The Birmingham age-herald., 1904-10-23

once becomes void and imperative. Thus back of all legislation stands the constitution as the supreme test by which the acts of president and lawmakers are judged It defines the rights of rulers end legislators and sets limits to their power and is the safeguard of national liberty.
 In the kingdom of God we have also a supreme authority. The councils of the churches may formulate doctrines, make decrees and construct creeds and catech- isms, but high over all there is the will of the great King of kings. Christ is the supreme ruler of his kingdom and his word is the test by which every dogma and practice must be judged. Let us con- slider some of the characteristics of this government.
 An Absolute Monarch.
 First, it $ an absolute monarchy. We have governments on earth that we de- scribe as absolute monarchies, meaning that they have no constitution. We speak about the Russian government as an absolute monarchy. but 1t is not. There are thousands of things which the Rus sian czar would like to do which he. can not do With his pistol or sword Nicholas might slay his own children as Ivan. the Terrible in maniacal rage killed his first
 born son, and no power on earth could bring him 10 justice. But there are limits to the present czars power. His own sub- jects recognize the fact. The old Russian proverbs are the following: Even the ozar's crown cannot protect him from headache" "The OK of the czar can have only two herns." Even the ear S vinegar will not sweeten." Put the czar in the desert and he is man and noth- ing more" 'The czar's edicts are good for nothing unless Gods Amen is writ ten on them" By these quaint aphorisms current in Russia, do the people show that they realize that, powerful as the Russian autocrat is. he is subject to hu- man limitations, like the most obscure peasant in his empire. It is well known, too, by statesmen that even as a ruler he is not so supreme as is thought. The robles who surround him exercise a con- straint upor him, and his agents often thwart his will
 In an infinitely higher sense is Christ the absolute ruler in his kingdom. In his wisdom and power he governs without check, and his word is the law and life of his people. He is in truth more than president more than a doge of Venice. more than a king, more than czar. He is an absolute monarch in the Christian world.
 A significant illustration of Christ's originality and his freedom from current principles and prejudices is given in the gospels. and it may help us to under stand his attitude if we study the story. One day while Jesus was teaching in the temple surrounded by the people the scribes and Pharisees tried to entrap him. Right into the temple where Jesus was they dragged a trembling frightened, sobbing woman who had been taken in adultery. Right through the crowds of listeners they pushed her, Then they cried out in stentorian tones so that all could hear: Master, what shall we do with her? Shall we stone her to death. as Moses commanded, or shall we let her go free?" Instead of Christ condemning or acqutting the poor creature, as they all supposed he must do, Christ by his actions as well as by the word of lip condemned the men who were her ac- cusers What was the meaning of that judgment? We cannot for moment sup pose that a being so pure as Christ thought lightly of so henous sin. It must have been loathsome and abhor- rent to him, but we may learn lesson from the way in which he treated the sinner and her accusers, lesson all the more weiehty because 1t comes from him who is the embodied law of the kingdom of God.
 The divine law, in the first place, makes no discrimination between the masculine and the feminine sins. It does not come to man and smilingly say, Husband, you have a right to be libertine, while your wife must tread the narrow path Of virtue" It does not say, Brother, hefe in the saloon of responsibility you can get a drunk, but if your sister is found in that saloon she will be disgraced for life" It does not say that man can tell vile stories and frequent the low race tracks and be the companion of pugillsuo thugs and absolute characters and stlll be respected. while a woman, having done wrong. can never be allowed 10 eh- ter again into the association of the good and the true and the respectable. But the divine law does say this: 70 men. if the sin that this woman has committed is to be punished by stoning. every one of you who has committed the same sin deserves to be stoned also. blaspnemy from a mans lips in the sight of God IS lust as vile and culpable as blasphemy from a woman's lips. The sins or Enan- ias and Ahab are as evil as the shs or sa pphira and Jezebel. And yet from time Immemorial the world has always had two criminal courts in which 1t has tudged it's moral delnquents. The one Is the 'court of mercy" for masculine offenders: the other is the court of no hope" in which lynx eyed Judge hard- heart sits upon the bench, charging the fury of mo regrets dIu SeHtehcihS WI man defendant after woman defendant to a life imprisonment in the ''peniten- tiary of despair"
 The rule is one condemnation for mas culine sins and another for feminine. We all know that the pharisaical ideas of old are common at the present time. h. deed, I go even further than this. sometimes think that. as far as the world is concerned. many people are prone to admire men if they are not too good if they have an immoral ue- smirchment of their record They are not glad when they say, "He is square true man." but they are happy when they can say, 'IIe Is wild fellow, but mighty nice" It is on account of this tendency of the human race to judge mans sins differently from womans sins that we often find men in public places boastfng of their evil deeds as though they were the signs of true manhood and nobility. A few weeks ago I was riding in a California railroad train opposite two men. One was a famous eastern con- tractor. What was my amazement to find that his conversation was divided into almost equal parts. The one was to tell his companion the hard work he was doing by the day, and the other was to fell how many tfrnes he got drunk by