New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-02-15
WHO'S WHO IN CHRISTIANITY
DR.. Manning's Birthplace in 19l4'lS and
the Ten Commandments

To the Editor OF The Tribune.
! Sir: As you gave prominence to the Rev.
DIR. Charles Aubrey Eaton's sermon OF last
Sunday in the Madison Avenue Baptist
/ Church. it seems proper that this comment
should be sent to you.
! II is evident from what DR.. Eaton said that
he feels strongly that the United States has
moral obligation TO support the cause of the
Allies in war against Germany. In his ad-
dress he said:
"You can't arbitrate the Ten Command
ments. You keep them or you break them
| Dr. Eaton is a Christian minister, and the
Founder of his religion, whom he believes to
be divine, talked very little about the Deca-
llogue but when asked what the great COM
mandment was replied:
"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all
thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all
thy mind This is the great and first COM
mandment. And a second is like unto 1t,
Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On
these two commandments hangeth the whole
law and the prophets
Those TO whom the Christian religion is
silly or superstitious have no concern with
/ this, but cannot the words attributed TO Jesus
Christ be fairly quoted to a Christian minis
/ ter as a criterion for his acts and thoughts
touching upon public matters? And IS DR..
Eatons attitude in harmony with the Gospel
of Love? Is he not trying to srbitrate the
two commandments, to keep them and break
them at the same time?
Incidentally, DR.. Eaton was born and edu-
Gated in Canada, snd-not entirely irrele-
lvantly-that other clerical apostle of mill
tant Americsnism which pleases the Allies,
the Rev. DR.. William T. Manning, was born in
Ill 81, norit, I do not
accuse either of these gentlemen of deliber-
ate and conscious hypocrisy, but does not the
evidence suggest that their spirituality is
alleged with that purely human sympathy
which we call prejudice when we. do not agree
with il?
As a matter Of, perhaps, amusing interest.
it may be added that in the paragraphs de-
voted TO Dr. Manning in the volumes Of
Who's Who in America for 1901 and
i912-I3 there is this information: Born
1866. in England. But in the paragraphs
devoted to DR.. Manning in Who's Who for
I19l4-I5 and 1861 there is only this infor-
nation concerning his birth: Born, 1866.
The birthplace is not mentioned. | am in
formed that each person whose name appears
! in Who's Who contributes the paragraph
about himself. Why is DR.. Manning's Eng
| lish nativity mentioned in the volumes that
appeared before the beginning of the war and
his preaching of Americanism. and not men
toned in the volumes that appeared after
the beginning of these things? Can it be
that the rector Of Trinity Church, in talking
as he has talked while England" was pub
Ilicly recorded as his birthplace, had that
guilty feeling" of which your +. p. A. used
TO write?
/ OF course ! shall be accused OF pro-Ger-
manism, shall not ask space fully TO refute
that charge, but only TO say that | no more
indorse Germanys british acts than the
most blatant Anglophle, that | was born in
| the United States, and that, so far as know.
only English, Irish. Scotch and French blood
runs in my veins. My position is simply
this although not protesting the theological
faith held by DR.. Manning and DR.. Eaton,
do not believe that we can make this world
worth while unless We attempt practical ap-
plication Of the fundamental principles Of
Christ's kind of Christianity
JAMES o. SPEARING.
| New York, Feb 49, 1917.
Unfortunately for our correspondents
reputation as an international detective,
the Who's Who for 1914-'l5, in which DR..
Manning's birthplace was first deleted, was
issued in May, 1914, some two months be-
fore the war; Our correspondent might
very readily have discovered this fact from
| the volume itself.-ED.]