Lib. Lights and Shadows of American Life Lights and Shadows of American Life BY THE Rev. a. C. DIXON, D.D. Author of " Heaven on Earth," etc. New York Chicago Toronto Fleming H. 'Revell Company Publishers of»Evangelical Literature N^f-Tb, Copyright, 1898 by Fleming H. Rkvell Company TWOCPPIFR RFnFIVFn- CONTENTS PAGE I. Our Homes ii II. Our Bread Winners 25 III. Our Money Makers 41 IV. Our Boys and Girls 55 V. Our Amusements ..... 69 VI. Our Sabbath 85 VII. Our Politics loi VIII. Our Cities 117 IX. Our Bible 131 X. Our Churches 145 XI. Our Dangers 157 XII. Our Women i6g XIII. Our Destiny 185 7 I OUR HOMES " Domestic happiness / thou only bliss Of Paradise that has survived the fall.'''' Cowper. " Ho7ne is the resort^ Of love, of Joy, of peace and plenty, where, Supporting and supported, polished friends A?id dear relations mingle into bliss ^ Thomson. OUR HOMES " Unto the upright there ariseth light in the darkness.^'' Psalm 112 : 4. The world owes to Christianity all that is meant by motherhood, fatherhood, brother- hood, sisterhood, and wifehood. Canon Far- rar says that in all the ancient classics there is no reference to the joys of childhood, and for the very good reason that the childhood of the ancients had little joy in it. The Roman's child was counted among his household goods. In Sparta the child was the property of the state rather than of the parents, and a father had as much right to correct the children of his neighbor as his own. Home life was noth- ing, and to-day in some languages there is little difference between the meaning of home and house. Wherever the Bible is honored, as in England, the real home exists, but where the Bible is not read, even in so-called Christian countries, as in France, there is little of home life. When, therefore, you hear an infidel speaking in praise of home and magnifying its II 12 Lights and Shadows of American Life sweetness and joy, while he rejects the Bible, and refuses to honor Christ, write after his name in great black letters, the word IN- GRATE. In America, where there is such a mixture of all nationalities, we need not be surprised to find that the home life is esteemed by some, while it is held in contempt by others. The Englishman carries in his heart wherever he goes the sacredness of his home, while the Frenchman is apt to take with him nothing more sacred than a house. In our American life, however, the home is the foundation of the church and the state. As the homes are pure, the churches will be prosperous, and the state permanent. The fourth verse of the ii2th Psalm gives us the foundation principle of home happiness. " Unto the upright there ariseth light in the darkness." Everything depends upon upright- ness of purpose, thought, character, and that implies right relation between husband and wife, parent and child, brother and sister, master and servant. In proportion as this right relation exists, the home is full of light ; when wrong relation exists, it is certain to be full of darkness. A dark shadow in many American homes is the disobedience of children to parents. Some parents are bringing up their children in the Our Homes 13 way they should not go. God commended Abraham because he taught his children obedi- ence, and if obedience is not taught in your home, you are training future anarchists and criminals. If the child does not obey the par- ent, he is not apt to obey God or the state. It is the duty of every parent to teach his children the relation between obedience and reward, disobedience and punishment. There is a sickly sentimentalism prevalent in some quarters which says that a child should never be punished. Paul asks the question, " What son is he whom the father chasteneth not ? " and he declares that such chastisement is the proof of true sonship, for " if ye be without chastisement, then are ye bastards and not sons." " Whom the Lord loveth he chas- teneth," and the father that does not lovingly chasten a child for disobedience is not a true father. Solomon spake truly when he said " he that spareth his rod hateth his son, but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes." I know that Solomon's advice is considered by some as out of date, old fogyish, but I am simple enough to believe that when he wrote those words he was inspired of God, and he spoke a principle that applies to all ages of the world. Someone asked a mother if she believed in the laying on of hands for the cure of diseases. 14 Lights and Shadows of American Life She said she did, for she had effectually cured her boy of smoking cigarettes in that way. Whatever you may think of the laying on of hands as a religious ceremony, if you love your child you must not withhold the proper punishment for disobedience. Let it never be done in anger. If you are mad, cool off, take a shower-bath, sit down and think, wait till to-morrow, do anything rather than pro- voke a child to wrath by your own hot temper. Another shadow is discord between hus- band and wife. I have just noticed in the newspapers that a young man failed to appear when the hour of his marriage came, because his bride objected to his wearing russet shoes and a black tie. It was not said which one prevailed, though there were mutual explana- tions, and the marriage took place. I fear that the home will be full of shadows. Where tastes are different and each one asserts and magnifies the difference, there can be no har- mony, and where there is no harmony there is no happiness. That there may be harmony. Christian marriages should be in the Lord. " Be not unequally yoked together with unbelievers." A Christian should not marry an atheist or an infidel. This does not apply to non-church members, for there are many such in sympathy Our Homes 15 with Christianity, and would like to be Chris- tians. But it does apply with tremendous em- phasis to those who are open opponents of Christianity like those around the church to which Paul was writing. At your peril marry one who does not hesitate to express his oppo- sition to the Christ you love. All honor to the Baltimore girl who, a few years ago, re- turned the engagement ring to her affianced as soon as she learned that he belonged to an in- fidel club. It brought him to his senses and led him to think seriously of a subject which he had flippantly despised, and the result was his conversion. It goes without saying that drink is the shadow in many a home, and it is a sad fact that social drinking customs are on the increase. We have spent so much time discussing the political phase of the drink traffic, and advocat- ing prohibition, that we have neglected, I fear, to train the young in the principles of total abstinence. The decanter and the demijohn are going again into the homes of not a few Christian people. I plead with you by the agonies of a drunkard's wife, and the disgrace of a drunkard's child, and the terrors of a drunkard's hell, to keep the accursed stufT out of your homes. Another shadow in some American homes is extravagance, living beyond one's income. i6 Lights and Shadows of American Life Receiving $5 a week and spending $6 means misery sooner or later. It means inability to pay debts, and the loss of manliness that follows. Receiving an income of five thou- sand dollars and spending five thousand and fifty will bring a shadow. Better a humble home in a cottage, or a garret, with bread and water paid for, than a palace splendidly fur- nished and supported by an outlay that fills your life with perplexity and burden. And that brings me to say that one of the common home shadows is everlasting worry. Stanley tells us that few of his men were killed by elephants and tigers. They suffered most from the " jiggers," little insects that it takes a microscope to sec. They get under the nails and the skin, producing irritation that fre- quently causes death. The " jiggers " of life worry many people into their graves. I read some time ago the experience of a hunter who shot a tiger, and thought he had killed him, but, on his approaching, the tiger sprang up and seizing the hunter by the knee, crushed the bone, and then fell back dead. The hunter found himself unable to walk, and his cries were not heard. After a few hours, how- ever, he forgot the tiger and even the broken bones in his terrific struggle with thousands of little ants. They covered him, and every nerve seemed to be bored with a hot awl. But Our Homes 17 for timely rescue he had soon been killed by the ants. So it is in many human experiences. It is not the great tiger of calamity and grief that Idlls us, but the little ant worries of everj-day life. Let us now turn from the shadows to the light which, sooner or later, will make all shadows flee away. We might express almost everj-thing under this head in one word : "love." *' Husbands, love your wives even as Christ also loved the church and gave himself for it." ]\Iu5t I love my wife well enough to sacrifice myself for her as Christ sacrificed him- self on Calvary? That is it exactly. Listen again, " So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies." " He that loveth his wife loveth himself." We husbands are rather fond of ourselves. We are certain not to hurt ourselves, if we can help it. Not for the world would we neglect our own interest and pleasure. Let us be as careful for our wives, if, as hus- bands, we would be in the line of Apostolic succession. Not simply furnishing a home and supplying the table, but with continual thought and tenderness seeking the wife's highest good and greatest joy. Sir Walter Scott began his married life in a very humble cottage. With his own hands he made the dining-room table. Over the gate 1 8 Lights and Shadows of American Life in front of the house he twisted the boughs of two willow trees; his wife and he came out in the moonlight and walked backward toward the house to observe the magnificence of their arched gateway. The splendor of Abbotsford did not attract him more than the sweet sim- plicity of this cottage in which love contrived and strove for mutual enjoyment. It is a love married to sympathy. We are told in an ancient legend that when Theseus was about to enter the labyrinth with drawn sword in hand to destroy the monster, his sister Ariadne tied around his ankle a silken thread, and told him that when he felt the gentle pulling of this thread he might know that she was thinking of him. In the struggle with the monster the gentle tug of the silken thread strengthened the hero's arm and helped to make him victorious. How beautifully this illustrates the sympathy between husband and wife. He goes out to struggle with the mon- sters of perplexity, it may be of misfortune. If he can feel the gentle pulling of the silken thread of sympathy at home it makes him brave and patient. And so the sympathy of the husband with the wife helps her to bear the burdens of the home. When Abraham Lincoln received the telegram announcing his nomination for the Presidency of the United States, he rose, put Our Homes 19 on his hat and coat, and said to the friends, "There is a little woman at home who would like to hear this." And he went off to spend the evening with her. Dark days when death had entered their home came in after years, and it was this silken thread of sympathy be- tween them that helped them to bear what God's Providence had sent. Every man's life is more or less a projection of the home of his childhood into the future. What he was made at home he is apt to be ever afterward. If he was taught to steal and lie there, he will be a thief and a liar in life. If he was taught to be true and gentle and pure in the home, truth and gentleness and purity will follow him all his days. The Prin- cess of Wales, you know, is a native of Den- mark. She speaks several languages fluently, but she said to a friend, " I always think in Danish." The language of the home filled her thoughts and was a part of her mental structure. The home influence never utterly forsakes us, and many times moves us to noble en- deavor. A French soldier boy lay sick in the hospital at Geneva. The physician telegraphed to his father that he must hurry, if he would see his son alive. The old man came and found the boy very weak. " I have no ap- petite, father," he said, "what I eat I must force, and unless there is a change I cannot 20 Lights and Shadows of American Life live long." The father took from his vah'se a bundle of brown bread which had been cooked by the boy's mother at home. The moment he saw it he said, " I think I could eat that." It was the thought of home that gave him appetite and brought him renewed vigor. As the bread made at home strengthened his body so the instruction and influence and prayers of a godly mother or father will strengthen the soul of the child in future years. He will love religion because it was honored at home. He will love purity because his mother was pure. He will love gentleness and harmony because they Avere together in the home of his child- hood. One word more. Homes on earth are easily broken up. Death enters and the home is sold, the family is scattered, misfortune passes it on to the hands of another. But there is a home before which the hearse never stops, and on the door of which the crape is never tied. Jesus calls it " Father's house." Some of our dear ones are there to-day, and their presence beckons us onward. As the Tyrolese fisher- men return from their day's work through the fog, their wives and daughters stand on the shore and sing their native songs. The husband or brother catches the strains of the music, and joining in it directs the prow of his little vessel toward home. Can we not hear through the Our Homes 21 fog of time the music that floats to us through the open door of our Father's house in heaven ? It is the music of love and peace and joy. Shall we not join in it while we direct our course to- ward the eternal home. ? II OUR BREAD-WINNERS " Honest labor bears a lovely face?'* Dekker, " By the work one knows the workman V Fontaine. II OUR BREAD-WINNERS " The Lord hath called by name Bezaleel the son of Uri, the son of Hiir, of the tribe of fudah ; and he hath filled him with the spirit of God, in wisdom, in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of luork- manshipy Exodus jj" :jo, jr. There is a distinction, all too definite, be- tween manual workers and brain workers. The hand cannot do without the brain, nor the brain without the hand. The man who wins his bread by writing may work harder than the man who wins his bread by digging. The brain worker is apt to wear out his nerves, while the brawn worker will build up his muscles. Whether by hand or brain, or both, we should all be working people. " Six days shalt thou labor " is as binding as the command to rest on the Sabbath. The man who idles away the six days as really breaks the law as the man who works in his shop on the Sabbath. And all honest workers have their lights and 25 26 Lights and Shadows of American Life shadows. The first ray of light is the fact that work is a blessing. Even in a sinless Eden man was required to labor, and now that sin has entered with its train of sorrows, labor is all the more a necessity. The ground was cursed for man's sake. It is for his good that he must fight the battle against weeds and thorns. To be doomed to perpetual idleness would be a dire misfortune. In heaven they serve. In hell, so far as we know, there is no employment. The weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth mentioned in the Bible may be the result of the fact that they have time simply to think upon the mistakes and sins of the past. Cer- tain it is that honest labor does much toward turning earth into heaven. Pity the poor prisoners in the jail or the penitentiary who have not the blessing of work. Count Caylus, a noted French antiquary, though very wealthy, continued to labor industriously. When asked the reason, he replied : " I work, lest I may hang myself." An eminent preacher was told by his physi- cian that he must quit work if he would live. "How long can I live without work?" he asked. " Six or seven years, doubtless," was the reply. " How long can I live with work ? " he continued. " Not more than two or three years." "Well, then give me three years of work instead of six years of idleness." And Our Bread-Winners 27 he was right. It is better to labor even one year than to spend a lifetime in doing nothing. If a man really delights in his employment daily toil carries with it its own reward. There is more in it than the money you make. Mr. Benjamin says, that while he was minister at Paris, he employed a frescoer to do some work in his home, and noticed that the man had really done much more than the contract called for. Mr. Benjamin expressed some surprise that he should work without pay. The reply of the frescoer ought to be written in gold, and hung up in the shop of every mechanic and artist. " I work not for money only," he said, "but because I love my vocation." It is said of Alexander the Great that when his army was on the march, he came upon a porter burdened with a pack of gold which he had taken from the back of a poor donkey that had sunk under its load. " Cheer up," said the General, " and walk faster, for when you reach the tent, the gold you carry shall be yours." So the burden of work which we do because we love it, and because we love others for whom we toil, becomes an enrichment which the idler never receives. And yet, if this be true, how can we explain the fact that some people have such a repug- nance to work. An old professor in college defined man as "an animal lazy as circum- 28 Lights and Shadows of American Life stances will permit," and it must be confessed that in many cases the definition is true. Lazi- ness is composed of gravitation and inertia, the gravitation of sloth that pulls a man down, and the inertia of the love of ease which holds him. Call it play or amusement and he can exert himself to the utmost. Some of you young men who would think it a hardship to rise early in the morning, and make a fire for your mother, can ride fifty miles on a bicycle without feeling any evil effect, and some young women who think that their health would be ruined by pedaling a sewing machine, can turn the cranks of the bicycle half a day at a time and feel refreshed. I heard of a farmer who wished some stones moved from one place to another, and he offered a prize to the boy who would throw the most stones within a certain space. The boys enjoyed it until it was suggested that it was really not play, but work, and then they left in disgust. The thought that we are doing something useful ought to exhilarate us, and inspire us more than the consciousness that we are simply killing time. All time-killers ought to be arrested for murder. A change of work to the man who loves it is as refreshing as the change from work to play. And we need not be too careful to draw nice distinctions between the kinds of work which people do. If it be Our Bread-Winners 29 honest and useful, it carries its own badge of honor. When the delegates from the Pope brought to Bonaventura, the general of the Franciscan order, his cardinal's hat they found him in the kitchen washing dishes. He came to the door and asked them to hang the hat on a bush until he got through with his dishes. He taught them that a man should have as much delight in humble work when in the line of duty as in wearing a Cardinal's hat. An Englishman asked President Lincoln what was his coat of arms. He replied, " A pair of shirt-sleeves." He was not ashamed of the fact that he had split rails for his bread, and with coat off had assisted father and mother in erecting their humble cottage in the forest. A pair of shirt sleeves worn by a work- ing man is a better coat of arms than a gold- headed cane, high collar and dainty cravat worn by that ambling thing called a dude, which it is difificult to distinguish from the missing link. A second ray of light in every working man's life is the fact that mechanical skill is honored of God. Bezaleel was called of Jehovah to his work in gold, and silver, and brass, cutting of stones, and carving of wood, just as much as Moses was called to the leadership of Israel, or Aaron to the priesthood. Great inventors are the prophets of nature. 30 Lights and S"haJov£ of American Life They revesl to us the message of God as it is concealed in natnral la^vr. Their mechanical ' ■ '- wt call machines, are £_ " • _ -• -angement of tie ^trvLr.ts of God for the doing of certain -vrori: The Bible piits special : '; ' - The only person in all hif.: : - - 1 power to choose his own parentage selected the vife of a carpenter for his mother, and put himself in an humble social sphere, as the ■world calls it, that he might thus be brought into intimate relation with the largest nur::ber of those whom he came to sai'e. He "vras hina- self a carpenter and doubtless worked to help support the large family of his struggling pa- rents. He called into his apost!'^- ' ■- "v.mble fishermen, and the most gifted : . ^wers was a maker of tent doth. Jesus brought a ^- - ' -•---'-- working man's life by . -.al. ** What shall it profit a man./ He asked, ** if he gain the whole " - - - -. . jio^iv" Organization - - --.. whether of the state, society or church, may fall to pieces and be ' ■ T- . . , _ . ' . _ -.j^ infinite ■ . . . - -tal. The Roman Government went out of existence, but ei'eni' Roman lives to-day. When Jesus spoke for the worth of man, the state was everything, the individual nothing. And just Onr Bread- Winners 31 here vre need to-day to hang out the red flag of danger. Tlie trend of the times is toward great organizations, and they may be a bless- ing to the working man or a curse. A blessing if they recognize the rights of the individual while they plead forthe good of the community ; a curse, if they !o5e sight of individual rights in tht '^"tr:-' : '. ..'.ake a great social machine. Lab;: : - existed in the time of Chr*5t. T._ ..^-..^miths had a separate r.r. ii"' :' - : ia Jerasalem. In the great s>'na- 1- :• ; : . . .5 crafts had as- : - - - ' ' ^'-.t build- --. seated ted by his 1 ;.:.:: ' — loy- ::.zr.-.. ... , en- joyed the ; of organization, they did not enjoy ; ' " " jiom. We hail with ^Tst:": f political econ- cr:; - - : . y;! den indeed, 1 - '. r.a.: they should 1: , :. V ,-.':.. God -ordained as it isy has r ; .'.■': ". '. :'..'.".:. s. rr.an to j it of 32 Lights and Shadows of American Life capitah'st or laboring man, when it tries by threatened starvation to compel men to adopt its views and plans. We believe in organizations that are loyal to this government. A set of vipers among us, who have been warmed into life by our institutions, are trying to put their poisonous fangs into the vitals of their benefactor. The Apostle Peter gives us their portrait: "they walk after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise government." A good description of the anarchist. Peter tells us how they ought to be treated. " These, as natural brute beasts made to be taken and destroyed, . . . shall utterly perish in their own corruption." Not many of them are working people. Their ambition is to get rich through some revolu- tion without work. The laboring man, if he would fill his home with light, had better support the organi- zations which regard whisky and the liquor traffic as his worst enemy. We are not among those who think there is more liquor drunk by the laboring people than by the so- called higher classes. But it is evident that the grog shop is a greater enemy to the man of small means than it is to the man who is able to buy his liquid fire by the barrel and keep it in his home. In a recent investigation it was found that 42 per cent, of a certain number of Our Bread-Winners 33 men out of work lost their jobs through drink, and every one of them represented a darkened home. A third ray of light in a working man's life is the fact that capital is always the friend of labor. Capitalists are not always the friends of laborers, any more than laborers are always the friends of capitalists. But though the capitalist may hate the laborer, his capital is, in spite of himself, more or less the laboring man's friend. A capitalist invests $100,000 in erecting a building from which he hopes to re- ceive 6 or 8 per cent, on his money, ninety per cent, goes directly into the pockets of working men who mold the brick, carve the stones, saw the wood, dig the foundation, paint and fresco. This capitalist may hate working people, but his capital is all the same their friend. Great railroad corporations are looked upon by some as the enemies of the working people, and yet wherever a railroad has gone through the country it has scattered money, and the work- ing man is benefited. The owners of the rail- road may hate him, but they cannot use their capital without employing him in some way. The loud-mouthed demagogues who are assert- ing that capital is the enemy of labor, and labor the enemy of capital, are the enemies of both labor and capital. Some men grow rich by rascality, and ought to be in the penitentiary, 3 54 Lights and Shadov^ of American Life while others grov- poor b}' rascality- and deserve the same fate. Though capitalists may op- press laborers, a.nd laborers may treat capital- ists unjustly, the proposition, I believe, remains uni\'ersalh- true that capital is the friend of labor and labor is the friend of capital. If this were understood, man^^ a shadow of mis- understanding would flee away. A fourth ray of light is the fact that the condition of the laboring man has greatly im- proved during the past centuries. In the time of Charles 11. the laborer received 12 cents a day for 14 hours" work. In the year 1349 under Edward 111. working men were impressed into - 'cd no pay. In : V - a - was erected fror. .0 Land's End. and the laborers were required to own tools, without a ,-.f ■). Some of them liters - cd to death. Such a thing to-day would bring "on. In the Mag-na Charta i- '^rons by King John, there was good prox-ision made for the clerg>% the land- but in Tjirler's His- - . ;^e part of the people who tilled the ground, who constituted in all of the nation, seemed •■ ..,....- --...v vonsidered in this great charter of freedom. They had but one single clause in their favor which stipulated that no Our l'.fnii(i-'//iafv^,r'i y-, villain or ruftf-ir. ikxr^XA by any [trrtf/-.^^ y,^. 4/t- ^tfivf-A of hU chftii, hh {Ar,'*/-^ Mvd i (il hut:h»andry. In of.h^r i'<^!:p/:/'.^i considferfed as a part of thtiqlt\^ to an estate, and w/er<^ f:r;! . t with ttue horsfts, cow/s, and oth^r m/. ; :.-... at th^ wiiV rA the ovvnurf. Even as Late a« the (/th rjtxi^ tury, Samuel Johnson l that " r^Uinq the wages of day labor-:. . . -. .ng, for it rir^es not make them live better, but only makf:^. them idler, and idleness i« a very ba/^i thini^ lor human nature." In the i/ith century fif- teen pounds ('l|75j a yrrar were the varze't of rt man with a family. The United Stat- : . working man. Wh<:n I that I could purchaiie three suit's of clnthf:^ lor little more than one «uit in this country, I yi':lded to the t . .at when I found that tailors who made my -suits were paid some of n" . yi cents a day, I felt at-..; . ...... ..... _-in. The sweat shops with their abominations remin/1 you at least of the wages of regiilar workmen in the old country. More than half of the millions in savings banks in the United Staters has been deposited by the working people ; not a few of them have the luxury of organ.'j and pianos, dress their children as they send them to school in a style that doe.s not mark 36 Lights and Shadows of American Life them as inferior to the children of the capitalist. Plenty to eat, plenty to wear, with civil and re- ligious liberty in which to enjoy it all. To be sure, the shadows have lifted from the lives of the laboring people in America. But there are shadows which come into the home of the working man which the blessing of work and the fact that his skill is the gift of God, that capital is the friend of labor, that his condition has greatly improved, does not ban- ish. His health fails, he loses employment, he works in search of work, and now he stands by the cot of a dying child or wife. He needs the sympathy of the Man of Sorrows, the touch of the Carpenter's hand, the voice that says " Come unto me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest." No music of organ can charm away his grief. No thought of his bettered condition can sweeten his sorrow ; only Jesus Christ with his tender sympathy can be of real help to a man in con- ditions like these. When in Baltimore I was invited to call at the home of a working man whose phy- sician had given him up to die. As I en- tered the door, the expression of his counte- nance with its smile of peace was a glad wel- come. The busy wife, though subdued by grief, was restful in heart. There was an air of cleanliness and joy about the room which I Our Bread-Winners 37 shall never forget. Reaching out his horny- hand and pressing mine he said : " The doctor told me the other day that there was no hope, but I said to him, Your no hope is the brightest hope you can bring me. I am going to be with Christ. I commit my family into the hands of a loving God, My little life insur- ance will help wife, and she will be able to take care of the children. To depart and be with Christ is far better than to stay here and suf- fer." I felt as I stood by the bedside of this son of toil, that I would rather have his hope, with all his struggles, than the millions of the Rothschilds with only this world as my por- tion. Ill OUR MONEY-xWAKERS " Thus, when ihe villain crams his chest, Gold is the canker of the breast ; ^Tis avarice^ insolence, and pride, And every shocking vice beside ; — But, when to virtuous hands Uis given, It blesses like the dews of heaven ; Like heaven, it hears the orphans'' cries And wipes the tears from widows'* eyes^ Gay. " Abundance is a blessing to the wise, The use of riches in discretion lies ; Learn this, ye men of wealth, a heavy purse In a foors pocket is a heavy curse. ^^ Cu7nberland 's Menander. Ill OUR MONEY-MAKERS " Thou shalt remember the Lord thy God, for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth J'' Deuteronomy 8:i8. Wealth is a comparative term, A man worth ten thousand dollars, living in a humble village among poor people, may be considered im- mensely wealthy ; while a man living in New York must own a million or more to be labeled as wealthy by his neighbors. But wealth in a general way means money, or what may be turned into money, whether it be much or little. The makers of wealth may, therefore, be placed in two classes — capitalists and labor- ers. The laborer works directly for money, the capitalist makes money work for him. In some parts of Africa a man's wealth is estimated by the number of wives he owns, because the wife and the slave work for him, and increase his income. When he gets a little surplus, he simply buys another wife or slave. In America, instead of buying wives and slaves, 41 42 Lights and Shadows of American Life the capitalist buys a bond or a piece of prop- erty. The motive is the same. He wants that bond or piece of property to work for him by bringing in interest, while he is engaged about something else. The capitalist is a laborer, for it takes work to look after money as well as to make it, and the laborer is a capitalist to the extent of his savings. His mind, muscle, and nerve are also capital. Labor is capital and makes capital, while capital demands labor. Into the lives of all money-makers, whether they be rich or poor, there come lights and shadows. Let us look first at the lights. One of the brightest is the fact that the power to make money is the gift of God. '* It is he that giveth thee power to get wealth." There are men, like Agassiz, who have not time to make money, because their lives are taken up with other things. There are callings, like the ministry, in which it is not expected that money-making shall be the principal object, and when money making does become the ob- ject, the calling is debased. And yet the ability to make money is as sacred a gift as the ability to preach. If you have the money-making faculty, thank God for it, and lay it upon his altar. Stand erect among men devoted to a noble calling. Pity it is that men should ever regard their power to make money as peculiarly Our Money-Makers 43 their own, and never think to thank God for it. It sometimes leads them to declare independ- ence of the Lord. They make money their god, while their souls become as yellow and hard as the gold they worship. Another ray of light is the comforts that money brings. It pays the rent, supplies the table, clothes the body, and educates the mind. But let it be remembered that the opportu- nity for self-denial may be a ray of light in the life of every money-maker. If we have not money, we must deny ourselves. There is little merit in that ; but, if we have money and choose to deny ourselves, in order that we may help others, there comes to us a joy inexpressible. Chaplain McCabe tells of a little church in a small village that was encumbered by debt. The membership was poor, but they determined, after much prayer, to make an effort to pay off the mortgage. James Gould rose in the meet- ing, and said that he and his wife had talked over the matter, and they had decided that the house of God must be free of debt, even if their own home had to be mortgaged. They had, therefore, raised a sum of money, which they wished to give to the church, by placing a mort- gage upon their home. The tears that Gould and his wife shed were not tears of regret. The light of joy sparkled through them. There was a strange thrill about their hearts. 44 Lights and Shadows of American Life It was the joy of the Lord who sacrificed him- self for us. Other members of the church caught the spirit, and more than the amount needed was soon raised. Still another ray of light is the influence which the ability to make money always gives. Philip of Macedon said: "We seek empire by money, and not money by empire." He knew that money was power, and the ability to make money carries with it influence. It implies in- dustry, economy, patience, perseverance, and many sturdy qualities that make true man- hood. The possession of money is not proof that a man is good or great. It may be an index to his rascality. Neither is the possession of poverty proof that a man is good or great. It may be the index to his laziness or dishon- esty, by which he has lost reputation and credit. But the ability to make money honestly gives one a standing which he may use for the glory of God. The brightest ray of light is the pleasure of doing good. Paul wrote to Timothy : " Charge them that are rich in this world that they be not highminded, nor trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy; that they do good, that they be rich in good works." The rich man is here permitted to enjoy all the things with which God has blessed him, but while he enjoys them Our Money-Makers 45 let him not forget that they give him the op- portunity and ability of doing good, and thus becoming rich in a wealth that will last when gold and silver have ceased to be coin current. There is a blessedness in the act of giving, for Jesus said, " It is more blessed to give than to receive." Giving cleanses. " Give alms," said Jesus, " of such things as ye have, and behold, all things are clean unto you." About the foulest thing on earth is the money of a man who has not given a portion of it to doing good. All money-makers should give at least one- tenth of their income to God. If you do so, you are a first-class Jew ; and no Christian, in the matter of giving, should ever fall short of the Jewish standard. But you who have money invested, drawing interest, should " Re- member the Sabbath day to keep it holy." Your invested money works on the Sabbath day. It draws as much interest on the seventh day as the first, so that in addition to the one- tenth of the six days' income, ought you not to give one-seventh of the interest which has accumulated upon God's days? But money-making has its shadows, and one of the darkest shadows is cast by a bad busi- ness. If your business is hurtful to your neighbor, debauching him in body and mind, you cannot think of it with pleasure. A poor 46 Lights and Shadows of American Life drunkard fell into the gutter in front of a saloon, and a mischievous boy pinned a placard upon his coat written in large letters, " Speci- men of the work done inside." When the saloon-keeper came out and saw it, he fumed with rage, tore the placard to pieces, and swore at the boy. His rage was produced by the consciousness that he was doing wrong ; his swearing was simply the vent of an unhappy spirit. When the rich brewer sees the rags and wretchedness caused by drink, he cannot enjoy his wealth, if his conscience has not been seared with a hot iron. He must hear in his dreams and waking visions the wail of the orphan, the moan of the widow, the shrieks of the maniac, the groan of the broken-hearted, caused by the curse of drink out of which he has made his money. Fred Charrington, who is now at the head of one of the greatest missionary works in London, was at one time a clerk in his father's brewery. Through the testimony of an American preacher, talking to him in the com- partment of a railway coach, young Charring- ton accepted Christ, and consecrated his life to his service. He began at once to do phil- anthropic work among the poor, opening night schools, and teaching the ragged children the way of life and virtue. He soon found that the greatest obstacle in the way of the progress Our Money-Makers 47 of his philanthropic work was the public houses, most of which had his father's name upon the signs. He said to himself, " I must quit either the business of making drunkards or curing drunkards. I work at night to cure drunkards and during the day to make drunk- ards." God gave him the victory, and he decided to leave the brewery business and keep on in the work of saving men. His father, in a fit of rage and disappointment, disinherited him, but before his death he re- lented, and gave to the son the money which he has been using for the glory of Christ and the uplifting of East London. The light of his new career and character is driving away the shadows of former days. The saloon is the upas shade of the world. It poisons, withers, and damns the man who sells as well as the man who drinks, and it is a sad fact that the liquor business is being attached to some of our large dry goods stores. It is easy now even for women and children to have the fire of death sent to their homes, with bundles of dress goods or toys. No respectable man or woman should even buy a spool of thread from such a store. Again: If your money is made by dishonest methods. It will cast a shadow upon your life. Legitimate business may be debauched by illegitimate methods of making money. 48 Lights and Shadows of American Life Young Adam Clarke was told by his employer that he must stretch the cloth in order to make the required number of yards, but Adam's conscience was not so elastic as the cloth he refused to stretch, and he frankly told his em- ployer that he would leave the store rather than be guilty of a dishonest trick. The em- ployer allowed him to leave, and as a result we have Adam Clarke the Commentator blessing the world by means of his character and writ- ings. If he had consented to stretch that cloth, he would doubtless have lived and died an unknown, unhappy wretch, making money in dishonest ways, if not serving his time in the penitentiary. Money-making with a low motive will also cast a shadow. What object have you in view ? Has your ability to make money been pros- tituted simply to money-making? Is it now a great greasy game with you ? Has it be- come play, or war? Do you wish to make money just as a football team wishes to win by gaining a higher score ? Are you simply ambitious to excel, and to have it said that you own more money than others ? If so, John Ruskin draws your picture in the following words: "The first of all English games is making money. That is an all-absorbing game, and we knock each other down oftener in playing at that than at football, or any rougher Our Money-Makers 49 sport, and it is absolutely without purpose. No one who engages heartily in that game ever knows why. Ask a great money-maker what he intends to do with his money, he never knows. He does not make it to do anything with it ; he gets it only that he may get it. What will you make of what you have got ? you ask. Well, I will get more, he says. Just as at cricket you get more runs. There is no use in the runs, but to get more of them than other people is the game, and there is no use in the money but to have more of it than other people in the game. So all that great vile city of London there, rattling, growling, smoking, stinking, a ghastly heap of ferment- ing brickwork pouring out poison at every pore. You fancy it is a city of work. Not a street of it. It is a great city of play, very nasty play, and very hard play, but still play. It is only Lord's cricket ground without the turf, a huge billiard table without the cloth, and with pockets as deep as the bottomless pit, but mainly a billiard table after all." Making money, just for the sake of making money, is not apt to make manhood. I have heard of a Scotcli Laird who made his servant pay him a shilling an hour for working in his own garden, that he might enjoy with the re- creation the intense pleasure of accumulating. A Mr. Taylor, of London, who had amassed a 4 50 Lights and Shadows of American Life fortune, decided while on his death-bed that he would give a thousand pounds to some benevo- lent object. While the committee were draw- ing the papers, the dying man said : " Gentle- men, will you not allow me ten per cent, for cash payment?" They of course agreed, and the miser died, pleased with the thought that he had made one hundred pounds by a sharp bargain. You may not be as mean as old Ostewalde, the Parisian banker, who refused to order beef for his broth while he was dying, because he could not think of what he would do with the beef after he had drunk the broth. You may not be as mean as a man I knew, who refused to get up on a Sunday morning and go with his wife to church, unless she would pay him regularly ten cents for the effort, acknowl- edging to a friend that he had been so accus- tomed to act with a view to making money that he had become incapable of action without it. These may be extreme cases of littleness and meanness ; but making money for the sake of making money is apt to result sooner or later in a character exceptionally mean. The in- spired record, in this as in all other things, is true : " The love of money is the root of all evil, which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows." Money itself is not evil ; the love of it always is, and every Our Money Makers 51 man who has money is either master or slave. If his money owns him, he is a slave. If he owns and uses his money, he is a master. If his money owns him, he will do the bidding of money without regard to truth, and the result will be that he is pierced through with many sorrows. His whole life becomes one shadow of evil. He gropes and clutches and creeps and crawls in dust and darkness, but never soars. His money is a weight that drags him down, never a wing that lifts him up. " A man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth." An over- estimate of money, or an over-confidence in money casts gloomy shadows. I would like to give to every money-maker the secret by which he may flood time and eternity with light. It does not depend upon the amount that you make or possess. It will hold in hard times or good, whether the gold or silver standard prevails. It is never affected by political, social, or commercial revolutions. In the midst of turmoil and confusion it gives peace. In work it gives rest. In perplexity it gives confidence. In despair it gives hope. We owe the secret to the Lord Jesus him- self when he said : " Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal." How stands your 52 Lights and Shadows of American Life bank account in heaven ? Are you transmut- ing the seen and the temporal into the unseen and eternal, by using your money in making character which will last through eternity ? Money here makes for itself wings and flies away. It has no wings in heaven. IV OUR BOYS AND GIRLS ** Suffer these little ones to come unto me" Was the commafid of Him who, on the cross, Bo7ved his anointed head and with his blood Purchased redemption for our fallen race — And blessed they who to that holy task Devote the energies of their young years, Teaching, with pious care, the dawning light Of infa7it intellect to know the Lord. Huntingdon. IV OUR BOYS AND GIRLS " Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages y Exodus 2 : g. " A?id the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in the streets thereof J'^ Zechariah 8 : J. " IVist ye not that I must be about my Father'' s business 1 " Luke 2:49. " And the Syria?is had gone out in bands, and had brought away captive out of the land of Israel a little maid; and she waited Ofi Naamaiis wife. And she said unto her mistress, Would God my Lord were with the prophet that is in Samaria ! then tvould he recover him of his leprosy,'''' 2 Ki?igs " The children [that were"] cryifig in the temple, and saying, Hosanna to the son of Davids Matthew 21 : IS. TWENTY-FIVE years ago, in a Western min- ing camp, a crowd of rough men had assembled 55 $6 Lights and Shadows of American Life to listen to music and speaking. While the band was playing, a baby in the audience, the only one in the whole camp, began to cry. A tall miner arose, and with stentorian voice said, " Stop that noisy band and give the baby a chance." The music ceased, and the rough men wiped the tears from their eyes as they listened to the baby's crying. It brought to them the hallowed associations of the home in the East. They were children again. My first message in this chapter is to parents. " Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages." Give the children a chance. They have a right to be welcomed into the world, and to find a place where they can feel at home. Children are the music and poetry of family life. The Bible speaks of them as olive plants around the table. The man who is blessed with many children is compared to the hunter with strong bow and quiver full of arrows. He is ready for any emergency, and has a resource of strength upon which he can rely. A wealthy man said to a poor friend, as he looked upon his house full of children : " These are the things that make rich men poor." " Nay, verily," replied his friend, " these are the things that make poor men rich, and not one of them would I give for all the millions of earth." Yet it is possible to make boys and girls Our Boys and Girls 57 feel that they are nuisances, encumbrances, drawbacks, weights instead of wings. A little boy when he was dying, was told by the minis- ter that he was going to heaven. His last prayer was, " Lord, make room for a little fel- low." He seemed to feel that there was no room on earth for him, and he was glad that he was going to a place where there might be room enough. And parents need not be discouraged when their children seem to be unpromising. When Dr. Todd was an infant it was said, even by his mother, that she thought it would be a mercy if the little sickly thing were taken from the world, much as she would miss it. But Dr. Todd grew up to write the " Student's Manual " and to make an impress on the world for good. Sir Walter Scott as a boy was dull, but the dullard of the school-house became the wizard of literature, OHver Goldsmith was so stupid that his teacher declared that he would never amount to anything, and though Oliver never learned to talk much better than poor Poll, he did write like an angel. Clarke, the commentator, was known when a boy as " Adam, the dunce," and Sir Isaac Newton, who became the most famous mathematician of his age, seemed in childhood to have a skull so thick that the teacher could not pound into him the multiplication table. Dulness in cer- 58 Lights and Shadows of American Life tain things does not indicate weakness of mind. A critical remark may stir latent powers into action. Paul Ritter wrote " I love God and flowers and little children," and they have something in common. God is great and strong, flowers are little and weak ; children are like flowers in their weakness, but they have in them the possibilities of strength which in maturity will at least remind us of God. Give the child a chance by protecting it from the influences that will mar while its nature is plastic. A traveler says that while he was in South America he noticed a bird fluttering about its nest, flying out and coming back with a leaf in its mouth, which it dropped among its young. He soon saw the cause of the disturbance, for a large snake had wound its body around the tree and was climbing for a meal. The mo- ment its head reached the nest it relaxed its hold and fell with a thud upon the earth. The instinct of the bird had taught it that the leaves were poisonous to the snake, and it had protected its young by filling the nest with these leaves. How careful should we be to throw about little children those influences that will protect from the serpents of evil that would destroy. The habits of childhood are apt to be the Our Boys and Girls 59 habits of mature age. " Do you do any lit- erary work ? " asked a neighbor of a mother. " Yes," she replied, " I am writing two books." " What are their titles ? " '' 'John' and 'Mary'," she answered. " My business is to write upon the minds and hearts of my children the les- sons that they will never forget." And this should be done at any sacrifice. No pleasure- seeking or money-making should hinder us from writing the truth upon the souls of our children. The testing time comes to many a father and mother, " Shall I turn my child over to another, or shall I sacrifice my pleasure or even my business for its training." It is said that a ship coming from San Francisco to the East took fire, and a strong man had just buckled around his waist his heavy belt of gold, when a little girl came up and with a tear in her eye said : " Can you swim ? " " Oh, yes, I can swim," " Will you not save me from drowning ? " It was a question with him as to whether he would save the gold or the child. It did not take him long to decide ; he flung aside his belt, took the child upon his shoulder, and swam to the shore. Whether this incident be true or not, it illustrates the crisis in the life of many a child. It is simply a question with the parents as to whether pleasure or gold shall be saved, or the child. If we decide for the child we are apt to fill the future with 6o Lights and Shadows of American Life light. If we decide for pleasure or gold we may fill it with shadows. My second message is to the boys and girls who are lights or shadows in our American life. We might widen the field and make it take in the whole Avorld, for childhood is about the same everywhere. Children cry and laugh in Chinese about as they do in English. Their child nature, with its joys and sorrows, is about the same until it has been marred by the forces of evil. The fifth verse of the eighth chapter of Zechariah gives us the right of every boy and girl in the world. It is the right to play. It describes the condition of Jerusalem during the millennium, when there will be no sin, no bad neighbors to protect children from, no bad language befouling the air, no evil habits that can be learned on the streets. The streets are full of boys and girls at play. Our parks and playgrounds hedged about by good influences are a section of the millennium pushed forward. Let the happy shout fill the air, let the vigorous body work off its abundant life by running and leaping and vaulting. The more noise in the open air the better. If we had enough to drown the rattle of the trolley, and the shriek of the engine, our nerves would not be so severely tested. " Keep quiet, and do not make so much noise," said a petulant mother to her boisterous son. Our Boys and Girls 6i " Mamma, were you ever a boy ? " he innocently asked. The life of playful childhood may be out of our stiff joints and aching limbs, but it should never be out of our hearts. Let the children fill the world with the light of happy play. It is certain that these playful boys and girls on the streets of the New Jerusalem are clean. I do not refer to their clothing, or their faces and hands, I have great sympathy for the child that has to sit up in clean clothes, not permitted to roll in the sand and romp in the dust. The business of its little life is to keep tidy. As well be in jail. But I do refer to clean language, and clean habits. Can you think of one of these boys playing on the streets of heaven as smoking a cigarette, or squirting tobacco juice, defiling the body with the poison of nicotine ? Nor can you imagine one swearing, or lying, or uttering vulgarity ? Clean lips because beneath them are clean hearts. The boys and girls on the streets of the New Jerusalem must be gentle. You cannot think of them as cruel or unkind. They con- trol their tempers. They never quarrel. They do not take pleasure in hurting animals, for the boy who would kill flies for a pastime would kill men, if he had the power. We are anxious that our boys should be gentlemen 62 Lights and Shadows of American Life and our girls ladies; it is more important that the boys should first become men and the girls women. Robert Burdette says truly that he could not imagine the angel as saying, " Ye gentlemen of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? " Our attempts to make gentle- men out of boys may result in making them dudes, and that is about as near nothing as we could make. And the attempt to make ladies out of our girls may result in making them butterflies of fashion. Luke 2 : 49 gives us a portrait of the useful child. Jesus lived in his home at Nazareth helping his father and mother in their work. He was known as he grew up to be a carpenter. You cannot think of him as loafing and idling away his time. He was doubtless the first in play, the happiest of the happy. He was also industrious and useful. Sometimes the boy is called upon to help support his mother, and though it is bad for him to leave school, in this new responsibility he secures an education of great value. A newsboy in New York was run over by a dray, and as they were taking him to the hospital he handed a few cents to the officer, saying: "Take that to mother, it is all I have made this morning." His thought was to help the one he loved. Mr. Miller, in his little book entitled, "Faults and Ideals of Girls," tells of a girl who, after she had gone Our Boys and Girls 63 through school and acquired a good education, returned to her home duties in the nursery and kitchen to lighten the burdens of mother who had sacrificed so much for her. Every child can be more or less useful in the home even when there is no need of an income from child labor for support. At twelve years of age Jesus is about his Father's business. Every boy and girl have capital which is of more value than money ; years before them that they can invest for God. While a Christian man in Connecticut was dy- ing, he groaned out " Lost, lost ! " The pastor, who was at his bedside, said in surprise, " I thought you said you were saved." " Yes," he replied, " my soul is saved, but fifty years of life are lost." He might have been useful during that long time, but now the opportunity is lost forever. In order to invest one's whole life in doing good, we must begin in child- hood, and a useful childhood is light without a shadow. 2 Kings 5 : 2-3 gives us the picture of a brave child. She had been captured by the Syrian army and taken away from home. The husband of her mistress was a leper, and though she lived among a people who despised the God and the prophets of Israel, she was bold enough to say, " If my master were in Samaria, the prophet could cure him of his leprosy." The 64 Lights and Shadows of American Life fact that these great people listened to this slave girl shows that she had a good character. She was truthful. They believed in her, and she was brave enough to confess in the midst of enemies that she believed in Jehovah. There have been heroic martyrs among chil- dren. In the year 304, during the reign of the Pro-Consul Aulius of Carthage, three children, two boys, Felix and Hilarion, and one girl, Victoria, were martyred for their faith in Christ. We read of Bassa, the Christian mother of Edessa, whose husband thought he could frighten his three sons into giving up their mother's religion, but to his consternation he found that they were brave enough to confess Christ before the executioners, and suffer death rather than deny their mother's Saviour. This little Israelitish maid reminds us of Daniel in a foreign court, who refused to drink the king's wine and eat his rich food, and as a result of his faithfulness became the Prime Minister of the empire. When we think of brave children, of course the ruddy-faced David occurs to us. The boy, who, though not used to battle, but who spent his time practicing with sling and stone in the open air, was brave enough to meet the giant Goliath, and in the strength of God slew him. And every boy can be a giant-killer. I wish that we might have an order of giant-killers, boys who refuse to do Our Boys and Girls 65 wrong and who conquer evil habit, because they believe in God and righteousness. This little maid was a truly beautiful girl. I do not know what her features were, whether' her hair was dark or light, her eyes blue or gray ; but there is a beauty which cannot be seen as you stand before the mirror : it is a beauty of soul. She was unselfish and magnanimous. She might have said, " Let old Naaman perish in his leprosy : he had no business to take me away from my father's house. It is good for him." Instead of that she was anxious to do him good. Unselfishness is beauty ; selfishness is ugliness. Matthew 21:15 gives us a picture of religious boys and girls. The old people in the temple did not like the children's noise as they praised Jesus, but Jesus took their part then as he does now. Every child has a right to be religious, and the happy religion of children fills the com- munity in which they live with light. Joseph was religious. His dreams were his Bible, God speaking to him. We have a better Bible than Joseph had, and ought therefore to be more re- ligious. Samuel, trained by his mother, lived in the temple all the time serving God, and be- came the greatest prophet of Israel. Our re- ligion should make us play better. It was said of a certain boy, " He plays like a Christian," 5 66 Lights and Shadows of American Life and that was a good compliment. Our religion, through the blood of Christ, will make us clean and keep us clean in our language and habits. It will make us gentle and brave, and useful and beautiful. Without religion a boy or a girl is only half-formed, and that means deformed. Jesus said, " Suffer little children to come unto me and forbid them not." Every boy and girl in the world has a right to come to Christ on that invitation, and, when they have done so, to help fill the world with light and gladness. V OUR AMUSEMENTS " Pleasures, or wrong or rightly understood^ Our greatest evil, or our greatest good.^'' Pope. V OUR AMUSEMENTS " If therefore the light that ts in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness / " Matthew 6 : 2j. One of the most joyful facts in all the Bible is that God can make light shine out of dark- ness, that Christ transmutes sorrow into joy. And one of the saddest facts is that expressed by the Scripture, that light may become darkness, and, when it does, the darkness is very great. Laughter is light. It cheers the heart, re- freshes the mind, and gives health to the body. I thank God that I am a laughing animal. But the light of laughter, under certain conditions, may become darkness. It is a trick of the devil to sugar-coat the poison of sin with fun and frolic. We need, therefore, to be as care- ful about our amusements as about our duties. Laughter is, indeed, an index to character. Tell me what a man laughs at, and I will tell you what he is. If he laughs at purity, he is impure. If he laughs at virtue, he is vicious. If he laughs at goodness, he is bad. 69 70 Lights and Shadows of American Life The things that amuse the people do much toward molding their character for good or evil. The theater, the card-table, and the dance are national and international in their influence, and it is our purpose to discuss each one of these in the light of Scripture, common sense, and fact. Being most popular they com- prise to a large extent the Lights and Shadows of Amusement in our American Life. I invite your attention to seven facts which will test the character of these amusements, and all others. L Amusements cast a shadow when they injure the body. This body of ours is God's temple and should be sacredly preserved. Whatever weakens, cripples, or pollutes it should be avoided. Excess in any amusement gives physical injury. The bicycle is the best instrument of recreation in the world, and yet there are not a few invalids to-day, the result of excessive wheeling. A glance into a ball- room often shows that the dressing is white and light and slight and tight. Every law of health is disregarded. Going from the heated room into the cold atmosphere has made many physical wrecks. The ball-room is the mother of consumption and rheumatism. Football has well-nigh ceased to be a game. It is a rough struggle for life. A broken arm, or leg, or nose is a mere incident. It should be ended Our Amusements 71 or mended. The Georgia Legislature did right in passing a law forbidding the brutal sport in the state until it is reformed. In its rough coarse brutality it seems to be a game fit only for Comanche Indians. II. Amusements cast a shadow when they injure the mind. The theater has the advan- tage of dancing and card-playing as a mental exercise. Cards were invented for the enter- tainment of an idiotic king, and it does not take much brains to amuse oneself with cards. " It is very wonderful," says Addison, "to see persons of the best sense passing away a dozen hours together in shuffling and dividing a pack of cards, with no other conversation but what is made up of a few game phrases, and no other ideas but those of black or red spots arranged together in different figures. Would not a man laugh to hear any one of his species com- plaining that life is short ? " Has a man or a woman a right to waste time in such a childish way ? The young man who has worked hard all day in the store or shop, might spend his evening reading a book that would give him entertainment as well as knowledge, but instead of that he sits down to a game of cards, and wastes the evening. This repeated year after year leaves him little wiser than when he began. Neither does dancing call into exercise the mental qualities. A dog, a cat, a monkey, or 72 Lights and Shadows of American Life a horse can be taught to dance. Pliny tells us that in his day elephants were good dancers. Whatever leaves us no time for mental im- provement casts the shadow of ignorance upon our lives. It is said that thirty million packs of playing cards are manufactured every year in America, and they are sold by book stores, grocery stores, saloons, and almost every busi- ness. These thirty million packs of cards are an index to a desert waste of precious time, which greatly retards the mental advancement of the young. in. Amusements cast a shadow when they injure the morals. It ought to go without saying that round dancing is immoral in its tendency. I do not say that all who dance the round dance are immoral, but I do say that, if they retain their moral purity, it is in spite of the dance, and not by means of it. It had its origin in the low dance houses of Paris, and ought to be sent back to its own place. Sev- eral years ago a police commissioner of New York made a report, in which he gave it as his opinion that three-fourths of the lost characters in this great city could trace their fall to danc- ing. The theater gives a few moral plays, and, when such a play is before the footlights, all the preachers in the community will receive free tickets. Then, for the next two months, look out for vileness on the bulletin boards ! Our Amusements 73 Dr. Buckley took the pains to examine about 200 plays that had been produced in the thea- ters of New York, and it was a very small per cent, of them that a decent man would be will- ing to have read in his parlor. Most of them were full of spectacular obscenity, and the dis- play of woman's shame. A friend urged an- other to go with him to a certain popular play. He agreed on condition that they should both leave as soon as something should be said or done that they would not like their sisters to hear or see. They remained not more than ten minutes until they felt that, according to their agreement, they must get up and go out. When cards are used for gambling in any form, card-playing casts a shadow of dishonesty. Gambling is an attempt to get something for nothing, and bears the relation to burglary or theft that dueling bears to murder. A man meets another on the highway, and shoots him down. That is murder. Two men agree to go out early in the morning, and shoot at each other until one is killed. That is murder. The difference is that in the first case there is one murderer, in the second case there are two. A highwayman meets you on the street, and compels you to surrender your purse. He wants something for nothing, and that is rob- bery. Two men sit by a table, and mutually agree by the shuffling of cards, to get something 74 Lights and Shadows of American Life for nothing. That is robbery. The difference is, in the first case there is one robber, in the second case there are two, and the fact that they agreed to rob each other does not change the moral quality of the act. Respectable people meet in a parlor for the shuffling and playing of cards during the evening. A prize is offered to the one who has the best luck, another prize to the one who has the worst luck. The excitement becomes intense, be- cause there is a desire to win, and to get some- thing for nothing. There still remains the moral quality of robbery. A mother in Boston remonstrated with her wayward son for gam- bling. He replied, " Mother, where did you get that vase in the parlor? " " I won it at a game of progressive euchre." " Then please do not ask me to quit gambling while you in- dulge in the same thing." Anthony Comstock asserts that many of the black-leg gamblers of New York belong to the first families, and were taught to gamble by their mothers and sisters at home. As you prize chastity, shun the round dance, as you prize honesty, shun gam- bling, whether in the parlor of respectability, or in the low dive of the city, and as you prize a clean mind and a pure character, shun the vile play in the theater. IV. Amusements cast a shadow when they endanger our joys. The German proverb says, Our Amusements 75 " The good is enemy of the best." Amusement, fun and pleasure may be good ; but joy is bet- ter. Amusement is the dash of the spray, the sparkle on the surface ; joy is the flow of the deep current in the soul. We should not sacrifice the current for the spray or the sparkle. The joys of many a home have been destroyed by its amusements, and the joys of many a Christian have been laid waste by his amuse- ments. Whenever you find that amusement is intrenching upon your joy, sacrifice amuse- ment that the joy may be saved. The Bible magnifies joy ; it believes in laugh- ter, and there are ripples of it all through its pages. But there is a soul experience too deep to be expressed by laughter; it sometimes flows in tears, and no one can afford to sacri- fice this experience for a mere pastime. V. Amusements cast a shadow when they are associated with some great evil institution. The people of Israel played before the golden calf. There may have been no harm in their play, but it was associated with the evil insti- tution of idolatry. Paul said that he could eat meat offered to idols, for he regarded an idol as nothing, and he would not be injured by it. He had a right to eat, but he had a higher right, which was the right to give up this per- sonal privilege for the good of the weaker brother. He determined, therefore, to surren- "jG Lights and Shadows of American Life der this right, and never to eat meat while the world stands. Two men were in a boat above Niagara Falls. When they saw that the cur- rent was taking them down, by a bold stroke they reached the bank, and there on a tree was the placard : " No trespassing on these grounds." A farmer appeared with a fierce bulldog at his side, and one of these men was cruelly torn. The magistrate at Niagara used these words, which are worthy of a place on the fly leaf of your Bible, " You had a right, sir, to placard your land, but in this case there was involved the higher right to surrender your right for the good of humanity, and, because you failed to do so, I send you to jail for 30 days." We may contend for the Christian privilege of indulging certain things, while we forget the higher privilege of self-denial, that we may have a larger influence for good. My rule of life is never to indulge in any amusement that links me with a great evil in- stitution. Let us try the card-table, the dance, and the theater by this test. The card-table is a world-wide evil institution which you find in all countries. Christian and pagan. It is the gambler's instrument. It has been blackened by dishonesty, stained by murder, and dis- graced by innumerable wrecks of character. A pack of cards is suggestive, not of an in- nocent game, but of a great foul institution Our Amusements JJ which has been a curse to mankind. Shall I indulge, and thus link myself with this institu- tion ? Or shall I deny myself that I may not be suggestive of the evil ? The square dance is in itself an innocent pastime, if indulged moderately, but the dance has become a world- wide institution of evil. The dance-house I cannot describe in polite society. The dance is linked with vice. It is not only worldly, but in many of its forms it is desperately wicked. Its associations are malodorous. There may be pleasure in the physical response to music, shall I yield to it and thus associate myself with a bad institution ? The theater as an institution is also bad. There are some moral plays as well as some moral actors and actresses, but, so far as I can find, there is not a moral theater in the world. Edwin Booth would not allow his children to go to the theater unless he knew the character of the play to be presented. His action proves that he considered the theater as bad, though some of the plays might be good. He deter- mined, however, to establish a moral theater, before whose footlights there should not be a display of woman's shame in spectacular ob- scenity. The result was Booth's theater failed, and paid five cents on the dollar. Henry Irv- ing determined that the Lyceum Theater should be moral, but the management had to 78 Lights and Shadows of American Life change its quality to keep it from bankruptcy. Mary Anderson has left the stage, and has de- clared that on moral grounds she does not wish her children to attend the theater. I have seen the statement that McCready would not allow his children to go to the theater. Edwin Forrest, after hearing Dr. Brantley in Augusta, Georgia, preach a sermon denouncing the theater for its immorality, lingered after the service long enough to take the preacher by the hand, and say to him, " Sir, what you have said to-night is true ; only you have not painted the picture as dark as it is." Every theater in this great city admits to its footlights plays that are immoral in their tendency, and as an institution the theater is utterly bad. If some Christian man or woman with millions of dollars would establish a moral theater, where the Christian virtues of humility, and patience, and purity are taught without revenge for insult, which is the heart of tragedy, I would go to it, but such a theater would have to be supported as churches are supported, by the offerings of the lovers of truth and purity. VL Amusements cast a shadow when they produce in us a pleasure-loving spirit. There is a difference between pleasure in the midst of business and making a business of pleasure. The pleasure-seeking spirit is a living death, Our Amusements 79 for God's Word says, " She that llveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth." When one determines to live the life of a butterfly, flit- ting from one flower of indulgence to another, he ceases to be a man ; he has become a thing. If you will turn to Job 21 : 12, you will find some of the results of this pleasure-seeking spirit : " They take the timbrel and harp, and rejoice at the sound of the organ. They spend their days in wealth, and in a moment go down to the grave. Therefore they say unto God, Depart from us ; for we desire not the knowl- edge of thy ways. What is the Almighty, that we should serve him ? And what profit should we have if we pray unto him ? " When the pleasure-seeking spirit fills a man's life, he ceases to desire God. He says to him, " De- part from us." He sees no profit in prayer, or in the service of the Almighty. Pleasure is his god, and he becomes vain and empty like the god he worships. The picture of a pleasure-seeking life which is given us in the 2d chapter of Ecclesiastes, is enough to startle one who desires to be something or do something in the world. Solomon was rich enough to have everything that he desired, and he set himself to seeking pleasure. The result was that he hated life and declared that " all is vanity and striving after wind." Some one has described the 8o Lights and Shadows of American Life palace of pleasure as a building " which has a gorgeous street entrance adorned with statuary and brilliant Avith variegated lights, and the passer is lured in by strains of music. The exit is a dark, narrow, concealed rear way which leads into the fields where swine are kept." As a gentleman entered a theater several years ago the usher beckoned to him with the words : " This way to the pit." The word " pit " was so suggestive that the man turned and left the theater in haste. However beautiful the en- trance to the pleasure-seeking life, and how- ever entrancing the music, the exit is into the swine field, and near the swine field is the precipice over which sooner or later we fall into the pit. VIL Amusements cast a shadow when, through this pleasure-seeking spirit, they dis- place the serious work of life. In the parable of the sower the seed was choked by the pleas- ures of the world, and when one makes up his mind that the end of life is simply to have a good time, duty is neglected, sacred obliga- tions are ignored, business lags, the prospects of life wither, and the end is despair. Here is a good place to hold the red flag of danger. The Duke of Orleans said when he was in this country he happened to be in a small village when a circus was there. He could not obtain dinner or any sort of service. The keeper of Our Amusements 8i the hotel informed him that no one would work that day, for everybody was going to the show. Such a holiday once in a while might produce little harm, but suppose that village should decide to quit work and attend the show every day, the result would be stagnation and death. Just so with the life of the man who allows pleasure to displace business, who lets fun and frolic swallow up the serious duties of life. The Romans became so greedy for amuse- ment that they demanded great outlay in pur- chasing wild animals and gladiators for their enjoyment in the arena. This pleasure-seeking spirit so enervated the people of Rome that they became easy prey to the serious North- men who came down upon them. As with the nation, so with the individual. Pleasure-seeking weakens character and makes it easy for us to be captured and destroyed by evil habits. I have read of some cavalrymen who, during iive or six weeks of rest, taught their horses to dance to the music of the band. It was great sport, but, when they were riding into battle, and the band began to play, hoping to inspirit the soldiers, the horses stopped in the charge and began to dance. The result was the enemy swept down upon them and conquered them. Many a man has lost the battle of life for the same reason. He is so possessed by the pleasure-seeking spirit that 6 82 Lights and Shadows of American Life when he ought to be serious and dutiful, he Is dancing, or gambhng, or in some other way frittering away his time. After Napoleon Bonaparte had killed the Duke D'Enghien, the indignation of the French people was so intense that there was danger of a revolution. The wily emperor quieted their consciences by producing for them the most magnificent ballet that Paris had ever seen. They rushed to the theater and forgot their grievances. It is hard for conscience to assert itself when the pleasure-seeking spirit is master. Everything that any one ought to enjoy the Christian may enjoy. What is sinful, or hurtful to body, mind or soul, should not be indulged by any one, and such indulgence displaces a purer enjoyment. If you will take Jesus Christ as your Saviour from sin, and as the Umpire of your life, submitting to him your pleasures as well as your duties, your life will be full of light, and the shadows that come will only refresh. He said, " I am the Light of the world. He that followeth me shall not walk in dark^ ness but shall have the light of life." And this light never becomes darkness. It grows brighter and brighter till the perfect day. VI OUR SABBATH ^*JIe who ordained the Sabbath loves the poor.*^ Holmes. " The day that God has blessed Comes tranquilly on with its welcome rest. It speaks of creation'' s early blootn ; It speaks of the Pritice who burst the tomb. Then siunjnoji the Spirifs exalted powers And devote to heave)i the hallowed hours^ Ware. *■'■ Bright shadows of true rest! some shoots of bliss. Heaven once a week; The next world'' s gladness prepossessed in this.''^ Vaughafi. VI OUR SABBATH '■'■ Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holyT Exodus 20 : 8. It is plain that the Sabbath existed before the law was given to Moses on Mount Sinai. " God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it, because that in it he had rested from all his work." It came in as one of the laws of nature, and is founded primarily on the neces- sities of man. The Jews observed the Sabbath before they came to Sinai, because we are told they gathered a double portion of manna on the previous day. And it seems that they were delivered from Egyptian bondage on the Sabbath day, for we read in Deuteronomy 5:15: " Remember that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm ; therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the Sabbath day." There is thenceforth to be a twofold reason for observing the Sabbath. First, God hal- lowed it after the six days of creation ; and, 85 86 Lights and Shadows of American Life second, because he delivered them from Egyp- tian bondage. And in Exodus 31 : 12-17 there is added still another significance to the day. " The children of Israel shall observe the Sabbath throughout their generations for a perpetual covenant. It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever." This trinity of hallowed meaning runs through the Old Testament. It is the day of rest, the day of deliverance, and the day which is to call to mind the covenant between God and his people. We are, therefore, not surprised to find in Isaiah 58: 13, 14, that God promises a great blessing to those who observe the Sabbath, and threatens a curse upon those who desecrate his holy day. ''If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath," that is, if thou refuse to trample upon the Sabbath, " from doing thy pleasure on my holy day ; and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honorable ; and shalt honor him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words ; then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord ; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth." Here is the promise to the Sabbath observer of personal joy and national prosperity. If we give up our own pleasure-seeking on that day, God will give us his pleasure, filling us with his joy. If Our Sabbath 87 we call the Sabbath a delight, he will delight in us. If we honor the Sabbath, he will honor us. But if we bring down our uplifted foot in contempt upon God's day, he will leave us exposed to the working of the inexorable laws which will carry ruin to our entire being The Sabbath is a physical necessity. Dr. William D. Love, in his excellent book entitled " Sabbath and Sunday," gives a great funda- mental fact when he says : " Laws for rest are stationed all along the physical nature. The lungs rest after each breath we take. The blood-vessels rest between the heart beat- ings. The nerves and brain will have rest and will revenge themselves upon us if we cut short the supply. The ordaining of day and night to follow each other in quick succession through all ages of the world was a merciful appointment of God ; without it the human species would probably have become extinct at a very early period of time. But experience and observation have shown that the rest of night, and all forms of daily and nightly rest put together are insufficient forthe highest end of man's physical well-being. There must be days as well as nights of rest." Horses demand it. A man who used many horses in street-car travel stated to a meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, in 1857, that his company, by not 88 Lights and Shadows of American Life working the horses on Sunday, made a saving of 12 per cent. Even Plato the pagan had a glimpse of this law of nature when he said : " Out of pity for the wretched life of mortals the Deity has arranged days of festal recreation and refreshment." In the settlement of the great West it was found that parties who did not travel on Sunday reached their destination sooner, and in better condition, than those who traveled seven days in the week. Several years ago the French Minister of Marine gave orders that no workmen be em- ployed in the dock-yards on the Sabbath, and gave as his reason that man can do more by resting one day in seven than by working seven days in the week. It is a well-known fact that there are more suicides in Sabbath-break- ing than in Sabbath-keeping countries. Mr. Wilkie the painter declares that the artists of his acquaintance who worked on Sunday were soon disqualified for working at all. France, in her hatred for the church and the Bible, de- cided to observe every tenth day rather than the seventh, but it would not work. Many people observed the seventh day as an extra holiday. The law of our being evidently de- mands the seventh rather than the fifth or the tenth day. Lord Macaulay does not speak too strongly when he says : " While industry is suspended, Our Sabbath 89 while the plow lies in the furrow, while the exchange is silent,while no smoke ascends from the factory, a process is going on quite as im- portant to the wealth of the nation as any process which is performed on more busy days. Man, the machine of machines, is repairing and winding up, so that he returns to his labor on Monday with clearer intellect, with live- lier spirits, with renewed corporal vigor." And Coleridge was not extravagant when he exclaimed : " I feel as if God by giving the Sabbath had given fifty-two springs in the year." The Sabbath is also a mental necessity. Mr. Love informs us that a man of twenty-five years' observation in New York city said that those merchants of his acquaintance who kept their counting rooms open on Sunday failed without exception. William Wilberforce declared that many public men who began life with him found an early grave, some being maniacs and others suicides, and he attributed the cause of their premature and untimely end to their dis- regard of the Sabbath. A professor of hygiene in Leipzig University said: "If religion calls the seventh day the day of the Lord, the hy- gienists will call Sunday the day of man." The unbending of the mental bow one day in seven gives strength for the work of the six days that follow. 90 Lights and Shadows of American Life The Sabbath is a moral necessity. More than 90 per cent, of all criminals were habitual Sabbath-breakers before they became criminals. An English chaplain of prisons declares that during twenty-eight years of service he had made it a point to see in private those who were charged with capital offenses, and that he did not remember a single case among them all where the party had not been a Sabbath-breaker, and many of them assured him that Sabbath- breaking was the first step in their course of crime. Of 1,633 criminals who were in the New York State (Auburn) prison previous to 1840, only 29 had any regard for the Sabbath. So conservative a writer as William Blackstone, the commentator on law, says a " corruption of morals usually follows a profanation of the Sabbath." A man who had to do with street railways in Boston gave as his opinion that the dishonesty of conductors was promoted by running the cars on Sunday. If men are taught to violate one of the ten commandments, why may they not violate another ? The cashier of a bank who was some time ago sen- tenced to the penitentiary for stealing, accused the president of being largely responsible for his crime, because the president had compelled him to work in the bank on Sunday. If you require your employees to desecrate the Sab- bath, do not blame them too severely if they Our Sabbath 91 steal from your purse. If you have a right to rob God of his day, why have they not a right to rob you of your money ? I read some time ago of a company of rough men in the far west who had assembled in front of a country church awaiting the time of service. One of them asked another why he did not bring with him his gun, that he might kill some game on his return home. The other replied : " Suppose I should come up here with seven fine horses, and should say, ' Boys, I would like to give you six of these horses to be yours, you can use them as you will. I only want one.' You take my six horses and then follow me down the road to rob me of the horse which I have kept. Now, fellows, ain't that mean ? " And yet that is just what the man does who robs God of the Sabbath by doing his own pleasure and working for him- self on that day. God has given him the six days, and it is simple robbery for him to take the seventh. The Sabbath is certainly a spiritual necessity. There is no such thing as Christianity without it. Without it the church cannot exist, and there is no such thing as growth in grace to those who desecrate the Lord's day. I have little hope of developing any member of this church into a spiritual worker who reads the Sunday newspaper before he comes to church, 92 Lights and Shadows of American Life or who rides his bicycle for a pleasure-trip into the country. It follows, therefore, that the Sabbath is a national necessity. Whatever is for the phys- ical, mental, moral and spiritual good of the people is for the good of the nation. " Right- eousness exalteth a nation," and without obedi- ence to the laws of our nature, which are the laws of God, there can be no national right- eousness. Laws for the protection of the Sab- bath are therefore for the protection of the nation. The men who, before the French Rev- olution, ceased to regard the Sabbath began to amuse themselves by cutting off each other's heads, and the result was anarchy. As animals, as thinkers, as moral agents, as Christians, as patriots, we should observe the Sabbath. Surely this fivefold necessity is a chord that ought not to be easily broken. But the question arises. What is the Sabbath ? The Jews observed the seventh day. Christians observe the first day. Which is right ? Well, you will notice that in the Decalogue we are not told to remember the seventh day, but remember the Sabbath, so that even in the ten commandments there is room for the obser- vance of another day provided it be one day in seven. It is of course impossible for everybody on the globe to observe the same point of time, for the seventh day in one place may be the Our Sabbath 93 sixth day in another. Ships sailing in one direction lose, and in another gain, a day. The principle is evidently observed when we hallow one day in seven. Jesus, in his teaching, rescued the seventh day from the superstitions which had gathered around it. The Pharisees even discussed the question as to whether it was right to eat an egg laid on the Sabbath day. Their ritualistic observances had made the day a burden rather than a refreshment and a joy. Jesus taught by precept and practice that it was right to do well on the Sabbath day. The sick might be healed, the hungry might be fed, the distressed might be relieved. The ox should be taken out of the ditch, the ass should be led to water ; there was no harm in plucking the ears of corn, that the necessary meal might be prepared. In Luke 14: i we are even told that he dined with a Pharisee on the Sabbath day, and improved the occasion by profitable discussion. It was certainly no feast, but rather a simple meal. The Jews would not fight on the Sabbath day even in defense of their sacred city. Ptolemy, while besieging Jerusalem, learned this fact, and by making the attack on the Sabbath day easily captured the city and put thousands of them to the sword. The hallowed day had thus been so wrested from its original intent that Jesus spared no pains to rescue it 94 Lights and Shadows of American Life and give it its proper setting. In the estima- tion of the superstitious Jew the Sabbath must be observed at the expense of health and life, so that it became a day not of rest but of ruin. And it was this day to which Paul referred when he wrote in Colossians 2:16: "Let no man judge you in meat or drink or in respect of a feast day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath days." The apostle had not thought of doing away with the day which is founded in physical, mental, moral, spiritual and national necessities. He was simply urging the Colos- sians not to be brought into bondage to the superstitious observances of the Jews with re- gard to that day. But we are told that Jesus did not reaffirm the fourth commandment in his conversation with the rich young man. True, but he did not reaffirm the first commandment. He tested this young man only by the second tabic of the law, which gives our relations to each other, not our relations to God. The Sabbath is God's day, and the command to observe it is in the first table of the law. On the same ground we might practice idolatry because Jesus did not reaffirm the command against worshiping idols. But in the Sermon on the Mount the Lord did reaffirm the whole moral law. " One jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law till all be fulfilled." While Our Sabbath 95 there are bodies, minds, hearts and souls on earth or in heaven the law of the Sabbath can- not pass away. The moral law will be as good for heaven as for earth, and is eternal in its binding force. To set it aside would be to throw the world into moral chaos. Jesus gives us the great principle when he says : " The Sabbath was made for man," and therefore no one has a right to take the Sabbath from him. It is for his good, and if he destroys it by deny- ing its obligations or by desecrating it, he is really destroying himself. " The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath," and has, therefore, a right to change the day from the seventh to the first, and this he did by a series of providences that hallowed the first day as truly as God hallowed the sev- enth at the end of the creative week. It was on the first day of the week that Jesus rose from the dead. He hallowed that day by ap- pearing five times to his disciples, and he does not appear again for six days afterwards. His next appearance is on the first day of the week, when he confirms the faith of doubting Thomas. There was a seventh day intervening, but he paid no attention to it. It was on the first day of the week when the Holy Spirit came on Pen- tecost in the tongues of fire and as a rushing, mighty wind. This was the birthday of the New Testament church. Paul preached at 96 Lights and Shadows of American Life Troas, and broke bread on the first day of the week, and he wrote to the Corinthian Christians to lay aside of their substance on the first day of the week as the Lord had prospered them. This act of giving was a sacred act of worship and harmonized with the sacredness of the day. On the Isle of Patmos John was in the spirit of the Lord on the Lord's day. The early church certainly observed the first day of the week as its Sabbath. The fact that the Christian Sabbath is not the seventh day, but the first, is one of the strongest proofs that Jesus Christ rose from the dead. As we have seen, the Jews regarded the seventh day with superstitious reverence, and yet within a gen- eration converted Jews ceased to regard the seventh day, and hallowed the first. No one can explain this change except on the ground that Jesus rose from the dead on the first day of the week, and the fact of his resurrection caused the change. I am glad that our Lord gave no specific command setting apart the seventh day. His resurrection is command enough. By its power the first day was sanctified, and by the incar- nation of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost it was made doubly hallowed. On the Lord's day we think now of the new creation rather than the old, of the deliverance from sin rather than Our Sabbath 97 from Egypt, and the covenant of blood rather than the covenant of works, of the power and presence of the living Christ rather than the form of dying Judaism. By faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus we may have the Sabbath in our hearts. " Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." As the Sab- bath day comes in the midst of busy days sur- rounded by turmoil and confusion, so the heart rest may be ours in the midst of business and even cares that press. This Sabbath within harmonizes sweetly with the spirit of the Sab- bath without, and is a foretaste of the eternal Sabbath which remains to the people of God. 7 VII OUR POLITICS " A politician, Proteus-like, doth alter His face and habit ; and, like water ^ seem Of the same color that the vessel is That doth contain it, varying his form, With the chameleon, at each object's changed Mason. ^* Atnerica, half brother of the world ! With something good and bad of every landV Bailey. VII OUR POLITICS " When the righteous are in au- thority, the people rejoice : but when a wicked Jtian bcareth rule, the people sighr Proverbs 2g : 2. " Render therefore unto Ccesar the thitigs which are Ccesar'' s.''^ Mat- thew 22 : 21. "/ appeal unto Ccssar." Acts 23:11. " Righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people. ^^ Proverbs 14 :J4. Politics is defined by the Standard Diction- ary, first, " as the branch of civics that treats of the principles of civil government, and the con- duct of state affairs ; the administration of public affairs in the interest of peace, prosperity, and safety of the state ; synonymous with state- craft and political science ; in a wide sense, embracing the science of government and civil polity." Second, " as political affairs in a party sense ; the administration of public affairs or lOI 102 Lights and Shadows of American Life conduct of political matters so as to carry elec- tions and secure public offices ; synonymous with party intrigues, political wire-pulling, and trickery." The first definition gives us the realm of the statesman who studies the science of govern- ment, and applies its principles to public affairs, seeking the good of the whole nation. The second definition gives us the realm of the pol- itician who studies the art of getting into office, and profiting all he can at the public expense. The statesman is a patriot who would serve his country. The politician is a barnacle attached to the body politic, who seeks to make his country serve him. We are told by some that Christians, es- pecially Christian ministers, should have noth- ing to do with politics, but whether we have to do with politics or not, politics is certain to have to do with us ; and, if the Bible does not touch upon politics, it is not the book we have taken it to be, which throws light upon every phase of human life. Politics is universal in time and space. It may differ in different ages ; it is one thing in a republic, and another in a monarchy, and still another in partly civil- ized nations, but in some from politics affect human life everywhere. In this country it affects not only the machinery of government but in its influence for good or evil touches Our Politics 103 the church, the home, the school-house, and the individual. We will now look at our politics in the light of four texts of Scripture : The first text gives us the underlying prin- ciple of all government, and is found in Proverbs 29 : 2 : " When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice : but when the wicked beareth rule, the people sigh." Bad rulers with bad laws tend to make a bad people, while good rulers with good laws tend to make a good people. Every man in high position is a fountain of health or disease. His influence is a light that gives life, or a Upas shade that poisons. If the president, governor, or mayor is known to be a bad man, young men will say to themselves : "If he can be bad, and yet be honored, why may I not in- dulge my evil desires without sacrificing the prospect of political preferment ? If his wick- edness is no obstacle to his success, my wick- edness need be no obstacle to my success." And yet there are Christian men who contend that, because their citizenship is in heaven, they have no citizenship on earth, and have therefore nothing to do with the election of men to office or the enactment of righteous laws. Two of the best men I have ever known have for fifteen years refused to vote, because they consider politics as thoroughly bad, and think 104 Lights and Shadows of American Life that a Christian by meddling with it will be pol- luted. They have simply left the city, state,and the nation so far as they are concerned, to be ruled by the Devil and his minions, and we verily believe are guilty of a great sin of omission. " Do good unto all men " is a command which should be binding upon the conscience of every Christian ; and, if by voting for a righteous man or a righteous principle, one may do good, he does harm when he refuses to improve this opportunity. My second text gives us the responsibilities of citizenship, and is found in Matthew 22: 21. *' Render therefore unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's." Caesar represented the state, and pagan though he was he was to receive his due. There are a few Christians who refuse to vote because the name of God is not in the Consti- tution, and because many of our officials are infidels. And in this they are wrong. The ballot is a weapon of peace for the remedying of all political evils : " A weapon firmer set And better than the bayonet, A weapon that comes down as still As snow-flakes fall upon the sod, And executes a freeman's will, As lightning does the will of God." The superscription on the coin indicated that tribute should be paid to Caesar, and it is Our Politics 105 right for Christian men to pay taxes for the support of Government. Thoreau declared that he did not desire any protection, he wished no government, he preferred to be his own govern- or, he would live in his cabin among the trees and birds independent of all others. He there- fore refused to pay taxes, and went to jail in consequence. And yet Thoreau, but for the protection of the government which he despised, might have been robbed and killed without hindrance. Every man who enjoys the pro- tection of government has upon him the re- sponsibility of doing what will support that government. If every man in the United States should refuse to vote, there could be no Republican government. The dictate of a ty- rant, or the sword of a military chieftain would be our only law, and, if one man has a right to refuse to vote, all have the same right ; and if the right should be asserted, the best form of government in the world would be at an end. "Pray for them that are in authority," says Paul, and prayer for rulers at that day was the only means that the Christain had for securing a better rule. If Paul were living now, he would say : " Vote to put good men in author- ity and then pray for them that they may rule well." Do we pray for those in authority? You reply that there is some doubt as to who is to io6 Lights and Shadows of American Life be in authority, especially in Greater New York, Mr. Van Wyck has been elected Mayor, but the newspapers more than intimate that Richard Croker is in authority. Well, then, pray for Richard Croker. I wonder if one of you ever did pray for the man who during the past ten years has been more soundly abused than any other man in New York State. He may be bad, — all the more reason that you should pray for him. If God should convert him, and win him from the love of gambling to the love of doing good, the bad boss would become a good leader. And it ought perhaps to be said that the cry against political bosses is usually very childish. Every great move- ment must have a leader, as every body must have a head. If the party leader be a man wise and true, patriotic and unselfish, he can do much for the enactment of righteous laws, the election of righteous men, and the uplifting of the people. Perhaps you do not believe in political parties at all ; you think that the non-partizan movement is apt to be the righteous one, and therein you may be sadly mistaken. The party in this country is necessary for the car- rying forward of any great reform. It means simply the organization of the men who hold certain principles. The difference between a political party and a thoroughly non-partizan Our Politics 107 movement is the difference between an army and a mob. The mob may have a leader, but it is a mob all the same. Mugwumpery is an attempt to run government without a party. The good in it emphasizes the importance of personal character in candidates, the bad in it is the failure to recognize the absolute necessity of organization for the permanence of any re- form. Between government by party, and government by individual candidates without any party to whom they are responsible, I, for one, choose the former. The man who feels that he has been elected by the organization and efforts of his party, and who knows that unless he is faithful to the principles that party represents, he will receive political chastise- ment, is more apt to do right than the man who has no party responsibility, but feels that he is a sort of pope in his own political sphere, dictator of his own terms, without any organi- zation to which he must give an account. He may be held in check by public sentiment, but the man who represents a party has also the check of public sentiment with the restraint of party fealty. Of course, when the party is or- ganized without principle, simply for spoils, and its business is to enrich itself while it robs others, the representative of such a party may be a very dangerous man. But sooner or later the public sentiment of this country will io8 Lights and Shadows of American Life sweep from power man and party when such a state of affairs has been discovered. What the Christian citizen needs to ask is what party represents righteous principles and nominates righteous men, and believes in enacting and enforcing righteous laws. With that party let him vote, and, if he can find no such party in existence, let him seek to or- ganize one, for he can find a few others at least of like mind who will stand together for righteousness. But let him not feel he can do most good by remaining apart from others, as a sort of bushwhacker, not connected with any regular army. My third text suggests the use of citizen- ship, and is found in Acts 25. ii : " I appeal unto Caesar." Paul was a Roman citizen. He had been unjustly arrested and persecuted- He sought safety by putting himself under the protection of the Roman Eagle. He wanted to preach the gospel in Rome and here was an opportu- nity of using his Roman citizenship to gratify that life-long wish. By appealing to Caisarhe could be carried to Rome, and there proclaim Christ under the shadow of the palace. It was by means of his Roman citizenship that he was permitted to preach to Caesar's household through the soldiers who were chained to him in turn. I can imagine Paul winning the favor Our Politics 109 of each one of these rough men by kindly words, pleasant conversation, and then preach- ing unto them Jesus with such clearness and earnestness that they accept him, so that when they are freed from their prisoner, they go out freed from the guilt of sin. Through the privilege of his Roman citizenship he was per- mitted to lay siege to the citadel of paganism until he made a breach in its walls. American citizenship means in the world to- day about what Roman citizenship meant in the time of Paul. It is the traveler's protec- tion and pride. Under the Stars and Stripes he is safe everywhere. It gives him an open door into every pagan land. To despise such a heritage is to be an ingrate indeed. To refuse to make this citizenship mean what it ought to mean by the election of righteous men, and the enactment of righteous laws, is to fail in the performance of sacred duty. My fourth text gives us the need of good citizenship, and is found in Proverbs 14:34: " Righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people." And this righteousness is civic, social and personal. Civic righteousness is right relation of the citizen to the government, and of the government to the citizen. No government has a right to treat its citizens unjustly, un- fairly, oppressively, and no citizen has the right no Lights and Shadows of American Life to treat the government unfairly or unjustly. Think of this, will you ? when you list your property for taxation. We are told that good men do not hesitate to use stratagem for de- frauding the government out of its tribute. It has been said that the tax list proves nearly every man in the community a liar. This may be an exaggeration, but I am quite sure that there is a sentiment prevalent which prompts men to deal with the government as they would not deal with individuals. When I returned from Europe I was told by several passengers on the steamship just how I might evade pay- ing tariff on some articles which I had pur- chased. I did not try to evade, and as the re- sult my trunk was opened and $25 or $30 was collected on articles purchased for my own private use. I noticed, however, that piles of trunks were not touched. They understood the trick of defrauding the government, but I have never regretted that I kept a good con- science. A few dollars would not pay for the reflection that I had acted unfairly or dishon- estly toward the government. Social righteousness is a right relation be- tween individuals. Much is said about in- equality in the distribution of wealth, and, if there should be an equal distribution to-morrow, there would come again the next week a great inequality. To make all people poor alike or Our Politics in rich alike is neither practicable nor desirable, but to make all people friendly and kind and considerate, whether they be rich or poor, is an end to be earnestly sought. If the rich man had some common footing with the poor man, if he would realize that his poor brother is truly human, with joys and sorrows and struggles like his own, he would be richer, and the poor man would be better off. If, on the other hand, the poor man could find a common foot- ing with the rich man, and realize that his wealthy brother has struggles, sorrows, and joys and burdens, like his own, there would be a common fraternity of humanity which would be the best cement for the perpetuity of our government. The horse of a rich man, while driving through Central Park several months ago, ran away, and his carriage struck a poor peddler, knocking him senseless and leaving him bleed- ing on the ground. The rich man went to him, put his head in his lap, sent for a physician, carried him to a good hotel, and had him care- fully nursed into health again. The poor ped- dler was surprised to learn that the man on whose lap he laid his bleeding head, and who spoke to him such words of loving comfort, be- longed to the class whom he had cursed as he thought of their wealth and luxuries compared with his poverty and struggles. He learned 112 Lights and Shadows of American Life for the first time that behind the exterior of wealth there was a genuine human heart. A rich woman in Chicago, who had lost her only child, was induced by her maidservant to take a bouquet of flowers and lay it upon the little cofifin in the home of her washerwoman. Rich woman and poor mother stood and wept over the little body, while they spoke to each other words of consolation. Li these two cases the rich and the poor had found a common footing ; they realized that they were akin, that they could suffer alike, and that manhood and womanhood did not depend upon the size of the purse, or the location of the house, or the quality of clothes ; and, when such relations of love shall be brought about by the gospel of Christ, this government will be forever secure. But until then we may listen for the rumble of the earthquake of revolu- tion ; we may guard against the foment of dis- content. We hear much about manhood suf- frage, which means that every man has the right to vote, regardless of the amount of money which he possesses. It ought to mean that only true manhood shall vote. Vice, anarchy, corruption, ignorance have no right with the ballot. And if this be true, every Christian should receive a new inspiration to work for the elevation of all the people. The love of Christ and patriotism should prompt us to give Our Politics 113 them the gospel which will develop in them a true manhood. Personal righteousness is the right relation between the individual and his God. Such righteousness can come only through Jesus Christ our Lord. *' For he hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him." Paul wrote the letter to the Romans, to prove that righteousness is primarily right relation, not right doing, and he besought men to be recon- ciled to God. Until we get right, we cannot do right. And until we come into right relation, all the righteousness of doing is filthy rags. Jesus Christ alone can make men truly righteous, and is therefore the Saviour of the state as well as of the individual. 8 VIII OUR CITIES " Saltpetre^ sulphur and charcoal are each one non-explosive, but brought together they make gun- powder. Neither ignorance nor vice is revolu- tionary iahe?i quite comfortable, fior is wretched- ness, ivhen controlled by intelligence and conscience. But ignorance, vice and wretchedness, combined, co/istitute social dynamite of which the city slum. is a magazine aivaiting only a casual spark to durst into terrijic destruction,^^ Strong. VIII OUR CITIES " And when he drew nigh, he saw the city, aftd wept over itr Luke ig : 41. The history of cities is the history of the world. The word city occurs in the Bible 262 times, and, if all references to Babylon, Nine- veh, Tyre, Sidon, Rome, Athens, Corinth, Ephesus, and Jerusalem were taken from the book, it would reduce its size by nearly one- half. Cities are truly the " nerve centers and storm centers of the world." Every city is a great heart, throbbing with life and sending out good blood or bad through its thousand arteries of activity. To save the cities is to save the world. The text tells us that Jesus drew near to the city of Jerusalem. He did much of his work there. It was cosmopolitan in its population. People from every nation under heaven, as we see from the list at Pentecost, were in the habit of visiting this great city. We, the followers of Christ, should draw near the city. It is said, 117 1 18 Lights and Shadows of American Life all the world is moving to town. Our great cities are increasing with Avonderful rapidity. But people can live in the city without being very near it. The merchant may know the way from his house to the street car, and from the street car to his store. He goes to church on Sunday, and to a few other places during the week, but he may be as far removed from the great surging life of the city with its sin and struggle, as if he lived a thousand miles distant. Men of wealth should come near to the pov- erty of the alleys, and learn how the other half live, and men of toil should come as near as you can to the wealthy abodes on the avenue and realize that riches have their burdens, and that men of money need sympathy. Oh, if we could just get nearer together in this great city, there would be a fraternity of humanity. If we knew more of each other, there would be less ill-will and hard speech. Jesus beheld the city. We think of his crossing the brow of Olivet, and seeing the domes of the city looming up before him in the distance. If we had been with him, we might have had only this external view. But he saw the whole city. Not a thing on its streets, or in its houses was hid from his view. He saw its sin, its suffering, its joy, its sorrow, its wealth, its poverty, indeed everything that Our Cities 119 the eye of the Omniscient God could penetrate was open to his view. As Jesus draws near and beholds the city of to-day, what does he see ? First of all, he sees the best type of Chris- tianity and the worse type of infidelity. The religion that stands the fire-test of the city is pure gold. There is a kind of country religion that will not bear transportation into city life. There are hundreds of men in New York who were useful as deacons, trustees, Sunday- school teachers, in the old country church, but now they are worthless. They have become ecclesiastical sponges. They drift around suck- ing in a little here and there, trying to get as much as they can for nothing. And yet the type of religion in the country church is just what the city needs, — faith before it is slimed over by infidelity, prayer that pleads the promises without the waver of doubt, praise that rises from simple honest hearts unto God the giver of all, a religion fresh as the grass of spring, and sweet as the perfume of the flowers of the field. That sort of religion is just what the dusty, rattling, bustling city needs. Young man from the country, hold on to it, prize it above gold, cultivate it in your room, and seek the church where you find it is fostered. But there is a religion from the country which the city can afford to do without. I20 Lights and Shadows of American Life People who are very pious at home vv^hen they come to the great city frequently feel free to attend the theater, and, as they say, " see the world." The country cousin entices city young people into places to which they would not think of going, but for the desire to please their friends. A man from the South said to a pastor in Baltimore : " How do you get along with these worldly Christians in the city ? " The pastor replied, " My friend, when did you go to the theater last ? " He had to confess that he had been the night before, and was in the habit of going at least once every time he came from his country home to the city. " Yes," continued the pastor, " And that is the evil we city pastors have to contend against. There are twenty-five members of my church, born and raised in Baltimore, who never went to the theater in their lives. They know the evil of it ; they were taught by pious parents to shun it, but you country people come here and tempt them to violate their con- sciences in order to gratify you." It ought to be said also that there is a type of city religion which will not bear transporta- tion. A pastor in the Adirondack Mountains told me that his church was greatly demoralized every summer by the influence of Christians from the city. At the summer place they in- dulge in things that he preached against. Some Our Cities I2i of his young people thought him old-fogylsh. These progressive Christians from the city at- tracted their attention, and turned them from the simple spiritual life to a mixed life of world- liness and church-going. But after we have said all that ought to be said about the sham religion of the city, there is here the highest type of faith, self-sacrifice, devotion to truth, sympathy with suffering humanity, in a word, love for God and man, and, under the stress of great temptation, there is developed the finest type of Christian character in the world. Again, Jesus would see the best institutions and the worst. Here are scores of organizations for the betterment of the people, hundreds of churches pointing with their spires to heaven, with a large percentage of their membership true and tried, seeking to do good in the world. Here are organizations for helping the news- boy, the bootblack, the orphan, the sick, the wandering, the criminal. Every department of sin and suffering has called forth circles of earnest men and women who are pledged and organized to contend against its ravages. There is more giving as well as better living in these great cities than anywhere else on the globe. But side by side with these good in- stitutions are the combined forces of evil. The liquor traffic is an octopus with its slimy ten- 122 Lights and Shadows of American Life tacle upon everything good. Gambling is ram- pant, the streets are full of mantraps. Joseph Parker declares that the Stock Exchange is the bottomless pit of London. There are Christian men on the Stock Exchange who do legitimate business, but most of them are gamblers seek- ing to get something for nothing. Club life is a growing menace to the home. The lodge is becoming the foe of the church. When a young man comes to the city, there are scores of forces which at once pull him down- ward, to one force that draws him upward. He lives in a bleak boarding-house, in a little room without fire, while Christian homes are closed against him because they do not know him. The saloon, however, asks no questions, invites him in, gives him a comfortable seat, and makes him feel at home. If the mother in the country knew some mother in the city, and would write to her about the boy in the boarding-house, the motherhood of the city would respond and seek him out. But harlotry does not wait for an invitation. Those "whose feet take hold on hell " are after him at once ; the Siren song entices, and when the boy comes back to spend the holidays in his country home, the mother notices a change. He has ceased to be the simple-hearted, trustful, pure boy that he was. If the wrecks of character made in this great city during the past ten years could Our Cities 123 be made visible and piled up on the streets, it would take the Street Cleaning Department a month to remove the debris ; all traffic would be stopped, while the air would be fetid with the malodors of lost characters. Jesus, as he beheld the city, was moved to tears. The word " wept " does not mean that he shed tears silently as he did at the grave of Lazarus. It means to shriek or to wail. As the city with its agony came before him, it broke his heart, his wail of agony mingled with the hosannas of the crowd, and hushed them into silence. If we could see to-day what he saw then, and what he sees now, our hearts, though harder than his, might wail out their agony. The politician sees in the crowd that throng our streets so many voters, the merchant sees so many customers, Jesus sees so many im- mortal souls with capacity for infinite develop- ment or degradation. How does the crowd affect you ? Are you indifferent to it ? Then you are not akin to " the Son of man " whose heart was big enough to take in all classes of people. While Jesus looked at the crowd, he spoke in faithfulness a fearful truth. He said, You have lost your opportunity, you refuse to accept the things which belong to your peace, but now they are hid from your eyes. " The days shall come upon thee, that thine enemies 124 Lights and Shadows of American Life shall cast a trench about thee, and compass thee round, and keep thee in on every side, and shall lay thee even with the ground, and thy children within thee ; and they shall not leave in thee one stone upon another ; because thou knewest not the time of thy visitation." For all that we know he is speaking these very words of New York, Chicago, and other great cities. He has given them the Sabbath, the day of rest and peace. Do they despise it ? Are they not planning to desecrate it more and more ? As I crossed Brooklyn Bridge last Sunday, and heard the clang of hammers while a greedy corporation was desecrating God's day that they may fill their pockets with gold, I thought I could hear these prophetic words from the Son of man. And as I read the accounts of large appropriations made to public works from the license of the liquor traffic, I hear the words of the prophet, " Woe to him that establisheth a city with iniquity." It might help us to walk amid the ruins of Babylon, Nineveh, Tyre and Sidon, with Bible in hand, reading the doom of those cities who refused to honor God. I am no alarmist, but I believe that the God of righteousness reigns, and the city that forgets him, refusing to submit to his law, will sooner or later meet the doom of the disobedient. But Jesus was not content simply to weep Our Cities 125 and warn, he set about remedying the evil. He went into the temple and drove out all those who made it a den of thieves. And while we look about us at existing evils, we are not to spend our time in fruitless tears, or bitter de- nunciation ; we should do something, and the first thing that needs to be done is a thorough cleansing of the church of God. Men who are saints on Sunday and devils during the week ought to be cast out. They are more apt to repent after they have felt the whip of scourges driving them from the temple of purity, than if they were kept in for the sake of their money or influence. If Jesus were here with his whip of scourges, he would drive out the millionaire who attends eccelesiastical conventions and makes big speeches, while he lives in adultery ; he would drive out the man who teaches in the Sunday-school and swears at his clerks during the week ; he would drive out the man who praises God as he sings from his well bound book on Sabbath morning, and during the week pollutes the air with the fumes of rum which he has taken with convivial friends over the saloon counter. He would drive out the wo- man who comes to church on Sunday to show her finery, and spends the week debauching the young by teaching them to gamble in pro- gressive euchre parties. In a word, he would drive out all men and women who are simply 126 Lights and Shadows of American Life whitewashed without being washed white. " Let judgment begin at the house of God." I believe that the real church of Christ was never better and purer than it is to-day, the church within the church that walk with God and do his will. The good is growing better, while the bad is growing worse, on the principle that the gospel is the savor of death unto death or of life unto life. There is more light now in the world than ever before, and those who resist it are made worse under the process. I am not railing against the church of Jesus, but I do contend that thieves, gamblers, adulterers, and corrupters of youth should, if they will not repent, be driven from the courts of God's temple, and, when they are out, honest people will come in. Jesus continued to teach daily in the city. The saloon is at work day and night ; the har- lot is always on the watch ; these mantraps are set every hour. Shall Christians be con- tent to open their churches for a pleasant ser- vice only once or twice a week, while the ser- vants of the Devil are at their nefarious busi- ness every day ? We need a revival of seven days' religion, not less of Sunday worship, but more of week-day work for Christ. The McAll Mission had never been heard of as a success if it had not preached the gospel every day in the halls of Paris. The Salvation Army Our Cities 127 has done a mighty work by keeping at it all the time. While we work with Christ for the salvation of the cities of earth, let us remember he is preparing for us a city. He said, " I go to pre- pare a place for you," and we learn that heaven is a redeemed municipality. The imagery of the Bible is suggestive of purity, — streets of gold, gates of pearls, walls of Jasper; " It has, no need of the sun, for the Lamb is the light thereof." The time is coming when there will be in the universe one great city, and one other place which has no characteristics of city life. Heaven has streets ; hell is represented as a lake of fire, tempest-tossed. There is no order there. Sin is anarchy. We have the choice between the city of order and light and the place of disorder and darkness : " Choose I must, and soon must choose Holiness, or heaven lose; While what heaven loves, I hate, Shut for me is heaven's gate. "Endless sin means endless woe; Into endless sin I go, If my soul, from reason rent, Takes from sin its final bent. " As the stream its channel grooves, And within that channel moves, So doth habit's deepest tide Groove its bed, and there abide. 128 Lights and Shadows of American Life " Light obeyed increaseth light, Light resisted bringeth night ; Who shall give me will to choose, If the love of light I lose ? " Speed, my soul ; this instant yield ; Let the Light its scepter wield, While thy God prolongeth grace. Haste thee toward his holy face 1 ^ IX OUR BIBLE " Thou truest friend man ever knew. Thy cons ta f icy Ih'e tried ; When all were false ^ I found thee true, My cou?isellor and guide. The mities of earth no treasures give That could this volume buy ; In teaching me the way to live. It taught me how to die." Morris, IX OUR BIBLE " The Word of Godr Hebrews 4. : 12. The Bible never casts a shadow. Its truth is light and life. Christian civilization owes its development to the Bible. It is translated into almost every language on earth, and by this linguistic intercourse of nations, commerce and arts and sciences have been promoted. Only the missionary who laid himself on God's altar as a sacrifice was willing to spend his life in mastering dif^cult foreign languages that he might translate the Bible into them, and carry the Word of Life to the people. The missionary has thus brought the ends of the earth together, and made possible the great commercial advances of modern times. When an Indian chief asked Queen Victoria what was the secret of England's greatness, she quietly handed him a Bible. The old Book is unique. Like Goliath's sword there is none like it. As in a composite flower there are many perfect flowers in one, 131 132 Lights and Shadows of American Life so in the Bible there are many books. It is really a collection of sixty-six volumes, a whole library between two covers. It was about 1500 years in growing. Its authors differed in language, nationality, and surroundings. There were among them shepherds, kings, priests, mechanics, fishermen, physicians, theologians, and law makers. Some were learned, others illiterate. While the personality of the different authors is clearly seen, it has a style of its own. Stand- ing on the top of the Rocky Mountains with a conch-shell to your ear, you can hear the roar of the ocean ; so the Bible carries with it everywhere the surf sounds of the ocean of God's thought and power and love. It teaches from beginning to end the fact of one God. Where did the writers get this idea? Certainly not from the nations about them, Herodotus informs us that 500 B. C. there were in Egypt more gods than men. In India not less than 300,000,000 of false deities. The Persians worshiped almost everything associated with light or fire. The fields, groves, and cities of Greece were full of im- aginary deities, and yet all these writers for 1500 years taught that there was only one God. There runs through the whole Bible a unity of purpose. We see it first of all in the curse upon Our Bible 133 the serpent in Genesis, and like the rising sun it grows brighter and brighter till the perfect day of the New Testament. Its purpose is to reveal God in Christ Jesus. With this bright rev- elation of Jesus the Saviour there is a dark revelation of man the sinner. The infidel in- forms us that there are parts of the Bible which ought not to be read in public. Yes, friend, and there are parts of you that ought not to be read in public. The old Book has no prudery, it speaks out, and has something to say to the daughter which the mother can scarcely whisper. It has a word to the son which the father would not venture to utter. It is a book, not for the crowd, but for the individual. More than four thousand times God signs his name to this book as his very word. Begin with Genesis and read through Revelation, and you will find that books, chapters, paragraphs, verses and words bear the signature of God. " Thus said the Lord," rings through it. " Hear the Word of the Lord." " The Holy Ghost spake by the mouth of David." " The proph- ecy came not in old time by the will of men, but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." "All Scripture is God breathed." " Of course there are utter- ances in the Bible which are not inspired. I would not preach from the words of the devil, 134 Lights and Shadows of American Life except to condemn them, but the fact that the devil said just those things is inspired. God is responsible for everything in the book. It is as clear as light that the authors of these books claimed that they were inspired. If they were not, then we have to explain how the book which contains the highest morality ever given to earth could be written by a set of liars. These bad men at the same time wrote their own doom, for no vice is more severely condemned in the Bible than decep- tion. To claim that good men wrote the Bible, and deny its inspiration, is like the claim that Christ was a good man while he pretended to be what he was not. Either assumption is a sword which pierces through the opponents of in- spiration. The Book was certainly written in its human aspects by good men or bad men. If good men wrote it, claiming inspiration, it is true ; if bad men wrote it, we have the spectacle of the best book in the world written by the worst men, who at the same time de- nounce themselves most pitilessly. About 250 years before Christ the Old Tes- tament was translated from the Hebrew into Greek by seventy men, and for that reason the translation is called the Septuagint. This trans- lation enables us to trace the history of the book back through the ages, and silences the infidel who would claim that it is of recent origin. Our Bible 135 There are, so far as we know, no original manu- scripts, and for a good reason. Jesus was careful to wipe away every vestige of his footprints on earth. The traveler as he goes through Pales- tine cannot be certain that he is standing just where Jesus once stood. He knew our tendency to worship places and things, and if an original manuscript in the handwriting of Paul or Peter were discovered, many would be inclined to worship it. It would be placed in holy shrines, and superstitious people would bow before it. God, therefore, in his wise providence, de- stroyed the original copy, but has left us more than 2,000 manuscripts copied by different hands in different ages and different places, and yet so nearly identical that not a single great fact or doctrine is affected by their differ- ences. As I looked upon the manuscript in the British Museum and compared it with other books, known to have been written hundreds of )^ears later, its pure whiteness and distinct lettering, compared with their faded and blurred appearance, impressed me with the conviction that the very angels of God must have watched over it and protected it. Amid political and social earthquakes, that have swallowed up na- tions and institutions, this manuscript has been preserved in its original purity. And as I gazed through the glass upon another manu- 136 Lights and Shadows of American Life script in the Vatican at Rome, I had the same feehng. God surely has exercised peculiar care over his written revelation. As history, the Bible gives the record of events which can be found in no other book. It begins with creation and ends with the con- summation of all things. Its first words, " In the beginning, God," is an explanation of the material universe, and if you would know the beginning of the family, the Sabbath, of sin and crime, of the diversity of languages, of the rise and fall of ancient cities, you have but to read this wonderful library. And there are many things in the book which antedate the discoveries of modern science. Before the world ever heard of Copernicus and Newton, Isaiah wrote of " the circle of the heavens," and Job said, " He stretcheth out the North over empty space, and hangeth the world upon nothing." At least 3000 years before geology as a science was born, Moses gave the order of creation and development. The Book was not intended to teach science, but all of its scien- tific references I verily believe, if properly interpreted, are up to date, and will continue to be up to date if the world should last and grow in knowledge a thousand years longer. As poetry, the Bible has no rival. It is a supernatural book from beginning to end, and there can be no real poetry without a belief in Our Bible 137 the supernatural. George Eliot wrote good enough novels, but reading her poetry is like eating dry bones. If you would feel the fire and mount upon the wings of poetry, you must read Longfellow, Whittier, Milton, Shake- speare, and other great poets who believed the Bible and echoed its noble sentiments. If you would hear music from master-minds you must listen to Beethoven, Handel, Mozart, Mendel- sohn, who drank their inspiration from Biblical fountains. The most fascinating part of the Bible, how- ever, is its prophecies. Hundreds of years before events took place they were foretold, and hundreds of years before men were born their names were given and their biographies carefully written. The place of Christ's birth, over which he could have no control, his char- acter and reception by the people, the manner of his death, the dividing of his garments, piercing of his body, the kind of companions he would have in death, all these and more are given with minute distinctness. How can we account for it ? By simply accepting the fact that the God who moved men to write the book could see ahead and tell what was coming to pass, and that he moved them to write what, as mere men, they could not possibly have known. Jesus, whose biography was thus pre-writteii 138 Lights and Shadows of American Life by the prophets, is himself a prophet, and tells his disciples that certain things shall come to pass, while they could see no indications of their approach. He declared that Jerusalem should be destroyed, and you read in Josephus the fearful fulfilment of that prophecy. The prophet Isaiah wrote the doom of Babylon while she was still in her glory. He declared that it should never be inhabited, that no Ara- bian would ever pitch his tent there, that only the wild beasts of the forest should dwell in it, and this prophecy has been literally fulfilled. No traveler has ever yet been able by bribery to induce his Bedouin guide to spend a night among the ruins of Babylon. The prophet Nahum declared that Nineveh, then in her glory, should be destroyed by fire and water. The historic fact is that, after the swollen river had washed away a part of the wall, the be- siegers rushed through the breach and set the city on fire. Tyre, the Liverpool of ancient times, the queen of the seas, had her doom written for her while there were no signs of decay. God said, through Ezekiel, " I will also scrape her dust from her, and make her like the top of a rock ; " and again, " thou shalt be a place to spread nets upon." Such is the proph- ecy. Here is the history written by Volney, the infidel : " The whole village of Tyre con- tains only fifty or sixty poor famiHes, who live Our Bible 139 obscurely upon the produce of their little ground and a trifling fishery." A traveler informs us that, while he was standing on the site of old Tyre, at the approach of evening he saw the fishermen pull their nets out of the water and spread them upon the bare rock to dry. He took out his Bible and read with deep emotion the prophecy of Ezekiel, whose fulfilment he had just seen. And Ezekiel prophesied of Egypt : " It shall be the basest of kingdoms." No one to-day denies the truth of that prophecy, and it was written when Egypt was at the climax of her glory — the England of her time. Every Jew among us is a living fulfilment of prophecy. More than one prophet declared that they should be scattered among the nations ; despised and persecuted, yet remain distinct. As we look into each other's faces we cannot tell whether our forefathers were English, German, Scotch, Irish, French, or Scandinavian, but I am quite sure that we can tell whether they were Jews. The Jew re- mains a Jew. In China he tried to become a Chinaman by adopting Chinese customs and wearing the pig-tail, but a Jew with a pig-tail is a Jew still. Millionaires, like Baron Hirsch, may advocate their mingling with the Gentiles, but all their persuasion only makes the average Jew more determined to remain distinct. 140 Lights and Shadows of American Life In Hartford, Connecticut, I attended a Satur- day service in the Jewish synagogue. There were business men by the score who had left their banks, stores, and factories at the busiest hour of the day to worship on the Sab- bath of their forefathers. As I sat there and listened to the mumbling of the Rabbi, recit- ing the Hebrew Scriptures, I did not know what he said, but I did know that his presence and that of his congregation were the fulfil- ment of prophecy written more than three thousand years ago. Frederick the Great asked a learned man to give him in one sentence a good reason for his faith in Christianity, and his reply was, " The Jews, your majesty." But we need always to remember that the Bible is a very practical book and no one can add to its moral code. When the infidel speaks against it, ask him for some improvement upon the ethics of the Bible, and you will find him speechless, if he be an honest man. He may prate about the bad character of some whose biographies are given in the Bible, but he knows that the morals of the book condemn everything that is bad. A man and his wife were sitting in their quiet parlor, she busy with her magazine and he with curious interest reading a Bible which he had picked up. " Wife," said he, ** if this book is right, we are wrong." She dropped her magazine and gazed at him Our Bible 141 curiously, and then resumed her reading. After a few minutes he said, a little more earn- estly, " Wife, if this book is right, we are lost," and she stopped to talk with him over that fact and then resumed her reading. After reading more carefully the precious volume for a half hour longer he looked up and said, with a tear in his voice, " Wife, if this book is right we may be saved." Read the Bible, friend, and it will tell you where you are wrong, why you are lost, and the blessed fact that you may be saved. It reveals in Jesus Christ the ful- ness of God's love and sympathy and mercy. It is the book that will comfort you when you are in sorrow, that will strengthen you in weak- ness, will guide you in perplexity, will cheer you in sadness, and when you come to die will shine upon the future and reveal to you the golden gates of the paradise of God. Throw the whole weight of your weakness and sin upon its promises and they are strong enough to hold you. X OUR CHURCHES " Clad in a robe of pure and spotless white, The youthful bride with timid steps comes forth To greet the hand to 7c>hich she plights her troth, Her soft eyes radiant with strange delight. The snowy veil which circles her around, Shades the sweet face from every gazer'' s eye. And thus enwrapt, she passes calmly by Nor casts a look but on the unconscious ground. So should the Church the bride elect of Heaven — Remembering whom she goeth forth to meet And with a truth that cannot brook deceit Holding the faith which u?ito her is given — Pass through this world which claims her for awhile Nor cast about her longing look nor smile.'''' Mrs. Neal. X OUR CHURCHES " He that hath aii ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches. ^^ Revelation 2 : ii. The church is the most important institution in the world. It was founded by our Lord Jesus Christ, who said : " On this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." The gates of hell have prevailed against governments that were flour- ishing in the time of Christ. They are known now only by name, and we walk with sadness amid their ruins. But the church still stands, and will continue to stand, for it is God's build- ing. When the lodge or the club conflicts with the interests of the church, the true Christian will let the lodge or the club go, while he clings to the church of Christ. If the lodge meeting is on the night of the prayer-meeting, your place is in the prayer-meeting. And if the club supports a saloon you have no right to lend your influence or your presence to it. We should be set against whatever influence or insititution is the enemy of the church. 10 145 146 Lights and Shadows of American Life In the seven churches of Asia we have pic- tures of the churches of to-day, and it is our purpose to listen to the message of the Spirit which comes to us through them. I. There is the backslidden church at Eph- esus. It was orthodox in creed and deed. The Spirit says of them " thou canst not bear them which are evil : and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars." But it was orthodoxy on ice. Opposition to the evil was so intense that enthusiasm for the good was frozen. They were ecclesiastical warriors, they believed in trials for heresy, and pursued the heretic with relentless faithfulness. They hated the deeds of the Nicolaitanes, but they failed to love the Nicolaitanes themselves. " I have somewhat against thee," says the Spirit, " because thou hast left thy first love." It is well to hate wickedness and error, but when this hatred dries up our love for the wicked and the erring we have backslidden. God hates evil, but he is love. While we hate sin we should love sinners, and nothing in the church of Christ can take the place of love. II. The rich, poor church in Smyrna. " I know thy poverty, but thou art rich." It seems to have been a sort of down-town church, from which the wealthy members had moved to the suburbs. It was surrounded by organized Our Churches 147 opposition. It was next door to " the syna- gogue of Satan." It walked in the furnace of martyrdom, and God gave to them what seemed to be a gloomy promise that the Devil should cast some of them into prison, and they should have tribulation even unto death. There is a poverty of wealth, and a wealth of poverty. This church had the wealth of poverty, poor in purse, but rich in grace. Its treasures were in heaven, and best of all the living Christ was with them. To the frightened sailors in the storm the conqueror of Gaul said, " Fear not, you carry Caesar." Wind and wave cared little for Cae- sar, but Jesus is the Master of the storm, and he says: "Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer." Like garments made of asbestos, you are to be cleansed in the fire. There is many a church like this to-day, its members struggling with poverty and persecu- tion, while their characters are the vaults in which God keeps treasures that delight his heart. Ill, The compromising church at Pergamos. There were faithful martyrs among its mem- bers, men who were willing to give up their lives rather than deny the faith of Christ. At the same time there were among them those who " held the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balac to cast a stumbling-block before the 148 Lights and Shadows of American Life children of Lsrael, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit fornication." The pastor of this church seemed to believe in a mixed membership of believers and unbelievers, gnos- tics and agnostics, good and bad. He had great respect for the character of the faithful, but he would not refuse to the Balaamites the privilege of believing and acting as they pleased. It was the paradise of the Nicolaitanes, who believed that the church should be married to the world. The tendency of the times to- day is to syndicate. We have syndicates of oil, leather, coal, almost everything under the sun. The parliament of religions at Chi- cago was an attempt to syndicate Christianity and paganism. There are some, it seems, who would syndicate earth, heaven and hell, and put God and Satan, angels and demons, good men and bad on the same footing. A good deacon of mine, in a former charge, declared that the Lord was binding things in bundles to burn them. Whether that be true or not, we are certain that light can have no fellowship v/ith darkness, nor health with disease, nor righteousness with sin, nor truth with falsehood. In the beginning God divided the light from the darkness, and he has been in this dividing business ever since. He will continue it until finally there will be only two worlds, one of light and one of darkness. The Our Churches 149 church of Christ is a called-out, separated, consecrated people, " in the world but not of it," and when we drag down the church to the level of the world, instead of lifting the world to the level of the church, we are doing the work of Satan rather than of God. IV. The erring woman's church at Thyatira. It seems to have been ruled and ruined by a woman named Jezebel, who called herself a prophetess, teaching and practicing the most abominable things. Now woman is usually an angel of light or a demon of darkness. Pure water is good, but when it stagnates it fills the air with malaria and death. Woman is apt to be the best or the worst. She is nearly always aggressively good or bad. When she is good she is very good, but when she is bad, she is awfully bad. A good woman in the church is an angel of loving ministry ; her sympathy, her prayers, her testimony, her character, her patient persistence, her purity, are powers for God. But a proud, worldly, pleasure-seeking woman who wears her religion as she does her diamonds, for show, can do an immense amount of harm, God be praised forthe Phoebes who are the true servants of the church. Let her testify and pray and expound the Scriptures, filling the large sphere in the church to which God has called her, while she sits as queen in the home. 150 Lights and Shadows of American Life The fact that the Scriptures do not provide for her ordination to the ministry does not contract her sphere, while it harmonizes with the fitness of things, but the Lord have mercy upon the church when Jezebel leads and rules. By her refined subtleties of sophistry the bad will appear good, error will look like truth, poison will taste like food, vice will resemble virtue, and imagination will seem to be solid reality. It is a noteworthy fact that the three great modern apostacies took their rise in the brain and influence of woman. Spiritualism came from the Fox sisters, and has grown more cor- rupt and corrupting. No spiritualist acknowl- edges the Divinity of Christ. Foolish table rappings are put on a par with the revelation of God. Whatever in it is not fraud, delusion, and deception seems to be the activity of demons whose mission of darkness to this world is to assist in the overthrow of the kingdom of God. " Christian Science " was founded by a woman. To say that it is neither Christian nor science is to speak the sober truth. Its claim that there is no reality of sin or Satan, and that therefore the atonement of Christ is not needed, is proof enough that it is not Christian. Its claim that material things are illusions, and the only reality is the Divine mind, is proof Our Churches 151 enough again that it is not scientific. If you have the headache, in the first place you have no head, and in the next place there is, of course, no ache. Convince yourself that you are without a head and without an ache, and then you are well. I have read some of their books, and having studied it quite thoroughly the definition of Christian science which has formulated in my mind is this : It is the art of making sensible people feel and act as if they were deranged. Only a woman of culture, hailing from Boston, could have founded and made popular such a refinement of folly. Theosophy comes to us in modern guise from the brain of Madame Blavatsky, Its head- quarters is in Thibet, the one country the gospel has not yet reached. Its mahatmas come through the air from this pagan stronghold to teach the followers of their prophetess. One of them presents a handkerchief to Colonel Olcott of New York, with his initials in the corner. Another relieves the embarrassment of a picnic party by showing a cup and saucer hidden under the root of a tree which matches precisely with the other cups and saucers of the party. Men that seem to have sense about other things are duped by this foolery, while they rail against the miraculous in the Bible. It is really the revival of an effete paganism which has been dead and buried in its native land for hundreds 152 Lights and Shadows of American Life of years. Only a woman could have unearthed its corpse, and with her gentle, delicate touch have painted it into the resemblance of life. God be praised for the good movements that have been led by women, assisted and encour- aged by their godly husbands, brothers, and friends, but the Devil only is to be thanked for these three great departures from the faith. V. The merely nominal church at Sardis. It had a name to live but was dead. Very active with many kinds of organization. There was doubtless scarcely any need for the theater in Sardis, for this church furnished theatrical per- formances for the people. It had big concerts, big fairs, big socials, and little prayer meetings. The services held for the salvation of lost souls were not popular. Evangelism was dead. There may have been a gorgeous ritual, artistic singing, rhetorical preaching, a splendid display, but no real life, simply a galvanized corpse — powdered and painted death. I leave you to say whether such churches exist to-day. VI. The faithful church at Philadelphia. The Spirit has no word of criticism. Before them is an open door, and they are entering it. With little strength they have depended upon God and obeyed His Word. The Synagogue of Satan has been compelled to acknowledge their supremacy. Their activity proceeds from spir- itual life within. Their meetings for praise and Our Churches 153 prayer are full, the gospel is believed and honored by pulpit and pew. Their name ex- presses the fellowship which prevails. It is truly a church of brotherly love. Such a church is like the sun in the heavens, it cannot be hid. VII. The half-hearted church at Laodicea. They are lukewarm, neither cold nor hot. God is disgusted with them. If there is nothing in Christianity, it deserves our opposition, and we should be hot against it. If there is anything in Christianity, there is everything, and we should be hot for it. There is no room for half-heart- edness, no neutral ground, no excuse for indiffer- ence. This church at Laodicea felt rich, plenty of money, good social position, fine organiza- tion. There was just one thing lacking, Christ was on the outside, " Behold, I stand at the door and knock." It was Christianity without Christ. I wish that I could give you the substance and spirit of a sermon I once heard a black man of the South preach on this text : " Behold I stand at the door and knock." Every sentence had broken grammar, but good religion in bad grammar is very much better than bad religion in good grammar, and we cared very little for his grammar while we listened to his fervent thought and earnest appeal. " There are two sides to this subject," he said, " first, the out- side, and, second, the inside. Firstly, Jesus is 154 Lights and Shadows of American Life on the outside knocking, and you are on the inside holding the door, with your hand on the bolt. He knocks, you hold. There is coming a time when you will be on the outside and Jesus on the inside and while you knock, he will hold. Open the door, brethren, and let him in, that he may open the door then and let you in, for unless he enters your heart and sups with you here, you will not be prepared to enter his heaven and sup with him there." The cure for half-heartedness is the presence and fellowship of Jesus Christ. The church is his. Let him administer through the Holy Spirit its affairs. Let us put him in the place of honor, crowned, sceptered, and enthroned. By his presence every evil will be cast out, all disorder will be cured, and the glory of heaven will have begun. XI OUR DANGERS •' We are afflicted with the had citizenship of good men.^'' " A New York brewer said : The church people can drive us and we k?iow it. Our hope is in workifig after they grotv tired and cotitinuing to work three hundred and sixtyfive days in the year." " This new social ideal is little more fhafi a millennimn of Christian co7nfort. It needs to be elevated, illuminated, and glorified by Christ's social ideal. It is quite possible for Society to be at the same time ivell housed, well fed, 7vell clothed^ well educated, and well rotted.''' Strong. XI OUR DANGERS " Righteoiisjiess exalleth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.^'' Proverbs 14. :J4. Whatever in national life makes people better is an element of safety, and whatever makes people worse is an element of danger. Righteousness is light ; sin is shadow. As righteousness prevails, the nation is safe ; as sin prevails, the nation is in danger. The form of sin that threatens our very national existence is selfishness. Corporations that have in view simply money-getting, with- out regard to the rights of others, are a national menace, and cast a shadow upon our institu- tions. As with corporations which represent immense capital, so with organizations which represent large numbers of men. An organi- zation can be as selfish as a corporation. The organization which has in view simply its own advancement, without regard to the rights of others, is as great a danger as a corporation cursed with the same spirit of self-seeking. 157 158 Lights and Shadows of American Life The drink-habit is another danger that threatens destruction of body, mind, and home. In our fight for legal prohibition, and it has been none too strong, we have forgotten to instruct the young as to the evils of tippling. It is an alarming fact that the decanter is taking its place on the sideboard, and the wine glass on the table. The Washingtonian movement drove the demijohn from the home to the street corner, — a better place for it, but it threatens to return to the home and do its dastardly work among the women and children. Americans plead for liberty. Our forefathers died for it, and the liberty which we have gained is in danger of rotting into license. In the prison of Chillon there is a deep dark shaft into which prisoners once fell to their death. The keeper would take them out into the dark corridor, shout to them that they were free, and urge them to take their liberty. As they rushed for the outside, they fell into this shaft, and were crushed to pieces. So this watchword of personal liberty may lead many a one to fall into the shaft of drunkenness, where body, mind, and morals, are destroyed. But a greater danger even than the liquor habit is the organized liquor traffic. Carlos Martin in his book *' Christian Citizenship, " gives the following facts. There are engaged in the liquor traffic of this country 1,397,500, all Our Dangers 159 males and voters. They run 200,000 saloons. Capital is directly invested to the amount of one thousand millions, and another one thou- sand millions indirectly interested. The liquor bill of the United States is one thousand millions. There goes up in tobacco smoke another six hundred millions. We spend for clothes and for meat, three hundred millions, each, for shoes tv,-o hundred millions, one hundred millions for schools, and the pitiful sum of five millions for foreign missions. This liquor traffic sends to the penitentiary 40,000 men and women every year, and distributes through the country its annual quota of 319,000 idiots. In the territor}- from Maine to Pennsylvania there is one liquor dealer for every 64 voters. From Delaware to Florida one liquor dealer for every 117 voters. From Ohio to Kansas one for every 70 voters. From Kentucky to Arkansas one to every 105 voters. From Montana to California one to ever>' 39 voters. So that we have an average for the United States of one liquor dealer to about everj' 80 voters. And these liquor dealers are organized. In solid phalanx they move together. Tem- perance people are divided, but they are a unit. They stand ready to use their voice, their money, and their votes for the support of their traffic. And v.-hen we remember that i6o Lights and Shadows of American Life this great liquor interest is controlled to a large extent by foreign capital, while three-fourths of the brewers and maltsters in this country are of foreign birth, the danger to our institutions is increased. It has been truly said, and ought to be echoed over the land, unless this govern- ment destroys the liquor traffic, the liquor traffic will sooner or later destroy the govern- ment. Another danger is the importation of foreign ideas. I do not fear numbers from immigra- tion. This country is big enough to hold and support most of the world, and because a man is poor he ought not to be pushed back into the hold of a ship and returned to his grinding poverty and oppression. If he is honest and industrious, let him have a chance in this free air, and on these broad acres. Not numbers, but the ideas that they bring, endanger our institutions. First of all, I would ask a man who lands on Ellis Island : Do you believe in the American ballot box, in rule by the majority? If he says, No, I would tell him to go home and live among those that hold such views, where his company will be congenial. I would ask. Do you believe in the American schoolhouse? If he replies. No, I would advise him to return to the land of ignorance from which he came, and enjoy it the rest of his life. I would ask, Our Dangers i6i again : Do you believe in the American Sabbath? Here the Sabbath is not a holiday, but a holy day. It has the attractive features of the Sabbath given us by the Bible, and brought with the pilgrims to Plymouth Rock. On this day the working man has a right to rest, the Christian a right to worship ; the wheels of machinery stop, and our country pauses to think of God. If he says, I do not believe in such a Sabbath, but in a day of beer drinking, carousing, business and frolic, I should inform him that he can be better accommodated on the other side of the ocean. He is not needed here. He will be a discord amid the harmonies of our beloved land. Paris gives the fashion in dress to the world, and it is a sad fact that she is giving the fash- ion in immorality to many of our great cities. A leading editor lives in Paris and runs a per- sonal column in his New York paper, which makes it unfit to enter a decent home. I have heard of two families which have been wrecked through this nastiest piece of journalism. The black carriage on the streets of Paris, which Frances Willard denounced, has been threatening to come to America. It means over there that prostitution is legal, that wo^ men have the right to sell their virtue, and men the legal right to trade in their shame. If we would be safe as individuals, and as a II 1 62 Lights and Shadows of American Life nation, we should erect a barrier as high as heaven against this flood of filth. Infidelity is another danger which Ameri- cans may well fear. This government is founded upon the truths taught by Christi- anity. The pilgrims landed on their knees. A republican democracy was organized after the manner of the first Congregational Church founded at Plymouth and Salem. Take Bible principles out of our institutions, and you have left a carcass or a skeleton. Lifidelity, by re- jecting the authority of God's law, weakens respect for all law. Go to a meeting of the wide-mouthed anarchists who fume out their sulphurous exhalations against marriage, the state, the church, the Sabbath, and everything which we deem holy, and you will find that every man of them is an infidel. A few years ago the champion infidel of this country headed a movement of the smut- dealers in favor of repealing what is known as the Comstock laws against sending obscene lit- erature and pictures through the United States mails. He lent his influence and eloquence, so far as he could, to the opening of the gates which would let this flood of moral filth into the homes and schools of our land. The enemy to be feared more than the guns of foreign nations is the spirit that rejects the Bible, ridicules the church, scorns to worship, Our Dangers 163 recommends suicide, and gives free rein to all sorts of indulgence. Patriotism should prompt us to be Christians, for Christianity makes men righteous, and thus exalts our nation. Every man who loves his flag should love the Bible and the cross, for without the civilization which has come to us through the Bible and the cross of Christ, the flag would mean nothing. The only safeguard against the dangers we have mentioned, and the only remedy for the evils that exist, is the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, If that is preached, and believed, and lived we will have a righteous people : if that is denied and rejected and scorned, we can ex- pect nothing but anarchy and ruin. Valen- tine Burke, a notorious thief and burglar, with hardened features, enters a meeting where Mr. Moody is preaching. He hears of One mighty to save ; he repents of his sins, and turns to God. He confesses Jesus Christ as his Sav- iour, and becomes an honest man the rest of his life. The problem as to what should be done with criminals, in his case, is settled once for all. Let Jesus into a man's heart and there is no longer a criminal to deal with. A poor drunkard with delirium tremens is on his way down Water Street, to throw him- self into the East River. Dismissed fourteen times from the United States Navy for chronic 164 Lights and Shadows of American Life alcoholism he has despaired, and thinks that the best thing he can do is to destroy himself. He sees a light above a transom, and hears floating through the light the words : " There is a fountain filled with blood, Drawn from Immanuel's veins, And sinners plunged beneath that flood Lose all their guilty stains." He halted, and said to himself : " These are the words my mother used to sing to me when a boy. I Avill go in and listen a moment." Sitting down in his drunken stupor he heard redeemed men tell how they were saved by the grace of God. Jerry McAuley rose and invited those who wished to be saved from their sins to come forward and kneel at the bench. To use his own expressive language " I staggered up against the cross of Christ, the blood fell upon me, and washed my soul whiter than snow." From that day to this, and it has been over five years, this man, now a preacher of the gospel, has been working for the uplifting of his fallen brother. The problem of drunken- ness, you see, is settled. Let Christ into the soul, and he will cither destroy the appetite, or give strength to overcome. On the title-page of a little book written by Mrs. Whittemorc of the Door- of Hope, New York, are two faces, one of them wrinkled, sour Our Dangers 165 and hard, the other with an expression of ineffable sweetness, gentleness and purity. These faces belong to the same person, yet not the same, and the photographs were taken only one year apart. " Blue Bird," the denizen of the slums in New York, comes to this Door of Hope in her degraded condition, hears of Jesus, trusts him, loves him, begins to tell others about him, and before she died was a model of virtue, an enthusiastic worker for the uplifting of her fallen sisters. So here the problem of prostitution is settled. Take Christ into the heart of a man or woman, and a pure life will be the result. But, after all, the whole matter rests with the individual. Men cannot be saved by whole- sale. God became man in the person of Jesus Christ, and as a man he pleads with us. ** Son, give me thy heart." We may form our social- istic schemes, but they will not work without a righteous people. Laws for the government of sheep cannot be applied to wolves and tigers. The tiger and the wolf must be transformed in- to the sheep, and then the socialistic economy meant for sheep will work well. Every man must open his heart, and let Christ come in and reign. In the picture of Holman Hunt, which represents Jesus standing at the door and knocking, you will notice there is no latch on the outside, no knob by which Christ can enter. i66 Lights and Shadows of American Life The latch and the key are on the inside. The lesson taught is practical and pointed. Even God himself will not break down the door, we must lift the latch of our will, and let him in, if we would have him to occupy our heart house. Lift the latch, and the entrance of Jesus will be the entrance of light and life. XII OUR WOMEN " To be man's tender mate was woman horn — Andy in obeying nature, she best serves The purposes of Heaven." Schiller, " The drying up a single tear has more Of honest fame than shedding seas of gore." Byroji. " Nature made thee To temper man ; we had been brutes without thee." Otway. XII OUR WOMEN " Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy." Acts 2 : 17. " The head of every man is Christ; a?td the head of the woman is the man." i Corinthians 11 :j. '■^ I permit not a womaft to teach, nor to have dominion over a man." I Timothy 2 : 12. " Let the women keep silence in the churches ; for it is not permitted unto them to speak." i Corinthians 14 :J4. " And coming up at that very hour she gave thanks unto God, and spake of hitn to all theni that tvere looking for the redemption of ferusalem" Luke 2 :j8. " These all with one accord con- tinued stedfastly in prayer, with the women, * * * and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance." Acts 1 : 14 and 2 : 4. The words of the prophet Joel quoted by Peter at Pentecost " Your sons and daughters 169 I/O Lights and Shadows of American Life shall prophesy," are the emancipation procla- mation for women. It is her charter of liberty. Woman in her proper place is always a light ; out of place she is a shadow. The impor- tant question, therefore, is what is her proper place ? Certainly she is in place as a wife in the home. Marriage is the normal state. For certain rea- sons one may remain unmarried. In the emer- gencies of his time Paul advised it, but it is not good that man or woman should be alone. God made her a helpmeet for man, and as such she should ever remain. In the home man is the head, and the wife is the helper. In i Cor- inthians 11:3 we read : " The head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is the man, and the head of Christ is God." The wife bears the relation to the husband that the church bears to Christ, and as Christ bears to God. Four or five times Paul exhorts the wives to be in subjection to their own husbands, and he tells husbands to " love their wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it." This subjection in point of authority does not imply inferiority. The home must have a head, and it is appropriate that man should be that head. God does not believe in two-headed monsters ; they are freaks, and he does not be- lieve in two sources of authority. The hus- band is to give " honor unto the wife as unto the Our Women 171 weaker vessel," and they are to subject them- selves one to another in the love of God," but in matters of authority the man is the normal head of the home. The law said to the wife, " thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee." And Paul said, " I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man." This may not be palatable to some modern thinkers, but it is the teaching of God's word, and for one I believe that God knows more than even modern thinkers. Paul at least intimates that woman fell in Eden be- cause she did not observe this law. " The woman being deceived was in the transgres- sion," and she led the man astray because she acted independently of him. Woman is apt to go right by intuition and wrong by impulse. Man is apt to go right by reason. If Eve, recognizing the headship of Adam, had consulted with him, his reason might have saved her impulse from the fall and all its direful consequences, and from that day to this, when the wife proclaims independence of her husband, she is apt to go wrong. Her intuition needs his reason, and his reason needs her intuition. The one is mentally and morally incomplete without the other. The husband should make great sacrifices for his wife. " A man shall leave his father and his mother and shall cleave unto his wife," but he should never 1/2 Lights and Shadows of American Life sacrifice the position of headship. Charles Wesley gives us the right relation of husband and wife in the words : " Not from his head was woman took. As made her husband to overlook, Not from his feet as one designed, The footstool of the stronger kind, But fashioned for himself a bride, An equal taken from his side, Her place intended to maintain. The mate and glory of the man. To rest as still beneath his arm, Protected by her lord from harm, And never from his heart removed, And only less than God beloved." From this you see that woman is the heart, while man is the head. The heart is not in- ferior to the head, it is just as important a part of the body. Nevertheless the heart is not to be the head, and if the heart by any abnormal power should get out of its place and get into the position of the head, while the head is pushed into the place of the heart, the result would be a monster. And so when woman, the heart and helper, would displace man from his headship, she is striving to make a social monstrosity. But some one asks, What if the husband be a blockhead and too weak to rule? Well, when the head of the body is diseased, the hands and the other members must get along Our Women 173 the best they can, but it is a failure ; it is not normal. As in the home, so in the church, woman's proper place, whether married or unmarried, is as a helpmeet to man. The headship is in him ! the helpship is in her. She can pray and pro- phesy, but both the praying and the prophesy- ing must be done in such away as to recognize the headship of man. Paul urged the Christian women at Corinth to pray and prophesy with their heads covered. He evidently referred to the smaller meeting in which only Christians were apt to be present. For a Grecian woman to appear in public with uncovered head was a badge of bad character. The head of the woman was sometimes shaven as a punishment for nameless sins, and Paul insists that her ap- pearing even in a small assembly with her head uncovered was about equal to her being shorn. It was a shame. In the Grecian city the wives and sisters who rushed out of their homes to meet their husbands and brothers on their return from battle were disgraced by the act, and it was proclaimed as a shame to the city where they lived. In Syria to-day some women would die rather than allow a physician to see their faces, and among the Greeks it was a shame for a woman to let her voice be heard in the public assembly. Only those like Aspasia, the infa- 1/4 Lights and Shadows of American Life mous mistress of Pericles, ever appeared as public speakers or singers. This act caused Paul to write to the Corinthian Church, " Let your women keep silence in the churches : for it is not permitted unto them to speak ; but to be under obedience, as also saith the law. And if they will learn anything let them ask their husbands at home : for it is a shame for women to speak in the church." This evidently does not refer to the business meeting, for the con- text shows that it was a meeting for worship and instruction. And to draw a distinction between the prayer-meeting and the public assembly, contending that the woman must keep silence in the prayer-meeting, while she is permitted to speak in the public assembly, is ludicrously wide of the mark. This 14th chapter of ist Corinthians describes the kind of meeting which the early Christians held. One man never did all the preaching. They came together, " one with a psalm, a doctrine, a tongue, a revelation, or an interpretation." It describes the most public sort of meeting, when believers and unbelievers were expected to be present. In such a meeting as this the woman must not only be veiled, but she must not be heard, for the moment she speaks she is branded as infamous. It is better that her reputation for virtue and obedience should be preserved than that she should prophesy, be- Our Women 175 cause her testimony would be worse than neg- atived by the bad reputation which she would make by speaking. Paul covers the whole subject when he says in the last verse : " Let all things be done decently." Mr. Love, in his little book entitled " St. Paul and Woman," has given us the true inter- pretation : The principle is always the same while customs change. The principle is that woman must maintain her modesty, her virtue, and if married, her loyal subjection to her hus- band. When custom sets aside either of these, let the custom be sacrificed. Take another ex- ample. The command is " Be courteous," and a Christian ought to be polite everywhere. If, however, he goes to China, he will find that when a man wishes to be cordial with another, instead of shaking his hand he shakes his own hand. When a pupil in school desires to be respectful to the teacher, instead of facing the teacher as he would in America, he turns his face to the wall with his back to the teacher. In this country you take off your hat in the presence of ladies to show your respect. In the Orient you would be expected to put on your hat. In this country when a man of em- inence enters the room you rise to honor him ; in the Orient you would sit down, and if he be a high official, his subjects would be expected to ;prostrate themselves. Here we show re- I ']6 Lights and Shadows of American Life spect to ladies by allowing them to enter be- fore us. In the Orient you show the same respect by entering before them. Now, if I were to go to China and should meet Li Hung Chang, I should shake my own hand, if I wished to show him respect. And if I were to send my children to a Chinese school, I should insist on their standing with their faces to the wall while reciting their lessons, and I would certainly keep on my hat as a sign of respect in the presence of dignitaries. Not a particle of principle would I sacrifice, while changing the outward custom. So with feet-washing. Christ washed his disciples' feet, and urged them to do the same. He meant to teach a lesson of deep humility and humble service. But when a friend on a dusty day comes to my house in Brooklyn, I never suggest to him that I would like to wash his feet. That would be an insult rather than a sign of respect. I might, however, suggest that I would black his boots, or do him a ser- vice however menial as a token of my esteem. The principle remains, while the custom changes. And if there be a place on earth to-day where the speaking or singing of a woman in public would mark her as bad, and disloyal to her husband, let her remain silent. It would be a shame for her to speak. Better not even ask questions in public meetings, Our Women 177 asking her husband or guardian at home, rather than disgrace the cause which she loves. Among the Jews the case was very different. Women went unveiled. Certainly Hannah was not veiled in the Temple, for Eli saw her lips moving. Anna, after she had seen the infant Saviour in the Temple, went out and " spake of him to all that looked for redemp- tion in Jerusalem." The woman may have worn some sort of covering over the head as a badge of loyal subjection to her husband, but the oriental veil covering all the head and obstructing speech was not common. On the day of Pentecost the prophecy of the text was certainly fulfilled. We are told in the first chapter of the Acts that " they were all with one accord in one place," and "they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and spake with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance." All of them, men and women, were public preachers. Peter's short sermon was doubtless only the introduction to many sermons like it. In this revival man was the leader and woman the helper ; and all through the New Testament this relation continues. The four daughters of Philip were evangelists. Paul speaks of those " women which labored with me in the gospel." It was the women who first proclaimed the resurrection. Both Priscilla and Aquila were Paul's helpers in 12 178 Lights and Shadows of American Life Christ Jesus, and the woman seems to have had the pre-eminence. The woman of Sa- maria, after she had accepted Christ as a prophet, went into the town and told all the men, and as a result many were brought to Christ. In all church work, however, the principle of man's headship and woman's helpship should be strictly observed. Woman had no ofificial position in the tabernacle and temple services of the Old Testament, and she has no ofificial position in the New Testament church. She ought not to be ordained to the pastorate. When Paul said : " I suffer not a woman to teach," he evidently meant to teach in ofificial capacity, thus usurping authority over the man. Such is the meaning of the word translated teach. But as man's helper she can prophesy " speaking unto men to edification, and ex- hortation, and comfort." (l Corinthians, 14, 3.) Physically, she is not fitted to bear the con- tinual strain and burden of of^cial position. Let it be repeated that this does not imply inferiority on the part of woman. There may have been a thousand men in the Union Army superior to General Grant in many ways, but he was the head and they were the helpers. So there may be women in the church vastly superior to men, but that docs not change the order that man should be the official head, and Our Women 179 woman in every way possible, public and pri- vate, the helper. As in the home and the church, so in the state, man should be the official head, and woman, married or unmarried, the helper. Deborah recognized the headship of Barak when she accepted his invitation to come and lead the army to battle. The plea that it is immodest for a woman to vote is simply sense- less. The one who makes that plea should never cross the Brooklyn Bridge at six o'clock in the evening. Walking in line up to the ballot box, and casting in a little piece of paper, is a very modest and womanly proceeding. My prejudices are all against woman suffrage ; my reasons are all for it. I feel against it, while I am compelled to think for it. The prejudice arises from the surroundings of early life, for I was raised where woman was indeed more highly esteemed than she is in other parts. The chivalry that almost worshiped her had not died out. Even to-day, in that section, a man in a street car is compelled by public sen- timent to rise and give his seat to a lady when she enters. For him to remain seated while she stands, would raise a protest of indignation from every other man in the car. This state of affairs has in it much to the advantage of woman. The new woman in striving to be a man, in i8o Lights and Shadows of American Life the estimation of men, forfeited her right to the consideration which they once gave to her. While she appealed to him for protection he would die for her, now that she has undertaken to protect herself he simply lets her do so with- out interference. By the ballot woman may be the true helpmeet of man and justice demands that she should have it. Taxation without rep- resentation made a revolution in this country over one hundred years ago, and yet we submit to this injustice in the treatment of women without a protest. " What makes you women meddle with politics? " asked Napoleon Bonaparte of Madame De Stael. " Ah, sire," she replied, " so long as you will hang us, we must ask the reason." " Who will take care of the children while you go to the polls ? " was asked of a Christian woman. " The same one who takes care of them," she replied, " when I go to pay my taxes." No one will deny that physically, mentally and morally, woman deserves the ballot. I am aware that 5,200 women in New Eng- land, many of them wives of eminent men, have formed an organization whose object is to pro- test against giving the ballot to women. They claim that the home is the unit of society, and is large enough as woman's sphere. They contend that woman, if she has the ballot, must be prepared to bear arms in defense of it. Our Women i8i They forget, however, that woman with the ballot may still be in the home sphere, for she can protect her home by voting. They forget again that as man's helper woman is able to defend the ballot. What he does with his musket on the battlefield, she does among the wounded in the hospital. Woman's work in helping is as important as man's in fighting. But in the state she should not be an official, any more than in the home or the church. As president, governor, judge, she would be out of place. Think of a woman policeman ! As in the home, the church, and the state, so in great world movements, man should be the head, while woman is the helper. When she declares independence of man, and exults in leadership, she is apt to make wreck. When she goes with man as his helpmeet, she is a great power in the world. Women who love the Bible and worship Jesus Christ cannot think with pleasure of Spiritualism, Christian Science, and Theosophy, three of the greatest apostacies of modern times led by women. The Woman's Christian Temperance Union has done great good, and yet if I had the power, I would to-day rub out the " W," and write in great golden letters, "Christian Temper- ance Union," opening the doors to men as well as women. There should be no great separate 1 82 Lights and Shadows of American Life missionary societies among women. There maybe women's societies in churches provided they are willing to be under the guidance of the pastor and officers, but the moment they declare their independence they forfeit their right to live. Woman's sphere is just as large as man's. Wherever he goes into merchandise, law, medicine, journalism, preaching, indeed any- where, she may go, married or unmarried, without revolting against the official headship of man. But no husband should join an organization that refuses to admit his wife, and no wife should join a society that excludes her husband. No husband should enter a business into which his wife cannot conscientiously go as a helper. " What God hath joined together let not man put asunder." But what every man and woman on earth needs is the Lord Jesus Christ. There is in him all that is womanly and manly. We need no woman to introduce us to him, for he has a heart tenderer than a mother's. Take him into the home, the church, and the state. Let him be the Umpire as to what you should be, as to how you should work and vote, if you would be happy and successful for time and eternity. Xlll OUR DESTINY " I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just. '^ Jefferson. " Whatever makes men good Christians juakes them good citizens.'^ Webster. XIII OUR DESTINY ^'■Watchman, what of the night? The watchman said, The mor?ting Cometh and also the flight." Isaiah 21 : II, 12. Our country is great in its area, its fertility, its mineral resources, its diversity of climate, and its political institutions. There are no autumn leaves like ours. Other countries may excel in ruins, but none can excel this country in the beauty of its scenery. An Englishman standing at the foot of Mount Vesuvius said to an American, " You have in your country no volcanoes like that." " True," replied the American, " but we have a little water-fall that can put out your volcano in three minutes." No water-falls, rivers, and lakes like ours. Our people ought to be better than any others in the world, for we ought to make some return of righteousness to God who has so abundantly blessed us. The practical question, however, is. What is to come of all this? What is to be our des- 185 186 Lights and Shadows of American Life tiny ? When the prophet Isaiah asked the watchman " What of the night ? " the watch- man said, " The morning cometh and also the night." In this chapter we propose to study the relation of the subjects so far discussed to the destiny of our nation, and, as we proceed, we shall try to see whether the morning cometh or the night. I. As to our homes. The home is the fountain of health or disease, of medicine or poison, of purity or impurity. Make the home pure, and the church will be pure. As is the home, so will be the nation. If marriage is holy, husband and wife and children happy, while the divorce-court is hated and avoided as a pestilence, it may be truly said, " The morning cometh." There is a bright future. If, on the other hand, the home is degraded, the marriage tie easily dissolved, if it is made a place of gambling, drinking, and carousing, children neglected, with no respect for parental authority, we may see written in letters of black cloud upon the future of our nation, " The night cometh." II. As to our bread-winners. The working people of this nation are prosperous. There are thousands out of work, to be sure, but even the men without work fare about as well as the workers in India, and other pagan countries. The laborers there are little better off than the Our Destiny 187 paupers here. The destiny of the nation is, to a large extent, in the hands of the wage-earn- ers. Mr. Gladstone is reported to have said some time ago that he regarded the trades unions and the accompanying strikes as the greatest menace to our civilization. He may be right, but organizations of working men are not in themselves evils. They educate, they make men read and think, they cultivate a spirit of fraternity. The danger is that the organization may become a machine, a sort of juggernaut that shall crush out the rights of the individual. If labor organizations obey the golden rule, " Do unto others as you would have them do unto you," and live up to the law of Christ, " Love thy neighbor as thyself," truly " the morning cometh." If, on the other hand, the leaders of these masses of men shall try to force a new social order upon people who are not prepared for it, make laws for lambs which must govern tigers and lions, the night of anarchy and ruin will certainly come. III. As to our money-makers. The rich are certainly growing richer, though it is not true that the poor are growing poorer. Rich men who observe the golden rule, and are permeated by the sentiment of the Scripture, " Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself," are the real friends of the poor. Combinations of capital give us real public improvements. Without it no 1 88 Lights and Shadows of American Life bridges could be erected, no railroads built, no steamship lines established. The outcry against such combinations of capital is as foolish as it is demagogic. Capitalists, like labor organiza- tions, may be a blessing or a curse to the country. If, like the devil-fish, they have only hands for getting and holding, with no hands for giving, they are a curse. If they make money just for the sake of acquiring, and with no unselfish philanthropic purpose, if they oppress the laborer in his wages, and esteem money above man, building up themselves upon the wreck of others, they will do much toward bringing about a national night of adversity. If laborer and capitalist respect the rights of each other, prizing men above machines or money, uniting against their com- mon foe the anarchist, and joining hands in every attempt to improve the condition of the people, then " the morning cometh," pro- phetic of the noonday. IV. As to our boys and girls. The enemy of the school-house is the enemy of this republic. We hear much about manhood suf- frage, and I believe in it, but every human be- ing has not manhood. Ignorance, either black or white, has no right to the ballot-box. No man should vote who cannot read the Con- stitution, and inform himself as to the prin- ciples of our government. He should be made Our Destiny 189 to wait until he learns to read before he ven- tures to assist in governing intelligent people. But education of the head is not sufficient. Universities can breed rascals. Their knowl- edge enables them to make dynamite and form conspiracies against good order. Read- ing, writing, and arithmetic will not transform their character. There must be an education of the heart. A ragged boy from the slums, who attended the public school in a certain place, was asked, if he knew it was wrong to steal. He replied, "No." "Is it wrong to lie?" "No." "Well, then," continued the questioner, " what do they teach you at school ? " " Sums, sir," was the reply. It is well to teach sums, but with that teaching should go the moral instruction which is the foundation of our government. Thieves, liars, and rakes with the ballot box at their com- mand will bring a night of national gloom. To save the children is not only Christian but patriotic. To transform one bad boy into a good man is splendid service to one's country. While " Chinese " Gordon was interested in many important movements, political and social, he kept hanging on the wall of his room a map covered with pins. Every day standing before this map he would move the pins. A friend asked him what that meant ? He replied that each pin designated the place where one of his 190 Lights and Shadows of American Life rescued boys was, some of them on land, others at sea, but he tried to follow each one with his prayers. More important than building up a great organization may be the salvation of some one ragged boy or girl. You may be saving a future Luther or Lincoln. The sal- vation of our boys and girls means the dawn of the morning. Their degradation means the coming of the night. V. As to our amusements. It will be a dark day when we become a pleasure-seeking na- tion. Rome went down in that gulf. The taste of the people, given up to amusing them- selves, became so morbid that they demanded in the arena not acting but reality. No make- believe murder would satisfy them ; it must be real blood and a real victim. The emperors pandered to this depraved taste by filling the circle of the Coliseum with wild beasts. But the blood of animals did not appease the de- mand. There must be the real human gladi- ator, and the crowd gloated upon the scene when Christians were torn to pieces by lions and tigers. This tendency needs always to be guarded against. Those who amuse the peo- ple for pay will go just as far as decent public sentiment will permit. The theater in its spec- tacular obscenity, its pandering to the worst passions, is a corruptor of public morals. The need of the day is a revival of genuine Puri- Our Destiny 191 tanism without its Puritanicalism. The Puri- tans beheved in pleasure that exhilarates and makes healthy and beautiful. They objected to the pleasures that debase and defile. In this they were right, and we need to emulate their virtues. As this nation shall become, if it ever does, a pleasure-seeking people, revelling in scenes of indecency and cruelty, the night of moral decrepitude will gather upon us. But if our amusements are rational and moral, un- bending the strain of work without breaking the stamina of character, they will add to the strength of our people, and hasten the dawn of the morning. VI. As to our Sabbath. Israel as a nation was destroyed because she desecrated the Sab- bath. Sabbath desecration is becoming a national sin, and we need to remember that in the 25th chapter of Matthew, all nations are called before God for judgment. " The wicked shall be turned into hell and all the nations that forget God." Sabbath desecration brings to the individual its train of physical, mental and moral evils, and so to the nation. If God's day is remembered and honored, we will keep our faces toward the sunrise. If it is forgotten and destroyed, we shall march toward the sun- set of departing glory. VII. As to our politics. If the nation is dom- inated by politicians who care only for success 192 Lights and Shadows of American Life and spoils, buying votes and corrupting legis- lators, our destiny will be as dark as midnight. If, on the other hand, we are led by states- men who incarnate principles of righteousness, placing the good of the whole country above partisan victory, we shall continue to be what Bartholdi's statue proclaims, " Liberty enlight- ening the world." Through us to the op- pressed of all nations "the morning cometh." Vin. As to our cities. The city is to be the salvation or the damnation of our civilization. It is the heart that carries out the blood, bad or good, to all the surrounding country. The city saved means the nation saved. If our cities shall be ruled by men of character, the masses evangelized, the atmosphere filled with Christian thought, and its activities dominated by Christian principles, " the morning cometh." But if our cities are to be ruled by spoilsmen and political thugs, the masses demonized by drink, the atmosphere malodorous with in- fidelity, truly " the night cometh." IX. As to our Bible. The Bible is the foun- dation of this republic, and the man who writes or talks against it is the enemy of his country. As the Bible is read, believed, and lived, repub- lican institutions which are founded upon the virtue of the people will flourish. As it is neglected and rejected, tyranny will prevail. The Bible is the promoter of civil and religipus Our Destiny 193 liberty. When Alexander the Great laid siege to a city, he hung up a great lantern which was to burn day and night. As long as that lantern burned, the city might surrender, and the lives of the people would be spared, but as soon as the lantern went out, there should be war to the knife, not one should es- cape alive. The Bible is the lantern which God has hung out from the heavens. While it gives light there is life and safety ; when it goes out there is darkness and death. The attempt to put it out is high treason. The Bible is being read in this country as never before. It is the book of the common people, and for that reason " the morning cometh." The old Book can never be destroyed. In 1793 a red Republican in France said to a Christian, " We are going to tear down your churches and wipe out everything that reminds the people of your God." " Pull down the stars, then," was the reply. The stars of truth that shine in the firmament of God's revelation can never be pulled down by the hands of in- fidelity. X. As to our churches. The real church of Christ was never better than it is to-day. There is a nominal outward church, made up of mere professors and hypocrites, some of whom attend church, while they support in- fidel papers and give help to the enemies of 13 194 Lights and Shadows of American Life Christianity. Now and then one of them dies, leaving in his will the record of his hypocrisy. But in spite of this the church of Jesus is marching on to victory. God is gathering out of the world his own. If the church shall take Christ to the people, and hold before them a high standard of righteousness and spirituality, " the morning cometh." But if, on the other hand, the church goes down to the level of sin and selfishness that prevails, she will lose her power and bring on the night. A holy, sepa- rated, consecrated Christly church is to be the salvation of the nation, XL As to our dangers. I am not pessi- mistic by nature or grace. I delight in keep- ing my face toward the East. To every one of us Christ is the morning star. And yet we must not turn away our eyes from facts. There are dangers which threaten, and they may be averted. In the window of a Salvation Army barrack is the picture of a poor convict with two angels standing above him. One angel is " Love," the other " Hope." They are both seeking to gain his attention, and they are there to uplift and protect him. The man who believes in the love of God may always hope, and if God, by the manifestation of his love in Christ Jesus, can only gain our atten- tion, and draw us to himself by the magnetism of his sacrifice on Calvary, our hearts will be Our Destiny ig5 renewed, and the future made aglow with the dawn of day. XII. As to our women. If wifehood and motherhood are held sacred, woman in the home as the helpmeet of man ; if Christian women shall " prophesy " in the church, pro- claiming to the world what Jesus Christ has done for her, while she leaves to man the bur- dens of of^cial position ; if wifehood, mother- hood, and sisterhood shall be allowed to speak through the ballot for the election of righteous men and the enactment of righteous laws, while women enter every sphere of industrial activity open to men, and receive the same remuneration for the same quality and quantity of work, " the morning cometh." But if loose views of marriage, and easy divorces shall degrade wifehood and destroy the home ; if woman shall neglect to prophesy in her rush for official position in church and state, there will be the confusion and curse which always follows disobedience to God's re- vealed will, and " the night cometh." If what has been said in the foregoing chap- ters fails to reach the individual, and attract his attention to Jesus Christ I have failed in my purpose. The discussion of general prin- ciples is valuable only in so far as they reach the individual. My closing appeal is not to the crowd, to 196 Lights and Shadows of American Life the city, to the state, or the nation, it is to YOU, the individual man, woman, or child. God saves not by wholesale. Each one must for himself come unto personal relation with God through Jesus Christ. By honoring the Son of God in our creed and lives, we do the best possible service to the church, the state, and the world. And, though I would not appeal to a selfish motive, the word of God abides, "Them that honor me, I will honor." When Professor Muller was in Berlin he re- ceived through Humboldt, the scientist, an in- vitation to dine with the Emperor Frederick William IV. The day before the dinner a young lieutenant approached Professor Muller, and laying his hand upon his shoulder said, " We advise you to leave the city within twenty- four hours." " By whose authority ? " asked the professor. " By the authority of the chief of police," replied the lieutenant. "Tell the chief," answered Professor Muller, " that I can- not leave within twenty-four hours, for I must dine with the Emperor to-morrow." That afternoon the Chief of Police called in person to apologize to Professor Muller, and asked him not to mention the conduct of the lieutenant to the Emperor, for it would ruin him. He explained that the police officials had noticed Professor Muller in company with some young students who were known to be enemies of Our Destiny 197 the government and for that reason they had decided to ask him to leave the city, but when they learned that he was the friend of the Emperor all of them stood ready to serve him. 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