the morrow. In the\nhospital they never mentioned them, as they lay lonely and fearful on\ntheir beds of pain. But they did ask, or long to ask, had shyness not\nprevented them, about the treasures for which the heart hungers and to\nwhich religion alone holds the key.\n\n\"Dear Sir,\" wrote a wounded soldier to the chaplain of his battalion;\n\"I often used to wish that you would talk seriously and privately to\nme about religion, though I never dared to ask you, and I must admit\nthat I seemed to be very antagonistic when you did start.\" \"I wish\nyou'd tell me what you think about it, padre,\" said another. \"Is there\nanything really afterwards?... I'd like you to tell me as man to man\nwhat you really think about it. Do we go on living afterwards in any\nsort of way or--!\" He struck a match to light a cigarette. A gust of\nwind, which carried a gust of snow round our legs, blew the match out\nagain. I daresay it was that which suggested his next words: \"Or do we\njust go out? I know the creed,\" he went on. \"... But that's not what I\nwant. I want to know what you really believe yourself, as a man, you\nknow.\"\n\nIs there a God, and can we actually lead men to experience him and to\ngrow like him? Is there any power in Jesus to save a brute and a\ndrunkard, a selfish worldling and a contented prig, not from a hell of\nfire after death from which he is snatched by some theological\ntransaction, but from his degradation and meanness in the present,\nuntil he is fit to be a husband and a father, a patriot and a friend?\nAre the fruits of the Christian spirit \"love, joy, peace,\nlongsuffering, goodness, meekness, faithfulness, and self-control,\"\nthe qualities of character which alone can make heaven anywhere, and\nwithout which a potential Paradise would be transformed into an actual\nhell? Are the wages of sin death, or does the good man simply lose a\ndeal of fun and prove himself to be a foolish prig and superstitious\nother-worlding? Does death end all, or are there many mansions in the\nFather's house? Such are the great questions; and to them Christianity\nhas very definite answers, capable of being tried out in experience.\nIn the past much of so-called religion has seemed to thoughtful minds\nremote from the facts of life, unreal, a bit queer if not abnormal. If\nthe flames of war are purging it from such unrealities and\nabnormalities, the facts which lie at the heart of the world's faith\nare being saved, yet so as by fire. The Christianity of the camp is no\npious sentimentalism, no sweet dream or unvirile worship of a \"gentle\nJesus.\" It is a living, indubitable experience, full of strength and\nof joy. Men are fighting to the death a thought and a purpose in the\nGerman armies which Prince Lichnowsky, their own ambassador to the\nBritish Court, characterized as \"perfidy and the sin against the Holy\nGhost\"; and in that fight they hunger and thirst for the power of a\nreligion of the Spirit, which--however the battle of bodies and of\nbrute force may be decided--in God's good time is bound to win the\nday.\n\nThe last effect of the war upon the work and message of the minister\nwill be to furnish it with a new dynamic. As he returns from the\nbattle with sin in the trenches, he will find in the same battle at\nhome William James' \"moral equivalent for war.\" The call to arms has\nrevealed the fact, seen in the success of the Student Volunteer\nMovement, that the church has not sufficiently appealed to men's\nlatent heroism. The ordinary individual has revealed an enthusiastic\nreadiness for high adventure and an almost limitless capacity for\nself-sacrifice, qualities upon which the work and preaching of the\naverage parish made practically negligible demands. There was a\ncontrast as noticeable as it was lamentable between the pompous\nphrases of certain militant hymns, sung chiefly by the choir, and the\nlack of ethical passion and aggressive righteousness on the part of\nthe pews. There was too little doing of brave deeds and too much\nflabby irresolution and orthodox laziness. Christianity seemed to act\nas a narcotic rather than a stimulant. Any preacher might say to any\ncongregation with perfect safety, \"Ye have not yet resisted unto\nblood, striving against sin.\"\n\nFor the chaplain fresh from the front all this will be changed. Not\nonly will he be the flaming apostle of a new enthusiasm; his church\nwill have been saved from the old lethargy and lukewarmness of\nLaodicea, the minds of his people purged from the _dolce far\nniente_ pietism, which dreamed sweet dreams while the wreckers of\nthe world prepared for war. For today religion stands revealed as the\ngreatest of all adventures. Christianity is history's crowning\ncrusade. The greed, the brutality, the imbecile and devilish\nlawlessness, which have revelled in an orgy of spiritual vandalism,\nare not peculiar to war. They have long been with us, in city and in\ncountry, in the slums and on the avenue, among peoples supposed to be\ncivilized and enjoying the blessings of an era of prosperity and of\npeace. It was an amazed world, rudely roused from its comfortable\nslumbers, which found these forces organized for battle; it will be a\nbloody and dishevelled but determined and aggressive world that, when\nour men have laid aside their khaki, will strive to hold them in the\nranks of an equally fearless and fighting army, which will never\nretreat from its trenches until these enemies of the world's peace and\nhappiness are driven from the field. Men who hated dirt and\ndiscomfort, blood and vermin, have endured and laughed at them for the\nsake of their cause and their country. When the call comes to carry on\nthe same fight in the homeland, such heroic souls will scarcely\ndecline to sacrifice something of their peace and comfort, or to\nattack the forces entrenched in saloon and dive and political cave of\nAdullam, because in the struggle they may be shorn of delights and\ndollars, know the shame and agony of temporary defeat, and as victors\nfind themselves with mire upon their garments and blood upon their\nhands. \"Never was there a religion more combative than Christianity,\"\nwrote Bernhardi. That is false as the apostle of carnage meant it; but\nit is true to the disciple of Jesus, who has heard Paul's summons to\ndon the full panoply of the Christian armor, and who so loves the Lord\nas to hate evil with the just but terrible wrath of the Lamb. Here is\na new dynamic, an irresistible appeal, which should and must be\nutilized by the minister. If the Christian Church is an army with the\ngreatest of fights on its hands, there will be a place for the\nsoldier. With the church service of the religious slacker he may be\npardoned if he declines to have anything to do.\n\nT. R. Glover in \"The Jesus of History\" has said that the Christian\nconquered because he out-lived and out-thought and out-died the pagan.\nIt is beginning to dawn upon the ministry that we must out-fight him,\nif he is to be conquered in our day. The clergy have seen their\nopportunity pictured in the words with which John Masefield in\n\"Gallipoli\" has told the story of the final attack upon Suvla Bay.\n\"There was the storm,\" he writes, \"there was the crisis, the one\npicked hour, to which this death and agony ... had led. Then was the\nhour for the casting off of self, and a setting aside of every pain\nand longing and sweet affection, a giving up of all that makes a man\nto the something which makes a race, and a going forth to death\nresolvedly to help out their brothers high above in the shell bursts\nand the blazing gorse.\" The thousands who are responding to that call\nare the priests of today and the prophets of tomorrow. They can cry to\nus, with their fellow soldiers, living and dead, in the words of\nLawrence Binyon:\n\n  O you that still have rain and sun,\n    Kisses of children and of wife,\n  And the good earth to tread upon,\n    And the mere sweetness that is life,\n  Forget not us who gave all these\n  For something dearer, and for you!\n  Think in what cause we crossed the seas!\n  Remember, he who fails the challenge\n  Fails us, too.\n\n  Now in the hour that shows the strong--\n    The soul no evil powers affray--\n  Drive straight against embattled Wrong:\n    Faith knows but one, the hardest, way.\n  Endure; the end is worth the throw.\n  Give, give; and dare, and again dare!\n  On, to the Wrong's great overthrow!\n  We are with you, of you; we the pain and\n  Victory share.\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\nTHE EFFECT OF THE WAR UPON RELIGIOUS EDUCATION\n\nLUTHER ALLAN WEIGLE\n\n\nThe term \"religious education\" stands for two ideas that are\nultimately one: for the inclusion of religion in our educational\nprogram, and for the use of educational methods in the propagation of\nreligion from generation to generation.\n\nOver seventy years ago, Horace Bushnell pointed out the folly of\nreliance upon the revival method of dealing with the children of\nChristian homes, and urged the educational method of Christian\nnurture. He did more than any other one man to determine the present\ntrend in religious education. Yet his work was prophetic; it took\nfifty years more of \"ostrich nurture,\" as he called it, to reveal to\nChristian people generally the full truth of his position.\n\nThe past twenty years, however, have witnessed a great movement among\nthe Protestant churches of America toward clearer aims and better\nmethods in religious education. A situation had developed that bid\nfair to let religion drop out of the education of American children.\nChanged social, economic and industrial conditions had transferred to\nthe school many of the educational functions once fulfilled by the\nhome, and had wrought a change in the forms of family religion. The\npublic schools had become increasingly secular in aim, in control, and\nin material taught. The development of science and philosophy in\nindependence of religion had made it possible for college students to\nget the idea that religion is not a significant part of the life and\nculture of the time. The Sunday school, indeed, was at work, teaching\nchildren of God and his will. But its curriculum was ungraded, its\nteachers untrained, and its instruction limited to one period of half\nan hour in each week.\n\nRoughly speaking, the beginning of the present century may be taken as\nthe date when the Christian people of America began to awake to the\ndanger involved in this situation. As early as the late eighties,\nPresident W. R. Harper, then Woolsey Professor of Biblical Literature\nat Yale, had organized the American Institute of Sacred Literature,\nand had begun to publish a graded series of Inductive Studies in the\nBible. In 1900, under his leadership, the University of Chicago\npublished the first of its present series of Constructive Studies,\nwhich provides text-books for a graded curriculum of religious\neducation. In 1903, the Religious Education Association was organized,\nits membership drawn from the whole of the United States and Canada,\nand its purpose declared to be threefold: \"To inspire the educational\nforces of our country with the religious ideal; to inspire the\nreligious forces of our country with the educational ideal; and to\nkeep before the public mind the ideal of religious education, and the\nsense of its need and value.\" In 1908, the International Sunday School\nAssociation authorized its Lesson Committee to construct and issue a\ngraded series of Sunday school lessons in addition to the uniform\nseries which it had issued year after year since 1872. In 1910 the\nSunday School Council of Evangelical Denominations was organized, a\nmark of the more definite assumption by the several denominations of\nresponsibility for the educational work of their Sunday schools and\nfor the training of teachers. In 1912, the Council of Church Boards of\nEducation came into being, which has devoted its energies thus far\nmainly to cooperative effort in behalf of Christian colleges and for\nthe religious welfare of college and university students generally.\n\nThese are but a few outstanding factors in a movement greater far than\nany single organization or group of organizations. There has been an\nawakening of the spirit of education in religion. Sunday schools the\ncountry over have been graded, and here and there week-day schools of\nreligion have been begun; problems of curriculum, method and\norganization have been studied and graded curricula devised; classes\nand schools for the training of teachers have been organized; and\nattempts of various sorts have been made to correlate public and\nreligious education. Churches in general have come to see that they\nhave an educational as well as a religious function in the community,\nand that there is a sense in which they share with the public school a\ncommon task. The public school can teach the \"three R's,\" the\nsciences, arts and vocations; the church must teach religion. Both are\nneeded if the education of our children is to be complete. Many\nchurches are employing paid teachers of religion and directors of\nreligious education. Courses in religious education have been\norganized and professorships of religious education established in\ncolleges and theological seminaries. \"The Educational Ideal in the\nChristian Ministry\" was the subject of the Lyman Beecher Lectures on\nPreaching, in the Yale School of Religion, a few years ago. The young\nmen who are entering the Christian ministry in these days are being\ntrained, not simply to preach and to care for a parish, but to teach\nand to direct the educational work of a church.\n\nThe immediate effect of the war has been to retard this movement in\nsome degree. Preoccupation with the war itself and with more\nimmediately pressing needs, has made more difficult the work of the\nchurches in this as in other respects. Churches that had planned new\nbuildings for their schools are postponing their erection till the war\nis over. Training classes for teachers are harder to keep up.\nMinisters are going into war service; and those who stay at home are\ndoing double work or more. Churches, like business houses and\nfactories, have found their organizations broken by the departure of\nmembers of military age. Many of their best teachers and leaders have\ngone to war; and it is not easy, in these days of urgency and stress,\nto discover others to take their places.\n\nIt is probable, however, that a deeper effect of the war will be to\nintensify our sense of the importance of religious education and to\nclarify the church's educational program, in point both of content and\nmethod. This conviction rests upon these fundamental facts: that the\nworld is achieving democracy; that it believes in and relies upon\neducation; that it is experiencing what may prove to be a renewal of\nreligion.\n\nEducation, democracy, religion--these three, we have long professed\nand more or less fully believed, belong together. The full life of\neach of the three is bound up in that of the other two.\n\nEducation without religion is incomplete and abortive; it falls short\nof that life more abundant which is education's goal. Religion without\neducation lacks intelligence and power, and condemns itself to what\nHorace Bushnell called conquest from without, as contrasted with\ngrowth from within.\n\nDemocracy without education cannot long hold together or be saved from\nmediocrity and caprice. Education without democracy perpetuates caste\ndivisions, or else breeds discontent and class hatred.\n\nDemocracy without religion is doomed to fail; and religion without\ndemocracy cannot realize the Fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of\nman.\n\nThese, I say, are familiar convictions. They are natural to\nProtestantism; they have entered into the very making of America. Yet\njust these old convictions are gaining a new force and a deeper\nmeaning in and through the experiences of these years of war. The\nstruggle for democracy is not only leading us to a new comprehension\nof the meaning of democracy itself; it is helping us to understand\nbetter both education and religion.\n\nIt does not lie within the limits of this paper to canvass the wider\nand deeper meaning of democracy which is opening before us. The\nmessages and addresses of President Wilson have interpreted that\nmeaning not simply to America but to the world. No one yet knows the\nfull promise of life after the war, when Pan-Germanism shall have been\nnot only balked but destroyed. The democracy for which we fight to\nmake the world safe will be a chastened, changed, completer democracy.\nIt will be a democracy between nations as well as within nations, for\nthe doctrine of the irresponsible, beyond-moral sovereignty of the\nstate must return to the perdition whence it came. It will be a\ndemocracy applied more fully to the whole of life, social, economic\nand industrial as well as political. It will be a democracy of\ncompleter citizenship, that gives place to women as to men. It will be\na democracy of duties as well as of rights.\n\nThe world is acquiring a new conscience. Just as the nineteenth\ncentury made slavery abhorrent to the moral sense of men in general,\nthe twentieth century will likely be looked back to as the time when\nthe world's conscience decided that the exploitation of man by man is\nwrong. The general moral sense of men has not been over-tender on this\npoint hitherto. They have checkmated the exploiter if they could, as\nthey did checkmate Napoleon, but they have not always, or even\nusually, looked upon him as a wrong doer. It required Germany's\nattempts at conquest and subjugation to wake the world to the absolute\nwrong of that monstrous thing--that one man should use another as a\nmere means to his own pleasure or aggrandizement, or that one people\nshould so determine the destiny of another people.\n\nHere lies the supreme moral issue of the war. Shall the world, which\nhas become a neighborhood, organize itself into a great community of\nmutual respect, good will and brotherhood, or shall its structure be\nthat of restless orders of exploiters and exploited? It is\nover-familiar; yet, lest we forget, hear some random verses from\nvarious Pan-Germanist scriptures: \"Not to live and let live, but to\nlive and direct the lives of others, that is power.\" \"To compel men to\na state of right, to put them under the yoke of right by force, is not\nonly the right but the sacred duty of every man who has the knowledge\nand the power.\" \"The German race is called to bind the earth under its\ncontrol, to exploit the natural resources and the physical powers of\nman, to use the passive races in subordinate capacity for the\ndevelopment of its _Kultur_.\" \"Life is essentially appropriation,\ninjury, conquest of the strange and weak, suppression, severity,\nobtrusion of its own forms, incorporation at the least, and in its\nmildest form exploitation.\"\n\nContrast with this the words of Jesus: \"Ye know that they who are\naccounted to rule over the Gentiles lord it over them; and their great\nones exercise authority over them. But it is not so among you: but\nwhosoever would become great among you, shall be your minister; and\nwhosoever would be first among you, shall be servant of all.\" The\npresent struggle is not merely between democracy and autocracy as\nrival systems of government. It is a struggle between opposed\nphilosophies of life. Nietzsche was more consistent than the Kaiser\nwho has followed him, for Nietzsche did not claim to be a Christian.\nHe frankly proposed a \"transvaluation of values\" which would do away\nwith the religion of Jesus as fit only for slaves. That proposed\ntransvaluation of values the Kaiser is trying to bring about, however\npiously he may lie about it or claim God's partnership in his\nenterprise.\n\nProphecies are always hazardous; never more so than now. The outlook\nfor religion has been discussed both by puzzled pacifists and by\nfacile forecasters of the fulfilment of their own wishes. One may\nperhaps question whether there will be any _one_ trend of the\nchurches in the immediate future. Yet this is clear: that the\ninterests of democracy and the interests of true religion are\nultimately one. We may confidently expect the churches of tomorrow to\nrealize this more fully, not simply in the ideals they preach, but in\nthe temper and quality of their own life. _One effect of the war\nupon religious education, undoubtedly, will be to make it more\ndemocratic in aim, content and method._\n\nEducation in general will become more democratic. The experiences of\nthese years are helping us to understand education and to estimate its\nvalues. Our eyes are being opened to the diametrical difference\nbetween democratic and undemocratic education. We have come to see\nthat the latter may be as great a menace to the world as the former is\na vital resource.\n\nThe time was, not long ago, when Germany was deemed the school-master\nof the world. German efficiency and German obedience to authority were\nseen to be the products of German teachers and German schools. In\nmethods of teaching and in school organization, as well as in ideals\nof scholarship, the world sought to follow Germany. If here and there\none objected that German education seemed to sacrifice the individual\nto the system and to beget an obedience too implicit, we felt that it\nwas only because the Germans are such docile, pious, family folk, and\nwe rather chided ourselves for our rougher ways and for that self-will\nthat made us unholily thankful that we had been born in a freer land.\n\nBut now the character of German education stands revealed. We are no\nlonger as hopeful as we once were of the possible success of an appeal\nto the German people over the heads of their military masters. They\nseem on the whole to like the kind of government they have, and to\nwant to be exploited by Prussia. They are perilously near to what Mr.\nH. G. Wells has given as his definition of damnation--satisfaction\nwith existing things when existing things are bad. They are\nexperiencing what Mr. Edmond Holmes has called the Nemesis of\ndocility.\n\nAnd it is their system of education that has brought about this\nresult. If the German people are damned to satisfaction with\nirresponsible autocracy and fatuous docility, their schools have\ndamned them. For a century, German education has been at work to breed\nthe present world-menace. The German schools have made the German\npeople what they are. They have sought to develop habits of mind\nrather than free intelligence; they have valued efficiency in a given\ntask above initiative and power to think for oneself. They have set\nchildren in vocational grooves and molded them to pattern. They have\neducated the few to exert authority, and have trained the many to\nobey. They have nurtured the young upon hatred of other peoples; and,\nmuch as the Jews of old awaited the Messiah, they have lived and\nlabored in expectation of \"The Day.\" They have exalted Vaterland into\na religion, and have degraded God into a German tutelary deity. The\nGerman schools have welded the German people into a compact,\nefficient, military machine. The desires of the State are their\ndesires; the Kaiser's will is their will.\n\nWe have been following false gods, therefore, in so far as we have\nsought to shape our schools upon German models. \"The German teacher\n_teaches_,\" wrote one of our great educators some years ago, in\ncriticism of our American way of giving to children text-book\nassignments which they are expected to study for themselves; yet the\ntext-book method, fumblingly as we have so often used it, gives better\ntraining in initiative and intelligence than the German teacher's\ndictation methods. Professor Charles H. Judd has recently pointed out\nthe confusion and waste of time brought about by the fact that our\neight-year elementary school was modeled upon the German Volksschule,\nwhich is a school for the lower classes, and not intended to lead on\nto higher education. Our purpose, on the contrary, is to maintain for\nevery American child an open ladder through elementary school,\nsecondary school and college to the university; and to that purpose a\nsix-year period of elementary education is much better adapted--a plan\nwhich many of our school systems have adopted within the last decade.\nWe need better vocational education in this country and better systems\nof vocational guidance; but we are becoming clear that these must not\nbe of the German sort, that compel a choice before the teens.\n\nEducation in a democracy must be education for democracy; and\neducation for democracy must itself be democratic in content and\nmethod. Such education practices and aims at intelligence rather than\nhabit of mind. It trains its pupils to think and choose for\nthemselves. It prizes initiative above conformity, responsibility\nabove mere efficiency, social good will above unthinking obedience.\n\nSuch education is more difficult, of course, than education of the\nundemocratic type. We shall at times be tempted to fall back into the\nways of the German schools in some respect or other, because they\nrepresent the line of least resistance in education. Specious\narguments will be presented in favor of these ways by shortsighted\n\"practical\" men. Education of the German type is more efficient, they\nwill say; it is more direct and practical; it brings more immediate\nresults. It is more patriotic, moreover, they will insist; it better\nserves the ends of authority; it makes people more prosperous and\ncontented, each in his appointed niche. But such arguments, we may\nwell hope, will no longer win the uncritical assent that they have\nsometimes found. German education may be more efficient in the\nfulfilment of its end than American education--but what an end it has\nsought and reached! In the moment of our temptation to undemocratic\nshort cuts in education, we shall henceforth look to the Germany of\nyesterday and today, and shall be strengthened to resist. Her ways are\nnot our ways. Her schools cannot be ours. Education must mean to\nAmerica something quite different from what it has meant to Germany.\n\nThe contrast between democratic and undemocratic types of education is\nas great with respect to religion as with respect to the rest of life.\nGermany has been most careful to maintain religion as a subject of\ninstruction in her schools. But the content of this instruction in\nreligion has been intellectualistic and formal. It has pressed upon\nGerman children a body of historical facts, moral precepts and\ntheological dogmas; but it has not begotten the freedom of inward\nspiritual initiative. State-controlled, it has bent religion to state\nuses, and has in time begotten a generation who can believe in the\n\"good old German God.\"\n\nReligious education in America has been and will be more democratic.\nHorace Bushnell used to say that the aim of all education is the\nemancipation of the child. We teach and train our children in order\nthat they may in due time be set free from paternal discipline. We\nfail in the religious education of our children if our teaching does\nnot result in their final emancipation from a religion of mere\nauthority and convention and their growth into a religion of the\nspirit. We aim, not simply to win their assent to a given body of\nbeliefs or to attach them to the church as a saving institution, but\nto help them to become men and women who can think and choose for\nthemselves. The Protestant principle of the universal priesthood of\nbelievers involves democracy in religion. And just as democracy can\nlook forward only to failure unless it can educate its citizens,\nProtestantism will fail unless it can educate men and women fit to\nstand on their own feet before God, able to understand his will and\nready to enter intelligently and effectively into the common human\nenterprises of Christian living.\n\n_A second effect of the war, closely related to this, is that\nreligious education will concern itself more directly with life, and\nwill put less emphasis upon dogma, especially upon those refinements\nof creed which have operated divisively in the life of the Christian\nChurch._ Its method will be more vital, and less intellectualistic.\nInstead of proceeding upon the assumption that true belief comes first\nand that right life is the expression of prior belief, it will\nrecognize that adequate insight and true belief are more often the\nresult of right life and action. \"If any man willeth to do his will,\nhe shall know of the teaching.\" If this be true of adults, it is even\nmore true of children. Our plans of religious education will first\nseek to influence the life, and will deal with beliefs as an\nexplanation of life's purposes and motives and an interpretation of\nits realities and values.\n\nIf they will realize this primacy of life, the Christian churches\nstand in the presence of a great opportunity. The experiences of these\nyears have shown us how much more of Christian living there is in the\nworld than bears the label. Religion is being tested, stripped of sham\nand embroidery, and reduced to reality. And there are being revealed\nbreadths and depths of real religion that we had not understood. There\nis a vast amount of inarticulate religion actually moving the lives of\nmen which the churches may lift to the level of intelligent and\narticulate belief if they will but approach it with understanding and\na willingness to be taught as well as to teach.\n\nIn Jesus' story of the last judgment, there is surprise all around.\nBoth those on the right hand and those on the left stand fully\nrevealed to themselves for the first time, it seems. \"Lord, when saw\nwe thee ...\" they cry on both sides. This war has constituted such a\njudgment day. A great moral issue has stood out, sharp, clean-cut and\nclear. It has set men on the right hand and on the left. It brooks no\nmoral hyphenates; it permits no half-allegiance, either to country or\nto God. Beneath all pretense and profession, it lays bare the real\nman. It reveals the hidden qualities of nations. There have been many\nsurprises. It has shown far more of evil in the world that we had\ndeemed possible; but it has shown, too, far more of goodness and\ncourage and true religion than we had thought was there.\n\nEvil is here--real, powerful, poignant, and more unutterably bad than\nthe farthest stretch of imagination had hitherto conceived that evil\ncould be. Since the world began it was never so full of pain and\nsuffering in body and mind, of needless death and of mothers brave but\nbroken-hearted. And most of this is the result of supreme moral evil,\nthe work of a power deliberately seeking world-domination and\nexploitation of the rest of mankind, even though it involve the\nextermination of other peoples, determined to use any methods that bid\nfair to bring about this result, and organizing deceit and lust and\nmurder as the instruments of _Schrecklichkeit_.\n\nBut goodness is here too--strong, calm, cheerful, brave, self-devoting\ngoodness. These years of war have revealed to us the supreme power of\nthe human spirit to endure pain, to resist evil, and to count all else\nnaught for sake of the right in which it believes and the good upon\nwhich its heart is set.\n\nThis goodness does not always call itself Christian, be it granted,\nor even know itself to be such. A chaplain in the English army\nwrites: \"There is in the army a very large amount of true religion.\nIt is not, certainly, what people before the war were accustomed to\ncall religion, but perhaps it may be nearer the real thing. It is\nstartling, no doubt, and humiliating to find out how very little hold\ntraditional Christianity has upon men.... So far as I am able to\nestimate, we are faced now with this situation, _a Christian\nlife_ combined with _a pagan creed_. For while men's conduct\nand their outlook are to a large extent unconsciously Christian,\ntheir creed (or what they think to be their creed) most emphatically\nis not.... Nevertheless I feel that out here one is very near to the\nspirit of Christ. There is a general wholesomeness of outlook, a\nsense of justice, honor and sincerity, a readiness to take what comes\nand _carry on_, a power of endurance genuinely sublime, a\nlight-heartedness and cheeriness (nearly always, I believe, put on\nfor the sake of other people), a generosity and comradeship which are\nobviously Christ-like.\"[1]\n\nThere is strength and goodness at home, too. We had become accustomed\nin late years to hear it said that the churches were losing their hold\nupon the people of America. Whether or not that be true, the war has\nbegun to reveal to America, as it has to our Allies, the depth and\npower of the real moral and spiritual life beneath the surface.\nGranted that we are witnessing no widespread evangelistic stirrings,\nno indications of a great revival. It seems probable, indeed, that the\nitinerant evangelists who had lately become the fashion among us, have\npassed the heyday of their power. Neither are the \"prophetic\" folk who\nmisunderstand their Bibles so persistently and look so confidently for\nthe second coming of the Lord, winning an assent at all commensurate\nwith their effort. But there is a vast amount of quiet, sensible,\ndevoted Christian living in America. There is more of genuine religion\namong us than we had realized. That religion, for the most part\ninarticulate, and hardly knowing itself to be Christian, is finding\nexpression in action. The spirit in which America entered the war; the\nhigh moral aims which President Wilson, interpreter yet leader of his\npeople, has set before the world; the quiet, matter-of-fact and\nmatter-of-duty way in which the principle of selective service was\naccepted and carried out as democracy's method of mobilizing its\npower; the cooperation and the giving; the uncomplaining solemn pride\nof homes that have already made the supreme sacrifice--these are but\nthe first evidences in America of a moral virility, a real religion,\nwhich, we may confidently hope, will strengthen us, with our Allies,\nnot only to carry on to victory, but to resist the victor's\ntemptations.\n\nWill this deep, elemental, common religion of America come to\nunderstand itself, and to recognize its fundamentally Christian\ncharacter? The answer to that question lies with the churches. And\nthere are clear indications that many of them, at least, will not fail\nto realize and meet their opportunity.\n\nNot that we shall do without dogmas. Religion cannot maintain itself\nas mere ethics. It is a way of living; but a way of living that\njustifies itself by a way of believing about God and duty and\nimmortality. The point is, that in the natural order of growth life\nhas a certain priority to belief, action to full understanding. And\nthat certainly is the order of growth involved in the present\nsituation.\n\nAs the churches share in the expanding and deepening common life and\nbring their beliefs to bear upon it, in interpretation of its ultimate\nmotives and hopes, there will be growth on both sides. Men elementally\nChristian in action will come to know what they believe; and on the\nother hand the churches themselves will discern more clearly which of\ntheir customs and beliefs are relevant to the real issues of life and\nfunction in essential ways. Our creeds will become simpler, but more\nvital. And that will make possible a closer unity of the churches. One\nmay well question both the possibility and the desirability of a\ncomplete obliteration of denominational lines. We may always have and\nneed denominational loyalty just as we shall always have and need\npatriotism. But denominational loyalties can be incorporated into a\nhigher loyalty to the inclusive fellowship of Christ's Church as a\nwhole, just as national loyalties, we now see, can and must be\nincorporated into a higher loyalty to humanity which will be given\nexpression and body in a world-wide League of Nations.\n\n_We may expect religious education after the war, again, to be more\nfully Christian in its conception of God as well as in its view of\nlife._\n\nJesus, so far as we know, never used the word \"democracy.\" Yet just\nsuch a democratic world-community as we are now beginning in a\npractical way to understand and strive for, he taught and lived and\ndied for. Christianity's ultimate ideal is no longer a mere ideal. It\nhas become an actual political and social program and possibility.\n\n\"The brotherhood of mankind must no longer be a fair but empty\nphrase,\" wrote President Wilson to Russia; \"it must be given a\nstructure of force and reality. The nations must realize their common\nlife and effect a workable partnership to secure that life against the\naggressions of autocratic and self-pleasing power.\" The world's choice\nis between \"Utopia or hell,\" is Mr. Wells' striking phrase, which he\nexpounds in a remarkable article in _The New Republic_ on \"The\nLeague of Nations.\" \"Existing states,\" he says, \"have become\nimpossible as absolutely independent sovereignties. The new conditions\nbring them so close together and give them such extravagant powers of\nmutual injury that they must either sink national pride and dynastic\nambitions in subordination to the common welfare of mankind or else\nutterly shatter one another. It becomes more and more plainly a choice\nbetween the League of free nations and famished men looting in search\nof non-existent food amidst the burning ruins of our world. In the end\nI believe the common sense of mankind will prefer a revision of its\nideas of nationality and imperialism to the latter alternative.\"\n\nMr. Wells is right. The proposal to establish a league of nations\npresents itself in our day as a matter of plain common sense. Yet if\nthere is one lesson written with perfect clearness on the pages of\nhistory, it is that common sense alone cannot save the world from the\ntragedies of error, self-will and sin, and that common sense motived\nby self-interest will in the end defeat itself. In his Lyman Beecher\nLectures on Preaching, Dr. Henry Sloane Coffin has called our\nattention to the remarkable prophecy of the present world war made by\nFrederick W. Robertson in a sermon preached at Brighton on January 11,\n1852, addressed to a generation that glorified commerce as the\nguarantor of world unity and sought to establish morality upon a basis\nof enlightened self-interest. The passage cannot be quoted too often,\nnor too firmly impressed upon the minds of the present generation, for\nthere were those among us who, even up until the invasion of Belgium,\nkept protesting that there could be no war in a world so bound\ntogether by economic and commercial ties, and there are those now who\nfind in such interests the only durable basis for world\nreconstruction. \"Brethren,\" said Robertson, \"that which is built on\nselfishness cannot stand. The system of personal interest must be\nshriveled to atoms. Therefore, we who have observed the ways of God in\nthe past are waiting in quiet but awful expectation until He shall\nconfound this system as He has confounded those which have gone\nbefore, and it may be effected by convulsions more terrible and bloody\nthan the world has yet seen. While men are talking of peace and of the\ngreat progress of civilization, there is heard in the distance the\nnoise of arms, gathering rank on rank, east and west, north and south,\nand there come rolling toward us the crushing thunders of universal\nwar.... There is but one other system to be tried, and that is the\ncross of Christ--the system that is not to be built upon selfishness\nnor upon blood, not upon personal interest, but upon love.\"\n\nIf Wells has stated the world's alternative, Robertson has shown the\nway of final and permanent right decision. To common sense must be\nadded love. The brotherhood of man must be established upon a common\nacknowledgment of the Fatherhood of God. The world community can\nultimately be motived by nothing less than the life within the hearts\nof men of the God whom they come to know through Jesus Christ.\n\nThis means both that the world must become more religious, and that\nreligion must become more fully Christian. We can no longer believe in\nany God less great or less good than the God whom Jesus Christ\nreveals. However much it may be tempted to the lower view from time to\ntime, we may reasonably expect that henceforth the world is done with\nbelief in a mere tribal or national God. The supreme and inmost bond\nof the world community can be nothing other and nothing less than the\nFather of our Lord Jesus Christ, who regards all men as his children\nand who steadfastly seeks, with them and through them, the good of\nall.\n\nReligious education after the war will be more democratic, more\nimmediately concerned with life, more fully Christian. In so\ninterpreting the present situation, we have had in mind especially the\nmore or less formal religious education in the church and the church\nschool. The same tendencies will influence the more informal and\nindirect religious education of children in the family. We have\nreason, indeed, to hope for a strengthening of family ties and a\nrenewal of family religion. The sacrifices of these days are rendering\nrelationships very precious that in a more careless, unthinking time\nwe had accepted as a matter of course. And it is entirely possible\nthat victory may wait until in America, as in England and France,\nthere are few families that do not live in closer fellowship with the\nunseen world because their sons are there. The gradual disintegration\nof family life which the past half century has witnessed was but\nincidental to a rapid change in social, economic and industrial\nconditions. There is reason to expect that the family will so adjust\nits life to these conditions as to maintain its character as a social\ngroup, wherein genuine democracy and true religion may be propagated\nfrom generation to generation by that sharing of interests,\noccupations and affections which is the most potent and vital of all\neducational methods. That it should so adjust itself and so fulfill\nits primary educational function, should be a matter of the utmost\nconcern to both Church and State, for it is hard to conceive how\neither the Christian religion or a democratic society could maintain\nitself without the aid of the family.\n\n[1] \"The Church in the Furnace,\" pp. 53-54.\n\n\n\n\nVII\n\nFOREIGN MISSIONS AND THE WAR, TODAY AND TOMORROW\n\nHARLAN P. BEACH\n\n\nIt might seem to the uninformed reader that foreign missions and war\nhave nothing in common; for \"what communion hath light with\ndarkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial?\" Fuller\nknowledge of the varied work of missions and of its many helpful\ncontributions to African, Asiatic and Oceanic peoples would remove\nthis misapprehension. Professor Coolidge, of Harvard, suggests some\nimportant points of contact between missions and the less developed\nraces, particularly of the enterprise as carried on today in\ncontrast with its earlier objectives.[1] How the races of mission\nfields that have been thus affected are contributing to the war at\nhome and in the trenches, Dr. Arthur J. Brown has described most\nvividly in a paragraph upon the cosmopolitan composition of the\nallied forces at the front.[2] Missionary periodical files abound in\nreferences to the war's inroads upon missionary enterprises, and to\nthe important mediating work of missions. A great volume of\ntestimony would show that while missionaries still regard the\nupbuilding of the mind and the saving of souls as fundamentally\ndesirable, the enterprise affects every phase of the personal and\ncommunity life of the peoples to which it ministers.\n\nStatistics of the missionary situation at the beginning of the war\nreveal the extent and scope of present-day foreign missions. In the\nlatest full collection of such statistics,[3] one finds a series of\ntables devoted to \"General and Evangelistic\" data, to \"Educational\"\nactivities of missions, and to \"Medical and Philanthropic\" enterprises\nconducted by missionaries. It is impracticable to present the totals\nof the seventy-two columns, suggestive of the many subordinate\nactivities of missions; a few items will indicate the more important\ncontacts established between the Protestant churches of Christendom\nand the fifty fields which their missions have touched in many helpful\nways. In these mission countries 351 Protestant societies had as their\nforeign staff 24,039 missionaries, including 13,719 women workers and\nwives. Stationed at 4,094 towns and villages, they directed the\nactivities of a native staff of 109,099 and of 26,210 churches, the\ncommunicant membership of which was 2,408,900, with 1,423,314 others\nunder religious instruction. In their elementary schools were\n1,699,775 pupils, while in secondary schools were 218,207, and in the\ncolleges and universities 15,636 students were enrolled. In\ntheological and Bible training institutions 10,588 were preparing for\nthe Christian leadership of the churches. Their industrial schools had\nan enrolment of 10,125, and their normal students numbered 7,504.\nMission hospitals and dispensaries were presided over by 1,589\nphysicians and trained nurses, aided by a native staff of 2,336. In\nthe year reported, 3,107,755 individuals were treated, in single\nvisits or during prolonged residence in hospitals. Orphanages numbered\n245, with 9,736 inmates, and 39 leper homes sheltered 1,880\nunfortunate outcasts. Such an exhibit, incomplete as it is, will\nindicate the manifold tendrils which have bound Christian missionaries\nto the hearts of the nations; and if Roman Catholic statistics for\nthis date were available,[4] the importance of missions as a steadying\nand reconstructive force at present and in post-bellum readjustments\nwould be even more manifest.\n\nIn discussing the war as affecting missions, only a few outstanding\nfacts can be mentioned. Practically all of the mission world has taken\nsides in the tremendous conflict, most of these nations declaring for\nthe Allies. Many of them have generously contributed the means and man\nforce to hasten the day of peace. In 1917 nearly half a million from\nIndia were enlisted, of whom 285,200 were combatants and the rest were\nemployed behind the lines in multifarious tasks. As a result of the\nrecent conference at Delhi, it is hoped that another half million may\nbe secured this year,[5] thus giving that Empire the numerical\nprecedence among Britain's dominions. From North China alone some\n135,000 laborers are serving the British forces in varied ways. \"They\ncome, also, from Morocco, Algeria, Tunis and the jungles of Senegal;\nfrom Madagascar and Tahiti, and several hundred thousand from French\nIndo-China and China proper. Black, yellow and white, East and West,\neducated and ignorant, progressive and backward, are laboring side by\nside.\"[6] So important is it that these polyglot assistants and\nwarriors should be cared for in a Christian way that many missionaries\nhave been called away from their distant fields to a manifold ministry\nto their adopted countrymen behind the trenches. Many of these\nrecruits are Christian volunteers, especially so in the Indian\ncontingent.\n\nThe effects of this European Armageddon upon the mission fields\nthemselves has been less harmful than had been expected and more\nadvantageous than was anticipated. German missions have been affected\nmost among the Protestants, and among Roman Catholics France has been\nthe chief sufferer. In the latter country there is no exemption for\neither Protestant or Catholic ministers of military age.\nMissions-Direktor Axenfeld of Berlin, in a recent publication,[7]\nstates that German Protestant work in Africa has been practically\ndisrupted, in India crippled by enforced withdrawals, in smaller\nBritish colonies similarly weakened by the expulsions, and permitted\nto go on with restrictions in other parts of Asia and North America.\nAccording to later information, about 400 German Protestant\nmissionaries and missionary candidates are in military service, 68 are\nin hospitals, 120 are prisoners of war in various countries, and about\n1,000 missionaries are still working in various fields. Referring to\nthe _Zeitschrift fuer Missionswissenschaft_, in the files for 1915\nand 1916, one learns that 3,000 Catholic missionaries are estimated to\nhave been called to the colors, and that in 1916 there were 2,336\nserving in the army. French Protestant missions, with a much smaller\nforce abroad, have suffered in similar proportion; so that in French\nand German mission fields the personnel has been greatly reduced,\nlimited, or has been obliterated entirely. British missions have\nlikewise sent to the colors many of their best men from the field and\nthe candidate list, while a number have been transferred from field\nservice to work among their constituency in Mesopotamian and French\ncamps. Relatively few native Christian leaders have enlisted.\n\nThe Christian communities in mission lands have suffered in various\nways through the war. The removal of supervising missionaries in\npart--almost wholly in the case of German societies--has left many\nflocks without their chief shepherds. Great as has been this loss, it\nhas wrought a greater benefit in churches whose native leaders thus\nhave been brought to the front and have proved to their congregations\nthat the church was so far indigenous as to survive the withdrawal of\nmissionaries. To help their pastors, the people have undertaken\nresponsibilities which without this necessity would not have been\nborne, thus developing unsuspected gifts and engendering hope for the\nfuture. During the war, evangelistic campaigns, largely participated\nin by the native church, have been carried on in a number of countries\nand with marked success.\n\nParticipation in the great conflict by the Christians and\nnon-Christians of mission lands has had mixed results. On the one\nhand, any delusion as to the civilization and attitudes of so-called\nChristian countries has been dissipated by the undreamed of savagery\nand international hatred which they have seen. This has led to\nopposition to missionaries on the fields, especially in Persia and in\nMorocco, where a Moslem said to Dr. Kerr: \"Why don't you turn your\nattention to Christians? With all our faults, we have some religion\nleft, but the Christians have none.\" On the other hand, it has\nrevealed to the peoples so aiding their European rulers their real\nvalues to them. This has given to Indians especially a renewed\ndetermination to secure from England _quid pro quo_ in the form\nof greater political liberty and social privileges. While this has\nbeen especially emphasized by Moslems and Indians, it has affected the\nChristians with so great a spirit of nationalism that the recent\nAll-India Christian Council sent a deputation to the Viceroy\nrequesting the Government to recognize the 3,876,203 Christians of the\n1911 census as a community deserving political representation in the\nImperial Legislative Council. The increasing demand of all Indians for\ngreater freedom led Parliament to send out a Commission to investigate\nthe situation; and while their report at time of writing has not been\npublished in full, the people of that Empire are assured of many\nalleviations of existing disabilities. The independent Powers of the\nFar East also will be benefited in many ways through their cooperation\nin the war. A greatly feared backset to the cause of missions in\nChina, through the exposure to fierce temptations and from the harsh\ntreatment unavoidable in war of its labor contingent in France, has\nbeen met in part by sending to those camps many successful\nmissionaries from North China, as well as a delegation of Christian\nChinese studying in American institutions. In Mesopotamia, also,\nsimilar work undertaken by Indian missionaries will do much to lessen\nthe ill effects of the war.\n\nAnother resultant of the unprecedented conflict comes from the ethical\nand religious reactions occasioned by seas of Christian blood. An old\nconvert in India pathetically asked his pastor if the great fire in\nthe West were still burning, and a South Sea islander stood bewildered\nand shaken when he learned that the war was primarily between\nChristian nations. Keen Japanese were at first ready to declare\nChristianity a failure because of this stupendous crime of\nChristendom; but their maturer thought and the increasing barbarity in\nGerman initiative has convinced them that instead of its proving the\nbankruptcy of Christianity, to quote Secretary Oldham, \"the War has\nshown the bankruptcy of a society which has refused to accept and\napply the principles of Christianity in social, national and\ninternational affairs. As has been well said, 'Christianity has not\nbeen tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and never\ntried.'\"[8] So contrary is it to Christian teachings that for a time\nthe churches in one district in China set apart a day each week for\nspecial prayer that this demoniacal evil might be divinely conquered.\n\nBut it is more than a problem of Christianity. The Moslem world has\nbeen fighting against itself. The Jihad, declared by the\nSheikh-ul-Islam and the Sultan of Turkey most solemnly in November,\n1915, failed to call to arms a body of fifty millions of fanatical\nMohammedans, as had been fervently hoped would be the case. \"There was\nno shock, since there was no sympathetic response. Protests were made\nby the Moslems of Turkey, while the eighty millions under British\ncontrol proclaimed their unshaken loyalty; and from Persia, Morocco,\nEgypt, India, Russia, Algeria and other Moslem countries, Turkey was\ntaken severely to task for forming an alliance with two Christian\nPowers in a conflict with other Christian nations.... Mohammedans are\nin despair especially since, as a last fatal blow, the Arabs have\narisen in open rebellion against Turkey, seizing the sacred places of\nIslam, and repudiating the right to the office of caliph or of the\nsultan of Turkey.\"[9] Similarly an Arabic periodical published in\nZanzibar says: \"The pillars of the East are tottering, its thrones are\nbeing destroyed, its power is being shattered and its supremacy is\nbeing obliterated. The Moslem world is divided against itself.\"[10]\n\nBut what have been the effects of this war upon the home base of\nmissions? The financial drafts made by the governments and voluntary\norganizations of warring nations upon their peoples and the increased\ncost of everything have affected the treasuries of some of the smaller\nsocieties unfavorably. For the most part, however, the mission boards\nhave not only met their expenses but in many cases receipts have been\nlarger than ever before. The contributions thus given have called\nattention to missions as being both worthy and indispensable elements\nin the world situation, and hence necessitating their support. Perhaps\nthis is felt most generally among friends of British missions.\n\nMan power causes the societies greater difficulty. Practically the\nentire German force has been sent from India, or else interned, and to\nfill their places has made new demands upon other nationalities. The\ndepleted ranks of French societies have not been filled. Great Britain\nneeds all her men for the trenches and has been sorely pressed in\ntrying to supply the foreign fields with the workers absolutely\nrequired. Even the United States, since her entry into the war, is\nexperiencing difficulty in keeping missionary candidates from going to\nthe front in Europe instead of re-enforcing the thin Asiatic and\nAfrican battle lines. Hope for improvement in this recruiting is\nslight, since the call to arms has laid strongest hold upon college\nand university men. Thus in 1915, out of 52,000 students in German\nuniversities, 41,000 were under arms; in France all students except\nthose physically unfit were called out; in Great Britain and Ireland\nabout 50 per cent of the male students were in the army or navy, in\nCanada 40 per cent, and in Australia 30 per cent.[11] In the United\nStates volunteering and the draft have emptied the colleges and\nuniversities of practically all the choicest men of twenty-one and\nupward. If this continues long, an interim must ensue before another\ncollege generation furnishes a sufficient number of missionary\ncandidates. Yet it may be expected that the present devotion to a\ncause that ends so commonly in death or lifelong crippling will end\nforever the old excuse urged against missionary enlistment, that the\nservice is a hard one and often fatal, in certain unhealthful\ncountries. Men will join the colors of the Prince of Peace and of Life\neven more willingly than they now march under the banners of\ndestruction and death in the hope of establishing once more justice,\nrighteousness and lasting freedom in the earth.\n\nA happy effect of the present stress is found in the growing\n_rapprochement_ between the missions of a given national group,\nand to a less extent between those of different nations. This is due\nto the necessity for cooperation in order to make a reduced force\nserve for the needs of an increasing work. In a few cases already a\ndesire to economize resources has led to readjustment of fields; in\nothers to a temporary filling of vacant places by missionaries of a\ndifferent denomination or nationality. The home constituencies are\nthus being taught the beautiful lesson of the trenches as related to\ntrue brotherhood and essential Christianity. Perhaps one of the best\ndiscussions of this war as affecting the international and\ninterconfessional relationships of missions is that of Dr. J.\nSchmidlin, a Roman Catholic professor of theology in the University of\nMuenster, found in _The Constructive Quarterly_ for December,\n1915, from which we quote two sentences: \"Thus that which has served\nto separate missionaries who were comrades in belief and\nconfession--national solidarity and love of country--has also united\nand reconciled children of the same country who were separated in\ntheir belief. Surmounting all barriers of dogma and church polity, men\nhave learned to love and cherish one another, yes, even to recognize\nthat in spite of all that separates us there is much also that binds\nus together.\"\n\nTurning now from the effect of the war upon missions, a few paragraphs\nmay be devoted to considering post-bellum reconstruction in mission\nlands. The Germans, even more than the Allies, are diligently studying\nthe many problems and possibilities of changes necessitated by the\nreadjustments that must surely come. The economic waste of the past\nfour years is almost inconceivably great; and to restore this waste\nputs upon every nation an amount of production vastly greater than any\nknown in the past. Raw material, freedom of the seas that the\nmanufacturing countries may buy from every land and carry back for\nsale and distribution the manufactured products, a new enlistment of\nlabor in countries where climate and primitive living make work\nirksome and unnecessary, an uplift in desires and ideals that new\nmarkets may be created, increasing intelligence and friendliness so\nthat cooperation may be willing and profitable--these are some of the\nessentials of progress after the war.\n\nIn earlier cognate discussions, men like Captain Mahan have emphasized\nthe importance of eastward and westward movements in the temperate\nzone, while others of Benjamin Kidd's school have insisted no less\nstrongly upon the importance of the Tropics and the consequent north\nand south line of industrial life. A score of years ago nearly,\nProfessor Reinsch, in his \"World Politics,\" startled many American\nreaders by his insistence upon the importance of the undeveloped and\nunoccupied tropical regions of the globe, mainly in South America and\nAfrica. Even more insistently Kidd's \"Control of the Tropics\" had, two\nyears before, magnified the same zone, but more particularly the\ndensely peopled tracts with their varied possibilities of production\nand exploitation. In a recent article by J. A. R. Marriott, M.P.,\nentitled \"Welt-Politik,\" General Smuts of Africa is thus quoted:\n\"Formerly we did not fully appreciate the Tropics as in the economy of\ncivilization. It is only quite recently that people have come to\nrealize that without an abundance of raw material which the Tropics\nalone can supply, the highly developed industries of today would be\nimpossible. Vegetable and mineral oils, cotton, sisal, rubber, jute\nand similar products in vast quantities are essential for the\nindustrial world.\"[12]\n\nAnother aspect of tropical Africa is brought out in an article by Herr\nEmil Zimmerman, writing in the _Europaeische Staats und Wirtschaft\nZeitung_ of June 23, 1917: \"If the Great War makes Central Africa\nGerman, fifty years hence 500,000 and more Germans can be living there\nby the side of 50,000,000 blacks. Then there may be an army of\n1,000,000 men in German Africa, and the colony will have its own war\nnavy, like Brazil. An England that is strong in Africa dominates the\nsituation in Southern Europe and does not heed us. But from Central\nAfrica we shall dominate the English connections with South Africa,\nIndia and Australia, and we shall force English policy to reckon with\nus.\"[13] And again Dr. Solf, the German Secretary for Colonies, has\nlately proposed a simple solution of Africa's industrial future. \"In\nredividing Africa those nations which have proved most humane toward\nthe natives must be favored. Germany has always considered that to\ncolonize meant doing mission work. That is why in the present War the\nnatives of our colonies stick to us. England's colonial history, on\nthe other hand, is nothing but a list of dark crimes.\"[14] The\nprinciple enunciated in the first sentence of this statement is as\nimportant and true as the later ones are incorrect, if the present\nwriter's inquiries and observations in British and German East Africa\nin 1912 are indicative of the facts in the case.\n\nThe political problems of the countries here considered are quite as\nimportant and perplexing as is their economic status. Three theories\nof control have been tried: (1) That of plantations or possessions,\nworked for the possessor's profit with little regard for the governed;\n(2) the policy of vigorous expansion by the whites themselves, despite\nthe perils of tropical environments; and (3) permitting the natives to\nwork out their own development independently, with or without white\noversight. Of these the third is the only one favored by the ethics\nand political sagacity of enlightened nations today. But this demands\nthe consent and good will of the governed, and how may these\nessentials be secured?\n\nIndia is the most important, politically considered, of all tropical\nlands. And that Empire's relation to England the eminent Indian ruler,\nSir Herbert Edwardes, declared in an address delivered at Liverpool in\n1860, should be that of a stewardship in Christian hands, a\ndesignation echoed in Kidd's general phrase, \"a trust of\ncivilization,\" and John H. Harris's \"trusteeship vs. possession.\" How\nshall this trust be fulfilled? Certainly one must consider the\nquestion of India's poet laureate, Sir Rabindranath Tagore, \"Is the\ninstinct of the West right where she builds her national welfare\nbehind the barricade of a universal distrust of humanity?\"[15] Such\ndistrust is not removed by the Indian educational scheme alone, or\nwith the addition of civilization. \"If we pursue the _ignis\nfatuus_ of secular education in a pagan land, destitute of other\nlight,\" quoting Sir Herbert again, \"then we English will lose India\nwithout those Indians gaining any future.\"[16] In a similar vein Sir\nAlfred Lyall testified: \"The wildest, as well as the shallowest notion\nof all, seems to me that universally prevalent belief that education,\ncivilization and increased material prosperity will reconcile the\npeople of India eventually to our rule.\"[17]\n\nA partial solution of India's political problems is found in the\ndeputation to that Empire in accordance with Mr. Montagu's speech in\nthe House of Commons of August 30, 1917, in the course of which he\nsaid: \"The policy of His Majesty's Government, with which the\nGovernment of India is in complete accord, is that of the increasing\nassociation of Indians in every branch of the administration, and the\ngradual development of self-governing institutions, with a view to the\nprogressive realization of responsible government in India as an\nintegral part of the Indian Empire.\"[18] The favorable outcome of the\ndeputation's visit has been mentioned already.\n\nReligious problems and readjustments will also be part of the\naftermath of the war. At least six millions of Jews, who rightly or\nwrongly are the objects of the Christian missionary propaganda, have\nbeen released from disabilities in Europe, and new careers and\neducational opportunities will lie before that remarkable race.\n\"Jewish influence in the life of the world, already great in\nproportion to the size of the community, will gain a fresh accession\nof strength. Religiously the emancipation may be expected to result,\nas it has done in other countries, in a decay of Jewish orthodoxy, of\nwhich the Jews of the Ghetto have been the main support. While the\nweakening of the forces of conservatism will open new doors of\nopportunity to the Christian Church, there is on the other hand the\ngrave danger that many Jews may drift into irreligion and cast the\nweight of their natural ability and energy on the side of\nmaterialism.\"[19] Mr. Balfour's letter to Lord Rothschild of November\n2, 1917, stated that the British Government viewed with favor the\nestablishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people.\nIn the case of missions to Moslem lands, if the Allies are victorious,\nthe work in Turkey will be greatly simplified. Whether this will be\nthe case in Africa depends upon whether the dominant Powers permit\nmissionary organizations to act with greater freedom than they have\nbeen granted in the past in North Africa and in certain British\npossessions. In any case Islam will present strong claims and serious\nproblems for consideration by missionary organizations.\n\nIs the foreign missionary enterprise willing and competent to aid in\nthe reconstruction soon to come in mission lands? Here are a few\ntypical and representative replies to this important question.\n\nRepresenting in a semi-official way the missionary societies of the\nUnited States and Canada, Dr. Robert E. Speer writes thus: \"Foreign\nMissions are the direct antithesis of the world conditions which men\nmost deplore and the purest expression of the principles which\nunderlie the world order for which men are longing. Foreign Missions\nrepresent international friendship and good will. The missionary goes\nout to help and serve. He bridges the gulf between his own nation and\nthe nation to which he goes. He is not seeking to exploit, or to take\nadvantage, or to make gain. He is seeking only to befriend and aid.\nAnd his aim and spirit are internationally unifying. The missionaries\nsucceed in surmounting all the hindrances of nationality and language\nin binding different peoples together in good will. Furthermore, they\nare demonstrating the possibility of the existence of a strong\nnationalistic spirit side by side with human brotherhood and\ninternational unity. They are seeking to develop in each nation a\nnational church embodying and inspiring and consecrating to God the\ngenius and destiny of each nation. But they are doing this because\nthese are the elements of a yet larger unity, the unity of mankind.\nThe first is not contradictory to the second; it is essential to it,\nas the perfection of the State requires the perfection of the family\nunit, and the family demands and does not exclude the richest\nindividualism. It is out of her perfect ministry to the life of each\nnation that the Church is to be prepared to minister to the life of\nall humanity and to achieve its unity.\"[20]\n\nAs editor of _The International Review of Missions_ and secretary\nof the Edinburgh Continuation Committee, Mr. J. H. Oldham states his\nviews of the world-functions of missions: \"Missions are the antithesis\nof war. They have created between different peoples relations, not of\ncompetition, but of cooperation. With all their shortcomings they are\nan embodiment of the idea that the stronger and more advanced nations\nexist to uplift the weaker and more backward. They are a vital\nexpression of the principle on which the new society must rest.... The\ngospel of love must embody itself in act no less manifestly than\nselfishness and brutality have expressed themselves in the terrible\nscenes that the world has witnessed. The non-Christian races fear, not\nwithout cause, that the object of western peoples is to exploit them.\nMissions must convince them that the Church exists to help and serve\nthem, and the desire to serve them must be made evident in ways that\nthey can understand. The task of Missions thus grows broader and\nlarger than we at first conceived.\"[21]\n\nAnd such statements are not the claims of interested propagandists\nmerely,--officials employed by missionary organizations, and hence\nliable to overrate the character and importance of missions to the\nnations. Few men have traversed the world as extensively and\nobservantly as Sir Harry Johnston, and probably no one equals him in\nhis varied administrative and anthropological services to Africa. In\nhis Introduction to the Cambridge University Maitland Prize Essay for\n1915, he says: \"Although the writer ... is so heterodox a professor of\nChristianity, practical experience in Africa, Asia and America has\nbrought home to him ever and again during the last thirty-four years\nthe splendid work which has been and is being accomplished by all\ntypes of Christian missionary amongst the Black, Brown and Yellow\npeoples of non-Caucasian race, and amid those Mediterranean or Asiatic\nCaucasians whose skins may be a little duskier than ours, but whose\nfar-back ancestry was the same, whose minds and bodies are of our\ntype, but whose mentality has been dwarfed and diverted from the\namazing development of the European by false faiths,--false in their\ninterpretation of Cosmos, false to the best human ideals in daily\nlife.\"\n\nOn a later page he upholds with the author \"the work of Christian\nmissionaries in general and lays down the rule that our relations with\nthe backward peoples of the world should be carried on consonantly\nwith the principles of Christian ethics--pity, patience,\nfair-mindedness, protection and instruction; with a view not to making\nthem the carefully guarded serfs of the White race, but to enable them\nsome day to be entirely self-dependent, and yet interdependent with us\non universal human cooperation in world management.\"\n\nAnd once more this British administrator asserts: \"The value of the\nChristian missionary is that he serves no government. He is not the\nagent of any selfish State, or self-seeking community. He does not\neven follow very closely the narrow-minded limitations of the Church\nor the sect that has sent him on his mission. He is the servant of an\nIdeal, which he identifies with God; and this ideal is in its essence\nnot distinguishable from essential Christianity; which is at one and\nthe same time essential common sense, real liberty, a real seeking\nafter progress and betterment. He preaches chastity and temperance,\nthe obeying of such laws as are made by the community; but consonantly\nwith all constitutional and peaceful efforts, he urges the bringing of\nman-made laws more and more into conformity with Christian\nprinciples.\"[22]\n\nAs representing nations of ancient culture coming under the helpful\ninfluences of Christian missions, perhaps no one will command a more\nattentive hearing than Marquis Okuma, ex-premier of Japan and one of\nthe world's foremost statesmen. From a summary of his address,\ndelivered at the semi-centennial of Protestant missions in that\nEmpire, we excerpt the following: \"The coming of missionaries to Japan\nwas the means of linking this country to the Anglo-Saxon spirit to\nwhich the heart of Japan has always responded. The success of\nChristian work in Japan can be measured by the extent to which it has\nbeen able to infuse the Anglo-Saxon and the Christian spirit into the\nnation. It has been a means of putting into these fifty years an\nadvance equivalent to that of a hundred years. Japan has a history of\n2,500 years, and 1,500 years ago had advanced in civilization and\ndomestic arts, but never took wide views, nor entered upon wide work.\nOnly by the coming of the West in its missionary representatives, and\nby the spread of the Gospel, did the nation enter upon world-wide\nthoughts and world-wide work. This is a great result of the Christian\nspirit. To be sure Japan had her religions, and Buddhism prospered\ngreatly; but this prosperity was largely through political means. Now\nthis creed [Buddhism] has been practically rejected by the better\nclasses who, being spiritually thirsty, have nothing to drink.\"[23]\n\nThese representative testimonies suggest both the fitness and the\nwillingness of Christian missions to participate in the coming\ninternational readjustments necessitated by the war. Such an\nenterprise supplies what the war-weary world so greatly needs--the\n_elan vital et creatur_, to borrow Bergson's fine phrase. And the\nmissionary leaders are alert and at their task. On April 4, 1918, Drs.\nJohn R. Mott and Charles R. Watson, representing the missionary boards\nof the United States and Canada, met with the Standing Committee of\nMissionary Societies in Great Britain and Ireland, when it was\nresolved to form an international \"Emergency Committee of Cooperating\nMissions.\" Already the British committee had been consulted by the\nGovernment concerning certain important matters affecting the mission\nfields and their problems arising from the war. Such questions are\nbecoming increasingly numerous, and their solution demands an intimate\nknowledge of missions and of the spirit and aspirations of African and\nAsiatic races. America is likewise needing such a body of experts to\nsupplement government investigations. This country has a slight\npreponderance in representation on the Emergency Committee; and in the\nchairman, Dr. John R. Mott, the foremost Protestant leader of the\nworld, and a man of such diplomatic gifts that President Wilson twice\nvainly called him to the position of minister to China,--though he\naccepted appointment upon commissions to deal with Mexico and Russia\nlater,--the committee has a missionary statesman who is equal to the\nimportant trusts that will be committed to its consideration. To serve\nas the eyes, ears and hands of this important post-bellum council, the\ntwo largest fields, India and China, have each an energetic\nContinuation Committee of the Edinburgh Conference of 1910,\nestablished as the result of Dr. Mott's visits and conferences in\n1912-1913. The Foreign Missions Conference of North America, and\nespecially its Board of Reference and Counsel, are in annual and _ad\ninterim_ consultation as questions arise from time to time.\n\nPresident King quotes these words from Lloyd George's address to a\nlabor delegation: \"Don't always be thinking of getting back where we\nwere before the War. Get a really new world. I firmly believe that\nwhat is known as the after-the-War settlement will direct the\ndestinies of all classes for generations to come. I believe the\nsettlement after the War will succeed in proportion to its audacity.\nThe readier we are to cut away from the past, the better we are likely\nto succeed. Think out new ways, new methods, of dealing with old\nproblems.\"[24]\n\nAnother horizon of the same idealistic character opens before the eyes\nof our own President, the seer to the nations in this epoch-making\ntime. In an address delivered on October 5, 1916, President Wilson\nproclaims the new day to the United States: \"America up to the present\ntime has been, as if by deliberate choice, confined and provincial,\nand it will be impossible for her to remain confined and provincial.\nHenceforth she belongs to the world and must act as part of the world,\nand all the attitudes of America will henceforth be altered.\" And\nagain three weeks later he adds: \"America was established in order to\nindicate, at any rate in one government, the fundamental rights of\nman. America must hereafter be ready as a member of the family of\nnations to exert her whole force, moral and physical, to the assertion\nof those rights throughout the round world.\" Here is a sentence from\nhis greetings to France on Bastille Day, 1918: \"The War is being\nfought to save ourselves from intolerable things; but it is also being\nfought to save mankind.\" And as a final word from President Wilson,\ntaken from his discussion of the new international morality: \"My\nurgent advice to you would be, not always to think first of America,\nbut always, also, to think first of humanity. You do not love\nhumanity, if you seek to divide humanity into jealous camps. Humanity\ncan be welded together only by love, by sympathy, by justice, not by\njealousy and hatred.\" While none of these utterances refer\nspecifically to missions, yet surely Dr. W. I. Hull is correct in\ninterpreting President Wilson's relation to races of the mission\nfields in these words: \"Instead of exploiting backward peoples, he\nwould apply the maxim of _noblesse oblige_, and would summon all\nnations to mutual aid in their ascent of 'the world's great altar\nstairs' up to the law and order, peace and justice, which constitute\nthe true sunshine of God.\"[25]\n\nThe \"really new world\" of Britain's Premier will not be dominated by\nMachiavelli, the motto of whose sixteenth and seventeenth century\nmonarchs was \"_L'etat c'est moi!_\" even though Treitschke ranked him\nsecond only to Aristotle as a political philosopher.[26] The present\ncataclysm of woes does not prove Professor Cramb's contention that\n\"Corsica has conquered Galilee\"; nor has Nietzsche thrust the \"pale\nGalilean\" from his throne. That semi-insane philosopher's _Uebermenschen_\nmust fall before Sir John Macdonnell's \"_Super-Nationalism_\" as set\nforth in the March, 1918, issue of the _Contemporary Review_. And the\nPresident's world-echoed phrase, \"world-democracy,\" is uttered only\nwith the corrective in mind that was sounded forth a score of years\nago by England's Colonial Secretary, Joseph Chamberlain, \"Think\nimperially.\" It is only by the establishment of an _Imperium in\nimperio_ through obedience to what the Duke of Wellington called the\nChristian's Marching Orders, the Great Commission, that the new reign\nof the Prince of Peace can become possible. If the blood-soaked\n\"savagery of civilization on the march to save the world from the\ncivilization of savagery\" is the dolorous duty of the present hour,\nthere is solace in the thought that Golgotha was but the prelude to\nthe Resurrection and Ascension. The Ascent of Mankind in all its\nnations and peoples and kindreds and tongues is at hand. To hasten\nthis universal uplift and aid the World Powers as they seek to\ninaugurate the New Order, no agency is likely to aid more than foreign\nmissions among the peoples reached by that enterprise. And the new\nImperial Thinking and Acts are simply those of the seven-fold\nCommission of the Saviour of the World, \"Behold, pray, go, heal,\npreach, teach, baptize, all nations,\" the conquering Labarum of an\nonward-moving Church.\n\n[1] A. C. Coolidge, \"The United States as a World Power,\" p. 329.\n\n[2] F. Lynch, \"President Wilson and the Moral Aims of the War,\" New\nYork, 1918, pp. 50-51.\n\n[3] Beach and St. John, \"World Statistics of Christian Missions,\"\n1916, pp. 59-61.\n\n[4] For the year 1913, see P. K. Streit, \"Atlas Hierarchieus,\"\nsummarized in \"World Statistics of Christian Missions,\" pp. 103-104.\n\n[5] London _Times_, May 16, 1918.\n\n[6] Personal letter from an investigator in France, May 29, 1918.\n\n[7] \"Das Kriegserlebnis der deutschen Mission in Lichte der Heiligen\nSchrift\" as quoted in _The Missionary Review of the World_ for June,\n1918, pp. 423-424.\n\n[8] J. H. Oldham, \"The World and the Gospel,\" p. 200.\n\n[9] J. L. Barton in _Missionary Ammunition, Number One_, 1916, p. 19.\n\n[10] _Missionary Review of the World_, January, 1917, p. 4.\n\n[11] _International Review of Missions_, April, 1916, p. 183.\n\n[12] _Nineteenth Century and After_, April, 1918, pp. 675-676.\n\n[13] Reported in the London _Times_, November 9, 1917.\n\n[14] _Nineteenth Century and After_, April, 1918, p. 681.\n\n[15] R. Tagore, \"Nationalism,\" p. 101.\n\n[16] Quoted in W. Archer's \"India and Its Future,\" pp. 307-308.\n\n[17] M. Durand, \"Life of Sir Alfred Comyn Lyall,\" p. 89.\n\n[18] _International Review of Missions_, January, 1918, p. 23.\n\n[19] _Ibid._, p. 53.\n\n[20] _Missionary Ammunition, Number One_, 1916, pp. 12-13.\n\n[21] _International Review of Missions_, October, 1914, pp. 632-633.\n\n[22] A. J. Macdonald, \"Trade, Politics and Christianity in Africa and\nthe East,\" xii, xv, xviii.\n\n[23] _Japan Daily Mail_, October 9, 1909.\n\n[24] F. Lynch, \"President Wilson and the Moral Aims of the War,\" p.\n72.\n\n[25] F. Lynch, \"President Wilson and the Moral Aims of the War,\" p.\n64.\n\n[26] H. von Treitschke, \"Politik,\" p. 3.\n\n\n\n\nVIII\n\nTHE WAR AND SOCIAL WORK\n\nWILLIAM BACON BAILEY\n\n\nAlthough the duration of this world-war, and the part which we may be\ncalled upon to play in it, makes the destruction in wealth and human\nlife in this country uncertain, and although we cannot tell so far in\nadvance what will be the probable extent of social reconstruction to\nfollow, still the war has progressed far enough, and its effects upon\nthis country are sufficiently apparent, to enable us to forecast more\nor less indefinitely certain changes which are likely to follow its\nclose.\n\nWith regard to the future of social service, three facts are apparent:\n\nFirst, the people of our country are contributing money as never\nbefore to social work. We have for a long time realized that there was\na reservoir in this country upon which we had drawn but little, but\nfew realized the extent of this surplus. At times of great distress\nboth here and abroad, our sympathy had been expressed by generous\ncontributions. We had annually contributed large sums for the support\nof various philanthropies in this country, but as a nation we never\nrealized how much we could give until the test came. One drive is\nhardly completed before another comes. We are surprised as a nation\nand as individuals at the amounts we can repeatedly give and still\ncontinue to meet our ordinary expenditures. This giving is getting to\nbe almost a habit with us and when the war is over, although we may be\nhelping to carry a huge national debt, I believe that our deserving\ncharities will be supported more adequately than before the war.\n\nSecond, we are getting more trained volunteer workers. One of the\nprincipal problems of charitable organizations engaged in case work\nhas been to secure a sufficient number of capable volunteers who would\nkeep their interest in the work and be regular in their attendance.\nThe past few months have seen an increase in this volunteer service\nwhich a year ago we should never have deemed possible. The Home\nService Section of the American Red Cross has enlisted the service as\nvisitors of thousands of our men and women who are anxious to do what\nthey can to preserve the homes from which some member has been called\nto the colors. In a large number of cities this service has been\nplaced under the supervision of paid workers who had been connected\nwith charity organization societies and who brought with them the\nexperience of years in directing and training volunteer friendly\nvisitors. They recognized the advantage of classroom instruction for\nthese visitors, even if necessity compelled that it be extremely\nlimited. Accordingly training schools for these volunteers have been\nstarted in many places in this country and the attendance has been\nsurprisingly large and regular. These volunteers are no longer timidly\ninquiring whether there is some opportunity for friendly visiting in\nthe homes; they are demanding that some opportunity be given them.\nAfter the war this vast army of workers with limited training will\ndemand work of a similar nature and the problem of finding\nsatisfactory volunteers should be solved for many years to come.\n\nThird, the war is raising the standard of care in charitable work.\nMost of these volunteers are visiting in soldiers' families. The\nallowance from the Government, the State and the Red Cross makes\npossible a good standard of living. While our soldiers are at the\nfront they do not need to fear that the standard to which the family\nhad been accustomed will be allowed to fall. At the close of\nhostilities these volunteers, accustomed to this standard, will demand\nthat the same standard apply to the out-door relief given by\ncharitable societies. The result will be a considerable rise in the\nstandard of care. Professional social workers are not talking so much\nas they did about \"cases.\" They are talking more about \"families.\"\nThis is the express desire of those who are directing the Home Service\nSection of the Red Cross. It is felt that in this way a more personal\nnote may be brought into family rehabilitation in the future. It would\nappear, therefore, that the future should find our charities more\nadequately financed, better supplied with trained volunteers, and\ninspired to a higher standard of work.\n\nThe habit of saving is likely to become much more firmly established\namong our people. We may never be so thrifty as the French nation, but\nwe are progressing in that direction. Subscriptions to the Third\nLiberty Loan were received from seventeen millions of our people. In\nmany of our public schools the purchase of thrift stamps by the\nscholars has been almost universal. It is probable that a very large\nproportion of those who are now purchasing liberty bonds never owned a\nbond of any description before. The habit formed in this way will\ncontinue in many cases. A banker a short time ago prophesied that upon\nthe conclusion of this war the savings banks would receive far larger\ndeposits than had ever been the case before. This habit of saving and\nthe ownership of bonds will not fail to have its influence upon the\nrank and file of our people. At the close of the war we shall have our\ntroubles with those who will advance repudiation or some scheme by\nwhich the burden of our national debt may be shifted and the necessity\nfor saving miraculously avoided in some way. But the common sense of\nour people will assert itself and we shall realize that the only way\nby which we can replace this capital is by spending less than we earn.\nThe plain word \"thrift\" seems likely to come into its own again.\n\nUp to the present time social work has appeared to many persons to be\na fad. Some have felt that people with too little to do have spent\ntheir time in interfering with the affairs of people who had too much\nto do. The charge has been made that social service was only a\ntemporary phenomenon which would soon disappear. But the war has\ntaught us a lesson. The military authorities were among the first to\nrecognize the need of proper recreation for the troops, and the demand\nfor workers in the cantonments and at the front has been too great to\nbe met. We see now that the need for recreation is a real need. It\nseems likely that commercialized recreation and amusement is likely to\nplay a smaller part hereafter, and that the community is going to\ndemand a share in this enterprise in the future. Assembly halls,\nplaygrounds, and similar provisions for the public will be required.\n\nWe have never had a caste system in this country and aristocracy based\nupon birth has been unknown. It is probable that nowhere in the world\nduring the past two centuries has it been easier for a man to improve\nhis financial and social standing by his own efforts than in this\ncountry. Land ownership has been widely distributed, we have had a\nlarge middle class and men have been constantly changing from the\ngroup of employees to that of employers. But notwithstanding these\nfactors, there has been a growth of class feeling in this country.\nEmployers have been mistrusted by employees. The growth of large\nfortunes has given rise to envy and bitterness in many quarters. Many\nhave felt that ignorance was the principal cause for this growing\nantipathy. Employer and employee no longer met upon a common footing.\nMany attempts have been made to bridge this chasm. Settlement houses\nhave been erected in order that individuals who would not be likely to\nmeet in the usual course of business or social intercourse might here\nbecome acquainted and learn one another's viewpoint. The industrial\nservice movement has been an attempt to link the interests of employer\nand employee together. But these movements have only scratched the\nsurface. The distinctions based on difference have persisted. It has\nremained for the war to bring the members of these opposing groups\ntogether. Camp and trench life know no class distinction. Rich and\npoor, educated and illiterate, rub elbows and share common life. It is\nno uncommon sight to find four men with three different mother tongues\nsharing a tent together. The effect of this close companionship, this\nsharing of dangers in common, cannot help but breed a companionship\nwhich will do much to bring together men of different birth, breeding\nand social station.\n\nAnother effect of this war has been to lessen sectarian and religious\ndifferences. Protestant, Roman Catholic and Jewish organizations are\nworking side by side in our military camps. The contributions to the\nwork of the Knights of Columbus and of the Y. M. C. A. have come from\nthe community as a whole. Men of different faiths have served as\nmembers of the same teams in these drives. The lessons learned in this\nway are not likely to be forgotten and the great charities to survive\nthis war will probably draw their support from a wider public\nregardless of sectarian affiliation.\n\nWe often heard at the beginning of this conflict that it was a rich\nman's war; that this country had been drawn into it through the\nmachinations of wealthy men who wished to make more wealth through\narmy contracts. This charge has been pretty thoroughly disproven, and\nnow little is heard of it. The rich have proved their patriotism as\nconclusively as any class in this country. They have contributed\ngenerously to our war charities, have submitted to unprecedented\ntaxation with very little grumbling, have bought Liberty Bonds\ngenerously, and have seen their sons volunteer for military service\nwith commendable pride. Many of our most efficient executives have\ncontributed their time to the service of the Government. In fact, one\nof the most interesting and inspiring features of this war has been\nthe service rendered by our men and women of wealth and social\nposition.\n\nThe war is also likely to change the extent and direction of the\nsocial movements in this country. In the early days most of the\ncharitable work in this country was directed to the amelioration of\nthe condition of some particular group of unfortunates. A group of\ntheir compatriots in this country would form a society for the\nassistance of Scotch widows. No study was made of the causes of this\nunfortunate situation. The widows were there and their helpless\ncondition called for aid. There was no attempt to reduce the number of\nwidows by safeguarding the lives of their husbands. In this assistance\nthere was much duplication as the number of these societies increased.\nThen came the attempt to eliminate this waste by the formation of\nsocieties to coordinate these charitable activities in our cities.\nAlthough the idea of constructive work entered the minds of these\npioneers, the contributors were interested chiefly in the relief of\nwant.\n\nIt soon became evident that this want was the result of certain\nwell-defined causes. Sickness, unemployment, intemperance and child\nlabor were recognized as the causes of misery and the extent of these\ncauses was studied by societies which worked for their removal. These\nactivities soon brought the realization that many of these causes were\nsocial rather than individual. Sickness is sometimes caused by\nindividual excesses, but it is also caused by unhealthful occupations\nand life in miserable tenements. We had held property rights as\nsacred, but when greed brought a train of social evils we directed our\nattention to regulation. It may be meritorious to help a widow whose\nhusband has been killed at a machine, but it is equally meritorious to\nsafeguard the machine that it may cease to be the cause of widowhood\nin the future. It is good philanthropy to assist those afflicted with\ntuberculosis, but it is better to remove the disease-breeding \"lung\nblocks\" from our communities.\n\nThis brought the realization that these are community problems which\nmust be met by community action. The state legislatures were appealed\nto with ever increasing success, but Federal action was difficult to\nobtain. The war has made us impatient with half-measures. The exigency\ndemanded immediate and drastic action. Things have been done to obtain\nefficiency which we would have considered impossible five years ago.\nThe rights of private property have had to give way before community\nneed. We have begun to deal on a larger scale with ultimate causes and\nless with the relief of apparent effects. This movement may receive a\ntemporary setback at the close of the war, but as a community we have\nlearned what is possible and this lesson will not be lost.\n\nCertain social reforms are being hastened by the war. We have long\nfelt that certain practices were harmful or wasteful, but in our\neasy-going manner had kept putting the matter off in the hope that the\nevil would cure itself. The necessity of waging successful war has\ncompelled the immediate elimination of this waste. Take one or two\ninstances only.\n\nFor a long time we have been more or less familiar with the financial,\nphysical and spiritual waste resulting from the consumption of\nintoxicants in this country. We have been interested in this problem\nfor a half century and various attempts have been made to eliminate\nthe most serious evils connected with excessive drinking without\ninterfering with a moderate use of alcohol. Our half-hearted attempts\nwere not very successful and finally, after we had experienced a coal\nshortage, and had accepted wheatless and meatless days, the country at\nlast made up its mind that intoxicants must go and the liquor traffic\nin this country appears to be doomed. It might have come sooner or\nlater in any case, but the war has hastened the day.\n\nFor a long time penologists have realized that it was poor economy to\nshut prisoners into dark and dismal cells, giving them but scant\nexercise with little or no employment and then to expect them, at the\nexpiration of their terms, to be returned ready to take their proper\nplaces in society. We have realized that out-door labor on farms was\none of the best things for this class because in this way the\nprisoners could be built up in health and be made more or less\nself-supporting while serving their terms. But we had the jails on\nhand and it was perhaps the easiest plan to lock the prisoners in\ntheir cells with the assurance that they could be found when wanted.\nThe demand for farm labor has finally forced our jails and\npenitentiaries to give up the labor so sorely needed on the farms. It\nis probable that during the coming summer a million acres of land in\nthis country will be tilled by those undergoing sentence.\n\nWe had recognized for years the ravages of venereal disease upon our\nmanhood and womanhood, and a national society and a large number of\nstate societies had been organized to combat the evil. But when the\nfigures began to be published showing the incidence of these diseases\namong our troops the public awoke to the seriousness of the situation.\nThe Federal Government has taken steps to remove diseased women from\nthe neighborhood of the army cantonments and naval bases. The\nGovernment is footing the bills for the treatment of these women in\nstate institutions, where such exist, and is providing suitable\nfacilities for their care in the states where no such opportunity for\ntreatment existed. After the war the lesson we have learned in this\nway is not likely to be forgotten. Another lesson we have learned from\nthe war has been that a considerable proportion of our young men are\nphysically below par. Poor care of the teeth and body, improper or\ninsufficient food, lack of proper exercise, unhygienic methods of\nliving, and various forms of excesses have produced a generation of\nyoung men many of whom are physically unfit for active military\nservice. The importance of this fact has now been driven home, and\nalthough much had been said and written upon this subject in recent\nyears, it will have added emphasis in the future.\n\nWe have always had a democratic form of government, and have in a way\nconsidered this country an asylum for the oppressed of all nations.\nFor several years previous to the outbreak of the war in Europe, we\nhad been receiving into this country immigrants at the rate of about a\nmillion a year. We had gradually increased the number of restrictions\nuntil most of the undesirable types were excluded. We had made the\nprocess of naturalization comparatively easy and had left it to the\nindividual immigrant to decide whether or not he would become a\ncitizen. We had recognized the desirability of Americanizing these\nimmigrants as soon as possible, but had proceeded about the\nproposition in a more or less half-hearted way. The Y. M. C. A.,\nthrough its industrial department, and through the industrial service\nwork in connection with the colleges, had done considerable to teach\nEnglish and civics to the non-English-speaking foreigners. Several\nother organizations, some of them national in scope, had interested\nthemselves in this problem, but our country seemed slow to appreciate\nthe necessity of making true Americans from these various racial\ngroups at the earliest possible moment. The war has brought home to us\nthe fact that we have alien enemies in our midst and from this time we\nmay expect to make a much more thoroughgoing attempt to Americanize\nthese groups. The National Council of Defense is investigating this\nquestion at present and we may with confidence look to a\nwell-considered plan of campaign from this body.\n\nThe very fact that we were receiving from the Old World annually a\ngift of a million foreign-born, most of whom were in the active ages,\nhas led us to think that the supply of labor for this country was\nassured. We were receiving from Europe all of the natural increase\nfrom a population half as large as our own. The ships that brought\nthese hopeful workers to this country took back many who had been\nmaimed in our industries. We had paid too little attention to this\nproblem since the source of this supply of cheap labor seemed\ninexhaustible. Upon the declaration of hostilities in Europe, the\nstream of labor to this country suddenly ceased and it is a serious\nquestion whether it will ever again reach its former proportion. Most\nof the European countries are going to be so drained of their young\nmen that a large emigration from them is not to be expected for a long\ntime to come. The demands for raw material and finished products from\ncertain of the European countries has increased tremendously and a\nshortage of labor in this country has been the result. Concerns have\nbid against one another to secure sufficient labor and for the first\ntime in years we have a condition in which the demand for labor of all\nkinds exceeds the supply. With the impossibility of securing this\nneeded labor from abroad, we have realized the necessity of conserving\nthe supply in this country. Every effort must be made to reduce the\ntoll from accident and injury and to decrease the amount of sickness\nin the country. We may expect an increase in compensation insurance\nand in health insurance among the states. This summer we are having a\ncampaign to save the lives of a hundred thousand children. This\nmovement for the conservation of life would undoubtedly have come in\ntime but has been hastened by the war. Thousands of our young men will\nbe returned to us from overseas more or less crippled and steps are\nalready being taken to give them expert training to fit them for some\nuseful occupation. It is only a step to provide the same sort of\ntraining for those who are maimed in our industries.\n\nNo matter what may be the waste in life and property resulting from\nsuch a conflict, if the people of this country can preserve in their\npurity the ideals with which they have entered upon this crusade,\nsocial workers may face the future with confidence.\n\n\n\n\nIX\n\nTHE WAR AND CHURCH UNITY\n\nWILLISTON WALKER\n\n\nThe great war has been conspicuously one of alliances. For its\nsuccessful accomplishment cooperation and individual subordination\nhave been manifested in military, political and economic fields in\nheretofore unexampled fulness. Liberties, the result of long\nstruggles, and deeply cherished, have been laid aside, for the time,\nthat larger efficiency may be accomplished. Individual opinions\nstrongly held have been subordinated to a common purpose. The time has\nwitnessed a reappreciation of values in many realms. Much that in days\nof peace has seemed of importance, has appeared in the fierce light of\nwar of relatively minor significance. A change of perspective has been\nthe consequence. Has this result, so apparent in most realms of\nactivity and of ordinary life, been manifest in the realm of religion?\nAre the same forces at work there also? An answer to these questions\ncannot as yet be fully formulated; but it is at least possible to\nindicate certain influences which are at work.\n\nThe entry of the United States into the world-war has been in a degree\nunexampled in the history of this country a response to the appeal of\nrighteousness. No action in which the nation has ever engaged has been\nso unselfish. We have taken our part in the struggle without hate, and\nwith full consciousness of the prospective cost in life and treasure,\nthat certain principles of justice may prevail, and that despotism,\nbrutality and falsehood may not dominate the civilized world. We look\nfor no indemnities, no annexations, and no pecuniary rewards. The\nAmerican people has never more fully exhibited that idealism which, in\nspite of frequent misapprehension by those unacquainted with the real\nnational spirit, is its fundamental characteristic. The consonance of\nthis attitude with some primary teachings of religion is apparent.\nSelf-sacrifice that the weak may be helped, that wrong may be\nresisted, and that a truer and juster order may be established among\nthe nations, are aims that are closely akin to those of the Christian\nfaith in its aspect of love to one's neighbor. Nor is it without\nevidential value to the essentially religious quality of American life\nthat no enterprise has ever so united the people, and that Americans,\nwhether so by long inheritance or immigrants who have more recently\ncaught the national spirit, have never before been so at one in a\ncommon endeavor. Nothing less noble, less idealistic, less in a true\nsense religious could so have fused them into one.\n\nThe war, furthermore, has been a revelation of the fundamental\npurposefulness of the rising generation. The years immediately\nantecedent to the struggle saw not a little shaking of older heads\nover what were called the irresponsibility and pleasure-seeking of our\nyoung people. The call to arms has shown them as patriotic, as\nwhole-hearted in devotion, as sacrificial as ever their elders were.\nThey need bow in reverence to none who have gone before them. The\ncheerfulness with which a selective draft has been accepted, and in\nthousands of cases anticipated, has shown the readiness of youthful\nresponse to high appeal. This demonstration of the soundness, the\nearnestness and the unselfishness of those who are soon to be the\nleaders of the national life is full of religious encouragement.\n\nEqually heartening has been the cheerful and effective answer of the\nresponsible population of America to limitations in food and drink\nthat the needs of the Allies should be met and the national resources\nconserved. Doubtless other nations in the world-struggle have made\nlarger sacrifices and endured far severer privations; but the\nimpressive quality of what America has done is that it has been so\nlargely self-imposed, a voluntary sacrifice, in which suggestion\nrather than compulsion has been the task of its leaders. Strikingly\nimpressive, also, has been the outpouring of wealth and effort to\nrelieve human suffering through the Red Cross and kindred agencies,\nnot only for the alleviation of the miseries of our own sons, but of\nthe martyred population of Belgium, of France, of Poland and of Syria.\nNo village has been too small, no community too remote or too rural,\nto have a share in this altruistic endeavor. Its spirit is in a true\nsense that of religion. More openly and professedly religious has been\nthe marvelous work of the Young Men's Christian Association and of the\nKnights of Columbus. No previous war has seen anything comparable in\nextent of effort or scope of plan. The aim, and to a great extent the\naccomplishment, has been to cast Christian sympathy and brotherly\nhelpfulness around the soldier and sailor in every camp at home and\nabroad, in the trenches, the hospitals, the battleships, the\ntransports, and in the cities where his furlough is spent and his\nideals so easily forgotten. These agencies have not labored for our\nown sons alone, but for those of France and Italy also. Even more\nimpressive than the vast sums of money contributed from all over the\nUnited States for this cause have been the numbers and the quality of\nthe men and women who have given themselves freely and in Christian\nconsecration to this service. The Young Men's Christian Association\nand the Knights of Columbus have been in truth the right arm of\nAmerican Christianity stretched out to shelter, to hearten and to aid.\nThey have been the agents of the churches in their ministry. Without\nthem the contribution of organized American Christianity would have\nbeen relatively ineffective. Through them that Christianity has\nexhibited itself in practical and achieving power as never before.\n\nThe outstanding feature of these conspicuous manifestations of\nAmerican religious life is that they have been absolutely undogmatic.\nTheir type of Christianity has been broadly inclusive of what may be\ncalled universally accepted doctrine. Chaplains from most various\ndenominational antecedents have labored together in a spirit of\nChristian comradeship, bearing only the sign of the cross. The\nworkers, ministerial and lay, recruited by the Young Men's Christian\nAssociation have been drawn from all shades of American Evangelicalism\nand have wrought not only harmoniously one with another, but with the\nKnights of Columbus and with the representatives of Jewish faith. In\ncommon efforts to reach common needs, differences which loomed large\nat home have been laid aside. The requirements and experiences of our\nsoldiers and sailors have been elemental, and these agencies have\nsought to meet them with a simple, earnest, uncontroversial\nGospel,--the common denominator, if it may so be called, of our\nAmerican Christianity. They have presented God, sin, salvation, faith\nin Christ, purity of life, brotherly helpfulness; and to this\npresentation the young manhood of our armies and navies has been quick\nto respond. These young men have cared little as to the particular\ndenominational label which these messengers may have worn at home.\nSpoken with manliness, sincerity and sympathy, the message has won\ntheir hearts.\n\nThese experiences have inevitably raised the question more\ninsistently, which had already before the war been sounded\nincreasingly loudly in our home churches, whether the divided state of\nAmerican Christianity is to continue. It has long been deplored. Can\nit not be in a measure abated? A disposition to believe that it can is\nincreasingly evident. The enlarging support given to the Federal\nCouncil of the Churches of Christ since the beginning of the war is\nsignificant of a growing conviction that at least a larger federal\ncooperation is not merely desirable but feasible. The much-divided\nLutheran body has taken steps which promise its union in one fold. The\nlast General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of the United States\nhas empowered a committee to issue a call for a Council to meet before\nthe close of the present year by which practical action may be\ninitiated looking towards the organic union of all American\nEvangelical Christianity. The Protestant Episcopal Church of the\nUnited States still urges its ambitious and remote plan of a World\nConference on Faith and Order, aiming at a general reunion of\nChristendom; though in this case the war seems to have delayed rather\nthan furthered the project. In the local field, the scarcity of fuel\nduring the recent winter led to hundreds of instances of temporary\ncombinations of congregations representative of different\ndenominations throughout the northern portion of the United States.\nNot only has no evil been the consequence, but better acquaintance and\nlarger Christian sympathy have resulted. In some places, as in New\nBrunswick, N. J., these temporary unions have led to efforts to make\nthese combinations permanent. It is evident that the possibility of a\nlarger unity is being discussed as never before, and in a spirit which\nmore than at any previous time tends to emphasize the great truths in\nwhich Christians are agreed and to minimize their differences.\n\nWill anything permanently effective come out of this widely diffused\ndesire? Shall we be satisfied with the remarkable exhibitions of\nChristian cooperation in our army and navy, shall we entertain a pious\nwish that something similar may be achieved at home, and will the end\nof the war find us, nevertheless, in our present divided state? The\nanswer will depend on the sacrificial willingness of our American\nChristianity. Is it ready to pay the cost? That is a far-reaching\nquestion any answer to which is at present impossible, for the\ndifficulties in the path of a larger union are enormous. Such a\ngreater unity can be achieved only as several barriers of great\nstrength are overthrown.\n\nOne such barrier is the inertia of local organizations. Few American\ncommunities are not confessedly overchurched, as far as the Protestant\npopulation is concerned. The spectacle of eight or ten relatively\nfeeble churches ministering to needs which two or three larger bodies\ncould much more effectively meet is one exhibited in hundreds of\ncommunities. Yet effective consolidation is opposed by serious\nobstacles. Long custom, ancient disputes, denominational loyalties,\nkeep these relatively feeble bodies asunder. These prejudices are hard\nto overcome. \"Our fathers worshipped in this mountain,\" is a feeling\nnot peculiar to Samaria. Much of this local loyalty is not without its\ncommendable qualities. It is bound up with traditions of parental\npiety, of devotion to a particular house of worship and to a\ncongregation of believers in which one has grown up in the Christian\nlife. These feelings are very real. Yet it is only as the advantages\nof a larger local unity become evident that our churches can rise to a\ngreater consolidation and more effectively meet the local situation.\nOnly the larger good can drive out the lesser goods.\n\nA further barrier, and one of no inconsiderable magnitude, which\nrenders local union difficult is that our local churches are parts of\nlarge organic wholes for the advancement of the Kingdom of God at home\nand abroad. By their gifts, their sons and daughters and their\nprayers, the missionary societies are supported, by which the\noutreaching work of the Kingdom of Christ is carried forward. These\nsocieties are now denominational. If two local churches are to become\none, where will their joint contributions go? One has aided one group\nof missionary societies hitherto, the other another. Shall the new\nunion divide its gifts? If it does, will they be as extensive or the\ninterest as great as formerly? These are practical questions for the\nmissionary societies. The only final solution of such a situation\nwould seem to be an extensive consolidation of the missionary\nsocieties themselves, so that they might become more representative of\nAmerican Christianity, at least of American Evangelical Christianity,\nas a whole, rather than simply the organs of particular denominations.\n\nA third barrier of difficulty barring the pathway of local\nconsolidation is that of ministerial and ecclesiastical\nresponsibility. Each of the various denominations now has its definite\nmethod of entrance on its ministry, and of responsibility for the\ncharacter and standing of those in its pastorates. Each holds itself\nbound to aid its feebler churches in their pecuniary necessities. If a\nnew congregation results from the union of two or more existing bodies\nrepresentative of different denominations, where is the test of\nministerial fitness, and the guarantee of continued ministerial\nstanding to be found, and who is to aid such a church if financially\nfeeble? These are the problems which are often raised by the so-called\n\"community church.\" Of course these difficulties are often met by the\nunited organization attaching itself to the denomination originally\nrepresented by one of its component parts; but this solution, though\neffective, makes so large demands on Christian self-denial as often to\nbe impracticable in the present still comparatively feebly developed\ndesire for unity.\n\nA still further barrier to unity, both on the local field and on the\nlarger national scale, is the fact, often overlooked, that the\nseparations of American Christianity are really due quite as much to\ndifferences of taste as to divergencies of doctrines or of polity.\nThere is an Episcopal, a Presbyterian or a Methodist way of doing\nthings that really differentiates these great families of believers\nquite as fully as their more generally acknowledged divergencies. They\nview the Christian life, they look upon worship, they express their\ndeeper feelings, in unlike ways. The variety is not so much a\ndiversity of belief as a contrast of temperaments. Being so, it is not\nsusceptible to argument, or to adjustment by conventions or creedal\nagreements. It is to be met, if met at all, by the increasing spirit\nof democracy, which the war has done so much to foster. In proportion\nas the fundamental Christian democracy of America becomes a real\nconsciousness these temperamental unlikenesses will tend to be\nsubordinated to a larger unity of spirit. They will continue. Men are\nnot all made in the same mould. But, it may be believed that they may\nbe overcome by a growing recognition of unity in variety.\n\nMoreover, in spite of an increasing longing that the multitudinous\nsubdivisions of American Christianity be merged in a larger whole,\nmuch tenacious holding of peculiar denominational tenets will have to\nbe overcome. The simplicity of the great truths which Christians hold\nin common will need to be more fully realized. Most American\nEvangelical denominations are now willing freely to admit that the\nessential verities of Christianity are held by their associated\ncommunions, and that a true Christian life is possible in each of\nthem. The evident working of the spirit of God makes a denial\nimpossible. But while each denomination is thus willing to recognize a\nreal, if grudgingly admitted, sisterhood as the share of the others,\neach regards its peculiarities of belief or practice as of extreme\nimportance, if not to the being, at least to the well-being of the\nchurch, so that effective inter-communion seems impossible. An\ninteresting illustration of this spirit has recently been shown in a\ndiscussion involving a communion which professes, one cannot doubt\nwith sincerity, a desire for a reunion of Christendom. A proposition\nwas made to it by a number of representatives of other communions,\nurging that the unity of American Christianity be illustrated by joint\nordinations of chaplains for service with the army and navy. That\nproposal, which involved no question of ministerial status in the home\nchurches, was declined by its highest authorities. It is not\nconceivable that those who thus refused it believed that chaplains\nwent forth to their arduous task in the name of Christ from other\ncommunions without the blessing of God; but such differences of\napprehension as may still coexist with obedience to the one Master are\nevidently yet deemed too great to permit mutual Christian\nauthorization for service. Doubtless many similar instances could be\nfound, but as long as they characterize American Christianity at all\nthey reveal the persistence of a spirit which exalts denominational\npeculiarities above the full recognition of common Christian\ndiscipleship.\n\nThese barriers have been thus frankly stated because they are very\nreal, and while the impulse toward Christian unity now flows in\nincreasing strength from the experiences of the great war, the\nmovement in that direction must acquire far greater momentum before\nits work can be accomplished. Christian unity was never so fully\nbefore the thought of the American churches as now. Never were so many\nsincerely desirous of it. Never was its need so obvious as in these\ndays when the church faces the tremendous problem of the\nreconstruction on a Christian basis of a shattered social order. It is\na task which demands all the forces of an undivided Christianity. Yet\ndesirable as the goal of unity is, it will never be reached save\nthrough the strenuous cooperant effort of all who long for it. That\neffort must be greater than any heretofore made. It must be patient\nand persistent and in full faith that the Master's prayer for his\ndisciples demands their utmost endeavor.\n\nThree steps are certainly needful for effective progress towards a\nlarger unity:\n\nThere must be a clearer recognition of the things in the Christian\nfaith which are of vital significance. The really great truths must be\nseen in their proper perspective. The simplicity of the Gospel must be\nincreasingly recognized. We have too often elevated relatively\nsubordinate convictions to an equality with the fundamentals of the\nfaith. In this clearer perception of proportions the experiences of\nthe religious work of the war is greatly aiding. We are seeing that in\nthe Christian life we need not so many things as much.\n\nNo less necessary is it that a spirit ready to sacrifice the\nimportant, but relatively subordinate, be developed. No denomination\nis called upon to sacrifice alone. If unity is to be achieved, each\nmust feel a willingness to subordinate that which though precious by\ncustom or antiquity or cherished possession is yet divisive.\n\nEven more imperative is it that American religious bodies know each\nother better. Existing side by side, laboring in the same communities,\nit is amazing how little real comprehension of each other's spiritual\nlife now exists. In mutual acquaintance by common association,\nwherever such intercourse can be brought about, lies the corrective of\nmuch present misunderstanding that separates us. All that aids a\ncommon acquaintance is an aid to ultimate unity.\n\nThe consideration just mentioned makes it probable that the most\npromising present step is in the direction of federal cooperation.\nReligious bodies that are far from willing to sink their present\ndifferences may yet work in harmony, and by working together increase\nthat mutual understanding and thereby confidence in each other's\nChristian spirit which is so essential a preliminary to unity. That is\nwhat makes the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ and similar\nmovements eminently worthy of support. They are not ends in\nthemselves. They are means of utmost significance to a larger end.\n\nThe war is showing a vision of our need and of the goal of our effort.\nThat the road to a larger and more effective unity of the religious\nforces of America is full of difficulties is no reason why a Christian\nman should hesitate to tread it. It is as true now as when the Master\nsaid it, that \"with God all things are possible.\"\n\n\n\n\nX\n\nTHE RELIGIOUS BASIS OF WORLD\nRE-ORGANIZATION[1]\n\nE. HERSHEY SNEATH\n\n\nWhen we reflect upon the situation of the race today, with the leading\nnations in the throes of a war of unparalleled dimensions and\ndestructiveness, we are appalled at the impotency of those forces that\nheretofore have tended toward world-organization. Time was when\ninternational treaties and laws seemed to have at least a semblance of\ninhibiting sanctity, but in recent years they are regarded in certain\nquarters as mere \"scraps of paper,\" and the supposed \"rights\" of\nnations are treated with scorn and contempt. The black flag of piracy,\nhitherto regarded as the symbol of international outlawry, floats on\nthe high seas, and the assassination of neutrals and noncombatants is\nregarded by some as a national virtue. For centuries humane\nconsiderations obtained with reference to prisoners of war and to\npartially conquered nations. Now, certain nations have substituted for\nsuch humanitarianism, outrage, brutality and enforced slavery. In\nshort, international pact and law seem to have broken down. Their\nrestraints have yielded to the unbridled force of national greed and\nlust for power.\n\nAgain, in the past, the moral imperatives, independent of political\ntreaties and laws, have exercised a wholesome constraining and\nrestraining influence on the relations of different peoples, and have\nmade for fraternal world-organization. Man is constitutionally a moral\nbeing, and is, to a certain extent, governed by sentiments of justice\nand benevolence. These moral elements of our nature have led us to\nhave regard for man as man, rather than for men as members of\nparticular nations and races. Hence, in our interaction there has been\na tendency to recognize and respect what we have been wont to call\nhuman rights as growing out of the essential constitution of\npersonality. The same tendency has characterized our attitude toward\nmen organized under political government. But alas! these fundamental\nmoral claims are now flagrantly violated. The morally right has, with\nsome nations, degenerated into the right of might.\n\nAgain, in the past, art has made for the unification of the race. The\naesthetic consciousness is on the side of harmony. It hates chaos and\nloves order. It functions in the social and political spheres and\ntends toward unity rather than anarchy--toward peace rather than war.\n\"Art binds together and unites the members of the nation; nay, all the\nmembers of a sphere of civilization; all those who have the same faith\nand the same ideals. Opinions and interests differ and produce\ndiscord; art presents in sensuous symbols the ideals which are\ncherished by all, and so arouses the feeling that all are, in the last\nanalysis, of the same mind, that all recognize and adore the same\nultimate and highest things.\"[2] When we deal with the ideal we are\ndealing with the universal. Thus art transcends both individualism and\nnationalism. It contributes toward international good will. But how\nineffective it has proven along these lines during the last few tragic\nyears. One of the first great outrages of the war was the wanton\nbombardment of the beautiful Rheims cathedral. The world protested\nagainst this iconoclasm, but it continued. Vandalism and robbing\nnations of their art treasures are features of _Kultur_; so the\nbreach between nations widens despite the supposed unifying power of\nart. The nation of Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Mendelssohn and Wagner\ngrips with mailed fist the throat of the nation of Michelangelo,\nTitian, Da Vinci, Correggio and Raphael, and tries to strangle the\nnation of David, Delacroix and Millet. The nation of Lessing, Goethe\nand Schiller schools its children in a gospel of hate toward the\nnation of Shakespeare and Milton and a long line of glorious poets\nfrom Chaucer to Browning. The refining and organizing influences of\nart have given way to the brutal instincts of malevolence and greed,\nand a lofty idealism that bound the nations together in a golden chain\nof beauty finds the precious chain rudely broken. Art, like the other\nbinding forces, has apparently failed in its work of unification.\n\nAnother force that has been operative in world-organization is\nreligion, and especially the Christian religion. With its proclamation\nof the universal fatherhood of God and brotherhood of man; with the\nlaw of love as its law of social interaction; with its \"Go ye into all\nthe world and preach my gospel\"--a gospel of universal membership in a\nkingdom of supreme values--in which every member is on a moral\nequality with his neighbor--the Christian religion has been promotive\nof a spirit of good will among men, and of harmony among the nations.\nBut what is the case today? A nominally Christian nation joins bloody\nhands with a traditionally murderous nation of Mohammedan faith in\nwholesale assassination of one of the most ancient Christian peoples,\nand attempts to incite the Moslem world to warfare against nations of\nChristian faith, merely to enhance her own selfish interests.\nFurthermore, in the present crisis we find Christian nation arrayed\nagainst Christian nation: Protestant against Protestant; Catholic\nagainst Catholic; Protestant and Catholic united against Protestant\nand Catholic. Peoples in whose ears for centuries have rung the glad\ntidings of \"peace on earth, good will toward men\" are today gripping\none another in mortal combat. The star of the East that, according to\nthe story, guided the Wise Men to the manger of the Prince of Peace\nseems to have lost its radiance and directing power. Never since the\nstar is said to have shone were men apparently farther from beating\ntheir swords into plow-shares and their spears into pruning hooks. The\nunifying power of him whose life illustrated even better than his\nparable of the Good Samaritan the highest law of human relationship is\nnot in evidence today. Where is the power of that cross, the vision of\nwhich carried with it still another vision of a world attracted to,\nand unified by, the power of self-sacrificing love--\"And I, if I be\nlifted up, will draw all men unto me\"? Is the power of sacrificial\nlove drawing the hearts of men and of nations together in the\nfellowship of Jesus Christ? Are not the dominant forces operating\ntoday centrifugal rather than centripetal? It is not the skeptic, or\ncynic, or pessimist, who asks these questions. They are the questions\nof thousands of earnest men and women who face the supreme crisis of\nhuman history. They bring home to us the fact that religion, even in\nits highest form, like international law, like morality, like art,\nhowever promotive of human brotherhood it has been, has failed in this\nmost crucial test to prevent the dreadful work of the destructive\nforces of mankind. This is a fact that the sincere believer in\nreligion must face whether he wants to or not.\n\nIn view of the failure of all of these more or less harmonizing and\nsynthesizing forces to prevent such a gigantic war, what are we to say\nabout world-organization after the conflict? Nations must live and\nsustain relations to one another. They must establish some _modus\nvivendi_, and it must be founded on justice. The necessity of\nrighteousness and good will in international relations has been made\nmore apparent than ever by this most tragic conflict. And the question\narises: What organized forces are to establish such righteousness and\ngood will among the nations? We must depend upon the very same forces\nthat have been operative in the past; that is, upon international law,\nmorality, art and religion, but they must be made more effective. How\nthis may be done in the case of religion it is the aim of this paper\nto try to explain.\n\nIn the first place, if religion is to become powerfully effective in\nthis direction, it must take a really ethical view of God. He must be\nregarded as essentially moral in his constitution; as ruling in\nabsolute righteousness, and a being whose ultimate aim with reference\nto men and the world is the realization of a new heaven and a new\nearth wherein righteousness is to dwell. Much as believers in religion\nhave said on this subject, the conceptions of many as expressed in\nbelief and conduct have contradicted their words. When the nation of\nMartin Luther, including not merely the docile masses, but the\nspiritually enslaved clergy and servile university professors,[3]\namong whom may be numbered such religious leaders as Harnack, can\naccept and pray for the success of the war program of a ruler who\nregards himself to be the vicegerent of the Almighty, cooperating with\nhim in a scientifically organized movement for the triumph of the most\ndiabolical forces the human race has ever witnessed--approving the\nvices of hell as though they were the virtues of heaven--this\nnominally Christian nation is either guilty of awful blasphemy or it\nhas lost its vision of an ethical God. Such a conception of the Deity\nproves divisive rather than unifying. It recognizes merely a partisan\ntribal Deity who cooperates with a people to realize its own ends,\nhowever unworthy and debasing those ends may be. Its influence is\npromotive of national selfishness, and makes against a brotherhood of\nnations. Professor Leuba speaks of the utilitarian ends for which men\nbelieve in God--making him hardly more than a meat purveyor;[4] but\nthe German conception of God is much crasser than this.[5] \"_Gott\nmit uns_\" is a God that is asked and believed to cooperate in the\nmost damnable atrocities the human mind ever conceived in order to\nfurther low national aims.\n\nNow, there is an important psychology here that we must reckon with.\nProfessor Stratton, in his work on \"The Psychology of the Religious\nLife,\" calls attention to the fact that religion breeds conflict, it\ngives birth to opposites or antitheses, and he devotes nearly the\nentire volume to a consideration of these conflicts. In one of his\nmost interesting chapters[6] he points out the fact that religion is\nproductive of both breadth and narrowness of sympathy, of both social\nand anti-social feelings, of both egoism and altruism. He illustrates\nthis in pointing out the exclusiveness of some religions, such as that\nof the Jews, and of the catholicity of others, such as Buddhism and\nChristianity. He points out, also, the jealousy and intolerance of the\nmonotheistic religions, such as Judaism, Christianity and\nMohammedanism, as compared with polytheistic religions, like Buddhism.\nThe former, like Elijah, are very jealous for their Lord, and such\njealousy breeds narrowness and intolerance. It breeds exclusiveness,\nstrife and often persecution. Now most of the conflict between\nnarrowness and breadth of sympathy to which religion gives rise is due\nto wrong conceptions of the ethical nature of God. This manifests\nitself in many ways. God is conceived as a God of one people, rather\nthan of others; or of one people particularly and peculiarly, and of\nother peoples merely generally; or a God choosing and rewarding the\nelect and damning the non-elect; or a God favoring only one mode of\nsalvation peculiar to a certain people or sect, and hostile to all\nothers; or a God of one revelation rather than of another. In short,\nGod is a God of favoritism instead of the impartial God and father of\nall mankind. Such a God is not a God of justice, much less of love.\nSuch a conception is productive of division, rather than of unity in\nthe race. It begets strife, rather than harmony. Witness the religious\nwars that history records. Witness, for example, the history of the\nconflict between Mohammedanism and Christianity; between Protestantism\nand Catholicism. As a rule, religion is so involved in the life of a\npeople that it becomes an integral part of their nationalism.\nHistorians call attention to the fact that the monotheism of the Jews\nwas largely the outgrowth of reflection upon their own history as a\npeople. They saw in this history a Divinity that had shaped their\nends, however roughhewn they may have been. They regarded themselves a\n\"peculiar\" people, specially chosen of God. For more than a century a\nsimilar belief prevailed in America. Our wonderful history led people\nto believe that we are a favored nation. God's providential government\nreveals a partiality for America when compared with other nations.\nWith such conceptions of a partial God, it is but a short step to\nmaking use of God for national ends, and, as illustrated in the case\nof the German nation today, only another step to conceiving God's\nwillingness to cooperate in realizing ends which, in the judgment of\nthe world, as expressed in international law, as well as in its own\nunwritten verdict, are regarded as unrighteous. Until the God of the\nrace supersedes in actual belief and practice the God of nationalism;\nuntil the God and father of all mankind displaces in our belief the\nGod of sect or of one religion rather than of another; until the God\nof absolute and universal righteousness takes the place in our minds\nand hearts of the God of partiality and favoritism, which is the God\nof injustice; men and nations will not be bound together in one great\nand glorious fraternity. The root idea of religion is the idea of God,\nand as is our idea of God, so will our religious life be. If it is the\nidea of an unrighteous Deity, our individual, national and\ninternational life will be unrighteous. A fundamental necessity in the\ndetermination of the religious basis of world-organization is an\nethical conception of God.\n\nIn the second place, in our religious efforts at world-organization we\nmust entertain and put in practice a far more ethical conception of\nman than we have in the past. The inalienable rights of personality\nmust be recognized and their sanctity remain inviolable. That\nvaluation which Christianity places on man as man must be seriously\nreckoned with in our reconstructive efforts after the war. Or, as Kant\nstates it, every man must be regarded as an end in himself. He must\nnot be used merely as a means to an end. The significance of this is,\nthat there is an essential moral equality among men. On it all\npolitical relations, whether national or international, must be based.\nThis means, first, that within each nation a true form of government,\nunder whatsoever name it may be known, must be democratic. \"It must\nderive its authority and power from the consent of the governed.\"\nAutocracy is opposed to moral and political equality. It treats its\nsubjects as tools or instruments. It builds governments of force that\nignore the moral and political claims of their own people, reducing\nthem to a docility in which they are little more than \"dumb driven\ncattle.\" Thus subjugated, they are schooled from childhood in a creed\nof jealousy and hatred of other nations. They can be hurled in masses\n\"into the jaws of Death\" in an unrighteous war of conquest. Autocracy\nis upheld by militarism, and militarism means strife. On the other\nhand, militarism is upheld by autocracy. It first robs the people of\nits own nation of their rights and then proceeds to plunder other\nnations. It is essentially anti-social in character, and it is so\nbecause it is anti-moral. It overlooks the moral equality of men. The\nreligion of the future must set its face like flint against this\nimmoral view of man. It must emphasize the autonomy of the human\nspirit--the essential value of a soul that can determine its own\nconduct in the light of ideals of worth. Once it does this, democracy\nwill assert itself in government, and autocracy, responsible for so\nmany of the wars that have afflicted the race, will be abolished.\n\nIn the next place, this essential moral equality of men, when\nrecognized, means that their mutual relations will become more\nethically articulate, and the law of social interaction will be at\nleast the law of justice, and in a measure the law of love,--\"Thou\nshalt love thy neighbor as thyself,\"--which being interpreted means,\nthat just as one is under obligations to labor for the realization of\nthe highest good in one's own person, so he is under obligations to\nwork for the realization of the highest good in the person of others.\nAnd this highest law of human relationship must be recognized, not\nmerely as obligatory upon individuals in their relations to other\nindividuals, but also upon nations in their mutual relations. Morality\nis transcendental in its character. It overleaps the bounds of\nindividualism. It knows not men merely, nor nations merely, nor groups\nof nations merely;--it knows the race. It knows man, rather than men.\nIt is difficult for us to realize this. Just as it was hard for\nprimitive tribes to realize any obligations to other tribes, so today,\nnotwithstanding centuries of so-called civilization, somehow or other\nan international morality fails to have the binding force either of\npersonal, community, or national morality. The righteousness that\nexalts a people seems largely to be a righteousness within its own\nborders. Egoism in a nation is just as blameworthy as egoism in an\nindividual. In the vast group of nations, no nation liveth unto itself\nalone, if it is to live according to the moral law of benevolence, or\naccording to the Christian law of love. The religion of the future\nmust, in its practical belief, emphasize this fact far more than it\nhas in the past. Nations are simply larger human units, and the moral\nlaw in its obligations applies just as truly to their interrelations\nas it does to those of individuals. Its demands are no more Utopian in\nthe former case than in the latter. It can at least serve as an ideal\nor guide to conduct. As in the case of individuals, so in the case of\nnations, each has its rights, and in their mutual relations the moral\nlaw or the law of love requires the recognition of the rights or just\nclaims of each. As President Wilson said in his memorable message to\nCongress on April 2, 1917: \"We are at the beginning of an age in which\nit will be insisted that the same standards of conduct and of\nresponsibility for wrong done shall be observed among nations and\ntheir governments that are observed among individuals of civilized\nstates.\" And again: \"It is clear that nations must in the future be\ngoverned by the same high code of honor that we demand of\nindividuals.\" Of course the cynical political philosopher and\n\"practical\" stateman will regard this as \"unpractical idealism.\" But\nthe ethics of the Nazarene will prove far more effective in promoting\na satisfactory _modus vivendi_ among the nations than the revived\nMachiavellianism of modern Germany, or the ethics of a Nietzsche, a\nTreitschke, and a Bernhardi. We see the inevitable outcome of the\nlatter in the most ghastly war of all history. There never will be\npeace on such a brutally egoistic basis as that laid down in the\npolitical philosophy of these writers so prized by many Germans. The\ndoctrines of the superman with their contempt for the weak, and of war\nas a \"biological necessity,\" so dear to Junkerdom, are confessedly the\naffirmation that \"might makes right.\" If peace be attainable and\npreservable on such a basis, and the lion and the lamb are to lie down\ntogether, it will only be as the lamb lies inside of the lion. Some\nlamb-like pacifists and \"conscientious objectors\" to war may be\ncontent with such a place of residence; but physically and morally\nred-blooded and self-respecting men and nations not only prefer, but\nfeel it a moral obligation to maintain the individual and national\nself against an unscrupulous and barbarous aggressor and destroyer.\nThey feel so, too, in obedience to the Christian command, \"Thou shalt\nlove thy neighbor as thyself\"--a command that not only includes self\nas the object of moral regard, but that makes it the norm according to\nwhich we are to determine our duty to others. Men and nations do feel\nmorally responsible for their own preservation and development, and\nwill, as a rule, defend the essential conditions of these against\nunjustifiable attack. Hence, as long as nations exist, war will remain\na possibility. The only way to avert it is through mutual respect for\nfundamental rights. Both the law of benevolence and the Christian law\nof love demand this. Indeed, they demand more! They call for a\nmanifestation or fuller expression of good will and fraternal regard\nboth in feeling and in conduct.\n\nNow, in the work of establishing a real brotherhood among individuals\nand among nations, religion has the advantage over mere morality, for\nit can avail itself of the power of the religious sanctions in trying\nto realize the kingdom of righteousness. But, on the other hand, a\nsubtle danger lurks in religion which it may be well to point out\nhere, and which must be guarded against in our future efforts at\ncommunity, national and world-organization, for it tends to\nsubordinate the ethical element in religion, and often degenerates\ninto an anti-social program. According to the sanest views of the\npsychology of religion, the whole mind as intellect, sensibility and\nwill functions in the religious consciousness. Because of this, there\nis a possibility of developing a wrong sense of values in the\nreligious life. There has been a notable tendency in human history to\nstress the intellectual element in religion. This has resulted in a\nlarge body of doctrine which frequently assumes extraordinary\nsignificance. The main thing, then, is to give intellectual assent to\ndogma and creed. Orthodoxy of belief rather than orthodoxy of life\nbecomes the primary thing. The ethical element in religion is\nsubordinated to intellectual belief. And how divisive and anti-social,\nrather than unifying, dogma has been, and how deadening to real moral\nendeavor! This constitutes a long and very tragic chapter in the\nhistory of Christianity, as well as of other religions.\n\nAgain, there has been another marked tendency in the history of\nreligion and that is the substitution of the religion of feeling for\nthe religion of will. Pietism and sentimentalism have supplanted in a\nlarge measure the ethical. Such religion is dominantly non-social, if\nnot, indeed, anti-social in its character. It does not make for\nbrotherhood. The pietistic monk shuts himself in a monastery and tries\nto work out his soul's salvation with fear and trembling, rather than\nto work it out by aiding his neighbor or society to work out theirs.\nBuddhism and Christianity have been most unfortunate victims of this\nsubstitution of solitude for solidarity. Dean Brown once said to the\nwriter that there is a great deal of pietism that is utterly wanting\nin ethical quality, and that is true. It is a kind of selfish\nsubjectivism devoid of any real moral character. It is self-centered\nand non-social. It represents the minimum of true religion. Where in\nsuch pietism do we find the universality of obligation involved in the\nethical law of benevolence or in the Christian law of love? Such\nreligion does not bear the marks of a really socialized gospel. It has\ndeveloped a wrong sense of values.\n\nAgain, there is in practically all religions a large element of\nsymbolism--the religious life expressing itself in worship--in rites\nand ceremony. And this carries with it a dangerous tendency in\nevaluation. It often substitutes ritual and ceremonial for what is the\nreal essence of religion--namely, righteousness. The great Hebrew\nprophets contended strongly against this misinterpretation of\nreligion. With them it represented an erroneous estimate of the\nessentials of religion. Indeed, it threatened its very life--the heart\nof which in their conception is righteousness in God and man. Isaiah\nrepresents Jehovah as being weary of sacrifice, incense and other\nforms of worship--regarding them as an abomination, and calling upon\nthe people to live a life of righteousness: \"Wash you, make you clean;\nput away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do\nevil; learn to do well; seek justice, relieve the oppressed.\"[7] Hosea\nexclaims: \"I desired mercy, and not sacrifice.\"[8] Micah, inveighing\nagainst burnt offerings, says: \"He hath shewed thee, O man, what is\ngood, and what doth Jehovah require of thee, but to do justly, and to\nlove mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?\"[9] And Jesus, all\nthrough the Sermon on the Mount and in the parables, in the most\npositive manner represents righteous living as the very core of\nreligion.\n\nAll of these elements--the intellectual, the pietistic, the aesthetic\nor symbolical--have a rightful place in the religious life, but they\nare all subordinate, and exceedingly subordinate, to the one great\ndominating element, the moral. And it is because of a failure to\nadequately recognize and practise this element that so many supposedly\nChristian nations are today in deadly conflict. All of them persist in\ntheir theological beliefs; all of them persist in pietistic communion;\nall of them persist in rite and ceremony; but some of them at least\nfail even to approximate the exemplification of the fundamental\nethical requirements of their faith. Their theology, their pietism,\ntheir worship,--their religion,--have not been moralized; and unless\nwe are willing to make, both in belief and practice, the religious\nbasis of world-organization truly ethical, we will fail as lamentably\nin the future as we have in the past.\n\nFinally, how is such a religious program to be carried forward? The\nanswer is, by systematic religious education. Such an educational\nprocedure involves beginning at the beginning, and that is, with the\nchild. Here, again, we meet with a melancholy failure in the\ndevelopment of a true sense of values. Despite the progress that\nmodern religious educational effort has made, there is still a\nwidespread lack of genuine appreciation of the importance of childhood\nfor moral and religious instruction. The premium is still placed on\nthe adult. We have but to examine the average church program to be\nconvinced of this. In a large number of churches we have three Sunday\nservices--two of which are devoted to adults and one to children. In\nthe average church the week-day services are largely services for\nadults. Our sermons, our hymns, our prayers, many of our week-day\nmeetings cover chiefly the interests of grown-ups: and the lamentable\ncondition of home religious education painfully fails to make up this\ndeficiency in what Dr. Horace Bushnell called Christian nurture.\nIndeed, under a false conception of conversion, and a false\napprehension of the spiritual birthright of children in most\nProtestant quarters, the child, as the late Professor George P. Fisher\nonce remarked to the writer, is regarded as an alien to the\nCommonwealth of Israel. Instead of being born into the church and\ntreated as a member of the household of faith, he must serve his\nprobation as a heathen, and await the dawn of adolescence when he will\nhave developed sufficient maturity of mind to interpret and give\nintellectual assent to a creed. The absurdity and tragedy of it all\nare manifest when we take into consideration the ethical character of\nreligion, and the fact that childhood is preeminently the period for\nestablishing the individual in habits of virtue. There may be some\nexaggeration in Dr. G. Stanley Hall's affirmation, that the moral and\nspiritual destiny of the average person is determined in the first ten\nyears of his life; but, to anyone who has studied the psychology of\nmoral and spiritual development, it is evident that Hall is dealing\nwith far more than a half-truth. The receptivity and plasticity of the\nchild make it possible for those to whom his most vital interests are\ncommitted to really save him or damn him. And, as we establish\nchildren in right thinking and right living, so we establish the\ncommunity, the state, the nation, and ultimately the nations in their\nreciprocal relations. In more ways than one is Wordsworth's statement\ntrue, \"The child is father to the man.\" It is preeminently true in the\nmoral and religious sphere. The Kingdom of God and his righteousness\nwill never make the progress on earth that they should make until the\nscales really fall from our eyes, and we gain a true vision of our\nduty to the child in establishing him in personal and community\nrighteousness, and thus pave the way for the application of the law of\nrighteousness in the state and among the nations of the earth.\n\nIn still another way, to one who is convinced of the supremacy of\nmoral and spiritual worths and of the ethical aim of all true\nreligion, is the lamentable failure to develop a true sense of values\nmanifest. Professor Pratt calls attention in his \"Psychology of\nReligious Belief\" to what he regards to be a fact, that in the average\nAmerican community, \"we find our friends and neighbors, of all degrees\nof education and intellectual ability, almost to a man accepting God\nas one of the best recognized realities of their world and as simply\nnot to be questioned.\"[10] That statement is in the main true. In\nother words, we are a religious people. And yet, notwithstanding this\nfact, so far as thoroughgoing, systematic religious education is\nconcerned, when compared with the time and efforts devoted to\neducation along other lines, and its quality, it suffers painfully. In\nnearly all of the states, five days a week, of at least four or five\nhours each, are given to what we call secular education, as against\none day per week, of one hour each, to religious instruction and\nworship. In secular education we have, on the whole, a trained body of\nteachers. In religious education we are dependent largely on amateurs.\nIn most places religion is not allowed a voice in our schools, so far\nas _systematic_ training is concerned, and in comparatively few\ncommunities has a systematic course of moral training even been\nintroduced. What does all this mean? Does it not mean that we err\ntremendously in our sense of values? If there is any doubt concerning\nthis, reflect for a moment on the possibility of organizing a\ncommunity on a basis of the vices instead of the virtues. Try to found\na community on sensuality, falsehood, dishonesty, injustice, hate and\nmurder, and see how far you will succeed. Society could not exist on\nsuch a basis. Were the German people to put into practice among\nthemselves the vices and crimes they have committed against other\npeoples, their existence as a nation would be exceedingly short-lived.\nThe vices are anti-social in their character. The virtues are social:\nthey make for unity, for organization. And what is true of communities\nis true of states and nations--not only in their internal relations\nbut in their relations to other nations. The virtues make for national\nand international organization. Now, religion deals with these\nsovereign values, and yet, comparatively speaking, we--a religious\npeople--relegate them to the background in our educational schemes. We\nwill never succeed in world-organization until we genuinely appreciate\nthe unifying power of the virtues, the harmonizing and binding force\nof righteousness, and systematically train a generation from childhood\nin a knowledge and an appreciation of their supreme worth, and try to\nmould their wills in conformity to their requirements.\n\nBut, as Herbert Spencer wisely remarks, we have not an ideal\nenvironment in which to work out our ideals. And that is eminently\ntrue in this case; therefore, wisdom dictates that we try to do our\nwork with reference to the conditions of the actual environment in\nwhich we are placed. If, for apparently good reasons, it be not\nexpedient under present conditions to introduce systematic religious\neducation into the public schools, it is possible for us to make\nprovision in some other way for religion to have its rightful place in\nthe general training of our children. This would require a religious\nschool organization, with a curriculum that interprets religion as\nethical in its aim. It would require a scientifically graded moral\nscheme with its corresponding religious sanctions; also the creation\nof a literature to meet these demands. It would require, at least,\nthree sessions a week. It should be separate from the Sunday school,\nwhere, with present conditions, sectarianism still enters into\neducation, and yet it should be supplementary to it. It would call for\na specially trained teaching force; and for skilled professional\nsupervision. All this ought to be done; it can be done; and it must be\ndone. We must do it in the interests of the individual, of the family,\nof the community, of the state, of the nation, and of the brotherhood\nof nations. It is a thoroughly practicable scheme. The literature\nexists already; colleges, schools of religion, and theological\nseminaries can easily become training schools for the preparation of\nreligious teachers. The only difficulty in the way, which is, indeed,\na serious one, but by no means insuperable, is the time-schedule of\nthe children. In my own judgment, if a real effort were made by the\nchurches of any community, a plan could be formulated in relation to\nthe public schools whereby the children would become available for\nsuch religious instruction. If the community is a religious one, it\nhas a right to, and must insist upon, having the children a fair share\nof the time for such purposes. If the moral and spiritual values are\nthe supreme values of society, then it is in the interests of society\nitself that these values should receive proper recognition in formal\neducation for citizenship. The real trouble is, that the churches are\nnot really in earnest concerning this important matter. It has taken\nan awful social cataclysm to make us realize that nations, like\nfamilies and communities, can hang together on no other basis than the\ncardinal virtues, and that something more than a mere formal\nrecognition of these virtues is required for world-organization. Men\nand nations must be disciplined in them, and the way to do this is to\nbegin in childhood. If the schooling of a nation in a gospel of\nnational egoism and hate be largely responsible for the present war,\nwith the brutal indifference of the German people to moral\nconsiderations in provoking it and to humane methods of waging it, why\nis it not possible to school the nations in those things that make for\ngood will and world-organization? To doubt it is to doubt the might of\nright.\n\nIn conclusion, my plea is, that, in our efforts at world\nre-organization, so far as religion is concerned, we adequately reckon\nwith its ethical character. Let us take, first, an ethical view of\nGod--that he is a righteous being, that he deals justly with all men\nand all nations, that he cannot be used by any individual or nation\nfor unrighteous ends, that he is the father of us all, and that he\ncooperates with men in their efforts to bring in the reign of\nrighteousness upon earth. And, secondly, let us take a more ethical\nview of man; recognizing the worth and inalienable rights of\npersonality; that no man may be used merely as a means, but must be\nregarded as an end in himself; and thus, whatever may be the outward\nform of government, it must in essence be democratic, rather than\nautocratic; that the law of interaction among nations must be the same\nas the law among individuals--the law of benevolence or the law of\nlove. Let us develop a true sense of values in religion that will\nplace emphasis on the voluntaristic or ethical element rather than on\neither the intellectual, pietistic and symbolical or aesthetic.\nFinally, let us try to realize this program by thorough, systematic\nreligious education in which we shall emphasize the interests of the\nchild rather than the interests of the adult; by giving an ethical\ninterpretation to the curriculum; by organizing a trained body of\nteachers; and by insisting that a fair amount of the child's time and\neffort shall be devoted to education in the supreme values of society.\nIf we act on this program, if we make this really the religious basis\nof world re-organization, we will make long strides toward the dawn of\na better day, when nations shall seek war no more; and the kingdoms of\nthis world shall become the kingdoms of our righteous God and his\nChrist, whose gospel and life teach the universal fatherhood of God\nand the universal brotherhood of man.\n\n[1] Address delivered at the Fifteenth Annual Meeting of the National\nReligious Education Association, New York, March 5, 1918. Republished\nwith modifications by courtesy of _Religious Education_.\n\n[2] Paulsen, \"A System of Ethics,\" trans., p. 559.\n\n[3] On the servility of German university professors consult David\nJayne Hill, _Harper's Magazine_, July, 1918, pp. 30-33.\n\n[4] _Monist_, XI, p. 571.\n\n[5] See, for example, the views of Pastors W. Lehmann (\"About the\nGerman God\"); H. Francke (\"War Sermons\"); J. Rump (\"War Devotions and\nMemorial Services for the Fallen\"); K. Koenig (\"Six War Sermons\"); also\nTolzien and others in \"Patriotic Evangelical War Lectures.\"\n\n[6] Pt. I, ch. II.\n\n[7] Isaiah 2:10.\n\n[8] Hosea 6:6.\n\n[9] Micah 6:8.\n\n[10] Page 231.\n\n\nTranscriber's Note:\n\nItalics are enclosed in _underscores_. Hyphenated words have been\nstandardized. On page 67, \"stablished\" changed to \"established\"; on\npage 167, \"sancity\" changed to \"sanctity\". Illustration on title page\nis variant of Yale University crest.\n\n\n\n\n\n<pre id=\"pg-footer\">","title":"Religion and the War","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":58580}