The Penn's Grove record., 1915-02-05
DAY COMES
Never Any Doubt of the Estab
Iishment of Gods Kingdom
on Earth.

1T shall come to pass."-Isaiah 2:2.
Such was the assurance with which
the prophets always spoke when they
told Of the coming of the time when
"the work of righteousness shall be
peace, and the effect Of righteousness
quietness and confidence f~oreverl"
Never was there any doubt in their
minds as to the advent of the new
and better day. Never did their
tongues falter when they prophesied
the establishment of Gods kingdom
among men. Israel might be the
weakest among the nations. but still
did the prophets dare to tell Of the
time when the Lords house" should
be established on the mountain, and
all peoples flow into it." Poverty and
suffering might be weighing upon the
people like letters upon a slave, but
still did they foresee the day when
every mar shall sit under his vine
and fig tree and none shah make him
afraid" Wars and rumors Of wars
might be all about them, but still did
they declare that men shall beat their
swords into plowshares, and their
spears into pruning hooks" Behold,
they said, with the confidence of the
Waterman who sees in the night the
first glimmers of the dawn. behold,
"it shall come to pass!"
Progress Is Apparent.
And it has come to pass. Not il
their day, nor yet in our own-but
ever more and more, like the spread
ing glow of morning in the eastern
skies! For what is more evident in
history than the steady progress of
the human race?
Step by step since time began
We see the steady gain of man.
says Whittier, in lines which COM
bine the accuracy Of the historian
with the vision of the poet. Always
has man been climbing a bit higher
reaching slowly to levels which his
forbears did not see or, if they did
see, did not dare to scale. Each sue
ceeding generation has seen barbar-
ism yielding a little to civilization.
ignorance to culture, anarchy to law
and order. Each passing century has
registered its. record of broadened
knowledge. deepened sympathy, ex-
tended vision. Now and then, to be
sure, have come the ~so-called dark
ages" when it has seemed as though
the gathered radiance of an epoch's
splendor has been engulfed in chaos
and dark night" Today, for example,
the whole fabric of modern times
seems crashing to ruin. But, taken
all in all, the story is one of progress.
If anywhere there is evidence of the
real existence of a God whose law
is love and whose will is right, that
evidence is in history. Matthew Ar
mold was a historian more than an
ethical teacher when he affirmed his
faith in God as that Power not our
selves which makes for righteous
ness!"
Assurance Justified.
Just here, in this recognition Of the
presence of God upon earth, guiding
and guarding the affairs of men, do we
f1n1 the explanation of the assurance
of the prophets Of the olden days in
their forecasts of the future, and the
Justification of similar forecasts on
our part today Isaiah believed that
there is a God in Israel" and there
fore did he dare to say Of even his
fondest hope 1T shall come to pass"
So also must we, if we read the his
tory of mankind and search the secret
places of our own souls Alright, believe
that there is a God and therefore dare
to say that every highest dream which
now we cherish for the race will some
time be fulfilled. The day seems dark
about us. Never lid a blacker storm
engulf the faiths of men. But why
despair? God lives, And as surely
as God lives, these things of which we
dream shall come to pass! Lowell put
it wildly in his lines:
Truth forever on the scaffold. wrong for
ever on the throne.
But that scaffold sways the future, and
behind the dim unknown
Standeth God within the shadow keeping
watch above his own.
John Haines Holmes.