CAN IT BE TRUE?

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · May 4, 1904

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 30, No. 18.

If you were told that in a very great heathen city a majority of the inns or hotels, when required, became houses of infamy, you would probably answer that it was the legitimate fruit of fake religion. And if you were informed that in the vast crowds of immigrants that came every year to this same city, ten thousand young women are ruined, going into a life of shame, you might consider it to be horrible, and place the blame on paganism.

But suppose your attention is called to the fact that this condition exists to-day in the home land, under the stars and stripes, in New York City. I think the question would inevitably arise, Can this be true?

The Independent, of New York, in an editorial article published March 10, 1904, makes the following statement:—

Hardened as the city dweller is to a knowledge of the prevalence of vice in all dense centers of population, we doubt if any decent American has read, without a touch of horror, Mr. Jerome's assertion that at least 2,000 of the 2,500 hotels in New York City are "open houses of prostitution." We call ourselves a Christian and a civilized people. We boast that in America the family life is at least as pure as it is elsewhere in the world. We take pride in what we are pleased to call an American reverence for womanhood, as if it were a virtue more characteristic of this nation than of others. We make relentless war upon polygamy, and keep up a persistent agitation for the enactment of uniform laws of marriage and divorce; and yet, in our chief city, a fearless official, who has devoted many of the best years of his life to an attempt to discover the actual facts about our moral condition, and to enforce the law of repression to the letter, is obliged to inform us that 2,000 hotels in this city are open houses of prostitution; and a recent investigator, whose statements are published by authority of the Charity Organization Society, tells us that at least 10,000 immigrant girls, landing at Ellis Island, are annually forced or lured into habits of harlotry.

Yet it is very likely that the average American, when reading the above, will put the blame almost wholly upon foreigners and upon cities. Investigations prove that out-of-town visitors contribute largely to the support of this notorious business. These facts are not sweet nor inspiring, especially when we have lulled ourselves to sleep, thinking we are the best people in the world, and live in God's country. But facts are facts, and they must be dealt with, whether beautiful or ugly.

What shall be our attitude in relation to these palpable truths? Wholesale condemnations or flashy conference resolutions are about equally futile.

You remember the story of the woman taken in adultery, how Jesus got rid of her accusers by saying, "He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her"? And they went out, one by one, the oldest rascals first. Our Saviour said, "Neither do I condemn thee: go thy way; from henceforth sin no more." But in most cases to-day, the door of hope is forever closed to the woman who bears the "Scarlet Letter" upon her breast. This is so, because we do not have the religion of Jesus, and know not how to forgive.

Resolutions by conferences on paper are at least worth the paper they are written on, and as much more as they are "resolved" in the hearts of the people. Does any one imagine that the great religious reformation begun by Christ, and carried on by the disciples, could have been consummated by assemblies of the church passing resolutions on parchment? "Ye have wearied Jehovah with your words." In the vast conflagration of vice sweeping over this entire country, far worse than any physical fire, we stand with folded hands and pious faces, saying, "Hush! hush!" Our strongest men, and purest, do not give themselves to the study of this problem.

May God have mercy upon us, for man will not.

—Rev. Carlisle Summerbell, in Herald of Gospel Liberty.

Is not the terrible condition above set forth a complete fulfilment of the Scripture declaration that in the last days "evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse"? "As the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be." "Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; . . . even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed." The iniquities of the antediluvians and the Sodomites are prevalent in the world to-day, and the punishments which overtook them will soon be poured out upon this offending generation.