Catholicism and Protestantism. The conversion of Constantine changed Christianity from a simple brotherhood to an ecclesiastical monarchy. Instead of plain and unpretentious teachers, there came lordly rulers; and instead of the simple worship of the early Church, a ritualism modeled after that of Jewish and heathen temples. The simple garb of the Galilean peasant was exchanged for the jeweled and spangled robe of the Romish priest. The Church, in making converts, no longer pursued the method of "sweet reasonableness" practiced by its Divine Founder, but issued her stern commands and marched her legions to enforce them. A Readjustment. Then came the time for "the supreme equity to reflect." The excessive weight of the papal power disturbed the balance, and a readjustment was necessary. A humble monk appeared upon the scene, protesting against this religious despotism with its countless wrongs, and boldly defying its power. Then followed two hundred years of relentless war, when Europe was turned into a battlefield and its inhabitants into contending forces. The mighty armies of Rome were hurled against the feeble and unorganized bands of Protestants, and for a time it seemed as if these sturdy defenders of freedom would have to submit to their heartless oppressors. Mighty Kings, like Philip II. of Spain and the Grand Monarch of France, and great generals like Tilley and Wallenstein, Turrenne and the Duke of Alva, were marshaled on the side of Rome. Among the Protestant leaders was Gustavus, the "Snow King," who led his forces into battle chanting the psalm, "A strong fortress is our God." Meeting Wallenstein at Lutzen, he completely routed his forces, as he had previously those of Tilley at Breitenfeld. Onward marched his victorious army to the very gates of Vienna, where the Catholic Princes were forced to accept terms of a most humiliating peace. A half-cen tury later, Marlborough and Prince Eugene met and defeated the army of the Great Monarch at Blenheim, and for the time broke the power of Rome upon the Continent. Of this battle the historian Allison says: "Had France been victorious at Blenheim, a universal despotism would have been established, and the power that perpetrated the massacre of St. Bartholomew and established the Inquisition would have proved irresistible, and beyond example destructive to the best interests of mankind." In Holland, where, in 1568, the Holy Inquisition of Spain had condemned to death as heretics all the inhabitants, save a few specially named, the Prince of Orange bravely resisted the forces of the Duke of Alva, until he was murdered by a hired assassin of Philip II. In England, a later representative of the same family led the Protestant forces in person, showing himself as fearless of papal bullets on the battlefield as he had previously been of papal bulls while on the throne. At the battle of the Boyne, the papal forces were defeated with great slaughter, and the hopes of James II., whom Macaulay calls "the last and meanest of the Stuarts," were forever blasted. The Balance Restored. Thus, after a struggle of two hundred years, in which Rome had been defeated upon every decisive battlefield, "the supreme equity reflected," and the proper balance was restored. While this conflict had been going on in Europe, an event of the greatest importance to the lovers of liberty happened in another part of the world. This was the discovery of America. For more than a thousand years Rome, in connection with the civil rulers, and sometimes nearly independent of them, had governed the world. Under the despotism springing from this unholy alliance, the Bible had been kept a chained book, and the world had lost all knowledge of the Church founded by Christ and His Apostles. But in America, those who had fled from Romish persecution in Europe had the opportunity of restoring Christianity to its primitive simplicity. Here a Church that sought no aid from the State was organized, and a government, recognizing the right of private judg ment, and allowing the utmost freedom in all matters pertaining to religion, was established. Rome's Opportunity. But with this grand opportunity to the Church, there came also an opportunity to Rome. Beaten upon the great battlefields of Europe, she might in America, by political intrigue and jesuitical cunning, regain her lost prestige and power. The liberty she had always denied to others would be a priceless boon to her in her endeavors to T subjugate the new continent to her sway. A free government would mean to her freedom to plan and plot for Rome. A free school could be used to teach Romish dogmas. A free press would be a most convenient medium for the transmission of Romish thought. To add to these advantages, the overcrowded Catholic countries of Europe could be counted upon to send over their ignorant and degraded masses; and these, by the use of Romish methods in politics, would help the priesthood to carry out their plans. Rome Triumphing. How well Rome has succeeded, may be seen in her large membership, now numbering eight millions, in her vast wealth, and in her rapidly growing political power. She has her permanent representative at the seat of the National Government, names governors, holds important offices in all the leading cities, and boasts of having elected one President. She demanded that the Bible be banished from our public schools, and then complained because she was taxed to support them. In the great cities where this foreign element is in control, there is scarcely any thing that is strictly American left. A foreign Sabbath, with its early mass, followed by drunkenness and revelry, has nearly supplanted our quiet American Sabbath. An army of foreign priests parade the streets and flaunt their robes, with rosaries and crosses, with unblushing insolence in the faces of plain American worshipers. Servile tools of this Romish priesthood plant their saloons upon every street corner, and locate their beer gardens under the very shadows of Protestant houses of worship, and use the enormous profits from this unholy traffic to fill the treasury of this foreign Church. Millions of dollars of taxes paid by Protestants have been seized by the greedy army of officeholders, and used to make converts to the Church of Rome. Revival of Americanism. Is it not time for the "supreme equity" to reflect? Has not "the excessive weight" of this foreign Church disturbed the balance? What means the present uprising of the friends of American institutions? Why these various unions of true Americans to quicken patriotic fervor and call back the spirit of the revolutionary fathers? Why this quickening of missionary zeal on the part of the churches and the multiplication of agencies for the evangelization of the degraded masses in our cities? There can be but one answer. The balance has been disturbed, and God is adjusting disturbed relations. This foreign octopus that has fastened itself upon the American body is no longer to fatten upon its indulgent host. What means this rallying of five or six millions of young people in enthusiastic conventions of trom twenty to fifty thousand? Monster patriotic demonstrations on Boston Common, tens of thousands of youthful Americans encircling Bunker Hill and catching inspiration from its sacred memories. When before in the world's history has there been seen such an array of physical energy, of intellectual culture, and youthful courage and vigor? This mighty army is organized for a better knowledge of the Bible and for completing the work begun in Germany three hundred and fifty years ago. With a free Bible and a free school there will come an end of priestly rule and intol erance. Young Protestants. This federation of young people means federation against common foes and in defense of common interests. Youthful Protestantism will not spend its strength in fratricidal war, but will march in solid phalanx for the overthrow of medieval superstition and modern intolerance and oppression. Some skirmishing, some conflicts between picket lines have already taken place, but the great battles are yet to be fought. Lutzen, Blenheim and Waterloo, are to have answering echoes upon American soil. The forces are being marshaled, the leaders trained, and the voice from Heaven cries "Forward." This is the Church's opportunity. With a revival of apostolic missionary zeal and New Testament consecration, America will be delivered from all her foes; "the glory of the Lord will rise upon her," and her light will shine forth to all the nations of the earth. THE GOSPEL OF "GO." REV. N. B. RAIRDEN, OMAHA, NEB. Many of our churches and pastors suppose that when they have established a church organization and have opened the building where the people may come and worship God and hear the Gospel, that they have done their duty by the community in which they live. If the Lord Jesus Christ had established himself at Nazareth, put up a tent or built a chapel, and then announced to all the world that they could come there and get the Gospel, His mission would have died without reaching to the next town. Nothing can be further from our conception of the Christ like method in Gospel work than for Him to have done so. He went from individual to individual, making the synagogue and the Sabbath services but centres and rallying points. If our missionaries upon the foreign fields should simply go into a community, build a house and establish themselves, and an nounce that they were ready to give the Gospel now to the heathen, they might build a chapel on every street corner and have, a missionary of ability and his family there, but the heathen would never come to Christ. It is not a question of nearness to a church or the opportunity to hear the Gospel. We must carry the Gospel to the individual, by individual effort. The human heart does not seek the Gospel. It has enmity against God. It does not desire the privileges. In whatever land or climate humanity is found, the same opposition to God is manifested. Therefore, there is mission work to be done on the very block on which your church is built. There may be those there who are as ignorant of the Gospel as any other place. Take the Gospel to them. Force it upon their attention as Jesus Christ did. Do it tactfully, but, nevertheless, insist that you have a message and that the message must be heard. This is the spirit in which the missionaries of the Home Mission Society are sent out. It is not simply that the people have not heard the Gospel, but it is that the Gospel must be forced upon their attention. The same lesson needs to be learned by every pastor, church and Christian worker. The history of the progress of civilization on this Western continent is inseparably interwoven with the history of Home Missions. From the day when Roger Williams penetrated the wilderness of Rhode Island, "not knowing what bed or bread did mean,' and sought there amid the Indians to lay the foundations of a Christian commonwealth, down to the present time, there has been an unbroken record of pioneer missionary work, unsurpassed for heroism, faith, intelligence and success in missionary annals. If you want to know what Home Missions means in its relations to America, blot out if you can in your imagination the record of Christianity from our history. What desolation you would thus create. PAPAL AGGRESSIONS. BY T. J. MORGAN, LL.D. One of the greatest contests of the ages is now in progress on this continent: the struggle between Protestantism and the pap. acy; between modern civilization and mediævalism; between republicanism and despotism; between Americanism and foreignism. The theatre of the struggle is continental; the parties engaged in it number more than seventy million people; its immediate results will affect, for weal or woe, our own nation, the Republic of the United States, and its ultimate effects will be felt around the globe and last forever. The issues of civilization are involved. It is of the highest importance that every lover of truth, every friend of liberty, every true patriot, every wellwisher of the race, should understand the significance of the contest, and be prepared to take his stand intelligently and forcefully on the side of the right. The Patriotic Aspects of the Struggle. The object of this paper is to set forth, clearly, the patriotic aspects of the great contest. The Roman Catholic Church as a religious institution, with its system of theology, its modes of worship, its discipline, its methods of propagandism, has the same right that any other religious organization possesses, and so long as its friends and advocates confine themselves to the realm of strictly ecclesiastical affairs it will receive from the American public, rightly, the same treatment that is accorded to Baptists, Methodists, Congregationalists, and any other denomination. As long as the papal Church appeals to reason it will be met by argument, and if it wins converts or makes conquests by its appeal to the intelligence of men, its triumph will be honorable and undisputed. In a land of free discussion, such as ours, there should be no limit to debate, and no effort made to arrest by force or other foul means the progress made by any sect. But the Roman Catholic Church is, distinctively, historically, a political organization. Politics and religion are inseparably blended. In Europe the Pope is recognized by all governments as a political potentate, having a voice in shaping the political destinies of European nations. The papal organization itself is modeled after the Roman Empire, and is the most complete despotism ever fashioned. The Pope claims to be a temporal ruler, subject to no rival power, equal in rank to the highest, entitled to be represented at the Courts of Europe, and he exercises control over the political relations and actions of his subjects, not only in Europe, but in America. A sharper contrast could not exist than that which separates the ideal American Republic from the Roman Catholic despotism. (For a fuller elaboration of this thought, see my Essays on the Papacy and the Republic.) Rome and Tammany. When Roman Catholics in America, acting, not as individuals—each expressing his own personal preference and following the lead of his own judgment in political matters, seeking to promote justice and to further the public welfare, as members of Protestant churches generally do-but, instead of this, unite under a compact organization, standing together, voting together, seeking to secure advantages for the Roman Catholic Church out of the political conditions in this country, they necessarily subject themselves to the challenge of patriotism. When Roman Catholics, simply because they are Roman Catholics, and without regard for their fitness, are thrust forward into public places and fill an exceptionally large number of the national, State and municipal offices; when it is understood that Roman Catholic votes are in the market, at the disposal of those candidates for office who, directly or indirectly, in money or in other ways, will pay the highest price for them; when the Roman Catholic Church, boldly, openly and almost unanimously, allies itself with one political party and seeks through that party to gain for itself advantages at the expense of other denominations; when the Church identifies itself with a disreputable political ring such as Tammany Hall, and fattens on the ill-gotten gains of blackmail and corruption, as has been shown by the Lexow Committee; when the Church is able to secure for its schools and charitable institutions millions of dollars from the public funds in the great cities and out of the State treasuries; when it is able, by its organized lobby and its political influence, to take from the United States Treasury millions of dollars for the carrying on of its missions among the Indians, it behooves every lover of the Republic and of Republican institutions to array himself against an evil that menaces, seriously, the welfare of the nation. Resistance to the encroachments of the Roman Catholic Church is the call of patriotism, and is as urgent as was the call for troops in '61 to preserve the Union. The assault made upon our institutions is more subtile, veiled in greater secrecy and more plausible, but none the less hostile and deadly, than was the assault made by those who sought to dissolve the Union. The Pope and the Indians. History is said to be philosophy teaching by example. We have much to learn as to the aim, method, spirit and ultimate tendency of the Roman Catholic Church in this country by studying the relation of the Papacy to the Indians. No one will deny that there have been self-sacrificing Roman Catholic missionaries, who have devoted themselves to work among the Indians, and no fair-minded man desires to withhold from them whatever meed of praise may be due to their zeal, conscientiousness, fidelity and efficiency. It is not easy, of course, to separate between the individuals who are involved in a system, and the system itself. Many of the individuals may be honest and praiseworthy, while the system to which they belong, and for which they themselves are not responsible, may be utterly vicious. It is fair to say that in relation to the Indians in this country, the chief motive, the impelling cause, the one dominant force which, more than anything else, and all else combined, has urged forward the Roman Catholics in their recent endeavors, has been the desire to augment their power, to extend the influence of the Papacy, to make Roman Catholics out of the Indians, and to secure whatever could be secured for the glory of the Church. To this end they have pressed their claims as Catholics, and have secured the largest possible share of appointments in the Indian service; have made the most preposterous claims as to their successes; have shown the utmost illiberality and intol erance towards all other workers. Contract Schools. The Government of the United States has, since 1876, been devoting an increasing amount of money and care to the work of educating Indian youth, with the view of fitting them for American citizenship. Some years ago, in addition to public schools es tablished and maintained by the Government itself, the Indian Office entered into contract with various religious bodies for the education of Indian children in mission or church schools. Methodists, Presbyterians, Congregationalists, Episcopalians, Friends, Lutherans, Mennonites, Unitarians, and Roman Catholics participated in this form of Government subsidy. Baptists are the only considerable body of Christians that have had no share in it. They have refused to have anything to do with it, because of their well-known doctrines as to separation of Church and State. The following table, taken from the records of the Indian Office, exhibits the amount of money paid out of the public treasury to the various religious denominations for carrying on their mission work $118,343 $194,635 $221,169 $347,672 $36,957 $363,349 $94,756 $375.845 $365,845 37,910 36,500 16,121 26,696 32,995 Total in 1986 1887 1888 1889 1890 1891 1892 1893 1894 9 years. $2,738 571 41,825 47,650 44,850 44,310 30,040 30,040 346,120 Congregational 26,080 29,310 28,459 27,271 29,146 25,736 8,450 Martinsburg, Pa. 5,400 10,410 7.500 23,310 Alaska Training School 4 175 4,175 8,350 Episcopal. 1,890 3,690 18,700 21,876 29,910 23,220 4,860| 7,020 110,166 Friends 1,960 27,845 14.460 23,383 23.383 24.743 24,743 10 020 10.020 160,557 Mennonite 3,340 2,500 3,125 4,375 4,375 4,375 3,750 3,750 29,590 Middletown, Cal. Unitarian.... 5,400 39,150 Lutheran, Wittenberg, Wis... 1,350 4 050 7,560 9,180 16,200 15,120 15,120 68,580 2,725 6,700 13,980...... 33,345 Mrs. L. H. Daggett. 6,480 Miss Howard. 275 600 1,000 2,000 2,500 3,000 6.480 9,375 Appropriation for Lincoln In stitution................. 33,400 33,400 33,400 33,400 33,400 33,400 33.410 33,400 33,400 300,600 Apppopriation for Hampton Institute. Total. In 1889 the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, when appealed to by the Roman Catholics to increase the number of Roman Catholic contract schools, declined to do so, on the ground that he regarded the entire system as objectionable, and hence he was unwilling to extend it. His action in this matter gave rise to a violent and bitter controversy, which continued during his administration, and attracted wide public attention. Among the reasons urged by the Commissioner for the position taken by him were the following: First. The schools carried on by the Roman Catholics, and by other religious bodies, while indirectly promoting the general welfare of the Indians, and tending to fit them for citizenship, were, nevertheless, distinctively mission schools, designed chiefly to proselyte the Indians to the peculiar form of religious faith held by each denomination carrying on its work among them. The basis of instruction in the Roman Catholic schools is the Roman Catholic Catechism, which inculcates in the minds of the Indian children-taught at public expense-that "the only true Church is the Roman Catholic Church," and that the Pope is its infallible head, to whom absolute obedience is due. While no one disputes the right of the Roman Catholics, at their own charges, to propagate among the Indians, or elsewhere, their own peculiar dogmas, the Commissioner insisted that they had no right to do this at public expense. Second. The money paid for the support of these contract schools is public money, taken from the United States Treasury, and belonging to the people of the United States, and raised by public taxation. It is a misuse of public funds to appropriate it to private purposes. Public money should be used only for public purposes. The propagation of a sectarian tenet is not a matter in which the public is interested. Third. It is a violation of the spirit, if not the letter, of the Constitution, which prohibits the establishment of any religion. The United States does virtually establish the Roman Catholic religion when, by act of Congress, or by the act of any executive officer, it takes public money and uses it for the establishment and support of a distinctively Roman Catholic school, which inculcates as a fundamental doctrine of its teaching the idea that it alone is the true Church, |