The Spirit of the Mob

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D.C. · Nov 2, 1911

The Spirit of the Mob

The claim that this is a Christian nation, loses much of its significance in the light of the spirit which has dominated entire communities in different parts of the country during the last few weeks. In Pennsylvania with its traditional Northern conservatism, in Oklahoma with its claims of freedom and justice, as well as in the Southland, men and women have laid aside every feeling of humanity, and have vied with one another in their efforts to inflict punishment upon a poor unfortunate, though doubtless guilty, fellow being.

Now comes a ghoulish story from Georgia that tells of the death of an aviator, and how the people fought and struggled to obtain some relic of the accident. The presence of death was not sufficient to sober their judgment, the spirit of morbid curiosity controlled every other feeling, and the desire for a keepsake of the ghastly accident was uppermost in their minds. According to press accounts even the things worn by the aviator were fought over before life was extinct in the body. Such things are indeed revolting, and they indicate the spirit of the times upon which we have entered, and the scenes which will be enacted on this earth many times.

It is in the midst of such scenes as these that God is seeking to bring out a people who will know his peace, who will be so guided by his Spirit that their impulses and emotions will be brought under its control. For this keeping power let us devoutly pray; and that others may share it with us, let us earnestly labor.