Blood for Blood

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jun 12, 1913

EVERY industrial conflict indicates the growing intensity which is possessing the hearts of men and the bitter spirit of class hatred being engendered between the working men and the representatives of capital. This was illustrated at the funeral of a workman killed during a recent strike at Paterson, N. J. A representative of the Industrial Workers of the World made a speech at the final exercises held at the grave. Casting a red carnation on the pine box, he said: “Fellow workers, don’t forget the principle of the toilers who come from Italy. For blood you must take blood.” The Thrice-a-Week World of April 23, in reporting this incident, says:—

No finished actor could have spoken a line with greater intensity, nor sent the words home with greater force. Though the earth had not yet been cast upon the box, the listeners let out a volume of applause that was startlingly strange in the resting-place of the dead.

If such sentiments could be understood to express the sentiments of the speaker alone, it would not appear so ominous; but when it is understood that such sentiments as these are uttered by representatives of various orders, and are put forth more or less openly by those who stand as leaders, and are openly applauded by those who hear them, and that, too, at a funeral, we repeat it shows the intensity that is taking possession of the minds of men, and the bitter feelings that are being engendered between classes at the present time.

The prophecies of Scripture indicate that this will be so. The last chapter of the book of James shows that in the last day a bitter warfare will be waged between capital and labor. We are already in the midst of that conflict, and the end is not yet. As the end approaches, we shall see bitter strife and bloodshed and revolution. Arbitration for a time may put off the evil day, but it will be powerless at last to effect an adjustment of the difficulties.

This old earth will never know peace only as peace is ushered in by the reign of the Lord Jesus Christ.