00B.37 Chapter 30. Fugitive Pieces

XXX. Fugitive Pieces

(1) An Interview; (2) Spending an Hour; (3) Youth and Atheism; (4) Clarence Darrow, the Newspapers, and Civilization; (5) Biteth Like a Serpent and Stingeth Like an Adder; (6) Agnosticism; (7) Retrospections and Resolutions; (8) The Criterion of Life and Re­ligion; (9) Illustration and Perversion. AN INTERVIEW

[While Brother G. C. Brewer was in a meeting at Springfield, Missouri, recently, one of the daily papers of that city sent a young lady reporter to interview him on topics of the day. The reporter asked for his views on companionate marriage, on evolution, on prohibition, on the tendency in present-day education, and on women smoking. The paper did not publish all Brother Brewer said in just the way he said it, but the editor did give liberal space to his remarks. Some of the questions as propounded by the reporter and as answered by Brother Brewer are here given.]

1

Question: "Do you think companionate marriage is now a dead issue, or do you think it still has a hold on a consider­able number of people?"

Answer: "Companionate marriage, as such, is now a dead issue; but the influence of the propaganda still lives and has worked great harm, in that it has caused our people lightly to regard the marriage vows, and it has made divorce re­spectable in the eyes of the people, and, therefore, easy to obtain. We have had a great increase in the number of divorces in the last few years."

Question: "Why is companionate marriage dead? Is it because the young people decided to reject it on their own judgment and responsibility, or did they listen to the coun­sel of their elders?"

Answer: "Well, companionate marriage was never legal­ized in this country. Most of our young people have too much sound sense, I think, to demand such a radical change in our established institutions. Some people still believe that marriage is a sacred institution, and our young people are not all ready, absolutely, to disregard and reject God’s laws. But the laws of our land and the voice of the pulpit and the teaching of sound social principles killed compan­ionate marriage."

Question: "What has caused the great increase in the number of divorces?"

Answer: "Divorces have increased with the general in­crease of iniquity, the general breaking down of moral standards and the general indifference to, and disbelief of, divine law."

Question: "Do you think the economic independence of women has played any part?"

Answer: "Yes; that is an element. It has had its bear­ings."

Question: "Do you think the women used to stick it out because they were dependent and helpless, but now being independent they refuse to tolerate it, and, therefore, throw off the yoke?"

Answer: "No; that is not what I think. But that is what they taught you in college, isn’t it? That is what the propa­gandists say. They thus imply that marriage is an intoler­able bond or state, and that only those endure it who cannot help themselves; that formerly men held their wives as cap­tives and slaves. This is a very insidious method of spread­ing a false idea. Marriage is not an intolerable state—not something that women had to ’endure’ because they were dependent, except in rare cases. There were not so many unhappy marriages when people were stricter in their morals and more conscientious in their vows and more scrupulous in their regard for the laws of the Lord.

"The economic independence of women has increased divorce in that it has made many women prefer outside work to the work of homekeeping. It has, in a way, un­fitted them for wifehood and motherhood. Where there is no home life and no family, marriage itself does not seem so tremendously important. Both its purpose and its sacred­ness have largely been destroyed. It is hard to make people believe that marriage has a sacred purpose, when they know that the only purpose that prompted them was a selfish purpose. When people are actuated solely by a selfish motive in getting married, it is no wonder that they discard and dissolve that marriage when some self-interest or senti­mentality demands or even suggests it. They married to gratify a sentiment, or a passion; and when that object is attained, why should they not dissolve the marriage to gratify a similar passion?

"We have to endure some hardships, disappointments, and heartaches in life, whether we are married or unmarried. But under the influence of the wrong teaching, some people refuse to endure these things in the marriage relation, be­cause they believe that in so doing they would be sur­rendering their independence and making themselves mar­tyrs to ’outworn traditional ideas.’ This foolish and hurtful propaganda has taken all of the sportsmanship, as well as all the sense, out of all those who heed it in reference to marriage problems. Problems that would have been solved under the idea of the permanence of marriage are now mag­nified and made an excuse for divorce. Hurts that would have soon healed are aggravated and made incurable.

"Under our loose ideas of marriage and under the in­fluence of these rotten social theories, many of our people marry with no idea of making it a lifetime union.

"We need to impress upon all young people the idea that when they take the marriage vows they cannot break them without breaking divine law and thus jeopardizing their soul’s salvation."

Question: "What do you think of women smoking ciga­rettes? Is that wrong?"

Answer: "Yes; I think it is wrong. If it is not actually sinful, it is a hurtful habit—it hurts physically and morally, too. In my eyes it is also coarse and vulgar. It cheapens a woman."

Question: "Why does it not have the same effect upon men? Why is it worse for girls to smoke cigarettes than it is for boys?"

Answer: "That is the usual stock argument, and I am glad to answer it. First, I must say that I do not claim that it is right for men and boys to smoke. We used to teach all boys the harmful effects of smoking cigarettes and try to keep them from forming the habit. We should do more of that sort of teaching now.

"With that made clear, let us next observe that there is a difference between boys and girls, or men and women. There is a fundamental difference; a biological difference—a difference in their psychological and physical make-up. That being true, why should we be so averse to believe that a habit can have different effects upon them? With these natural and unchangeable differences existing, what sound sense is there in girls trying to be like boys in habits and appearance? Do girls show their intellectual and moral strength and independence by trying to ape boys?

"Suppose it is no worse for girls to smoke than it is for boys, does that make it proper? It is no worse for women to commit murder than it is for men. Shall we argue, there­fore, that women should begin murdering those who dis­please them?"

Question: "Do you think that this difference between the sexes that you allude to justifies a double standard of morals?"

Answer: "No; there should not be a double standard. But the logic of the contention that girls have as much right to smoke as do boys is that girls should do wrong because boys do. All this clamor against a double standard is not intended to lift the standard for men up to that which has always been set for women, but it is a concerted and almost a universal effort to break down the standard of morals for women and put them on a level—not with man’s standard, but with the class of men who never had a standard. As a result of this sort of propaganda we now have no univer­sally-accepted standard of morals for either men or women. We are in moral and intellectual confusion. Every man and woman is allowed to be a law unto himself or herself."

Question: "I would like to ask you some questions on the evolution controversy. Do you think that question is now dead?"

Answer: "Well, those who oppose evolution have ceased to agitate the question as much as they did a few years ago, but the question is by no means dead, and those who favor evolution have never ceased to teach it. It is found in our textbooks and taught in all of our schools, and many news­paper articles, magazine stories, and other literature are based upon the assumption that evolution is true. The opponents of the theory cannot now get the attention that they did when Mr. Bryan was living and when he was lead­ing in the fight. Those who favor the theory will not come out into the open and fight for it, or even attempt to prove it. They assume that it is a settled fact, and they ridicule those who oppose it."

Question: "Don’t you think the great majority of the people believe the theory now?"

Answer: "The majority of the people do not know any­thing about it, and are not, therefore, able intelligently to express an opinion; but they do not believe the theory as a whole—that is, the common people do not accept it. The scientists themselves admit that it is only a theory, has never been proved, and some of them say it is not suscep­tible of proof. These are the real scientists. They accept the theory as a theory, or as a working hypothesis. There is a great difference between real scientists and the ordinary teacher of science in our schools. These teachers think that evolution is a fact, and teach it as such, or many of them do; but it is not a fact, and, as said, the real scientists admit that it is not."

Question: "You admit that there is truth in the theory, do you not?"

Answer: "That depends on what you understand by the theory. If you mean that it is true that we have made progress in many lines, have developed many of our latent powers to a marvelous extent, that we have made many scientific discoveries and marvelous mechanical inventions—if this is what you mean—of course, none of us denies this, but that is not evolution. When I speak of the theory of evolution, I mean the theory of descent—the theory that claims that man descended from the lower forms of life. That theory is not true."

Question: "The scientists do not claim that man descended from a monkey. This is only the idea that ignorant people have concerning the claim, is it not?"

Answer: "The people who have that idea are not so ignorant after all, and the claim that the scientists do not say that man descended from a monkey is only a dodge, and it is intended to bewilder the people and make them think the theory is not what it really is, and to leave them per­plexed about the teaching of these propagandists. What the scientists say about man and monkey is that man did not descend from any known species of monkey—that none of the monkeys that we now see or know are our ancestors; but they claim that these monkeys and man had a common ancestor—that the monkeys went up one branch of the tree and man went up another, and we severally developed into different and distinct types; but that involves the claim that man passed through the monkey stage in his develop­ment, and that man was once a monkey or something similar to the monkey."

Question: "The scientists do not teach that, do they? Did Darwin teach that?"

Answer: "The scientists most certainly do teach that, and Darwin taught it. You know they claim that all life sprang from a single cell, and that all the animals of earth have developed from that tiny speck of life known as the primordial protoplasmic germ. Life existed first in the fish form, then came the amphibian, then the reptiles, then birds, then mammals, and next man; and man was a product of this growth and development and came through these lower forms. That is the theory. Don’t allow anyone to try to hide the ugliness of this by saying that man did not descend from a monkey."

Question: "Well, don’t you think that this is the chief objection that the common people have to the theory? They just don’t like the idea that they sprang from the monkey."

Answer: "No; this is not the chief objection that the common people have to the theory. Their chief objection is that the theory is not true, and it destroys all faith in God and all hope of heaven."

Question: "Then the common people do not know whether the theory is or is not true, do they?"

Answer: "They know that the theory has not been proved, because they have been told this by all who oppose the theory, and we have all quoted the real scientists, such as Dr. Robert Milligan, who say that the theory is not proved and never can be."

Question: "But is it a fact that the theory destroys faith in God? Did not Darwin believe in God?"

Answer: "Darwin believed in God when he was a young man, but his materialistic views destroyed his faith. He was not an atheist, or one who positively denies that there is a God, but his faith was nothing but a doubt, and all others who believe the theory of evolution find that they have no room for faith in a personal God who created life by miracle, and who knows and loves his children and hears and answers their prayers."

Question: "You think, then, that evolution conflicts with the creation story? Do not many Bible scholars claim that the seven days of creation week were long periods? Would that not leave room for evolution?"

Answer: "Yes; some Bible scholars think that those days were cycles or epochs. But it is no use trying to make an easy miracle out of creation. If God performed a miracle, he could perform a great miracle as easily as he could per­form a small one. What good sense is there, then, in ad­mitting that life started by miracle and then trying to de­vise a scheme by which it would be only an easy miracle? Evolution denies all miracle and accounts for the origin of life by natural law. Ernst Haeckel said: ’Evolution is the nonmiraculous origin of the universe.’ Joseph Le Conte said: ’Evolution is (1) a continuous progressive change, (2) according to certain laws, (3) by means of resident forces.’ Edward Drinker Cope said: ’The doctrine of evolution may be defined as the teaching which holds that creation has been and is accomplished by the agency of the energies which are intrinsic in the evolving matter, and without the interference of agencies which are external to it. It holds this to be true of combinations and forms of inorganic na­ture, and those of organic nature as well. . . . The science of evolution is the science of creation.’ You see, this leaves no room for a creator; it allows no touch of a divine hand or any other force that is external to the evolving matter. This is the chief objection of evolution. Aside from the fact that it is not true, it takes away from us the only account that we have of creation that can be accepted while we have faith in God. It also assumes that man has developed and climbed upward through all the ages. It, therefore, contra­dicts and destroys the story of man’s fall. If man did not fall, then he needs no Redeemer. Christianity is a remedial system. We do not need a remedy where there has been no ruin. Evolution denies that such a fall has ever taken place and that such a ruined state now exists; therefore, it denies the need of a Redeemer and makes useless and void the story of Christ, man’s Redeemer."

Question: "According to that, you think that one could not be both an evolutionist and a Christian?"

Answer: "That is what I think. One might be a theist and an evolutionist, but there is a wide difference between a theist and a Christian. My conception of a Christian is one who believes in Christ as the Son of the living God, born of the virgin, who died a vicarious death, and was raised from the dead and now lives at God’s right hand, and is coming back again to judge the earth and take his children home. No one can believe these facts and believe in evolution. Some people who claim to be Christians simply mean that they accept the ideals of Christ and the moral teaching that he gave to the world. But that kind of a ’Christian’ is no better than a Buddhist or a Confucianist."

SPENDING AN HOUR

While waiting in a bus station with an hour of precious time on my hands, I began to look about for some profitable way of engaging my mind. The first thought was to find something to read. On one side of the room there was a newsstand with its colorful display of magazines and papers. One glance at the flaming headline announcements and the flamboyant covers and one could see that here was a con­glomeration of exciting cowboy tales, wild adventures, shallow sentiment, sickly romance, coarse humor, and the erotic dreams and sloppy sentimentality of "silly women laden with sins" paraded as "True Stories" and "Confes­sions." Suggestiveness, salaciousness, morbidity, and sex psychosis fairly screamed from that newsstand and pro­claimed the depravity of the reading public of our age.

Turning away in disgust from this exhibition of modern mental pabulum, I walked across the room to the "free literature" rack. Here were the inevitable Christian Science tracts and papers. Some copies of the current issue of the Christian Science Sentinel were there, and I took one and sat down to read it. It was modest in color, clean in appearance, and artistic in mechanical make-up. After looking at some of the vulgar magazines on the newsstand, the Christian Science Sentinel breathes refinement, culture, and intellect. So I spent my hour in examining that journal. Some of the things I observed about this journal may be of interest to others. In that hope they are here given.

I shall speak first of—

Some Things to Be Remembered. The paper was found­ed in 1898 by Mary Baker Eddy. This is Volume 32, Number 45. The quality of the paper is good—"book stock"— and the type is clear and the printing faultless. There are sixteen pages and the covers. There is not a picture, a cartoon, or an advertisement on those sixteen pages. Bible and Christian Science literature are advertised on the inside of the front cover and on both sides of the back cover. Nothing else is advertised, and these only on the cover pages. There is not a misspelled word, a grammatical error, or a typographical error in the journal, that I can find. There is not a coarse word or a slang expression in any article in the paper. There is no controversy, no wrangling, and no harsh and dogmatic assertions. Yet the claims of Christian Science are presented and earnestly contended for. Its merits are proclaimed. Its ministry of healing is declared. Its soul-refining, peace-giving, and happiness-bringing power is affirmed and exalted by all the writers. If the publishers intend for this paper to "sell" Christian Science, I do not see how they could improve on their effort. Only those who closely examine the merits of these claims will fail to be convinced. The spirit and manner of their presentation are convincing. But next let me speak of—

Some Things Hard to Be Understood. After commend­ing this magazine for its lack of controversy and its freedom from harsh criticisms it would not be either consistent or becoming for me to let loose a barrage of criticism against the paper. But perhaps I can without harshness point out some errors. It must be kept in mind that Christian Science says there is no sin, no suffering, no death. Hence there is nothing for Christian Science to condemn. What seems to be sin, suffering, and death is error, the "Scientists" say. This paper repeatedly speaks of error. It does it in a spirit of sympathy and kindness, however. Since I am convinced that Christian Science is error, I should not incur the dis­pleasure of its adherents by endeavoring to correct error. This paper speaks with reverence of the Bible. Its writers seem to believe the Bible, but they must have it unlocked by Mrs. Eddy’s "Key to the Scriptures." Do they think God could not speak so as to be understood? God gave his com­plete will to man eighteen centuries before Mrs. Eddy lived. Do these followers of Mrs. Eddy think God’s effort was futile and men could not understand him until Mrs. Eddy came to unlock the Scriptures? Every article in this Sentinel quotes Mrs. Eddy as authority for its claim, and her book and page are always given. O n every page she is quoted. The writers refer to her as "our beloved Leader" and "our revered Leader," always spelling "Leader" with a capital L. The covers not only advertise all her books, but they also offer her photographs for sale. The prices run from seventy-five cents to ten dollars per picture.

We have long criticized the Catholics for worshiping the Virgin Mary and for selling charmed relics and blest candles, but these "Scientists" seem to be guilty of the same sort of idolatry and superstition. It is hard to understand how people who are intelligent as the Christian Scientists are can believe such things.

Here is another anomaly. In advertising Mrs. Eddy’s books for sale, this magazine announces that some of her books are printed in Braille type for the blind. It repeatedly tells us that we can secure the Textbook (and "Textbook" is always spelled with a capital T) for the blind. Yet times without number the writers in this magazine claim that they —the Christian Scientists—can do the works that Jesus did! Pray, why do they not give sight to the blind? Did any poor blind person who ever bought with good money a Braille Textbook later receive his sight and discard the Braille edition and read the marvelous Textbook by the sight of his eyes instead of by touch of his fingers?

Another strange thing is seen in the fact that these writers all speak of our Lord as "Christ, Truth." Christ is equal to Truth, which is correct; but these "Scientists" seem to think of him not as a reality, but as an abstraction; not as God with us or as divinity manifested in the flesh, but as a principle, an ideal. But notwithstanding this strip­ping Christ of all materiality, all reality, they speak of Jehovah as our "Father-Mother, God." Of course God is the sole Author of our being, the source of our life; but these religionists seem to be unable to think of him as our Creator without in some way associating natural, physical law with the process. They are psychical, spiritual, and metaphysical in their philosophy, and yet behold this in­consistency! They associate the idea of male and female, of father and mother—the physical law of procreation—with God. I wonder if the fact that the founder of this faith was a woman and that many of its leaders and writers are women has had anything to do with this habit of putting the mother idea in the God concept? Truly, There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

It is hard to understand these things. But my hour was soon gone and my heart was not corrupted by the offerings of the newsstand. But I sigh for the confusion that exists in the world in reference to the teaching of God’s word.

YOUTH AND ATHEISM In the May 2, 1931, issue of The Scholastic, "a national classroom magazine," is announced the names of the prize winners among the high-school students of the nation in a contest which that magazine has conducted in short stories, essays, poetry, art, etc. Also the stories, essays, poetry, etc., that were adjudged to be the best are published in this number of The Scholastic, together with the pictures of the student authors. The names of the judges and their pictures are also given. The title of the essay that was awarded first prize is so blasphemous that we with great reluctance give it to the readers of the Gospel Advocate. It seems almost a desecra­tion of the page of a religious journal even to repeat it, but the purpose of this article makes necessary its announce­ment. The title was the two words, "God Dies." The author of this article is Frances Farmer, a high-school student of Seattle, Washington. Her picture shows her to be an imma­ture, sweet, baby-faced little girl about sixteen years old. In the essay the girl tells how she had outgrown the childish idea of praying to God. She has now found out that God is a myth; that there is no God. She congratulates herself on her great discovery and boasts at the beginning and at the end of the essay that she learned this all by herself, and she is perplexed and puzzled because others cannot overcome the foolish idea that there is a God! With apologies to our readers again for repeating such irreverent language, we here give the first and the last paragraphs of the winning essay:

"No one ever came to me and said: ’You are a fool. There isn’t such a thing as God. Somebody’s been stuffing you.’ It wasn’t a murder. I think God just died of old age; and when I realized that he wasn’t any more, it didn’t shock me. It seemed natural and right."

"I felt rather proud to think that I had found the truth myself, without help from anyone. It puzzled me that other people hadn’t found out, too. God was gone. We were younger; we had reached past him. Why couldn’t they see it? It still puzzles me." This whole case is pathetic, and it is with a sad heart that we make the following observations:

1. "You Are a Fool. There isn’t such a thing as God." This sentence from the child author is remarkably similar to a sentence in the Old Testament. She says that no one ever told her that she was a fool for believing in God. She just found it out herself. She probably does not know that a wiser man than any of her teachers or any of the judges who awarded her first prize, a man whose name and whose writings will be celebrated in literature long after her name, her essay, and the names and the writing of her judges shall have perished from the earth, is now emphati­cally telling her that she is a fool when she says there is no God. The writer of some beautiful poetry, some pro­found philosophies, and some sublime prophecies that have been accorded first place in the literature of all time said: "The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God." (Psalms 53:1.)

2. What Caused This Child t o Reach Such a Dire Con­clusion? Although the girl repeatedly asserts that she reached her conclusion without the aid of anyone, we are not entirely without suspicions on this point. No doubt she thinks she states the truth, and perhaps no one ever had spoken directly to her about her faith; but she would hardly have been so bold as to write the essay she did write in a contest if she had not, in some way, sensed the fact that she was in congenial company, and that irreverence would not be counted a demerit by the judges. There can be little doubt but that the girl believed that a pronounced atheism would be considered a mark of independent thinking and of superior ability; and she was evidently not mistaken on that point.

Furthermore, the title that the child used is not at all new. "The Death of the Deity," "Jehovah’s Funeral," etc., have been favorite themes and often-repeated "wisecracks" by blasphemers for many years and decades. Naturally we just wonder if this girl had not read some of the leaflets and tracts that are being sown broadcast among the youth by the Four-A Society. At least we know that these atheists realize that the only way they can turn us into a nation of atheists is to destroy the faith of the young, and in this they are busily engaged, while parents, preachers, and Bible- school teachers are sleeping or ignoring and even denying the danger.

3. The Attitude of the Modern Youth. The attitude that this girl expresses in the last paragraph of her essay is a very general attitude among the youth. They have "reached past" God; they are far too sophisticated and enlightened to believe in God. When we begin to talk to them about God and Christ and the Bible, they look at us with the same expression of mingled amusement, resentment, and disgust that a ten-year-old boy shows when we talk to him about Santa Claus, as though he believed that myth. They are puzzled when they see anybody of intelligence who pro­fesses to believe in God. They do not know just how to classify such a man. They do not know whether to reckon him an arrant hypocrite or just a plain "nut." Have these children ever considered the pros and cons of religion? Have they studied the question? Have they had a course in evidences? Have they read any of the many books that have been written by scholars—historians, lin­guists, archaeologists—in favor of the authenticity of the Scriptures? Of course, the answer to all of these questions is negative. They have not had time to study these things if they had the inclination; yet they assume to know more about these great questions than learned men who have spent their entire lives in research and investigation. They take a definite stand against something about which they know nothing; yet they will never be told by their teachers that this is the height of intolerance, bigotry, and prejudice, which things are always characteristic of ignorance and of little minds; that those things never belong to an educated man or an independent thinker.

Atheists and atheistic teachers do not want them to hear evidence, to be unbiased, or even to lend an ear to the voice of inner consciousness. They want them to hear only banter and sarcasm and ridicule instead of reason. They want them to hear only "verbal subtleties" and "endless negations." They want them to listen only to the voice of their fleshly passions that cry out against restraints and demand indul­gence and deny that such is sinful and that they shall have to account for their conduct at any bar of judgment.

4. The Attitude of the Teachers and of the Judges. What shall we say of the attitude of the teachers of this girl and of the judges who awarded her the first prize? And also of the "classroom magazine" that published her irreverent essay? At least we can say with all confidence that none of them were shocked or grieved or felt that the essay was anything to be astonished at or concerned about. They did not feel that it called for any sort of reprimand or even correction. They gave it praise, publicity, honor, and first prize.

These teachers, judges, and editors will, no doubt, claim that they decided the question solely upon the literary merits of the essay and with no regard for the truth or falsity of the question discussed or as to the correctness or the error of the student’s position. But shall we credit their claim fully? And, even if we do, is that the right attitude for persons in such a responsible position to take? Suppose some student had written a very clever paper—clever in composition, correct in spelling, grammar, punctuation, etc.— denying the Copernican theory of astronomy or the Einstein theory of relativity or the Darwinian theory of evolution, would the judges award that paper first prize? Let them answer that question and then we will know whether or not to credit their claim. We will also know whether or not they regard it their duty to correct a student when he is in error according to their beliefs and theories. Can we get an expression from the Scholastic and its judges on this point? Will not other religious papers take up this question and force the Scholastic to make some reply? Will not Christian teachers take this matter up and demand that the Scholastic tell why this essay went uncriticized?

Furthermore, has the time come when irreverence is a literary merit—rather, when it is not a demerit? Reverence has always been considered an evidence of refinement, an element of culture. Coarseness, slang, profanity, and irrev­erence in speech or writing were always looked upon as an evidence of ill breeding, a lack of culture, and a manifesta­tion of bad taste, if not of a bad heart. Has all this changed? Is there any cultural side to our present-day education? Has the word "refinement" been left out of our lexicons? Does education now consist only in frankness and in a wanton exhibition of every impulse and desire? If culture still exists, is reverence no part of it?

5. The Attitude of Religious Teachers. It has already been suggested that this girl would not have written as she did if she had not believed that her title and essay would at least not be objectionable. The youth of our land would not be so outspoken in their doubts and unbelief if they did not know that they would be approved and even praised in this by many of their elders. In this, as in other things, they are a product of the times. It is popular to doubt and disbelieve and deny. Even many religious teachers—all modernists—have no settled conviction on anything. They have no firm foundation for their faith; in fact, they have no faith. They are not teaching the youth anything as definite truth. They are asking the youth questions and praising and applauding the youth for their frank opinions. In the Baptist, a modernistic Baptist paper, published in Chicago, there is a department devoted to youth. In that department have appeared the reports of some interviews that the editor has had with some high-school students on the subject of religion. These students were asked for their opinions about religion and about the future of "the church," etc. These students told the editor that religion is out of date; it is "done for"; it is useless, and it must go.

We are not so much interested in the opinions of these students as we are in the editors of the paper. Why would they publish such opinions? Why would they ask for them? Is it not because they have nothing to teach the young peo­ple? They are in hopeless confusion themselves. They are in doubt themselves about the future of Christianity. They really do not believe it will survive, and they are doing their part to accomplish its destruction. Do astronomers go to high-school students and ask for their opinion concerning astronomy? Do medical men go to them for their opinions about preventive medicine or about the various serums? Do economists, bankers, or busi­nessmen go to these students and ask them for their opinions about great economic questions? Why not? You answer: "Because they are not insane." That is it exactly. They know these students have never studied these questions. They know that their minds are not yet matured. Moreover, they have some definite ideas and principles to teach these young people. But modernistic religious teachers have nothing to teach. They believe nothing. They only deny something. They talk endlessly about "broad-mindedness," "modern thinking," our new development, our broad toler­ance, and our great brotherly love that promises salvation to men of all faiths and of no faith at all. With them it is not necessary to believe anything in order to be saved.

6. The Attitude of Parents.    How do parents feel about their sons and daughters going into atheism? They are in­different. They are too busy with their clubs and social and business affairs to be concerned about their children. They are not grieved over the lost souls of their own sons and daughters. They shed no tears over them. They hold no prayer service with them. They do not provide good re­ligious literature for them and urge them to read it. They are not deeply and sincerely religious themselves. Their children cannot see that religion has ever done anything for them, then why should they adopt such a useless theory?

Even some parents who read the Gospel Advocate and commend our fight against infidelity and immorality allow their own children to associate with infidels and scoffers and people of ultramodern views on moral questions. If their children get through high school unscathed, they will send them off to some school where atheism is taught and Chris­tianity is ridiculed, where the social life is rotten, and where immorality is the order of the day.

What hope is there for the world? There isn’t any? W e must come out of the world and be separate, if we wish to be saved. We must teach and safeguard our children, if we do not wish to rear them for eternal perdition.

Note.—Some four years after this article was written the Scholastic was investigated by a congressional committee and found to be red or communistic, which, of course, means atheistic and un-Amer­ican. Harold Rugg, its editor, is the author of several textbooks widely used. As this book goes to press the American Legion is making a fight against his books and has succeeded in getting them banned in some states. Communism in our schools has caused much of the immorality and crime that curses our land today. When it was recognized only as un-Christian and atheistic, we could not get any support in fighting it; but when it was seen to have economic implications many people rose up against it. For that we thank God.

CLARENCE DARROW, THE NEWSPAPERS, AND CIVILIZATION

Some few days ago Mr. Clarence Darrow came through Memphis (Tenn.), and stopped here for about two days. He spent the time in the home of a Memphis lawyer who was associated with him in the Scopes trial at Dayton in 1925. A reporter for one of the newspapers at Memphis interviewed Mr. Darrow and then wrote a lengthy article for his paper based on some things Darrow said. This article was given prominence in the paper, which also carried one or two pictures of Darrow. The reporter referred to Darrow as an atheist and also said he desecrated the Sabbath because he spent Sunday in social conversation and a discussion of things in general with those who were invited into the home in which he was a guest.

After Mr. Darrow was gone from our city, the editor of the Memphis Commercial Appeal    wrote an editorial on

Darrow, in which he defended him of the charges made against him by the reporter of a rival newspaper. This incident and this editorial give us a fine opportunity for some observations that ought to be helpful to all who think. Below the editorial is given in full:

MR. DARROW BREAKS THE SABBATH

Clarence Darrow spent Sunday at Memphis in the home of Mr. and Mrs. R. S. Keebler. A few friends were invited in to meet him. A newspaper reporter was courteously received. Mr. Darrow was described as an atheist and a Sabbath breaker.

While Mr. Darrow was breaking the Sabbath in the drawing room conversing with local intellectuals, hundreds of good Christians were playing golf, enjoying a picture show at their club, having a bridge party, a few cocktails, or otherwise observing the Sabbath as it should be observed.

Furthermore, Mr. Darrow is not an atheist, but an agnostic. He does not deny anything. He simply says he does not know about the hereafter and has grave doubts about anyone else possessing inside information.

Mr. Darrow is a quiet man of simple tastes. He has done a lot of good and perhaps some harm. He is unique. He has devoted his great talent to the downtrodden and the unfortunate. He has not overlooked any good clients, but money has never been his objective. The importance of his failure to accept a religious creed has been exaggerated. His interest in humanity has not been sufficiently stressed. He is more interested in the here than the hereafter. While some people are striving to be saved, solely on their faith, he may be saved, despite himself, by his works. The following points in the editorial afford opportunity for comment:

Whatever, therefore, Mr. Darrow did on Sunday was not a desecration of the Sabbath. He may have shown dis­respect for the Lord’s day and even for the Lord himself, but he could not break the Jewish Sabbath on the first day of the week. There was no way to learn from the news­papers how much, if any, irreverence and blasphemy there was in Darrow’s talk before the reporter. The editor’s point on the fact that Darrow’s conduct was no more a desecration of a sacred day than that of many professed Christians is well taken and deserves to be com­mended. But the editor was in error when he called such people "good Christians." If the New Testament is to be taken as our standard and if the lives of the early disciples are to be our examples, those who were engaged in the things the editor described are not Christians at all, to say nothing of "good" Christians. There is a shade of redun­dancy in the expression, "good Christians," anyway; but in this case it added poignancy to the editor’s sarcasm.

Darrow lectures and debates all over the country, and he is always on the negative side of every question—re­ligious, moral, sociological, or governmental. He is against practically all our established institutions. He would over­throw our present order of civilization. Those who are ac­quainted with his numerous tracts and essays—published by Halderman-Julius—must know that this is true. In his essay on "Resist Not Evil" he not only borrows a scriptural title, but he runs close to the Christian ideal in declaiming against war, but he even goes so far as to denounce police power to maintain law and order. He defends anarchy and crime and seems to deny that any organized government has any right to interfere with a man’s conduct, it matters not what he does. It is not denied that Darrow is intellectual or that those who conversed with him in Memphis (no doubt our editor was in the group) were "local intellectuals," but many people who would not presume to ask admission into this exalted company of the intellectually elect can see that Darrow and those who agree with his negations are in the most helpless and chaotic intellectual confusion. The editor applies Huxley’s term to Darrow, but it will not disguise Darrow. His cars are too long and his voice is unmistakable. Huxley invented the word "agnostic" to apply to himself because he disliked atheism. He did not want to be an atheist, yet he knew he was not a believer. He did not deny the postulates of the Christian religion. He admitted that they are as reasonable as some scientific truths. He said he had no means of disproving them. In a letter to Charles Kingsley, written September 23, 1860, Huxley said:

I neither affirm nor deny the immortality of man. I see no reason for believing it, but, on the other hand, I have no means of dis­proving it. I have no a priori objections to the doctrine. Give me such evidence as would justify me in believing anything else and I will believe that. Why should I not? It is not half so wonderful as the conservation of force or the indestructibility of matter. In another letter, dated May 5, 1863, he said:

I have never had the least sympathy with the a priori reasons against orthodoxy, and I have by nature and disposition the greatest possible antipathy to all the atheistic and infidel schools. Neverthe­less, I know that I am, in spite of myself, exactly what the Christian would call, and so far as I can see is justified in calling, atheist and infidel. I cannot see one shadow or tittle of evidence that the great unknown underlying the phenomenon of the universe stands to us in the relation of a Father—loves us and cares for us as Christianity asserts. So, with regard to the other Christian dogmas, immortality of soul and future stale, of rewards and punishment, what possible objection can I—who am compelled perforce to believe in the im­mortality of what we call matter and force, and in a very unmistak­able present state of rewards and punishment for our deeds— have to these doctrines? But Clarence Darrow will debate these issues and under­take to disprove these doctrines in public debate. He is proud of his unbelief and is blatant and boisterous in his attacks upon the Christian faith. The word "agnostic" is only a euphemism, anyway. Those who call themselves "agnostics" are in plain terms infidels or atheists. Huxley took the word from Paul’s agnosto theo —unknown god—of Acts 17:23. He and his kind claim that Jehovah is unknown and unknowable. He would be both had he not revealed himself unto man. We accept this revelation, and therefore know Jehovah only by faith. But these so-called "agnostics" reject this revelation and attempt to learn of God through physical research. They cannot find him, and they will not seek by faith. Hence they are atheists.

3. Darrow a Quiet Man. The editor tells us that Darrow "is a quiet man of simple tastes." This will be a startling revelation to the public. Darrow may have simple tastes and he may be soft-voiced and mild in his parlor manners. Perhaps that is what the editor meant. He surely cannot mean that Darrow is reticent; that he has not voiced his sentiments on every question now before the public. The editor must know that Darrow is going up and down through the country lecturing and debating all the time. He lectures to negroes and tries to stir them up against the white people. He writes and speaks and debates against Christianity and tries to destroy the only hope the human race has of life and salvation. Yet the editor says he is "a quiet man."

Some few years ago when that great-hearted statesman and peerless orator, William J. Bryan, was touring the coun­try and speaking on questions of peace and good will, social sanity, sober living, and religious faith and hope, the news­papers ridiculed and satirized him both in news columns and in editorials and by cartoons as a publicity hunter; as a sensationalist, a seeker after front-page space, and as an incessant talker. But when Clarence Darrow, who is not equal to Mr. Bryan in intellect, in personality, in oratorical ability, in attainments, or in any other sense, goes over the country broadcasting his infidelity, debating against prohibi­tion and the hope of a future life, defending criminals, justi­fying crime, and fighting against everything upon which civilization rests, the newspapers lionize him and speak of him editorially as "a quiet man"! Still there are some people who think that newspapers are a factor in civiliza­tion. Perhaps they were long ago.

4. "Darrow May B e Saved b y His Works. ” Of course, we do not expect a newspaper editor of this age to be theo­logically sound or even scripturally sane, and we shall not, therefore, take him to task for contradicting Paul by putting salvation on a basis of works, or for making useless the cross of Christ by saving a man independent of the atone­ment, or for disrespecting the Lord’s word when he said, "He that believeth not shall be damned"; but we would cer­tainly not be unreasonable if we should call upon the editor to point out the good works that Darrow has done that would entitle him to even honorable mention among the worthy of earth. Can he be enrolled as a great author? No! Is he an educator? No! Does he deserve mention as a social worker? No! What are his good works? O, he has defended strikers and anarchistic rioters. He defended the men who blew up a public building—a newspaper plant. He defended the men who murdered an ex-governor. He defended the young perverts who had committed numerous unmentionable crimes, but who were detected in blackmail, kidnaping, and murder. He has helped the downtrodden, we are told. Yes, those who are downtrodden by the laws which they have flouted and defied. He said in Memphis that he does not know what a good citizen is.

If Darrow should even get to heaven, Jehovah would have to work a stupendous miracle on him in order to get him reconciled to a reign of righteousness and make him submissive to the will of the Lord. And Darrow does not believe in miracles of that kind. Nor do we.

"BITETH LIKE A SERPENT, AND STINGETH LIKE AN ADDER"

Any person who has ever seen a drunken man and heard him talk knows that Solomon’s description is accurate. Read Proverbs, twenty-third chapter, verses 29 to 35. The drunkard has woe and distress and sorrow. H e has con­tentions. He is quarrelsome and ready to fight; often goes armed. H e has babbling —he babbles and blathers in un­intelligible tones. H e has wound s without cause. He hurts himself by falling. He is wounded by other drunken men with whom he fights when there was no cause for a fight—except they were drunken. H e has redness o f eyes and also of nose. H e sees strange women —he is lascivious and lustful and imagines himself in carnal embrace when he is not actually in such connection with sinful women. His heart utters perverse things —he utters vile and obscene language. He talks of the most perverted and unnatural deeds and often commits them. H e is like one who lieth down i n the midst o f the sea. He utterly disregards danger. He often actually does lie down on a railroad track and in other places where his life is endangered. He sobers up and discovers that he was beaten and bruised, but he knew not when it happened. He is such a victim of the drink habit that he resolves to get drunk again at the first opportunity.

These symptoms are all too familiar; but all of us may not know that Solomon’s description is also scientifically accurate. A medical authority says: "Under the influence of alcohol our animal tendencies, which are normally under the control and restraint of the highest brain centers—those through which our will, our self-control, our judgment, our reasoning, etc., are exerted—are depressed, and there results a certain freedom from restraint, with consequent failure of judgment, inability to appreciate or to weigh conse­quences of one’s acts, marked overconfidence in one’s powers, both mental and physical, careless, freer speech, and other evidences of profound intellectual depression. It is obvious, too, that those who desire to cultivate chastity of thought and feeling should avoid alcohol altogether, or to use it in its weakest forms and in careful moderation." The serpent-and-adder simile is also found to be remark­ably accurate from a scientific standpoint. We know that both of these words designate what we commonly call "snakes"—poisonous snakes. However, we do not ordinarily think of a snake as stinging; but this will be found to be true when we enter into a study of the nature and habits of these venomous snakes. Our poisonous snakes—and those of the Bible—are in two classes both as to the matter of biting and as to the nature of the venom. These are the serpents and the vipers. (The word "adder" in our text means cockatrice or viper.) The serpents, with the cobra of India and the cottonmouth moccasin of America as examples, must bite their victims— that is, they insert the fangs and macerate or chew the tissue as the venom is being injected. Hence the expression, "biteth like a serpent." The venom of these serpents is exceedingly death-deal­ing. Death may ensue within twenty minutes. This depends upon the amount of dosage, and that, in turn, depends upon the size of the serpent, upon how long it had been since he had bitten something else, etc. There may be no local evidence of the bite, except a small puncture or torn place in the flesh. No discoloration or swelling. But the patient begins to have difficulty in breathing and soon expires. The venom of this class of snakes is predominantly a poison of the nerve tissue, and is, therefore, scientifically classed as a neurotoxin. The viper class of snakes docs not bite. They strike and drive their fangs into the victim like the sting of a wasp, inject the venom, and withdraw the fangs in a fraction of a second. Hence "stingeth like a n adder" —viper. The rattlesnake is an example of the viper class. The fangs of the viper fold back, like the blade of a pocketknife, against the snake’s upper jaw when he is quiescent; but when he strikes, they spring out to right angles with the jaw and are driven into the flesh of the victim like a hypodermic needle. The venom is in a sac or pouch at the root of the fang, and by the pressure of the upper jaw this venom is shot through the fang into the blood of the victim. The venom of the viper class of snakes is a poison of the blood and blood vessels. It is therefore classed as a hema- toxin—a poison of the blood. It destroys the blood cells and alters the blood-vessel walls, therefore poisons all the tissues of the body. The area around the sting of the victim swells, turns dark or black, and is very painful. The unfortunate victim may die in a short time or may linger two or three days and then die. The analogy between the biting of a serpent and the stinging of an adder and alcoholic poison is perfect. The serpent bites and the adder stings. Alcohol does both. The venom of the serpent is a neurotoxin and that of the adder is a hematoxin. Alcohol is both.

"At the last"—as a final result of drinking wine, whisky, or any other alcoholic drink—"it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder." The drunkard is a mental or nerv­ous wreck. Alcohol as a neurotoxin has ruined his nerves. He sees imaginary reptiles and other vile images. He raves in wild delirium and fights a million devils that haunt his couch.

He suffers a physical breakdown. Alcohol as a hema- toxin has wrecked his whole body. It has brought on cirrhosis, or ruined the liver. It has caused chronic ne­phritis, or ruined the kidneys. It has produced stomach ulcers and subsequent malignancy, cancer of the stomach. It has superinduced high blood pressure and may cause apoplexy. A very reliable medical authority classes sixty diseases as directly or indirectly traceable to alcohol.

Jonathan Swift, in his "Thoughts on Various Subjects," said: "Elephants are always drawn smaller than life, but a flea always larger." This would have to be true. What could you do with the picture of an elephant as large as the elephant really is? Just so it is in drawing the pictures of the evils of alcohol. We cannot draw the picture full size. It is impossible to reckon the ruin wrought by strong drink. And yet it looks as if our country is going to let the manu­facturers of alcoholic liquors have a legal right to feed and fatten off the souls of our youth! Those who favor this hellish business make the plea of revenue to the state: We must balance our budget and build up our institutions, etc.! As if in direct answer to this foolish argument, God says: "Woe to him that buildeth a town with blood, and estab­lished a city by iniquity!" (Habakkuk 2:12.)

Those who plead for this legalization of poison on the ground that they want to drink it are also described by an ancient prophet of God: They "have given a boy for a harlot, and sold a girl for wine, that they may drink." (Joel 3:3.) But whatever the state may or may not do, those who believe the Bible, love life, and regard decency will touch not the "unclean thing."

AGNOSTICISM

Agnosticism is a form of skepticism or of disbelief. As we begin to study this "ism," it seems wise for us to consider some of these forms of unbelief and to see what distinction is made between them. Other writers in this issue of our paper will discuss some other of these forms, especially atheism. There may be, therefore, an overlapping on some points. This, however, should not be at all surprising, since it is all disbelief—by whatever name it is called—and de­structive of faith.

Some disbelievers are more blatant and bold than others. These do not hesitate to announce themselves as atheists and to openly avow the fact that they are set for the over­throw of all religion. The other type is less aggressive in their purposes and more mild in their language. They seek for some euphemistic and complimentary term by which to designate themselves. Some of this group are clandestine and two-faced in their dealing. At heart they are just as bitter against faith in God, Christ, and the Bible as the most blasphemous atheist. Even some modernistic preachers have been reported to have contributed money to the American Association for the Advancement of Atheism. All modern­istic preachers and all "liberal" and "agnostic" college professors of our day habitually praise, pet, and coddle Russia. Why? Because Russia is vehemently atheistic. It is blind, bitter, and blasphemous against all religion. These preachers and professors blandly smile over and wink at the murders, robberies, bastardies, barbarities, and brutalities of the Bol­sheviks because of their blasphemies against God. Every disbeliever, regardless of what he calls himself, rejoices to see faith attacked by any foe. If this has not always been true, it is certainly true in our age. We may see that con­ditions have been different in other times as we review the history of these forms. We shall now proceed with that study.

I. FORMS OF UNBELIEF

Skepticism originated with Pyrrho of Elis (360-270 B.C.). The word is from the Greek word skeptomai, which means I consider. A skeptic is supposed to be one who has not yet arrived at a conclusion, but who is carefully weighing the evidence. This is seen, therefore, to be a complimentary term which ancient unbelievers modestly applied to them­selves. The skeptics claimed to attain undisturbed tranquility of mind by a constant balancing of opposing arguments, thus reducing everything to a state of uncertainty and doubt. A boastful skeptic would, therefore, consider it inconsistent with his wisdom and dignity to believe anything. But through the ages skepticism has assumed the follow­ing forms:

The history of Gibbon (1737-1794) is one of the most dangerous examples of this form of unbelief that has ever appeared. It is dangerous because it admits of no reply; for, as Paley (1743-1805) observed, who "can refute a sneer"?

Rousseau (1712-1778) was an example of this type. So was Elbert Hubbard in our own age.

The mere definition of these forms should help students, as it will enable them to classify their infidel teachers. Some of the definitions also show the fallacy and the unfairness of the form.

AGNOSTICISM FURTHER DEFINED: THE STORY OF ITS ORIGIN The term "agnostic" is much misused. It is supposed to designate a man who is neutral on all religious questions. He does not have even a well-fixed opinion. H e does not know. He takes neither side. He is noncommittal. This is the way the agnostic wants to represent himself, and he thinks he compliments himself. He is not gullible. He does not believe orthodox views. They have not been scien­tifically demonstrated. Yet he is not prejudiced or narrow, and he would not deign to be dogmatic. H e just does not know. This is what agnosticism means to many people, but this is a false impression. We have pointed out the fact that these supposed-to-be neutrals are not at all neutral in their sympathies and inclinations. We shall see also that the term was not invented to designate a neutral. It is true that it carries the idea of something that is unknown, but it also announces unbelief. The true agnostic is not one who merely does not know because he has not studied the question or heard the evidence. He is not one who is yet willing to hear and then decide—one who has deferred decision for further investigation. No indeed. An agnostic is a very different person from that. He is one who claims to have heard all the evidence and found none of it worth his attention. He has weighed all the proof and repudiated it. He now says there is no proof. There is not one scintilla of evidence according to his dictum. And he even goes further. He says no proof can ever be found. God is not only unknown; he is unknowable. When man studies a question of that nature, his intellect has floundered out of its depths, accord­ing to the agnostic. This attitude of mind has existed from the days of the Greeks down, but the term "agnostic" was first applied to Thomas Henry Huxley (1825-1895). Some writers have said that he took the term from Paul’s agnosto theo —the un­known god—of Acts 17:23. But he himself gives a different account of its origin. From his own words we learn of the origin of the word and also the attitude that it describes. The following is taken from the Encyclopedia Britannica and found under the term "Agnosticism":

Though Huxley only began to use the term "agnostic" in 1869, his opinion had taken shape some time before that date. In a letter to Charles Kingsley (September 23, 1860) he wrote very fully con­cerning his beliefs:

"I neither affirm nor deny the immortality of man. I see no reason for believing, but, on the other hand, I have no means of disproving it. I have no a priori objections to the doctrine. No man who has to deal daily and hourly with nature can trouble himself about a priori difficulties. Give me such evidence as would justify me in believing in anything else, and I will believe that. Why should I not? It is not half so wonderful as the conservation of force or the indestructibility of matter. . . .

"It is no use to talk to me of analogies and probabilities. I know what I mean when I say I believe the law of the inverse squares, and I will not rest my life and my hopes upon weaker convictions. . . .

"That my personality is the surest thing I know may be true. But the attempt to conceive what it is leads me into mere verbal subtleties. I have champed up all that chaff about the ego and the nonego, noumena and phenomena, and all the rest of it, too often not to know that in attempting even to think of these questions the human intellect flounders at once out of its depth." And again, to the same correspondent, the fifth of May, 1863:

"I have never had the least sympathy with the a priori reasons against orthodoxy, and I have by nature and disposition the greatest possible antipathy to all the atheistic and infidel school. Neverthe­less, I know that I am, in spite of myself, exactly what the Christian would call, and so far as I can see is justified in calling, atheist and infidel. I cannot see one shadow or tittle of evidence that the great unknown underlying the phenomenon of the universe stands to us in the relation of a Father—loves us and cares for us as Christianity asserts. So with regard to the other great Christian dogmas, im­mortality of soul and future state of rewards and punishments, what possible objection can I—who am compelled perforce to believe in the immortality of what we call matter and force, and in a very unmistakable present state of rewards and punishments for our deeds —have to these doctrines? Give me a scintilla of evidence, and I am ready to jump at them." Of the origin of the name "agnostic" to cover the attitude, Huxley gave (Coll. Ess. v. pp. 237-239) the following account:

"When I reached intellectual maturity, and began to ask myself whether I was an atheist, a theist or a pantheist, a materialist or an idealist, a Christian or a freethinker, I found that the more I learned and reflected the less ready was the answer. The one thing on which most of these good people were agreed was the one thing in which I differed from them. They were quite sure they had attained a cer­tain ’gnosis—had more or less successfully solved the problem of existence, while I was quite sure that I had not, and had a pretty strong conviction that the problem was insoluble. This was my sit­uation when I had the good fortune to find a place among the mem­bers of that remarkable confraternity of antagonists, the Metaphysical Society. Every variety of philosophical and theological opinion was represented there; most of my colleagues were -ists of one sort or another; and I, the man without a rag of a belief to cover himself with, could not fail to have some of the uneasy feelings which must have beset the historical fox when, after leaving the trap in which his tail remained, he presented himself to his normally elongated companions. So I took thought, and invented what I conceived to be the appropriate title of ’agnostic’ It came into my head as sug­gestively antithetic to the ’gnostic of church history who professed to know so much about the very things of which I was ignorant. To my great satisfaction the term took." THE ANSWER TO AGNOSTICISM

There can be no argument with agnosticism unless it will consent to come into the domain of Christian evidence. The kind of evidence that it demands is impossible. And it is unreasonable to ask for evidence on a question that is entirely out of character with the question. Such a demand may be illustrated thus: A man shuts himself up in a dark dungeon, where no ray of sunlight can penetrate. He denies that the sun is shining, or he questions whether there is a sun or any such thing as sunlight. His friends insist that the sun is now shining, and although you cannot look directly into the face of the sun, you can see its light, feel its warmth, and bask in its beauty. But the dungeon dweller declares that he has heard such tales all of his life, but no proof has ever been given. His friends urge him to come out and enjoy the sunlight. But he sneers that there is no sunlight, and demands that if there is a handful of it, it should be brought in to him so that he could take it into his hands and test it; he could hold it to his nose and smell it and put it into his mouth and taste it. His friends cannot meet his demand. He then says: "Ah, ha, I told you so! There is no proof, not one scintilla of evidence." And he settles down to a confirmed state of agnosticism.

WE WALK BY FAITH AND NOT BY SIGHT

Christians have never claimed scientific proof for their position. Spiritual things cannot be demonstrated by physi­cal research. God cannot be found with either the telescope or the microscope or by any other physical means. Chris­tianity is a revealed religion. We learn its great facts from the word of God—given to us by inspired men. "Canst thou b y searching find out God? canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?" (Job 11:7.) No. Why? Be­cause God in his wisdom shut himself off from man so that man by his wisdom could not find God. Then God used a method to make himself known that is "foolishness" to those who look only for scientific demonstration—viz., by inspired preaching—revelation. "For seeing that in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom knew not God, it was God’s good pleasure through the foolishness of the preaching to save them that believe"—believe the preaching. (1 Corinthians 1:21.) THE GROUND OF FAITH

Countless volumes have been written on the evidences of Christianity. The ground for theistic and Christian belief has been thoroughly canvassed and hotly contested. But the arguments have never been answered or even fairly con­sidered by the opponents. They evade the issue, shift the fight to irrelevant things, and hide behind verbal subtleties and endless negations. Some of Mr. Huxley’s contemporaries wrote unanswerable books on Christian evidence. Two names are here given: George Park Fisher (1827-1909) and Canon Farrar (1831-1903). The works of these men are still extant, and they have never been excelled.

We close this article with the following eloquent words from Farrar:

We may freely concede that, of the separate existence of the im­material soul, and our survival beyond "the intolerable indignities of dust to dust," we have no mathematical demonstration to offer. But this fact does not in the slightest degree trouble us, because neither is there any such proof of the existence of a God. It is perfectly easy for a man to say, if he will: " I do not believe in a God. I do not care to offer up any worship, even of the silent sort, even at the altar of ’the unknown and the unknowable.’ I do not even think it worth while to pray that wild prayer once uttered by a criminal upon the scaffold: ’O God, if there be a God, save my soul, if I have a soul.’ " A man may say all this, and plume himself on this melancholy abnegation of man’s fairest hopes; on this deliberate suicide of the spiritual faculty; and if he considers such opinions to be a sign of intellectual emancipation, we can offer to him no proof that will necessarily convince him. When Vanini lay in prison on a charge of atheism, he touched with his foot a straw which lay on his dungeon floor, and said that from that straw he could prove the existence of God. We can pluck the meanest flower of the hedgerow, and point to the exquisite perfection of its structure, the tender delicacy of its loveliness; we may pick up the tiniest shell out of myriads upon the shore, so delicate that a touch would crush it, and yet a miracle of rose and pearl, of lustrous iridescence and fairy arabesque, and ask the atheist if he feels seriously certain that these things are but the accidental outcome of self-evolving laws. We can take him under the canopy of night and show him the stars of heaven and ask him whether he really holds them to be nothing more than "shining illusions of the night, eternal images of deception in an imaginary heaven, golden lies in dark-blue nothing­ness." Or we may bid him watch with us the flow of the vast stream of history, and see how the great laws of it are as mighty currents "that make for righteousness." Or we may appeal to the inner voices of the being, and ask whether they have indeed no message to tell him. But if he deny or reject such arguments as these; if he treat with arrogant scorn that evidence of the things unseen which has been enough in all ages for the millions of humanity— which was enough in past times for Dante, and Shakespeare, and Milton, and Newton—which was enough till yesterday for Brewster, and Whewell, and Herschel, and Faraday—if he demand a kind of proof which is impossible, and which God has withheld, seeing that it is a law that spiritual things can only be spiritually discerned, and that we walk by faith and not by sight—if, in short, a man will not see God because clouds and darkness are round about him, although righteousness and judgments are the habituation of his seat, then we can do no more. He must bear or must forbear, as seems him best. We cannot argue about color to the blind. We cannot prove the glory of music to the deaf. If a man shuts his eyes hard, we cannot make him see the sun. That the blush of morning is fair, that the quietude of grief is sacred, that the heroism of conscience is noble, who will undertake to prove to one who does not see it? So wisdom, beauty, holiness are immeasurable things, appreciable by pure perception, but which no rule can gauge, no argument demonstrate. My brethren, if you know God, or rather are known of him, you will need no proof that he is, and that he is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him; and you will not be much troubled by the skepticism of philosophers. Oh, let us get near to God by faith and prayer, and we shall break with one of our fingers through the brain-spun meshes of these impotent negations. Prove to us that by the word of God we ought only to mean "vortices of atoms," or "streams of tendency," and at the end of such triumphant demonstrations we shall but kneel down before him who made us, and not we ourselves, and with bowed head, and sad yet kindling heart, shall pray, if possible, with yet deeper conviction, "Our Father which art in heaven." And when we thus believe in him whom we have not seen, all else follows. We believe that he did not befool with irresistible longings, that he did not deceive with imaginary hopes, the man whom he had made. We believe that the breath of life which came from him shall not pass away. We believe that he sent his Son to die for us and to save us. We believe that because he lives we shall live also. We believe; we are content; we do not even ask for further proof. In this belief which we believe that he inspireth, we shall console ourselves amid all the emptiness and sorrow of life; we shall advance, calm and happy, to the very grave and gate of death.

RETROSPECTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS The beginning of a new year is always a time for reflec­tion, retrospection, and resolution. We are all inclined to be meditative and perhaps more or less melancholy, because as the old year dies out and the new year dawns upon us we are made cognizant, for a few hours at least, of the rapidity with which the years race by us. Also at such a time we seem disposed to recall the experiences of the year that is passing out, and, while in the mood for looking back, we often turn the pages of memory back to the very first chapter of life and read again the story that we ourselves have written. And what a variety of conflicting emotions swells our bosoms as the scenes of our lives reappear before us! We experience feelings of shame and chagrin as we pass over deeds that were unworthy and sinful, and in vain we try to blot them from the pages of life’s story. But that is impossible; they are there, and there they must stay. Like Pilate, what we have written we have written, and it is impossible to make a single correction. We can never undo any deed that was done. Some deeds may be counter­acted and their influence in a measure corrected, but undone —never. Life is made up of daily deeds, and what we are is the sum of what we have done. The time taken up in a sinful act is as much a part of life as the same length of time employed in the noblest deeds of service or in the most solemn devotions. It matters not how much we may regret the waste of time or how genuinely we may repent of the misconduct, we can never recall the time or reverse the conduct. If our bitter, briny tears of remorse and repent­ance could flow forever, they could not wash one sinful stain from life’s escutcheon. If we should never waste an­other moment of time, the days that are already lost could not be regained. There is no such thing as "redeeming the time," and the translators showed by their marginal read­ing that Paul meant to convey a different idea in that Ephe­sian passage. As the philosophical but pessimistic poet, the unbelieving Omar Khayyam, sadly said:
The moving finger writes; and having writ, Moves on; nor all your piety nor wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a line, Nor all your tears wash out a word of it. When such thoughts as these intrude into our medita­tions, or rather when this awful truth stares us in the face, how sweet it is to hear Jehovah tenderly saying concerning the wicked man who turns from his sins to obey the Lord, "None of his transgressions that he hath committed shall be remembered against him" (Ezekiel 18:22); and concerning those under the new covenant who have been washed in the blood of the Lamb, "And their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more" (Hebrews 10:17)! But even Jehovah does not promise to avert a man’s record—that is impossible with Omnipotence; but in his mercy our Father forgives and forgets. What a gracious provision this is for us! And how grateful we should be, as we see our utter helplessness before our own failures in life, to know that when all of our years have come and gone and all our deeds have been recorded, Infinite Love will spread the mantle of oblivion over our sins and we shall pass through grace into glory forever!

If we err in human blindness, And forget that we are dust:

If we miss the law of kindness In our struggle to be just, Snowy wings of love shall cover All the faults that cloud our way, When the weary watch is over, And the mists have cleared away. But as we re-read life’s story we do not find it all un­pleasant. On the contrary, we come upon scenes that thrill us and upon which we delight to dwell. In memory we live again the days that are forever gone and enjoy associations that can never again exist in reality. And here it is strange­ly true that "distance lends enchantment," for the days and experiences that are farthest away seem the sweetest. Our early days—how often back We turn on life’s bewild’ring track To where o’er hill and valley plays The sunlight of our early days!

Things that seemed trivial as we passed them on life’s highway now loom large in the distance, and we return in memory to bestow upon them the consideration that was perhaps their due. It is unfortunate that we cannot properly value things that are present. We are so much inclined to look for some "better day" and to aspire to do some "great thing" that we undervalue the present moment and overlook the opportunities for noble deeds that every day brings to us. Then soon life is over, and that better day never dawned and that great thing was never done. Life is not made up of great things. It is given to only a very few men to do that which the world calls great, and even in their lives that which made them famous—the great thing they did—occupied only a few days or, at most, a few years of their allotted time on earth. Perhaps threescore years of their whole threescore and ten were spent in toil and sacri­fice. Those years were filled with little things, common­place things, prosy things; but it would be safe to say, if those men were truly great, that all those little duties had been faithfully discharged. Neither man nor God will make a man lord over many things who has not been faithful over a few things. A person who is not punctual, diligent, and loyal in the ongoings of daily life will not rise to the oppor­tunity for a great deed when the opportunity comes. Should we not, therefore, guard against our disposition to stand be­tween a dream of the future and vision of the past and let the precious present moments pass unheeded? It was Shelley who said:

We look before and after And pine for what is not; Our sincerest laughter With some plain is fraught; Our sweetest songs are those That tell of saddest thought. When we pause to review our lives and when we see our mistakes; when we consider the somewhat trite but ever true philosophy that life is made up of little things, it is but natural that we should form resolutions for the future. It is a bad indication for a person to reach the point where he never reviews, regrets, repents, and resolves. Only the fatted, fatuous person is satisfied with himself and his achievements. And a purposeless, aimless life is worthless. Nothing worth while ever comes through accident. A man who is unintentionally good is good for nothing. Unless we purpose in our hearts to be better than we have ever been, it is certain that we will be no better. We should form a definite plan for work and service for God and humanity, and then use all our energies in the prosecution of that plan. The past cannot be recalled. The present is ours and its demands are great.

Let us, then, be up and doing, With a heart for any fate;

Still achieving, still pursuing, Learn to labor and to wait. THE CRITERION OF LIFE AND RELIGION

Every man is governed in his life and religious practice by some standard. It may be that his rule is a legacy re­ceived from his ancestors, and he, unconscious of its influ­ence, may boast of his freedom and originality; or it may be that early environment so firmly fixed his habits that he cannot get away from them, yet he is often not aware that he has any established rule of life or settled convictions in religious matters. But however ignorant we may be of the fact, we all have our ideas of things, and by these ideas we measure every new thought or practice that comes under our observation. Too often we make these our criteria. This is the cause of the opposition with which every step of progression meets. But is this unfortunate or is it legiti­mate? Shall we meekly accept the ideas of every would-be progressionist or fall victims to the doctrine of every re­ligious fanatic? Emphatically, no. By what, then, shall we decide the merits of their claims? Shall we appeal to the bias for inherited customs or pander to the dictates of native prejudices? No one, I presume, would contend for such a standard of authority. Hence we are forced to the con­clusion that a criterion is a necessity. That some standard of authority other than our taste and preferences is a necessity is further evident from the mutability of circumstances and the fallibility of the human nature. Man is to some extent a creature of circumstances. When circumstances are favorable to his views and his practice is popular and it requires no sacrifice to maintain his conviction, then there is not much likelihood of his changing; but if contrary and adverse conditions obtain, he is not so strong in his claims. Let no one think that this applies only to the giddy and gullible. Even the strongest minds may be influenced by the press of circumstances. How often do we see men who once held a pronounced conviction upon an issue changing and persistently fighting the thing to which they once tenaciously held! Whether the change be from truth to error or from error to truth matters not, the illustration is the same. Nor should anyone think that all who thus change are prompted by mercenary mo­tives. Man is so constituted that in the hours of despondency and gloom he sometimes doubts the correctness of his fa­vorite dogma. Points that at times seem clear and indisput­able, under different conditions, become misty and uncertain. John the Baptist, who had seen Jesus and had borne witness to his Messiahship, after he was cast into prison, sent to Jesus to know if he was the Christ.

Man’s views are as certainly and as obviously colored by his surrounding circumstances as vegetation is colored by different shades of light. A plant kept in the dark is pale and feeble, but one of the same variety growing in the sun­light is verdant and vigorous. Man is fallible. He cannot know certainly that he is right on any subject incapable of being dealt with by physical research. In all matters of a metaphysical nature he is An infant crying in the night, An infant crying for the light, And with no language but a cry.

What then? Shall man be left to find his only consola­tion from conjecture and speculation in matters of the soul? And for rules of moral and religious conduct, shall he look to his own feeble and fallible self? Shall his own unsus­tained judgment and vacillating opinions be his law of life? Or shall he be governed by a code made by beings who he realizes are as imperfect as he? From these considerations, we are again driven to the conclusion that man must have a standard in which he has faith, and to which he can appeal all questions of dispute, and in which he may find a refuge from doubts. Such a standard we have in the Bible. This Book of God has proved to be worthy of such faith by its victory over the bitter opposition it has received from countless foes in ages past. Every standard men may endeavor to bind on their fellows soon passes out of date and sinks into oblivion; but the Bible marches on, calm and undisturbed, and the battles of each succeeding century only demonstrate its divinity. Skeptics may dispute its claims and higher critics may deny its miracles, but they cannot improve its principles or sub­stitute its promises. An article in the Progress Magazine, under the caption, "The Life Worth While," by Professor George Burham Fos­ter, of the University of Chicago, begins:

"How is one to find out what it is that makes life worth while? Like all questions of the moral life, this was for­merly decided, when the old view of the world and life pre­vailed, by men who were esteemed as bearers of divine authority—that is, it was decided by an appeal to divine wisdom and commandments somehow and somewhere and sometime dictated to divine plenipotentiaries."

Thus in the outset, without telling to what authority he is going to appeal, he makes us understand to what he is not going to appeal and discredits the Bible and classes it with the "old view of the world." In his haste to announce him­self as a new and independent thinker and in his desire to make his readers understand that he is no adherent to old views, he rejects the Book of God, ignoring its claims, not considering the evidence of its divinity or accounting for its influences. In another paragraph he says:

"Upon this great question our only rational recourse is to find out what human nature itself has to say, and to rely upon her deliverance as fundamental and final. And this attitude is in accord with the spirit of our new age. Modern morality will no longer acknowledge offhand criteria and commandments from external source. We want to know their inner reason and inner right. If, for example, we even say on authority that the greatest commandment of morality is love to God and love to man, doubt would arise in the heart of a modern man as to whether this be true or not, as to the source of such a judgment."

Having thus completely rejected the authority of God’s word, he proceeds to set up his own standard and to decide by it what it is that makes life worth while. And, strange as it may seem, he adopts the oldest and best-known prin­ciple of the Bible and preaches it as the governing principle of life. He says: "Considered from this point of view, the greatest question of our time is as to whether man by nature is an individual or a social being—in other words, whether egoism or love is the basic law of life." He decides in favor of love, and says: "I call this the new, the social spirit of our day." Again: "This social spirit has declared war against its foe who says that the individual may ’live unto himself and be made the center of life."

I call this the old and Christian spirit of Paul’s day and the sum of the law and the essence of the commandments of Moses’ day. But it would not have been progressive and philosophical enough for a Chicago professor to quote these principles and emphasize them as the laws of life. Never­theless, he preaches the truths of the Bible, and therein I rejoice. He may discard the old Book and open his mouth to utter a new philosophy, but like Balaam of old, he was filled with divine truth and pronounced the precepts of God.

(Published in Gospel Advocate November 30, 1911.) ILLUSTRATION AND PERVERSION In recent issues of the Gospel Advocate several of our writers have referred to the use that our Lord made of parables and illustrations. We discussed also his frequent use of the a d hominem method of reply to his opponents (which means to base the reply upon the opponents’ own premise or basis of reasoning, but does not mean that he who uses the ad hominem accepts the premise as true; he only uses it for argument). We, therefore, discussed the fallacy of supposing that Jesus endorsed the whole character of a person whose performance on some particular occasion is commended, or of imagining that every circumstance in a parable or every incidental in a figure of speech is endorsed and set forth as an example for us to follow. We pointed to instances in our Lord’s teaching where such a course would be so obviously absurd that any honest person would know better than to make such a use of the great Teacher’s lan­guage. Examples are not lacking, however, to prove that persons who are animated by prejudice or who are actuated by motives of personal envy and hatred can wrest and pervert any language of any teacher or writer into meaning anything that the perverter wishes it to mean. In our former articles, however, we did not have in mind so much this dishonest, malicious, and malevolent wrester of sentences and circum­stances and perverter of language as the unthinking literalist who tries to force figures of speech to go upon their all fours, so to speak. This sort of mistake is rarely to be expected in an educated person; and when it is found in such a person, it cannot be excused on the ground of ignorance and must be accounted for on the ground of prejudice or of something even worse—if anything can be worse. A person who is really educated will not be actuated by prejudice; such things have always been considered as characteristics of ignorance. Education is supposed to lift the soul above narrowness, bias, unfairness, malevolence, and dishonesty. The fruit of a real education will be seen in the behavior of the man when under fire, when in controversy, when con­tending for his convictions. If he cannot stand this test, his education is deficient, it matters not what degrees he may hold or what academic position he may occupy. The evidence of his education will be seen in an open-minded­ness, a fair and judicial treatment of any issue, in a kindly spirit and a courteous consideration of an opponent. This, however, does not in the least militate against a positive con­viction or a firm stand. It would of course and of necessity prevent and prohibit any wresting of words, or perversion of language, or any misrepresentation and unfairness of any kind. Truth, however, cannot be refuted by fair means; and when a man runs counter to truth in any field or in any contest, he may be expected to resort to devices that are unworthy and to use methods that are low and sinister.

Unfortunately, too, much that passes for education today is nothing more nor less than propaganda for something or against something, especially against something. And that "something" is not nebulous and indefinable. It is definitely against Christianity, or faith in God, and the whole social order built upon Christianity. The only evidence that some college men can show of their education is a fin e contempt for God and the Bible, and the biggest difference you will note in your son after he has had four years in college is that h e left home a Christian and returned a pagan. The methods used to overthrow the young man’s faith and to destroy his morals were not logical, ethical, fair, or honest. The day of weighing honestly the evidences of Christianity has long ago faded into night. Modern education consists in a complete blackout of Christianity. As an example of just the kind of misuse of our Lord’s parables and illustrations that we have been discussing, we cite the following from the highest source:

"Christendom," "A Quarterly Review," is a journal that issues from the University o f Chicago Press and sells for one dollar a copy or four dollars a year. At the time of the appearance of the article here quoted, Charles Clayton Morrison, of the "Disciples of Christ," was its editor pro tempore. The article appeared in the autumn number of 1936, which we have preserved for the sole purpose of using the article here quoted, and we have used it in the pulpit often. The title of the essay declares its nature. It is, "The Aversion o f Men o f Taste t o Evangelical Religion.” The author is Nathaniel Micklem, who is one of the high priests of modernism—so high that he is sometimes quoted with approval by such men as J. J. Walker and C. C. Kling- man. As the title shows, the author argues throughout that "evangelical religion" is distasteful and wholly unacceptable to men of taste and culture. It originated with the ignorant and was intended for the base, he avers. The doctrine of the cross is especially repulsive to men of taste, the author claims. On this point he says: The ultimate scandal of evangelical religion (which in this con­nection includes both historic Protestantism and the Church of Rome, but excludes much of modern Protestantism) lies not in dogmas and symbolism, but in its intolerable offense to human pride.

"Nothing in my hand I bring;

Simply to the cross I cling" — it is that which the man of taste and culture cannot bring himself to say; he feels no need of so utter a salvation; to him, therefore, it is nonsense or mere mythology that the majesty of God should take a servant’s form.

Thus Christ is repudiated and the cross is spurned and resented. That the majesty of God should take a servant’s form is nonsense. If it had taken the form of king or ruler or philosopher and had complimented the human race for its wisdom and goodness and for its great achievements, then Christ would have been acceptable to men of taste; and in the University of Chicago and "Christendom" he would probably have been treated as an equal with Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, or Bertrand Russell—probably! But the point that serves as an example of the fallacy pointed out above follows. Just immediately following the quotation just given about the cross and the servant’s form the author gives us these lines of poetry and closes his essay with the one sentence that follows. Thus:

"Perish virtue, as it ought, abhorred, And the tool with it who insults the Lord. The atonement a Redeemer’s love hath wrought Is not for you—the righteous need it not.

Seest thou yon harlot wooing all she meets, The worn-out nuisance of the public streets, Herself from morn till night, from night till morn, Her own abhorrence and as much your scorn; The gracious shower, unlimited and free, Shall fall on her when heaven denies it thee; Of all that wisdom dictates, this the drift: That man is dead in sin and life a gift." That is what the Master said, "The publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you"; that is the reason for the aversion of men of taste to evangelical religion.

It would be difficult to imagine a more gross perversion of our Savior’s language than is here made by this scholar and theologian and Bible teacher, Nathaniel Micklem. The idea that our Lord offered divine mercy to harlots and denied i t to men of taste and good character, or to anyone else, would be inexcusable in an ignorant man who can read; and when we find it put forth by a scholar as the teach­ing of Christ, we are at a loss to know how to characterize it. No one who reads this statement from our Lord in its con­nection can honestly deduce the conclusion that the Lord desires that harlots enter the kingdom in preference t o others, or that he denies others the right. The determining factor was not in the Lord’s desire, nor in his offer, but in the desire and the will of the individual. The publicans and harlots and the common people heard him gladly, and they repented of their sins and entered joyfully into the kingdom, but the chief priests and elders of the people—the men of taste of that day—would not repent. They would not ac­knowledge themselves sinners. They felt "no need of so utter a salvation." Since Dr. Micklem and the poet he quotes put themselves and their compeers of the literati not only in company with, but squarely upon, the same basis of the scribes and Pharisees, they must not blame us if we accept their own evaluation of themselves. Those ancient "men of taste" did not enter the kingdom for exactly the same reason that Nathaniel Micklem assigns for his repudiation of the cross. It was an intolerable insult to their pride to call upon them to repent! And they criticized our Lord for the same thing that our "men of taste" find fault with: He received sinners! But that this misrepresentation of our Lord’s teaching may be seen in all of its inexcusable ugliness, and that the blasphemous imputation that our Lord put a premium upon harlotry and sin may be exposed, let us here read and ex­amine the entire passage of Scripture which has been so grossly misused. In the twenty-first chapter of his record, Matthew tells of "The Triumphal Entry," "The Traders Cast Out of the Temple," "Jesus’ Authority Questioned," "The Parable of the Two Sons," and "The Parable of the Wicked Husband­men." It is clear that these critics of Christ—these men of taste—were represented by the false son (who pretended to do something he did not) and the wicked husbandmen (who the chief priests themselves said should be miserably de­stroyed). But the paragraph between verse 22 and verse 33 gives us the language and the incident that have been mis­used. When these men questioned the authority of Christ, he in reply asked them about the baptism of John which they had rejected. They refused to answer his question, and he likewise refused to give them his authority. Then, beginning with verse 28, we have this language: But what think ye? A man had two sons; and he came to the first, and said, Son, go work to-day in the vineyard. And he an­swered and said, I will not: but afterward he repented himself, and went. And he came to the second, and said likewise. And he an­swered and said, I go, sir: and went not. Which of the two did the will of his father? They say, The first. Jesus saith unto them, Verily I say unto you, that the publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you. For John came unto you in the way of righteousness, and ye believed him not; but the publicans and the harlots believed him: and ye, when ye saw it, did not even repent yourselves afterward, that ye might believe him.

"Which o f the two did the will o f his father?" Neither of these boys did the will of his father fully. The first one gave an improper and a disrespectful answer, which must have grieved the father deeply, but he afterward repented— changed his attitude toward his father and his father’s com- mand—and went into the vineyard and worked. They, there­fore, correctly answered that he did the father’s will. The second son gave his father a very proper and a respectful answer, which would evince an obedient and dutiful son. But his suave answer was a base hypocrisy; he did not obey his father. This first son represented the publicans and harlots, whose former conduct had been in defiance of, and displeasing to, the heavenly Father, but who were now ready to repent and to go into the vineyard and do the Father’s will. The second son represented the chief priests and elders (verse 23), who made loud claims and pious protestations of loyalty to God, but refused to obey his word or to reverence his Son (verse 37).

Brother McGarvey sets forth this same idea in a better way. Here is his comment: The assertion that they "go into the kingdom of God before you" does not mean that either party had already gone into the kingdom of God, but it declares the direction in which they were moving and points to the result soon to be attained. The publicans and harlots had made one step in that direction by believing in John (verse 32), while the priests and elders had not gone so far as that. The rebuke was a stinging one on account of the contempt with which publicans and harlots were regarded by the priests and elders, and the great disparity which had formerly existed between the two classes.

32. For John Came. The precedence declared in favor of the publicans and harlots had reference, not to their reception of Jesus, but to their regard for John. Previous to John’s coming these wicked characters had been like the first son, saying, " I will not," making no pretense of obedience to God, while the priests and elders had been like the second son, saying, "I go, sir," making great profes­sions of respect and obedience. But when John came and by his preaching put both parties to the test, the latter "believed him not," made no change in conduct; but the former "believed him," giving up their evil practices, confessing their sins, and being baptized for the remission of sins (3: 6; Mark 1:4).

How manifestly fair, sane, and true to the text is this language of McGarvey, the believer and the reverent student of God’s word! How different the language of Micklem, who, although he is at the head of a leading theological college, is an unbeliever, a scoffer, and a blasphemer, "deny­ing our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ" (Jude 1:4), and wresting the language of a parable to make his argument seem plausible and philosophical!

(Published in Gospel Advocate January 2, 1941.)