THE "CHAIN-LETTER" SCHEME.
By Editor
AMONG the schemes for raising money easily in these days of feverish generosity is the "chain letter." It was more used ten years or so ago than now. Its exposure then was helpful, and it may be now. In a word, the plan is to conceive a chain of ten, twenty, fifty, or more links, each link of which multiplies itself. For instance, some poor boy or unfortunate man needs help to get an education or support a sick family. He or a friend gives a nickel or a dime, and writes a touching letter to two or three or five or ten others, asking each one of these to give the same sum of money, and duplicate the letter which he received to as many others as the plan contemplates, numbering the letters one in advance of the letter he received. A friend of ours has sent us a letter of this kind which we reproduce, with our friend's reply, for the benefit of our readers, and to discourage such questionable way of raising funds. Here is the appeal:— No. 1.
Dear Mr. Stockton,—
A desire to aid George W. Fowler, a young man who has been totally blind for three years, is the apology for sending you this letter. Make three exact copies of this letter, signing your own name to each, numbering them one number higher, and send to three of your friends, and they in their turn will do the same. Then return this letter, enclosing ten or more cents and the address of the three friends to
Geo. W. Fowler,
Lower Salmon Creek,
Chapman, N. B.
Canada.
No. 50 completes the chain. Here is our friend's reply:— Mrs. John Fowler,—
Dear Madam: Your favor has been received, and before entering into the chain would like some light on the project, and to be sure that I have a clear understanding of it. It looks a very simple thing; but there are some tremendous possibilities in it, if my idea of numbering the letters is right, and the friends respond readily. You will notice on the enclosed slip, that I have calculated up to the 16th number, and if my three letters are numbered each No. 2, and the nine letters of the three friends are numbered 3, and their twenty-seven letters are numbered 4, and so on, then the 16th number will give, when all is added, the somewhat astonishing sum shown on the slip, $2,152,336.
Now if we follow this to the 50th number, we would certainly bankrupt the world, and the Postal Department would be heavily taxed to furnish the stamps and mailing facilities, and yourselves completely drowned under the awful aggregation of letters and dimes. I am a poor man myself, but I shrink from touching the button that would put in motion such a ponderous multiplying machine, even tho I were to be the recipient of its silver showers. I will be glad to do something to aid a worthy fellow Christian, but do not like to enter into arrangements by which my initial impulse might be perpetuated till it includes the world; my plans to do good are on a more modest scale.
E. A. STOCKTON. The reader can easily calculate the tremendous possibilities which soon, from their magnitude, become impossibilities. The first letter, if successful, would bring ten cents. This multiplied by three, thirty cents; this in the same progression ninety cents; No. 4, $2.70; No. 5, $8.10; No. 20 would amount to $125,226,146.70, and the sum of all these numbers would reach $187,339,220; and there are thirty more multiplications to be made. No. 25, if each letter was successful, would aggregate the enormous sum of $47,069,656,618.80, and 470,696,566,188 persons would have been addressed. If confined to this country, each man, woman, and child would have received on an average over 672 letters each; and if each responded each time, they would pay, besides cost of letters and postage, $67.20 apiece to support this blind man. Mr. Stockton speaks modestly when he says it would bankrupt the world; it would bankrupt the solar system. It is yet true, we believe, that every worthy case of charity will be supported in the community where it is, if rightly made known. Let every reader of the SIGNS discourage all such schemes. A SIGN OF THE TIMES IN THE PHILIPPINES.
THE defenders of the Roman Catholic faith in the Philippines are growing desperate. A correspondent of the Catholic Mirror, writing from Manila, says, "No one who understands the genius of this people can contemplate without horror the possible Protestantization of these islands." An instance of the manner in which the people are being incited to loyalty to the faith is given as follows:— Recently the inhabitants of San Juan del Monte made a public profession of Catholicism. A junta was organized pledging active and enthusiastic support to the Filipino Catholic Center, and promising to use all possible efforts to uphold the Catholic faith, and to resist assaults upon it. The following oath was administered to members of the junta:— We solemnly promise, through the love of our Lord God, of Jesus Christ His only Son, our Saviour, of the Holy Ghost, and of our Lady, the most holy virgin, to persevere in the religion of our fathers, in which we were born, and at the same time we promise never to prove false to the sacred teaching of the Vicar of our Redeemer Jesus, his Holiness Pope Leo XIII. We also promise to defend our creed with the courage and resolution worthy of the glory of God and of our Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church. The adversary of Christ is doing all he can to inculcate the war spirit among professed Christians. Catholicism being a carnal religion, its votaries have always been taught to maintain it by any means, by physical force when deemed necessary. Apostatizing Protestantism is following in the wake of Rome in many respects, and was mainly responsible for the Spanish war, which developed the war in the Philippines. The theory was that by means of war God was placing the islands in the hands of the United States in order that they might be Protestantized. So, from both Catholics and Protestants, the Filipinos are being taught that war is an essential feature of Christian progress. The past four years have been a season of disseminating the principles of religious warfare in the name of Christianity, by teachers professing Christianity, yet maintaining antagonistic positions, through the argument of force. If the poor Filipinos are to be saved, it is time somebody was giving them the Gospel of Christ from the standpoint of faith in His power, rather than in the power of any human government or institution.