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October 28, 1914.
with increasing clearness what we are appointed
to do and are gradually setting ourselves to the
doing of it. We may be so conscious of our limitations
as to be timid and unwilling to risk
making an effort, but we know what we need to
io. This may not be true of all, but it is true
of the Church as a body, and anyone who will
think back thirty years will see it.
3 As a result of this clearer sight, the Church
as a body is more radical. Radicalism means to
go to the root of things. John the Baptist was
•• radical when he said, "Now the ax is laid to
the root of the tree." True radicalism means
that things are considered in their fundamental
relations and that an effort is made to be thoroughly
consistent. Most men have a conservative
tendency and hold to things because they
are old, because the fathers held them, or a
liberal tendency and accept things because they
are new and novel. The radical tendency is +0
bold to things if they are fundamentally right
and not otherwise,, whether they are new or
old, and whatever may be the outcome.
The Covenanter Church seems to the
writer to be growing along this line and he believes
that this is peculiarly the line for thi
Church to follow. If she is sacrificing popularity
for her principles, let her put her principles
to the front and keep them there, whatever the
result may be.
4. At the same time the Church is becoming
more evangelical. Radicalism and evangelism
go together. As men love Christ more and
preach him more fervently, they are ready to
make sacrifices tor him, and as they fight sin
in all its forms they feel the need of divine
grace to sustain them. More piety brings us
right up to our principles. As men think more
ot Christ as a Priest,, they think more of him
as a King. The movement toward evangelism
is one of the most marked tendencies of the
Church at present, and no characteristic could
be more hopeful, or more in harmony with the
will of the Head of the Church.
5. The Covenanter Church is learning to give.
It is more generous now than it was with two
thousand more members. No other Church gives
anytfiing like as much lor political reform and at
the same time no other Church gives as much
per member for missions. No other Church has
accepted so fully the plan ol giving one-tenth
to the Lord, and as this plan is accepted the contributions
come up. This looks like progress ol
a substantial kind.
6. We have a better trained Church than we
bad thirty years ago. This is largely due to the
rise of young people's societies. A generation
ago it was the exception when a young person
took any active part in any religious meeting;
now most of the young people have grown up
in the habit of doing something in the way ol
public speech and prayer. This strengthens the
whole membership and makes them more useful
at home and more influential abroad. It is evidence
of the strong materialistic spirit of the age
that this training does not send more of our
young men into the Seminary.
7. We have a harder working Church than
thirty years ago. There is no doubt in my mmd
but that the people of this country are going
down morally and that the work of saving men
is growing harder year by year. It was much
easier to gain converts thirty years ago than at
the present time. The love of pleasure had not
4en possessed the coun try. as it has now. We
are ripening for judgment and approaching a
crisis. It looks as if we were in the last days
A FAMILY PAPER.
when perilous times have come. Allowing lor
immigration the only Church that grows now
is one that is letting down the standard. That
a Church with such unpopular principles as
ours should even hold its own in such circumstances
is a great tribute to its working power.
1 have no disposition to say that 1884 was
better than is 1914, no desire to go back and try
it over again. We have had our faults and failings,
but God has been good to us.
WHY THE GREAT POWERS ARE FIGHTING.
Motives of Rival Civilizations Analyzed.
By Frank Irish Cadwallader, of Cadwallader's
Bureau.
The editor of the Christian Nation has asked
me to prepare a short account of the great World
War, with some remarks on the causes leading up
to it. And he wished me to be absolutely fair to
all the nationalities concerned. That injunction
I intend to observe strictly—that is to say, so
far as such a thing is humanly possible; for certainly
anyone who can contemplate the dread
cataclysm, and remain indifferent, must be either
more or less than a man—I think considerably
less. So it won't require any vast acumen to
discover which side has my sympathy. No matter
how much care a writer takes, the mere
selection of facts to be presented will show what
phases of a controversy he regards as being most
important, and will thereby afford a sure indication
as to how he views the points at issue. 1
will premise, also, that we know very little of the
actual,, inside history of the last three months,
as yet. Not that I wish to put too much stress
upon the common talk about "newspaper lies,"
for that sort of stuff gives me a most unconscionable
weariness. As an experienced newspaperman
I have had ample opportunity to observe that
there are plenty of liars in this world who are in
no way connected with journalistic work, and
their productions are not infrequently of such
skill and finish that they will deceive even a
trained reporter, and thereby secure undeserved
publicity. It is to be remembered, too, that it is
the business of newspapers to sell papers, and the
best possible way to insure success in that line
is to publish prompt and genuine news—not fakes.
My very first difficulty is to state the causea
of the war. Technically, the cause of the war
was the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand,,
heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary,
and his wife, on June 30 last, at Sarajevo, the
capital of Bosnia. Xow personally, I am thoioughly
convinced that the world lost mighty litt'e
when that archduke was murdered, for he was a
reactionary of the most pronounced type, a militarist
through and through, and a convert to the
propaganda of Pan-Germanism,, a policy based on
medieval ideals of conquest, with the definite and
openly-avowed plan of dominating the whole
world, and of ruthlessly crushing any nation and
any race which may stand in the way.
But"~assassination is very poor policy, to consider
it from a purely utilitarian standpoint, because
it is almost certain to develop an amount
of sympathy which will tend to defeat the very
cause which the assassin has most at heart. Precisely
that happened in the present case, lor instead
ol securing any amelioration in the condition
of the Slavic peoples under the iron rule of Austria,
an ultimatum was sent by the Austrian Government
to that of Servia, an investigation having
shown,, as was asserted, that not only the assassination
plot had been hatched in Servia, but
even that persons high in the Servian government
had been privy to it. The youthful assassin who
executed the plot was himself a Servian, though
born within the Austrian dominions.
When that ultimatum was sent, on July 23, it
was like the proverbial thunderbolt from a clear
sky So far as the general European public was
concerned the double assassination had passed
into history as one of the unpleasant incidents
that one does not like to hear about, but still a
naatter of negligible note. But that same public,
alert to all rumors of wars,, perceived on the instant
that Russia would not stand for the destruction
of little Servia, which was plainly implied
in the demands made by Austria. A few
years before, Russia had protested against the
complete annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, but
Russia had not at that time recovered from the
exhaustion of its resources by the Japanese War,
and so the protest came to nothing when Kaiser
William "rattled his sword in its scabbard," and
announced that he would stand by his ally "in
fehining armor"—a most deliciously medieval
phrase. Bosnia-Herzegovina had been placed
under the protection of Austria by the Treaty of
Berlin, after being wrested from the Turks, but
their complete annexation was not authorized.
But this time Russia meant business, and when
Austria declared war on Servia, on July 28, she
proceeded to mobilize. Servia, it was reported,
had complied with all the Austrian demands except
one, that Austria be officially represented in
any proceedings connected with the investigation
of the murder plot and the punishment of the
participants—which would of course have been
tantamount to a surrender of her national independence.
July 31 the Kaiser sent an ultimatum
demanding that Russia cease her mobilization,
and the next day, Saturday, August 1, he declared
war against Russia. France at once joined in,
as Russia's ally, and five days later England declared
war against Germany, basing her action on
the violation of the neutrality of Belgium, which
Germany had been long bound by treaty to protect,
just as England and France were.
Xow that is the record, so far as mere superficial
facts go. But for myself, I don't believe a
word of it. I have been predicting precisely such
a conflict for fully ten years past. It is the natural
outcome of agencies perfectly perceptible to
any observer who looks beneath the surface. For
one thing, it is true, as the Germans often say,
that the English are jealous of their marvelous
success in developing manufactures and pushing
trade. The legislative requirement that German
products be labeled "Made in Germany'' proves
such jealousy, but that was the outgrowth of
previous irritation when many great English
manulacturers lound that some exceedingly capable
German apprentices who had learned every
secret of their business, turned out to be the
sons of rich Germans who started a rival
business and often cut out the Britisher by underselling
him.
There is no question whatever,, that the Germans
were genuinely surprised when England
entered the war—and not a little displeased, too.
1 have talksd with many Germans about these
matters in past years, with scores, even hundreds
of them, and I know that the great majority of
Germans believed that England would never willingly
fight a great power again, so great was
their contempt for her as a non-military country.
So entirely sure of this were their militarist
writers that they frankly gave away their plan of
campaign, which was to crush France first, and
then,, a few years later, to smash England. At
present German apologists belittle these writers,
but the fact remains that they have had honors
heaped upon them, and have been hurt in no
wise in their professional careers.
A year ago, after Turkey had been beaten, and
it had become apparent that a new Slavic power
was about to arise in the Balkans, which would
be a menace to Pan-Germanism, the Kaiser increased
his standing army by 150,000 men. Since
that date,, all the banks of the Continent have
been hoarding gold, being sure that war was imminent.
I am myself fully convinced that the
war would now be on, even if that archduke had
never been killed. That was merely made a convenient
pretext.
For my part, also, I have not the slightest d^ubt