p. 8 | THE REIGN OF MORGAN.”

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Oct 1, 1902

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 28, No. 40.

THE REIGN OF MORGAN.”

The Worship of Gold.

Such is the subject of an article in the Springfield Republican of August 29, from which we take the following:—

This is distinctively the reign or the era of J. P. Morgan. He is the first personage and first power in the United States to-day, and is so recognized abroad quite as much as at home; and the people down East who are crowding about to see, and hear, and applaud the President of the United States are following a secondary attraction. Let Morgan start out on a talking journey, and see if this would not be so. But Morgan is quiet, and this gives the President his chance. Nevertheless, there seems to be no popular question as to where the real chief-executive power of the nation is to be found. The place is Wall Street, corner Broad.

We find proof of this abundantly in the news of the day. There goes up from the helpless people of the country a frantic appeal for the ending of the coal strike, so that we may not all freeze the coming winter, and it is now addressed, in every case, to Morgan. It is generally conceded that he can end the strike, if he will, by a single word or a nod of the hand, and to him all prayers and petitions for relief are being directed. Duly constituted authority counts for nothing. The delegated might of millions of citizens is something laughed at by citizens themselves no less than by the coal monopolists. The governor of Pennsylvania is a nonentity in the matter, altho the coal roads are violating their charters every day. The President of the United States is a cipher in the case, altho the anthracite combination exists in open defiance of federal law. And all recognize the fact, and so the appeal lies to Wall Street, corner Broad. Great is Morgan, and who is big enough to be his prophet?

But after all, this is not the worship of man, but of the gold he represents. If Mr. Morgan were a poor man, if his talents and energy were used as an artist, a poet, a philanthropist, he would receive no more recognition than millions of his fellows are receiving. It is the call of gold which the people are worshiping. The age is intensely in love with gold; it worships gold; and the man who controls and manipulates the movements of the gold is the acknowledged king.

It would be amusing and ridiculous from some view points, were it not for the tragedies involved in it. The control of money means monopoly, and monopoly of the worst sort. It is felt, for instance, that Mr. Morgan could settle the anthracite coal strike. He probably could; but he does not wish to offend his wealthy friends, the coal barons. He therefore holds aloof. But his action and the action of the coal capitalists engenders bitter hatred in the hearts of striking miners, a suffering public, and the millions of sympathizers with these suffering classes. The disregard of their rights, the ability of men of wealth to control legislatures and courts in these mammon-worshiping days, are sowing seeds of class hatred which will bear abundant crop in disorder, lawlessness, rapine, plunder, and blood-red anarchy. Note what the prophet says of the great monopolist (the term is used in a generic sense), and of the results of his work:—

“He is a haughty man that keepeth not at home; who enlargeth his desire as Sheol, and he is as death, and can not be satisfied, but gathereth unto himself all nations, and heapeth unto him all peoples.” Hab. 2:5.

On account of this predatory covetousness, this exploiting of the world, this swallowing up of “the man more righteous than he” (see last of previous chapters), this making of “men as the fishes of the sea, as the creeping things that have no ruler over them,” this merchandise of men as things, this devising of schemes as nets to take them, this sparing not even the very nations (for the monopolist loves big game),—on account of all this and more, note the results predicted when the poor and oppressed are made to believe they can endure no longer:—

“Shall not all these take up a . . . taunting proverb against him, and say, Woe to him that increaseth that which is not his! how long? and that ladeth himself with pledges? Shall they not rise up suddenly that shall bite thee, and awake that shall vex thee, and thou shalt be for booty unto them? Because thou hast plundered many nations, all the remnant of the peoples shall plunder thee.”

Another prophet speaks thus:—

“And the songs of the palace shall be wailings in that day, saith the Lord Jehovah; the dead bodies shall be many; in every place shall they cast them forth with silence. Hear this, O ye that would swallow up the needy, and cause the poor of the land to fail.” Amos 8:3, 4.

Similarly also speaks a New Testament writer:—

“Come now, ye rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and your silver are rusted; and their rust shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your flesh as fire. Ye have laid up your treasure in the last days.” See James 5:1–8.

There is more than we have quoted, merciful warnings to the men who are heaping up their millions with little thought of the masses.

And the men of wealth—at least some of them—see the danger. Russell Sage, whose estimated wealth is $100,000,000, while in a measure defending the great industrial combinations, especially in the establishing of industries, on August 21, said:—

Combinations of all great industries are a menace to the government. Such combinations are not only a menace, but are the oppressors of the people.

Should an era of combinations ensue, the American people will certainly revolt against them, and if they do, there will be financial ruin such as people have never dreamed of in the history of the world.

If a combination is continued after the industry is well established, it becomes a monopoly and a menace to its own commercial life as well as to the government.

The American people will most certainly revolt at no very distant time against the enormous combines of the various industries. If continued, the combines will some day result in financial ruin, not only to those interested, but to the country.

The success attending the combination of some industries has led to the belief that the same success will mark the organization of other great combinations. They will not prove so, and before many years every one will realize it.

Seven days afterward, Bishop Potter, who is in intimate touch with the great kings of commerce, said in speaking of the coal strike:—

The situation is plain to every one. The operators realize that they have a handful of trumps, and they are determined to play their game, and crush these poor people. They may win, but their victory will carry with it a bitter sting. If I should take you into the next car, and pummel you, and kick you, and crush you to the floor, because I was the heavier man and could do so, that might subdue you, and I would win in our dispute; but if you were also a savage, you would lay for me, and at the first chance you would avenge yourself.

And conditions are rapidly reaching that climax where the desire for revenge is rapidly supplanting the desire for justice. There is no use disguising the dangers; they are both imminent and manifest to him who will see, and hear, and feel. They can be seen in the rapidly organizing forces of discontent, from law-abiding but revolutionary Socialism to the most intense Anarchism. They can be seen in the mad-mob spirit which sweeps into its death-dealing vortex whole communities of professionally law-abiding and “Christian” men and women. Such a cyclone of mob-rule may sweep down upon the rich. These dangers can be heard in every passing political breeze, in laborers’ camps, in the mutterings of discontent fast growing into growls of horrid hate. They can be felt everywhere. And when the culminating forces break, woe will then be upon the rich, woe upon the world.

We sympathize with the poor and the oppressed. We know there is much injustice and inequality. But all the rich are not responsible, and some of them, we doubt not, are endeavoring to be faithful stewards of God. It is many times true that the hatred on the part of the poor is a resultant of the worship of the golden calf, the envy born of covetousness. On the other hand, there is unthinking, heartless oppression on the part of the great, soulless combinations to which men are mere parts of a machine,

usable only for profit. And there are many poor who are looking only for a sufficiency for themselves and family, and to whom the almshouse in old age looms ominously.

The better way for the rich is to recognize the rights of the poor, to put themselves in the place of the poor, to live the Golden Rule in respect to the poor. But if not, God would not have the poor or oppressed rise up in rebellion, and destroy the rich and with them many good. Politics can not cure the evil. Rebellion can not cure it. Violence can not cure it. It would accomplish little good at the best, and bring untold evil. There is another world, a better time, coming. But it will come neither through politics nor violence; “the zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.” Christ is coming, and He will right all things that are wrong. He says to the poor and oppressed: “Be patient, therefore, brethren, to the coming of the Lord.” James 5:8. Jesus Christ alone can extirpate sin. First of all, from the heart, if the human wills; if not, in His own good time, from the world. Not till then will oppression cease. Wait His time.