Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1919-05-02
By William T. Ellis

Like escaping from the noise ana
stencil and contentious of an orl-
entail city, to a hillside whence may
be seen, in all their vast and eternal
grandeur, the snow-crowned peaks
of storied mountains, so is the turn
ing from the babble and strife or the
days news to a contemplation VI
the sublime story of mans creatloi
and of his primary purpose IN eA-
istence. There is a widespread tonic
effect bound to follow the study inns
week of the story of human peSlh-
nings by the millions of SUNDAY
school members of the world. w me
we are talking about making over
the universal social order, let US
consider the one essential iactol'
which is man. Nobody VIII De tne
worse and everybody Will be the
better. for little hard thinking on
this subject. We see life and we see
it whole from the standpoint of the
Garden of Eden.
When machinery gets seriously
out of repair, it sometimes has 10 De
sent to the maker to be MADE risht'
Suppose we look upon our JahShhs,
creaking humping, mal-adJusteu
state of society as a bit of machlh-
cry that needs repairing by tne
Maker. Society is merely people III
the mass. 1t is the multiple of one
man. Most of it's defects are IN lts
individual parts. The whole me-
chanism will work we'll only after
the personalities which comprise II
have been made right. our day
supreme issue is one. whether IL oe
the League of Nations or the latest
neighborhood strike, and that issue
is personal to people. When an
mems good becomes each man
rule" then we shall have the per-
feet day toward which the World mas
been so bloodily, blindly, groplhs'
Getting Down to Bedrock
Small boys pass through period
wherein they believe that a morse
hair, if left long enough in oottle
of water, will turn into snake. Hs
we grow older. we are almost equal
ly Credulous concerning the capacity
of human beings to grow into Nnat
they were not The deluslon that
society will evolve itself into new
order dies hard. 1t matters not tnat
the scientist who has followed the
race back, through excavations anu
archaeological records, declares thaI
for period of known history
man was as man is. He mas not
essentially altered in more than
five thousand years. Still host OF
intelligent folk believe that human
ity, like Topsy. Just growed,' ana
that it will continue to grow uhIll
it reaches perfection.
We are not accidents. Man came
not by chance, a mere prank OF cos
mic forces. He was created. Goa
made him. Before he was thlhS
of fleslS, he was a thought OF God'
The inscrutable councils of eternity
sat in deliberation upon his advent:
Here we have the greatest truth oil
all concerning ourselves and our
times-God had hand in our max
ing. And that hand has never oeen
removed from man. If we kno"
ANYTHING at all about a Supreme Be
ing, it is that his chief interest IN
this earth is in mankind.
SO the Garden of Eden viewpoint
is that before there was man there
was a God; and that man is because
God was: and that the Maker OF
man has proprietary rights in him;
and that the Almighty who began
the race of man still stands by to see
it through. We anchor Il sustaining
faith for troubled times in the very
character of Omnipotence.
RcshapinS the Scheme of Things
Old religions. such as Paul dis
cussed on Mars Hill, did not get