LIBRARY 
 
 UHIVE SITT OF 
 CAIIPORNIA 
 
 SAN DIEGO 
 
 >
 
 
 XX
 
 THE 
 
 SOCIAL LAW OF SERVICE 
 
 BY 
 
 RICHARD T. ELY, PH.D., LL.D. 
 ^> 
 
 PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL ECONOMY AND DIRECTOR OF THE SCHOOL 
 
 OF ECONOMICS, POLITICAL SCIENCE, AND HISTORY 
 
 IN THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN 
 
 NEW YORK: EATON & MAINS 
 
 CINCINNATI ; CURTS & JENNINGS 
 
 1396
 
 Copyright by 
 
 EATON & MAINS, 
 
 1896. 
 
 Composition, electrotyping, 
 printing, and binding by 
 
 EATON & MAINS, 
 150 Fifth Ave., New York.
 
 TO 
 
 MY WIFE.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 THIS little volume of essays, the growth of 
 years, deals with topics belonging to that 
 border land in which theology, ethics, and eco- 
 nomics meet. Scientifically no territory is more 
 fascinating; practically none can be more im- 
 portant, for it is in this border land that the 
 problems of life present themselves to us. 
 
 While the author's aim has been to write a 
 work which the young person of high school at- 
 tainments may read with profit, possibly even the 
 more mature reader will not in one perusal ex- 
 haust all the meaning which has been put into 
 it. May the author, therefore, venture to hope 
 that the present work will find readers who deem 
 it not unworthy of careful study? 
 
 The character of the work and the point of 
 view from which it is written have been made so 
 plain in the opening chapter that further words 
 of explanation can scarcely be necessary ; and it 
 only remains for the author to express his thanks 
 to those friends who have assisted him with wise 
 criticisms and helpful suggestions. 
 MADISON, Wis., U. S. A., 
 February 19, 1896.
 
 TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. PAGE 
 
 OUR FIRM FOUNDATION n 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 OUR POINT OF VIEW 25 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE RELATIONS OF THE OLD AND THE NEW TESTA- 
 MENTS SOCIALLY CONSIDERED 49 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 THE SOCIAL LAW OF SERVICE 75 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE SOCIAL SIGNIFICANCE OF BAPTISM AND THE LORD'S 
 
 SUPPER v 103 
 
 \ 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 SOCIAL SOLIDARITY 125 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 OUR NEIGHBORS 141
 
 10 Contents. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. PACK 
 
 THE STATE 157 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 MAKING MEN Goon BY LAW 177 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 INADEQUACY OF PRIVATE PHILANTHROPY FOR SOCIAL 
 
 REFORM 191 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 OUR EARNINGS 209 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 OUR SPENDINGS 223 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 WHAT TO Do 247
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 OUR FIRM FOUNDATION,
 
 " How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord, 
 Is laid for your faith in his excellent word ! "
 
 THE SOCIAL LAW OF SERVICE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 OUR FIRM FOUNDATION. 
 
 A RCHIMEDES was so impressed with the 
 i\ power which even so weak an instrument 
 as man could exert with the aid of the lever that 
 he said, " Give me a place where I may stand, 
 and I will move the earth." What we need, if 
 we would develop principles and rules for the 
 action of ourselves and others in our mutual re- 
 lations, is solid ground under our feet as a firm 
 foundation. The advantage which those enjoy 
 who have accepted Christ and His Gospel is in 
 this respect immeasurable. Using the figure of 
 the lever, we may say that Christ and His Gospel 
 constitute the lever itself, and that the Church is 
 the fulcrum, and that this lever is sufficient to 
 move the world. 
 
 Let us consider more carefully what these 
 statements just made signify. This book is 
 written for those who accept Christ and His
 
 14 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 teachings. It is not necessary to argue about 
 them, because they are taken for granted. In 
 all systems of conduct, the difficulty is to estab- 
 lish first principles ; when these are granted, the 
 rest follows easily enough in accordance with 
 scientific laws. Now, ethical teachers start with 
 principles of social conduct essentially like those 
 which we find in the New Testament, but the 
 difficulty which they all labor under is the estab- 
 lishment of these first principles. One school of 
 writers takes as a guiding principle the greatest 
 amount of happiness. These writers claim that 
 we should so regulate our conduct that the total 
 amount of happiness in society may be increased. 
 If a sacrifice of happiness on my part, which we 
 may represent as 2a, brings to some one else, or 
 to others, or to the whole of society that is, to the 
 entire world happiness equal in amount to 3a, 
 then it is my duty to sacrifice my own happiness 
 in this case, thereby increasing the total amount 
 of pleasure or happiness in the world. This is 
 what is called the utilitarian system of morals. 
 When it was felt that all sorts of happiness were 
 not entitled to equal rank, the utilitarian system 
 was further elaborated by a distinction between 
 different kinds of happiness, giving us happiness 
 of a higher and happiness of a lower order. There 
 can be little doubt that when we build upon these 
 principles a system of conduct, we shall have
 
 Our Firm Foundation. 15 
 
 something to guide us in our social relations 
 which accords with the teachings of Christ. But 
 if we ask, " Why?" when each of these funda- 
 mental principles is stated, the answer is not alto- 
 gether easy. Why should I give up my own hap- 
 piness to increase the total amount of happiness 
 in the world ? Why should I divide pleasures into 
 classes and place the pleasures of the mind and 
 spirit above those of the body ? What is it which 
 guides me when I distinguish between higher 
 and lower orders of pleasures ? Scientific writers 
 upon conduct that is to say, the ethical philoso- 
 phers are divided among themselves when they 
 attempt to give answers to these questions. 
 Their speculations are exceedingly interesting 
 and valuable, and there is no reason why they 
 should be disparaged; but when we want a guide 
 and a support in our life, we feel that we must 
 have a firmer foundation under our feet. The 
 discussions of the scientific writers seem to leave 
 us too much in the air. But when one accepts 
 Christ and His teachings, one can answer the 
 question why we accept our fundamental prin- 
 ciples. We say we believe in the law of self- 
 improvement and self-sacrifice because it has 
 been given to us by one whose wisdom and 
 authority we acknowledge. 
 
 Christ, Himself, gave us in a few words a fun- 
 damental principle which should guide us in our 
 2
 
 16 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 conduct to our fellow-men. The whole duty of 
 man is divided into two parts : the one relating 
 to our duty toward God, and that is that we 
 should love Him with all our heart and mind 
 and soul ; and the other is our duty to our fel- 
 low-man, and that is that we should love him as 
 we love ourselves. Christ said, " On these two 
 commandments hang all the law and the proph- 
 ets," meaning that the entire message of God 
 to man was but an elaboration of these prin- 
 ciples. 
 
 The simplicity of these two fundamental prin- 
 ciples has misled many. We may compare 
 them with the axioms and definitions in math- 
 ematics. Nothing could be simpler than these 
 axioms and definitions. Everyone will accept 
 it as a mere matter of course that " a whole is 
 greater than any of its parts," and so on with other 
 axioms. Yet, simple as these axioms and defini- 
 tions are, easily as they are understood even by 
 the schoolboy, they contain in themselves the 
 whole of mathematics ; even the higher branches 
 of mathematics, which a very few are capable of 
 grasping, are all involved in the axioms and defini- 
 tions with which we start. Similarly there may be 
 difficulties, and in modern society there are unques- 
 tionably very great difficulties in the elaboration of 
 the "Golden Rule" intoasystem of conduct which 
 shall solve the problems of life as they thrust
 
 Our Firm Foundation. 17 
 
 themselves upon us. It is not the purpose of the 
 Gospel to render every difficult problem easy. 
 Nothing can be further from the will of Christ 
 than to say, when one faces the problems of mod- 
 ern society, " The Gospel of Christ will solve 
 them," if we then, with this general statement, 
 turn away from an attempt at their solution. It 
 is true that there is no problem of society which 
 the Gospel of Christ will not solve if it is ap- 
 plied. But the question is, What does this Gos- 
 pel mean now and here in this conflicting chaos 
 of views and obligations ? What does it mean for 
 the magistrate and for the legislator ? for the rail- 
 way president ? for the president of a college and 
 for a professor ? for employers, large and small, 
 and for wage-earners? When any member of a 
 legislative body is asked to fix a rate of wages 
 for public employees somewhat in excess of the 
 competitive rate in order that he may give an 
 upward tendency to wages and help raise the 
 rate generally, is he to do this? Or, is he to 
 take the stand that the taxpayers' interests are 
 paramount? Must he say, "I have no right to 
 use public money to pay more than the lowest 
 competitive rate of wages? " Or shall he say, on 
 the other hand, that organized society has a 
 moral character and is under moral obligations, and 
 that in this matter, as in other matters, he must 
 endeavor to carry out a line of conduct which
 
 18 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 will promote general well-being? Or, we may 
 take the case of a railway president who has, on 
 the one hand, to consider his stockholders and, on 
 the other, his employees. How do their interests 
 weigh over and against one another? What 
 does the Gospel of Christ teach him in this con- 
 flict of interests and apparent conflict of duties? 
 From this Gospel can he elaborate any general 
 principle which will tell him whether wages or 
 dividends should come first in the allotment of 
 the rewards of their joint earnings? Or to what 
 extent, perchance, should the one take the pre- 
 cedence of the other? Take the case of a pres- 
 ident of a privately endowed and supported col- 
 lege. Shall he receive every sum of money 
 offered, no matter how this money has been got- 
 ten together? If he must ever refuse money, 
 under what circumstances must he refuse it, and 
 under what conditions must he receive it? Shall 
 he say, when certain money is given him, " This 
 represents the gains of iniquity, and I cannot 
 receive it?" Or, shall he make a distinction be- 
 tween those cases in which the iniquity is sup- 
 ported and bolstered up by the acceptance of the 
 gift and the wrongdoer glorified, and those in 
 which the acceptance of the wealth seems to have 
 no bearing upon an encouragement or discour- 
 agement of the course of action which resulted 
 in its accumulation ? Does it make any differ-
 
 Our Firm Foundation. 19 
 
 ence whether the giver is dead or living, or 
 whether, if living, he comes as a penitent who 
 would make restitution, or one who seeks honor 
 for himself' 1 Again, shall the authorities of an 
 educational institution allow the management 
 of the institution to be influenced consciously by 
 the hope of gifts? Shall certain views be sup- 
 pressed or only uttered in whispers because they 
 would be likely to give offense to actual or pro- 
 spective benefactors? Again, is there danger 
 that schools and churches may be even uncon- 
 sciously perverted by gifts? Do warnings against 
 gifts which are uttered in the Bible ever apply 
 to present conditions? Is there still danger that 
 a gift may " blind the eyes of the wise, and per- 
 vert the words of the righteous?" Do we still 
 need to be reminded that with God there is 
 no "taking of gifts?" 2 
 
 Answers to some of these questions may seem 
 easy to the readers of this little work, and an- 
 swers to others difficult. It is safe to say that 
 they would not be answered by all in precisely 
 the same manner, yet these are by no means the 
 most difficult questions which could be asked. 
 In actual life questions often present themselves 
 in a much more complicated form, and it is pre- 
 cisely characteristic of modern society that the 
 
 1 Deuteronomy xvi, 19 ; also Exodus xxiii, 8. 
 4 2 Chronicles xix, 7.
 
 20 . The Social Law of Service. 
 
 problems confronting us become more and more 
 complex and difficult. On the other hand, we 
 have in the principles of Christ a secure founda- 
 tion upon which to build, and we have in the 
 Church sufficient intellect for their solution. 
 
 We have, however, something far more than 
 principles. The most powerful social force known 
 to man is religion ; beyond anything else, it has 
 shaped and is shaping the world's history. It is 
 the power which leads men to subordinate their 
 own inclinations and interests to the well-being 
 of society. It is something more than this, but it 
 is this among other things. Our religion is not 
 something abstract merely ; it is something con- 
 crete and living which presents itself in the per- 
 son of Him who more and more is attaching 
 to Himself the affections of men. It is not any 
 combination of abstract principles, nor is it any 
 number of articles of religion, nine or thirty-nine, 
 that will draw the world, but only a living per- 
 sonality. Christ said, " I, if I be lifted up, will 
 draw all men unto Me." This prediction is in 
 process of realization. Men dispute about creeds, 
 but are more and more filled with admiration for 
 Christ. Workingmen reject with contempt eccle- 
 siasticism, but look to Christ as their leader. 
 And in Christ we have a leader, meek beyond 
 comparison, yet unequaled in strength ; gentle, 
 as no one has ever been gentle before, yet un-
 
 Our Firm Foundation. 21 
 
 paralleled in sternness ; one who presents to us 
 the best qualities of woman, and yet a manliness 
 which is a model to the strongest. 
 
 Christ revealed to us the fatherhood of God; 
 and fatherhood means the brotherhood of man. 
 Now, this points us to something else. Brother- 
 hood implies fatherhood, and this also must not 
 be overlooked. Brotherhood cannot be real and 
 genuine without fatherhood. 
 
 But our standpoint gives us something further: 
 We must desire social righteousness if we are 
 Christians, and we must work for it. Yet, at 
 times, disappointment is certain to be the out- 
 come of our effort. The way to the attainment 
 of the destiny of society is slow and wearisome, 
 and the struggles which attend our progress are 
 hard. Many begin the journey and turn aside, 
 but the Christian has a twofold source of strength: 
 First, in Christ we have a personal Comforter who 
 affords us consolation in our weariness and dis- 
 appointments, and we have in Him a Friend whose 
 life was an apparent failure, and apparently as 
 complete a failure when He hung on the cross at 
 Calvary as the world has ever seen. In the 
 second place, we have the assurance that nothing 
 is in reality lost ; that we are working for a cause 
 which will finally triumph because, back of it, 
 there stands a Ruler of human destinies. We 
 have thus a sure and steadfast hope.
 
 22 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 We know that self-sacrifice is real, and that the 
 individual perishes for the race. This is a literal, 
 scientific truth ; yet we have before us the final 
 purpose which is accomplished through the self- 
 sacrifice of countless generations of individuals, 
 and, so far as the individual is concerned, we 
 know that death means life. He that lays down 
 his life, saves it. It is religion which makes pos- 
 sible this sacrifice, and, at the same time, alone 
 makes it rational. 
 
 . The final triumph of social righteousness is 
 something given to us in countless passages in 
 the Bible, and is something, furthermore, which 
 is implied in our entire standpoint. The Psalmist 
 tells us, " The wicked shall be turned into hell, and 
 all the nations that forget God. For the needy 
 shall not always be forgotten : the expectation of 
 the poor shall not perish forever." 1 And the 
 prophet Isaiah says of Christ, " He shall see of 
 the travail of His soul, and shall be satisfied." 2 
 
 Our standpoint gives us the cross to be borne 
 for our fellows. This may come in many forms ; 
 often it comes in part in personal infirmities, 
 weaknesses, and the like ; but borne in cheerful- 
 ness, it proves a blessing ; yet the cross remains. 
 '. It may not be too much to say that nothing 
 less than religion can render reforms and reform- 
 ers safe. It is because religion furnishes a basis 
 
 1 Psalm ix, 17, 18. 2 Isaiah liii, n.
 
 Our Firm Foundation. 23 
 
 and an enduring hope, and at the same time fur- 
 nishes restraints. It points out the only sure 
 road to success in social reform. Those who 
 have not thjs help and this hope are liable to 
 mistakes which have been witnessed in thousands 
 and thousands of cases; frequently they grow 
 weary in well-doing because the coming of the 
 Kingdom is delayed, and turn aside from their 
 high purpose. On the other hand, some seeing 
 the slowness with which the methods of peace 
 accomplish their purpose, feel inclined to resort 
 to methods of force, and the propaganda of an- 
 archy is the result.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 OUR POINT OF VIEW.
 
 " MANY nations have believed in gods of mixed or positively 
 malignant character. Other nations have, indeed, ascribed to 
 their deities all the admirable qualities they could conceive, 
 but benevolence was not one of these. They have believed in 
 gods that were beautiful, powerful, immortal, happy, but not 
 benevolent." Sir J. R. Seeley, Natural Religion, p. 13. 
 
 " But the Ethics of the Greeks were at the best narrow and 
 egoistical. Morality, however exalted or comprehensive, only 
 seemed to embrace, the individual ;. it was. extremely incomplete 
 as regards the family ; and had scarcely any suspicion of what 
 we call social relations. No Greek ever attained the sublimity 
 of such a point of view. The highest point he could attain was 
 to conduct himself according to just principles ; he never 
 troubled himself with others. By the introduction of Chris- 
 tianity, Ethics became Social as well as Individual." George 
 Henry Lewes, Biographical History of Philosophy, Vol. 7, Con- 
 clusion of Ancient Philosophy, pp. 337, 338.
 
 Our Point of View. 27 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 OUR POINT OF VIEW. 
 
 EVERY great advance in science has had as 
 its beginning and first cause a new point 
 of view. Every epoch-making discovery has im- 
 plied a way of looking at things different from 
 that which has previously prevailed. As the 
 world's civilization advances new points of view 
 prevail. Great stages in the evolution of religion 
 are characterized by progressively better points 
 of view. The great lights in the world's history 
 give us new points of view. Every system of 
 philosophy or religion has its point of view 
 which is a key to its comprehension. 
 
 The Copernican system of astronomy reversed 
 the old way of looking at the earth, the sun, and 
 the planets. Copernicus asserted that the sun 
 was the center about which the earth and the 
 planets revolved. The correctness of this sys- 
 tem was thoroughly established by Kepler, Gal- 
 ileo, and, above all, Newton. It was a glorious 
 achievement, and it lies at the basis of subse- 
 quent progress in this branch of knowledge. 
 William Harvey, in the seventeenth century, dis-
 
 28 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 covered the circulation of the blood, and this 
 gave a point of view which was epoch-making in 
 the knowledge of the human body. Lavoisier 
 overthrew the theory of combustion based upon 
 an escape of a substance called phlogiston, and 
 showed that combustion was an act of combina- 
 tion with oxygen. He demonstrated that in 
 combustion the weight of the product was equal 
 to the sum of the weight of the substance burned 
 and the oxygen used up. His great instrument 
 was the balance which had previously been neg- 
 lected, and he thus introduced the quantitative 
 period of chemistry. This was a new point of 
 view which gave an immense impetus to chem- 
 ical knowledge. Charles Darwin's vast contribu- 
 tion to knowledge consists in the doctrine of 
 evolution which has been and is being applied 
 to every branch of knowledge, even to religion, 
 with astonishing results. Error has been mixed 
 with truth in the immense intellectual activity to 
 which Darwin's point of view has given rise, but 
 it will in the end be seen that probably the work 
 of few men who have ever lived has so advanced 
 the intellectual progress, and perhaps, also, the 
 social progress, of the race. Yet it was all given 
 in the point of view. 
 
 If we would understand the Christian religion 
 we must have the point of view of Christ. What 
 was it which distinguished His message to the
 
 Our Point of View. 29 
 
 race from that of all other religious teachers, and 
 made it infinitely more fruitful of good ? There 
 is one word which will sum it all up, and that is, 
 love love of a different sort from anything which 
 the world had known. The revelation of Christ 
 was the revelation of love. It manifested itself, 
 however, in two different aspects: a Godward 
 and a manward aspect. 
 
 Now, it is our purpose to consider rather the 
 second manifestation of love, but we cannot neg- 
 lect entirely the first. It has been well pointed 
 out that the God revealed to us by Christ is some- 
 thing quite different from the gods worshiped by 
 Greece and Rome and all the nations of antiquity, 
 save the Jews. The gods of Greece and Rome 
 did not give men their highest ideas and ideals 
 of character and right conduct. The priests of 
 ancient religions were not the leaders of nations 
 in what was highest and best, but there were 
 philosophers with higher ideas and ideals than 
 those given them by their gods. ' 
 
 There was revealed to the Jews a God who 
 could command the devotion of the heart and 
 soul and mind of men, the contemplation of 
 whose attributes could not fail to elevate all His 
 worshipers. This was a God who loved all men, 
 
 1 This is well brought out in Religion in History and in Mod- 
 ern Life, by Rev. A. M. Fairbairn, D.D., Principal of Mans- 
 field College, Oxford.
 
 30 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 and therefore hated human sacrifice and the abom- 
 ination of the heathen nations which always 
 meant cruelty to men ; a God whose purpose it 
 was, through Israel, to bless all the nations of 
 the world. Now, this true God was revealed 
 more fully to men through Christ. There is no 
 break between the revelation of Christ and that 
 of the Old Testament in this respect, but the 
 Gospel of Christ was a further unfolding of the 
 earlier revelation. Christ revealed to us the 
 fatherhood of God, and Max Miiller regards 
 this as the distinctive peculiarity of Christianity. 
 
 While His doctrine of the ruler of the universe 
 was the basis of Christ's entire message, yet His 
 point of view is given pre-eminently in His new 
 view of man. It is, in fact, this new view of 
 man which reflects back light upon His revelation 
 of the character of God. How, indeed, other- 
 wise can we understand the opening words of the 
 Lord's Prayer, "Our Father?" 
 
 Christ taught the infinite worth of every hu- 
 man individual, and our endless mutual obliga- 
 tions, so that after we have done our utmost for 
 our fellow-men we must still say that we are 
 unprofitable servants. The distinctive feature of 
 Christ's teaching from the human standpoint is 
 the exaltation of man, carrying with it universal 
 benevolence as a supreme law of conduct. Christ 
 thus furnishes a strange contrast to all who ever
 
 Our Point of View. 31 
 
 went before Him, and became literally the first 
 philanthropist, as He has well been called by a 
 distinguished historian. 1 These words sound 
 strange to modern ears at the present time when 
 we have become so accustomed to philanthropy, 
 both genuine and spurious. We find, indeed, 
 much philanthropy outside the visible Church, 
 and there are those who deny the claims of Christ, 
 and yet exercise philanthropy, unconscious that 
 their ruling motive has been derived from the 
 Leader whom they misunderstand and deny. 
 When we read in the biography of a man in a 
 religious paper that, although he was a philan- 
 thropist, he was at the same time a professed 
 Christian and church member, we may think that 
 the separation between organized Christianity 
 and philanthropy has gone far. But without 
 philanthropy there never would have been a Chris- 
 tian Church, and without Christ we would have 
 had no philanthropy. 
 
 It is hard to grasp the fact that we are here 
 dealing with literal, historical truth; but the 
 author has to say that the more he thought 
 about this subject, the more he has read about 
 it, the more he has looked into the opinions of 
 various authorities who have given attention to 
 it, the more strongly he is impressed with the 
 fact that Christ was the first philanthropist. We 
 
 1 The author of Ecce Homo.
 
 32 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 hear about the Stoics and about Gotama Buddha, 
 and we are told that in them we find a philan- 
 thropy like that of Christ ; but it is only neces- 
 sary to look more carefully into their teachings 
 to ascertain that we have to do with something 
 very different, as we shall see presently. The 
 author of Ecce Homo says : " Though there was 
 humanity among the ancients, there was no 
 philanthropy. In other words, humanity was 
 known to them as an occasional impulse and not 
 as a standing rule of life. A case of distress 
 made painfully manifest and prominent would 
 often excite compassion ; the feeling might lead 
 to a single act of benevolence ; but it had not 
 strength enough to give birth to reflection, or to 
 develop itself into a compassion for other persons 
 equally distressed, whose distresses were not 
 equally manifest. Exceptional sufferings had, 
 therefore, a chance of relief; but the ordinary 
 sufferings, which affected whole classes of men, 
 excited no pity, and were treated as a part of 
 the natural order of things, providential dis- 
 pensations which it might even be impious to 
 endeavor to counteract." If space were suffi- 
 cient, many illustrations could be given to show 
 the radical difference between Christianity on its 
 manward side and the teachings of other 
 religions and of ancient philosophers; but, as it 
 is, only two or three striking contrasts can be
 
 Our Point of View. 33 
 
 adduced. Let us take Brahmanism, which has 
 governed for centuries the life of millions of 
 human beings : In contrast to the brotherhood 
 of men and their essential equality in the sight 
 of God, the Father of them all, we have the 
 doctrine that one class of men comes from the 
 mouth of God and are forever superior to all 
 other classes of men from whom they are 
 separated by a line which it is the height of 
 impiety to cross. The Brahmans are raised so 
 high above other men that a man who strikes 
 one of them but with a blade of grass is regarded 
 as worthy the condemnation of hell. Now, 
 below the Brahmans there is another class, or 
 caste, created from the arms of God ; below 
 these there is still another class of men created 
 from the thighs of God, and below these there is 
 still a class, the Sudras, springing from the feet 
 of God, and these are regarded as unworthy 
 even to read the Brahman scriptures. But even 
 now we are not at the end, because below this 
 lowest class we have those who belong to no 
 class the Pariahs, veritable outcasts. Thus we 
 have the Indian system of castes, which is an 
 essential part of the Indian religion. 
 
 The nations which previous to Christ attained 
 the highest degree of civilization were the Greeks 
 and the Romans, and it would probably be 
 admitted that among them three of the most
 
 34 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 enlightened and, at the same time, humane men 
 were of the Greeks, Plato and Aristotle, and of 
 the Romans, the orator and philosopher, Cicero. 
 Plato is so far from regarding all men as em- 
 braced in one universal brotherhood, that he 
 divides them into classes, separate and distinct 
 in very nature. We find in Plato, men of gold, 
 men of silver, men of brass, and men of clay ; and 
 the lower orders subsist for the gain of the 
 higher orders. The English authority on Plato, 
 Professor Jowett, states that in Plato we find 
 few traces of even humanity to slaves, 1 and 
 humanity, as we have seen, occupies a far lower 
 rank than philanthropy. Slavery was accepted 
 and defended as a permanent basis of civilization, 
 and so far was Plato from the universality of 
 Christ, that he looked upon all the human race, 
 outside the Greeks, as naturally slaves. 
 
 Aristotle was in theory and practice a man 
 who must rank high among the ancients on 
 account of his humanity, yet, in speaking of men 
 in general, he says : " The lower sort are by 
 nature slaves, and it is better for them, as for all 
 inferiors, that they should be under the rule of 
 a master. . . . The use made of slaves, or of 
 tame animals, is not very different ; for both 
 
 1 See Jowett's Translation of Plato, vol. 5, p. xciv. 
 Jowett himself says that Christ first " taught men to love their 
 enemies." College Sermons, p. 165.
 
 Our Point of View. 35 
 
 with their bodies minister to the needs of life. 
 It is clear, then, that some men are by nature 
 free, and others slaves, and that for these latter, 
 slavery is both expedient and right." 
 
 Cicero, the ethical philosopher, asks the ques- 
 tion, Who would not slay ten slaves of whom one 
 had been guilty of murder, rather than let the 
 guilty one escape? It seems to him far better 
 that nine innocent slaves should suffer death 
 than that the guilty one should escape. 
 
 Need we bring all this in contrast with the 
 whole life and teachings of Christ ? Surely all 
 the words of Christ, and the whole life of Christ 
 from beginning to end, bring us into a different 
 world of thought and feeling. Christ taught us 
 universal, all-embracing love, and so far was He 
 from regarding the lower orders as created sim- 
 ply to subserve the gain of the higher orders, 
 that He especially enjoined upon the higher to 
 use their superiority to elevate the lower orders, 
 even those most wretched and degraded. He, 
 Himself, set the example in the lowly office of 
 washing the feet of His disciples, and told them 
 that " Whosoever will be great among you, 
 let him be your minister; and whosoever will 
 be chief among you, let him be your servant : 
 even as the Son of man came not to be min- 
 istered unto, but to minister, and to give His 
 
 1 Aristotle's Politics, translated by Jowett, I, c. 5, 8-n.
 
 36 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 life a ransom for many." ' Christ habitually asso- 
 ciates with the poor and the outcasts, and this 
 is something so strange and unusual that His 
 contemporaries cannot grasp the principle upon 
 which He acted, for they express their constant 
 astonishment and also their condemnation. It 
 was a strange leader among the Jews who loved 
 to associate with publicans and sinners. But 
 notice this: When John the Baptist asked for 
 proofs of the Messiahship of Christ, those which 
 Jesus offered were His ministry unto weak and 
 feeble folk. We all remember how John, when in 
 prison, sent two of his disciples to Christ, " And 
 said unto Him, Art thou He that should come, 
 or do we look for another?" And how Jesus 
 answered, " Go and show John again those things 
 which ye do hear and see : the blind receive their 
 sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, 
 and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and 
 the poor have the Gospel preached to them." 2 
 
 But note this, further : Christ describes the 
 last judgment when He gathers about Him all 
 the nations of the earth, separating them one 
 from another like a shepherd dividing his sheep 
 from his goats. But what is the test ? Ministry 
 to the lowly, to the abandoned, to the outcast ; 
 feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, 
 clothing the naked, visiting those sick and those 
 1 Matthew xx, 26-28. s Matthew xi, 2-5.
 
 Our Point of View. 37 
 
 in prison. Brahmanism says: " He who strikes 
 a Brahman with a blade of grass is worthy of 
 hell." Christ says those who neglect to minister 
 unto the lowest of the needy and wretched of 
 earth shall be cast away into everlasting punish- 
 ment. 
 
 But we must consider at somewhat greater 
 length Buddhism and Stoicism, because these 
 two are held to have the strongest claim to rank 
 with Christianity with respect to altruism. 
 
 Buddhism has received much praise lately, and 
 has even found adherents in Christian lands. It 
 is claimed that Buddhism inculcates a lofty phi- 
 lanthropy like that of Christianity, and choice 
 selections from the sacred writings of Buddhism 
 give a show of color for this assertion. We read, 
 for example, that toward the close of his life, 
 Siddartha or Gotama Buddha, the founder of 
 Buddhism, addressed his followers in these words: 
 "Beloved mendicants, if you revere my memory, 
 love all the disciples as you love me and my doc- 
 trines." Another saying of Gotama Buddha is 
 this : " As even at the risk of her own life a 
 mother watches over her child, her only child, 
 let him [that is, the Buddhist saint] exercise good 
 will without measure toward all beings." Still 
 another saying reminds us of the eulogy of love 
 written by the Apostle Paul in the thirteenth 
 chapter of First Corinthians: " If a man live a
 
 38 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 hundred years and spend the whole of his time 
 in religious attentions and offerings, ... all this 
 is not equal to an act of pure love." 
 
 Now we will not criticise the favorable pres- 
 entations of Buddhism which have recently been 
 made, nor will we attempt at present to show 
 how probable it is that the glory of Christianity 
 has been reflected back on Buddhism, making it 
 brilliant with a brilliancy not its own. Let us 
 take Buddhism at its best and gratefully acknowl- 
 edge all its services, its sympathy with all created 
 things, and its devotion to the good of men and 
 animals, and ask ourselves the question : Have 
 we in Buddhism a real and genuine philanthropy 
 like that revealed in Christ? 
 
 First : The end of Buddhism is escape from 
 the pains of existence in Nirvana, which, if it be 
 existence at all and not annihilation a disputed 
 point is an existence as impersonal as that of 
 the jellyfish floating on a quiet sea of peace, and 
 " drinking in the warm fluid in a state of lazy, 
 blissful repose." : The end of Christianity is life, 
 more life, and yet ever more life, spent in service. 
 
 Second : The altruism of Buddhism is largely 
 based on a desire for the suppression of the ego 
 of self. Self-assertion means desire, and desire 
 brings continued existence from which Buddhism 
 seeks relief. The suppression of self, and thus 
 
 1 Sir Monier Williams's Buddhism, p. 141.
 
 Our Point of View. 39 
 
 the cessation of the possibility of service to others, 
 is its ideal. Christianity means the suppression 
 of selfishness, but the enlargement of self in 
 service. 
 
 Third : Buddhism knows no personal father- 
 hood of God. The God of Gotama Buddha was 
 " the Unknowable," for only the laws of nature 
 could be known in obedience to which Nirvana 
 might be found. Christianity gives us the father- 
 hood of God, a condition of genuine brother- 
 hood, and brotherhood is the basis of altruism. 
 Buddhism takes away the very foundation of 
 philanthropy. 
 
 Fourth : Buddhism is essentially a philosophy 
 of individualism, whereas social solidarity is an 
 essential part of Christianity. In Buddhism each 
 man stands alone. Karma, justice, rules all; 
 everything which we suffer comes to us from a 
 guilty past in our present existence, or some one 
 of innumerable past existences. From Karma no 
 one can release us. We work out our own sal- 
 vation in self-culture, self-abnegation, self-cruci- 
 fixion, and cessation of rebirths when Nirvana is 
 reached. Christianity binds men together in sin 
 and in salvation. Heredity and environment en- 
 circle us all with common ties. Christianity in 
 its very essence is a social religion. Buddhism 
 is self-centered ; Christianity directs attention 
 outward to others. The salvation of Buddhism
 
 40 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 is a purely individual salvation ; the salvation of 
 Christ is a social salvation as well as an individual 
 salvation. 
 
 Fifth : Buddhism seeks escape from this world 
 and directs conduct to this end. Its rules of 
 action are preparation for future nonexistence, 
 or at best semipersonal existence. At any rate, 
 Buddhism directs attention away from this world ; 
 its religion is " otherworldliness." Christianity 
 teaches eternal life, but eternal life begun now in 
 the present world and gained in a right use of 
 the present world. " If you would live with 
 Christ in the next world, you must live like 
 Christ in this world." This otherworldliness of 
 Buddhism weakens essentially its philanthropy. 
 
 We cannot dwell long on Stoicism, which, like 
 Buddhism, we are considering only in one of its 
 aspects. There is much that is grand and noble 
 in it, and for this we are grateful. There is no 
 reason why we should hesitate to give it its full 
 share of praise. Christianity is not contrary to 
 the best in other religious beliefs and in other 
 philosophical systems, but it is simply superior 
 to all others. It is an unfolding as well as a 
 revelation. What is highest and purest outside 
 of Christianity but strengthens Christianity. The 
 three Stoics most quoted are Seneca, a contem- 
 porary of the Apostle Paul, and Epictetus and 
 
 1 Charles Kingsley.
 
 Our Point of View. 41 
 
 Marcus Aurelius, of the second century of our 
 era. It seems to the present writer not im- 
 probable that sayings of Christ and His apostles 
 and something of the spirit of Christianity may 
 have reached these Stoics. He is aware of the 
 grounds urged against this view, but does not 
 regard them as sufficient. However, this is a 
 minor matter. 
 
 First of all, Stoicism was a philosophy for a 
 select few and Christianity a life for all. The 
 fact that no effort was made to extend to all men 
 the benefits of the Stoic philosophy shows that 
 the loftiest of the Stoics were not animated by 
 the philanthropy of Christ. Second : The father- 
 hood of God was not an essential part of the 
 Stoic philosophy. God was nature, a great 
 Power to be obeyed, obeyed cheerfully, but a 
 Power not to be moved by human wants, desires, 
 and petitions. If an idea of a closer relation 
 than a cold one to nature is discovered among 
 the Stoics, this idea is neither habitual nor vital. 
 Third : The brotherhood of man as taught is weak. 
 We are children of Zeus, the father of us all, it is 
 said ; but does this mean more than that we are 
 all products of great natural forces ? We are all 
 partakers in common reason. We should regard 
 all men as fellow-citizens of our world and ab- 
 stain from unkindness. The benevolence toward 
 all men of the Stoics was chiefly negative. A
 
 42 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 doctrine like the Christian doctrine of sins of 
 omission in our relations to our fellows is some- 
 thing which cannot be found in Stoicism. " In- 
 asmuch as ye did it not," Christ said, but phi- 
 lanthropy of this kind was something that not 
 even Marcus Aurelius taught. Fourth : Stoicism 
 was cold, impassive, self-centered. Its ideal was 
 in some respects like that of Buddhism. Self- 
 centered superiority to the passions of life, pas- 
 sive acceptance of the allotments of a Superior 
 Power, an unruffled temper in time of prosperity 
 and time of adversity these were ideals, and their 
 attainment was an individual work. The Stoic 
 was, too, an individualist. Yet not always did the 
 Stoic counsel passive acceptance, because when 
 life offered nothing and duties to friends did not 
 hold one back, suicide was a wise act. As has 
 been well said, Stoicism, like the philosophy of 
 many Oriental nations, was barely above the 
 suicide mark. Shall we then be led away by 
 comparisons of this cold philosophy with the 
 life-giving power of Christianity, Christianity 
 which means fullness of life for self and for 
 others? 
 
 A college-bred woman, a friend of the author, 
 gives in the following words her own experience 
 in an attempt to find a refuge in Stoicism : 
 
 " Originally I had derived a great deal of hap- 
 piness from the commonplaces of everyday life,
 
 Our Point of View. 43 
 
 but the continued ill health of those with whom 
 I was associated baffled all plans for the future 
 and present. 
 
 " The problem was how to live and meet suc- 
 cessfully the disappointments that the future was 
 certain to bring, with no possible hope of phys- 
 ical recovery for the one dearest to me and all 
 that that entailed. 
 
 "The only sane conduct for me seemed to be 
 to keep myself steeled against delusive hopes 
 and nerved up to meet every possible disappoint- 
 ment. 
 
 "For two years I tried most conscientiously 
 to be a Stoic, holding myself self-poised to meet 
 every emergency. There is no doubt that I 
 gained greatly in self-control ; but the range of 
 my life became so restricted as to become finally 
 unbearable. 
 
 " This was the result that might have been 
 foreseen, but I failed to see it. 
 
 " If it was the greatest virtue to be self-con- 
 tained and self-controlled, then it was as great a 
 virtue for others to be self-contained ; reliance 
 on self was as salutary for others as for me, and 
 the altruistic attempt to benefit others might not 
 help indeed, it might hinder their progress to- 
 ward self-dependence. There was not the demand 
 or occasion for personal contact and helpfulness 
 that there was before. My interests became
 
 44 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 more circumscribed and self-centered ; the in- 
 tense individualism of the Stoic ideal steadily 
 undermined my interests in others, until my life 
 became so intolerably narrow to me that in self- 
 defense I was compelled to discard altogether 
 the Stoic ideal of life. 
 
 " I had learned self-dependence, but with it 
 my life had become pauperized." 
 
 Anything so fundamental as our religious con- 
 victions must find expression in all our activities, 
 and the absence of the Christ-view, exalting 
 man, is discerned in the art, literature, and cus- 
 toms of all heathen lands. Bishop Westcott, 
 with his deep insight, observes that in the " mar- 
 velous products of Indian industries at Kensing- 
 ton . . . you will search in vain, I think, in all 
 that multitudinous display of ornament, rich in 
 exquisite harmonies of colors and in delicacy of 
 patient skill, for one trace of reverence for man. 
 Every human form . . . there . . . is either gro- 
 tesque or hideous." ' 
 
 If, with this point of view in mind, which our 
 comparisons have brought out, we read the entire 
 New Testament, we shall see many things which 
 have escaped our attention heretofore. We shall 
 find that God's commands to man are not arbi- 
 trary, but that they have their ground in the 
 welfare of man. This is plainly stated over and 
 
 1 Bishop 13. F. Westcott, Social Aspects of Christianity, p 59.
 
 Our Point of View. 45 
 
 over again. There is an inclination on the part 
 of many to make a distinction between things 
 wrong in themselves, and things which somehow 
 are wrong, but are not wrong in themselves. 
 Among those wrongs of a lesser order it will be 
 found that men place those acts which bear hardly 
 on others ; those things which grieve and injure 
 others. But we are taught plainly by Christian- 
 ity that the purpose of the most fundamental 
 laws is the welfare of men, and in the promotion 
 of this welfare we find the unity of all those laws 
 which regulate our social conduct. 
 
 Why should we not steal ? The answer will 
 probably be because God has commanded us to 
 abstain from theft ; but St. Paul does not hesi- 
 tate to give us a human reason : " Let him that 
 stole," says the apostle, " steal no more ; but 
 rather let him labor, working with his hands the 
 thing which is good, that he may have to give 
 to him that needeth." ' What does this mean ? 
 It signifies that the thief engages in conduct 
 which is socially negative ; he destroys wealth ; 
 instead of contributing to others, he takes from 
 others. He is enjoined to cease this negative 
 line of conduct, and to engage in positive, con- 
 structive work. And for what purpose ? In 
 order that as a result of his work he may have to 
 give to him that needeth. 
 
 1 Ephesians iv, 28.
 
 46 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 Why should we speak the truth ? St. Paul 
 says, because "we are members one of another." ' 
 As it is put by another, 2 " untruthfulness is an 
 offense against our fellowship in Christ." 
 
 But how this point of view throws light on 
 many other injunctions which have proved a 
 stumbling-block! Why should women adorn 
 themselves in "modest apparel," with "shame- 
 facedness and sobriety ; " not with " braided hair, 
 or gold, or pearls, or costly array?" When an 
 answer is given which implies asceticism, it pro- 
 vokes a rebellious feeling. Why should not we 
 enjoy all these good things of the world? When 
 this sort of an answer is given it is seen to be in 
 clear contradiction of the general tenor of Christ's 
 teachings. But the apostle did not stop at this 
 point ; he added an explanation for his com- 
 mand, telling us plainly that it was becoming in 
 women, professing godliness, to adorn themselves 
 with good works.* The other kind of adorn- 
 ment did two things contrary to the law of love: 
 First, it turned attention away from one's 
 fellows, from social duties and can we not see 
 this to-day all about us? and, furthermore, it 
 consumed that substance which could be used to 
 minister to the needy. 
 
 Our point of view gives us a guide for individ- 
 
 1 Ephesians iv, 25. 2 Bishop B. F. Westcott. 
 
 3 1 Timothy ii, 8-10.
 
 Our Point of View. 47 
 
 ual reform and social reconstruction. It puts 
 new meaning into what St. Paul tells : "And if I 
 bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and if I 
 give my body to be burned, but have not love, 
 it profiteth me nothing." 1 In fact, it profiteth 
 nobody anything. It does no good to the world. 
 Giving without love has so degenerated that the 
 very word " charity " has become an offense, and 
 men ask if benevolence has not done more harm 
 than good. Giving may have done more harm 
 than good ; not benevolence. Love makes 
 fruitful giving possible. That is, perhaps, the 
 one great lesson of Tolstoi's What to Do. But 
 love bridges over the chasm between human 
 souls, and makes it if more blessed to give than 
 to receive still a blessing to receive, for under 
 the law of love, both giving and receiving are 
 directed by a wisdom born of loving thought and 
 care. This is the lesson which we must learn 
 over and over again, coming back continually to 
 the point of view of Christ. 
 
 1 1 Corinthians, xiii, 3.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE RELATIONS OF THE OLD AND 
 THE NEW TESTAMENTS SO- 
 CIALLY CONSIDERED.
 
 " MORE than once did the Hebrew kings seek to break away 
 from the intermeddling of the clergy ; but God smote the poli- 
 tician and not the prophet. . . . Saul meddled with Samuel's 
 duties, and God took his kingdom from him. But Samuel was 
 never censured for his intermeddling with the affairs of Saul. 
 David had to submit to the authority of more than one priest. 
 No priest was ever compelled to silence before him. Isaiah, 
 Ezekiel, Jeremiah, Hosea, Amos, all the preachers of righteous- 
 ness dwelt on social and civil sins. They dwelt on hardly 
 anything else." Bishop G. Haven, National Sermons. 
 
 " The great idea that the Bible is the history of mankind's 
 deliverance from all tyranny, outward as well as inward ; of the 
 Jews, as the one free constitutional people among a world of 
 slaves and tyrants ; of their ruin, as the righteous fruit of a 
 voluntary return to despotism ; of the New Testament, as the 
 good news that freedom, brotherhood, and equality, once con- 
 fided only to Jud3ea and to Greece, and dimly seen even there, 
 was henceforth to be the right of all mankind, the law of all 
 society who was there to tell me that ? Who is there now to 
 go forth and tell it to the millions who have suffered and 
 doubted and despaired like me, and turn the hearts of the 
 disobedient to the wisdom of the just, before the great and 
 terrible day of the Lord come ? Again I ask who will go 
 forth and preach that Gospel, and save his native land ? " 
 Charles Kingsley, Alton Locke, p. 323.
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 51 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE RELATIONS OF THE OLD AND THE NEW 
 TESTAMENTS SOCIALLY CONSIDERED. 
 
 ONE of the marked features of Biblical study 
 at the present time is the increased atten- 
 tion given to the Old Testament. This is most 
 fortunate, for the New Testament cannot be 
 understood except as a growth out of the Old. 
 The social teachings, however, of the New Testa- 
 ment have not as yet by anyone been brought 
 into sufficiently close connection with the social 
 law of the Hebrews, and consequently those 
 teachings are only inadequately grasped, even 
 when not fully misinterpreted. The cry has 
 been raised, "Back to Christ," but to go back 
 to the real teachings of Christ we must go back 
 to the Old Testament. 1 
 
 It cannot be our purpose in this little book to 
 treat this subject exhaustively, for that would 
 require vast study and a large work. Certain 
 suggestions, however, may be thrown out which 
 
 1 Some say the rallying cry should be, " Forward to Christ." 
 This is equally true, but it is, after all, expressing the same 
 idea, only in other words.
 
 52 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 will prove helpful as a guide to thought and 
 study. 
 
 The purpose of all the laws and regulations 
 of both the Old and the New Testaments is 
 undoubtedly the glory of God and the welfare 
 of man in society ; or, more simply, the welfare 
 of society. But the Bible teaches us more and 
 more clearly, as we proceed in Biblical history, 
 that the glory of God means the welfare of 
 society. We can do nothing for God, Himself, 
 whose are all the riches of the earth ; " the cattle 
 on a thousand hills," as the Psalmist sings ; but 
 we can do something for his creatures, and all 
 divine institutions have a social purpose. 
 
 If we take up the Old Testament and read it, 
 we find that we have in it the history of Israel. 
 In this history we have laws and regulations for 
 the upbuilding of a national morality, but with 
 glimpses of something larger. The promise was 
 to Abraham that in him all the nations of the 
 earth should be blessed ;' and this larger view 
 was something which was never entirely lost 
 from the consciousness of the wisest and best in 
 the nation. 
 
 The religion of the Jews was designed for the 
 welfare of society, furnishing a sanction for social 
 conduct in the individual. Of this the greatest 
 and best in Israel had a keen consciousness. 
 
 1 Genesis xvii, 18.
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 53 
 
 The nation and the glories of the nation filled 
 the minds and hearts of those Israelites in whom 
 God was represented as specially well pleased. 
 And reference is always had to provision made 
 for the weak and the feeble. This is the pecul- 
 iar glory of Israel, making Israel stand out in 
 bold relief from the other nations of antiquity. 
 This is the meaning of the land laws, of the 
 usury laws, of the regulations of the year of 
 Jubilee and other laws of this kind: "And 
 when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou 
 shalt not make clean riddance of the corners of 
 thy field when thou reapest, neither shalt thou 
 gather any gleaning of thy harvest : thou shalt 
 leave them unto the poor, and to the stranger." 1 
 David said : " I have been young, and now am 
 old ; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, 
 nor his seed begging bread." This was a 
 natural outcome of the law of Israel, and must 
 always be the case when righteous social laws 
 prevail. It was all this which made the law of 
 Israel a delight in which one could " meditate 
 day and night ;" a fortress, a bulwark, a protec- 
 tion against every vicissitude of fortune. Think 
 what this means ! Does anyone ever sing the 
 praises in these tones of a modern code ? 
 
 And when the law ceased to carry out the 
 divine purposes, God's wrath is kindled and His 
 'Leviticus xxiii, 22.
 
 54 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 prophets proclaim His anger in thunder tones: 
 " Rise up, ye women that are at ease. . . . 
 Many days and years shall ye be troubled, ye 
 careless women : . . . Upon the land of my 
 people shall come up thorns and briers. . . . 
 The palaces shall be forsaken ; the multitude of 
 the city shall be left ; the forts and towers shall 
 be for dens forever, a joy of wild asses, a pasture 
 of flocks ; until the Spirit be poured upon us 
 from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful 
 field, and the fruitful field be counted for a 
 forest. 
 
 " Then judgment shall dwell in the wilderness, 
 and righteousness remain in the fruitful field. 
 And the work of righteousness shall be peace ; 
 and the effect of righteousness, quietness and 
 assurance forever." 
 
 Still clearer are verses from another chapter, 
 namely, chapter v : "And now go to ; I will tell 
 you what I will do to my vineyard : I will take 
 away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up ; 
 and break down the wall thereof, and it shall be 
 trodden down : 
 
 "And I will lay it waste : it shall not be pruned, 
 nor digged ; but there shall come up briers and 
 thorns : I will also command the clouds that 
 they rain no rain upon it. 
 
 " For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the 
 
 1 Isaiah xxxii, 9-17.
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 55 
 
 house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleas- 
 ant plant : and he looked for judgment, but be- 
 hold oppression ; for righteousness, but behold 
 a cry. 
 
 " Woe unto them that join house to house, 
 that lay field to field, till there be no place, that 
 they may be placed alone in the midst of the 
 earth ! 
 
 " In mine ears said the Lord of hosts, Of a 
 truth many houses shall be desolate, even great 
 and fair, without inhabitant." ' 
 
 Turning to Jeremiah, chapter v, we have the 
 heading, "Judgments upon the Jews." 5 The 
 chapter opens with these words : " Run ye to and 
 fro through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, 
 and know, and seek in the broad places thereof, 
 if ye can find a man, if there be any that ex- 
 ecuteth judgment, that seeketh the truth; and 
 I will pardon it." 
 
 Then we have specifications, as idolatry and 
 adultery, then denunciations and warnings ; then 
 in verses 25-29 we find these words: 
 
 "Your iniquities have turned away these things, 
 and your sins have withholden good things from 
 you. 
 
 " For among my people are found wicked men : 
 they lay wait, as he that setteth snares ; they set 
 a trap, they catch men. 
 
 1 Isaiah v, 5-9. * Chapter v, i, and 25-29.
 
 56 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 " As a cage is full of birds, so are their houses 
 full of deceit : therefore they are become great, 
 and waxen rich. 
 
 " They are waxen fat, they shine : yea, they 
 overpass the deeds of the wicked: they judge 
 not the cause, the cause of the fatherless, yet 
 they prosper ; and the right of the needy do they 
 not judge. 
 
 " Shall I not visit for these things ? saith the 
 Lord : shall not my soul be avenged on such a 
 nation as this?" 
 
 We cannot understand the separation of the 
 Jews from other nations, and the strong con- 
 demnation of the practices of these other na- 
 tions, unless we know at the same time what 
 those practices carried with them. We do not 
 for a moment deny that God wished for Himself 
 the services of Israel. It is repeatedly declared 
 that God is a jealous God. But warnings against 
 idolatry have also a social significance which is 
 brought out clearly when it is ascertained what 
 the worship of false gods carried with it. The 
 abominations of all sorts which are condemned, 
 embraced immorality of every kind, often a very 
 part of the worship of the false gods; cruelties 
 of every description, including even human sac- 
 rifice. 
 
 The office of the Jews was to establish right 
 relations among themselves, first for themselves,
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 57 
 
 then for others. The nation is God's instrument 
 for the establishment of universal righteousness. 
 " In many epochs of the world, nationalism is 
 often the truest universalism." ' This is not the 
 place to enter into an exhaustive discussion of 
 the treatment which the heathen nations received 
 at the hands of the Jews, yet a few thoughts in 
 the present connection may prove helpful. The 
 Jewish nation conceived it to be its mission to 
 punish and exterminate utterly certain corrupt 
 and depraved tribes. First, let us remember 
 that in all ages the nation has control over life 
 and death, and that that is righteous in the na- 
 tion which is criminal in the individual. This 
 holds with respect to property as well as person. 
 This is recognized by religious teachers of all 
 ages, as well as the greatest political philosophers 
 who have ever lived. The nation is an instru- 
 ment in carrying out God's plans, and it need 
 not excite astonishment if the mission is given to 
 the Jews to exterminate utterly debased and de- 
 praved nations, whose degradation has proceeded 
 so far that their condition is a hopeless one. It 
 it said, to be sure, that the innocent suffer with 
 the guilty. That must always be so in this world. 
 
 1 Rev. W. H. Fremantle, D.D., The World as the Subject of 
 Redemption, second edition, p. 76. It can scarcely be necessary 
 to remark that universalism here means much the same thing 
 as cosmopolitanism.
 
 58 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 It is a part of the social solidarity which is one 
 of the profoundest laws of the world, and brings 
 before us a truth of science, of history, and of 
 religion, namely, that there is no such thing as a 
 purely individual sin. 1 
 
 The difficulties which so many persons have 
 with the Old Testament, in so far as these dif- 
 ficulties pertain to the relations between the 
 Jews and other nations, are largely due to a one- 
 sided religion. We have of late been led by an 
 extreme reaction against neglect of the individ- 
 ual in Church and State to lose any keen con- 
 sciousness of what Church and State mean. We 
 have to do in the Old Testament with God's 
 dealings with nations rather than individuals who 
 were reached through the nation. But if our 
 teachers no longer know what the nation means, 
 if they have no idea of the part which in 
 past history the nation has played in the work 
 of God in the world, if they do not perceive that 
 God is still working through the nation in the 
 redemption of the world, if they have no sense 
 of the gradual unfolding of God's purpose and 
 of the growth of righteousness in the world such 
 as is indicated by Christ's words, " first the blade, 
 then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear ;" 
 
 1 Those who are interested in the study of this point are re- 
 ferred to two great works by Professor von Oettingen, Die Moral- 
 statistik, and Die Christliche Sittenlehre.
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 59 
 
 then how can we wonder if in their flocks there 
 are many who are distressed and troubled by 
 that which cannot be understood by those who 
 look upon each individual as a disconnected atom 
 and not as one of a family, a member of a nation, 
 and a part of humanity? 
 
 One or two further suggestions may be offered. 
 There have been wars in the past in all lands, 
 and wars still continue. Much as these are to 
 be deplored, earnestly as we may strive for the 
 abolition of war, we must acknowledge that 
 through war as well as peace human progress 
 has been achieved. Every historian asserts this. 
 Can we then fail to say that in ourworld, composed 
 of weak, ignorant, sinful men, wars have been a 
 part of God's plans for mankind ? If we have 
 any knowledge of the general conditions of the 
 world at the time when the Jewish nation made 
 war upon foreign tribes and nations, we know 
 that they were not ripe for the message of inter- 
 national peace. Moreover, we are plainly taught 
 that God's messages were adapted to their con- 
 dition. As Christ said, Moses suffered certain 
 things because of the hardness of their hearts. 
 Consequently war and conquest were not forbid- 
 den, but an effort was made to render war far 
 more humane than it was among the oriental 
 nations, and what was commanded the Jews in 
 this respect was a marvelous advance on what
 
 60 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 had been and still was customary. Limits were 
 set to cupidity as a motive of conquest in the 
 command not to take the silver and gold on the 
 graven images, 1 and a more considerate treat- 
 ment of foreigners living among them in a state 
 of bondage was urged, than was taught by the 
 most enlightened of the Greeks and Romans be- 
 fore the time of Christ. 
 
 Even while we second with all our might ef- 
 forts to establish peace among nations., it would 
 be rash in the extreme to say that war has now 
 accomplished its purpose while oriental barbar- 
 ities such as have recently been witnessed in 
 Armenia still continue. And what, indeed, has 
 maintained the power of Turkey in this century? 
 Is it the gentleness and love of the Christian 
 nations of Europe? Quite to the contrary. The 
 fear of rival nations in commercial competition ; 
 in other words, the lust of gold has been a po- 
 tent factor in bolstering up the iniquity of the 
 Turk. And will Christians lament the fact if in 
 the fullness of time, in bloody war, the power of 
 Turkey is annihilated and ceases to curse the 
 earth ? Yet Turkey is far more enlightened, far 
 more humane in her ordinary transactions, in her 
 usual civic life, than the depraved nations who, 
 
 1 Deuteronomy vii, 25. Compare the sermon, " The Nation 
 and the Church," by Frederick Denison Maurice, in The Patri- 
 archs and Lawgivers of the Old Testament.
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 61 
 
 after they had made full the cup of their iniq- 
 uities, were destroyed by the Jews. 
 
 The sacrifices and entire worship of the Jews 
 were national as well as individual. No one 
 could set up a church or a religious establishment 
 for himself. The ordinance of circumcision, which 
 was compulsory, was designed, among other 
 things, at any rate, to indicate national solidarity 
 in all its phases, religious and ethical. 
 
 The New Testament is a continuation of the 
 old dispensation, but with certain marked differ- 
 ences. The social law of the Old Testament, 
 which was designed to establish right relations 
 among the Hebrews, we distinguish from the 
 ceremonial law. The New Testament did two 
 things with respect to that social law of the Old 
 Testament which was designed to establish right 
 relations among men. First of all, it univer- 
 salized this social law; a national morality was 
 no longer sufficient ; the idea of ethical obliga- 
 tion, it has been said, is conterminous with the 
 idea of society. Heretofore society was exclu- 
 sively national, and morality was essentially na- 
 tional. Christianity replaces the national society 
 with a world-wide society and makes morality 
 universal. Our duty is no longer to those of 
 our own house, or even of our own nation, but 
 it is to all the world. 
 
 Christian thought has so permeated our life
 
 62 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 that it is hard for us to understand how difficult 
 it was for a Jew to comprehend this idea of a 
 universal society ; yet, in passing, we may observe 
 that it was easier for a Jew than it would have 
 been for a Greek. 
 
 It was necessary for Christ and His apostles 
 to come back, again and again, to this idea of 
 universal society and the corresponding extension 
 of ethical obligation, and approach the same sub- 
 ject from every standpoint ; and even then the 
 idea was only slowly grasped. It was one which 
 had gradual growth among the immediate dis- 
 ciples of Christ; one which was resisted stren- 
 uously by the new adherents of these disciples 
 among the Jews, and one which awakened in- 
 tensest anger on the part of the Jews in general. 
 
 Christ illustrates the universality of human 
 relations and brotherhood in the parable of the 
 Good Samaritan. "Who is my neighbor?" 
 The answer is given, Everyone who needs my 
 help. Moreover, it is a condition of salvation 
 that I should render help to the needy one. Be- 
 fore His crucifixion, Christ said, " I will draw all 
 men unto Me." After His resurrection He gave 
 commandment to His disciples, " Go ye, there- 
 fore, and teach all nations." 
 
 The teachings and deeds of the twelve apos- 
 tles, as recorded in the New Testament, show 
 how gradually this truth was received. It re-
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 63 
 
 quired a vision to persuade Peter to enter the 
 house of Cornelius, " one of another nation." 
 At last, the universal nature of Christ's religion 
 seemed to dawn upon Peter, and he said, " Of a 
 truth I perceive that God is no respecter of per- 
 sons: but in every nation he that feareth Him, 
 and worketh righteousness, is accepted with 
 Him." 1 
 
 The Jews were astonished when they found 
 that on the Gentiles was poured out the gift of 
 the Holy Ghost. The Apostle Paul was able to 
 obtain a hearing when, from the stairs of the 
 castle, he made his great speech to the Jews in 
 Jerusalem, until he announced the message which 
 had come unto him to go unto the Gentiles, and 
 then they " lifted up their voices, and said, Away 
 with such a fellow from the earth : for it is not 
 fit that he should live." 2 
 
 Now, the second thing which Christ did for 
 the social law establishing right relations among 
 men, was to intensify and elevate it. If we speak 
 of the Christian revelation in the first respect as 
 the " extension " of the social law, we may speak 
 of it in the second respect as its " intension." 
 This intension of the law is clear throughout the 
 utterances of Christ. Christ opposes what He 
 said to what Moses and their traditions had told 
 the Jews. Again and again he uses the words : 
 
 1 Acts x, 34, 35. 2 Acts xxii, 22.
 
 64 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 " Ye have heard that it hath been said . . . but 
 I say unto you." Whenever this is done, it is 
 not the act merely, but the evil thought or de- 
 sire with respect to our brother that is for- 
 bidden. In every case it is the very spirit of 
 the law which is to be carried out absolutely 
 without restriction, and we must not think an 
 evil thing with respect to our brother. " Ye 
 have heard that it was said by them of old time, 
 Thou shalt not kill ; and whosoever shall kill 
 shall be in danger of the judgment: but I say unto 
 you, That whosoever is angry with his brother 
 without a cause shall be in danger of the judg- 
 ment : and whosoever shall say to his brother, 
 Raca, shall be in danger of the council : but who- 
 soever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of 
 hell fire." 1 
 
 As in our day, so in the time of Christ, men 
 found all sorts of pretexts to justify themselves 
 in disobedience to the social law, and then, as 
 now, one of the most frequent seems to have 
 been gifts to further the maintenance of religious 
 worship. It was thus that evil persons justified 
 themselves for neglecting so plain a duty as the 
 obligation to contribute to the support, when 
 needful, of one's parents. If one said of money 
 which ought to have been given to a father or 
 mother, " It is corban," a gift for a religious 
 
 1 Matthew v, 21, 22.
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 65 
 
 establishment, then he was held to be under no 
 obligation to minister to his parents. But Christ 
 sternly rebuked those who maintained this tra- 
 dition, and said unto them, that thus they had 
 made the law of God of no effect. Christ men- 
 tions one duty after another to our fellows : love, 
 forgiveness, etc. ; and closes with, " Be ye there- 
 fore perfect, even as your Father which is in 
 heaven is perfect." ' 
 
 The intension of ethical obligation, as well as 
 its extension, is illustrated by the emphasis laid 
 on sins of omission. This is what the parable 
 of Dives and Lazarus means. The writer well 
 remembers a powerful sermon on this subject.* 
 The message of the divine was a plain, simple 
 one. We were asked, What was the offense of 
 Dives ? We have no reason to suppose that he 
 was not respectable, was not a pillar of society, 
 giving employment to many and all that sort 
 of thing. If we adhere to the Bible narrative 
 and we have no right to do anything else the 
 only fault we can find with him is that he did 
 not think. He did not consider the poor; he 
 passed by absorbed in his own concerns ; he did 
 not know the needs of the beggar at his gates ; 
 and so, we are told, he went to hell. 
 
 The same emphasis on omission is brought out 
 
 1 Matthew v, 48. 
 
 3 Preached by Bishop I. L. Nicholson, of Milwaukee, Wis.
 
 66 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 in the account of the last judgment : Those who 
 were sent away accursed are very much surprised 
 when they are told by the Great Judge, " I was 
 an hungered, and ye gave Me no meat : I was 
 thirsty, and ye gave Me no drink: I was a 
 stranger, and ye took Me not in : naked, and ye 
 clothed Me not : sick, and in prison, and ye vis- 
 ited Me not." In their astonishment they ask, 
 " When saw we Thee an hungered, or athirst, or 
 a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did 
 not minister unto Thee?" 1 But they are told 
 that their sin was one of omission ; they had not 
 done it to the least of the needy, and so they 
 had not done it to the Judge. The same em- 
 phasis on omission is given by St. James in his 
 epistle, " Therefore to him that knoweth to do 
 good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin." ! 
 
 St. Luke gives the spirit of Christ's entire mis- 
 sion in the sermon of Christ's which he records 
 early in his gospel : " 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, to preach 
 the acceptable year of the Lord." ! This to be 
 understood must be brought into immediate con- 
 nection with the Year of Jubilee, to which it re- 
 
 1 Matthew xxv, 31-46. J James iv, 17. 3 Luke, iv, 18, 19.
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 67 
 
 ferred. What was the purpose of the Year of 
 Jubilee? Manifestly it had a social purpose; it 
 aimed to abolish poverty, to secure as nearly as 
 practicable a competency for all, to prevent vast 
 accumulations, and generally to establish right 
 relations among men. Had Christ's meaning 
 been purely transcendental, referring to things 
 of another world entirely, He would have had 
 to explain himself to the Jews, whose hope was 
 for righteousness in this world. He evidently 
 wished them to think of the Year of Jubilee, and 
 they were pleased with His message, " And all 
 bare Him witness and wondered at the gracious 
 words which proceeded out of His mouth." ' 
 
 Take again the doctrine of stewardship. Un- 
 fortunately this doctrine gives satisfaction in 
 proportion as it is vague and general ; but, as 
 taught in the New Testament, it is definite and 
 precise enough. It has direct reference to the 
 relations of Israel to the land which the nation 
 held. This land was not the property of the 
 nation, not even of the family, much less of the 
 individual. It was God's property, and was as- 
 signed to families for their use under national 
 regulation. It was literally a trust. And it was 
 this trust which Christ extended and intensified. 
 
 Does not all this help us to understand better 
 what the apparently contradictory statements in 
 1 Lake iv, 22.
 
 68 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 regard to the law of Moses mean ? When the 
 abolition of the law is spoken of, or is advocated, 
 either in theory or practice, by Christ and His 
 apostles, we have to do with the ceremonial law 
 which separated the Jewish nation from other 
 nations. This law had to pass away precisely be- 
 cause it was a wall of separation ; but the social 
 law could not pass away, not even one "jot or 
 tittle," until all was fulfilled; on the contrary, 
 that was extended to all the world, and inten- 
 sified even to perfection. 
 
 Another thing must be noticed. Moses said 
 nothing about a future life ; his purpose was to 
 establish the right relations among men in this 
 world. He was well acquainted with the doc- 
 trine of the future life, and thus with the work- 
 ings in Egypt of a religious system which had 
 reference to the life to come, rather than the 
 present. It has been held, and as the writer be- 
 lieves truly, that it is a strong proof of the 
 divine character of the Old Testament that it is 
 confined to the present world. Christ takes, un- 
 doubtedly, a step in advance. He brings to light 
 and establishes conclusively, for all Christians, 
 the doctrine of the resurrection and immortality ; 
 in short, eternal life. But, note : This eternal 
 life begins in this world. The establishment of 
 right relations in this world is our work, and is 
 our preparation for the life to come. Again and
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 69 
 
 again, when Christ's disciples would peer curi- 
 ously into the future, they are turned aside to 
 the present life and its duties. Christ thus kept 
 in the footsteps of Moses, and His message was 
 simply a further evolution of the teachings of 
 Moses. His prayer says nothing about the 
 future life, but teaches us to pray, " Thy King- 
 dom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in 
 Heaven." 
 
 " But," it may be objected, " did not Christ 
 say in so many words, that His kingdom was not 
 of this world?" Yes, truly. But the interpre- 
 tation of these words cannot be extremely diffi- 
 cult when an attempt is made to interpret them 
 in harmony with the other sayings of Christ and 
 with the general spirit of His utterances. The 
 world is frequently used to denote age or dis- 
 pensation, and when we find the word " world " 
 in the Bible we shall often catch the true idea in- 
 volved if we substitute the word " age." Thus, 
 whether we say, " the present wicked world," or 
 " the present wicked age," is frequently im- 
 material. But more than this may be said. 
 The world which is condemned, and which is the 
 exact opposite of Christ's kingdom, is the world 
 used in the sense of worldliness, and worldliness 
 is essentially self-seeking, self-indulgence, and 
 neglect of one's highest interests, as well as the 
 welfare of others. When one condemns the
 
 70 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 worldly man or the worldly woman, one does 
 not imply of necessity any doubt as to the ulti- 
 mate triumph of Christ. We say of the worldly 
 person, and of the saint of God, " They live in 
 two different worlds." It is very true ; Christ's 
 kingdom is the direct antithesis of the one 
 world, while the other world is that kingdom. 
 The world in the bad sense is, indeed, defined 
 in the First Epistle General of John as " the lust 
 of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the 
 pride of life." * Yes, it is true ; Christ's kingdom 
 was not of the world which surrounded Him, nor 
 is it of the world which envelops us; but our 
 world is much nearer His coming kingdom. 
 Things are becoming new, old things are passing 
 away, and it is for Christ's people to make of the 
 kingdoms of this world Christ's kingdom. 
 
 Finally, a few words must be devoted to the 
 removal of misconceptions. We should remem- 
 ber, however, first of all in this connection, that 
 it is infidels rather than Christians who interpret 
 
 1 The Revised Version reads : "Vainglory of life" (i John 
 ii, 16). 
 
 Somewhat, but not precisely, the same idea is expressed in 
 the following quotation : " The artificial, conventional order 
 which communities establish among themselves an order un- 
 natural, transitory, and tending to corruption has been called 
 World, and has been contrasted by poets with Nature and by 
 theologians with God." Sir J. R. Seeley, Natural Religion, 
 p. 83.
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 71 
 
 Christ as one standing aloof from this world and 
 its concerns, and directing the attention of men 
 to the future life. If we would fairly understand 
 Christ's preaching and conduct, we must remem- 
 ber He was a member of a subjugated nation. 
 He was a Jew, living under the Roman power, 
 and one teaching obedience to the civil authori- 
 ties, paying tribute to Caesar, and obeying the 
 laws of Rome. When this is borne in mind, we 
 must be more and more astonished at the social 
 character of Christ's message. Naturally it was 
 not what it would have been had the Jewish 
 nation at that time been an independent sov- 
 ereign nation. To understand the position of 
 Christ, we must call before our mind the position 
 of missionaries in foreign lands let us say, Turkey 
 in Asia. Now, missionaries in a land like Turkey, 
 however much they may believe in social Chris- 
 tianity, must confine themselves exclusively to 
 individual work ; no other course is open to them. 
 This individual work must, they believe, sooner 
 or later, have its social consequences, and these 
 missionaries must all regret the limitations that 
 are imposed upon them ; yet Christ went much 
 further than any missionary say, to Armenia in 
 Turkey will go to-day. He spoke continually 
 of a kingdom, and this kingdom, however estab- 
 lished, means a social organization. The estab- 
 lishment of this kingdom was the supreme thing
 
 72 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 with Christ. His enemies knew very well that 
 this was a social message, and He knew it ; but 
 He adhered to His social message and laid down 
 His life for it. 
 
 It can scarcely be necessary to go into verse 
 after verse which is misinterpreted and often 
 used as a support to those who w r ould evade 
 social responsibility. " Render unto Caesar the 
 things that are Caesar's, and unto God the 
 things that are God's; " this is an injunction of 
 loyalty even to a foreign power which had con- 
 quered the nation. It recognized the sovereign 
 authority although established by conquest. It 
 is wrenching and twisting things out of all their 
 connection to make this precept of Christ's 
 imply an injunction on the part of Christians 
 to neglect the affair of this world. The whole 
 spirit of the Old and the New Testaments 
 teaches us that we must strive for national 
 righteousness and help to carry out God's pur- 
 pose, which is to make the kingdoms of this 
 world God's kingdoms. 
 
 Similarly Christ laid down principles which, 
 carried out, will establish right relations among 
 men. These right relations will be political, 
 economic, social. The distribution of wealth 
 will no more escape regulation in accordance 
 with the principles of mutual love than any 
 other social relation. But Christ refused, we
 
 The Old and New Testaments. 73 
 
 hear it said, to divide the inheritance between 
 two brothers when requested to do so by one 
 of them. 
 
 Those who wish to draw from this a general 
 principle in accordance with which Christianity 
 has no concern with the distribution of wealth, 
 should ask themselves what would have been 
 the result if Christ, Himself, had undertaken to 
 decide individual cases. First of all, we may 
 observe that He would have had no time or 
 energy for anything else. Second, we may 
 notice that He would have come into conflict 
 with the civil authorities. What Christ did was 
 to lay down general principles to be carried out 
 in detail by His followers in all generations to 
 come. He laid down principles by which men 
 were to settle their controversies, and His fol- 
 lowers developed institutions which had in 
 mind the regulation of economic and all other 
 social relations, and these they carried out as far 
 as the circumstances of the time permitted. 
 
 We thus see that the Gospel of Christ was an 
 extension and intension of the teachings of the 
 law and the prophets, and veritably " good 
 tidings of great joy " for all the nations of the 
 world, " from the rising of the sun, even unto 
 the going down of the same."
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE SOCIAL LAW OF SERVICE.
 
 " THEREFORE come what may, hold fast to love. Though men 
 should rend your heart, let them not embitter or harden it. We 
 win by tenderness, we conquer by forgiveness. O ! strive to 
 enter into something of that large celestial charity which is 
 meek, enduring, unretaliating, and which even the overbearing 
 world cannot withstand forever. Learn the new commandment 
 of the Son of God. Not to love merely, but to love as He loved. 
 Go forth in this spirit to your life duties ; go forth, children of 
 the Cross, to carry everything before you, and win victories for 
 God by the conquering power of a love like his." Rev. Freder- 
 ick W. Robertson, Sermons, p. 184.
 
 The Social Law of Service. 77 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE SOCIAL LAW OF SERVICE. 
 
 WE all crave happiness. Happiness is an end 
 of life which is worthy of effort, but it is 
 an end which must be subordinated to another 
 end if it is to be pursued successfully ; and this 
 other end is service. But service means sacrifice ; 
 apparently the opposite of happiness. We reach 
 this paradox then: Happiness is a worthy end 
 of our efforts ; but if we place it before ourselves 
 as the direct and immediate end to be striven 
 for, we cannot reach it. It will elude us. It 
 will be to us like the water all about Tantalus, 
 the cold flood welling ever to his chin, yet 
 always retreating from his fiery lips ; like the 
 fruit over his head which the winds whirled sky- 
 ward through the air : 
 
 " Whensoe'er, 
 
 The old man fain to cool his burning tongue, 
 Clutched with his fingers at the branches fair." 
 
 Individual lives repeat the race-history. If 
 you would attain to happiness seek something 
 else. Poets, philosophers, and prophets, all tell 
 us this, for to all it comes as the result of the
 
 78 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 deepest insight and the ripest experience. But 
 all go further. You must cast aside the 
 thought of happiness as a chief aim. You may 
 not keep it concealed in a corner of your mind 
 and heart as after all the main thing, but a 
 thing to be reached in a round-about way. You 
 cannot successfully juggle with yourself. You 
 must in very truth renounce yourself to find 
 yourself, and give up yourself to save yourself. 
 
 To the author's mind there are few more inter- 
 esting, more instructive, and withal pathetic life 
 histories than that of John Stuart Mill, penned 
 by himself. It is the story of a rarely gifted, 
 noble nature, purposely brought up outside of 
 the pale of Christianity and taught to look upon 
 all religions as so many forms of superstition, 
 yet gradually approaching the light as the years 
 passed by. Mill tells us that in his early life his 
 object was to be a reformer of the world, and 
 that his conception of his own happiness was 
 entirely identified with this object. He thought 
 he had the certainty of a happy life, because he 
 had placed his happiness in something durable 
 and distant ; in a goal toward which approach 
 could always be made although it could never be 
 reached. But Mill found that even so noble a 
 pursuit could not give permanent happiness when 
 happiness was the end sought. He reached a 
 period when existence seemed almost an intoler-
 
 The Social Law of Service. 79 
 
 able burden ; a burden which he himself said 
 was well described by Coleridge's lines on " De- 
 jection : " 
 
 "A grief without a pang, void, dark, and drear, 
 A drowsy, stifled, unimpassioned grief, 
 Which finds no natural outlet or relief, 
 In word, or sigh, or tear." 
 
 When a moderate happiness returned he discov- 
 ered that, " Those only are happy who have their 
 mind fixed on some object other than their own 
 happiness ; as, the happiness of others, on the 
 improvement of mankind, even on some art or 
 pursuit, followed not as a means, but as itself an 
 ideal end. Aiming thus at something else they 
 find happiness by the way." 
 
 We have in these words of Mill a partial state- 
 ment, at least, of the great ethical law of indi- 
 rectness. We reach ethical ends only indirectly. 
 Resolving to be good will in itself never make 
 us good. 
 
 But shall we heap paradox on paradox? We 
 have already found that while the craving for 
 happiness is natural and the desire for happiness 
 is legitimate, we shall lose it if we seek it. We 
 have discovered that the secret of life is renun- 
 ciation. We must sacrifice our life to receive it 
 in fullness. " Surely, then, self-sacrifice is an 
 end," we may be told. By no means. Self- 
 sacrifice in itself is no virtue and may not be 
 6
 
 80 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 made an end in itself. Self-sacrifice pursued 
 as an end leads to a gloomy asceticism which 
 would have us refuse the joy of life as some- 
 thing bad and hateful to the Giver of all good 
 things. Self-sacrifice bears its fruit of peace 
 and happiness, and life only when it is pursued 
 indirectly. 
 
 Self-sacrifice itself falls under the law of indi- 
 rectness. 'Let us listen to wise words of Bishop 
 Boyd Carpenter : " A man cannot perfect him- 
 self in anything if he seek perfection directly ; 
 for, if he does, the shadow of himself intervenes 
 and spoils his work. Sacrifice, when it is sought 
 as a sacrifice, has a self-consciousness which mars 
 its simplicity and spoils its moral force. When 
 men preach self-sacrifice self-sacrifice as the 
 moral force which can regenerate mankind they 
 forget that self-forgetful ness is essential to per- 
 fect sacrifice ; a sacrifice, undertaken because 
 sacrifice is noble, is alloyed with that self-regard- 
 ing look which mars its beauty in the view of the 
 soul itself. Sacrifice which knows itself as such 
 is not pure sacrifice." ' 
 
 Have we not seen this in those who have found 
 the secret of life? Have we not noticed how 
 those whose life is wholly given to others per- 
 haps in some far-away land, deprived of almost 
 everything which we hold dear speak of their 
 
 1 The Permanent Elements of Religion, pp. 36, 37.
 
 The Social Law of Service. 81 
 
 privileges ? Have we never heard a noble woman, 
 wholly given to good works in a dreary slum of a 
 great city, and who in the opinion of a host of 
 admiring friends is almost ready for canonization, 
 resent the thought that her life was one of self- 
 sacrifice ? Undoubtedly. And there is one word 
 that gives the key to these paradoxes. What is 
 it ? We know what it is : Love love, the se- 
 cret of the universe. Sacrifice is not an end in 
 itself, but sacrifice is the condition of service. 
 The law of society is service. This is the su- 
 preme law of society from which no one can es- 
 cape with impunity. Ethical teachers now 
 approach unanimity in the assertion that the 
 criterion of right conduct is social well-being. 
 The welfare of society is the test of conduct in 
 the individual. It would be interesting to take 
 four great writers a theologian, a jurist, a pro- 
 fessor of natural science, and a student of society 
 and to discover their entire and complete har- 
 mony in the view that the purpose of the rules 
 of right individual conduct is the welfare of so- 
 ciety. 
 
 There is one law, and only one, taught by the 
 Christian religion and on its manward side ; that 
 is, the law of love, which finds expression in the 
 social law of service. Christianity and ethical 
 science agree perfectly. Social welfare is the 
 test of right conduct. All right laws which reg-
 
 82 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 ulate human relations have in view the well-being 
 of society and they are all one. Thus it is true 
 that he who breaks any one law breaks all, for 
 they all have one source and one purpose. The 
 thief and the undutiful child, the murderer and 
 the slothful person, all alike have violated the 
 social law of service. When you utter unkind 
 words, when you neglect an opportunity to lend 
 a helping hand, when you spend material wealth 
 to gratify whim, caprice, vanity, instead of to 
 accomplish worthy ends, you have broken the 
 same law which has been violated by the crim- 
 inal classes in our prisons and penitentiaries. 
 
 This may seem like a hard saying, but the 
 more we ponder it, the more meaning it will have 
 for us. Arid the message which it conveys to us 
 is one which is needed in these days of great 
 wealth and easy-going self-indulgenee, if it ever 
 was needed. 
 
 It will be well for us to contrast at some length 
 Christian self-sacrifice, the condition of social 
 service with asceticism, which is its perversion. 
 The two following quotations will be so helpful 
 to us that we take them as a text in our treat- 
 ment of the entire subject of Christian self-sacri- 
 fice versus asceticism : 
 
 "Then said Jesus unto His disciples, If any 
 man will come after Me, let him deny himself, 
 and take up his cross, and follow Me.
 
 The Social Law of Service. 83 
 
 " For whosoever will save his life shall lose 
 it : and whosoever will lose his life for my sake 
 shall find it." ' 
 
 " The first condition of all really great moral 
 excellence is a spirit of genuine self-sacrifice and 
 self-renunciation." a 
 
 An enduring truth is expressed in these quo- 
 tations. The first is one of these pregnant say- 
 ings of Christ which have been bearing fruit for 
 nearly two thousand years, and which are as vital 
 to-day in Christendom as ever before. They 
 have, indeed, but begun to do their work, because 
 they contain lessons founded on the fundamental 
 principles of man's nature. They belong to no 
 age and to no country. They reveal that mar- 
 velous insight, not merely into human nature, 
 but into the depths of moral and spiritual truth, 
 which again and again has provoked from men 
 the spontaneous and surprised exclamation: 
 " Never man spake like this man." 3 What Emer- 
 son says with some exaggeration, perhaps of 
 Plato, is fully true of Christ in the sense in which 
 Emerson uses the words : " The citizen of an 
 Eastern [Greek] town, but no villager nor patriot." 
 Christ was one of those who, in the best sense of 
 the word, are cosmopolitan belonging to the 
 
 1 Matthew xvi, 24, 25. 
 
 8 Lecky, History of European Morals, ii, 155. 
 
 3 John vii, 46.
 
 84 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 world laying the foundations of a true patriot- 
 ism, yet not patriotic in a narrow and exclusive 
 sense, because transcending all national bounds. 
 
 The second quotation, taken from Lecky's 
 History of European Morals, is the author's pro- 
 found reflection after his admirable study of 
 Christian asceticism, and is, perhaps, all the more 
 significant because the author reaches his con- 
 clusions as a result, not of religious experiences, 
 but of independent investigations and historical 
 researches. 
 
 What is the difference between Christian self- 
 sacrifice and asceticism ? Certainly it is not in 
 the degree of self-renunciation. What asceticism 
 has exacted from those who have thought to find 
 in it the way of life, we may read in the painful 
 narrative of Lecky. Wife, husband, children, the 
 blessings of civilization enjoyed in the midst of 
 abundant comfort, pleasures of every sort, all 
 have been exchanged gladly for the hermit's 
 cell, often a wild beast's den in the desert, for 
 rags and filth, for the scantiest diet, for long 
 vigils, for castigations, for privations and suffer- 
 ings, which have cut short thousands of lives. 
 St. Simeon Stylites, on his pillar, bidding his at- 
 tendant replace the worms which fed on his 
 flesh, as they fell from the sickening sores of his 
 disgusting body, saying to the worms, " Eat what 
 God has given you," is a well-known type of the
 
 The Social Law of Service. 85 
 
 ascetic. Blaise Pascal is one of the higher types 
 of the ascetic, and his self-inflicted tortures are 
 described in these words : " To avoid wandering 
 and worldly thoughts when engaged in conversa- 
 tion, he took an iron girdle full of sharp points, 
 which he placed next to his flesh, and when con- 
 scious of an impulse to vanity, or even a feeling 
 of pleasure in the place where he happened to be, 
 he struck the girdle with his elbow in order to 
 increase the pain of the punctures. He ate a 
 certain regulated quantity of food whether hun- 
 gry or not, never exceeding it, however good his 
 appetite, and never eating less, however great 
 his loathing; and this on the ground that taking 
 food was a duty, which was never to be accom- 
 panied by any sensual pleasure. . . . He morti- 
 fied his affections not less than his body, and said 
 that we should never allow anyone to love us 
 with fondness ; in fostering such attachments we 
 occupied hearts which ought to be given solely 
 to God ; that it was robbing Him of that on 
 which He set most store. ' It is not right that 
 others should attach themselves to me, even if 
 they do it willingly and with pleasure. I should 
 deceive those in whom I excited such a feeling. 
 Am I not about to die? The object of their 
 love will then perish. As I should warn people 
 against believing a falsehood, however profitable 
 to me, I should warn them not to attach them-
 
 86 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 selves to me ; for their duty is to spend their 
 lives in striving to please God, or in seeking 
 Him.'" 1 
 
 Yet the sufferings of the ascetic were not more 
 severe than those which Christ invited His fol- 
 lowers to endure. How strange the allure- 
 ments held out to men to join the Christian 
 ranks in the time of Christ and His apostles ! 
 The birds of the air have their nests, the beasts 
 of the field have their holes, but I, the Christ, 
 have nowhere to lay My head, yet follow Me. I 
 am not to receive earthly honors, as has been 
 vainly supposed I shall be despised and re- 
 jected, persecuted to the death, hung upon the 
 shameful cross to die an ignominious death, yet 
 follow Me and see the things which I must suf- 
 fer. Do not think, however, that you will fare 
 better than I ! Far from it. If they have 
 called me Beelzebub, how much more shall they 
 call you the children of hell ! If I have been 
 maltreated, so shall you also be scourged, im- 
 prisoned, crucified. Follow Me and I will show 
 you how great things you must suffer for Me! 
 Did ever captain draw his hosts about him with 
 such promise of reward? Yet a response to the 
 call of Christ has never been lacking. From the 
 time of Christ to this day an interesting multi- 
 tude of believers have accepted the call to suffer 
 
 1 J. C. Morison, Service of Man, pp. 211, 212.
 
 The Social Law of Service. 87 
 
 for Christ, and accepted it not only without reser- 
 vation but with joy. Remember the conversion 
 of St. Paul. The disciple of Christ who hesitated 
 to receive the persecuting Saul is reassured with 
 these words : " He is a chosen vessel unto Me, . . . 
 for I will show him how great things he must 
 suffer for My name's sake." And St. Paul entered 
 on his work, not with assurances of great success 
 in a large field of usefulness, not with promises 
 of large victories as a result of battles with the 
 enemies of Christ, but with the knowledge that he 
 must bear unusual cruelties. This was his in- 
 citement, this was the inducement held out for 
 an alliance with a despised sect. Yet gladly did 
 St. Paul accept the proffer, and before the end 
 of his sufferings we find him describing with a 
 certain feeling of exultation his experiences as a 
 follower of the Nazarene : " Of the Jews five 
 times received I forty stripes save one. Thrice 
 was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice 
 I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have 
 been in the deep ; in journeyings often, in perils 
 of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine 
 own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in 
 perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in 
 perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren ; 
 in weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, 
 in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold 
 and nakedness ; besides those things that are
 
 88 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 without, there is that which presseth upon me 
 daily, anxiety for all the churches." ' * 
 
 Nevertheless there is a marked difference be- 
 tween the exhortations of Christ and the 
 entreaties of the preachers of ascetism and self- 
 renunciation. Asceticism is self-denial for its 
 own sake, and Christ never urged that upon His 
 followers. What the world offers is in itself 
 good and to be enjoyed with thanksgiving. The 
 flowers of the field have been clothed by God 
 with a beauty of which Solomon could not boast, 
 to rejoice the eye of man. The beasts and fields 
 produce food and raiment in abundance, and all 
 innocent enjoyment is a positive duty rather than 
 a sin. Rejoice and be exceeding glad for the 
 gifts of your heavenly Father; this is the spirit 
 of Christ. 
 
 We may, indeed, rejoice that we have been 
 emancipated from the bonds of a gloomy asceti- 
 cism which made a virtue of sacrifice and suffer- 
 ing in themselves. Suffering goes with sin ; joy 
 with righteousness. Christ came to make this 
 world a happy world and, as His purposes ap- 
 proach completion, happiness of the highest sort 
 
 1 2 Corinthians xi, 24-28. 
 
 * The author wishes to acknowledge at this point the valuable 
 assistance received from Bishop Boyd Carpenter's Permanent 
 Element of Religion, from which book this illustration and some 
 other quotations are taken.
 
 The Social Law of Service. 89 
 
 must increase. This world will become a happier 
 and happier world as time goes on, for the com- 
 ing of the kingdom means the subjugation of the 
 entire world to Christ. And by the entire world 
 we understand not only man, but external phys- 
 ical forces. This thought is clearly revealed in 
 the prophecies of the Old Testament, especially 
 in Isaiah : " Instead of the thorn shall come up 
 the fir tree, and instead of the brier shall come up 
 the myrtle tree." ' This signifies the subjugation 
 of the forces of nature, but nature includes man's 
 physical body, and that, too, in a righteous state, 
 will have long life gradually, peacefully, fading 
 away at last. "And I will rejoice in Jerusalem, 
 and joy in my people : and the voice of weeping 
 shall be no more heard in her, nor the voice of 
 crying. There shall be no more thence an infant 
 of days, nor an old man that hath not filled his 
 days : for the child shall die an hundred years 
 old. . . . They shall build houses, and inhabit 
 them; and they shall plant vineyards, and eat the 
 fruit of them. . . . For as the days of a tree are 
 the days of my people, and mine elect shall long 
 enjoy the work of their hands." 2 
 
 The miracles of Christ have this same signifi- 
 cance. The Son of man must show Himself 
 Lord of the external physical world in order to 
 bring out its significance and the ultimate domi- 
 
 1 Isaiah Iv, 13. 4 Isaiah Ixv, 19-22.
 
 90 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 nation of man. The miracles puzzle many, but 
 when we think about it in this light we must 
 see that the life of the Messiah would have been 
 strangely incomplete without them. This must be 
 felt by all who think deeply on social righteous- 
 ness and its results. The teachings of the 
 French socialist, Fourier, are instructive at this 
 point. These teachings are wild and erratic in 
 many particulars. They contain much chaff, but 
 in the chaff we find valuable grains of wheat. 
 Fourier predicted a happy social state to con- 
 tinue long in the future, and he prophesied that 
 in this state lions should become servitors of man, 
 drawing his chariot hundreds of miles in a single 
 day, that whales should draw his ships across the 
 great deep, while the ocean itself would become a 
 delightful beverage. 1 
 
 We laugh at these crude fantasies, yet there is 
 in them the sound thought indicated. 
 
 But we have in all this only the teachings of 
 history and the revelations of natural science. 
 National wickedness has repeatedly turned fruit- 
 ful plains into deserts and social righteousness is 
 capable of turning barren wastes once more into 
 smiling gardens. 
 
 Yet there is the great fact of self-denial and 
 self-renunciation " the first condition of all 
 really great moral excellence." And this fact, 
 
 1 Ely, French and German Socialism, pp. 88, 89.
 
 The Social Law of Service. 91 
 
 stern and unrelenting, so far from anywhere in 
 the New Testament being concealed, is thrust 
 at times it would seem almost with unnatural 
 violence into the foreground of the entire Gos- 
 pel message. 
 
 Why did Christ Himself suffer ? Why was He, 
 although keenly appreciative of the beauties of 
 nature and social in His disposition, loving to 
 eat and drink with His friends why was He " a 
 man of sorrows and acquainted with grief?" 1 
 These words contain the explanation : " And 
 I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto Me." 
 Ah, the sacrifice of Christ had an object outside 
 of Himself. It was not sacrifice for sacrifice' 
 sake, but sacrifice for others' sake. Because 
 Christ loved men with an infinite yearning love, 
 He died for men. Love was the ground of 
 sacrifice. " God is love." This is the secret of 
 Christian self-denial, and asceticism, whatever 
 its external resemblance, is its perversion. It is 
 like the perversion of charity, in the lower sense 
 of the word charity ; that is to say, almsgiving. 
 Men first gave to benefit their fellows, then later, 
 in the time of the perversion, to benefit them- 
 selves by accumulating thereby, as it was sup- 
 posed, heavenly treasures ; but when the true end 
 
 1 Those persons who think they imitate Christ in merely 
 wearing long faces, miss the mark widely. It was the intense 
 sympathy of Christ which made Him sad.
 
 92 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 of charity was lost sight of, it became a curse and 
 not a blessing to the world. It is not said that 
 a proper motive in giving is not the benefit 
 which may come to one's character, but a true 
 saint will scarcely think of this, but only of those 
 to whom he hopes to minister, because he loves 
 them as children of a common Father. The 
 self-motive is altogether subordinate. Likewise 
 it is not claimed that self-denial should not be 
 practiced for the sake of character-culture, and 
 we may admit an educational value in asceticism, 
 though we claim the same end can otherwise be 
 reached and that by methods more in harmony 
 with the teachings of Christ. 
 
 Asceticism, indeed, often grows out of self- 
 sacrifice. Men go without for the sake of others ; 
 then, later, they lose their love for others and 
 continue their self-denial as if there were virtue 
 in that of itself. The spirit is gone, the lifeless 
 form alone remains. Thus asceticism has often 
 displaced love to others and become intensely 
 cruel. 
 
 Love leads to self-sacrifice of necessity, as 
 we see in the lives of those who have manifested 
 in a marked degree generous love for men. The 
 biography of the seventh Earl of Shaftesbury 
 shows us this ; also, the biography of two Ameri- 
 can women, the Grimke sisters. 1 These sisters 
 
 1 The Sisters Grimke, a Biography, by Catherine H. Birney.
 
 The Social Law of Service. 93 
 
 illustrated the motto on the title-page of the 
 book in which is recorded the story of their 
 lives : " The glory of all glories is the glory of 
 self-sacrifice." At first sacrifice with them found 
 a basis in asceticism. It was thought well 
 pleasing to God that they should deny them- 
 selves without any human motive or aim external 
 to themselves. This early period of their history 
 finds expression in many passages in the book. 
 Sarah Grimke writes: " I went to meeting, and 
 it being a rainy day I took a large, handsome 
 umbrella which I had accepted from brother 
 Henry, accepted doubtfully, therefore wrong- 
 fully, and have never felt quite easy to use it, 
 which, however, I have done a few times. After 
 I was in meeting I was much tried by a wander- 
 ing mind, and every now and then the umbrella 
 would come before me, so that I sat trying to 
 wait on my God, and He showed me that I must 
 not only give up this little thing, but return it 
 to my brother." After other reflections she adds, 
 in a note : " This little sacrifice was made. I 
 sent the umbrella with an affectionate note to 
 brother, and believe it gave him no offense to 
 have it returned, and sweet has been the recom- 
 pense, even peace." 
 
 Angelina says : " A great deal of my finery, 
 too, I have put beyond the reach of anyone." 
 She had put into a cushion two handsome lace
 
 94 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 veils, a lace flounce, and other laces. This was 
 done, as she wrote on a slip of paper sewed up in 
 the cushion, " under feelings of duty, believing 
 that as we are called with a high and holy 
 calling, and forbidden to adorn these bodies, but 
 to wear the ornament of a meek and quiet 
 spirit, as we have ourselves laid (in this cushion) 
 these superfluities of naughtiness, so we should 
 not in any measure contribute to the destroying 
 of others ; " that is, by allowing others to wear 
 all this finery. The sisters wanted at this time 
 by such means to separate themselves from the 
 world and condemn it. Angelina was troubled 
 by a cashmere mantle which had cost a sum 
 which then seemed large to her, and cut the 
 trimming off; but this did not suit her, and she 
 finally decided never to wear it again although 
 she had at the time no money to replace it with 
 anything else. 
 
 Soon, however, we perceive other motives, 
 motives of an altruistic nature, appearing as the 
 ground of self-sacrifice. Angelina writes in her 
 diary at a somewhat later date than the time of 
 the last quotation : " It is not only the food I 
 eat at mother's, but the whole style of living is a 
 direct departure from the simplicity that is in 
 Christ. The Lord's poor tell me that they do 
 not like to come to such a fine house to see me; 
 and if they come, instead of reading a lesson of
 
 The Social Law of Service. 95 
 
 frugality and deadness to the world, they must 
 go away lamenting the inconsistency of a sister 
 professor. One thing is very hard to bear. I 
 feel obliged to pay five dollars a week for board 
 [then a much larger sum than now], though I 
 disapprove of this extravagance, and am actually 
 accessory in maintaining this style of living, and 
 am therefore prevented from giving to the poor 
 as liberally as I would like." 
 
 It was not, however, until these sisters were 
 aroused to the wrong of slavery, and began to take 
 a part in the abolition movement, that the full 
 measure of their capabilities for self-sacrifice ap- 
 peared, and then self-sacrifice found its true basis 
 in love for others. They lived a life of self-sac- 
 rifice then because, loving others and perceiving 
 the needs of others, they could not do otherwise. 
 They with all their resources were dedicated to 
 what they deemed a holy cause, and every cent 
 saved from personal expenditure was a cent to 
 be used to help others. They had, indeed, a 
 "love-purse," as it was called, into which such 
 savings were dropped. These sisters Grimke 
 were the daughters of Judge Grimke", of Charles- 
 ton, S. C., and were brought up like young ladies 
 in the best Southern social circles. Only those 
 who know what this means can appreciate the self- 
 sacrifice in them when they lived in a rude little 
 cottage in New Jersey, across the Hudson from 
 7
 
 96 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 New York, and did their own housework, dress- 
 ing simply, while the husband of one of the sis- 
 ters, Theodore Weld, wore noticeably coarse 
 clothing, which he thought might have cost him 
 nearly one hundred dollars one year, when he was 
 traveling and lecturing, and the whole of one suit 
 and part of another were destroyed by mobs. 
 Listen to a few quotations from letters. Sarah 
 writes : " We can make good bread, and this with 
 milk is an excellent meal. This week I am cook, 
 and am writing .this while my beans are boiling 
 and pears stewing for dinner." Angelina writes 
 at another time : " As to how I have made out 
 with cooking, it so happens that labor (planting a 
 garden) gives Theodore such an appetite that 
 everything is sweet to him, so that my rice and 
 asparagus, potatoes, mush, and Indian bread, all 
 taste well, though some might not think them fit 
 to eat." Shortly after her marriage to Mr. Weld, 
 Angelina wrote : " We ordered our furniture to 
 be made of cherry, and quite enjoy the cheap- 
 ness of our outfit, for the less we spend the less 
 the Antislavery Society will have to pay my 
 Theodore for his labors." 
 
 Does it not become apparent that this repre- 
 sents the spirit which must of necessity animate 
 all Christians ? No one can love his fellows truly 
 and waste any resources. 
 
 Now this parallel between charity and asceti-
 
 The Social Law of Service. 97 
 
 cism, to which allusion has already been made, is 
 instructive in another sense. Men saw the evils 
 connected with perverted charity, and said : 
 " Charity is a bad thing. Gifts are bad things. 
 One may sell things, but may not without injury 
 give them away. Self-seeking is a beneficent 
 social law." Thus men substitute the teachings 
 of Satan for the commands of Christ. Without 
 love we may not, it is true, give to our fellows 
 and benefit them. 
 
 Likewise in our day men, perceiving the ex- 
 cesses of asceticism, and the cruel selfishness 
 which has too often accompanied it, and even 
 been a part of it, have acquiesced silently or 
 openly in self-indulgence. Give nothing with- 
 out a valuable equivalent, and enjoy all that your 
 resources permit you to enjoy this is the log- 
 ical conclusion of much that passes for Christian 
 teaching. 
 
 No earnest man is to-day satisfied with the in- 
 fluence of the Christian Church. Its members 
 are not leading the life which is expected of them. 
 It may or may not be true that they are better 
 than they have been in former ages, but we are 
 still sadly far behind the mark. Under present 
 circumstances what is particularly needed is for 
 us to take home to ourselves the doctrine of 
 Christian self-sacrifice. To renounce " the devil 
 and all his works, the vain pomp and glory of the
 
 98 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 world, with all covetous desires of the same, and 
 the sinful desires of the flesh, so as not to follow 
 or be led by them," is a very real thing and a 
 very great sacrifice. It is a cross which only the 
 love of Christ can make an easy burden. Our 
 resources of every sort, time, strength of body 
 and mind, and our economic resources, are all 
 limited, and, however great they may be, love 
 will show us how we can use all to the last 
 minute of time and the last farthing of 
 money for the promotion of the welfare of hu- 
 manity. 
 
 Let us consider a few quotations from great 
 thinkers who are strongly impressed with the 
 necessity of self-sacrifice, and the testimony for 
 present purposes is perhaps all the more valu- 
 able because so many of them profess slight 
 allegiance to Christianity. Says Carlyle : " It is 
 only with renunciations that life properly speak- 
 ing can be said to begin." ' . . . 
 
 " In a valiant suffering for others, not in a 
 slothful making others suffer for us, did noble- 
 ness ever lie." * 
 
 George Sand uses these words : " There is only 
 one sole virtue in the world the eternal sacrifice 
 of self." 
 
 1 Sartor Resartus, quoted by Bishop Boyd Carpenter in his 
 Permanent Element of Religion, pp. 350, 351. 
 3 Past and Present.
 
 The Social Law of Service. 99 
 
 George Eliot sings : 
 
 " May I reach 
 
 That purest heaven ; be to other souls 
 The cup of strength in some great agony. 
 
 So shall I join the choir invisible, 
 
 Whose music is the gladness of the world." 
 
 Another writer ' expresses himself as follows : 
 " You talk of self as the motive to exertion ; I 
 tell you it is the abnegation of self which has 
 wrought out all that is noble, all that is good, all 
 that is useful, nearly all that is ornamental, in 
 the world." 
 
 Our American philosopher, Emerson, says: 
 " A man was born, not for prosperity, but to 
 suffer for the benefit of others, like the noble 
 rock-maple, which all round our villages bleeds 
 for the service of man." a 
 
 Let us hear the great German, the poet 
 Goethe : " Everything cries out to us that we 
 must renounce. Thou must go without, go with- 
 out ! That is the everlasting song which every 
 hour, all our life through, hoarsely sings to us : 
 Die, and come to life ; for so long as this is not 
 accomplished thou art but a troubled guest upon 
 an earth of gloom." 3 
 
 Matthew Arnold, from whom these last quota- 
 
 1 Whyte Melville, Bones and I. 
 4 Emerson, Method of Nature. 
 3 M. Arnold, Literature and Dogma, pp. 186, 187.
 
 100 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 tions are taken, expounds these words of Jesus : 
 " He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that 
 hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life 
 eternal." " Whosoever will come after Me, let him 
 renounce himself, and take up his cross daily, and 
 follow Me." He tells us that these words con- 
 tain the secret of Jesus, and says : " Perhaps 
 there is no other maxim of Jesus which has such 
 a combined stress of evidence for it, and may be 
 taken as so eminently His." This is the secret 
 by which His Gospel, says Arnold, brought life 
 and immortality to light, and it is repeated by 
 each one of the four gospel writers. 
 
 The writer has often thought of a remark made 
 by a principal of a Normal School in a New Eng- 
 land State. This principal was a lady who had 
 been brought up in the strict ways of a religious 
 denomination which in her childhood was in- 
 clined to be severe in many of its requirements, 
 but she had changed with the change of her 
 church and had become liberal in her views. She 
 asked one day, " Why is it that when I want a 
 faithful teacher in my school, I seek a young 
 woman brought up in the old strict ways in which 
 I myself no longer believe ?" 
 
 Do we not come, in what has been said, to the 
 root of the difficulty ? It is better for men to be 
 called upon even by superstition and false reli- 
 gion to make self-sacrifice, than to lead a life of
 
 The Social Law of Service. 101 
 
 self-indulgence; and a certain so-called liberaliz- 
 ing tendency in all the churches has been over- 
 inclined to say simply: Thou mayest do this, 
 thou mayest do that ; go to the theater, dance, 
 play cards, enjoy a good horse race, etc. Now, 
 if this teaching be true, it is only half of the 
 truth. We need not now enter into the question 
 of dancing, card playing, etc. If the reader ob- 
 jects to these, he will see an argument in what 
 has been said for his convictions. If the reader 
 regards these as innocent recreations, then he 
 will, perhaps, be more keenly aware than before 
 how near to their use is their abuse. If the old 
 restrictions are removed, new ones equally, nay, 
 more severe, are raised by the duty to love and 
 serve our fellows, and to make of the earth God's 
 kingdom. 
 
 A young lad, full of the enthusiasm of humanity 
 and eager for self-sacrifice, once said : " Father, I 
 almost feel sorry that slavery has been abolished, 
 and that I can have no part in that struggle." 
 Alas ! evils still exist, evils as bad as slavery, and 
 those who fight the world, the flesh, and the 
 devil will still have opportunity to suffer. Fre- 
 quently men will not speak well of them, but 
 will turn them the cold shoulder, will malign, 
 slander, and persecute them. Christ said to the 
 men of His day: "Woe unto you! for ye build 
 the sepulchers of the prophets, and your fathers
 
 102 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 killed them.' ' ' These words express a permanent 
 historical truth. We are all brave with respect 
 to the struggles of the past, and we honor the 
 memory of those we would have helped to per- 
 secute had we lived in their day. When the 
 twentieth century is well advanced, it may be 
 found that we have been stoning those to whom 
 our children will then be erecting monuments. 
 The world advances, true, and in some respects 
 it is easier to do good than before, but there is 
 still no lack of opportunity to suffer. The cross 
 is still a reality. 
 
 The Roman Catholic Church provides oppor- 
 tunities for self-renunciation the most complete. 
 To Protestants this often appears worse than use- 
 less ; but it is, nevertheless, one source of its 
 strength. May not our own Protestant churches 
 return from one of the mistakes of Protestant- 
 ism, and in orders of deaconesses, brotherhoods, 
 sisterhoods, and associations of lay worshipers 
 provide a fruitful channel into which self-sacrifi- 
 cing efforts can flow to the glory of God and the 
 good of our fellow-men ? Let us, at any rate, 
 see to it that for us religion is something more 
 than a " graceful and pleasing appendix to life." 
 
 J Luke xi, 47.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE SOCIAL SIGNIFICANCE OF 
 
 BAPTISM AND THE LORD'S 
 
 SUPPER.
 
 " IT is to be noted, that whereas nothing in this life is more 
 acceptable before God, or more pleasant unto man, than Chris- 
 tain people to live together quietly in love and peace, unity and 
 concord, this sacrament doth most aptly and effectuously move 
 us thereunto. For when we be made all partakers of this one 
 table, what ought we to think, but that we be all members of 
 one spiritual body, whereof Christ is the head; that we be joined 
 together in one Christ, as a great number of grains of corn be 
 joined together in one loaf ? Surely, they have very hard and 
 stony hearts, which with these things be not moved ; and more 
 cruel and unreasonable be they than brute beasts, that cannot 
 be persuaded to be good to their Christian brethren and neigh- 
 bors, for whom Christ suffered death, when in this sacrament 
 they be put in remembrance that the Son of God bestowed His 
 life for His enemies. For we see by daily experience, that eat- 
 ing and drinking together maketh friends, and continueth friend- 
 ship ; much more then ought the table of Christ to move us so to 
 do." Archbishop Cranmer, on The Lord's Supper, Parker Soci- 
 ety Publications , pp. 42, 43.
 
 Of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. 105 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE SOCIAL SIGNIFICANCE OF BAPTISM AND THE 
 LORD'S SUPPER. 
 
 IT is a strange thing how we forget one half of 
 the Gospel message, and precisely that half 
 which Christ emphasized. We slur it over, and 
 do not perceive its import when we read the 
 Bible. Having eyes we see not, having ears we 
 hear not, the true tests of Christianity. Herein 
 is revealed the marvelous nature of Christianity. 
 All religions exalt a superior being, or at any rate 
 profess to exalt a superior being, but as we have 
 already seen it is a distinctive feature of Christ's 
 teaching that Man is exalted man created a lit- 
 tle lower than the angels " a little lower than 
 God," we are told is the correct translation. 
 
 The beloved Apostle John plunges into the 
 heart of Christ's doctrine when he affirms, " If a 
 man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he 
 is a liar : for he that loveth not his brother 
 whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom 
 he hath not seen ?" St. Paul ventures to affirm, 
 " The whole law is fulfilled in one word, even in 
 this : Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself."
 
 106 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 The first great commandment is not mentioned 
 in this place by St. Paul, whereas Christ and his 
 apostles nowhere sum up all the law without 
 mentioning the second. It is as if the first were 
 something assumed something which could be 
 assumed as a mere matter of course, but as if 
 the second were something which needed per- 
 petual emphasis, and must ever again and again 
 be brought forward as the test of a Christ-life. 
 
 Such a view has been confirmed by the entire 
 history of the Christian Church. Men have been 
 ever ready to substitute alleged service to God for 
 true service to man, and have employed a multi- 
 tude of devices to reconcile cruelty and neglect 
 of one's fellows with membership in the body of 
 Christ. Vain effort ! How painfully, in the great 
 day of judgment which must come to every soul, 
 will the veil pretense be torn away! "Lord, 
 Lord," will many a one say " Lord, Lord, have 
 we not been zealous champions of orthodox 
 creeds ; have we not made long prayers ; have we 
 not attended the regular services of the church ; 
 have we not said our verses and told our experi- 
 ences in our meetings ; did we not lead Epworth 
 Leagues and Societies of Christian Endeavor?" 
 But then the neglected portions of the Gospel 
 will come into the consciousness and burn like 
 flames of fire neglected portions, such as these : 
 " Pure religion and undefiled before God and the
 
 Of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. 107 
 
 Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows 
 in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted 
 from the world." . . . " Therefore, to him that 
 knoweth to do good " to him that hath abun- 
 dance and useth this abundance for himself, 
 while neglected children die needlessly by the 
 hundred thousand in the slums of the cities ; 
 to him that useth his resources for luxurious self- 
 indulgence, while untold thousands of young 
 people are growing up in our lands without 
 wholesome physical, mental, and spiritual food, 
 hurrying forward on the road to perdition ; to 
 him that exalted himself so above others that he 
 spendethhis substance for superfluities while oth- 
 ers lack the things necessary to worthy human 
 life "to him that knoweth to do good, but 
 doeth it not, to him it is sin." And how will a 
 passage like this one day burn into the souls of 
 some who talk to us about the " simple Gospel of 
 Christ," meaning thereby an emasculated gospel 
 which extends only to public worship and not to 
 the markets of the world, where they claim self- 
 interest rightly reigns supreme : " Woe unto 
 you, . . . for ye devour widows' houses, and for a 
 pretense make long prayer : therefore ye shall 
 receive the greater damnation?" 
 
 We have in this passage just quoted the con- 
 demnation of positive wrongdoing to our neigh- 
 bor. But, as we have already seen, the severest
 
 108 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 words are reserved for simple neglect to serve our 
 fellows in need : " I was an hungered, and ye 
 gave me no meat." 
 
 The social side of Christianity is not something 
 which may be neglected or not. The manward 
 aspects of Christianity are an essential part of it 
 an essential part, without which it cannot ex- 
 ist. Some Christians speak, and most Christians 
 act, as if philanthropy were a sort of ornamental 
 appendage to Christianity, pleasing enough if it 
 exists, but something apart from its very essence. 
 And some, wiser than Christ, even claim this in 
 so many words ; but Christ and His apostles 
 teach that philanthropy is more than a cloak ; 
 more than garments to protect ; even more than 
 food to nourish ; that it is a part of the very 
 being of Christianity. 
 
 Our poets and sages have often enough told us 
 this, but we have viewed them with suspicion, 
 and have been ready to bring charges of heresy 
 against them when they have repeated to us 
 Christ-words. 
 
 What does James Russell Lowell tell us ? 
 
 " He's true to God who's true to man ; wherever wrong is done 
 To the humblest and the weakest 'neath the self-beholding sun, 
 That wrong is done to us." 
 
 Listen to Ruskin, who follows his condemna- 
 tion, " You might sooner get lightning out of 
 incense smoke than true action or passion out
 
 Of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. 109 
 
 of your modern English religion," with this 
 definition of a true Church : " Wherever one 
 hand meets another helpfully, that is the holy 
 mother Church which ever is or ever shall be." 
 
 Certainly no true definition of the Church can 
 be less inclusive. A true definition of the 
 Church may be more inclusive doubtless is 
 more inclusive but not less conclusive. 
 
 The effect of dwelling chiefly on the theological 
 and neglecting the social side of Christianity is 
 observed in inadequate ideas touching Bap- 
 tism and the Lord's Supper. Rarely is their 
 social significance brought out, and it is not at 
 present deeply impressed on the consciousness 
 of the Christian Church. It is not a part of the 
 ordinary and habitual thought of Christians re- 
 specting these sacraments. Yet their social 
 significance is most marked. It is no new dis- 
 covery, for it has been present in the minds and 
 hearts of Christians as a mighty power. Even 
 now it is not entirely forgotten, but it has 
 rather, as it were, fallen out of the Christian con- 
 sciousness of modern times ; it has, if we may 
 use the expression, become subconscious, and 
 although now and again temporarily brought 
 forward into the consciousness, it has lost its due 
 relative importance for us. This social signifi- 
 cance is fraternity. 
 
 A few words only will be said about Baptism,
 
 110 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 and that for several reasons. One is that the 
 social significance of the Lord's Supper is per- 
 haps more marked ; another, that Baptism is a 
 topic which theological differences have made 
 more difficult of treatment on its social side. 
 But whatever views we hold respecting the sig- 
 nificance of Baptism on its Godward side, it 
 cannot be overlooked that it has its social mean- 
 ing. It is the method whereby we enter into 
 relations with our fellows and form the Church 
 of Christ. " All one body we," but it is through 
 the doorway of Baptism that we enter into the 
 visible Church. All men are brothers, but 
 among those thus connected there is a peculiarly 
 closer relation. But the broader relations must 
 not be overlooked. As has been well said by 
 one valued highly by multitudes in all religious 
 denominations : " Baptism is a visible witness to 
 the world of that which the world is forever for- 
 getting a common humanity united in God. 
 Baptism authoritatively reveals and pledges to 
 the individual that which is true of the race." ' 
 The splendid declaration of solidarity in Christ 
 which the Apostle Paul makes in the Epistle to 
 the Galatians 2 is connected with baptism, al- 
 though this is often overlooked : " For as many 
 of you as have been baptized into Christ have 
 
 1 Rev. F. W. Robertson, Sermons, p. 274. 
 
 2 Galatians iii, 26 29.
 
 Of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. Ill 
 
 put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, 
 there is neither bond nor free, there is neither 
 male nor female : for ye are all one in Christ 
 Jesus." 
 
 And may we not for a moment turn our atten- 
 tion to infant baptism? For those who do 
 not hold that baptism works a change in the in- 
 fant baptized, has not the baptism of infants 
 chiefly a social significance a significance 
 which is something added to its deeper meaning 
 for those who accept the doctrine of baptismal 
 regeneration ? It would seem that here we have 
 a common standing ground for all those who 
 hold to infant baptism, and one which may ren- 
 der this institution more precious than it is now 
 in the eyes of many. Infant baptism recalls the 
 fact that Christ proposed a universal kingdom as 
 successor to the national kingdom of the Jews, 
 and that as circumcision was in a manner natural- 
 ization of the infant in the national kingdom, so 
 baptism is in like manner naturalization in the 
 universal kingdom. It points to the solidarity 
 of the family in the kingdom of Christ, and re- 
 calls the fact that the first converts in Europe 
 were families, namely, Lydia and her household, 
 the jailer and all his. Like Joshua of old, the 
 Christian father of a family in the baptism of his 
 infant children proclaims to the world, "As for 
 
 1 Bishop B. F. Westcott, The Incarnation and Common Life. 
 8
 
 112 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 me and my house, we will serve the Lord." 1 
 Fortunately, the view of the kingdom of God 
 enunciated in this book by no means depends 
 upon infant baptism alone, for among those who 
 on theological grounds reject this right are found 
 many strong adherents of this conception of the 
 kingdom, but it does give a richer and fuller signif- 
 icance to infant baptism for other Christians who 
 have overlooked its import of solidarity in Christ. 
 Turning our attention to the Lord's Supper, 
 we find the claim made that bread and wine, 
 rather than other kinds of food and drink, were 
 chosen by Christ because they typified fraternity 
 so admirably ; many grains of wheat but one 
 loaf of bread, " for we being many are one 
 bread," writes St. Paul; many grapes but one 
 cup of wine. As Archbishop Cranmer says in 
 the quaint language of his time : " For like 
 as bread is made of a great number of grains of 
 corn, ground, broken, and so joined together 
 that thereof is made one loaf; and an infinite 
 number of grapes be pressed together in one 
 vessel, and thereof is made wine ; likewise is the 
 whole multitude of true Christian people spir- 
 itually joined, first to Christ, and then among 
 themselves, together in one faith, one baptism, 
 one Holy Spirit, one knot and bond of love." a 
 
 1 Joshua xxiv, 15. 
 
 s Archbishop Cranmer on The Lord's Supper, p. 42.
 
 Of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. 113 
 
 The Godward side of the Lord's Supper 
 draws us to heaven, and bids us contemplate 
 in humility the infinite yearning love of our 
 Father revealed to us in our blessed Lord and 
 Saviour, and so to receive the bread and wine in 
 remembrance of His death and passion " that 
 we may be partakers of His most blessed body 
 and blood." l 
 
 The manward side of the Lord's Supper 
 draws us to our fellows and bids us love men as 
 Christ loved men, giving ourselves for them 
 even to the extent of washing workingmen's 
 feet in our passion for the service of man ; bids 
 us spend time and substance, strength of body 
 and mental faculties, to seek and save the lost. 
 
 This manward side of the Lord's Supper 
 when it becomes real will inspire Christians with 
 ceaseless activity for the redemption of the 
 world and no less a task has Christ given them 
 and when exhausted by labor and long vigils 
 they contemplate such sights as we can see in 
 New York and Chicago, or in any other great 
 town ay, even in the country ; ay, even in many 
 a county jail, a veritable high school of crime 
 
 1 The writer has adhered to the form of the Ritual of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church. Other Christians may believe 
 more than is implied in these words, but not less, and in a 
 work of this kind it is desirable to avoid, so far as possible, even 
 the appearance of theological differences.
 
 114 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 they will in anguish repeat the words of Christ, 
 the Infinite Love, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, . . . 
 how often would I have gathered thy children 
 together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens 
 under her wings, but ye would not ! " 
 
 When the Lord's table is spread, brothers 
 and sisters in Christ partake of a common meal 
 eat from the same plate, drink out of the same 
 cup and this from most ancient times has been 
 regarded both as symbolic of brotherhood and 
 promotive of brotherhood. 
 
 To partake of one's salt, to break bread to- 
 gether, are terms of significance. The very 
 savage either refuses to eat with his enemy, or 
 first lays aside his enmity. The untamed and 
 cruel Indian, as we have learned in many a 
 noble and touching tale, is bound to him at 
 whose table and with whom he has eaten. 
 
 To this day German students drink " Briider- 
 schaft " brotherhood. When with locked arms 
 they drink together, they no longer use in 
 addressing each, " Sie " (you), which is the 
 common form of address among friends and 
 acquaintances, but ever after they employ " Du " 
 (thou), a term by which brothers and sisters 
 and intimate friends address each other. Even 
 after this single ceremony they make use of the 
 terms of fraternity. 
 
 Notice, too, that the violation of this feeling of
 
 Of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. 115 
 
 fraternity by Judas, one who sat at the same 
 table with Him, seemed to add a new pang to 
 our Saviour's woes: " He that eateth bread with 
 me hath lifted up his heel against me." 
 
 The Germans have a term, " tafelfahig," 
 worthy to sit at table (on state occasions at 
 least). " Tafelfahig " worthy to sit at the 
 royal table is a high distinction. It means 
 a long line of distinguished ancestry, pure blood, 
 or high service to the state. Sitting at the same 
 table elevates one as it were to a fraternal re- 
 lation with the host making them of one family. 
 So among us who belong to the more ordinary 
 humanity, those who sit at a common table, are, 
 for the time being at least, in our social circle, 
 even if not necessarily equal. But relative 
 equality is the marked feature, and in the great 
 world those with whom we cannot mingle as 
 friends do not sit at table with us. 
 
 In the Lord's Supper we sit at the table of 
 Him who is Lord of lords and King of kings, 
 and among us human beings, weak and erring 
 human beings, " miserable sinners," equality 
 swallows up inequality. We, so far below Him 
 in power and holiness, in our humility and peni- 
 tence fail to recognize what must then appear to 
 be insignificant differences. Let not the prince 
 presume at this table to jostle and push the 
 beggar. "My brother," " My sister," these words
 
 116 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 must at such a time be the natural mode of 
 address. This mode of address undoubtedly 
 arose spontaneously, but, continued in absence 
 of a spirit of fraternity, became such a hollow 
 mockery that generallyeven the pretense has been 
 dropped, 1 and too often nothing distinguishes 
 the cold formality of Christians partaking of a 
 common meal from that of worldly gatherings. 
 Some way or another, whatever progress has 
 been made in other respects, there has been sad 
 retrogression in this vital matter of fraternity, 
 when we compare the present with certain earlier 
 periods, although now we may be God grant 
 it ! again advancing in Christ-life when we com- 
 pare the present with a nearer past. 
 
 Yet, what can be more disheartening than the 
 use of individual communion cups here and there? 
 Is not the meaning of the Lord's Supper thereby 
 half lost? Indeed, may we not say that to the 
 worldly-minded this innovation must seem like a 
 caricature of the sacrament? The loving-cup 
 still passes from mouth to mouth in many a social 
 gathering in every land, and signifies fraternity 
 outside the church, but within the church hun- 
 dreds of little glasses on huge trays are carried 
 
 1 Perhaps the practice is continued more generally in some re- 
 ligious denominations than others; and doubtless is more fre- 
 quent in smaller towns than in the great cities ; doubtless also 
 more common among poor than among wealthy Christians.
 
 Of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. 117 
 
 about, or other new devices are employed to 
 avoid what is after all little more than an imag- 
 inary danger. And if, after all, in this service of 
 Christ, one soldier of the cross among ten times 
 ten millions should perish and for so great a 
 danger as this there is no scientific proof what 
 then ? Is our earthly life so precious that it must 
 be so saved at all hazards ? To those who think 
 so, the words of Christ apply : " Whosoever will 
 save his life, shall lose it." 
 
 The services provided in Christian churches 
 for the administration of the Lord's Supper by 
 no means neglect its social significance, even if 
 this is not always brought out so fully as some 
 of us might regard as desirable. The chief fault 
 to be found, however, is with the neglect by us 
 at present of what is plainly expressed or clearly 
 implied in our services. Thus the Articles of Re- 
 ligion, both of the Protestant Episcopal and Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Churches, state : " The Supper 
 of the Lord is not only a sign of the love that 
 Christians ought to have among themselves one 
 to another, but rather is a sacrament of our re- 
 demption by Christ's death." The word " rather" 
 lays emphasis upon the Godward side of the 
 Lord's Supper, but this by no means justifies 
 neglect of the social aspects of the sacrament, for 
 these aspects are expressly mentioned and find 
 emphasis in the first position in the article of the
 
 118 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 words calling attention to them. Furthermore, 
 only those are invited to partake of the Lord's 
 Supper who are " in love and charity with their 
 neighbors." Why ? Because love is the essence 
 of the sacrament, and among us men love is 
 fraternity. We approach God in the sacrament 
 of the Lord's Supper as members of the Christian 
 Church ; that is to say, of a brotherhood. Malice 
 and hatred violate the sacrament. Do they not 
 crucify afresh the Christ ? 
 
 Among the sentences which may be read as 
 part of the service is this (and there are many 
 others like it) : " Whoso hath this world's 
 goods, and seeth his brother have need, and 
 shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, 
 how dwelleth the love of God in him?" Most 
 appropriately is the offertory connected with the 
 Lord's Supper. 
 
 Our Hymnals, however, seem to be more re- 
 mote from the full and perfect doctrine of Christ 
 than our Rituals and Prayer Books, for in the 
 Hymnals, under the heading, " The Lord's Sup- 
 per," there are very few hymns which bring out 
 its social significance fraternal love. 
 
 The import of the Lord's Supper has been 
 well-nigh lost to many Christians. Both its theo- 
 logical significance and social significance have to 
 too many well-nigh disappeared. Early Chris- 
 tians partook of the Lord's Supper daily, but a
 
 Of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. 119 
 
 leading divine of a great religious denomination 
 said publicly that he did not attach any peculiar 
 importance to this sacrament. This illustrates 
 the danger of losing sight of the manward aspects 
 of a sacrament of the Church. 
 
 May we not well return to primitive Christian- 
 ity in respect to the Lord's Supper? May it not 
 be possible so to order its observance that it may 
 be more like a common meal, with ceremonies 
 added calculated to emphasize the idea of frater- 
 nal love, and celebrate more frequently than most 
 of us do this great sacrament ? The author does 
 not venture upon anything more than mere sug- 
 gestion at this point, and even suggestion he 
 makes with diffidence. Let us, at any rate, re- 
 store to the Lord's Supper in our minds and in 
 our hearts and in our practice its full mean- 
 ing, and may it become more and more precious 
 to us ! 
 
 We all know the legend of the Holy Grail. It 
 was the cup out of which Jesus drank wine at the 
 last supper with His disciples. It is related that 
 Joseph of Arimathea brought this cup to Eng- 
 land, where it long remained an object of adora- 
 tion, working miracles, restoring health to the dis- 
 eased, and bringing blessing to those who made 
 pilgrimages to it. It could be kept only by the 
 chaste in thought, word, and deed, and one of the 
 keepers, a lineal descendant of Joseph of Arima-
 
 120 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 thea, failing to preserve this requisite chastity, 
 the cup disappeared. 
 
 Tennyson relates the story in these words : 
 
 '' The cup, the cup itself, from which our Lord 
 Drank at the last sad supper with his own. 
 This from the blessed land of Aromat 
 After the day of darkness, when the dead 
 Went wandering o'er Moriah the good saint, 
 Arimathean Joseph, journeying brought 
 To Glastonbury, where the winter thorn 
 Blossoms at Christmas, mindful of our Lord, 
 And there a while it bode ; and if a man 
 Could touch or see it, he was healed at once, 
 By faith, of all his ills. But then the times 
 Grew to such evil that the holy cup 
 Was caught away to Heaven, and disappeared." 
 
 Knights of the Round Table went in search 
 of the Holy Grail. The quest of Sir Galahad 
 is described by Tennyson in what our own 
 Lowell calls one of his most exquisite poems. 
 But in this poem Tennyson missed the oppor- 
 tunity which Lowell seized in his beautiful 
 poem, " The Vision of Sir Launfal." Sir 
 Launfal, on the eve of going in search of the 
 Holy Grail, has a vision, and in this vision finds 
 the precious treasure. A leper and in the vision 
 leprosy had once been scorned by Sir Launfal 
 begs an alms " for Christ's sweet sake." Sir 
 Launfal in his vision had then become " an old, 
 bent man, worn out and frail." His raiment was
 
 Of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. 121 
 
 " thin and spare," and himself in want, he replied 
 to the leper : 
 
 " I behold in thee 
 
 An image of Him who died on the tree. 
 Thou also hast had thy crown of thorns, 
 Thou also hast had the world's buffets and scorns, 
 And to thy life were not denied. 
 The wounds in the hands and feet and side ; 
 Mild Mary's Son acknowledge me ; 
 Behold, through Him, I give to thee." 
 
 Sir Launfal " parted in twain his single crust," 
 shared his all with the beggar. He broke the ice 
 on a stream and dipped out water with a wooden 
 bowl and gave the leper to drink. 
 
 " 'Twasa moldy crust of coarse brown bread, 
 'Twas water out of a wooden bowl, 
 Yet with fine wheaten bread was the leper fed, 
 And 'twas red wine he drank with his thirsty soul." 
 
 Thus was found the Holy Grail. Sir Launfal 
 partook of the Lord's Supper and through the 
 leper had entered the presence of his Saviour, 
 who addressed him thus : 
 
 ' ' Lo, it is I ; be not afraid ! 
 
 In many climes without avail 
 
 Thou hast spent thy life for the Holy Grail ; 
 
 Behold it is here, this cup which thou 
 
 Didst fill at the streamlet for Me, but now ; 
 
 This crust is My body broken for thee, 
 
 This water His blood that died on the tree ; 
 
 The Holy Supper is kept, indeed, 
 
 In whatso we share with another's need ;
 
 122 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 Not what we give, but what we share, 
 For the gift without the giver is bare ; 
 Who gives himself with his alms feeds three, 
 Himself, his hungering neighbor, and Me." 
 
 This is a poet's true interpretation of sacred 
 Scripture. The Holy Grail is within reach of us 
 all. When we worthily, in love with all men, in 
 true sacrificial love, partake of the Lord's Supper, 
 giving ourselves to Christ's flock, we drink from 
 the same cup out of which Jesus partook of the 
 last supper. 
 
 Let us not in our optimism, in our hopefulness, 
 be blind to the sin and misery about us, and so 
 miss the opportunity to find the Holy Grail, the 
 cup of love and of sacrifice for us as well as for 
 Christ. Let us not forget that millions of human 
 beings are needlessly sad, needlessly tormented 
 and tortured daily ; let us not forget the multitudes 
 who even now in this present life are perishing, are 
 losing their souls ; and let us, when we partake of 
 the Lord's Supper, ever pray that we may be 
 strengthened to walk in the footsteps of Christ, 
 loving and serving men as He did ; let us resolve 
 to let no day pass without some kind act, some- 
 thing done to make others happier and better. 
 Let us determine, according to the full measure 
 of our resources of body, mind, and estate, to toil 
 without ceasing for the coming of Christ's king- 
 dom. Let us bear constantly in mind the clos-
 
 Of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. 123 
 
 ing acts and words in the life of Him whom we 
 call Lord and Master, namely, the Lord's Supper 
 with His twofold significance, its Godward and 
 manward aspects, the washing of feet, and such 
 commands as these : " If I then, your Lord and 
 Master, have washed your feet; ye also ought to 
 wash one another's feet. For I have given you 
 an example, that ye should do as I have done to 
 you. Verily, verily, I say unto you, The servant 
 is not greater than his Lord ; neither he that is 
 sent greater than He that sent him. If ye know 
 these things, happy are ye if ye do them. ... A 
 new commandment I give unto you, That ye love 
 one another ; as I have loved you, that ye also 
 love one another. By this shall all men know 
 that ye are My disciples, if ye have love one 
 to another." ' 
 
 1 St. John xiii, 14-17, 34, 35.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 SOCIAL SOLIDARITY.
 
 "A SOLITARY individual, in no way connected with fellow- 
 creatures, would have as little opportunity for good as for evil." 
 Baroness von Marenholtz-Bulow, Barnard's Kindergarten 
 and Child Culture, p. 209. 
 
 " What depresses the standard of living in any one class, 
 lowers the level and worth of life throughout the community as 
 a whole." Rev. A. M. Fairbairn, D.D., Religion in History 
 and in Modern Life, p. 8. 
 
 " God tells us that He has made man in His own image ; not 
 a few particular men who are different from their kind, but the 
 kind itself. And he assuredly who is the most perfect specimen 
 of it, in whom the divine image is fully manifested, will be he 
 who is most entirely at one with the whole race, who the least 
 separates himself even from the most miserable and degraded 
 portions of it." F. D. Maurice, Patriarchs and Lawgivers of the 
 Old Testament, p, 323. 
 
 "For I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity 
 of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth gen- 
 eration of them that hate Me ; and showing mercy unto thousands 
 of them that love Me, and keep My commandments." Exodus 
 xx, 5, 6.
 
 Social Solidarity. 127 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 SOCIAL SOLIDARITY. 
 
 NOTHING in that associated life of man 
 which we call society is more remarkable 
 than social solidarity. Social solidarity is a prin- 
 ciple which underlies a large proportion of all 
 social facts, but one which has received compar- 
 atively little attention, and which is probably 
 grasped in its full import by no one. It means 
 so much, and reaches out in so many directions 
 into the social life of men, that it is difficult to 
 give anything like an adequate idea of its true 
 significance. Doubtless we must know more 
 about social solidarity than we do before it will 
 be possible to frame a perfect definition of this 
 principle, which is at the same time a mighty 
 social force. However, there are some things 
 we may say about it. 
 
 Social solidarity means the oneness of human 
 interests ; it signifies the dependence of man 
 upon man, both in good things and in evil 
 things. Social solidarity means that our true 
 welfare is not an individual matter purely, but 
 
 likewise a social affair : our weal is common weal ; 
 9
 
 128 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 we thrive only in a commonwealth ; our exalta- 
 tion is the exaltation of our fellows, their eleva- 
 tion is our enlargement. Social solidarity im- 
 plies not only fellowship in interests and respon- 
 sibilities, but that unityin nature which is brought 
 before us by the expression, " human brother- 
 hood." Social solidarity signifies not only that 
 man needs association with his fellow-men, but 
 that he shares with them their sins and their suf- 
 ferings. Our sin is sin for others ; their sin is 
 our sin. There is no such thing, either as purely 
 individual sin, or a purely individual righteous- 
 ness. 
 
 Although social philosophy and natural science 
 are just beginning to get a glimmering of the 
 grand truths of social solidarity, the doctrine 
 itself is a very old one. No one has ever given 
 clearer expression to it in its ethical and religious 
 bearings than the Apostle Paul. Human sin 
 comes to us through the human race. The unity 
 of the race is shown in its sin-taint. We are one 
 in our evil character, and in our wrongdoing in 
 which this evil character terminates. This is 
 what is meant in the statement that in Adam 
 we have all sinned. The sin of Adam is not im- 
 puted to us in any mechanical fashion, but we 
 have the nature of Adam ; that is, the race- 
 nature. " By one man sin entered into the world, 
 and death by sin ; and so death passed upon all
 
 Social Solidarity. 129 
 
 men, in that all have sinned." ' " In Adam all 
 die." 1 This states the law of social solidarity 
 on its passive side ; but it is stated with equal 
 plainness in its active aspects : " For as by one 
 man's disobedience many were made sinners, so 
 by the obedience of one shall many be made 
 righteous." ! " For as in Adam all die, even so 
 in Christ shall all be made alive." 4 
 
 The doctrine of social solidarity is brought for- 
 ward again and again throughout the entire 
 Bible, from Genesis to Revelation, and is, in- 
 deed, one of the most remarkable features of this 
 wonderful book. It is clearly expressed in that 
 part of the Bible which deals with the human 
 race before the time of Abraham ; and the entire 
 history of the Jews, both in their internal rela- 
 tions and their relations to foreign nations, em- 
 phasizes social solidarity. The nation rejoices 
 together and suffers together ; the nation par- 
 takes of the benefits of the righteousness of the 
 righteous, and is punished on account of the 
 wrongdoings of the wicked. The active power 
 of a few righteous men is told us in the history 
 of Abraham's pleading for Sodom, the city of 
 Lot. The Lord promised that should but ten 
 righteous men be found in the city it would not 
 be destroyed for the ten's sake. But when Israel 
 
 1 Romans v, 12. 3 1 Corinthians xv, 22. 
 
 8 Romans v, 19. 4 i Corinthians xv, 22.
 
 130 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 departs from God and no longer maintains right- 
 eous relations among men, and when the rich 
 oppress the poor and the strong make a prey of 
 the feeble, then the nation is led away into cap- 
 tivity. And this is all easily enough understood. 
 It is the legitimate outcome of natural laws 
 established by God. And these laws are still 
 operative, and their working in the history of 
 Israel is written for our admonition. 
 
 When we come to the New Testament we 
 have taught, with even greater force, the law of 
 social solidarity. But there is that difference 
 which has been pointed out in general between 
 the Old and the New Testaments. The law is 
 not merely national but universal, and it be- 
 comes more intensive. If we collectively, as 
 well as individually, seek the kingdom of God, 
 all material blessings will be added unto us. 
 Let it not be forgotten that it is the kingdom 
 which we are to seek, and a kingdom is a social 
 state. Many a theologian interprets the passage 
 as if it read, individual salvation, and not the 
 kingdom of God. The few may prosper materi- 
 ally through unrighteous social relations, but it 
 is only through right social relations that the 
 many can thrive. " Righteousness exalteth a 
 nation." So long as wrong relations exist among 
 men, the righteous man, the man who seeks the 
 kingdom of God, may suffer in material things
 
 Social Solidarity. 131 
 
 on account of his righteousness. A mistake is 
 often made by a too narrow interpretation of 
 Christ's words. When we forget that Christ 
 spoke of the coming of His kingdom continually, 
 and always had this kingdom in His mind, we 
 are apt to interpret individually what He intended 
 should be taken as applicable to society. When 
 a condition of things exists like that found in 
 Jerusalem in Christ's time, a man may seek the 
 kingdom of God, and yet may be persecuted 
 even unto death. In the Epistle to the Hebrews 
 we read of the prophets who subdued kingdoms 
 and did many wonderful works, and of whom 
 the world was not worthy; that they were 
 stoned and sawn asunder ; that " they wandered 
 about in sheepskins and goatskins ; being desti- 
 tute, afflicted, and tormented." ' 
 
 This oneness of men was peculiarly close 
 among the followers of Christ, for they are 
 spoken of again and again as " one body." " We 
 are one body in Christ, and everyone members 
 one of another." a In another place it is said 
 we are members of Christ's body, " of His flesh 
 and of His bones." ! Christ ardently longed for 
 a more perfect union with His disciples than 
 that which existed, and He prayed for His disci- 
 ples that remarkable prayer recorded in the 
 seventeenth chapter of the Gospel According to 
 
 1 Hebrews, chapter xi. 9 Romans xii, 5. 3 Ephesians v, 30.
 
 132 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 St. John, containing these words: "Neither 
 pray I for these alone, but for them also which 
 shall believe on Me through their word ; that 
 they all may be one ; as Thou, Father, art in Me, 
 and I in Thee, that they also may be one in Us : 
 that the world may believe that Thou hast sent 
 Me. And the glory which Thou gavest Me I 
 have given them ; that they may be one, even 
 as We are one." 
 
 If we read the words of Christ in the light of 
 this doctrine of social solidarity, we shall find in 
 them a meaning which probably has escaped most 
 of us. This doctrine does not take away any- 
 thing from what we have rightly held dear, but it 
 adds new fullness and depth to Christ's teachings. 
 We find Christ again and again rebuking those 
 who would separate themselves from their 
 fellows, who thought they could exalt them- 
 selves above their fellows, and believed that 
 they were free from the wrongs which prevailed 
 all about them. Again and again Christ con- 
 victs those self-righteous people of their iniquities. 
 One of the most remarkable instances is given in 
 the narrative of the woman taken in the very 
 act of sin. She was brought to Christ, and He 
 was reminded of the law of Moses that such a 
 woman should suffer death. He was asked 
 what should be done with her. Christ com- 
 manded that he who was without sin should
 
 Social Solidarity. 133 
 
 cast the first stone, and " they which heard it 
 went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, 
 even unto the last." ' This by no means signifies 
 that each one of those Pharisees had been guilty 
 of this very act, but that they all shared in the 
 common guilt, for they had not done what 
 might have been done to banish sin and to 
 restore men to righteousness. They neglected 
 sinners and did not seek to save the lost. 
 
 Social solidarity relieves the weak and erring, 
 it is very true, of a part of their individual guilt; 
 and for this reason doubtless Christ was so 
 gentle with this class, but on the whole it in- 
 creases individual responsibility immensely. This 
 is unconsciously admitted in the very general 
 desire to escape social responsibility. We are 
 responsible to a certain extent for all the poverty 
 and sin and suffering about us. An entire city 
 is guilty on account of the murder which 
 occurs in some alley in a slum ; yet whoever 
 utters a word publicly which tends to separate 
 men out from the common lot of their fellows, 
 and to assist them in an evasion of their share of 
 social responsibility, is a speaker sure of a warm 
 welcome, and what he says will pass readily 
 from newspaper to newspaper throughout the 
 entire length and breadth of the land. 
 
 Writers of deep insight have given frequent 
 
 1 St. John viii, 9.
 
 134 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 expression to the great truths of social solidarity. 
 Hawthorne says : " While there is a single guilty 
 person in the universe, each innocent one must 
 feel his innocence tortured by that guilt." Mar- 
 garet Fuller utters a similar thought in these 
 words : " While one man remains base, no man 
 can be altogether great and noble." Matthew 
 Arnold expresses the principle of social solidarity 
 in these words: "Culture, or the study of per- 
 fection, leads us to conceive of no perfection as 
 being real which is not a general perfection, em- 
 bracing all our fellow-men with whom we have 
 to do. Such is the sympathy which binds hu- 
 manity together that we are, indeed, as our re- 
 ligion says, ' members of one body,' and if ' one 
 member suffer, all the members suffer with it.' 
 Individual perfection is impossible so long as the 
 rest of mankind are not perfected along with us." 
 Man is the son of man, the blood of the race 
 flows in his veins. If we trace back our ancestry 
 we find that the lines of our descent cross and 
 recross almost to infinity. Thus it is a true say- 
 ing that " society gives us ancestors." Recent 
 interest in families awakened by organizations, 
 like the " Daughters of the Revolution," shows 
 how all the old New England families and all the 
 old Virginia families are related, and closer re- 
 search gives an immense network embracing 
 both sections. The lines in reality extend much
 
 Social Solidarity. 135 
 
 farther than anyone thinks, because in certain 
 directions these lines are not pleasing and conse- 
 quently not followed out. We lose the threads 
 which would enable us to trace back our ances- 
 try very soon, but we can go far enough to fur- 
 nish at least strong evidences of a unity of con- 
 siderable proportion of the race, and science can 
 carry the proof much farther. There is a race- 
 blood given as our inheritance, carrying with it 
 tendencies and capacities. Man is born into a 
 moral atmosphere ; he breathes it in and shares 
 in its guilt and in its excellence. At first the 
 moral quality is given, and the early development 
 of personality takes place on the basis of what 
 is given. Responsibility of the individual in- 
 creases with age. The individual is first a result, 
 but later becomes a cause. Early individual irre- 
 sponsibility is recognized by the courts of all civi- 
 lized lands, equally with growing responsibility. 
 Investigations into causes of physical infirmi- 
 ties, like deafness and blindness, show very gen- 
 erally wrongdoing on the part of some ancestor. 
 Quite frequently this wrongdoing takes the form 
 indicated by alcoholism. The child suffers for 
 sins committed before his birth. 1 Investigations 
 
 1 When the author not long since listened to a series of lectures 
 on the defective and unfortunate classes, he was impressed with 
 the frequency with which this thought was advanced by the 
 various experts who delivered the lectures.
 
 136 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 into causes of crime and pauperism show us a 
 network of evil forces indicated by the two 
 words, "heredity" and "environment," sur- 
 rounding thousands and hundreds of thousands 
 at their very birth. Those more fortunate ones, 
 well-born physically, mentally, and morally, are 
 apt to turn away in scorn from the unfortunate 
 and degenerate classes, and to neglect the oppor- 
 tunities which are abundant to improve the con- 
 ditions under which they live. It was to such 
 as these that Christ gave warning that those 
 upon whom the tower in Siloam fell were not 
 guilty above all the other dwellers at Jerusalem, 
 but that unless they repented they should like- 
 wise perish. So it is with us ; wretchedness and 
 disease travel from class to class and from indi- 
 vidual to individual. 
 
 We may trace social solidarity into every de- 
 partment of our common life. If we take it on 
 its physiological side, we find that physically we 
 suffer together : " The whole creation groaneth 
 and travaileth in pain together until now." ' 
 This was understood in a general way long ago, 
 but in the modern study of disease it has re- 
 ceived scientific demonstration. The whole 
 world is bound together in the chains of disease. 
 Mohammedans gather together in multitudes in 
 a city in Persia at a time of unusual drought, and 
 
 1 Romans viii, 22.
 
 Social Solidarity. 137 
 
 cholera begins to make its way round the world. 
 There is a crop failure in five provinces of Rus- 
 sia, and during the ensuing famine Russian 
 peasants die by the thousand. In this suffering 
 region we find the origin of the grippe which 
 has carried away hundreds of thousands in Eu- 
 rope and the United States. Still more closely 
 are all parts of one country, and more especially 
 of one city, connected together in health and dis- 
 ease. Says Dr. Cyrus Edson in a remarkable 
 article on the subject : " While the communities 
 have, through their Boards of Health, prepared 
 for the battle with contagious diseases, and while 
 they can trust with perfect confidence to their 
 defenses, the work of the men employed in these 
 Boards reveals to them more clearly day by day 
 the close connection which exists between the 
 health interests of all members of the commu- 
 nity, be these rich or poor ; the microbe of dis- 
 ease is no respecter of persons ; it cannot be 
 guarded against by any bank account, however 
 large." * Nevertheless, it is true that a bank 
 account is a help, although no sure guarantee. 
 Persons of wealth live much longer than the 
 poor, but in so far as they escape the common 
 consequences of disease their moral responsibil- 
 ity increases, and morally they are the more 
 
 1 See " The Microbe as a Social Leveler," North American 
 Review, October, 1895.
 
 138 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 guilty if they do not use their larger resources to 
 establish conditions of health for all. 
 
 Social solidarity may also be traced in things 
 intellectual. Our intellectual products are pecul- 
 iarly individual, and yet they are all dependent 
 upon conditions which no one man has established 
 or could establish. A Shakespeare could not 
 arise in the heart of Africa, nor could we find a 
 Tennyson to-day in China. Man has achieved his 
 greatest and best in intellectual efforts of every 
 sort when surrounded by a large life. When man 
 speaks nobly the race speaks through him and he 
 speaks for the race. Witness the great eras of 
 literature and art in Greece, in Rome, in England. 
 
 Political solidarity is something so old and so 
 familiar that we need scarcely more than mention 
 it. We are all responsible for the political acts 
 of our country, both with our persons and with 
 our property. If those who manage the affairs 
 of the nation act foolishly we may lose both our 
 goods and our lives. Punishment for the sins of 
 the rulers is a fact as old as history, yet the rulers 
 of nations do not stand alone. As John Wesley 
 says, " God frequently punishes a people for the 
 sins of their rulers, because they are generally 
 partakers of their sins in one kind or other." ' 
 
 It is a peculiar fact that social solidarity grows 
 
 1 John Wesley's sermon, " National Sins and Miseries," in his 
 Sermons, vol. I, p. 515.
 
 Social Solidarity. 139 
 
 with the growth of civilization ; men come closer 
 and closer together and the unity of the race be- 
 comes more and more intensive. This is best of 
 all illustrated in that department of life in which 
 it is most marked ; namely, economics. To a 
 greater and greater extent we are dependent on 
 others for the conditions of our own prosperity. 
 It has been pointed out in modern society that 
 man is dependent for his economic well-being, 
 first, upon what he himself produces ; second, 
 upon the exertions of others who produce the 
 things which he wants in exchange for his own 
 products ; third, upon the efforts of others who 
 produce the same things which he produces, giv- 
 ing us competition among sellers ; fourth, upon 
 the efforts of those who want the things that he 
 wants, giving us competition among purchasers. 
 Along one line, then, man is dependent upon him- 
 self; along three lines, he is dependent upon the 
 efforts of others. The man who produces only 
 shoes would starve to death did not others work 
 for him, while he works for them. As the division 
 of labor is carried farther and farther, economic 
 dependence increases, and thus social solidarity 
 grows. 
 
 The author has a friend connected with a hos- 
 pital whose experience shows what an awful thing 
 it is for a man to get out of human relations, 
 either because he has sundered the essential ties
 
 140 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 of humanity, or because they have been sundered 
 for him by others, or because, for him, perchance, 
 they have never existed. The waifs, the strays, 
 the morally abandoned, frequently have no spe- 
 cial tie binding them to anyone. This friend of 
 the author makes inquiry into the personal rela- 
 tions of those coming to the hospital ; he asks es- 
 pecially, in case of possible death, " Who cares 
 for you, what relative have you ? " and like 
 questions. Frequently the reply is, " No one." 
 To upbuild human character in men you must 
 establish for them right social relations. On the 
 other hand, we fulfill our own mission and develop 
 our own true individuality, not in isolation, but 
 in society, and by bringing ourselves in body 
 and mind into harmony with the laws of social 
 solidarity.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 OUR NEIGHBORS.
 
 " A CERTAIN lawyer . . . said unto Jesus, And who is my 
 neighbor ? And Jesus answering said, A certain man went 
 down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, which 
 stripped him of his raiment, and wounded him, and departed, 
 leaving him half dead. And by chance there came down a cer- 
 tain priest that way; and when he saw him, he passed by on the 
 other side. And likewise a Levite, when he was at the place, 
 came and looked on him, and passed by on the other side. But 
 a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was ; and 
 when he saw him, he had compassion on him, and went to 
 him, and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set 
 him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care 
 of him. And on the morrow when he departed, he took out two 
 pence, and gave them to the host, and said unto him, Take 
 care of him : and whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come 
 again, I will repay thee. Which now of these three, thinkest 
 thou, was neighbor unto him that fell among the thieves ? And 
 he said, He that showed mercy on him. Then said Jesus unto 
 him, Go, and do thou likewise." St. Luke x, 25-37. 
 
 " The intent of the similitude is to show to whom a man is a 
 neighbor, or who is a man's neighbor, which is both one, and 
 what it is to love a man's neighbor as himself. The Samari- 
 tan holp him, and showed mercy as long as he was present ; and 
 when he could be no longer present, he left his money behind 
 him, and if that were not sufficient, he left his credence to make 
 good the rest ; and forsook him not, as long as the other had 
 need. Then said Christ, ' Go, thou, and do likewise ; ' that is, 
 without difference or respection of persons ; whosoever needeth 
 thy help, him count thy neighbor, and his neighbor be thou, 
 and show mercy on him as long as he needeth thy succor, and 
 that is to love a man's neighbor as himself. Neighbor is a 
 word of love : and signifieth that a man should be ever nigh, and 
 at hand, and ready to help in time of need." Tyndale, The 
 Wicked Mammon, Parker Society Publications, p. 85.
 
 Our Neighbors. 143 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 OUR NEIGHBORS. 
 
 A QUOTATION from Sir Henry Maine will 
 serve as a text for the present chapter. It 
 reads as follows : 
 
 " What is the real origin of the feeling that it 
 is not creditable to drive a hard bargain- with a 
 near relative or friend ? It can hardly be said 
 that there is any rule of morality to forbid it. 
 The feeling seems to me to bear the traces of 
 the old notion that men united in natural groups 
 do not deal with one another on principles of 
 trade. . . . The general proposition which is 
 the basis of political economy made its first ap- 
 proach to truth under the only circumstances 
 which admitted of men meeting at arm's length, 
 not as brothers of the same group, but as 
 strangers. . . . If the notion of getting the best 
 price for movable property has only crept to re- 
 ception by insensible steps, it is all but certain 
 that the idea of taking the highest obtainable 
 rent for land is relatively of very modern origin. 
 The rent of land corresponds to the price of 
 goods, but doubtless was infinitely slower in 
 10
 
 144 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 conforming to economical law, since the im- 
 pression of a brotherhood in the ownership of 
 land still survived when goods had long since 
 become the subject of individual property." 
 
 The ancient village community was an associa- 
 tion of men bound together by peculiarly close 
 ties. These men were generally supposed to be 
 descended from a common ancestor and thus to 
 be more or less closely related, and any outsiders 
 received into the community became members 
 of this large family. They felt themselves to be 
 brothers, and in an imperfect manner attempted 
 to establish brotherly relations among them- 
 selves. Competition was greatly restrained in 
 fact, in the modern sense could hardly be said to 
 exist custom regulated prices, and sharp prac- 
 tice and hard bargaining were viewed with dis- 
 approbation and often severely punished. Ethical 
 obligation extended to all the relations of life. 
 The range of this obligation, however, was not 
 extensive ; once outside the community, moral 
 law was scarcely recognized. There was often a 
 place touching three or four village communities, 
 but not belonging to any one, which was neutral 
 territory. This became a market where the cus- 
 toms and usages of the village community no 
 longer held sway, and it was in this market that 
 the idea of the legitimacy of hard bargaining and 
 sharp practice took its origin, as we are told by
 
 Our Neighbors. 145 
 
 Sir Henry Maine. This authority regards sharp 
 practice and hard bargaining as true economic 
 practice, and inquires why it is that somehow or 
 other men are still frequently inclined to view it 
 with disapprobation. He finds the explanation 
 in survivals of feelings which once obtained 
 among closely connected groups of men. The 
 highest rent obtainable for land is not always 
 exacted in England, and it is said that there are 
 places where such an exaction would ostracise 
 the land-owner. The explanation given is that 
 manorial groups were substituted for village com- 
 munities, and that they still survive, even if in 
 imperfect form. 
 
 As old groups of men broke up with modern 
 progress, ethical ideas have seemed to become 
 weaker, and there has been an attempt to take 
 one great department of social life, namely, the 
 economic, entirely outside the range of ethical 
 obligation. Ancient groups were associations of 
 brothers, but those not within the groups were 
 enemies. The three words, foreigner, stranger, 
 and enemy, were similar, and often the same 
 word denoted all three relationships that of 
 foreigner, that of stranger, and that of enemy. 
 When men's dealings were chiefly with those 
 not connected by any recognized tie of mutual 
 obligation, each one naturally tried to do the 
 best he could for himself, regardless of conse-
 
 146 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 quences to others. Yet there never has been a 
 time when there have not been those associations 
 of one sort and another within which ordinarily 
 good men have viewed with disapprobation hard 
 bargaining. It may be said, indeed, that a genu- 
 ine feeling of brotherhood is incompatible with 
 sharp practice and hard bargaining, and Sir 
 Henry Maine is altogether on the wrong track 
 when he looks for a time when what he styles 
 economic practices shall universally obtain, and 
 men shall applaud that person who drives a hard 
 bargain or indulges in sharp practice with neigh- 
 bors and friends. The breakdown of old ties 
 which were intensive and not extensive led to a 
 great weakening in the intensity of ethical feel- 
 ing, especially in business life, because the same 
 amount of feeling was, if such an expression may 
 be used, made to cover a territory so much 
 larger. Men, however, have long been taught in 
 all civilized nations that all men are brothers, 
 and most enlightened persons profess to accept 
 this teaching of universal brotherhood. There 
 has been, then, an extension of brotherhood 
 which is simply immense, placing us in the 
 modern world indefinitely in advance of the 
 closely related but exclusive groups of the 
 ancient world. The range of ethical obligation 
 has been widened until it embraces all humanity, 
 but it has not been deepened in proportion.
 
 Our Neighbors. 147 
 
 The work of deepening this feeling, however, 
 goes on uninterruptedly. 
 
 Day by day the phrase, " All men are brothers," 
 comes to mean more and more, and the time is 
 surely coming when it will ethically mean as 
 much in the world at large as once it did in the 
 village community ; and when that time comes 
 no decent man will any longer advocate the 
 legitimacy of the universal sway of sharp prac- 
 tice and hard bargaining. Men will then try to 
 put all business relations upon a brotherly basis, 
 and will always inquire what forms of industrial 
 organization and what modes of doing business 
 are in accordance with the highest standards of 
 right, and best promote the general welfare. It 
 is this deepening process of ethical obligation 
 which explains many social problems of our day. 
 The deepening is going on with remarkable 
 rapidity, and the result is that men everywhere 
 are bringing to bear ethical tests upon all rela- 
 tions of life, and are rejecting as unsound all 
 practices and customs inconsistent with genuine 
 brotherhood. Mere conventional phrases no 
 longer satisfy us ; we want the reality of brother- 
 hood. Now, a business world which has taken 
 its origin in middle ground lying between com- 
 munities within which the range of ethical obli- 
 gation was confined can never satisfy a highly 
 developed Christian consciousness. Men may
 
 148 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 talk and argue as they will about economic law, 
 yet there is deep down in our hearts a feeling 
 that there is something better than sharp prac- 
 tice and hard bargaining. 
 
 It was an unbelieving age of materialism which 
 asserted the all-sufficiency and even beneficence 
 of unrestrained self-interest, and attempted to 
 restrict economic inquiries to this one question : 
 " How produce the greatest amount of wealth ? " 
 Aristotle, Plato, and the wisest of the ancients 
 never asked, " How can our nation become as 
 rich as possible? " but rather, " How may such 
 economic and social relations be established 
 among citizens as to render them good and 
 happy?" They sought in the business world 
 merely a basis for the highest physical, mental, 
 and spiritual development of man, but they 
 never looked upon the accumulation of riches as 
 an end in itself. These ancients did not extend 
 the range of ethical obligation beyond nationality, 
 but our age regards all men as closely connected 
 as the Jews in the eyes of Moses or the Greeks 
 in the mind of Plato. Consequently we begin to 
 ask similar questions. 
 
 The widening and deepening range of ethical 
 obligation rests upon a basis of solid facts. One 
 of the most characteristic features of the latter 
 half of the nineteenth century is the extension 
 of international connections. Men of all nations
 
 Our Neighbors. 149 
 
 are drawing nearer and nearer together in every 
 department of social life. After men ceased to 
 regard the foreigner as necessarily an enemy, 
 they long continued to consider him as an in- 
 ferior. Doubtless there are still Americans who 
 regard Americans as superior to Englishmen or 
 Germans or Frenchmen ; but as knowledge ex- 
 tends and practical Christianity advances we feel 
 that God has created all men of one blood. This 
 is seen in international marriages, which have 
 their good side, and that one of no mean signifi- 
 cance. The number daily increases of those who 
 have ties of blood relationship extending to 
 several countries. It often happens that people 
 of culture and means have friends in three or four 
 countries, and dear friends with whom connection 
 is kept up by correspondence and occasional in- 
 terchange of visits. 
 
 The freedom with which capital moves from 
 country to country has become a matter of com- 
 mon knowledge, and it is often said that capital 
 knows no country, but is strictly cosmopolitan. 
 This is, to be sure, an exaggeration, but it em- 
 phasizes forcibly actual facts. The past genera- 
 tion has witnessed a marvelous growth of a feel- 
 ing of brotherhood among the wage-earners of 
 modern industrial nations. Possibly when the 
 history of the nineteenth century comes to be 
 written, several generations hence, this will be re-
 
 150 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 garded as the most marvelous feature of the 
 second half of the century. The ties which bind 
 workingmen to workingmen all over the world 
 are very real, and are felt wherever there is an 
 intelligent wage-earning class with a developed 
 class-consciousness. Papers devoted to the inter- 
 ests of labor published in every European country 
 find their way to the United States, and our labor 
 papers find their way to all European countries. 
 Even Asia and Africa are coming into this world 
 movement. Workingmen of one nation contrib- 
 ute to those of others to assist them in their 
 upward struggle, and refuse advantages procured 
 at the expense of brothers whom they have never 
 seen. Why cite facts when all know that con- 
 tributions of Australian workingmen helped 
 English workingmen to a victory in one of the 
 most momentous struggles with their employers, 
 and when the fact has frequently been published 
 that workingmen from the Continent of Europe 
 who have been brought to England to take the 
 place of strikers have returned to their own 
 countries as soon as they found out the true 
 nature of their engagement, and when under 
 similar circumstances European workingmen 
 have even crossed the ocean from America to 
 Europe after they had come over here in the 
 hope of finding better wages? 
 
 The extension of the range of ethical obliga-
 
 Our Neighbors. 151 
 
 tion moves most readily along what may be 
 called horizontal lines that is to say, it is largely 
 an extension within social classes. The English 
 merchant recognizes ties which bind him to the 
 merchant in New York and Paris and Berlin. 
 Manufacturers and employers generally are more 
 and more conscious of relations of brotherhood 
 binding them together, and as has just been 
 stated, the wage-earners of all lands feel their 
 oneness, and their great rallying cry has gone 
 forth : " Workingmen of all lands, unite ! " Thus 
 it often happens that there is a better under- 
 standing among members of any one industrial 
 class in different countries than among members 
 of different industrial classes in the same country. 
 It cannot, indeed, be denied that while industrial 
 and social classes in different countries are draw- 
 ing together, there is in some places a growing 
 hostility often separating class from class in the 
 same country; yet there is also in many quarters 
 evidence of efforts to bring together into broth- 
 erly relations all classes. The range of ethical 
 obligation is in this respect likewise deepening. 
 We are more and more inclined to put ourselves 
 in the place of those who socially or industrially 
 are differently situated from ourselves, and 
 hence it is that so many young men and women 
 of means and culture are devoting themselves in 
 social settlements, like Hull House in Chicago,
 
 152 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 and elsewhere, to social problems in the hope of 
 ameliorating the condition of the less favored 
 portions of humanity, and that in great centers 
 of education, like Oxford, we find an admirable 
 enthusiasm of humanity which, in its earnest- 
 ness and intensity, can only be compared with 
 the crusades. 
 
 Those of us who belong to what would ordi- 
 narily be called the cultured, well-to-do, and in- 
 fluential classes in the community, ought to make 
 it clear to ourselves that we are still very far from 
 ethical fairness in our dealings with the less 
 favored social classes and in the judgments which 
 we pass upon them. We have one measure 
 which we apply to the acts and utterances of 
 those in our own social class, and another measure 
 which we apply to the acts and utterances of 
 those belonging to other social classes, in par- 
 ticular the wage-earning classes. Let a dispute 
 arise between employers and employed, and we 
 at once accept the statement of the employers. 
 This is given to the press, and this alone as a 
 rule ; yet we pass judgment without trying to 
 find out what the workingmen could say for 
 themselves. If, however, two employers quarrel, 
 we suspend judgment until we have heard both 
 sides. We assume, moreover, that the obliga- 
 tions which rest upon workingmen are different 
 and far severer than those which apply to their
 
 Our Neighbors. 153 
 
 employers. Journals of the highest respectability 
 will assure us that employers have a perfect 
 right to refuse to treat with a representative of 
 the employees, whereas they would regard it as 
 a most unwarrantable impertinence and impu- 
 dence if workingmen should refuse to deal with 
 any one whom their employers might select as a 
 delegate. The writer has in mind a strike which 
 occurred some two years ago, and a prominent 
 newspaper in New York said that the employers 
 had an undoubted right to refuse to treat with 
 outsiders assuming to represent the wage-earners. 
 There is no doubt, however, on the part of any 
 honest and well-informed man that these repre- 
 sentatives were genuine representatives. Let us 
 reverse the case and suppose the strikers who 
 in this case happened to be street-car employees 
 should refuse to treat with some delegate of 
 the capitalists, claiming that he was an outsider, 
 owning no part of the capital invested in the 
 street railway. 
 
 Another incident which occurred during this 
 same strike shows how unequal and unfair are 
 our judgments. What is called an iron-clad 
 agreement was presented to the workingmen, 
 forcing them to withdraw from all labor organi- 
 zations as a condition of employment. This was 
 regarded by many papers and among them 
 even religious papers as perfectly fair and
 
 154 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 proper. Let us reverse the case. Employers 
 have their associations, and one of the avowed 
 designs of these associations is the regulation 
 and control of labor. To deny this is simply a 
 confession of ignorance or dishonesty. Suppose 
 these workingmen had united and presented an 
 " iron-clad " to their employers, refusing to work 
 for them unless they dissolved connection with all 
 associations of employers. Would not editorials 
 innumerable have been penned and sermons 
 many been preached in denunciation of these 
 workingmen ? Employers have a right to con- 
 duct their own business as they please within 
 limits, but this does not involve their one-sided 
 regulation of conditions under which employees 
 must work and the selection of associates with 
 whom they must work. When workingmen in- 
 terfere in business as it is claimed by their em- 
 ployers it is usually to regulate those conditions 
 which are of importance to themselves. Very 
 rarely do workingmen attempt to interfere with 
 employers in the conduct of their business except 
 in so far as it is a matter of direct and immediate 
 concern to themselves. What must be said 
 about such controversies as this from the standard 
 of ethical fairness ? 
 
 We may ask this question : Is there a growing 
 feeling of ethical obligation on the part of the 
 wage-earning classes with respect to their em-
 
 Our Neighbors. 155 
 
 ployers ? Do they feel more and more that they 
 must give good work for good pay? Do they 
 feel, to an increasing extent, that their work is 
 an ethical calling ; that they have a mission in 
 God's world to minister to the happiness and 
 well-being of society? Do they always greet 
 with warm appreciation self-sacrificing efforts 
 made in their behalf? Unfortunately, while rec- 
 ognizing the high and conscientious and truly 
 Christian conduct of many wage-earners, a nega- 
 tive answer must be returned. If we speak of 
 the richer and employing classes as higher and 
 the poorer and wage-earning classes as lower 
 social classes and to refuse to do so is to refuse 
 to acknowledge facts as they exist we must say 
 that the downward movement in the extension 
 of the range of ethical obligation has in recent 
 years been stronger than the upward one. The 
 favored classes are to some extent trying to atone 
 for the shortcomings of past centuries. This is 
 well ; but it is also right that earnest endeavors 
 should be made in all kindness to quicken the 
 consciences of wage-earners especially, and gener- 
 ally the less favored social classes, to a realizing 
 sense of their duties and obligations, for, like all 
 others, working people have been thinking too 
 much about rights and too little about duties. 
 Even a feeling on the part of wage-earners, that 
 the present social order is one which ought to
 
 156 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 be changed, cannot be held to free them from 
 obligations to their employers and to others. 
 
 In conclusion, while in view of what remains 
 to be accomplished we can scarcely say that we 
 have made more than a beginning, we may never- 
 theless characterize our age as one in which may 
 be perceived a clearly defined widening and deep- 
 ening range of ethical obligation.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE STATE.
 
 "OUR patriotic duty is our Christian duty." Rev. E. A. 
 Schell, D.D., Secretary of the Epworth League, in an address 
 entitled ''Methodism, a Layman's Movement." 
 
 " From history we learn that the great function of religion 
 has been the founding and sustaining of States." Sir J. JR. 
 Seeley, Natural Religion, p. 202. 
 
 " The State the greatest institution on earth elevates every- 
 thing that appertains to it, every duty, interest, or measure, 
 into great importance, for the simple reason that it affects all, 
 and, what with its direct and indirect operation, it very mate- 
 rially influences the moral well-being of every individual. . . . 
 Good laws elevate man ; bad laws, if persisted in for a series of 
 years, will degrade any society. ... It is one of the greatest 
 blessings to live under wise laws administered by an upright 
 government, and obeyed and carried out by good and stanch 
 citizens; it is most grateful and animating to a generous heart, 
 and a mind which cheerfully assists in the promotion of the 
 general good, or salutary institutions. It greatly contributes to 
 our self-esteem if we live in a community which we respect, 
 among fellow-men we gladly acknowledge as fellow-citizens. 
 Many of the noblest actions which now adorn the pages of 
 history have originated from this source of inspiration. On the 
 contrary, we feel ourselves humbled and dispirited, we find 
 our own views contracted and our moral vigor relaxed, we feel 
 deprived of that buoyancy without which no manly and resolute 
 self-possession can exist, it wears off the edge of moral sensitive- 
 ness when we see ourselves surrounded by men with loose 
 political principles, by a society destitute of active public 
 opinion, which neither cheers the honest nor frowns down 
 immoral boldness." Francis Lieber, LL.D., Political Ethics, 
 Edited by Theodore D. Woolsey, pp. 79, 80. 
 
 " In order then to the chief good, the righteous man must 
 
 live in a righteous state ; virtue within and virtue without must 
 
 dwell together in beautiful and holy unity. But if God means 
 
 that each person realize the chief good, what ideal does He set 
 
 11
 
 before us for society ? This : That the individuals composing 
 it shall, every one of them, be perfectly virtuous, or perfectly 
 holy, and that the State into which they are organized shall in 
 every respect be perfectly ordered and perfectly righteous, an 
 altogether good and holy State. No less an ideal as respects 
 man, on the one hand, and society, on the other, can satisfy the 
 Christian idea of God." Rev. A. M. Fairbairn, D.D., Religion 
 in History and in Modern Life, p. 257. 
 
 " We wait for the next stage in the growth of the State, 
 when in full and generous cooperation each citizen shall offer 
 the fullness of his own life, that he may rejoice in the fullness of 
 the life of the body. Such an issue may appear to be visionary. 
 It is, I believe, far nearer than we suppose. It is at least the 
 natural outcome of what has gone before. Society has been 
 organized effectr.ely without regard to the individual. The 
 individual has been developed in his independence. It remains 
 to show how the richest variety of individual differences can be 
 made to fulfill! he noblest ideal of the State." From an address 
 by Bishop B. F. Westcott at the Church, reprinted in " Chris- 
 tian Socialism " by Rev. Philo W. Sprague.
 
 The State. 161 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE STATE. 
 
 THE word State is, in the United States 
 especially, liable to be misunderstood, 
 when it is used in its generic sense. Our United 
 States is made up of forty-five commonwealths, 
 and these are called states. But State in its 
 most general sense is not equivalent to state in 
 the sense of the American commonwealth. The 
 State means the entire American nation, politi- 
 cally organized. The American State embraces 
 the American in all his political relations, as the 
 German State embraces the German in all his 
 political relations. The English State and the 
 French State similarly embrace the Englishmen 
 and Frenchmen respectively in all their political 
 relations. The Americans, however, like the 
 Germans, have a federal State, while the English 
 and the French have a unitary State. We 
 might therefore, in the present chapter, when 
 speaking of Americans, substitute for State " the 
 nation and the commonwealth," because both 
 make up our State, but the substitution would 
 be objectionable, first, because it would involve
 
 162 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 the use of three words where one is sufficient, 
 and this would frequently be awkward ; second, 
 because it is desirable that we should become 
 accustomed to the use of the word State in its 
 generic sense and remember our relations to 
 nation and commonwealth alike. 
 
 Commonwealth is often used as equivalent of 
 State as later in this chapter. If a common- 
 wealth has full and complete sovereignty, it is of 
 course a State in its complete sense. In the 
 United States, the nation and commonwealth 
 must be taken together to give complete sover- 
 eignty. The word State is used in this broad 
 sense both in John Wesley's " Sunday Service " 
 and in the revised book of Common Prayer of 
 the Protestant Episcopal Church in the petition, 
 " O Lord, save the State." 
 
 Family, Church, and State are frequently men- 
 tioned together as the three pre-eminently divine 
 institutions known to man. It is claimed by 
 some that the State is the chief institution of 
 these three, and that if we select one institution 
 as above all others divine it must be the State. 
 Such a comparison manifestly cannot be under- 
 stood too literally. If several institutions are 
 established by God, it can hardly be strictly true 
 that one is more divine than another. What is 
 meant is this : That God works through the State 
 in carrying out His purposes more universally
 
 The State. 163 
 
 than through any other institution ; that it takes 
 the first place among His instrumentalities. 
 
 The family is clearly a divine institution. The 
 Bible leaves no doubt about this in the mind of 
 anyone who accepts the Bible as true. Destroy 
 the family and you destroy one of the fundamen- 
 tal conditions of that righteousness which God 
 desires to establish. Yet the family is not inclu- 
 sive of all men, like the State. Most men are 
 undoubtedly born into this world as members of 
 a family, and not to be included in a family at 
 one's birth is abnormal and most unfortunate. 
 Yet as men grow up they must leave the family, 
 if, as not infrequently happens, death has not 
 already destroyed it. Many of those scattered 
 elements of former families unite and form new 
 families ; yet there are always large numbers living 
 isolated lives, forming no part of any family. 
 Not only has this always been the case, but it 
 always must be ; and there is some reason to be- 
 lieve that it will be the case to even a greater 
 extent in the future than at present. There are 
 physical reasons why many men and women 
 should not marry and establish families, and there 
 are economic reasons. Men otherwise amiable 
 and intelligent occasionally lack the capacity 
 to support a family according to the standard of 
 life suitable to their station. Physical and eco- 
 nomic reasons for a single life will be more appre-
 
 164 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 dated, as men become more conscientious about 
 assuming responsibilities toward others. Dis- 
 parity between the number of men and the num- 
 ber of women in most parts of the earth is a 
 cause of singleness. It is not to the point to re- 
 ply that the whole number of men in the world 
 is nearly equal to the number of women, provided 
 they are not evenly distributed. A bachelor in 
 Montana cannot marry a spinster in Germany. 
 The more dangerous avocations of men tend to 
 reduce the supply of available husbands. Again 
 there are humanitarian and religious motives 
 which keep men and women from marrying. 
 Christ ranked such motives very high, and prom- 
 ises great rewards to those who for His sake give 
 up husband or wife. Much more might be said 
 about the family and its limitations, but space 
 will not admit of it. The State includes now and 
 always has included within its embrace all civ- 
 ilized men and women, but only some of these, 
 and not all, belong to distinct families or house- 
 holds. 
 
 The Church, as we understand it, began to ex- 
 ist less than two thousand years ago ; but long 
 before the apostles of Christ established the 
 Church God worked in the world, and the institu- 
 tion through which He worked above all others 
 was the State. His chosen people, the Jews, 
 constituted a commonwealth established, we are
 
 The State. 165 
 
 told, by God. The revelation of God to the 
 Jews, and through the Jews to the rest of the 
 world, is found in the laws and in the life of the 
 Hebrew State. These laws and this life were an 
 inspiration to David and the other poets of Israel, 
 and they were the prime object of solicitude to 
 the prophets. The prophets, in fact, were states- 
 men, or, if you will, politicians, in the nobler sense 
 of the word. When Christ came His mind was 
 full of the kingdom or commonwealth in which 
 righteousness should prevail. The coming of the 
 kingdom was proclaimed by Christ, and it was 
 His followers who began to talk about a Church 
 as distinct from the State. The Church was 
 early established, and it has increased in numbers 
 and in power, but it has never embraced more 
 than a minority of civilized human beings. 
 There have always been followers of God who 
 have not been adherents of any visible Church, 
 any regularly established ecclesiastical organiza- 
 tion, but these are all embraced within the State, 
 and the State also includes those outside sinners, 
 those unregenerate persons who do not love God 
 and man, and do not seek righteousness, among 
 whom the Church works. 
 
 We must ever remember that Christ and His 
 apostles always recognized the authority of the 
 State as divine in character even under most try- 
 ing and perplexing circumstances. Christ coun-
 
 166 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 seled obedience to the Roman emperor, and St. 
 Paul uses well-known words which could scarcely 
 be more explicit : " For there is no power but of 
 God : the powers that be are ordained of God. 
 
 " Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, 
 resisteth the ordinance of God. . . . 
 
 " For rulers are not a terror to good works, but 
 to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the 
 power ? do that which is good, and thou shalt 
 have praise of the same : 
 
 " For he is the minister of God to thee for good. 
 But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid ; 
 for he beareth not the sword in vain : for he is 
 the minister of God. . . . 
 
 " For this cause pay ye tribute also. . . . 
 
 " Render therefore to all their dues : tribute 
 to whom tribute is due ; custom to whom custom; 
 fear to whom fear ; honor to whom honor." 
 
 It has also been pointed out that while Christ 
 manifested no respect for mere wealth or assumed 
 titles, he never failed to show obedience and 
 honor to the regularly constituted public author- 
 ities. 2 
 
 So essential is the State to the work of God in 
 this world, that if missionaries penetrate into a 
 
 1 Romans xiii, 1-7. 
 
 s By Rev. F. W. Robertson in his sermon, " The Message of 
 the Church to Men of Wealth," in the volume of his Ser- 
 mons.
 
 The State. 167 
 
 stateless region, say, the heart of Africa, and 
 convert men to Christianity, those men will at 
 once form a new State, or become incorporated 
 as part of an old State. All great and glorious 
 deeds of men have taken place within a State, 
 and the highest achievements of the mind of man 
 have been preceded or accompanied by a large 
 and expanding national life. 
 
 The State has been described as a continuous, 
 conscious organism, and a moral personality, 
 which has its foundations laid in the nature of 
 man. It is not the product of the will of man. 
 Men have never come together in a state of na- 
 ture, and then by the formation of a State passed 
 out of a condition of nature into an organized 
 political existence. The State grows up natu- 
 rally, spontaneously, and men are born into the 
 State, and the State is one of the forces making 
 them what they are. The basis of the State is 
 human nature, and the State is the natural condi- 
 tion of men. Some would have us to go to sav- 
 ages to find out what is natural, but Aristotle has 
 taught us that it is the perfect man, and not the 
 imperfect man, who can reveal to us what is nat- 
 ural, just as we look at a perfect and not an im- 
 perfect specimen of fruit to understand the nature 
 of the fruit. 
 
 Aristotle described an order of development 
 when he said the State was formed for the sake
 
 168 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 of life, but that it was continued for the sake of 
 the good life. This means that the State is nec- 
 essary in order that man may live at all. Its first 
 purpose was the provision of material resources for 
 the nourishment of the animal life, but the higher, 
 nobler purpose of the State is not the material 
 life, but the soul and mind of man. As soon as 
 the means of life are provided, we must aspire to 
 the good life. The ignoble doctrine that the 
 State is a necessary evil was as far from Aristotle 
 as it has been from all great political thinkers. 
 The State was to him not only a necessary good, 
 but the highest and noblest of all good. 
 
 For a long time previous to the Protestant 
 Reformation false notions concerning the Church 
 obscured the idea of the State. It was held by 
 leaders in the Church that the Church was no- 
 ble because it was concerned with spiritual 
 things, and that the State was base because it 
 was concerned with temporal things. Conse- 
 quently it was maintained that the Church 
 should dominate the State, as the spirit ought 
 to rule the body. The rulers of the State were 
 to be the servants of priests, humbly doing their 
 bidding. The Protestant Reformation meant 
 the exaltation of the State. The truth was pro- 
 claimed with emphasis that the work which God 
 intended His people to do while on earth was to 
 concern themselves with the things of the world,
 
 The State. 169 
 
 and to establish here on earth righteous relations 
 among men. The wide separation between 
 things secular and things sacred was denied. 
 The whole earth was held sacred. Nothing was 
 secular in any bad sense of the word except sin, 
 and the purpose of Christians was to combat it. 
 As soon as it was recognized that the work given 
 to Christians was the establishment of righteous- 
 ness, the function of the magistrate became as 
 sacred as that of the priest. One of the reform- 
 ers uses these words, expressing a belief of 
 early Protestantism : " The distinction of eccle- 
 siastical and profane laws can find no place 
 among Christians. The magistrate himself is 
 holy and not profane, his powers and laws holy, 
 his sword holy." This exalted idea of the State 
 was followed by most momentous practical conse- 
 quences. The State began to concern itself with 
 education, and schools and universities became 
 State institutions, and the educational work of 
 the State continued until in the most enlightened 
 Protestant nations every child was guaranteed 
 at least a minimum amount of education. The 
 cry of the poor became a matter of concern to 
 the civil authorities, and in Protestant Teutonic 
 countries the right of man to at least a bare 
 livelihood was guaranteed by the Poor Laws. 
 The obligation to maintain the poor was for the 
 first time assumed by civil society in the six-
 
 170 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 teenth century, after the Protestant Reforma- 
 tion. Another consequence of the exaltation of 
 the State was the curtailment of the functions of 
 ecclesiastical Courts and the extension of the 
 function of the civil Courts, to which all alike, 
 clergy included, ultimately became subject. If 
 the civil sword was holy and civil justice divine, 
 why should there exist a separate ecclesiastical 
 jurisdiction arrogating superiority to itself ? l 
 
 The only limit to the functions of the State is 
 that laid down by Aristotle ; the general princi- 
 ple cannot be stated better than he stated it : " It 
 is the duty of the State to do whatever is in its 
 power to promote the good life." Any other 
 limitation is false to the fundamental principles 
 of Protestantism, both ancient and modern. 
 The venerable Hooker repudiated with these 
 vigorous words the doctrine that the State ex- 
 isted only for the sake of material goods : " A 
 gross error it is to think that regal power ought 
 to serve for the good of the body, and not for 
 the good of the soul ; for men's temporal peace, 
 and not their eternal safety ; and if God had 
 
 1 The author does not understand that there is anything in 
 this paragraph which a Roman Catholic must of necessity reject. 
 Every enlightened Roman Catholic acknowledges that those 
 claiming to speak and act for the Church have made many 
 mistakes. The writer, however, speaks from the Protestant point 
 of view, but can only rejoice if Roman Catholics also can accept 
 what is here stated, as he is convinced many of them can.
 
 The State. 171 
 
 ordained kings for no other end and purpose but 
 only to fat up men like hogs and see that they 
 have their mast ? " 1 
 
 The imperfect political life of our time, espe- 
 cially in our own country, may be thought by 
 some to be antagonistic to the doctrine of the 
 divinity of the State. The divinity of an insti- 
 tution, however, does not mean its perfection in 
 its actual existence, but only in its idea. God 
 has given us the idea, and we have carried it out 
 poorly. The State is, alas, corrupt and de- 
 graded ; but so have been also the Church and the 
 family at many times and in many places. The 
 polygamy of the Mormons no more militates 
 against the divine idea of the family than the 
 corruption of New York politics against the di- 
 vine idea of the State. Government is divine in 
 idea and purpose, but those in New York city 
 who administer government are too generally 
 unworthy of their high trust. One reason why 
 political life in the United States is so unwor- 
 thy is because the true idea of the State has 
 become so obscured. The nature of offenses 
 against the purity of political life as offenses di- 
 rectly against God has not in recent years been 
 adequately emphasized. Yet we may feel en- 
 
 1 Hooker, Ecclesiastical Polity. This is a reprint of the text, 
 but it appears to be corrupt or incomplete, although the mean- 
 ing is clear enough.
 
 172 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 couraged when we compare American political 
 life with the life of the Church in the period pre- 
 ceding the Protestant Reformation. How could 
 a President of the United States be conceived 
 as living a life so debased as that of some of the 
 popes, or others who have held high positions in 
 the Church ? 
 
 Church and State are much alike in their na- 
 ture and in their purposes, and it is because they 
 are so much alike that there has been so much 
 conflict between them conflict of which we 
 shall hear more in the United States in future 
 years than we have in the past. It has been 
 held by some Protestants, like the Lutheran 
 Rothe, that the State in idea is the Church, and 
 that when the perfect State comes it will be the 
 Church. He of course speaks of an idea to be 
 realized in a distant future, but he distinctly 
 states that the Church must decrease and the 
 State increase. This doctrine cannot be elabo- 
 rated in this place, but it may be asked what 
 need there is of a separate institution for right- 
 eousness when the whole of social and individual 
 life and all institutions are permeated with the 
 Christian spirit. We are told, indeed, that 
 there shall be no temple in the New Jerusalem. 
 But certainly we are yet far from this New Jeru- 
 salem, and we must work for the extension of the 
 Church, while we at the same time endeavor to
 
 The State. 173 
 
 instil Christian principles into our entire public 
 as well as private life. 
 
 It is true that the main purpose of the State 
 is the religious purpose. Religious laws are the 
 only laws which ought to be enacted. But what 
 are religious laws ? Certainly not in the United 
 States laws establishing any particular sectarian 
 views or any theological tenets, in regard to 
 which there may be diversity of opinion, but 
 laws designed to promote the good life. Factory 
 acts, educational laws, laws for the establishment 
 of parks and of playgrounds for children, laws 
 securing honest administration of justice, laws 
 rendering the Courts accessible to the poor as 
 well as the rich all these are religious laws in 
 the truest sense of the word. The Church can 
 go in many respects far beyond the State. It 
 can place ideals ahead of the State to which the 
 State must gradually approach ; it can rebuke 
 and inspire the State ; it can quicken the con- 
 sciences of men, of those who rule and of those 
 who obey. The Church always has the oppor- 
 tunity of doing work neglected by the State, and 
 in particular the dogmas of religion are com- 
 mitted to the Church. Theology in the narrow 
 sense of the term belongs to the Church and 
 not to the modern State. On the other hand, 
 let the Church see to it that all her actions and 
 teachings strengthen and purify the State. Let
 
 174 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 all Christians see to it that they put as much as 
 possible, not of doctrine or creed into the State 
 constitution, but of Christian life and practice 
 into the activity of the State, working, to be 
 sure, to change the constitution in so far as this 
 may stand in the way of righteousness. The 
 nation must be recognized fully as a Christian 
 nation. 
 
 Love of country must show itself in service, in 
 the upbuilding of the institutions of the country. 
 The schools of the country must be nourished. 
 If they lack religious instruction, let the churches 
 supplement the schools on this side. If the con- 
 version of the world is our object, we will not 
 attempt to pull a few out of the world, nor will 
 we so much endeavor to separate our children 
 from the public schools as to make these public 
 schools what they should be. We will establish 
 our centers of religious influences at the seat of 
 State universities and reap the harvest in them 
 which awaits Christian effort. If we have our 
 own separate denominational schools we will see 
 to it that they minister to the entire life of the 
 State, and help, not hinder, public effort. 
 
 This serves as illustration, and illustration may 
 be continued indefinitely, but one more illustra- 
 tion may be given to emphasize the thought 
 that real patriotism finds expression in acts, not 
 merely words. The matter of tax-payment is
 
 The State. 175 
 
 one which in its ethical bearing a Christian 
 cannot neglect. The Apostle Paul commanded 
 Christians to pay tribute, which was a sign of 
 subjugation ; only conquered nations pay trib- 
 ute. How much more should Christians pay 
 their full share of self-imposed taxes, common 
 contributions for common purposes ! And re- 
 member, he who neglects to pay his fair share, 
 places a heavier burden on some one else, pre- 
 sumably one of the weaker elements in society, 
 as widow or orphan. What would Christ say of 
 tax-dodging coupled with hurrahs for the stars 
 and stripes on the Fourth of July ? That is a sort 
 of patriotism to be spewed out of one's mouth. 
 
 What in short we especially need, and what 
 the Christian standpoint necessarily carries with 
 it, is emphasis on duties rather than rights. This 
 is a first condition of civic regeneration. 
 
 There" are now hundreds of various religious 
 sects, and the unity of the various denominations 
 seems remote, even with the best and most 
 earnest efforts. One sort of unity of Christians, 
 however, is found in the State. Men of all 
 denominations act together in the administrative, 
 legislative, and judicial branches of government 
 for the establishment of righteousness. Let 
 this unity be valued at its true worth, let it be 
 cultivated and as much meaning put into it as at 
 
 any time the circumstances will admit ! 
 12
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 MAKING MEN GOOD BY LAW.
 
 "OF law there can be no less acknowledged, than that her 
 seat is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the world : 
 all things in heaven and earth do her homage, the very least as 
 feeling her care, and the greatest as not exempted from her 
 power, both angels and men and creatures of what condition 
 soever, though each in different sort and manner, yet all with 
 uniform consent admiring her as the mother of their peace and 
 joy." Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity, Book /, chapter xvi, p. 8.
 
 Making Men Good by Law. 179 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 MAKING MEN GOOD BY LAW. 
 
 TWO quotations from widely separated 
 authors will serve as a text for the present 
 chapter. The first is taken from the Rev. Hugh 
 Price Hughes, and is found in his sermon, entitled 
 " National Character Determined by the Na- 
 tional Laws," one of the collection making up 
 his book, Social Christianity. It reads as follows : 
 " How often we hear it said that ' you cannot 
 make men moral by act of Parliament.' I never 
 heard anybody say that except when he was 
 trying in some way to hinder the kingdom of 
 God. When men try to prevent the advance of 
 the temperance movement and other great moral 
 enterprises, they are very fond of rattling off 
 that sentence. It is supposed to be a reply to 
 moral fanatics ; that is to say, to sober and wise 
 patriots. When men glibly tell us that we can- 
 not make men moral by act of Parliament, I 
 should like to know what they mean. They 
 probably do not know themselves. Do they 
 mean that force in itself is no remedy ? If so, 
 let them live up to their convictions. But let us
 
 180 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 not forget that a law is a good deal more than 
 force. An act of Parliament is not mere force, 
 it is educational. It teaches the conscience, it 
 strengthens the conscience, and even the most 
 degraded usually realize that what is illegal is 
 wrong." The second quotation is furnished by 
 Professor Lester F. Ward, and is found in his 
 Dynamic Sociology, which, notwithstanding some 
 unfortunate views on religion, is one of the 
 ablest sociological works ever written by an 
 American. The quotation reads as follows : 
 " We may regard all legislation as belonging to 
 one or the other of two general classes: (i) 
 Compulsory legislation ; and (2) attractive legis- 
 lation. ... In the department of social forces 
 most of the attempts to control them have thus 
 far been made according to the coercive method ; 
 and this illustrates in a remarkable manner the 
 infantile stage of the science of sociology. We 
 are living in the ' stone age ' of the art of govern- 
 ment. We shall not emerge from it until the 
 principle of ' attractive legislation ' is thoroughly 
 understood and applied." 
 
 As Mr. Hughes points out, there is a radical 
 difference between modern thinkers, who tell us 
 that you cannot make men good by law, and 
 Moses, one of the greatest, if not the greatest, 
 of all lawgivers, who found the test of national 
 greatness in laws. The ideas of people who
 
 Making Men Good by Law. 181 
 
 assert that laws cannot make men good seem to 
 be crude indeed. They evidently suppose that 
 advocates of legislation as an agency of morality 
 wish to accomplish their ends directly and imme- 
 diately. Let us suppose that we pass a law to 
 the effect that after May 15, 1898, all men in 
 the United States shall be true and upright, 
 ceasing from lying, cheating, begging, and 
 stealing, working diligently with their own 
 hands. We may readily admit that such a 
 law would accomplish nothing. No one in his 
 senses, however, has ever advocated a law 
 decreeing the establishment of goodness. The 
 method to be pursued to make men good by 
 law must be the method of indirectness. 
 
 Laws establish the conditions of social life 
 and make social life possible. Now God has 
 made man a social animal, as the wise old 
 teacher, Aristotle, long ago discovered, and it is 
 only in society that man can accomplish his 
 destiny and attain to true moral development. 
 Laws in making possible human society make 
 possible morality. Laws are the basis on which 
 rest the great fundamental social institutions of 
 civilization. Laws are the bulwark of the fam- 
 ily, and without laws any amount of preaching 
 cannot preserve the family intact as a social 
 institution. The basis of the family must be 
 something stronger than mere exhortation. Let
 
 182 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 the laws become weak and inadequate, and fail 
 to protect the family against the assaults of evil 
 forces constantly at work, and divorces multiply, 
 and Mormonism becomes rampant, as we know 
 but too well in the United States, where the im- 
 portance of law has been so little understood. 
 It goes without saying that teaching and preach- 
 ing are required to make the family what it 
 should be, but it is asserted without hesitation 
 that this teaching and this preaching cannot 
 be successful unless they rest upon an adequate 
 legal foundation. 
 
 Laws are required to make person and prop- 
 erty secure, and to enable men to lead their 
 lives in peace, free from the assaults of trans- 
 gressors. So important is legal security the 
 guaranty of right against successful attack that 
 one of the great jurists of this century, Professor 
 Rudolph von Jhering, says that it is a condition 
 of the development of national character. His- 
 tory seems to offer abundant confirmation of 
 this dictum. Subjects of an unprincipled despo- 
 tism, like the Turks, always become mean and 
 contemptible, servile and tyrannical in turn. 
 Manly character, free and independent, can be 
 developed only in countries where law, suit- 
 ably enforced, establishes secure conditions of 
 social life. 
 
 The laws establish and regulate the conditions
 
 Making Men Good by Law. 183 
 
 of industrial life. They give us a certain moral 
 level of competition. What was accomplished 
 by individual effort for the abolition of slavery ? 
 We may reply, practically nothing, except in so 
 far as individual effort worked through laws and 
 government. The strong arm of the law abol- 
 ished slavery, and that alone could abolish it. 
 Competition has continued to operate under 
 freedom as it did under slavery, but it operates 
 on a higher moral plane. Surely much indi- 
 vidual effort, much teaching and preaching, are 
 required to make men good who live in the 
 United States, even with slavery abolished, but 
 the law has established a fundamental condition 
 of true morality and goodness. 
 
 One function of individual effort and of volun- 
 tary combinations of individuals in society must 
 be to arouse public opinion to public evils 
 sufficiently to secure the passage of laws, with 
 satisfactory arrangements for their enforcement. 
 Mr. Hughes tells us that the factory acts of 
 England produced a moral revolution in the 
 manufacturing district called the " Black 
 Country." He uses these words: " In many 
 parts of England women and children were 
 degraded beyond expression, and because a 
 national conscience embodied these protective 
 acts in the statute books of this country, the 
 whole moral condition of vast masses of the
 
 184 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 people has been entirely changed." The ex- 
 perience of the United States in banking is 
 especially instructive in this connection. The 
 old State Banking laws before our late war were 
 calculated to make banking a disreputable and 
 immoral business. It can scarcely be said that 
 in our early history banking as frequently con- 
 ducted was an honest business. The legal 
 conditions were too unfavorable, and they 
 directly invited men to cheat and swindle. 
 Whatever criticisms we may pass upon our 
 present banking system, it must be said it is 
 much more favorable to morality, because the 
 laws upon which it rests are honest in purpose 
 and the administrative machinery for their 
 enforcement is adequate. Comparatively speak- 
 ing, there has been very little dishonesty con- 
 nected with our National Banks. Few businesses 
 in the country have been so safe, and the law has 
 laid a very heavy hand on transgressors of bus- 
 iness morality in the National Banking business. 
 It ought not to be necessary to mention 
 educational institutions in this connection. It 
 was surprising to read the statement in a reli- 
 gious paper not long ago that legislation could 
 do nothing for the Negroes, that they must look 
 to education and not to legislation. The basis 
 of successful popular education is legislation, 
 and must be legislation.
 
 Making Men Good by Law. 185 
 
 Education must be regarded as part of the 
 moral development of man, for the life of man 
 cannot arbitrarily be divided into parts, because 
 the physical, mental, and ethical departments of 
 life are most closely related. Educational insti- 
 tutions furnish an opportunity, even without 
 direct religious instruction, for a teacher to 
 operate directly upon the character of the pupil, 
 and the teachers of the country, take them as a 
 whole, are a morally superior class of citizens. 
 How many hundreds of thousands of men and 
 women of the United States have to thank 
 teachers in public schools for some of the best 
 influences which have entered into their lives ! 
 
 These general considerations ought to be suf- 
 ficient to show the close connection of law with 
 morality in the educational sphere of social life ; 
 but we may take a narrower, more special view 
 of the subject. Christians believe in reading the 
 Bible, and think that this practice helps to make 
 men better. 1 Universal and compulsory educa- 
 tion established by law renders the Bible access- 
 ible to all, and we may say that the law is thus 
 indirectly a means of grace, to use the technical 
 religious expression. A recent annual report of 
 
 1 In the baptism of children in the Methodist Episcopal 
 Church the minister admonishes the parents or guardians that 
 it is their part and duty to see that their children read the Holy 
 Scriptures.
 
 186 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 the American Bible Society pointed out wide- 
 spread illiteracy in the United States as one of 
 the obstacles most difficult to overcome in its 
 beneficent activity, and suggested the passage of 
 laws to secure at least a minimum amount of 
 education to every child. 
 
 The penal law and reformatory institutions 
 bring to mind another kind of beneficent activity 
 of legislation. The moral education and value 
 of penal law is remarkable. Missionary workers 
 among the poorer and more ignorant masses 
 often tell us that positive statute law furnishes 
 millions of human beings with nearly all their 
 ideas of morality. It is important, on the one 
 hand, to carry forward this educational work of 
 the law; and, on the other, to educate men morally 
 so that their ideas of right and wrong may not 
 be bounded by legality. While it is true that 
 ideas of right and wrong ought to go much fur- 
 ther than is possible for law, it is a gain when 
 positive law can re-enforce the requirements of 
 ethics, giving them a firmer and securer ex- 
 istence. When we look back upon the past de- 
 velopment of mankind we must admit that the 
 moral progress of the human race has been 
 largely due to law. 
 
 Reformatory institutions established by law 
 have shown their power to reform and improve 
 the morally defective classes of the community.
 
 Making Men Good by Law. 187 
 
 If reformatory institutions do not make men bet- 
 ter, it shows that there is something radically 
 wrong in them, and it must be confessed that 
 such is too often the case with our jails, prisons, 
 and penitentiaries. When, however, the Elmira 
 Reformatory, of Elmira, N. Y., a legal institu- 
 tion, is able to report that eighty per cent of 
 those who leave its gates are permanently re- 
 formed, it is difficult to see with what propriety 
 it can be said that you cannot make men good 
 by law. 
 
 Anti-poverty has been so associated with a 
 particular sect of social reformers that one hesi- 
 tates to use the word, yet it is a good one, and 
 the law has done much and is still doing much 
 to lessen if not to abolish poverty, especially in 
 its acute form of pauperism. Christians have 
 ever held that one of the chief functions of the 
 State is the elevation of the weaker members of 
 the community. A reform and improvement of 
 the Poor Law of England in 1834 is generally 
 believed to have greatly lessened pauperism, and 
 although this law is not all that it ought to be, 
 there can be no doubt that this claim for it is 
 warranted by the facts. 1 Still better Poor Laws 
 in German cities like Leipzig, Berlin, and Elber- 
 feld have greatly lessened pauperism, and brought 
 
 1 While the population nearly doubled, the number of per- 
 sons in receipt of public relief decreased one third.
 
 188 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 into helpful connection the strong and the weak. 
 Now to diminish poverty and pauperism means 
 to help men become moral, and if this diminu- 
 tion takes place by law, these men have been 
 made good by statute. We often talk about the 
 classes of men whom Christ reached, and about 
 the common people who heard Him gladly, but 
 it does not seem to have been pointed out that 
 Christ did not reach paupers. Christ converted 
 poor people, and notorious sinners adhered to 
 Him. We read of at least a few rich and cul- 
 tured persons who listened to the words of 
 Christ, and who were among His early followers, 
 but not of one pauper. All experienced workers 
 among the various defective classes in the com- 
 munity will tell us that in many respects the 
 prospects of a highway robber for a future 
 honorable and useful life are much better than 
 those of a confirmed pauper. 
 
 The words quoted above from Professor Ward's 
 Dynamic Sociology supplement the preceding re- 
 marks. Legislation has accomplished some- 
 thing, statutes do help to make men good ; but, 
 as Professor Ward justly remarks, practical so- 
 ciology is still in the stone age. Laws are 
 chiefly negative, repressive, and mandatory, 
 whereas they ought to be attractive and per- 
 suasive as well. Undoubtedly positive legisla- 
 tion is more difficult than negative ; but when
 
 Making Men Good by Law. 189 
 
 men earnestly give their thoughts to the im- 
 provement of their fellows, and study sociology 
 deeply, it will be found practicable to develop a 
 great body of attractive laws. We have followed 
 too exclusively the law of Rome, and have 
 neglected to develop the excellent features which 
 can be found in other legal systems like the 
 Greek and Teutonic, and especially the Mosaic. 
 The Roman law is undoubtedly one of the 
 greatest products of the mind of man, and yet it 
 is extremely imperfect, and some of its weak- 
 nesses were at least partially responsible for the 
 downfall of Rome. The Roman law was nega- 
 tive and repressive, and emphasized rights 
 rather than duties, especially so as far as prop- 
 erty was concerned, and strengthened tendencies 
 toward plutocracy, which divided population 
 into a few very rich and a vast majority of poor 
 people and paupers. Some beginnings of at- 
 tractive and persuasive legislation already exist, 
 and perhaps chief among them rank the modern 
 public-school systems. Rewards for meritorious 
 conduct are not unknown. We read occasionally 
 of medals and prizes awarded in the Post Office 
 Department for excellent work, of medals granted 
 to policemen and firemen for courageous con- 
 duct, of honors conferred upon those in the Life 
 Saving Service who have hazarded their own 
 lives for others. European countries have other
 
 190 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 incitements to virtue and patriotic conduct. 
 Men who have rendered distinguished service of 
 any kind in Germany and in England may be 
 raised to the peerage, and they may be rewarded 
 even with large grants of land and money. 
 Monuments are erected to commemorate worthy 
 deeds and distinguished services. 
 
 Many things which are practicable in aristo- 
 cratic European countries are out of the ques- 
 tion in the United States, and it remains for us 
 to develop a system of rewards to take the place 
 of decorations, titles, and patents of nobility. 
 We Americans instinctively feel that we ought 
 to honor and reward men who have distinguished 
 themselves for their services to humanity in 
 general or to their country in particular. This 
 is why we elected General Grant President of 
 the United States. He was, possibly, not the 
 best man for that place, and it was not, perhaps, 
 the best kind of reward, but we felt that we must 
 do some great thing for him, so we elected him 
 President twice by overwhelming majorities, and 
 many of us were even inclined to trample on tra- 
 dition and elect him a third time.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 INADEQUACY OF PRIVATE PHILAN- 
 THROPY FOR SOCIAL REFORM. 
 
 13
 
 " A SHORT time ago I went down to the Pottery district, and 
 was told of the unspeakably degraded condition in which men, 
 women, and children lived before the law of England protected 
 the weak against the greedy and the strong ; and I say that 
 when Lord Shaftesbury, as a devout believer in the Lord Jesus 
 Christ, persuaded this country amid the opposition of John 
 Bright and a great many sincere friends of the people, who did 
 not understand the bearings of the question to decide that all 
 over England the weak and defenseless should be protected by 
 these acts, he did more to establish the kingdom of Jesus 
 Christ than if he had merely spent his time in preaching thou- 
 sands of what my critic would call Gospel sermons." Rev. Hugh 
 Price Hughes, M.A., Social Christianity, p. 28.
 
 Inadequacy of Philanthropy. 193 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 INADEQUACY OP PRIVATE PHILANTHROPY FOR SOCIAL 
 REFORM. 
 
 WISE words were those uttered two thou- 
 sand years ago : " When thou doest thine 
 alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the 
 hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the 
 streets, that they may have glory of men." It 
 cannot be said that private philanthropy has 
 always obeyed this scriptural injunction. Es- 
 pecially is it true in our day that the achieve- 
 ments of private philanthropy are heralded 
 abroad with trumpets, and all men are called 
 upon to behold the deeds of private philan- 
 thropy with admiration. It has thus happened 
 that the possibilities of private philanthropy 
 have been exaggerated, and its proper place as a 
 social agency has been misconceived. Private 
 philanthropy plays an essential role in all higher 
 civilization, and when it is modest and unassum- 
 ing, and deprecates all sounding of trumpets, it 
 is truly a glorious thing. It is, however, spas- 
 modic, irregular, and insufficient for social re- 
 form. It is, socially considered, an auxiliary, a
 
 194 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 subordinate. Social reform must be accom- 
 plished chiefly by established, regularly working 
 institutions, served by individual effort and 
 strengthened by private philanthropy. 
 
 The limitations and true functions of private 
 philanthropy may be better understood if we 
 consider it in relation to certain lines of social 
 work. It would seem that charitable relief is 
 the sphere of all others for private effort, yet it 
 may be seriously questioned whether individual 
 attempts to relieve pauperism have not done 
 more harm than good. This is true beyond all 
 question so far as almsgiving is concerned. Ever 
 since the modern era of charities began we have 
 been trying to correct the evils of private philan- 
 thropy as well as of public effort in this sphere 
 of social activity. Moreover, the evils connected 
 with unwise giving to alleviate poverty must be 
 corrected with the aid of law and public institu- 
 tions. 
 
 Let us turn our attention to education. Pri- 
 vate philanthropy endeavored to provide educa- 
 tional facilities for all sorts and conditions of 
 men, and this effort was continued for centuries 
 with the aid of the Church. With what success, 
 however, did it meet ? While it cannot be said 
 that nothing was achieved, it must be acknowl- 
 edged that what was accomplished was small in- 
 deed as compared with the achievements of
 
 Inadequacy of Philanthropy. 195 
 
 public schools. The State has done what indi- 
 vidual effort, alone and unaided, could never ac- 
 complish it has rendered education universal. 
 Probably the experience of no country is more 
 instructive than that of England, because there 
 private individuals, aided by the Church, were 
 intrusted with the duty of providing educa- 
 tional facilities for the nation, and during sev- 
 eral hundred years had a fair opportunity to 
 show what could be accomplished in this way. 
 Twenty-five years ago, however, the State under- 
 took to establish an educational system designed 
 to reach every child in England ; and in this 
 brief period the State has made more progress 
 than was made by private philanthropy in three 
 centuries. The efforts of despised politicians 
 were incomparably more fruitful in proportion to 
 the expenditure of energy than the sacrifices and 
 exertions of philanthropists. 
 
 The question may be raised whether inde- 
 pendent private effort to furnish educational 
 facilities does not at present accomplish more 
 harm than good. The author has had abundant 
 opportunity for observation, and while there are 
 many exceptions, and brilliant exceptions, too, 
 he asserts without hesitation that the education 
 furnished by private schools is mostly inferior in 
 quality and, taking it all in all, decidedly below 
 the level established by public schools. As a
 
 196 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 rule, private schools lack the first condition of 
 success, which is the power to establish disci- 
 pline, because they are too dependent upon those 
 who patronize them. This is not all, however. 
 Private schools divert energy and attention from 
 public schools, and tend to make the latter 
 poorer than they would otherwise be. Private 
 philanthropy, as represented by great educa- 
 tional societies in England, was opposed to State 
 education. It was an obstacle which had to be 
 overcome. 
 
 The author often thinks of the labors of the 
 late lamented Charles Loring Brace, the head of 
 the Children's Aid Society in New York. He 
 established schools for poor children, and was at 
 length able, with the support of private philan- 
 thropy, to provide educational facilities for sev- 
 eral thousand destitute children. When, how- 
 ever, his work was at the height of its success, 
 some fourteen thousand children were turned 
 away from the doors of the public schools be- 
 cause there was no room for them. To anyone 
 who knows the amount of energy required to 
 support properly a few private industrial schools 
 like those which Mr. Brace established, it can 
 scarcely appear doubtful that the same amount of 
 effort and private philanthropy expended in the 
 improvement of the public schools would have 
 prevented the disgraceful turning away of children
 
 Inadequacy of Philanthropy. 197 
 
 from their doors, and would have improved very 
 appreciably the entire public-school system of 
 the city, thus benefiting the hundreds of thou- 
 sands who attend these schools. This truth 
 seems to be perceived, because it is now pro- 
 posed to amalgamate these schools with the 
 public schools of New York. The main point 
 which the author has in mind is well brought 
 out by a writer of much insight, who describes 
 the probable result as " greater watchfulness on 
 the part of the workers in such organizations as 
 the Children's Aid Society, to the end that the 
 public schools may now completely fill the re- 
 quirements of the present day." 
 
 Probably there are no two men in the United 
 States whose judgment concerning the education 
 both of the Negroes and of the whites in our 
 Southern States deserves more consideration 
 than Hon. J. L. M. Curry and Dr. A. D. Mayo. 
 They have both recently felt called upon to give 
 emphatic warning against reliance on private 
 schools and the dangerous tendency to concen- 
 trate attention and beneficence on these schools 
 rather than on the public schools, which are the 
 chief thing. The following words are quoted 
 from Dr. Mayo, and are unreservedly indorsed 
 by Mr. Curry : " It is high time that we under- 
 
 1 Dr. Albert Shaw in his article, " The Higher Life of New 
 York City," in The Outlook, January 25, 1896.
 
 198 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 stood that the one agency on which the Negroes 
 and nine tenths of the white people in the South 
 must rely for elementary instruction and training 
 is the American common school. The attempt 
 to educate two millions of colored and three mil- 
 lions of white American children in the South by 
 passing around the hat in the North ; sending 
 driblets of money and barrels of supplies to en- 
 courage anybody and everybody to open a little 
 useless private school ; ... all this, and a great 
 deal more that is still going on among us, with 
 of course the usual exceptions, has had its day 
 and done its work. The only reliable method of 
 directly helping the elementary department of 
 Southern education is that our churches and 
 benevolent people put themselves in touch with 
 the common-school authorities in all the dark 
 places, urging even their poorer people to do 
 more, as they can do more, than at present. The 
 thousand dollars from Boston that keeps alive 
 a little private or denominational school in a 
 Southern neighborhood, if properly applied, 
 would give two additional months, better teach- 
 ing and better housing, to all the children, and 
 unite their people as in no other way." ' 
 
 Sanitary reforms are among the most benefi- 
 cent and important social reforms demanded at 
 
 1 The Education of the Negro," by Hon. J. L. M. Curry. 
 American Magazine of Civics, February, 1896.
 
 Inadequacy of Philanthropy. 199 
 
 the present time. When we touch upon sanitary 
 reforms, however, we find that individual effort 
 can accomplish almost nothing, except in so far 
 as it aids and supports public authority by help- 
 ful co-operation. The experience of cities in 
 Europe and America is most instructive. Public 
 authority in Chicago diminished the percentage 
 of deaths in proportion to population by thirty per 
 cent by important sanitary arrangements. The 
 Mayor of Chicago, in his annual message of April 
 1890, says that the death rate of the city in 1889 
 was 17.49 to the thousand, and that this lowered 
 death rate was " due mainly to the extension of 
 the sewer system, in conjunction with the vigi- 
 lance of the Department of Health. Through 
 the efficiency of the corps of factory and tene- 
 ment-house inspectors, the sanitary police, and 
 others, nearly eighteen thousand official visita- 
 tions and notices combined have been made and 
 served for the purpose of correcting various vio- 
 lations of the health laws." 
 
 Thousands of lives are saved every year in 
 Liverpool, London, and Glasgow by the improved 
 conditions of life introduced by public authority, 
 which public authority alone could introduce ; and 
 sanitary reforms inaugurated in Berlin a few years 
 ago, under the auspices of Professor Virchow, 
 one of the leading scientists of the world, have 
 already saved hundreds of thousands of lives.
 
 200 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 The reader must reflect carefully upon what this 
 means. It does not mean merely fewer deaths, 
 but less illness, greater strength and robustness, 
 for the population as a whole, consequently a 
 greater capacity for self-support and self-help of 
 every kind, less pauperism, fewer dependent 
 widows and orphans. We may contrast what 
 public authority has accomplished in sanitary 
 reform with the achievements of private philan- 
 thropy in the housing of the poor in cities, both 
 in this country and abroad, but especially in this 
 country. 
 
 The need of improved dwellings for the poor 
 was pointed out in New York city a generation 
 ago, and the appeal to private philanthropy to 
 take up the work of tenement-house reform has 
 from that time to this been uninterrupted. 
 Wealthy Christians in particular have been en- 
 treated and implored to enter this work, and all 
 sorts of considerations have been urged why they 
 should take it up. The appeal has been to self- 
 interest as well as to generosity. There is more 
 than one professed Christian in New York city 
 whose resources are sufficient, alone and unaided, 
 to renovate the tenement houses of New York 
 city. Yet what has private philanthropy accom- 
 plished ? There are a few model tenements in 
 New York and Brooklyn, but in proportion to 
 the need of the people they are almost less than
 
 Inadequacy of Philanthropy. 201 
 
 a drop in the bucket. It may be said without 
 hesitation that a single sanitary law, even with 
 imperfect means of administration, has accom- 
 plished more for the tenement-house population 
 than all the achievements of private philanthropy 
 in a generation. 
 
 Compare also the following, quoted from St. 
 Andrew 's Cross, February, 1896: " Richard Wat- 
 son Gilder, the editor of the Century, who last year 
 served his city as the Chairman of the New York 
 Tenement- House Commission, says, as a result 
 of observation upon a recent trip abroad, that 
 the European slums are fast disappearing under 
 the enforcement of rigid sanitary laws. Many 
 buildings, which were the breeding places of 
 disease in the Whitechapel district of London, 
 have been torn down and replaced by clean, 
 wholesome houses, properly equipped with all 
 sanitary appliances, and owned and controlled 
 by the municipality." We have no reason to 
 believe that private effort alone could in ten 
 thousand years have accomplished this result. 
 On the other hand, we can never secure laws of 
 this kind without private effort, and in the 
 United States, at least, the laws once secured 
 cannot be enforced without a vast amount of 
 determined and probably also organized private 
 effort. 
 
 We can also see in this connection how the
 
 202 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 success and possibilities of private philanthropy 
 are overrated. A most estimable gentleman in 
 Brooklyn has established some model tenements. 
 The example which he has set has had compara- 
 tively little influence ; these model tenements are 
 reaching perhaps a few hundred people ; they 
 furnish the subject of numerous articles, attention 
 is again and again called to them, and honors are 
 conferred upon the man who established them. 
 Far be it from the author to detract from the 
 praise which is his due, yet the fact ought to be 
 emphasized that relatively speaking we can hardly 
 say that anything has been done toward the 
 solution of the problem. Attention is fixed upon 
 the few reached by such efforts, but the millions 
 unreached are forgotten. On the other hand, 
 when law and administration reach beneficially a 
 million people, it is all taken for granted as a 
 mere matter of course, and it is not thought 
 worth while to call attention to blessings con- 
 ferred by government. 
 
 This is still more plainly seen in the educa- 
 tional field. It is a noble spectacle to see the 
 people of New York State, rich and poor alike, 
 voluntarily tax themselves seventeen millions of 
 dollars a year for education ; yet this achieve- 
 ment of self-government is scarcely noticed, 
 whereas the gift of a few millions by a private 
 man, who has left more than he can possibly
 
 Inadequacy of Philanthropy. 203 
 
 need, is heralded from Dan to Beersheba, and 
 cannot be admired sufficiently. We are not to 
 detract from the praise we owe the rich man, but 
 we should not lose a proper sense of proportion. 
 Industrial reforms ought to be carefully exam- 
 ined in order to determine the limits and func- 
 tions of legislation and administration on the one 
 hand, and of private philanthropy on the other. 
 Child labor has been a great and growing evil in 
 this and other countries. Attention has been 
 called to it in the press and in the pulpit. Thou- 
 sands perhaps hundreds of thousands of ser- 
 mons and editorials have appealed to the individ- 
 ual to abate the evils of child labor. The nature 
 of these evils has been explained again and again. 
 Child labor in hundreds of thousands of cases 
 destroys mind, body, and soul. When it was at 
 its worst in England, physicians testified that the 
 generation growing up was stunted in body and 
 weak in intellect, and the moral evils were patent 
 to all observers. Nevertheless it may it be said 
 without fear of contradiction from any well-in- 
 formed and honest person that private philan- 
 thropy, alone and unaided, accomplished simply 
 nothing. While eloquent sermons were preached, 
 moving editorials penned, and even poems like 
 Mrs. Browning's " Cry of the Children " written 
 the evil of child labor increased without interrup- 
 tion until the strong arm of the law interfered, and
 
 204 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 owing to legislation and administration the worst 
 evils have disappeared in England, and have been 
 greatly lessened in States like Massachusetts. 
 
 Sunday labor brings us to another topic of in- 
 dustrial importance. Private philanthropy is so 
 strongly re-enforced by religion when it attempts 
 to lessen the amount of Sunday toil that perhaps 
 something appreciable can be accomplished. 
 Nevertheless, the evil of needless Sunday toil can 
 as a whole be abolished only by legislation. We 
 may take up many other industrial reforms, and 
 we will find that as a matter of fact private phi- 
 lanthropy has not accomplished the change 
 needed ; and if we analyze industrial phenomena, 
 we ascertain that it never can secure the desired 
 result. The reason is that men are bound to- 
 gether in industrial life by the law of social soli- 
 darity, and within certain narrow limits w.hat one 
 does the others must do, or become bankrupt. 
 This gives the worst men in the community an 
 enormous power, unless they are restrained by 
 law. If one barber out of twenty keeps open his 
 barber shop on Sunday, the temptation for the 
 other nineteen is stronger because they are com- 
 petitors, and they fear they will lose a part of 
 their regular business. Among the other nine- 
 teen we shall find at least one who will follow the 
 example of the least scrupulous among the 
 twenty. We shall then have two whose barber
 
 Inadequacy of Philanthropy. 205 
 
 shops are open on Sunday, and the temptation 
 to the other eighteen becomes still stronger, and 
 at least another will yield quickly. Thus the 
 temptation to do business on Sunday will contin- 
 ually increase, until the twentieth man will find 
 himself confronted with the alternative of keeping 
 his shop open on Sunday or quitting business. 
 It is thus that an entire trade may become de- 
 moralized. Barbers have been known to raise 
 money to secure the passage of a city ordinance 
 closing barber shops, and the Sunday closing of 
 barber shops has been advocated by the national 
 organization of the barbers and thus become a 
 live question in our cities. The author has him- 
 self heard a photographer in New York say that 
 he would gladly give one hundred dollars to have 
 a law passed closing all the photographic galleries 
 in the city on Sunday, in order that he might 
 close his without becoming a bankrupt. We 
 have in all this what the author has called the 
 problem of the twentieth man. 
 
 The great lines of social reform must be the 
 concern of agencies which work steadily and per- 
 sistently, and the support of which does not de- 
 pend upon the life of any individual or on the 
 vicissitudes of individual fortune. These are, 
 however, always individual cases which require 
 individual treatment, and they furnish the chief 
 field for private effort and generosity. A private
 
 206 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 individual may discover a poor boy with a great 
 talent for art and educate him, and thus confer a 
 benefit upon the community. 
 
 There are always many persons temporarily in 
 need and distress who can be better assisted 
 quietly by private philanthropy, and in fact 
 can only be relieved by such philanthropy. 
 There is also abundant opportunity for individ- 
 ual effort of every kind in assisting in improving 
 the action of public agencies. The administra- 
 tion of law with us is imperfect, and is so arranged 
 that it often fails to protect the poorer members 
 of the community. The Chicago Bureau of 
 Justice illustrates the kind of effort needed to 
 help poor people protect their rights. It is or- 
 ganized by private effort, its very efficient secre- 
 tary is a competent lawyer, and it undertakes to 
 secure justice for those who are comparatively 
 helpless, especially for wage-earning women. 
 With small outlay it has benefited thousands 
 directly, and tens of thousands indirectly, 
 because it is feared by unscrupulous oppressors. 
 It endeavors, however, not merely to render the 
 machinery of law available to all, but it attempts 
 also to improve this machinery, so that it may be 
 less difficult for the ordinary man to secure his 
 rights. 1 
 
 'The annual reports of this society are most instructive. For 
 these reports and other information the reader should apply to
 
 Inadequacy of Philanthropy. 207 
 
 The Elberfeld system of poor relief is an ex- 
 cellent model, because it combines so admirably 
 private and public agencies. Poor relief was ad- 
 ministered by the city for a time unsuccessfully, 
 and it was then turned over by the city to the 
 churches and private effort combined, but that 
 experiment did not work well, and finally the 
 city again took charge of poor relief, but in such 
 a manner as to secure the active co-operation of 
 the best private citizens. 
 
 It was thus that the so-called Elberfeld sys- 
 tem of poor relief was established. It means the 
 organization of charities by public authorities, 
 their unification through the municipality, and 
 their general supervision by regular officials ; 
 but these are assisted by some hundreds of private 
 citizens who serve as friendly visitors. Every 
 condition of success is thus present. The evils 
 of giving are reduced to a minimum, the benefits 
 of giving increased, and pauperism is greatly less- 
 ened. It is not said that this precise system can 
 
 Joseph W. Errant, Esq., Agent and Attorney, Rooms 718 and 
 719, Garden City Block, Randolph Street and Fifth Avenue, 
 Chicago, 111. The New Century Club of Philadelphia has 
 organized a Committee on Legal Protection for workingwomen, 
 and furnishes advice, court charges, and counsel free to women 
 who work for their living, and are too poor or uninformed of 
 legal methods to protect themselves. Information regarding 
 methods, etc., can be obtained from Mrs. S. C. F. Hallowell, 
 Chairman, 124 South Twelfth Street, Philadelphia, Pa. 
 14
 
 208 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 be transplanted to our shores, but it is asserted 
 without hesitation that the harmonious co-oper- 
 ation of public authority and private effort is 
 needed to secure the best results. 
 
 Let no one say that the office of private phi- 
 lanthropy is not sufficiently large. Without it, 
 nothing can be accomplished. In a vast field it 
 alone has undisputed sway, and in this field no 
 willing worker need lack opportunity for useful- 
 ness, and no one with surplus wealth can say that 
 the calls upon him will not be sufficiently large, 
 even if public activity has an enlarged scope. 
 Moreover, private philanthropy must precede 
 legislation and make it possible, and it must en- 
 lighten public opinion, or good laws cannot be 
 enforced. Sanitary reform and factory acts have 
 been brought about by the efforts of philanthro- 
 pists. What is wanted is to direct philanthropy 
 into proper channels, in order that thus it may 
 accomplish the greatest good of which it is capa- 
 ble.
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 OUR EARNINGS.
 
 " IT is impossible to conclude, of any given mass of acquired 
 wealth, merely by the fact of its existence, whether it signifies 
 good or evil to the nation in the midst of which it exists. Its 
 real value depends on the moral sign attached to it just as sternly 
 as that of a mathematical quantity depends on the algebraical 
 sign attached to it. Any given accumulation of commercial 
 wealth may be indicative, on the one hand, of faithful indus- 
 tries, progressive energies, and productive ingenuities ; or, on 
 the other, it may be indicative of mortal luxury, merciless tyr- 
 anny, ruinous chicane. Some treasures are heavy with human 
 tears, as an ill-stored harvest with untimely rain ; and some gold 
 is brighter in sunshine than it is in substance." Ruskin, Unto 
 This Last, ii.
 
 Our Earnings. 211 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 OUR EARNINGS. 
 
 BY the ancients, both among the Jews and 
 among other highly civilized nations, much 
 has been written on the acquisition of wealth. 
 The best given us by the Jews on this subject is 
 naturally found in the Bible, and perhaps nothing 
 better has been given us by the wise men of old 
 of other nations than is found in the writings of 
 Plato and Aristotle. There is singular unanimity 
 on the part of these ancient writers in regard to 
 many fundamental points which touch the acqui- 
 sition of wealth. Moreover, there is general 
 harmony on the part of the fathers of the Church 
 and their successors up to modern times, as well 
 as of wise political philosophers of all ages, 
 touching the fundamental principles involved in 
 the acquisition of wealth. John Wesley, in his 
 sermon on " The Use of Money," ' presents lead- 
 ing principles clearly which will guide us wisely if 
 simply elaborated so that they may be made ap- 
 plicable to our new times. Our age is doubtless 
 one of progress, but the careful student can 
 1 Wesley, Sermons, vol. i, pp. 444-448.
 
 212 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 scarcely fail to see, in particulars, retrogression. 
 There hardly seems to be dominant as clear ideas 
 and as sound ideas touching our earnings as 
 those which have been current in past ages. 
 
 If we open our Bibles and examine what the 
 various writers in the Bible have said concerning 
 the acquisition of wealth, .one of the first things 
 which must strike us is the praise of moderation. 
 The greatest weight is attached to this, and it is 
 made, indeed, a duty of high rank. The utterances 
 of the Bible on this point agree in the main with 
 the teachings of Plato and Aristotle. While the 
 various bodies of Christians claim that the Bible 
 gives sufficient guidance in all affairs of life, all 
 enlightened persons are glad to receive subsid- 
 iary aid from other writers, and it may be well to 
 give a short space to the ideas of the great social 
 philosophers who have just been named. 
 
 Plato states that the very rich man can hardly 
 be a very good man, and he gives certain reasons 
 for his view. He says that there are different 
 sources of acquisition, those which are just and 
 those which are unjust, and that he who derives 
 riches from both sources indifferently, will gain 
 more than double the wealth of him who derives 
 his riches from just sources only. The bad man 
 has, moreover, an advantage, Plato claims, in the 
 expenditure of money, spending only half as 
 much as the good man. " The sums," says he,
 
 Our Earnings. 213 
 
 " which are expended neither honorably nor dis- 
 gracefully are only half as great as those which 
 are expended honorably and on honorable pur- 
 poses." It thus happens, according to Plato, that 
 the good man cannot be wealthier than the bad 
 man. On the other hand, "The utterly bad man 
 is in general profligate and therefore very poor; 
 while he who spends on noble objects and ac- 
 quires wealth by just means only can hardly be 
 remarkable for riches, any more than he can be 
 very poor." Plato again and again comes back 
 to the position that the end of the state is the 
 production of men and not of wealth, and that 
 moderation secures the best results. 
 
 Aristotle views the subject in its broader as- 
 pects, and gives special attention to the political 
 effects of accumulations which go beyond a mod- 
 erate competence. He fears poverty, which he 
 claims leads to revolutions ; but he regards great 
 wealth as even more destructive. He dreads 
 what he styles" the encroachments of the rich." 8 
 In another place Aristotle uses these words: 
 " Those who have too much of the goods of for- 
 tune, strength, health, friends, and the like, are 
 neither willing nor able to submit to authority. 
 The evil begins at home : for when they are boys, 
 by reason of the luxury in which they are brought 
 
 1 Jewett's Plato, vol. v, p. 125. 
 
 2 Jewett's Politics of Aristotle, pp. 131, 145.
 
 214 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 up, they never learn even at school the habit of 
 obedience. On the other hand, the very poor who 
 are in the opposite extreme are too degraded. 
 . . . Thus arises a city, not of freemen, but of 
 masters and slaves, the one despising, the other 
 envying." Aristotle also points out the danger 
 that the cares of property will keep men from 
 attending to public business. 2 
 
 The ideal of the Bible with respect to earnings 
 is given in Agur's prayer : " Give me neither pov- 
 erty nor riches; feed me with food convenient 
 for me : lest I be full, and deny thee, and say, 
 Who is the Lord ? or lest I be poor, and steal, 
 and take the name of my God in vain." ' In an- 
 other chapter in Proverbs we read these words : 
 " He that tilleth his land shall have plenty of 
 bread. ... A faithful man shall abound with 
 blessings : but he that maketh haste to be rich 
 shall not be innocent [Revised Version, "un- 
 punished "]. . . . He that hasteth to be rich hath 
 an evil eye, and considered! not that poverty 
 shall come upon him." * 
 
 When we turn from the Old to the New Testa- 
 ment, we find the same ideas expressed with 
 equal emphasis. We remember what our Saviour 
 said about the difficulty with which a rich man 
 could enter into the kingdom of Heaven. St. 
 
 1 Jewett's Politics of Aristotle, p. 127. 9 Ibid., pp. 119, 120. 
 3 Proverbs xxx, 8, 9. * Proverbs xxviii, 19, 20, 22.
 
 Our Earnings. 215 
 
 Paul utters these well-known words : " But they 
 that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, 
 and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which 
 drown men in destruction and perdition. For 
 the love of money is the root of all evil." ' 
 
 This moderation, which is the ideal, means 
 negatively an avoidance of hurtful desires for 
 large acquisitions and of those wrong practices 
 which spring out of the bad disposition. But 
 positively it means diligence, thrift, and all right- 
 ful efforts to acquire a competence. The Bible, 
 and the other writings which have been quoted, 
 all insist upon this positive aspect of the ideal. 
 The dangers of poverty are pointed out. Aris- 
 totle speaks of the temptation to crime and rev- 
 olution which poverty carries with it. Agur's 
 prayer points to the danger that poverty may 
 lead to a denial of God. St. Paul admonishes 
 Christians to be diligent in business, not sloth- 
 ful. Apart from the public dangers which attend 
 poverty, other evils follow from a lack of dili- 
 gence and foresight and the self-denial involved 
 in frugality. First, we must notice that if we do 
 not exert ourselves to acquire the things need- 
 ful, there is danger that we may become a burden 
 upon others. Second, we must remember that 
 without these efforts which are commended to 
 acquire a moderate supply of material goods, we 
 
 1 r Timothy vi, 9, IO.
 
 216 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 shall not have a surplus ourselves to do for those 
 who need our help. Of course, there will ever 
 be those who, in spite of all they can do, through 
 accident, infirmity, etc., will require help, and 
 provision must be made for these ; and it is no 
 reproach to these to accept gratefully the help 
 cheerfully proffered. 
 
 Moreover, moderation leads to contentment, 
 which is highly prized. While making all due 
 effort to improve our condition, we are at the 
 same time enjoined to be content with what we 
 have. 
 
 If space were not too limited, a cloud of wit- 
 nesses could be quoted, all of them emphasizing 
 again and again the dangers of wealth and the 
 importance in all particulars of moderation in our 
 efforts to acquire wealth. As it is, we must be 
 content with only one or two quotations. Bishop 
 Wilson, who is quoted approvingly by Matthew 
 Arnold, 1 uses these words : " Riches are almost 
 always abused without a very extraordinary 
 grace." Professor Bruce, in his Kingdom of God, 
 expresses himself as follows: "Possession, or 
 wealth, in every form, is conservative, cautious, 
 slow in sympathy, and languid in support ; 
 whether it be the intellectual wealth of knowl- 
 edge, or the moral wealth of character, or the 
 material wealth of outward property. The role 
 1 Culture and Anarchy ', p. 167.
 
 Our Earnings. 217 
 
 of the rich in wisdom, wealth, or gold, is not that 
 of the ardent pioneer, but of the tardy patriot ; 
 so they miss the glory of martyrdom and also its 
 pain. Their place in the history of the kingdom 
 is a very mean one ; in the more heroic phases 
 of that history they are mainly conspicuous by 
 their absence." ' It will be noticed that he 
 speaks of the " wise " much as Christ does. In 
 another place he says : " The wise espouse no 
 cause when it is new." * Those familiar with our 
 higher institutes of learning know what a large 
 measure of truth there still is in this assertion 
 concerning the conservatism of those who have 
 much book learning. 3 
 
 The reasons for this ideal of moderation in 
 wealth acquisition have been already expressly 
 stated or implied. One of the weightiest is that 
 craving for wealth turns away attention from 
 higher spiritual things. This is seen with great 
 clearness by Plato, who uses these words : " For 
 there are, in all, three things about which every 
 man has an interest ; and the interest about 
 money, when rightly regarded, is the third and 
 last of them ; midway comes the interest of the 
 
 1 Kingdom of God, p. 302. 2 Ibid., p. 302. 
 
 1 " A learned class will appreciate indeed certain thoughts to 
 which the multitude are indifferent, but not wholly new thoughts, 
 not thoughts foreign to. its learning." Sir J. R. Seeley, Natural 
 Religion, p. 103.
 
 218 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 body ; and, first of all, that of the soul." ' How 
 strikingly in harmony is this with the thought 
 of the Biblical writers ! Christ, Himself, makes 
 special mention of the deceitfulness of riches as 
 one of the causes which hinder the extension of 
 the kingdom. 
 
 We notice, also, the dangers to our own mind 
 and body which accompany undue and feverish 
 activity in the acquisition of wealth ; likewise the 
 neglect of the bodies, minds, and souls of others, 
 which too frequently attends immoderate efforts 
 in wealth acquisition, and also the neglect of 
 civic duties. When we are bent upon wealth, 
 we employ indifferently the just and unjust 
 sources of its acquisition. Again, it is to be ob- 
 served that poverty is one of the dangers which 
 threaten those who make haste to be rich. They 
 take undue risks, and frequently lose their all. 
 How many hundreds of thousands of families in 
 this broad land would to-day enjoy a competence, 
 who now live in poverty, had they not made 
 haste to be rich." 
 
 A few points must be elaborated further, and 
 
 1 Jewett's Plato, p. 126. 
 
 4 An analysis of the causes of failures in business in the 
 United States since 1892 has been made by one of our com- 
 mercial agencies, and it is alleged that haste to be rich, shown 
 in capital inadequate for the business undertaken, is the chief 
 cause ; commercial crisis ranks second ; incompetency, third ; 
 and fraud, fourth.
 
 Our Earnings. 219 
 
 we cannot do better than to take them up some- 
 what in the order in which we find them in 
 Wesley's sermon on " The Use of Money." 
 
 Wesley strongly insists upon the importance 
 of diligence and the utmost use of rightful oppor- 
 tunities in wealth acquisition, but he points out 
 the dangers which must be avoided. We ought 
 not to gain money, he tells us, at the expense of 
 our life or of our health ; therefore, we should 
 never enter into nor continue in an employment 
 " attended with so hard or so long labor as to 
 impair our constitution." Proper seasons of 
 food and sleep in such proportion as our nature 
 requires must not be neglected. But as we 
 seek occupation under such conditions for our- 
 selves, we must likewise avoid anything which 
 can injure in these particulars our neighbors. 
 Unduly long hours and unhealthful avocations 
 are especially mentioned. Wesley speaks about 
 lead workers, and lead working is still an un- 
 healthful occupation. He also condemns em- 
 ployments dealing with arsenic or other hurtful 
 minerals. As a mere matter of course, it follows 
 from his premises that Sunday work must be 
 avoided, or, in case Sunday work is a necessity, 
 that one day of rest in seven should be secured. 
 
 We observe that Wesley treats this subject 
 chiefly from an individual point of view. We 
 must now add the social point of view, for the
 
 220 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 character of our industrial life has changed es- 
 sentially since Wesley wrote his sermon. The 
 modern era of competition, based upon division 
 of labor and exchange, is essentially a product 
 of this century, and it gives us social solidarity of 
 such a sort that the individual alone is unable to 
 govern the conditions under which he works and 
 earns his daily bread, or, indeed, acquires a com- 
 petence. Wesley had in mind, evidently, the man 
 working in a small shop or on a farm, and who 
 could regulate largely the conditions of his toil. 
 We must think of the street-car employee who 
 has to work frequently too many hours a day, 
 and very often seven days in a week, or else lose 
 his occupation. We must remember the army 
 of those who are employed in great factories and 
 manufacturing establishments, and who must toil 
 under conditions which are the same for all, and 
 which are beyond the control of the individual. 
 It is these modern conditions which have given 
 rise to the modern system of factory legislation, 
 prohibiting the toil of very young children, lim- 
 iting the toil of young persons and women, 
 safeguarding the home, prescribing healthful 
 conditions under which toil must be conducted. 
 All this is entirely in line with Wesley's rules of 
 industrial conduct and a necessary deduction 
 from it. 
 
 But one quotation from Wesley is important
 
 Our Earnings. 221 
 
 because it points to practices which it seems 
 were not unknown in his day, but with the 
 growth of great industry have become far more 
 serious. " We cannot," says Wesley, " consist- 
 ently, with brotherly love, sell our goods below 
 the market price ; we cannot study to ruin our 
 neighbor's trade in order to advance our own ; 
 much less can we entice away or receive any of 
 his servants or workmen whom he has need of. 
 None can gain by swallowing up his neighbor's 
 substance without gaining the damnation of 
 hell." ' The application to current conditions is 
 self-evident. Those competitive methods which 
 increase our own substance at the expense of 
 our neighbor's prosperity are condemned in the 
 strongest terms. 
 
 Another strong point made by Wesley, and 
 which is found also in the Discipline of the Meth- 
 odist Episcopal Church, is that we must not de- 
 fraud the king (that is to say, the state) of his 
 lawful customs. This is done in many ways at 
 the present time. There are still those who 
 smuggle goods into the country, and it is notice- 
 able that women especially seem to have little 
 
 1 This cannot be applied to legitimate competition so long as 
 we have a competitive system of industry, but it does apply, 
 as Wesley intended it should, to deliberate attempts to break 
 down our rivals and secure a monopoly, partial or complete, for 
 ourselves.
 
 222 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 conscience in this matter, their singular defi- 
 ciency in this respect probably being due to their 
 lack of civic training, and consequently civic 
 consciousness. But this implies, likewise, any 
 withholding of taxes of any sort due to nation, 
 commonwealth, or city ; or any traffic which de- 
 rives a gain from frauds upon the public treasury. 
 It is furthermore specially noticed that we 
 must not hurt our neighbor by selling him any- 
 thing which is injurious to him. Spirituous liq- 
 uors are particularly mentioned, and Wesley's note 
 in regard to the character of the traffic in intox- 
 icating beverages is as clear as anyone could de- 
 sire. He says that the curse of God rests upon 
 the wealth thereby gained. Food adulterations 
 would come under this same head, and here like- 
 wise we see the need of social regulation. The 
 problem of the " twentieth man " again confronts 
 us. One begins to adulterate his food products, 
 and through the force of competition others 
 gradually fall in line until an entire trade is 
 demoralized. The position which is taken in 
 the Discipline of the Methodist Episcopal Church 
 with respect to temperance reform, in which it is 
 stated that it " rests chiefly upon the combined 
 and sanctified influence of the Family, the Church, 
 and the State " is applicable generally to those 
 reforms which have been suggested with respect 
 to our earnings.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 OUR SPEND1NGS. 
 
 15
 
 "THE idea of ancient Roman civilization should be reproduced 
 in our day: 'Private expenditures were small, public expenditures 
 large.' We may be simple in our habits although surrounded by 
 wealth ; and, by using the more costly appliances in our posses- 
 sion for the general enjoyment, we may realize the Christian idea 
 of a stewardship. This is the tendency which the Church must 
 foster in social life among all classes of its members." The 
 Hon. and Rev, W. H. Fremantle, D.D., The World as the 
 Subject of Redemption, p. 346.
 
 Our Spendings. 225 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 OUR SPENDINGS. 
 
 OUR spendings are closely connected with 
 our earnings. Consumption of wealth is 
 the purpose of acquisition. He who spends 
 without earning is a parasite, a cumberer of the 
 ground, living upon the toil of others. But earn- 
 ing in this case must be understood in a very 
 broad sense and include any useful service. Man 
 does not live by bread alone, but the service to 
 justify consumption ethically must be an indi- 
 vidual service. The fact that a person may have 
 acquired wealth by gift, or inheritance, does not 
 justify consumption on any ethical grounds, un- 
 less his acquired wealth is attended with personal 
 service. 
 
 Individual responsibility is more pronounced 
 in our spendings than in our earnings. We find an 
 established social system into which we are placed, 
 and in our earnings, within certain limits, we must 
 be governed by the social system which exists. 
 The very words " social system " suggest some- 
 thing formed by society and which can be changed 
 only by society. The individual, to produce
 
 226 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 changes in the social system, must work in and 
 through society. But when, as a result of our 
 efforts within the social system, which exists, we 
 receive certain sums of wealth annually, these 
 sums are largely within our individual control, 
 and we must be held individually responsible for 
 our use of our power to make expenditures. 
 
 The supreme law which governs us in our 
 spending is the law of mutual love. " Love thy 
 neighbor as thyself" is a principle which must 
 be applied to this department of our life as to 
 all others. The test question for the individual 
 is this : " Do I, in my spendings or what we 
 call, in Political Economy, my ' consumption ' 
 show that I love my neighbor equally with my- 
 self?" 
 
 John Wesley has given the following directions 
 to guide us in our consumption : " If you desire 
 to be a faithful and a wise steward, out of that 
 portion of your Lord's goods which He has for 
 the present lodged in your hands, but with the 
 right of resuming whenever it pleases Him, first, 
 provide things needful for yourself: food to eat, 
 raiment to put on, whatever nature moderately 
 requires for preserving the body in health and 
 strength. Secondly, provide these for your wife, 
 your children, your servants, or any others who 
 pertain to your household. If, when this is done, 
 there be an overplus left, then ' do good to them
 
 Our Spendings. 227 
 
 that are of the household of faith.' If there be 
 an overplus still, ' as you have opportunity, do 
 good unto all men.' " ' 
 
 We have here an order of expenditure which 
 is helpful. I must first provide for myself and 
 for my family. And the provision for one's self 
 and the members of one's family includes the 
 training of all our powers and faculties, and the 
 maintenance of our strength. This sometimes 
 involves a large expenditure, as in the case of a 
 musician, an artist, or a scholar. This dispropor- 
 tionate expenditure might seem at first sight 
 selfish and a violation of the principle of mutual 
 love. Considered more carefully, it is not, pro- 
 vided these powers, developed and maintained 
 at their best, are used in social service. There 
 is no power like that of a gifted and thoroughly 
 trained man devoted to the well-being of others. 
 His powers are of indefinitely greater value to 
 society than anything needful for their full cultiva- 
 tion and maintenance. The family must come 
 before others. We proceed from self to larger 
 and larger circles. There are those who would 
 bring a reproach against Christ because in their 
 opinion he had no regard for the family. There 
 is no ground, however, for the supposition that 
 He was wanting in any respect in consideration 
 of those members of the family into which He 
 
 1 Sermons, vol. i, p. 447.
 
 228 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 was born. While hanging on the cross in in- 
 tensest agony He was able to think of His mother, 
 and instructed His beloved disciple to care for 
 her as his mother. "When Jesus therefore saw 
 His mother, and the disciple standing by, whom 
 He loved, He saith unto His mother, Woman, 
 behold thy son ! Then saith He to the disciple, 
 Behold thy mother ! And from that hour that 
 disciple took her unto his own home." ' 
 
 But clearly and unquestionably Christ taught 
 that our circles must expand until the whole 
 world should be included. We should in our 
 spending, so far as may be, have reference to the 
 welfare of the entire world. We must not neg- 
 lect the family. Families build up nations. We 
 must not neglect the nation, for it is through the 
 nation that humanity is lifted up ; but we can 
 never stop short of entire humanity. As it is 
 narrow and hurtful even to the family to confine 
 one's interests to the family, so it is likewise 
 narrow and hurtful even to the nation to restrict 
 one's benevolence to one's own nation. All the 
 nations of the world are our concern. It is a 
 shortsighted and selfish policy of social reform- 
 ers to denounce foreign missions ! 
 
 But we must consider our expenditures in the 
 broadest sense. We are not concerned merely 
 with material wealth, but with personal services 
 
 1 John xix, 26, 27.
 
 Our Spendings. 229 
 
 of every kind, and with all our powers. The 
 talent intrusted to us may be some intellectual 
 gift, or it may be a quantity of material wealth, 
 and the responsibility is as great in the former 
 case as in the latter. All our time is some- 
 thing for the use of which we are equally respon- 
 sible. 
 
 The reason why we should proceed from 
 smaller to larger circles is obvious upon a little 
 reflection. It is in this way that all wants will 
 best be satisfied and that the general welfare will 
 best be promoted. We have only to ask our- 
 selves this question, What would happen if we 
 proceeded in the reverse way ? to see clearly that 
 this is true. It requires, indeed, judgment and 
 self-examination to hold a true balance between 
 all the claims upon us. There are those who 
 unduly neglect the narrower circle with which 
 we may begin, but there can be no doubt that 
 the more general fault is of the opposite kind. 
 There is such a thing as family selfishness as well 
 as purely individual selfishness. It is a part of 
 a higher and better civilization to overcome both. 
 Fortunately there are those standing outside the 
 narrower circles of interest who can give them- 
 selves entirely to the larger circles. 
 
 It is helpful to classify our wants. We make 
 expenditures for necessaries, for conveniences, 
 for comforts, and for ostentation. Such a classi-
 
 230 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 fication may be sufficient for present purposes. 
 Our consumption will follow along the line of 
 this classification. Necessaries must first be pro- 
 vided. Other things being equal, we must place 
 upon a higher plane the necessaries of others 
 than those things which are to us merely con- 
 veniences and comforts. The considerations, how- 
 ever, which we have already adduced will show 
 that often other things are not equal. Conveni- 
 ences and comforts may be helpful to us in our 
 work, and thus find ample justification. When 
 we come, however, to expenditures for ostenta- 
 tion, for mere show and display, we must draw a 
 sharp line ; they are absolutely interdicted by 
 the law of mutual love. We cannot find any 
 justification in ourselves for such expenditures. 
 Any attempted justification when analyzed is 
 found to involve ignorance of the real nature of 
 our acts, or juggling with ourselves. Such ex- 
 penditures are what we may call, properly, lux- 
 uries, and they are condemned, not only by wise 
 political philosophers of all ages, but by the 
 fathers of the Church, with singular unanimity. 
 How can I claim that I love my brother as my- 
 self when I see him need the very necessaries of 
 life and expend money for that which contributes 
 in no measure to my real well-being ? The whole 
 tone of the Bible, from beginning to end, con- 
 demns in the strongest terms anything of the
 
 Our Spendings. 231 
 
 kind. Not only this, but anything of the kind 
 is condemned explicitly in the severest language, 
 over and over again, and it is an entire contra- 
 diction to the example which Christ set us in 
 His own life. 
 
 A further discrimination may be made between 
 expenditures for exclusive and those for inclu- 
 sive pleasures. Food and clothing are exclu- 
 sively consumed. I alone enjoy my consumption 
 of these articles. A house is more inclusive in 
 the satisfactions it affords. It may minister to 
 many. Still another distinction is that between 
 outlays for things which quickly perish and those 
 which endure for a long time. Other things 
 being equal, the expenditures for inclusive pleas- 
 ures are ethically preferable to those for ex- 
 clusive pleasures, although many delight in ex- 
 clusiveness as such, showing a mind the exact 
 opposite of that of Christ. Naturally, also, an 
 expenditure unjustifiable for an object which 
 would yield pleasures but for a moment, might 
 require no justification if it were for an object of 
 enduring value. 
 
 It may be worth while to stop for a moment 
 to consider one very lame justification which 
 people frequently use as a salve to conscience in 
 their attempted evasion of social responsibility. 
 It is said that luxury gives employment. Louis 
 XIV, one of the most extravagant kings of
 
 232 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 France, said, " When a king makes great outlays, 
 he gives alms." A newspaper writer, speaking 
 of certain extravagant social events which oc- 
 curred a few years since, used these words : 
 " Murmurs against luxury may be heard among 
 people in straitened circumstances when the 
 lavish expenditures and sumptuous pleasures of 
 great society entertainments are discussed. But 
 such persons are prone to forget that these ex- 
 penditures that seem so prodigal go in large 
 part to benefit the working people." We cannot 
 consider now all the economic fallacies involved 
 in arguments of this kind. They have been ex- 
 posed over and over again by able men. It may, 
 however, simply be pointed out that the same 
 expenditure made in behalf of others would give 
 equal employment to labor. Let us take the 
 case of a man who contributes a million dollars 
 for a public building, and contrast it with the 
 case of a man who spends a million dollars on 
 his own private house. Labor has equal employ- 
 ment in both cases, but the benefit of the toil 
 accrues to the public in the one case, and in the 
 other to the selfish enjoyment of an individual. 
 Another comparison : Contrast the expenditure 
 of ten thousand dollars for an evening's enter- 
 tainment with an expenditure of ten thousand 
 dollars for books for a public library. Labor is 
 alike employed in both cases, but in the second
 
 Our Spendings. 233 
 
 case the enjoyment is more widely diffused and 
 is of a far more enduring character. This at- 
 tempted justification is precisely on a line with 
 that which people advance for the maintenance 
 of gambling dens and the support of the traffic 
 in intoxicating beverages. As the author writes, 
 there lies before him a long description of a vast 
 brewery ; emphasis is laid upon the large em- 
 ployment which it gives to labor both directly 
 and indirectly. Mention is made of the hop 
 raisers in various parts of the country and to the 
 growers of barley. The article closes with the 
 statement that every keg of beer sold by this 
 New York brewery " helps to buy pianos for our 
 farmers' wives and daughters." The late Pro- 
 fessor Cairnes, an able and conservative political 
 economist, uses these words concerning the 
 abundant expenditures of the idle rich : " Polit- 
 ical economy furnishes no such palliation of un- 
 mitigated selfishness. . . . The wealth accumu- 
 lated by their ancestors, or others, on their be- 
 half, when it is employed as capital, no doubt 
 helps to sustain industry. But what they con- 
 sume in luxury and idleness is not capital, and 
 helps to sustain nothing but their own unprofit- 
 able lives. By all means they must have their 
 rents and interest as it is written in the bond ; 
 but let them take their proper place as drones in 
 the hive, gorging at a feast to which they have
 
 234 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 contributed nothing." ' The whole of this will not 
 apply to the industrious rich, but what has been 
 said condemns likewise their luxury, which is 
 contrary to the doctrine of stewardship, and 
 violates the law of mutual love. 
 
 The principles which are under discussion, how- 
 ever, admit of greater inequalities than one might 
 at first suppose. Needs vary indefinitely. We 
 have the variation found in inequalities of 
 capacities and faculties already mentioned. The 
 differences in expenditures required for the best 
 and harmonious development of all our powers 
 vary immensely. Moreover, apart from personal 
 development, what is necessary to one person 
 may be wanton extravagance to another. A large 
 library, costing thousands of dollars, is a wise 
 consumption for many individuals, although the 
 housing of it, and the care of it, also, involve con- 
 tinuous expenditures. But for the majority, the 
 expenditure for books which is wise is limited, 
 especially since the era of public libraries. Again, 
 the positions which different men occupy cause 
 large variations in justifiable expenditures. A 
 man in public station frequently cannot live in a 
 manner which would be proper for him if his 
 station were a private one. Not only this, but 
 his expenditures in many respects have a public 
 character, and their benefits are widely diffused. 
 
 1 Some Leading Principles of Political Economy, pp. 32, 33.
 
 Our Spendings. 235 
 
 The writer has in mind the president of a uni- 
 versity in one city, whose expenditures exceed 
 many times what would be possible for the aver- 
 age mechanic or farmer, and which, nevertheless, 
 are wisely and generously made. Strangers of 
 distinction are entertained and hospitality ex- 
 tended to professors and students. The benefits 
 of a refined and cultivated home are shared by 
 many. The writer has also in mind a household 
 in another city which, in the entertainment of 
 strangers and the extension of hospitality to per- 
 sons of distinction coming to the city, for years 
 occupied almost a semipublic position. It is 
 altogether fitting and proper that men who have 
 attained distinction on account of their services 
 in art or letters, or on account of their high po- 
 sition in the State, should receive suitable recog- 
 nition when they visit other parts of their own 
 country or foreign lands. The reader can continue 
 this line of thought for himself. It may be ap- 
 plied to the President of the United States, or 
 an American ambassador at a court of a foreign 
 power. The purpose is to show that while we 
 must draw a line and condemn most strongly the 
 wanton luxury of our period, we must make dis- 
 criminations ; above all things, we must never be 
 animated by petty envy and jealousy. Yet there 
 never was a time for plainer speaking on this 
 subject. Now is the time for prophets to arise
 
 236 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 with a message : " Thou art the man ; " and to 
 bring home to us our shortcomings with respect 
 to our wealth consumption. Yet it is not merely 
 the rich who stand condemned, but the disposi- 
 tion which is found in all social classes, and which 
 expresses itself now in one way and now in an- 
 other. The disease is, indeed, widespread. 
 
 The discrimination which has already been 
 made suggests other distinctions which must be 
 borne in mind. We cannot at all place upon the 
 same plane private and public expenditures. 
 Expenditures for private galleries, libraries, and 
 mansions, which must be condemned without 
 reservation, are amply justified when made for 
 public purposes. Millions of dollars expended 
 for public galleries of art are justified because 
 their benefits extend to countless thousands, and 
 continue for generations. The large diffusion 
 of benefits, the satisfaction and the joy in fine 
 architecture, will justify grand public buildings. 
 Such expenditure as this tends to elevate the 
 public life. It will naturally follow, from what 
 is said, that the author cannot join in the con- 
 demnation of the expenditure of millions for 
 a magnificent church or a great cathedral, pro- 
 vided always that the structure is to be adminis- 
 tered for the benefit of the masses, and not for 
 the private enjoyment of the few. If the struc- 
 ture is to be, as it is asserted some church build-
 
 Our Spendings. 237 
 
 ings are, a sort of clubhouse for millionaires, then 
 it cannot be approved from an ethical standpoint. 
 But if it is to be a grand architectural work for 
 the spiritual uplifting of men, the expenditure is 
 a wise one. 
 
 Another line of thought is suggested by im- 
 provements in wealth production. As things 
 become cheaper their enjoyment may become 
 more widely diffused, and that which was a lux- 
 ury at one time can no longer be placed in this 
 category at present. This process will continue 
 indefinitely. What we condemn is not the enjoy- 
 ment of what nature and 'society provide ; ascet- 
 icism finds no sanction in this book. The main 
 point is the limitation of resources, or, as some 
 one has said, that there is not enough material 
 wealth to go round and satisfy all needs. When 
 we spend large sums for what is rare and costly, 
 we lessen our power to satisfy more urgent needs 
 of others ; but when rare and costly things be- 
 come common, the consumption of them must 
 be judged differently. 
 
 What has just been stated suggests another 
 excuse which men urge to justify themselves in 
 self-indulgence. It is said that it is the luxury 
 of the rich which encourages improvements, and 
 thus that such consumption finds justification. 
 A little careful reflection, however, will show 
 within what narrow limits this is true. More-
 
 238 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 over, the justifiable inequality of which we have 
 spoken, and the large public consumption for the 
 satisfaction of social needs already mentioned, 
 together with other forces continuously operating, 
 will be quite sufficient to bring about improve- 
 ments ; or, should there be any slight loss in this 
 one particular, it would be counterbalanced by 
 an immense gain in other respects. 
 
 Different tests have been proposed to determine 
 what may be justified in way of personal expend- 
 iture, and what we must condemn. A person 
 who examines himself conscientiously in this re- 
 gard cannot be very seriously perplexed, and at 
 any rate is not likely to spend too much upon 
 himself. Occasionally a conscientious person will 
 spend even too little upon himself because he 
 fails to appreciate the importance of the cultiva- 
 tion and maintenance of all that he has within 
 himself. 
 
 We have heard much lately about the diffi- 
 culties of giving, and these have been so strangely 
 magnified as to suggest the thought that we have 
 to do with another false plea for the evasion of 
 social responsibility. A highly esteemed religious 
 periodical quoted a millionaire approvingly who 
 used these words: " Let anyone attempt to give 
 away one hundred thousand dollars a year, and 
 do good, not harm, in the giving, and he will find 
 that he has undertaken a task of much greater
 
 Our Spendings. 239 
 
 difficulty than the making of one hundred thou- 
 sand dollars a year." This utterance was spoken 
 of as the " truth, patent and appalling." A 
 short time previously, however, this same peri- 
 odical printed an appeal for a gift of one hun- 
 dred thousand dollars for an institution which it 
 was claimed was doing admirable work; and 
 shortly afterward an editorial appeared, entitled 
 " Three Urgent Calls." 
 
 A bishop in one of our Southern States re- 
 cently said in an address : " One of the two or 
 three enormously and absurdly rich men in the 
 country dead now, and enjoying a little rest I 
 hope said to me once, ' I envy you.' ' Envy 
 me?' I asked. 'Yes; you are a free man, your 
 own master, and doing and saying hopeful things 
 to people every day ; and I am like a blind horse 
 in a bark-mill, tramping the same monotonous 
 path round the safe that contains the deeds and 
 securities." The bishop offered to help him 
 bear his burden. He knew exactly where five 
 millions would found a university, doing enor- 
 mous good; where another million would endow 
 ten missionary bishoprics ; where five millions 
 more could be used advantageously toward the 
 instruction and Christianizing of seven million 
 Negroes. The bishop also mentioned places 
 where several other millions could be used; but, 
 although the rich man would still have been 
 
 1G
 
 240 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 struggling under a burden of millions, he de- 
 clined the proposal. 
 
 From what the writer knows of the bishop, 
 and of his situation, he has no doubt that all 
 these millions could have been employed to good 
 advantage in the ways pointed out. 
 
 Mistakes have been made, doubtless, in giving, 
 and much money has, through insufficient thought, 
 been given unwisely. Much which has been 
 given in such manner, as to do some good, might, 
 with greater wisdom, have been so given as to have 
 accomplished greater good. Still, it is true that 
 we have heard altogether too much about the 
 difficulties of giving, and thus there has been a 
 tendency to dry up the springs of generosity. It 
 is stated here and there that it is becoming more 
 and more difficult to raise money for good works, 
 and the number of givers remains comparatively 
 small on the contribution lists for benevolent en- 
 terprises ; in all our cities, the same names recur 
 again and again. 
 
 The greatest difficulty in giving is in giving to 
 individuals who are needy. Anything of the 
 kind, especially in the form of almsgiving, is 
 difficult, and it is doubtless true that it would 
 be difficult for a millionaire himself to give 
 away in alms anything like one hundred thou- 
 sand dollars a year, and to give it helpfully. 
 This giving to needy individuals requires per-
 
 Our Spendings. 241 
 
 sonal contact and personal knowledge. It is 
 to overcome the difficulties of giving of this 
 kind that Charity Organization Societies have been 
 established, and that we have developed what is 
 called scientific charity. 
 
 Perhaps it may be laid down, as a general rule, 
 that giving to individuals is especially the func- 
 tion of those who themselves are poor, or only 
 moderately well-to-do. A very rich man, almost 
 of necessity, gets too far away from needy indi- 
 viduals to help them. As his wealth increases 
 he grows away from the needy, and, moreover, 
 he is especially liable to imposition. 
 
 Yet, there are many different ways of giving, 
 and it is not easy to feel that any earnest man 
 can find it difficult to give advantageously all 
 the surplus which he is able to spare, even if he 
 adheres most rigidly to Christian principles in 
 regard to his own expenditures and those of his 
 family. If one is a believer in foreign and do- 
 mestic missions and no one can fail to believe 
 in both who accepts Christianity a way at once 
 is opened to him for the expenditure of millions 
 of money. It is said that even now nearly, if 
 not quite all, of our boards of missions are in 
 debt. 
 
 When we turn to educational enterprises the 
 opportunities for giving are simply unlimited. 
 A man may well take time in order to choose
 
 242 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 between various objects presented, but there is 
 no lack of opportunity for disposal of more mil- 
 lions than any living human being has. The 
 writer sees how, in the institution with which he 
 is connected, millions could be expended wisely. 
 And probably there is no professor in any insti- 
 tution in our land who would not undertake to 
 use all the money that could be placed at his dis- 
 posal. What are the things that occur to the 
 writer ? One or two may be mentioned : Scholar- 
 ships and fellowships, as an aid to gifted young men 
 and women in the development of their faculties 
 for social service ; a building for the Young Men's 
 and Young Women's Christian Associations, as a 
 headquarters for their religious work among the 
 fifteen hundred students in his own university ; 
 dormitories, established and maintained by Chris- 
 tian people, under Christian influences, which 
 would be genuine homes for the young men and 
 young women in this institution; an adequately 
 endowed department of Economics and Politics 
 which would be as amply equipped for its work 
 as any department of Natural Science. These 
 are illustrations which might be continued in- 
 definitely. 
 
 When we turn to free public libraries, and 
 think of the good that has been accomplished 
 by their establishment in different communities, 
 and of the large number of communities in the
 
 Our Spendings. 243 
 
 country without such an educational institution, 
 we see here, likewise, almost unlimited oppor- 
 tunities for giving. One hundred million dollars 
 could be wisely expended within a year in estab- 
 lishing free public libraries in different cities of 
 the United States. The entire South is almost 
 destitute of the blessings of free public libraries. 
 
 But mention of the South reminds us again 
 of its large Negro population, and also its large, 
 illiterate white population, both of which need 
 aid in the development of educational and re- 
 ligious institutions. 
 
 The common schools of the country are in 
 many particulars inferior, and millions of money 
 could be wisely used in their development and 
 improvement. A far larger proportion of in- 
 dividual effort and private philanthropy ought 
 to be turned in this direction. A few years 
 ago some philanthropists in Boston contributed 
 money to add new features, like cooking, to the 
 public schools. They defrayed the expenses of 
 the experiment, and when the stage of experi- 
 mentation was passed the work was taken up 
 and carried forward by the taxpayers. Private 
 philanthropy has likewise encouraged the estab- 
 lishment of kindergartens, bearing the entire ex- 
 pense until the taxpayer could be educated up 
 to an adequate appreciation of their mission. 
 This is philanthropy of the most fruitful sort.
 
 244 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 We have also our denominational schools and 
 colleges which, like the public schools, must be 
 reckoned with as a permanent force. Their funds 
 are inadequate, and even with a wise policy of 
 consolidation and co-operation with public insti- 
 tutions, like that pursued in some quarters, their 
 needs are pressing and large, and afford a field for 
 wise giving. Especially must one remember that 
 theological training is exclusively committed to 
 private efforts, and the endowments of our the- 
 ological schools are sadly inadequate. At a time 
 like the present, when the demands on the pulpit 
 are becoming so vast, training schools for pastors 
 and preachers must especially appeal to the 
 thoughtful Christian of means. 
 
 If we turn to the slums of our cities, we find 
 there countless thousands who need our help, 
 and who can be saved from their evil surround- 
 ings by efforts of the right sort. It has been 
 proved, by experience of the Children's Aid So- 
 cieties and other agencies, that the majority of 
 the children living in the slums can be brought 
 up to lead useful and honorable lives if their 
 surroundings are changed and right influences 
 brought to bear upon them. '* Save the children 
 to-day, and you have saved the nation to-mor- 
 row." In the redemption of the slums of our 
 cities we have opportunities for the application 
 of social service of many times the number of
 
 Our Spendings. 245 
 
 workers now found in them, and also for the use 
 of millions upon millions of money. 
 
 The work, however, which is to be done, can- 
 not be done by any one class in the community 
 alone ; each one is responsible according to his 
 talents, whatever they may be. It will not do 
 for the rest of the community to stand aside and 
 wait for millionaires to take action. A poor per- 
 son with very small material resources can often 
 accomplish a large work. Moreover, it is always 
 unwise for the wealthy by their gifts to take 
 responsibility off the shoulders of others. Sev- 
 eral rich men recently, in giving to institutions, 
 have made it a condition that others should 
 make contributions also. One of the wealthy 
 men of the United States, whose favorite form 
 of benevolence is public libraries, says that he 
 does not think it worth while to give a public li- 
 brary to any city which is not willing to tax itself 
 for the support of the institution. The readiness 
 of most of us to appeal to the wealthy, and to 
 roll upon them all the public burdens which they 
 are willing to carry, suggests a disposition which 
 is a counterpart of the niggardliness of some rich 
 men. It is always well to bear in mind what has 
 been so frequently and so wisely said concern- 
 ing the importance of helping others to help 
 themselves. 
 
 It would be possible to continue the discussion
 
 246 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 of the opportunities for giving, both material 
 means and personal services, indefinitely. There 
 are about us those who need our help of both 
 kinds, as well as institutions which can be advan- 
 tageously sustained and strengthened. All our 
 resources are insufficient for the work which lies 
 ready at our hand. Now, as ever, " the harvest 
 truly is plenteous, but the laborers are few," ' and 
 their resources are inadequate. 
 
 1 Matthew ix, 37.
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 WHAT TO DO.
 
 "AND respecting human feelings generally, I think that we 
 may lay down this law : That in proportion as they are exerted 
 on higher objects, they may safely be allowed to grow more and 
 more intense ; there can be no danger in our loving God too 
 much, if only we understand His true nature, nor any possibility 
 of abuse in devoting our lives for the good of man, if only we 
 know the means by which that good is to be attained." Jow- 
 ett, College Sermons, p. 162. 
 
 " Men formerly thought that the simple direct action of the 
 benevolent instincts by means of self-denying gifts was enough 
 to remedy the misery they deplored ; now we see that not only 
 thought, but historical study is also necessary." Arnold Toyn- 
 bee, The Industrial Revolution in England, p. 94. 
 
 " When you have found your work, whatever it be, give your- 
 self to it with all your heart, and make the resolution in God's 
 sight never to go to your rest leaving a stone unturned which 
 may help your aims. Half-and-half charity does very little good 
 to the objects ; and is a miserable, slovenly affair for the work- 
 ers. And when the end comes and the night closes in, the long, 
 last night of earth, when no man can work any more in this 
 world, your milk-and-water, half-hearted charities will bring no 
 memories of comfort to you. They are not so many 'good 
 works ' which you can place on the credit side of your account, 
 in the mean, commercial spirit taught by some of the Churches. 
 Nay, rather, they are only solemn evidences that you knew your 
 duty, knew you might do good, and did it not, or did it half- 
 heartedly ! What a thought for those last days when we know 
 ourselves to be going home to God, God whom at bottom, after 
 all, we have loved and shall love forever that we might have 
 served Him here, might have blessed His creatures, might have 
 done His will on earth as it is done in heaven, but we have let 
 the glorious chance slip by us forever." Life of Frances Power 
 Cobbe, by Herself, pp. 554, 555.
 
 What to Do. 249 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 WHAT TO DO. 
 
 THE demand for a practical program is a nat- 
 ural one. One will say, " Here am I, a 
 clerk in a drygoods house; what must I do?" 
 Another, " Here am I, a worker on a farm ; what 
 does the social message of Christianity mean for 
 me ? " Another will say, " I am a teacher ; what is 
 the thing for me to do now, and here ? " So repre- 
 sentatives of various industrial classes, the pastor, 
 the merchant, the legislator,, the judge, all ask 
 the question, " What have I to do if I would follow 
 the social teachings of Christianity ?" What are 
 the practical conclusions drawn from the general 
 principles which have been already elaborated? 
 
 A complete guide of conduct is out of the ques- 
 tion. We have liberty, and with liberty goes 
 responsibility. No one can keep at our elbow 
 perpetually, turning us now in this direction, 
 now in that ; we would then become automata 
 and not free personalities ; we would, indeed, 
 become things and not persons at all. No prob- 
 lem that presents itself is precisely like a previous 
 problem, and we must decide the problems as
 
 250 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 they arise, seeking such aid as we can find within 
 our reach. We have the inner light, and we 
 have available a vast amount of positive knowl- 
 edge based upon reflection and experience. 
 
 Nevertheless, helpful suggestions of a general 
 character may be given ; in regard to some things 
 we may be clear. The way in which we must 
 travel is not altogether without signposts afford- 
 ing needful directions. 
 
 We speak about social righteousness, but for 
 each person the beginning is found in personal 
 salvation. It is safe to give this advice : Bring 
 yourself into right relations with God ; that is 
 the beginning of all things. Through this right 
 relationship with God, seek to enter into right 
 relations with your fellows. If we begin other- 
 wise, it is impossible to tell where we will end. 
 Humanitarianism by itself that is to say, hu- 
 manitarianism which does not rest back upon 
 God is as unstable as the sands. The enthu- 
 siasm of humanity of to-day may end to-morrow 
 in cold egoism. The question naturally soon 
 suggests itself, " Why, after all, should I trouble 
 myself about my neighbors ; my efforts seem to 
 accomplish little, and, after all, man is a poor 
 creature." It is only in Christ that man is ex- 
 alted. Apart from Christ the natural tendency 
 is to come back to the standpoint of the Greeks 
 and despise the masses.
 
 What to Do. 251 
 
 We need to keep close to Christ to avoid the 
 dangers which beset each one of us. Whatever 
 our situation, it has its peculiar dangers. We 
 have seen how much is expected of us, and we 
 are reminded that Christ said, " Narrow is the 
 way." We have found how great the responsi- 
 bility of a rich man, and how difficult for him to 
 conform to the law of mutual love in his earn- 
 ings and in his expenditures, and we are reminded 
 that Christ said that it was easier for a camel to 
 go through the needle's eye than for a rich man 
 to enter into the kingdom. But the poor also 
 have their peculiar dangers, and especially so 
 at the present time when so much social agita- 
 tion of an evil character is going forward. Envy 
 is a social force pulling men down, and this is 
 observable at every turn at the present time ; it 
 is one of the things making our public life poor 
 and mean. It shows itself in a communism of 
 the worst type which, instead of pulling men up, 
 wants to pull all down to a common level, and 
 reduce every manifestation of excellence to a 
 wretched mediocrity. 
 
 Each one may well bear in mind the parable 
 of the fig tree : If it bears fruit, it is good ; if 
 not, it is hewn down. If we receive Christ in 
 our heart, and then do not go to work to bear 
 fruit ; if we do not help and comfort others ; if we 
 fail to minister to those about us, to show mercy
 
 252 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 unto prisoners and captives, then the sap of life 
 dries up, the life in us dies, we wither away and 
 lose that which we had. It is a condition of life 
 that we must pass on what we receive, and pass 
 it on enlarged. " Blessed be God, . . . who com- 
 forteth us in all our tribulations, that we may be 
 able to comfort them which are in any trouble." ' 
 In our practical activity, there are no words 
 more useful to keep in mind than these: "The 
 next thing." Do the next thing. Generally 
 this is something definite and concrete; possibly 
 not something large and grand, yet who can tell ? 
 The story of the leper general is typical. He was 
 told to wash in the waters of a little brook. This 
 was something so simple that it was rejected in 
 scorn. Some great and difficult thing was wanted. 
 The work of everyone tells. Society is an organ- 
 ism made up of interdependent parts, each one 
 in itself a living organism. We have to work 
 both ways : downward to the parts, and upward 
 to the whole. At any moment what can be done 
 will find fixed limits in the character of the indi- 
 ,viduals who comprise the whole. Every improve- 
 ment in your own character and in your own sur- 
 roundings is an improvement for every circle, 
 large and small, of which you form a part. Every 
 helpful word, every kind deed, is a contribution 
 
 to the perfection of society. We must be care- 
 
 \ 
 
 1 2 Corinthians i, 3, 4.
 
 What to Do. 253 
 
 ful, lest we despise small things. We may read 
 of the grand work of a man like Charles Loring 
 Brace, the soul of the Children's Aid Society of 
 New York city, and feel discouraged, or think 
 our own sphere of action too small, when we are 
 told that he rescued hundreds of thousands of 
 children. A spirit of despondency, possibly, may 
 seize us if we read an account of the vastly larger 
 work of the seventh Earl of Shaftesbury, and learn 
 that the factory legislation which he did so much 
 to bring about, and his other social efforts, changed 
 greatly the life of England, benefiting millions 
 of human beings in his own lifetime, and many 
 more millions unborn at the time of his death. 
 Their deeds were grand, indeed, and all honor to 
 them ! But what social conditions made their 
 beneficent activity possible? When we reflect 
 carefully upon this question, we discover that 
 millions toiled to make their deeds a possibility. 
 The next thing is the thing for each one. If we 
 take a step at a time, always doing the next 
 thing, and walk forward in the right path, we 
 may find that finally we have traveled a long dis- 
 tance ; and one thing is certain, and that is, in 
 the end we will receive the plaudit, " Well done." 
 The work for a student is to do his best as a 
 student, acquiring what he can. The thing for 
 the carpenter to do is to become the best possible 
 carpenter, feeling that his calling is a calling of
 
 254 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 God ; that he is, indeed, a carpenter by the grace 
 of God. If a way opens for something which 
 seems larger and brings greater emoluments, very 
 well; but good carpenters, good blacksmiths, 
 good farmers, as well as good lawyers, judges, 
 and congressmen, have an honorable work, and 
 if their tasks are well discharged their work will 
 help bring in the kingdom. 
 
 Another word "Seek light." Misguided en- 
 thusiasm may do more harm than good. We 
 are responsible for the use of our intellectual as 
 well as our emotional natures. It is for us to use 
 such opportunities as we have to know what 
 should be done, and how it should be done. We 
 must remember how Christ reproached the pro- 
 fessedly religious people of His day with blind- 
 ness, and how grievous a sin in His eyes was this 
 blindness. "Ye blind guides," "Ye fools and 
 blind," "Ye fools and blind," " Ye blind guides," 
 " Thou blind Pharisee " these all occur in a 
 single discourse an awful sermon of condemna- 
 tion, the like of which in its severe denunciation 
 has, perhaps, never been surpassed. " Get wis- 
 dom, and with all thy getting, get understand- 
 ing." ' We are told that wisdom is the principal 
 thing ; and if we interpret wisdom largely enough, 
 this is true. " Look and see," is the injunction 
 of an economist who believed in observation. It 
 
 1 Proverbs iv, 7.
 
 What to Do. 255 
 
 is a good motto. " Look and see." We must 
 read the Bible, and we must read the lives of 
 those who have done great things ; the lives of 
 servants of God, like Elizabeth Fry, John How- 
 ard, and the seventh Earl of Shaftesbury. 1 Meth- 
 ods of conspicuously successful soldiers of the 
 cross are to be studied. Our Church is a Church 
 militant, and tactics may not be neglected. Our 
 meetings together should be meetings in which 
 to lay plans for work, and meetings in which re- 
 ports should be made of work done. Reports 
 should be made of poor succored and children 
 rescued from evil surroundings, and of alms- 
 houses, jails, and prisons visited. 
 
 We may take up our various social circles, one 
 after the other, and seek to apply our general 
 principles in each one of them. For the indi- 
 vidual, the first social circle is the family. This 
 is the social cell, and must be regarded from the 
 social point of view. Multiplied divorces are a 
 natural outcome of an individualistic point of 
 view of the family. It may seem hard that two 
 incompatible natures should be obliged to live 
 together and should not separate, and each one 
 
 1 Especially the latter, as he is a man of our own times, and his 
 work is peculiarly instructive for us. See Life and Work of the 
 Seventh. Earl of Shaftesbury, by Edwin Hodder, in three vol- 
 umes. Cassell & Company, New York, 1886. The work is 
 exceedingly entertaining, and should not fail to be in every Sun- 
 day school library. 
 17
 
 256 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 join itself to a congenial and helpful nature ; but 
 the social point of view at once forces home the 
 question, What are the social consequences ? To 
 this question there can be only one answer, and 
 that completely vindicates the law of Christ with 
 respect to divorce. We are to build up in every 
 way the family, providing for our own, and not 
 drawing the line too closely about those whom 
 we consider members of our own family. There 
 is a tendency at present to a decay of family 
 feeling, and even close relationship is too fre- 
 quently forgotten when there is an occasion for 
 helpful service, although vividly enough remem- 
 bered when an estate is to be divided among 
 heirs ! We have, in considerations based upon 
 the family, a guide for a large proportion of our 
 social conduct. A sound family life implies a 
 right physical environment, and this brings be- 
 fore us sanitary reform in all our cities. Improved 
 drainage, small parks, playgrounds, may be men- 
 tioned. Saloons and brothels in the neighbor- 
 hood of the home and the school mean a poi- 
 soned environment. It is particularly the poor 
 who suffer in this respect, as was well brought 
 forward before the American Federation of Labor 
 at its recent convention by a representative of the 
 Women's Christian Temperance Union. It ap- 
 pears that in New York, some time ago, there 
 was one liquor saloon to 200 inhabitants, but in the
 
 What to Do. 257 
 
 slum district one saloon to 129 persons; in Phil- 
 adelphia the figures were 870 and 502 ; in Balti- 
 more, 229 and 105 ; in Chicago, 212 and 127. l 
 
 Conditions of work may also be examined from 
 the standpoint of the family. If the father toils 
 fifteen, sixteen, and seventeen hours a day, as 
 happened a few years ago in the case of the street- 
 car employees of Baltimore, it must be at the 
 expense of the family. It is impossible that 
 he should discharge his duties to his family when 
 he scarcely sees his own children awake for weeks 
 at a time. If wage-earners toil seven days in a 
 week, this can only be at the expense of the 
 family. If work on other days is so hard that 
 Sunday is used simply for recovery from physical 
 exhaustion, then the family is deprived of reli- 
 gious influences. If little children who should 
 be in school are at work in shops and factories, 
 and the mothers are obliged to leave home for the 
 support of the family, then this, likewise, can 
 only tend to the decay of the family. When we 
 discuss the children in the family which should 
 be a shield to them, a bulwark of defense against 
 evils, a garden in which they may grow up into 
 manhood and womanhood surrounded by all 
 
 1 See the article on " Our Slums," by Dr. J. H. W. Stucken- 
 berg, Homiletic Review, October, 1895 ; also, " Labor and 
 Temperance," by Mrs. J. H. W. Stuckenberg, in the American 
 Federationist, of Indianapolis, January, 1896.
 
 258 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 good influences, we think of the bad environ- 
 ment which poisons childhood so frequently, and 
 we remember Christ's solicitude for little chil- 
 dren: " Whoso shall offend one of these little ones 
 which believe in Me, it were better for him that 
 a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that 
 he were drowned in the depth of the sea." 1 If we 
 have eyes to see, we cannot fail to discern con- 
 ditions all about us, those mentioned and many 
 others, which cause our little ones to stumble, 
 and every one is responsible precisely in so far 
 as he has not given heed to these conditions, 
 and done what in him lies to remedy them. 
 We have here brought before us vast evils, and 
 some way out of them must be discovered. 
 There is wisdom enough in the churches for 
 the solution of these problems, if it is earnestly 
 applied to them. 
 
 The mention of the Church brings before us 
 another social circle which must be yeast in 
 society, leavening the whole. The work of 
 the Church becomes immensely more difficult 
 with the complexity of modern society. Pas- 
 tors and preachers have a natural leadership in 
 the work of the Church, and the vastness of 
 this work suggests the need of strong men in 
 the pulpit. But the laity, also, have their work. 
 It is not for them simply to receive, but for 
 
 1 Matthew xviii, 6.
 
 What to Do. 259 
 
 them also to feel like responsibility with their 
 leaders. It is for all in the Church to make her 
 a fit bride of Christ. 
 
 The Church must hold before herself her ideal 
 as a transforming power for righteousness. 
 Righteousness means Tightness right relations 
 toward God and man. It is, perhaps, signifi- 
 cant that we have come to use the word " reli- 
 gion " more frequently than " righteousness." 
 They may mean the same things ; but it is sug- 
 gestive that in the Bible the word " religion " is 
 used three times, and the word " righteousness" 
 more than one hundred times three times. Prob- 
 ably the modern Christian uses the word " reli- 
 gion" at least ten times asoften as theword "right- 
 eousness." The ultimate ideal, so far as we can 
 gather from the prophets and the Book of Reve- 
 lation, is the Church as the all-embracing form 
 of association for every kind of social work. But 
 this must mean a oneness of Church and State, 
 as we have already mentioned. This implies a 
 complete transformation and change from any- 
 thing that we now know, and we have to build 
 up each one of these great divine institutions in 
 its own sphere. We have work in the Church 
 to do which we may call extensive, bringing 
 others into relations with the Church and in- 
 creasing its members. 
 
 But quite as important is intensive work, to
 
 260 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 be conducted, not ostentatiously, but quietly. 
 This is the field for individual and social effort. 
 This is the kind of work which the Epworth 
 League, the Christian Endeavor Societies, St. 
 Andrew's Brotherhood, and other organizations 
 are all doing, and will do, we may hope, more 
 effectively in the future. Through these organi- 
 zations individual power may be brought to bear 
 upon the life of the Church. We criticise the 
 Church, not as an ideal organization, but as an 
 actual organization of those who profess Chris- 
 tianity ; and we do so rightly. Yet there is no 
 reason why we should despair of the Church, but 
 quite the contrary. We may also say, so far 
 as the relations of anyone to his individual 
 Church is concerned, that a change should not 
 lightly be made. The work to do is extensive 
 and intensive. 
 
 It is a great thing to work through the 
 Church. We have in the Church an immense or- 
 ganization, built up by the efforts of generation 
 upon generation for well-nigh nineteen hun- 
 dred years. We have an organization which will 
 endure, and efforts put into this organization will 
 last. 
 
 Within the Church it is for us to do good to 
 those about us and to form a true brotherhood, 
 so that men may say again, " How these Chris- 
 tians love one another ! " At times a particular
 
 What to Do. 261 
 
 church organization tends to become a fashion- 
 able club. Nothing could be further from the 
 mind of Christ. The church is to exercise the 
 widest hospitality. We are to attend the serv- 
 ices of the church, not merely in plain but in- 
 expensive attire, lest worldly discrimination 
 should creep into the church, and our conduct 
 become a stumbling-block to others. 
 
 But our work in the Church is the redemption 
 of the world, not plucking a few out of the world. 
 The Church must ever be remembered as leave*n, 
 leavening the entire lump. This suggests a true 
 unity of Christians, working together on the 
 world. If all institutions are to be redeemed, 
 then it is important to remember that we have 
 something far larger before us than merely the 
 upbuilding of denominational institutions, im- 
 portant as these may be. It is for us to put the 
 spirit of Christ into all social institutions. It is 
 for Christians not only to exercise a care over 
 the home for the aged which bears a denomi- 
 national name, but over the county poorhouse. 
 It is for Christians not only to exercise solicitude 
 with respect to the church hospital, but to ex- 
 tend their watchfulness to the city hospital. It 
 is for them not merely to build up the school of 
 a religious sect, but the public school ; not 
 merely to care for the church college, but to see 
 to it that the State university is all that it
 
 262 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 should be. We have a family selfishness, against 
 which Christ warned us in His precepts and 
 practice. But we have also a church selfishness 
 which is equally contrary to the mind of Christ. 
 Christ scarcely uttered the word "church," but 
 the word " kingdom " was perpetually in His 
 mouth. We must see to it that for us the church 
 means the kingdom. 
 
 Coming back to our maxim, " The next thing," 
 we may ask ourselves, " What is the ' next thing ' 
 in'social work for the Church ? " There is cer- 
 tainly no work of this nature less open to ques- 
 tion and more pressing than that which is 
 brought before us by chanties and correction. 
 Beneficence has in all ages been considered a pe- 
 culiar feature of the life of the Church. It is 
 especially mentioned that it is one object of 
 the Epworth League to train young members 
 and friends of the Church " in works of mercy 
 and help." ' No Christian organization has ever 
 denied the duty of Christians with respect to 
 charities and correction. This is work which 
 can be only in a limited sense denominational 
 
 1 It is interesting to read that John Wesley, Charles Wesley, 
 George Whitefield, and other members of Oxford University 
 formed a society and " began practical work with the prisoners 
 in Oxford castle, visiting and comforting them in their confine- 
 ment, helping the unfortunate debtors locked up in Bocardo, 
 and paying for the education of poor children." Vide English 
 Social Reformers, by H. de B. Gibbins, M.A., p. 78.
 
 What to Do. 263 
 
 work. It is a work in which Christians must 
 unite with one another, and enter into relations 
 with public authorities and public institutions, if 
 their work is to be fruitful. Yet, notwithstand- 
 ing the clearest instructions from the founder of 
 the Church and His apostles, notwithstanding 
 all our professions, there is the strangest neglect 
 of those most wretched and unhappy classes of 
 human beings for whom charities and correction 
 exist. We pray continually for " fatherless chil- 
 dren and widows, and all who are desolate and 
 oppressed." A great deal of charitable work is 
 accomplished ; but much of it is so unintelligent, 
 that the question is often raised whether it does 
 more harm than good. What we are instructed 
 to do is to consider the poor and needy, endeav- 
 oring always so to help men as to prevent the 
 evil of pauperism, and to cure it where it does 
 exist. 1 That is what we do not do, for we put 
 
 1 In anticipation of a plea often urged for an evasion of social 
 duties it may be observed in this connection : First, that Christ 
 did not say, " The poor ye shall always have with you." He used 
 the present tense, pointing to a present fact. The poor were 
 always present with them. Second, poverty is one thing, pau- 
 perism is another. Thoughtful people are beginning to feel that 
 there is no reason why pauperism should continue, although rel- 
 atively poor people will always be with us, and there can never be a 
 time when mutual helpfulness will not be needed. We have abun- 
 dant experience to show us that pauperism can be exterminated, 
 if an earnest and intelligent and general effort is made to accom- 
 plish this purpose. Third, if the poor are always with us, this is
 
 264 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 little heart and less mind into our charitable and 
 correctional work. If it is proposed to consider 
 the charitable and correctional work of a city 
 full of churches, and the wisest and most expe- 
 rienced men in these lines of work come to im- 
 part to those who are gathered together lessons 
 derived from their wisdom and experience, it is ex- 
 tremely difficult to gather together an audience for 
 those things which ought to concern Christians 
 most deeply. It would be something to create 
 surprise if, in a city with fifty churches, one of 
 them could be filled on such an occasion. The 
 management of public charitable and correctional 
 institutions is of the most vital concern to the 
 most needy, and in some cases the most helpless, 
 members of the community. In some instances, 
 as in the case of the feeble-minded and the in- 
 sane, we have, indeed, to do with those who are 
 utterly helpless. Trained workers of high char- 
 acter may do a great deal for those thousands of 
 unhappy beings in every commonwealth in the 
 Union. Management of the reverse kind works 
 immeasurable harm and unspeakable cruelty. 
 Nevertheless, so neglectful have the churches 
 
 no excuse for our neglect of the problem of poverty. Quite the 
 contrary is taught in the Bible. The statement in Deuteronomy, 
 that " the poor shall never cease out of the land," is immediately 
 followed by this injunction : " Therefore, I command thee, say- 
 ing, Thou shall open thine hand wide unto thy brother, to thy 
 poor, and to thy needy in thy laud" (Exodus xv, 11).
 
 What to Do. 265 
 
 been of charities and correction, that they raise no 
 general, forceful protest when offices connected 
 with these institutions are made the spoils of 
 partisan politics and distributed, not on the basis 
 of merit, but as "plums," or " pie," or " fat ; " 
 expressions used every day in the press, but in- 
 dicating a low moral level of public life. 1 It will 
 
 1 Not long since three men held important offices in Illinois, 
 which were concerned with the administration of charitable and 
 correctional institutions. These men had held these offices for 
 many years, and had become recognized throughout the entire 
 country as distinguished authorities in their field. They were 
 an honor to their State, and their activity was beneficent to those 
 unfortunate classes placed under their charge. When partisan 
 politics removed these men, there was no protest on the part of 
 the churches of which the author has been able to discover any 
 trace. When recently partisan politics, instead of tried and ap- 
 proved fitness, decided appointments in an industrial school, in- 
 sane asylums, and the school for the blind in Wisconsin, the 
 Christian people of the State, except in the case of a few indi- 
 viduals, had nothing to say. Sh'all we blame the politicians ? 
 A politician who may regret the existing condition of affairs 
 can well say: "I am powerless. There is no evidence of any 
 sentiment in the State which would support me, should I do 
 what is really desirable in the matter of these appointments." 
 The answer may not be entirely satisfactory, but the blame rests 
 chiefly on the churches, for if they were deeply interested and 
 watchful, these things would be impossible. When societies like 
 the Epworth League, the Christian Endeavor Societies, and St. 
 Andrew's Brotherhood become aroused on subjects of this kind, 
 these things will have to cease. Politicians of the better sort 
 will rejoice, and politicians of the baser sort will be powerless 
 to prevent righteousness in their appointments to these public 
 offices.
 
 266 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 not do to say that we have not thought of these 
 things, for we are put here, and given minds and 
 hearts that we may think of them. The con- 
 demnation is, " Inasmuch as ye did it not unto 
 one of the least of these." 
 
 It may be well to give some definite and pre- 
 cise methods to be followed by those who would 
 arouse an intelligent interest on the part of Chris- 
 tian people in charities and correction, and who 
 would stimulate right action. The following 
 suggestions are offered : First, study the results 
 of experience and thought, as presented in two 
 excellent books on these subjects, namely : War- 
 ner's American Charities and Wines's Punishment 
 and Reformation. A class may be formed taking 
 up first Dr. Warner's book, chapter by chapter, 
 and then Dr. Wines's work. All persons who 
 can be found willing to " lend a hand " should 
 be asked to join the class. From time to time 
 some one with special knowledge or experience 
 may be invited to address the class on that topic 
 with which he or she has become familiar. Jails, 
 poorhouses, insane asylums, police stations in 
 cities, are topics which occur at once to the mind. 
 Then when some knowledge has been gained, all 
 institutions of this character which can be reached 
 should be visited, their actual administration 
 studied, and their needs discovered. Work will 
 be found in abundance. On the one hand there
 
 What to Do, 267 
 
 will be inmates of institutions to be visited reg- 
 ularly, and it may come about that on visiting 
 lists of ladies will be found those who now are 
 hungry for what can be given in cheerful and 
 helpful words. Hospitality, which is praised by 
 the Apostle Paul, may be extended in directions 
 indicated in the New Testament. On the other 
 hand, evils and abuses will be discovered, and 
 after these are thoroughly understood they may 
 be brought before the public and kept before the 
 public until remedied. And if wherever there is 
 a Christian church, or even wherever there is a 
 branch of the Epworth League, or a Christian 
 Endeavor Society, there are at least one or two 
 who understand these questions and are alive to 
 their import, whenever it is proposed to use pub- 
 lic offices in charitable and correctional institu- 
 tions as " pie " and "fat," there will arise such a 
 mighty cry, "Hands off," that no politician will 
 dare to disobey it. 
 
 If we open the Prayer Book of the Protestant 
 Episcopal Church, or Wesley's Sunday Service, 
 we find this petition : " That it may please thee 
 to preserve all who travel by land or water, all 
 women in the perils of childbirth, all sick per- 
 sons, and young children ; and to show thy pity 
 upon all prisoners and captives ; We beseech 
 thee to hear us, good Lord." It may be sup- 
 posed that like prayers may be heard in every
 
 268 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 church. How much social reform is embraced 
 in this one petition? How much social work 
 does it suggest, if, indeed, we are to work for 
 that for which we pray ? " All who travel by 
 land or water " railway employees, exposed to 
 needless jeopardy every hour ; likewise railway 
 passengers ; also stokers and other employees of 
 steamship companies, whose environment is no- 
 toriously bad. The preservation of all who travel 
 by land or sea involves a goodly proportion of 
 needed reform. " All women in the perils of 
 childbirth," and "young children," remind us, 
 among other things, of needed sanitary reforms, 
 for unsanitary conditions imperil both classes, 
 destroying, needlessly, the lives of hundreds of 
 thousands yearly. "Young children " suggests 
 the abuses of factory labor on the one hand, and 
 the improvement of schools on the other ; also 
 the opportunities for helpful, life-giving enjoy- 
 ment. 
 
 The labor movement and the Church is a fruit- 
 ful topic. Everywhere the question is asked, 
 " What attitude shall the Church take with re- 
 spect to the labor movement ? " The Church, as 
 such, can, to be sure, take comparatively few posi- 
 tions, and these must relate, for the most part, 
 rather to ends to be accomplished than to meth- 
 ods to be followed in the accomplishment of these 
 ends. But certain general things can be made
 
 What to Do. 269 
 
 clear. The aims of life for wage-earners and all 
 others should be held before us. The social doc- 
 trines of the entire Bible may be explained, bring- 
 ing into right relations the Old and the New 
 Testament. The Bible doctrine of land is one of 
 importance. It is well said of " the law given 
 from God by Moses " that the civil precepts 
 thereof ought not " of necessity be received in 
 any commonwealth." This would imply an 
 adoption of institutions which are not adapted to 
 modern conditions, and which would accomplish 
 results quite contrary to the purposes of these 
 civil precepts. But the permanent spirit of them 
 must again and again be brought before us, re- 
 membering that Christianity always means more 
 kindness than Judaism, not less ; more generos- 
 ity, not less ; more love to all men, not less to 
 any man. 
 
 It is not easy for the writer to understand how 
 a preacher, as a preacher, can advocate at the 
 present time anything in regard to which there 
 are such differences of opinion on the part of 
 good men, and in regard to which there is so 
 much uncertainty, as the single tax. The same 
 may be said with respect to socialism, in a nar- 
 row sense, implying specific schemes for reform. 
 On the other hand, for the sake of social peace, 
 such schemes may occasionally be described with 
 impartiality and their religious aspects explained.
 
 270 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 Certain ideals which both the single tax and 
 socialism place before men are implied unques- 
 tionably in Christianity. Each man is to be 
 treated, not as a means to an end, but as an end 
 in himself; each man is to be given the best 
 opportunities for the development of all faculties, 
 and the utmost sympathy must be shown for all 
 efforts to elevate truly the masses of men. It 
 can also well be pointed out how vast are the 
 new responsibilities brought upon us by our in- 
 creasing wealth. Certain ideals which would 
 have once been out of the question are now 
 brought within the realm of practical discussion 
 by our larger productive power. A question like 
 the eight-hour day will serve as an example. 
 The Church, as Church, can scarcely take a posi- 
 tion at the present time in regard to anything so 
 definite and precise, and so uncertain in its re- 
 sults. It can, however, well be brought forward 
 that a question of this kind means something dif- 
 ferent now from what it could have meant in 
 earlier days. It is a question of how we can best 
 utilize the new opportunities given by greater 
 power in the production of wealth. It can also 
 be clearly shown that if the larger productive 
 power of labor is consumed simply in greater lux- 
 ury and self-indulgence, then the decay of nations 
 which past ages have witnessed will inevitably 
 continue, and a grave will close over the national
 
 What to Do. 271 
 
 powers of to-day, as it has over the many nations 
 which were once the admiration of the world, but 
 have now utterly perished. Peace is also some- 
 thing which can be promoted by the Church, as 
 Church, and this will be effected if the aims and 
 aspirations of the labor movement are under- 
 stood, and if the perplexities and difficulties of 
 various classes are brought forward. It is not 
 for the preacher to a congregation of wage-earn- 
 ers to dwell merely upon the shortcomings of em- 
 ployers and the vices of the wealthy ; nor is it 
 for the preacher to wealthy congregations so 
 much to hold up the alleged wickedness of walk- 
 ing delegates, as to help his congregation to 
 know what the workingmen really want, and to 
 enforce upon the wealthy their own vast respon- 
 sibilities. 
 
 We may, in short, " study in common how to 
 apply the moral truths and principles of Chris- 
 tianity to the social and economic difficulties of 
 the present time," and we may " present Christ 
 in practical life as the Living Master and King, 
 the enemy of wrong and selfishness, the power 
 of righteousness and love." 
 
 It has been suggested that certain Sundays 
 may be set apart for the consideration of social 
 topics from the Christian point of view. Many 
 cities already have a hospital Sunday, and every- 
 where at least one sermon a year may be de- 
 18
 
 272 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 voted to chanties and correction. It has been 
 recommended that the Sunday before the first 
 Monday in September (the Sunday before Labor 
 Day) should be devoted to the labor problem, 
 and this recommendation has been followed with 
 good results in at least a few churches. The first 
 Sunday in May may also appropriately be used 
 for some such purpose, inasmuch as generally 
 throughout the world wage-earners are inclined 
 to look upon the 1st of May as an international 
 labor day. If still a fourth Sunday should be 
 set apart for the consideration of a civic topic it 
 would be little enough when we remember the 
 importance Christ attached to whatever con- 
 cerned the well-being of the masses of men, for 
 we must not forget that all his miracles were 
 wrought to relieve pain and sorrow and to pro- 
 mote physical and mental happiness. There was 
 a higher purpose, but the occasions of the mira- 
 cles surely are not without significance. 
 
 If we encourage those who have the opportu- 
 nities and the brains to carry on studies designed 
 to show what the Gospel means in all the details 
 of modern life, if we take pains to keep in touch 
 with them, if we take up in our churches the next 
 things, those about which least difference of opin- 
 ion exists on the part of conscientious and well- 
 informed persons, as, for example, charities and 
 correction, and child-saving in our cities, also
 
 What to Do. 273 
 
 the question of the homes of the people and 
 the efforts to improve the dwellings of the 
 poor, treating the moral bearings of this prob- 
 lem, helping the formation of social settle- 
 ments, where the fortunate may learn the needs 
 of those less fortunate, and minister to them; if 
 we then pass on to the problem of the wage- 
 earner, dealing first with the demands least open 
 to question, as the demand for a rest day once a 
 week, the demand for leisure for duties in the 
 family every day and for the satisfaction of the 
 higher needs of our nature, then to the various 
 phases of the temperance problem, then to right- 
 eousness in civic affairs, feeling our way cautious- 
 ly, but advancing at the same time fearlessly, we 
 shall find our vision continually growing larger, 
 and our field of work broadening out and finally 
 including the entire life of human society. 
 
 When we come to individual Christians, then 
 we also enter the sphere of methods as well as 
 aims. If a Christian believes that the single tax 
 will accomplish what is claimed for it, then he is 
 bound to advocate it at the proper time and in' 
 the proper place. The same holds with regard 
 to many other questions of the day, even with 
 respect to the temperance question. We may 
 safely go as far as the Discipline of the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church goes, and say that it is for the 
 family, the Church, and the State to work to-
 
 274 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 gether for the success of the temperance reform. 
 We must be very clear in our own minds about 
 methods before we can insist upon precise politi- 
 cal methods to be promoted by the Church. 
 
 A high citizenship suggests another line of 
 work. Here, again, what the Church can do 
 finds its limitations, and yet within these limits 
 the field for the Church is a vast one. The 
 old New England custom of election sermons 
 preached before each election is entirely in keep- 
 ing with the teachings of Christianity. At such 
 a time it can be pointed out what moral issues 
 are involved, what the State means, and whence 
 the State derives its authority. The ideals of 
 the State can be held up to men ; a love of coun- 
 try can be inculcated as a part of Christianity, 
 and a very important part. And this love, real 
 and genuine, showing itself, not so much in loud 
 talk as in deeds, is a condition precedent to any 
 permanent and decided improvement in citizen- 
 ship. 
 
 For it is true that those who place civic reform 
 simply upon a business basis have not yet taken 
 one step in the road which will lead to the at- 
 tainment of their goal. Aristotle, even before 
 the time of Christianity, was wise enough to 
 recognize that the affairs of the nation were some- 
 thing far larger than business affairs in any nar- 
 row sense, and that the aim of citizenship was
 
 What to Do. 275 
 
 something higher than the acquisition of wealth. 
 It is true that private aims and the commercial 
 spirit, when dominant, lead to political degrada- 
 tion and not to purification. It is said, for ex- 
 ample, " the government of the city is business, 
 not politics." No one can point to any great 
 and enduring triumph achieved on this basis. 
 It will not fire the heart of the masses upon 
 whom, in the long run, the life of the nation, in 
 all its various spheres, must rest. What does 
 business mean to the wage-earner ? He hears the 
 expression, " Business is business," and down go 
 his wages ten per cent. " Business is business," 
 and the factory is closed. " Business is business," 
 and he is offered permanent employment in the 
 service of the city on condition that he will sup- 
 port a corrupt faction. The author well remem- 
 bers meeting a barber in Berlin, who had once 
 been a citizen of the United States. The con- 
 versation turned upon the approaching elections 
 in Germany, and the writer asked the barber 
 whether he was going to vote. " Why should I 
 vote ? " was the reply. " I do not concern myself 
 with politics, nobody gives me anything for my 
 vote. When I was in New York I always got 
 five dollars for my vote, and that was a different 
 thing." This is a natural outcome of the down- 
 ward tendency of the maxim, " Business is busi- 
 ness," when introduced into politics. Let us take,
 
 276 The Social Law of Service. 
 
 however, the larger idea of the city as a house- 
 hold, and we have something upon which we can 
 build. This idea means larger life, and it awakens 
 genuine patriotism ; that is to say, real love for 
 one's country. A deservedly popular writer ' has 
 well said, " Without reverence and love citizen- 
 ship cannot exist." We must have a feeling for 
 our city, for our country, like that which is in- 
 culcated in the Bible. Our Jerusalem must be so 
 dear to us that we can say with the psalmist, 
 " If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand 
 forget her cunning. 
 
 " If I do not remember thee, let my tongue 
 cleave to the roof of my mouth ; if I prefer not 
 Jerusalem above my chief joy." 2 
 
 When we reach this point, then we shall attain 
 civic reform; then our commonwealths will be re- 
 generated ; then shall we see our nation a new 
 nation, exalted by righteousness. 
 
 1 Ian Maclaren. s Psalm cxxxvii, 5, 6.
 
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