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The Cause of the Peril

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · May 29, 1907

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 33, No. 22.

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The Cause of the Peril.

By T.

IT is very easy in any part of the country for society to be turned loose into a howling, violent mob. Increasing occurrences show that this is the case. To state it is simply to present an undisguised fact about which there should be no question in the mind of any one.
This condition of things is bringing the half suppressed suggestion from some of the leading editorial writers of the country that society is being so broken up that it will soon be a hopeless undertaking to maintain law and order. A very small minority make their inflammatory speeches, and a very small minority make open avowal for the vengeance of the mob. But the great majority seem to be powerless to hold the incendiary element in check. There seems to be a lack of firmness in government that allows the lawless element to break loose and do its dastardly work.
When the reason is sought for this condition of things it is not hard to find. Men are so intent in making money for themselves that they advance “business reasons” why they can not take a stand against the various wrongs that they know to be growing up right under them. The craze to get hold of money in the present is shutting the eyes of men so that they do not seem to realize the seriousness of the situation. An unhealthy and foolish optimism leads them to say, “O, it will all come out all right some way, and so we do not need to bother our heads; we must attend to business.”
And when riots and strikes are holding communities in terror, the thing that is talked most and made uppermost is the loss that is occasioned to “business.” “Our business is suffering, and we are losing thousands of dollars; and our community will be shunned by business enterprises,” is the great wail that is sent out.
The apostle exhorts Christians to be “diligent in business,” and we have that other scripture statement that the man who is diligent in his business shall stand before kings, but there are things sometimes that are more important than business. When the very fundamentals of organized society, expressed in just civil government, are not only being attacked but are being broken up, it is time for men to begin to study into the cause of this condition, and to act from a principle that has a much broader foundation than mere “business reasons.”
But the money-mad generation that would throw principle to the winds for “business reasons” has been very clearly sketched in the pages of sacred writ. One scripture reads:
“But know this, that in the last days grievous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, haughty, railers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, implacable, slanderers, without self-control, fierce, no lovers of good, traitors, headstrong, puffed up, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God; holding a form of godliness, but having denied the power thereof; from these also turn away.” 2 Tim. 3:1-5.
Self-love and also the love of money, together with a list of other evils that show an utter disregard for principle, make grievous times in the last days. Such is the statement of the apostle, and the apostle was bidden to write under the direction of Him who knows the end from the beginning. If this world is not plunging headlong into the condition described in the foregoing text, pray what kind of conditions would it take to mark its fulfilment!
The reckless disregard for the very principles that have made this one of the foremost nations of the world, and the turning away to the call of self-love and money-love are digging the foundation from under our national structure. And the conditions that prevail here are just as bad, when they are not worse, among all the other nations of the earth. The seed has been sown, and is rapidly growing to the harvest. We must do everything we can to enlighten our fellow men in regard to the final outcome. They must be shown that the only hope of permanently peaceable conditions in this world is for the armies of heaven, with the Lord Jesus at their head, to strike the decisive blow that will forever put an end to all this lawlessness and these violent conditions.
Every heart should be made to rejoice in the hope that the Master’s coming will be very soon and this reign of terror can not continue long. The evidence is incontestable, and the outlook is glorious. The Lord’s coming is right at hand.