Earlier text: Sunday Observance and State CompulsionIN daily life credulity finds its food in the ready credence given to slander and iniquity. Ninety-nine out of every hundred people believe an infamous story if only given with sufficient detail. The hundredth alone demands corroboration. It is so much easier to believe evil than good!—just as it is easier to write a telling satire than a wholesome panegyric. Repeat a story, no matter how bad, with aplomb and the air of conviction, and you carry your audience with you. Mention the sum for which ministers have been bought, and that which they have paid as hush money, and your hearers will rise to the fly, swallow it, and never ask whether it is made of living protoplasmic material, or of silk, dead feathers, and brown fluff. It does not signify how impossible in detail, how infamous in application, how improbable in circumstance—it is a bait which credulity cannot withstand; and the more unlikely the conditions of the story, the more certain are they to be accepted. All those who are able to delve deep into another’s mind come to tracts of credulity—that is, to beliefs entirely unsupported by evidence—which make them wonder at the folly, and sometimes despair of the advance, of humanity.—London Queen. Faith and Works
By S. S. Times
FAITH and works are not two distinct and separate agencies, as many persons would seem to suppose, any more than are cause and effect. Faith is the life, and works are the proof of life. Unless good works are to be seen as the result of faith, there is no reason for supposing that there is any faith in that direction; and unless the good works which are seen are a result of faith, they are not to be depended on as a permanency. The apple tree that never bears apples is a sham apple tree; but good apples found on the top of a fence-post give no ground for supposing that the fence-post is an apple tree. Faith ought to show itself in works, and works ought to have their prompting in faith.—S. S. Times. The Antidote Against Evil
The late Dean Stanley is the author of the following excellent advice: Leisure misused—an idle hour waiting to be employed, idle hands with no occupation, idle and empty minds with nothing to think—these are the main temptations to evil. Fill up that empty void, employ these vacant hours, occupy these listless hands; the evil will depart, because it has no place to enter in, because it is conquered by good. The best antidote against evil of all kinds, against the evil thoughts that haunt the soul, against the needless perplexities which distract the conscience, is to keep hold of the good we have. Impure thoughts will not stand against pure words and prayers and deeds. Little doubts will not avail against great certainties. Fix your attention on things above, and then you will be less and less troubled by the cares, the temptations, the troubles of things on earth. The Only Objection Against This Book
WILLMOT, the infidel, when dying, laid his trembling, emaciated hand upon the Sacred Volume, and exclaimed, solemnly and with unwonted energy, “The only objection against this book is a bad life.”—Selected. HOW THE CANNON KING DIED.
By Theron Brown
HERR KRUPP, the cannon king, was Tubal-Cain of modern times, and his achievements in hand work and brain work inside of fifty years probably surpassed all that his prototype accomplished in an antediluvian life-time. He was so busy that one reading the record of his labors and inventions would imagine he never slept. Indeed, he used often to say, “Man will only find rest after the soul is freed from the body.” His temper and character seemed to assimilate the material of his trade; for the epithet, “man of iron,” belongs to him by right of merit. He was harsh, vindictive, stubborn, and implacable. His men, and even his own family, had bitter cause to know this. When his son Fritz contested the seat in Parliament for his native borough of Essen, and the candidate of the clerical or “ultramontane” party defeated him, Herr Krupp gave orders that no employé of his should read or take home one of that party’s local papers. Soon after, discovering that a poor workman had wrapped his dinner in a copy of an ultramontane journal, he sent for him, and discharged him on the spot. Of the strange cowardice which makes him the dark side of our present picture, the cause of his separation from his wife is a lurid illustration. A relative of his wife, while on a visit to his home, suddenly fell sick and died. Herr Krupp, when he heard of it, refused to enter his house, but fled to Dusseldorf, and stayed there till the funeral was over. Mrs. Krupp’s very natural remonstrance against his conduct so enraged him that she found it impossible to live longer with him, and from that time she made her home in Dresden. He remained relentless to the last; and when, in his sickness, she sent word asking to visit him, he sternly resisted the entreaties of his son to let her come. He would not see her. The weakness which sent this “man of iron” flying from a funeral scene was a long known and inseparable trait, and he even took pains to make it conspicuous. He never forgave anyone who spoke to him of dying. The greatest manufacturer of death could not bear the thought or mention of death. It was a standing order throughout his vast works that no one there should ever refer to it in conversation. No man ventured so much as to utter the word “death,” for fear of provoking the wrath of the cannon king. As Krupp grew old, the horror of the inevitable end constantly haunted him, and finally, when sickness came, all the most famous doctors in the German Empire were sent for in turn to attend the unhappy millionaire. The last was Chancellor Bismarck’s own physician, Dr. Schweniger. A few days before his death he said to him, “My dear doctor, make me live ten years longer, and I’ll gladly give you a million.” One cannot help recalling the dying shriek of Queen Elizabeth: “Millions of money for an inch of time!”—Rev. Theron Brown, in Congregationalist. THE BIBLE THE WORD OF GOD.
By Ellet Joseph Waggoner
THE Christian Union of April 4 contains the following question and answer:— "Will you please tell me what authority there is for believing the Gospels to be anything more than the honest narratives of men who had lived with Christ; also the Epistles to be anything more than the counsels of wise and good men, not inspired—that is, not having the words put into their mouths by the Holy Ghost?" "The Gospels themselves do not profess to be anything more. In the Epistles it is asserted that 'we speak in words which the Spirit teacheth.' 1 Cor. 2:13. 'Words' here means 'discourse' rather than the grammatical parts of speech—that is, the ideal rather than the material element of language. To be inspired is not identical with having the words put into the mouth by the Spirit. That the Gospels and Epistles are inspired is plain from the fact that they are inspiring. Their inspiration is seen in the moral and spiritual power which they exert upon the conscience, and attests the illumination of their own consciences by the Spirit of Truth. But that this illumination was such as to exclude all error in whatever they wrote, although it is a tenet of local and provincial belief, is no part of the faith of the church catholic." We do not propose to give a dissertation on inspiration, but we do want to protest against the passing of such theories as the above under the name of "Christian." To say that the Scriptures are to be considered as inspired if they are inspiring, but that the illumination of the writers was not such as to exclude all error in what they wrote, is simply to place them on a level with the writings of Shakespeare, Scott, Milton, and Macaulay. Some people are never moved by the reading of the Scriptures; then, according to the theory of the Christian Union, the Scriptures are not inspired to such ones. "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." So then the Christian Union would have us believe that the Scriptures are not inspired to worldlings. Its theory, by denying that they are indeed "the Scriptures of truth," makes it useless to preach to sinners, for there is nothing to reach them with. If only the Christian Union were concerned in this matter, we should not say anything; but there are God-fearing men who rest all their hope on the truthfulness of the Bible, who have been caught by this theory, which virtually undermines their hope. We say that the theory that men are to judge of the inspiration of the Bible by the impression which it makes upon them, is the foundation of heathenism. Thus, it makes man a judge of God. To be able to decide upon the kind and degree of inspiration in any given passage, is to be able to know the mind of the Spirit of God. And the man who measures the inspiration of the Bible by his own understanding of it, makes himself equal with God; indeed, he makes himself a god; for he virtually declares that his own mind is the rule for himself. When he pursues a certain course, he does so, not because the Bible says so, but because he wants to. He has no higher standard of right and wrong than himself. There are men who have held these loose views of inspiration who have yet been good Bible Christians, but only because they have not followed out their theories; but the effect of their teaching on others is often most disastrous. To us it seems a terrible thing to sit in judgment upon God. The man who accepts as inspired only what commends itself to his judgment and understanding, either lifts himself up to the level of God, or else brings God down to his own level, which is the same thing. He says in effect that God cannot know any more than he does, and he really makes his own Bible. As we said before, men may hold such a theory as a theory which they have never, even in thought, followed to its end, and may remain earnest, God-fearing Christians; but what must be the effect of such a theory upon those whose Christian character is wholly unformed? We earnestly exhort every reader of the SIGNS OF THE TIMES to accept the following theory of the Bible as the only safe one, even if they do not comprehend to the full the mind of the Spirit of God:— "All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness; that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." 2 Tim. 3:16, 17. "Every word of God is pure; he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him. Add thou not unto his words, lest he reprove thee, and thou be found a liar." Prov. 30:5, 6. "Yea, let God be true, but every man a liar." Rom. 3:4. DIVINITY OF CHRIST.
By Ellet Joseph Waggoner
WE may take the fourth commandment, and show that what is true of the whole law is specially true of it. Thus; in that commandment we read that "in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath-day, and hallowed it." Ex. 20:11. Gen. 2:3 also says: "And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it; because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made." The One who made the heavens and the earth also made the Sabbath for man. He made it by resting at the close of his creative work, and by afterwards blessing and sanctifying the day upon which he rested—the seventh day. It was the same being who created, who rested on the seventh day, who blessed the seventh day, and who sanctified it, or set it apart for man to use, with instruction how he should use it. But it was Christ who created the heavens and the earth, for "by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible." "All things were created by him." Therefore it was Christ who made the Sabbath. He is Lord of all, even of the Sabbath-day. Matt. 12:8. Thus we identify the Sabbath,—the same day which the Jews professed to keep, and which they wickedly accused Christ of violating—with the Lord's day. So we have proved in general and in particular that Christ is the Lawgiver for all mankind. We must honor him, therefore, as Creator, and as Lawgiver, and now, lastly, as Redeemer. And in this we come to the comforting, encouraging part of all that has gone before. A few texts will suffice on this point. We first quote John 3:16: "God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." But the giving was not all on the part of the Father. Both Father and Son shared equally in this, as in all things else. Paul says of Christ that he "gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father." Gal. 1:4. See also Titus 2:13, 14. But while the Father and the Son shared equally in this work, the Son was the one in whom the Father was revealed, as we have learned from John 1:18 and 14:7-9. Paul also expressly declares that "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself." 2 Cor. 5:19. We can know the measure of God's love for man only as we "know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge;" and we can learn this only from Calvary. So John says, "Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us." 1 John 3:16. It is our God that is our Redeemer. What a pledge this affords of the faithfulness of the "exceeding great and precious promises" of the gospel. The great law of the universe was broken by the inhabitants of this little planet, and the Lawgiver gave himself to redeem these rebels. If he had deputized an angel, we would have no surety of salvation; but he gave himself. No other life was of enough value. By giving himself he fulfilled the words of the prophet: "The Lord is well pleased for his righteousness' sake; he will magnify the law, and make it honorable." Isa. 42:21. He magnified it by his death. By that he showed its worth, and how utterly impossible it is for the law to be changed or abrogated, or to swerve in the least from its rigidity. This meets the infidel cavil of the injustice of having an innocent person suffer for a guilty one. That would be unjust, under ordinary circumstances; but when that innocent one is the Lawgiver himself, there is no injustice. God could not relax one jot of the claims of his law. To do that would have been to deny himself, to set aside his own righteousness. But he had a right to give himself for man, and in so doing he vindicated his law and justified believing sinners, and at the same time was perfectly just. And if the Lawgiver gave himself for us, to redeem us from the transgression of his own law, what greater assurance could we ask that he will save to the uttermost all who come to him? Well might Paul say, "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day." 2 Tim. 1:12. When we remember also the wonderful power manifested in the creation, in bringing the worlds from nothing, how appropriate are the words of the apostle Peter: "Wherefore, let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to him in well-doing, as unto a faithful Creator." 1 Peter 4:19. He who is able to take things that are not, to bring to naught things that are (1 Cor. 1:28), is able to take our very weakness and turn it into strength; and for our further assurance we have the record of many who "out of weakness were made strong." Heb. 11:34. Well may the poet sing:— "How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
Is laid for your faith in his excellent word!
What more can he say than to you he hath said,
Who unto the Saviour for refuge have fled?"
E. J. W. REDEMPTION VERSUS CREATION.
By M. C. W.
WE do not by the above title design to convey the idea that either one of these great works is opposed to the other. They are both the works of the great all-wise I AM; therefore there can be no collision or disagreement between them. And yet they are set one against the other by many advocates of first-day sacredness. These men admit that the seventh-day Sabbath was given as a memorial of the creative works of God, and that it was the only Sabbath of divine appointment which existed during the first four thousand years of the world's history. But when Christ came, he finished the work of redemption by his resurrection on the first day of the week; and because of this the first day should be kept in honor of redemption, or in honor of that event which finished redemption. They reason that as redemption is greater than creation, and as redemption was finished by the resurrection of Christ on the first day, therefore the first day ought to be kept in preference to the seventh day. The above, though brief, contains a fair summary of one of the main arguments for the Sunday-sabbath. The high claim that it makes, and the number of its advocates, demand that it should be examined; and this we will do by the standard of the divine word. We will find as we investigate that the claim is founded upon the most unwarranted assumptions. 1. It is assumed that redemption is greater than creation. We say "assumed," for it is not revealed in the word of God. It is not only assumption, it is presumption, for short-sighted, mortal man to pass on the relative greatness of the Creator's works, works which call forth the essential attributes of263 Deity. Only God can create, or bring into existence; only God could redeem the fallen world. Both works are infinite. Creation is the manifestation of God's infinite power and wisdom—"his eternal power and Godhead." Rom. 1:19, 20. Redemption is the manifestation of God's infinite love. For puny, weak, witless man to assume to declare the relative merits of Jehovah's mighty works, when he has not revealed them, is Heaven-daring presumption. No one knows which is the greater; God has not revealed it. Without such revelation, no mortal can know it; and with such revelation no mortal can comprehend it; for the finite can never comprehend the infinite. Man can better weigh the mountains in scales and the hills in a balance. 2. Redemption was not finished at the resurrection of Christ. The resurrection, it is true, was a great step in the wondrous scheme; so also was the incarnation, and the crucifixion, and the ascension; so also will be the second advent. They are all steps in that great progressive work which will close only when the mediatorial work of Christ shall cease, and he shall come to gather his children home. That redemption does not close till the Lord comes is evident from our Saviour's words in Luke 21:28, where, in referring to the signs which should precede his appearing, he says: "And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh." Again, the Lord declares through his apostle that it is for this coming of Christ, when the sons of God will be manifested (1 John 3:1, 2), when the corruptible body will be made like Christ's glorious body (Phil. 3:21), when the body will be redeemed, that all creation groans and travails. Rom. 8:19-23. Redemption, then, is not completed till the second coming of our Lord; and to set apart a day as a memorial of redemption's finished work before that work is finished, is not only unwarranted, but it is another evidence of the folly of human wisdom when separated from divine revelation. 3. Redemption means a buying back, but this world was not purchased by the resurrection of Christ, but by his crucifixion. The following scriptures conclusively prove this: "Forasmuch as ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, . . . but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot." 1 Peter 1:18, 19. "In whom [Christ] we have redemption through his blood." Eph. 1:7; Col. 1:14. And this is also the song of the redeemed: "And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof; for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation." Rev. 5:9. But Christ's blood was poured out, as is generally supposed, on Friday. Therefore if any day of the week was to be set apart, certainly that day in which our Saviour paid the purchase price has the pre-eminence. On that day he cried, "It is finished;" that is, the great Sacrifice was made. But the work of redemption goes on till Christ ceases to plead his blood. It is the marvel of the universe that God should give his Son to die, that Christ should give himself; but it was not so wonderful that he should raise him from the dead. But for neither event has God set apart a day. In neither event does the record make the day on which it took place prominent. 4. But God has given us memorials of the crucifixion and the resurrection. For the crucifixion, the Lord's Supper is given. "As often," says the apostle, "as ye eat this bread and drink this cup, ye do show forth the Lord's death till he come." 1 Cor. 11:26. And this ordinance was to be observed in "remembrance" of Christ. Verse 24. For the resurrection, we have the ordinance of baptism and the new life of the Christian. Says the apostle: "Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection." Rom. 6:3-5. Thus the administration of baptism, or immersion (for baptism is nothing else), shows to others the faith possessed by the one baptized in the great facts of the gospel,—the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ our Lord. 1 Cor. 15:1-4; Col. 2:14. The very mode and symbolism of immersion indicates the faith of the believer. Sprinkling or pouring shows faith in nothing. When the true significance of baptism was lost, the form, or mode, was changed. And the Greek word for immerse (baptize) is now applied to the perversions of the gospel ordinance. In these perversions of the ordinance of baptism, the resurrection has been entirely lost sight of, on the part of many who think it ought to be remembered. They find in their creed that the resurrection is unmarked by any ordinance, and they find an institution, Sunday, for which no scriptural reason can be given; so they, without warrant of revelation, make the Sunday a memorial of the resurrection and of redemption. But God has not left the resurrection without a memorial; he has given the ordinance of baptism. God has not left the crucifixion, in which the great purchase price was paid for our redemption, without a memorial; he has given the Lord's Supper to be celebrated till he come. The resurrection of Christ is also an ever present fact, pregnant with power, in the life of the regenerate. He arises from baptism to walk in newness of life, to overcome sin, not by his own power, but the power of a risen Redeemer. "That I may know Him," says Paul, "and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death." Phil. 3:12. Every day of Christian life is a manifestation of the power of the resurrection of Christ. Further argument might be made and further evidence given to show the baseless character of this Sunday support, but the above is sufficient. If this evidence has taken from our readers the Sunday as a memorial of the resurrection or of redemption, it has taken only the false. It has given that which is better, the true gospel ordinances of the Lord Jesus Christ, baptism and the Lord's Supper. Further than that, it shows the necessity of restoring the Sabbath of the Lord, God's memorial to all generations. Sunday is only a usurper. It cannot be made to memorialize or honor any great event without detracting from the sacredness of divinely appointed institutions. God has made his wonderful works, his wonderful love, his wonderful power to be remembered. He has in his own wisdom appointed just such memorials as are demanded, and he has clearly revealed just what those are. And Sunday is not one of those institutions. It has no scriptural foundation, and even the very law with which its friends endeavor to guard its pseudo-sacredness is borrowed from the true institution of God,—the seventh-day Sabbath,—which has been dethroned to make place for the "wild solar holiday of all pagan times." Why are not men willing that God should appoint his own institutions? Worse than all else, the worst wounds, as of old, are made in the house of his friends. Yet the word of God endureth forever, and that declares that "the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God." “HE CANNOT DENY HIMSELF.”
By C. P. B.
A CORRESPONDENT asks, “Is it not impossible for God to do a wrong act?” We answer, Yes, quite impossible, for the reason that God “cannot deny himself.” 2 Tim. 2:13. But because God cannot deny himself it does not follow, as our correspondent seems to imply in his letter, that He who created matter, i. e., caused it to spring forth, or come from nothing, could not, if he so willed, also utterly destroy, or annihilate, that which he called into being. We do not, however, think that God will annihilate any matter. There is certainly nothing in the Scriptures to warrant the claim that matter will cease to exist. “The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.” 2 Peter 3:10. But the apostle says (verse 13) that “we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.” This “new” earth will, we understand, contain the same matter of which the present earth is composed. Burning changes the form of matter, but does not destroy it; and so in Mal. 4:3 we read of the wicked, not that matter of which they are composed shall be annihilated, but that it shall be ashes. The wicked are to be burned up, decomposed, and reduced to their original elements, but not annihilated in the sense of bringing matter to nothing. C. P. B. IS ROME LOYAL TO AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS?
By M. C. W.
The Catholic Review of March 23 makes the following declaration:— “When any man, or any body of men, we care not who or what they are, seriously and deliberately assert or intimate that the Catholics of this country are not loyal to its institutions, they not merely make themselves ridiculous—they violate the dictates of justice and charity, and are not worthy of being listened to by candid, fair-minded men.” It is a strong, positive statement, and we wish we could believe it to be true. While there is no conflict between the Catholic Church and the Government, or the institutions of the State, of course that church will support the Government. But if the free institutions of this Government come in conflict with the institutions of the Catholic Church, it is the church first and always. Concerning its position on education the same article says:— “The rule requiring religious education for Catholic children is simply a law of the Catholic Church. It is not an arbitrary rule imposed by the Pope upon the American Church whether they like it or not. It is a law passed by the Plenary Council of Baltimore, approved by the Holy Father, and sanctioned by the whole Catholic Church. And the principle itself of religious education is sanctioned by a very respectable portion of our Protestant fellow-citizens. There is nothing political about it.” Religious education is right, and the Catholic Church has the right to educate its youth religiously, but this belongs, as the Government rightly recognizes, to the home and the church. The State, in its public schools, designs to fit men to become intelligent citizens. A tax is levied for that purpose upon all. All can avail themselves of its benefits. The school only teaches those things which are of benefit to all. It aims to inculcate no religion; in fact, it has no right to teach religion. If it were right to divide the public money with Catholics, then Methodists, Baptists, Quakers, Mormons, infidels, and pagans could as justly claim their share of the public funds, and the State would be responsible for all the religious teaching. But the public schools teach no religion whatever, so that none can be offended, while they do teach those things beneficial to all. But against this just institution of the public school, Rome has issued her fulminations. She has brought it into politics again and again. She certainly is not loyal to one, at least, of the very foundations of a free Government,—free education to poor and rich alike in all things necessary to fit them for the common walks of life. Their opposition may be “simply a law of the Catholic Church,” but it is directed with all the power of that church, through indulgence, precept, and anathema, against the institution of free non-sectarian education. “Loyal” means fidelity to law. If the Pope were in America, would not the Catholic Church take the same position which she now takes concerning the church in Italy? If the question were between our entire code of free laws and free institutions, on the one hand, and the temporal power of the Pope, on the other, would the Church of Rome then be loyal to the Government? We are not discussing questions which lie between man and God, but between temporal rulers only. The Catholic Church stands alone here. No other church pays homage (at least,264 professedly) to a temporal ruler but the Roman Catholic Church, and the ruler in the Vatican is to that church the ruler over all others. But this the Catholic Review would say was “simply a law of the Catholic Church;” “there is nothing political about it.” In this way every persecution of the past of which that church is guilty could be justified. The Church of Rome is inimical to every free Government. Her idea of loyalty is to use the civil power to further her own designs. To the vacillating Government which will swing to Rome's wishes, she is loyal; but woe be to that Government which despises her wishes, if she can only bring it beneath her heel. THE MORAL TENDENCY OF THE WORLD.
By C. P. B.
THE Sabbath Recorder of April 4 blows hot and cold upon the question of the present moral condition and tendency of the world. Editorially it says: "It is not an unusual thing to hear men speak of the church as losing ground. 'People do not profess religion and join the church now as they used to do, while the number of infidels, free thinkers, etc., is greatly on the increase;' so these pessimists are constantly informing us." And then, after asking, "What are the facts?" concludes that "while a mere show of numbers does not always imply a sound spiritual life, a steady, general outward growth can hardly be possible without such spiritual life." On the other side of the question it publishes with approval in another department, under the heading, "What of the Future?" the following from a writer in the Examiner:— "In a little book which came to my notice recently, called, 'Dying at the Top,' written by Rev. Joseph W. Clokey, D. D., of Indiana, it is affirmed that of the 7,000,000 young men estimated to be in the United States, only 15 per cent. attend Protestant Christian services of any kind, leaving 85 per cent. who never enter the church doors. Only 5 per cent. are members of our churches—including consistent and inconsistent members—and probably only 2½ per cent. are active and godly. "These figures are astounding, and strike with the effect of almost stunning us. Our young men are doing one-half of our voting; they are doing a very large proportion of the reporting for our daily papers, and thus are practically making public opinion. The young men of to-day are also to be the fathers of to-morrow, and at the head of the homes, the business, and all the forces of society of twenty-five years from to-day. Add to this the estimate that there are more convicts among the young men to-day than there are church members, and—shall I speak it?—Ingersollism vies with the church in numbering its followers among the young men, and it surely seems time for us to be cast upon our knees in prayer, and to rise from our knees only to hasten into the most active campaign ever instituted for the rescuing of our young men—the character makers for the next twenty-five years." The Examiner writer may be a pessimist, but he gives facts and figures, and it does seem that it would be as well not to close our eyes to the existing state of affairs. The fact is that there is comparatively little vital piety in the world to-day. A profession of religion is popular, however, and as the idea has obtained to no small extent that in some way or other church-membership is a passport to Heaven, very many people prefer to have some church connection, but they are not careful to have a living connection with Christ. The Scriptures teach that in the last days many will have a form of godliness without the power, and certainly the facts are in harmony with the teaching of the Scriptures.