p. 2 | Note and Comment by L. L. C.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D.C. · Aug 17, 1916

Note and Comment

By L. L. C.

Of General Interest

A Bankrupt Europe

The present European war is threatening to bankrupt Europe, according to a statement which Francis W. Hirst made in his final article in the Economist, of which he has resigned editorship after nine years of service. He says:—

“In my view, the financial fabric of western Europe is in imminent peril, and in a few more months it will no longer be possible to disguise the bankrupt condition of several great nations.”

Placing Tradition above the Bible

It is generally understood by Protestants that the Roman Catholic Church is very much opposed to the work of the Bible societies. The recent centennial of the American Bible Society has brought praise from all quarters save one,—the Roman Catholic Church. In America (Roman Catholic), May 20, 1916, the position of the Roman Catholic Church is editorially stated in a concise way:—

“It is a cardinal Protestant principle that the Scriptures are the one and all-sufficient rule of faith, that the individual reading of the Bible, without assistance from notes or commentaries, is the sure guide to revealed religious truth. Not such is the doctrine of the church, which has always held that the Scriptures are a supplementary, not the primary, and much less the exclusive, source of revelation; that Christ’s doctrines, in the economy he himself established, were to be conveyed to the world by the preaching of the apostles and their successors; and that the Holy Writ is to be interpreted, not at the individual reader’s pleasure, but strictly, in accordance with the sense of living tradition which has come down unbroken from the apostles. This doctrine the American Bible Society denies; in its opinion each reader may interpret the Bible as he thinks best.”

One can but notice the frank statement that Catholics consider the Scriptures as “a supplementary, not the primary, and much less the exclusive, source of revelation.” Thus they place tradition not only on an equality with the Scriptures, but even above them.

Raising Church Funds

In these days of various methods for raising church funds, the position of a Roman Catholic priest of New Orleans, in refusing the offer of the members of his congregation to raise funds for the building of a church by means of a lawn party, is very striking indeed. This priest is reported in one of our exchanges to have said:—

“Churches should not be built with money derived from questionable pleasures. The Lord prefers to have his children give their money freely. My church will not be built from the proceeds of candy raffles, grab bags, wheels of fortune, and other forms of gambling. Neither does the Lord want his temple to be built from the proceeds of dances and other entertainments. The church sets a mighty bad example when it profits from gambling and entertainments.”

We most heartily approve of the position here taken. We, too, very much deplore the method of raising church funds which is in vogue in some of the popular churches, a method which has been called by A. J. Gordon the “cooking-stove apostasy”—concerts, chicken pie suppers, ice cream socials, bazaars, etc.

Who is Entitled to Damages?

It is a generally recognized principle of law that any one injured shall have the right to demand damages of the one who injures him. Would it not be well if this method were also applied to the liquor sellers? Those engaged in the liquor business are quick to ask for compensation for any loss that may come to them. William Jennings Bryan is quoted in one of our exchanges as saying:—

“If the people engaged in the liquor business ask for compensation for any pecuniary loss brought to them by prohibition, a very complete answer can be made to them. Do they give back to the wife the value of the husband drink has taken from her? Do they give back to the children the father whom drink has brutalized? Do they give back to the mother the son whom drink has ruined? Do they recompense society for the moral disease which they spread? Do they give back to government the purity for which they have substituted rottenness and corruption? . . . Why should the liquor interests, that make no effort to compensate, ask compensation? They live by sufferance; they must take their chances. They cannot complain of the wrath their business arouses.”

Number Slain in Papal Persecutions

Several readers have written to this office, asking for a statement as to how many persons have been killed by persecutions of the Roman Catholic Church. The following, appearing in Dowling’s “History of Romanism,” page 542, quoted from Scott’s “Church History,” may be of interest to our readers:—

“No computation can reach the numbers who have been put to death, in different ways, on account of their maintaining the profession of the gospel and opposing the corruptions of the Church of Rome. A million of poor Waldenses perished in France; nine hundred thousand orthodox Christians were slain in less than thirty years after the institution of the order of the Jesuits. The Duke of Alva boasted of having put to death in the Netherlands thirty-six thousand by the hand of the common executioner during the space of a few years. The Inquisition destroyed, by various tortures, one hundred and fifty thousand within thirty years. These are a few specimens, and but a few, of those which history has recorded; but the total amount will never be known till the earth shall disclose her blood and no more cover her slain.”

Of course, as this quotation itself indicates, there is no accurate account of the number of the victims of the Papacy. A favorite position of Roman Catholic apologists is that the church, as such, never killed any one, but that heretics were in past ages killed by the state as enemies of the public welfare. They fail to add, however, that the civil power did it at the command of the church.

Industrial Strife

In this present time of great prosperity, it seems strange that our country should be troubled with strikes. The public press, however, gives us recent news that in New York 60,000 workers refuse to ratify the proposed agreement with the Garment Manufacturers’ Association. The strike of these workers, which has tied up the garment-making industry for three months, was expected to be ended by this proposed agreement, but it now seems that it is to continue. We do not have at hand information to enable us to judge as to the merits of the case, even if we should so desire. We only wish to point to this strike as a fulfilment of the prophecy of the struggle between capital and labor which is to characterize the last days.

L. L. C.