The theocrat. [volume] (Zion City [i.e. Zion], Ill.) 1914-1949, 1920-02-07

happened, and, creeping from their filthy
la1rs, began at once to menace public life
and property. Many Of the police beats
were unprotected. By midnight, the whole
police service had become temporarily dis
organized, if not actually demoralized
Under these circumstances, the hordes of
vicious and 'out-of-works' grew bolder
every hour. They had no fear of the spirit
ual character of the strange situation, for
God, to them, was name only to blaspheme
Shops and private houses, and some of
the larger business houses, had been openly
burglarized. A rumor spread abroad that
the banks were to be raided. The guard
around the Bank Of England was quad
rupled.
| A gentleman, curious to know how the
translation Of the night before had affected
soldiers in the barracks, passed around that
way and fell into conversation with a
private.
"All the blue lights as we call the Chris
tians, sir, are missing the private replied
| in answer to question. "You see, sir, if
| fellow processes to be Christian in the
army and isn't real, he soon gets the pro-
| fession knocked out of him. On the other
hand, if he is real, why, all the persecution
only drives his religion deeper into him.
Those who are gone were mostly the mid
| dle-aged and the old ones and those who
had been in India, Malta, and other foreign
stations. [ have known lot of officers who
| used to have Bible readings at their
bungalows. All, we know now that they
were right and we were wrong. All Lon
don today is full of FOOLS for if we had all
been doing and thinking as those fellows, we
would now be up in glory with them. I have
heard the truth at the Soldiers Homes and
such places, and many times I have sung
with the others:
Blessed are those whom the Lord finds
watching;
| In His glory they shall share:
| If He shall come at the dawn or midnight,
Will He find us watching there?
ooh, can we say are ready, brother?-
Ready for the souls bright home?
| Say, will He find you and me still watching,
Waiting, waiting when the Lord shall
| Gomez"
The gentleman moved on up Cheapside
His destination was St. Paul's Cathedral.
| The Cathedral was packed to the doors.
| The whole area of the interior showed one
black mass of silent, waiting, expectant peo-
| ple-it was curious to note that almost every
woman had donned black in some form or
! other
The great organ was silent No one
| thought Of singing. The choir seats were
| full of strangers. The stalls were filled with
an indiseriminate crowd There was no
rule, no discipline today
Suddenly the tall, square-built form of a
certain well-known Bishop rose near the
| pulpit. He had linked his arm in that of one
of London's most popular Noncomformist
preachers, and almost dragged him to his
| feet There was evidently a controversy
going on between the two as to which of
them should address the people, each urging
the other to lead off. The same thought was
in the minds of nearly all who were in view
of the namely, "How comes it that
Bishop and a popular preacher like the
Rev. - have been left behind?"
A strange new tenseness, deepening
silence, settled upon the mighty mass gath
cred under that great DOME Suddenly the
silence was broken by voice calling,
Bishop -." Another voice immedi-
ately cried, ''No! The Rev. "
A momentary clamor of voices ensued.
j The voices were not shrill in their eagerness,
but sullen, sombre, almost savage, in fact.
A moment, and the Bishop slowly entered
the pulpit He bowed his head in prayer.
Like the slow, rushing sound of the let
ting loose of some distant water, the noise
of thousands of bending forms filled the
place, for every one bowed the head.
A moment later the heads were raised.
The silence almost Of tomb filled the place
when the first momentary rustic of the up
Bishop broke the silence crying:
"We are face to face with the most
solemn1y awful situation the human race
has ever known, if we except the conditions
under which, during those three hours Of
blackness at Calvary the people Of Jeru-
salem were found while the Cruciied Christ
hung on the fatal tree.
1T NAV be said that our position bears
some likeness to that of the people who were
DESTROYED at the Flood. Those Antediluv-
ians had one hundred and twenty years
warning we, as protesting Christians, have
had nearly two thousand years warning, yet
London, England, and the whole world have
by last night events been proved practically
best fit our character.
"For some years now, conferences and
conventions, addresses, Bible-readings, etc,
where this subject Of the Second Coming OF
Christ has been specially taught, have been
multiplied nightly. have been present at
some of these gatherings, but to my present
sorrow and shame, what [ termed the wild
utterances of visionaries merely amused me,