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October 2, 1912 ] THE F
Morality in the
By JUAN URT
The extreme weakness of the Roman Catholic
Church lies in her utter and absolute failure
to uplift public standards of learning and mor
ality in the lower and middle classes, to say
nothing of the higher classes.
In my book Roman Catholicism Capitulating
Before Protestantism I said: "If to theological
guilt we wished to add social wickedness, what
nations present criminal statistics more appalling
than the Latin countries, ordinarily Roman
Catholic? In what countries does public morality
occupy a higher level than among the Saxon
peoples, ordinarily Protestant? "Whence
come the majority of assassins of presidents and
kings if not from Romanism? "What society appears,
according to statistics, involved in revolution
and incapable of self-government, of an
honest existence or of showing the mutual regard
due to others, if not Romanism? In what
countries is opposition to the principle of authority
proverbial, the same as venality in the
administration of justice, and corruption among
high officials, if not within Romanism? In what
nations can it be almost declared that public
justice is a lie, the law a myth and wealth and
nobility synonymous with impunity and looseness,
if not in the holy society of Romanism? We
should obtain the same result if from theological
death, symbolized by sin, and from social wickedness,
represented by public insubordination
and corruption, we wished to pass on to physical
and intellectual misery. What a scandal! What
a shame! The Anglo-Saxon people, as we might
say, freed themselves only a few centuries ago
from the Roman Church, it is scarcely three hun
dred years since they trod down their degrading
tutelage; when they realized this great act, they
were in the eyes of Romanism, inferior to us. Let
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healthiness and morality, and our healthiness and
morality, their intense progress in all th0 orders
of civilization compared with our frightful decadence.
There ig only one Latin nation that can
with decorum stand side by side with the AngloSaxon,
and that is France; but alas! in that
nation, before the Vatican Council, the clergy
was the standard-bearer against Vaticanism. It
is more than one hundred years that the governments
of that nation have been fighting hard
against the Papacy. It may be said that the profession
of Romanism is a sure stigma of ruin,
J J ^ - 1 V 99
ucuaueiicu tuiu aeam.
Pour years have passed since I wrote these
words and in this time I have in no wise changed
the opinion I then expressed, on the contrary
I have found new and more striking facts,
new and more convincing arguments to confirm
and strengthen the entire accuracy of my statement.
The present conditions of public life in
America are, however, such that I consider the
time ripe to give some explanation in order to
prevent misleading public opinion. The startling
and ever increasing public briberies in the
large cities of the United States and particularly
the horrible scandals never before seen or even
imagined in the New York police department
have produced an effect so general and depress
ing upon public opinion in this country that I
am exceedingly afraid the cunning Roman Catholic
Hierarchy will take advantage of it and
present all these facts as a new, tremendous and
practical argument both of the failure of Protestantism
in building up and strengthening a
-system for the common good and of the-imperious
need of more Roman Catholic influence in
the public life of America.
RESBYTERIAN OF THE SO
Romish Church
S GONZALEZ
I am watching as carefully and as closely as I
can the American public press and I have found
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iuai tuv xiumiiii v^aiaonc unurcn is now aiming
constantly and by several well organized means
to discredit entirely Anglo-Saxon civilization.
The Catholic World, one of tlie most trustworthy
Roman Catholic monthlies and one which
is widely read among the leading Catholics in
America and not a few prominent Protestant
families and writers has the effrontery in a recent
series of articles to question whether there
be such a thing as Anglo-Saxon civilization
among the peoples who speak English and more
than one prominent American writer of to-day
have disclaimed the predominant Anglo-Saxon
influence in building up the American nation.
Nowhere ought the issues of public opinion
to he more carefully watched and more con
stantly guarded than here in North America. Almost
half of the present population have no
definite standards either in regard to religion
or politics. They are yet crude foreigners who
rely for information and guidance almost entirely
upon their daily, weekly or monthly
j)apers. They change from one opinion to another
according to the trend of the papers which
they read. They have neither family nor national
traditions, nor have they convictions to check
their ever wavering opinion.
Catholics know this full well and they know
also that if they succeed in discrediting Protestantism
all this vacillating element will stand with
them if not for the sake of religion at least as a
needed moral force to check the ever-increasing
puonc evils, it is a question of life and death
to face squarely and fearlessly the present social
problems and to place the responsibility for existing
evils on whom it belongs, otherwise both
Christianity and the life of the nation stand in
deadly peril. For that very reason before going
farther 1 desire to make some remarks about the
public evils which exist in America today. By
this means I hope to be of some service, both to
the citizens of the United States at large and
particularly to my Protestant brethren.
Every unbiased writer must acknowledge
plainly that the American mode of government
has failed utterly to give an honest administration
in the largest American cities. Writers both
in this country and abroad agree on this point.
No one who knows anything about New Orleans
in the South, New York in the North, Chicago
in the Middle West, and San Francisco in
the Far West can fail to acknowledge that graft,
immorality and corruption abound in public administration.
I do not mean to say that the largest American
cities are worse than the largest European cities.
Every one who knows something about Madrid,
Paris, London, Berlin, Rome and the other great
cities of Europe will be cautious about making
such a statement.
But even in case I were able to prove that
European cities are worse than ours those facts
would by no means take away in the least the
corruption in our own cities. The fact to be ex
plained is not whether our own or the others are
bad or worse, but how can we account for the
fact that the American middle sized cities and
towns have the most honest administration in the
world and yet the American form of city government
has failed utterly to give the same kind of
administration to the larger cities in the United
States.
The Roman Catholic Church takes advantage
of this failure and says boisterously from the
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confessional, from the pulpit, in tneir prayers and
on many occasions through the most widely read
magazines, "Behold how Protestantism has failed
in its task!"
In other words the Roman Catholic Hierarchy
places the blame upon the Evangelical Churches.
Is it true, fair and just? Are those large cities
truly and geninely American? Is it a fact that
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muse cines are to-day under Protestant influence
! Are they governed by Protestant principles
and Protestant administration 1 I hope to
give a brief and satisfactory answer in my next
article.
"AN INEXHAUSTIBLE TREASURY."
MR. UEOKUE MUI-I-EK (BY EDWIN A. WILSON.)
"Every word that proceedeth out of the mouth
of God."
How refreshing to be able to rehearse the
testimony of this man of God, whose faith God
delighted to honor. In our day, perhaps no man
has tested and confirmed the constancy of the
promises of God as did this man of faith, who
did not think of his strong faith but of the
resident power lodged in the God who promised,
in whom he trusted. The obligations resting
upon George Muller in his work for God, kept
him in absolute dependence upon God. The
uniquely dependent relation that this exceptional
exponent of faith bore to God, certainly
left God at his beck and call. His need was so
great that his own and all human resources were
but as the "small dust of the balance," hence
absolutely inadequate, and not to be reckoned
upon. He was transparent, no mixed motives intervened
to clog the heaven conceived machinery
whose daily, earthly grist was needed to preserve
the life of the multiplying thousands of
helpless and dependent ones whom he had gathered
about him. The desire to honor God. constrained
him. The wisdom of the Lord directed
him. The goodness of the Lord sustained him.
The blessing of the Lord attended him.
"THEM THAT HONOR ME I WILL HONOR."
In striking contrast with many men of today
with affixes and prefixes, George Muller without
either, honored God and his Word. He did not
believe that a man could honor God while amending,
criticising, neglecting, apologizing, and rejecting
his Word. George Muller believed that
God's most holy Word was the symbol of his
thought, hence characteristic of himself. George
Muller, in lovely simplicity, clasping hands with
Abraham, across the centuries intervening, with
one accord,
''BELIEVED GOD."
This father of the faithful and this God provided,
God animating father of the fatherless
pleased God. "Without faith, it is impossible
to please Him."
In his 93rd year, he was to address the British
and Foreign Bible Society at the Town Hall in
Birmingham on October 26th, 1697, but owing
to the weak state of his heart, he reluctantly gave
a resume of his sixty-eight and one-quarter
years of service just then ending.
"Since July, 1828, I have been a lover of the
Word of God, and that uninterruptedly. During
this time, I have read more than one hundred
times through, the whole Bible with great
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a. ..ore jlui jimuy years read through the
whole Old and New Testament four times every
year."
"I also state to the glory of God, as his witness,
that in my inmost soul, I believe that all
the books of the Old Testament and the Gospels,
Epistles and the Revelation of the New Testament
are written by inspiration. This I have to
the full believed ever since my conversion in the
beginning of November, 1825.
(Oontinued on page 5.)