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February 7, 1*12] THE!
Editorial 1
A valued friend and reader in West Virginia
in subscribing for " The Presbyterian of the
South" to be sent to a friend says: "We love
the Presbyterian and cannot do without it. I
often read in prayer meeting selections from
your good paper." We would rather have "The
Presbyterian" to be a companion and an inspirer
of deep spiritual devotion than to attain any
other object. When the Church shall become
pre-eminently devotional it will be a reservoir of
gladness and vitality, a dynamic of resistless
might, a conquering army with the weapons of
peace and the banner of love, a luminary reflecting
beauty, hope and joy to the uttermost
parts of the earth.
The writer takes this method of thanking his
dear friend, of many years, the Associate Editor
of The Presbyterian Standard, for those hours
of genuine pleasure his little brochure has given
him. "As it Seemed to Me," is a gem?in its
eighty-five pages Dr. Reed, in that charming
style so peculiarly his own, tells of his visit to
the Edinburg Convention and his impressions
thereof, of points, places and persons in Scotland,
England, Holland, Prance, Germany and
Switzerland?brief, but pointed and raey, full
of information as an egg of meat,?he rivets the
attention of the reader from start to finish. Dr.
Reed is a model writer of travels. Read it and
see.
Dr. Jowett's statement, "God docs not comfort
us to make us comfortable, but to make us
comforters," is fine. It merely repeats, however,
the Apostle's words, "Who comforteth us in all
our tribulations, that we may be able to comfort
them which are in any trouble, by the comfort
wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God."
All the same, while the primary end may not be
that we may be comforted but that we may be
comforters, the sweetest comfort comes to us, and
the most comfortable condition, from the fact
that .we are God's messengers of comfort to
others. The reflex good of helping others is always
appreciable and helpful. To be a blessing
to others is a blessing to ourselves.
The press dispatches tell us that "his eminence
^William Cardinal O'Connell," of Boston,
has returned from Rome "as the first prince of
the Church ever resident in New England,"
bringing expression of papal affection and love
tVin A morinan nonnlr\ Po f V*r\l !
niv, i?nivi luuii I 'V u|'iu, iiwirv/iiiuwiii;^ in uuii
as Catholics." And this notwithstanding the
fact that "his eminence" had just subesribed a
solemn oath in which he pledged himself to uncompromising
hostility to civil and religious
liberty in America, the conclusion of which oath,
as found in the Manualt Romanian for the
Secular Clergy, is as follows: "I will seek out
and oppose, persecute and fight against heretics
and schismatics who oppose our Lord, the Pone
of Rome, and his heretofore mentioned sucessors.
and this I will do with every possible
effort ."
On a recent occasion Dr. Clifford, the militant
London divine, paid a glorious tribute to the
British Chancellor of the Exchequer, which may
suggest to Americans what it is that makes a
statesman and the kind of men to place at the
head of public affairs. Speaking of the Insurance
Bill, just passed by Parliament, Dr. Clifford
said: "Britain and the world owe this
glorious advance in legislation to the matchless
skill, brillian statesmanship, prodigious labor,
nnfalling tact, winsome courtesy, fearless
ourage, unrelaxing tenacity of purpose, and
PRESBYTERIAN OF TEE Si
Notes and
true Christian principles of Lloyd George." If
America had a bunch of statesmen like that,
Canada would want reciprocity right away, and
we might form a new political party to be known
as the Sanitation League.
The sympathy of all editorial offices in Southern
Louisiana is extended to "L'Abaillc,"
("The Bee,") the Frenh morning paper of
JN'ew Orleans, in the death of its able editor, Mr.
Annand Capdeville, which occurred last week.
"L'Abaille" is by many years the oldest daily
in New Orleans and perhaps in the South, and
its distinctive features, in standing for old time
thought and expression and the most consorvatve
ideas, were well represented in the late
editor.
Many managers of industrial plants and enterprises
are shockingly indifferent to the fate
of their employes. They are so intent on profits
and dividend* that they give little thought
to the value of human life. Bodies, lives and
souis are sometimes forfeited to the lust of gain.
Dr. Josiah Strong publishes this startling statement
indicating the extent of the evil: The average
number of annual casualties of our civil
war and the war between Russia and Japan
combined were not equal to the average casualties
of our industrial army year by year." An
exchange remarks: "Think of carrying on two
such wars at the same time without end. Would
it not be well to give some attention to international
safety as well as to international
peace t"
General Leonard Wood, in command of the
military forces of the United States, is reported
as asking that the conteen?government liquor
shops, be provided for the army. lie is also reported
as advocating laws allowing race-track
gambling. Ilis reason a-signed for the latter
plea is that the army will not be able to get
8uitable horses for the cavalry service unless
il 1 1 n * "
me nreecung or race norses is encouraged. It
is to be supposed that almost any army officer
would be sufficiently familiar with practical mi1itary
affairs to know that race horses arc not
the kind needed for military service, unless it
is asmmed that running is to be the soldier's
specialty when he meets the enemy. The general
might be suspected of looking for excuses.
We must remember also that army officers of
the present day are not conspicuous as expounders
of ethics.
Some persons look upon the present day tendency
to erect machinery and to push out into
the world with all kind of "movements" as a
proof that religious organization is keeping pace
with industrial and commercial organization, in
becoming national in scope, and that thereby it
is showing its inherent strength and vigor. "We
fear they are greatly mistaken. Over-organization
is a sign of weakness or mistaken policy.
Departure from the divine model and addition to
me organization wnicn tlie divine mind devised
and gave to his church is too often simple unbelief.
It i3 a questioning of the Divine wisdom
and knowledge and purpose. It is a reaching
out of the hand to steady the ark. The majority
of the organizations of the larger kind, and
especially of the "movements," are engaged in
an effort to vitalize smaller organizations. Careful
observers of American religious life have declared
that the great characteristic of American
churches is that they are always creating organizations
to do this, that, and the other form
of religious work, and then when these organiz
0 U T H ' (129) 9
Comments
ations fail organizing more to see that they do
their work. It is thus an endless chain of organization
that the church has to hang by when
it leaves the fundamental principle of the divine
order of God's Church and the divine efficacy
which is in the Spirit's work.
A NOTABLE SERIES.
We are soon to begin the exclusive publication
of a series of articles by Dr. Juan Orts Gonzalez,
now a student at Uuion Theological Seminary
at Richmond, and formerly a Franciscan
friar and priest in the Roman Catholic Church of
Spain, and superintendent of the theological educational
work of that Church in Valencia. Dr.
Orts is well known in many parts of the South as
an able and learned exponent of the principles of
Protestantism as contrasted with the perverse
and dangerous religious system, which the light
of truth acquired in recent years has constrained
him to abandon.
This series will consist of between twenty and
thirty separate numbers, will be published continuously
until completed and will deal with
tome of the most momentous religious issues
now confronting the American people, and demanding,
in terms that cannot be ignored, that
they be settled.
The general subject which Dr. Orts discusses
is "The Religious Future of America." He
handles his theme with a frankness and
thoroughness, a conservatism and freedom from
bias, a reliance upon conclusive authority and
logical demonstration, that at once engage the
confidence and enlist the sympathies of the
reader, while shedding new and surprising light
on questions of surpassing interest to every
citizen of the American Commonwealth. Of
Dr. Orts' qualifications for this discussion, the
President of the Seminary, who has known him
intimately as a student and scholar for more
than two years, says: "lie has done a notable
work with his pen in the exposition of our faith,
not only through his book and through his
pamphlet and newspaper articles, but aDo
through such articles as the two which he recently
contributed to the new SchafF-Ilerzog Encyclopedia
on Portugal and Spain. ITc has done
fAcfiicni worK as a lecturer and preacher among
the Spanish-speaking people of Texas. "\Vc have
a strong conviction that he is a chosen vessel or
the Lord to do a work among the Roman
Catholics of our time for which very few living
men, if any, are as well qualified as he."
These articles, while searching and convincing,
are written in the spirit of utmost fairness
toward the Romish hierarchy and utmost kindness
toward the adherents of that religion. Indeed
the author avows and evidences a genuine
devotion to those who cherish the religion which
he once cherished, but finally abandoned under
a profound conviction of its radical and fatal
error. His enlightened affection for the people
of that faith is of a quality which is rare among
themselves.
Dr. Orts writes not simply as a student and
observer of the principles nnd practices of
Romanism, but as one who has been identified
with its work, has held responsible positions in
its organization, has had access to records nnd
documents unnccessible to the usual Protestant
historian, and knows both the letter and the
spirit of that age-long conspiracy against freedom
of conscience nnd thought and against civil
liberty, which is known as the papacy. Every
lover of all that is worthy to be cherished in our
American institution*?intollic*n?n/?
_ ? - vvil>p?v?iv?. ,|UOl IV/V3, V I I
tue, domestic happiness, nn open TV?b1e. a sacred
day of rest, Scriptural worship, material prog