Earlier text: The Great Warning MeetingsThe Sick Man of Europe Is Dying at Last
By Albert Bushnell Hart
NOTWITHSTANDING the fearful destruction of human beings which goes on from day to day as gigantic armies grind individuals to pieces between their flinty fronts, a soldier's funeral is a solemn event. Who can be unmoved by the black plumes, the dirge, the riderless steed led in the procession, the soldier's coffin on the gun carriage, the following of companions in arms? How much more tragic are the obsequies of a nation, the last ceremonies over a proud empire which for half a millennium has caused the people to rejoice and its enemies to tremble—the extinction of an organized government which for ages has issued its mandates from a splendid capital city! That is what the world is witnessing now, or rather it is looking on at the death struggle of one of the world's great powers, the erasure from the map of a once majestic empire. The Sick Man of Europe is dying at last, and his convulsive agonies are felt throughout the world. The government offices are open; Constantinople is there; twenty millions of Turkish subjects still live; provinces and vilayets, cities and villages, are busy; couriers pass to and fro with orders; hundreds of thousands of men are called soldiers, and a score of vessels name themselves a navy. Nevertheless Turkey is seeing its last days. It may live weeks, months, perhaps a few years, but the end is in sight; the country is dying. . . . What is this Turkey? How did it come to life? Why should it be dying? And who is to inherit the property of the defunct? These are questions which this article will attempt to answer. Little European Turkey Now
A few people in the United States can perhaps still remember how, when they first studied geography, they learned that “the empire of Turkey is a country lying partly in Europe and partly in Asia. European Turkey includes the provinces of Wallachia, Moldavia, Rumelia, Bulgaria, Servia, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Macedonia, Albania, and Greece. The principal religion is Mohammedan, although many of the inhabitants are Christians. Turkey is one of the strongest powers in the world. Since 1453 the capital has been the city of Constantinople.” At present European Turkey includes the city of Constantinople and a district extending a few miles westward to Bulgaria. Two hundred years ago the Turks had a territory, a European population, and a military might superior to that of any European state east of France and west of Russia. They made the Black Sea a Turkish lake; they held half the coast of the Ægean, most of the coast of the Black Sea, the Mediterranean from the Strait of Gibraltar eastward, northward and westward to the head of the Adriatic Sea, and the interior up to Budapest. Across the Bosporus the Turkish dominions stretched to the farthest point of Arabia, to the mouths of the Tigris and Euphrates; to Mt. Ararat; to the Caucasus. They conquered the holiest shrine of the Moslem world at Mecca; they annexed the caliphate, and thereby the sultans became the religious heads of the whole Mohammedan world. The sultans held a rich and splendid court in Constantinople. By land and sea, in the camp, in Constantinople, across the diplomats' table, the Turks were a great and majestic power. Christian nobles would have flattened themselves to earth before the presence of the sultan's three-tailed pashas. Great and splendid was Turkey! . . . For the slow but nearly steady decline of Turkey from the position of a first-class European power to a feeble country, terribly strained by inward convulsions and pressed upon by enemies from outside, there are three main causes: the complex of races, the wretched government of the empire, and the pressure of foreign powers. The fundamental weakness of Turkey is that it is not Turkish. Of six million Turkish subjects in European Turkey previous to the last Balkan wars less than two million were Moslems. Even in Constantinople only about half the population is Turkish. In Asia Minor there are large elements of Greeks, Armenians, and Kurds. The Arabians are not Turks. Probably not for a moment in the last five hundred years have the Turks been in a majority in their own empire. . . . The Turks throughout their history have suffered from the lack of a definite and clearly organized government. They are organized on the principle of absolute monarchy, but the rule of succession is uncertain, and there have been many assassinations and forcible setting aside of the Lord's anointed. Of popular government, of representative government, they hardly had a glimmer, until in 1909 a parliament was elected, which was allowed to lapse because it really tried to legislate. While Abdul-Hamid was in power, he governed exactly as his forefathers governed, by brute force, by banishment, terror, murder, assassination. The present so-called “government” has not even that authority. The sultan is a figurehead. . . . If Turkey had been let alone by outsiders, the empire would have died an ignoble death a good sixty years ago; for on the European side of the Bosporus the Christians could probably have long since taken care of themselves. If unable to break their chains, Russia has stood ready to aid them ever since the treaty of 1774, in which the Turks gave them indefinite powers to look after the Christians in the Moslem empire. In 1850 Turkey was falling to pieces; it had long since lost the four Barbary powers of North Africa. Egypt, under Mehmet Ali, had practically made itself an independent principality. Greece had been able, by the combined fleets of England, France, and Russia,—an alliance fateful for later times,—to throw off the Turkish yoke, and had a German king. Roumania was united into a principality, Servia was practically an independent principality in which the Karageorgovitches and the Obrenovitches cordially cut each other's throats for the privilege of being princes. All that was necessary was to form a ring of interested spectators around Turkey, and allow the Christians to fight themselves free. The collapse of the Turkish Empire would have been a righteous and natural solution of the European question of Turkey, but it was clear that whenever European Turkey broke up, Constantinople would cease to be Turkish. Without this ancient capital, Asiatic Turkey was sure to succumb. When Asiatic Turkey went to pieces, somebody would pick up two significant fragments,—the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, which is the natural overland route to India; and the Isthmus of Suez, which is on the shortest sea line to India. The fall of Turkey would also affect the Mohammedan subjects of England, especially in India, because they look upon the sultan as the head of their church. Hence England came out as the friend and supporter of Turkey, and for many years Sir Stratford Canning, British ambassador, was a focus of “spontaneous” action on the part of the Turkish government. Friendship with Turkey required a blind eye to the most important things that were going on in Turkey, such as brigandage, murder, pillage, and rapine in the Christian states of Turkey. The power that had the most direct and largest interest in Turkey was Russia, which at intervals had been fighting the Turks during two centuries, partly because the Russians hoped that Constantinople would soon be vacant, and they knew just the right kind of reliable tenants to move in. Allowing that the Bulgarians, Macedonians, Montenegrins, and other Christians in the Balkans could look after themselves, plainly none of them was competent to hold Constantinople. A basal need of Russia was direct access to the ocean through ice-free ports; and the obvious short, direct, and desirable route to the ocean was through the Bosporus and the Dardanelles. Russia is still in need of that water connection. “Backing the Wrong Horse”
If Christian Europe could have realized the real character of the Turks and the desperation of the Christians, they would not have allowed the Sick Man to go through a racking chronic illness of sixty years: they would have left the7Christians and the Turks and Russia to fix matters up to suit themselves. Unfortunately for the present peace of the world, England adopted a policy which Lord Salisbury years later neatly described as “backing the wrong horse.” Great Britain and France backed up Turkey, fought Russia in the Crimean War, and thereby probably sacrificed more lives than this fearful war year of 1914. All the murders, outrages, civil wars, executions, and combats between the little Balkan States in the last few years may fairly be charged to this interference with the political laws of nature. For about forty years England was the particular friend of the Porte. From the British embassy, Sir Stratford Canning long suggested spontaneous action on the part of the Turkish government. To be sure the English firmly urged reforms upon the Turks, and the Turks as firmly did not carry them out. Even in 1877, when Russia, stirred up by the performances of the Bashi-Bazouks,—irregular Turkish soldiers who were sent to teach the Bulgarians good behavior,—sent an army to the Balkans, freed Bulgaria, and dictated a peace at San Stefano, within sight of the minarets of Constantinople, England still backed the wrong horse, and blocked the way of Russia; but the boundary line of Turkey was, nevertheless, pushed back far down the Balkan Peninsula. After 1890 England and Russia began to approach, just as Russia drifted out of an alliance with Germany and Austria. Soon after, the Turks found another charming friend, much nicer than that English prig, who was always saying, “You mustn't.” This was the emperor of Germany, who did not stand by Bismarck's famous saying that “the whole Eastern Question was not worth the bones of one Pomeranian grenadier.” Nobody knows just what the interest and purpose of Germany was, except that Germans sought and obtained concessions for railroads and other investments; and of late years the stately German embassy in Constantinople has been looked upon as the clearing house between Turkey and the Western world. German officers replaced Englishmen as drillmasters and military and naval advisers. German steamer lines with excellent ships reached Constantinople. The Germans finally obtained permission to build a railway line from Constantinople to the Persian Gulf. It is probable that these advances have something to do with a big scheme for extension of Austria down through the Balkans to Saloniki, and perhaps to Constantinople, as a part of a great rail route from Germany to mid-Asia. Whatever may have been the ultimate purpose of Germany, conditions were rudely disturbed by the Turkish revolution of 1908, which brought about the deposition of Abdul-Hamid, the only Turk who had a definite policy, and that was a wicked one. This opened the way for the Balkan war of 1912, which pushed the Turks back to the fortified lines of Tchataldja, just outside Constantinople. Emperor William at that time remarked that the result of those wars would oblige him to increase the German army; which probably meant that it showed the Turkish weakness and the strength of the Balkan powers which were nearest neighbors to Austria. In the great war of 1914 the Turks have been in a state almost of frenzy, for the whole struggle is so intertwined with the Balkan situation that from the first it seemed likely that Turkey must choose one side or the other; that it must be part of the hammer or part of the anvil. The danger of the Turkish Empire is acute. To side with Germany means that in case the allies are victorious in their general war, Russia will infallibly demand and must receive Constantinople and the waters leading to the Ægean Sea. German officers trained the Turkish army which took the field in 1912; nevertheless it was fearfully defeated. German officers are now supposed to be the advisers of the war department. Two German cruisers have taken refuge in the Dardanelles, and have become the instruments for bringing on war between Turkey and Russia. Between Turkey and Germany in one direction are Greece, Servia, and Roumania, all strongly anti-Turkish; and in another direction the Mediterranean Sea, which is completely controlled by allied fleets. Germany can send no aid except by defeating the Russian armies in Poland or the fleets in the North Sea and the Mediterranean. On the other hand, if Germany is victorious in the end, it can only be by defeating the Balkan powers, as well as the rest of Europe. Even then these independent states could hardly be placed back under the crescent. There will then be no probable outcome, except that the Turkish Empire will become a dependency of Germany, and eventually will drift into about the present condition of India—a complex of races and former nations taking its government from a distant European power. Constantinople would become as truly a German city as Calcutta and Cairo are English cities. There is not much comfort for the Turks in that prospect. As to the power of the Turks to defend themselves, and, still more, to attack their enemies, no American who has seen Turkish troops and Turkish ships within the last two years is likely to believe that there is any serious military strength left in the empire. Men are abundant—crude, good-natured, willing, patient, and long-suffering fellows, who when well fed and well led are probably as good troops as Russians or Austrians. But where are the magazines of clothing, arms, and ammunition? Where is the necessary accumulation of food? What are the arrangements for supplying marching armies or for transporting troops to Egypt, to India, to the Crimea? The available Turkish navy is made up of two modern German cruisers, as good as some of the fleet of twenty ships which the allies could place at the mouth of the Dardanelles. The Turkish Empire appears to be entering on a war with Russia, France, and England with a military preparation much inferior to that of two years ago, when it was abjectly defeated by three little Balkan States. War on a grand scale, affecting general results, is out of the question for Turkey. There are still millions of people in Turkey, nearly half of whom are discontented Christians or discontented Arabs. But in the true sense of the words, there is no Turkish Empire, no Turkish army, no Turkish navy, no Turkish government. Even the so-called cabinet is divided, one faction holding out a white flag, while the other faction fires its gun at the allies. A good, hard land highway leads from the Balkans to Constantinople, and another from the Russian frontier through Armenia and western Asia Minor also to Constantinople, but there is no road by land or sea which the Turks can follow in force to attack the allied hosts. This once mighty empire, this former rival of Russia and Austria, this proud military kingdom, must, perforce, stand aside, while its fate is decided on the battle fields of France, Germany, and Hungary. Whether it accepts or resists the hammer strokes of the combatants, the anvil must receive blows and cannot return them. Apparently the end of the Turkish Empire is at hand, whether it accepts or resists the hammer strokes of either side.—Prof. Albert Bushnell Hart of Harvard, in New York Times, Nov. 8, 1914. To forget,—that is what we need,—just to forget. All the petty annoyances, all the vexing irritations, all the mean words, all the unkind acts, the deep wrongs, the bitter disappointments,—just let them go, don't hang on to them. Learn to forget. Make a study of it. Practice it. Become an expert at forgetting. Train the faculty of the mind until it is strong and virile. Then the memory will have fewer things to remember, and it will become quick and alert in remembering the things that are worth remembering. It will not be cumbered with disagreeable things, and all its attention will be given to the beautiful things, to the worth-while things. No matter what business you are pursuing, no matter what literary subjects you may be studying, no matter what scientific problems you are trying to solve, take up the study of forgetting. The art of forgetting will give added luster to all your literary, business, or scientific attainments, and it will add immeasurably to health of mind and body.—St. Louis Christian Advocate. Living With a Good Person
To live with a good person is an education.—Henry Ward Beecher. “Rome Never Changes”—No. 3
By C. M. S.
In the preceding articles it was shown conclusively that in at least three very striking particulars Rome has changed. She has changed on the question of the Pope’s infallibility, on the question of “who is the authoritative teacher in the church,” and on the question of the worship of the Virgin Mary. In this article we shall endeavor to show that upon another question of most vital importance Rome has made a complete and very radical change. The most important thing in the life of the Christian is his attitude toward God. All that comes to him in eternity comes as a result of the attitude he has maintained toward his Maker during his lifetime. That attitude is very clearly expressed in his worship. If his worship has been of Jehovah alone, untinctured with any other worship, he is counted as a faithful follower of God and is given a part in the eternal inheritance of9saints. If he has worshiped other things, — self, man, images, idols,—and has died without repudiating such worship, he is counted as unworthy of eternal life, and meets the punishment of the unfaithful and impenitent, which is eternal death. In order that man might not rush blindly into the worship of those things that make one unworthy of eternal life, God has given due warning in his Word:— “Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them; for I Jehovah thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation of them that hate me, and showing loving-kindness unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments.” Ex. 20: 4-6. That is Jehovah’s warning to every son and daughter of Adam — a plain prohibition with no exceptions, and a faithful pronouncement of what the result of disobedience will be. “Thou shalt not,” is Jehovah’s mandate concerning the worship of anything that human hands have made or of anything that Jehovah himself has made. “And Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying, . . . Turn ye not unto idols, nor make to yourselves molten gods: I am Jehovah your God.” Lev. 19: 1-4. We have this record concerning one of Israel’s kings, and it is left for the admonition of God’s people in all generations since that day:— “But there was none like unto Ahab, who did sell himself to do that which was evil in the sight of Jehovah, whom Jezebel his wife stirred up. And he did very abominably in following idols, according to all that the Amorites did, whom Jehovah cast out before the children of Israel.” 1 Kings 21: 25, 26. That is God’s estimate of an idol worshiper. God cast the Amorites and other heathen nations out of their land because they were worshipers of images, and put his people in their place, who were positively forbidden to make or to worship images or idols. Surrounded with heathen nations, the Israelites were continually tempted to adopt their idolatrous customs; and the records of their yieldings, God’s solemn appeals and warnings, and the terrible results of their frequent adoption of idolatry, make up a very large portion of the Bible. In the New Testament as well as in the Old the child of God is taught the attitude of God toward the worshiping of images. Speaking of the heathen world, Inspiration says:— “Knowing God, they glorified him not as God, neither gave thanks; but became vain in their reasonings, and their senseless heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts unto uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonored among themselves: for that they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. For this cause God gave them up unto vile passions.” Rom. 1: 21-26. The danger of adopting idolatry in the earliest days of the Christian church was a very real one. Therefore John the Beloved, in the last sentence of his first epistle says:— “My little children, guard yourselves from idols.” 1 John 5: 21. In the early years of the Christian church idolatry was looked upon with abhorrence. In the fifteenth chapter of Acts (verse 20) the decision of the church was that the Gentiles should be admonished to “abstain from the pollutions of idols.” In verse 29 they are admonished even to “abstain from things sacrificed to idols.” We next take the testimony of some of the early “fathers” of the Catholic Church. St. Irenæus (A. D. 120-190) mentions the use of images of Christ, with religious honor done to them, as a peculiarity of the Carpocratian heretics, distinguishing them from Catholic Christians. See “Contra Hereticos,” i. 25. Minucius Felix (A. D. 220) bears this testimony: “Crosses, moreover, we neither worship nor wish for. You [heathen], who consecrate wooden gods, do worship wooden crosses, perhaps as parts of your gods; for your very standards, as well as your banners and ensigns of your camp, what are they but crosses gilt and decked?”—“Octavius,” xxix. Origen (A. D. 230) testifies to this effect: “We say that those are the most untaught who are not ashamed to address lifeless objects, . . . and though some may say these objects are not their gods, but imitations and symbols of real ones, nevertheless they are untaught, and slavish, and ignorant, who imagine that the hands of low mechanics can fashion likenesses of Divinity; for we assert that the very lowest amongst us (Christians) have been set free from this ignorance and want of knowledge.”—“Contra Celsus,” vi. 14. “What sensible man can refrain from smiling when he sees that one who has learned from philosophy such profound and noble sentiments about God or the gods, turns straightway to images, and offers to them his prayers, or imagines that by gazing on these natural things he can ascend from the visible symbol to that which is spiritual and immaterial?”—“Contra Celsus,” vii. 44. Lactantius (A. D. 300) says: “It is indisputable that wherever there is an image, there is no religion. . . . Images are outside of religion, because there can be nothing heavenly in what is made from the earth; . . . thus there is no religion in images, but a mimicry of religion.”—“Divinarum Institutionum Libri Septem,” ii. 19. St. Ambrose (A. D. 370): “They talk about God, they worship an image.”—Epist. xviii ad Valentinianum. St. Augustine (A. D. 430) speaks as follows: “‘Confounded be all they that serve graven images, that boast themselves of idols.’ But some disputant, who thinks himself learned, comes forward and says, ‘I do not worship a stone, nor that image which is without feeling; for it is not possible that your prophets should have known that they have eyes and see not, and I be ignorant that the image in question has no soul, and sees not with its eyes, nor hears with its ears. I do not worship that; but I bow before (adoro) what I see, and serve him whom I do not see.’ Who is he? ‘Some invisible power,’ he replies, ‘which presides over that image.’ By giving this sort of explanation of their images, they think themselves very clever, as not worshipers of idols.”—Enarr. in Ps. xcvi. ii. In A. D. 595 and 600 Pope Gregory the Great wrote letters to Serenus, Bishop of Marseilles, taking the bishop to task for destroying certain pictures and images which the people had superstitiously begun to worship. The Pope said: “We praise you for having been zealous lest anything made with hands should be adored, but we are of opinion that you ought not to have broken those images; . . . you ought to have preserved them, and have prohibited the people from worshiping them.”—Ep. vii. ii. 3. The bishop chose not to restore the pictures and images, and received a second letter from the Pope, in which he said: “In so far as you forbade their [the pictures and images] being worshiped, we entirely praised you, but we blamed you for breaking them. . . . In every possible way avoid worshiping images, . . . and let the people humbly prostrate themselves in honor of the Almighty and Holy Trinity alone.”—Ep. ix. iv. 9. In the Council of Constantinople (A. D. 754) the worship of images was condemned, but in the Seventh General Council held at Nice in 787 the worship of images had its first formal authorization. Alongside of St. Augustine’s denunciation of the worship of idols and alongside of Pope Gregory’s declaration in reference to the worship of pictures and images, place the following from the10Council of Trent (Conc. Trid. sess. xxv):— The images of Christ, of the Virgin Mother of God, and of the saints, are to be had and retained, especially in churches, and due honor and veneration to be paid to them, . . . because the honor which is exhibited to them is referred to the prototypes which they represent; so that through the images which we kiss, and before which we uncover our heads and lie prostrate, we adore Christ and pay veneration to the saints, whose likenesses the images bear. It will be noticed that the very same excuse for image worship which St. Augustine denounces in the heathen is given here by the Council of Trent in its authorization of image worship. It will be noted also that up until the time of Pope Gregory the Great and the Nicene Council of 787 image worship was a prohibited practice, denounced and forbidden by the “fathers,” by the Pope, and by the council. Nevertheless the practice gradually came into the church, and was finally sanctioned and authorized by the Seventh General Council of Nice, and later by the Council of Trent during its deliberations from 1545 to 1564. This was surely a change — a very striking and very radical change — in the belief and practice of the Roman Catholic Church. It would be difficult to conceive of a greater change than this. That which had been denounced and forbidden is now authorized and encouraged. This change carries with it disastrous consequences; for God, who does not change, maintains the same attitude toward the worship of images that he has always maintained. What he condemned in ages gone by he condemns today; and the same judgment which he pronounced upon idolatry then he pronounces upon it today. Says the inspired Word:— “Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, . . . shall inherit the kingdom of God.” 1 Cor. 6: 9, 10. “But for the fearful, and unbelieving, and abominable, and murderers, and fornicators, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, their part shall be in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone; which is the second death.” Rev. 21: 8. Rome does change, and the changes that she has made have not been for the best. Mixing Iron and Clay
By F. M. W.
In the second chapter of the book of Daniel we have the record of a notable dream which was given to Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon. He saw a great image. “This image’s head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, his legs of iron, and his feet part of iron and part of clay.” The prophet Daniel, in interpreting this dream, clearly stated that the kingdom of Babylon was represented by the head of gold, and that the kingdom which would succeed Babylon was represented by silver. This was Medo-Persia. The kingdom which, in turn, would overthrow Medo-Persia—namely, Grecia—was represented by brass; the kingdom which absorbed the remnants of Alexander’s kingdom was represented by the legs of iron. This fourth kingdom, Rome, although “strong as iron,” should be divided, as represented by the mixture of iron and clay in the feet of the image. Efforts would be made, the prophet indicated, to unite these divisions. Particularly would this effort be made through marriage and intermarriage. “They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men.” But all these efforts would prove unavailing. It would be as impossible to cement these kingdoms together as it would be to form a union between iron and clay. “They shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.” This prophecy has been literally fulfilled. Babylon, Medo-Persia, Grecia, and Rome have come and gone. We are living in the days of the divided state of the Roman Empire. It is interesting to note the industrious attempts which have been made to bring about a union of the divisions of this fourth kingdom. Warriors have tried to do it by the power of the sword. Its realization seemed almost reached in the days of Charlemagne, and later through Napoleon, but the prophet of the Lord saw that all such efforts would prove futile. It has been fondly hoped that inter marriage between the reigning houses of European states would bring about a closer affiliation of national interests. The extent to which the present reigning houses of Europe are related is shown in an editorial appearing in the Boston daily Globe of October 17. The editor declares that when Queen Victoria of England died some years ago, she was mourned “as mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother by children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren in half of the capitals of Europe.” We quote further, as follows:— Her eldest daughter married Frederick, the father of the present German emperor, William II. Her second daughter married the Grand Duke of Hesse, and to them was born Alice (Alix), who became the wife of the present czar, Nicholas II of Russia. Her third daughter married Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein, and the fourth the Duke of Argyll. Her fifth daughter married Prince Henry of Battenberg, and from that union came a little girl who grew up to be united in wedlock with Alfonso XIII, king of Spain. Queen Victoria’s eldest son, afterward crowned as King Edward VII, married Alexandra of Denmark, whose sister is the mother of the present ruler of Russia. Her second son married the only daughter of Czar Alexander II, grand-aunt of Nicholas II, and their offspring became the wife of Ferdinand, king of Roumania. Her third son married the daughter of Prince Frederick Charles of Prussia, uncle of the present kaiser, and the fourth married Princess Helena of Waldeck and Pyrmont. It is interesting to contemplate the nationality of some of the rulers of Europe who are now engaged in the great war. As stated by the Globe, the present British queen is the daughter of a German duke; the kaiser is half English and half German; Albert of Belgium is German; the czar is mostly German, with none of the Slav in his make-up. The blood relationships existing between some of these rulers is given as follows:— King George and Kaiser William are first cousins, the former’s father and the latter’s mother having been brother and sister. King George and Czar Nicholas are first cousins, their mothers being sisters. King George and the czarina are first cousins, his father and her mother having been brother and sister. Kaiser William and the czarina are first cousins, their mothers being sisters. Kaiser and czar are first cousins by marriage. But notwithstanding these close blood relationships which have been created, there has not resulted any bond of lasting unity. Says the prophet: “They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.” The failure of all these man-made efforts to bring about a united empire proves the correctness of God’s foreknowledge. It shows that the Spirit which prompted the prophetic utterance could foretell with unerring accuracy the course of empire. The prophecy concludes: “And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed.” For long years we have been living in the divided state of the Roman Empire. So far as the prophecy of Daniel 2 is concerned, the only event lacking of fulfillment is the setting up of the everlasting kingdom of God, represented by the stone which was cut out without hands and smote the image upon its feet, grinding it to powder. This sequel is about to be consummated. The kingdoms of this earth will soon become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ. Where the power of sin has reigned, where hatred and strife have borne sway, there the kingdom of peace will be established. Let us lift up our heads and rejoice, for our redemption draweth nigh. F. M. W.