104 THE NEW TESTAMENT AND THE CHURCH. to save the world" has been the Christian slogan from the beginning till now. "He gave his life for us." "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." Jesus died for his enemies. To have in us the mind that was his ("Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus") influenced in our doing by the same love that moved him ("By love serve one another") it is to be a Christian, according to my understanding of New Testament teaching our love ending in self-sacrifice and service voluntarily bestowed. And further, regarding service: He took upon him the form of a servant." And to set this idea of service in a very strong light and make it so clear that it cannot be misapprehended, I repeat he "washed his disciples' feet." Did he mean that this should end in ceremonial, as it is in the Greek church? Or did he mean by it real service of "bearing one another's burdens?" How much of formalism was there in the service Jesus or St. Paul gave the world? Christianity stripped bare of ceremonialism and formalism and become a life of service and self-sacrifice in well doing, was that of Jesus and his immediate followers, that ended in the setting up of a social order to which modern Christian socialism bears a greater resemblance than any other Christian order now existent. No one can deny this. How much like the Pentecostal society is the modern church? Very little. This proclamation may well be given the world of human kind, viz: "Know ye, that as the people have emerged from the condition of barbarism, that engulfed them during the dark ages, and have become clothed with knowledge and enlightenment, do they, the more and more, come to appreciate the grandeur of the first church, accepting willingly the offices of service and self-sacrifice required by it for the common good and they devote themselves, body and soul, to its rehabilitation and the making of a world-wide commonwealth." YE 69TH LESSON. The New Testament and the Church. They differ widely in their teachings. Love is the law of the New Testament. Auto da fes, torture and massacre for heresy were, for many centuries, the law of the church, and would be to-day (is so in Russia, and, it is reasonable to think, it would be so everywhere) but for the state. Of all the books ever written that are now extant, the New Testament is best. Of all the institutions ever set up on earth for the good of humanity, the original church, instituted on the day of the Pentecost, is, ideally, best. God grant that it may soon be reestablished in fact and become universal! Who is the heretic? Is it he who will not pronounce the word "Credo," in obedience to ecclesiastical laws formulated in the dark ages? Or is it not, rather, he "that hath the world's good and seeth his brother have need and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him?" If one "love his neighbor as himself" he will refuse to live in a better house than his neighbor; to ride in a better carriage, or sleep on a softer bed; and he will be "eyes to the blind and feet to the lame." Reader, you believe the New Testament to be the word of God. Your saying, "I believe," is that the all of your religion? Or do you obey the word? You say, "Jesus is God." And at the same time, do you forget "If we love one another, God dwelleth in us?" Have we forgotten that "God is love" and "he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in him?" How strange that men lose sight of the teachings and commands of the Master-“do unto others as we would they do unto us," "love one's neighbors as one's self," as was practiced and put into institution-"all things common" and "distribution made to every one according as he had need" by the Pente THE POSITIVE DEMANDS OF THE HOUR. 105 costal disciples-these so plain-while metaphysical dogma-the difference of a letter in the words "homoiousian" and "homoousian”— defining the being of Jesus-his relationship to Him whom he addressed as "Father," doomed thousands to horrible deaths by torture, while the "weightier matters of the law" of Christ were entirely ignored! Who are the truly Christians?-they that cry "Lord, Lord," or they that do the Father's will? The Old Testament, though not emphasizing the altruistic element of human nature, as does the New, but holding fast the law of retaliation neutralized by Jesus, says: "To what purpose are the multitude of your sacrifices? put away the evil of your doings. * * * * learn to do well * Cease to do evil * relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow," etc. (Isaiah I: 11 to 17.) Is not European and American society Pagan? Would it not, if Christian, be modeled more nearly after the pattern of the Pentecostal social order? Now, of so-called Pagan society-Japanese, for instance -is it not more nearly Christian than ours? Men and women are not imprisoned in Japan for being as poor, as were Jesus and the twelve, as here they are imprisoned. Our falsely so-called "Christian society" differs in nothing from the society of Rome, anterior to the Christian era, except that chattel slavery has been, with us, lately abolished. But "wage slavery" occupies its place. Nevertheless, the Christianity of the New Testament has been forging on, like a great packet ship, regardless of adverse winds and waves. In spite of our Pagan society and Paganized church, it has done a great and good work, as Jesus said it would do the "lump of leaven"-the "grain of mustard seed"-the "Kingdom of God" that "cometh not with observation;" for the philosophy permeating the New Testament is the leaven of social progress. What is that superb philosophy? It is love deified. When boiled down and crystallized, that is all that Christianity is love the supreme motive of life of God and man. How wonderful the zeal of St. Paul, moved by this divine motive. The time is near at hand when love (altruism) alone will affect the movements of nations and individual men and women. But no people has ever yet been greatly dominated by it, except spasmodically when calamity opens the doors of Christ's cathedrals and unbars the gates of his kingdom. That great motive is today affecting individual minds as never before. Roosevelt is moved by it-Lincoln was controlled by it, and so was Washington in their public acts. It is the only God-like motive-for "God is love." It was unknown to Alexander the Great-unknown to Caesar, Pompey and Crassus-unknown to Napoleon-but Jesus knew no other motive of action and the Christian knows no other. YE 70TH LESSON. The Positive Demands of the Hour. A cruel slavery is the wage system of industry backed up by courts and bayonets, president of the nation and governors of states, sheriffs and two hundred and fifty thousand national guards, the regular army and United States marshals, deputy marshals by the millions, and deputy constables innumerable, all at the disposal of the slave drivers to hunt the workers down. That is the condition that environs the industrious wage-workers. It cannot and will not be a great while longer borne. True statesmanship demands a reconstruction of our social and industrial systems. The toilers cannot be worked longer as slaves. They are too intelligent for that. The old order of slave labor has 106 THE POSITIVE DEMANDS OF THE HOUR. passed. What is demanded? Courts of arbitration to determine the rights of employers and employed and to see that the strong do not oppress the weak. Surely this is only a proper demand. But the lawmaking power of nation and states is under the control of the plutocrats. Congress and the state legislatures are made up of lawyers held in pay of corporations. Three factors must be considered in discussing the economic questions of today. First, land; second, machinery, and, third, money. The disciples of Henry George emphasize the land question; the socialists have most to say of co-operation, which refers more particularly to the control of the tools of production, that is to say, machinery. But the disciples of Peter Cooper talk almost exclusively of finance. They think that plenty of money is the chief factor of good times. It dawns on my mind that there is no absolute unit of prosperity suited to all stages of civilization and to all times. What was suited to Sparta was not suited to Carthage. What is fitted to a condition of slavery for the toilers is not fitted to a condition of freedom and equality. If the purpose of social organization is to establish class-rich and poor-then society must be organized precisely as ours is organized. It was the purpose of the framers of our federal constitution to inaugurate a state of society precisely as ours has become -millionaires and tramps; masters and slaves-and it was intended that the rich should rule. And they do rule. That, however, was not the purpose of Thomas Jefferson when he framed the Declaration of America Independence; but it was the purpose of Alexander Hamilton when the federal government was set up. The struggle has gone forward ever since between the followers of Jefferson and those of Hamilton. While the followers of Jefferson have ruled equality of all free men (non-chattels) was in some degree kept up. But while the followers of Hamilton have ruled the wealth of the nation has been rapidly centralized in the hands of the few. The few have become very rich and the many very poor, but not before the year 1873 were tramps ever seen in the United States, and not till after the close of the civil war did millionaires abound. Invention has been a great factor of progress. It has increased production within the memory of living men more than a hundred fold; but that increase has been placed to the credit of capital; so that now the industrial condition of the world is one of dissatisfaction and unrest. It is a smoking volcano. Already it sends up red hot stones and lava; explosions are heard a great way off and the ground under our feet begins to tremble. Beware! Between the employers and the employed the world over a chronic condition of war exists, and especially is it so today in the United States. "Chattel slavery has been abolished, but the rights and relations of labor stand just where they did before the emancipation in respect to the divisions of its products. The difference lies only in the methods of abstracting the results and concentrating them in the hands of a few capitalists. Capital is now the master and dictates the terms, and thus all laborers are practically placed in the same condition as was the slave before the emancipation. In thus placing them the interests of all laborers become common and they must fight the battle in unity if they would succeed." The words above quoted are copied from the platform of principles of the Independent Party of Labor adopted June 10, 1874, at Indianapolis, Indiana. The years since intervening have made more emphatic the truth then uttered. Radical reformation is demanded today: (1) The wage system of industry must give place to co-operative production. (2) Land monopoly must be broken up. (3) Our monetary system must not represent gold alone; but all wealth. THE PROGRESS OF IDEAS. 107 To this purpose the tools of production and of distribution must belong to the commonwealth. The ownership of the soil must be limited to a small homestead for each adult person, the head of a family. Depots of exchange of labor products must be set up by the state in every neighborhood and all products of labor be received on deposit at an appraised valuation and certificates of deposit receivable for all articles held for exchange and for debts and taxes be given out for them, thus creating a "medium of exchange" based on all products instead of on gold alone, or on both gold and silver. In short, we must do for the common good what common sense dictates. YE 71ST LESSON. The Progress of Ideas. No doubt, when the cave-man discovered how to crack nuts with a stone and to throw it and bring down game or kill his enemy, he thought he was ready to "stand pat"-thought that he had reached the limit of discovery and invention; and when he had learned to use fire he was at the top and would be content forever to maintain "statu quo." His children increasing in number, he, from necessity, built an artificial shelter of brush and bark. Then all was complete. Surely man had reached the zenith of grandeur! Later he found out to make a bed of dry leaves (learned from the squirrels and wild pigs), utilized the sharp edges of mussel shells to skin and carve his meat, and he made the grand gastronomic discovery that to broil it improved its taste. He then "stood pat" for a thousand years or more, no doubt, before any other new idea took possession of his mind or any farther progress was made by him along the line of invention and discovery. Have we reached today the ultima thule of perfection? Are we ready to "stand pat?" It looks so in regard to machinery of production at least-water, air, steam and electricity harnessed for the service of man. But man is yet in the beginning of his great possibilities. He is a savage still. See him maiming and killing his fellowmen by wholesale to satisfy his robber greed, or to prevent his being enslaved by banditti. See him trampling on the rights of other men because, forsooth, they happen to cast a different reflection than his, of the sunlight, from the epidermis of their bodies! We are surely as yet far from perfection. The coming New Jerusalem, the Kingdom of God, when "He shall dwell with men," has been long on the way-an old-time dream of a better day for humanity. That dream will come true. How soon? Not while we still hold on to stone implements and crucify those who present us steel axes; not as long as we regard the past as a "golden age" and the teachers of the age of stone and savagery superior to those of modern days. The old-time implements are fit only for the show-cases of museums and, too, the old-time fetiches and "theologies" are fit only to become "machinery" of poetry as they are of Dante's and Milton's immortal epics. He that believes in "standing pat" belongs to the dead past. He is a stagnant pool covered with green scum. What do we see approaching? Not just evolution, but revolution--the overturning of our present order-its complete abrogation and the setting up of a better in its place. And what will be the purpose of the change the end to be accomplished? Homes! All productive labor and manipulation of machinery will be done by adult men. The minimum wage of each man will not be below the maximum of support for the largest family. Not any but married men or those who have families to support will be wage earners. All the unmarried will be engaged in preparation for the married state the males in school or learning trades; the females in securing the education that will fit them to be wives and mothers. No woman, young or old, will work to earn wages. Her duties will be domestic. Nor will any unmarried man work for wages. All men and all women, as in ancient Peru and in Mohammedan lands today, will marry when they have come of age. As now we have compulsory education, we shall then have compulsory marriage. There will then be an equitable distribution of the surplus products produced by machinery, and no exportation permitted of the products of our factories or our farms to foreign markets to the extent of denuding our own country of the essentials of life and leaving our own people destitute and starving, as is done by the British in India and so starving to death millions of the natives. Nearly every acre in America will support a human being. Let our country become a garden of beauty and fertility, supporting a population of a billion or more of happy souls. This is the new order briefly outlined which is sure to come (or something better). We will have the best-and not far different will it be from the high standard of ancient Athens in the age of Pericles, slavery left out, when the city of Minerva produced the greatest men that have lived in any age. If woman have no gainful work to do, and only the bringing up of children to give attention to, as in old Athens, she will have leisure (now the distaff laid aside) to build up her mind, educate her daughters and sons, indoctrinating them with high ideals and love of righteousness common to her sex-and, too, she will produce wonderful works of art and of genius and do benevolent deeds of love, as is her nature. YE 72D LESSON. The Good and the Beautiful. "The good and the beauHence the grandeur of All men admit that God I worship the good. The good is God. tiful are one," the sages of Hellas taught. the supreme ideal of the age of the great. is supremely good-"The Good;" but many say that "goodness is an attribute," that God has other attributes: love, truth, etc. They worship the "Infinite," they say. Indeed, they do so make of God a frigidity, an abstraction, a nonentity. Hence their religion is, like their God, a nonentity; an abstraction-not any practical well doing; but long prayers and ceremonials-walls of division between sects and neither good nor beautiful. The God we ought to worship and the Christ we ought, as Christian men, to serve (it seems to me) are the God and the Christ of the New Testament-the God "not far from any one of us" and "in whom we live and move and have our being" and the Christ incarnate in humanity. "As ye have done it unto the least of these my brethren ye have done it unto me." But, I hear one say, "My brethren means his disciples only." When the woman came behind Jesus and touched the hem of his garment and who for twelve years had been suffering from an infirmity, did Jesus say, "Inquire if she be indeed one of my disciples that, if she be, I may heal her?" No, he healed her and she, then, of course, became one of his disciples. So with the blind man and with all others that he cured. He drove the devils into the swine, cleansed the lepers, raised the dead, went about doing good, feeding, at one time, five thousand who had come to hear him preach, and he not inquiring whether they were his disciples or not, as the modern bigot would nave it that we ought to do before feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, etc. No; Jesus was not guilty of narrowness. He taught us to say, |