The Old Book Stands by Editor

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, Cal. · Feb 7, 1911

The Old Book Stands.

By Editor

Let men revile and scoff. The word of God called from chaos to cosmos, from darkness to light, a world. It can—and has so done myriads of times—call from the chaos of sin to the cosmos of righteousness lost and wandering souls. It is able to meet the infidelity and helplessness of man on the one side, or the tradition and helplessness of humanity on the other, and save from both. It is mighty in God to create and re-create, to generate and regenerate. All human effort and human schemes will prove ineffective as in the past; but the word of God has within it all the potency of its Author, and can not fail. "For no word from God shall be void of power." Luke 1:37, A.R.V. Then, soul, yield to that power. Let it cleanse, re-create, and keep the soul. It will prove an anchor to hold your bark on life's sea. It will be a cleft in the Rock of Ages into which you may flee from life's storms and be safe.

The Need of the Bible.

Never was there a time when the Bible was made the object of attack as now. It has little to fear from open infidelity. That has been the same practically in all ages, and in fair, open conflict with the Word has ever been the vanquished. Infidelity says much; the Bible does much. Its worst foes are among its professed friends, "in the church," oftentimes D.D.'s and S.T.D.'s and Revs. Set to proclaim that Word to lost souls, they mutilate and dissect it, and parade its disjecta membra before the people in unholy, insinuating criticism or questioning. As the envious sons of Jacob dipped the beautiful multi-hued coat of Joseph in the blood of a goat, and held it before the weeping father, and said and asked, "This have we found: know now whether it be thy son's coat or no," so these professed sons of the Most High tear apart the Bible—the One Book—cover

it with their own exudations of frothy knowledge, and hold the mutilated and defiled parts before the longing soul, and say and ask insinuatingly, "This in our profound research we have found; knowest thou whether it is the Word of God or not!" And as the aged patriarch wailed, "Joseph is not," so there are sorrowing souls who in the face of this professedly profound knowledge of the critics are saying, "The Bible is not; ah! whither shall I go?" But as the very evil which Joseph's brothers thought to do brought salvation to the weeping father and his family, the very son sold into slavery his only hope in time of trouble, so in these days of trouble, despite the criticism and work of the professed friends of truth, the Old Book—still the One Book—is the hope of every longing soul. "Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men."

Religious and Class Legislation.

The Barber's Labor Union has presented a barber's Sunday bill in the assembly at Sacramento, through Mr. McDonald, from San Francisco. It has been referred to the Committee on Public Morals. Its proposed penalties are quite severe—for the first offense a fine of $5.00 or term of imprisonment, or both, upon any barber who shaves a customer on Sunday; for second offense, fine of from $10.00 to $50.00, or imprisonment, or both. In 1896, as we pointed out in our issue of January 3, the State Supreme Court, through Justice Henshaw, decided a similar barber's Sunday law to be unconstitutional because class legislation. It is both class and religious legislation, and on either or both features ought to be summarily turned down.

Religious legislation, if carried into ultimate practise, always results in developing three classes; namely, martyrs to principle, hypocrites, and religious tyrants. The last is composed of those who are devotees to the false principles of religious legislation. The middle class is constituted of those who do not believe the law, but who act as if they did, in order to avoid its penalties. The first named believe in the worth of the principles of liberty, and are willing to suffer for it. In reducing the law to practise, therefore, it results that the most conscientious are counted the worst criminals, while the hypocrites and tyrants go scot-free. Do our legislators, our liberty-loving friends of any belief, want to place upon the statute-book such laws as that?

Religious liberty! What a precious boon! Is there a rational soul in the universe who does not want and in his heart at least demand such liberty for himself—the liberty to worship or not to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience? That, however, is not the test of religious liberty. There must be stronger evidence than a man's demanding such liberty for himself to prove that he believes in religious liberty. The pagan Roman persecutors, the very directors of the Spanish Inquisition, the blue-law Pilgrims of Massachusetts, each and all believed in religious liberty for themselves. But that is not the test of religious-liberty principles. He who believes in religious liberty, believes it for the other man, for his opponent, for his bitterest enemy. The Roman Catholic, if he be a true lover of religious liberty, will demand it for the Protestant; the Protestant for the Catholic; both for the Christian Scientist; and all for every one. Be not deceived; if you hold the principles of religious liberty, you hold them for the other man.

A Foe to Himself.

The man who believes in religious legislation, may become a particeps criminis in his own persecution; for his own convictions may lead him to oppose and disobey—rightly, too—the law he helped to enact, and that unjust law becomes the basis of his prosecution and conviction. He thus in the logic of events has become his own enemy. His law prosecutes and punishes him while in reality he is guilty of no immoral act. One principle ought forever to hold a Christian back from religious legislation: (1) If the thing desired is of

Christ, He is all-powerful, and it may safely be left with Him. It has within it the potency of the divine, and it will live by its own inherent power. (2) If it is not of Christ, it is worthy only to die. "Every plant, which My heavenly Father hath not planted," says our Lord, "shall be rooted up."

Not Institutions but Man.

If legislators would keep in mind a great vital principle, religious legislation would cause them little trouble. That principle is that all legislation should be for the benefit, freedom, liberty, of man, and man as the representative of the whole race. Not the rich man or the poor man, not the professional man or the ordinary common workman; but the man—all humanity irrespective of class. But no legislation should be for the exaltation of an institution, let it be what it will. As soon as an institution is exalted, the class that supports it is correspondingly exalted, and law becomes partial, unequal, unjust. If the liberties and rights of the individual are secured, the mass need not fear.