Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1917-03-17
VITALIZING THE VIRTUES
The International Sunday School Lesson For March
18 Is, Jesus Saves From Sin" John 8:12, 31-37
56-58. A Temperance Lesson
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BY William T. Ellis.

Enlightened selfshness may do
much for the race. China, as a
product of Confucianism, is proof of
this. But it will not do enough; as
China also has demonstrated. Now
that it has become the fashion to put
the temperance reform upon an eco
nomic basis, let us be clear-thinking
enough to admit that this is not a
sufficient foundation for so great a
cause. This present Sunday School
Lesson opportunely links the quar-
terly temperance lesson with certain
tremendous teachings of Jesus.
How to vitalize the virtues, so that
they will be warm, living, positive
things, attractive to all mankind, is
one of the problems of religion. A
cold morality repels. Even the aru-
fetal glow and cheer of alcohol mas
been more winsome in the eyes OF
the thoughtless than the stern, gray
repressive and apparently joyless lie
of some abstainers. This question is
not an academic one. 1t is or nrst
Importance in many communities
which have cast out the saloon anu
have not yet found SUBSTITUTE
Negations get the world nowhere.
No people are to be saved spirit
ually, socially, economically, by the
things they do without. The devils
like nothing better than an empty
room. s,.
tians-the majestic, Incompatible ut
terances-of Jesus, in this passage
which has been assigned to us, TO
discover what their bearing is upon
temperance. First OF them is the
sweeping declaration of the Messiah,
II am the Light of the world Is II
in following that Light that society
has come to the decision that the
traffic in strong drink should be eX-
terminated? The liquor habit be-
longs to the darkness of the world.
1T comes from ignorance and an IN
adequate appreciation of values. No
thoroughly wise man. would tolerate
the traffic in alcohol, if he could stop
it, We are abolishing it because we
have advanced farther into the light
of spiritual values
The Worlds EnliShtener
AS it has followed the Light, what
strides society has made! Moral re-
form has ever followed in Vie train
of Him whose sway brings perfect
light and perfect justice to pass.
Jesus never said a word about slav
erv. yet slavery has gone from all the
civilized world, and at His behest.
Jesus never mentioned the drink
habit, yet the growing wave of pro-
hibtion around the world is essen
TALLY a Christian movement. He
knew nothing about tenements:
nevertheless, the irresistible impulse
for better housing of the poor, which
is being written upon the statute
books of civilization. is wholly in the
spirit of Christian love. All our mod
ern moral reforms. against the social
evil. against the drug habit, against
rN1 m of a
NAL of the right of the child to
playtime and a schooltime, are di-
rect consequences of the Light that
Jesus has shed upon the hearts of
mankind. The new light that, is
streaming into our prisons. the illu-
mination of the problems of the in
digent and the defective, is but the
reflection of the increasing radiance
of the Light of the World.
Big words are sometimes used in
small fashion. Later we grow up to
them. Thus, we have freely talked
about 'the world" with no such con-
ception of what the term involves as
is now ours since we have matriculated
in the great school of the war. AS
we have all of us learned geography
and other lessons in the war dis
patches. and have grown into. some
measure of appreciation of the vast
ness of this great human family of
which we are members, some of us
have been taking thought of the
hitherto unnoticed fact that Jesus had
so much to say about 'the world"
He thought in world terms. Nothing
that He said or did was in the Ian
guage of provincialism. Not under
stood at the time. or for many CEN
turies afterward. it is clear that Jesus !
used the word world" with the
prescience of omniscience.
Nothing good exists anywhere that |
is not ultimately to come to pass
everywhere. Because temperance prin-
ciples were enacted into radical laws
in the United States, Russia prohibited
vodka. and every other one of the
warning nations took somewhat SINH |
lar measures. We have come to the
day of worldism. The Light of the |
WorlS has arisen for the entire race. |
Missions and reform are now seen to |
be one. There is no darkness of anv
sort so dense or remote that it will |
not be driven out by that Light which !
lighteth every man that cometh into |
the world. To-day a temperance les |
son is also lesson in cosmopolitanism |
The Slaves and the Free
Afriend of mine in Japan. veteran |
missionary, was one day conducting a
service in the back country when a
man took him aside mysteriously and |
whispered, Honorable Foreigner, do |