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The Golden Age
(SUCCESSOR TO RELIGIOUS PORUN)
Published Ebery Thursday by the Golden Hge Publishing
Company (Inc.)
OFTICESc LOWNDES WILDING. ATLANTA, GA.
Price: $2.00 a Year
Ministers $1.50 per Tear.
tn cases of foreign address fifty cents should be added to cobet
additional postage.
Make all remittances payable to The Golden Age Publishing Company.
WILLIAM D. UPSHfXW, - - - - Editor
A. E. PA MS A UP, . . . Managing Editor
LEK G. 9KOUGHTON - - - Pulpit Editor
Entered at the Post Office tn Atlanta, Ga.,
as second-class matter.
\ T R COUNC?IL>
To the Public: The advertising columns of The
Golden Age will have an editorial conscience. No
advertisement will be accepted which we believe
would be hurtful to either the person or the purse
of our readers.
The "Track Through the Bible.”
Our readers will have noticed the absence in this
issue of the regular instalment of Dr. G. Campbell
Morgan’s “Track Through the Bible.” These ar
ticles are being written by Dr. Morgan and for
warded to us from week to week prior to the time
for publication. We regret very much to announce
that owing to the strain of his work and the bur
den of his many duties, Dr. Morgan’s health has
threatened to give way and by the advice of his
physician he has been forced to take a complete
rest from the duties of his pulpit as well as al’,
others for at least two weeks. As this period
which seemed to be necessary for his recuperation
has already expired, we are expecting to receive
by each mail the article which should have appeared
in this issue, and we trust that we will be able,
to resume the regular order of publication after
this week and that the series will continue without
any other interruption throughout the year. Me
very earnestly hope to be able in our next issue to
inform our readers of Dr. Morgan’s complete re
covery and that he will be able to continue at his
post of duty.
* n
Baraca.
What does it mean? Come to Atlanta to the
great National convention at the Wesley Memorial
Tabernacle next week, and find out.
From all over the United States and Canada the
hosts of Baraca hoys and their sister workers, the
Philathea girls, will come —holding separate ses
sions during the day and joint mass meetings at
night. Marshall Hudson, the layman father of this
great movement, will be here, and it is worth trav
eling a long way to see a man who has thought a
great thought and given it to the world in the crys
tallization of such a mighty movement for good.
The Baraca and Philathea pins—always badges
of honor —are being seen on land and on sea, and
wherever found, there is the handclasp of fellow
ship between young people who are giving the
morning of their fair, fruitful lives to God.
Come to the convention —and catch the whole
some enthusiasm that will make you worth more to
the world.
The Lobe of Scandal.
Isn’t a pity that so many people revel in im
punity rather than purity—because they love dark
ness rather than light? Isn’t it a pity that deeds
of light languish on so many tongues, while the
same tongues leap and sing to tell the world deeds
that are shady, suspicious or dark? We would not
connive at sin or give even quasi indorsement to
flagrant wrong, but Christian people, decent people
and decent papers oughit to be ashamed to deal in
The Golden Age for April 11, 1907.
a rumor that is hurtful to such a sacred thing as
a good name.
We are suspicious of suspicious people. A man
who says “all men would be dishonest if they had
a chance,” should not be trusted with any man’s
pocket book.
And the man who is quick to believe on suspi
cion, and not proof, that a man or woman of hith
erto spotless reputation is guilty of immorality, be
lieves it, and is glad to believe others impure be
cause he himself is impure..
And the newspapers—Lord forgive them —how
they flash in flaming headlines stories of rumors
and suspicions, often cruel and groundless, that
cloud a noble, but helpless, name forevermore.
We have been informed that “The Macon Tele
graph” never prints a story of scandal. Good!
Would that every big daily in the land would
follow “The Telegraph’s” high and helpful ex
ample! And it ought to be made a crime for a
paper to publish anything hurtful to such a sacred
thing as a reputation unless the facts are absolute
ly known.
Beware of the talemonger! He is usually an im
pure channel for an impure stream.
A Christian Science Decision.
The Supreme Court of Texas recently handed
down a decision reversing the judgment of the
court below, granting damages to the plaintiff, a
husband, who had sued a railroad company for in
juries to his wife, a Christian scientist, consist
ing in humiliation, embarrassment and other in
juries to the feelings.
The action was brought in the District Court of
Wilbarger county against the Fort Worth and Den
ver City Railway Company by J. A. Travis, and a
judgment for $l9O obtained, mainly on account of
the physical and mental suffering of his wife in
being expelled from one of the defendant’s pas
senger trains. On the cross examnation of Mrs.
Travis the counsel for the company asked her why
“she refused to state why she didn’t take certain
medicines prescribed by her family physician, Dr.
Dodson.” She persisted in her refusal to answer,
whereupon she was asked whether “it w’as not a
fact that it was because she belonged to a sect
called ‘Christian Scientists.’ ” The objection of
the plaintiff’s counsel to this question was sus
tained by the trial judge. Counsel for the com
pany then stated to the court that he wanted to
show that the witness would not take medicine
on that account, and also that it was her belief
that she suffered only when she thought she suf
fered, and did not suffer when she thought she
didn’t, and it was only a question with her whether
she suffered or did not suffer.
It further appeared in the bill of exceptions that
the defendant could have proved by this witness
that she was a Christian Scientist, and that as
such “she lived on a spiritual plane above mental
and physical sufferings; that it was an article of
her faith that there was no such thing as mental
or physical suffering, and that she did not actually
suffer.” The witness on being questioned further
said: “I don’t take medicine unless I get down
so that I can’t help myself.” Counsel asked her
whether she made that a rule and she answered
yes. The Court excluded any further testimony
along this line.
The Supreme Court found that it was reversible
error not to allow the questions proposed by coun
sel for the railway company to be propounded to
the witness —she being the person claiming to be
injured; and it was upon this point as to the ex
tent of cross examination permissible, that the re
versal was granted. This decision, therefore, does
not hold, by any means, that a Christian Scientist
cannot’recover for mental pain and suffering. It
does hold, however, that counsel may interrogate
the Christian Scientist as to the existence of such
suffering; and by inference, the ruling may be con
strued to mean that a profession of faith which
denies the existence of such things as pain, suffer
ing and death, would constitute a bar to any one’s
claiming damages for the existence of something
which does not exist. From the Christian Science
standpoint, there is no real pain; it is true that
there is evil lurking in spot* around and about us;
but the mind properly in harmony with the All-Good
can put it out of existence in the twinkling of an
eye, in a simple twist of the mind It is a comfort
to settle the whole matter that way. If through
some misunderstanding of the real facts, a person
hastily concludes, from seeing a train of cars and
a couple of locomotives piled in ruins and the whole
pile blazing, that there has been a railroad wreck:
a moment’s thought will convince that this is a
mistake. There is really no wreck; it is a misun
derstanding of the Laws which stand back of the
Whole-Thing: and if a casual glance would lead
one to infer that there are broken bones and
crushed bodies, that also is a mere delusion. It is
simply another misconstruction placed upon the
rules governing the Here-And-Now. Therefore,
why damage suits? Wherefore limiment and obit
uaries ?
* I?
A Georgia Artman.
Georgia has an Artman of her own, thank you!
He is Solicitor-General AV. E. Thomas of the fair
but still saloon-cursed city of Valdosta.
“Will” Thomas, as his friends love to call him,
is a lawyer of parts and an undisguised politician
of probity and genius. Smile if you will, but the
two words find their full meaning in W. E. Thomas.
/ e . .
He is a “natural born” politician, but one who
never deals in unclean speech or unclean deeds.
And politician that he is, with all his geniality and
optimism, lie has ahvays been constitutionally,
openly, secretly, designedly, schemingly and ever
lastingly “agin” liquor! He does not drink it
himself, he does not use it in his political cam
paigns either for himself or his friends, and he is
determined, the Lord and the law being his helper,
that other people shall not use it to the debauch
ery of the body and the blight of the soul!
Solicitor Thomas has declared and is prosecut
ing accordingly, that a man in any way connected
with getting liquor into the hands of a minor is a
laiv breaker. It is not necessary that this law
breaker be a saloon keeper, selling it to a minor
over the bar; but if a distant dealer or a nearby
transmitter accepts or delivers an order that di
rectly or indirectly goes into the hands of a minor,
he is a criminal in the sia'ht of the law of Geor
gia, to say nothing of the law of God.
This is the basic and vital ground on which So
licitor Thomas is prosecuting both open and covert
law-breakers in his part of Georgia, and Robert G.
Mitchell, the eminent jurist and upright judge of
Thomasville, has sustained this sweeping conten
tion.
And so while Judge Artman, of Indiana, is start
ling the nation and scaring the whiskey men out of
their wits by his decision that a saloon cannot be
constitutionally licensed by law any more than a
gambling den, a lewd house, or any other menace to
society and good government, we have an Artman
down here —a couple of them, may it please the
court —whose wise and fearless jurisdiction we
■would extend over e\ ery rum-cursed ball wick on
earth!
All right, Solicitor Thomas, we salute you! There
are higher heights for young men of your type,
your ability and character.
* *
President Roosevelt, as we have before taken oc
casion to remark in these columns, is earnest and
interested. His interest in practically everything
under the sun leads him to occasionally make re
marks. There are times also, when alone, and away
from the telephone, that he writes letters. He
wrote some to “Dear Maria” and some others,
perhaps, to a certain gentleman interested iu rail
roads. I hese are only two unimportant instances.
But human nature is weak and prone to error, and
therefore the recollections of certain parties have
been all wrong in the matter of what was said by
President Roosevelt on certain subjects. Therefore
he has been forced to fell them, gently it is true, but
firmly, we must admit, that they had lied. Quite
a number of people have lied and some attention
has been given the matter in the papers. It is all
summed up, however, in a recent communication to
the New York Sun. It is as follows: “Sir—Ev’
erybody ]i«s bqt 'Roosevelt, (Signed) T. J,”