The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1921-08-26

experienced a different dream-if he
had heard of the Ganges and the
Yangtze rivers calling, instead OF the
Meander and the Danube and the
Tiber-we westerners might still be
pagans, receiving missionaries from
India and China. Sometimes indi-
vidual decisions are pregnant with
destiny for the whole of mankind.
If Paul had not crossed from Asia to
Europe, there would be no proverb,
Westward the course of empire takes
its way" Concerning this most mo-
mentous journey recorded in the an
nails of the human race" DR.. Stalker
says THE fate of our continent was
decided when Paul crossed the
Agean.'
Other names have more glamour.
Alexander, Caesar, Columbus, all have
larger space in the schoolbooks,
which, indeed, rather ignore Paul.
Yet by the coolest historical stand
ards the journeys of this first Chris
tan missionary have meant more to
humanity than the marches and voy-
ages of any of the other three. In
deed, we cannot forget the tradition
that it was the Pauline motive in the
mind of Columbus, to fulfill the legen-
dairy meaning of his own name"Chris-
topherAChrist- over" that prompted
seas to the Christless East Indies, that
led him to undertake his daring quest.
Paul and the Cablegrams.
If Imagination and common sense
and the clear record of facts are to
do their share with this lesson three
publications need to be at hand or in
mind - the latest Newspaper, any
Bible. All three dovetail into one
another like a finished piece of cabi-
net work. without the newspaper
dispatches which tell of the present
desperate struggle between Greeks
and Turks, west and east, in the very
regions covered by the lesson story,
we shall miss the sense of continuing
contention for control of this bridge
head between Asia and Europe. Seri-
Gus as is the fighting now under way.
and complex as the Near Eastern
question has become, it is only part
of the ceaseless issue OF the east YER
Sus the west.
Tragically, the fighting today over
Paul's old stamping ground is in the
same spirit and on the same lines as
the countless battles of which the his
tory books tell US. Sheer lust Of do
minion and power are the actuating
motives Within four miles of Troas,
where Paul had his vision, lie the
plains of Troy. where the Homeric
battle was fought primarily over one
woman,
THE face. that launched a thousand
Ships
BY Great GalIipoli.
AS have repeatedly entered and
left the HelIesponte here, my musings,
confess have oftener been of the
classical conflicts than of the Pauline
adventure. Why is it that secular his
tory, with its sordid sameness, grips
the imagination more keenly than the
sacred story with it's far greater Sig
nificance? For the conflicts which
mark this crossing point between Asia
and Europe (Troas bore the name of
Alexander the Great, being really
from Alexandria in Egypt were real
ly monotonous clashes of Imperialism,
such as we are witnessing today.
Only Paul's crossing stands out as
distinctive. He carries a message of
peace and not of war. In his hand
he bore the strands of the bonds Of
Christian love and good will which
ultimately will bind the nations to-
gether. His imperialism was that of
universal brotherhood. By giving ali
mankind one Master he provided the
possibility of their becoming truly
brothers. After we have got thru with
the Cyrus way and the Alexander way
and the Caesar way and the Great
Powers way, perhaps we shall try the
Pauline way. Until then, the Hell
lesponte will continue to echo to the
clash of arms. Then there will be no
edy of Gallipoli. more Homeric than
any enacted on the neighboring
Plains of Troy.
A Great Imperiaist's Dream.
The thing that was really wrong
with the imperialism of the kaiser and
of Napoleon and of Ghengis Khan and
of the Caesars and all the rest of the
unpleasant company, was the same
thing that is wrong with the postwar
imp erialism of Europe and Russia and
Japan-it was not too large, too
vaunting, too comprehensive. but en-
tirely too small. After all, its aims
were only man-sized and self centered.
Political imperialism has ever been
too narrow-visioned to be really prac-
ticable. Because of its ungenerous
spirit and limited detectives, this sort
of imperialism was a menace to man
kind and had to be overthrow. Alex
ander sighed for more worlds to con-
quer. when the poor profligate had not
begun to win even the world within
his own corselet.
On the other hand, this man Paul
was an imperialist of a different sort.
His imagination had magnitude. He
was too great to care for any petty,
tawdry or power for himself. he
wanted to bring every last man on
earth under the dominion of the cross,
the truly imperial emblem. He
thought in terms of cities and of coun-
Lr1eS ana continents ana OF words.
All the strutting and posing and
pompous parading which made the
kaiser absurd are entirely lacking
from the record of this staggering i'm
peT1alist Paul He was too greL- for
any of it.
Just as from the first he drove his
missionary campaigns into the strate-
gic city centers Of Syria. Cilicia and
Asia Minor, so it was inevitable that
Paul should aspire to carry the cross
gospel to the seats of intellectual and
political power, such as Athens and
Rome. Doubtless he saw beyond into
the dark forests of western Europe.
where virile peoples dwelt as painted
savages. He wanted them all, all, for
his Master and King.
Religion and Politics.
Politics tend to make men little and
cowardly. There is nobody SO timid
as your average vote-seeking poll
ticians. whose convictions, ordinarily,