The Globe-republican., 1900-01-18

ty-seven books of the New Testament
1000 years ago. Twenty-seven books
of the New Testament now Marcion,
for wickedness, was turned out Of the
church in the second century, and In
his assault on the Bible and Christian
ity, he incidentally gives a catalogue
of the books of the. Bib1e-that cata-
1ogue corresponding exactly with ours
testimony given by the enemy OF the
Bible and the enemy of Christianity
The catalogue now just like the cata-
1ogue then Assaulted and spit on |
and torn to pieces and burned, yet adj |
herring The book today, in 300 Ian /
guages, confronting four-hfths of the |
human race in their own tongue Four |
hundred million copies of it in ex-
fstence- Does not that look as If this
book had been div1nely protected, as
God had guarded it all through the
centuries2
Nearly all the other old books are
mumif1ed and are lying in the tombs
of old libraries, and perhaps once in
twenty years some man comes along
and picks up one of them and blows
the dust of, and opens it and finds it
the book he does not want. But this
old book, much of it forty centuries
old, stands today more discussed than
any other book. and it challenges the
admiration of all the good and the
| spite and venom and the animosity
| and the hyper-criticism of Garth and
hell I appeal to your common sense,
| If book SO divineIy guarded and pro-
| tected in its present shape, must not be
| in just the way that God wants it to
| come to US, and if it pIeases God ought
| 1t not to please us?
/ Not only have all the attempts to de-
| tract from the book failed, but all the
| attempts to add to it. Many attempts
were made to add the apochryphaI
| books to the Old Testament. The
| council of Trent, the synod of Jeru-
| of a
cided that the apochrypha1 books must
be added to the Old Testament They
must stay in said those learned men;
but they stayed out. There is not an
intelligent Christian man today that
will put the Book of Maccabees or the
Book of Judith beside the Book of
Isaiah or Romans. Then great many
said: I'VE must have books added to
the New Testament and there were
epistles and gospels and apocalypses
written and added to the New Testa-
ment, but they have all fallen out.
You cannot add anything You can
not subtract anything to the divinely
protected book in the present shape.
Let no man dare to lay his hands it
with the intention of detracting from
the book or casting out any of these
holy pages.
am also opposed to this proposed
! expurgatIon of the scriptures for the
fact that in proportion people be-
r come self-sacrificing and good and
? holy and consecrated, they like the
, book as it is 1 have yet to find man
or woman distinguished for self-sac-
, rifce, for conservation to God for hoI1-
! ness of life, who wants the Blble
' changed Many of have inherited
family Bibles Those Bibles were II
i use twenty, forty, fifty, perhaps a hun
dred years in the generations. Today
take down these family Bibles, an(
find out if there are any chapter.
a which have been erased by lead pencil
or pen, and if in any margins you cal
a find the words: This chapter is no
. fit to read There has been plenty o
= opportunity during the last half cen
: fury privately to expurgate the Bible
a Do you know any case of such expur
o cation? Did not your grandfather Civ
. it to your father, and did not you
father give it to you?
= Beside that, 1 am opposed to the ex
- purgatiOn of the scriptures because tn
;, sO-called indeIicacies and cruelt1es @
the Bible have demonstrated no evi
= result. A cruel book will always Pre-
duce cruelty-an uncIean book wi
produce uncleanness. Fetch me a vic
=, tim. Out of all Christendom and OIL
of all the ages, fetch me a victi1
-, whose heart has been hardened
, cruelty, or whose life has been mad
-, impure by this book. Show me on
One of the best families 1 ever knew
or for thirty or forty years, morning an
q evening, had all the members gathers
- together, and the servants of tt
= household, and the strangers that hal
:, | pened to be within the gates-twice
20 | day, without leaving out chapter
:, a verse, they read this holy book, NOR
/ ing by morning, night by night N
-, ! only the elder children, but the lit
US chlio Mno eouio JUST Sp0iA nel w
re through the verse while her moth
Is helped her The father beginning al
I'd reading one verse, then all che mer
I'M bers of the family in turn reading
,is verse. The father maintained his i
he 1egrlty' the moCher maintained her
.er tegrlty, the sons grew up ana enter
on professions and commercial life, ador
" ing every sphere in the life in viii
" they lived. and the daughters went in
ed families where Christ was honored al
sst All that was good ana pure ana rlgf
NJ eous relgned perpetuaiIy- For thlT
zee years that family enduring the Scri
CHI lures Not one of them ruined
St them