Watchfulness Against Satan’s Deceptions
"ETERNAL vigilance is the price of liberty." This is no less true in political and civil life than in spiritual. "Be vigilant," "Watch thou in all things," "Watch and pray," "Watch unto prayer," "Watch and be sober," are all injunctions of Inspiration to the people of God. And Jesus our Lord says, "What I say unto you I say unto all, Watch." THERE is reason for watching. Peter says, "Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour." This is Satan's attitude and disposition. He is seeking to devour souls. Unlike some beasts of prey, who kill to satisfy their needs, Satan is like those who kill to satisfy their ferocity. He devours because he loves to devour. He destroys souls as a business. Hatred, ferocity, cruelty, revenge, malignity, are elements in his disposition. BUT Satan does not show all his malevolent characteristics openly and boldly. He does not advertise his real designs. He is crafty as well as wicked. He is subtle, and shrewd, and sly, as well as cruel. He beguiled our first mother by his subtlety, and "deceiveth" in various ways "the whole world." He comes not as the prince of wickedness, but as an angel of light, clothed in his faded glory of over six millenniums ago, yet brighter still than man knows in mortal sphere. He comes, especially in these last days, "with all deceivableness of unrighteousness," and "with all power and signs and lying wonders." That is, the deceivableness of unrighteousness is making unrighteousness appear like righteousness. It is the counterfeit of the good. All deceivableness of unrighteousness is the counterfeit of all good. The "all signs and lying wonders" is the counterfeit of all miracles of God. The Egyptian magicians counterfeited the miracles of Aaron till the dust became lice, when they were forced to admit, "This is the finger of God." The prophets of Baal could not, in the presence of Elijah, bring fire down from heaven. But in the last days there will be the counterfeit of all miracles, even to the bringing down of fire from heaven in the sight of men. See Rev. 13:12. He who desires to see a sign as an evidence of the divinity of a doctrine may be accommodated by Satan. BECAUSE of these terrible deceptions God has given us the warning to watch, and to watch with diligence. Not only are we in danger from our fearful foes without, but from every tendency of the mortal flesh within. We must watch that the life of Christ reign in our mortal flesh; that every passion of the man, every desire of his being, whether seemingly good or bad, be submitted to Him who ruleth righteously. We must watch diligently to know that not one outpost of our being, not one corner of our heart, not one foot of the purchase of Christ's blood, be in possession of the enemy for one moment. His entrance is always sin. He may knock for admittance, he may beset the gates of the soul with sore siege; but it is not sin till the vigilance is relaxed, the gates yield, and the enemy enters. Sin then leaves its venom, and nothing but the blood of Christ can wash it free. The danger is not that Christ will not do this, but that the entrance of sin will so corrupt and pervert the heart's desires that we will never desire him to do it, will never ask him. The very nature of sin is to deceive; and, once admitted into the life, it poisons every sentiment and affection, and obscures and perverts every moral sense. The only safe way is to keep it out. THEN watch, diligently watch unto prayer. There is no time for ease, no time to rest off guard, no time for furloughs in the army of God. The soldier of Christ, except at the risk of eternal loss, cannot say, "I have fought hard; I will rest to-day in this bower of roses." He must find his joy in greater watchfulness for the Master, must find rest in greater vigilance. Even in his sleep he must be fortified to watch. "Thine shall be a watchful sleep,
Wearier than another's waking." BUT it is not discouraging to watch. It is not destruction of life and body. In the garden of watching Christ has kept vigil before. With every wakeful watcher he keeps vigil still; he will do it to the end. In all unceasing labor come new strength and power to prosecute the battle, new views of the wise and mighty Commander who is leading, new delights of rest in labor. Courage, soldier of God! Buckle on anew the armor. Rouse the energies by a keener sense of your fearful dangers. Rouse hope by a faith-look at the glorious reward before; and keep faith by your side by a constant study of the word of Him who declares, "Lo, I am with you alway, even to the end of the world." Christ hath made you free; stand fast in his liberty. THE ONE FOLD AND ONE SHEPHERD.
The Outlook (formerly Christian Union), in commenting on the late papal encyclical, in which the pope pleads for the union of Christendom, says, after giving a summary of its contents:— "Only the most narrow minded and bigoted can fail to acknowledge the wisdom and courtesy which pervade the most of this latest utterance of the venerable head of Roman Catholic Christendom. With much of it, of course, Protestants can have no sympathy, but the spirit of the document is decidedly and conspicuously Christian. We do not believe that Christendom will ever be united on the basis of the Roman Catholic Church, but we also know that there will never be a united Christendom until in some way both Romans and Protestants have come to clear and friendly agreement. Very fitting is it, in these last years of the life of the venerable and honorable man, whose word carries so great weight with millions of people, that his appeal to the Christian world should be in behalf of a united and aggressive Christianity. May his prayer be answered, and the day swiftly come when there shall be neither Romanists nor Protestants, but only Christians." The Outlook is a paper of large influence, and is the representative of a large class of so-called liberal Christians. Its utterance is worthy of notice as showing the attitude of liberal Christianity toward the Papacy. The papal encyclical is, it is true, kindly expressed; it is designed to woo and win. But to our mind it expresses nothing which should meet with any Protestant "sympathy." The pope makes not the slightest concession to Protestantism. The Roman Catholic Church is, in his mind, the one and only fold of Christ. He tells Protestants that they have no certain rule or standard, and that their case is hopeless outside of the Roman Church. He treats them as sinners and heretics, and appeals to them (courteously, of course, why should he do otherwise?) to return to the mother church, just as the minister of Christ would courteously plead with the sinner. And this is "the wisdom" "which pervades" his letter, but it is worldly wisdom; and Protestants, many at least, cannot see it. The wisdom of Christianity is that fear and reverence of God which counts God's will wisest and keeps his commandments. It makes no Protestant creed, nor Roman creed, nor human creed, the642basis of any union, but the word of God as it is in Christ Jesus. It will count the utterance of the pope of Rome no more than that of any other man. The utterances of the word of God are alone paramount. The Outlook prays, "May his [the pope's] prayer be answered." And it will be. Protestants are becoming ashamed of the name Protestant, because they have disavowed its principles. Roman Catholics will not admit of the term "Romanists," as applied to Catholics. Under the name "Christian" they will all unite, while they crucify Christ afresh in his holy word. We do not plead for the name "Protestant;" it is of itself worthless without the principle. This is just as true of the word "Christian." But the true Christian will be a true Protestant ever and always against those errors upon which the Roman apostasy is built. He will hold high above all things else the paramount authority of God's word; he will protest against creed interpretation and the interference of the civil magistrate, or any other civil authority, in matters religious. From all this Protestants have as a whole departed, and in the same measure have they returned to Rome. From the principles which made Rome what she was during the Dark Ages, what she still is, Rome has not swerved a hair's breadth. In the union that is to be, for which the pope prays, and which prayer the Outlook prays may be answered, it will be easily seen that the one fold will be the Church of Rome, the one shepherd, the pope. But, amid the sacrifice of truth and principle for policy's sake, there are those, there ever will be those, who will witness for Christ and truth, who will bear witness against antichrist and error, who will bear aloft the gospel of Christ as the power of God unto salvation to the believer, who will keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus, who will, with all others whose names are written in heaven, form the one fold—the church of the living God—under the one Shepherd—Christ Jesus, the Lord. Clouds may at times overshadow the little flock, but God stands "within the shadow, keeping watch above his own." HUMILITY is a precious grace. It is not only a low opinion of one's self, it is the renouncement of self. There is a mock humility which is sheer hypocrisy. Of this the prophet speaks, "And the mean man boweth down, and the great man humbleth himself; therefore forgive them not." Isa. 2:9. Such humility is for purely selfish purposes. It is saying, "See how humble, how lowly, I am, how deserving of favors;" and it expects them. But true humility sees somewhat of the wickedness and weakness of sin and self, and yields it up to God, the worthless thing that it is; not that the person may be exalted in physical or social station, but that the selfishness may be taken away; that the life walk may be with the Master; that God's own will may be wrought in the soul. The very humility of such an one is exaltation. If maintained, it makes him a prince and puts him into constant companionship with God, the King of the universe. Who could ask more? CHURCH AND STATE UNION.
By W. N. G.
WHAT is Church and State union?—It is the dependence of the church upon the State to do by civil law the work which the church itself is designed to do by persuasion. Or it may be the dependence of the State upon the church to further political ends by unduly influencing a credulous, superstitious membership. A mutual employment of their respective functions for the purpose of furthering mutual designs, is a union of Church and State. Legitimately the Christian Church has no interest in common with the State which united organic effort can advance. If we say they are mutually interested in good government; it has been demonstrated that that object is best subserved by each attending to its own business. When each labors in its own proper sphere, each keeping out of the other's way, there is an incidental, mutual assistance. The Christian Church cannot unite with the State for the reason that the State is of this world, and the church, being the domain of Christ, is not of this world. The word of Christ concerning his disciples is, "They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world." John 17:16. Neither Christ nor his apostles ever sought the aid of the State in the furtherance of the work of the church. They never asked the State to pass any laws for the enforcement of moral sentiment or religious doctrine. Nor did they in any way attempt to reform the politics of the State by entering into political operations. Their labors consisted solely in doing good to others and preaching Christ. They never sought official position themselves, nor sought to place their friends and sympathizers in office. They were content to render to Cæsar his due, and to God that which belonged to him. If Cæsar demanded more than his due, they obeyed God rather than men, and patiently bore the consequences. Apostasy and worldly ambition have ever been the result of church affiliation with the State. And a State-wedded church invariably thinks to cure her ills by means of more State power. The State becomes her physician, and civil law the imaginary cure-all. The bane of the church has been and is a desire to use the power of the State for the enforcement of church dogmas. It has been the boast of the United States Government that Church and State are separate. Yet the Supreme Court, in its decision that "this is a Christian nation," would make it appear that there never has been an entire separation. The Constitution is designed to insure such a separation so far as the general government is concerned, but in most of the States there have always been laws providing for the religious observance of Sunday, and in some cases other laws of a kindred nature. These were brought over from the Church-and-State colonies, out of which the United States were formed, and have always been deemed a matter of States' rights. These laws have proved a seed which, although in a great measure dormant for a century, have at last begun to grow and bear fruit. The spirit of Church and State union first gained sufficient influence to beguile Congress into making appropriations for church schools among the Indians. Then it urged and obtained a decision of the Supreme Court that "this is a Christian nation." This was followed by a fiat of Congress that the first day of the week is the Sabbath of the fourth commandment, followed again by a direct attack on the Constitution, demanding that it be changed to harmonize with the unwarrantable legislation and unwarrantable decisions of both State and Federal courts which had previously gone into operation. This spirit creeps in under the most specious garb, with the most captivating words. For instance, we have the National League for the Protection of American Institutions, incorporated to "secure constitutional and legislative safeguards for the protection of the common-school system and other American institutions, and to prevent all sectarian or denominational appropriations of public funds." This league has proposed an amendment to the Federal Constitution which reads as follows:— No State shall pass any law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or use its property or credit, or any money raised by taxation, or authorize either to be used, for the purpose of founding, maintaining, or aiding by appropriation, payment of services, expenses, or otherwise, any church, religious denomination, or religious society, or any institution, society, or undertaking which is wholly or in part under sectarian or ecclesiastical control." This reads well, and is well calculated to catch the popular ear. It has been introduced in both Houses of Congress, and is now in the hands of the Judiciary Committees. Of its merits the general secretary of the league says: "The principles embodied in this amendment have been incorporated in the revised constitutions of two of the older States, in the constitutions of all of the new States, and in that prepared for the Territory of Arizona, and now twenty-three of the forty-four State constitutions contain like provisions." From further statements of the general secretary, in the Baltimore Methodist of May 24, we learn that the national conventions of American patriotic orders have indorsed the proposed amendment, and its adoption is ostensibly designed to perpetuate the separation of Church and State. But it is plain that we cannot perpetuate that which does not exist. The statement that its provisions are already embodied in the constitutions of a large number of States which have Sunday laws on their statute books, is evidence that it is not expected to wipe out the existing features of Church and State union, either State or national. The proposed amendment does not propose to establish a separation of Church and State, hence it is folly to assume that it will perpetuate such a separation. There is no "safeguard" in the proposition that "no State shall pass any law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." The first643amendment to the Constitution already provides that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;" yet Congress has made a law establishing the first day of the week as the Sabbath of the fourth commandment of the Decalogue, and appoints chaplains to teach the Christian religion to soldiers and marines. And the Supreme Court has decided that the Christian religion was established before the first amendment came into existence. It is evident to anyone who will look squarely at the facts of recent history that such a constitutional prohibition of State action would have no more force than the same prohibition of congressional action. Furthermore, one of the "American institutions" which this National League proposes to protect is the so-called "American sabbath" (Sunday). Yet the protection by law of this or any other institution of the church is a marked feature of Church and State union, which the league's suggested amendment to the Constitution proposes to prohibit. Again, the league assumes to be nonsectarian and nonpartisan, while its objects are a direct blow at the Catholic Church. The inconsistency of the position is manifest in the aim to prevent the States from aiding Catholic schools, on the plea of keeping Church and State separate, while it advocates the support by the State of that other Catholic institution, the Sunday holy day. THE BIBLE TO BE UNDERSTOOD BY ALL.
By Ellen G. White
"SEARCH the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life; and they are they which testify of me." "And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent." "For he whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God; for God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto him. The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand. He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth upon him." By searching the Scriptures we are to know God, and Jesus Christ, whom he hath sent. The Bible has not been given for the benefit of ministers only; it is the book for the people; it is the comfort of the poor man. It is a great mistake for ministers to give the impression to the people that they should not read the Bible because they cannot understand its sacred teachings, and should be content with the interpretation given by those whose business it is to proclaim the word of God. Ministers who thus educate the people are themselves in error. The Bible and the soul were made one for the other, and through the agency of the word and the Holy Spirit, God moves upon the heart. To him who receives the love of the truth, the word of God is as a light that shineth in a dark place, pointing out the path so plainly that the wayfaring man though a fool need not err therein. He realizes that "the entrance of thy words giveth light; it giveth understanding unto the simple." The uneducated man, in earnest desire of soul, may in his humility and simplicity reap from the Bible far greater consolation than the learned or more exalted and honored man. He may never be able to present to another the same evidences of the inspiration of the word that a learned man could, but he can bear in his life and character a testimony of strength, showing forth in his outward demeanor the evidence of the power of the truth. God means that the poor and uneducated should have his word as a sure light and guide in the path of righteousness. If they are sincere, and desire earnestly to know the will of God, they will not be left in darkness. It is the privilege of everyone to be wise for himself in reading the Scriptures. No man can safely trust his soul to the minister, or to men who are learned and talented. Jesus charged the priests and rulers, who were regarded as learned in the Scriptures, as being ignorant both of the Scriptures and the power of God. Those to whom God has intrusted talents are responsible for the use of their gifts, and should study the Bible as a book that may be understood. A single text has proved in the past, and will prove in the future, a savor of life unto life to many a soul. As men diligently search, the Bible will open out new treasures of truth, that will be as bright jewels to the mind. If the poor and unlearned are not capable of understanding the Bible, then the mission of Christ to our world was useless; for he says, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised." The command to search the Scriptures, Christ addressed not only to the Pharisees and scribes, but to the great multitude of the common people who crowded about them. If the Bible is not to be understood by every class of people, whether they be rich or poor, what would be the need of the Saviour's charge to search the Scriptures? What profit would there be in searching that which could never be understood? What would be the consistency of this command, if the searching of the Scriptures would not dispel the clouds of error, and would not lead men to an understanding of the revealed will of God to man? Let everyone who has been blessed with reasoning faculties take up the neglected Bible, and search the Scriptures, that he may understand what is the will of God concerning him. In this book heavenly information is given to men. The Bible has been addressed to everyone,—to every class of society, to those of every clime and age. The duty of every intelligent person is to search the Scriptures. Each one should know for himself the conditions upon which salvation is provided. Satan has interposed his shadow between your soul and the bright beams of light that shine from heaven to guide you to the portals of bliss. Through his confederacy of evil angels and evil men, Satan has wrought in such a way as to bury up the truth under the rubbish of human traditions, customs, and practices. In Christ's day, as in our day, the people were looking to the educated men, to the scribes and Pharisees, to explain to them the meaning of that which the God of heaven had revealed. These teachers had departed from God, and were following their own understanding, and did not follow the ways of the Lord. They thought they must interpret the Scriptures in a way that would harmonize with their course of action. They were seeking the praise of men, and departing more and more from the plainly revealed way of the Lord, following the traditions of men's devising. Of them Christ declared, "In vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." The Pharisees and the religious teachers so misrepresented the character of God that it was necessary for Christ to come to the world to represent the Father. Through the subtlety of Satan, men were led to charge upon God Satanic attributes; but the Saviour swept back the thick darkness which Satan had rolled before the throne of God in order that he might intercept the bright rays of mercy and love which came from God to man. Jesus Christ revealed the Father in his true4character to the world, representing him as full of mercy, love, and light. Christ took upon him humanity in order that the light and radiance of divine love should not extinguish man. When Moses pleaded, "I beseech thee, show me thy glory," he was placed in the cleft of the rock, and the Lord passed by before him. When Philip asked Christ to show them the Father, he said, "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." He revealed the Father to Philip as he had revealed him to Moses when he passed by before him, and proclaimed, "The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth." Jesus proclaimed himself to the world as the perfect representation of the Father, and invited the love and confidence of the world to be centered in the Father. He said: "I am in the Father and the Father in me." "If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also; and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. . . . Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself; but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me; or else believe me for the very works' sake." In plain language the Saviour taught the world that the tenderness, the compassion, and love that he manifested toward man, were the very attributes of his Father in heaven. Whatever doctrine of grace be presented, whatever promise of joy, whatever deed of love, whatever divine attraction be exhibited, had its source in the Father of all. In the person of Christ we behold the eternal God engaged in an enterprise of boundless mercy toward fallen man. Christ clothed his divinity with humanity, that his humanity might touch humanity, and divinity reach divinity. THERE is one judge, and that is "God, the Judge of all." He also is the Law-giver. He who judges another, therefore, puts himself in the place of God; he brings God and his law not only down to his own level, but below his level. He virtually says, "God cannot be trusted to judge, but it is necessary for me to pass sentence." A proper sense of our own sinfulness would give us more charity for our brethren and fellow-men, and a little faith in God would lead us to commit all judgment to him. "If ye will inquire, inquire ye." "But avoid foolish questions." 149. WHAT DAY DID CHRIST RISE FROM THE DEAD?
Is there any proof in the Scripture that Christ arose on the first day of the week? There is no such positive statement in our common version, though there is in others. Mark 16:9 is the nearest to such a statement: "Now when Jesus was risen early the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene." The Diaglott translates this passage thus: "And having risen early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary of Magdalene." Rotherham translates it: "And rising early on the first day of the week, he was manifested first to Mary the Magdalene." The Syriac makes it positive: "And in the morning of a first day of a week he arose, and he appeared first to Mary Magdalene." Campbell and McKnight render it: "Jesus having risen early the first day of the week." All the translations which have come to our notice give the same meaning. They make the rising from the dead on the first day of the week. Is not this sufficient proof? SUBMISSION.
By Marie D. Thorne
THERE is in love transforming power
To make the proudest heart that beats to-day
Say, Master, make me what thou wilt;
Thou art the Potter, I the clay. Make me a vase with splendid tracery
Of gold for kingly palace meet,
Or the rude cup the Norse child fills
With the wild bird's Christmas wheat. If but one shall say, "The gold is His,
And His the graver's skill,"
And the wild birds sing, "The desert wastes
His love and goodness fill." SALVIAN'S TESTIMONY.
By I. E. Kimball
SALVIAN continues: "With so general a consent, do we all follow our sins as if we sinned from a deep and well-considered conspiracy so to do. The demons are ferocious and tremble; thou art like them, ferocious but tremblest not." "Some, indeed a very few there be, who may be excepted from the general crimination." "Why do the slaves lie about in terror of the torture they are liable to? While perchance they wish to release themselves from torture they lie." "That a few may become illustrious the whole world is overturned; the honor of a single one is the destruction of the world." He arraigns persons in power as devastations of the country, relentless extortioners. A poor man could not remain unhurt near to a rich man. "Murder, which is rare among slaves, restrained by the fear of punishment, is frequent among the rich who confide in impunity. But perhaps I am wrong in speaking of murder in the rich as sin, inasmuch as when they slaughter their slaves, they reckon it an exercise of right, not of crime. And a like privilege they claim in behalf of their impurities." Never was sketched a more revolting condition of a community, calling themselves Christian, no, never by human hand. The profane custom of swearing "by Christ" (per Christum) which was in use even among the monks a hundred years before, is now almost universal. "Finally, many swear by the name of Christ that they will do a certain thing, not only those that are passionless, but also wicked deeds, because I mortally strike this one by Christ, because I slay this one by Christ. Can pagans do more than this? With how much less sin had those sworn by the demons than by Christ." "Such men seem to think that when they have sworn by Christ, their crimes are in some way sanctioned by religion. They can in conscience do no less, having already pledged their faith to Christ that they would do as much." "Behold, such are they who love Christ." "The rude natives around us cannot be reproached with any such inconsistencies as attach to us. Neither the Huns, the Saxons, the Moors, the Scythians. They attach no disgrace to the life of a brigand, but rather glory in it." Thus Thucydides' notes of the proudest heroes of ancient Greece: "The poor are plundered, widows groan, orphans are trampled upon, and many are driven to take refuge among the barbarians, seeking indeed among the barbarians for Roman humanity, because among the Romans they cannot endure the barbarous inhumanity." "Multitudes," he says, "thus purchased liberty under the pretense of captivity." The barbarian and Saracenic devastations which soon followed were remedies rather than calamities. They themselves conceived the awful truth that they were sent to punish the idolatrous and sweep away insufferable filth. "We compel an unwilling God to avenge the enormity of our crimes." A shameless wickedness "beset the whole mass." "We now lament over the whole as guilty." He names every quarter of Christendom before he concludes. He now inveighs against the horrors of the theater, and the spectacles exhibited to thousands of Christian eyes. "For such are the things done there that one not only is not able to speak of them without pollution, but not even able to write of them." "Innumerable thousands of Christians daily" witnessed them. "The heathen celebrated these games fully believing them to be acceptable to their gods [they were]; we celebrate the same well knowing them to be abominable to our God. But this is not the worst, therefore to Christ—O monstrous madness!—we consecrate the spectacles and the actors." Think of it! He mentions the innumerable and terrible calamities visiting every part of the Roman world, yet they were in no way reformed. Sardinia, Sicily, and Africa too had fallen, but the gravity of morals was not changed. Hardened as Pharaoh of "old, they would not be reformed." What was it that happened at Carthage? "Even while the noise of war was ringing around the walls, the church of Carthage maddened in the circus and luxuriated in the theater. . . . Being slaughtered without, practicing lewdness within." And he depicts the same of Gaul, whose devastations he witnesses. He shows family relations to have been almost wholly broken up, and challenges contradiction from all the world. "Who did not plunge into the abyss of foulest impurities, who returned to the confidence of his wife? Nay, as far as pertains to the promiscuousness of lust, who did not reduce his wife to the rank of his servant or slave?" He says, "The barbarians were offended at their lewdness." "In Africa, if any are fierce, they are fiercer; if any are drunken, they are sottish; if any false, they are the most false; if any fraudulent, they the most fraudulent; if any are rapacious, they the most; if any perfidious, they the most treacherous, and in all they bear the palm." But as to impurity, all that could be said of Sodom, Babylon, Tyre, he says of Carthage. "A religious man," a monk, hardly dare show himself in the city. Yet they were all accredited members of the holy orthodox church, and partakers of the sacraments. I must stop adducing this evidence. "Carthage, a Christian city, an ecclesiastical city," was only a type and example of all. "The judges saw and acquiesced" in all their foul indecencies. The monks had now become a graceless horde of vagabonds, full of impurities, eyes full of adultery; they could not cease from sin, as our "Jeremiah of his age" tells us. It was the last stage of all debauchery which Salvian compared to the cesspool of a large ship. Neither is he ironical, neither acrimonious, nor yet is he vindicating any other point than the justice of God in the great visitations of wrath then being visited upon the Roman world. Everywhere they were stained with marks of mortal crime. Law was altogether slackened; judgment no way asserted itself. It was easier to find a man guilty of the greater crimes than the less, of all crimes than of none—the nobles and the rich every one of them charged with either murder or adultery,—mortal crimes,—slaughtering slaves without any compunction, swearing and executing most execrable villainies "by Christ," consecrating the vile debauching theaters to Christ, the wealthy robbing the poor, many finding protection, shelter, and home among the barbarians, conjugal affection and family relations in all confusion, the monks and the "religiosi" a band of villains and hypocrites. Now was not this people that professed the holy orthodox faith, and said they were the church, abandoned to delusion? And was not this a bad time to draw out "church principles" for the after ages? THE MAJESTY OF BIBLE PRECEPTS.
By The Examiner
THERE is no weakness in them. No one of them is emasculated by the modern prefix "try." The Bible says: "Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded." "Cease to do evil, learn to do well." "Depart from evil and do good." And thus through the whole book, from Genesis to Revelation, a moral precept is never prefixed with the enfeebling "try," now so universally common. Just think of the Bible saying, "Try to depart from evil." "Try to cleanse your hands, ye sinners." "Try to speak the truth to one another." And, instead of "Do not kill," "Do not steal," "Do not commit adultery," suppose we had, "Do try not to kill," "Do try not to steal," "Do try not to commit adultery." It is time to stop experimenting in morals. None of it is from above. It is all from beneath, a device from the devil to break down the force and majesty of the precepts of the Bible. That glorious Book never uses the word "try" in any such connection. It knows nothing of experimental morals. "Try" is never properly used except where a failure may be justifiable. A failure in morals never was and never can be justified.—The Examiner.