The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1919-09-26

Our Saviour and King. Matt. Il:
1-9. Is, 16.
Wanted: A World Leader.
World-crises, like the present, usu-
ally produce world-leader, one DOM
| inant figure rising above his time. To-
day there is no such mortal on the
| horizon. Great men there are; but,
in the test, none has been great
| enough to stride forward in an old or
| new path so that bewildered and wan
dering humanity will follow him.
| Causes must have leaders. Great
movements seldom get far without one
strong figure to front them. Amid
| the confused voices OF our troubled
day; amid the pulling and hauling,
criss-cross and everyway; amid the
uncertainty as people halt between the
old and the new, the worlds greatest
| felt need is for a leader: one whose
steps do not stumble and whose voice
does not falter and whose eye sees
clearly the true goal. Men have tried
discipleship to this world figure and
that one, only to fall back baffled; the
| hero for the hour has not yet emerged
from the common level of statesmen.
thinkers and men of affairs.
Only the fool fails to perceive that
] humanity, puzzled and questing,
stands now at a crossroads of history
! Our time is like no other: decisions
made today are more momentous
| than the decisions of yesterday
strange impulses anu purposes, sumo
noble, some base, sway the newly
awakened common consciousness of
| the race. Mass movements are seen
4 all over the earth One of our newer
poets, Thomas Curtis Clark, puts it:
around the world truth speaks in new
The darkness flees and all the world re-
The peoples God has heard the peoples
plea;
When we come to examine the quail
tiles essential to such a leader we
find that no other possesses them than
the Hero and Savious about whom we
have been studying for the past three
months.
Marks of the Great Leader.
Check up the characteristics of
Christ, and at once they are revealed
as the essentials Of the World Leader
for the present hour. Let me indicate
a few, appealing ever to the readers
judgment for confirmation:
The new World-Leadcr must be one
whose judgment is not swayed by a
sense of expediency. The calamity
OF the Paris conference was that other
considerations than righteousness en-
tered in as decisive factors. Com
promise, concession, fear, pride. re-
venge, self-a ACKNOWLEDGMENT all went 10
make UP the conclusions which nave
left the world dissatisfied and re-
bellious Statesmen have arisen from
their seats at the Peace table and gone
home to face indignant nations, whose
moral convictions were higher than
those of their leaders. 1t now seems
as IL China and Korea and Egypt, TO
cite only three conspicuous instances,
will ultimately secure from the pub
lie opinion of mankind the justice de-
MED them at Paris. Perhaps states
manship will yet learn, in the bitter
school of experience, that what is not
morally right cannot be politically ex-
pedient. When leaders make truce
with their consciences they automat-
icalIy abdicate their real leadership.
though not necessarily their position.
What do we find when We apply
this test ,of integrity to Jesus? He
simply scored expediency. None of
the parties of His day could adopt
Him. because He was impossible;
He did not know how to compromise.
His clear-cut utterancesi sometimes
alienated his own followers; as they
did also the great and powerful of
His time. Trimming was simply out
of the question for Him. He never
stepped aside from His plain path for
selfs sake, even when He knew that
path led to a cross. All who trusted
Him wholly, found Him wholly true.
By the soldiers Test.
War taught MILLIONS of men that
the supreme quality in character is
courage. Among the soldiers no other
virtue counted at all, if this were lack
ing. We are applying the same test
now in political life. The world will
follow no timorous, half-hearted,
"safety-first'' leaders. Only one gifted
with a splendid spirit of self-abandon-
ment can command the hearts of men
today The single word, coward"
would brand into oblivion any man
who sought to lead his fellows.
No hero Of romance ever rode more
valiantly into the face of embattled
wrong than the Strong Son of God
AS a study in heroism, there is no
other character so fruitful as Jesus
Natures storms, mob perils, ecclesi-
astical jealousy. officialdom's deadly
enmity, all left him serene and I'M
afraid. BY battle-test. Jesus rings
true. Singsl the poet already quoted;
eve serve no weak and timid Christ,
We would not-heed a futile Lord;
Tho Man fe follow unto death
was not afraid of rod or sword.
'TIe asked no pillow for His head,
He sought no luxury of ease:
The tides that swept His daring soul
Were hauntless as the mighty seas
"a soldier Of the truth was He;
His anger flames at vested wrong;
He challenged kings to fateful war
And sounded clear HIS battlesong.
Politicians Who Profitccr.
That shrewdest of books, the New
Testament, makes it clear that the
i especial temptation of office-holding
Is covetousness. How unerringly the
public has laid its finger upon this
weak spot in the conduct of the new
Russian leaders. We have an Ameri-
can word, CRATER" for the politician
who profiteers. Lloyd George never
stood higher in Great Britain's esti-
nation than when he refused to take
any decoration or gift for himself as
/ a reward for his war work Great
| leaders can never become such If ami
mated by love of money.
| Recently. I met an Oriental official
whose name has figured frequently
in the cablegrams: and whose future
place is problematical. l quickly
| learned that he is manacled with