The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-06-09
THE VOICE OF THE PULPIT
A SHORT, TIMELY DISCOURSE ON
PEACE, WAR AND RELIGION
By Rt. Rev. Fred'k ID. Huntington,
ID. d., IL. D., Episcopalian,
Syracuse, n. Y.

Nation shall not lift up sword against
nation. neither shall they learn war any
| more. Isaiah ii. 6.
From whence come wars and lighting
| of your lusts that war in your members?
! Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord,
| and He shall lift you up.'-St. John Nv,
| LILO.
| Two distinct lines of evidence, with cor
responding courses of instruction. tell us
what peace and war have to do with re-
ligion: what they have to do. that is. with
that state of society which is the most
prosperous and most perfect. which Christ
| came to bring about and set up. and which
He called 'the kingdom of heaven on the
| earth"
Is that highest and happiest social state
created by war in any part of the world?
AS citizens. as members of families. as
| neighbors, as Christians. is it mutual serv-
ice or mutual destruction between mer that
we ought 70 promote and glory in, with
| thanksgiving? One answer is found writ
ten in man himself. man as he is made
social man and his history. Another is in
the written record of God's purpose through
| the life of Christ and His teaching.
For the actual testimony as to what war
is we might very we'll look to the great
l
or poets or moralists, or political partisans.
| or orators. story tellers, or even to his
torians-but to generals and commanders
| of armies, men of calm and guarded
| speech, who have been SCARED and crippled,
and have fought with courage to the last.
and have won the highest titles. No wit
nesses to the horrors of warfare have been
palmer or more positive than these. Deco
4 ~,
will: go from the shouts and banners, the
triumphs and professions of the jubilee, to
the battlefield: lift the veil and look under
meath. There are miseries and cruelties,
agonies and desolation. These are warfare.
not as 1t is painted. but it is.
In whatever degree, however, man any
where passes out of sympathy with strife
and bloodshed. in his long progress from
| savagery to highest civilization, he passes
upward. however slowly. to occupations
and studies which advance human welfare,
to productive industry and service, By
| which man helps and blesses and comforts
his fellow-men He honors the peaceable
| labors which gather and preserve treasure,
| instead of wasting it with havoc
! Among the earliest men, without iron and
without traffic, the chief necessity of life
| was 10 get 1000, ana therefore CHROME
and universal quarrel was inevitable. The
struggle meant mutual slaughter. and the
hercest races of fighters would be those
| which would survive and perpetuate their
kind. The first exception to this ceaseless
| violence of war was in the family, where
| there were motives for peaceful co-opera-
ton. That was the germ of civilization.
Gradually 1t came to be found out that
society itself is only larger family. and
| it ceased to be true that one mans real
interest is opposed to another's, or that
| one mans success meant anothers starva-
| tion.>
| QUESTION OF TINE.
| 1t took several thousand years to bring us
where we are now. but in the evolution Of
| humanity thousand years are as one day.
| The final federation of nations GER
| tain to come about as civilization was in
| the days of Nimrod and Tamerlane. The
| late international conference at The Hague
was only the first of a series that will be-
| come as regular an organization the
| American Congress. People stupidity ask
what is accomplished. The answer is. that
| with dignity, elaboration, moral purpose
| and intellectual power 1t began a move
| ment that will not rest till it has swept the
| military method mode of settling in
| ternational questions of right and truth
from the lands and the seas, along with
| the duel the bull fight and the prize fight
| er's ring.
| 1t is only a question of time. because 1t
is the manifest will of the Maker, with
whom the steps of human advance are not
| measured by years. 1t means that the uni
| yersal struggle for existence rises finally
| into a struggle for character. for honor, for
| mercy, for love, for all that is loftiest and
sweetest in human life. More and more,
| in spite of appetite and passion, greed and
| ambition, it comes to be felt that human
| interests should be adjusted. human wrongs
| righted, human justice done, human pity
and mercy and order shown, not by the
! bloody hand, but by conscience, by educa-
| ton, by self-sacrifice, by love.
| So stands the one of the two witnesses
| with these three testimonies:
| /. Man, every man, is meant to be the
friend, the helper. the brother Of his fell
| bowman; every fellow-man, of whatever
| race. nation speech, faculties or faults: not
| the fellow-man's enemy, not his robber, not
| his destroyer.
2. What makes man the enemy, the rob-
ber the tyrant, the fighter and killer of
his -fellow-man is that part of him which is
| the lower, the meaner the selfish part, no
matter how you dress 1t or name it or mix
| it up with the better part. Whence come
| wars and fightings? Come they not of the
| lists that war in your memberS?"
| 3. Just far any nation of men
| CendS in the true honor, grows toward per-
| lection, advances in civilized power, great
| ness. grandeur or glory 1t practices and pro-
| claims peace. ii discards and denounces
war. A revival of the military spirit and
| habit i'm a people, especially in the youth
1 of dorm Ia frn
| height once gained from ideals once in
| vision, a decadence in national character
! We turn to the other witness and listen.
| Ii speaks in the same voice, only clearer
| and louder and more artcuate-from the
| same divine and supreme authority. 1t
| rings out over the earth from the eterndi
| heavens announcing His arrival who comes
| tc set up an everlasting kingdom among
| men. GLORY to God in the highest. on
! earth peace, good will to men" This L.
| the anthem of the worlds worship: il is d
| summons to the worlds action; il is a
| prophecy of what the world shall be.
THE VOICE FROM THE MOUNT.
The voice says from the Mount, Blessed
are the peacemakers, for they shall be
called the children of God"-not the war
makers 1t says: Follow peace with all
men" Let nothing be done through
strife or vainglory." The only bloodshed
| ir, tho reliofOn Of Christ lie bo hIood IF