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<Jhe Golden Age
A JOURNAL OF FACT HOPE AND COURAGE
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in this issue
TEACHING TO SERVE GOD, OR MAMMON?
FLAG "EDUCATION”
ROMANISM VS. WILLIAM PENN
MEDICAL ITEMS
RANSOM
OBEDIENCE BRINGS VISIONS OF THE SON OF GOD
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every other WEDNESDAY
five cents a copy one dollar a year Canada & Foreign 1.25
Vol. XVII - No. 423 December 4, 1935
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CONTENTS
••OaS)"
LABOR AND ECONOMICS
SOCIAL AND EDUCATIONAL
Teaching to Serve God, or Mammon?
Locating the “Fakes and Frauds’’ 138
Not All Boneheads in Minnesota
Broadcasting Truth in Australia
Obedience Brings Visions of the Son of God
FINANCE—COMMERCE—TRANSPORTATION
Radio Corporation and New Deal
POLITICAL—DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN
AGRICULTURE AND HUSBANDRY
Russian Thistles as Stock Feed
SCIENCE AND INVENTION
Pollution of Human Blood Stream
HOME AND HEALTH
Dr. Kingsbury Scores the A.M.A.
Missoula Runs out of Tick Serum
TRAVEL AND MISCELLANY
A Knowledge of 500 Languages 138
RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY
British Ecclesiastical Warmongers 142
Another Church-Anny Card 148
The Chicago Heifer Exchange 155 “Bloody Sweat” Demonism in Italy 158
Selassie’s Priests Like Others 159
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The Golden Age
Volume XVII Brooklyn, N. Y., Wednesday, December 4, 1935 Number 423
Teaching to Serve God, or Mammon?
By Lester Whitlock (Illinois)
THE American public school has been hailed with due respect, since its foundation, for the making of our nation. It is given credit for making such responsible leaders as Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, and other “great” men of America. By means of it the ignorance of the Dark Ages has been dispelled by present educational enlightenment. But such enlightenment has also brought us a ray of knowledge on the imperfection and possibly the injurious reaction of the source of our information.
In John 8:32 we read, ‘The truth will make us free’; but Satan is a liar, and the father of lies. (John 8:44) By this standard we may say, “Where source is known, credit is given.”
The former “three R’s” have made way for also a new list of subjects, the complete list now containing arithmetic, grammar, physiology, geography, history, and civics. Their merits (or demerits) will be discussed in the order given.
The fundamental principles of arithmetic, of course, are the processes of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. But after these have been learned, we enlarge on each. The teaching of interest, stocks and bonds, stock exchange, and profit and loss are examples.
Are the above-mentioned absolutely necessary to promote the career of the American boy or girl? Was not the interest system forbidden to the Jews by Jehovah? Is it necessary to instruct our boys and girls in a system that is denounced by the Most High?
But let us go on down the list. Stocks and bonds! We all admit their purpose is for making money or receiving a profit at the expense of some company or individual. Is this the system by which our boys and girls must make their way in life? Are these the ideals which the American school instills in their young minds ? Does not the scripture teach that the love of money is the root of all evil ?—1 Timothy 6:10.
Are we instructing the coming generation that they too may be swindled by “Merger, Morgan and Murder” on Bolivian bonds?
And thus it goes. Stock exchange, another means of ill-gotten gains; profit and loss, a means by which we hook the next man for hooking us the last time.
Are these the high ideals which our great American schools instill into the lives and minds of our children? But let us delve into more atrocious crimes.
Physiology, a study of the body in reference to health, should be the most important of all school subjects. Yet, if things are taught which are detrimental to health, then this subject also becomes detrimental.
We were impressed by a picture in the physiology textbook of a rural school. A little six-year-old girl sat innocently holding out her arm to a doctor, well up in years, who was about to inject “pure virgin serum” (decayed pus) into her arm. It read, “Vaccination will prevent diseases among school children.”
Imagine, a little innocent child with a slender outstretched arm, facing a doctor, well along in years, holding a needle containing poison as dangerous as the virus of a rattler! Imagine, a group of innocent school children studying this picture lesson, facing a teacher who knows the fallacy of this fiendish practice! What must he tell them? In the name of common decency, what must he tell them? Will he have the courage to tell them the book is wrong, the doctor is wrong, the system is wrong, and thus preserve their innocent lives from the pus-shooter fiends? Can he face the school board with a clear eye of defiance if harassed because of his actions?
The writer of this article, being a teacher, met this test in a little rural school in southern Illinois. The results were inevitable, but the children were saved.
At a meeting of the Illinois Medical Association, one of their former presidents addressed them as follows: “Talk vaccination, advocate it, have it preached from the pulpit, for every person is a possible prospect for vaccination; yet if we wait for an epidemic to develop, only a small percent will require our treatment.” Is the American school a salesroom for the medical profession?
Geography is the study of earth, its relationship toward man, how he gains a livelihood, and his relationship to others.
We are thrilled to read the Biblical account of the garden of Eden, earth's paradise, and contrast this with the present condition of the earth, which has degenerated during these some thousands of years.
A pupil in school asked what was necessary to cause the earth to bring forth its increase equal to its original state. The teacher, in detail, told of the possibilities of the earth if brought to perfection. But the boy, with a look of despair, sighed, “Will that ever come to pass? If so, when?” Did that teacher have the courage to answer a child's question and thus remove despair and in its stead place joy and confidence? He did. But, sad to say, the boy in his enthusiasm took the story home, it grew to a rumor, spread over the district, and the teacher was removed at the end of the term for teaching false religion in school. (Matthew 5:11,12) Are the American schools for the purpose of suppressing the truth? Can they not make way for the present enlightenment?—2 Timothy 3:7; Proverbs 4:18.
History, the study of man’s actions in the past, is one of the most interesting studies in the American school if properly used. Yet, strange to say, the truths of history must be as flexible as India rubber to fit the situation into which they are oftentimes pressed.
George Washington, our great American patriot, founded our present government and secured the location of the capital at Washington, D.C. Why didn’t they mention that in order to get it thus located he log-rolled, or voted for every other fellow’s measure, right or wrong, in order to secure the victory of his own?
Alexander Hamilton, known as America's great financier, is given credit for putting our government “on its feet”; yet why is his policy withheld that ‘if America is to be a successful nation it must legislate in favor of the wealthy class’? (Proverbs 22:16) Are we so ashamed of the history of this great republic that we must conceal our rags beneath garments of silk? (Matthew 23:27) Will the American boy respect these and us any the more after he has learned the facts? Is the American school a school of deception ?
Civics is the study of the workings of our local, state and national government and how we are benefited by them.
For years a desirable government has been the efforts of man. Yet, looking back down the ages, the strongest and most desirable government lasted only for a while, was corrupted, and fell. Nation after nation has risen up, and, like the story of the “great stone face", has cried, "Here it is! Here is his likeness!” But after a short time the people, seeing its undesirableness, say, "No, not yet,” and still look forward to the coming of the ideal government.
In civics we study of corporations, private utilities, service commissions, laws, judges, etc. The corporations are praised for their worthiness, the private utilities for their services, the commissions for their benefits, and the judges for their performance of duty.
Should we tell the boys and girls that the corporations have their part in making the textbooks to suppress prejudice against them? Should we tell the boys and girls that the private utilities have their part in making the textbooks so that they may charge exorbitant electric, power, and transportation rates without arousing the ire of the people? Should we tell them the legislators and judges write their own “epitaph” in the textbooks so that they may hold sway among the next generation? (Proverbs 20:6) Do the American schools really resort to treachery in order to hold sway?
Reading, without doubt, stands paramount in the list of subjects in the American public schools. It is the gateway to wisdom and learning. It is through reading that we receive our knowledge and proof of our previous learning. Reading, above all other subjects, has the power of interesting the American boy and girl and getting doser to his inner self.
Many a boy or girl has been inspired to become more useful and successful in life through the gateway of reading. Even Abraham Lincoln is said to have received his greatest inspiration to become president through the reading of The Life of George Washington.
Yet, with all its importance, if reading should cause the American boy or girl to get the wrong view of life and thus cause them to fall by the wayside either morally or spiritually, then it has become a vain thing.
The American home was founded upon the principle of “worshiping God according to the dictates of one’s own conscience”, and upon this principle the American school falls in line. Almost every American teacher is instructed either by the law or by the parents to teach no religion in school whatsoever, so that all may be free to worship God as they see fit and thus receive no teaching abominable to them.
The American school “reader”, however, does not hold so true to this doctrine, and thus the teacher is faced with the gravest of all situations : placed upon the precipice of understanding, he alone is held responsible should the student fall into the abyss of falsity. Let us see, then, what the American school has to offer the young reader and on which the teacher is not allowed to lend a helping hand.
Elson Reader, Book 2, “How the Days Got Their Names”: Here we find eight-year-old children being taught the names of pagan gods and their duties. Strange but true, it states in each case that------is the god of------, etc. Imag
ine the situation of the teacher whose mouth must be closed as the mouths of the lions with which Daniel abode for a night.
Does the American school teach a pagan religion? (Exodus 20:3)
Elson Reader, Book 7, “In Flanders’ Fields” —McCrae:
“We are the dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders’ fields.’’
Here we find dead men 'really talking’. Yet Ecclesiastes 9:10 says ‘there is no knowledge nor wisdom in the grave, whither thou goest’. Also Psalm 6: 5.
Does the American school teach disrespect for God’s Word?
Elson Reader, Book 4, “Annabel Lee”—Poe:
“We loved with a love . , .
. . . that even the winged seraphs of heaven Coveted her and me.
This was the reason that . . .
A wind came out of the cloud, by night, Chilling . . . killing my Annabel Lee.”
Here we find the angels in heaven so jealous of a couple that they committed murder.
Does the American school teach that the angels in heaven are a bunch of gangsters?
“Snowbound”—Whittier:
“How many a poor one’s blessing went With thee below that low green tent
Whose curtain never outward swings! ’ ’
The scripture teaches, ‘All in their graves shall come forth.’ Doesn't the American school believe in an earthly resurrection?
“Safe in thy immortality,
What change can reach the wealth I hold?”
Doesn’t that sound like the American school teaches the immortality of the soul?
“And looking from some heavenly hill Do those large eyes behold me still?”
‘David hath not ascended unto heaven.— Acts 2:34.
“All hearts confess the saints elect Who, twain in faith, in love agree.”
Does this coincide with Ephesians 4: 5, which reads, “One Lord, one faith, one baptism”? (Read What Is Truth? by J. F. Rutherford, page 22.)
Young and Field Reader, Book 6:
“And the soul of ‘Father Damien’ ascended like a dove unto heaven, unto the one who gave it.”
Strange, it seems, these “heavier than air” souls of Catholic priests always go up.
“Hamlet”—Shakespeare:
“To die, to sleep; To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub;— For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, . . .”
We never would have suspected the American school if it hadn’t put that one in print. Does the American school teach “eternal torment after death”?
Not only does the American school teach a false religion. Examine these outbursts!—
Elson Reader, Book 4; Patrick Henry:
“We shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations and w’ho will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active and the brave.”
Surely Jehovah does not participate in Satan’s schemes to gain dominion over many lands or to take sides in political skirmishes.
Could it then be possible that the American school would desecrate the name of Jehovah God?
‘‘Evils of War”—Henry Clay:
“Pestilence and famine, no doubt for wise although inscrutable purposes, are inflictions of Providence, to which it is our duty, therefore, to bow with obedience, humble submission, and resignation.”
Does not the scripture teach that God is the Author of every good and perfect gift, is all merciful, and just ? Can we thus accuse God of such horrible crimes. Him who is a Cod of love ? -—2 Corinthians 13:11.
Is it possible that the American school would tell a lie on the Creator?—Romans 1: 25.
If these be true, what spirit must the American bov possess when he is hailed thus?—
“Hats off! Along the street there comes A blare of bugles, a ruffle of drums, A flash of color beneath the sky;
Hats off! The flag is passing by.”
Or thus ?—
“There is the national flag. He must be cold indeed who can look upon its folds rippling in the breeze without pride of country. . . . And all together, bunting, stripes, and stars, waving in the sky make the flag of our country to be cherished by all our hearts and upheld by all of our hands.”
Can it be possible we are preparing for another war by teaching our children as Germany did ? Read this by Henry Ward Beecher (Elson Reader, Book 4):
“Let us resolve, come weal or woe, we will in life and in death, now and forever, stand by the Stars and Stripes. They have floated over our cradles; let it be our prayer and our struggle that they shall float over our graves.”
We are inclined to believe that there are more flags on the battlefield than in the cemetery. Is the American school a recruiting station for a future war?
Elson Reader, Book 7, “In Flanders’ Fields” —McCrae:
‘ ‘ If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders’ fields.”
Doesn’t that answer the question why we had to feed the flower of our country to mouths of cannon ?
A noisy lullaby, we think.
“America’s Answer”—R. AV. Lillard:
‘ ‘ Fear not that ye have died for naught; The torch ye threw to us we caught.”
And hand in hand, side by side, they faced the foe and made the world safe for “hypocrisy”, did they not ?
Imagine the chagrin of a bonus marcher’s son when he reads the following (Elson Reader, Book 4, “Citizenship”—William P. Frye):
“What right has the republic to demand his life, his property, in its hour of peril, if when his hour of peril comes it fails him?”
Of such the scripture says: “Rob not the poor, because he is poor; neither oppress the afflicted in the gate; for the Lord will plead their cause, and spoil the soul of those that spoiled them.” (Proverbs 22:22,23) Such was the case at Washington, D.C.
What, then, can we as teachers hold outward as a standard of truth to the boys and girls of America?
Must we continue to teach the basic principles of present (big) business, the heathen practices of medicine, the bestowung of honors on men, and the permanent degeneration of the earth ?
Must we continue to teach the infallibility of the American Republic, the never-ceasing services of the large corporations, and the supremacy of our legislators and executives'?
Must we continue to teach little children a pagan religion, that the dead are not dead; that the angels in heaven are fiends; that the earthly resurrection is a mistake?
Must we continue to represent Jehovah as a participant in bloody wars for selfish gains, Jehovah as a fiend who causes much suffering by means of plagues, famines and pestilences?
Must we continue to teach the fiendish doctrine of eternal torment?
In short, must wTe continue to desecrate the name of Jehovah God in order that our school curriculum may be carried out to the letter?
Let every teacher decide this question for himself.
But after teaching the ways of big business, the honor of man’s name, the pus-shooters doctrine, the permanent degeneration of the earth; after teaching the infallibility of the American Republic, the never-ceasing services of the large corporations, and the supremacy of our legislators and executives; after teaching false doctrines and desecration of Jehovah's name, can we, who know “the Kingdom is the hope of the world”, say at life’s journey’s end as the apostle Paul: “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.”
“The Spirit of ’36”
SEEING- that the politicians of their state are trying to make the United States flag and the United States Constitution as ridiculous as possible, on the day when the professors of Williams College took their oaths of allegiance as required by the new Nazi law in Massachusetts, students goose-stepped on the campus, clicked their heels, and gave salutes similar to those bestowed by the Nazis. One student, Francis B. Sayre, Jr., son of the assistant secretary of state, and grandson of President Wilson, and himself born in the White House, amused all manldnd that will ever hear of it by carrying a large swastika flag down past long lines of cheering students. The students had a good time marching behind two youths with fife and drum representing the decadent “spirit of ’36” that believes in hammering patriotism into the youth with a potato masher. To these depths of foolishness America has been led by the idiotic politicians that knew no better than to sacrifice everything for the sake of getting the Roman Catholic vote.
Patriotism by Force
REFERRING to the bigotry shown in the Lynn case, the Waterbury Republican said: “Quite aside from religion and patriotism, one wonders by what mental process intelligent adults are able to justify such attitudes . . . Denying an eightycar-old boy a place in the public schools because he will not lift his hand to his forehead is so ridiculous that one wonders if such a thing could have happened . . . One notes a growing tendency to suppress individualism, to regiment not only business and industry, but human conduct and character. If the Massachusetts boy had saluted the flag, the authorities would have been satisfied, though the very act of lifting his hand had engendered a hatred for the thing it symbolized. He was expelled from school, then, not because he had less patriotism than his schoolmates, but because he refused to conform. When we honestly want to inspire patriotism and not satisfy some stubborn notion of discipline, we will do it by granting to the individual the greatest possible liberty of action and the unqualified right to do his own thinking.
Making Fools Out of the Bay-Staters
THE attempts of our fierce patriots to drill love of country into the hearts of youth are leading to ludicrous consequences. By means of compulsory oaths of allegiance, salutes to the flag, and high-sounding creeds, learned by rote and repeated with hand uplifted, they intend by main force to make good Americans of the boys and girls who fill our schools. And in order that the school child may be constantly reminded of his patriotic duty, they obtain the enactment of laws providing that school busses must be painted red, white and blue. All hail to Massachusetts for setting her sister states such an example of real red-blooded, one-hundred-percent, honest-to-God patriotism. What noble thoughts of mother-land must well up within the little breasts of the children as they are trundled over the hills in busses painted as much like circus wagons as the arch-patriots of Massachusetts could make them.—The Glens Falls (N.Y.) Times.
New York Teachers Resent Being Hitlerized
THIS matter of being forcibly shoved into outward acts of so-called “loyalty” to this or that suits the Hitler-Mussolini-Ratti combination well, but is distasteful to the intelligent. When Professor Mather, able teacher of geology at Harvard, declared his unwillingness to being crowded into signing the Teacher’s Oath law of Massachusetts, the New York Times learned that the Teachers College staff of Columbia University were almost unanimous in their opinion that Professor Mather’s stand was right, and was the stand that all intelligent educators should take, even if (as was finally the case with Mather) fear does lead them the opposite way. Wonder if Thomas Dorgan, author of the Teachers’ Oath bill, was educated in a parochial school, where, as is well known, the constitutions of both state and nation are held in contempt and derision.
Americas Pattern of Fascism
CO-OPERATION between legionnaires and law enforcement officers has become an accepted part of America’s pattern of emerging Fascism. Here in our own State, the Cradle of Liberty, we have the sorry spectacle of school boards at war with little children. And now that teachers have become State officials by taking the oath of office, they forget the rule of the spirit. The job must be retained, no matter what souls may be crushed. Let us put the blame for these silly loyalty laws right where it belongs— on the General Court. We voters can retire our servants to private life, however, when we choose.—Maud Grant Parks, in the Boston Transcript.
Romanism versus William Penn
Chahles <T. Margiotti, Roman Catholic attorney general of the State of Pennsylvania, ruled that “religious scruples cannot be considered as justification for refusing to salute the flag”; and so Otto Meng, a citizen of that state who is well posted on its history, wrote the Pittsburgh Presa as follows :
131 Kendall Avenue Bellevue, Pa.
October 28, 1935
Editor, Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, Pa.
Dear Sir :
The Margiotti Compulsory Flag Salute ruling is contrary to the best traditions of the Slate of Pennsylvania. It is also impractical, and unjust.
When William Penn appeared in the presence of King Charles II to receive the grant of land which is now Pennsylvania he declined to bow and to remove his hat. His worship and obeisance were reserved for Jehovah God, and Him alone. He also refused to have an oath administered even in a court of law. This attitude on his part might legally have been construed as high treason punishable by hanging, in which event the brightest chapter in the dark and bloodj’ history of America’s settlement would never have been written. Penn’s noble example of faith in God and justice to the Indians would never have been given. The world would never have learned of the “disloyal” conscientious objector and pacifist who declined the offer of a regiment of soldiers to enforce his claim and who won the love of the Indian by a humane consideration of his rights. Pennsylvania would have been strangled in her infancy.
The ruling is impractical because it defeats its own purpose, as evidenced by a parallel experience, the dismal failure of a legal experiment known as the 18th Amendment. We now know, as the result of bitter experience, that men’s appetites cannot be regulated or controlled by law. We have yet to learn that patriotic devotion cannot be induced by compulsion. The hates and hypocrisies of historj'' have been fostered by force and threats of violence. Not so its loves, which grow only under the sunlight of the good example of those who are faithfully devoted to the service of Jehovah God.
The ruling is unjust because it works an injury upon a minority which is law-abiding, clean-living and industrious, whose only offense is that they innocently hold to the belief that Christ’s kingdom was (in fulfillment of prophecy) established in 1914, that Christ is now smiting the nations with the rod of iron, that they will be completely destroyed in the impending Battle of Armageddon, following -which Christ’s authority will be undisputed and world-wide; that then, and not until then, can school children consistently be asked to pledge allegiance to “one nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all”.
Respectfully,
Otto Meng.
Margiotti Has the Bull by the Tail
EFUSAL to salute the flag at the behest of chauvinistic educators, as part of the compulsory school routine, is becoming too stubborn to yield to the stuff-and-nonsense dictums of absent-minded professors. If the disinclination to salute the flag spreads much farther it will become a major issue in the politics of publie education. Minersville, Pa., is not the only place on the map noted for its reticence in parading its patriotism, and our public educators are slow to learn that they can no more force patriotism than the tyrant Gessler could force William Tell to kowtow to his uplifted cap, or King Nebuchadnezzar could bring Daniel to his knees in obeisance to his image. When such a ceremony takes on the appearance of petty tyranny and military despotism it would serve the interests of patriotism to discard it or ignore the few infractions. There are places where the salute can be demanded with perfect propriety, as in the army, but that place is hardly the public school. Insistence on its salute by local school boards will simply promote parochial schools, which the government seeks to discourage. Educators will do a great deal for patriotism if they will stick to their knitting and keep anti-American textbooks out of the curricula and set the good example of keeping their left hand out of the public coffers while saluting the flag with their right. The Beacon hopes that the flag-saluting issue will be kept out of sight in the local school district. Since writing this, Attorney General Margiotti has unwisely taken the bull by the tail instead of the horns, and, as thousands of our city’s matadors can attest, when this happens there is trouble in the offing. —Altoona (Pa.) Beacon.
Should Join the Dominicans
HE minister's daughter at Lynn that started the flag row with her unwelcome and unnecessary assault upon the integrity of an eightyear-old boy, the minister’s daughter at Canonsburg that participated in the torture of a frail child, and the minister himself that suspended the Sperling boy at Lakewood, N. J., should join the Dominican torturers.
The Attorney General of Pennsylvania
HE children of Pennsylvania are to be taught to love the flag, even if they have to be choked and beaten to encourage their “love”. (This was done in at least two cases.) The attorney general of Pennsylvania, Charles J. Mar-giotti, has ruled, in the case of an admittedly excellent teacher who refused to worship the flag: “Whether such refusal be based upon conscientious or religious scruples, or upon any other reason, it should be followed by immediate dismissal.” The attorney general is not charged with favoring the beating of pupils, but his “ruling” implies that coercion is all right, and that freedom of conscience and religion are to be wholly ignored. This logically leads to such misdirected efforts to foster “respect” for the flag. Obviously his ruling is contrary to the fundamental laws of the land. On the other hand, being a Roman Catholic, Margiotti would, no doubt, favor appointment of Roman Catholic teachers, who have no scruples about “saluting”, because it means nothing to them to profess outwardly what they deny inwardly. In one case on record these Catholic instruments of a foreign power wore their black habits while teaching children in one of America’s public schools. The very fact that this outfit is so strong for saluting flags should lead one to suspect that there is something rotten, and that it is not as far away as Denmark, either. The truth, plain and unvarnished, is the most dreaded enemy of the Romish ecclesiastical crowd, and since Jehovah’s witnesses stand for the truth they are rightly considered to be the worst enemies of the Papal cult. Hence, the flag-salute test is a good way to weed them out everywhere.
God and Country
NCE upon a time there was an apple-knocker by the name of William Tell. Probably there isn’t a literate person in the United States that doesn’t know about William’s famous stunt of shooting the apple off his little boy’s head. But it seems that some portions of the population have forgotten just what it was that inspired this feat of archery. To jog the memory a bit, let us recall that William had refused to obey an order to bow before the cap of the tyrannical Austrian governor of Switzerland, hung upon a post in the governor’s absence. As punishment William was sentenced to shoot the apple off his son’s head. So popular did the archer become due to his action that he was shortly able to lead an uprising which threw off the yoke of foreign rule. Now the moral to this tale is that for many centuries compulsory kowtowing to symbols of authority, has been very unpopular with freedom-loving peoples. The good folk of Massachusetts, and to a lesser extent those of Connecticut, seem to have forgotten this. As a consequence we have these absurd incidents involving various members of a religious sect known as Jehovah’s witnesses who have run afoul of a law, inspired by misguided patriotic zeal, requiring all school pupils to salute the American flag every day. The surprising thing about this situation is not the refusal of Jehovah’s witnesses, but that others not belonging to the sect have not likewise refused. Pick a thousand good, loyal, patriotic citizens, tell them they must salute the flag each time they see it, and promptly about 600 of them will rebel. That’s simply typical American perversity. If there is anything which cannot be regimented, it’s loyalty. Also, there is still some constitutional privilege concerning freedom of religion in the United States. Possibly from a strictly legalistic viewpoint the Massachusetts cases do not involve this right, but in principle they certainly do. So far as we know it is still “God and my country”, and not the other way around.—Columbus (Ohio) Daily Citizen.
“Deadly Heresy”
UT to require ordinary citizens to pay the same formal respect to the flag (as soldiers, sailors and public officials) is to assume that all citizens are servants of the Government. This is deadly heresy, because the truth is that the Government is the servant of the citizens. The other thought is a survival of the old monarchical idea, which prevailed when there were no citizens, but only subjects. The American Revolution was fought to defeat the monarchical idea; so those who would reintroduce it in this country are striving to undo the work of George Washington, are raising a counter-revolution after a century and a half. They ought to be branded for what they are—false Americans, whose hearts yearn back to the system which our forefathers overthrew, the spiritual, if not the lineal, descendants of the Tories of Revolutionary times. They are at heart enemies of the thing the republic stands for.—Gerald W. Johnson, in the Baltimore Evening Sun.
Locating the “Fakes and Frauds”
A HUE and cry is being raised throughout the country because members of the religious sect known as Jehovah’s witnesses refuse to salute the flag. Surely the excitement is farfetched and artificial. Why bother? In the years that have passed Quakers would not take an oath, hence we have affirmations; nor would they remove their hats. Yet the world has gone on and the country has met no danger, from them. If the 100-percenters would only have the principles of the flag in their hearts and in their minds and guide their actions by them, it would be vastly better. Lip-service and protestations coming from any source have no meaning, and usually the 100-percenters are fakes and frauds. —Clement H. Congdon, editor and publisher, Philadelphia (Pa.) Sunday Transcript.
Patriotism, by Gesture
A NOTHER Massachusetts child has been barred from the public schools for refusal to salute the American flag. It is the ninth such case since recent enactment of a law requiring school children to take the oath of allegiance and salute the emblem. Undoubtedly intended to promote patriotism and respect for American authority, the Massachusetts law apparently succeeds only in making the State and our vaunted ‘patriotism’ seem a little ridiculous. The salute is intended, of course, to be merely an outward evidence of respect. But it is by no means necessary to a proper feeling of patriotism. When imposed upon the ordinary citizen by operation of law, it becomes meaningless in its original purpose, and quite obnoxious.—The Wheeling (W.Va.) Intelligencer.
Not All Boneheads in Minnesota
A TWELVE-YEAR-OLD girl at Monroe Junior high school, St. Paul, Minnesota, refused to salute the flag on religious grounds, and after a careful consideration of the basic and other laws on the subject the city corporation counsel, the superintendent of schools and the commissioner of education moved that she was within her rights and that the subject is closed. Too bad that Massachusetts could not import a few level-headed citizens from the Gopher State. It seems, in recent years, that America, the real America, has drifted west. Persecution of liberty-lovers are, thus far, mainly in Catholic Massachusetts and the East.
An Entirely Unfair School Superintendent
N DISPATCH from Rockford, Illinois, states that the superintendent of schools, William W. Ankenbrand, has ruled that teachers who are not comely need not apply to him for jobs. Rockford should get another superintendent of schools, and, above all, should avoid getting another with such an (to an American) uncomely name as Ankenbrand. If the teachers must be handsome they should at least be hired by men with handsome names.
St. Louis Kiddies to Get Their Money
ST. LOUIS kiddies put $92,500 in the Savings Trust Company and the National Bridge Trust Company, both of which failed. The courts having refused to put the claims of the children in the preferred class, Dr. Henry J. Gerling, superintendent of schools, gave $25,000 from his personal fortune, so that the faith of the children in the honesty of grown folks could be restored.
A Working Knowledge of 500 Languages
IN THE person of George E. Hay, 81 years of age, a retired proofreader, London claims as a citizen a man who has a working knowledge of about 500 languages. It goes to say that he has a marvelous memory. Even though retired, his recreation is the studying of foreign languages. His work as proofreader was principally in the correction of some thirty of the Asiatic languages.
Pollution of Human Blood Stream
Alfred Ptjlford, M.D., in Truthteller for June, expresses his opinion that the increase of insanity of 840 percent in less than 50 years is due to the pollution of the blood stream with serums, vaccines and toxoids, and believes that 25 percent of heart disease among school children, and the world-wide spread of sleeping sickness and infantile paralysis, are largely due to the same cause.
University of Virginia
THE University of Virginia, supported by taxes on blacks as well as whites, refused to receive into its classrooms Alice C. Jackson, daughter of a Negro druggist. Miss Jackson, a graduate of Smith College last year, desired to go further with her studies in the Romance languages.
Money Back in 49 Years?
SUBSCRIBER sends in an enrollment blank which explains that applicants may enter government service at from 1G to 65 years; the blank is put out by a private concern in Denver which apparently gives instruction in forestry. On the blank, above the student’s signature appear these words, “If I fail to pass or am not offered an appointment before the termination of my eligibility, my fee is to be returned to me.” The man’s son is 16 years of age. The father wants to know if the son will get his money back in 49 years. Not that you could notice it. The son will pass. Never fear. And when he “passes” the responsibility of the 'school’ also passes. The catch is all in the little word “or”. But if the unexpected should happen, and the boy should not “pass”, it would still be 49 years before one could be sure whether or not he would be offered an appointment. By that time he might be alive and so might the proprietor of the 'school’; but they might not. In either event the collection would be difficult. If these schools do not teach people anything else, they should at least teach them to be careful not to fall for clever ads.
Deaf Mutes of 14 Nations
EAF mutes of fourteen nations have been holding a convention in London under the auspices of the International Congress of Phonetic Sciences. They have a natural sign language that enables persons of various races and tongues to make themselves understood without the utterance of a sound. For example: The American Indians, the Australian aborigines and the deaf mutes indicate a house by placing the two hands, with the tips of the fingers together, in the form of a pointed arch; a snake is indicated by a sinuous forward movement of the hand; the command to go is by the hand raised sharply as if throwing something over the shoulder. One of the most touching scenes ever held in London was when 700 of these acted out prayers and hymns at a meeting held in St. Paul’s cathedral without the uttering of a sound.
Bengali on a Linotype
Y REDUCING- the number of characters from the original 600, and by doubling up, the Bengali language has now been reduced to the range of the linotype keyboard and, as a matter of fact, the first Bengali linotype machine has already been delivered in Calcutta.
What the Teachers Must Be
EW YORK teachers must be habitually neat, clean, orderly, refined, good-mannered, tactful, courteous, co-operative, unselfish, industrious, reliable, honest, integrious, kind, cheerful, affectionate, sympathetic and skillful in teaching and adapting a thorough knowledge of subject matter to the needs of the pupils. They must habitually use correct English in writing, speaking and teaching, must maintain discipline, be loyal to the public school system, to the fellow teachers and supervisors and to organized Society; must have the spirit of service and enjoy good health, mental, moral, emotional and physical. They must be young, goodlooking, not too fat or too thin, well dressed and agreeable, and, if a woman, unmarried. In the South they may not be Republicans, and in most communities must not be Socialists, Communists, Negroes, Jewish, Catholic or foreign-born. In some places college graduates are rejected, as lacking imagination, vision, courage and personality.
Site of New York’s World’s Fair
EAV YORK plans to have a world’s fair in 1939 that will far surpass anything elsewhere ever attempted. The site, two miles long by one-third of a mile wide, is at the population center of Greater New York, adjacent to Kew Gardens and Flushing, and is at present unoccupied. It will require some filling. It will have an airport. It can be reached by ships at Flushing bay. The cost of getting there is but 5c. There are 11,000,000 people within the fortymile zone.
Hungry School Children in Arizona
k. S. D. Ring, county school superintendent of Maricopa county, Arizona, is reported as saying that “many children who are attending school go to their classes daily without breakfasts and only have morsels found in garbage cans for their noonday meals. Teachers have witnessed the starving children taking food that other students had discarded, from garbage cans”. Ethiopian papers (if there are any), please copy.
The European Jargon
OF THE 3,500 languages now in use in various parts of the earth, 120 are regularly broadcast from European radio stations.
Free Medical Broadcasting
HE American people are duly appreciative of the acts of the National Broadcasting Company and the Columbia Broadcasting System in allotting free time on the air to the American Medical Association. When the Citizens Medical Reference Bureau, Inc. (which is against compulsory medicine or surgery for children or adults), desired some time to present their views they found they could have no time allotted. They found also that, in the case of the Columbia Broadcasting System, their application had to be submitted to a board of six allopathic M.D/s. Unable to get on the air, the Bureau registered the following protest:
"The allopathic school of medicine probably represents the opinion of the majority of the citizens, but it is none the less true that there is a considerable body of the citizens, including many doctors, who feel that one perhaps more important element in public health is the centering of the thought of the public on health rather than disease, on confidence rather than fear, on sanitary engineering rather than medication. It is also our feeling that entire freedom should be given both adults and children and parents of children in the selection of the brand of medicine or surgery they prefer to rely upon. There is also the obvious fact that more exaggerated claims have been made from time to time by commercial houses and commercially minded individuals as to the healing properties of certain substances, vaccines, antitoxins, etc., than unprejudiced analysis of the results achieved would support. Our feeling is that governmental agencies or semi-publie agencies, such as the radio, should not be encouraged to adopt a salesmanship attitude of assuring the public that one particular system is the only one with healing efficacy and without danger if there is any considerable body of intelligent citizens holding to the contrary. At the very least, the opposition should be given their opportunity to present the facts on the other side intelligently, amicably, and fairly. In no sense do wc question the serious and kindly intent of those men and women within or out of the medical profession who are earnestly devoting their time and labor to the relief of human suffering, nor do we differ from anyone as to his right to urge the wisdom of the means of healing recommended by him.
Curious Combination of Bone Diseases
A COMMERCIAL artist of Azusa, Calif., has two curious bone diseases threatening to kill him within two years. By the operation of one of these he has lost four inches in height in one year. By the operation of the other his hat size has increased in the same time from 6% to 8i/i.
Dr. Kingsbury Scores the A.M.A.
R. John A. Kingsbury, former commissioner of charities of New York city, in an address at Montreal, Quebec, made the following statements:
"I do not hesitate Io say that the American Medical Association has resorted to every trick known to politicians and political organizations to prejudice the public and to sway legislators in an effort to stem the rising tide of public sentiment favoring health insurance. Like certain big business organizations that are seeking to defeat other aspects of the New Deal program, so-called ‘organized medicine’ has passed resolutions based on selfishness and prejudice. Like ordinary lobby groups, they have sent thousands of telegrams to the president and to Congress, seeking to exert pressure without reference to the merit of proposals under consideration. They have sought to use personal influence on those in high places, have spent tens of thousands of dollars on publicity campaigns of misinformation, have spread false rumors and resorted to scurvy attack of personalities. ’ ’
A.M.A. Would Censor Radio
TN CONVENTION at Atlantic City the American Medical Association went on record as favoring radio censorship, with itself, of course, as the censor, of all matters affecting public health. In view of the fact that over half of the people of the country are on record as favoring other means of keeping well or of getting well than are of interest to the A.M.A., this is rich, to say the least. It smacks of the same spirit as shown by the Roman Catholic Hierarchy in seeking to censor religious programs. All of these would-be censors should be tied up in’ a bag together and the hose turned on them.
Honey for Wounds
r. N. Zaiss, of Vienna, reports wonderful results in treating wounds with honey. The wound is completely filled with strips of gauze dipped in honey. The wound is said to be perfectly clean in 24 hours, any pollution at that time adhering to the dressing material, which is changed daily. After a slight transient smarting the honey is cooling and soothing, and is altogether antiseptic.
500 Adrenalin Revivals
IT IS claimed that by the use of adrenalin and one other means not named not less than 500 persons in New York and Chicago have been restored to life after death had occurred and there was otherwise no hope.
The Whooping Cough Vaccine Racket
SAYS Gordon White, M.D., in the Medical liecord, New York, June 5, 1935:
“Recently some papers appeared in medical journals by not disinterested physicians extolling certain vaccines for the prevention of whooping cough. Foliowing these publications a host of high-pressure salesmen came down to boost these products. These vaccines are, as yet, unapproved by the American Medical Association, or any health department or health authority. Their prophylactic value is still in the experimental stage. It will require many years of study and observation in institutions for children to prove their usefulness. In the end these vaccines may turn out to be either most valuable or entirely useless. In spite of the uncertainty of the prophylactic effect of these vaccines, and in order to make a few paltry dollars, a large number of physicians, especially of the younger set, have descended like locusts on innocent infants and children vaccinating every one of them that comes their way, leaving in their wake swollen arms, infections, high temperature and other discomforts. The use of vaccines or serums in children must have a definite, proved therapeutic or prophylactic indication. No foreign protein should be injected into children on a possible chance that it may do some good in the future. It is well for these enterprising doctors to stop, look and listen before this unsavory practice becomes the talk of the town.”
Why the Typhoid Vaccine Was a Poor Seller
Dr. John Dill Robertson, former commissioner of health of Chicago, in an address published in the Illinois Medical Journal, July, 1926, explained why the typhoid vaccine was a poor seller. He said:
“When the typhoid fever vaccine was first produced it was freely predicted that we would be able to conquer typhoid in our city through its use. Experiments showed that this vaccine, like that for diphtheria, toxin-antitoxin, was difficult to sell to the people. Sanitarians, with their pasteurization, their chlorination, their food coverings, their screenings, their elimination of toilets from backyards, the elimination of horses by the automobile, all together, did what it was hoped the typhoid immunizing agent would do.”
Who Is to Blame for These Deaths?
AT Elizabeth City, N. C., the mother of 19-month-old Doris Hurdle caused her to be vaccinated with one of the diphtheria serums on Wednesday, July 10. This was done without the father’s approval. The child was well when the poison was injected, but died at three o’clock Friday morning, July 12. Thereupon the mother committed suicide. Who is responsible?
Missoula Runs Out of Tick Serum
AN ITEM in the Sunday Missoulian, Missoula, Montana, explains that only 1,000 Mis-soulians were vaccinated against bites of wood ticks in 1935, as against 2,000, which is the usual number. The item explains that these vaccinations are given in the Missoula county health office. The population of Missoula county is 21,782. What happens to the 19,782 who are never vaccinated against bites of the wood tick (which number, in 1935, is 20,782) remains unexplained; but one can guess. And the guess is that they are just as well off without the serum as they would be with it. There are said to be 15,000 kinds of small bugs or beetles. Some claim that there are more. Would it be good sense to be vaccinated against bites of each kind of bug? If one were in the serum business, the answer might possibly be yes. And so it does not seem to matter seriously that in Missoula somebody let the wood tick serum get too much chilled and the health authorities could give only 1,000 shots of it, where they had planned to give twice as many. Anyway, as the story stands, the serum dispensers lost only half their business; but 90 percent of the people of the county never were customers, anyway. They have to get along just as they did before the serum was invented.
This Business of Government Doctors
HDHIS business of government doctors for everybody, if it ever comes, will be one of the worst evils imaginable. In Coventry, England, after six months of inefficient government doctoring, Miss Harriet Taylor, 10 Ena Road, had two halves of a cedar-wood pencil 4% inches long, and the black lead which the pencil had contained, cut out of her leg by another doctor, who knew his business. The so-called “panel” doctor refused to believe the pencil had penetrated her leg, refused to send her to a hospital, and medical “courtesy” makes it impossible for her to disclose his name. If that is not tyranny, name something that is.
Chaulmoogra Oil Working Well
/^HAULMOOGRA oil, extracted from the seeds of a fruit resembling grapefruit, is found to work out well in the treatment of leprosy. Out of 750 lepers received at the Federal Hospital for Lepers, Caryville, La., 171 have been paroled as symptom-free. Leprosy is not rapidly contagious, but is contracted only by prolonged contact, such as living together.
Cruelty to Children
qiHE terrible years preceding Armageddon J- are showing ominously in human misconduct. In Great Britain, for now seven successive years, cases of violence against children have increased, until last year there were 4,814 cases in court. In more than one-fourth of the cases the father had been unemployed for a long period. One man who admitted he could make £4 a week preferred to exist on the dole and had his young wife and a six-month-old infant living in a hencoop in a back yard. To enter it one had to double up and crawl in.
The Schick Test
IN THE Lancet, of October 6,1923, Dr. Peters, lecturer on infectious diseases, in the University of Bristol, wrote that one of his Fever Hospital nurses, not allowed in the diphtheria wards until six weeks after the last of two or three doses of toxin-antitoxin, developed diphtheria two months after completion of the immunizing dose, and two other nurses developed diphtheria while being immunized, and not in contact with any known case of the disease. In Vienna early in 1924, seven children were inoculated with toxin-antitoxin in a children’s hospital, and promptly died of heart failure. Its use has now been forbidden in Austria. The slogan in New York city is, “Every baby under six immunized by June 1.”
Immunity from Diphtheria
nnie Riley Hale, in an open letter to Mrs.
Franklin D. Roosevelt, reminds the first lady of the land that “according to figures furnished by the U. S. Public Health Bureau in November, 1924, the natural immunity from diphtheria for the whole population is five times greater than that even promised for the immunizing serum by the manufacturers and users of it. In the light of this fact, where is the excuse for even one death by the artificial immunization r
A Brief “Case History”
0. Sampson, pioneer, writing from the home • of his host in North Carolina, said: “Less than a week ago his little boy of 4 years 10 months took a cold and fever. The local doctor was called, giving a pill each call, which revived the child. Finally he administered antitoxin; then followed an operation in the hospital; the funeral was yesterday at 3 p.m.”
British Ecclesiastical Warmongers
RITISH ecclesiastical warmongers are getting what is coming to them in a book published in London, entitled Arms and the Clergy. In “sermons” preached in 1914-1917 some choice expressions were: “God could stop this war, but in mercy abstains from doing so.” “I beseech you, my hearers, to continue this war in the Christian spirit.” “God calls England to send every man it can into the battlefield.” “Kill Germans, not for the sake of killing, but to save the world, to kill the good as well as the bad, to kill the young men as well as the old, to kill those who have shown kindness to our wounded as well as those fiends who crucified the Canadian sergeant. As I have said a thousand times, I look upon it as a war for purity.” The book contains 100 pages of pro-war speeches by the ecclecias-tical murderers, and makes a good companion volume to a similar production in America entitled Preachers Present Arms, reviewed in our issue of November 22, 1933 (No. 370).
“Pope Leads 30,000 in Prayer”
HEADLINE in the New York Times says, “Pope Leads 30,000 in Prayer for Peace.”
Concerning this “great” prayer the account says: “His Holiness’ head bowed low and he remained a long time on his knees pleading in Latin prayer for world peace. At this point the throng of worshippers bowed their heads and joined him in silent appeal.” The account does not say what scriptures were read at this time, but an appropriate one would have been Matthew 6: 6-8, which reads as follows: “But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father, which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly. But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of before ye ask him.”
Landlord Removed the Roof
IN Marinette, Wis., a landlord who was trying to force a widow and her eight children to move conceived the brilliant idea of removing the roof. The idea worked all right, but it rained, the woman’s furniture was spoiled, she was humiliated in the sight of her neighbors, and she sued the landlord and received a judgment for $600 damages.
Aluminum Trust 91.11 Percent Perfect
IT WOULD not be quite correct to state that the Aluminum Trust holds all the departments of public health in the United States in the hollow of its hand. Indications are that there is a slip somewhere; not a serious one, but sufficient to draw to their attention. For example, here is the usual stupid report to a stupid public health official. It goes ahead and gives all the details of two women being poisoned in a public restaurant, an A No. 1, first-class place, too. The food with which they were poisoned was all first-class food, and well cooked. The report occupies 421 words. In the course of the report the inspector said in parenthesis ten fatal words that gave the whole thing away. Those words were “(the pot or kettle being of the usual material, aluminum)”. To be sure, those ten words of truth constitute but 2.29 percent of the total, and that still leaves the Aluminum Trust 97.71 percent master of the situation ; yet, in a job where it is desired to kill every last man, woman and child in the United States by aluminum poisoning rather than have the truth come to the light, one wonders how it was that these ten words were overlooked. Of course, the head of the “health” department overlooked the ten words. He would have overlooked them if the whole 421 words had been devoted to an angry protest against aluminum poisoning, but in that case the poor inspector would have been fired forthwith, for the poisoning must go on. After this inspector has made enough reports he will learn that nobody is interested in learning that the poisonings were due to the food's being cooked and left to stand in aluminum containers, and will say nothing further on the subject. And then the Aluminum Trust will have scored a 100-percent record.
Navy Casting Out Aluminum
CW. Schmits, of California, discloses that • the navy is making progress. He says: “A civilian employee working in the United States navy yard at Mare Island, California, has informed me that the aluminum cooking utensils and other culinary implements heretofore made of that metal are being discarded from the ships’ galleys and are being replaced with utensils of stainless steel. It is evident that unhealthy seamen make poor fighters and are an expensive upkeep. I. wonder if the navy officials have been reading The Golden Age."
Aluminum Feet
A FLORIDA subscriber writes: “Repairing our home and painting our garage, husband hired a neighbor to do our work. He had been ailing eight months with sores on his legs and feet. One doctor pronounced it ‘muck sores’, another said ‘athlete’s foot’. His feet were running sores full of pus and would bleed. He had on an old pair, of loose storm rubbers, his feet all bandaged. Had tried all kinds of medicines, salves and washes. I handed him a copy of The Golden Age and he read the articles on aluminum. His wife had just returned from the hospital after operations for tumors and ulcerated womb. They threw away all their aluminum-ware a year ago. Both at this time are feeling fine. He can wear his Sunday shoes. Feet healed up fine.”
Out of the Depths
TV/Trs. Josephine Carney, Ohio, says feelingly: 1VX owo a great debt of gratitude to The Golden Age. Five years ago I felt that if our boy did live he would be a complete invalid, between chronic asthma, hay fever, and an exceptionally poor stomach. I was in the depths of despair over his condition. Then one of Jehovah’s witnesses happened to call and she left The Golden Age. I was so surprised, and extremely doubtful, regarding articles about alu-minumware. However, my husband persuaded me to discontinue its use entirely for a while and see, and I assure you I did ‘see’. Would not give a stray cat a drink out of aluminumware now. Our boy, with the aid of a mineral food tonic and good wholesome food, is now growing to be a fine, healthy youngster. I, too, stopped getting dizzy spells, immediately after discarding its use.”
It Wasn’t the Stewer!
MOTHER cooked some navy beans in
-*-VX an aluminum stewer and left them in the stewer three hours. Mr. Anderson (my stepfather) ate some of them and in about an hour he was sick, and in 3| hours had to have a doctor, who said it was food poisoning, but that the stewer did not cause it. Another doctor was called, and he said the same thing. Mr. Anderson came near dying. He turned blue and was unconscious, looking like a dead man. He was sick for three or four days. We know perfectly well it was the aluminum that caused it, because he did not eat anything else that day but beans and corn bread.”—C. S., Oklahoma.
Governmental Gestures
Sinclair’s 150-Word Statement
BUENOS AIRES newspaper requested the United Press to send a 150-word statement by Upton Sinclair regarding the Ethiopian situation, which he supplied as follows:
“Under our social system the natural resources and means of production are in the hands of a small class, which controls the governments of all nations and makes each nation an agency for the promotion of class interest. Since all goods produced must be sold for profit, each nation competes with other nations for colonies and markets, and thus our social system leads automatically and inevitably to predatory wars. The desperation of Italy’s move against Abyssinia is merely a measure of the imminence of the collapse of her political and industrial system under the pressure of unemployment and debts both public and private. When poverty becomes greater than the masses will endure without revolution, it is necessary for the rulers of the nation to undertake a raiding expedition, to seize new wealth, and at the same time provide excitement and arouse patriotic sentiment. For Mussolini it is war or downfall, and probably both.”
“Normal Wear and Tear”
Walter Seymour, accountant for New York State legislative committee, was drawing off data for state use from the work sheets of the New York Power and Light Company. He told the company what information he was seeking; five days later the cornel’s of the work sheets, which contained important memoranda, had been clipped off. When the company came to explain the mutilation in court they attributed the mutilation to “normal wear and tear”. The utility people insist that they have not an honest man in their ranks, who can be trusted to manage a public utility plant in the interests of the public, and it appears that on this one point they have told the truth.
Governor Talmadge, Poet Laureate
overnor Eugene Talmadge, of Georgia, is not an enthusiastic advocate of prosperity gained by shooting cows or driving sheep over cliffs to raise the price of meat. After indicating this, at an address in New York, he blossomed out into poetry with the following original composition: “I thank my God the sun and moon are both stuck up so high that no presumptuous hand can stretch and pluck them from the sky. If they were not, I do believe that some reforming ass would recommend to take them down and light the world with gas.”
Williamsburg Housing Project
/^NE thousand men are now at work demolishing all the old out-of-date houses and other buildings in twelve city blocks in the Williamsburg district of Brooklyn. The twelve blocks, if strung out in a straight line, would extend two and a half miles. The cost of the site is $4,000,000; the new buildings will cost $8,000,000. The funds are being borrowed from the national government.
Digging for Water
AYS C. A. Reed, Oregon: “Almost everybody here in Grant county, Oregon, is about half crazy about the Townsend Plan, but for my part I will have nothing to do with it, as I believe it is another scheme of the Devil to draw people away from Jehovah and His dear Son Christ Jesus. As far as I can see, they are digging for pure water, but instead they are getting blood, as the Egyptians did in Egypt.”—Exodus 7: 24.
End of Wisconsin Blue Laws
UNTIL recently it was unlawful in the state of Wisconsin for anyone on Sunday to be present at any public diversion, show or entertainment, or take part in any sport, game or play. No one might ride in an automobile for pleasure, or ride horseback except to and from “church”.
Job-Slaughtering Machinery
IN THE last five years the big industrial corporations have installed so much laborsaving machinery, and it is so efficient, that only 80 percent of the workers employed in 1929 would now be required to operate industry on the peak basis of that year.
Taxes on Cigarettes
MAN who smokes one package of cigarettes a day pays $29 a year in taxes upon them, and if he lives in Arkansas he pays $19 more a year. Other states are also taxing cigarette smokers heavily, and should.
Unicameral Legislation
THE unicameral (or one-house) legislature system works well in Queensland, Australia, where it was first tried, and is expected to work well in Nebraska, which state is being redistricted for that purpose.
A five-minute talk
by Judge Rutherford
EXPLAINING His mission on earth Jesus said that He came “to give his life a ransom for many”. What did He mean by those words? Ransom means an exact corresponding price given to purchase a thing of value. God gave Adam the right to live upon condition that he would be obedient to God’s law. Adam’s right to life was of great value to him; and since all men are the offspring of Adam, that right to life is of value to all men. Adam violated God’s law and thereby lost the right to life, and died. All men have inherited the result of that death sentence; hence all men are born sinners, as is stated in Romans 5:12.
God’s law is unchangeable; hence Adam and all his offspring must die and remain dead forever unless provision is made for another to pay the penalty imposed upon Adam. Only the life of a perfect man could pay that penalty, because it was the perfect Adam that was sentenced to death. All the offspring of Adam being imperfect, there was no man available to take Adam’s place in death. God graciously provided the way by sending His beloved Son Jesus to earth, making Him a perfect man. Jesus was born pure, holy and without sin, and when He arrived at the age of manhood He exactly corresponded to the perfect man Adam.
It is written, in Hebrews 2: 9, that ‘Jesus was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death, that He by the grace of God might taste death for every man’. The death of the perfect man Jesus provided the ransom price; and dying in the place and stead of the sinner, He thereby purchased the right of life for all men. There is no possible way for any man to get everlasting life save that which God has provided through Christ Jesus. It is written, ‘Life is the gift of God through Jesus Christ our Lord.’ The reason is that by the ransom price the right of man to life has been purchased and God gives life to all men who comply with His requirements.
What are God’s requirements? Faith in God and in Christ Jesus, evidenced by obedience to God’s commandments. One seeking life propounded the question of how he might get life; and the answer is given (Acts 16: 31): “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” Further the scripture addressed to those inquiring says (Romans 10:9,10): “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”
When a person realizes that by nature he is a sinner and that Jesus by purchase holds his right to life, then, if he believes, he confesses to God and Christ Jesus that he is a sinner and that Jesus is his Redeemer. In this manner the person manifests faith in God and in Christ; and the scripture says, ‘By faith is man justified.’ Faith means to receive a knowledge of God’s truth and then to confidently rely upon it and to act accordingly.
Jesus’ words therefore mean that He gave His life a ransom or purchase price for as many as believe on Him. Knowledge of the truth is therefore of vital importance because no one can believe anything unless he first hears about it. The Scriptures say, at Romans 10:14: ‘How shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear unless some be sent to tell them?’
God has made provision for others to hear by sending His witnesses to bear to the people His message of truth concerning the sacrifice of Christ Jesus and the blessings to be administered to the people by and through His kingdom. Jehovah’s witnesses are coming to you with this needed information, that you may learn God’s provision to give you life everlasting. Take the books that they bring to you, and study these, together with your Bible, and find out God’s provision to administer to man everlasting life.
Jehovah God is love; which means that God is entirely unselfish. It is written, in John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” That means that God unselfishly provided the ransom price for man, through Christ Jesus, and this He does that all who exercise faith in
God and in Christ and devote themselves to the Lord and obey Him shall live, and shall never die. For that reason Jesus made this statement (John 8:51): "Verily, verily, I say unto you, If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death.-’ Serve God and Christ, and live.
[The foregoing talk, one of'thirty-six, is published by arrangement with the Watch Tower Bible & Tract Society, Brooklyn, N. Y., who arc distributors of these pointed Bible talks in the form of phonograph records. Inquiries concerning these records should be addressed to the Watch Tower, not to The Golden Age.]
Jehovah’s witnesses
Took The Golden Age Under Protest
By 0. 11. James (Washington)
I HAVE been a constant reader of The Golden Age almost from the first. One of the friends gave me a couple of copies one day here in town. I did not want them at the time, and told him so, but finally took them to get rid of him. I took them home and threw them down and did not look at them for several days. One day when I didn’t have anything else to read I hunted them up and read them and sent in my subscription at once, and, thanks be to God, it is still coming.
Before that I had been a member of Satan’s dead organization for about twenty years. I believed in eternal torment, Devil dreams and visions, palmistry, astrolog}7, “divine” healing, talking with the dead, League of Nations, immortality of the soul, and was always afraid of seeing ghosts on very dark nights. I also believed in the unlucky thirteen, but fortunately I did eat at a table where there were thirteen seated at dinner before I thought to count noses, and not one of us died during the year either. I guess I had about a full quota of all the Devil’s deceptions, excepting the trinity: that was too much of a gag for me to swallow. I never could understand it until I began to understand the light of the truth of God’s Word. But now praise God for His great goodness and His wonderful light, for all my night has passed away. Judge Rutherford has made the whole subject clear and plain in very few words in The Golden Age; also a more lengthy explanation is given in the hook Reconciliation.
I did not know that the Kingdom had been horn. I hadn’t heard that the King was present. The abomination of desolation was a mystery. Satan’s organization was not in sight. Babies went straight to heaven at death, the preacher said so; likewise all good people who attended church and paid their dues regularly. All others were headed straight for hell. It was here that I began reading The Golden Age and later The 'Watchtower, and that wonderful set of Judge Rutherford’s books. Each and all are a goldmine of information to those seeking the truth.
This is my eighth year in the service of the King. I am standing firm on the solid rock. “Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty; just and true are thy ways, thou King of saints.”
Why Not?
SAYS T. R. Weeks (Washington): “As one of Jehovah’s witnesses I have given samples of The Golden Age to truth-hungry people for about the past five years, realizing that I was giving them real help and consolation by doing so. 1 am sorry to say that it took five years of study and reading The Golden Age before it finally percolated that it was the best, up-to-the-minute magazine of vital news in circulation offered to the public today, and that it should be in every home, no exceptions. During the past three weeks I thought I could help them more by obtaining their subscriptions for a year or six months, and during the past three weeks, to my surprise, I have obtained about twenty-five Golden Age subscriptions. Mr. Editor, how about encouraging every Golden Age reader to get his relatives or neighbors to subscribe. Dollar a year, or if they really want to see what kind of magazine The Golden Age is, they could try it for six months, and from then on they could renew it once a year. As the trials and sufferings of the people increase through the world day by day it is of the most vital importance to all people to ascertain the cause and remedy, and what they may do to safeguard the interests of themselves and their families. The Golden Age is an eye opener for these truth-hungry ones, and all they have to do is to read a copy of one issue and they will realize it.”
Broadcasting the Truth in Australia
/YDIO stations at Albury, Goulburn, Grafton, Gunnedah, Lismore, New Castle, Sydney and Wagga Wagga, New South Wales; at Brisbane, Mackay, Maryborough, Rockhampton and Townsville, Queensland j at Launceston and Riverstone, Tasmania; at Ballarat, Bendigo, Hamilton, Horsham, Melbourne, Sale and Swan Hill, Victoria, and at Kalgoorlie and Perth, West Australia, are broadcasting the truth, but there is yet one more broadcaster, what the Malaya Tribune describes as “a 24-ton auxiliary ketch”. This boat, the Lightbearer, was recently at Singapore after a 5,000-mile cruise touching North Australia, Papua, Java and many smaller islands. After establishing a branch at Singapore, it was expecting to go on to Shanghai. The craft is handled by E. C. Ewins, a surveyor by profession, who lived for years in Fiji, and understands the handling of a boat in rough waters. The picture of the boat in the Tribune shows seven of Jehovah’s witnesses. They are not long-haired and anemic fanatics, by any means, but men who have a job to perform and who go about their business in an unostentatious way. The Tribune story says, “An electric transmission set is installed on board capable of addressing 10,000 people.” At one port of call, Port Moresby,, with a total European population of but 350, about 300 bound books and 450 booklets were placed. The Torres Strait islands were visited without landing permits’ having been first obtained. Though the natives, many of whom read English, were delighted with the music and lectures, and obtained about two hundred bound books, yet the Anglican missionary of the district, being grieved that they taught the people (Acts 4:2), was mean and small enough to report the landing to the magistrate, who happened to be away at the time. Quarantine and other regulations were innocently contravened in this instance. The Devil knew it, and his chosen sons, the clergy (John 8:44), are always on the job, to do whatever mischief is possible.
Transcription Machines in Hopyards
THE Kentish (England) Midweeldy Express, under the heading “What We Hear”, says of “The Big Buzz” “that this was heard by many in Staplehurst and Marden on Sunday; that it was particularly prevalent in the hop gardens [where there were at the time 40,000 hop pickers at work]; that it did not emanate from the pickers ; that it was occasioned by a special visit of Christian workers known as ‘Jehovah’s witnesses’ ; that they came down fully equipped for the occasion; that they had seven cars in action; that five were fitted up with electrical machines; that their broadcast message radiated throughout the area; that the lectures were interspersed with musical interludes; that the ‘hoppers’ accorded them a hearty welcome.”
A Jonadab in the Furniture Business
eonard H. Stege, of North Dakota, writing of a Jonadab in his home city, says: “Mr.
G----, a furniture man, said, ‘When people ask
what my religion is I reply, “Fixing furniture and selling it; but my Christianity is Christ, the Son of God.” ’ He is reading the books written by Judge Rutherford; has ordered full sets and given them to his friends, free. When some have criticized their author he has replied that Judge Rutherford is too far advanced for the world, as he lives about ten years ahead of the present generation, but what he says will and must come true because it is God’s Word.”
Preacher with Backbone!
PIONEER working in Tennessee reports having found a preacher with a backbone.
Ele stayed over night with one who is a come-outer, having left the bondage of the Methodist denomination, so that he could serve God without having to preach for money. This man has become a farmer and preaches in a schoolhouse gratis. He is now reading the books by Judge Rutherford and designates himself as an honest truth seeker. The pioneer says, guardedly: ‘Wife in full sympathy with him; ‘honest’ part remains to be proved.”
Radio Corporation and the New Deal
THE Tulsa Tribune seems to think somebody was helped by the New Deal. It says:
“The Radio Corporation of America reports that its net profit for 1934 was $4,249,263, as against a loss of $582,094 for the year 1933. This improvement of $4,831,357 is accredited to the fact that RCA has succeeded in co-ordinating ‘the three broad fields in which it operates—manufacturing, broadcasting and communications’. In other words, while the NRA was sending pants pressers to jail for unfair competition of cutting prices five cents, the RCA was getting more of a stranglehold on the heavens above us.”
Dairy” Department
Clergy Still for War
EVEREND ROSS K. CAMEBON, pSgtOI of Rogers Presbyterian church, Toronto, Canada, is reported by the Toronto Daily Star as saying that since the World War the clergy of Canada as a whole has not changed its attitude to war, and if the British Empire is threatened the Empire can count on the clergy in the future the same as they always have in the past. Everybody with a particle of sense knows that this is the absolute truth, that the preachers are the same bloodthirsty murderers now that they always were, and that all their professions of a desire to be Christians and to follow the Lord’s teachings are the purest kind of absolute hypocrisy. Reverend Cameron’s stand is echoed and even emphasized by his brother in the pulpit, Reverend Stuart Parker, D.D., pastor of St. Andrews Presbyterian church of the same city. Reverend Parker said: “No man is justified in saying that the Bible forbids a Christian to take up arms . . . the greatest danger to the character of the Christian man today is this continual preaching of peace at any price.” How is that ? Whoosh! Whoop 1 Hurrah! Three cheers and away they go. But not the “Reverends” Cameron and Parker. Not on your life, as long as the bottom stays in the collection box.
Visions of Plowhandles
ISIONS of plowhandles, overalls and hobnailed shoes disturb the slumbers of Reverend H. B. Seese, Grace United Brethren church, Pleasant Valley Boulevard and Thirteenth Street, Altoona, Pa., and so he rushes into print to let it be widely known that he is on the Devil’s side, advertising, “Don’t buy books from anyone who does not have testimonials from your pastors or priests.” How very evident that the “Reverend” Seese sees it coming. The Altoona company is evidently O.K.
Bishop of Exeter, D.B.
HE bishop of Exeter, D.B., says democracy is a prey to the disease of corruption and that it is filled with conceit, that the move for shorter hours is a move of sloth, that mothers should have more children so that the war manpower can be kept up, and that the unemployed should be uniformed and drilled and in event of war be sent to the front Here is a case where the Payette degree awarded seems to be entirely appropriate.—2 Thessalonians 2:12; Matthew 23:33; Hebrews 12: 8.
Another Church-Army Card
ERE is a church-army postcard, or missionary card drawn by T. Noyes Lewis for the First Western Hospital, Fazakerley, Lancashire, England. It is about the chaplain; it tells the soldier not to gamble; to think about God so as to get something back from Him; and to go to church on Sunday. The design is a wounded soldier. On one side is a comrade leading him from the field of battle; on the other is Christ saying to him, “Hard Hit! Lean Hard.” Above Christ’s head are four military men who, presumably, have gone to that heaven where all British military men go at death; gadzooks and forsooth. It is to be hoped, if the wounded man’s nerves go back on him, and he becomes delirious, that the attendants will not choke him with a towel around his neck, or pummel him in the stomach, or put him in an ice pack, as is the custom in the land of the free and the home of the brave, in military hospitals for the insane; for, if they do, the wounded man will probably be sorry that he did not have the good luck to go right through to heaven and dodge all the discomforts en route, the same as the other four in the picture.
Why Pick on the Porter?
TN AN address at Freeport, Long Island, the Reverend Karl Francis Moore, of St. Mark’s Methodist Episcopal church of Rockville Centre, made the statement that “the minister is in the same position as a porter seeking tips in order that he may get along”. The reason for picking on the porters does not appear at the moment. And besides, the porters are of some use in the world. Besides, while a porter is grateful if you slip him a quarter, a minister considers you a piker if you do not come across with at least $5, though in these hard times he often has to be content with much less, but finds it hard.
Should Pay for Prayers C.O.D.
ARMERS of Sykkylven, Norway, are objecting to paying the pastor $7.50 each a year for praying the sparrows away from their fields. They complain that though they have to give up the $7.50 regularly every year, the sparrows continue to come. Obviously the pastor should do his praying on a C.O.D. basis, and only if there are no sparrows should he collect the sparrow tax of which the farmers complain.
The Replacement of Jesus (?)
npiIE NORDLAND, a periodical published by -*• the German Glaubensbewegung (Faith Movement) had a special article for the German youth, from which the following lines are taken:
‘ ‘ Today much is spoken about the youth bearing the inheritance of the great war. To avoid a false conception it is necessary to know exactly just what is the inheritance of the dead in the great Avar. This inheritance is that the nation is the last word in potential value, a value before which everything else is secondary. Christ, of whom we are in ignorance as to which professed religion contains his true doctrines, has sunk down in the darkness of history. Now we recognize that his visage-marred death, for which the world butchered itself, is of no value to us. But on the other hand the death of those heroic fighters fox’ a nation of Germans is a deed making the old-time ransom mystery superfluous. The death of these heroes fighting for a new empire was not less voluntary than the death of the Nazarene, and their’ death speaks volumes to us, because it represents a sacrificial death for the great nation of Germans. In face of this fact the cross as a symbol of a formci’ most precious value must retreat before the emblem of the highest living value—the nation. The war monuments in German lands are altars of the next generation, and the unknown soldier of the great war is a fitting pathfinder of the next empire, who shall replace Jesus of Nazareth.” (From the German Golden Age, June 1, 1935, page 7.)
Only One Evil
IN A radio message over WOR, Eduardo Villasenor, consul general in New York, said: “I only know of one evil, which is hard to remedy, because it needs many years of difficult work. I mean the one that the Catholic campaign is consciously or unconsciously causing when it works so intensely to divide and even place against each other two great nations which nature has made neighbors and which common sense, if nothing else, should keep friends?’ The truth is that the acts of the Mexican government do not permit fair-minded observers to accuse the government of any persecution.
Germany like Jonah
AT LEICESTER, England, at a League of Nations meeting one of the speakers said, sadly, “We cannot keep Germany down any longer. She has become too strong.” Come to think of it, that was what happened to Jonah, and after he landed on the dry land he was better off, and so was the fish that originally took him in.
Refugees from the Red Terror
AS IN the French Revolution, so in the Russian Revolution, no one can be sure of his safety, even for an hour. The OGPU, Russia’s dreaded secret army police, were believed to be seeking the overthrow of Stalin. They had great power, but not enough. The Red Army was called in, the OGPU became at once not a haven of safety, but a place of death. Something like 200 were slain. Trials were secret, and death by shooting followed instantly upon conviction. At one time, in the dead of winter, there were hundreds of refugees hiding in the forests, exposed to hunger and cold. In some instances they started big forest fires as a protection against pursuing soldiers. The man who murdered Sergei Kiroff was put to death along with his wife, son, two daughters and 85-year-old mother. Probably the latter was glad to go, to get away from such a place and condition.
Fordlandia, on the Amazon
FORDLANDIA, on the Amazon, 900 miles from its mouth, now has over 4,000 workers busily engaged in clearing away the forests and planting the best variety of rubber trees. These trees, five years from now, it is expected, will be producing rubbei’ in quantities sufficient to attract world attention. Wages are 60 cents a day and up, which is considered good for Brazil. The workers live in sanitary and neat homes. There are ten miles of railway, forty miles of highway and an airplane landing field, telephones, electric lights and power. The tract embraces 3,700,000 acres.
Protection of Guano Islands
THE Guano Islands, off the coast of Peru, and being one of that country’s principal sources of income, are now forbidden to allow commercial and private planes to fly within a half mile, for fear of frightening the birds. The average production of guano for the past ten years was 135,000 tons a year.
French Lobster Company
THE French Lobster Company left employees stranded on a sun-scorched island in the Indian ocean, and four perished before attention was given to their plight. A woman survivor, whose baby died two months after its birth, was awarded $2,000. The widows of the four workmen who perished received $2,300 each.
Nazi Persecution of Jews
NAZI persecution of Jews continues. Hitler recently said, “We can justly compare Jews to tuberculosis germs.” Julius Streicher, prominent Nazi, admits that his plans are to drive the Jews from every country, including Palestine. Any German may arrest any Jew, tie and fetter him, and the Jew may not sue him for illegal detention. Hotels and rooming houses near Berlin are putting up signs, “Jews not served here.” Courts have ruled that it is “undesirable” for Jewish attorneys to appear as counsel. Trucks decorated with anti-Jewish signs parade the streets and highways. Although Jews are denied full citizenship rights, they are nevertheless compelled to serve in the German army. In some districts business men and persons on relief have been warned that they must not buy from Jews, otherwise they will be excluded from municipal orders and from relief. In a Nazi official statement by Streicher the Jews have been described as “a mixture of Nordics, Mongols and Negroes, carrying in their soul the bad qualities of all these races”. Some employers have ordered all their employees to break off all business and social relations with Jews, on pain of dismissal.
What German Youth Are Taught
A REVELATION of what German youth are being taught, with the full protection of the German government, is disclosed in the following from an address by Ernst Hauck, headmaster of the boys’ school at Neustadt:
“The field-gray soldier who throws his last hand grenade, the dying seaman, who, felled by a murderer’s hand, pronounces Der Fuehrer’s name as his last word, those are more for us divine figures, much more, than is the crucified Jew.’’
Can you wonder that God is about to destroy such blasphemers, as unfit to live1?
Foreigners Need Not “Heil Hitler”
NOTICES are published in Cologne and Berlin to the effect that foreigners are not to be molested if they fail to give the Hitler salute. Just how foreigners are to be identified as such before they are attacked is not explained. The implication is that anyone else who fails to bow to this grotesque German “idol” may be molested with impunity. Foreigners need not feel any too confident that they will not be molested. In the proposed Hitlerization of the United States, however, nobody will be exempted or excused.
Golden Coach Headed for Junk Yard
UP UNTIL the opening of the last session of Parliament the king of England had always ridden in the golden coach reserved for such occasions. It made a big hit back in the days of wooden plows, monks, and such. Now it is a laughingstock, and so the lang went by automobile, as any sensible person would do. The prince of Wales also went by automobile, and the account says, humorously, “Even the crown, which is usually sent from St. James’ by coach was taken in a closed motor.”
Sudden Weather Changes in England
A BOUT the middle of May a good portion of England was under snow, and on June 24 they had the hottest June night in 64 years. Four persons died of the heat in London, and at the beaches many remained in the water until after midnight. Sudden weather changes tend to promote alertness of mind and to make people progressive and independent. The ‘superior intelligence’ of many New Englanders is in part attributed to the cold winters and hot summers that keep them on the move mentally and otherwise.
Five Hundred Children Faint in March
HPHE Roman Catholic cult put on a big show in Manchester, England, one of the features of which was a parade by 15,000 children in white dresses. Five hundred of the little kids fainted and were picked up by ambulances. Just how this so-called Wliitsuntide procession could be of any honor to God’s name, or, in fact, anything more than a piece of arrant nonsense intended to help keep a lot of grafting priests away from picks and shovels, remains unexplained.
Britain Hopes to End Slums
THANKS to the repudiation of her debt to the United States, Britain has had a budget surplus for three years past, is completing new houses at the rate of 1,000 a day, and expects to see the last of the slums disappear within the next five years.
Some Improvement in Britain
THE improvement in Britain continues and was sufficiently pronounced on June 24 that on that date more persons were employed than at any previous time within fourteen years. The total unemployed on that date was 2,000,110.
Freedom at Port Moresby
Asia and Australia
Growing Bananas in Australia
PORT MORESBY, New Guinea, is in British IXTRITING in The Queensland Producer an territory and therefore the natives have lib- V V Australian gentleman who had spent much
erty. That is to say, they have liberty to wear breechcloths. But shirts ? Mercy no! In other words, and in all seriousness, it is actually against the law in New Guinea for a native to wear any clothing above the waist unless permission to do so has first been obtained from the “authorities”. What is more, a native named Kauri did wear a shirt on November 21, 1934, and was fined 2/6d for the offense. He failed to pay, and, in the words of the “authorities”, absconded. On April 29,1935, the same young man came into the shopping area of Port Moresby, and again he committed the heinous offense of having on a shirt (maybe the same one, probably so, and maybe unwashed in the intervening five months). The police grabbed him, asked him to produce his permit to wear a shirt (which permit he had not obtained), and not being able to do so he was fined 10 shillings, which he could not pay, and was forced to go to prison for 30 days, with the first fine of 2/6d still hanging over him. The conscience of the British government is in the care of the Church of England. The missionaries lay great stress on clothes, and probably had got the information to this poor black man that the ability to wear a shirt is about the most important thing the Lord requires of anybody. Gog save the kink!! E Pluribus Aluminum! The police stole the boy’s shirt, and at the expiration of his sentence sent him home without it.
General Feng Yuhsiang
Genebal Feng Yuhsiang, so-called “Chinese
Christian general”, has probably been the means of putting as many of his fellow men out of this life as any of the other professionals in his line of business in the Flowery Kingdom. Seeing how much more efficient the Christians are at killing than are their heathen neighbors he naturally feels that if he can get to be a Christian his chances of filling up his cemetery are better than they otherwise would be. He feels the same way about his men, and not long ago baptized 10,000 of his troops with a fire : hose. This was quite an improvement over the conditions when the Roman Catholic church was getting its start; for at one time, back in those days, it was the habit of some to drink the com- , munion wine out of the skulls of their enemies.
time and money growing bananas, and then found there was almost no market for them, said: “One does not realize what this depression means till directly affected by it personally; then it is that one fully realizes the devilish nature of our whole system from A to Z. I heartily agree with you in your exposure of 'high finance". This is surely the root cause. I remember Judge Rutherford a few years ago issuing a warning that the international bankers were getting their heads together, and direful results would likely occur later. It seems as if he was about correct. Could anything be worse than the present conditions of the more poverty, etc., with the more production'? One man in the world today above all others is scathingly exposing the whole 'show’, and it is a pity there are not more like him.”
Filipinos and Japanese
THE Filipinos, to be free in ten years, are now generally considered the most fortunate people in Asia. In thirty-six years the population has doubled, the wage-level has trebled, and the standard of living is four times as high as that of any Asiatic neighbors. Schools have multiplied. Sanitation is excellent. The people are long-lived; they are at peace with the world. They will start as a nation without any arms. But see! A Japanese authority has said that Japan will content herself with selling goods in the Philippines “as long as they are courteous and peaceful, but if there is chaos in the independent Philippines then it will be the duty of a civilized (?) nation to step in and use force”.
Effort to Meet Japanese Competition
IN THE effort to meet Japanese competition the British have created a Spindles Board. No new plants may be built in England unless acquired through this board with the surrender of an equivalent plant. The Japanese have the latest and best of everything, each worker looks after 30 automatic machines, hours are long, wages small, and mill managers and workers eat the same food and live under about the same conditions. Japanese competition at present is sweeping all before it.
United States
The Hopes of the Martians
amuel Bottomley, president of the American
Society of Martians, has written an open letter to President Roosevelt setting forth how public confidence can be restored in one day and national prosperity within two weeks if the Government will only act upon its prerogative of creating unborrowed money for all national governmental purposes. His argument, in part, is as follows:
“The statement that every cash dollar is a thirty-five-times-borrowed dollar is verified by the fact that we have less than six billion dollars in paper and metal money (gold is not in use), while the total debts of our governments, our institutions and people approximate 210 billions of dollars. These figures show, therefore, that every cash dollar in the country is a thirty-fivc-times-borrowcd dollar. To explain the monstrous bunco game in another way is to say that we owe the money-changers thirty-five times more than all the United States cash currency in the country. So, if the people of the United States were to attempt to pay all the money they owe the money-changers they would find that after gathering together every cash dollar in the country (which of course they could not because it already belongs to the money-changers), they would still be short $205,000,000,000. If they then attempted to settle their debts by surrendering all their property to their creditors at its taxable rate value (estimated at 150 billion dollars) they would find themselves $55,000,000,000 short of squaring their account. In simple yet startling words, the people of the United States are today in a financial hole approximately $50,000,000,000 below the line of financial bankruptcy, and with no possible way of getting out of the hole without the nation’s undergoing a monetary revolution. Our $210,000,000,000 industrial deficit is ample proof of the statement.”
Friendly Correction of the Tribune
HE Miami Beach Tribune, making an uphill fight for a better Miami, is alleged to have said of The Golden Age, “It is trying to do the same work we are trying to do—clean up the world.” Almost right, fellow scribe, but not quite. The Golden Age, as you suspect, is unburdening itself about how rotten is everything in the Devil’s organization, but it isn’t trying to clean it up; only the Lord can do that, and His method, so the Scriptures say, is to “burn them up”, “that it shall leave them neither root-nor branch.” When the tares get to burning in good shape The Golden Age is willing to help carry gasoline to aid the good work, but has no higher ambitions.
Cost of Crime
CRIME costs the United States $12,000,000,
000 a year. So stated Earle AV. Evans, president of the American Bar Association at one of their meetings. America has a homicide rate fifty times greater than that of Great Britain. Criminal racketeers employ lawyers from whom they obtain legal advice in their organized lawbreaking, paying them large fees. Almost every effort of the nation to do away with organized crime has been obstructed by lawyers who make it their business to protect criminals in their activities. An effort is now being made to clean up the legal profession and to purge it of lawyers who will assist by giving advice to criminals even before the crime is committed. (This calls to mind indulgences sold by “holy church” in the Middle Ages, which forgave sins a sinner thought he might commit at some future date.) The “shyster” lawyer is ready to give his regular support to the habitual criminal and get him “protection” before, during and after the crime, if need be. Criminals can get professional advice so as to proceed in a defensible though none the less effective and criminal course of action in gaining their ends.
Daniels’ Statement on Mexico
osephus Daniels, United States ambassador to Mexico, in a statement released on his return to America on a vacation, said:
‘ ‘ The Mexican Government insists there has been no persecution of Catholics and that all religions are treated alike in the republic. To my own knowledge there has been no complaint made to the United States embassy in Mexico City of any American being denied religious freedom. The Mexican people have a sovereign pride in their country and would resent any interference from an outside nation in any of its problems which they consider they should be allowed to settle by themselves. ’ ’
Adolf Weiss on Relief
RiSBANE, in the New York American, tells of Adolf Weiss on relief:
“Mr. Weiss did $54,000 worth of iron work for New York’s Park Department, on contract most profitably, during the year past, and at the same time drew $45 a week on relief. His son, Harry, was employed by the New York Park Department; his brother-in-law, also named Adolf Weiss, enjoyed a $45-a-weck relief job. His son-in-law, Samuel Pcsin, has been making about $400 a month profit renting acetylene torches to the Park Department at $25.60 a day. He paid torch operators $5, the code scale being $11.20. His father-in-law, Adolf, owned the torches.
Big Business
Kreuger’s Whale Comes Up for Air
Ivab, Kreuger’s whale, International Match
Company, now bankrupt, has been in deep waters for years. It has now come up for air and is suing to collect $2,019,066 income taxes for 1929, 1930 and 1931, which, so it seems, were just paid to the United States playfully at the time Mr. Kreuger was borrowing money by the barrel from New York’s great financiers to keep his great, big deep-sea monster from drowning. An item of interest is that in 1930, when the company had a net loss of $11,150,141, it reported a net income of $10,994,071 and paid a tax on that amount of $1,198,235.
Eastern Financiers Enjoy Vermont Scenery
EASTERN financiers enjoy Vermont scenery, and they also enjoy receiving interest from frugal people. Possibly these two reasons partially explain why Vermont was offered a $10,-000,000 loan from the Federal treasury if she would build a modern highway the length of the Green Mountains. Vermont turned the proposition down, because she does not like to go into debt, and so the financiers will miss the Vermont scenery and also the interest on the tax-free bonds that they might have had if Vermonters had been less hard-hearted.
A Windowless Office
H ERSHEY, Pa., will have a windowless office building; now, if they will just make it lightless and heatless and put up over the door the sign, “Abandon hope, all ye who enter here,” it looks as if the place would be all O.K. for what it seems designed to be. Just why an office worker should never rest his eyes by gazing out of a window is something only an “efficiency expert” could understand.
General Electric Prosperity
THE New Deal is accomplishing something for Big Business, as was designed. The
General Electric Company made profits of $10,-854,682 in the year 1933, but in 1934 the profits were $17,151,000; sales were up 21 percent, and the pay roll was up 70 percent.
Montgomery Ward Profits Up
TN THE year 1933 the net profits of Montgom-ery Ward & Company were $2,227,957, but in 1934 they were $9,161,053. The sales in 1934 were $249,805,721, the largest in the company’s history, except in 1929.
Wealthy Man with a Heart
HORICON, Wisconsin, had an implement maker, Willard A. Van Brunt, who made a success of his business. On his 88th birthday he sent 94 employees (some of whom had been with him over 60 years) $3,000 each. The result was a boom in Horicon. Debts were paid, mortgages canceled, furniture was bought. It all shows how easy it will be under Christ’s perfect government to make everybody happy. At the moment nothing would So much help as the wide distribution of what is called “hot money”, i.e., money which deteriorates unless used promptly. This money, first suggested by Silvio Gesell, and advocated in America by Dr. Hugo Fack, has worked wonders wherever tried. The refusal to give the soldiers their bonus was a crime against civilization. What is needed in America is not more prosperity for those who have it all, but for the common people who have nothing.
Selling a Non-Existent Line
IT IS well known that salesmen of purgatory sell something that does not exist; the same is true of the ecclesiastical hell; there is no such place; nevertheless millions have paid considerable sums to be misinformed on both of these subjects. A subscriber, Mrs. R. O. Clark, writes in from Oregon that in her city there is an electric radio shop run by a preacher, and adds: “My husband and a friend went in under the inducement of an advertisement in the local paper to look at a radio advertised at $12.50. They asked to see the radio advertised, and were shown others, but not that one. Finally my husband insisted on being shown the advertised radio; and the preacher then informed him that that was only a bait to get people to come to his shop.”
Ford Motor Company
THE Ford Motor Company began with $28,000 in cash actually paid in, and after paying
• immense dividends for 31 years had accumu-; lated additional property calculated to be worth I $600,000,000. It is the duty of teachers to explain to boys that every boy may do the same, which, of course, is utterly foolish, when the boy leaves school and finds he cannot even get a job.
And what of the boy who honestly wonders whether Adolf of Swastikaville has secretly aped the ‘flivver king’ who also used the so-; called “Protocols” in trying to down the world’s champion gold-getters I
Agriculture
Tubercular Cattle for Meat?
AM sending in a few facts concerning this J- land of the free. A man from the government has been in and around Buena Vista testing the cattle for tuberculosis. If a party protested he was told it was compulsory, and in one case the government man got the sheriff:. Now here is where the rub comes in. It is O.K. to rid the community of tubercular cattle, if they have tuberculosis, or, as far as that goes, any contagious disease, but the cattle that are condemned are shipped to a central location, in this case Denver, Colo. They are shipped there and sold alive or butchered for meat, which meat is to be canned and distributed to the people.
“Now, what I’m wondering is this: Is this meat fit for consumption, supposed to be tubercular, canned or otherwise? Those who had cattle condemned and which cattle were shipped didn’t get a receipt of any kind showing that the government got said cattle. The government man appraised the stock at $35 per head, and stated that the owner would get $20 or thereabouts, but how is the owner going to be sure of what he will get, not having a receipt showing that the government got the stock? One middle-aged couple gave up three head, which were their entire means of self-support. Is this right in a land that is supposed to be free?”—W. E. S----,
Colorado.
Russian Thistles as Stock Feed
UPPLYING further information on an item in issue No. 415, page 731: “Russian thistles are tumbleweeds (Salsola pestifer), grow annually from the seed and develop in hot, dry weather when most other vegetation is shriveling up and dying; hence the 400,000 tons in the drought area of Kansas in 1934. The Russian thistle is very easy to handle in any fields where the growing crop is cultivated, but in small grain fields, where the grain is a poor stand, or the weather unfavorable to its natural development, especially when drought is the unfavorable condition, Russian thistles literally take the field. Then in stubble fields of the Dakotas, Nebraska and Kansas a rank growth of Russian thistles is very common. The young plants are almost as soft as down. Cattle, hogs and horses go out of their way, when grass is plentiful, to eat these young plants. They are succulent and nutritious. Tame hay, cut where Russian thistles are present in this early stage, is rather improved in palatability and nutritive value. The thorns begin to develop according to the season and the location of the growing plant. In cultivated land, where there is little competition, plants may be as large as a half-bushel measure and be handled barehanded with impunity. In sod they may be very small, and irritate through a thickness of cloth. Thousands of tons of Russian thistles were eaten green last year by livestock in the belt west of the Missouri. Other thousands of tons were stacked for winter feed. After blossoming stage is reached Russian thistles are very harsh, woody and covered all over with short, sharp thorns, but probably thousands of cattle are alive today in the middle west because of Russian thistles.”— F. B. Dwi-gans, Nebraska.
Chasing Monkeys on Long Island
SMALL army of monkeys escaped from a wild animal ranch in eastern Brooklyn, and, though many were captured, there were still 117 at liberty at the end of the second day. Meantime four had been electrocuted by coming in contact with third rails and high-tension wires. It is conceived possible that these monkeys are able to withstand the climate and survive and breed on Long Island.
Butter Stocks Running Low
TN THE middle of April butter stocks were so A low, owing to last year’s big drought, that wholesalers were canvassing dairy farms for supplies. The poor are feeling the pinch of almost double prices for butter that is not as good as it used to be.
Land of the Kangaroo
USTRALIA is the only land where there are kangaroos; it is the only land where there are black swans; it is the only land where the honest lawyers club together to make good the losses which clients sustain through robbery of trust funds by dishonest lawyers.
Tremendous Migration of Jack Rabbits
UTOMOBILE travelers in the Texas panhandle report a tremendous exodus of jack rabbits, mostly females, in a horde 300 yards wide and miles in length. It was headed toward the southeast, probably in search of water.
Proposed Bounty on Blondes
THE Atlantic City Evening Union is responsible for the following: “Double Zero— A placard advertising a lecture entitled ‘Armageddon ! What Is the Way of Escape?’ is on display in a window of the Boardwalk Arcade. Two blondes of the mental midget class on their way to the beach paused for a moment to analyze the message. What’s Armageddon—a new racket?’ queried the curious one. Her companion had the answer. Tt’s a basket made out of the shells of those little porcupines,’ she answered happily. We’ve got one at home.’ The first speaker thought that was a funny thing to have to worry about escaping from, but she accepted the explanation for what it was worth. ‘That dame must be thinking of an armadillo,’ said a bystander. He added that there ought to be bounty on blondes instead of stray cats and dogs.”
The Rush to Ruin
SAYS W. C. Robinson, of Tennessee: “In 1850 we had 4,000 centenarians out of 50,000,000.
Now we have 2,840 out of 120,000,000. In 1850 there were sixty-seven insane out of every million. Now there are 2,500 out of every million. In three years the arrests for counterfeiting have tripled. In ten years crime has increased 400 percent; and in thirty-five years, 1,200 percent. In 1850 the proportion of prisoners to population was 1 to 3,000; in 1890, 1 to 800; and in 1932, 1 to 375. Divorce has increased 125 percent since 1890, while sex crimes have jumped 700 percent since 1900. The World War cost $1,000,000 an hour, but the crime bill of the United States is now $2,000,000 an hour. There were 20,000 suicides in 1931. Our annual death toll by homicide is now 12,000. Slayings have increased 100 percent since 1900.”
Georgia Father Sells His Daughter
ONE often reads of the sale of Japanese and Chinese daughters by their fathers. Prices are as low as $10, possibly sometimes even less. It is with shame that the admission is now made that this disgraceful practice has made its appearance in the Western world. A man in Rossville, Ga., sold his eleven-year-old daughter for $125, to be the wife of a man 35 years of age, and lied in the bargain, giving her age as 14. The girl ran away to Atlanta and applied to the courts for protection.
The Chicago Heifer Exchange
K COPY of The Calumet Index, of Chicago, under the heading of “Weddings and Engagements”, describes the wedding of Edythe Dekker and John Wood and then says feelingly: “Cows were exchanged before the pastor of the Bethany Reformed church, Dr. Harry J. Hager”. This is all right, every way, you understand, but just why this happy Chicago couple should want to swap livestock with each other, and drag the pastor in on it, is not made clear. The proofreader goes on to say of the effect of this on the bride that she had a “gown of white satin with a train and a veil of tulle enhanced by a blushing veil”. Nobody has any business to say that one of the cows stepped on the tulle and made the veil blush, but maybe it did. It all seems like Alice in Wonderland.
A Twin 46 Hours Late
AT Bethlehem, Pa., a second daughter in the family arrived forty-six hours after the first, which is perhaps a record. Some years back twins came to a family, one of the twins born in one year and one in another, although the time between their births was not as long as in the Bethlehem case. The Bethlehem mother was 29 years of age; her babies weighed about six pounds each.
New Recipe for Getting Bald
IN News Week it is said of Joe Ruddy, water polo player, that he “has lost all his own hair —probably, he says, because of alum [potassium aluminum sulphate] once used in pools to purify the water”. Persons desiring to accomplish this result can make rapid headway in that direction by using an ordinary aluminum washbasin.
The Price of Relief
IN AN address in New York city Roger Babson, statistician, said, in part: “Every two workers are supporting one idle worker. In spite of the highest taxes in our history, the nation is going into the hole at the rate of $281,000,000 per month, or $66,000,000 per week, or $6,500 per minute.”
Baby Speaks 1,100 Words
K 20-month-old baby, Jackie Grub, Minneapolis, has a vocabulary of 1,100 words. The child’s vocabulary is now equal to that of a 40-month-old child.
Obedience Brings Visions of the Son of God
BEFORE the dawn of the twentieth century, it is estimated, about twenty thousand millions of the children of Adam had been born, run their little span of a fraction of a century, breathed their last, and moldered into dust. They await the Life-giver, without whom all is lost.
Suppose you had been one of these Suppose you could have had the choice of being of any race, living in any clime, and at any period in those fifty-nine centuries. What would have been your choice?
Would you have chosen to be one of the multitudes that gazed with awe upon the military achievements of Alexander the Great, or Caesar, or Napoleon, or any other man that filled the world with widows and orphans, and with blood and tears? Would you even have been willing to be any one of these imperial impersonations of force and murder? You know you would not.
It would have been a great inducement to live to see the dramas of which Joseph, and Moses, and Mordecai, and David, and Daniel and Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego were central figures, or to be one of these, but no one of these brought eternal life to any, and they, all alike, await the voice of Him who spake as never man spake, when they shall rise from their dwellingplaces in the dust. Indeed, most or all of these long since moldered away completely, and the dust of which they were composed has gone hack into the great reservoir from which it came.
Would you prefer to have lived in the days of Washington or Jefferson or Lincoln, or to have been one of these? These too have gone, and though their sepulchers remain, and their memories are green, yet their one hope is in the One who shall speak and all that are in their graves shall come forth, because to Him is committed all power in heaven and in earth.
And so, if you had been one of those who lived in any of the centuries that have gone before (and you were now with the unnumbered multitudes who lived and died hoping for eternal life under perfect conditions), you would have wished to live in the days of the only One who ever did, or ever could, or ever will have it in His power to bestow that unspeakable gift. You would have wished to live in the days of the Son of Man.
And So You Were Like Nathanael
Nathanael Bartholomew was not a great man, as the world counts greatness, and never pretended or desired to be. He was just a common, ordinary man who wanted to be right and do right, and he was hoping the great hope that had been instilled in him by his parents and other teachers that a great Savior would soon make His appearance and he and all such might thereafter and for ever be delivered out of the hands of all their enemies and serve Jehovah God without fear of death or any other evil, in holiness and righteousness, forever and forever. The apostle John always calls Nathanael by his proper name; all the other sacred writers called him Bartholomew (son of Ptolemy).
Nathanael was born at Cana, five miles northeast of Nazareth, on the road from Nazareth to those cities at the head of the sea of Galilee where Jesus lived (Capernaum) and where most of His mighty works were performed, there and at Chorazin and Bethsaida. Cana and Nazareth were some twenty-five or thirty miles distant from the three cities last named, which are all within a radius of five miles of each other.
The word "Bethsaida” means "fishing town”. It was the happy fortune of that town that Jesus selected three of its residents, Peter, Andrew and Philip, to be His disciples. Jesus was at the convention of John the Baptist at Bethabara and was just about to accept an invitation to the wedding at Cana. A day would be required to make the journey. The day following would be the wedding, near His old home town of Nazareth, when the story opens as recorded in John 1: 43-51:
"The day following, Jesus would go forth into Galilee, and findeth Philip, and saith unto him, Follow me. Now Philip was of Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip findeth Nathanael, and saith unto him, We have found him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. And Nathanael said unto him, Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth? Philip saith unto him, Come and see. Jesus saw Nathanael coming to him, and saith of him, Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile! Nathanael saith unto him, Whence knowest thou me? Jesus answered and said unto him, Before that Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig tree, I saw thee. Nathanael answered and saith unto him, Rabbi, thou art the Son of God; thou art the King of Israel. Jesus answered and said unto him, Because I said unto thee, I saw thee under the fig tree, believest thou? thou
slialt see greater things than these. And he saith unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Hereafter ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.'’
Nathanael Was a Man of Prayer
Nathanael was a man of prayer. He was '■’found” by Philip, as Philip himself was “found” by Jesus. Both were sought after. Both were previously known. Probably both were followers of John the Baptist, and had been baptized of him, con Cessing their sins. Both, without a doubt, were friends of Andrew, Peter, James and John, who lived in Philip’s own town, and probably by this time the whole convention knew that John the Baptist had pointed out Jesus as “the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world”.
The record seems to show that this finding of both Philip and Nathanael was at Bethabara, in the valley of the Jordan, some thirty or more miles from their home, and an equal number of miles (nearly) from Cana and Nazareth. Here was one of John’s favorite places for baptisms; thousands were in attendance. Twice at this convention John the Baptist had called attention to Jesus as the Lamb of God. It is not so easy to “find” people at a convention of thousands of earnest seekers after truth. This was demonstrated recently at Washington.
At any rate, even before Nathanael was “found” he was alone with God under a fig tree, and doubtless upon his knees, away from all prying eyes, asking God to direct his course. He did not assume to know it all. He knew he needed guidance. He was ready to be taught of God. He was ready to be led. He wanted only to be led in the right way, and he prayed that God would help him, that he might make no mistake in something so vital.
There are two ways that Jesus could have seen Nathanael. The most natural one would be that He had seen him with His natural eyes when Nathanael withdrew from the others to pray for guidance; the other would be that, by the ministrations of the angels, a miracle was performed, and an act of television was performed two thousand years ahead of time, by which Jesus saw hiin no matter where He himself chanced to be at the moment. At any rate the identification was complete, and according to the will of Jehovah God, who ‘sets the members in the body as it pleases Him’.
No Miracles Yet Performed
No miracles had yet been performed by Jesus. John and Andrew stayed at His lodging place the day when Jesus was identified as the Lamb of God. The next day Peter was located, and the day following, Philip and Nathanael. It is probable that the very day that Philip and Nathanael were found, all five were on their way home. They may all have gone back to the head of the sea of Galilee, some forty-five or fifty miles, by way of Cana, and probably did. In any case it is likely that Nathanael went along with Jesus to the wedding which was to occur at his birthplace. Probably the people that were to be married were well known to Nathanael; they were certainly well known to Jesus, because Jesus’ mother seemed to feel and to show considerable responsibility for the happy management of things pertaining to the marriage festivities.
At the conclusion of the marriage festivities, after the water had been turned into wine, and the ruler of the feast had praised the wine as excellent, the account says: “This beginning of miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth his glory; and his disciples [the four, including Nathanael, summoned within the past three days] believed on him. After this he went down to Capernaum, he, and his mother, and his brethren, and his disciples.”—John 2:11,12.
It was a happy party that went down from Cana to Capernaum; but one of the happiest of all, it is easy to understand, was Nathanael. One day he is praying that he may not go astray in following the one pointed out by John the Baptist as the Lamb of God; the next (or possibly the same day) Philip finds him and tells him that they have really found the Christ, he invites him to come and see that it is really true, and Jesus comforts his fluttering heart by telling him that He knows he is a lover of God, guileless and true, that He saw him under the fig tree, and that he shall have still greater evidence that He i’s all Nathanael supposed Him to be.
That very same day “Jesus would go forth into Galilee”, and it is exceedingly probable that the whole group of five went along to the wedding. What an opportunity that would be for Nathanael and all the rest, to ask questions, but, above all, to listen to the One who spake as never man spake!
The Curious Promise
In Nathanael's mind there would be Jesus’ curious promise, (Hereafter)1 "ye shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man.” How could that be fulfilled? When would it be fulfilled? Would there be more than one fulfillment? He would wait and see.
It is not necessary to alter the story by even one word to see the first fulfillment. It took place at Nathanael’s birthplace, at the wedding at Cana of Galilee, where the first miracle was performed. Nathanael there had it clearly revealed to him that the angels of God acting as Jesus’ messengers always have access to the face of the Father which is in heaven.
When Mary came to Jesus saying, "They have no wine,” it may be that Nathanael took the matter to God in prayer, or he may have heard Jesus do so. In any event the angels of God “ascended”; they had access to the Father’s face; heaven was opened to them; and the result followed that Jesus had predicted. They descended upon the Son of man with commission from the Most High God to turn the water into wine, and well they fulfilled their commission.
Subsequently, on the night of the betrayal, Nathanael heard Jesus say: “Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions [120,000] of angels?”—Matthew 26:53.
It is not claimed for Nathanael that he was a man of strong faith; rather, his faith was weak. But he had a good heart, and Jesus said, ‘These are they that have received the word into good and honest hearts.’ And because he had a good heart, and because he wanted to do right and be led in the right way, and asked to be led in that way, he got his heart’s desires.
It All Hinged upon His Obedience
But it all hinged upon his obedience. He prayed for guidance. That prayer was answered by Philip’s coming to him and telling him of the great ‘find’. It sounded too good to be true. Nathanael had come from Cana, of which, it might almost be said, Nazareth was but a suburb. He knew the town did not amount to much. He knew it was mentioned in the Scriptures.
When he obeyed he got the blessing. First he had the unspeakable privilege of meeting the One who would die for him that he might live; then he heard that One commend him for his guilelessness, and for his secret prayer for guidance before Philip found him. Then he (most probably, following the record as it runs) walked with Jesus a day’s journey to Cana; then he saw with his own eyes a miniature fulfillment of Jesus’ promise about ‘the angels of God ascending and descending upon Him’ with their gifts from heaven.
But it did not stop there. The next day he was with the disciples that trudged another day’s march to Capernaum. Then he was with Jesus the rest of His earthly life. He (along with Peter, Thomas, James and John) was one of those who saw Jesus after His resurrection.— John 21: 2.
He did not leave any record except that of his obedience, recorded by John. What more could he leave? Is not that enough? Now he is for ever with the Lord. Does he now see heaven’s portals open to the wishes of the Son of God, now at the temple for judgment work? What think you? Why, you see that yourself. Does he see the angels returning with their gifts, the gifts of an understanding of the prophecies, and the guidance of God’s true remnant on earth further and further in the way that leads to the vindication of Jehovah’s name, the Happy Day? You know he does. You know that he is himself a treasured part of the organization of the great Jehovah God, one of those privileged to inquire forever and forever in the temple. “And still new beauties shall he see, and still increasing light.” And all because he was obedient.
“Bloody Sweat” Demonism in Italy
IN Cosenza, Italy, two young women this spring-are alleged to have exuded blood profusely from their faces on Good Friday; one of these has had this experience eleven consecutive years, so it is claimed. While there have been frauds in Italy in such matters within very recent years, and such frauds have been mentioned in The Golden Age, yet it is quite possible that these two cases are not frauds, but are genuine manifestations of demonism, made public to hold poor creatures in bondage to a devilish ecclesiastical system, and to dishonor God by falsely making it appear that He is interested in seeing others sweat a bloody sweat, as Christ did at Gethsemane.
Bunk, Buncoed, and Buncombe
The Kellogg Peace Pact
WHY, yes, to be sure, there is the Kellogg
Peace Pact, originated in the United States, that denounces war as immoral and declares against it as an instrument of national policy. Ethiopia, threatened by a powerful murderer already at its very door, happened to think of the Kellogg Pact, and drew it to Uncle Sain’s attention. And Uncle Sam, with sublime hypocrisy, sent back a note that he could not believe that Italy would do such a thing. But on the very same day Mussolini stood on top of a cannon and said that Italy would not be turned aside, and on the very same day the United States ordered out of Ethiopia all the 125 American citizens who then were there. And thus endeth the Kellogg Peace Pact.
Ethiopia Would Prefer British Rule
IN AN address at London the Ethiopian minister to London, Dr. Azaj AV. C. Martin, let fall the statement: “In any case, if worst comes to worst, I think my people would rather be under the just and considerate administration of Britain than Italy.” And perhaps that is what may happen, temporarily. The Ethiopians are up against it. Of the emperor’s fleet of twelve planes only five can get off the ground at all, and if one should go up in the sight of Italy’s air force the aviator in charge would be dead before he reached the ground. Ethiopia, humanly speaking, has no chance whatever. The trained lions which once sat on either side of the king, and which on occasion could be used to dispose of unwelcome guests, are now replaced by dogs.
Selassie’s Priests Like All the Others
elassie’s priests are like all the others. They have been going about among the Ethiopians and assuring the young men who will be slain that those dying for their country will be sure of heaven. Talk is cheap, and a priest is paid to talk. No man would cheerfully urge an other man to die, while he himself stayed in the rear, except for good and sufficient compensation. It goes in Ethiopia, the same as in all other lands where this century-old fraud is perpetrated, that the priest is in the priest business because it is a relatively safe and exceedingly well paid job. As far as the common man is concerned, the priest cares nothing whatever what becomes of him, and would not even pray to get him out of a purgatory bake oven without being paid for it.
Year Book of Jehovah’s witnesses for 1936
ALL who arc interested in the advancement of the
Kingdom interests in the earth will be thrilled with the 1936 Year Book of Jehovah’s witnesses. It contains a report of the activities of Jehovah’s witnesses throughout the earth for the year 1935, and you will be interested to know how the witness work is progressing in various countries. Further, the Year Book contains a Scripture text for each day of the year, with a short comment taken from The Watchtower, which is a great aid to God’s people in carrying on the Kingdom work.
Send in your order now. It will be mailed anywhere on a contribution of 50c per copy.
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Calendar for 1936
HERE is now ready the new Calendar for 1936, which is specially prepared for Jehovah’s witnesses and their companions. It contains an interesting letter from Judge Rutherford, and information that will be helpful to you in arranging your part in the witness work for 1936. The striking picture on the calendar will greatly stir all those who arc for Jehovah and His kingdom.
These will be mailed to any address at the following rates: singly, 25c; in lots of 5 or more, 20c each. Send your order in early, as there is only a limited supply.
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159
YES, IT IS TRUE
But for December Onb?
Judge Rutherford’s latest bound book, “Jehovah,” and two others, “Prophecy” and “Preservation”, the three of them on a 50 c contribution.
f—"' 00D persons have long wondered why God has permitted so much wick-j edncss on the earth. Why there are such feverish preparations for war. Why God promised to establish a righteous government on earth, and when that promise will be fulfilled. These three large books and the booklet Government will answer all these questions and many more, and prove that the answers are correct. The information they contain is of greatest value to you. Why not read them carefully?
This special combination of clothbound books, Jehovah, Prophecy and Preservation and the booklet Government-Hiding the Truth: Why? you can have and the contribution of 50c which you make will enable the publishers to put into the hands of some other truth-hungry person this message of comfort and hope. By using the coupon below you can obtain as many combinations of this special offer as you desire. We will mail them to any address you give us, or to you direct so that you can distribute them amongst your friends.
We hope that every Golden Age reader will have a part in this unusual distribution. Can you imagine three clothbound books of 360 and more pages each, beautifully illustrated, embossed, stamped in gold, filled with the truth which is of real value to man? The special offer is good for the month of December only, so your order should reach 117 Adams St. before the 31st of December, 1935.
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the three books and booklet mentioned above (at one set on a contribution of 50e).
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Sinaitic and Vatican MSS. omit tho word “Hereafter”.
