The Commoner
DECEMBER, 1921
11
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owed Philemon or any wrong that he had done .
To make the appeal more weighty, Paul
reminds Philemon that he is willing to do this,
although Philemon owed unto Paul his own self.
THE GROWING POWER OF PERSUASION
There is one thought in Paul's letter to his
Mend that is especially worthy of note at this
time "Wherefore," he writes to Philemon,
"though I might be -much bold in Christ to en
join thee that which is convenient, yet for love's
Jake I rather beseech thee."
Paul waives the' right to enjoin and, for love's
Bake, endeavors to persuade.
This choice brings us face to face with the
two powers that have been employed through
out history, viz.: Force and persuasion. We
And this difference in' niethod running all
through society.
Force is the antithoris of brotherhood.
Christ everywhere c-mphasized the idea of en
treaty instead of command. He sought, to re
concile brother with .brother. In one striking
case He said that the pacriflce should be left
at the altar until reconciliation was effected
with the brother who has aught against the
one offering the sacrifice. "Agree with thine
adversary quickly" is His advice along the same
line.
We have seen this spirit growing, even in our
own time. A century ago men fought duels
over trivial questions of honor; even Christians
felt justified- in taking human life because of
words said, possibly in. anger. N6w every State-1
has a law against dueling fnnd one need not
claim to be a prophet to predioi that dueling will
one day be abolished . throughout the entire
world.
In business the relations between employer
and employee are improved just in proportion
as persuasion is substituted for arbitrary meth
ods. , "
The capitalist used to say, "There is nothing
to arbitrate. I will conduct my business as I
please." If this is still sometimes heard it. is
not spoken so loudly because the capitalist sees
that he is conducting more than his own busi
ness when he fixes the condition and determines
the hopes of thousands .who work, for him. 'And
so the spirit of brotherhood leads the employee
to resort to every available means of recon
ciliation before. he suggests an interruption of
work. , .
I have only applied this in a few directions;
it is capable of universal application, and it
will be applied increasingly as the spirit of
Christ pervades society and molds, institutions
to conform to His, precepts.
FORCE AND LOVE FACE TO FACE AT WASH
INGTON Just now' we see an illustration of this prin
ciple exhibited in a forum- upon which, the eyes '
of the world are turned. The two principles,
force and love, that met in the trial of Christ
before Pilate, again stand face to face in the
Disarmament Conference.
Selfishness prefers for:e to persuasion; the
diplomacy of the world has been built upon
force; it has spoken through ultimatums that
veiled threats of violence. The- result has very
naturally been .the exciting of hatred and the
begetting of force. ,The history of the human
race has been written In blood because nations
resorted to force rather than to persuasion.
The hope excited by the Disarmament Con
ference, now in session, rests entirely upon the
substitution of persuasion for force. If two na
tions are hostile and force is to be the instru
ment to be used, there must be as much force
as conditions may require; -hence, the rivalry
in armaments. When nations choose the policy
of persuasion battleships can be scrappjd and
armies reduced, because persuasion has other
and more potent weapons.
The proposition presented by Secretary
Hughes for destroying more than half the bat
tleship tonnage of the three leading naval nar
tiona and a holiday of ten years breathes the
spirit that animated Paul when he wrote to
Philemon, "I might enjoin thee, yet I rather
beseech thee." 'President 'Harding laid the
foundation for the sweeping reductions pro
Posed when he announced that the American
people wanted "less of armaments and nothing
of war." He spoke still more fundamentally
when, at the burial of the unknown soldier, he
concluded his great speech with the Lord's
Prayer.
It was a scene worthy " to be remembered
jvhen the highest official in the United States
invoked the blessing of the Supreme Being and,
in the words that Christ Himself proposed, led
a nation in prayer. This speech, published in
every tongue, in every land, brought the Lord's
Prayer Into the thought of more people than
mSSSSTi lt on oho day 8lnco lh0
, THE ONLY ENDURING WAY
Truly the religion of Christ has a plaim upon
mankind when it is broad enough to prescribe
rules for every day in a human life, for every
problem that has to be solved, and for every
emergency that may arise. Wonderful gospel!
It is so simple that a slave can understand it,
and yet so sublime that the greatest and the
noblest can look up to it and be controlled by
it, no matter in what walk or occupation.
He is "The Way," and the only way, Tho
smallest and most helpless nation can find in
struction and comfort in the words of Christ,
and the most powerful cannot afford to ignore
th,em.
Many nations in the past thought their gov
ernments wore eternal. They put their faith
in implements of warfare, but they are dead.
Their wreckage can be seen all along the path
way of the human race. Only one kind of gov
ernment can endure, and that is the kind that
is built upon tho teachings of the Prince of
Peace.
In the sixth verso, .ninth chapter of Isaiah,
the prophet describes the Messiah that was to
come and gave Him, among other titles, tho
"Prince of Peace." Tho seventh verse contains
a, truth even more important: it says, "Of the
increase of this government and peace there
shall be no end." And it gives the reason for its
permanence and its growth. It is to rest on jus
tice. Individuals have been learning the value of
Christ's persuasive methods, and now it seems
as if the world' were about to adopt a plan whoso
foundation is Brotherhood and whoso end is
Peace.
, MENACE OF DARWINISM
If. Bryan' had been elected president, on his
first or second attempt, a great teacher might
have been lost to the world. For then he could
not have .taken to the platform. There would
indeed have "been ff chance that, as an ex-president,
ho would have been called to a college
presidency or professorship. Then his wonder
ful voice and ready pen would have placed him
where he belongs, among the greatest instruct
ors of the multitude in tho things that pertain to
righteousness and right living.
Whatever may be said of the political and
economic doctrines for which William Jen
nings Bryan has stood, the principles of peace,
of temperance, of domestic economy of social
order, of morality and-of religion which ho has
presented to the ears of millions in the press,
have been as seed that is yielding, and will con
tinue to yield, long after his generation has
passed, an abundant harvest of blessing to hu
manity. "The Menace of Darwinism," an essay or lec
ture by William Jennings Bryan, -has reached
me in the form of a little coverless pamphlet.
What the Great Commoner, as he is fitly called,
does to the so-called scientists who monkey
with man, in this effort, leaves nothing but a
grave in Oblivionland. By quotations and com
parisons he shows that Darwin was a great
guesser, whose guesses did not match each
other; that the best scientific minds of the age
condemned his hypotheses, denying them the
dignity of theories; that Darwinism has cor
rupted the fountains of learning and blighted
the minds of learners without number, and that,
as clearly the traced inspiration of Nietsche,
it was a primary cause of the world war with
all its desolations and aftermath of distress.
For well-informed people" the demolition of
Darwinism may be regarded in the light. of
super-erogation. As a scientific philosophy it
has long ago' been discarded. Yet now and then,
as Mr Bryan gives recent instances of, it crops
'out as a basic doctrine even in pulpit utter
ances More frequently by partly educated peo
plo it is taken for granted as an undisputed
truth, to point a. moral or prop an argument.
If it were not for these sorrowful faqts, I should
regard Mr. Bryan's assault on the Darwinism
works in the same way as the Indian did the
trick of a white hunter to do him out of a wild
goose. He had brought the bird down with a
lone shot, but while the goose was still flutter
ing in midair, another shot rang out. When
the Indian reached the spot a pale-face gunner
was picking up the goose. "Ugh!" the red man
Sustedly exclaimed, "white man shoot 'm
dead goose!" ,,.'
Alive or dead when struck by the Bryan
Detard, Darwinism has given occasion for one
of the strongest gospel sermons ever delivered.
"Without religion," Mr. Bryan says at the out
bJ "one can play a part in both the physical
and tho intellectual world, hut ho cannot llva
up to tho possibilities which God has placed
within tho reach of each human beThg?" In his
oloquont peroration those burning words appear:
"God beckons man upward and the Biblo
points tho way; man can obey and travel to- ,
ward porfection by the path that Christ re
vealed, or man can disobey and fall td'a level
lower, in some respects, than that of tho unites
about him. Jjooking heavenward, man can find
inspiration in his lineage; looking about him,
ho is impelled to kindness by a sonso which
binds him to his brothors. Mighty problems
demand his attention; a world's destiny is to bo
determined by him. What time has ho to waste
in hunting for 'missing links' or in sonrchlng
for resemblances between his forefathers., and
tho apo? In His Imago in this sign wo con
quer." National Magazine.
THE DANGER OF RECKLESS TEACHING
"School go slow," is a familiar sign to
motorists. It is a recognition of the fact that
in such a locality most of the caution must como
from the grown-ups inside tho car and a mini
mum from tho children on tho street. Similar
ly, we are told, every man who has the moral
responsibility of training tho juvenile mind owes
it to his surroundings to go-slow in the matter
of teaching and setting an example. Ho must
so comport himself that the child may not get
hold of any false philosophy; ho must teach
and explain fundamental religious truths so
that the child may have constructive moral prin
ciples to guide him through the complexities of
life. It, is for tho parent, preacher, and teacher,
.says The Continent (Presbyterian) to supply "all
tho caution, all the safeguards, all tho protec
tion." If they leave it to each student to look
out for himself, they are like the drivers who
dash by a school in recess time, remarking that
the public highway is to drive on and that chil
dren must look out for themselves. Teachers
may defend the things they do as a personal
right; but in the presence of the plastic soul
and mind it is advised that they go slow, els
the youthful and untrained mind may placo a
wrong interpretation1 on the habits of teacher
and be molded to a false idea.
"In -presence of some problems of education
the safeguards have to be furnished from th
teacher's desk, not from the schoolroom floor.
In ethics and philosophy and economics, stu
dents do not come to a teacher with well-baK
anced minds; he must furnish the balance In
stead. And .if ho is loose-minded, scatter
brained, wild-eyed, ho can hardly fail to leave
them disorganized in their own thinking and
often in their personal conduct. If he dashes
about, joyously exulting over tho sound of
breaking china and falling, idols, and expecting
young minds to make their own reconstruction,
he is merely playing the fool. In the moral
court of the world he would be convicted as
guilty of the ruin that follows.
"The application of the warning in the matter
of teaching religious truth, is almost too obvious
for comment. There seems to be a peculiar sat'
isfaction among some- teachers in pulpits and
Sunday-schools and Institutions in destroying
tho accepted opinions of their students, with the
specious plea that destruction may occur before
constructive ideas can get room to grow. The
plea is plausible, but it overlooks the fact that
the soul must dwell somewhere during recon
struction and that those disinherited souls are
not hardened to the exposure forced on the,m.
No man has any right to try to rebuild faith un-,
less he knows how to maintain the values of
the old in the. production of the new. Hardened
souls may endure the tearing down of their
assumed shelter, but the man who will tear
down an orphan asylum without making pro
vision for the, protection of childhood, though
too foolish to be called a murderer, has- much to
answer for." Literary Digest. , ,
Several more Republican congressmen .are
letting it be known that they may not ask for
re-election because they have found it impos
sible to live on the salaries paid to members.
The number is likely to greatly Increase tho
longer and the more closely the returns from
the November elections are scanned by the
membership.
Pour hundred million dollars a year is the
saving to the American -people covered by the
Hughes naval program for the United States as
presented for adoption to the limitation of "arms
conference. That is large enough to even in
terest a member of the four billion dollar Con
gresses we have been having of late. '
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