The midland journal., 1894-07-27
QUESTIONS OF THE DAY.
Crucial Moments fin National Life.


crusts a civilization, a gross and
deadly materialiSm crushes faith
and hope, turns the index finger
downward, and sneers at the ideals
of duty, justice and love by whose
leverage the world is raised when
human sympathy becomes par
alyzed in consequence of self -absorp-
ton when capital becomes more
precious than human rights when
life is less sacred than property
when the letter is enlarged aud the
sprint disregarded when theology
magnities the importance of form,
rite and ritual while industry begs
in vain for employment; when
widows starve and orphans grow
up amid an environment of moral
death when divine love is at a
discount, and the faith so loudly
proclaimed by the lips finds no
responsive echo in the deep recesses
of the soul-then we have the mel
ancholy spectacle of a nation which
has reached a point beyond which
it cannot go without forever losing
the soul which made progress pos
sible, and which alone held the ele-
ment of perpetual regeneration
Then the voice of the divine speaks
through prophets, poets and seers,
crying "Choose.n On the one side
are duty, justice, love and stern
morality; on the other the selfish
ness of pure animalism expressed
in luxury, voluptuOusness and
venality. The moment is supreme.
The corOnal region struggles with
the basilar for final supremacy, and
the issue is life or death not nee
essarily sudden going out if the
lower triumphs, for sometimes, as
in the civilization of Rome, slow
and terrible agony Of decay pre-
cedes the final downfall.
We are today facing one of these
great crises. Professor George D.
Heron voices the common convic-
ton of earnest students of social
conditions when he says:
We are in the beginnings of revolution that
will strain all existing religions and political
institutions, and test the wisdom and heroism OF
the earth's purest and bravest souls. 1t will not
do to say the revolution is not coming, or pro-
nounce it OF the devil. Revolutions, even in their
widest FORMS are the impulses of God moving in
tides of fire through the life of man.
The slogan cry of "All for alp is
far more noble than the creed "All
for self'' which has held sway in
the past. The dogma of divine
right of property has too long OBJ
obscured the rights of man. Plum
dering by law may be safe, but it is
not moral, and throwing few mil
lions of acquired gold into the lap
of philanthropy, conventional edu-
cation or a church more awake on
the material than the spiritual side
of her being, may be polite, but
such acts do not take away the woe
pronounced by Jesus upon the
Pharisees who paid tithes and posed
as philanthropists while they
"devoured widows houses" and
ignored the "weightier matters of
the law" such as Judgment and
mercy"
The hour for dreaming is past.
Not "A moment is to be lost if the
republic is to be redeemed. From
this time forward plain speaking
will be i'll order. The time for the
soul to assert its supremacy has
arrived; blessed is the man OF
woman who makes the great renun-
citation, and consecrates lir e to the
cause of the people and for the
restoration of the republic from the
rule of the Assyrians.
| Hast thou chosen, o my people
On whose party thou shalt stand,
Ere the doom from its worn sandals
Shakes the dust against our land?
| Though the cause of evil prosper,
| Yet tits truth alone is strong,
And, albeit she wander outcast
Now, see around her thrOng
Troops of beautiful tall angels,
To enshield her from ali wrong"
"Hes true TO God who's true to man;
Wherever wrong is DONE
To the humblest and the weakest,
Meath the all-beholding sun,
That wrong is also done to u.s.
And they are slaves most base,
Whose love of right is for themselves,
And not for all their race.
''Tis ours to save our brethren,
With peace and love to win
Their darkened hearts from error,
Ere they harden it to sim
But if before his duty
Man with listless spirit stands,
Erelong the Great Avenger
Tak9s the work from out his hands"