The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1891-05-14
CARDINAL GIBBONS PLAN.

CARDINAL GIBBONS PLAN.
lack to CHRIST, His example and His
teaching is Cardinal GIBBONS explana-
ton OF the duty of all good men who would
do something to avert the impending crisis
between capital and labor "This,'' he
claims, ''is the looking backward available
and practicable to all There Is enough
and more than enough, within the pages of
the four gospels to disarm at oncs this
array of class against classn No one can
doubt the correctness OF the cardinals DO
sltion, or the soundness OF his conclusions.
Back to CHRIST, His example and bis
teaching would truly solve not only this
economic question of capital and labor.
wealth and poverty, but all the other ills
which afflict humanity. If only to do were
as easy as it is to know what it were good
to do, chapels had been churches, and poor
mems cottages palaces. 1t is easier to tell
twenty men what it were good to do, than
to be one of the twenty and fol-
low our own counsel. And so
is it easier to say what the remedy
is for our economic, social and political ills,
than to get the world to adopt the course
of treatment we prescribe. One may call
spirits from the vastly deep; tits easy
enough, but will they come when we do call
thems IT'S easy to say shack to CHRIST,
his example and his teaching but will the
world so back to CHRIST? There's the rub
The cardinal himself is not.unaware of the
difficulties that attend that movement.
Speaking of the sacred pages of the gos-
pels which TEEN with warnings to the rich
and inviegh against the spirit of wealth
and greed oftener than they do against
adultery and drunkenness, he says:
The bane OF our lives is that the voice lof the
Scr1pturesl Is no longer to many living voice.
in the rush and clamor of money-getting; the
sacred characters are OVERLAND and wellnigh
ooliterated by the daily gathering dust of
worldl1ness.
1t is this which stands in the way of the
adoption of the cardinals remedy-the
world will have none of it, men do not really
believe it. We have fallen upon a state of
affairs in respect to believing the scriptures
and faith in religion, which, according to
one OF our modern historians, resembles
the conditions prevailing in Rome about
the time the mighty CESAR appeared as the
foremost man of all the world" time
when religion, once the foundation of the
laws and the actions Of the people, has
fallen into matter of opinion merely; a
Tune when men speak conventionally of
Providence, but only that they may throw
the odium Of un5elief on their opponents: a
time when churches are being built with
increasing splendor; when religious forms
and ceremonies are being more scrupuI-
ously observed, when the world is full of
cant-cant religious, cant political, can't
moral; a time when thought flows
in unreal speech; time when
there IS great affectation of
a high principle which no longer affects the
conduct of men; time when Christianity
itself stands on tradition instead of faith,
when it is strong as a social institution
rather than religious discipline; a time
when, as the cardinal himself saws, the
bane OF our times is that the voice of CHRIST
is no longer. to many, living voice. Let
it be remembered, too, that this is con
fessed in the face of the fact that Chris
SO Colltu. las DdO Tie 1elQ Tor
nineteen centuries, but all that time men
seem to be receding from instead of ap-
preaching the goal proposed by it. THE
rich are daily becoming richer" saws the
cardinal, "the poor. poorer; luxury, high
living and the pride of life are on the in
crease. The thirst for wealth becomes
daily more insatiate; the cries of the dis
tressed more sharp and loud and poignant
What remains then! What is the out
look in relation to the crisis which the
good cardinal would avert by calling men
hack to CHRIST, his example and his
teaching" The outlook is that the crisis
viii not be averted; that on the contrary
it will come. When a wave rises on old
oceans crest and there is strong wind be-
hind it and mighty cliff bound shore be.
fore it, there can be but one result, the
wave does not subside and break in gentle
murmurs on the beach, but it is driven
straight on to the cliffs with force to be
determined alone by the velocity of the
wind, and is broken into clouds OF spray
and thrown Indignantly back into the
ocean; so will it be with regard to the crisis
that all men who watch the development of
events can plainly see is coming. "If we
may believe those who stand upon the
watch towers and scan the signs of the
times" says Cardinal GIBBONS, "a tempest
of war, to which all former wars were holi-
day tournaments, looms big upon the
horizon and threatens to whelm
the world in horrors. Wealth
and poverty, they say, stand more and
more apart and glare across the widening
channel more fiercely. While the wicked
are proud, the poor man is set on fire
Capital and labor, after severe skirmishes
with raging success, are arming for the su
'preme conflict. How imminent the strug
gle may be no man can affirm precisely, but
signs there are, which may well fill US
with disqueis." But after the crash, when
men will turn their attention to recon
struction of their affairs. if they shall bet
ter them, which we hope and believe they
will. it will be by following the lines laid