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Me Golden Age
A JOURNAL OF FACT HOPE AND COURAGE
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in this issue
ARMAGEDDON
BY JUDGE RUTHERFORD
" MASSACHUSETTS -THERE SHE STANDS!”
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every other WEDNESDAY
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Vol. XVIII-No. 449 December 2, 1936
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CONTENTS
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‘ ‘ Massachusetts—
District of Columbia — Florida 148
Michigan — Missouri — Nebraska 151
Pennsylvania — Tennessee
Vermont — Washington
Was the Gentleman
Whole-Wheat Michigan Rocks
Two Springs Controlled by Moon
Cartoons
“Massachusetts—there she stands”
Oh, it’s awful to be beaten
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Golden Age
Volume XVIII Brooklyn, N.Y., Wednesday, December 2, 1936 Number 449
Armageddon
Judge J. F. Rutherford’s speech to the public and broadcast over WBBR Sunday October 18, 1936
TT WILL BE CONCEDED by all persons that -*• the peoples of the nations of the earth have suffered much during the past twenty years. The people are in perplexity. The rulers likewise are in perplexity and in distress. The peril that is just ahead, however, will bring upon the peoples of the earth far greater suffering. The people prefer to hear good news rather than bad.
Then some may ask, Why use the subject, such as this afternoon, to tell the people about the greatest trouble that shall ever come upon the earth? I answer, by way of illustration, that when the country is threatened with a great storm or tidal wave, the government officials warn the people, and that properly so, even though it is very bad news. With stronger reasoning should the people be warned of the approaching world disaster. It is the command of Jehovah God that the people must be warned in order that they may intelligently seek the only place of safety if they so desire. It is voluntary with everyone. What is here said concerning the peril that is approaching is not the expression of man’s imagination. It is based solely upon the Word of God. Christ, in speaking of this approaching peril, uses these words: ‘Then there shall be tribulation such as the world has never known, and no, never will there be another.’ That should be sufficient reason for every thoughtful person, and particularly every professed Christian, to give careful consideration to the proof relating to the tribulation that is impending and about to fall.
Verbatim Report of the Public Lecture of Judge Rutherford at Newark, N. J.
In the last previous issue, which please see, details are given of the splendid reception of this address, which was the principal feature of the assembly of Jehovah’s Kingdom publishers held at Newark, N. J., October 18, 1936. When the Resolution was proposed, the vast audience, more than filling Newark’s largest auditorium, jumped to their feet and shouted “Aye” as one man.
That great affliction that is coming upon the world is designated in the Bible as ‘Armageddon, the greatest battle of all time’. The battle will not be fought between contending factions or contending nations, but will involve the whole world. On one side in that battle array will be all the wicked angels, unseen by men, and all the wicked people on the earth in all the world, under the seductive influence and command of Satan the Devil. The purpose of that side of the war is to destroy the human race. This is one of the best evidences that the Devil is man’s worst enemy. On the other side of that battle array will be the Lord Jesus Christ, the Vindicator of Jehovah’s name, and all the holy hosts of heaven, and all under the command of Jehovah the Almighty God. The purpose of that righteous side of the battle is to vindicate Jehovah’s name and show to all living creatures that He is what His name implies, the Supreme One, the Almighty, the One from whom all good things proceed.
The word “Armageddon” means the place of battle, and therefore the name itself means, the assembling of troops at the place of battle. The Scriptures designate it as “the battle of that great day of God Almighty”, because the Almighty God will be completely victorious in that battle and He brings it about for His own purpose. It will definitely settle the rule of this world, and settle it right. It will eliminate the wicked from all the earth and enthrone righteousness ; and that is good news to every honest person on earth, regardless of his religious faith.
Why Fought
Well, why should this great battle be fought ? Centuries ago Jehovah God, by His holy prophets, foretold that coming battle and assigned the reason and recorded it in the Bible prophecies for the benefit of those who desire to know. If the peoples of the nations of the earth had been taught the Bible instead of religion, if the parents had taught the children in their homes, and it were taught in the schools, and the people had given heed to God’s Word, the Bible, there would be no disturbance on earth right now. But the time has come when the message of warning must be proclaimed to the peoples of earth and it becomes the bounden duty of every Christian to know and to proclaim to others the reason for Armageddon. It is therefore essential that the facts leading up to the battle should be related on this occasion, because there could be nothing so important as this just now. Therefore I give some time to stating these facts.
The great Creator of heaven and earth, the Maker of all things, is Jehovah God. He reveals himself to man under different titles. His name God means the One who is the creator of all things in heaven and in earth. His name God Almighty, and that is the name that the Constitution of New Jersey has adopted, means that His power and authority is without limitation. His name Most High means that He is above all; and His name Jehovah means His purposes toward His creatures. He is the source of all life, and all creatures who live must serve Him. All will have to take their stand on one side or the other, either for or against Jehovah, and all who take their stand on God’s side must now become His witnesses.
Order of Creation
In the creation of all things, as the Bible recites, the Logos was the first created, and His name subsequently appears in the Bible as Jesus, and the Lord Jesus Christ. Then God created Lucifer, whom He made the overseer of the world. Then He created the angels in heaven, who are the servants who serve in God’s organization. The time came, after many centuries, for the laying of the foundation of the earth and the creation of man; and it is stated in the 45th chapter of Isaiah that the earth was created for man and man for the earth. Had man remained in harmony with God there would have been no sickness and sorrow amongst the human race. It is evident from the prophecy of Job (38:4, 7) that Jehovah informed His heavenly creatures of His purpose to create the earth, and to create man for the earth, and this so thrilled the hearts of those creatures that “the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy”. Lucifer beheld this praise given to Jehovah by other great creatures, and he coveted for himself that which did not belong to him.
It is recorded of him in Jeremiah’s prophecy (51:13) that Lucifer is the covetous one. He resorted to fraud, lying and deception to accomplish his wicked purpose. He seduced Eve and caused her to walk in the way of unrighteousness, and then Adam, because of his selfishness, joined Eve in the transgression and they were both sentenced to death. God gave Lucifer a suspended sentence, which has not yet been executed; and the reason therefor I shall state to you in a moment. He changed Lucifer’s name because Lucifer had become the wicked one, and since then until now he has been known and designated in the Scriptures under four names: Devil, meaning slanderer of Jehovah; Serpent, meaning deceiver; Dragon, meaning devourer; and Satan, meaning adversary or opposer of God. The Devil challenged Jehovah to put on earth men who would maintain their integrity toward Him under adverse circumstances. He defied Jehovah thus to attempt it, declaring that he could make all men ‘curse Jehovah God to His face’. This raised the issue of supremacy, Who is supreme, Jehovah God or Lucifer? Would any creature maintain toward God his integrity? All the creatures of heaven would necessarily ask the question, Who will win? Many of the angels followed Satan in his wicked course and have been wicked since. God could have killed the Devil immediately, of course, but had He done so, the question would never have been settled in the minds of intelligent creatures. Jehovah’s perfect wisdom caused Him, of course, to accept the challenge and to give the Devil all the opportunity he wanted to carry out his threat. Jehovah gave Satan a long period of time in which to do so, and therefore God said to him, as recorded in Exodus the ninth chapter and sixteenth verse: ‘For this cause have I permitted thee [the Devil] to remain, that I might show thee my power, and that my name may be declared in all the earth.’
Jehovah cannot be thwarted in His purpose, although there are many arrogant men that rule in various parts today (and some of them are in New Jersey) that think they can override Jehovah. God has said, as recorded in His prophecies: “I have purposed it, I will also do it.” He gave His promise and decreed that He would establish on earth in His due time a righteous government, put out of existence all the wicked and never permit wicked men or wicked angels to rule, and that then He would bless all obedient ones of the earth with life everlasting and attending blessings. He permits Satan, then, over a long period of time from the creation of man down to Armageddon, to put forth his best endeavors to carry out his wicked challenge. In all that period God would have some witnesses in the earth.
I want to emphasize this fact, that there are two things that Jehovah declared must take place: One was that His name should be witnessed in all the earth, and that then He would show His power is supreme. He sent forth His prophets, who over a period of many centuries declared His name. Such were from Abel down to John the Baptist. They prophesied of God’s purpose and His kingdom. Every one of these was persecuted, and many of them were put to a violent death; and Satan was the instigator of such persecutions. Then, after 4,000 years, Jesus, the Son of Jehovah God, came to earth. He is designated as the “Faithful and True Witness”. He came expressly to declare God’s purpose towards the peoples of the earth, and He did so; and He was persecuted unto death because He told the truth. His apostles that followed Him likewise proclaimed the truth, and they were persecuted to death. All the true followers of Christ Jesus on earth today must be witnesses for the Lord, because now is the time when the witness work must be carried forward. Now is the time when we should expect the Devil, through his agents, to put forth his most strenuous efforts to stop the witness work and put out of existence Jehovah’s witnesses.
Religion and Christianity
I am going to make a statement to you now that will startle some of you, but I will prove it to the satisfaction of every honest man and woman who hears what I say, and that is concerning religion and Christianity. All men are created with a natural faculty, and endowed with the desire, to look up to and worship something higher than themselves. Satan, knowing this, began a long time ago to build his organization amongst men for the purpose of defying and besmirching the name of Jehovah God. It was on the plains of Shinar in Babylon that Nimrod, as the chief leading man, the dictator, the mighty one amongst men, as the visible leader, was put forth as greater than God, and who declared that he did not have to come in line with God’s Word. (Genesis 10:8-10) He was lifted up and made the leader of a religious organization; and this was in defiance of God. Upon the plains of Shinar was builded the tower of Babel, the announced purpose of which was that men would climb up to heaven thereon. That was an insult to Jehovah God and deceived many persons. Satan’s organization there began to have a name, and the Scriptures designate it under the name of “Babylon”. (Genesis 11:1-9) The city of Babylon is likewise a symbol of his organization, religion being the most prominent part thereof. All the nations on earth then embraced the devil religion in defiance of Jehovah God, and practically all persons were turned away from God. Then God organized a nation from the descendants of Abraham, under his grandson Israel, and which was later designated The Jews, that name being derived from the name Judah. The word “Judah”, or Yehudah, means “praise”. When God organized that people in Egypt and led them out as His own people, and put Moses at their head, He gave them His law, and He said to them these words: ‘Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image of any thing in heaven or earth, nor bow down to any thing, for I am thy God.’ (Exodus 20:1-5) Why did He do that ? He did it for the express purpose of safeguarding His people from the devil religion and holding them in line for righteousness until the coming of His beloved Son, Christ Jesus. The apostle Paul, in Galatians the third chapter, expresses this in so many words. Jesus Christ was an Israelite, a Jew, born a Jew, and He came to the Jewish people and taught them. Jesus at that time defined the clear distinction between religion and obedience unto God or Christianity. I am going to read to you in a moment His testimony by which you can determine that His testimony is exactly correct.
The Jewish leaders at that time had departed from the covenant God had made with that nation, and had builded up a religious system. The clergy, or the leaders thereof, were called Pharisees and scribes. Now there are a great many people today on this earth who honestly and sincerely believe that religion and Christianity are synonymous terms and that they mean one and the same thing. Many honest people have never thought about this matter, because the time had not come to mark it out so distinctly. It was about the third century that the terms “religion” and “Christianity” began to be used synonymously; and thereafter the nations of the earth enacted laws concerning religion, and the lexicographers wrote definitions giving religion and Christianity practically the same meaning. The correct definition of religion, however, from the Scriptures, is this: Religion is any form of worship based upon the teachings of men handed down by tradition from one generation to another and is in defiance of or against God’s Word. Christianity means to follow in the footsteps of Christ Jesus by being fully obedient to God’s commandments. With these definitions fully in mind, let me read to you what the Lord Jesus said concerning this matter.
Religion serves man and attempts to please man. Christianity seeks only to please God. I read now from the fifteenth chapter of Matthew: ‘Then came to Jesus scribes and Pharisees, which were of Jerusalem, saying, Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders ? for they wash not their hands when they eat bread. But Jesus answered and said unto them, Why do you transgress the commandment of God by your tradition ? Thus have you made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition. You hypocrites! well did Esaias the prophet say of you, This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoreth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. But in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.’
Here, then, is the clear distinction made so plain and unequivocal that there could be no doubt that religion is based upon the theories or traditions of men handed down from years past; whereas Christianity is based solely upon the Word of Jehovah God as taught by Jesus Christ and obeyed by Him. Jesus at that time gave utterance to these words addressed to the Israelite leaders, the Pharisees and scribes, the clergy of that day, who had adopted and practiced religion, and God declared that because they had departed from His commandments He would destroy that nation; and He did destroy them.
The reason that Armageddon will bring the greatest tribulation upon the world that was ever known is, because the leaders amongst men, in defiance of Jehovah God and His Word, and acting under the seductive influence of Satan the Devil, have adopted and do practice religion contrary to the Word of Jehovah God. By this means they have turned the masses away from the understanding and the worship of Almighty God.
Let no one take offense because I say that religion was organized by the Devil to deceive men. I am going to support my statement with the authority of Christ Jesus, the greatest teacher ever on earth. And I read from John, the eighth chapter, the words of Jesus addressed to those Jewish clergymen, and when I say this I am not speaking against present-day Jews. I am pointing out to you how those Jew religionists had departed from their covenant and were teaching the people religion and not God’s commandments; and that they did in defiance of God's Word; and that the Devil had overreached them by his deceptive influence and caused them to do it. Jesus said to them (beginning forty-first verse of that chapter): ‘Ye do the things of your father. They said unto Him, We are not born of fornication; we have one father even God. Jesus said to them, If God were your Father you would love me, for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but He sent me. Why do ye not understand my speech? because ye cannot hear my word; ye are of your father the Devil, and the lust of your father ye will do; he was a murderer from the beginning and abode not in the truth because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own; for he is a liar and the father of it; and because I tell you the truth you believe me not and seek to kill me.’ Then Jesus told them that because they had yielded to the seductive influence of Satan and led the nation of Israel in defiance of God’s Word, Jehovah God would destroy that nation; and He did destroy it. I am stressing this point to show you why Armageddon is going to come; and this evidence is corroborated by facts which are well known to everyone within the sound of my voice.
Paul, whose name was originally Saul, for years zealously practiced the Jews’ religion. He was a Pharisee of the Pharisees, but when Jesus Christ was revealed to him he became a Christian ; and this is conclusive proof that a religionist, if honest, can become a Christian. A Pharisee of the Pharisees, he persecuted Christ Jesus, and at the same time claimed to represent God; but when he became a Christian he wrote these words, which I read from his epistle to the Galatians, in the first chapter. Mark what he says. I quote: ‘Do I seek to please men? For if I please men I should not be the servant of Jesus Christ; but I certify to you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached to me is not after man; for I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it by man, but it was the revelation of Jesus Christ. For ye have heard of my conduct in time past in the Jews’ religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it: and profited in the Jews’ religion above many my equals in mine own nation, being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers. But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb, and called me by His grace, to reveal His Son [meaning the Lord] in me,’ then he went forth and preached Christ Jesus and the kingdom of heaven. Here is the conclusive proof, then, of the great witness, Paul, that he was once a religionist, he became a Christian, and then not only did he cease to persecute Christ and His brethren, but he became a zealous advocate of the kingdom of God, and suffered persecution himself because he told the truth. Mark this, if you please: a religionist may become a Christian, but a Christian cannot be a religionist. “Christian religion,” as it is called, is a misnomer. There are many religions; there is one Christianity. There is no such thing in existence as the “Christian religion”, because Christianity is based wholly upon the Word of God; and that is the reason the Devil is against it. Because all religions are contrary to God's commandments such are an abomination in God’s sight, as He declares.
The prophets foretold that there would arise in the earth, after the death of the apostles, a great religious organization, ■which would assume to speak for God and in the name of Christ Jesus, and which would become political and commercial, and that it would become “an abomination that maketh desolate” the truth. For this reason Armageddon, as the Lord declares, will destroy the same, and all who support it. You are interested in this because, I am quite sure, you are more interested in your own eternal existence than you are in the theories of any man.
I want to make this statement as plain as I can, because I realize the tension that now exists between those who are blinded by the adversary and those who are on the Lord’s side. It is not right nor is it necessary to hold up any man or any group of men to ridicule and contempt because of their faith or belief which is called religion, and I will not do so. Every man is entitled to believe what he desires; every man should be free to believe what he desires and freely speak his belief, and that has always been the principle recognized in America until recently. But I say this, when any man or group of men organize and practice a system of religion in the name of God and Christ, and use that religion to advance crooked politics and manipulate commercial schemes, then the people should be told the truth in order that they might see that such religion is used by the Devil to defame the name of Jehovah God, and is against the common interests of the people because of its turning them away from God. [Great applause]
Let the enemy take what course they like. I want that statement to be clearly understood and not whitewashed. I am not here for the purpose of assaulting men, but I am here, by God’s grace, to expose a wicked religious system that exists and practices under the name of God and Christ Jesus, which is the greatest enemy on earth to the people’s interests. I shall now submit the proof that there is a mighty religious organization on earth that exactly fulfills God’s prophecy and which defrauds the people and leads them into the wrong way and which is an abomination in the sight of God. I have nothing against any man because he is a Jew, nor have I anything against any man because he is a Catholic. There are millions of honest, sincere men and women on earth who are Catholics, but these are not members of the Catholic church; and for proof of that statement I cite the Catholic Hierarchy’s own publication. The Hierarchy is the ruling body, and it is made up of a few men, and those that control the organization reside in Rome, Italy, and attempt to dictate to the people of the whole world. Their doctrines are even more deceptive because some apparently find foundation in the Bible, but are based really upon the traditions of men and are against the commandments of Almighty God.
Purgatory
The chief doctrine that the Hierarchy has put forth to the peoples of the world, and by which millions of honest and sincere people have been deceived, the doctrine that is the source of the greatest amount of revenue to the Hierarchy, is founded upon the teachings of men and handed down by tradition extending over a long period of time. Now, somebody says, “I don’t believe that.” I will read you something from an authority that no one of the Catholic Hierarchy on earth dares call in question. I hold in my hand a book entitled The Faith of Our Fathers. (78th Rev. Ed.) It is written by the late distinguished James Cardinal Gibbons, about whom every Catholic in America knows. On page 208 he says concerning “purgatory”, after describing it, that a man goes to “purgatory” if he is guilty of some sins, and has to wait there for an indefinite time while undergoing torture. Then he says: “His soul will be ultimately saved, but he shall suffer, for a temporary duration, in the purifying flames of Purgatory. This interpretation is not mine. It is the unanimous voice of the Fathers of Christendom." (Not of the Scriptures, however.) Continuing Cardinal Gibbons says: “Now, the same motive which you have for rejecting the opinion of an ignorant politician and embracing that of eminent jurists, on a constitutional question, impels you to cast aside the novelties of religious innovators and to follow the unanimous sentiments of the Fathers in reference to the subject of purgatory. I would wish to place before you extended extracts from the writings of the early fathers of the church bearing upon this subject: but I must content myself with quoting a few,” and then he quotes two pages from the fathers or men, to wit, Tertullian, Eusebius, Cyril, Ephrem, Ambrose, Jerome, Chrysostom and St. Augustine. [Laughter]
Now let’s take this solemnly, my good friends, because I am trying to drive home a point for the purpose of enabling honest, sincere persons who are held by a religious organization to see the truth for their benefit. Continuing Gibbons says: “That the practice of praying for the dead has descended from Apostolic times is evident also from the Lihtrgies of the Church. ... Now, all these Liturgies, without exception, have prayers for the dead, and their providential preservation serves as another triumphant vindication of the venerable antiquity of this Catholic doctrine.” “A Liturgy is the established formulary of public worship, containing the authorized prayers of the church.”
I cite that not to hold up anybody to ridicule. I don’t think that Cardinal Gibbons was altogether to blame for that. He had the reputation of being a sincere man. But going back to the time that he cites, beginning ’way back 1500 years ago, he cites the teachings of men as authority. He had come to the conclusion that words of those men were sufficient authority and that having been handed down by tradition it was not necessary to have their words supported by the Word of God.
I submit, if you please, that this doctrine of “purgatory” has done more harm to good, honest people than probably any other one doctrine, and it finds no support in the Bible. It proceeds upon the theory that a man after he is dead is still alive in “purgatory” and that prayers by men on earth can shorten the duration of his punishment, whereas the Bible expressly says: “The dead know not any thing. . . . Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.” (Ecclesiastes 9:5-10) In Psalm 115:17: ‘The dead praise not the Lord, because they go down into silence.’ Every scripture upon the point shows that when a man dies he is dead and must wait in unconsciousness until the resurrection. If the doctrine of resurrection is true, the doctrine of “purgatory” is as false as the Devil himself. Why do I say that? Because there is no doctrine in God’s Word so clearly and unequivocally taught as that of the resurrection of the dead. The resurrection of the dead means to awaken out of death and stand up again unto life. I submit that if one is in “purgatory” undergoing punishment he could not be resurrected, because he is already alive.
Let me distinguish between the Roman Catholic Church and the common Catholic people called “Catholic population”, and who have no voice in the Catholic Church. The Hierarchy, which is the “Catholic Church” and which rules or controls, resides at Rome (Vatican City, to be more explicit). It claims to represent God and Christ on earth and indulges in the politics of every country on earth, and yet Christ Jesus said: “My kingdom is not of this world.” He kept himself holy and separate from the political affairs of this world. This Hierarchy crowd have sought to control the politics and the commerce of every nation under the sun.
For instance, the Fascists of Italy, whose dictator now rules with an iron hand, are supported by the Hierarchy; the Nazis that rule in Germany by the cruel fist of one Hitler are in full accord with the Hierarchy, and it was the Hierarchy’s scheme to cause a great scare and hullabaloo about Communism in order to frighten the people and then organize the Nazis, seize the government, and destroy the last vestige of liberty in Germany. I know the German people, many of them; I have mingled with them time and again, talked with thousands of them, and there is doubtless no more sincere people on earth than the rank and file of the German people; and yet their liberties are gone, they are held in subjection, they are compelled to honor Hitler whether they want to or not, and he flashes the false statement to the world that everybody in Germany supports him.
In Austria the Hierarchy is in the saddle and rules the politics of that land. Concerning the revolution that is now in progress in Spain the public press misled the people for a while, but now everybody knows, who reads, that the Roman Catholic Hierarchy is back of and prosecuting that revolution against the Spanish government in order to again rule Spain with an iron hand, even as Germany is ruled. There are honest Catholics in Spain, I know. How do I know? Because I have talked with them. There are honest priests in Spain, and who are fearless. I talked with some of them. I had an interview with a priest in Madrid, Spain, a lovable man. No one could say anything against him because he was a Catholic, because he said to me honestly and sincerely: “I have been reared under the doctrines of my church, of course, but I have long looked for the second coming of the Lord and the setting up of His kingdom of righteousness and it is the dearest thing to my heart.”
I quote from Harry F. Ward, who is probably well known to you, and who is chairman of the American League Against War and Fascism, who went to Spain recently and interviewed many Spaniards. That League in its publication quotes the words of a distinguished Catholic priest in Spain, who broadcast his speech by radio. I read this to show you that there are honest men amongst them who do not indulge in politics. Here is what he said: “A Christian cannot be Fascist; for Christianity represents the liberation of the human spirit, while Fascism is the negation of liberty, the reign of violence, and this not in the service of the humble but to safeguard privilege. ... A Christian cannot accept the doctrine of race-superiority, nor the policy of exterminating Jews and Communists. ... A Catholic must obey and respect the church, but the church must not be confounded with those degenerate priests who degrade God to the position of a belligerent, nor with religious orders which heap up riches, nor with priests who shoot from belfries and carry machine guns into battle to the degradation of their holy office which bids the praying for the peace of everybody.”
A question then was propounded to a government official of Spain, as follows: “Mr. McLeod, the Hearst press and the Dailg Mail in England carry daily stories about alleged attacks on churches, on priests and nuns. What has the delegation to say?” One answer was this: “The opinion of the Spanish people is that the government has been, if anything, too lenient with the church all these years, and has not properly pushed the reforms which were much needed. When, after such leniency, the church took advantage of it to attack the government, legally elected by the people, there was an explosion of public anger against churches and priests.” “In these Catholic or church buildings, as government soldiers were passing they were fired upon from the tower of the church, . . . Also in Guadarrama front was a priest in robes standing on a high point and sharpshooting against the People’s militia.”
Now I cite this merely to show that a religious organization, that claims to represent God, is pursuing an inconsistent and God-dishonoring course, in doing those things.
The United States, which has boasted for more than a century of being the land of the free and the home of the brave, stands today on the very brink of disaster and is likely soon to become the home of the pauper, serf farmers and public workers, and the land of the slave, because liberty of speech, and liberty to worship Almighty God, is vehemently opposed by organizations that claim to represent God and Christ, but which represent the Devil. The Hierarchy, although a foreign power, a religious organization, has invaded the official part of every department of America, influencing the judges, putting its tools in the legislative offices, appointing judges in the courts, magistrates, city officials, and others who do the bidding of the Hierarchy. To them the Hierarchy is supreme, and such public officials, at the behest of the Hierarchy, use their power to persecute men and women who honestly and sincerely go about serving God and Christ Jesus. You call to mind that the New York Sun, some time ago, published the fact, and I cite that paper as my authority, that the president of the United States had promised to recognize the Vatican in America, “as soon as the American people can be brought around to the idea,” and I presume that the intention is to bring them around to it next month in the election.
I cite here two newspapers, and there are many others supporting this one point. At the present time, when the political fight is hot in America, there suddenly lands in America the Papal secretary of state, the first time in the history of America. I ask you to solemnly consider, Why does he get here just on the eve of election ? Let the newspaper suggest the reason why, and I cite this too, to show that religion is in politics and is opposing Christianity. I read from the New York American, which says this: “Cardinal’s Historic Visit. For the first time in history a Papal Secretary of State visited America yesterday, and at a time when political and religious conditions inspired rumors that the event would prove historic in its consequence.” I read from the Washington Star, published right under the dome of the Hierarchy’s office at Washington: “The visit of the Secretary of State of the Vatican, Cardinal Pacelli, to America, is believed in well-informed quarters to be preparatory to the recognition of the Papal State by the United States Government and establishment of a diplomatic mission at the Vatican.”
Let me suggest this, my good friends, and the Bible clearly supports it, that the Hierarchy may get into power in this land, but when it does America will find herself in the same condition that Germany now is in.
Persecution of Christians
Probably you hadn’t thought about this, but looking over the history of the men who served God from the time of Nimrod down to this present moment, each one of them has been persecuted because of being a faithful servant of Jehovah God. And who has done the persecuting? In every instance it has been religionists. Religionists persecuted and killed the prophets of Jehovah, and when Jesus came and told the people the truth they persecuted Him and sought all manner of means to put Him to death, and finally succeeded. He told His followers just before being crucified: ‘If they have hated me they will hate you; and because I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.’—John 15:18-21.
Paul, when he was a religionist and went under the name Saul, indulged in the most vigorous persecution of Christians. When he became a Christian, he became the greatest of all the apostles, and then he was persecuted himself in the most fiendish way by religionists. How do you explain this? Why, there is but one explanation, and that is, because of the Devil’s influence. I wouldn’t mention it for any other reason. I am not here to try to cause a fight between religious organizations. I am citing this merely to show that the Devil has overreached men, blinded their minds to the truth, and caused people to practice religion in order to turn them away from God, that he might carry out his threat made more than six thousand years ago.
Call to mind now the Inquisition that was so vigorously prosecuted in the various countries of Europe and America years ago. I have visited the cathedrals in Spain and other parts of Europe. There remain still today, if they have not been destroyed in this war, the places where men were put in racks, others had their joints pulled apart, and others were burned to death. Who did it? The Boman Catholic Hierarchy did it, and the encyclopedias and the histories of the world bear undisputed evidence to that fact. That Inquisition was carried on in Europe, in South America and in other parts of the earth by religionists, that is, the clergy and those under the control of the Hierarchy.
Today in Germany, where there are many honest and sincere men and women, more than 2,000 true and faithful Christians linger behind the prison bars. Why? Because they had in their possession a Bible and an explanation of it, and for no other reason. Many of them have been sterilized because they dared speak the name of Jehovah God and Christ Jesus. Religionists are doing this, whether they are backed by one denomination or another, and the Roman Catholic Hierarchy is in full accord with Hitler carrying on that cruel persecution.
In Austria persecution likewise is carried on by the Roman Catholic Hierarchy, and books are burned which attempt to explain the Bible. The same thing is being done in Quebec. Now we come down closer home. If you had been told, ten years ago, what I am about to relate to you now, you would have said: “Such is utterly impossible.” Here, in the fair state of New Jersey, a state whose early fathers wrote and adopted its Constitution, cruel persecution is carried on in flagrant violation of that Constitution. That Constitution says that ‘every man possesses the inalienable right to worship Almighty God according to the dictates of his own conscience’. That is in harmony with the Constitution of the United States, which holds the same thing in almost the same words. Here in Jersey City, and adjoining towns, a modern dictator instructs his magistrates and his officers, who act under his direction and must obey or lose their jobs, that no Christian, no Jehovah’s witness, can go from place to place and even invite you to come to a public meeting like this without being subjected to arrest.
You came to this convention from different parts of the country. You came here to worship God according to the dictates of your own conscience. The people of Newark and its officers have been very kind, but just outside of this city and within sight of this place, in the last 48 hours 120 persons, who attended this convention, who are devoted to the Lord, have been arrested, and 66 of them are in prison right now. And the modern dictator says: ‘You can’t preach the gospel without a permit from me or some other representative of the Hierarchy.’ I am not citing these facts with the expectation of causing any reform on his part, or the Hierarchy’s part, but I am citing them to warn the people of this great state and the people of America that an underground movement is being forwarded, the purpose of which is to destroy liberty of speech and liberty of action and to throttle the people and compel them to obey the dictates of a foreign religious power. This local dictator causes ordinances to be so construed as to nullify the Constitution of the United States and to nullify the Constitution of the State of New Jersey, and, above all, to defy the Word of Jehovah God.
When the apostles were arrested and brought before courts in their day they said, ‘We must obey God rather than men,’ because God had sent them forth through Christ Jesus to proclaim this message; and they suffered imprisonment for the same reason that honest and sincere Christian people are doing so now. I do not believe that the honest, sincere, faithful Catholic population of this state want to support any such highhanded movement as that. I am quite certain that you, as honest Catholics and honest Jews, and honest nonbelievers, regard your eternal existence and your liberty to worship Almighty God as far superior to the opinion of any man or organization, whether that be foreign or in America. But here is the most serious part of it, and it explains the reason why the apostles, when they stood before the courts in J erusalem, charged with preaching the gospel, were cruelly treated by religionists. There stood up one man of that distinguished court, the Supreme Court of Jerusalem. He called to the attention of his brother judges in that court the fact that they were proceeding in a wrongful manner. That instance is recorded in the fifth chapter of The Acts. To the other members of the court he said: ‘If the work that these men are doing is wrong it will fall of its own weight; but if it is of God there is nothing that can prevent it, and you will find yourselves fighting against God if you oppose it.’ That is exactly the situation today in New Jersey. Men who have defied God have said in the New Jersey courts: ‘Who is Jehovah God, that we have got to obey him?’ Let them take notice now that they are defying Jehovah and fighting against God and they are doing it at the behest of religionists.
The Devil religion has driven the peoples of the nations into darkness and arrayed them against God; and for this reason God declares His purpose to destroy at Armageddon everything that defames His name, because His name shall be vindicated. The speech that I make today could not reform the world. My only purpose is to warn the people who hear, in order that they may take a course to safeguard their own interests, and their only course is to take their stand on the side of Christ Jesus and follow the commandments of Jehovah. Armageddon will be fought, not by men, not by labor organizations against capital, not fought by one religious organization against another, but will be fought under the leadership of Christ Jesus, the rightful ruler of the world, against the Devil and bis hosts that have defamed God’s name. That wicked crowd has kept the people in darkness all these years, caused them to be ruled by a selfish class of men, and finally has driven them into despair. Jehovah declares that all the wicked He will destroy; and the Scriptures so conclusively prove this that there can be no doubt.
Why should Jehovah’s witnesses, who go about the country testifying to God’s kingdom and nothing else, why should they be persecuted ? Why should they be thrown into jail ? There is but one answer: Because the Devil and his agents hate the truth and the people who serve Jehovah God. Such the Devil does in his endeavor to make good his wicked challenge hurled at Jehovah centuries ago.
When
Now the question is, When will this battle be fought? Jehovah decreed that He would have his name declared in all the earth and then He would show the Devil His power and that He would manifest it in the battle of that great day of God Almighty. Before doing that, and after the coming of Jesus Christ, He causes His witnesses to go throughout the land and proclaim His truth. The ransom sacrifice has been paid by Christ Jesus by His death and resurrection. Jesus ascended into heaven long ago and was at that time ready to set up the Kingdom had it been God’s time, but Jehovah said to Him, as written in the 110th Psalm: “Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool.” The fulfillment of that time is at the end of the world, that is, the end of Satan’s uninterrupted rule. Well, no wonder the disciples of Jesus pressed upon Him time and time again their request for some evidence as to what they might see as evidence of the end of the world. The prophecies of the Bible, the chronology of the Bible, and the physical facts that God has brought to pass in fulfillment of the prophecies prove conclusively that the world of Satan’s uninterrupted rule ended in 1914, when the Lord Jehovah placed His great King upon the throne and sent Him forth to rule. God permits Satan to go on for a time, and during that period of time and until Armageddon the opportunity is given men to prove their integrity toward God, and for other men and women to hear the truth and take their stand on the side of God and live, or remain where they are and die.
Revelation twelve tells of the ousting of Satan from heaven, and then explains why all this woe is in the earth. The World War brought great woe, but have you noticed, notwithstanding the slogan that “the war will make the world safe for democracy”, that democracy has practically perished from the earth? That was another deceptive slogan by which the Devil knew he would take advantage of the people. Now all these trials and tribulations and sorrows that have come upon the world in recent years, such as floods and disasters, of various kinds, destruction of crops, hard times, and so on, the religionists tell you have come because you are not faithful to your church religious organization. The Bible tells you differently. The Bible, at Revelation 12:12, says that these woes come from the Devil; because the words of the great Prophet, Christ Jesus, are these: ‘Woe to the inhabiters of the earth, and to the people; for the Devil is come down unto you, knowing that he hath but a short time.’ A short time for what? A short time to prepare for the great battle of God Almighty, the battle of Armageddon, which is just ahead.
For His Name
Why has the Lord been selecting Christians ? Is it because He is trying to get them into heaven? No, that is not it. His promise is that the faithful shall find their eternal abode in heaven, but the purpose of gathering out Christians is stated in the fifteenth chapter of The Acts. God’s purpose is to take out a people for His name that they might become witnesses for Jehovah. Every Christian, therefore, is a true follower of Christ Jesus, and every true Christian is a Jehovah’s witness. Why do I so state it? Because it is stated in the prophecy of Isaiah (43:10-12), “Ye are my witnesses.” And these witnesses are sent forth to do what? To declare Jehovah’s name and kingdom. The Lord says, in Matthew 24:14: ‘This good news of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness, and then the end shall come.’ Therefore the proclamation of the truth, which you Christian men and women have been trying to deliver to the people of this town and surrounding towns in the last few days, has been and is strictly in obedience to God’s commandments.
War on Jehovah’s witnesses
Throughout the whole earth, and particularly in that part of the land called “Christendom”, there is a constant warfare against Jehovah’s witnesses. Who is responsible for this warfare ? The answer is found at Revelation 12:17. One of the names of Satan is ‘the old Dragon’. Jehovah’s organization is symbolized by a woman, and the remnant of her seed are Jehovah’s witnesses. That scripture text reads: “And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.” It is Satan who is using the religionists as his instruments to prosecute this war against Jehovah’s witnesses in his endeavor to destroy everyone who is on Jehovah’s side. His determination is to rule or ruin. The only thing he can do with Jehovah’s witnesses is to try to destroy them. Those who are faithful to the Lord will not be destroyed.
Satan is preparing for the final conflict between all of his forces and the forces of righteousness under Christ Jesus. Concerning this it is written, in The Revelation: “And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet. For they are the spirits of devils, ■working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty. And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.”—Revelation 16:13,14,16.
This Scriptural authority proves that the Devil will plunge all the world into this war with the hope that he may succeed in destroying all mankind. Knowing that it is God’s time to destroy wickedness and establish righteousness, if the Devil can turn all mankind away from God, all such he knows will be destroyed.
Amongst other things his religious agents are carrying on, to accomplish his -wicked purpose, is to cause the people to give to creatures and things honor to which God alone is entitled. In Germany his representatives compel the people to “Heil Hitler”, meaning thereby that salvation and protection proceed from Hitler. In America the religious ceremony is to compel the saluting of the flag, and thus attributing protection and salvation to the flag; whereas all protection and salvation come from Jehovah God through Christ Jesus. In America the Roman Catholic Hierarchy saw the opportunity of deceiving honest, sincere people by instituting compulsory flag saluting. The very ones who attempt to compel others to salute the flag are not the ones who love the American institutions. It is a selfish scheme to take away the liberties of the people. The compulsory flag saluters reason that all good Americans would surely agree to salute the flag. Jehovah’s witnesses do not yield to this compulsory action, because to do so would be disloyalty to Jehovah God. Every Jehovah’s witness in America today w’illingly obeys the laws of the land for which the American flag stands. The saluting of the flag could not make them be more obedient to the laws. In order to be faithful to Jehovah they must obey every law that is in harmony with His law, and therefore they do obey all the laws of America that are in harmony with God’s law, and such are the laws for which the flag stands as representative. When, however, a compulsory rule without law or reason is attempted to be enforced, and that rule requires the saluting of a creature or thing, a true Christian cannot do this and at the same time be faithful to God and to Christ Jesus. The reason is, because God has expressly commanded that those who are His faithful witnesses must not have any god before Him, that they must make no image of anything in heaven or on earth and attribute salvation to that thing or image, for the reason that all protection and blessing proceed from Jehovah himself.
I have nothing to say against the American flag, of course. Everyone who desires to salute it should be privileged to do so, but to compel one to attribute protection and salvation to what a flag represents violates the Constitution, which is the fundamental law for which the flag stands, and, above all, violates the law of God; and for that reason, and that reason alone, Jehovah’s witnesses will not attribute salvation to any thing or creature. That does not mean that they will not obey the laws. They do obey the law; but it is the men who attempt to force this on others that are violating the Constitution and the laws of the land. It is the extreme religionists, in their attempt to control the people, that compel the poor kids, who know nothing about the meaning of the flag, to salute it, and if some of these, who have been taught by their parents to fear God and to serve Him, refuse to salute the flag for that reason, and that alone, they are expelled from school and denied the privilege of an education which the laws of the land guarantee. There is no law in any state compelling the saluting of the flag, and yet the religionists, and such organizations as the so-called “American Legion”, attempt to make and enforce their own laws which deny the rights of the people.
I am certain that honest people, be they Catholics, Jews, Gentiles or others who are law-abiding, do not favor such compulsory action on the part of the extreme and fanatical religionists. Even if all the world would attempt to compel a Christian to do that which God’s Word forbids, then one who is truly devoted to the Lord would not do so. It is time that honest Catholics, Jews and all other honest Americans awaken to the seriousness of this matter and stand by the Word of God and by the principles in harmony therewith that are announced by the fundamental law of the land.
The apostle Paul, the faithful apostle of Jesus Christ, warned against the subtle influence that would be exercised over the people by the philosophy of men, which is contrary to the Word of God. He said: “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.”—Colossians 2:8.
This is a solemn warning sounded by the Lord’s inspired witness and applies to this day of great crisis. The people are told to beware lest they be led into the dark by the sophistries and theories of men who do not represent God and His kingdom but who are against the same. The hour has struck when the people of the world must choose between the teachings of men, handed down by tradition, and the commandments of Jehovah God. Many will choose to follow tradition. Those who love Jehovah God and are faithful to Him will obey His law and look to Him for protection and salvation. Fines, jails and other means of punishment will not deter these faithful ones in showing their devotion to the Almighty God.
The taxpayers of towns in this vicinity will have to pay for the vanity of a few men, the agents of the Roman Catholic Hierarchy, who desire to stop the proclamation of the message of God’s kingdom. Many attending this convention have been arrested and are now in jail and will be tried, and the taxpayers of the community will have to bear the expense, merely because the religionists wish to prevent the people from knowing the truth. God has commanded that the witness to His name and kingdom must be given; and these witnesses will continue to give the truth to the people, regardless of what it may cost. When this witness work is done, then, declares the Lord, there shall come upon the world the greatest tribulation ever known, and that tribulation is designated “Armageddon”.
Result
What will be the result of Armageddon? That will be an act of Jehovah God, which act will destroy wickedness in all the world. The great deluge or flood that came upon the world in Noah’s day was an example of Armageddon, and foretold the results. In the twenty-fourth chapter of Matthew the Lord Jesus declares that as it was in Noah’s day, so shall it be at the end of the world, where we now are. The deluge destroyed the wicked, and only righteous Noah and his family were saved. That foretells the result of Armageddon.
Another example foretelling the result was the battle of Gibeon, in which Joshua led the forces of righteousness. The people of Gibeon were the only ones of the heathen nations that refused to join in opposition to Jehovah’s servants but joined themselves to Joshua, the servant of God, and asked for protection. The enemy attacked the town of Gibeon, and they called upon Joshua for help. Joshua is the figure or type of Christ Jesus, and the Gibeonites represent the people of good will on earth who look to the Lord for help. When Joshua reached the city of Gibeon the fight had already begun. With his army he attacked the enemy, and the enemy fled. As the enemy forces were fleeing along the valley Jehovah God opened the heavens and threw down great chunks of ice, by which many more were slain than fell by the sword. Thus Jehovah foretold that at the battle of Armageddon the forces of heaven will destroy all the wicked in the earth.—Joshua 9,10.
Again I call your attention to the twenty-fifth chapter of Jeremiah’s prophecy, which is a description of what shall come upon the world at Armageddon. The words which I read are not the words of man, but the Lord’s Word, and therein it is written: “Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Behold, evil shall go forth from nation to nation, and a great whirlwind shall be raised up from the coasts of the earth. And the slain of the Lord shall be at that day from one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth: they shall not be lamented, neither gathered, nor buried; they shall be dung upon the ground.” (Jeremiah 25:32,33) So great will be the slaughter by the invisible forces of Jehovah God that there will not be enough people left on earth to bury those who are dead. That will be a tribulation such as the world has never known.
The prophet Habakkuk describes the battle of Armageddon, showing that the sun and the moon shall fail to give their light, that darkness will envelop the whole earth, and the only light to the world will be the flashing missiles of fire and destruction flying through the air. Furthermore, the description discloses that the wild beasts of the forest and the zoos will be turned loose upon the people who have ill-treated the beasts for many centuries, and all these shall take part in the destruction of humankind. Floods and storms, hurricanes and fire, dashing to pieces and destroying cities, towns and nations, and the inhabitants thereof. These things I cite, not for the purpose of exciting anyone, nor to induce you to join something, but they are cited as a solemn warning of why God will bring this great calamity upon the world and what will be the result.
Religionists have for many years persecuted the faithful representatives of God. The religious leaders in the various denominations call themselves ‘the shepherds of the flock’. They speak of the population or congregations as their own flocks. Those shepherds shall have very great woes in this time of tribulation; as it is written by God’s prophet: “Howl, ye shepherds, and cry; and wallow yourselves in the ashes, ye principal of the flock; for the days of your slaughter and of your dispersions are accomplished ; and ye shall fall like a pleasant vessel. And the shepherds shall have no way to flee, nor the principal of the flock to escape. A voice of the cry of the shepherds, and an howling of the principal of the flock, shall be heard; for the Lord hath spoiled their pasture.”—Jeremiah 25:34-36.
The Roman Catholic Hierarchy, with ambition to control the whole world, raises the hue and cry that everyone that is not for the Hierarchy is a Communist. Such is for the very purpose of frightening the people against Communism and thereby driving them into the Catholic organization. The Hierarchy has no interest in the salvation of humankind. Its interest is to rule the world. The Roman Catholic Hierarchy’s newspapers declare that I am a Communist and that all of Jehovah’s witnesses are Communists, whereas in truth and in fact there is not a Jehovah’s witness in the earth who is a Communist. The real conflict is between those who are on Jehovah’s side and those who represent the Devil. What, then, shall the people do under these conditions? Shall they rise up in war or revolution? Shall they resort to carnal weapons? In the language of the Scriptures I answer, No. The part to be performed by Jehovah’s witnesses on earth is not to indulge in revolutions, wars or any other means of destruction. To them Jehovah says: ‘This is not your fight, but mine.’ (2 Chronicles 20:15) The battle is the Lord’s. Those who are witnesses for the Lord must sing His praises as a testimony to His name and wait upon the Lord and mark the exhibition of His power for their salvation and deliverance. To all who love Him Jehovah says: “Therefore wait ye upon me, saith the Lord, until the day that I rise up to the prey; for my determination is to gather the nations, that I may assemble the kingdoms, to pour upon them mine indignation, even all my fierce anger: for all the earth shall be devoured with the fire of my jealousy.”—Zephaniah 3:8.
These striking examples set forth in God’s Word are for the purpose of warning the people as to what they may expect in the very near future; and, as it is said in England, “You have been warned.” Therefore those who have received the warning must choose which side they will take. Whom will you serve, Jehovah or the religionists, who represent Satan the Devil?
Escape
Is there any way to escape this terrible tribulation that is coming upon the earth ? There is just one way. The purpose of calling your attention to this today is that you may see that one and only way. Those who are on Jehovah’s side, which means the remnant and the Jonadabs, are hated by the nations because of their faithfulness to God and devotion to Him. Jehovah God, by His prophet Zephaniah, therefore says to them: “Gather yourselves together, yea, gather together, 0 nation not desired; before the decree bring forth, before the day pass as the chaff, before the fierce anger of the Lord come upon you, before the day of the Lord’s anger come upon you. Seek ye the Lord, all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgment; seek righteousness, seek meekness; it may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord’s anger.”—Zephaniah 2:1-3.
Here Jehovah marks out the only way of escape, and that is by seeking righteousness and meekness. Righteousness means to learn from God’s Word what is right and obey that. Meekness means to be teachable; therefore a willingness to learn what the Lord says to man. If you desire and expect to escape the terrors and the destruction of Armageddon, you must obey the Lord and seek righteousness and meekness. The promise is to such, and such only, that they may be protected in that time.
Some will ask, When shall I take the steps to seek the way of escape? The answer is in the Scriptures: At the present time, right now. Referring to this same time, the Lord Jesus gave this warning to those who desire to be on the Lord’s side, to wit: When ye, therefore, shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place [where it ought not to stand], then flee to the mountains.’ (Matthew 24:15) The “mountains” here mentioned are Jehovah God’s kingdom under Christ Jesus. It is therefore to God and Christ one must flee in order to find the only place of safety. The ‘abomination that maketh desolate’ is the religious organization, which includes all the nations of “Christendom” (Matthew 24:15,16); which religionists, politicians and commercialists, claiming that they have the right to rule the world, stand where they ought not to stand. (Mark 13:14) It is these religionists who claim the exclusive right to interpret prophecy, and to teach the people what they should hear. It is that class that collects the money from the honest Catholics and honest Protestants, to carry on their purposes. That great religious system has reached out now and grabbed many of the countries in Europe and is seeking to control all the countries of the world. It is this great religious system, which includes the combination, or League of Nations, that stands up and claims the right to rule the world in the place or stead of God’s kingdom under Christ. The Lord Jesus then says to the people: When you see this, then you must flee to God’s kingdom and take your stand on the side of Jehovah God and Christ Jesus, if you will escape the terrors of Armageddon.’-Matthew 24:15-21.
Warning
All true Christians must now be obedient to Jehovah God and, as His witnesses, must sound the warning. Jehovah commands, as set forth in the thirty-third chapter of Ezekiel’s prophecy, that His witnesses must sound the warning in order that the people may hear that Jehovah is God, that Satan is the worst of all enemies, that the kingdom of God is the only hope for mankind, and that God purposes to destroy all that are in opposition to His kingdom. The great crucial hour has come, and the question now is, Who will stand on the Lord’s side and who will be on the Devil’s side? Only those who take their stand on Jehovah God’s side, and remain faithful and true to Him, will find salvation.
The religionists have grabbed many of the countries of Europe and ruled them with an iron hand, contrary to God’s commandments. If America falls under the same rule, not only will the truth be suppressed, but freedom of speech, freedom of conscience and freedom of worship will be done and the people will be ruled by the harsh hand of a dictator. To be ruled by a dictator is bad enough, but to be denied the right to worship Almighty God is far worse. Those who do attempt to keep the people in the dark, such as the religionists are now doing, and those who thus fight against God are wicked; and Jehovah declares, in the 145th Psalm, and twentieth verse, ‘All the wicked God will destroy’; and this destruction will take place at the battle of the great day of God Almighty, called “Armageddon”.
The judgment of the nations is now in progress; all nations are before Christ Jesus, the Great Judge. The people must elect to take their stand either for or against God’s kingdom. The peoples of all nations are divided into three classes: (1) God’s anointed witnesses, who are counted a part of Christ Jesus himself, because they are His faithful followers; (2) the “other sheep” of the Lord Jesus Christ, who are people of good will toward God and Christ; and (3) all who oppose Jehovah and His kingdom, and whom the Lord designates as “goats”. Upon this latter class, the “goats”, who fight against God and against His witnesses, the Lord Jesus pronounces this judgment: ‘Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his angels. These shall go away into everlasting destruction.’—Matthew 25:41-46.
This warning is not for the purpose of frightening, but is given strictly because Jehovah God has commanded it to be given; and anyone who is devoted to the Lord, and who then should fail to obey this commandment, will suffer destruction. Such is the declaration of Jehovah, as set forth in the prophecies of Ezekiel, and also Deuteronomy 18:19 and Acts 3: 23. The Christian has enlisted under the banner of Jehovah, and there, by the grace of God, he must abide faithfully until the end. He must continue to bear witness to Jehovah’s kingdom and to His name, and must declare the day of God’s vengeance. He must do this, because Jehovah expressly commands it, as recorded in Isaiah 61:1,2. The Christian, as a witness for Jehovah, must sound a warning to the people, and the Jonadabs, or people of good will, must likewise take their stand on God’s side and join in the proclamation of this message of truth. In this hour of sounding the warning, each one must choose; and therefore to each one it is properly said: “Choose you this day whom ye will serve.”—Joshua 24:15.
Many persons will put their trust in men or rulers on earth; and all who do will fail. The Lord expressly says, in Psalm 146: 3: Tut not your trust in man, in whom there is no help.’ What, then, shall we do ? The Scriptures answer: “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge" him, and he shall direct thy paths.”—Proverbs 3: 5, 6.
All persons who will live must be loyal and faithful to God and Christ Jesus. There is no other way to obtain life; concerning which Jesus says: “And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.”—John 17: 3.
There is but one hope for the human race, and a knowledge of the Scriptures upon which this hope is based is good news today to all. When the babe Jesus was born the angelic hosts sang: ‘Behold, we bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be unto all people. . . . On earth, peace to all of good will toward God.’ Now the Savior and King of the world has come and His kingdom is begun, and to the people Jehovah says: ‘Behold my servant, mine elect, whom I have chosen; in His name shall the nations hope.’ (Matthew 12:18-21) There is no other hope.
Again referring to this great and mighty King Jehovah says: ‘The government shall be upon His shoulder; His name shall be called Wonderful Counsellor, The Mighty God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace, and of His government and peace there shall be no end.’— Isaiah 9:6,7.
The great question at issue before all creatures of the universe now is that of supremacy, Who shall rule the world? That question Jehovah God will for ever settle, and settle it right, at Armageddon. God’s purpose will be fulfilled, and the world shall be ruled by Christ Jesus, the Righteous One, according to the will of Jehovah. Then all wickedness, including the Devil and all of his organization, having been destroyed, every creature that lives shall be praising Jehovah God.
Never has there been before the peoples of earth an issue so vital as this. Therefore God has commanded that this issue shall be plainly proclaimed and His name made known to the peoples of earth, and the opportunity is given to intelligent creatures to select their own course and thus have to do with their own destiny.
I now propose a Declaration and Warning before this assembly, which I ask you to carefully consider, and then express your opinion concerning the same.
DECLARATION AND WARNING
This company of Christian people, assembled in convention at Newark, New Jersey, give thanks to Almighty God, whose name alone is Jehovah, for the privilege of serving Him and His kingdom. We declare as follows:
Because we have devoted ourselves to the service of Jehovah God and His kingdom under Christ, we, by His favor and appointment, are witnesses for Jehovah.—Isaiah 43:10-12; 61:1,2.
The law of Jehovah God is supreme, and should be obeyed by all persons, and must be obeyed by those persons who have covenanted to do His will. When the law of man is in conflict with God’s law we must and will obey God’s law rather than man’s law. In obedience to God’s law, as set forth in Ezekiel 33 and other prophecies of the Scriptures, we sound His warning that God will destroy all who willfully violate His law and who oppose His kingdom.
The kingdom of God under Christ is at hand, and as Christians and servants of Jehovah we declare our unqualified allegiance to Him and His kingdom. The time for the execution of Jehovah’s judgments draws nigh.
Satan is man’s worst enemy, and by means of fraud and deceit Satan is attempting to turn all the people against God and thereby bring about their destruction. Satan employs religion to deceive persons who are sincere. Religion is a form of worship based upon the traditions of men. Christianity is the true worship of Almighty God by serving Him in obedience to His commandments. There are many religions. There is but one Christianity. A knowledge of the teachings of the Bible is therefore of vital importance to all who will gain everlasting life.
In fulfillment of Jehovah’s prophecy there has arisen in the earth a powerful religious organization which is wrongfully called a “Christian” organization. That organization is not only religious, but also political and commercial, and is Satan’s chief visible instrument employed and used to rule the world and to keep the people in ignorance and in subjection to selfish men. That religious organization designates itself as the “Hierarchy of the Catholic Church” and names the millions of sincere persons who are supporters of that organization as the “Catholic population”, but which persons are not members of the Catholic Church. The Hierarchy is composed of a few men, the controlling number of whom are citizens of Italy, but who rule the masses of sincere persons called the “Catholic population” who reside in every part of the earth. The “Hierarchy” is against God and His kingdom under Christ, and at the same time claims the right to rule the world in the name of Christ, thereby deceiving multitudes of good persons who are sincere supporters of the Catholic Church. Those who compose the Catholic Church are the men of the Hierarchy, and other priests, some of which priests are unduly favored, while many other priests are mere menial servants of the Hierarchy and compelled to do the bidding of the Hierarchy.
The Scriptures declare that all persons who by any means oppose Jehovah God and Christ Jesus are wicked and that in due time ‘all the wicked God will destroy ’.—Psalm 145: 20.
We call all the sincere people of the earth, including Catholics, Protestants, Jews and Gentiles, to witness that in Germany the true worshipers of Almighty God are cruelly and fiendishly persecuted, and many of them killed, and that sueh persecution is done by religionists who have forgotten God and who follow the teachings of men. It is well known and generally conceded that the Hitler government and the Hierarchy, that rules the Catholic population, are in full accord. Furthermore we call all good persons to witness that within New Jersey religionists, led by the Roman Catholic Hierarchy, have indulged in and continue to indulge in the cruel persecution and punishment of true Christians, merely because such Christians declare the truth of God’s Word and carry God’s message to the people in obedience to Jehovah’s commandments.
We vigorously protest against the cruel persecution of Jehovah’s witnesses by religionists, and we denounce as cruelly wicked the persecution of all persons because of their faith or belief. Regardless of all persecution we will continue to serve Jehovah God, relying upon His promise that in due time He will duly recompense the wicked by completely destroying them. Jesus Christ, as Jehovah’s chief officer, says to those who persecute His followers: ‘Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. . . . Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his messengers. These shall go into everlasting destruction.’—Matthew 25.
The indisputable facts show that the world’s greatest tribulation is at the door and that there is only one way of escape. In obedience to Jehovah’s commandment we warn all persons, without regard to religion, race or color, that their only hope is in the kingdom of God under Christ. All who would live must take their stand firmly on the side of Jehovah God and His King, Christ Jesus, and give heed to the words of Jehovah, to wit: ‘Behold my servant [Christ Jesus] ; He shall judge the nations, and in His name shall the nations hope. ’ (Matthew 12:18-21) Therefore the people are warned that they must no longer rely upon and give support to religionists, but that they must rely upon Jehovah God’s commandments and must find protection and salvation only by and through the kingdom of God under Christ.
We have no desire to influence the political affairs of this world, but in obedience to God’s commandment we must sound His warning, that the people may be informed and may intelligently choose whom they will serve.
We send loving greetings to our persecuted brethren and bid them be^of good courage and to remember the words of our Lord: “Shall not God avenge his own elect? ... He will avenge them speedily” (Luke 18: 7, 8) ; and, further, to give heed to the words of the Lord Jesus addressed to His faithful servants: “Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee the crown of life.” Blessed is the lot of those who are permitted to endure all manner of suffering for the sake of the name of Jehovah and His kingdom under Christ. (Matthew 5:10-12) The everlasting peace, joy and life of the people is centered in the great Prince of Peace, whose government is at the door and which will be administered in full righteousness and to the good of all obedient ones.—Isaiah 9: 6, 7; 32:1.
Resolved, That a copy of this Declaration and Warning be published throughout the earth.
Dated October 18, 1936.
If you believe in God and His Word, instead of the traditions of men; if you love righteousness, and hate iniquity, and you are for God and Christ Jesus, then you will support this Declaration. I ask you, therefore, that every one who is of that mind support it by rising and saying, Aye.
[This Declaration and Warning was unanimously adopted by a rising vote and shout of “Aye” and amidst great enthusiasm.]
“Massachusetts—There She Stands”
| As you read the scathing comments in American newspapers on the disgrace of Belchertown, Massachusetts, in refus- | | ing a knowledge of reading, writing and arithmetic to three little children because they are not converts to the “flag- f | salutin’ religion’’ (the new, cheap, Roman Hierarchy substitute for patriotic Americanism), do not get the idea that there | | are no Americans in Massachusetts. Representative Dorgan, who fathered the ‘ ‘ flag-salutin ’ law ’ ’, and Governor Curley, | | who boasted of being ‘ ‘ the only Catholic governor ’ ’, who signed it, were both defeated for re-election, for which all people | 1 with common sense are grateful. Neither one is fit for any public office. Now, maybe, the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, | | which has been leisurely studying the effect of this nonsensical law for a year (and meanwhile tacitly consenting to de- | I priving these little children of their educational advantages—and threat of a reformatory sentence if they do not salute) I | will come to a decision that the law is about on a par with what one could expect of a Dorgan or a Curley, and everybody i | with any sense will be happy. |
Massachusetts is making progress, in 1635 she expelled Koger Williams from the colony because his religious views differed from those of the Puritans. After 31 years she became a little ashamed and, after Mr. Williams’ house had been burned by “Indians”, sent word that he could return to the colony if he would remain silent about his religious views. Wonderful ! Then after another 270 years she revoked the sentence of expulsion, but, for fear history would say she had moved too fast toward civilization, in the same year she sentenced three little children to a reform school because the children had different views from those of the majority as to what constitutes idolatry.
“Massachusetts—there she stands’’
In an address at Northampton, Massachusetts, regarding the proposed imprisonment of three children of Ignace Opielouski for refusal to salute the flag, Roger Baldwin, president of the American Civil Liberties Union, said, in part:
“This is the first ease in the United States where children have been threatened with removal from their homes to a training school because they put loyalty to God above loyalty to State. That issue was once decided in Massachusetts in favor of God, but it appears today that He occupies second place in the State. Massachusetts gets the brown derby for going further in these eases than any other State.”
This case attracted much attention in the public press. Some of these press comments are here presented, arranged in order of the states:
Alabama — California — Connecticut
The crime of the three little Belchertown children is that they honor their father. Now their father may be singularly wrongheaded, but you are not likely to convince his children of that by packing them off to a reformatory. You are only likely to persuade them that their father is a more kindly man than a judge who punishes children for holding firm to a religious belief. It is no wonder that religious leaders and educators are outraged.—Mobile (Ala.) Press.
Fortunately the youngsters have not gone yet, as their father, who seems to be a determined person, is carrying the case to a higher court. But this Massachusetts case will probably be useful. It has gone to just the right extreme to show up the preposterous nature of this campaign to punish children for what their parents think they find in the Bible. It has already produced a revulsion in the Bay State, which finds itself unwilling to go back to Salem witchcraft days.—San Francisco Chronicle.
The salute law echoes the spirit of the teacher’s oath bill. It expresses an impatient, self-
righteous, short-sighted impulse of the mass to inflict obedience. “Let them say Heil, Heil or suffer for it.” That is the spirit, a spirit too often born not of confidence and faith but of strain due to fear and doubt. In the instance of the children, it defeats its own ultimate purpose, the upbringing of loyal and intelligent citizens. If this is not an act of tyranny, rather than one of enlightened self-government, it is hard to understand why not. The Boston Globe aptly quotes De Toqueville as saying, “Under a tyranny, you have only one tyrant, but under a democracy you exchange one tyrant for a million.” There are more than four million tyrants in Massachusetts who permit this law to remain on the statute books. Liberty apparently means little to them. What they want is conformity.
—Hartford (Conn.) Courant.
The sect taught the children not to set up idols alongside the real God; and it considers saluting the flag in the form of doing obeisance to an idol.
The Constitution of the United States, as well as all state constitutions, guarantees to the individual the right of free religious worship and religious freedom. . . .
What is to be done in such cases? Certainly not as the judge in Northampton acted. The youths are not to blame; they did not found the sect, and merely by accident were born into it. Furthermore, the sect is a law-abiding and deeply religious organization, conserving a high type of citizenship generally except in the utter refusal to indulge in anything smacking of “idol worship”.
The Northampton case rightly has been appealed. It should go through to the U. S. Supreme Court. Obviously nothing could be gained by the state in keeping the children of Jehovah’s witnesses in reform schools; they would not be reformed, and the state would be footing the bills of their keep and running the risk of manufacturing an undying enmity to the state on the part of the children and their parents.
And care must be taken not to give Communists and Fascists too much to chew about. The state should exercise care in not providing followers of these schools of thought with readymade arguments. And between either the Communists and Fascists—both of whom are quite willing to mumble patriotic phrases if and when put to it—we prefer the religious sect as less of a danger to the commonwealth.—New Britain (Conn.) Herald.
Even those in Massachusetts who have let themselves be persuaded of the necessity of such an imposition, in the name of patriotism, might find themselves constrained to agree, if they could be induced to stop and think about it, that there is something grotesquely incongruous about such an incident on or about the IGlst anniversary of the traditional episode of Paul Eevere’s ride.—Waterbury (Conn.) American.
District of Columbia — Florida
The real question is, do these people in refusing to salute the flag intend to be disloyal to their government ? This does not seem to be the case. Are Quakers considered traitors because for religious scruples they refuse to fight? We are coming to a pretty pass when we cannot see the motive behind the deed. In New England children refusing to salute the flag were actually sent to a reform school. The school board should have been sent instead. Do let us get our sense of humor working and see the thing for what it is, an odd interpretation, to be smiled at possibly, but not scoffed at and certainly to be respected as everyone's religion should be in this land where there is supposed to be religious liberty.—I. H. K., in Washington (D.C.) Post.
If there has ever been a more foolish exhibition of patriotism run amuck we haven’t heard of it in times of peace. What good can it do, either to the children or the nation, to put three little children in jail because they were not old enough to realize the issues involved?—Key West (Fla.) Citizen.
Illinois
State “loyalty” laws are unnecessary. Children like the Opielouski kids should be put back in school, where they belong. Then if their parents present a written request, they should be freely excused from the patriotic exercises.— Chicago Daily News.
The astounding verdict of Judge Mason is, of course, being appealed, and students from Amherst college are tutoring the children while they are excluded from the public schools. But the commonwealth of Massachusetts shows that, while it may no longer be able to drive the children of religious conscientious objectors into the wilderness (there being no more wilderness), it is still quite ready to throw them into jail. Jail the six-year-olds and thus safeguard American patriotism!—Christian Century.
Even if the father were convicted of treason as serious as that of Benedict Arnold, the constitution forbids the visitation upon his children of the punishment for his crime.
We trust that Mr. Hearst and his fellow red-baiters are now satisfied. The country is going to be saved by putting little children in reformatories. All little children apparently must learn that the flag is something to be feared rather than an emblem to be loved and venerated, an emblem that guarantees freedom of religion as well as freedom of the press.—Chicago Daily Times.
The members . . . consider it idolatrous to salute the flag. They may be wrong, but they have courage commensurate to their conviction.
The verdict of Judge John W. Mason seems unbelievable. Jail the six-year-olds to safeguard American patriotism! If it were not for Mason’s verdict, we would say, It can’t happen here. But it did, anno 1936.—The Covenant Weekly (Swedish).
To take the position that the children were lawbreakers is silly. They were too young to understand implications of their refusal to salute their country’s flag and were acting out of a sense of loyalty to their parent. It would seem that Massachusetts authorities should hasten to right the mistake and see that charges against the children are dropped. There probably has been no more flagrant example of judicial blundering than the sentence pronounced by the Northampton judge.—Rockford (Ill.) RegisterRepublic.
Another notable victory stands to the credit of the patriots who think they can force Americans to love flag and constitution, by the compulsion of law. In Massachusetts, the busybody organizations succeeded in lobbying through the legislature a law compelling every school child to stand and salute the flag. Now flag saluting happens to be an act that is condemned as sin by a religious sect of this country, otherwise harmless and respectable, and having members in every state of the country. The regimenting of the Massachusetts pupils in their schools, for forced flag salute, was no sooner started than trouble appeared. Here and there, a child refused, upon the advice of his devout parents.
What to do with these children, made criminals by definition of law, has been a problem for teachers and public authorities. In the village of Belchertown, public authority has decided to go the whole way in the name of law-enforcement. The two children of a pious family have been taken away from their parents and lodged in an institution for delinquents, because they would not salute. By this rigorous expedient, both children and parents, of course, will be filled with love of their country and its institutions.—Urbana (Ill.) Evening Courier.
Iowa — Maryland
If Mr. Opielouski lived in Germany, instead of Massachusetts, he would long since have gone to a concentration camp; for he is not a pagan, as good Nazis must be today, but a member of a religious group which makes strict application of the Biblical injunction against bowing down to “graven images”, whether they be calves of gold, swastika banners or the American flag. To this group a salute is a form of “bowing down”. Its refusal is a matter not of politics, but of faith.
Moreover, Mr. Opielouski’s denomination starts early to inculcate its beliefs in its young, and his own six-year-old is already a non-salut-er, quoting Holy Writ.
Mr. Opielouski, of course, might have gone to the concentration camp for the additional reason that a brown-shirted sergeant did not like the last syllable of his name.
But the Opielouski little ones, in Germany, probably would have stayed at home with Frau Opielouski and would somehow have managed to get along until papa could escape from the camp and emigrate with his brood to the “land of the free”, taking refuge in Massachusetts, as the persecuted of other centuries had done before him. That would have happened in Germany.—Des Moines (Iowa) Register.
The organic law of this country forbids even treason in the father to be held against the children. Since treason is the most serious crime that can be committed against the state, it stands to reason that minor offenses cannot work corruption of the blood. Obviously what Massachusetts needs is judges who know the law they are supposed to administer—judges who know not only the letter of the statutes, but also the spirit of the charter of liberty to which all laws must conform. The fact that a man can pass a bar examination is, unfortunately, no proof that he knows what the Constitution of the United States means; but unless he does know, he is going to make a rotten judge.—Baltimore Evening Sun.
Massachusetts
1636. Massachusetts banished Roger Williams for expressing certain “new and dangerous opinions” in the realm of religion contrary to law.
1917. Massachusetts ratified amendment XLVI to its Constitution, whose first words read: “No law shall be passed prohibiting the free exercise of religion.”
1936. Massachusetts repealed its banishment of Roger Williams.
1936. Massachusetts sentenced to a reformatory institution three Christian children, aged 9, 12 and 14, for maintaining their religious liberty to express their opinions in the realm of religion in opposition to a law passed by the Legislature in 1935.—Boston Herald.
As matters stand now, an appeal has been taken to the superior court, the children are at liberty on bail without having been confined, and the courts will finally straighten out the tangle somehow. Meanwhile, of course, the state and the Legislature which passed the recent law will appear rather ridiculous. The Belchertown situation, and the other cases arising from the salute law, are so complicated and so palpably unfair to the children concerned that relief should be provided either by the courts or the Legislature. The penalties inflicted on Jehovah’s witnesses, moreover, seem to be in direct contradiction to the general provision: “No child shall be excluded from a public school of any town on account of race, color or religion.”— Boston Herald.
Delighted though we are with the news that the aggrieved children in the flag-salute case find strong friends and defenders in the faculty of Amherst, Smith and Mt. Holyoke, and also in the presidents of the two latter colleges, we are bound to say that some of the early reports are disquieting. In the first place, it cannot be wise to have the membership of the defense committee consist solely of college professors. The issue whether the three Opielouski children should be preserved in their right to a decent education and kept safe in their home or be sent to a reform school is no mere collegiate question. It is a public issue of the broadest sort, affecting many and many a phase of the civic welfare of the whole Commonwealth. Consequently, leading citizens from various walks of life should at once be recruited to give their names and counsel to the defense movement.—Boston Transcript.
The particular religious group makes it quite clear in its literature that the members refuse to take oaths of allegiance to any flag. Wherein, therefore, lies disloyalty to this country, to the preferment of any other?—Boston Traveler.
By giving a sentence to be served, the judge makes it possible to carry the case to the highest courts of state and nation.
Earnestly it is to be hoped that the Belchertown case will not attract crackpot agitators who may smear the incident with the taint of radicalism. This is no case for radicalism, but for progressivism. Yes, it is a case that appeals to conservatism, for the true conservative supports justice.
The Traveler can see much law and little justice in the predicament of these children. The Traveler is disinterested in the fact that the father is not a citizen. The children are citizens. They are our fellow Americans, even though they do not salute the flag.
Repeatedly we have said that it is not alone the United States flag these children refuse to salute, but any flag. This is no fight to support any particular religious group. It is a fight for justice to the people of this country, and particularly to little children.—Boston Traveler.
State Commissioner of Education Reardon defends the process of law and adds that:
“They have been excluded from the public schools because they have refused submission to a reasonable regulation which they mistakenly interpret as an act of worship. ’ ’
Does the authority of the commissioner of education extend to the right to determine for others what is or is not religion? Our understanding is that parents are bound with special emphasis to watch over the spiritual welfare of their children and the right and duty to educate their offspring abides natively and primarily with the parents. Further, parents have a right, and many persons agree a duty, to provide carefully for the child’s religious education. Any threat to faith and morals must be avoided by the parents.
This Belchertown family, whether we agree with it or not, believes in a creed that forbids saluting flags. It is a tenet that antedates the flag-salute law. In our opinion the law interferes with freedom of worship, and therefore is unconstitutional.
This is no mere matter of Jehovah’s witnesses, the cult now affected. Every parent, every citizen, has an important stake in this matter. —Boston Traveler.
In one of the most vicious and absurd pronouncements since one of its number gave the world a better laugh by asking that Einstein be deported as an “undesirable alien”, the Daughters of the American Revolution ask the same fate for Ignace Opielouski, father of the children whose refusal to salute the flag may send them to reform school.
The D.A.R. was once a powerful organization. Its opportunities for making a better nation have been innumerable. And, undoubtedly, it has contributed much. But it is in grave danger of canceling all its credit marks.
Everyone who loves his country must realize that in return for the benefits he receives by living there he must give an unflinching loyalty. He should expect that if the existence of his country were threatened he would be called to its aid. But loyalty cannot be won by coercion. A child cannot be made to love his flag by forcing him to go through a meaningless ritual, the implications of which he is too young to comprehend. And certainly the D.A.R. should know this.
If the D.A.R. would stop looking for “hotbeds of Communism” behind every bush, and instead look back at the principles for which its forebears fought, it might then refrain from violating the most basic of those principles.— Pittsfield (Mass.) Eagle.
The American people were originally of pure, lofty ideals; throughout the colonial period and for generations afterward this country was one of the most law-abiding nations.
Today the United States has more crime in proportion to the population than any other nation in the world; the country has twice as many murders as Italy, four times as many as Australia and South Africa, eight times as many as New Zealand and Spain, nine times as many as Holland, and thirty-six times as many as Switzerland. Chicago has twenty-five times as high a murder rate as London, and Cleveland has more crime each year than Great Britain with forty times its population.
Our government officials know conditions, but are without courage to face the issue. They carefully walk around it, pretending not to see it, but they do enact teachers’ oath and salute-the-flag laws, in an effort to disguise their betrayal of the people. Every intelligent person knows of the evil conditions that exist. Is it any wonder the adherents of the religion known as Jehovah’s witnesses think they have just cause in refusing to salute the flag, believing that Satan governs the country instead of Jehovah?—Springfield (Mass.) Republican.
Michigan — Missouri — Nebraska
It was an offense against the very thing the flag stands for. It was an act savoring more of Russia than the United States. The experience of the three Hampshire County victims, far from teaching them respect for the flag and what it represents, will be apt to create in them a lifelong resentment and hostility.—Detroit Free Press.
Had they merely given the outward sign of “patriotism” and raised their fingers in salute, however hypocritical or insincere, they would be perfectly free, for the school records show them to be “comparatively co-operative” in conduct and “comparatively superior in study”, and their father is not, in fact, “against the government.” —Sault Ste. Marie (Mich.) Evening News.
Hurrah for government! We’re saved again. Massachusetts shows the way.
For two weeks I’ve been a bundle of nerves. But I feel perfectly safe now. In Massachusetts they’ve put three grade-school children in the reformatory for failing to salute the flag.
Oh, ye of little faith, the majesty of government will prevail!
Of course, I am aware that the law moves slowly sometimes. But not in this instance. Sometimes the law falters. As both Mr. Hoover and Mr. Roosevelt have demonstrated, it isn’t always possible to apprehend tax evaders, no matter how big and how obvious they may be. When the war department is caught with the goods, there just isn’t very much that can be done. And there seems to be no way of curbing the traitorous machinations of our munitions men. There are cynics who contend that these delayed failures have undermined public confidence in government. But that need not be. Not when we have valiant officers of the law and a great and wise judiciary to prosecute the traitorous little children in our schools.—Marion Ellet, in Kansas City Journal-Post.
Tough kids whose father and mother couldn’t do a thing with them? Not a bit of it. As a matter of fact they got into trouble because they apparently minded their parents not wisely but too well.
The parents then? Perhaps they weren’t the right sort. Maybe they were encouraging incorrigibility in their children. There is nothing in the record that indicates so. The Opielouskis appear in the case as a hard-working, honest, God-fearing family, who mind their own business and stay off relief.
It seems pretty odd, doesn’t it, that well-behaved children should be taken away from well-behaved parents and placed in a reform school? It is. It is even odder than that. What the state of Massachusetts did in this case was first to deny the right of attendance at public school to these children and then charge them with delinquency because they didn’t go to school.
It’s so outrageous that one is inclined to doubt it. Such things you say can’t happen in the state of John Hancock and the Adamses, the state of Fanned Hall, the Old North Church and Boston Common, the state of Lexington, Concord and Bunker Hill. But it is true, every word of it, nevertheless.
It looks a good deal like religious persecution, and it is, although the 100-percent patriots never intended it to be. The purpose of the ritual is to inculcate patriotism, to plant in the mind of the child realization of the inestimable privilege of living under it and the constitutional liberties of which it is a symbol. It can’t do that very well when it is so misconstrued and misapplied that it does violence to those liberties. In the minds of the victims of such persecution the flag becomes, instead of the symbol of freedom, a symbol of oppression and petty tyranny.— Omaha World-Herald.
New York
After all, they are infants under the law, not of an age commonly regarded as responsible. If the offense had been one designated as a felony, the judge probably would have been able to impose upon them no greater punishment than confinement in a reform school. In other words, he employed the full force of the law against them for not saluting the flag. Better, one would think, to let these children continue regular attendance at the public schools in the thought that, as time went on, instruction there would disabuse their minds of the idea that a salute to the flag as an expression of respect for what it typifies—the spirit of Concord, Lexington and Bunker Hill—could do violence to the essentials of any religious faith. As it is, the children are punished for the seeming offense of their father. The procedure is not consonant with the true spirit of Americanism.—Buffalo (N.Y.) Evening News.
The arresting and sentencing of little children by the government will, unless we miss our guess, shock our best women into the rare but powerful indignation they can sometimes show. We have seen so much of it lately in the U. S. that we wish now we had kept clippings on the subject so we could compile them into statistics, and be impressive. Instead, we can only think of horrible examples, like the Massachusetts Baby Pacifists, sentenced to reform school. If a babe says boo at the flag, the government apparently will have the jitters. Making them mind, formerly thought to be the business of parents, is coming to be a greater concern on the part of the state than provision for the 500,000 children who are homeless and destitute in our land, and the 5c an hour paid for child labor in New Jersey.—Fight (Magazine).
Massachusetts is setting a poor example in this matter. It is, in fact, making itself and American patriotism quite ridiculous.—Rochester (N.Y.) Democrat and Chronicle.
The father of the three children belongs to a religious sect known as Jehovah’s witnesses. He testified at the hearing that he had instructed the children not to salute the flag because he regarded it as contrary to Biblical passages against “bowing to graven images”. Persons who hold such special views frequently regard them as absolutely vital.—The Saratogian.
Under the Massachusetts statutes no child may be barred from any public school on account of race, religion or color. Under another statute every child of a certain age must attend school. Under still another statute every teacher in the public schools must cause the pupils in his or her charge to salute the flag. Put them together, add the beliefs of Jehovah’s witnesses, and they spell muddle.
It is hoped that the supreme judicial court of Massachusetts will untangle this situation in the light of common sense and of constitutional rights. Or failing there, that the U.S. Supreme Court will do so. Those who are defending the rights of the Opielouski children in the Belchertown case deserve thanks for their interest in the children and in the wider issues at stake.— Utica (N.Y.) Observer-Dispatch.
These super-patriots badly afflicted with a flag complex, or what is it, believe they can induce patriotism by force, so they use methods similar to those of the Spanish Inquisition. The mind of this judge obviously runs in a groove similar to that of the Salem witch-hunters of Colonial fame and shame, and obviously he cannot understand that such Hitleristic methods will not increase patriotism.
Our egotistic, spread-eagle, high-pressure patrioteers tell us the flag is sacred. Will sotne of them tell us how it got that way? From what source does it derive its assumed sacredness? As government is merely adventitious and secular, it cannot transmit sacredness to any of its productions, the most familiar of which is money. The essence of a flag is its device; therefore any sacredness must inhere in the device; and as these devices have in our flags contained the figure of a beaver, a rattlesnake and a dragon, they were and still must be for us sacred animals. It also follows that any act of devotion toward it is a religious act. And as it is predominantly treated as a symbol of war, by it war, however unjust, is sanctified and becomes a holy war.
Oh, it’s awful to be beaten with your own doorstep!
Without giving further deductions from this foolish idea of sacredness in a piece of printed cloth the above should be enough to show anyone its absurdity.
Our goggle-eyed patrioteers tell us it symbolizes the glories of the past. If it symbolizes the past at all it symbolizes all of it, and not any particular epoch or event one may prefer to choose, and it symbolizes it up to the present moment—the new government of today—of F. D. Roosevelt and the present Congress, and during the years of its existence it has always been the symbol of the government then in power.
As the flag represents the government, so it represents its vices and faults as well as its virtues; and if we must reverence it we have no right to oppose government policies however corrupt or tyrannical they may become. So in the glories of the past we must include the slave trade North as well as South and the ministers and judges who held stock in slave ships and received dividends through the blood-stained lash of the slave driver—the torture and killing of women as witches in colonial times, the treachery toward the Indians, the prodigious steal of oil lands in the Harding administration when he acquiesced in the act of Secretary Fall and his gang of conspirators. And the flag was used to the utmost limit in 1928 to conceal the great conspiracy of international bankers, stockholders and government officials that wrecked our entire economic system.
The flag has its proper and useful function which is not related to the heresies propagated by our fanatical flag-wavers whose object is to confuse a love of country with a feeling of insolent superiority—a selfish and domineering nationalism. So the powder magazines of national antagonism are filled, and the fuse adjusted for the day when our benevolent international bankers, exporters, industrialists, politicians and other patriots wish to start a war. At any time these overlords desire a conflict they will use the concentrated influence of speech and song and the waving of many flags that shall affect at once the eye, ear and mind to produce mob-mania.—W. H. W., in the White Plains (N.Y.) Daily Reporter.
North Carolina
A strange repressive faith it is in a free land which undertakes to make children honor their flag by putting them in jail. Assuredly that is a queer method of nurturing love of country among the nation’s young. Perhaps, however, this incident is not to be regretted. It provides the ultimate reduction to absurdity of all those repressive measures which so-called “patriots” have been urging in American legislatures by which patriotism in America would be snatched from the realm of the natural, high and fine emotions, and made a degrading, repressive, regimented display under the fear of punishment.—Raleigh (N.C.) News and Observer.
If Jehovah’s witnesses can be denied rights which the Constitution undertook to safeguard for all, then anybody anywhere in America can be denied those rights.
Apparently Jehovah’s witnesses are simple and sincere people, even if mistaken ones. Put them in jail and the Bill of Rights goes into jail with them. Jehovah’s witnesses may be also witnesses of the increasing disposition in America to deny to unpopular groups the very rights which have been regarded as the most sacred aspects of the American heritage.—Raleigh News and Observer.
It is not the turn of Tarheelia to beat breasts in approved pharisaical fashion and thank the deity that the Old North State is not as others are, however. It is rather her business to be ever on the qui vive to prevent her super-patriots and fanatical 100-percenters from saddling down her school children with a legislative piece of idiocy comparable to that which the tiny tots of Massachusetts must now endure.—Winston-Salem Journal.
Ohio
It’s a lucky thing for the children of Massachusetts that the state has no child’s-size electric chair. A judge in Northampton sentenced two brothers and their sister, the youngest six and the oldest nine, to the county “corrective school” for delinquency because they failed to salute the American flag. Here’s the strangest part The father testified he had ordered them not to salute because his religious sect believed it was contrary to the Bible’s teaching. Think of that happening in 1936—three children obeying their father—and all three in one family. I had supposed there weren’t any children who obeyed a parent any more.—In Akron (Ohio) Times Press.
This gives us all something to think about. How much longer can we even pretend that this is a land of freedom, if such things can happen? How far have we come from those years of an untarnished spirit of liberty when this nation was founded by rebellion against an earlier flag? Can it be that this sentence by a “court of justice” is the precursor of a reign of intolerance which will bring us to a state something like that of Fascist Italy or Nazi Germany?
This is a peculiarly flagrant case, and comes from Massachusetts, where the ridiculous teachers’ oath bill already had shown how stupid this sort of intolerance can be. It is a precedent, carried through under the guise of law, for imprisoning citizens, children into the bargain, for their political opinions, and nothing else.—Cincinnati Enquirer.
Communism begins, as all students of the revolution in Russia must know, with the nationalization of the children. One needs go back no more than to our newspapers of fifteen years ago to see in profusion accounts of the tearing of Russian children from their homes and from their mothers’ breasts to place them in charge of a hard and relentless state. It remained necessary even to the Soviets to depend on natural processes for their children’s births; but after that they belonged, as we heard with horror, to the state.
The attention of the Liberty Leagues, the Sentinels—all the long list of organizations devoted to fighting Communism in the United States—is called to the “nationalization” of children as already begun in one of our own great states. The recent report, three children six to nine years old, torn from their parents and taken over for control by the state, should have set these foes of Communism agog. These children are taken over by the state, not for lack of a home or of parents of good character, but to keep them from worshiping God in their own way. This is Massachusetts, where Pilgrim feet have trod!
Roger Williams, for wanting to worship God in his own way, was driven from Massachusetts to Rhode Island. The children of this Massachusetts farmer, for wanting to worship God in their own way, are confiscated by the state of Massachusetts, and their father, for teaching his children so to obey himself and worship God, is sentenced to jail.
Perhaps it is a mistake to call this Communism. Come to think about it, it is also Fascism.
It is emphatically not Americanism.—Dayton (Ohio) Daily News.
Speaking, of religion, there are those innocent children at Northampton, a Massachusetts town, the little children of Ignace Opielouski, a steady, self-supporting citizen, farmer and factory worker and of deeply religious bent.
“Thou shalt have no other gods before me,” says the Commandment, and Opielouski, as a member of his religious sect, takes the law with a simple, literal seriousness. He will render unto God those things that are God’s and Caesar must take second place.
So he will not salute the flag, holding that only God can claim the adoration which that involves. That is an extreme view, but it is his conscience’s law.
Because that is his conscience, his children have been taught accordingly. Massachusetts makes a law requiring school children to salute the flag. Opielouski’s children follow another Commandment: “Honor thy father and thy mother.” So obeying father and mother, they refuse to salute the flag.
For that they are torn from their home, sent to a reform school, their religious scruples stamped on by the state.—Day ton (Ohio) Daily News.
Governor Curley, of Massachusetts, proposes now to revoke the decree of banishment issued against Roger Williams in 1635. Massachusetts was wrong in 1635. In 301 years can we depend upon the state of Massachusetts to revoke the sentence of banishment to a reform school of the three little Northampton children who have been torn from their parents in this year 1936 because in a matter of saluting the flag these parents are heretics? Must we always be 300 years behind in granting freedom of conscience to men?—Springfield (Ohio) Daily News.
When we drag forth a malcontent and force him to salute the flag and make a public expression of love for it, we but add to the baseness of his character by smearing it with the stigma of perjury.
There is another contingent of high-powered patriots who are determined to have all schoolteachers take the oath of allegiance to the Constitution of the United States before they are allowed to tell our children that two and two makes four. And they seem to be making a success of the undertaking. Here is a piece of legislation that stumps the understanding. We find the finished product of our schools and colleges, who take up the profession of teaching, singled out as a group of potential traitors.
We spend millions of dollars to educate our children in order that they may become better citizens and then, apparently distrustful of our handiwork, proclaim to the world by law that they cannot be trusted. I believe that such laws are a nasty reflection on our system of education and should be dispensed with. There should be less shouting about the flag and more time given to the study of the principles it stands for.
It isn’t the flag, of itself, that counts;
Not the bars that lace it through,
Nor the cluster of stars in the corner there, That flash from a field of blue.
It is the ideas that underlie
This symbol that floats above,
The virtues the banner represents, That claim our lasting love;
It is not the number of oaths we take, Or the manner in which we swear;
Nor the loud acclaim that we express For the grand old flag up there—
It is the sincerity in the heart, The quiet resolve to stand, A living example in all respects, For the laws of our native land.
Our patriotism we need not flaunt Or loudly boast and brag.
If we act our part, there will be no need To worry about the flag.
—W. R. Dineen, in Dayton (Ohio) Daily News.
Pennsylvania — Tennessee — Texas
The case of the Massachusetts children who refused to salute the American flag offers an interesting commentary of the nation’s liberalism and embitters those liberals who strive desperately to believe in democratic procedure. Is the Constitution’s only purpose the protection of the superwealthy, or might it, by some farfetched construction, actually help the ordinary person? Or is that radicalism?—0. Abramowitz, in Philadelphia Record.
Prof. Colston Warne, of Amherst, spokesman for the Massachusetts Committee on Civil Liberties, investigated. He found the children above the average in their classes, and the father an otherwise loyal, patriotic and law-loving farmer. Said Prof. Warne:
This is one of the most important violations of civil liberties in recent years. Any decision which would break up a family because of a refusal to salute the flag seems more like a judicial decree from Fascist Germany than from Calvin Coolidge’s home town.
To turn the children into reform school delinquents for obeying what they believe to be a religious command is alien to everything they —or we—have been taught is America.
The American Civil Liberties Union, in keeping with its stout tradition of fighting oppression wherever and whenever it appears, is already at work on this case. We recommend that the American Liberty League also get interested, and for once admit that a human right—such as religious freedom—is as precious as a property right.—Memphis Press-Scimitar.
In the Fort Worth Star Telegram, and in the New York Times, Reverend Dr. Frederick L. Anderson, professor emeritus of Andover Theological Seminary, in an address opening the Baptist convention at St. Louis, is alleged to have given forth the following brave words of warning:
The tyrants who sit in Rome, Moscow and Berlin are endangering most of the things which Baptists hold most dear, especially our civil and religious liberty. The swirling currents of nationalism, secularism and atheism are undermining the very foundations on which liberty rests.
Religious liberty is not only a sacred right, but is also a sacred duty. It is not merely something we enjoy for ourselves and our own group, as Baptists have always believed, something which it is our duty and glory, not to concede, but to proclaim and give to all men.
The very essence of this liberty, guaranteed by the Constitution, is the right to think, the right to express our thoughts, free speech, a free press as a courageous and honest exponent and former of public opinion, the right of the security of our persons and our homes, the right of public and impartial trial before the constituted authorities and, above all, the right to religious liberty through the separation of church and state.
Moreover, we are not asleep to the attempts in the United States to use the guise of patriotism to undermine our freedom. This last month three Christian children of 9, 12 and 14 who, however mistakenly, dared express their unshakable religious convictions in refusing to salute the flag, were given an indeterminate sentence in open court to what was really a reform school. And this happened in the free State of Massachusetts, a State which has in its Constitution the words, “No law shall be passed prohibiting the free exercise of religion.”
Awake, Baptists! Defend their liberties and yours. Hitlerism marches on. A reform school foreshadows a concentration camp, and religious persecution a totalitarian state, perhaps under an American camouflage. Do not fool yourselves into believing that it cannot happen here.
Vermont — 'Washington — Wisconsin
In the Opielouski case, what we outsiders have considered the grand old state of Massachusetts is apparently apologizing for Concord and Lexington.
Does it really regret that the embattled farmers of ’76 did not salute the British banner which was then the lawful emblem of their government?
If the gangs behind this compulsory flag salute nonsense do not understand how they’re advertising Massachusetts to the rest of the world, it is time the world told them.
They are trying to turn that flag from the symbol of liberty into the symbol of tyranny, Fascism and death.
I still can’t quite believe that the American flag and the Swastika flag are one.—By Sinclair Lewis. (Copyright, 1936, by United Press)
Perhaps the Massachusetts judge who sentenced two little children to the reform school because their religious belief did not permit them to salute the flag but taught them to reserve their religion for God alone, was a descendant of one of the judges who, in other days, sentenced witches to be burned.
It does not make the burning of Christians seem so remote, either. And it makes Daniel seem almost a modern figure. Remember his ultimatum, ‘Be it known unto thee, 0 king, that I will not bow down unto thee, or worship the idols which thou hast set up.’ It comes ringing down the ages as the most colossal one-man defiance of all time.
If a member of the D.A.R. had been present in Daniel’s day, she would probably have said, “Daniel has broken the law, and the lions’ den is where Daniel belongs.” Let us hope in this case that the supreme court will close the lions’ mouths.
Of course, the sentence was really passed to punish the parents, and I can conceive of no greater torture for a parent than having his children abused. Imagine taking little children from their homes and imprisoning them, merely because they dared to live up to their faith as they saw it. Reform schools are no place for little children who are striving with all their might to lead Christian lives.
But I suppose if this Christian doctrine were allowed to spread, especially the part about not believing in wars, when the capitalists who profit from wars proceeded to send out their barrage of propaganda to stir the people to conflict, the people would turn a deaf ear to them, and that would be too bad.—Zela Pargeon, in Tacoma Times.
The parents of the three children in question belong to a church called Jehovah’s witnesses. They are hard-working people living on a well-kept eighteen-acre tract near Belchertown and are reported to have an unusually harmonious and happy family life. The father works in a factory. It happens that the parents believe that saluting the flag is forbidden by “the law of God”, hence the children are instructed not to salute. Both the father and the children were arrested. The father was fined $40 and the children were sentenced to be sent to a county institution. The case is appealed and the children are at present out on bail.
Did you ever hear of anything more stupid from the standpoint of patriotism?
About due now
It makes any genuine patriot ashamed. Children in the schools should be so treated, and in life they should be so treated, that they will just naturally love their country. To persecute them is to make them hate their country. Therefore, such an episode as that in Massachusetts is utterly unpatriotic and un-American. Yet such absurdly unpatriotic laws are fathered by persons who pretend to be patriotic!
One does not have to indorse the religious views of the parents in order to be on their side. One has only to believe in the American spirit.
Not only would the children in question be damaged if they were torn from the family fold on such a miserable pretext, but all other children and grown people who hear or read about it are injured. They are given to understand that love of country is something to be forcibly injected into people—a travesty upon real patriotism.
If these children should actually be sent to an institution because they declined to salute the flag, what sort of conception would they get of their country?
In the institution, if it has classes, or if not, they would be taught that their country is a glorious place, that it is a country dedicated to freedom and liberty—and they would know in their own hearts that, instead of giving them freedom and liberty, it had torn them from their beloved mother and father and brothers and sisters, and incarcerated them. What sort of impression w’ould that make on them? In other words, what would be accomplished by sending them up? Certainly the results would be exactly the opposite of the results supposedly desired. The tendency of such brutal treatment would be to make them hate their country, whereas their refusal to salute the flag does not in any sense indicate hatred of their country; it only indicates that their parents have religious scruples against their doing so.
One would think that
any just judge, who believes that judges have the power to nullify laws, would jump at the chance to nullify that one. But it is very seldom that a bad law is nullified; more often good laws are nullified. The case will, however, be appealed to the state supreme court, and, if necessary, to the United States supreme court, in an effort to kill the stupid statute.—Milwaukee Leader.
Other states are moving Fascistward, besides Massachusetts. Hearst should not have great influence, but he does, and most politicians, though they have no fear whatever of God, are very much afraid of the Devil, and therefore stand in mortal terror of the Roman Catholic Hierarchy.
Was the Gentleman Frank Hague?
(If the “gentleman” referred to was Mayor Frank Hague his discourteous treatment and entirely impudent questioning of this innocent Christian woman who wished to visit her equally innocent Christian son, locked up by the insolent rascals under his control, can be readily understood. On one occasion, so Collier’s magazine states, some highminded pussyfoot politicians sent 12 Princeton athletes to watch Jersey City polls and within an hour eleven of them were in the hospital. Mayor Hague, being a “practical” Catholic, did nothing to prevent it, or render redress.—Ed.)
Mayor Hague is a member of the Knights of
Columbus, one of the so-called “Catholic Action” groups recently “blessed” by the Roman Catholic Hierarchy’s secretary of state, Eugene Pacelli, recently a distinguished visitor to the United States. The organization of which Pacelli is secretary of state is not only religious, but also political and commercial. That organization is Satan’s chief visible instrument employed and used to rule the world and to keep the people in ignorance and in subjection to selfish men. That religious organization designates itself as the “Hierarchy of the Catholic Church” and names the millions of sincere persons who are supporters of that organization as the “Catholic population”. The Hierarchy is composed of a few men, the controlling number of whom, like Pacelli, are Italians, but who rule the masses of sincere persons called the “Catholic population” residing in every part of the earth. The “Hierarchy” is against God and His kingdom under Christ, and against the law of God contained in the Bible. At the same time the “Hierarchy” claims the right to rule the world in the name of Christ, thereby deceiving multitudes of good persons who are sincere supporters of the Catholic Church. Those who compose the Catholic Church are the men of the Hierarchy, and other priests, some of which priests are unduly favored, while many other priests are mere menial servants of the Hierarchy and compelled to do the bidding of the Hierarchy. The Word of God declares that all persons who by any means oppose Jehovah God and Christ Jesus are wicked, and that in due time ‘all the wicked God will destroy’.—Psalm 145: 20.
The New Jesuit Religion
M Ip LAG-SALUTIN’,” the new Jesuit religion, is spreading wherever there are “practical” Catholics. It gives them a chance to “get” Jehovah’s people; and do they enjoy the pastime?
(Continued)
At the penitentiary, Secaucus, for preaching the gospel among the businessmen of Hoboken, Harry Whitaker, on return from working in the quarry, was lined up with the other prisoners for the flag salute. Although he was in the second line a Roman Catholic keeper by the name of Burns took him out and placed him in the front row. The object was to be sure to “get” him.
It worked as anticipated. Whitaker was sentenced to five days on bread and water in a dungeon black as night, without any furniture or any bedding and without any heat. When the time comes for Burns to get his reward from the Devil he can remember his part in this little drama.
Whitaker, after release from what is called “solitary”, was given the job of cleaning the penitentiary toilets, also those at the quarry. In a few days he obtained his liberty on a writ of certiorari, but although the writ was granted he was kept in prison.
This retention for several days after the writ was granted was cleared up subsequently by the fact that he was privileged to remain over for a day or two to be confined at Hoboken with twenty brothers of like precious faith who were destined to follow in his footsteps. Concerning his confinement in solitary for refusing to salute the flag, Whitaker said:
There is no physical examination given to any prisoner before he is put in solitary, and it is enough to make anybody insane, but, by the strength of Jehovah, I came out just as good as when I went in, and would have stayed forever had it been Jehovah’s will. We have got to hand it to the kids when we know what they have gone through on this flag-saluting issue. If it were not for the strength which proceeds from Jehovah neither they nor we could go through these experiences.
Whole-Wheat Michigan Rocks Are Good
FOUR eggs; 1| cups brown sugar; 1 cup butter and lard, mixed; 1 cup peanuts rolled with a rolling pin, or nuts cut fine; 1 cup chopped dates or raisins; 1 teaspoon cinnamon; 1 teaspoon vanilla; 1 teaspoon baking soda, in warm water; | teaspoon Royal baking powder; 3 cups whole-wheat flour. Cream the sugar, shortening and eggs, then add the remaining ingredients. Drop on cooky pan or sheet quickly, cone-shaped, and bake in 500-degree oven five to ten minutes. These are scrumptious.
Miscellany
Bootes and the Bear
CERTAIN groups in the constellations of
Bootes and the Big Bear are already at a distance of 70,000,000 parsecs from the earth. A parsec is four times the distance light travels in a year, when the light is moving along 186,300 miles in a second. That seems far enough away; but not so. These certain groups are now speeding away from the earth at the rate of 40,000 kilometers a second. A kilometer is five-eighths of a mile, so the outward speed is around 25,000 miles a second.
Heights and Depths
THE deepest depth of ocean measured is 35,400 feet. The highest mountain is 29,141 feet. Highest balloon altitude is 72,000 feet. Highest airplane altitude 47,352 feet. Highest flight of a small unmanned balloon 22 miles, or 116,160 feet.
The Big Room at Carlsbad
THE Big Room at Carlsbad Caverns, New Mexico, is 625 feet wide, 4,000 feet long, and 350 feet high. There were 116,457 visitors to the caverns last year. It takes 5| hours to make the trip through the caverns. No one may touch any
---.—-—---------------- of nature’s handiwork in the cave, under penalty of $500. It is calculated that 3,000,000 bats make their home in the cave, and that each day they consume about 11| tons of insects, gathered in their evening forages outside the walls.
Persecution Even of the Blind
AMONG Jehovah’s witnesses are some of the physically blind. One such is a proofreader for the Watchtower and books in Braille. She was an inmate at the Clovernook Home for the Blind, Mount Healthy, Ohio, and because she refused to vote and refused, on her constitutional rights, to attend the Episcopalian church service, she was ordered to leave the home, and compelled to telegraph to a sister in the flesh to come right away and get her.
Two Springs Controlled by the Moon
THERE is a spring in Africa and another one on Mount Zircon, near Rumford, Maine, the flow of which is controlled by the moon. The Maine spring has a normal flow of 42 gallons a minute until the night of the full moon, when the flow increases to 61 gallons per minute. The temperature of the water is never colder than 38 degrees nor warmer than 40.
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YOUR. FRIENDS WILL BE INTERESTED IN THIS ISSUE OF The GOLDEN AGE
THOSE who were present in the Newark Armory when Judge Rutherford gave his lecture on “ARMAGEDDON, THE GREATEST BATTLE OF ALL TIME”, will long remember that thrilling occasion. That lecture is published in full in this issue of The. Golden Age, and whether you were at the Newark convention or not you have undoubtedly read and studied this lecture with keen interest. This is a splendid issue to distribute among your neighbors and friends, and, anticipating a heavy demand, we have made an extra large run of The Golden Age No. 449. You can secure 40 copies for $1.00 (Canada and other countries, $1.25), and we advise you to send in your order early if you want to be assured of getting it filled.
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“HIS VICTORY”
HE nine-day period December 5-13, 1936, is designated “HIS VICTORY”. As the name implies, this is a time of war. On one side is the Roman Catholic Hierarchy and its allies, who are in a conspiracy to keep the truth from the honest people, both Catholics and Protestants. On the other side are God’s faithful people, Jehovah’s witnesses and their companions, who have sworn to stand for God and His kingdom, unto death if necessary. These are putting forth every effort to spread the truth throughout the earth, and to expose the wicked lies which the clergy have taught the people. Jehovah God and His witnesses will be victorious in this battle!
Are you going to share in the joy of that great victory? If you are, of course you’ll have to have a part in the fight that’s now going on. “HIS VICTORY” period, December 5-13, will be a good time to start in this wonderful work, if you haven’t already. During this special period, and throughout the month of December, Judge Rutherford’s latest book, RICHES, and three of his booklets will be offered, on a contribution of 35c. If you want to have a part in this work, send novo for a supply of these publications. Then, beginning with December 5, go out and offer this special combination to the people in your own neighborhood. The coupon below is provided for your convenience.
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