Earlier text: THE TWO ROADSThe Industrial Conflict in the Light of Revelation.
By Geo. W. Rine
CAPITALISTIC MONOPOLY AND OPPRESSION.
During the first century of the American Republic, obsolete laws and usages, the reign of popular ignorance, the tyranny of kings, the horrors of chattel slavery, and, above all, the despotism of religious dogma, were to a large extent overthrown. Marvelous, too, was the development of constructive science and of political liberty and popular government, during the same period. A counter tendency, however, has set in, a tendency toward industrial despotism. Union and organization are in themselves expedient and helpful; but if controlled in the interests of a few, they speedily become despotic, whether in the sphere of religion, civil government, or industry. For thousands of years political tyranny and religious despotism were the common lot of humanity. To the masters of political federations government was private property to be exploited for their personal benefit and to be used as a means of extorting from the people the utmost tribute in service and taxes. The whole trend of thought and action in the realm of politics during the last two centuries was an irresistible protest against private monopoly of government. Yet the closing years of that same period were marked by the birth and swift development of the “Trust,” or private monopoly in the industries. Evolution of the Monopolistic Trust.
In the article I contributed to the last week’s issue of this journal, a mass of statistical and other evidence was adduced, illustrating the startling rapidity and the approximate completeness which have marked the concentration of our enormous present-day wealth into the hands of a relatively few persons. This resistless tendency toward the congestion of wealth is strikingly exemplified by that notorious institution of to-day, popularly called the “trust.” The term needs no explanation. It has become current coin in the vocabulary of all classes of society. The tendency for great corporations to merge into still greater corporations until nearly all the productive forces in any one industry have been amalgamated into one great body has been a comparatively recent movement, and has come with startling suddenness. Fifteen years ago there were less than a dozen industrial combinations in America, which might be called trusts in the accepted sense of that term to-day. According to Mr. John Moody, a widely-known writer on economics, there are now in the United States 445 trusts, capitalized at $20,379,162,511. In these it is not millions, but billions, that pile up, and baffle the wings of imagination. The trust movement can no longer be thought of in seven and eight figures; eleven figures are now required to express its stupendous meaning. This unique movement has been the growth of a few years, of less than a generation. The total capitalization of these mammoth business consolidations exceeds one-fifth of the aggregate wealth of the nation. The trusts formed in the year 1899 alone represented a capitalization of $4,000,000,000, a sum equal to two times all the metal currency in circulation in America. The spring of 1900 was, however, only the midday of this consolidation movement. Previous to 1897 only sixty-three of these “combines” had been formed, while more than fifty per cent of the 445 were formed during the eighteen months from Jan. 1, 1899, to June 30, 1900. The movement has since then swept forward like a great tide. The combination of manufacturing companies for the first five months of 1901 alone exceeded $2,000,000,000 in capitalization. This unprecedented rush to industrial and financial consolidation is universally regarded as the paramount wonder of the close of one century and the beginning of another. Magnitude of Individual Trusts.
The average mind can form but an inadequate conception of the magnitude of these concerns. A New York newspaper recently made some computations on the United States Steel Corporation, which help us to form some realization of the size and power of that leviathan syndicate. Its net profits for 1902 were double the total revenues of the United States in the year Lincoln was elected. Its wage-roll carries on an average of the round year over 58,000 names—an army of employees larger by 45,000 than that which serves the National Government in every branch of its civil service, classified and unclassified, except only fourth-class postmasters. The wage-payments of the same year aggregated nearly $113,000,000. Its annual production of steel is 10,000,000 tons, sixty-seven per cent of the total production of the country; and its freight bill for 1901 amounted to more than $54,000,000. This prince of the trusts was organized as late as 1901, with a capital approximating $1,400,000,000. Out of this vast total an enormous quantity of “water” has been “squeezed”; but conservative financiers admit that the solid capital of the corporation still exceeds one billion dollars. Its scores of thousands of men are employed in its coal and iron mines, in its furnaces, in its steamers, in its limestone quarries, in its docks, in its railways, in its coking ovens, in its mills, in its offices. “Millions depend upon the use of its products for their livelihood—builders of bridges, of edifices, of safes, of toy pistols—users of iron and steel in every form.” Approximately all the sources and the productive forces of the oil industry of the country have been amalgamated into one great corporation, now known as the Standard Oil Company. Beginning with a small company, chartered in Ohio, John D. Rockefeller gradually systematized and extended the business of producing and distributing oil until he controlled ten separate corporations, chartered in as many different states. In 1872 Mr. Rockefeller conceived and carried into effect the idea of merging his state companies into a single body, officially entitled, the Standard Oil Trust. At that time he controlled a little more than one-half of the entire output. Three years later he was the absolute master of two-thirds of the output, and practically controlled the market. From the beginning it was the Standard’s avowed policy to crush competition, and at no time has this policy been departed from. As a result the Standard is to-day the undisputed master of eighty per cent of the output of American petroleum. Including its good-will and earning power, this lordly syndicate controls a capital of $650,000,000. Its yearly profits amount to $225,000,000. The annual income of the Standard’s president exceeds $30,000,000. Its monopoly of this world-wide industry is admittedly absolute. Mr. Rockefeller virtually dictates the price which must be paid by the hundreds of millions of consumers. A writer, in a recent number of the International Economist, says: “The three greatest trusts in the world are the Morgan group of railways, with a capitalization of $2,265,116,350, the Pennsylvania group, with a capitalization of $1,822,402,235, and the United States Steel Corporation, with a capitalization of nearly $1,400,000,000.” These figures practically make J. Pierpont Morgan the dominant financier of the United States, if not of the world. Industries involving a capital of $3,635,116,350 are subject to his undoubted control. All the gold in existence, from every clime and country, amounts in value to a little more than $8,000,000,000, just a little more than twice the value of two of Mr. Morgan’s great creations.” The Amalgamated Copper Company controls a capital of $175,000,000; the American Smelting and Refining Company, $201,550,400; the American Sugar Refining Company, $145,000,000; the Consolidated Tobacco Company, $502,915,700; and the International Mercantile Marine Company, $170,786,000. Finally, the six great railroad groups of the country represent capital aggregating nearly ten billion dollars. The trust movement is obviously destined to spread over the entire field of production and distribution. The universality and spontaneity of the movement have startled the attention of the thinking men of the world. Hardly an industry, even at this date, has escaped consolidation. The term monopoly means the power of exclusive buying or exclusive selling or both. It therefore implies control of the price in buying or in selling or in both. Where competition is excluded, there we find monopoly. Being able to control the whole supply or the whole demand of a given commodity, the trust magnates are, of course, able to control the price. This all the great trusts are really able to do. Most of them have a few, though insignificant, competitors. But their control of prices is so nearly exclusive, or absolute, that, practically, they are monopolies. Let it be understood, however, that not all monopolies are sinister or menacing in their nature. The Federal Government has a monopolistic control of the postal service of the country—a control essentially advantageous to the people. Other legitimate monopolies are the exclusive right to sell inventions and books, secured by patents and copyrights. Monopoly has its uses. It is the abuse of monopoly that has so terribly stigmatized it in the popular mind. “Monopolies in the hands of those who do not love their neighbors as themselves will ever become an infernal machine. The great trouble with human monopolists is that they have conceived for themselves a new version of the Golden Rule: ‘Do unto the other fellow as he would like to do unto you—and do it first.’” It is “the love of money,” it is greed, that has made monopoly a synonym of oppression and of extortion.5 It is admitted by trust magnates themselves that they control from seventy per cent to ninety-five per cent of the output of the productive industries, in which they are formed. Industrial plants, often thousands of miles apart, are amalgamated into one organization by trust managers. The American Steel and Wire Company’s plants are located in ten states, from Massachusetts to California, inclusive. The plants of the American Sugar Refining Company are scattered over seven states, including Louisiana and California. These two are a sufficient illustration. The sugar trust referred to above controls ninety-five per cent of the sugar output; the United States Rubber Company handles sixty per cent of the rubber trade; the American Tin Plate Company controls ninety per cent of the tin plate business; the International Paper Company produces sixty-five per cent of the news-print paper; and the consolidated whisky combinations control about ninety-five per cent of the distilling business of the entire country. These examples attest the practical monopoly which the trusts have attained. Competition has been strangled by cut-throat methods. The multi-millionaires in control of the trusts are abundantly able to sell an article for less than cost, until all competitors “go under.” The president of the National Salt Company frankly admits that his policy is to sell below cost wherever there is competition, and to recoup himself off the general market. He emphatically points out that such a policy is universal in business of every size wherever there is competition. The Standard Oil Company has become notorious for its use of the “freezing out” method of crushing competition. It is by such tyrannies of the self-constituted despots of the market that thousands of small business concerns have been ruthlessly crushed. Ah, how true the inspired declaration, “The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil!” Collusion with the Railways.
In one of its recent reports the Interstate Commerce Commission said: “There is probably no one thing to-day which does so much to force out the small operator and to build up these trusts and monopolies, against which law and public opinion alike beat in vain, as discrimination in freight rates. This problem is so serious that it will soon attract an attention which has not yet been given it. There can be no doubt that special favors from railroads were a prominent factor, probably the most important factor, in building up some of the largest combinations.” “By reason of their control of enormous traffic, the trusts are able to dictate to the railways the terms upon which they will purchase transportation.” Those who have read the late H. D. Lloyd’s remarkable book, “Wealth against Commonwealth,” will recall the overwhelming evidence there given that the absolute monopoly and the crushing preponderance which the Standard Oil Company enjoys are very largely the result of the secret rebate granted the company by the great railways and other common carriers. The independent oil producer was thus speedily and unceremoniously “frozen out.” Apropos of the great anthracite coal trust, Mr. Lloyd wrote: “The official of the Pennsylvania Railroad, by the use of the rebates, handed over the state of Pennsylvania to three coal-dealers, each of whom had his territory, and was supreme in it, as the would-be competitors found out where they attempted to ship coal into his market. They made a similar division of the iron and steel business. The rebate is the ‘golden rule’ of the ‘gospel of wealth.’” To-day the coal mines and the coal-carrying railroads are owned by the same capitalists. Hence, the independent coal-miner has not a “ghost of a chance” to make a success of mining. “The Sugar Trust and all the other capitalistic trusts are favored by the railroads in just the same way.” As long ago as 1888 it was estimated that out of $800,000,000 paid yearly in this country, for the carriage of freight, nearly $100,000,000 goes to favored shippers, by way of rebate. A famous financial expert, as a result of a personal examination made for the enlightenment of stockholders, ascertained that one of the great trunk lines had in the last twenty years thus diverted to favorites of the managers $100,000,000 of the money of the stockholders. “Pay our price or do without,” is the contemptuous challenge which the great trusts hurl into the teeth of the whole consuming world. Collusion with the Banks.
Even the banking institutions of our great money centers have not escaped the all-conquering tide of concentration so dominant in our age. The National Bank of New York is not only the controlling head of a dozen other large banks of that city, but has also become the undisputed master of sixty other banks in widely-scattered parts of the country. This chain of financial houses is controlled by Mr. Rockefeller and his associates. Through those twelve New York banks alone, the Rockefeller interests dominate the use of nearly one billion dollars. Another chain of banks nearly as opulent as the Rockefeller chain is controlled by J. P. Morgan and Company. Together these two alliances have at their disposal about one-half of the banking capital of New York City. Not only are they ready at a moment’s notice to loan millions and to undertake any vast enterprise for the favored trusts, but “by their preponderance in the money market they are able to force the rivals of the trust to borrow at disadvantageous rates.” This iniquitous alliance between the trusts and the banking institutions is perhaps the most remorseless and powerful weapon used by the Napoleons of finance to annihilate competition. The following excerpt from The Economist, of London, is at this point most pertinent:— “The sinister influence of the trust financier is everywhere felt in the United States. Their power over the New York banks enabled them to compel those institutions to overlend their resources, with results little short of disastrous. Their attempts to dominate the industries of the country have been productive of grievous injury to the people, and the control which they exercise over the railway systems of the United States has given them the power to mulct the shareholders in a fashion that never would be tolerated here. One can not help wondering at the lamb-like submission of the American public under this tyranny, and asking whether the trusts are sufficiently powerful to dominate the legislature as well as the general interests of the country.” It is evident that but few kings of the olden days exacted so vast a tribute from the people as do the kings of steel and emperors of oil in America to-day. History proves that it is usually only one step from the control of a nation’s wealth to the control of its political institutions—from the undermining of its industrial freedom to the subversion of its political freedom. And that step has already been taken, at least to the extent of debauching the institutions of government. This we shall demonstrate in a later paper. “To what purpose?” the reader may ask, “is your extended discussion of the industrial and monetary consolidations of the day?” My answer must be brief. Do we not see plainly that to-day rich men heap their “treasures together,” that they live “delicately” and are “wanton”? Do we not see that this is an age of brutal selfishness, of remorseless greed, of crass commercialism, of disgusting sycophancy toward the rich, of voluptuous idleness and wanton luxury? All this, according to the emphatic predictions of Holy Writ, was to be a marked characteristic of the last days. See James 5:1–9. Compare Eze. 16:49, 50 with Luke 17:28–30. The former reads thus: “Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and the needy. . . . Therefore I took them away as I saw good.” Now let us note the application that Jesus makes of the foregoing description of the experience of Sodom. “Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot [Sodom]; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded; but the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed.” The buying, the selling, the planting, the building, prosecuted by the Sodomites, prove the greed, the opulence, the commercialism of that age. Is not this age, in these particulars, the exact counterpart to that of Sodom at the time referred to? Is not our age repeatedly referred to by the clergy, and by our magazine writers as the age par excellence of materialism and commercialism? “Even so,” declared the Master, “shall it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed.” Observe how in the heaping of treasures, in surfeiting and banqueting, in neglecting the claims of the poor, in extortion and oppression, society is to-day not only repeating, but outdoing, the orgies, the voluptuous pleasures, and the haughty selfishness of the ancient Sodomites. It is when this condition of things obtain in the world, that James declares, “The coming of the Lord draweth nigh.” This discussion is intended solely to help the reader to know this solemn truth. BE IN EARNEST.
By A. B. Simpson
WE are living in an earnest age. All the forces of human intelligence are intensely alive. Be in earnest. The world is in earnest. Satan is in earnest. Redemption is an earnest business, and cost its Author every drop of His crimson blood. The Holy Ghost is intensely in earnest. Everything in heaven, earth, and hell is earnest, but man. It is an awful thing for a Christian, redeemed by the blood of Christ, and destined to an eternal future of weal or woe, to be foolish or trifling. O friend, think if that day you are wasting were to be cut off the end of your life instead of the middle; how quickly you would awaken and tremble at the thought of trifling! If every hour you waste were deducted from the sum of your life at its close, how frightful the sacrifice would seem! And yet it is even so. God help us to be intensely aroused to life's solemn meaning.—A. B. Simpson. Love to Christ and His Law
It is no use talking of your love to Christ while you reject the law of Christ.—Ram’s Horn. When Jesus went away from earth, He promised His disciples, “Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world.” Matt. 28:20. This did not mean that He would be with a special number alone; that is, with those who saw Him ascend from Olivet, or who heard His voice as He uttered the promise. It was to all of His disciples; for “God is no respecter of persons.” Jesus said: “Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also that shall believe on Me through their word.” The “you” of the promise includes all believers in the Gospel of Christ. The promise was not to that age or generation alone. It was to the end of the world or age, as long as the age-lasting Gospel would be preached. So long would Christ be with His true disciples, according to the promise. The promise is, therefore, to us if we bear the test of discipleship: “If ye continue in My word, then are ye My disciples indeed.” The promise is to the church of Christ. Our Lord uses the plural, “Lo, I am with you.” Through the apostle Paul He said: “Ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them.” Again: “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God?” “Ye . . . are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner stone; in whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto a holy temple in the Lord; in whom ye also are builded together for a habitation of God through the Spirit.” This last scripture reveals how the Lord dwells with His people, by His Spirit. Jesus promised, “I will not leave you comfortless [orphans]; I will come to you.” And in those wonderful chapters, John 14, 15, 16, we are told how Christ will dwell with His people, not by His personal presence, but by the Comforter, the Holy Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, the Spirit of Christ and of God. When Christ was personally here, He could be in but one place at a time; but His Spirit is everywhere present with His children, carrying with it the very presence of Christ. It is life and power flowing out from the great Fountain of Life, manifested in all the gifts, so beautifully and clearly set forth in Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12, and Ephesians 4. It is God dwelling in and manifesting His power in that church which has not rejected His commandments for the traditions of men, which has not set aside His living Word for the dead creeds of dead hands. Christ still walks among the candlesticks. But it is not to the church alone, as a body or congregation, that Christ comes by His Spirit. It does not dwell in the church as a man dwells among men. It dwells in the church by dwelling in those who compose the church. So Jesus promises: “If a man love Me, he will keep my words; and My Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and make Our abode with him.” Of the Spirit He says: “He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you.” This presence is Christ in us, dwelling in our hearts by faith (Eph. 3:17); not as a sentiment, or an emotion, or in theory, but as a life principle, moulding, purifying, re-forming, re-creating the character, so that the believer can truly say: “I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.” Christ, when here, lived God’s life. God’s life was manifest in the flesh of Jesus of Nazareth, in order that Jesus might live God’s life in us; that the life that is in Him “might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.” This is the mystery, or secret of godliness, God manifest in the flesh (1 Tim. 3:16), triumphing over sin and sinful tendencies (Rom. 8:3), “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col. 1:27). This is Jesus Christ come in the flesh, not merely that He came nineteen centuries ago, but is come now, living in our flesh, living in me, if we but believe. 1 John 4:2-4. This only is true confession of Christ; not confession in words only, but confession backed by a fruit-bearing life. “With the heart man believeth unto righteousness [right-being, right-doing]; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.” Rom. 10:10. A belief that is satisfied short of a life of righteousness is spurious, and a confession that is not based on such a belief will profit nothing in the day of judgment, however it may deceive men or ourselves. But the faith that lets Christ into the life, that takes His life for the life of sin, knows the mystery, the secret, of godliness, or piety, “because greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world.” There is all victory in such faith—victory over the world, the flesh, and the devil. Men may take advantage of us in worldly concerns, they may malign us, and abuse us, may persecute us, and even put us to death, but still we conquer, for in us is the life of Him who has power over death, and in whom we eternally triumph. “And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of Him who raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you.” Rom. 8:10, 11. Blessed life, the life of Christ! Blessed power that comes by that life! Blessed companionship in Him! And, blessed thought! it is free to all. THE ENSIGN OF THE HOLY ONE.
The distinguishing characteristic of the true God is creative power. It is by this that He is differentiated from the gods of the nations. In both the Old and New Testaments by prophet and apostle, creative power is the distinguishing characteristic of the true God. Two passages, among the many, must suffice to show this: “Jehovah is the true God; He is the living God, and an everlasting King. . . . Thus shall ye say unto them, The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth, these shall perish from the earth, and from under the heavens. He hath made the earth by His power, He hath established the world by His wisdom, and by His understanding hath He stretched out the heavens.” Jer. 10: 10-12. After the same manner Paul preached the Gospel of God unto the heathen: “Ye should turn from these vain things unto a living God, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea, and all that in them is.” Acts 14: 15. The ensign of His power is the Sabbath, around which cluster the great facts of a completed creation. Read it as it is set forth in His own holy law:— “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.” Ex. 20: 8-11. The fourth commandment is the only precept of God’s holy law which reveals Him for what He is, Creator and Redeemer, mighty to save, because of His creative power, the Holy One of Israel. “He hath made His wonderful works to be remembered” by His Sabbath. It is His memorial to all generations. And yet when this ensign of God’s authority is lifted high before the people, many ridicule, despise, and reject it. But this very thing the Lord foretold by His prophet of old: “Now go, write it before them in a table, and note it in a book, that it may be for the time to come forever and ever [marginal Hebrew “the latter day”]; that this is a rebellious people, lying children, children that will not hear the law of the Lord; which say to the seers, See not; and to the prophets, Prophesy not unto us right things, speak unto us smooth things, prophesy deceits; get you out of the way, turn aside out of the path, cause the Holy One of Israel to cease from before us.” Isa. 30: 8-11. Men may shut their eyes from God now, and cover their eyes from His truth, but they will sometime meet it all in the judgment. They will then meet their own delusions, which they have chosen. See verses 12, 13. Now the Lord says, “Turn and live.” “Turn away thy foot from the Sabbath.” “Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord.” The destruction of faith in God's Word, and the destruction of faith in the plan of salvation which God instituted, was bound to result in a man-made plan of salvation—and it has come. Schools for the propagation of this new faith-destroying teaching of the “Higher Criticism” and the soul-wrecking doctrine, or philosophy, of the “New Thought” are starting up in many places in this and other countries. The core of those teachings is this: Disbelief in the Bible as the Word of God, and confidence in the sufficiency of man for the salvation of man. With the destruction of faith in God's Word, God's plan, and, consequently, in God Himself, man has begun to look to himself, to exalt himself, to make a saviour of himself, while treating as a myth or fable the only Saviour who can save anybody or anything in the world or out of it. Those theories, or philosophies, are working the works of “the man of sin” as truly as the Papacy has ever done it; for they put man in the place of God as Saviour, teach the abolition of a mediator between God and man, and the dethronement of an everlasting King. All that is what Satan tried to do in heaven, and he is seeking now to accomplish it in the minds of men in the earth; and men and women are allowing themselves to be deceived into taking just such a disastrous position. The “New Thought” is expressed in various forms; but a prominent exponent of the idea has expressed it in such language as this:— Man is his own saviour, by virtue of the divine immanence within. It is an eternal decree of life that man must evolve and work out his own destiny throughout the earth and the more interior spiritual spheres of his existence. The Christ must be generated from within in every individual soul. Every living soul must be its own saving power. There will not be a single soul saved by any power external to itself. What it means to be “saved” in the sense in which it is there used is difficult to imagine. What that kind of a saviour is able to do for one they do not tell us. But every one who has measured his own life by the true Pattern and realized how far short he has come of it, can determine that for himself. It is certain that the salvation of which they speak is not the salvation which the blessed Bible brings to view. The saviour of whom they teach is not the Saviour by whose life and sacrifice man and the earth on which he walks are to be redeemed from the curse of sin. They are different entirely—and not only different, but diametrically opposed to one to the other. The inspired Word declares, “In none other is there salvation.” This latter philosophy makes every man his own saviour, and not only that, but goes so far as to declare that there is no salvation outside of man—no one but man who can save man, thereby taking direct issue with God, contradicting God's pronouncement word for word. Christ declares, “Without Me ye can do nothing.” This philosophy declares, in effect, that Christ Himself can do nothing for us; that all the Christ there is within us. These are its own words: “There will not be a single soul saved by any means external to itself.” God's Word teaches that in Him is the treasure-house of wisdom and knowledge; that in Him is the fountain of life. The “New Thought” receives “the fundamental truths of life direct from the interior realms of being,” which they hold to be “the central home of all truth.” Its reception by the individual “will make him free in thought and action and enable him to become independent of all external methods of salvation.” Certain it is that such belief will put men beyond the reach of the salvation of Jesus Christ. While promising man salvation as a saviour, that philosophy robs him of both, and fits him for the salvation which God has prepared.391 But these two things, the contradiction of God's Word and the building of the new tower of Babel, are working in perfect harmony under the direction of one mind, for the accomplishment of one purpose. That purpose is the ruin of souls, and the directing power is the same that contradicted God's Word in Eden and inspired wicked men to build a tower of self-salvation on the plains of Shinar. There is only one power that can save souls, and that is the power of God. Any agent that comes to you with any other plan is the agent of God's age-long enemy, who is bent upon your ruin. It will come to you in ingenious phrases, folding and infolding into each other, interweaving and intertwisting, until the mind is lost in its mysterious mazes, confused and unsettled. Do not dally with the tempter. There is One God, whom you know to be the way, the truth, and the life—cling to Him. There is one sure way, straight and narrow—take that; for the straight line is the shortest line, and the narrow way is the safest way. It is plenty wide for you and the Man of sorrows and sympathies to walk side by side. There is a world of difference between desiring to be like Christ in purity, truth, and love, and the assertion that we are Christ—deity incarnate in our flesh. The first is the legitimate outgrowth of yielding to God, while the second is the fruit of selfishness and disobedience. Let us not carve out of our own corrupt natures a god of self with which to block our path to Paradise. “BROUGHT ABOUT OF JEHOVAH.”
The Lord always does the best thing for His people, always considering the circumstances. But the best thing under the circumstances is not always that which the Lord would prefer. The best thing under the circumstances depends on the attitude of the people toward God and His law. As long as the people are loyal, it is safe to trust them with a good degree of prosperity, and the Lord’s desire is that they shall always be prosperous. But the best thing for the people is to be near the Lord, and to acknowledge Him in all His ways; and whatever will conserve this end is the best thing for them. Sometimes the best thing is chastisement, and when chastisement comes to the people, or to the individual, it is because that is the best thing under the circumstances. “For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence; shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live? For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but He for our profit, that we might be partakers of His holiness.” Heb. 12:6–10. This is the purpose of the reverses that God permits to come upon His people. The Sunday-school lesson in this paper (page 14) is on “The Kingdom Divided,” and in the lesson text is the statement that “it was a thing brought about of Jehovah.” 1 Kings 12:15, A. R. V. We must not suppose that the division of Israel was an arbitrary decree, just for the punishment of the people in a spirit of vindictive retaliation for their disloyalty; nor must we suppose that it could not have been averted. It could have been averted by a thorough repentance and turning to the Lord on the part of the young king, and the putting away of idolatry on the part of the masses. A divided people is not of the Lord’s choosing; when He brings about or permits such a condition, it is always of necessity, that the people may be brought to realize their dependence upon Him. “For the Lord will not cast off forever; but though He cause grief, yet will He have compassion according to the multitude of His mercies. For He doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men.” Lam. 3:31–33. Under David the kingdom of Israel had been built up to a leading position among the kingdoms of the earth. It had been so firmly united and established that Solomon was guaranteed a reign of peace, in which to build the house of the Lord, and otherwise to disseminate a knowledge of the true God amongst other peoples. The Lord designed that the kingdom should remain united and strong forever. But Solomon in course of time, gave himself up to pleasure (Ecclesiastes 2) and the aggrandizement of Jerusalem. He gathered about him many idolatrous women, and made many worldly alliances with the heathen nations about him. The consequence was the spiritual decline of the people. The Lord gave this reason for the rending of the kingdom: “Because that they have forsaken Me, and have worshiped Ashtoreth the goddess of the Zidonians, Chemosh the god of the Moabites, and Milcom the god of the children of Ammon, and have not walked in My ways, to do that which is right in Mine eyes, and to keep My statutes and My judgments, as did David.” 1 Kings 11:33. Prosperity under such conditions would only encourage the departure from the service of the true God, and hinder the cause of salvation, thus endangering the final welfare of the people. Not only so, but the present temporal welfare of many in Israel was also at stake. Solomon had impressed the services of the northern tribes for building great works in and about Jerusalem until the burden had become unbearable; and the prospect that Rehoboam would make their yoke even heavier, rendered a division of the kingdom necessary for the relief of these people. So not only the spiritual reformation of the people, but also the emancipation of a large number of brethren, who were really treated as slaves, was contemplated in the division of the kingdom. Even in what seemed to be the utter ruin of the cause of God in the earth, through an irreparable division of His people, He had in mind only their eventual good and the final success of His cause. God always sees the end, even from the beginning, and all of His dispensations have the end in view. His very chastisements are inflicted because He is “longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.”