The Fulton County news. [volume] (McConnellsburg, Pa.) 1899-current, 1905-01-25
The Victories of the Meek

Blessed are the meek for they shall in.
herit the earth-Matt. ". 5.
When these words were spoken bv the
Son of Man-who had not where to lay
His head-Imperial Caesar had but to nod
to be obeyed by hundred millions OF peo
pie.
Behind Caesar were the proud legons
and all the boast Of heraldry and pomp
of power" that went along with them,
while behind the Son of Man there was
nothing but the simple truth which lie
hoped might, some time or other, make us
all "free."
Caesar and his legions and pandects and
palaces are a faded memory. a part of the
archaeology OF things. but the Galilean is
stronger to-day than He was when 2000
years ago He uttered that word about the
meek.
Steadily since that date the Man of love
and gentleness and truth has been grow.
ing, while the man OF power the man with
the legions back of him, has been dwind
ling.
The empire of arms, the dominion of
brute force, is slowly but surely retrograd
ing. while the kingdom of reason, of love
and OF quiet truth has been pushing to the
front.
When Jesus announced His truth about
meekness it sounded very strange. Ii was
time of storm and stress, of blood and
IRON, OF organized violence and robbery,
and in the midst Of such condition OF af.
fairs what show was there for such as were
meek" for such as were modest gentle,
unassumng?
But Jesus knew what He was about. He
was talking. not wildly, but nationally and
well. and the twenty centuries that have
elapsed since He threw His beatitude into
the world only seem TO show how well He
knew what He was saying.
Brute force and violence are but prelim.
mary. When the man comes in TO take
have reason and for violence love.
The history of the process we call civil.
cation is the history of the slow, but
steady advance OF the spiritual upon the
animal the elimination OF the animal, the
enthronement OF the spiritual.
Even when the most noise is being made,
when the armies are laundering and the
trumpets are changing it will be found that
it is the quiet genius of the few thinkers
behind it all that is doing the business.
| Power, when all is said is subiecton.
not objection; a thing of tbe brain and
heart and soul, rather than pf the mighty
enginery panoplied with its Insignia OF
material might.
This is the greatest and 2randest geneva.
! tion simply because it is the fullest of love,
of gentleness and OF Sweet reasonable
ness"
The old idea of the conquerer- "wading
through slaughter to throne" and found.
ing his dynasty on the wreck and ruins
of millions OF human lives-is fast making
way for another idea that of the one who
conquers by good will. by the force of
truth, by the silent omnipotence OF princI-
] pie.
I And so it has steadily gone on from the
beginning right down to the present, that
| the meek the kind, the rational the
| iust-have been getting more and more of
a footing on the earth, and larger share
in its true possessions.
The oldtime struggle for life" still goes
on, il is true, and in the struggle it is still
the tittest that survives. but the fittest of
to-day is a finer thing than was the fittest
of the long ago.
There has been a great moral advance,
and the cookies OF mems hearts to-day are
warmed by the great spiritual ideals
which Caesar never dreamt of and of
which the Alexanders and Dariuses never
once heard
The giants of the Prince that tare each
other in their shrine" are long since dead,
and the physical force that once lorded it
over the world is beginning to be subordi.
mated TO the force of mind and character
which wins its battles not by blows and
blood, but by the silent influence OF its
own superior excellence Thomas b. Greg
ory, in the New York American.