ible. His voice is still pleading: the inward is of more consequence than the outward, the life more than food; think, then, how life may be greatened and bettered, and trust the foodful earth to grow enough for the nourishment of all who live upon it. Do not trouble about what you will have to eat, what clothes you will have to wear; think rather how to live uprightly. Look out for the inner man; Nature may be trusted to provide for outward needs.* He did not fail to see that social conditions were out of joint and working wretchedly; in fact, the human world in its organization, its government, its superposition of classes, its exploiting of the weak by the strong, was so obnoxious to him that, seeing no way of renovation in the natural course of things, he held that the divine justice must supervene and, by a manifestation of power such as never was seen since first the world stood, set aside the whole accursed system of things; † and this most momentous overturning was coming so soon within the lifetime of those to whom he spoke ‡ — that there was no use in undertaking to reconstruct the old social mechanism, a task, moreover, which must have looked too formidable for human accomplishment within any assignable time.

*Matt. 6:19–34.

† Matt. 24:27; Mark 13:26; Luke 21:32.

Matt. 16:28; Luke 21:32.

THE OLD ORDER NOT PASSING MUST BE ASSAILED AND DESTROYED

With his anticipation of the near approach of "the last day," in which the existing social order should receive its coup de grace at the hand of an irresistible Power, it was but natural that Jesus, leaving conditions which seemed past remedy to go their way to their appalling consummation, should direct his efforts to the rescue of individual souls, to a work of inward purification whereby an elect few, at any rate, might be saved from the impending wreck of the old world.*

The

But the end of what had been did not come. sun was not darkened; the moon has not turned to blood, much occasion as she had to crimson at what she looked down upon through the centuries.† No supernatural hand having intervened, as was expected, to do away with the old and bring in a new order, that task, prodigious as it is, falls to human agencies, and falls peremptorily by all the force of Jesus' word. His kingdom cannot come without a transformation of outward conditions. It is mockery to ask for it while consenting to a system which blocks its advance, a system which regularly corrupts and defiles, which, not content with leading the world into temptation, infalliby weakens where

*Matt. 24:29-31.

+ Expressions, however, which may well be taken as referring only to eclipses, the reddish earth-shine on the face of the moon during totality suggesting the phraseology "turned into blood."

it does not destroy the power to resist temptation. Many and important steps toward this transformation have already been taken,* every one of them full in the spirit of the gospel teaching. The world, urged on by that spirit while so largely disregarding it, is tending unmistakably to an order of things accordant therewith, and which when it comes will be on all sides conducive to the virtues and not to the vices.

And this coming, what is it in reality but that which is foreshadowed in the gospels where Jesus, seeing the impossibility, within the brief period allotted him, of shaping social conditions to make them favorable to the establishment of his kingdom of righteousness and peace, declared that in due time the Son of Man would return, coming "in power and great glory," to clear the way for his kingdom and bring it fully in? Without resorting to any fine-spun theory of prophecy and its fulfilment, it may not be out of the way here to say that of all things that have ever been dreamed of or hoped for, socialism, rightly understood, best answers to the Parousia or second coming of Jesus as set forth in certain passages of gospels and epistles. Not that this movement was definitely in the mind of speaker or writer, but that it suits to what they had in mind, be that what it may, in a manner worthy of attention. Even capitalism, as monstrously developed in our day, cannot escape seeming to be limned under the figure of the "man of sin," far better than Rome was, in the passage:

*See Chapter II.

"Let no man deceive you by any means; for that day will not come unless there be a falling away first and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition, who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God or that is worshiped, so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. The mystery of lawlessness is already working, . . . and in time will the lawless one be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will consume with the breath of his mouth, and destroy with the manifestation of his coming." And how shall the preachers under capitalism who minister only to the rich, avoid seeing themselves referred to in this?

"And many will follow their pernicious ways; by reason of which the way of truth will be evil spoken of. And through covetousness will they with feigned words make merchandise of you; whose judgment now for a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not." +

Of the "second coming we are told that it was not to be under cover, hidden away in a corner; no one village or city was to be distinguished as the place of the great appearing. It was to be a worldwide manifestation, everywhere seen and everywhere significant. The Master's caution is, not to be deceived by any local pretender, for many such will rise and will lead away many; people will acclaim a Christ here and a Christ there. "If therefore they say to you, 'Lo! he is in the wilderness,' go not forth;

or, 'Lo! he is in private chambers,' believe them not. For as the lightning cometh from the east and shineth to the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man."* This is a brilliantly poetic characterization of the rise of the modern socialist movement, which indeed has flashed as the lightning round the whole world.

But the fitness of this representation of socialism lies not so much in the manner of its coming as in what it brings with it, what it proposes to do, which is nothing less than to shape the conditions of human life in accordance with gospel precepts; to accomplish that for which the life of Jesus was all too short and for which he felt that he must needs come again, namely, to sweep away the old social order, built on principles hostile to the Golden Rule, generating all manner of cupidity and covetousness, outrage and abomination, and set up in its place a new order founded in justice and making for practical brotherhood, the "new heavens and the new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness." These things which have come largely to be reckoned mere visions and dreams, "too good to be true," or else pertaining to some other state of existence, are to be realized in a veritable Parousia here in this world by creatures of flesh and blood like ourselves. But it is not to come out of any such simple plan as that of the English Christian socialists of the last century, who seemed to think all they had to do was to start a few co-operative

* Matt. 24: 26, 27. † II Peter 3:13; Rev. 21:1, 10, 24–26.