Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1918-02-09
BOLSHEVIKI CANNOT
"SOCIALIZE" GOD

vIyE OBSERVED not long ago among the
~ casual drawings in a humorous period
teal INSTALLATION Of "The Big Man in the
City" He sat at his desk surrounded by
tickers, telephones messenger boys, clerks,
minor executives, and the open safe re-
vealcd stack after stack of gold. The
caption Of the drawing opposite was, "The
Big Man in the Country" He stood in
awful solitude, mere spot in wilder
ness of colossal mountains, with yearning
precipices between. Man is an atom at
the side of the Grand Canyon.
The Russian peasant is God-fearing.
His close communion with nature makes
him so. He knows nothing of the higher
criticism and he cares nothing for dogmas,
but in his soul he dreams Of immortality
and he shapes his life according to the
teaching of the church, as he has learned
knee. His religion, pressed indelibly on
his heart, is to him the sum and substance
Of all things. Holy Russia! II has been
Holy Russia for generations, and Of all the
pillars supporting the throne of the Ro-
manoffs none wthstood so well the ravages
Of time and held so long its strength as
the church. Tho Little Father was God
given. When he tumbled and fell down,
It was the equivalent of religious earth
quake.
But the Bolsheviki cannot decree :he
abolition Of the Almighty within the cots.
fines of their disintegrated nation. The
Bolshevki cannot substitute political
program for religious discipline. They
cannot excise from mems hearts devotion
to the affairs of God. They cannot dis
charge Goods servants with two weeks
pay and find Endorsement OF their action.
{ OF what abuses the church may have
/. been guilty we do not know. The increase
of cynicalism in Petrograd, the hypocrisy
Of higher classes fiaunted in the faces of
the populace, the degradation of religion
by such infamous characters as the false
revolution, but the Bolsheviki might as
we'll outlaw the stars and issue edicts
against the sun as to attempt to vulgarze
the formulas of religion and make Russia
nation of agnostics. Yet separation of
church and state in Russia az this time
will be everywhere viewed as an attempt
10, hroa ha nf ba churpb
1t brings against the Bolshevkl the in
calculable power Of accommodation.
which has already been declared. 1t gives
moral rallying cry to the conservative
y element of character certain to develop
: strong support. 1t is not the first time a
Evolutionary movement has muddled into
reiigious confines and collapsed
There is now, Of course, no organized
K Russia and she Is thoroughly done, so far
a. the war is concerned, but she is going
Z to give another demonstration, we believe,
Of the fact that a Government can no
more get along without religion than it
can without revenues. The discipline of
t law 10 5uPpiSuiSHtoiS " thc uiScipilHc VI
religion and character. Not by laws is
the social order preserved, but by the
& conscience Of the people and their divine
knowledge of right and wrong. To disrupt
sJthe religious establishment of Russia is
to feed chaos and coax it into further
extremes.
Doctor Odell has charged in the Atlantic
Monthly that the churches have fallen
3 down. If they have. the nation has fallen
down and there is no hope in Flanders
Ihere are, we think. spires by lonely roads
under whose shadows meet on Sundays
& 6Q1amn men who worship God as their
5<forsfathers worshped Him, who pray fol
Victory and carry their prayers with them
behtnd the plow, who give their sons
r1adly to battle and whose stern purpose
81 ~ the evidence and pledge Of our nationa
g power. They have something Of the smpl,
fsith that dominates the Russian peasant.
y Take God out Of civilization and nothing
|Tza lsft but the buzz Of wheels. the changing
VIZ machinery the rumble of the mob ant
ooyeh sinking into the desert. TAX
- 3 81 - out Of civilization and we have left
nssiantsm. The war is. In fact. a re
ous war. waged by religious men for tn,
Skenapce OF religion and the re-estab
ent OF justice.