The record-union. [volume] (Sacramento, Calif.) 1891-1903, 1899-07-03

took sides with those who were op-
pressed and enslaved by an ubiquitous
Industrial system.
There are Pharoahs to-day as heart
lessly cruelsand as viciously oppressive
as was old Ramases of the Nile. The
great trusts and plutocratic combine
lions of our day are the shame. and II
not checked will be the ruin OF our
modern civilization The Greek tyrant
with an army of mercenaries, was q
tender and beneficent angel. compared
with some Of these modern monopolisss
who, like one Of the characters in
David Harum, wasn't satisfied to get
the best piece and the biggest piece,
he hated to have any one else get any
thing at all. The hymn most popular
with these earth-gobbling plutocrats is
the little child hymn entitled, LET Us
Gather Up the Sunbeams." They have
somewhat revised it so that it reads as
follows:
Let us corner up the sunbeams, lying all
around our path;
Get q trust on wheat and roses; give the
poor the thOrnS and chaff;
Let US find our chiefest pleasures hoard
So the poor shall have scant measure and
two prices have to pay.
Yes, we'll reservoir the rivers, and we'll
levy on the lakes,
And we'll lay a trifling toll tax on each
poor man who partakes.
Wen brand his number on him that he'll
carry through his life;
Well apprentice all his children, get a
mortgage on his wife.
We will syndicate the starlight and mo-
nopolize the moon,
Claim royalty on rest-days. a propric-
tary noon;
S MportHi; wen charge just what its
Wen drive our stakes around the lakes
IN fact We'll own the earth.
There is no literature in the world
that inveighs so vehemently against
the oppression of the poor by the rich.
of the weak by the strong, as the liter
azure of the Hebrew prophets. They
were preachers of Righteousness and
We're always on the side of the people.
II Amos or Micah stood IN modern
pulpit we would hear 1Hkne preaching
that would make monopolists tremble
with fear and rage. The New Tesla
ment writer's are equally outspoken
against oppression and wrong. Robert
OF Sicily may well complain of the
dangerous phrases Of TIE Magnificent,
He hath put down the mighty from
their seat, and the rich hath He sent
away empty" Jesus lifted his voice
against those whose greed devoured
widows houses and left Lazarus to
starve with dogs at the gate. The men
who preached in apostolic days had a
message of denunciation against those
who wronged the poor. Listen to this
burning invective, Go to zow, We rich
men, weep and howl for the miseries
that shall come upon you. Your riches
are corrupted and your garments moth
eaten, your gold and silver is cankered
and the rust of them shall be a wit
ness against you. Behold the hire of
the laborers who have reaped down
your fields, which is of you kept back
by fraud, crieth; and the cries of them
who have reaped have enteredinto the
ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. Ye have
lived in pleasure on the earth and been
wanton. Ye have condemned and killed
the just They are branded MUIR
derers because they withheld from the
poor the just recompense of their labor.
Is there no hire of laborers to-day kept
back? Do no cries from sweaters dens
and factories and mines reach the ear
of the one Father in heaven, who made
a favored few. but for all His children
alike.
We must never fail to remember that
the sacredness Of man is distinctively
a scriptural doctrine. It is a doctrine
of divine revelation. 1t was learned
originally from the Bible. No other re-
ligion or philosophy even taught it or
dared to teach it. The governments Of
Assyria, Babylon, Egypt, Greece, Rome
put no value on the common people.
They believed and acted on the belief
that the world was made for the few
and that. the many should toll and
sweat away their lives in the service
Of the few. In the midst of those ma
lions and as protest to their theories,
there grew up a people and nation
whose fundamental idea Of government
was the equality of every citizen in
privilege and opportunity. In the sys-
tenn of government that God gave that
people through His servant Moses,
there was no royal family to inherit
the highest places. The commonwealth
Of Israel was a theocracy and there
fore democracy. Before God, who is
the one supreme ruler. all men are
equal. Because every man stood in
the same relation to God. therefore
they stood in the same relation to one
another. Jesus carried that principle
out to it's ultimate when he said to
his disciples, call no man your mas
ter, for We are all children of one
father who is in heaven. That prin-
ciple undermined the throne of the
Caesars, and paved the way for modern
democracy. That was the little mus
tard seed that grew until it became the
Magma Charta Of England and the
Constitution Of the United States. Sc
ward was right when he said that the
government of this country would
never have had an existence but for
the Bible. And yet, folly of follies, we
have decided to keep the book that
created the republic out of the schools
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