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Contents
Why Pacelli Wants a “Soft Peace”
**, Latvia, the “Belgium” of Eastern Europe 10
J Some Events Since World War I
The Home of Guayule and Scheelite
Mere Longevity or Life Everlasting
Supreme Court Reviews Federal Prosecution 22
Let Public Officials Take Notice
John Wycliffe and the Lollards
“An Honest and Good Heart”—Luke 8:15
The Haunted Church Pillar ' Twenty-five to Thirty Copies of Every Issue 31
President
Secretary Editor
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In Brief
The State/ Department and
Kennedy and Tyler Kent
♦ That is a big idea the politicians have, getting Catholic votes by turning over as many big political jobs as possible. That is why Kennedy was sent as ambassador to Britain. His own relatives consider him a joke. He was a Catholic, and so was Tyler Kent.
It used to be that 30 Americans were selected for presentation to the king and queen of England, but Kennedy pre-' sented_his daughters Kathleen and Rosemary and two or three others, Kathleen made wise use of her time. She nabbed the Protestant marquis of Huntington, son of duke of Devonshire.
Her pa was at Chamberlain’s right hand while that gentleman was selling Czechoslovakia detwn the river, and as soon as the job was done he confided to New York businessmen that Hitler’s triumph in the coming war was a foregone conclusion. Then he resigned, as was meet.
r One of his clerks was Tyler Kent, educated in the University of Madrid, and, of course, a member of his “chureh”. The state department, learning from Scotland Yard -that Kent was crooked, issued a statement regarding his activities which reads, in part, as follows:
By his own showing, he had, while occupying a very special position of confidence within the embassy, displayed a shocking disregard for every principle of decency and honor so far as his obligations toward the United States were concerned.
This rascal had in bis private room copies of 1,500 private embassy papers. . He had “the whole confidential communi-, cation system of the United States”. He had “two newly made duplicate keys to the Index Bureau and the Code Room of the Embassy”, and the papers which he stole “covered practically every subject on which the Embassy was carrying on correspondence with the department of state”. He got seven years.
CONSOLATION
“And in His name shall the nations hope/’—Matthew 32:21, A. 5. P.
Volume XXVI
Brooklyn. N. Y., Wednesday, July 18, 1945
Number 674
Why Pacelli Wants a “Soft Peace”
THE popes are always much interested in wars and their outcome. The present pope is no exception; In practically every war the subjects of the pope light on both sides; so he might be expected to show some interest in the outcome, though, as the professed father of Catholics he is supposed to be very impartial, lie has said so on many an occasion, especially when caught in an embarrassing situation, 'flic present pope, moreover, has been called the "pope of peace”, which, it seems, should now be amended to the "pope of a soft peace”.
Having come at last to a realization that the side, he has been favoring was losing, the "soft peace" song has been sung by Mr. Pacelli with increasing vehemence. It was not so before.
That the haby-killer Franco and his religious backers were and are Fascists, and that they were ably sup|M>rted by the Axis partners Hitler and Mussolini, cannot be denied. The record is there. The pope called Franco the Butcher “that illustrious chief” of Spain, who had given "unequivocal proofs" of his “supreme religious" interest. Hence Franco was given the "paternal congratulations” of the pope, who thus acknowledged his fatherhood. The pope generously overlooked Franco's killing of thousands of inoffensive Catholics.
Franco had no "soft peace” for those who defended the Spanish republic against his betrayal. Ten months after that republic had been completely destroyed by the combined treachery of Italy, Germany and Pacelli, together with the aid of certain interests in Britain and the United States, there were still '>00,00(1 men and women in Franco's prisons, while 1,200,000 were in their graves.
In those ten months, it was estimated, 40,000 executions had taken place in Madrid. By the end of the year they wore still 1,000 a month, and gave a striking proof of Franco’s "supreme religious" interest. The prisoners were shot at the Eastern Cemetery at dawn, and taken away by the lorryload. Sometimes there were as many as four lorryloads per day.
Thousands of men, women and children, crowded into prisons built to hold fewer hundreds, lived in fear of suffering the same fate as those who had been taken to the Eastern Cemetery. Some of them wore beaten to death and others were garroted. German Gestapo constantly questioned them.
Franco's “supreme religious” interest was in full harmony with the sentiment expressed by that eminent French Catholic Veuillot, whose candor was unusual, when he said, “When you are the masters we claim perfect liberty for ourselves, in accordance with your principles; when we are the masters, in accordance with our principles, we refuse liberty to you.” Nice, isn’t it ?
Returning now to the pope, who approves all this, hut who now wants a soft peace for the Nazi criminals. Don’t blame him too severely. Remember his "impartiality”. Of course, he knew the plans upon which the "new order” contemplated by the Nazis was to be based. If he and his partners didn't succeed in carrying them out that was not their fault. At first everything seemed to be going along all right, and the pope waxed quite enthusiastic, forgetting that old proverb of Holy Writ, “Let not him that girdeth on his armor boast himself as he that putteth it off.” Or, as a modern writer has rather" quaintly expressed it, “It is best not to get too fresh too soon.”
Some Revealing Dispatches
According to one “Reverend Father” Geo. Alfred Beck, Jesuit, the Catholic church stood to gain by the course the Nazis were taking. He said, as reported in the press when they started out, “National Socialism is preparing the way for the unification of all Christians in Germany and is gradually sending all who want Christianity to the Catholic church.”
This trend was favored in the provision, on October 26,1935, that all Protestant churches in Germany were required to fly the swastika Hag, but the Catholic churches were not required to fly it. On November 29 of that year the Nazis seized the funds of the Confessional (Protestant) Church and Confessional Synods, consisting of voluntary contributions by Protestants.
About that time, too, Hitler had a lengthy interview with Count von Preysing, the Roman Catholic bishop of Berlin. It was followed by a statement that “Hitler will lead the party along the path of positive Christianity, and not along the false path of anti-Christian doctrine”.
On June 9,1941, an editorial appeared in the Turin newspaper Stampa saying that Germany and Italy were organizing a new European order in conformity with the principles laid down in the encyclical Rerum Novarum, to which Pope Pius called attention in his June 1 speech. Postwar Europe, the editorial said, will be a group of states whose national sentiments will he subordinated to a greater Europe. It added that the new order was already being put in operation.
Von Papen, Hitler’s Catholic ambassador to Turkey and the politician who, more than any other, was responsible for Hitler’s theft of power in January, 1933, said, “The Third Reich is the first power which not only recognizes, but which puts into practice the high principles of the papacy.”
At the beginning of the war a dispatch to the New York Times from Frankfort-on-the-Main said, “The Catholic leaders of Germany have been exhorting the faithful at home and abroad to do their utmost in the fight for the righteous cause of the German nation under the guidance of Chancellor Hitler.”
A “Prodigious Spiritual Cure”
When France had been overrun and Petain had been put into the position of power, the pope’s newspaper, Osserva-tore Romano, said of him:
Petain . . . the brave marshal, the good marshal who, more than any other man, seems to personify the best traditions of his race. It is of this old octogenarian that the youth invoke the renewal of their country with a happy intuition in that perennial youth which the religious, Christian, Catholic faith of the marshal knows how to guard to obtain for his sick country a prodigious spiritual cure. Such is the dawn of a new radiant day, not only for France but for Europe and the world.
That was taking in a good deal of territory, but indicates the aims of the papacy in conjunction with Germany and Italy, to administer that “prodigious spiritual cure” of which the “supreme religious” ardor of Franco gave a demonstration in Spain. As a start in that direction a French priest, Abbe Robert Aleche, caused the arrest of more than 800 French patriots during the German occupation, as charged by Judge Doniso-mi at Paris, presiding over an inquiry into the activities of the French Gestapo in Paris. Aleche heard the confessions of the political prisoners and others in the Fresnes prison, and would hurry to the Gestapo with the information he extorted from his foolish victims.
The dissatisfaction of the French resistance movements with the attitude of the priests during the German occupation was shown in comment on declarations by the pope. They said, “We wish the pope had taken his stand during the shameful years and done his denouncing then. It is painful to think that the church left that task to others who were more obscure and who lacked the church’s authority ...”
That was putting things mildly, but put the pope on the spot when he was trying to crawfish while at the same time gently hinting that a soft peace was the Christian thing to hand out to the Nazis.
“Father” Richard Felix, O.S.B., of Conception, .Mo., who believes that the most effective argument in answer to one who does not agree with you is to give him a stinging blow in the face, knock him down, or see that he wears the stripes of a convict, explained why Hitler was not excommunicated. He said: “The church has not excommunicated Hitler for the reason that Hitler has excommunicated himself long ago.” This was hardly in harmony with the foregoing facts, and overlooked that “touching occasion” when Hitler and Goebbels attended St. Hedwig's cathedral for the “requiem mass” on behalf of the soul of Klarshal Pilsudski. Both stood at the elevation of the wafer.
Catholics in Germany did not suffer under Hitler, and the pope was aware of Hitler’s favorable attitude, so why excommunicate him ? The editor-in-chief of the Madrid Alcazar, Senor Casariego, made the statement:
There are 30 million Catholics living in the Third Reich, and in all cities all the Catholic churches are open the entire day. In Berlin’s cathedral, we Spanish journalists attended a solemn high mass after which a Dominican priest preached a sermon lasting nearly an hour. In Berlin’s sixty Catholic churches, and in thousands of others throughout Germany, exactly similar services were taking place at the same time. Later on, in the occupied section of France, we saw posters, placed by the military authorities at the doors of numerous churches, announcing the hours of masses for the soldiers of the garrison. Great care is taken that soldiers attend church service regularly.
That statement is in full harmony with one that appeared in the San Antonio Light for January 21, 1945, headed “Religious Items Fill Nazi Homes”. It said:
American soldiers who invaded Germany found rosaries all over the place, and religious statuettes in every room of the homes the German occupants had fled, Chief Warrant Officer Wally Gursch . . . informs his parents ... in a letter.
Churches as Arsenals
Some will contend that the use of churches in Italy as arsenals shows that the Nazis were lacking in respect for the church. But that conclusion does not follow. It is not unusual for Catholic churches to be so used. It was done extensively in Spain, and it accounts for the fact that so many nuns and priests lost their lives in the Spanish Civil War. It was a case of kill or be killed with their ammunition.
Incidentally, mention may be made of the bomb caches seized in Colombia early this year. Several hundred homemade hand grenades were found in sacks beside the organ in the Bogota cathedral, ready for use. When caught with the goods, the archbishop said that he was “painfully surprised”, which was doubtless true. Archbishops have a neat way of getting out of scrapes of this kind. The one at Bogota even accompanied the police to the cathedral, knowing they would go there anyway.
The foregoing proves again that outward appearances are often deceiving. In neither case was the presence of ammunition, etc., in the churches revealed until it was discovered by others than the church authorities themselves. Draw your own conclusions. It seems to suggest that the “soft peace” idea, like the proposition of liberty, works only one way. It is like saying, “When you are the
winners we claim a soft peace for ourselves, in accordance with your principles ; when we are the winners, in accordance with our principles, we deny it to you.” Which brings us back to our theme.
Not only does Pacelli sing for a soft peace for the Nazi criminals, but his Yellow religionists sing the same song. With due caution we look into the sayings of the “Rt. Rev.” Msgr. Fulton J. Sheen, who certainly must know the mind of the Hierarchy and its head. He said, in a broadcast over NBC, Sunday, February 4, 1945:
You must love your enemy as you love yourself. Does that mean that you must love Hitler as you love yourself ... "It means just that.
Presumably Americans could not love their enemies as Franco, with his “supreme religious” sensibilities, loved his enemies. Or perhaps one does not properly understand Hierarchy.reasoning. If that is the case it isn’t because they haven’t made themselves clear in the past. Remember Veuillot, and you will understand it perfectly. “Heads, I win; tails, you lose 1” Monsignor sure preached a touching sermon, but those who remember Hierarchy persecutions of the past and the present will not be deceived.
Let the other side of the picture appear, and keep things in focus. Hear the German archbishop of Muenster, Count von Galen, reputed “foe” of the Nazis. He said, “The German people must consider the Allies as enemies and take it for granted that you regard them as such. I hope the future will bring a time when we are all good neighbors. But that will be a long time away. Maybe it will be possible in 65 yrears.” That would give the Germans an opportunity to try once more to unify the world in harmony with the principles of the papacy, as they at» tempted to do in the last six years. The report states that the interview with this representative of the Hierarchy was* conducted standing. Evidently the archbishop did not love his enemies sufficiently to offer them a seat. Americans, with characteristic softness
(suspected by some to be softness in the head), dined with Nazi leaders until Eisenhower, feeling justly indignant,' . put a stop to it.
Nor did the Nazis show any love for their enemies, in spite of the “Christian” program which they were supposed to be following, as laid down by the papacy. The atrocious treatment accorded their victims is well known, and Consolation here spares its readers a repetition. One item, however, will be mentioned as summing up the story fittingly.
Two hundred and fifty children liberated by the Red Army from a German slave camp near Lodz, Poland, recently arrived in Kiev. They were all that survived of more than a thousand children taken to the camp. The little captives related with horror what their experiences had been. They were driven tq work and fed on starvation rations. Many died of starvation, exhaustion, and beatings. Anyone with an ounce of manhood would want to be shot rather than lend himself to such treatment of children.
Another archbishop sang the song of a soft peace quite poetically. It was a “prayer”, published in the papers, and apparently intended for the eyes of the people rather than the ears of'God. The archbishop offered it from the throne, instead of to the Throne. He said, among other things,
Grant that in victory we not offend thy justice by revenge, sinning against mercy [like Franco] by hate, destroying also ourselves.
The prayer was read from the pulpit in the cathedral at every mass. A member of the cathedral staff, preaching at solemn mass, asked “merciful judgment” for the conquered countries. Said he, “Our attitude toward the average per-' son in the conquered countries should be one of Christian consideration and compassion,” He quoted the spurious text crediting Jesus with the words, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Jesus never uttered them.
They are not in the oldest manuscripts. Even so, such sentiments would hardly apply to the Nazis. They knew what they were doing. .
Constant Needling
The constant needling of the pope and his assistants for a "soft peace” is designed to get under the skin of those concerned, and particularly now that the pope or his representative is not having a part in the visible peace negotiations. The archbishop just referred to, Francis Spellman, was slated to be the pope’s “peace envoy” at postwar peace parleys, if the pope should be invited to participate, officially or indirectly. His indirect efforts would be through contact with the most important United Nations’ leaders. .
The archbishop is a great admirer of the pope, according to reports. He ■ thinks the pope “parallels Christ”, in the following inordinate words of Battery:
No robust physical stature nor strong broad shoulders has the pope to bear the sorrows of the world, but the Christlike figure, Christlike shoulders, and above all, a Christlike sanctity and spirit seem to characterize him. It is impossible for me to see him without identifying or rather paralleling his life with the life of Christ- and the cross of Christ, and today he reminds me of the wounded Christ.
Aside from the fact that no one knows anything about the figure or shoulders of Christ, the foregoing words, in their obsequious flattery, are but another boot for the “soft peace” propaganda. They do not fit in with the pope’s enthusiastic endorsement of Franco the Butcher.
Nor do these tactics deceive the mentally pubescent. Russia, which has suffered so tremendously from Nazi aggression, is exceedingly wary of the pope. Ever and anon some statement comes from Moscow indicating that it is not taken in by the ‘drooping figure’ propaganda, or anything else that comes from the Vatican. Rather, the Russians saw the pope as the “Nazis’ Mouthpiece”, and offered no apologies. Russia’s stand on the Polish question is greatly influenced by its suspicion of the Vatican. The Red Star, Russian paper, said,
The Vatican’s anti-Soviet campaign on the Polish question is being carried on by the Catholic press in England and the United States.
Nor can one blame Russia for being suspicious, even though that suspicion may take on aspects which it may be hard for Americans to understand. It was not a little disconcerting to have the Russian ambassador Andrei Gromyko call at the state department and demand to see the body of President Roosevelt before its interment. But the request could not be granted. No one had seen the dead president in his coffin, once the lid was closed, which was done privately. Others besides the Russian ambassador have wondered about this. It was all bather unusual. But Andrei Gromyko was not satisfied to accept the refusal. He insisted that the message from his government requesting the viewing of the body be signed, so that he could be seen to have done his duty. It was signed.
Eastern Churches Make Statement
Charging the Vatican with seeking to shield the Nazis, representatives of the Eastern Churches met in Moscow and issued the following statement addressed to the people of the world,' on February 10:
In view of the present international situation representatives of the Orthodox church present at the Sobor (church congress) raise their voices against those, the Vatican especially, who try to protect Hitlerite Germany from responsibility for crimes committed by her and ask forgiveness for Fascists who spilled the blood of innocent victims all over Europe.
Some of the erstwhile Protestant churches are also waking slightly.
The Atlanta Baptist Ministers Conference in February demanded an investigation by the Senate of the government’s relationship with the Vatican. The resolution was signed by 89 ministers.
Establishment of diplomatic relations between the United States and the Vatican was also opposed in a report presented to the biennial meeting of the Federal Council of Churches, representing 25 Protestant denominations with a claimed total of 26,000,000 members in America. They did not, however, see any harm in Myron C. Taylor’s activities at the Vatican as President Roosevelt’s personal representative, which began in December, 1939. They wouldn’t. They said: "We find it necessary to make a sharp distinction between the Roman Catholic religion and the political power exercised by the Roman Catholic hierarchy for its own institutional ends.” They “see men as trees, walking”.
Another statement opposing any involvement of the democracies in a “deal” with either the Vatican or any other religious establishment was signed by 1,600 religious leaders. The statement read, in part:
It is tragically significant that when, in 1929, the papacy re-entered the political field it did so in alliance with enemies of those very cultures in which its church had thrived. As a political power it gained its first fatal successes in treaties of friendship with Fascist powers. Supporting Mussolini in Italy, Dolfuss and Schuschnigg in Austria, Hitler in Germany, Franco in Spain, and Petain in France, the papacy has thrown its weight into the scales of the present human struggle on the side of the enemies of democracy.
(And not mentioning the deal with Japan, after Pearl Harbor.) The statement was directed to Roosevelt, Stalin and Churchill. ■
The Archbishop of the Prayer
The archbishop of the prayer, mentioned foregoing, was highly displeased with the statement of the 1,600 protesting religious leaders, however mild their protest. He could not let it pass. The very next time he entered ,the cathedral he censured these clergymen, even though he had to talk to the Boy Scouts about it. He knew that it would get into the papers all right, like his prayer. (Peter never got his prayer printed in the papers.) The archbishop was really - “mad”. Said he:
These self-styled super-patriots could have benefited with the Boy Scouts of America and learned the fundamental tenets of the Boy Scouts, the love of God and country. In the newspaper article published yesterday 1600 men call themselves ministers and religious leaders. They do a disservice to the country and violate the Golden Rule. [Which the archbishop and his friend Franco always observe!]
The Boy Scouts didn’t know what it was all about, but they knew the archbishop wasn’t talking about Catholics. Anyway, the 1,600 protesting ministers put one over on the archbishop. They cabled their message to the big three, where it would do the most good. He had to be satisfied with telling it to the Boy Scouts.
The pope is suspect in South America too. The Ulster Protestant recently published the following statement:
The Roman Catholic Church and its priests are decidedly most unpopular among the people of South America. One indication is that a book written against the Boman Catholic Church and the priests is an assured bestseller in those lands. Leading Latin Americans welcome Protestant missions . . . They look upon adherents to South American Roman Catholicism as “defenders of a privilege rather than followers of a faith”.
This statement was made by a Methodist minister, who also said, 'T find myself doing now what in all these [35] years I refused to do. [Preaching against Romanism.] I do it because we must win for ourselves the privileges of religious freedom.”
. The proponents for a “soft peace” do not seem to be popular: So the Vatican is trying .to backtrack a bit. When Hitler was wounded in the July 20, 1944, bomb attack condolences were sent by the pope. Thereafter Hitler was reported as hiding in a Jesuit monastery at Salzburg, Austria. Three Jesuit priests reported the matter at the Vatican. The monastery was made a secret refuge for Hitler, they said. Meanwhile the Kazis were reported as using a double for Hitler. The London Daily Express said it had “incontestable proof” that this was the case. The double did not have the same size of ears as Hitler, which is said to have given the secret away.
Mussolini’s End
Hitler’s partner, Mussolini, came to a sad end. He had found sanctuary in the palace of Cardinal Schuster, but was suspicious and left his place of hiding, with the result that he was caught and executed. His remains were subjected to numerous indignities, being kicked and spat upon and hung up by the heels for public contempt.
But a mass was held for him in Santiago, Chile, at the Catholic Temple of National Gratitude. Throughout the service Italians present gave the Fascist salute. The temple is said to have been assaulted by “Communists”, persons who expressed their disapproval of the ceremony.
And so Mussolini and Hitler disappear from the world-stage. Their “popu-arity” had begun to wane, however, long before they themselves were finished. Their friend, Franco, foresaw the outcome. A story in Time (July 31, 1944) illustrates the point. It said:
An Allied observer, visiting the State Department, graphically illustrated current political trends in Spain with a story about pictures. The pictures were on General Francisco Franco’s handsome desk. A year ago, when the observer visited Franco, there were three of them, a large autographed photograph of Pope Pius XII, flanked by large autographed photographs of Hitler and Mussolini. When he called again eight months later the pictures were still there. But when he went to see Franco less than a month ago, two of Franco’s heroes had disappeared. Gone were Hitler and Mussolini.
The pope’s “new order” lies in fragments. All he can do is pick up the pieces, and save what he can of the wreckage. This he is attempting by holding out for a “soft peace” for the aggressors. Sometimes the publicity given to some of his agents is amusing, and defeats its own purpose. Cardinal Faulhaber, of Munich, for instance, was represented as about the only good German a reporter met in Germany. The story was given wide publicity. But if he is the only good German, the rest of them cannot be considered as worthy of a “soft peace”. The cardinal is supposed to have opposed the Nazis right along, but kept out of danger. He did not get into a concentration camp.
The pope continues to put the Nazis, Fascists and Allies in the same category. He says they are all equally guilty, and is planning a “holy year” for thtf “purification of the world” from all the crimes committed during the conflict. The last “holy year” failed to bring peace or prosperity, but coincided with Hitler’s rise to power. The pope had a lot to do with that development. And still he sings of a “soft peace”.
A Good Story from the West
♦ One of Jehovah’s witnesses in a far-western state was proclaiming to a fellow worker the good news of The Theocracy as the only hope of man. The man was so interested that, without knowledge of the witnesser, he slyly appropriated to himself the January 17, 1945, issue of Consolation. That interested him so much that he came back, admitting that he had pilfered the magazine, but that it had such a ring of truth about it that he wished to know more about the whole subject. Now the man who lost the magazine is delighted.
Latvia, the “Belgium” of Eastern Europe
MANY have reflected upon the fact that the Belgians are peaceable, in, dustrious and intelligent citizens of a fertile land, and yet they are not permit* ted to live in peace. For about two thousand years Belgium has been a battleground over which some paper-hanger or Hohenzollern or Napoleon or other monstrosity has sent millions of men to . their death, and made it plenty hard for the Belgians as well.
Latvia is in the same predicament in eastern Europe. The Letts are also peaceable, industrious and intelligent citizens of a fertile land, and, although the Letts have lived in Latvia for two thousand years and have never tried to overrun any other peoples or lands, their land has been constantly made a battleground by Germans, Russians, Poles and Swedes who know that there is such a thing as the Golden Rule but haven’t the least idea or intention of guiding themselves by it.
The middle one of the three states on the eastern shore of the Baltic sea, Latvia, half as large as New York state, is twice the size of Denmark; or, to put it in still another way, is as large as Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg put together. The people are mostly farmers, and considered among the most progressive and intelligent in that indispensable industry. The population in 1935 was 1,950,502. -
On account of being alternately "bossed” by the Germans and the Russians, the Letts commonly speak three languages, Lettish, German and Russian. A woman traveler describes them as only a woman might:
As to dress. The men dress much 'better than the women. For Some reason the latter are devoting themselves to hard felt hats of uncompromisingly bright colors. And this brings out the fact that Latvian women as a rule have large hands and feet. Their mouths, however, are generously medium and well
shaped. The men run to bright colored raglan coats, spats and high-heeled shoes. Their hats are usually gray felt, and they always carry canes. All Lettish noses turn up, and nearly all Letts are blond and gray-eyed. .
Riga, Queen of the Baltic
It used to be that if anybody wished to go anywhere in Russia he took the steamer to Riga, the capital of Latvia, and from there went wherever he pleased, by rail. The population of the city in 1930 was 3'77,917. The gulf in which it is located is 100 miles long and 60 miles wide and is frozen for an average of 127 days in the year, but the port is equipped with great ice-breakers which smash their way through ice three feet thick, and in normal times the city is equipped to do a great business in its position as Russia’s port to the west.
Deprived by the Devil of any sense of sanity otthumor, the popes have attempted to run everything on the planet, and so, in viewr of the present fact that 57.2 percent of the Letts are Lutherans, and only 22.6 percent of them are Roman Catholics, it is comical to read in the encyclopedia :
About 1190 the Augustinian monk Mein-hard erected a monastery there, and in 11991201 Bishop Albert I of Livonia obtained from Pope Innocent III permission for German merchants to land^at the new settlement, and chose it for his seat, exercising his power over the neighboring district in connexion with the Teutonic Knights. [ Despite the pope, the people became Lutherans anyway.]
It should be explained that the Teutonic Knights and Knights of Columbus were evidently sired by the same father and had the same mother. The Lettish religious census above mentioned showed 9.1 percent of the population Russian Orthodox, 4.8 percent Old Russian Orthodox, 5.1 percent Jews, and all others, such as non-Luther an Protestants, etc., only 1.2 percent. "
When Riga was functioning normally it was the Reno, Nevada, of Europe. A person wanting divorce went there and established a residence for three months, but during those three months he could go anywhere in Europe that he chose. At the end of that time he came back and all that he had to do was to sign a paper that he and his companion had not lived together for a time, and the total divorce costs were $40 for the attorney and $1.20 for court expenses.
As seen from the deck of an incoming steamer, Riga is a magnificent city.
Some Events Since World War I
It seems not worth while to summarize Latvian history for two thousand years, but on August 11, 1920, Russia, which had been the ruler of the country for the past 122 years, signed a peace treaty with Latvia and recognized Lat-. via’s independence forever. It was good that this was to be for such a definite period, because Russia grabbed the country again on June 17, 1940. It thus appears that “forever” is a period of 19 years 10 months 6 days, Russian style. The hitch in this ease is that Germany has had it , since then, for a few months only, but now the Russians have it a second time. Just how long the “forever” will be is at this time not known, but it might last until Armageddon, depending on when Armageddon comes.
When the Letts had their try at liberty, they did not get along any too well. But who do, when they have been restrained so long? Years ago, in Washington, D.C., there was a little boy whose parents were overcautious in taking care of him. He was never allowed to play with other boys; he might get hurt. He was always in the care of a servant who watched his every step. He chafed under the restraints, and one day, when the eyes of his caretaker were diverted for a moment, the lad ran for liberty and was killed by an automobile.
So, when the Latvians had their spell of liberty from August 11, 1920, they divided their parliament of one hundred members into twTenty parties, which is eighteen too many. America has proved that a first-class political fight calls for just two sluggers who mean Iftsiness, or pretend that they do. When there are more than two parties, democracy works poorly. The ten women in the parliament of Latifia wTere sprinkled around among the various political organizations. That was the situation in 1923. In 1934 Karlis Ulmanis, who had been a ptofessor in the University of Nebraska, tried to straighten out the tangle by taking charge of the whole works. He suspended the constitution, replaced parliament with a so-called “state economic council” and a state cultural council, and from then until Russia’s grab of the country in 1940 it was an authoritarian or totalitarian setup.
Under the Ulmanis dictatorship there were sweeping land reforms that broke up both the Russian communal village system and the vast estates of the Baltic barons and the absentee Russian and German and Polish aristocracy. There was created an army of 220,000 small holders out of these huge estates. In taking over the huge German holdings the Letts argued that they were entitled to the land on the theory that it had been stolen from them seven centuries previously. This was slightly irregular, because the regular theory is that if some hundreds of years ago somebody obtained, by theft or murder or otherwise, a title to land or a title as king or queen, then it is their divine right to hold it forever. ,'
Seventy percent of the Latvian people are engaged in agriculture; they have made a great success at it and have been in great demand as teachers of modern farming methods, the use of agricultural machinery and fertilizers, and the standardizing and marketing of products. Of course, World War II has upset everything, but the farms and the farmers are still there, and the future is still future.
Some odd items about Latvia are that wooden plows are still used to some extent, or wTere in 1924; pretzels are exceedingly popular and widely sold by their makers on the public streets; there are a dozen varieties of bread sold in the markets; and, finally, there are Dilling-iers there as elsewhere, and in 1927 one iof them was hanged at two o’cloqjr in the morning (why such an unearthly hour?) as his reward for committing two hundred robberies, of which two were one-man holdups of entire trains, and incidentally killing twenty-two of his fellow men. What he did looks like a smalltown show compared with what has been done since his day.
x Stirring Events in Utah
IT WAS but one Eve that God created and brought to Adam, and God’s will respecting marriage was expressed by His own Son and in His own words: “For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh.” (Matthew 19:5; Genesis 2:24) It was Sarah that pressed concubinage upon Abraham; it was Laban’s treachery that brought polygamy to Jacob. Noah had but one wife; Shem had but one wife; Ham had but one wife; Japheth had but one wife. Lot had but one wife. Isaac had but one wife. Joseph had but one wife, Moses had but one wife. Job had but one wife. Polygamists were not to be made bishops (overseers) or deacons (assistants). (1 Timothy 3:2, 12) Jehovah God is represented as the husband of one wife (His organization), and Christ Jesus as the spouse of the one and only true bride of Christ, His church.—Ephesians 5: 25-33.
It is not denied that David, Solomon, and many others were polygamists; nor is it denied that there have been, and still are, cases where men have six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot. So much and no more for the outbreak of polygamy, which is never long out of sight in Utah. Out of every 33 births, 17 are males and 16 are females. The males are more easily killed. The sexes were evidently intended to pair off, one of each. In actual practice, polygamy has brought no blessings to anybody. Never, at any time, was plural marriage practiced by more than 3 percent of the Mormon population. Harems or convents were unknown in Utah. Where a Mormon did have more than one wife he had her and her children in a home by themselves.
The Ogden (Utah) Standard' Examiner comes to hand explaining thus :
Apostle Charles A. Callis said that John Wesley and Charles Wesley, God bless them, in the spirit world are Mormon elders, working with Joseph Smith, shoulder to shoulder.
There is no doubt that Joseph Smith was guided by unclean spirits, demons, devils; and what else can be said for men who, like the Wesleys, spent much of their lives teaching the horrible bias- i phemy of eternal-torture? But it will be a shock to some Methodists (there are 20 kinds) to learn that the Wesleys and the Mormons are now all Mormons together. Of course, it is all pure nonsense. These men are all dead, and if they ever wake up, those who do will be much ashamed of what they once believed and taught.
Released Time in Salt Lake .
Always eager to do anything it can to destroy the American public school system, the Roman Catholic Hierarchy in Utah has joined with the Mormons to “permit” high school, students to attend religious instruction classes off public school premises for one period each day. If the Hierarchy could fix that period so that it would take the entire school day on each of the five days in the week when classes are held, it would be well pleased. The tremendous illiteracy in Roman Catholic countries is proof of this statement. The Protestants are sore and will not participate. About 40 of the 256 denominations are represented in the strife.
At Layton, a few miles north of Salt Lake City, the board of trustees met and solemnly decided that if an American citizen is of Japanese ancestry he may not conduct a business in their midst. They might just as well have decided that he may not conduct it. if he has freckles on his face, or if he has red hair, or if he has false teeth, or if he walks flat-footed, or wears spectacles. Clarence Okuda, born in the United States, moved into Layton in the spring of 1942, opened a grocery, was refused a license to operate it because his ancestors were Japanese, and was threatened with arrest for operating his business without a license. Can you beat that for injustice and narrow-mindedness? He sued for an injunction. What kind of country would America be if nobody with curly hair could be legally employed? Or if everybody must worship the pope or starve?
At Price, the other side of Salt Lake City, on the Denver and Rio Grande railway, were two boys each twelve years of age, who were led astray by just such intelligence as was manifested by those Layton trustees. They set on fire the home of a Japanese-American and his wife, who had five little American children, with just as much right in America as the youngsters who wanted to burn them alive. The boys said that they “wanted to help”. Neighbors broke down the doors and rescued th'e family from the flames. Within a month thereafter the Salt Lake Tribune said editorially of another case, probably in Salt Lake itself:
It is reported and verified by bullet marks that the home of a Japanese family, the head of which had been, interned several weeks ago, was twice the target of fusillades of rifle shots fired from moving automobiles the other night, the first at 00 a.m., and the second two hours later. Only cowards, afraid to enlist and fight for their country and for the maintenance of its integrity, would fire upon the fragile shelter of a mother and five children while the father is in a concentration camp.
The Home of* Guayule and Scheelite
No, Mabel, Guayule is not a Frenchman, and Scheelite is not a German. It is nothing like that. Guayule is a plant that grows in desert places in Utah, Arizona and California, and is one of many shrubs that can be used for making rubber. When the plants are four years old a tractor-drawn vacuum harvests the seeds needed for the plant reproduction. Then the stalks ard1 cut and* pulverized, When the pulp is moistened, the liquid bearing the rubber globules floats to the top. The rubber is then skimmed off and cleaned, and the result is a very good grade of natural rubber. So Utah now is helping to provide rubber for Uncle Sam.
There are vast mineral treasures in Utah. One of these is scheelite. This, it has been discovered, is rich in tungsten. Uncle Sam used 9,027 tons of tungsten in 1937, and of that amount 5,527 tons came from Burma and China, which are not now able to ship any at all. Scheelite, it has been discovered, becomes fluorescent when it is exposed to ultraviolet light. It can thus be quickly identified. Uncle Sam has to have the tungsten, because cemented tungsten carbide, the hardest artificial substance known, is required in today’s activities for the production of tools which can cut or drill the very hard metal castings and alloys so much used. There are 210 minerals in Utah, metallic and non-metallic.
It has been freely admitted by Amer- * ican statesmen that the National Irrigation Law of 1902, by which the government co-operates with the people of the Rocky Mountain and plains states in extending and building up a system of irrigated agriculture, had its inception with the enterprising Mormon pioneers of Utah.
Kruger National Park
LOCATED two hundred miles east of
Johannesburg, on the railway to Lorenco Marques, and stretching north therefrom 200 miles, and' with a width of about 40 miles, the Kruger National Park of 5,000,000 acres in extent is the world’s greatest wild life sanctuary. None may enter or leave the park without permits; they must travel by automobile; they may travel only on the 1,100 miles of automobile roads; they must not get out of the cars except at the park stations.
Motorists often have to slow down to allow lions to get out of the way; they often hear them roaring outside the camps where they stay overnight; they may see families of giraffes, impala, buffalo, elephants, elands, reedbucks, steen-bucks, waterbucks, wildebeests, leopards, hippopotami, kudu, warthogs, zebra, duikers, bushbucks, baboons, tsessebe, jackals, and crocodiles. And when it comes to birds, there are secre-tary*birds, guinea fowl, hornbills, hoopoes, partridge, heron, and other interesting forms of life seldom seen elsewhere. The martial hawk eagle has a nine-foot wing span. The giant baobab tree, shown in one of the park tourist guides, is not less than sixteen feet in diameter.
Termites, or Wood Lice
TERMITES, or wood lice, are' often called "white ants’’, but they are not ants, though they do have many traits in common. The 1,200 kinds of termites do immense injury to man by the destruction of trees, crops, buildings, and goods, Among certain forms of termites there is but one king and one queen and they remain true to the connubial attachment for life, being fed and tended by their numerous progeny. Among some of the termites, the queen may attain a length of four inches, and may lay 4,000 or more eggs a day, and many millions during a lifetime of perhaps ten years. ■
- The termite lives in the ground and works and feeds in wood. To get at the wood he thinks nothing of building vertical tunnels of mud, excretia, saliva and wood dust for as much as three or four feet from the ground into a wooden beam, from wffiich, if he gets the' chance, he will remove most of the cellulose contents, leaving it an empty shell. If he can build on a brick or concrete wall, he may extend his tunnel (he always works in the dark) as much as tw’d stories until he finds some beam that he can rob from the inside.
In southern and tropical Africa, and in Australia, certain species of termites build termitaria, as they are called, which may reach to a height of twenty feet, with a basal diameter of twelve feet. These are formed of earth particles cemented together and are of cementlike hardness. In the deeper recesses of these vast structures the brood is reared, and here the royal cell of the queen termite is located. In the United States -the department of agriculture has estimated the annual damage done by termites at $29,300,000. They eat up houses, telegraph poles, and trees, and, once they get started, are difficult to check. ■
Like ants, the termites have workers, soldiers, chemists and carpenters, and,
f
like ants, they may attack and have at- helpless and in their power. To get rid tacked banians that they believed to be of them, creosote the timbers.
The Special Edition Racket
Occasionally one sees special editions of big and little newspapers, featuring reviews of industry, holidays, anniversaries, and carrying advertising the total of which runs annually to hundreds of millions of dollars. In Fact mentions these, after due and proper mention that modern racketeering had its origin in Chicago newspaper wars between Hearst’s Herald-Examiner and the McCormick-Patterson Tribwic. After remarking that the sluggers and shooters branched oil into the liquor, prostitution and labor field, In Fact returns to the newspaper theme with this one:
The newspaper business, while pretending to be pure as Caesar’s wife in its public relations, privately admits its racket. For example, here is the November, 1942, issue of The National Publisher in which Maynard Knis-kern, publisher of Cranston (R. I.) Herald, says:
“It is not too difficult, as every publisher knows, to ride herd on advertisers . . . and corral them into special pages, anniversary editions, .booster messages, congratulation cards, flag-waving space, and the like. But we" on the Herald have always been opposed to racket pages of this sort. ... It seems to us that to prey on civic spirit, fear of public opinion, or simple vanity, is a mighty poor way of conducting a business, particularly when that business is a newspaper.”
This 1942 quotation brings up to date the old story of corruption of the press which was given to the world in 1934-35 when the Federal Trade Commission published its 73 volumes of testimony showing that the electric light and power lobby (NELA), representing $10,000,000,000, spent an average of $25,000,000 a year corrupting the majority of American newspapers.
Today’s bribery, blackmail, or racketeering, as it is known within the advertising and journalistic professions, consists largely of the special edition in which the corporations which have been- defended and whitewashed throughout the year, and in whose behalf labor has been smeared, and for whom news has been suppressed, can pay off.
Viewing the advertising racket from another angle, that always interesting paper The Railway Clerk explains further :
According to the U. S. Department of Commerce, all sorts of advertising have increased 60 percent over the'prewar level. The money spent for advertising would, if not so spent, go to the Treasury Department in taxes and would help pay for the war. What were these advertisements going to say if they did not advertise to increase sales 7 Well, you know the answer to that one if you read the advertising pages. They told how the dear old Yo-Yo Company is helping win the war. Even for products not even remotely connected with the. war effort, some contribution to the war effort is dragged in by the heels to give the company credit for helping win the war.
The vice-president of the National Association of Manufacturers wryly observed, in speaking to a group of businessmen, that if this trend kept up, the boys in the foxholes, when they got back, would be forced to hire a press agent to convince the public that soldiers, too, had something to do with our victory.
Fourteen Thousand Packing Cases ♦ When William Randolph Hearst bought the Saeramenia monastery in Spain, he had it taken apart stone by stone, packed in 14,000 packing cases, and shipped to New York, where the cases are now for sale. Srf, if you wish to build a monastery for yourself and your family, now is your chance. The path of glory leads to 14,000 useless packing cases.
JSWOR.D ISTkUTH”
-Johnl7:17
Right Use of the Bible
THE true follower of the Son of God, while always interested in all things relating to the Bible, does not give him* self concern in the matter of textual criticisms which are leveled against it by men learned in the world’s wisdom. He does not concern himself about those much more numerous and harmful “higher criticisms” which are made by the religious clergy, which clergy, although set apart by their respective sects to expound the Bible, nevertheless spend time in criticism professedly to make it clearer but really to destroy the belief that it is the revelation of God to man.
To the disciple of Christ it is enough that Jesus accepted the writings of Moses, the law, the historical records, the Psalms, and the prophets as a Godgiven record for the guidance and instruction of all His servants, not excluding himself. To Jesus these sacred writings were a treasure store of God’s revelation of His purpose for man.
. Today the Bible is in greater circulation than ever before. The Bible societies which exist to get it into circulation are active in their work. They ardently further their work abroad; and even during total war times it has continued to be the “best seller”. Yet by the great mass of Christian peoples, who profess to be guided by it, it is held in less esteem than ever; for the critic has been abroad in the land, with the result that confidence in th$ Lord’s Word is very low among Protestants as well as Catholics.
If it is objected that without “scholarly criticism” we do not know that these Scriptures, which we reverence and to which we trust, are the same as those which Jesus knew so well and which He took for His guidance, then let us answer that the Hebrew Scriptures as we have them, which contain the same writings that Jesus used, are consistent with themselves. There is no indication of their having lost or gained in their long journey through the changing centuries down to us. The quotations from the Hebrew Scriptures which were made by Jesus’ apostles and disciples in setting the foundation of the faith and practice of the church of God lix the authority of such Scriptures for the church.
Further, the researches of men of good-will, and even of those who have searched rather to find errors than to find corroboration, have only served to prove to the follower of Christ and to the lover of God that the Bible is singularly free from serious blemishes which might naturally, have so easily gotten into it. To the honest Bible student there is no room for doubt on any matter that is really vital to a true knowledge of God’s will and purp'ose.
To the old Hebrew Scriptures must be added the writings of the apostles, the w'hole making the complete Word of God, which is to be received by Jesus’ followers now and ultimately by all men that live. Every word of Jesus that has been recorded is part of the revelation of God. Also the accounts written of His birth and works, of His death and resurrection, are received as God-given. The common trivial matters of the early Christians’ daily arrangements and of their communal life were not necessary to the faith and life of the church, and are not recorded.
That the holy spirit or active force of God brought back to the apostles’ memory those things necessary to be recorded and believed is certain. (See John 16:13.) The doings and sayings of the apostles as they instructed the church were made part of the revelation in order to guide the church; and the whole of such forms the Word of God as it must be received, the Word which is able-to make a man wise unto salvation and to make the man of God perfect in his equipment for service. Besides this,_ it should be understood that the Scriptures are God’s wntness to Himself. Its prophecies were placed on record that when, in God’s due time, their time for fulfillment would come, they would thus be a proof that Jehovah alone is God. None other than Jehovah could foretell the future; and there are thousands of years between the prophecies and the events which have fulfilled them.
How is the Word of God to be used? Moses told Israel that the things which he taught them about God they were to bind on their hand for a sign, and have • them for frontlets between their eyes. How literally this was to be understood is not certain. Israel was to write the instruction of Moses on the door posts; that is, some reminder, a text as we would say, was to be written there as nowadays we have mottoes with Scripture words for hanging on the walls of dwellings. But the Israelites were also to write the words of the law on their hearts; that is, they were to lay them up in their minds so as to be able to meditate on them day and night, abroad or at home; and to preserve them by telling their children the story of God’s wonderful dealings with them, and of all His goodness.-—Deuteronomy 6: 4-9. ' The Israelites in, the days of their nation’s degeneracy made a great profession of reverence for the law of God, and with great ostentation wore their phylacteries, with passages from the law, on their arms and on their foreheads. But it was almost all for outward show. Jesus did not condemn the Pharisees for wearing a phylactery; all He said was that they made them broad so as to call the people’s attention to their claim to reverence for the law. At the same time the Word of God was not in their minds, nor the love of the Word of God in their hearts. The organized systems of “'Christendom” have made the same profession of reverence for the whole of the Bible as the Jew did for His sacred writings, the Hebrew Scriptures. But they have done exactly as the Jew did. The religious systems of Rome and of England have done little to explain or expound the Word of God. Each, based its claim upon the Word, and founded its ceremonies and creeds, and then expected no further light on the Scriptures.
In later days, as Protestantism began to be broken up into sects, more attention was paid to the Bible. In still later days sects have arisen which have called attention to certain texts of Scripture and, by making “a belief" out of their choice, have emphasized them. Thus it has come about that with many there is a much wider knowledge of the text of the Word of God than ever before. It is apparent that a knowledge of certain texts is not in itself of service; indeed, frequently such knowledge does more harm than good, because pride takes the place of a humble desire to serve God. “Knowledge puffeth up,” says 1 Corinthians 8:1, and this refers especially to Bible knowledge. But, granted a knowledge of the truth of the Bible, and humility along with it, also a desire to glorify God by means of that knowledge, then the more of it that Christ’s follower has, the better he can serve his Master. Thus he makes right use of the Word of God, the Bible.
The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. Moreover by them is thy servant warned: and in keeping of them there is great reward.—Psalm 19:7-11.
Current Education
IN ITS survey of 7,000 freshmen in
36 American colleges the New York Times discovered that 25 percent of the* _ students did not know that Lincoln was president of the United States during * the Civil War; 30 percent did not know that Woodrow Wilson was president of the United States during World War I, and 85 percent did not know that William McKinley was president of the United States during the Spanish-American war. Only 6 percent could name the original 13 states of the Union, and only 40 percent connected Robert Fulton with the steamboat or Alexander Graham Bell with the telephone. Many had only the haziest and most ridiculous ideas as to where the various states are located, what are the contents of the Bill of Rights, or what Thomas Jefferson contributed to American institutions. Whatever else they had been taught, they knew but little about their own country.
Those with their eyes open can see that what is going on all over the world is a campaign to keep the people in ignorance of the things they have a right to know. How apparent that was in Poland, for example, where the Nazi rulers decreed that there should be no schoolbooks in the Polish language; and in Belgium, where all mention of the in-■ vasion of the country by Germany in 1914 was forbidden! The German authorities have said that they would make the French people forget all about the French Revolution.
The teachings of the Vford of God are the truth, and the teachings of religion are contrary and opposite thereto, yet at a convention of educators of 30 nations that met near Washington in the fall of 1943 one of the American educators there present urged that the children all over the world be taught the basic principles of all the great religions, such as Christianity, Judaism, Mohammedanism, Confucianism, etc. The result would be confusion worse confounded.
Cut Out the Green Scum
A generation or more ago the preachers of the world fell for the evolution nonsense, which at every point is in flat contradiction with the known facts of science and history and devoid of common sense. Occasionally one of them is bright enough to see this. One of them went before the board of education in Kansas City and asked them to omit from one of their textbooks the instruction that man originated from green scum. He said that such instruction is “wrecking and ruining the morals of our children’’, leaving them with the impression that they have no moral responsi- > bilities. Quite true.
False teachings interfere- with true teachings. In Sunday schools little folks have been mistaught that the literal earth is to be burned up, whereas the Scriptures say that it abideth forever and was made to be inhabited, and that the obedient shall remain on it. In Sheboygan, Wisconsin, a teacher properly calmed the fears of a little girl about the possibility of a comet’s hitting and destroying the earth. She went home and told her mother the teacher had been teaching against religion. The preachers of the city made a big row,.but in the end they signed a paper to divorce1 religion from public education and,not to interfere in the conduct of the schools. If the preachers can’t help the teachers in any other way, they can render a real service by keeping still about things of which they know nothing. That would keep some preachers quiet all the time.
America is threatened with a big loss of teachers. At the University of California in three years the number studying to be teachers fell from 1,393 to 325. In a two-year period, out of 882,000 teachers 130,000 left the classroom. Most of these were men; hence the burden of instruction will hereafter fall more heavily upon women than hitherto. Even as it was before the war, women constituted 80 percent of the teaching personnel. Enrollment in teachers’ colleges has fallen from 175,000 students to 72,000.
Odd Ideas on Education
Technocracy seems to have the wild idea that hereafter no education will be necessary. It wants to conscript all citizens, male and female, all machines, all materiel, and all money. It would grab all banks, transportation systems, communications systems, manufacturing industries, mining industries, patents, inventions, and other things too numerous to mention. It would abolish all foreign languages and their use, suspend all dividends, prolits, interest, rents, dues and taxes.
Basie English is up for discussion. Some think it is practical to boil the 600,000 words in Webster’s dictionary down to a mere 850. The Funk & Wagnails dictionary had it down to 450,000. That is quite a cut, but still not enough. The “’New Testament” has been translated into Basic; and the following are well-known passages which anyone familiar with the Holy Scriptures will at once .recognize:
Let your change of heart be seen in your works.—Matthew 3: 8.
You may not be servants of God-and of wealth,—-Matthew 6: 24.
He is off his head and in great pain.-—Matthew 17:15.
We have never seen anything like this. * —Mark 2:12.
A loud-tongued bell.—1 Corinthians 13:1.
Put up with the foolish gladly.—2 Corinthians 11:19.
Be ready with the good news of peace as shoes on your feet.—Ephesians 6:15.
The substance of things hoped for and the sign that things unseen are true.—Hebrews 11:1.
Do not put hands on any one without thought.—1 Timothy 5: 22.
What credit is it to you ?—Luke 6:32,33,34.
Giving the good news.—Luke 8:1.
The statesmen that expect to straighten out all of earth’s tangles have some ’ excuse for wanting one language. At present there are calculated to be about 3,400 tongues, of which only about one-third have thus far been reduced to writing. It is a good thing that they don’t each have 600,000 words. In any event, it show’s that the job that was done at the tower of Babel was a good one.
Frequent attempts are made to subsidize education. Some politicians would fain lay their hands on everything, so that those that are convinced that they know it all could write out from Vatican City via Washington, telling the school boards what kind of teachers to hire, and what to teach, just how and when to swing their arms, etc., etc., to the end of time. It’s a big idea, but it’s as crazy as the ward that is given over entirely to padded cells.
Upward Steps in Education
Most folks are common folks; but there are some prodigies, and they have the same rights as others, though they usually burn out early in life. Yale university welcomed at 12 years of age a Cleveland, Ohio, boy who spoke a complete sentence at 4 months, read a book through on his first birthday, picked out a Listz melody at 22 months, and was asked to leave the local graded school in Cleveland because he asked too many questions and volunteered too many answers. Other prodigies were Beethoven, who composed at 10; Schubert, at 11; and Richard Strauss, who wrote a polka and a song at 6. Samuel Wesley played the organ at 3.
The Holy Scriptures (King James translation) have been recorded on 169 long-playing phonograph discs, thus making the complete Word of God accessible to all the blind who can reach the 27 libraries where the records are kept. These records-are also sent through the mails, to the blind, postage free, without cost. Surely that is a big educational item. The recording has just recently been completed.
The greatest educational work ever performed in the earth is that of Jehovah’s “faithful and wise servant”, His own organization, using the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society, looking after the Kingdom interests and conducting on a huge scale the house-to-house min-Hstry practiced by Christ Jesus and the holy apostles and the seventy that were sent out. Here, in the sight of all men, is the visible proof that the second advent is an accomplished fact and that the kingdom of heaven is really here, ruling in the midst of the very active and influential enemies of The Theocracy, Others can and do discuss the wisdom of such house-to-house work, but the only people that will do such work, and keep at it( are the ones that have done it for a generation in the face of hatred and persecution, are still doing it and will do it until all that is left of Satan’s organization will be like Sodom and Gomorrah.
Anybody using only a part of one side of his head ought to be able to see that the Higher Powers are not nor ever wrnre Franco the Butcher, Salazar the Torturer, Mussolini the Windbag, Hirohito the “son of heaven”, Pacelli or Hitler.
Anyway, the “faithful and wise servant” knows the truth on the subject. “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.”
Mere Longevity or Life Everlasting
LONGEVITY is a great blessing, because it is a prolongation of the greatest of all gifts, life. But the Scriptures definitely promise everlasting life on the earth. The prayer that God’s will shall be done on earth as it is in heaven means that there will be an end to death on this planet. “For the upright shall dwell in the land, and the perfect shall remain in it. But the wicked shall be cut off from the earth, and the transgressors shall be rooted out of it.”—Proverbs 2:21,22. _ _
All are familiar with the fact that Adam lived 930 years, while Methuselah passed away at the age of 969, which was in the year of the Flood. These men were contemporaneous with each other for 243 years, and, without a reasonable doubt, knew each other very well. After the Flood longevity was greatly reduced. Of late there has been an upward trend, and physicians not familiar with the truth are indicating that a proper age limit is 90 years, not threescore and ten.
The way they reason is that it takes 30 years, under present conditions, to bring the human body to its full development; at that age the normal discharge of carbonic dioxide from the lungs is 1,340 cubic inches an hour; for the next 30 years waste and repair equal each other, but at 60 years of age the discharge of carbonic dioxide from the lungs is only about 1,000 cubic inches an hour. The reason assigned is that the lungs have become slowly impaired through dust. The lungs were pink at birth; in dust-free localities the lungs of the aged have turned to dark-gray; in agricultural districts they have become, dark-greenish or bluish; in smoky or sooty districts they have become grayblack or brown-black. At 60, then, there is less air inhaled; the breathing is slowed up; the blood becomes impaired; the propulsive power of the intestines weakens; a portion bf the urea which should be eliminated is retained in the' blood; the tissues degenerate as a result of insufficient and perverted blood; the heart loses its tone; the bones become brittle; at 75 there is a senile climacteric and a readjustment of functions of the body, and then comes senility, and death at 90.
Not a Pretty Picture
Any way one looks at it, death is not a pretty picture, and the loss of one’s powers as it approaches is not attractive. In the United States, in the census of 1910, there were only 40 persons 100 years of age whose centenaries could be verified, and the ominous Huth is evidently plainly indicated by the Encyclopedia Americana when it states:
The unreliability of longevity statistics is apparent when we consider that the largest number of reputed centenarians are found in countries having a large illiterate population and incomplete records or no records at all.
The Encyclopedia Britannica takes a more cheerful view of the subject than the Americana's position, that “the causes for old age are insufficient sleep, improper food, intense excitement and depressing emotions”, and makes some interesting propositions from which a few sentences are isolated: #
There is more danger of rusting out than of wearing out, provided tthe body is healthy and the mind is free from worry.
Retirement, often looked forward to in early life, is a source of danger, as it may bring with it cessation from activity.
Poverty, within limits, is an advantage, inasmuch as it removes the dangers of excessive eating, particularly of meat, after the body has reached maturity. . . . The majority of centenarians have be.en small eaters.
Among centenarians women outnumber men in the proportion of three to one. . . . Children born between four and eight years after their parents’ marriage live longer than those born earlier or later.
Something on the Other Side
With the waning of sexual power the mind becomes calmer and more philosophic, so that the limitations of activity are more cheerfully accepted; but fatigue is more readily produced, 4uemory, especially for names, becomes less agile, and will power, like the gait, becomes less certain.
This sortie into the field of longevity was caused by reading in the Catholic Herald of London that Guadalupe Sierra de la Rosa of Manzanillo, Cuba, recently died at the age of 148; that she was born in 1795 and was never ill a day in her life, never had a physician, and never
took any medicine. She had 200 descendants, helped with the housework every day in the home of her 98-year-old daughter, ate staple fbods with a great deal of fruit, and passed away in her sleep. .
If death has not meantime intervened, Consolation’s files show that George and Elizabeth Goben, of Lucas, Iowa, are now 98 years of age, have been married 83 years and have not been away from each other a single day or night in that time; that William Klinck, a carpenter, of 4118 Reese street, Philadelphia, Pa., is now 104 years of age, as are^also Mrs. Grazia Abbate,_of 16 Spring street, Lodi, N.J. (with 137 descendants), and Mrs. Maria L. Ferres, 129 Herkimer street, Brooklyn, N. Y. (wfio doesn’t like war news); that Mrs. Elizabeth' Nelson, of Ballston Spa, N. Y. (who has so many great-great-grandchildren that she has lost count), is now 105, as is also Robert Graham, of Toronto, Canada; that John Ferguson, of Iberia, Mo., is 106, aryl so is Alex Lipen, of Chicago, Ill.; that Dr. S. J. von Hirsch, of Oakland, Calif., is 108 (and believes in plenty of walking, a cold bath every day, a good nip of liquor now and then, and kissing the girls whenever one gets the chance); that Charles H. Benedict, Columbiaville, N. Y., is 110 and thinks the world is going crazy; that Jerry Patterson, of Indianapolis, Ind., drives his own auto at the age of 110; that Mrs. Anna Wheeler, of Coxsackie, N. Y., works crossword puzzles at the age of 111; that John Nelson Ridgley, Portland, Oreg., likes such music as “Turkey in the Straw” at the same age; that Mrs. Henrietta Jackson, Fort Wayne, Ind., helps with the housework at age 113, and that Charles Parcansas, of New Orleans, La., is 136. Charles says that he was 51 when the Civil War started, in 1860, and he was too old for service. Though he says he has had 17 wives, he has lost interest in women since he was 122.
Maybe this is a good place to stop this story.
“I Dissent!”
Justice Murphy
Stands Solid for Civil Rights and Common Sense
ENERGETIC, clear-headed Frank Murphy well deserves his growing ’v reputation as the foremost proponent of civil liberties ever to sit as a justice of the United States Supreme Court Never in the historic struggle to preserve civil liberties during recent years has there been an individual on the Supreme Court of the United States who has more consistently and courageously fought for the preservation of the rights ■ of the common man. To a court that has often lost sight of the dignity and worth of these rights to the people of this nation, his numerous dissents have been troublesome and annoying. But to those who appreciate the necessity of molding the law in conformity with the framework of the Bill of Rights, his opinions have been a refreshing source of reassurance. One of his latest dissents, rendered on May 7, 1945, in the case of Screws v. United States (65 S. Ct 1031), rings the same familiar note that has characterized his fearless stand for the “inalienable” constitutional rights of the individual.
The Screws case, as the whole court agreed, “involves a shocking and revolting episode in law enforcement.” It seems that one M. C. Screws, sheriff of Baker county, Georgia, nursed a grudge against Robert Hall, a Negro lad in the community, and had threatened to “get” him. Screws’ single-stranded courage was much too thin, however, to carry out this threat. But when twisted in with the frayed courages of two other ‘daw-less lawmen” and cemented with a quantity of alcohol at the local saloon, Screws found himself able to execute his threats. Thereupon he proposed to his two colleagues that they go that very night to Hall’s home and settle their account. Realizing the corrupt and murderous design of these men, the bartender tried to dissuade them, but in vain.
Late that night, Sheriff Screws, accompanied by his two companions (one a policeman and the other a deputy sheriff) barged into Hall’s home with a warrant charging him with theft of a tire.-Seizing their victim, they immediately handcuffed him and took him to the courthouse, where they would be safe from interference. When flail, still handcuffed, stepped from the car into the dark courtyard, one of these three “brave” officers leaped on him, striking him a crushing blow over the head with a two-pound “solid-bar” blackjack. The other two men came to the “assistance” of their “brave” confederate and the three of them set upon Hall’s unconscious body with fists and boots. After about thirty minutes of the most bestial treatment of which depravity is capable, they finally tossed Hall’s limp and dying body on the floor of a cold jail cell. An ambulance was finally called, but before Hall could be taken to the hospital he was dead.
Supreme Court Reviews
Federal Prosecution
For some reason, not difficult to imagine, the Georgia authorities took no action against these officers, who had come lamely forward with the obviously inadequate excuse that Hall had “resisted arrest”. It looked as if they were to go scot free. However, vigorous protest was made to the proper federal authorities, and, after thorough investigation by the F.B.I., a federal grand jury returned an indictment charging that the officers, acting under color of the laws of Georgia, willfully caused Hall to be deprived of his “rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected” to him by the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution; that is, the right not to be deprived of life without due process of law; the right to be tried,
upon the charge on which he was arrest* ed, by due process of law and if found guilty to be punished in accordance with the laws of Georgia. This was indeed a surprising but effective way of getting at these officers who had supposed them* selves to be safely above and beyond the law by reason of their badges of office. They retained legal counsel and defended desperately, but the jury returned a verdict of guilty and the judge imposed a prison sentence and fine on each. They forthwith appealed to the United States Circuit Cpurt of Appeals, but their convictions were affirmed. Then they took the case to the Supreme Court for a final review.
One of Screws’ chief contentions be* fore the Supreme Court Was that the constitutional term “due process of law” was so vague and indefinite that it would require a whole law library to define its exact meaning and hence it would be impossible for a citizen to know just what was prohibited by the criminal statute. A person ought not to be held criminally liable, contended Screws, when it is thus impossible for him to know precisely what conduct the law prohibits. The majority opinion of the Supreme Court, written by Mr. Justice Douglas, toyed with this con ten ti on at great length, indicated great perplexity on the matter, and then avoided the responsibility of deciding the question by seizing on a 'technicality which Screws had not even urged in defense. It was held that the trial judge did not properly instruct the jury that it must find that the officers not only had a bad purpose, but also that they specifically intended to deprive the deceased of his constitutional rights. This, held the court, required that the case be sent back to the lower court for a new trial. Of course, by the time the case can be tried again, the witnesses,,if they are available at all, will not be clear on the facts, and it is probable that the officers will be found not guilty.
Justice Murphy Dissents
Cutting boldly through this bewildering tangle of legalises, Justice Murphy filed a brief but clear-headed dissent, landing squarely on the issue involved. To him the reversal of the conviction of these criminals was a shameful miscarriage of justice tending directly to encourage lawlessness among those who are charged with upholding the law. He did not permit the finespun defensive arguments of the officers to becloud the one central fact that their act was deliberate, calculated, cold-blooded murder committed in- total disregard of their duties as officers of the law and in defiance of the United States Constitution. Justice Murphy’s dissent ably speaks for itself: , '
. - . Our attention is directed solely to ' three state officials who, in the course of their official duties, have unjustifiably beaten and ’crushed the body of a human being, thereby depriving him of trial by jury and of life itself. The only pertinent inquiry is whether Section 20, by its reference to the Fourteenth 'Amendment guarantees that no state shall , deprive any person of life without due. process of law, gives fair warning to state officials that they are criminally liable for violating this right to life.
Common sense gives an affirmative answer to that problem. The reference in Section 20 to rights protected by the' Constitution is . manifest and simple. At the same time, the right not to lie deprived of life without due process of law is distinctly and lucidly protected by the Fourteenth Amendment. There is nothing vague or indefinite in these references to this most basic of all human rights. Knowledge of a comprehensive law library is unnecessary for officers of the law to know that the right to murder individuals in the course of their duties is unrecognized in this nation. No appreciable amount of intelligence or conjecture on the part of the lowliest state official is needed for him to realize that fact; nor should it surprise him to find out that the Constitution protects persons from his reckless disregard of human life and that statutes punish him therefor. To subject a
state official to punishment under Section 20 for such acts is not to penalize him without fair and definite warning. Rather it is to uphold elementary standards of decency and to make American principles of law and our constitutional guarantees mean something * more-than pious rhetoric.
Under these. circumstances it is unnecessary to send this case back for a further trial on the assumption that the jury was not charged on the matter of the willfulness of the state officials, an issue that was not raised below or before us. The evidence is more than convincing that the officials willfully, or at least with wanton disregard of the consequences, deprived Robert Hall of his life without due process of law. A new trial could hardly make that fact more evident; the failure to charge the ju$y on willfulness was at ’ most an inconsequential error. ...
It is an illusion to say that the real issue in this case is the alleged failure of Section 20 fully to warn the state officials that their actions were illegal. The Constitution, Section 20 and their own consciences told them that. They knew that they lacked any man, date or authority to take human life un-' necessarily or without due process of law in the course of their duties. They knew that their excessive and abusive use of authority would only subvert the ends of justice. The significant question, rather, is whether law enforcement officers and those entrusted with authority shall be allowed to violate with impunity the clear constitutional rights of the inarticulate and the friendless. Too often unpopular minorities, such as Negroes, are unable to find effective refuge from the cruelties of bigoted and ruthless authority. States are undoubtedly capable of punishing their officers who commit such outrages. But where, as here, the states are unwilling for some reason to prosecute such crimes the federal government must step in unless constitutional guarantees are to become atrophied.
In a time when thick-skulled fanatics are trying to stir up racial hatred and destroy the constitutional rights of the people, Justice Murphy’s dissent is appreciated and respected by all freedom-and order-loving peoples.
Let Public Officials Take Notice
♦ Title 18, Section 52 of the United States Code prescribes that a fine of $1,000 or imprisonment for 12 months, or both, may be imposed on anyone who “under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom willfully -subjects or causes to be subjected, any inhabitant of any State, Territory or District to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution and laws of the United States. . .
Although the majority opinion of the Supreme Court gives Screws and his henchmen an opportunity" to escape the punishment of the law, in construing the foregoing statute, the majority holding is not altogether without merit, however. It holds that any public official acting under color of state or municipal law, who willfully deprives any person (citizen or not) of his constitutional rights, or conspires with others to do so, is subject to punishment under this statute. The court’s opinion states:
“Take the case of a local officer who persists in enforcing a type of ordinance which the court has held invalid as violative of the guarantees of free speech or freedom of worship. ... If those acts are done willfully, how can the officer possibly claim that he had no fair warning that his acts were prohibited by the statute? He violates the statute not merely because he has a bad purpose but because he acts in defiance of announced rules of law.”
It will be remembered that the maximum punishment of this law was recently meted out to Sheriff Martin Catlette, of Richwood, West Virginia, for his mistreatment of Jehovah’s witnesses. Catletter. United States, 132 F. 902 (1942).
Anyone having knowledge that a-public official has willfully deprived a person of constitutional rights should make a full report of such incident to the Civil Eights Section of the Department of Justice, Washington 25, D. C.
John Wycliffe and the Lollards
John Wvolute (wiklif) has been called “the morning-star of the Reformation”, as he was the one who first, more than a hundred years before Luther, prominently set forth those truths which marked that mighty movement away from the corruptions of Rome, It is common to think of John Wycliffe as . a solitary figure, standing out from among others as a witness for the truths then coming to the fore, but he was, in fact, but one of many who realized that there was something distinctly wrong with the state of so-called “Christendom”. Those who, with him, took a stand against such flagrant disregard of Christianity as was then manifest were dubbed “Lollards”.
• Wycliffe was born at Ipreswel, Yorkshire, England, about 1320. He studied at Balliol College, Oxford, and became a mastef or professor there in his late twenties. In 1361 he was appointed to what is called “a living”, meaning that he was given charge of a congregation and church building, at Fillingham, in Lincolnshire. John Wycliffe had ample opportunity to observe the state of “Christendom” at close range, for he was also in intimate touch with the friars, who were given the distinctive title of "religious” as contrasted with the common people.
Having gained great influence as a . philosophical disputant in the schools, Wycliffe now began to figure prominently in the religio-political conflicts of the ' time, which centered around the pope’s demand for tribute. A little before this he had been made “doctor of theology^’, and, always conscientious, gave to this trust bestowed upon him by the University of Oxford his earnest attention. Among other things, he began to expose the greed and superstitions of the monks,. not without that keenness of satire which made his speech and writing so effective. The abuses practiced by these <fholy” men had become such a public burden that the king himself took the matter up and appointed a commission, in 1373, with Wycliffe as the second member named, to take the matter up with the papal representatives. The English were particularly disgusted with the numerous aliens sent in by the pope to take over the more lucrative jobs in the religious business. The representatives of the pope gave the commission his word that the abuses would be corrected. It soon became manifest, however, that nothing the pope or his representatives said could be relied upon. Wycliffe began to get his eyes open, just a little more. Being an honest man, Wycliffe told what he knew, preaching at the same time the Scriptural truths which began to stand out in clear contrast to the methods of the pope and his supporters. Now, as there is nothing the hierarchy of Rome so much fears and hates as it does free speech, it soon took notice of Wycliffe’s stand for righteousness, and so summoned him to answer, on February 19, 1377, to accusations of teaching error. The trial started on time, but the Lord was not unmindful of His witness, and two of the men set to try Wycliffe started to fight each other, being no less than the bishop of London and the duke of Lancaster. The whole assembly was thrown into an uproar and the struggle spread to the streets outside, the people joining in the free-for-all with keen appreciation. In the confusion Wycliffe was carried off by his friends to a place of safety, and that was the end of his first trial.
Another Attempt
The hierarchy in England now took the matter up with the pope (Gregory XI). He came forth with five “bulls” against Wycliffe, three of them being dated the same day, May 22, 1377. The reformer was cited to answer the charge of insubordination and the favorite charge of “heresy”. (The favorite answer to anything that now involves the hierarchy is “Insult”.) Before the summonses Arrived in England, however, the king (Edward III) died, and Richard II was crowned in his stead. The parliament was not too ready to turn ^Wycliffe over to Rome or to permit his 'imprisonment. Hence, in February of 1378, a trial was arranged to be held in Lambeth Palace twt> months later, by order of the archbishop of Canterbury and the bishop of London. Wycliffe made answer by reading a prepared statement, but the proceedings were broken up once again, this time without violence, the people as well as the king’s mother rising to the defense of Wycliffe. The bishop and the archbishop withdrew in confusion, after having commanded Wycliffe to keep silence, an injunction to which he paid no attention.
It was about this time that the situation at Rome was getting complicated; for, instead of having but one infallible head, it was found that the “holy church” had two, Clement VII and Urban VI, calling each other anti-Christ, which was true. Wycliffe pointed out that since righteousness is the proper basis of dominion, neither of the contestants for the papal throne had any right to rule. He realized that the Higher Powers were not unrighteous and immoral men.
Wycliffe’s preaching was with power. His pamphlets were sent everywhere and his “poor priests”, organized by him to carry on an educational work among the people oppressed by religious leaders, zealously did their work. They did not look for money; in fact, the less they had of this world’s goods, the better. Their course strongly contracted with that of the “regular clergy”. Above and beyond everything else Wycliffe did was his publication of the Bible in English. He and John Hereford had translated it from the Latin, and some years later it was revised by John Purvey, another eolaborer. Wycliffe constantly appealed to the Bible. In one of his books he quotes 700 passages of Scripture. No wonder his preaching, writing and teaching were with power!
The First English Bible
Wycliffe’s translation of the Bible was the first, English version, claims of hierarchical agents to the contrary notwithstanding. Wycliffe did not translate for scholars or for nobles, but for the common people. He used words they would understand, plain, brief, and to the point. Yet the spirit of truth shone forth from it, and as men read it, or had it read to them by Wycliffe’s “poor priests”, they felt they were hearing or reading no ordinary book. It was God’s own Word, for the first time available to the English people in their own language. It had a wide circulation. In spite of the fact that it could be produced only in manuscript form (printing was to come later), it* went far and wide, throughout the kingdom.
•Its cost limited its possession, yet those who could not hope to possess it might have access to it. Those who could afford to invest in a copy would let others read it. A load of hay was given for permission to read it for an hour a day over a certain period of time.
There was, on the other hand, fierce opposition to the circulation of the Bible. In fact, a bill was brought into Parliament to forbid the circulation of the Bible in the language of the people; but. John of Gaunt, a powerful prince, and a friend of Wycliffe, sturdily asserted the right of the English people to have the word of God in their own tongue.
When it is kept in mind that it took Wycliffe’s copyists ten months to complete a- single copy of the Bible, and that one copy necessarily cost hundreds of dollars, the fact that it was so widely circulated stands out as remarkable.
It is even more remarkable that even yet, more than five hundred years later, a hundred and seventy copies of Wycliffe’s Bible in manuscript form remain. They are the treasured possessions of certain private and public libraries.
The preface of an old copy concludes with the words, “God grant us to ken and to kepe well Holie Writ, and to sulf er joiefully some paine for it at the laste.” And many who loved it did just that, as will be noted as this story progresses.
Wycliffe’s Last Years
While Wycliffe reached the common people by means of his poor preachers, his tracts and his Bible translation, he appealed to the rich and the learned in able and scholarly treatises, written in Latin. During 1378-1379 he issued two noted works on Holy Scripture, on the church, on the position of the king, and on the papal power.
About this time he began to expose the fallacy of a new doctrine that put in an appearance, that of “transubstantia-tion”. This is the outstanding Romish doctrine which claims to prove philosophically that the bread and wine in the Lord’s supper is actually, literally and physically the body and blood of Jesus Christ. This teaching Wycliffe denounced as “blasphemous folly” and philosophical nonsense, which it was. It was, in fact, the product of carnal minds perverting the spiritual things of God’s Word.
But now the theologians were aroused. William Barton, the chancellor of the university, together with twelve doctors, solemnly condemned what Wycliffe had written on the subject. Wycliffe appealed to the king, for he had no confidence in the pope. But the king and his counselors, though in favor of getting after the dissolute clergy and “religious”, were wary of touching the doctrines of the church, which, however incomprehensible, they must profess to believe, or be in danger of the “pains of hell” because of “heresy”. So John of Gaunt hastily sent a message to Wycliffe, telling him to say no more. The support which Wycliffe had so far had from high places now began to be withdrawn. The situation was further complicated by the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381, which the clergy were not slow to charge up to Wycliffe. No connection, however, could be shown. Nevertheless, the clergy and the ruling class were drawn closer together.
Wycliffe himself was not interfered with. His influence was still great, and when the House of Lords, in 1382, tried to pass an ordinance against the poor preachers, it was annulled on petition of the House of Commons. Wycliffe’s works meanwhile spread to other parts of Europe. His Trialogus was a sort of summing up of his conclusions. Four complete manuscripts, produced by followers of Huss, are still to be found in the Imperial Library at Vienna. When printing was invented, more than a hundred years later, it was his first work to be issued in print.
Wycliffe died from the result of a paralytic stroke, on New Year’s Eve, 1384. He was buried at Lutterworth.
The Lollards
The term “Lollards”, which was applied to the followers of Wycliffe, was not a new one. There were Lollards in the Netherlands at the beginning of the fourteenth century. They were a sort of brotherhood that renounced "the world and its wealth, and the pope along with it. Since Christ was poor, they did not see why His followers should live in luxury. As those who were benefited by Wycliffe’s labors held similar views, the term Lollards was applied to them. The name was first attached to them in an action "against five of the poor preachers by the bishop of Worcester, in 1387.
The convictions of the Lollards were set forth in a document known as the Conclusions of 1395. They asserted that temporal possessions ruin the church and drive out the Christian graces of faith, hope and charity; that the priesthood in communion with Rome was not the priesthood Christ gave to the apostles; that the monk’s vow of celibacy resulted in the practice of vice, and should not
be imposed; that transubstantiatiqn was a false miracle, and led to idolatry; that prayers made over bread, wine, water, oil, salt, wax, incense, altars, churches, vestments, crosses, etc., were magical ’.and should not be allowed; that no special prayers should be made for the dead; that confession to the clergy was the root of their arrogance and the cause of abuses in pardoning sin; that wars were against the teachings of the Bible; that the vows laid upon nuns led to child murder; that the worship of images, the going on pilgrimages and the use of gold chalices at communion were sinful.
The “Lollard movement", so called, spread with surprising rapidity after Wycliffe’s death. A writer, not at all in favor of the trend, said that almost every other man in England was a Lollard, The ecclesiastical authorities met the situation with characteristic cruelty. Burnings at the stake became frequent. Possession of the Bible was the surest means of winding up on the funeral pyre with the Bible tied about one’s neck. Truly, they suffered some “paine for it at the laste”.
The clergy could not now wreak their vengeance on Wycliffe personally. All they could do was to show their contempt for His remains, which they proposed to dig up from their final resting place and bury in a dunghill. The pope, however, had another idea. By a decree of the Council of Constance, May 4, 1514, over which Pope John XXIII presided, Wycliffe’s remains were ordered to be dug up and burned. This decree was not then put into execution, but after fourteen years, at the command of Pope Martin V, the order was finally carried out by Bishop Fleming, and the ashes of the reformer were thrown into the Swift, whose waters carried them into the Severn, whence they were carried to the seas. And so, poetically, the ashes of Wycliffe, like his preaching, may be said to have been carried to all parts of the world.
THE TRUTH BEFORE FREEDOM
To gain freedom that is lasting it is necessary first to learn the truth as to the source of bondage and the way to evade its clutches. Next one must learn the truth as to when, where, and how true freedom will reign and be accessible.
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“An Honest and Good Heart”—Luke 8: 15
AN HONEST person desires to know the truth because falsehood works to his injury. To first gain one’s confidence and then to induce that person to believe a false representation which affects his liberty, property or life is a work of fraud upon the person deceived. The original liar and author of fraud and deception is Satan the Devil. He has induced men to publicly teach falsehoods which directly affect the liberty, property and life of the people, and thereby millions of sincere though credulous persons have been deceived. Falsehoods are veiled for the purpose of deceiving the people. A falsehood or covering is presented to the view which hides that which is beneath. Nothing has worked greater hardship to more people than falsehood. Putting darkness for light, error for truth, misrepresentation for common honesty; that has been the order of the day. Nowhere is this so manifest as in the expressions of religious organizations. The credulity of men has been played upon by wicked, scheming religionists, using their spiritual advantages for fleshly gain. Religion has been a fertile breeding-ground for liars and hypocrites. Warning of this was given by the apostle Paul: “That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive.” (Ephesians 4:14) The traditions of men have never been promulgated to teach others the truth, but rather to bolster the tottering structure of diversified creeds and to satisfy the selfish lusts of arrogant, pompous, presumptuous and ambitious modernday Pharisees.—H.B.R.
Kingdom Hall at Washington, North Carolina
The Kingdom Hall of Jehovah’s witnesses at Washington, N. C., was remodeled from a deserted gas station at very nominal cost and will accom
modate at least eighty persons comfortably. The above picture was published originally in the State magazine for February.
Kingdom Hall at Washington, North Carolina
The Kingdom Hall of Jehovah’s witnesses at Washington, N. C., was remodeled from a deserted gas station at very nominal cost and will accommodate at least eighty persons comfortably. The above picture was published originally in the State magazine for February.
JULY 18, 1945
29
The Haunted Church Pillar
WHILE working from door to door in a very religious section of Baltimore I met a lady who I thought was definitely a “goat”. With a stern stare she came at me, “If you are one of those 1 Jehovah’s witnesses, I don’t want to hear anything you have to say. I have been told not to listen to you. I have my church and I am satisfied.” I asked her point-blank, “What do you have against Jehovah’s witnesses?” When she said, “Nothing,” I asked her what her church had against Jehovah’s witnesses. Thinking deeply she said, “You know I don’t know. What does our church have against you people? That’s something I have always wondered. Won’t you come in where it is warm and tell me just what it is about?” .
This was the beginning of an hour with her, and the results were a book placement, many more questions yet to be answered, and an invitation to come back. “Now you be sure and come back,” she said, “because if I can’t find Bible proof for what is written in this book I want to tell you about it. A Seventh-Day Adventist called on me, but he couldn’t •answer the questions I had on the Bible but he promised to call back. That was several weeks ago and I haven’t seen him since.” Upon assuring her that I would be back, I called at the next house.
A week later I was again rapping at Mrs. X—’s door. Because of the rest of the territory, I was convinced that she was' going to be bitterly opposed. The door opened and I was greeted with a cheery, “Hello there; do come in where it is warm.” As soon as I stepped inside she started talking, “Before you ask me any questions, I want to tell you that T read that 'Truth Shall Make You Free’ book and liked it very much; in fact, it is one of the nicest books I have ever read. Now I understand ‘trinity’ and I would like to go over this trinity matter with you, but I don’t have time right now. Can you call back on me so we can study this together? I don’t want to be converted, but I love to study and you seem to know more about the Bible than my preacher. He says that ‘trinity’ is a ticklish subject and is quite a mystery. You say it is not a mystery’; and I have proved it to myself by reading this book, but I still have a lot of questions on it. Will you please call back on me?” When she finally stopped talking, I was so winded by surprise that I couldn’t talk for a moment. Arrangements w’ere made for a study, but before I left she said, “You know, ever since you left last w’eek y’our face has been before me. I w’ould be working around the house and I would see your face; you haunted me. I kept thinking about the things you said about religion and the Bible and then I would get the book and read. When I lay dowm to take a nap in the evening I would see your face again and then I would get the book and read some more. I finished reading it, too. I am so glad you came back. You know, my sister told me not to let you in my house again and not to read the book because I would get all mixed up. You haunted me so that I just had to read the book, and I am going to study no matter what anybody says.”
At the first study’ we went over the section in the book on “trinity”; and toward the end of it she threw her hands in the air and said, “How do they get away -with it? How can they teach ‘trinity’ the way they do? and why don’t people realize it’s a lie?” For a moment she had forgotten that just two weeks ago she, too, believed wholeheartedly in this lie just because her church taught it.
After spending an additional hour with her in answering questions she said, “Then ‘trinity* isn’t the only reason why Jehovah’s witnesses are hated; ‘trinity5 isn’t the only thing they teach that is ‘wrong1; and it is true, every word of it. Look how long I have been going to church and I have been chewing the same
old cabbage for years.” At this point I ' asked her what the Bible calls that old cabbage, and she said, “Husks.” She didn’t stop here, but continued. “My husband is thoroughly disgusted. Just last Sunday, even before he left the church steps, he said, "Why did I come here? He (meaning the preacher) didn’t tell us anything we didn’t already know, I’man elderly man and could have been home catching up on my sleep.’ ”
Before leaving she said that it’s a shame that there are so many people in the world who don’t realize the message that Jehovah’s witnesses have for them; and if they would only invite them in their homes and speak to them for a few minutes they would realize the big mistakes they are making. “Why, there are about thrfee hundred fifty people that go to the same church I go to and out of all of them I bet I am the only one who would invite you in.” I told her, now that she knew "trinity” was wrong, she could tell her friends. Perhaps they would listen to her where they wouldn’t to one of Jehovah’s witnesses. “Oh, I couldn’t do that; I am a pillar in the church; I am Mrs. X----, superintendent of the Sunday-school classes. They would say I am crazy and I’d lose all my friends. It would be like throwing me into a puddle of mud.” I then asked her which she valued most, the friendship of God, the Almighty, or the friendship of man; and I quoted the scripture, ‘A friend of the world is an enemy of God,’ and that shd ‘couldn’t serve two masters’. With deep thought all she said was, “Oh.” I then spoke of the friendship of the Lord’s people all over the world and told her that we had many thousands of brothers and sisters.
I had one study with her since that, but two weeks have passed since we have had. that—the Devil has been at work. Because of her boys’ going into service they find it necessary to move. They have been living in that home for seventeen years. Realizing the pressure the Devil is putting upon her she is determined to study, but not un^l she is settled again. This, no doubt, will be a most enjoyable study, because she has all the symptoms of a “stranger”, a person of good-will who is seeking a knowledge .of Jehovah’s provisions.—Margaret Geiselman, Maryland.
Twenty-five to Thirty
PLEASE let me compliment you on the fearless stand you manifest in exposing the enemies of God and honest men. I have read and fully appreciate Consolation since it started, in 1919. It surely is an instrument used by the Lord to expose the rackets of religious and other racketeers. I place from 25 to 30 copies on the street, and from store to store, of each issue, and the people who read it will continue to read it because of the pews which it contains.—D. D. Reusch, California. .
(The writer of the above enclosed a clipping showing that Archbishop John J. Mitty, Monsignor Patrick G. Moriarty, and thousands of others, including bishops, auxiliary bishops, and at least
Copies of Every Issue , one vicar apostolic, were praying for the success of the peace conference $t San Francisco. That’s tough luck for the conference. The pope prayed for Roosevelt’s health and he died right off.)
David and Ronnie Sorry for Grandma ♦ Last December, while another publisher and our two small boys, David, age 5, and Ronnie, age 3, wrere waiting in the car for me to return from the post office, they noticed the holiday decorations, and explained'to their temporary caretaker, “We have told and told Grandma not to buy us anything for Christmas, but she just does it anyway; she doesn’t know any better; why, she even thinks there is a Santa Claus.”—Helen Lowe, Indiana,
JULY 18, 1845
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