Editorial by Francis McClellan Wilcox

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Apr 9, 1914

Editorial

By Francis McClellan Wilcox

The Portent of the Times

THIS is an age of change and transformation and revolution. In every quarter are seen unrest and disquietude. The changing emphasis in religious faith and teaching, the leavening effects of subtle skepticism, the inroads of the present-day spirit of commercialism, federation, and worldliness, which has invaded the great Christian church, are fast sweeping away professed Christians from their old-time faith and primitive simplicity. Many are inquiring, as did Pilate of old, only with greater eagerness, "What is truth?"

Socially and commercially the individual unit is coming to be counted of small consequence. Orders, societies, guilds, federations, fraternities, etc., have classified the great majority of mankind under some flag or with some following. Individual convictions are subordinated largely to class control and to party domination. Class distinctions are growing more pronounced, and class hatreds more intense. In the great world of labor and commerce, class rivalry and hatred are particularly marked.

Political Complications

Politically, eager expectancy awaits every day's happenings. Look where we will, we see disturbed national or international conditions. Continued revolution in Mexico, with all the accompaniments of such strife in bloody battle, murder, robbery, pillage, etc.; thousands of people without food, shelter, or raiment in the Balkan States, as the result of the devastating strife of several months ago; similar conditions existing in Japan in consequence of the recent earthquakes; penury, want, and suffering in China following the long-drawn-out revolution in that country, where even now affairs of government are far from having reached a stable condition; uprisings of the excited populace in Paris and Tokio over political questions; great labor demonstrations in Rome, Vienna, and other cities of Europe,—these are but a partial review of the conditions which exist in the world today.

English Crisis

And some of these conditions are found in the most stable and settled governments of earth. England has but recently passed through a great industrial war in which practically every industry in the kingdom was paralyzed and the very integrity of the government menaced, to be plunged later into the widespread agitation accompanied by riots, assaults, arson, etc., represented in the suffragette movement. At this writing the country is passing through a crisis such as she has not experienced since the period of the American Revolution; namely, the threatened uprising in event of the passage of the Home Rule Bill for Ireland. With the formation of Irish regiments who favor the passage of the Home Rule Bill, and opposing regiments averse to its adoption, both factions armed and drilling for active conflict; with the officers of the regular army resigning from the service rather than take up arms against their corelligonists in the threatened insurrection,—a peculiar and unique situation confronts the British government at the present time.

Class Hatred in the United States

Engrossed as are the people of the United States in their business and social affairs, many do not realize that in this usually quiet and generally law-abiding country there are some strong and growing orders which threaten the security of peace and order in the future. We have spoken in the past of the spirit which actuates some of these organizations, particularly the most active and aggressive one, known as the Industrial Workers of the World. Members of this organization a short time since invaded some of the church buildings of New York City, demanding as their right, without work, food and shelter. The Washington Post for March 22 describes one of the parades of this organization in the city of New York as follows:—

Under a silken black banner inscribed in blood-red letters, "Demolition," and led by Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman, a seething stream of excited men and women of the I. W. W. and anarchist organizations, surged up Broadway and Fifth Avenue to One Hundred and Seventh Street this afternoon in one of the most riotous class demonstrations that New York has ever known.

Commanded by Miss Goldman to "march to Fifth Avenue and help yourselves to the things you have earned," the mob, a thousand strong, took the east sidewalk of the fashionable thoroughfare from Madison Square up, insulted all well-dressed persons, drove women for shelter into hotels or the doorways of houses, stopped automobiles, flung jeers and hisses at the mansions of the rich, stopped to denounce the men who peered from the windows of the millionaires' clubs, hurled insults at the churches they passed, and through all the long march kept the large force of police on careful watch for a dangerous outbreak. . . .

This demonstration, regarded as one of the most extraordinary in the city's history, was subsequent to a mass meeting in the streets near Union Square, where the throng had been denied the right to gather. The wealth of the nation was the product of their toil, those gathered were told by speakers, and they should march forth into Fifth Avenue, and upon church and restaurant and hotel and shop, and take what was theirs. Emma Goldman and Carlo Tresca were some of those who exhorted the restless crowd.

"New York is a rich city," said Emma Goldman. "There's enough here for every man's comfort and enjoyment. The city owes you a livelihood. It rests with you whether you are going to get it."

In conclusion, Miss Goldman advised the crowd to "march on the mayor, on the churches, and on the police department," and "don't quit until you get what you want."

Precursors of the End

We do not fear that the government of Great Britain will go down in the crisis through which it is passing, nor do we anticipate that we shall witness today or tomorrow the destruction of law and government in the United States as a result of this spirit which is at work. But these internal complications are rapidly increasing in every government of earth, and like the preparations for international warfare, indicate the times which we have reached in earth's history. Says the Saviour, of the age just preceding his second coming, there shall be "distress of nations, with perplexity;" men's hearts shall fail "them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth." Luke 21: 25, 26. And he declares that when we shall see these and other conditions which he enumerates, existing, we may lift up our heads, knowing that our redemption draweth nigh.

The apostle James gives as one of the signs of the last days the conflict between capital and labor. James 5:1-8. The conditions which he points out we believe are fulfilled in the state of affairs which we see around us. This will become more and more evident as we follow the progress of events through the years to come until our Lord appears. These conditions which exist are God's monitors, indicating to us where we are living in the history of this world. In considering them we should not become hysterical in feeling, nor alarmists in words or actions. However, we must not shut our eyes to their import. They speak to us the message of our Lord's soon coming, and in this relationship we should candidly and earnestly point them out to our friends and neighbors.

Warning to the Church

Our danger is that these conditions will become so common that they will

lose their force and significance, so that the day of the Lord will come upon us unawares. Against this danger we are warned by our Master. He says:—

“Take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares. For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth. Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man.” Luke 21: 34-36.

May God grant that we shall be admonished of the days in which we live; that when we read in the daily press of the things transpiring on the earth we may see in them a fulfillment of the prophetic word concerning this day and generation. Let us prove of the number who shall not be in darkness, so that the day of God will come upon us unawares, but, regarding the times and the seasons, let us sound abroad the warning cry, preparing our own hearts, and seeking to prepare others, through God’s grace, for the things which are coming upon the earth.

F. M. W.