^ I t r r 
 
 VllJZATlON 
 
 ■IN CWOGLLEY 
 
 UC-NRLF 
 
 
OF THE 
 
 University of California. 
 
 » 
 
 <iAccession 96|>.4.^ Clms 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
 in 2007 with funding from 
 
 IVIicrosoft Corporation 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/civilizationbyfaOOwoolrich 
 
divdisation bp fattb 
 
 By 
 
 rOHN G. WOOIXEY 
 
 \t 
 
 With portrait of the Author 
 
 COPYRIGHT 1899 BY 
 
 THE CHURCH PRESS 
 CHICAGO U. S. A. 
 
■^C! 
 
 ^^5; 
 
 ^'^^^^■•'P 
 
 irn (P-a.^^ 
 
 Ai^V^ 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Civilization bv Faith 
 Young Men for War 
 The Mercies of God - 
 *%IKE A Tree" - 
 The Ranqe Finder 
 
 96642 
 
 9 
 
 34 
 
 64 
 
 87 
 
 109 
 
TJie Jive speeches here presented were pre- 
 pared for Conventions of the Young PeopWs 
 Christian Union of the United Presbyterian 
 Church. 
 
 Only one of them — ^'The Mercies of God^' — 
 was ever repented. It is printed here from, a 
 newspaper report of the Virgini i Conference 
 of the M. E. Church, South. 
 
 None of them has been revised, though 
 doubtless all of them would be the better for 
 it; but it seems to me that their purpose ivould 
 not be furthered by extra p lish. They have 
 made people think; they may make others. 
 For themselves, they have neither ambition nor 
 hope. Of justification for their present con- 
 spiracy, there is none but this, that they may 
 better serve and better wait. 
 
 Without a formal dedication, which would 
 be presumptuous, I send a blessing and. a 
 cheer to the Society tvhich has been the greatest 
 blessing and, the greatest cheer to me. 
 
 Ch/icago, Jan. 1, 1899. 
 
dmiisation bp f aitb 
 
 "And at midnight, Paul and Silas prayed, and 
 Bang praises unto God; and the prisoners heard 
 them, and suddenly there was a great earthquake, 
 so that the foundations of the prison were shaken, 
 and immediately all the doors were opened, and 
 every one's bands were loosed. And the keeper of 
 the prison awaking out of his sleep, and seeing the 
 prison doors open, he drew out his sword and would 
 have killed himself, supposing that the prisoners 
 had been fled. But Paul cried with a loud voice, 
 saying, Do thyself no harm, for we are all here. 
 Then he called for a light, and sprang in and came 
 trembling, and fell down before Paul and Silas, and 
 brought them out and said. Sirs, what must I do to 
 be saved? And they said. Believe on the Lord Jesus 
 Christ, and thou shalt be saved.'* 
 
 ^T is a strange story, abrupt, inartistic, 
 improbable; the bones of a story — re- 
 ported after the manner of modem 
 stenography, in consonants — omitting 
 all vowel sounds. But one thing stands 
 out plain as a pikestaff, which answers 
 my whole purpose with you tonight, and 
 that is, that these two men, one a great 
 preacher and the other a yoimg business 
 man, traveling with him, were severely 
 tried in a variety of ways in a brief time, 
 yet *pulled together,' and were exactly 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 10 
 
 true to God, their neighbors, and them- 
 selves. 
 
 They were not show people; they had^ 
 even avoided Macedonia., until one of them 
 heard a, clear call thither, and "immedi- 
 ately" they "went with a straight course.*' 
 They were no»t hunting a sensation, they 
 made no business for the bill-^posters of 
 Philippi, but found a quiet prayer-meet- 
 ing' '^out of the city by the riverside,' and 
 "went and sat and spake to the women who 
 resorted thither." But the conversion of 
 Lydia opened to them the doors of good so- 
 ciety, and 'they entered as a matter of 
 course, and began to cut a figure In the 
 place. Then the advertising devil struck 
 them. It was a crazy girl — it would have 
 been a Sunday newspaper now — and they 
 suppressed the whole edition, and so, 
 not oaily lost business, but also won the 
 hiaitred of the news-mongers, who had a 
 *puir with the magistrates and the ear of 
 the croiwd. And they were publicly 
 whipped, and graduated from polite sioci- 
 ety to take a post-graduate course in jail. 
 
 And a.t midnight, with thedr feet in 
 stocks, and their backs raw and bleeding, 
 they prayed and sang. It was fanaticism 
 pure and simple, and ridiculous — or else 
 sublime. 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 
 n 
 And the prisoners heard them, and 
 Withered about the duin.geon grating, &a«y- 
 ing to one another: "Hello! prayer-meet- 
 ing, dnawing-rooim, st^reeit eoTne-r, court, 
 whipping-post, prison pen, Sunday, week- 
 day, mid-day, midnight — all are one to 
 these Christians; whatever foolery tiheir 
 notion is, they stand by it." And so, when 
 the sickening ground-swell of an earth- 
 quiake seit the teeth of the Romaii law to 
 chaittering, and the bolts shrunk back 
 appalled into their sockets, and the hinges 
 dropi^ed their jaws, and the doors gaped, 
 and the stocks let go, and the chains fell 
 off; these prisoners, represeniting the pov- 
 erty, vice, idleness, crime, and the misun- 
 derstood "and oppressed inmocence of the 
 state, with one accord, fell in about the 
 two men of .God who sang in Jail. 
 * * * 
 
 It was a great earthquake. It awoke the 
 night policeman, and in the new experi- 
 ence of being awake on duty he lost his 
 head, and did sundry strange things for a 
 policeman; among other things, got undier 
 cionviction of sin, when he heard the voice 
 of a fanatic — who had tried to introduce 
 Christianity into a country where there 
 had always been pagans and alw^ays would 
 be, and had wasted his influence and 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 J2 
 
 thrown a good thing away — cry out, with 
 
 authority amd power: 'Do thys'elf no harm, 
 
 for we are all here.' — 
 
 * * * 
 
 And when he heard that voice, so clear 
 and strong and steady that it put the roar 
 and panic of the storm at a discount, he 
 forgot that he was an official and remem- 
 bered that he was a man, forgot to worry 
 about the state of public sentiment and 
 began to hunger and thirst after right- 
 eousness for his own soul. And he called 
 for a light and sprang into the prison, 
 himself a prisoner now to a new terror 
 and a new hope, to look into the face of a 
 man who spoke like that at such a time as 
 that. 
 
 And with the weird and glaring flam- 
 beau held aloft, he stood before them, and, 
 betwix*! the midnight and the torchlight, 
 siaw a gleam that never shone to him be- 
 fore, on land or sea; and "the true light" 
 "that" at some time or other "lighteth 
 every man that comethinto the world," was 
 blazing through his soul — ^God's own radi- 
 ant energy, sihining from the faces of two 
 truth-obeying, truth-compelling men. 
 And he sank upon his knees, while anotheir 
 eiarthquake shock shook open every door 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 13 
 
 that -shut him away from liberty, and 
 eried: "What must I do." And they said: 
 **Come, come, this is no time to talk 
 about that. You must not try to bring re- 
 ligion into an earthquake; wait till the 
 storm blows over!" No, they didn't; their 
 faith and truith were earthquake-proof, 
 a<n.d they said simply, without any cir- 
 cumstance, circumlocution, or stilts: *'Be- 
 lieve on the Lard Jesus Christ, a-nd thou 
 Shalt be saved. " 
 
 * * * 
 
 This is the end of the story and the 
 beginning of my speech — every speech of 
 mine, I reckon. I have said it from one 
 end of the land to the other: to young 
 m-en in the glory of their reckless 
 strength; to tempted men in the stress 
 and strain of mighty trial; to drunkards 
 in the deiath-rattle of their manhood; to 
 the pious rings that work the mammon 
 of political unrighteousness for place and 
 p'ofpuliarity and power; to the boneless 
 ministry that sings small and situdies the 
 oontemptible meteorology ocf pew-holders* 
 faices 'to iseie where sits the wd'nd' and prog- 
 nostioate the time and track of stormis; 
 and to our ovsm conventions of brave men 
 and women when they have caught the 
 fever of wire-pulling and rebelled at 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 14 
 
 truth's slow schedule. I have stood hard 
 and fast by this old Book, and said neiitheT 
 less nor more than "Believe on the Lord 
 Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved." 
 
 But may I halt the column of my pur- 
 pose here a little w^hile, to ask you to ad- 
 mire w^ith me the crystalline intensity of 
 the man's motive? The light of truith 
 was flashing- upon him with such tremen- 
 dous voltage, that the candle-power of his 
 mind was multiplied by some\thing like 
 infinity, and his question has facets like a 
 brilliant, and the words are clearest at 
 the edges, where in ordinary speech they 
 shade off into a pleasant haze together, to 
 diffuse and mollify or to obscure the 
 meaning. "What must I do?" — Not "how,'* 
 —faith is a, subs'tantive, ntot an adverb; a 
 fact, not a system; a thing, noit a mode. 
 
 * 4t * 
 
 "What must I do?"— Necessity, not pol- 
 icy — striaaghit course, not shilly-shally — 
 not "a step in the right direction" — not "the 
 choice of two evils" — the ultimate thing, 
 niarrow-gU'a.ge, single plank — ^must. 
 
 * * * 
 
 "What must I do?" Not we, not my 
 friends — my manager, my party, my sio- 
 ciety; I, the focal poinit of responsibility. 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 15 
 
 "What must i do?" — Not resolve, leave 
 off, think, love, hope, sympathize with, pay, 
 subscribe to. Salvation at the eear end is 
 doing Bomeithing". 
 
 * 4{- * 
 
 "What must I do to be?" Infinitive form 
 O'f the verb that expresses existence, *d>o' 
 is for you, Ho be' is the g-if t of God. 
 
 <«• * 4«- 
 
 "W^hat must I do to be saved?'* — not 
 elected, appreciated, rewarded, loved, un- 
 derstood, settled in a gfood pulpit; saved, 
 the perfect participle of the divinest part 
 of speech — uttermost salvation by the 
 power of God belted on to me, by my own 
 choice, responsibility and duty. 
 
 * «• * 
 
 Now, read the wonderful answer again. 
 "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou 
 Shalt be saved." It answers the "what" and 
 the "must" and the "I" and the "do" and 
 the "to be" and the "saved." "I?" Christ.— 
 "Nevertheless not I but Christ that work- 
 eth in me." "Do?"— Christ.— "Other founda- 
 tion can no man lay than is laid in Jesuis 
 Christ." "To be?"— Christ.— "For me to live 
 is Christ and to die is gain." "Saved?" — 
 Christ. — "For Christ is the end of the law, 
 for righteousness, to every one that be- 
 lieveth." "AnH it doth not yet appear what 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 
 we sball be, but we know that when He 
 shall appear we shall be like Him, for w« 
 shall see Him as He is." 
 
 4f # «f 
 
 And there you have the whole doctrine 
 of personal jutstification, not only, but aleo 
 the immensely grander conception which 
 is my theme tonight, and every night; 
 civilization by taith. 
 
 And I am not afraid that you will 
 charge it to the exuberance of my fan-cy, 
 when I say that the social conditions of 
 today present a strikioig, though exagger- 
 ated, parallel to t(his old tale of Mace^ 
 donda. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Society in all ages has dealt with re- 
 form and reformers too much upon the 
 basis of the jail; and the weaker the gov- 
 ernment the stronger the jail. If as much 
 care had been expended, proportionately 
 to its educational im/portance, upon the 
 law, to make it clean and good, the neces- 
 sity for jails, inste^ad of being on the in- 
 crease, as it is, would be diminishing; but 
 so far, in too great a measure. Christian 
 government says: "If any man sin, he be- 
 longs in the lock-up. The law was wick- 
 ed, to be sure; but away with him out of 
 sight and out of mind and out of hope!" 
 
CivUization by Faith 
 17 
 
 And government has proceeded upon 
 this theory, not only with its enemies, but 
 al'so with its innocent dependentis and its 
 truest friends. The drunkard'is wife pite- 
 ously lifts her hands to the state for help, 
 and it promptly sends a policeman to club 
 her already breaking heart to a pulp^ by 
 putting her husband on the chain gang, 
 and cries to her, in her helpless anguish; 
 "Get thee to a madhouse, or a brothel, go, 
 go!- 
 
 4f 4f if 
 
 Eeform and reformers are familiair 
 with the whipping-po'sit ; and civilization 
 has done some of its deepest thinking in 
 a cell. On the other hand, there has been 
 a congestion of effort at the church edifice. 
 The great American desert of Christian 
 tesitimony is the region that lie>s between 
 the prison and the prayer-meeting. The 
 church has had, not too much, but too ex- 
 clusively, to do with secluded places, out 
 of town, sick beds, consecration meet- 
 ings, funerals, and the like; as in the case 
 of Paul and Silas, she has co'me into the 
 national life and *'sat and talked to the 
 women who resorted thither," and the 
 more passive and non-combative elementa 
 of the social order. She has made much 
 headway there, and some among men, and 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 18 
 
 the more positive and aiggressive forces. 
 It has come to be the fashioai for giovern- 
 meintal bodies and party conventions, even 
 vs^hen "God is not in all their thoughts," to 
 invite her ministry to open their session© 
 with prayer. Courts vrhich despise her, 
 cause witnesses to kiss her book, before 
 they swear to lies; the devil-possessed, 
 greedy, puTchasable traitors, whom we 
 call bosses in politics, own pews in llie 
 house of God, and hold official posi/tioms in 
 church boards; saloon keiepers put gospel 
 temperance advertisementts in their show- 
 windows; a weak and venal press, that 
 advertises bawdy houses, and sells its ciol- 
 umns to the IiqUor traffic, prints the Sun- 
 day Scthool leisson, and follows up the popu- 
 lar ministers and says, like the poor de- 
 moniac girl at Philippi. "These men are the 
 servants of the Most High God, whilch 
 show us the way of salvation." And they 
 dio this because there is mioney in it for 
 the owner. 
 
 4t « 4f- 
 
 But she has rebuked the evil spirit in 
 them all, and put their revenues in jeop- 
 a-Tdy, and has threatened to cost them 
 place and power; and in the nuarket-plaee 
 of politics has been stripped aoid insulted, 
 atnid scourged, and shut up in the limbo of 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 J9 
 
 party politics, witih bawds and tihieves and 
 a^njarchists a;nd bloody men. And theire, 
 crippled and worn, and in the dark, and 
 fast in the stocks, she waits tod-ay, and 
 prays, and sing-s her plaintive songs to her 
 fellow-priso'ners, while the free and the 
 powerful go on their way, not hearing' or 
 
 heeding. 
 
 *fr <t * 
 
 But, meantime, the mountainous in- 
 equalities and injusitices of the social sys- 
 tem have been dripping the imgredients of 
 an earthquake inito the caverns bemeath 
 t!he government; and at this m'inute the 
 foundations of the state are trembling, 
 and in the throes of political iniquity, rock 
 like a ship in a storm; party ^bolts' unlock 
 the party doors, and the providence of a 
 gen'eiral election, swings theim wide, and 
 every bond is loosed, and every chain falls 
 off, and every mam is free to wash his 
 bands of fratricidal blood, or stain them 
 anew with the bribes of the saloon; and 
 society, with pallid lips, wakes up, aind 
 dashes here and th'ere am'ong her tottering 
 idols, demented to the point of self-de- 
 struction, for fear her prisoners may get 
 
 away. 
 
 tf (f {f 
 
 But the church, splendidly calm, erect, 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 20 
 
 unfettered, standing in th'c midnight and 
 apparenit ruin of the world, cries with a 
 loud voice: *'Do thyself no harm for we are 
 all here— *and what is more serious, we 
 have to stay here together — you and I and 
 these wretched ones — and deal with one 
 another on the level, with no advant<ages 
 but righteousness, and no weakness but 
 wickedness." 
 
 «£■ K- M- 
 
 And the plain, political, providential 
 meaning of this remarkable campaign, is 
 that our American civilization, flying 
 abouit with its torchlights and its lanterns 
 and its bands of music, is vaguely peni- 
 tent and looking for truth, though afraid 
 it will find it, and the stump is ringing 
 about "conscience," "honor," "character," 
 amd crying to the true men and women of 
 the land: "What must I do to be saved?" 
 There ca-n be no answer to tha;t, save at the 
 polls; and I dare stand here and d'efy the 
 overwhelming avalanche of cheap, proble- 
 matic, pinchbeck piety that says, "Don't 
 press that now, we are about to lose a dol- 
 lar!" — and I do hereby defy and scorn and 
 despis'e it. And I say that a Christian 
 voter in this crisis is careless of his honor, 
 an ignoramus or a poltroon, who will not 
 stand by the church aoid answer, by his 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 21 
 
 ballot on election day. "Believe on the Lord 
 Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved." 
 
 But some one will say: "We shall vote 
 that, somie in one party, and some in 
 another, according to our r'esidence, our 
 education, and our conscience." I deny 
 it. If we are to guess at ouo: principles 
 and o*iw methods — ^which are our princi- 
 ples in action — what is the use of the 
 church? An intelligent mam with. *a two- 
 foot rule' in his hand, who agre<es with a 
 thief tha.t perhaps thirty-five inches make 
 a yard, is a liar. And the Christian voter 
 has a two-foot rule, the law and the gos- 
 pel, marked in plain figures, and he says 
 he can read them. 
 
 «• ¥r K- 
 
 The will of God for civiliation is that 
 the liquor traffic ought to die now, at the 
 hands of American politics. The church 
 is my authority, listen: "No political par- 
 ty hats a right t'o expect, nor ought it to 
 receive, (the vote of a Christian mam so 
 long as it stands committed to the license 
 policy, or refuses to put itself upon rec- 
 ord in an attitude of open hostility to the 
 saloon, and the time has fully come when 
 Christians should unite their efforts re- 
 gardless of previous affiliations for its sup- 
 pression." 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 22 
 
 I am not the author of that; no "crank" 
 wrote tha.t; thait is no Hhird-pairty' non- 
 semtSe; that is the deliberate and oft-reit- 
 erated judgment of your church, delivered 
 under all the mtost solemn .sanotions of 
 its highest legislative IjOdy, and written 
 down of record in the Year Book, and 
 there is no worthy man in the communion, 
 who would wish to, or dare to, miove tha.t 
 it be expunged or materially modified. 
 
 •5f ^ * 
 
 But cannot a man vote for McKinley 
 or for Brya^n and still stand for thait? No; 
 no man, I care not how enlthusdastiic a 
 partisan, will claim that the plaitform of 
 either party, or the party itself by any 
 siane construction of words or signs 
 stands for that, in this electi'on; and he 
 who would be true to this church must 
 sltand for that, in this election. For if 
 the liquK)(r traffic ought to die now, it is a 
 crime to reprieve it for f oiur years, or four 
 minutes. 
 
 # * * 
 
 "But public sentiment is not up to it, and 
 tihe money question is vital and ready for 
 settlement!" I deny that. The money 
 qu'esti'On is not ready for settlement; it 
 will laisit a generation yet. I beldeve in the 
 gold standard and in the improvement of 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 23 
 
 our naitional banik sy(S't€in, but I kntow 
 well, that the silver men in general are as 
 honestt as they are earnest, aind that they 
 will not give up the eitiruggle, even though 
 they fail tO' carry one elector for their 
 candidate this fall; and a Kepublican or a 
 Democratic victory this year, would sion- 
 ply inaugurate the money fight and settle 
 nothing, but who should adminiisiter the 
 spoils of politics the next four yea^rs. 
 
 And I deny that the money question is 
 vital. This country could live and prosper 
 under either of the plasms proposed, if the 
 liquor traffic were bloated ou»t, comscaemce 
 made the focal point of politics, and the 
 dalculations of statesmanship were to put 
 rman at the centre, and no't money or party. 
 This n'a»ti'on could and would be honest 
 with its creditors, even though it were to 
 h»ave a> defective sitandai-d of curremcy; 
 but it never can be honest with its own 
 people, while it tlakes money for protect- 
 ing the saloon; and honestj^ as well as 
 charity, ought to begin at home. And I 
 deny that public sentiment has anything 
 to dio about it. What I can do, defends 
 on public sentiment; what I stand for, i» 
 Almighty God's affair witli me. 
 
Qvilization by Faith 
 24 
 
 A Republican ballot in this election is 
 a<n indorsement of the most overt and un- 
 mitigated treason of boss rule that this 
 country has ever known. In his sipeech to 
 the visiting delegation from Beaver coun^ 
 ty, Pennsylvaaiia, on Sept. 5, the Republi- 
 can camdidate committed himself without 
 refserve to the methods and the record of 
 the portentous man who hangs upon the 
 orbit of political corruption, like a moon, 
 whose masis controls the ebb and flow of 
 t!he uncleanest tides in American politics. 
 * «& * 
 
 I read from the St. Louis Globe-Demo- 
 crat — ^a Republican paper — of Sept. 8: 
 *'My fellow-citizens, I do not forget that 
 this delegaition comes from the home of 
 that disitinguished leader and unrivaled 
 Republican organizer, whose unfaltering 
 devotion to Republicamsm has never wav- 
 ered, and whose splenddd services to the 
 cause have more than once assisted to 
 achieve the most signal triumphs in both 
 your state and the nation. I remember 
 w^ell that when the Wilson tariff law went 
 from the House to the Senate, and was un- 
 der discussion, Senator Quay stood reso- 
 lutely for every interest in his state, -and 
 prevented the destruction of her great in- 
 dustries by his famous speech, which was 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 25 
 
 the longes't ever delivered upon tlie tariff 
 question, in the history of the Republic, 
 and which has not yet been concluded. 
 When he was fighting for the industries of 
 your state, on the floor of the Senate, if he 
 could not save them in any other way, he 
 resumed his speech, which went on day 
 afiter day, without apparent diminuti^on of 
 his manuscript, which was laid before 
 him. I wish he might have been a part of 
 this great delegation today, but his ab- 
 sence is compensated by the fact that an 
 a.niother part of this great tield of con- 
 test he is serving the siame cause in which 
 you are engaged, and for the success of 
 which so many of the people are striving." 
 
 »t if N- 
 
 A Republican ballot, in this election, 
 means a high protective tariff, a single 
 gold standard; and an extenision of the 
 partnership of the government with the 
 liquor traffic indefinitely. Young Chris- 
 tian voter, is that your message to your 
 country? is that the size of your apostle- 
 ship? 
 
 4f 4f H- 
 
 A Democratic ballot means lower tariff; 
 a silver standard; and unchecked saloons. 
 Our gold friends say that Bryanism is 
 repudiation, and so it is; but that is only 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 26 
 
 half the truth, for Bryaniism and McKjn- 
 leyiam are, both and etach, repudiation of 
 the LoTd Jesus, for this electiooi, accord- 
 ing to the measure of your church. 
 
 How many of you believe it is the will 
 of God that the beverage liquor traffic be 
 abolished now? Please to stand up, those 
 of you who do believe that. 
 
 How many of you believe that the pro- 
 hibition of the liquor traffic ought to be 
 the foremo'St issue in politics this year? 
 Please sitand again, if you do believe that! 
 
 How many of you believe that the Re- 
 publican and Democratic parties — both or 
 either — are the cause of the question of 
 Prohibition being kept back from submis- 
 sion to the people? Answer that, also, by 
 rising, if you please! 
 
 4f 4f «■ 
 
 You have answered unanimously and 
 truly. Out of your own mouths then I 
 have proven: first, that it is the will of 
 God that the beverage liquor traffic be 
 abolished now; second, that the prohibi- 
 tion of the liquor traffic ought to be the 
 foremost issue in politics this year, and 
 third, that the Republican and Democratic 
 parties, both or either, are the cause of the 
 question of prohibition being kept back 
 
« Civilization by Faitk 
 
 27 
 
 from submission to the people. Well, tben, 
 listen. I submit it to your plainest com- 
 mon-sense tbait any man of you who votes 
 for either of those parties at the next elec- 
 tion will be lukewarm in his paitriotism, 
 false to himself, and recreant to his Lord. 
 * * * 
 
 Believing on Jesus Christ is no transac- 
 tion of an instant. When one holds up hia 
 hand, and says 1 do believe, that does not 
 close that incident. Believing is a trinity. 
 Jesus illustrated it when He said: *'He that 
 cometh unto Me and heareth My words and 
 doeth them; I will show you to whom he is 
 like; he is like a mian which built a house 
 and diigged deep, and I'aid the foundation 
 on a rock. *'Come;" "hear;" "do;'* decide; 
 dig; do business. For eighteen hundred 
 j^ears the church ha's worked for comers, 
 for the last fifty she has agonized for hear' 
 ers, but today the whole eairth cries, out 
 for Christian doei^s and one of the sure 
 corollaries of believing is: Remember elec- 
 tion day to keep it holy. One who says he 
 believes on the Lord Jesus Christ, and re- 
 linquishes that faith upon elec^tion day, at 
 the command of a boss or in the interest 
 of a parity, is either false in his profession 
 OT feeble in his courage; at any rate it is 
 not true-that he believes, that day. A man 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 
 28 ^ 
 
 who says: "I believe I can swim," but keeps 
 his toe O'H the bottom, is an amphibioius 
 fraud, that swims on the land and walks in 
 the water. 
 
 4f » 4f 
 
 But, you say: "It is certainly the will of 
 God ithat I should be practical as well as 
 true, and the rules of conduct that apply to 
 the narrow spheres of personal righteous- 
 ness are too small and 'too rigid for use in 
 the wide domain of politics." That is the 
 OT-iginal suggestion of the slimy, undulatt- 
 ing politician of the story of Genesis: "Ye 
 shall not surely die, for God doth know 
 that in the day you go in for the manuflac- 
 ture of 3^our own knowleage, then your 
 eye« -shall be opened, and ye shall be afi 
 god's, kn'owing good and evil, on your owm 
 
 hook." 
 
 «t «t «{• 
 
 Be ntot deceived, O my young friends! 
 Bgn't tooich that reasoning! Don't have 
 to be ashamed to meet God when He walks 
 in the garden of the world in the evening 
 of election day! There is no way to main- 
 tain a parity between divine truth and 
 political crookedness, at any ratio. A 
 soul that has a vision of God's truth and 
 then coquets vdth an opposing public sen- 
 timent, courts damnation. The gist; of 
 
UN)VcK3rTY 
 
 Civilization by Faith 
 29 
 
 redemptive power is that you be made 
 whole. Your self are the cosmos. Every 
 heart-beat of yours thr'obs health or sick- 
 ness to the ends of the world. Every vein 
 of yours brings back the blue debris from 
 the ou'termo'S't verge of life, to be reddened 
 and warmed in your bosom. Every nerve 
 of yours compels the body of the universe . 
 for good or ill. The whole art and sci- 
 ence of Christian citizenship lies in the 
 question: "Lord, what wilt Thou have me 
 to do?" and when you ask it, you must shut 
 your ears to public sentiment. The clear- 
 est minds of earth have said it. 
 
 Ask William Shakespeare, whtat about 
 public sentiment? "This, above all, to 
 thine own self be true, and it must follow, 
 as the night the day, thou canst not then 
 be false to any man." 
 
 Balzac, what about public sentiment? 
 "To live in the presence of great truths and 
 eternal laws, and be led by permanent 
 ideals, that is what keeps a man patient 
 when the world ignores him, and calm and 
 unspoiled when the world praises him." 
 Abraham Lincoln, what about public sen- 
 timent? "If ever I feel the soul within 
 me elevate and expand to those dimensitms 
 not wh'olly unworthy of its almighty arch- 
 itec't, it is when I contemplate the cause of 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 30 
 
 my country, deserted by all the world be- 
 side, and I, standing uip, boldly and alone, 
 and hurling delia-nce at her victorious op- 
 pressors. Here, without contemplating 
 consequences, before high heaven, and in 
 the face of the vv^orld, I swear eternal fidel- 
 ity to the just cause, as I deem it, o»f the 
 land of my life, my liberty, and my love." 
 
 Solomon, what about public sentiment? 
 "Know thyself." Paul, what about public 
 sentiment? "Keep thyself pure." Job, 
 what about public sentiment? "The right- 
 eous shall hold on his way, and he that 
 hath clean hands shall grow stronger and 
 stronger." Jesus, what about public sen- 
 timent? "What is that to thee, follow thou 
 
 Me." 
 
 * * * 
 
 But when shall we "get there?" I don't 
 know; but, if you mean to be a Christian, 
 you would better never get anywhere, 
 than to ride on a scalper's ticket to a place 
 where you don't want to go. Let us hold 
 our value high, as friends of God! The 
 two old parties are the two places for 
 cents in the world's ledger; a sound Chris- 
 tian voter belongs in the dollar column. 
 
 * ^ * 
 
 In pugilism, first blood is prized, but 
 even in the philosophy of the prize ring, 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 31 
 
 blows over the heart, although they show 
 mo immediate effects at all, yet sicken the 
 boxer slowly but surely, so that finally he 
 goes down before a mere tap by the cum- 
 ulative force of heart blows. We have 
 been trying to conquer the world by 
 sparring to draw first blood from the niose 
 of a party; let us stop that, and all hands 
 pound the voting church, which is the 
 heart of civiliza'tion, and though it may 
 take longer, the victory will be sure and 
 final. 
 
 » * » 
 
 But, in the meantime, how shall we 
 fare? Shall we get offices? No. 8ha.ll 
 men speak well of us? No. Shall we be 
 able to pose as sweet and lovely leaders of 
 popular movements? No. Shall we get 
 mionuments to our memory? No. But 
 remember we are Christiians. 
 
 I began with a story about the greiat 
 apostle, let me close with his own words: 
 "Only let your conversation be as it be- 
 cometh the gospel of Christ, that whether 
 I come and see you, or else be absent, I 
 may hear of your affairs, tha-t ye shall 
 stand fas>t in one spirit, with one mind, 
 striving together for the faith of the gos- 
 pel, and in nothing terrified by your ad- 
 versaries, which is to t^hem an evident 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 32 
 
 token o(f perdition, but to you of salvaftion, 
 and that of God, for unto you it is given in 
 the behalf of Christ n'o't only to believe on 
 him but also to suffer for his sake." 
 
 * * * 
 
 In imagination, I go back to that other 
 R'oonan jail and see the old hero, bent and 
 vs^e'ather-be.aten, leaning against the Ma^ 
 mertine rocks, and w^ith quick, difficult 
 breathing, waiting for the voice which 
 once before ravished his soul and made him 
 a bond -slave forever; and as he waits there 
 I see a slippery old trilobite Pharisee, one- 
 third Roman, one-third Jew, one-third 
 Christian, long-praying, Joud-resolvin(g, 
 anything-to-win, approach and say, "Well, 
 Paul, how is it? What did you get out of 
 it?" And I see the old man redden at the 
 insult and spring to his feet, straight as a 
 Lebanon cedar for the moment, and fling- 
 ing back his scan't gray hair, and lifting up 
 his voice like a trumpet, say: "What did I 
 get out of it? I have fought a good fight. 
 I have finished the course. I have kept the 
 fai'th. Henceforth, theire is laid up for me 
 a crown of life, whdoh the Lord the righte- 
 ous Judge shall give me at that day." 
 
 * * * 
 
 Young man, take your bearings tonight, 
 right your compass, lay your course. 
 
Civilization by Faith 
 33 
 
 stand up before God in your soul, and say 
 which shall your le'ader be, Quay, the win- 
 ner of elections, or Paml, the loser of all, 
 that he might win Christ- For my own 
 part, I declare to you that on the third of 
 next November, up to the full illumlnait- 
 intg power of my conscience, I shall sta-nd 
 by the church, and no mat«ter what the lay 
 of patrtdes, the choice of candidates, or the 
 chances of present vict'ory, my ballot shall 
 speak to my country just one word, "Be- 
 lieve on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou 
 Shalt be saved. ' 
 
foung flfien for (Bar 
 
 '* Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, 
 having this seal, The I^ord knoweth them that are 
 His. And, I^et every one that nameth the name of 
 Christ depart from iniquity. 
 
 EMONG all the voices which have 
 come to me in the toil and stress 
 of the Great Reform, there has 
 been none of truer ring or clearer 
 resonance than that of the United Presby- 
 terian Church. 
 
 * * * 
 
 And, without a word of flattery, I may 
 tell you that the carefullest considera- 
 tion of the forces, among ourselves, which 
 make for righteousness gives me the im- 
 pression that the "crack regiment" of the 
 line — the personal troops, so to speak, of 
 the Commander whose we are and whom 
 we serve — is the Young People's Christian 
 Union. 
 
 4f « » 
 
 I have no idea that your motive is high- 
 er or your spirit finer than those of your 
 sister socie/ties, but you suggest to me a 
 robuster fiber. 
 
 «f » w 
 
 It can do no harm to tell you this, for 
 even if it be not true, the involuntary 
 
Young Men for War 
 35 
 
 over-estimate may pique some of you to try 
 to make it true.- 
 
 It may be but a prejudice of mine, born 
 of a great personal aifecition foi> some of 
 your numbtr, or it may be only that I have 
 caught in some degree the popular opinion 
 of 3^our old "rock-ribbed and unemotional 
 theology/' and with it a sense of the grim, 
 gray immutability of Scotch granite 
 mountains; or that your stately psalmody, 
 in contrasit v^^ith the rollicking ditties 
 which so often offend good taste and good 
 s^nse, has put the roar of Lebanon into 
 my soul and confused my judgment; but 
 there seems abundant reason why I may 
 count myself not to have misapprehended. 
 
 * * * 
 
 In the first place, your church, though 
 o]d, is small, and for that you are probab- 
 ly entitled to no praise. You would have 
 had it the biggest if you could. But it is 
 well set-tied in church history, as in for- 
 estry, that slow growth implies carefuller 
 aliment, completer digestion, and harder 
 grain than very rapid increase canadmitof. 
 
 * * * 
 
 In the second place, I understand that 
 Ihis society belongs to the members vfho 
 belong to it. I am informed that it would 
 be in order, at any parliamentary oppor- 
 
Young Men for War 
 36 
 
 tnnity in these proceedings, for any one of 
 you to presemt any motion he might feel 
 led to, and its reception would depend 
 upon the tact of the chairman and the 
 good sense of the convention. That is 
 democratic; that Is strong; that is right. 
 
 * * * 
 
 I saw recently a "bull" that had been 
 isJTued to 'the constituency of a convention 
 far more splendid in dimensions and in 
 feme than this of yours, in which it was 
 ordered, adjudged, and decreed, that, 
 while the proceedings should be In the 
 form of an "open parliament," yet no res- 
 o]ution would be entertained which would 
 connect any individual to anything. That 
 is undemocratic; that is weak; that is 
 wrong. 
 
 * * * 
 
 It is the A B C of logic that such conven- 
 tions are foredoomed to "miss connection" 
 and to fail of the highest good. There is 
 paresis in the advertisement and impu- 
 dent ring-archy that is afraid of something 
 and dare not trust the rank and file. 
 
 Liberty, with a ball and chain, is slavery, 
 and — whatever the motive — a "cut-and- 
 dried" mass-meeting is a cripple, if not a 
 sham, from invocation to doxology, though 
 angels make the program. 
 
Young Men for War 
 37 
 
 In the third place, your church has, to 
 an unusual degree, held her young men in 
 loyalty and activity. This fact alone 
 seems sufficient to sustain my judgment 
 and to set the seal of power upon you. 
 
 A weak church or society cannot hold 
 young men of high quality. "The world'* 
 bids high for "good stuff," and inevitably 
 draws away the manhood of any organiza- 
 tion which by slovenly testimony, timidity, 
 or machinery puts a premium upon "cold 
 blood" and small calibre. And probably 
 tlie gloomiest fact in church life today is 
 that young men, as a rule, will have none 
 of it. 
 
 The bicycle rolls away with the boys on 
 Sunday, because there is a sense of power 
 in it — and liberty; for the rider pedals with 
 his own feet, at his own will, and himself 
 holds the handle-bars. Let a board of 
 trustees go with each wheel, and the bi- 
 cycle trade would be as discouragin'g as 
 tlie church! 
 
 And so, since no conditions have been 
 put upon me, and since (the loyalty of 
 Christian women is beyond praise or 
 blame, comparatively, and since the crying 
 need of the church is virility, I speak "to 
 you young men, because you are strong." 
 
Young Men for War 
 38 
 
 I remember when it was anmounced that 
 Edison had invented the incandescent 
 lamp that it Wias said he had sent aigents 
 into all the earth to search for a certain 
 metal which was known to be precisely- 
 suited to the contrivance, but which as 
 yet had not been found in sufficient quan- 
 tity. I come in the name and in the inter- 
 est of "the light of the world" prospeot- 
 ing for strong men for incandescent Chris- 
 tian citizenship, sans boss, sans trustees, 
 sans policy, sans pledge, sans party, sans 
 anything, but liberty in Jesus Christ. 
 * ^- * 
 
 "Thou Shalt love the Lord thy God "svith 
 all thy heart and with all thy mind and 
 with all thy strength." The heart of the 
 church is well nigh sick of preaching. The 
 mind of the church is all but crazed by 
 learning. But the strength of the church 
 has scarcely heard of the gospel. Strength 
 the third member of the trinity of wor- 
 ship, I would hold up before you. 
 
 "Th€ glory of young men is their 
 R^trength." I preach to that. I come to 
 call you to the field of glory. Not to some 
 merry jousting of adventurous gentlemen, 
 :n knightly lis«ts laid out between long lin-es 
 of silk pavilions carpeted with cloth of 
 gold, whence passionate and regal beauty, 
 
Young Men for War 
 39 
 
 watching the games, flashes an amorouf 
 frenzy into the sinews of the gallants and 
 accents every blow and every parry with 
 applause; where ribbons, gems, and gold 
 await the champions, and those who fall 
 are borne by faithful squires from the field, 
 to perfumed couches, where soft love and 
 languorous music soothe the fretted nerves 
 and sweet sleep sucks from their wounds 
 tne venom of despair. 
 
 * * * 
 
 NoJ no! This is the year of our Lord^ — 
 that is to say, the year of Godlike manli- 
 ness — eighteen hundred and ninety-seven. 
 Here, is our Holy Land, and the ambling 
 chivalry of those old days has never even 
 landed on these shores. American nobility 
 refuses to answer to a horse derivative, 
 but calls itself manhood, and walks the 
 earth in majesty and beauty, with the 
 simple justice of human right, thrice 
 armed to fight the paynim forces of this 
 
 age. 
 
 * * * 
 
 And some of us call our manhood Chris- 
 tianity, and say we sit four times a year, 
 or more, at .the Round Table of the King 
 of Glory: 
 
 That He, Himself, has spoken to us, and 
 washed us in His own blood, and cleansed 
 
Young Men for War 
 40 
 
 US every whit, and given us a new name 
 and a new armor, and "the sword of the 
 spirit," and shown us "a new way," and 
 put "a new song in our mouth," and laid 
 upon our shoulders the accolade of His 
 own transcendant knighthood, and raised 
 us; to the peerage of "kings and priests un- 
 to God," and bidden us rise to a new life, 
 and up to the fullness of the measure of 
 the stature of His own perfection. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Not for possession of His holy sepulchre, 
 but for the honor of the knighthood of the 
 living, reigning, conquering Christ, I come 
 from the front of the hardest battle-field 
 that cruelty ever camped upon, to call you 
 to the merciless rough-and-tumble of red- 
 hot war, against the ruler of the darkness 
 of this world and the betrayers of your 
 
 own land. 
 
 * * * 
 
 I would not have you to enlist "as the 
 horse rusheth into the battle." Strength 
 is the theme, and strength is thought, 
 first of all. Stand still; study the field; 
 count the cost. The clear-headed are the 
 strong. 
 
 * * * 
 
 You would fight, I should trust you for 
 that, without a question. But whether 
 
Young Men for War 
 41 
 
 you have courage to face the facts in this 
 issue, I am not so sure. Blows and bayon- 
 ets and shells and flames and mines can 
 invent no terror such as "sicklies o'er" the 
 face of a hateful preliminary fact. I 
 should rather fight a thousand devils single 
 handed than simply to face my ow^n s<on in 
 a disgraceful company; and this fight is 
 far less difficult to w^in, when we get into 
 it, than it is to look at, in the morale of 
 its battle-front. 
 
 It is a hard gospel that I preach today; 
 antiphlogistic to the freezing point; for I 
 would check at the outset the effusive 
 quixotry that rushes headlong into a 
 fight — and then collapses like a rag at see- 
 ing who is with the enemy; and it is that 
 ^'hich makes this battle terrible. 
 
 There must be no more see-sawing in 
 this business. There must be no more 
 muddy-headed dependence upon some 
 heavenly "streak of luck" to win this vic- 
 tory. Into the heart of "the allied pow- 
 ers" of the saloon must the church's iron 
 
 go. 
 
 » * * 
 
 A friendly critic wrote me recently, 
 complaining of what he called a certain 
 undertone of discouragement in my voice 
 these days. And if you discover it aigain 
 
Young Men for War 
 42 
 
 today you must bear with me and under- 
 stand from first to last that I hate the sa- 
 loon and the saloon law and the saloon 
 newspaper and the saloon party. I have a 
 right to, and I were less a man to haite 
 them less. 
 
 Pain I confess to, that is inevitable to 
 flesh and blood in such an occupation as I 
 follow; but I am not discouraged nor dis- 
 courageable. 
 
 * ^e- * 
 
 " For tho' the fig tree shall not blossom, 
 Neither shall fruit be in the \4nes ; 
 The labor of the olive shall fiail, 
 And the field shall yield no meat ; 
 The flock shall be cut from off the fold, 
 And there shall be no herd in the stalls ; 
 Yet I will rejoice in the I^ord, 
 I will joy in the God of my salvation." 
 
 * * ¥r 
 
 My life has not been easy. You know 
 something about it. In the choke-d(a.mp of 
 a "horror of great darkness** I thoug^ht a 
 voice from heaven said to me: "Believe x>n 
 the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shialt be 
 saved." I did it, the best I could, and for 
 nearly ten years have kept the faith and 
 told the truth. But even yet it happens, 
 after wearing, homesick days, that the 
 sweet night seems thick with treachery, 
 and again and again I start from troubled 
 
Young Men for War 
 43 
 
 sleep, tasting alcohol as plainly as ever in 
 the old, »ad days; and with the old pan- 
 ther-leap of alcohol in my brain and its 
 old blasphemy upon my lips. But I am no*! 
 discouragfed. 
 
 Ard sometimes, when my own rest waa 
 free from any tinge of sham-e or s-orroiw, I 
 have heard my wife cry out in the night. 
 4nd then, to my questiondng, she has re- 
 plied: "It was only a dream; I thought I 
 smelled 'the drink' again." So, even in our 
 sleep, the whip-lash of the sialoon "laya 
 upon" me and mine. 
 
 But I am not discouraged, 
 lie * * 
 
 I thought the voice called me to give my 
 life to drunkards. 
 
 It cost all of what the world calls "prosr 
 peets;" but I paid it, and filled my home 
 with ruined men; and after spite and hate 
 and parvenu meanness had conspired to 
 defeat me, and succeeded, and I had paid 
 the dear tuition of another term of ex- 
 perience, there was just one man remain- 
 jng true, of the many whom I had lived for 
 and nearly died for; but that one was so 
 true and his mother was singing such 
 paeans of victory that I warmed my shiv- 
 ering heart by their joy, and said: "After 
 all, it paid." 
 
Young Men for War 
 44 
 
 But just before the last election there 
 came to me from that mother's broken 
 heart a wail, in pen and ink, that must 
 have m^ade the leathern mail-pouch ache to 
 carry it. And the letter said: "He is fall- 
 en! He is gone! He is lost! My boy! 
 My boy! Whai shall I do?" 
 
 i^ * * 
 
 What could I write? I waited until the 
 votes were counted, and they said: "Tell 
 the importunate widow to curse God and 
 die; her child, her church, her country, so 
 say they all of them." 
 
 But I am not discouraged. 
 
 * * •» 
 
 I thought the voice bade me put my sore 
 heart at the service of the Prohibition 
 Party, not for the party's siake, but for the 
 sake of decency, honor, conscience. I d5d, 
 and was stoned like a tranup dog from 
 1 own to town. But I am not discouraged. 
 
 * * * 
 
 And then I came to the Church. In every 
 corner of the country her doors were 
 slammed in my face; but she did not shut 
 them; I knew by instinct that her heart 
 was sound and very warm to such as I. 
 
 I knew little, and cared less, about "the 
 dogmta." My Quaker stock forbade, per- 
 haps. But by "tlie true light which light- 
 
Young Men for War 
 45 
 
 eth every man that eometh into the 
 world," I read her mind, and took her vows 
 upon me, and became her man, and have 
 remained her man until today. 
 
 * * * 
 
 I stood at the polls in "eighty-eight" 
 and "ninety-two" and "ninety-six," and 
 saw her men ignore her voice and ridicule 
 her honor. But I am not discouraged. 
 <«• * * 
 
 I saw her Bible lying idle in accumulat- 
 ing dust while the party newspaper, silent 
 about the liquor traffic, opulent in ignor- 
 ance and niggardly of truth, had the right 
 of way in Christian homes. But I am not 
 discouraged. 
 
 * * * 
 
 I saw that certain of the great metro- 
 politan journals were in the hands of Chris- 
 tian men and called themselves "inde- 
 pendent." But the best word they had to 
 offer upon the greatest subject of this 
 age was the dastard philosophy that the 
 saloon ought to be abolished but could 
 not be. But I am not discouraged. 
 
 They had no word but praise for the 
 flabby governor of Kansas, who, standing 
 as the tribune of that great people, backed 
 by the church, and by the Word of God, 
 and with a penal statute fitted to his 
 
Young Men for War 
 46 
 
 hand, at the crucial moment tilted like a 
 miserable snipe, and piped small, to please 
 a tried and convicted traitor to the Com- 
 monwealth. But I am not discouraged. 
 
 * ■» * 
 
 They cheered the cheaj:) disciple at Des 
 Moines, who, in the greatest moment of 
 his official life, gave the lie to an honor- 
 able record, spat in the face of his church, 
 and with a hand that he said had been bur- 
 ied with his Lord in baptism, signed his 
 name to the contemptible bill of sale that 
 gave up the homes that were under his 
 protection to the pillage of the ealoon. 
 But I am not discouraged. 
 
 * -x- * 
 
 They said that Prohibition had been 
 honestly tried in that state, and that was 
 a lie, and thej^ knew it. But I am not dis- 
 couraged. 
 
 * * * 
 
 I saw that the nerve-destroying forage 
 which is fed by bales to the youth of Chris- 
 tian homes — the religious press — was as 
 cowardly and false as the "secular." The 
 highest thing it taught about the saloon, 
 beyond the staple, popular abhorence of 
 the thing itself, was that the Christian 
 vcter ought to be as true to his church as 
 he guessed that the state of public senti- 
 
Young Men for War 
 47 
 
 ment — that is to say, the party interest- 
 would warrant. But while I charge the 
 press to be unfair, cowardly, weak, inade- 
 quate in this matter, I want to inject into 
 these lamentations a gloria for the news- 
 papers, religious and secular, rare but in- 
 creasing, which illustrate and ennoble 
 Christian journalism, teaching truth and 
 strength — truckling to nothing. BUT I 
 
 a:m not discoueaged. 
 
 * * * 
 
 For in the midst of hissing ministers and 
 venal editors and dirt-eating officials, in 
 the scud and fog and eclipse of faith-de- 
 stroying ecclesiasticism, when "I saw the 
 prosperity of the wicked" and "was envious 
 at the foolish*' and "my feet were almost 
 gone," I heard fhe flag of the church of 
 Jesus Christ sitraining at its halyards and 
 flapping in the swirl of on-coming revolu- 
 tions; and I looked up, and, by the inter- 
 rujJted flashes of straight truth — forked 
 and zigzagged by heaven-hiding banks of 
 doubt and fear — spelled out the blood-red 
 letters on its field of snow: "The liqu/or 
 traffic can never be licensed without sin, 
 and no political party has a right to ex- 
 pect nor ought ft to receive the vote of a 
 Christian man so long as it stands com- 
 mitted to the license policy or refuses to 
 
Young Men for War 
 48 
 
 put itself upon record in an attitude of 
 open hostility to the saloon;" and 1 
 crawled up out of the wrack of daily ship- 
 wreck, and my feet took hold upon the 
 strength of the hills, and i stood straight 
 and said, as I say now, that though every 
 other man cry craven at the polls, I will 
 defend her name until her colors dip to the 
 saloon. 
 
 Standing beneath that flag, I plead with 
 you, not that you will be loyal or moral or 
 liberal — you intend to be, you will be. 
 But I beg of you to be strong. For I call 
 you to a service where each success will 
 Icok like a new kind of failure, where there 
 will be rarely a cheer but such as come 
 from the blue lips of helpless agony, and 
 where the brightest thing in sight, for 
 years to come, may be the tears that glis- 
 ten on the haggard cheeks of drunkards* 
 wives and mothers; and the most inspir- 
 ing music you shall hear will be the wails 
 of little children crying in a night that bas 
 no dawn: where victories will only open 
 up new labors and anxieties, and where, 
 perhaps, mo rest will come, until under the 
 culminative heartache of it all you yearn 
 tor the tender grace of a grave — ^glad to 
 return to dull dust, inert, irresponsible, in- 
 sensible, until the judgment day. 
 
Young Men for War 
 49 
 
 So now lift up your hearts and pray for 
 a strip of God Almighty's thorough-brac- 
 ing* from heel to medulla, while I point out 
 to 3-0U from this mountain-top the posi- 
 tion of the enemy and his personnel: 
 
 The saloon with all the flower of hell's 
 feudal chivalry holds the center, greaved 
 and helmeted with federal laws, and in 
 chain-mail of statutes and ordinances in- 
 terwoven, rich beyond computation, hun- 
 gry beyond any d.reQ.m of gluttony, cruel 
 past the imaginings of any terror — ^whose 
 madmen kill each other in the name of 
 friendship, whose murderers strip the 
 dead and hunt the soul to deaith. Breeder 
 of wife-beaters, motheir-killers, brutes to 
 whom rape is playful, and nameless crim.- 
 inals of low and high degree. 
 
 « 4f « 
 
 Against that, I do not seek how to inr 
 flame you. You have seen it, and my poor 
 words are sheerest rubbish in descrip- 
 tion. 
 
 You know it well, and hate it in your 
 soul. You have fought it, do fight it, will 
 fight it to the death. 
 
 But look you: its power has grown un- 
 der your fire. You have bombarded it 
 with antiseptics and tonics and prophy- 
 lactics. It would have died of apopl-exy 
 
Young Men for War 
 50 
 
 by the plethora of its own aecursed heart- 
 be-a't ere this, liad we not bled it into 
 sounder health by the imbecile phlebot- 
 omy of tax and mulct and license, and for- 
 t'fied it by the enforced gymnastics of 
 "regulation." And on the firs.t day of 
 every fiscal year it bares its murderous 
 arm, and inTites your life-saving lancet, 
 mounts the "health-lift" of "restriction" 
 voluntarily, and laughs the church to 
 scorn. For the sake of the luxury of self- 
 respect, stop that! It is a case for a dag- 
 ger, not a lancet. But I adjure you by 
 the barest common sense of the feeblest 
 among you not to fire another shot at the 
 saloon until you change your ammunition 
 nor even then until you shell the wings. 
 
 Shell the wings,, I s-ay. For see! upon 
 the right and left the hired mercenaries of 
 the liquor traffic, your own great political 
 parties, bought off from loyalty and duty 
 to turn the power you have delegated to 
 them, against you and your JOord, and paid 
 in offices and spoils and bloody* gold. I 
 must be careful what I say; but if the sa- 
 loon is an enemy of this country, those 
 parties are trait or S' — ^by every definition of 
 the word. 
 
 *«• » * 
 
 The task I set myself this afternoon is a 
 
Young Men for War 
 
 most thankless one, but peremptory, and you 
 have put no check upon me; no boss with 
 a blue pencil has poked his wooden convic- 
 tions and blue-clay brains into this manu- 
 script. 
 
 And I must tell you what you already 
 know too well, that the great cause is 
 losing — is lost unless our lines reform. 
 
 Our plan of battle 5s too small. It is a 
 childish, popgun business to push this 
 fight from year to year up to the very 
 door of the saloon, while every time we 
 mass the power of the church upon the 
 center, and really threaten it, the Republi- 
 can right wing and the Democratic left 
 wing of the triple alliance swing *round 
 upon our flanks and enfilade us with ghost 
 filories until we come to terms. 
 * * * 
 
 And we do come to terms. The saloon- 
 keeper is no match for the Christian voter, 
 man for man. The Christian manhood of 
 this nation has never given an inch be- 
 fore the liquor traffic. 
 
 But it flies like wild-fowl before the 
 twin scare-crows it sets up alternately. 
 >* * -If 
 
 I call but one witness, poor, bedraggled 
 Iowa, fallen from the forefront of Western 
 progress and standing now in scarlet at 
 
Young Men for War 
 52 
 
 her windiow, soriciting- sbame for revenue. 
 
 She would have stamped out the saloon 
 
 like the foul reptile, that it was, but that 
 
 fear of iparty, put a "buck and gtag" upon 
 
 the church, while the saloon siandbag-g^ed 
 
 the public school. 
 
 # » » 
 
 After fifty years of education, evangeli- 
 zation, and legislation, the saloon is com- 
 mander-in-chief of our political forces. 
 Jt holds its place by virtue of owning" a 
 controlling' interest in each of the ruling 
 parties, and the church vote is in the deal. 
 
 What are you g'oing to do about that? 
 Therf» is the issue "in a nutshell." You 
 may shut your eyes to it. You m,ay refuse 
 to listen to it. You may shut the doiors 
 of your conventions in the future to such 
 a3 I. But there is a question you have 
 got to answer — or answer for it in the 
 jadgment. 
 
 « « » 
 
 You ask me for a method that will 
 please us all. There is none. But one 
 methiod is open to us, and it will please no- 
 body. 
 
 The slimpsey soldiery that is on the 
 look-cut for something easy, non-partizan, 
 non-sectarian, inter-partizan, inter-sec- 
 tarian, has worn out its occupation. 
 
Young Men for War 
 53 
 
 The man who fights the saloon for a per 
 diem, collected from Republicans and 
 I>em.ocrats, is as incapable in this fight as 
 a jumping-frog filled with sho't. 
 
 What we do now must be super^ec- 
 tirian and super-partizan; and to that 
 height no man rises but in piain. 
 
 * 4t * 
 
 What can we do? 
 
 Reform the line; leave the non-voting 
 public sentiment to hold the centdr. The 
 women and children will kill the saloon, 
 whenever there is manhood enough to 
 guard the flanks. 
 
 Christian men must break the spell of the 
 paltry party effigies which in the old clothes 
 of patriotism work treason to the church, 
 the school-house and the home. 
 
 The fight now is simply a duel between 
 Christianity and party politics, and for 
 that the present voting basis will not an- 
 swer. 
 
 It takes the straight, uncomplicated 
 * faith of the Son of God" to make a man 
 or woman stand fire in a fight like thia. 
 » « « 
 
 You will be told to join "The Anti-Saloon 
 League," but I venture to advise you not 
 to touch it. An inter-saloon party anti- 
 saloon league might be a throne for a. non- 
 
Young Men for War 
 54 
 
 combiatant, but it is a dunce-block for a 
 Ghristian vo.ter. 
 
 « « « 
 
 You will be told to stay in the party 
 where you are, and take "the world for 
 Christ." If that is not nonsense, I do not 
 understand the word. As w^ell might 
 Daniel's friends have said to him: "Eat 
 djrt with Belshazzar and take Babylon for 
 Christ." "Ye cannot serve God and Mam- 
 Tnon," and the business of the great parties 
 is to "hold up" the people — a crime com- 
 pared to which sporadic bank robbery is 
 
 pure altruism. 
 
 «- ^ « 
 
 I call you to face the teaching of your 
 catechism tha't never yet, to man or party, 
 did regeneration come from within. Your 
 party will never feel under compulsion, 
 or need, or anxiety, to mend while it can 
 hold your suipport and yet serve the sa- 
 loon. 
 
 And so, against those cringing fl-anks 
 that swarm w'itli your own friends and 
 kindred, I call you, young man, to be one 
 of a handful now, wdthout political pros- 
 pects, purse, or scrip, or any weapon but 
 the Word of God and the free ballot of an 
 independent American citizen. 
 
 I knew what I was talking about when I 
 
Yonng Men for War 
 55 
 
 took "Strength" for my theme. It does 
 your heart no discredit if you shrink. For 
 I call you to nothing less than to break, 
 *n politics, with life-long friendships and 
 even with your own blood. 
 
 But I speak ''by the Book:" "Think not 
 that I am come to send peace on earth; I 
 came not to send peace but a sword. For 
 T am come to set a man at variance against 
 his father, and the daughter against her 
 mother, and the daughter-in-law against 
 her mother-in-law. And a man's foes shall 
 be they of his own household. He that 
 loveth father or mother more than Me is 
 not worthy of Me. And he that taketh nat 
 his cross and followeth after Me is no»t 
 worthy of Me." 
 
 If He who spoke those words spoke with 
 authority, what will He say of a church 
 which at the general election divides its 
 voting strength between two parties that 
 ar€ openly coadjutors of the saloon? 
 
 But let us stand squarely to the facts. 
 This is a government of the worst people, 
 for the worst people, by the worst people, 
 and the peril of the nation and the dis- 
 grace of the church is that 99 per cent of 
 the best people stoop to get unclean money 
 "for the support of the gospel" or to get 
 unclean votes for the support of the party. 
 
Young Men for War 
 56 
 
 There is absolutely nu hope for thia 
 country while the current of Christiian 
 citizenship sets that way. The reason, sta^ 
 bility and value of popular g^overnment 
 require that each g^ood citizen stand for 
 the best he knows at the polls. He may, he 
 should, consider himself a subject and a 
 fragmen-t, as to what he pays and what he 
 gets, but a sole, self-sufficienit, divinely 
 imperial mionarch when he votes. 
 
 The ballot-box' is a meter for the free 
 public virtue of a community. The legis- 
 lature is the indicator of its static value 
 when comfined. The executive shows its 
 loss in application by the stretch of belts 
 and the friction of machinicry. 
 * * * 
 
 The relation of these things never varies. 
 The civil service is as good as the legisla- 
 tion, and the legislation is as good as the 
 voting. The policeman sells out to the 
 saloon-keper because the legislature sold 
 out to the saloon, and the legislature sella 
 out to the saloon because the people have 
 already sold out to the saloon party. 
 
 The present, prospective, and ultimate 
 necessity of the matter is the political 
 emancipation of the Christian voter. 
 
 And for that, it is no disparagement 
 
Young Men for War 
 57 
 
 of other Christian virtues to say that we 
 need nothing now but strength. 
 
 The time is ripe, education is abundant, 
 senitiment is ready. But men watch 
 each other and weaken in the tug o-f pairty 
 war. It is not because they are insin- 
 cere or weak, intrinsically. They are vic- 
 tims of flimsy educatio-n. They have not 
 been taught to be strong, but to be cau- 
 tious. The American eagle has raised a 
 brood of woodcock, while the voting 
 ohurch has taught that discretion is the 
 better part of virtue. They have been 
 taught that Satan's teeth are to be plugged 
 with gold until the Lord comes. 
 * * * 
 
 It is on record that the most noted evan- 
 gelist of modern times said recently: "I 
 am a Prohibitionist. I always vote Pro- 
 hibition at home. But I would not turn 
 my hand to give Prohibition to the nation, 
 because public sentiment is not ready." 
 
 Which is to say: That, as to this thing, I 
 will accept Christ except where the crowd 
 is against him. 
 
 Loyalty as discreet as that looks' like 
 treason. Such teaching poisons the wells 
 of faith and spreads disease, and by such 
 example the young manhood of the nation 
 learns to scorn the church. 
 
Young Men for War 
 58 
 
 I speak of miy betters, not to impugn 
 Iheir mo'tives, but to point out their falla- 
 C'es, while I preach to you the glory of the 
 cross of Christ, and a glorious indiscre- 
 tion that would attempt the impossible, on 
 His bare word for honor and for truth. 
 
 "Virtue for popularity defiles like vice." 
 
 •K- * * 
 
 Some one will object to this that the 
 business of the church is to "preach 
 Christ" and "save souls," and that is true. 
 And by the same token it is the business 
 of the Christian voter to stand against 
 her enemies so that she may have a decent 
 chance to save souls. And I siay without 
 a misgiving, that the deadliest handicap 
 upon the spiritual power of the church is 
 old-party politics. 
 
 The saloon does not debauch sinners 
 more rapidly or m'ore effectively than the 
 
 old party debauches saints. 
 
 * * * 
 
 You say that there must be no union of 
 church and state. But I remind you that 
 the government of this Christian nation is 
 determined every four years by a union of 
 
 the church and the saloon. 
 
 * * * 
 
 You tell me that the call of the church 
 is to save individuals from their sins, and 
 
Young Men for War 
 59 
 
 50 it is. But I poin^t out to you that the 
 last* congress held the hides of Texas 
 steers higher than the hearts of American 
 womanhood, and that at the last election 
 the voting church went in for saving every- 
 thing but men, and she swarms with men 
 in pulpit amd in pew who make a mock a't 
 sin in party polities, and who get votes 
 and offices and power by the destruction of 
 the faith of more men every year tha-n 
 sLe even deals with. 
 
 ^ * * 
 
 You say this is the dispensation of grace, 
 not of law. But I tell you that this is the 
 dispensation of disgrace, in American pol- 
 itics, with the Christian voter particeps 
 crimiuis. 
 
 ^ ^ * 
 
 You say that the work of the church is 
 Fpiritual. But I tell you that on the ge-n- 
 eral election day she is swamped in the 
 baldest, basest, worldliest materialism, and 
 has no fitting emblem but a flesh-pot. 
 
 What new malignity is this I utter 
 against the church? Not a word of mar 
 lignity or even of criticism have I or had I 
 ever to spe<ak against her. She, the official 
 church, has done what she could, and even 
 the men whom I hold most to blame for 
 our sad plight are in their hearts sincere, 
 
Young Men for War 
 60 
 
 but weaik. She has declared the wbole 
 counsel of Goicl upon this ma'tter. She it 
 was, amd no crank party Prohibitionist, 
 who put her fing'er on party slavery and 
 said: *'There is the knot to cut." But she 
 could not cut it. I said she put her finger 
 on the spot, but she has no hands. She 
 has naen, and men have hands, and men are 
 free, and the same men who have made her 
 glorious in speech have made her con- 
 lem<ptible in action with their hands. 
 
 Her power in the premises was exhia>ust- 
 ed when she em;bodied truth and duty in 
 a resolution which to any noble mind 
 ought to have bad the force of law, and 
 sent it ringing through the land. 
 
 But she has no machinery for the con- 
 servation of Christian energy, but mem, 
 and her men have failed her in the crisis 
 of election day. 
 
 •5f » * 
 
 And the most splendidly pitiful spectacle 
 in this world today is the church as ehe 
 stands, white and clean, upon the summit 
 «>f civilization, entrenched, impregnable, 
 irresistible. Her stupendous batteries 
 command every square inch of the battle^ 
 field, One broadside of spiritual grape 
 and canister would rout the mercenaries 
 and put the arch enemy at her mercy. But 
 
UN 
 
 Young Men fot War 
 6J 
 
 while her flag flies bravely out against the 
 sky, she fires blank cartridges at her foes, 
 who laugh at her, and give her missionary 
 money, as if she were some ga-rrulous old 
 btldame, to toss a penny to and then ig- 
 nore. 
 
 * 4t * 
 
 There are two reasons why she fires 
 blank. First, because her gutnners fear 
 that the reicoil of shotted siege guns might 
 jar the stained-glass windows and inter- 
 rupt the offertory. 
 
 By "gunners" 1 mean the managing offi- 
 cers. If they would stand together at the 
 polls to sustain the par value of her polit- 
 ical declarations they would throw the 
 old parties upon thedr beam ends and leave 
 nothing to be dome but to tow the slippery 
 old derelicts into port and break them 
 up. 
 
 And in a realignment of our citizenship, 
 Prohibition would take the first place 
 upon the program without a rival or a 
 
 question. 
 
 * * » 
 
 The other, and the principal reason why 
 t]ie church fires blank, is because she is 
 short of ammunition. Her resolutions 
 make a noise, and with magnificen't loyal- 
 ty to principle, and most pathetic help- 
 
Young Men for War 
 62 
 
 lessness, she rams her guns with them to 
 the muzzle, and at sunrise and sunset fires 
 a salute to show that she is "against" the 
 one my. 
 
 But the only missiles she can use arci 
 ballots, and they belong to her men, and 
 are immovable by any fulminate but their 
 own will. 
 
 She cannot cast the votes for her mem- 
 bers. Her gunnery is spiritual. She can 
 onl}'^ rake the field by having such true, 
 strong men in her service thait when her 
 resolutions thunder forth the will of God 
 upon any subject, m.en will walk straight 
 to the polls and underscore it with th« 
 bayonet of civic power. 
 ^ * * 
 
 Do not fail of my meaning. I am not 
 here in behalf of the Prohibition Party. 
 But I assert that you must join it or make 
 a new party, or leave the church dishon- 
 ored and disabled. 
 
 4f # » 
 
 I say that every man of you who would 
 follow Jesus Christ, must leave the two 
 old parties. You cannot keep that company 
 and have Him with you at the polls. 
 « « # 
 
 "Come out from among them and be ye 
 separate and touch not the unclean thing, 
 
Young Men for War 
 63 
 
 and I will receive you a.nd will be a Father 
 
 unto you, and ye shall be My sons and 
 
 daughters, saith the Lord God Almighty." 
 
 ^ * * 
 
 I finish as I began, pleading for Strength, 
 Christian manhood, of heart power, brain 
 power, hand power, that measures by 
 foot-pounds, not up, but forward, in Jesus' 
 name. 
 
Zk flDcrciee of (Boo. 
 
 •' I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by Ihe mercies 
 of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, 
 holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable 
 service." 
 
 flDO not speak today to slaves of al- 
 cohol or lust or crime, but to tlie 
 self-respecting, self-controlling, self- 
 indulging victors in the race for 
 life: the leaders, molders, masters — 
 if they would be — of the social or- 
 der, the Christian voters. And toward 
 e^^ery one of you who is a Cha-istian, no 
 miatter what your party, sect, or creed, 
 race, color, or previous condition of polit- 
 ical servitude, when I take my first words, 
 as I do, and indeed the whole body of my 
 thought, as I do, from this great book 
 which you call the Woird of God, and which 
 you acknowledge to be the binding and 
 paramount authority of your life in all itts 
 ways, I put myself in a position to demand 
 of you a hearing, and while I keep true to 
 its spirit and within its scope, to commamd 
 your heads and hearts not only, but your 
 
 hands as well. 
 
 « « « 
 
 Listen: "I beseech you, the.refore, 
 
 €4 
 
The Mercies of God 
 65 
 
 brethren, by the mercies of God, ithat yon 
 present your bodies a liviing- saicrifice, holy, 
 accep't'able un'to God, which is your rea- 
 efonable service." 
 
 One oftetn hears it said that Paul was a 
 hard, harsh, opinionated, unsympathettic 
 man; that is the usual misjudg^m-ent of the 
 Eeformer who stands four-square t'o truth, 
 in word and life; but it seems to me, that 
 upon that si-ngle verse might well be build- 
 ed a monument to the great Apostle to the 
 Gentiles as one of the world's most gra- 
 cious iteachers aind most courteous gen- 
 tlemen. 
 
 « 4f 4(- 
 
 "I beseech you!" It is the humblest aip- 
 peal a noble man can make to others, no 
 acdd, no hard words, no rancor, no unch'ar- 
 ity. I wish that I myself had learned the 
 lesson; I have tried to, and will try to get 
 the gracio'us use o'f that apostolic "I be- 
 seech you." God help us all to do it! 
 
 "Brethren!" It is an aippeal upon the 
 level; no "orders" from the headquarters 
 of some swaggering martinet, repeated by 
 lieutenants and sergeants to the rank and 
 file; no speaking down from some top- 
 lofty pulpit or pedestal of wealth or rank 
 or scholarship or office, but plain, straight, 
 hand-to-hand, brain-to-brain, heart-to- 
 
The Mercies of God 
 
 heart Christian democracy "upon the 
 
 squiare." 
 
 * * * 
 
 I addressed a meeting- of working people 
 in England once, where the chairman, an 
 earl's daughter, and an excellent woman, 
 introduced me something like this: 
 "Now, good people, you of the lower class- 
 es muii^ know that we, of the nobility, are 
 interested in you; for we nave brougbt Mr. 
 Woolley 'all the way from America, to 
 speak to you ! " It was said in the best of 
 humor, and seemed quite pal'ktable enough 
 to the crowd, for they applauded — ^to a 
 hiamd. But there is none of that about 
 Paul. He had a pedigree, too, bu't he did 
 no't wave it in the faces of the people whom 
 he sought to move -to righteousnetss of 
 life. 
 
 In the laist campaign the victorious party 
 came out into the great, generous, hon- 
 est, mistaken Wesit and said — in effect: 
 "Now you fools and cranks and repudia- 
 tOTs, honesty is a Eepublican attribute; 
 patriotism is ours; the Stars and Stripes 
 are a McKinley badge. Come, now, good 
 fellows, we are interested in you. Do as 
 we tell you, or you'll hear froiri the mort- 
 gagee. Come, now, with us, or look out 
 for panic. Take a ticket, and make an ex- 
 
The Mercies of God 
 67 
 
 cursion to Oantt)n, and see what we will 
 d'o for you." 
 
 And brave old generals of the armies, of 
 the South and of the North, in the heat of 
 the struggle for money, felt led to intimate 
 that all loyalty bad been thrown into a 
 "blind pool" under the management of 
 Matthew Quay, Mark Hanna, and other 
 evangelists. And sleek and petted East- 
 ern ministers leaned arms that had never 
 a<;hed upon their velvet pulpits, and told 
 their golden pews that silver men, and 
 Socialisits, and Democrats, and Prohibi- 
 tionists were dishonest and disloyal and 
 depraved. 
 
 The parity of the m'onumental impudence 
 won the day, and if money had to be the 
 measure of patriotic expediency, if Chris- 
 tian m'anho'od could be put, life-size upon 
 a gold dollar, 1 think it was for the best 
 that it should win; but for the insolent 
 arroga-nce of its address to the country it 
 earned the deep contempt of every friend 
 of fair and free debate. 
 
 What a different tone — ^what an object- 
 lesson for debating, here: *'I beseech you, 
 brethren." T am no boiss, but a bond- 
 servant of Jesus. God is our common 
 Father. "One is our Master, even Christ, 
 and all we are brethren." 
 
The Mercies of God 
 68 
 
 But it is not by the strong bond of kin- 
 dred blood tbait 1 beseech you. 
 
 God is a spirit, and hard for us to realize 
 itn homely, every-day affairs. We pray to 
 Him, and stretch out our hands up into 
 the darkness of our greater experiences, 
 if haply we might feel His hand; but He 
 seems far away, to some of us — to all of us, 
 sometimes. And so, not by His father- 
 hood, nor by His son, nor by His throne, 
 nor by His extra or diniary revelations, but 
 by His mercies, I beseech you; the com- 
 mon, sensible, unmistakatjle daily bless- 
 ings He bestoiws, of which David siaid, 
 "Blessed be the Lord God who daily load- 
 eth us with benefits." Th€ bre'ad you ate 
 this miorning, while others as deiserving, 
 fasted — and some starved; the drouth that 
 did not come; the bolt that did not fall; the 
 sal'ary that continued through the years of 
 pfa«nic; the illmess that yielded to treat- 
 ment; the lie that fell flat; thelettter from 
 home that put am end to fear; the love that 
 shines upon your life in all its ways; 
 the baby face at the winidow and the grefat, 
 faithful, unfa'thomiable heart, back in the 
 shadow: — one is not apt to take these things 
 very seriously unless he himself ha® been 
 a "mian of sorrows and acquainted with 
 grief." 
 
The Mercies of God 
 69 
 
 "By the mercies of Gad:" I wonder 
 how many of you have really thoug-ht of 
 them. Your son has no taint of the drink 
 mjadness in his blood: do not say that 
 therefore you ha.ve no Interestt in the 
 Great Eeform, but by thait mercy, and for 
 the sake of odher boys who have no chance 
 a»t all for a clean life, enlist with us to 
 close the mills that grind up boys 
 like rag's to make the paper for the diary 
 of failure and oi crime. 
 
 Two hundred and fonty thousand sa- 
 loons yawn along our way. They are no 
 temptation to you. You despise them, and 
 pass them. But the man behind you, as 
 briave as you are, and ten thousand times 
 m'ore anxious to do right, hates the saloon, 
 but goes in, a.nd drinks his mind to a chaos 
 and his heart to a clot, because he has to. 
 You did not have to; is that your own good 
 managememt? In such a fight as his, what 
 would have become of you? By the mercy 
 of God that has spared you that, I beg of 
 you to lend a hand for the other man. 
 
 I telegraphed to my home in Boston, 
 after a long a.bsence on the wes't coast: 
 "I will arrive at home tonight at 11." 
 The train was late; long after midnight I 
 came under her window. The light was 
 bumiinig, and i knew that she was waiting 
 
The Mercies of God 
 70 
 
 for me. I let myself in; there were two 
 flights o'f stairs, but tm^enty w^ould hiave 
 been noithing to rae, my heart wais hauling 
 awiay, like a greai; balloon. She stood in 
 the middle of our room as pale a.nid cold 
 and motionless as a woma*n of snow, and I 
 knew a't a glance that the swe'et, brave life 
 was in torture. "What is it?" I cried, 
 "wha't is the matter?" and in my arms she 
 sobbed out the everlasting tragedy of her 
 wedded life: "Nothing — at any raite, noth- 
 inig ought to be the matter. I do believe in 
 you; I knew you would come home; but 
 I have listened for you for so many years, 
 that I seem to be just one great ear when 
 you are aw^ay beyond your time; I seem to 
 have lost all sense but that of hearing 
 whe(n you are absent, unexplained, and 
 every sound on the street startles me, and 
 every step on the stairs is a threat and a 
 pain, and the stillness chokes me, and the 
 d'arkne-ss smothers me. \nd all the old, 
 unhappy home-co«mings troop through my 
 mind, without omitting one detail, and to- 
 ndght I heard the children sig*hing in their 
 sleep, a«nd I thoug'ht I should die when 1 
 thought of you having to walk in your 
 weariness, and in this midnight, through 
 Kneeland street alone." 
 She thinks thait I will never fall; and 
 
The Mercies of God 
 71 
 
 would deny tod-ay tha^t she knows any f eiar, 
 but yet, until the under'taker screws her 
 sweet face out of my sight forever, tbat 
 ghastly, unformed, niameless thing will 
 walk the chambers of her heart whenever 
 I am uoaccoumted for. 
 
 By the mercy of God, -that has given t.o 
 you the unshaken confidence of her you 
 love, "I beseeeh you," make a fighlt for the 
 wome-n who wait tonight until the saloon 
 sipews out their husbands and thedr »0'ns 
 and sends them maudlin, brutish, devilish, 
 vomiting, stinking, to their arms. A'ud 
 you, happy wives, whose hearts have never 
 w^avered nor had occasion to waver. Bind 
 who, when your husbands fail to come on 
 time, can go to bed without a fear and gro 
 to sleep with smiles upon your lips, and 
 sleep the long night through too peacefully 
 even to dream, bv the mercy of God, that 
 gives you th>at, I beseech you, band your- 
 selves to help, at least to cheer, the wive«s, 
 who, their whole lives throug^h, must walk 
 the rotten lav^a-crust of burnt-out conifi- 
 dience — their very love a terror and a paim. 
 f » » 
 
 I shall never dr^ink again, but one night 
 in a New England train, and very ill, I met 
 a stranger who pitied me and gave me a 
 quick, powerful drug out of a small vial, 
 
The Mcfciss of God 
 72 
 
 and my pain was gone in a mdnute or two. 
 but alcohol was licking up my very blood 
 with tongues of flame. 
 
 I should have gotten drunk that night, if 
 I could. I thought of everything — of my 
 two yetars of clean life; of the meeting I 
 was going to, vouched for by my friend 
 and brother, D. L. Moody, w'hose faith in 
 me — withdrawn, now, I fear — had gone out 
 into all the world; of the bright little 
 home in New York; of Mary and the boys; 
 I tried to pray, and my lips framed oiaths. 
 I reached up for God, and He was gone, and 
 the fiercest fiend of hell had me by the 
 throat and shouted, "Drink, drink, drink!" 
 I said, "But Mary — ^but the boys;" it said, 
 "To hell with Mary — come om, to the sa- 
 loon!" 
 
 It was not yet daylight, Su'nd»ay morn- 
 ing, when I stood on the platform at Paw- 
 tucket alone. 1 flew from salo m to sa- 
 loon, they were shut, so were the drui;- 
 sit ores, and all that day, locked in my room 
 at the hotel, I fought my fight and won it 
 in the evening, by the grace of God; and 
 the people never knew that the man who 
 spoke to them that night had been in hell 
 all day. 
 
 What would you take, in cash, to hav« 
 that putt into your life? 
 
The Mercies of God 
 
 It is I'o be my portion untdl my dyiii>g 
 diay, and if merciful, patient time sliall 
 cauterize and he-al the old, dishonoTa-ble 
 wounds -and cover them, with repulsive but 
 impetrviouis cicatrices, yet beeause I had 
 those wounds 1 am to be through my whole 
 life considered a moral cliff-dweller, a 
 creature of precipices, where one false s'tep 
 ends all; amd so, denied full coaifiden<je of 
 nay fellow-men — ^the highesit graice of life 
 to strive for, in this world; a.n«d I am told I 
 have a Christ iian enemy or two who wait on 
 tiptoe of expetctancy and oheerfully pno- 
 phesy the sure, near-co'ming O'f my final 
 plunge back into the Dead Se'a of drink. 
 
 By the mercy of God tha.t has spared you 
 tha.t* kind of peril and that kind of halte, 
 "I beseech you'' castt a vote next time for 
 the Son of Man, who died for drunk- 
 ardis, and to make the stations on life's 
 highways, safe for storm-tossed men to 
 sttop at, any day or any night. And you, 
 good, calm, untempted men who never fell, 
 who never t'asted dearth for .any man and 
 never mean to; who love your party more 
 than you hate a lie, bear with rae if you 
 can. Count me an enemy of the church if 
 you must, a marplot and a fool, but spare 
 me the nuisance of your letters and your 
 admonition, and hear me say, upon my 
 
The Mercies of God 
 74 
 
 soul, tbat baittles on, tempted and beleag- 
 uered, to 'the judgment day: I distrusft 
 any anti-saloon mfovement thait would 
 leave us at the mercy of the two old par- 
 ties as a cheat or a delusion, and I de- 
 nounce those parties as corruptors of 
 manhood and misulteris of womamhaod, 
 common cheaits and bearers of false wit- 
 ness, the frienids and advocaites of the sa- 
 loon: and I say that for the country's good 
 and the church's opportunity they ought 
 to die, not one of them by the hand of the 
 oither, but both together, by the Christian 
 vote ,and be buried at the parting of the 
 ways, in one grave, for worms to eat theni 
 together, as they together have eaten out 
 the substanice of a people plundered and 
 belt rayed. 
 
 4f * w 
 
 "Present your bodies!" Your what? 
 Your bodies — not your resolu'tio-nts — ^your 
 feelings — your sympathy — your influence — 
 your song — your soul, bu. thait substan- 
 tial, tangible, ponderable tning, which the 
 wo<rld can see and touch and judge and 
 weigh; that with which you work and 
 vote and fight, defend, endure, suffer. 
 
 "With the heart man believeth unto 
 righiteousnesis, with the mo.ut»h confession 
 is made unto salvation." Witfc the body 
 
is cample'te, acceptable, *'reaisona,ble ser- 
 vice" umt'o God. Our Lord "was wou'nded 
 for our transgression's, bruised f>or our in- 
 iquities, cbastised for our peiace, striped 
 for our healing-, bore our sins in His own 
 body upon the tree." The cross of Jesus 
 stands for a crucified body, and that is 
 reason enough why you a^nd I should offer 
 our bodies. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Whose body? Your body; no hired mam 
 — no proxy — no commutiatiun for cash. 
 "Glorify God in your body as well as in 
 your spirit, which is His." 
 
 The saloon-keeper serves with his body, 
 aiud in consequence controls this nation 
 today. Go to the drink-seller, thou Chris- 
 tian, amd learn body service How much 
 of my body? My vocal cords? My signia^ 
 ture? All your body; a cle^an heart means 
 clean hands, as well. Hold up your hand. 
 You held it mp once before in the ohurch. 
 Whait did that mean? Was i't only a po- 
 lite conventionaiity, a graceful noithing to 
 help along the meeting? It mea.nt thait 
 you bad given it to God. Hold it up now; 
 look at it; think of it; God's band, upon 
 your honor. Will you clasp the dirty 
 band of a rum-seller with it to carry an 
 election? Will you cast a ballot thait in- 
 
The Mercies of God 
 
 suits high heaven with it? Will you man 
 the blo'ody ropes to draw on a whisky 
 party with it? Most of ns mean well, but 
 we have kept our eyes on the clown in- 
 stead of the King, and played the fool. 
 
 * * * 
 
 To whom? God — not the board of trus- 
 tees — niot the public sentiment — not the 
 bishop, nor even the church — God. 
 
 * * * 
 
 When? Nex: time? *Tre-sent," "Pre- 
 sent;" it is two words in one— verb and ad- 
 verb combined — and means act now. What 
 would you think of asoldier who at the 
 command, "Present arms," should s'ay, 
 "When?" or "I will next time," or "I will if 
 the rest do," or "I will whenever my gun 
 will decide the victory." 
 
 * * * 
 
 A what? — -a success — a candidate — an 
 aispirant for wealth and fame? 
 
 No, a "sacriiiee ! " To be burned? No, 
 to burn. To be consumed? No, to con- 
 sume. To die? No, to live. Many a man 
 would die for his country who has not the 
 courage or faith to live for it through one 
 election day. There is no such terror in 
 a cannon's mouth as in the mouth of a 
 political friend who sneers. 
 
I'hc Mercies of God 
 
 Why should I do this? Because thiait "is 
 your reasonable service" — the sensible, 
 practicial way to serve. 
 
 * * * 
 
 What shall I accomplish, a revolu'tion? 
 Probably noft. Save my own state? Bard- 
 ly. My own son? Maybe noit. Wha-.t 
 shall I get out of it? A gravestone, pos- 
 sibly. No matter, you are to do i't "that 
 you may prove what is that good and ac- 
 ceptable and perfect will of God" for a 
 man who says lie serves. There will in all 
 probability be no ea/rthqu'ake when you 
 begin 'to do right, buit you will get out of 
 it, even by some surpassing miraicle, "the 
 peaice of God that passeth understanding" 
 — ^and that is power. And power is what 
 we need. 
 
 You need not worry about the eledtion 
 if only you carry your own fragment 
 right. 
 
 * * * 
 
 A stoker in the hold of a great steamship, 
 homesick, swea»ty and grimy and weary, 
 with am insignificant shovelful of coal 
 poised ready to be thrown inito the fur- 
 nace, talks with himself: "Will tihis sthoiv- 
 ol-ful of coal drive this ship across the 
 ocean? No! Will it keep the ship going 
 one mile, one inch, on<e second? No^ but 
 
The Mercies of God 
 78 
 
 there 'are ot'her s'tokers, and more coal; 
 will ithey be faithful? I don't know; I'm 
 noit th« capfain of the ship, but I am the 
 commodore of this shovel. 
 
 "This ship may go to port or lie to or 
 go to the bottom, but my duity goes on, 
 and I will. Let the captain se-e to the ship 
 and the resit of hi'S crew. But he m(ay 
 know he Was one stoker who will shovel 
 square until the bell rings him off his 
 Bhifit." 
 
 * * * 
 
 You say: I wlil give a sermon. He 
 wants the preaclier for week days and 
 election days no less than for th-e pulpit. 
 Y'ou slay: I will give a song. He wants the 
 singer. There is such music in you as you 
 neveir dreamit ol, if you will le>t Him play. 
 I will give a prayer. He wants the pray-er. 
 Christians are like carpets; yo«u can't 
 judge them by tihe color or nap or fringe. 
 Tapestry and bod^-brussels look alike 
 oin the front, buit differ mightily on the 
 floor sdde. -"Tapestry" looks all riglit in 
 the store, but shows ino color on the un- 
 der side, and will not bear walking on, and 
 beaiting ruins it. "Body-brussels" shows 
 the colors through; it looks no better, biilt 
 will wear, and beiating helps it. Every 
 preacher in the land would have 
 
The Mercies of God 
 79 
 
 vo/ted for Joshua Levering last November 
 but for the fear of being beaten. Beiaiting 
 is good for a good man or a good partty — 
 it takes the dust out and the 
 moth, softens, brightens, purifies. The 
 Church, South and North, needs 
 beating. You priay foe an ingathering. 
 Batiter pray for a sifting. A revival is a 
 great machine, but it is apt to make tap- 
 estry, and so are all the hurrah forms of 
 Chrisltian work. Whia>t this counttry needs 
 is "body" Christianity, anr' that can only 
 be miade by ste.idy, eveiry-^day church work 
 and honie work, homest teaching, honest 
 praying, honest voiting honest living. It. 
 can never be produced by a church whose 
 word is not as ^^ood on elecition day as any 
 other, nor by a ministry that dishonors 
 at the polls the resoluitdons it prom-uilgates 
 in the conference. 
 
 * * » 
 
 Shall I not preach? Ye& surely, but let 
 the gospel show on the under side of your 
 ministry, clear down to the earth of eleic- 
 tion day. Shall I no't sing? Certainly, 
 but let the mfusdc sihow in your hand as 
 well as in your voice. If a man sings, 
 "Am I a Soldier of the Cross, a Follower 
 of the Lamb?" and votes for license or 
 keeps silenrt for it or supports a license 
 
The Mercies of God 
 80 
 
 party — he answers his own question. He 
 is not a soldier of anything, but a sutler; 
 he is not "a follower of the Lamb," but a 
 partner of the wolf. The sonigs that m«ai 
 sing at worship tramslaite themselves in 
 d'aily life inito very startling mea.nings. 
 In the body of a license Christian, or a 
 Democrat, or a Republican, (which is the 
 same thing) on a general election day, old 
 "Coronation" is rendered: "All hail the 
 power of Jesus' n'amie, let angels prostrate 
 fall, bring forth the royal diadem, and 
 crown him Lord of all" — but not umtil af- 
 ter this election. 
 
 Shall I not pray? Yes, "heel and toe," 
 with your "body." You are a prosperous 
 Christian; there is a poor woman in the 
 next block, bed-ridden, hungry. Pray for 
 her? Surely, with a baskeit on your arm, 
 a cheer on your lips, a blessing in every 
 finger-tip, and the light of God in your 
 eye. It will be time enough to do the 
 other kind of praying when you get back. 
 * * * 
 
 The truesit part of prayer Is bodily. 
 
 We often hear the expres^sion, "Vote as 
 you pray." There is no sense in that; one 
 always votes as he prays. 
 
 Listen to a tragedy in one act: — Scene 
 first: Family prayers; a. man on his knees 
 
The Mercies of God 
 8J 
 
 before an open Bible, saying: "Our Father 
 who art in he'aven, hallowed be Thy name, 
 Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on 
 earth as it is in heaven." What is thatt? 
 You can't tell by the sound; habit maybe; 
 sham possibly; certainly, "words, words, 
 words." 
 
 Scene second. A caucus; same man, 
 (aside): "Now J must act as Jesus would 
 have me act, and demand, the world for 
 Christ." Enter the chairmian of the cen- 
 tral oommiit'tee, and says pointedly: "What 
 do you want?" The man: "If you please, 
 I should like to offer a copy of the resolu^ 
 tion of my church abomt the liquor traffic." 
 The chairman: "To hell with your church 
 resolutions; do you want to lose the sa- 
 loon vote? Don't you know the honor of 
 the country is at sitake this tim^e? Stand 
 back and shut your mouth until after elec- 
 tion." The man does it. What is that? 
 That is "Christian" politics, as it is taught 
 by object-lessons at our caucuses. 
 
 Scene third: A polling-booth; chorus 
 of workers: "The party is in the holy 
 temple, with the saloon; lei all the church- 
 es be silent before them, this time;" and 
 the man presents his body and his soul, 
 "a living sacrifice" to the "convenient sea* 
 son" devil, splits his piety up the back. 
 
The Mercies of God 
 82 
 
 crawls out of li^s convictions, and buttex- 
 
 flies it with the resit over the mud-flats of 
 
 spoils politics. What is that? Prayer, 
 
 I called it a tragedy; it is a farce in 
 
 three acts. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Let us be very clear about this. I speak 
 my testimony record my vow, sing my 
 psalm, say my prayer, and in my little per- 
 sonal circle it may pass at par, but God 
 iooketh at the heart, and works are the 
 windows of motives. 
 
 This government can stamp its dollar 
 mark on it fifty cents worth of silver and 
 pass it to he boundary line of its authority, 
 but there its value drops "to the market 
 price of ihat kind of bulliotn — at so much 
 per ounce. 
 
 Prayer is like that — ^worth precisely 
 what we will redeem it at, in work, ac- 
 cording to our light, our opportuity, and 
 our ability. 
 
 When a Christian man votes for men or 
 measures or parties, or to continue condi- 
 tions that permit or protect or ignore the 
 saloon, or, by refraining to vote, consen»ts 
 to them, it is, to all intents and purposes, 
 precisely the same as if he knelt ait the bal- 
 lot-box and prayed: "O God that hatest 
 sin, help our sinner to win, today. De- 
 
The Mercies of God 
 83 
 
 feat the Prohibitionists, who insist upon 
 righteousness prematurely. Help us to 
 keep back the evolution of conscience in 
 young Chris«tian men, and to sih'a^me im- 
 politic converts out of being too true to 
 t'heir convictions. Help us to make our 
 party as clean as the saloon vote w^ill 
 *sitan'd.' Spare the saloon a little w^hile, 
 until w^e beat the other party for being 
 the saloon keeper's friend. Let the murder 
 of the innocents go on yet a little w^hile, for 
 Jesus' sake!" 
 
 * 4f »f 
 
 Eighteen sixty-one; all the air pregnant 
 and heavy with peril. Fifes and drums 
 scream and rattle in the streets. Men 
 stand in excited groups upon th-e corners. 
 In the square a flag flies and a man har- 
 angues other men to go to war. What does 
 it all mean? The long struggle between 
 two theories of the Constituition is to be 
 foug^ht out by wager ocf battle. There is 
 to be w-ar: men are to be shot and starved, 
 are to die of homesickness in Northern 
 prisons, to be crippled for life, killed in 
 Southern swamps, and lie there lost until 
 the judgmenft aay. War — well, what of Tt? 
 Look at all the patriots, speak to them: 
 "Wh'ait will you do for the country now?" 
 One answers, '*! will go tc Congress;" I 
 
The Mercies of God 
 84 
 
 will be a home guard;" **I will be a con- 
 tria,citor;" "I will send a substitute;** "I 
 will stand by my sta^te;*' "I will throw my 
 influence for the Union;* "I will loan 
 money to the government;" "I will write 
 loyal editorials;" "I will pray for the 
 country.** I am not latrg-hing at these 
 amswens. All those things were useful, 
 neceissary, worthy; intellectual patrio't- 
 ism, vicarious paitriotism, emotional pa^ 
 triot'ism, financial patriotism, officdal pa- 
 triotism, and so on. 
 
 But wait: ovei by the flag yonder a line 
 is forming; a tall young fellow with 
 flushed cheek and flashing eye steps into 
 the open and iries: "Stand here, every 
 man who will give his bady with his prin- 
 ciples! I will be first; come on, come 
 on!** 
 
 The crowd cheers, and the recruiting 
 officer is busy. 
 
 ^f * "H- 
 
 A hundred men and boys marched down 
 the street to the crude mu-ic oi the drum 
 and fife, accepted by the governor and 
 ordered to report for duty lorthwith. 
 
 You remember how it was: hiandker^ 
 chiefs waved from every balcony until to'o 
 limp to wave at all; we followed to the 
 station. Then the train drew out wi'th 
 
The Mercies of God 
 85 
 
 our soldiers on board, their hands fillea 
 with keepsakes and mLnia(t.UTeiS pressed 
 upon them ait the last moment, and the 
 band played: '*Brave boys are they, Gone 
 a;t their country's call. And yet, and ye/t 
 we cannot forget, That many brave boys 
 must fall." That was body paftriotism. 
 
 And we sang" and played and resolved 
 and enacted and proclaimed! But vt was 
 over the graves of half a million bodies 
 that the great commander, beloved now by 
 both sides, said, "Let us 'have peace." It 
 was in the blood of a million — ^North and 
 South — that the final interpretation of lib- 
 eir»ty was written into the Constitution, 
 and the home guard and officials and min- 
 isters and editO'i"s, the loyal to their views, 
 and honorable in their way. are forgotten 
 in the iincreasing splendor of the faxne of 
 the men who sitopped bullets with, their 
 bodies in the dark old diays of SLxty-one 
 and two and three and four and five. 
 
 Nationial and state pen&don laws, sol- 
 diers' homes, battle-flags in the capitols, 
 buittons red, white and blue, and bronze, 
 statutes in miarble, blue and gr»ay to- 
 gerther, speak, and will always speak, of 
 them in eulogy 
 
 And as the seasons come and go, we and 
 our children and their children will thatch 
 
The Mercies of God 
 86 
 
 their graves witli flowers, and chisel inito 
 graniite and cast in bronze the ntameis of 
 the bodies that were offered a living sac- 
 rifice to education, to conscience, and to 
 liberty. 
 
 Heroic Southierners lie abouit us in their 
 shrouds of gra^^ and yonder in my be- 
 loved Nortihland lie the Boys in Blue. 
 
 They fought as true men fight till the 
 light failed, and a mtan is a coward who 
 would deny the loyalty or dim the fame of 
 either side. The fittest truth survived, 
 thanks to God alone! 
 
 So lett them rest; in honor and in pe'ace, 
 and leit us carry on this war as tliey did 
 that, until, under God, the soldiers of both 
 sides get the victory. God bless the old 
 Dominion! God bless the Church every- 
 where! God curse the liquor traffic now, 
 for Jesus' sake. Amen. 
 
"like a Zx^C 
 
 ** Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel 
 of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, 
 nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful, but his delight 
 is in the law of the lyOrd, and in His law doth he 
 meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree 
 planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his 
 fruit in his season ; his leaf also shall not wither, and 
 whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. The ungodly are 
 not so, but are like the chaff which the wind driveth 
 away. 
 
 " Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the 
 judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the 
 righteous. For the lyOrd knoweth the way of the 
 righteous ; but the way of the ungodly shall perish." 
 
 ^T has been discovered that David was 
 not the author of the first Psalm. 
 It is at least equally certain that 
 he v^^as. 
 It does not much ma>tter, it is not the 
 kind of thing to greiatly add to or diminish 
 his fame. (Somebody wrote it; it is very 
 old, and so simple as to both form and 
 substance, that it seems to me that I 
 should have written something very like it 
 myself, if no one else had done it. 
 
 And the decided weight of opinion is, 
 that whoever wrote it did so by the inspir- 
 ation of God, and I reckon that is so. 
 Whatever definition of inspiration be ac- 
 cepted, for it would be Lard to find one, 
 
 87 
 
**Like a Tree'' 
 88 
 
 learned or simple, who would not puit his 
 linger on that stickful of poetic prose amd 
 say, "Chance or law or miracle, that is 
 right, that is reliable, that is true, that 
 will do to tie to." At any rate, this church 
 imputes to it absolutely verity and accepts 
 it unequivocally as the very word of God, 
 and in the most earnest circles of church 
 work it would greatly detra.ct froon one's 
 usefulness, if not destro-y it altogether, 
 even to express a doubt upon the subject. 
 
 * * •}«• 
 
 And so, because I prize this hearing and 
 wou?d set every step of my thought in a 
 sure place today and bar out of this hour 
 any possible personal vagary, I propose to 
 you that, as you have oiften seen a tailor 
 lay a pattern upon a piece of cloth, we lay 
 this ancient, accepted, evident, true, in- 
 spired Scripture upon our politics, and 
 cut it out and wear it at the next election, 
 as the toga virilis of our Christian citizen- 
 ship. Wear it, I say, for it matters very 
 little how admirable the cut of one's piety 
 is if he takes it off in the polling-booth, as 
 men take off their overcoats indoors, for 
 fear of no»t "feeling" them when they come 
 out into the open air. 
 
 * * * 
 
 It is a "narrow-guage" psalm. Its si- 
 
Or r '. 
 
 **Likc a "Xttz** 
 89 
 
 lence as to any corrupt contemporary 
 money system, might be objected to, by a 
 superficial mind with bolting tendencies, 
 as in the nature of sanction of conspiracies 
 of banks or soime such thing. And I can 
 see how, possibly, its use of the masculine 
 noun, man, might seem to some extreme 
 feminine sensitiveness a slight to woman. 
 But these infirmities of the Holy Scrip- 
 tures we shall have to put up with, in view 
 of the general good character of the Book. 
 « ♦ » 
 
 T will tell you frankly that with such 
 very moderate ability as I can bring to 
 bear upon the money question of today, I 
 am persuaded to favor the present gold 
 standard, upon grounds of the most ele- 
 mentary honesty, but I think him a most 
 noisome and pestilential bigot who keeps 
 crying '^blatherskite!" to silver advocates, 
 or saying that there is no reapectable or 
 honorable argument upon the silver side. 
 
 And I am in favor of Woman Suffrage 
 upon grounds of a, b, c, decency. My vsdfe 
 is married to a wanderer, and is the 
 mother of three tall, straight men, and, in 
 the natural division of our labor, her place 
 seems where her heart is, in her home, 
 while we men do the voting. 
 
 But whenever, as wife, mother, Chris- 
 
**Likz a Tree'* 
 90 
 
 tian, citizen, she may deem It well for her 
 to add the ballot to the gentle enginery of 
 her power, we four stand pledged, by every 
 homespun chivalry, to champion her right 
 to it, against the world. But I confess to 
 a ceritain gentlemanly Christian languor 
 when I hear that party platforms which 
 emit the subject are to be deemed an in- 
 sult to our Christian womanhood. 
 * * -jt 
 
 But Christian citizenship is new and 
 strange to many, and must deal with poli- 
 tics in its elementary forms at first, and 
 while each of these questions, money, suf- 
 frage, tariff, direct legislation, etc., is 
 worthy of the time and thought of any 
 man, yet neither one of them is funda- 
 mental; each is, as yet, involved, unre- 
 duced tO' distinctively moral terms, and 
 unready, by so much or so little, for solu- 
 tion. 
 
 On the other hand, the question of the 
 liquor traffic is already reduced to a sim- 
 ple equation, from which the reduction of 
 a single election day will suffice to give 
 the value of "X"— -the Cross of Christ upon 
 a freeman's ballot-slip. 
 
 •K> « * 
 
 An election is an example in division; 
 the voting body is the dividend, the issue 
 
"'Like a Tree'' 
 91 
 
 is the divisor, if it be single, the quotient 
 will be simple and final; if it be a poly- 
 nomial, the answer will be but another 
 problem as difficult as the fir-"*. The one 
 bright spo.t in the sky of practical poli- 
 tics today is that the people have com- 
 pelled the panties to form a campaigTi 
 upon single issues. 
 
 * * * 
 
 The choice of divisors is one of three, 
 an amiable medley, the measure of a dol- 
 lar, and "the measure of a man." What 
 the c^hurch will get out of this election, 
 depends upon what she divides by. If she 
 divide by a medley she will get confusion 
 more or less hopeful; if she divide Dy 
 money she will get money; and if she di- 
 vide by manhood, she will get manhood. 
 
 *' God, give us men; a time like this demands 
 Strong minds, great hearts, true faith, and ready hands. 
 
 Men whom the lust of office does not kill; 
 Men whom the spoils of office can not buy; 
 
 Men who possess opinions and a will; 
 Men who have honor, men who will not lie; 
 
 Men who can stand before a demagog 
 And scorn his treacherous flatteries without winking; 
 
 Tall men, sun-crowned, who live above the fog 
 In public duty and in private thinking. 
 For while the rabble, with their thumb-worn creeds, 
 Their loud profession, and their little deeds. 
 Mingle in selfish strife — lo! 
 
 Freedom weeps, wrong rules the land, and waiting Justice 
 sleeps." 
 
**Ukc a Trce^' 
 92 
 
 I do not say that any of the great econ- 
 omic questions are without the purview of 
 this psalm, but, going out to meet them 
 with no weapon but "the sword of the spir- 
 it" 3 cannot clearly see where to strike — 
 at gold or silver or tariff or the rest — to 
 maim the wrong or kill it. 
 
 * * * 
 
 But the liquor traffic is not economics, 
 but treason, overt, insolent, bloody as the 
 shambles, and black as the lees of mid- 
 night. I hate it, and when I think of it, 
 all the voices of memory, the words of the 
 Book, and every fibre of my soul and body 
 become a seething, unreasoning mob, and 
 cry, "Kill!" 
 
 « « « 
 
 T would not ask you to accept this red- 
 hot, lashing fever of my blood as any ar- 
 gument. I have eaten hell-ashes until my 
 minJ is alkaline and cuts up the unctuous 
 lubricants of calm and decorous debate, 
 and spoils the play of thought. Perhaps 
 there may be something to be said in favor 
 of the drink, for all my hatred of it. 
 
 * * 4f 
 
 I will not offer you the testimony of the 
 Woman's Christian Temperance Union; 
 most of those women have been chained 
 by the implacable tyranny of their own 
 
**Likc a Tree'* 
 93 
 
 love to the Caucasus of drink, with bosoms 
 bared to the beaks and claws of licensed 
 and protected vultures, and shame and 
 wounds have made them hypochondriacal 
 — may be. Let us have something* level- 
 headed and dispassionate. 
 
 * * * 
 
 William Ewart Gladstone! stand up and 
 speak to these young people! What about 
 the liquor traffic? "Gentlemen, we need 
 not give ourselves any ti*ouble about the 
 revenue, the question or revenue must 
 never stand in the way of needed reform. 
 Besides, with a sober population, not wast- 
 ing their earnings, I shall know where to 
 obtain the revenue." 
 
 * * 4f 
 
 Coleridge, Lord Chief Justice o.f Eng- 
 land! What about the liquor traffic? 
 "There is scarcely a crime before me that 
 is not directly or indirectly caused by 
 strong drink." 
 
 * * # 
 
 The United States Supreme Court! stand 
 up in your robes and speak! What about 
 the liquor traffic? "It is not necessary to 
 array the appalling statistics of misery, 
 pauperism, and crime which have their 
 origin in the use and abuse of ardent 
 spirits. The police power, which is ex- 
 
**Like a Tree" 
 94 
 
 elusive in the states, is competent to the 
 correction of these great evils, and all 
 measures of restraint and prohibition 
 necessary to effect that purpose are with- 
 in the scope of that authority, and if a 
 loss of revenue should accrue to the United 
 States from a diminished consumption of 
 ardent spirits, she will be a gainer a thou- 
 sandfold in the health, wealth and happi- 
 ness of the people." 
 
 * * * 
 
 The New York Tribune! What aboiit 
 the s-aloon? "It is the heaviest clog upon 
 progress and the deepest disgrace of the 
 nineteenth century." 
 
 * * * 
 
 The London Times! W^hat about the 
 liquor traffic? "Drink baffles us, con- 
 founds us, shames us, and mocks us a't 
 every point, and the public house holds on 
 its triumphant course." 
 
 * * * 
 
 General Boo.th"! What about the liquor 
 traffic? "Nine-'tenths of our poverty, 
 squalor, vice and crime spring from this 
 poisonous tap-root. Society by its habits, 
 customs, and laws, has gveased the slope, 
 down which these poor creatures slide to 
 perdition." 
 
**Likc a Tree'' 
 95 
 
 Abraham Lincoln! What about the li- 
 quor traffic? "The liquor traffic is a can- 
 cer in society, eating out its vitals and 
 threatening destruction, and all attempts 
 to regulate it will not only prove abortive, 
 but will aggravate the evil. There must 
 be no more attempts to regulate the can- 
 cer, it must be eradicated, not a root must 
 be left behind, for until this is done, all 
 classes must continue in danger of becom- 
 ing victims of strong drink." 
 » * * 
 
 But may not tliese be ttie unconsidered 
 edicts of fallible men and overburdened 
 courts. Yes: I shall not ask you to rest 
 on what they say. But I do "thank God, 
 and take courage" as I remember that 
 though Lincoln died and his party with 
 him, thirty years ago, there survives to 
 this betrayed and plundered people an 
 incorruptible judiciary, in the main. But 
 it ought to be high treason for the confi- 
 dence men wlio "do" the people, in the 
 dominant politics, to call their organized 
 conspiracies "the party of Jefferson," "the 
 
 party of Lincoln," God save the mark! 
 * * * 
 
 Nc sore-hearted appeals shall war^) your 
 judgment here; no outraged and indignant 
 womanhood shall obtrude her tears to 
 
**Like a Tree'' 
 96 
 
 stampede your sympathies; let stricken 
 childhood wail on through the starless, 
 voiceless midnight of its wrongs, unheed- 
 ed; let statesmanship find audience else- 
 where tonight. Upon the certified record 
 of the Church herself, and his own admis- 
 sions to his inner consciousness, I will in- 
 dict the Christian voter, and on the third 
 of next November, let him plead "guilty" 
 or "not guilty." 
 
 * * * 
 
 But may not the church be wrong? 
 Yes, but nothing on this planet is so apt to 
 be right as she! By the word of Jesus 
 Christ she holds her commission; His own 
 disciples were her first ministers; His 
 mother. His brothers and sisters molded 
 her early life; her life has been one long 
 contemplation of His perfections; she. is 
 the mother of interpretation and criticism, 
 old and new alike; the greatest heights of 
 science are but spurs of the main range 
 of her thought; God help this world, if she 
 cannot be trusted by her own sons! 
 
 * * * 
 
 But does her word bind us? JNo, our own 
 word binds us. We have taken her vows 
 upon us and pledged ourselves in the blood 
 of the New Testament, to love, honor, and 
 cherish her. You revere her, and I do, but 
 
•*Uke a Tree*' 
 97 
 
 it is by no sentiment that I exhort you. 
 My business with you has to do with coan- 
 nion honesty and nothing more nor less. 
 * * * 
 
 I open here before you, the official record 
 of your General Assembly, listen — I read 
 extracts; but every word of context in- 
 tensifies the meaning: *'To license the li- 
 quor traffic is a sin against God, and a 
 crime against humanity, being morally 
 wrong it can never be made legally right, 
 and the time has fully come when Chris- 
 tians should unite their efforts, regardless 
 of previous affiliations, for its suppression. 
 No political party has a right to expect, 
 nor ought it to receive, the vote of a Chris- 
 tian, so long as it stands co-mmitted to the 
 license policy or refuses to put itself upon 
 record in open hostility to the saloon." 
 
 I £,peak no compliment, I make no de- 
 fense, but take it as I find it, and ask no 
 quarter when I assert, that to cast a bal- 
 lot for the Democratic party in the coming 
 election is to cast a stone at the church. 
 
 I open the Bible, put my finger upon the 
 First Psalm, and remind you again that 
 the church says: "That is the handwriting 
 of divinity," and then I weigh my words 
 when I aver that he who casts a Kepubli- 
 can ticket at the national election repudi- 
 
I 
 
 98 
 
 ates the Word of God and insults Him to 
 His face. Have no fear that I shall speak 
 of party politics — ^this is party religion. 
 * * * 
 
 Some one will say, and truly, that the 
 liquor traffic has become a question of 
 ?nere method, but methods are principles 
 in motion, and the First Psalm presents the 
 whole rationale of Christian method, in a 
 simple song — how to walk, how to stand, 
 how to sit, how to meditate, how to grow, 
 how to prosper; and the music of it will fill 
 the whole earth when the people sing it 
 with a ballot box accompaniment. That 
 portion of the psalmody requires an in- 
 strument. 
 
 ¥f * * 
 
 I presume I shall be within the truth and 
 the proprieties of this occasion in saying, 
 that the saloon-keeper is an ungodly man. 
 "God is not in all his thoughts. His ways 
 are always grievous, his mouth is full of 
 cursing and deceit and fraud; under his 
 tongue is mischief and vanity. He sit- 
 teth in the lurking-places of the villages, 
 in the secret places doth he murder the in- 
 nocent, his eyes are privily set against the 
 poor. He lieth in wait secretly as a lion 
 in h5s den; he lieth in wait to catch the 
 poor; he doth catch the poor when he 
 
**Likc a Tree'' 
 99 
 
 ilraweth him into his net. He croucheth 
 and humbleth himself that the poor may 
 fall by his strong ones. He hath said in 
 h:s heart, God hath forgotten." 
 
 What has he to say for his business? 
 Upon what basis does he calculate his 
 politics? To what measure does he lay 
 the lines of his citizenship? He says: 
 "Men always drank and always will drink." 
 *'Tf T do not sell, somebody else will." 
 "There is a revenue in it." "It is a person- 
 al matter and moral suasion is the only 
 I emedy." "Close the low dives by increas- 
 ing the license and make the saloons re- 
 spectable." "Regulation is an eternal 
 principle." "Keep the ques<tion out of 
 politics." "We are in sympathy with all 
 wise and we''l-directed efforts to prevent 
 the evils of intemperance.'* "Public senti- 
 ment will not tolerate a Prohibition law," 
 and more, but all to the same effect, and so, 
 year In and year out, upon election day — 
 the one day of the calendar when men are 
 equal — the average Christian voter, like a 
 dreary parrot perched upon a party boss's 
 thumb, sometimes right side up, sometimes 
 upside down, echoes the blasrphemy and 
 takes up the damnable parody and 
 chants it through, to the dismay of the 
 church and the joy and satisfaction of her 
 
**Like a Tree^' 
 JOO 
 
 enemies: "Blessed is the practical man 
 that walketh as erect as possible, in the 
 counsels of the ungodly, atfiliates with the 
 iinclean in politics, to control the soap 
 ra^arket, and confesses spiritual insolvency, 
 to speculate in his own dishonored pledges, 
 for the profit of a party pool that scorns 
 the inconvenient virtue that would do 
 right all days alike." 
 
 4t * * 
 
 "Blessed is the man that walketh not in 
 tlie counsels of the ungodly." 
 
 All the triune beatitudes of the First 
 Psalm have to do with action. In Chris- 
 tian citizenship aresolution shows how 
 the resolver feels, a ballot shows where 
 he stands. "Blessed is the man that stand- 
 eth not in the way of sinners." Under our 
 system, a party is a voter's "way" in poli- 
 tics. We stand in the valley of the shadow of 
 a national election; political virtue will -be 
 in it only as a voice and a protest. The 
 honor of the nation is not at stake in the 
 contest over money standards; that is a 
 sparring match of discredited pugilists, 
 each of whom has, in advance, sold the 
 
 fight to the saloon. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Three ways are open, where a Christian 
 voter may take a stand: Republican, Dem- 
 
**Like a Tree" 
 JOI 
 
 ocrat and Prohibition. I omit the Popu- 
 list and Naitional parties in order not to 
 cumber my illustration, but I do so with- 
 out prejudice to them. To be a Republi- 
 can this fall is, at the best, to stand for 
 the honor of the gold dollar, as to be a 
 Democrat is to stand for the justice of a 
 silver dollar. To be a Prohibitionist is to 
 stand for the integrity of Christian man- 
 hood, the honor of the church, and the 
 justice of Almighty God in American pol- 
 itics. Where are you going to stand? I 
 assume that there is no one in this audi- 
 ence so weak in his Christianity or bo 
 mean in his citizeniship as to run away 
 from the election. 
 
 Stand here with me upon this mountain 
 top and see the marshaling of the hosts 
 upon the plain. Two hundred ,and forty 
 thousand saloons belch forth their self- 
 destroying, promise-breaking home-defil- 
 ing, pauper-breeding, wife-beating clans, 
 and they form in two sections and march 
 by with all the jeweled, painted, ragged 
 harlotry of the nation following on — the 
 stock-jobbers, and men who corner gold 
 and silver, coal and light, and food — the 
 gamblers, confidence men, vagrants, and 
 criminals of low and high degree; the 
 
J02 
 
 office-seekers, the jackals of the vicious 
 classes, move to their places. Where? 
 Half to the Democratic party, whose lead- 
 er, a clean, brave, honest, mistaken Pres- 
 byterian, bears the flag of Jefferson, sus- 
 tained, advised, and cheered by Tammanj^ 
 Hall, Hill, Gorman, and the rest. Half to 
 the Republican party, led by a smug and 
 wil> Methodist, vs^hose hands are held up 
 by Greenhut, of the National Whisky 
 Trust, Saloon-keeper Cox, of "Dead Man*s 
 Alley," the Platts, Quays, Braytons, and 
 other despicable but pow^erful procurers of 
 that ilk in darkest politics. 
 
 I say no word in personal disrespect of 
 these candidates; but they stand "in the 
 way of sinners," they are "in the hands of 
 their friends," and their friends comprise 
 the scum and crime of cities, states, and 
 nations, and they expect to win by standing 
 "in the counsel of the ungodly," and by 
 the contributions of the agglomerated 
 treasons of the body politic. And for my- 
 self, I freely say that rather than choose 
 between them, in that company, and upon 
 that conceded and stipulated bankruptcy 
 of principle, I would strip off my right of 
 franchise as a filthy rag and voluntarily 
 become "a man without a country." 
 
"Like a Tree'' 
 103 
 
 In politics, a man's "counsel" is the way- 
 he reasons, his party is the "way" he goes, 
 his ballot is the "way" he stands, and the 
 sum of them all, is the way he foots up 
 in the long run — his seat of government — 
 his capital. He occupies it by election to 
 office or by elecl:ing some one else. 
 
 * * «{• 
 
 "Blessed is the man that siitteth noit in 
 the seat of the scornful," but I dare to say 
 to you that the winning candidate in this 
 campaign will take his seat by virtue of 
 his having scorned the voice of God and of 
 the church. 
 
 * * * 
 
 The peril of the republic is tha/t Con- 
 gress is no deliberative body "according 
 to the counsel" of the godly or the patri- 
 otic, but a nest of schemes where agree- 
 m-ent is impossible save at a price paid 
 down in party counters, or some local 
 cr personal interest which, disregarding 
 downright loyalty, says covertly, "You 
 vote for my bill and I vote for yours," to 
 the glory of jobbery. Eight eousness is 
 unthought of there, save as an ad captan- 
 dum incident in debate; while in munici- 
 pal government, no man, with rare excep- 
 tions, can get or hold a seat without the 
 condition of holding godliness, as defined 
 
**Likz a Tree'* 
 J 04 
 
 by the church, in utter scorn. The United 
 States Senator who said that "the Ser- 
 n?on on the Mount in politics is an iride- 
 scent dream" spoke literal truth according 
 to his light and the practice of the Sen- 
 ate. 
 
 Send the most careful newspaper re- 
 porter to Mr. Bryan to ask him what his 
 administration will do about the saloon 
 in the event he wins, and he will tell you 
 frankly: "Nothing, I am opposed to sump- 
 tuary legislation.'* 
 
 Send to Mr. McKinley the same question, 
 and he will say, "I decline to be imter- 
 viewed." Is it as bad as that? Yes, worse, 
 for if they were to answer according to 
 the counsel of the godly, they would be 
 execrated by their parties as fools and 
 traitors. But I do rejoice to know that 
 there is a candidate in the field, the peer 
 of either of the others in body and in 
 brain, and a. full century beyond them 
 both in business standing and ability, who, 
 if you ask him, "What will your adminis- 
 tration do about the saloon in case of 
 your election?" will say, promptly as 
 thunder follows lightning: "We will kill 
 it, bv the grace of God, and divide its an- 
 nual income of $1,000,000,000 among the 
 honest industries of the land." 
 
**Likc a Ttcc*^ 
 105 
 
 But what would the one-idead Prohibi- 
 tionists do about money? That is a per- 
 fectly fair question, and I will answer it: 
 We would hold a session of Congress, in the 
 name of God and home and country, with- 
 out respect to sections, classes, or party 
 condition, and thresh out the money argn- 
 ment in sober, clean, loyal, debate, and do 
 rig-ht about it. But if Bryan be elected 
 will there not be a panic ?Yes, but it will be 
 a petty, jumpting--3ack thing, compared to 
 the perennial panic of the liquor traffic, 
 that swamps the entire volume of our cur- 
 lency every year, and gives back to civili- 
 zation a quid pro quo of vice, disease, and 
 crime, unmixed with any good. But if 
 McKinley be elected is there not danger 
 of a revolution? Yes, but it will be light 
 comedy compared to the ceaseless murder 
 and pillage of tTie saloon. 
 
 But is it not a waste of power to vote 
 for the narrow righteousness of Prohibi- 
 tion this year? No, it is the most hopeful 
 and most wise expenditure of power in 
 s'ght. You can do nothing for McKinley 
 or Bryan or gold or silver without you can 
 carry a m'ajority of the electoral college, 
 that means the polling of say, 7,000,000 
 votes. While on the other hand, 1,000,000 
 votes for Joshua Levering — without a 
 
**Lifce a Tree'' 
 
 J06 
 
 member of Congress or an elector — ^will 
 elect our issue to the next place upon the 
 calendar of the nation, and in the first 
 campaign of the twentieth century, some 
 party, or all parties, will fly David's flag 
 and cover the church with glory. 
 * * * 
 
 Young men, as nearly as I can under- 
 stand my own heart, I do not come before 
 you as a partizan, but we must look at the 
 case as it is, and you must be honest, br-ave, 
 patriotic, and clean. It is the Word of 
 God I preach to you. "Blessed is the man 
 whose delight is in the law of the Lord, 
 and in his law doth he meditate day and 
 night," — that is, in the activity and hard 
 practicalities of living no less than in the 
 hours of worship and repose. 
 
 But is it practicable? Will it work? 
 Will it win? Listen. "He shall be like a tree. 
 "The counsel of the ungodly" says, "Bet- 
 ter be a vine and cling to some grand old 
 p'le and hide its scars and rotting but- 
 tresses, and eat its decayed glory, and nest 
 i+^-s bats and owls, and weave your clean, 
 young, lusty life about its parting seams to 
 shield it like the vdcker on a demijohn." 
 >To, no, "like a tree," no crawling, no veil- 
 ing; growing, wide open to God looking 
 down, wide open to men looking up. The 
 
"Like a Ttcz*' 
 107 
 
 counsel of the ungodly says: "If you want 
 to be a tree at least adapt yourself to your 
 habitat, and take the direcjtion of your 
 ^Towth according to the slant of political 
 progress, albeit oblique to God, until the 
 world gets level; Be relatively honest — 
 .stand by the G. O. P." Never! On the 
 contrary, let your motto be U. P. — United 
 Presbyterian, U. P.— UP. 
 
 "Like a tree planted," not potted, nor 
 heeled in, nor hung up by the roots to 
 be set out in the spring — not hanging by 
 one root in the crevice of the rock, "plant- 
 ed at the meeting of the streams." 
 * * * 
 
 Bear with me a moment, you must think 
 this thought through. I lay my hand up- 
 on this Bible and say, "There is a river, 
 the streams whereof shall make glad the 
 cfty of God, the holy place of the taber- 
 nacles of the most high. God is in the midsit 
 of her; she shall not be moved." 
 
 Law, medicine, sofciology, political econ- 
 omy, flowing on in gathering he'adv/ay 
 from their mysterious sources, meet the 
 voice of the church and the teachings of 
 this book at the saloon. The political 
 party, existent or yet to be, that is plant- 
 ed there, shall run its roots wide and deep 
 in an exhaustless soil, and as the roots in- 
 
**Likc a Tree*' 
 JOS 
 
 creiase and hold, the branches will spread 
 high and wide to correspond. 
 
 * «• * 
 
 "That bringieth forth his fruit in his 
 yeeason." Whose season? That of the man 
 who planted it? No, no, the tree's season 
 — an orang-e tree brings forth fruit in or- 
 ange season, that is, God's season for 
 oranges. "His leaf also shall not wither'* 
 — evergreen, blooming, growing, bearing 
 renewing — day by day. 
 
 "And whatsoever he doeth shall pros- 
 per," -and if that does not mean victory^ 
 there is a lie in the First Psalm. 
 
, i3 H ^ ; 
 
 Or y.^'L 
 
 Ck Ifiange f inOer. 
 
 *'This kind cometh not out but by prayer and 
 fasting." 
 
 a THOUGHT of loveliness and good- 
 ness and happiness and of a ter- 
 rific sorrow starts out of the shad- 
 owy edges of this hour and bars 
 the way and will not let me pass to the 
 main line until I speak to it. 
 
 • « # 
 
 An agitator's life is well nigh destitute 
 of what we call amenities; but may be 
 very rich in friendships — not in the num- 
 ber of them certainly, but the quality. 
 Mine has been so blest and it involves 
 nothing invidious to the others for me to 
 
 speak of one of them just here. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Ever since I came upon the platform, my 
 eyes have swept this sea of faces, looking 
 for a friend of yours and mine. At rapid 
 intervals I recollected that she could not 
 be among you, yet in spite of what my rea- 
 son said to me, 1 kept the search. 
 
 She was one of my children according to 
 the gospel of prohibition; her face was 
 beautiful; her faith was straight as an ar- 
 row and her Christian life was like a low, 
 sweet psalm upon the quiet water when the 
 sun is down. 
 
The Range Finder 
 
 no 
 
 Last year at Indianapolis we sat to- 
 gether through that wonderful meeting 
 while her husband was pouring out upon 
 us all, his noble eloquence about "The Sep- 
 arated Life;" — God comfort him, he has 
 learned some startling meanings of it since 
 that night. 
 
 I had never seen her so wrought upon, 
 so tense, so rapt. She worried me with her 
 bolt uprightness — insensible save of the 
 man who spoke and Him of whom he spoke. 
 
 In the confusion of the breaking up she 
 said no word of what was passing in lier 
 mind. We went our ways; and then the 
 news came that she had gone out of the 
 darkness into everlasting light. 
 
 I will not cheapen the memory with many 
 words; but it will do us good to pause a 
 moment on the threshhold of this ugly 
 theme and in our hearts salute the "Sep- 
 arated Life" of Comrade Ella Barnett Kyle. 
 * * * 
 
 It is the fourth time that I have spoken 
 to an International Convention of the 
 Young People's Christian Union. 
 
 In so far as plain sincerity entitles, I 
 might expect — and do expect — the com- 
 mon recognition due to any well-meaning 
 man; but for the distinguished and re- 
 peated honor of an important place upon 
 
The Range Findef 
 tit 
 
 this program, I cannot see, much as I 
 should like to, any personal deserving, or 
 any explanation, save only that certain 
 reflex of fine courtesy, vs^hich leads w^ell 
 bred people to show^ extreme politeness to 
 a guest w^ho has experienced coarse vul- 
 garity at the hands of some crude or weak 
 member of the family. 
 * * * 
 
 I do allow myself a single touch of pride, 
 in this, that, loving ease, I have been 
 given grace to keep to my uncomfort- 
 able furrow cr<oisis-wilse oif ithe public semti- 
 miemt, while the s-miooth, haird tuinnipike of 
 expediency w^as 'open itio me ait a sm-adl lex- 
 pe^nise of truth at 'tihe tioll galte o<f (the 
 *''boiss," in church ainid isitaite. Thalt, liovi'nig 
 popularity, I have been gfiven sitranlgth tio 
 fig^ht rig^it loin, when o-utclaislsed anid ov!e(r- 
 miatched ait eivery point; a.nd to fighit fair, 
 when miisunld'erfsltloiod 'au/d hdsseid alt by the 
 very men w^ioisie dieiseir.ted p^oisitis in th,e 
 breiajch of the chunch w^all, I trield to h/oM 
 for God aind hoim-e and counltiry; anid to 
 **istiay put," ^o-r Jesus' slake, wihen worsiteid, 
 and tiake unstinted punisihmenit withlouit a 
 whine. 
 
 I have done whiat I could to prev^einit thie 
 ele-dtoral disipeirsiion o'f t;he Ohrisltilanis; I 
 iuave off enjdad no brave man ; I havie s^pread 
 
The Range Finder 
 ill 
 
 the news oif Jesus Cbriist tto a losit church 
 Bit every g^eneral eleiotioa; I have owned 
 no maisteir buit Him'seilf ; mor deserved cem- 
 sure froon any friend of his; I hiave floug-ht 
 the diragioai of the liquor tiraffic wdtlh all 
 my heartt and v^^ilth all my mind land wuith 
 ail my tstrengith for tein yea,r& and more, 
 withoult so much ais grazing one vile wtart 
 of its aocursied liide, becauise it lay and lies 
 today — ^grunttiinig, buit siatisfied and safe, 
 within la holHow square of Ohristiain vot- 
 eDs, who loaithe it, but defend it, beo'auise 
 •they think ithey have to; and every blow 
 I admied at 'txJe sialoon wa(S (pairnieid by the 
 bayo'met of a Ohrisitiain. 
 
 I hiave cheered the thin, white lime of 
 prohibd'tioin, and shouted the ohundh's 
 ch'aillemig'e, to the chuir'ch's mien, so lonig", 
 thiait a raisiping voice, a querelouis tone and 
 th eexia/g-g^erated activity oif a wonn-oult 
 body laisih/ed by a itireleiss will, gelt ftor my 
 mlndstry, 'ait ithe besit, sipasms of kindnesis in 
 a wotrld of hate. 
 
 « « « 
 
 You hiave been my best friend's, and frfom 
 my iheiarit, I thamk you motre than wordia 
 dan tell; buit, borro'Wiing an elegiamlt and 
 iscripitunal figure from your chur'ch presis, 
 I cofme (now to buzz myself ouit of the oinit- 
 ment and fly to other pots; warning the 
 
The Range Finder 
 US 
 
 squeamfiislh. lapotheciary, however, t/hiat 
 whalt hias seeimed in his ol:fia.ctories a tairut, 
 its the ozone of coming- thunder stoTms oi 
 civic faith 'and tru'th aind efforts as un- 
 crediitaible fto me ais discreditable to him; 
 :Sor, thi's siociety ha.s gone for prohibitiofn, 
 "horse, foot and dragons," thanks to no 
 mia.n! The positern dto'or wdll be shut by 
 this convention and any man who ha.s his 
 nose thecre will get it pinched; and be- 
 cause of my unbounded love and pride ajnd 
 confidence in you, a;nd of miy own absolute 
 insigrnifioauce to the ou'toomie; fr<om to- 
 ndg-ht I hold myself inieligiible to the call of 
 future "General Committees," until, per- 
 haps, in brig'hter days you bid me co-me to 
 celebraite with you the time when the 
 United Presbyteriian Ohurch vsdll hold in 
 honoir mo mia.n who would rather be a 
 menilal in Eg^ypt, with "a sure thkng-" than 
 a prince of God on the f ron/tier. 
 * * * 
 
 And for tionig'hlt, I purpose noithing" miore 
 aimbiitio»uis thian to sound in your eiars oince 
 mioire the »old pitch pipe of the g'O'sipel, and 
 to exhort you that Avhaterer the heat and 
 stress of the great campaign, you — of all 
 men — muislt never fail to carry your civic 
 psalmody in the key of Jesus Christ. 
 
The Range Finder 
 JJ4 
 
 You hiave no timie tb fol'lofw ime wool- 
 ga.thard;nig: Whalt, wh©n, wibere, why, 
 whethier la man ©ug-lit to drink; let dtberis 
 answer if 'tlbey can. I stand uipon the cer- 
 tiaimty itha.t by bo-th the letter and t(he 
 Sipirit of tihe officia'l aiction of the church 
 "The liquor 'traffic cam never be licensed 
 withouit sin," anid t'hait "No political party 
 is enititled t)o expect nor ougtbt it fto re- 
 ceive the vote of a Chriatiain mam, so long 
 Q)s it s.tiandis committed tio the licemise pol- 
 icy or refuses to put i'tself om record in an 
 altititude of open hostility to the s-aloon." 
 ■jfr * * 
 
 Somie oily magnate will advise you thiat 
 alithouigh the church has miade thait deicliar- 
 attiom and irepea.f edly confirmed it, tha't it 
 has not the foirce of law io bind an indi- 
 vidual, buit I tell you that if thait resolu- 
 tion stiaites tftie truth and the righiteous- 
 ness in the case it has ten million timee 
 the binding force of any formal laiw upom 
 the individual conscience and conduct of 
 every honoraible man in the connection, 
 and iit dis peittifoggimig with God Almighty 
 to taike to the cover of a technicality to 
 shlirk a dtuity. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Think of your Robinsons, and Kylets, and 
 McCriorys, and McGills, amd Wislharjts, and 
 
The Range Finder 
 115 
 
 Hannlas, amd Euissells, a.iid Atcliiisonls, and 
 sudh, inoisinig thrcug^h lexicoms aind pre<ie- 
 de.n^is to find auithioirity to decllare rfig-hte- 
 ousness, and do wiriomg, lat the ssaime time! 
 Shoick yiou? I sbould expect so! It elhocks 
 ane, even to think of it by the wtay of illus- 
 tration. JS^evier mind the shock! Gat the 
 leiss'on lamd hold it for your life! That, 
 ■When a straight man sei&s (the r^g^ht of a 
 thing — -a gift, a ciontraot or a viotte — 'he will 
 do it thoug^h eveTy bell of panic ring him 
 
 off. 
 
 * * * 
 
 What is night? Is that what you want 
 ito kn'OfW? Come on, then, and ait that 
 level and not a hair below it, drift with 
 m:e oncie more into the black mountain of 
 the liquor pnoblem. 
 
 * * * 
 
 Some of yon may find it hard to give at- 
 tenition, beeauise the suibjeat doeis n'oit 
 appeal to yo^u, but it is impontamt to yoiu, 
 one amd all. It is appropriate to any aiu- 
 dienice froim the nursery to the eongreisis 
 amd I ithink that if *the domeistic bruit-cs 
 could hear amd und'e.risitiamd me, they wouild 
 be gaithering at these doors and winid'owis 
 to listen, for ithey know full well some of 
 the meanings of my minisitry; and vv^hem 
 
The Range Finder 
 
 the dhiurch sliould daist me off, d'og« omd 
 hiorseis would take mie up. 
 
 lit conicerinis society -at larg^e ; for like (tftie 
 fiox beneaith 'tbe Sparltan soMier'is dlouib- 
 leit, i't teairs her very heant ouit, bravely as 
 sihe car riles it. 
 
 It aotnicennis governiment : for it fouls the 
 weils fro'm which it drawis its veiry bre«a<th 
 of life, daiiieis its title to itself, viola^s the 
 de(aid, piumders tihe Mvinig- and breeds pre- 
 naital paiuperfs and crimiiQalis to peirplex amid 
 defeiait (Lt. 
 
 It 0on)cie/rns capital, foT it is tlhie iruainr- 
 sprinlg" of arsion, etmibezzleimenit, mobs 
 riot anid murder. 
 
 It concennis labor: for iit sia^ps its 
 stiremigith, its honoT and its hope umtil iu- 
 d'usitry becoimes a g"alley slave, willing- to 
 take its pay lin b'lows and sweaty ragis and 
 squal'or. 
 
 It concerns the church: for by so much 
 ais it enjoys islhe suffers loss. 
 
 It con'cernis the school: foir by so much 
 ais it outrunis it in the race for power, it 
 converts culture into crime, anid mtakes 
 the educated the dangerous classes to 
 the common weal. 
 
 It Conjcerns every home: fgr it is a denial 
 of its every sianotity amid a.n insult to its 
 beist ideals. 
 
\. 
 
 VAU- 
 
 The Range Finder 
 U7 
 
 It conicernis love: — and h'ow in]a.ny a love 
 atory is gomig- throug-h itis fireit cilia.pt6r in 
 this convention — ^it leeches its very blood 
 amid leaves beihind, the ashes of inexpressi- 
 ble desolaitioins. 
 
 It concerns the land nolt o^nly, but the 
 sea as well; for every stately ocean liner 
 that clears our portts land siails down over 
 the edge of the world with the "union" at 
 her flagstaff, carries on board, a bar of 
 uinchanted sihoals and sunken reeifs, for 
 sofnie of the voyagers, aod many a gallant 
 life goes dbwn at sea inside 'the ship aind 
 wfliile the watch is calling at every bell: 
 All's well! airs weJll! all's well! 
 
 London fog was never demser than the 
 popular mlicapprehension of tihe drink 
 question: — not long ago I v^as in ooinversa- 
 tion with a lady who evidently thought to 
 show me a politeness by asking abouit the 
 progress of what she called "temperance/' 
 She spoke as one migh'it mention a new or- 
 chid she haid heard of, but never seen; and 
 b3^ her knee her little boy was clinging 
 posy, and lusity aind fine. "It must be 
 dreadful work," she said, *''buit I have no 
 personal interest in it, 'and so I do nott 
 keep informed about it; there has never 
 been a drunkard in our family on either 
 «ider' 
 
The Range Finder 
 118 
 
 She wais a moral •soimnamib'uli/sit wide- 
 eyed buit st'O'ne blinid, walking along the 
 eaves of Tophett \^^iltlh her chdld. I wolie 
 her, as iii'duity boutiid, by sayinig: "Madam* 
 How do you know thiat tihis boy wiill mot be 
 a drunkard? My mother was as good and 
 as beautiful as you are, <and our hoime was 
 far more beautiful 't'han it'his of yours: my 
 f'ather's blo'O'd ran pure as any in your hus- 
 band's famdly or your ow^n, and they were 
 a^ liovdng amd as tender and «as careful as 
 yoTi can be; bust when tihe natural and 
 honorable griefs and losses oif the world 
 had beaiten fthem with (many Btripes, but 
 left thean family pride and an untarndshed 
 name and 'an onily son wh'O'm tiheir united 
 love clothed upon as with a garment of 
 imimiunity agaiinst deiileiment, the salo»on 
 came a'nd'took all: and the only bit of land 
 I own today at a mid-life of ceased'css labor, 
 is a li'tltle squa.re of cemeitery hill side 
 where they lie wi'th tiheir broken hearts 
 waiting for whatever possible joy may "toe 
 requited to them at the last." 
 
 Before I had finished, her boisom was 
 heaving v^iith tumult uotui^^ bre'athing, and 
 her eyes were pitiful witih unshed tears, 
 and snaitching the boy to her heart, she 
 cried: "Forgive me! forgive me! I had not 
 thought!" 
 
The Range Finder 
 JI9 
 
 I do nioit speak of 't'hisi to lay a railinig ac- 
 cusation aig-ainst lihie careless-seeaning 
 happy people. I know perfectly well the 
 ignoible servitude of Christian people to the 
 saloon parties is due to the lack of 
 thought, but tJhe churcih has tho'Ugbt. and 
 sipoken so thait all earth and hcaiven have 
 heard, and you are thinking now, and must 
 Hhink. Bear with me this once! I do 
 no(t expiectt you ^o feel as I do, you could 
 mot, withont sntferinig what I have suf- 
 fered, and I have no onemy, and nevier had 
 ■one whom I would not spare tlhart, if I 
 could: I aan pleading with yon for the 
 merest huimanity, such as you would show 
 a wounded dog. There is not a cradle 
 rocking, rocking, in an American home, 
 but close beside the dr^ink wolf crouches, 
 and grams, and waits; -there is mot a baby 
 m'an swinging into the lists of life in the 
 royal chariot of his mother's arms, 
 but the saloon vulture with bloody 
 beak and cliaws, and sick of old carrion, 
 ftaips its hideoms wing^ above thait holdeisit 
 pageiantt of ithe universe, and soars and 
 waits. 
 
 * * * 
 
 One of the .slt»rangeisit, mosit fo'undia(t ion- 
 less of prevalenrt opindoms, is thiait tfhe drink 
 quesition relates chiefly or whiolly to 
 
The Range Finder 
 J20 
 
 drunkairdis. I tMiik it m'ore thian probaible 
 thjaJt soime young woiman aitltinig" here to- 
 day 'is (Sayinig* to herself: "Why does t/his 
 mlan oomie here with hi's scars a.nid luigu- 
 brious wairningis? We are no(t drunikacrds 
 nor drinkers. Let him go to Pitt stireeJt or 
 Canal tsitreeit, or Mulberry Bend!'* Ah, 
 well, I only wish my work wetre to the 
 wratcftied only, 'but if we who occupy this 
 platform could have a flashlight of futurity 
 "throiwn upcn youir faces, I know toio well 
 and so do ytooi that I ami looking-, mow, inlto 
 the quiieit ©yes of m^^ore than oaiie girl who 
 does aind always did absta.in and w^hio livets 
 in a village where tihere is nio s'al'oo-n^ but 
 yat who in the bitter days to co-me will 
 Btretch her helpless arms to save the mlan 
 sihe wor^ips, only to hea.r him cunse her to 
 her face, with all his love and all his man- 
 hood swamped in alcohol. 
 * * * 
 
 I will not vmisite yoiur time by further 
 aiccusatiiion of the aal'oion, or warninlg^s for 
 your person'ail safety, or other mialtter of 
 apology for speiaking. No audieaice of 
 equal size ever conveinied, that njeeded such 
 an introduction to the sulbject, lesis than 
 this one neiedls it. 
 
 Let 'the indicitm'ent close ! I owe mo m^aia 
 or woimjan any syllable of arguflnent or amy 
 
The Range Finder 
 J2J 
 
 111011116111) of deJiay before I move foa* 
 judgment, on the current and admitted 
 f a^otis of eveiry day : for every reiaision tftiat a 
 cbild oughit to be haippy; for every rea- 
 son 'tlha)t a w'omian oughit to be purer for 
 every reaison thait a man ouight to be 
 n)0'ble; fofr every reasson tbait the church 
 ougjhit to live an hour; the liquor traffic 
 ought to die! It muisit die! It will die! 
 Who w^ill kill it? Yon, aod sucli as yooi, vdll 
 kill it. When? W^henever one million of 
 Christian mien respect themselves enough 
 to quit the two great political parties by 
 which it lives and moves and has its be- 
 ing. 
 
 I do not urge upon you any claims of the 
 party which I belong to. A new one 
 may suit you better, it will suit me quite 
 as well, provided only that it builds on 
 God. "Jesus Christ Himself being the 
 dhief coimer srttonje." 
 
 Of dourse, I undeinstand thia<t he who 
 would drop (hdis words inito the ddi^h waiter 
 of conforanaty and miake no bubbleis, mast 
 speak -smooth tftikigs, and cold, bait I am 
 speakiiKg not to conformity, but to con- 
 scieoDce and to trutih, to briavery and to 
 honor. You would s<jorn me if I were 
 offeframg to coddle you, and I am not can- 
 vaeteing" tOie chutrich for smiles or tears. 1 
 
The Range Finder 
 J22 
 
 -wfanit 'to finid ou't the niig-litt and do it, and so 
 do yooi, and if it 'takeis w'ouindis to teach 
 me AvQiiat yoai knoiw, thien in tfhe name of 
 Chriisitiian frtiendisIMp, strike! ainid iso will I 
 do to you, untiil tlhe error dies; land then in 
 recitified -and iwiified. bfroitherhood we will 
 face the fioe and figftiit i)t to a finiislh. 
 
 And it needs to be siaid agiain 
 that sinoe we work the people's will 
 by pialrties, in this cou-nltry, Christian 
 people have to have a new one. It will not 
 help my case to speak much ill about the 
 old ones. They have done well in many 
 thing-s and would again, for there is none 
 so bad but that the rigfht is in the main 
 convenient to it. 
 
 But Mammon is the only god they know. 
 Let us prosper! is their most sacred shib- 
 boleth. "Whatsoever things are true, 
 whatsoever things are honest, whatso- 
 ever things are lovely, whatsoever things 
 are of good report, if there be any virtue, 
 and if there be any praise" — forget them, 
 one and all, to save the party and to 
 gather gold! 
 
 So says Mammon; he tempereth the 
 truth to the smooth Christian and is con- 
 sequently well beloved; but you would as 
 well trust the saloon to kill itself, as to 
 trust either of the great parties to kill 
 
The Range Finder 
 J23 
 
 it. They serve Mammon; the saloon serves 
 tJiem; 'the saloon makeis money, and the 
 g-overnment (takes it nearly all; t(he ^alaon 
 helps the great and cold-blooded to pros- 
 per, and g-rinds the face of the weak, ig- 
 norant and improvident poor. It is 
 prime mimister of every oppression, al- 
 though itself a slave. Yon vs^ould safely 
 trusit either of the "prosperity" panties to 
 fig>ht Spain; I should not fear to trust them 
 either or boith to solve wisely, in the long 
 run, the p*roblems of the currency and of 
 the revenue. There is paitrioltiom in the 
 old pa.nties, there is brain and bmsiiness 
 honesty, but Maimm'on's friend will never 
 die by the hands of Mammon's friends.- 
 But the saloon musit go! and '^t^his kind 
 Cometh not out but by prayer and fasting.'* 
 
 Gold men must stand together for 
 gold! silver men must stand together for 
 silver! and praying men mustt stand to- 
 gether for Grod and home and ooiuntry 
 against the liquor traffic. 
 
 I am preferring no charges against the 
 government, or the parties, or the officials, 
 or the old party voters, but this one; that 
 they are not fit to deal with the saloon 
 problem. I have already said that as to 
 all ordinary matters — such as the public 
 defense, the public health, the public 
 
The Range Finder 
 J24 
 
 revenue, the care of the poor, the insane 
 and the criminal, and so forth, I believe 
 sound principles of government v^ould 
 eventually w^in out in their hands. The 
 business of defense has practically no 
 corrupting tendency, it appeals to self 
 denial and to gallantry in a man: the care 
 of health appeals to mercy and to the 
 good side of selfishness; the charge of the 
 afflicted and the criminal appeals to pity 
 and to self-love at its best. And the mon- 
 ey devil so to speak is a sane and normal 
 devil, capable of rebuke, capable of reason. 
 But the saloon is a maniac, blind to rea~ 
 son, deaf to rebuke, insensible to fear, but 
 prodigious in cunning and cruelty. So far 
 as such a thing can be dealt with upon a 
 money basis the parties have perhaps done 
 w^ell enough. But my w^hole thesis is that 
 Mammon cannot cope v^ith the saloon: it 
 cannot be bound; it cannot be improved; 
 it cannot be regulated! There is no pru- 
 dence of economics nor shrewdness of 
 policing, nor wisdom of jurisprudence that 
 can stretch up to the height of this en- 
 deavor. History within your own knowl- 
 edge verifies that. 
 
 Every form of Mammon treatment is in 
 vogue at this minute in this country, and 
 open to inspection. Cut off its customers? 
 
The Range Finder 
 J 25 
 
 cries the man with a pled-ge; and the sa- 
 loon itself encourages that. Tax it! cried 
 Ohio! It was done. The saloon howled 
 and we were encouraged, but it paid the 
 tax and went right on and prospered more 
 than formerly. 
 
 License it under strict rules! cried New 
 Jersey. It was done. The saloon howled 
 and we were encouraged, but it paid the 
 price and chuckled as it raked in the 
 sweaty nickels of the poor. Raise the 
 price! cried Illinois. It was done. The 
 saloon howled and we were encouraged, 
 but it put up the money and watered the 
 stock and fortified it with poison and 
 kept the even tenor of its way, and the sa- 
 loon today favors high license. 
 
 Grant local option! cried Massachusetts. 
 It was done. The saloon howled and we 
 were encouraged, but the saloon was not 
 a local thing: it could catch a boy in Con- 
 necticut or California and break a moth- 
 er's heart in Massachusetts; and the "dry" 
 towns were dull and the "wet" ones were 
 lively; drunkenness was not greatly dimin- 
 ished if at all. Christian men lost heart; 
 officers grew careless; the towns vibrated 
 back and forth from vice to virtue till they 
 lost the thread of honesty in the argument 
 and the saloon worked its territory with 
 
The Range Finder 
 126 
 
 redoubled energy, and from a sa^e dis- 
 tance battered down the d'Cfences of the 
 forbidden districts. 
 
 Go to! I shall be a saloon myself! cried 
 South Carolina! The liquor traffic howled 
 and we were encouraged, but the old South 
 state, that s-tarted out to teach the world 
 the science of government, wears an apron 
 and sells whisky for a living, and the sa- 
 loon, that was a. slave, is king. 
 
 What's the use of keeping truth, when 
 we can sell it, and save the rat- 
 age in the river towns! cried 
 Iowa. There did not seem to be any 
 use; a "miulct!" postscript was w^ritlten to 
 the \pro>hibiitoTy laiw, and the welsitern Mas- 
 sachusseitts hung a oard in the window: 
 "Brain damaged, for sale, cheap!" and the 
 s-aloon took her. 
 
 Take the mtatter ou<t of politicis! cried 
 New YoTk — 'and put it into tihe baaixits of 
 the Rerpuiblican party! Wed the brothel 
 to the saloon, and then let virtue have its 
 perfect work! and in this state the liquor 
 traffic is the autocrat of trades. 
 
 Practical politics cried: Form an ant\- 
 saloon republican movement, and swing 
 the great party of moral ideas into line 
 for sober citizenship and happy homes! It 
 was don/e, the saloon howled and we were 
 
The Range Finder 
 J27 
 
 encouraged, but although the plan waa 
 called a "movement" it never moved again. 
 
 Somebody cried: form an omni-partisan 
 anti-saloon league, spot the whisky men 
 and intimidate the legislature! It was 
 done. The League and the saloon met at 
 the capital. Each house of the legislature 
 took an arm of the saloon and walked 
 away, the governor following — without so 
 much as a glanoe at the League. 
 
 The supreme court wrote itself down 
 an enemy of the saloon one day, and the 
 next butted its own brains out against 
 the inter-state commerce law and gave a 
 "charact'er" to the saloon. 
 
 A half a century of this has passed. 
 Every effort was honest from the Mammon 
 poiin't 'of vieiw, but. (the saloon is a wotrse 
 plajoe today than it ever was: anid drumik- 
 enn^ess Is on the dnorease; the voiting 
 dhurch 'ambleis aiftetr the heanses Cf a hun- 
 dreki thoiiisand drunkards every year and 
 reads ^a hoipeJjess buriiall service over tiheim, 
 ain?d as th^y relturn from the grave and see 
 tlhe body politic renjt, frenzied, miad with 
 al'dolhoQ, twisting" and writlhing in the dujsit : 
 tihey say, "Lord, wliy eould we noit casjt 
 this 'ddaf, dhiimb, demon<ilatc deVil out?'* and 
 
The Range Finder 
 J28 
 
 out of the miardh of even/ts rings i)he \^otice 
 of the Messiah: You could not ca,st him oujt, 
 "because of yoai.r unbelief." 
 
 Why did 't(he Chrisitian voter offer to ta-ke 
 the I'O'W license money for a leave to ateal 
 amd lie and kill? Be<^ause he did nott be- 
 lieve God. Why did he after thait hiad 
 failed and he had seen not only that 
 it w^ais fu'tiile, but tha/t it wias w^rong also 
 agree to continue the corrupt bargain 
 for a.n increase 'of the price? Because he 
 did not believe God. 
 
 Why did he choose far his helpers to 
 drive ou(t the sailootn, its twio slaves? Be- 
 cause he 'did not believe God. 
 
 Bear w^ith me! I speak not one syllable 
 in anger, no, nor in sorrovs^, either, buit in 
 hope that v^^ill mot be ddsmayed, and confi- 
 dence that will not be put dow^n. We 
 sha-ll kill the saloon, buit no party that for- 
 gets God, can muster us into thait fight, 
 nor any man vsrho holds a second best 
 right eou'snes's, to wear upon eleetion day. 
 
 The clains aire gathering that will do it. 
 The prohibition party is the nucleus of 
 the viotory; a hundred (amid fifty thousland 
 men, fa/r from wise, miany of ithem; fiar 
 from perfeict, the best of them; but goinig 
 straighit laihcad, nioit evein lookinjg t<o the 
 right or to the left; without purse or 
 
The Range Finder 
 129 
 
 scrip, rwever resting', never waiting' for re- 
 in.foroean<ent, never g^oinig back — ^forward, 
 forever! a^nd i:h.e banjneir over /them is: 
 * ^volineiss tmto -fihe Lord." 
 
 "This kind eomelth noft outt bu't by 
 prayer -and fasit<iin|g!" I>o men not pray in 
 the old parties? Oh, yes, unrtil -th-e mind is 
 sick land the heiart fail n't. -For fully fifty 
 years tihe chu;rc(h hiais prayed for the de- 
 struction of the saloon — not a scattering" 
 few, buit <aJl 'of iihe memibers practiaally; 
 not carelesisily, bu't 'darnesiily amd with 
 teans. "Wttiait has come of it? N(Oth&n,g! 
 And our own child re>n have come to doubt 
 'tfh<at pr<ayer is anything but a kind of a 
 frill uipioai the Sundiay cloitheis of ouir pro- 
 fession. At almos.t any 'service yooi will 
 he'ar >thle petition 'to the throne of heaven- 
 ly grace: Oh, God: smite the -saloan hip 
 aind t)hfl;gh, destroy it from the eiarth, for 
 Jesus' <aake; and it goes right on gorging 
 and vonnitiimg, amd gorging again "yelars 
 throug(fci and thtrough," and nobody is sur- 
 prised. Nobody expected the praj^er to be 
 answered; everybody would have been as- 
 tonished if it had been. 
 
 Is God dteaf ? Is He also on the ^idte of 
 the sailoon? Is He 'afraid of a panic? Am 
 I sneering at praying men in the old par- 
 ties? No! no! I should hope lit>tle for 
 
The Range Finder 
 J30 
 
 iiiliis world, but for them, buit liislten: "If 
 we regard iniquity in our hearts, the Lord 
 Willi 'noit heiair us." A-nd I say to yo-u with 
 tihe f etar of G<od BefoT'e my eyes, thait every 
 old ptatrlty voteir in the liasit election, con- 
 doned the ifniqudlty of tIhe saloon; 'and I 
 say to you thait beitweien that Sitatus ir 
 citizenslhip 'aind the 'thronie of God, ftihe 
 wireis of prayer aire down. 
 
 In this eoiunitry 'the liquor traffic is a 
 governimenit monoipoly, disitilleries are 
 built om plams, inspected and laipproved of 
 by it, the boioks of the businetss are aiudited 
 by it, th^e worm of 'the sitill drools its venom 
 initk>'the poissiession of a governtmenit officalaJ 
 w»ho looks iit up in the goiverrumlenit waire- 
 houjsie with *a governiment padloick; it is 
 g^aujg'ed by a government ganger. If iit 
 sells for a dollar amd t^wen'ty cemts a glal- 
 lon, Itflie ddisitiller 'takes thirty cemts amd 
 payis a.lil expenlseis — Itihe grain, tftie labor, the 
 inrtereis(t, ;and (the goviernimenit tiakes 90 
 cents and pays nOtlMng. 
 
 The liquor traffic is the go vern/ment ; 
 aind the ddstaller works hajrd for a smiall 
 percentage of the profit, every do»llar of 
 whidh ^represents debasemieinlt of the citii- 
 zenisihip and a wT^O'ng to a, woman or a 
 child. The as<sesisor of infteriial revenrue, 
 the coMedtor, the gaoiiger, the ^tore-keex)er, 
 
The Range Finder 
 I3J 
 
 the oonigTeBsmian, tftie ©ecretiary, the treas- 
 urer, »anid the president \vOio appoi/nits them 
 all: every one of tihem is the creaiture of 
 one of 'the old paa*/tieis and he reimeimbers 
 •hi»s Orea^t'or all the d-a.ys of his lif'e. And 
 if you belong- in one or the otheir of those 
 camips, you migbt as well pray God to but- 
 ton your boots, as to pray Him to close 
 
 your saloon. 
 
 * * * 
 
 O church of the livimg- God! Frie^nd o-f 
 humanity; hope of tftie world! Some^thdng 
 ails your worship! Your prayers go wild! 
 Your baftfteries 'hea^t and smoke and roair, 
 bu>t effect notlhing. Can you noNt read 
 the meaning of the cailm, ordeo-ly, unaf- 
 frighted ranks of the enemy, umd-er the 
 sputtering a!ss"a>ults of your disrupted bait- 
 tle line? Do you not believe this Bible? 
 Does >n'oit t'he ap.palling silence of heavem 
 over the hell oi vice that licks up the ma- 
 itionial hope 'and truth aind honor, teadh 
 you anything? Brtave, I kn^ow you are, at 
 the core, and wise, amd noble; but men 
 bave well nig*h ceased to expect anything 
 of you. You have coime to expect little of 
 yourself. On the eleiction day you count 
 with the soorners of your Lord: You cail 
 on God to help you break the power of 
 tlbjB saloon amd He answers ever the eame: 
 
The Range Finder 
 J32 
 
 ^'Whiait hiais/t tliou t<o do to declaine My 
 statute, or it bait ttou s,hoiu)Mst take My 
 ooveinatnlt into tliy raou/bh seeing ttliou hjatt- 
 es-t instiruotdon and oaatat'h My words be- 
 hind thee. When thou sa:wes»t a thief then 
 thon contse-njt'edst with him, aaid hiatsit been 
 paa-itaker with adultere-ns. Thotu givesit 
 thiy moufth to evil and thy tongue :finaim- 
 e<th deceit; thou sittest and spaak^eisit 
 aigaiimsit thy brother; th'on slander est thine 
 o!wn molther'is son. Theise thinigs haist thou 
 done, and I kept sile>nt. Thou thougihjteiSit 
 that I was altojgethier such an one ais tihy- 
 Belf ; buit I will reprove thee, and seit thieto 
 in order be:Pore thine eyeis. iN"ow -conisid'er 
 this ye that f oTgett God, le«st I tear you in 
 pieces, and there be none to deliveT. 
 Who.so offerejtih praise, glorifie.th Me; and 
 to him tbait 'ord'ere<th his wa^ys aright, will 
 I show the salvaitioai of Grod." 
 
 Grod is patdenlt, <a.nd the church is truie 
 aind powerful in many ways. Butt it is 
 plain as a pikestaif th;at her praiyeins foT 
 the overthrow^ ol the sialoon, cut no figure. 
 Why should they? When the mian who 
 prays reifuses or negleats to chang'e his 
 way, 'ooe atoon on Grod's akJ count, why 
 ehoulld that pnayer ca,usie God to m'ove? 
 
 "This kind oomieith mot out buit by prlayeo* 
 and fasting.*' Fasting, here meams atppro- 
 
The Range Finder 
 J33 
 
 priate action; it is no g-astric operaition. 
 Faith is not fortified by fish. "Prayer 
 and fasting" is prayer with conduct to 
 match; or in other words prayer in dead 
 earnest: or in other words full weight 
 faith in God — prayer which seeks not to 
 get something from God but to do some- 
 thing for him. 
 
 Think of the insolence, of a Christian 
 citizen voting forbearance and legality to 
 the saloon, and then praying God to be his 
 fag and get him prohibition! If you 
 have been of that sort in your civic life, 
 what you need to do, is to go to your 
 closet and shut the door and pray God to 
 burn out your fear of men, your love of 
 party and popularity and money and to 
 fill you with a vision of His own perfect 
 love which casteth out fear and his own 
 peace that passeth understanding and 
 show you whait to do and where to go; 
 and stay there until he does it. 
 » » « 
 
 Prayer and fasting is prayer that "set- 
 tles it" — conclusive prayer. The only 
 reason why the members of the church are 
 not together voting for prohibition, is that 
 the great mass of them have not prayed 
 the subject through, and settled it, apart 
 from outside influences. The first step 
 
The Range Finder 
 J 34 
 
 if we are to kill the liquor traffic is to 
 learn to pray. 
 
 Pray so earnestly that the demands oi 
 the body will go unheeded! Pray while 
 the breakfast bell rings! Pray deny- 
 ing yourself to wife or child! Pray 
 while the rich and powerful visitor waits 
 in the drawing room! Pray when your 
 salary is in jeopardy! Pray when offices 
 are being given out by the boss! Pray 
 when flattery is ringing in your ears! 
 Pray when curses mutter all around you! 
 Pray until God and you are square on the 
 subject, and then go out with your face 
 shining and men will follow you. The sa- 
 loon will perish like the viper that it is, un- 
 der the heel of the church, whenever and 
 never before, she prays like that. 
 
 I am told that the secret of the wonder- 
 ful gunnery of our navy lies in a rather 
 simple instrument called a **range finder.*' 
 Near the bow of a high-class battle-ship, 
 a small telescope is set up electrically con- 
 nected with another just like it near the 
 stern, and the two connected with the 
 gunners' station, the distance between 
 the two telescopes being precisely meas- 
 ured. Through each one an observer 
 watches the enemy. When the hostile 
 ship appears at the cross hairs of the two 
 
The Range Finder 
 J 35 
 
 instruments at the same time, the di- 
 recting mind has the base and two angles 
 of a triangle, from which an instantaneous 
 automatic calculation shows the disttance, 
 and in the twinkling of an eye, does the 
 rest. The church has not yet found the 
 range of the saloon. If, while she has 
 her ministry "forward" ait the telescope of 
 prayer, her laity "aft" will train the tele- 
 scope of Christian suffrage on the enemy, 
 and fire when the saloon appears at the 
 cross hairs of the prayer and the ballot 
 box at the same instant, she will have the 
 true protectory, and hell will enlarge her- 
 self and swallow the saloon forever. 
 
 # * * 
 
 By every motive that can inspire a noble 
 manhood, I implore you get the range. 
 Up! up! to the mountain top and learn to 
 pray! Up, to the mountain top and wait 
 until you get the transfigured Christ of 
 God into your mind and heart to stay; and 
 in the power and the glory of that vision 
 down! down! into the muddy pool of pol- 
 itics, yourself a Christ man, to cast out 
 this political epilepsy by prayer and vot- 
 ing. 
 
 * » * 
 
 Now, I have fini'shed. I fear I have been 
 frightfully inadequajte to this siplendid 
 
The Range Finder 
 136 
 
 oppcr^tunity, but I am doaie: If I Imve 
 saiid ia hianslh thing*, I lam sorry. If I luave 
 gione wide of reiaison, I pray to find omt 'tiie 
 truth. Wihe;t<b;er we ever me'eit ag»ain in 
 tthe relaitioai thalt we hold today, mjaftters 
 little to ei'th.er of us. I shall always thkik 
 of you a)s the Hoibsloai party of the f oirce of 
 Jesus the King. I believe you will run the 
 United Presibyteiriiian Church uinder the 
 g'uns of tlh-e Kepubllcan "Morro," amd the 
 Deanocrtaitac "Socapa," and sink her for 
 Jesus' slake, in the neck of Amieirican poli- 
 tiics. The other churches will keejp tihe 
 blockade .gx)(od, while tflieir young- people 
 invest the citadel of the bottle, atnjd we 
 sihall hia«ul dowm the jiauTidiced ra.g of bos- 
 sisim. aed piartyisna, a.nd run up the Old 
 Glory of the Cross of Ohrisit to fl'oa<t for- 
 ever. 
 
 ^iic viotory is coanLng-! It is close ait 
 h'aiiti; and <as for mc, I ^hall be perfccttly 
 conteaift in the day of it, to find that my 
 part was not held worthy of m'entiion in 
 t«he di'sjpatches. 
 
14 DAY USE 
 
 RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED 
 
 LOAN DEPT. 
 
 This book is due on the last date stamped below, or 
 
 otL the date to which renewed. 
 
 Renewed books are subject to immediate recall. 
 
 l60d'606M 
 
 
 
 
 ^fgCDVO 
 
 
 OCT 2tM0 
 
 
 i^^V^ ^ 
 
 
 ,-ifc>^*<^ 
 
 
 i» ,.«•»"« 1 1 13 n A 1 
 
 vi 
 
 INTER LitSKMi 
 LOAN 
 
 
 
 
 lA^YB ^^'^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 trofeito^j^VJ" ^'^^i!^-'^ 
 
VB 07645 
 
 96642