Social Conditions.

A Bad Outlook for Reformers. Before us is the latest report of the United States Commissioner of Internal Revenue. He reports an astounding increase in the sale of cigarettes and intoxicants. During the three months, from July 1 to October 1, the past year, this nation consumed a million more cigarettes than during the same period of 1911. Worse is the increase in alcoholic beverages. The nation drank during these three months three hundred and twenty thousand more barrels of beer and four hundred and fifty thousand more gallons of whiskey than during the same three months of 1911. This increase is the more appalling in view of the great efforts made by the reformers and prohibitionists, who make the foolish claim, that this nation is about to stop the manufacturing and sale of all alcoholic drinks. And preachers can, in spite of all these evidences, continue to speak of "this Christian nation" and how the church is rapidly changing the moral condition of the world. These false prophets are ignorant of what God's Word predicts about the end of this age and they are equally ignorant of existing conditions.

Lawlessness, Violence and Murder. The confession of the McNamara brothers has brought to light an awful condition of things. It seems these men for years resorted to deeds of violence and are responsible for the lives of a number of people. Behind them others stood who are equally responsible. What the investigation now in progress will bring to light remains to be seen. The current of anarchy is far stronger than it is generally known. We quote from one of the leading dailies of New York City:

American Socialism made a fool of itself over the McNamara case, and a very dangerous fool at that. The McNamaras were not Socialists, but no labor leaders were so virulent as the Socialists in denouncing the arrests. No labor leaders used such incendiary language as the Socialists in seeking to convince the country that these men were martyrs who were about to be murdered by a bloodthirsty capitalism.

Mr. Debs practically defied the courts to convict the McNamaras. Immediately after their arrest, the "Call," the organ of the Socialists in New York, said: "The same attempt is made to arouse public fury not so much that the McNamaras may be murdered, but in order that the working class may be beaten into submission." Everywhere Socialists seized upon the incident to preach a more vindictive gospel of class war.

Even when the stunning confession became public, no Socialist leader expressed the faintest degree of horror at the crimes that had been committed. They were all engaged in reviling the confession as a "plant" to injure the Socialist ticket in the Los Angeles election. It was not until the country had begun to appreciate the full significance of the pleas of guilty that Socialist leaders suddenly discovered that they were opposed to the use of dynamite in advancing their doctrines. But they had been preaching a class war in language that led logically to dynamite and murder. If social and economic conditions in this country are one-tenth part as bad as Socialist orators and writers pretend, workingmen would be justified in resorting to any weapons to release themselves from an intolerable slavery.

The fact of the matter is that under its irresponsible leadership American Socialism has been dealing in an incendiary demagogisra that must inevitably turn such minds as those of the McNamaras. Socialism cannot shirk its share of the responsibility and throw all the blame upon organized labor. Its language has consistently given the lie to its own doctrines.

Socialistic Sunday Schools. The remarkable rise and spread of Socialism is baffling the statesmen of all nations. In this country, In Germany, England and other lands the rising generation Is being taught systematically the principles of Socialism and the hatred of the rich. The following Is a report of what Is done In this direction In England:

"The character of the ideas taught in the Socialist Sunday Schools established in England for the purpose of making Socialists out of children has served as a basis for protests to the newspapers. One writer asserts that this conversation took place in such an institution:

The Teacher -- Can a boy socialist be a Boy Scout. "

Answer -- No, comrade.

The Teacher -- Why cannot a boy socialist be a Boy Scout. f*

Answer -- -Because a Boy Scout has to salute the Union Jack.

The Teacher -- Why must not a boy socialist salute the Union Jack.?

Answer -- Because the Union Jack is an emblem of oppression and slavery."

It Is dreadful to think what the harvest will be ere long from this kind of seed. "Despising authorities and speaking evil of dignities" (Jude vii) Is one of the predicted marks of the apostasy. Utter lawlessness cannot be far away. The restraining power In the world, the Holy Spirit, holds It still In check.

The Solemn Lessons of a Great Disaster. The most magnificent steamship ever built, the Titanic, collided during a clear night with an Iceberg and sunk In a few hours. Over 1,500 human beings lost their lives and were swept suddenly Into eternity. Among the passengers were some of the wealthiest men of the world, as well as others well known in the sphere of literature, art and science. Perhaps never before a ship sailed the ocean which carried such prominent men, leaders of society and the financial world. Their baggage contained millions of dollars worth of precious stones, pearls and other treasures. A few hours only and this proud monarch of the ocean found a grave and resting place some 12,000 feet below the water level. Many of the great men perished with all their wealth. But a few of their bodies were recovered. It was on a Sunday night when the Titanic, going at a high speed, hurled itself against an immense wall of ice. Different witnesses declared that it was a night of merry-making. A ball was going on and the band played at its best, while others were engaged in card-playing. Even when the crash came few realized the danger. The officers for a time laughed down the idea that the ship could sink. And then the horrible scenes which followed and the death-wail of the hundreds which went into the watery grave. But there is no need to describe the details of this greatest sea disaster of the world. Our friends are sufficiently familiar with it from the reports of the daily papers. We turn our attention to a few of the lessons this terrible event teaches.

We are convinced that our God has given a solemn warning to this age in the sinking of the Titanic. We feel that this dreadful disaster was permitted by our Lord for a wise and great purpose. The age, which is soon to close is "Man's Day." It is the age of boasting and the age of defiance of God and His laws as the Creator. As all intelligent readers of the Word of God know, the god of this age is ''Satan'' (2 Cor. iv:4); and he blinds the eyes of them that believe not. His object is to make men believe that this age is constantly improving, getting better and will thus go on indefinitely. God's Word declares that it is an evil age, an age of unrighteousness and that its end will come suddenly in great and mighty judgments of God. Satan, as the god of this age, has used the progress, inventions and achievements of late years to back up his lies. He uses the supposed fireproof skyscrapers, earthquake-proof buildings, unsinkable ships, wireless telegraphy and other things to blind the world to the real conditions of things in this age and lulls thereby the great mass of people into a false security. And now one of the greatest achievements of this age, a great swimming palace of immense size, filled with all the luxurious appointments to satisfy the lusts of the flesh and the eye, a marvellous structure in which a thousand modern day inventions were united, an "unsinkable ship," is wiped out of existence on its maiden trip! Surely God has spoken. God, so to speak, calls a halt to this age in its mad race for progress and improvement. The warning is a solemn one. Man's boasted progress cannot keep back disaster and judgment. That in a night, clear and calm, such a catastrophe should have happened is more than striking. It is a warning that still greater disasters will come. God has written it in His Word that judgments will be visited upon this age, when it has reached its heights, judgments such as the world has never known before. The sinking of the "Titanic" is God's warning that He is not mocked and that He will deal soon in judgment with this age. If one looks at downtown New York and sees upon this narrow strip of land the great awe-inspiring structures, perhaps greater than the tower of Babylon ever was, one thinks what an awful catastrophe if some day an earthquake should shake this island. Who knows but that may be the next to humble man with his proud achievements.

The false security of the passengers and the absolute trust in the unsinkable ship gives us another solemn lesson. All reports said that there was no alarm when the collision occurred, officers and stewards allayed the fears of the passengers. The wireless operators joked about sending out the extreme danger signals calling for help. Even when the lifeboats were commanded to be in readiness and to be launched, only a few women went into the first one. And when the danger became more apparent men could stand about and believe in the absolute safety of the ship and trusted in the statement, "She cannot sink." Then suddenly the great ocean liner plunged forward and the poor souls hoping against hope were swept away by the seas or sunk into the terrible depths with the doomed vessel. Then what happened? Let an eyewitness give us the story.

"Then there happened the most terrible thing. I do not believe, as long as I live, that I shall ever be able to get out of my ears, my mind and my heart, the terrible cries of the sixteen hundred doomed souls which floated to us across the water.

"For an hour, through the darkness of the night, we heard them, the pitiful heartrending wailings of those dying in the water, for whom there was to be no help on earth. Then gradually one by one they died down, and we heard them no more.

"It was sad, sad, and we could do nothing for them. The cold, a bitter, numbing cold, which palsied nerves and muscles alike, had done its work and the sea had claimed those who had no right to die. I am told that one or two bodies were seen in the water afterward of persons frozen, and doubled stiffly by the awful cold."

In reading all this how one is reminded of that which is yet to come. "For when they shall say Peace and Safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon them" (1 Thessal. v:3). This disaster may be looked upon as a little sample of what is coming for this world with its mass of nominal Christians, unsaved and pleasure-seeking. Peace and Safety! This is the delusion Satan tries to strengthen, and he does it not alone by using the great achievements of the age but also by such lying "isms" like Christian Science, the New Theology, Bahaism and others. Peace and Safety -- then sudden destruction! What a wail of despair when God's judgments overtake this world at last! Then they will say to the mountains and to the rocks, Fall on us and hide us; the great day of His Wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand (Rev. vi:15-17).

How gladly the multi-millionaires would have sacrificed their millions, the wealthy women their gems and magnificent gowns, if only they might have been saved. But all had lost its value. They had no more use for it all. Perhaps not once they remembered the beautiful idols of silver and gold. Death stared them in the face and after death, as God's holy Word tells us, the judgment.

All has its lessons and is but a little prelude what will be in the day when Jehovah deals in judgment with this earth. Then "they shall cast their silver in the streets, and their gold shall be removed; their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the Lord; they shall not satisfy their souls, neither fill their bowels" (Ezek. vii:19). "And I will bring distress upon men, that they shall walk like blind men, because they have sinned against the Lord, and their blood shall be poured out like dust, and their flesh as the dung. Neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the Lord's wrath" (Zeph. i:17-18).

But will the world heed the warning of this disaster? Will the unsaved masses profit thereby? Will the rush of the age after the things of this passing age be arrested? A few weeks have passed since the great disaster and the above questions are answered. All goes on in its usual way. New plans are made to overcome difficulties and danger. There is no sign of repentance, no sign of turning to God and to the Lord Jesus Christ.

May we, His people, give heed to the solemn lessons of this great disaster. Judgment will be God's next work. We praise Him for His Mercy which hath delivered us and will deliver us from the wrath to come. May we use the time and our privileges as long as our Lord still waits in patience.

China's Hungry Millions. Another great famine has come to poor China. The last great famine a number of years ago claimed nine million victims, and it is now feared that the present one may assume similar proportions. What such a famine really is and means, w^e, in a land of plenty, can hardly realize. We quote from one who spent almost twenty years in China:

"It is difficult for us to realize the real horror of these extensive famines, confined almost wholly to China, India and Russia. Under the best conditions, the Chinese live but a sordid life devoid of many things we would regard as necessary to existence, and with every form of luxury unknown. What the Chinese know as prosperity, we should regard as the severest hardship, as it means a coarse and meagre living, a cramped and cheerless hut, and the most trying toil from the rising of the sun until the fall of darkness.

"Milk and butter are practically unknown; meat is rarely tasted oftener than once a week, and then only under prosperous conditions, and in the fat years there is little surplus to be saved for the lean years of famine. Hence, when drought or flood destroy the crops, there is nothing for the hard-working farmers to fall back upon.

"In the case of a man of means, he sells first his cow, the water buffalo that ploughs his fields, then his farm utensils, and finally his household goods. One by one, all are 'eaten up,' as he would say. Then the doors and windows are taken from the mud-brick hut and carried to market, and at last the few timbers that support the roof go to nourish the family. Left at last without a roof, they join the endless procession of refugees, some to drop and die where they fall, and others to struggle and stagger onward, in the hope of reaching some more prosperous region. Often they are huddled into tiny huts, hardly larger than a half-barrel, cut endwise, and made of cheap matting, and in these camps pestilence soon finds its way, often in the form of relapsing fever, frequently the deadly typhus, and also in small-pox."

How thankful we ought to be for God's goodness to us in our own land. And some day God will visit the countries so privileged with sore judgments, including famines. Read Rev. vi:5-8. When one thinks of the luxurious living and the sinful waste, which goes on in this land of plenty, as well as the ingratitude to God, one feels that judgment must come some day. And too little compassion there is for the suffering millions on the other side of the globe.

The Socializing of Christianity. When, a few years ago, the American Institute of Social service began to issue the "kingdom lessons" introducing social questions into the Sunday School, we sounded a warning in our editorial remarks. We predicted that the Gospel and the Bible would surely be crowded out. A few years only and now we see an interdenominational movement in the council of church federation, adopting a creed, which ignores the Gospel of our salvation and substitutes the social questions of the day. Everywhere one hears the Statements, that the business of the church is to throw herself into the social side of things and that the old way of the preaching of the Gospel is no longer sufficient. We could fill many pages with reports of meetings, utterances by preachers and others, which reveal the almost universal drift of Christendom towards the socialistic idea. In the Brooklyn Methodist preachers meeting a Jewish Rabbi delivered, as the press gave it, "A New Epistle from the Hebrews."

Rabbi Nathan Krass, of Brooklyn, gave the Methodist ministers' meeting last Monday a lively "Epistle from a Hebrew," emphasizing the new social religion as a plane upon which Jew and Christian may unite in behalf of humanity and "make this world an antechamber of the world to come."

"Too much time is spent in discussing doctrine," said the rabbi, "and not enough in applying it. Preachers speculate a lot on how many angels can dance upon the point of a needle and forget about his angels who are suffering for the necessities of life. They split hairs on matters of theology.

"This is a new age, and the great emphasis of thought is upon human welfare. Theology has given away to sociology. Men are beginning to find out that God has great concern for humanity. His book does not have much about the world to come, but has a lot about this world. That is where the emphasis is, and we must make the world an antechamber to the divine dwelling -- transform the present world. And that is where the Jew and the Christian can get together.

"You cannot convert me and I cannot convert you, but we can unite in an overture for our fellow men. If we can't get together on creeds we can get together in behalf of humanity. But what are we doing together? There are problems too shocking to name -- there is the social evil. We can leave the Police department to those who are investigating it, though we have learned some things about it we did not know before.

"There are the same evils on Fifth avenue as on the east side. I overheard the butler of one of these castles of wealth, and what he said could not be repeated even before you men; but I do not refer to that; what they do behind their closed doors we cannot prevent. But there are places where we can protect the girls, where they are underpaid for their work and driven to the streets. We can tackle the procurers, the white slavers and those who build the brothels and bring innocent girls to them. Many of these girls are weak, but we can prevent most of them from going into such places.

"Have you seen the play, ^Milestones'? I have, and its movement illustrates the movement of religious thought. There was the age of great faith, of theology, of eschatology -- milestones -- and now it is the age of sociology.

"And this is the epistle from a Hebrew -- the heart-to-heart talk of a Jew to his Christian brethren."

He received the usual vote of thanks and compliments for his address. A few years more and where will this thing lead to? We firmly believe this socializing of Christianity, this reform-movement, this progressive ecclesiastical endeavor to rule out and vote out vices and present day evils, this coming together for social service, is the finest game Satan is playing. He stands behind this whole business and is satisfied with it, as long as he can achieve his great object. His aim is against the Son of God and against the Gospel. There is no room for Christ, no room for Salvation by Grace in this social movement.

The Increasing Unrest of the World. This is an editorial from a daily published on the Pacific coast, it gives the present unrest of the world. Daily papers have their eyes far more wide open than some of the "religious leaders" with their optimistic programs.

Since the message of peace was borne on academic lips to the world, war has gradually become the order of the day; until now all the world is at war, or at least preparing for it.

In Europe the smaller nations have been at war for some time, while the greater ones but wait an open chance to get Into the conflict.

In Asia, Persia is in anarchy, expecting dissolution. In India, unrest has eaten into the very fibre of its people. In China, a newer revolution is arising from the ashes of the last, and the extent of its rebellion cannot be gauged. In Africa, the rioting which is taking place in Johannesburg merely exemplifies the anarchical state of that country, and the deadly danger it incurs from the countless colored people in the land.

In Australia, the united resistance to authority will create a condition of affairs in which all will feel hostile to freedom, here run riot.

But it is with matters more nearly at home that we are concerned. Within the past few weeks certain European nations have seen fit to interest themselves in American affairs and presume to dictate to this continent. Relying on their presumption, an Asian nation again stepped into untimely prominence, and has been hailed by a people of this country as their deliverer.

Mexico thus becomes to us of more immediate concern than the many warrings of the nations. In result, in almost every quarter of the earth war is in swift preparation, according to the wisdom of the rulers. But the prospective national wars are of small concern in comparison with the fermenting and rebellious nature of each people.

National strikes are on all sides in progress and indirectly retard the effective outlet of military operations. Thus internal wars may prevent international conflagrations. This is the condition of the world's peace so noisily out heralded."

This ever increasing unrest forebodes nothing good. It is the murmuring of the approaching storm, which will soon sweep in unprecedented fury over the earth.

Fire Losses by Suffragettes. The following taken from the Times is a list of the principal fire losses caused by suffragettes this year: Eight private houses, three cricket pavilions, two churches, two railroad depots, two race stands and a boathouse were destroyed or damaged.

Several other fires have to be added and the end is not yet. There is only one explanation of all this, these wicked women are possessed by demons.

The Progress of Moral Corruption. During July a prize-fight occurred in London, England. Two men slugged away at each other for money which was offered to them. This wicked, barbaric sport was witnessed by thousands of people. The master of ceremonies, who stood up to announce the combatants was an English "clergyman," a certain "Reverend" J. K. Boudier. At least twenty more gentlemen of "the cloth" with their peculiar collars were in the audience to applaud the nasty, ungodly scene. We quote from the special cable despatch.

The scene about the ringside was one never to be forgotten by those privileged to see the coronation of a new lightweight monarch. The group of tight collared ministers in evening dress was but a trifle more dignified in behavior than the lords and dukes surrounding them. They applauded as heartily, if slightly less vociferously, the introductions of the champion and the challenger. And throughout the heated duel even the clergy so far forgot the straight and narrow path as to vent a hearty British cheer for some telling blow well sped.

Into bold relief these occasional slight indignities of the dignified threw the merry, mad abandon with which the richly gowned ladies voiced cheir appreciation of the struggle. Bejewelled matrons and budding debutantes who never would forget the stern mandates of decorum in the drawing room had an occasion here to turn back the leaves of time to the less civilized past. They exhorted, they applauded, they cheered; at times they waved their graceful arms or shrugged their pretty, bare shoulders as either pugilist rallied to turn the tide of battle.

More than a thousand women, among them many of the most exclusive aristocracy, saw the titanic struggle. And in their favor be it said they showed a shade more sportsmanship than the male element. For the men, like all men with money down, rooted loyal for the success of their respective choice, while the ladies -- and some of them wagered as enthusiastically as their escorts -- applauded without favor the skill of either man.

We cannot find words strong enough to condemn a scene like this. These "tight-collared'' sports should hide their faces in shame. That women were so prominent is in fullest keeping with their emancipation schemes. Their corruption is surely the worst the world has ever seen. Surely in such scenes all is fulfilled that God has revealed about the last days, the days of peril and unrighteousness. "Lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God." May God have mercy on some of them and open their eyes before it is too late.

Great Wealth and Luxuries the Forerunners of Judgment. We read recently an interesting volume on the "The influence of wealth in Imperial Rome."1 It depicts from different sources the great accumulation of wealth, the world-wide commerce, the astounding extravagances and vices of the Roman Empire, as well as the miserable conditions of the poor and how all these things brought about in the end the fall of the great world empire. The Roman Empire had its capitalists, its bankers, a Wall Street and a vast financial system. The commercial pace was furious -- almost as furious -- if it can be possible -- as in the twentieth century. This book declares that Alexandria, for instance, had a commercial pre-eminence not possessed by even London or New York to-day, not to mention Hamburg or the European capitals. The Roman commerce extended all over the known world as the finding of Roman coins in India, Ceylon, China and other distant parts witness. As a result immense fortunes were obtained and money began to control everything. Sensuality, so declares a Roman writer, effeminacy, prodigal display of wealth went hand in hand with soulless money grasping. A gilded vice stifled all morality. Money was sought frantically, because it was needed for what the fashionable world called enjoyment. After the fiercest rush for wealth, we find coming into the Roman world, so says the author of this volume, the fiercest rush for excitement, for something new to feed the sated senses, hence the scattering of fortunes on tasteless palaces, race horses, pretty slaves, elaborate suppers, perfumes and pearls and many things worse. In conclusion Prof. Davis says: "Its citizens served Mammon in the place of God, with more than usual consistency. The power they worshipped carried them a certain way -- then delivered them over to their own rottenness, and to the resistless enemy. Their fall was great, for their empire with their social structure still looms as the greatest fabric ever reared by human ingenuity; while the lesson of their fall lies patent to the Twentieth Century."

But will the Twentieth Century read the awful lesson which is ineffaceably written on the pages of history? Will that which is now occupying the territory of the Roman Empire and our own great continent profit by the conditions prevailing in that Empire, which led up to its fall? We think not; but history repeats itself. If one beholds the surging masses in our great cities, the mad race after the dollar, the even greater rush for pleasures and excitements to gratify the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, one trembles in view of what is bound to come. And the great mass of people do not see that judgment is hastening. They do not realize that a civilization which is built upon unrighteousness, which leads to extravagance, luxuries and its attending evils, must sooner or later be swept away and fall like others fell. How successfully the god of this age has blinded the eyes to the real conditions of things. Great commerce, great wealth, great progress, great inventions -- but they cannot save.

But we do not need the lessons of past great empires, their wealth, their luxuries and fearful ruin and fall. The Word of God in which we implicitly believe foretells an end of judgment for the present age.

Ominous Gatherings. Recently on the anniversary of the death of Prof. Francesco Ferrer, who was shot in Spain in connection with the anarchistic movement in that country, meetings commemorating his death were held in all the larger cities. In New York 5,000 persons gathered in Cooper Union and over 5,000 more outside. Three other meetings in different parts of the city were held to inflame the people against law and order, God and the church. We quote from an exchange.

Inside the Cooper Union speeches extolling the worth of Ferrer were made in English, German, Italian, Spanish, Bohemian and Yiddish. When the woman Emma Goldman took the platform she attacked God, denounced the churches, especially the Roman Catholic Church, and the public schools. She ejaculated: "I came here to-night to commemorate the death of a great man and to attend three funerals -- that of the Church, for it dominates the human mind; that of Capitalism, for it dominates human needs; and that of Government, for it dominates human conduct." This is fine phrasing. Many are so intoxicated by phrases that they cannot discern true from false or what is from what is not. Leonard Abbott, chairman, said that within a year Ferrer's name would be as well known as Theodore Roosevelt's, and within one hundred years as well known as Jesus Christ's!

Ernest Haeckel, of Germany, who, whatever he says in his heart, says in public, "There is no God," sent a communication.

Ferrer Sunday Schools have been set up in this city and about one hundred boys and girls from the Ferrer Sunday Schools came on the stage, sang and decorated the portrait with flowers. It was explained that these Sunday Schools are the forerunners of a big public daily school. Alexander Berkmann, the anarchist, who served a prison term for shooting Henry Frick, the iron multimillionaire of Pittsburgh, and who was afterward the "companion" of Emma Goldman, is superintendent of the largest of these schools. It was claimed that the Ferrer Association has about $40,000 in hand for the construction of this daily school."

The worst feature of the Cooper Union gathering was that a number of influential men federated with these anarchists. Many thousands of Jewish young men are outspoken anarchists. The agitation for an out and out overthrow of all existing orders and laws grows at an appalling rate. Well do great statesmen fear and tremble for the future. The lawless One looms up more prominently. When at last the great upheaval comes it will produce such suffering and tribulation, that the world has never seen before. Even so God's Word tells us.

The Food Problems the Result of Greed. The enormous prices charged for the necessary articles of food 3uch as eggs, butter, milk, meat, flour, etc., have of late called forth a vigorous and almost universal outcry from the suffering masses.. Hundreds of thousands pledged themselves to abstain from certain kinds of food till the prices are lowered. The cause of these conditions is sought in different directions. The greed of large and influential trusts is no doubt at the bottom of it all. God has been good in giving rich and plentiful harvests, but the greed and selfishness of man hoards it up and produces situations such as we have been witnessing.

We think of the message of Amos given at a time of similar conditions, when in days of luxuries, the extravagant living of the rich, the poor were trodden down. Then the Prophet declared that the sellers of the wheat made the ephah small (a small measure) and th^ shekel war^ made great (a big price charged), they also falsified the balances by deceit. The refuse of the wheat was sold (Amos viii:4-6). And God, who considereth the poor, announced judgment: "! will never forget any of their works." The Lord will surely deal with all these evils in His day. But before that day comes these conditions will become worse. The present day combinations and trusts are the forerunners of that which we read in Rev. xiii:16-17: "And he (the anti-Christ) causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or on their foreheads; and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name."

The White Slave Traffic. The exposures of this infernal twentieth century traffic, which recently have been made in New York City and elsewhere, are simply terrible. Our great cities are sinks of vice and immoralities which would make Sodom and Gomorrah blush. It seems evident that Jews, apostatized from the faith of their fathers, have a good deal to do with this awful curse, though wicked Gentiles are just as prominent in it. One Lewinson, who confessed to this crime of luring girls of fifteen and sixteen years into a life of shame, made the statement that the five-cent picture shows are the places where this work is most successfully done. The nasty details of the seductions we care not to reprint in our pages. On an average, as shown by the police reports, from eight to ten young girls disappear daily mysteriously in New York. And this evil is not confined to the Metropolis, it is as bad in all the larger "Christian cities." What a mockery, "Christian cities!"

"As it was in the days of Lot so shall it be when the Son of Man Cometh."

Sources of Discontent Among the Masses. There is a growing and widespread discontent among the masses. The high cost of living, the oppression from the side of selfish employers resulting in the grinding of the poor, produce this unhappy condition. One leading cause is the extravagances and luxuries of the wealthy class. Recently some eight society ladies gave an expensive luncheon to their eight pet dogs. A special caterer had been hired for the occasion and there were special decorations and other costly arrangements, all in honor of eight society dogs. One of these creatures, it is said, cost about $25,000. Such an affair creates the most bitter feeling among the poorer classes and feeds the smouldering flames of rebellion and anarchy. Some day there will be an outburst of lawlessness which will deal a fearful blow to the rich. Then their miser>^ will surely come upon them as predicted in the Word of God: ".Come now, ye rich, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you" (James v.1).

The Great Anti-Romish Agitation. That Rome, the corruptress of nations, is passing through a severe crisis is known to all readers of present day events. France has completely revolted against that powerful institution which claims to be ''the'' church. And now Spain has joined the same revolt against the Vatican. What conditions exist in priest-ridden Spain is learned from the "Statesman's Year Book."

"The national Church of Spain is the Roman Catholic, and the whole population of the kingdom adhere to that faith, except about 30,000 -- Protestants (about 7,000), Jews (about 4,000), Rationalists, etc. Within the Peninsula, apart from Portugal, there are nine metropolitan sees and forty-seven suffragan sees, the chief being Toledo, whose archbishop bears likewise the title of Patriarch of the West Indies. The Constitution requires the nation to support the clergy and the buildings, etc., of the Church, and for this purpose the State expends annually about 41,000,000 pesetas ($8,200,000) * * * The relation between the Church and the State, and the position of the religious orders, are regulated by the Concordat of 1851. A restricted liberty of worship is allowed to Protestants, but it has to be entirely in private. The communities of the religious orders arc numerous and influential in Spain. Many of them have schools, and about 5,200 of their members are engaged in teaching boys of the upper and middle classes, while, within many of their establishments, industries of all kinds are carried on. The number of religious orders in Spain is about 3,253, of which 597 are for men and 2,656 are for women. Of those for men, 294 are devoted to education, 92 to the training of missionaries, and 97 to the training of priests. The total number of monks is about 10,630 (including 840 foreigners). The orders for women comprise 910 for education, 1,029 for charity, and 717 for a contemplative life. The, number of nuns is about 40,040 (including 1,360 foreign women)."

Besides these facts others could be stated which give the reasons why such an agitation is in existence. But while Rome is losing ground and is thus being spoiled in the lands which tolerated her abominations for centuries, she makes great headway in England and in America. The stronghold of Rome to-day are the countries which boast of being Protestant. Protestantism is so completely stripped of its power to protest that it slumbers in the lap of Delilah. "Back to Rome" seems to be the drift in the two great English speaking countries. More toleration! We are all brethren! Away with the narrowness of past ages! -- are some of the Protestant shouts we hear about us. But Rome remains the same. She has still a great future, though brief, before her. This is revealed in the last book of the Bible. Once more Rome will become the great mistress of the world. Her coming and final doom is faintly outlined in what is happening to her in France and in Spain. The political revival of the old Roman Empire will give her again, in the coming closing years of this age, the supremacy. But the ten Kings will turn against her. It is written: "And the ten horns (ten Kings), which thou sawest upon the beast (the revived Roman Empire), these shall hate the whore (Rome) and shall make her desolate and naked and shall eat her flesh and burn her with fire. For God hath put in their hearts to fulfill His will, and to agree and to give their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled. And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the Kings of the earth" (Rev. xvii:16-18).

"A Youth of Nineteen, Nervously Unsettled by a Trying Occupation, sought recreation at a moving-picture show in Newark, N. J., The "entertainment" in eluded a realistic suicide by gas-inhalation, enacted with vivid and horrible detail. The boy went to his lodgings, stopped keyhole and door cracks as the pictured suicide had done, turned on the illuminating gas, and set his soul adrift into the great darkness. He was found dead on Sunday morning. If a manhole cover in the highway is ofi", the authorities put up a warning or a barrier, lest a brute fall in and suffer harm. But the moving-picture show had a license from the authorities to keep its more dangerous pitfall open on the public way, and to lure men into it. This is a sensational case, but it shows at the worst a baneful influence which is being allowed almost free course for the corruption of youth under the guise of harmless amusement."

Thus speaks the N, Y, Christian Advocate on this frightful evil and we endorse every word of it. But we add also that not the half has been told. Covering the country as we do we have heard and seen considerable more of the disastrous influence these moving-picture shows have upon the minds of the young. Thefts and even unnamable crimes have been committed because the suggestions came from these miserable shows. But what shall we say to the professing church here and there endorsing this instrumentality of the devil? In several places "churches have rented the airdomes" (moving-picture exhibitions in the open air) to hold their services there and make the summer Lord's day evening meetings attractive by moving pictures. Of course the pictures are of a "religious" nature; nevertheless the whole is an endorsement of these places. Last year while South, in a small southern Georgia town, we were told of a preacher who offered for an inducement to attend the prayer meeting a free moving-picture show at the close of the prayer meeting. When that service was concluded he took the people across the street to the show and treated them old and young. He belongs to the largest evangelical denomination on this continent. And what about Christian men and women being stockholders in these concerns? But such is the case. Corruption increases on all sides. An insane desire for pleasure and a good time seems to have seized all classes.

What an awful awaking there must soon come!

A Socialistic Preacher. The pastor of the First Congregational Church of Schenectady, N. Y., became the socialist mayor of that city. He went from bad to worse in his political career. His congregation at last asked him to resign. The New York Sun had a sarcastic editorial on this matter, which we print herewith:

"Nothing could be more natural than the indignation that over-swept the preacher-mayor of Schenectady when the congregation for whose spiritual welfare he is responsible voted him out of his pulpit on the mean and petty ground that he had neglected his ministerial duties. The contemptible nature of their attack is evidenced by the specific charges against him. These include the subjoined allegations:

"That the sacraments of the Church are no longer observed.

"That we have no pastor who visits the sick, buries our dead, or who offers the consolation of our Christian faith to its bereaved or distressed members.

"That the minister now serving denies his belief in the orthodox Christian faith and ridicules those churches that hold these doctrines.

"To refute these accusations the preacher-mayor has only to point to his record. Has he not got himself arrested in Little Falls? Has he not run for Congress on the Socialist ticket.? Has he not acquired without cost to himself several acres of press notices and an amount of sympathy far greater than could have been got in any pulpit or sickroom? Finally, is he not to be put on trial on February 17 for incitement to riot?

"It is difficult to keep patience with persons who so completely misunderstand the functions of a preacher-socialist-mayor as do the members of the First Congregationalist Church of Schenectady. They must be reactionaries. By way of punishment they should be compelled to sit under their present preacher all their lives."

If our Lord tarries just a few years longer we shall see hundreds of men who call themselves "clergymen" and who are following the socialistic, progressive, political platform of the federation of the churches. The essential thing, the preaching of the Gospel, they cast to the winds; the faith they give up. But at best they are the laughing stock of the world.

Increasing Immorality. That the great centers of Christendom are sinks of iniquity and vice is well known. Investigation has partly uncovered the existence of unspeakable abominations. Well meaning men like John D. Rockefeller, Jr., have offered large sums of money to combat the evil. How hopeless this task is, may be learned from the report of an expert investigator.

Samuel H. London, the vice investigator who has testified before the Curran committee, announced last night that he intended to make known some new and startling information in regard to the social evil in this city. He said that this evil is not confined alone to the middle or lower classes, but that it exists in the very highest.

"When I turn loose my information on the social evil and its gold lined, jewel studded ramifications in this city," he said, "the decent citizens of New York will turn an amazed 'right about face' in the sadly incomprehensive idea of this important and growing problem."

There is no vice trust here, according to Mr. London, for he says that girls auction themselves off for the privilege of working in a number of the cheaper class of disorderly houses here. For this they bid, he says, from $6 to $16, the money going to the procurer.

"If John D. Rockefeller, Jr., hopes to discourage prostitution materially by seeking to reform unfortunate women his task is hopeless, for the number of women whose careers can be turned to the right road is infinitesimal," is one of the statements he makes.

He declares that prostitution in Brooklyn is increasing at a remarkable rate and is encroaching even upon the best of the residential sections. The same conditions, he says, are met with in the Borough of Richmond.

Mr. London's figures, backed up by numerous reports of Federal agents who worked under his direction, show that women earn and turn over to their procurers in this city $57,000,000 each year. In New York City he has found aged women who have acquired wealth by teaching young girls how most successfully to pursue this vocation.

The outlook for these reformers must be gloomy indeed. Corruption through lust is in the world. Immoralities will increase as men and women turn away from God's revelation. The constantly increasing immoralities are the result of the rejection of the Word of God.

The Moral Conditions of the German Capital. The Berlin Correspondent of an English paper has recently given a sad description of the moral degradation into which Berlin, the capital of the German Empire, has fallen. Germany used to be to a certain extent morally cleaner than the other European nations, but now their larger cities become more and more modern Babylons. We give a part of the article:

Serious German writers are raising their voices and pointing out that their great capital of four millions, once the centre of hard work and frugality and pristine German virtues, is now clothed in fine linen and purple and scarlet, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, and has become "the habitation of devils and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird."

It is not a pleasant task to point ouc the faults of the great city in which one has lived so long, in which one has found sterling friendship, and in which there are magnificent and powerful elements for good; but the startling developments of Berlin in evil things during recent years must not be left out of account by anyone who would follow the rise, progress and decay of nations. The rapid growth of Berlin in wealth and population has followed the marvellous development of the German empire during the past forty years. Wealth has poured into the capital, and with this wealth has come vice and corruption of a character surpassing in grossness anything to be met with in the older capitals of Europe. May I examine a few of the phenomena which force me to this conclusion?

I take up the newspapers of the past fortnight. Hardly a day of these fourteen has passed without its tale of murder. A landlord shoots a tenant in most brutal fashion because the tenant insists on leaving without paying his rent; the owner of a shady hotel, resorted to by vicious persons of both sexes, shoots an indignant father who protests against the methods employed in conducting the hotel. There are scores of these hotels in Berlin. They are known to the police, but whilst the Berlin police show extraordinary activity in hunting down Socialists who make themselves obnoxious, they close their eyes to these plague spots. Two women of about forty were murdered by their lovers; a husband who had been wronged shot the man who wronged him; a woman of fifty was slaughtered by her husband in bed, the murderer using a hatchet for his deed; a poor seamstress was murdered in a wood outside Berlin by a ruffian who was a professional marriage swindler; a bath attendant murdered the woman who owned the baths because they had quarrelled about a bet on a horse. This by no means exhausts the list, but it shows its character and variety. The criminality of Berlin not only mounts, as far as numbers are concerned, but shows a tendency to increasing brutality.

As ominous in another direction is the appalling number of suicides which fill the papers. Girls drown themselves because of unrequited affection; young people commit suicide because they have received bad marks at school, or have failed in their examinations; nearly every day we read of family tragedies, where fathers in money difhcukies make a cowardly exit from life. And, leaving the chapter of murders and suicides, the recent cases are innumerable where men in positions of trust betray the confidence placed in them and decamp as defaulters.

Berlin at night is one of the most disgusting sights in Europe. When you speak to an ordinary Berliner you gather the impression that he is rather proud of what he calls the "Nachtleben" of his city. Of what does this ''night-life" consist? It consists of nnumerable resorts in various quarters of the city -- cabarets, cafes, variety theatres, dancing rooms, etc., glittering in meretricious splendor, which are the resorts of the depraved and vicious of both sexes, and where vice in its grossest and most ghastly forms has free course. These haunts of vice are practically open all night, and are crammed to the door with the youth of both sexes who believe that in these hells they are seeing life.

I know a score of places, and more in the best parts of the city, where young men and women with decent bringing-up, with honest and clean homes, are being rapidly ruined, and, save in the feeblest way, hardly a protest is raised against this awful iniquity. If you venture to speak about it in ordinary society you are voted a bore and a Puritan, and are told that the twentieth century has other ideas than those which prevailed in the seventeenth. . . . There are, of course, purity associations here, and numerous faithful men and women who have not bowed the knee to Baal, but their voices are not heard in the raucous noises of Babylon. All over the city glittering cafes are being built, decked out with crystal and gilding, with comfortable chairs, with beautiful music, which are open all night long, and are resorted to by the clerks and shop-girls in their thousands. You can see them sitting there until two and three o'clock in the morning, sipping their beer or their coffee, and making one another's acquaintance. These places also are the resort of more doubtful characters of both sexes.

The Enormous Waste. In a recently issued work, 'The Price of Inefficiency" the writer shows that in this country ten billions of dollars are annually wasted. It is hard to grasp the meaning of this enormous sum of money. But it means that forty cents on every dollar goes for nothing. We quote a few of the principal items, which are well worth studying. Mr. Frank Koester in his book gives us the following figures:

We waste $50,000,000 and sacrifice fifty lives a year in forest fires, and have been doing it for over a generation, while in some years the loss amounts to $200,000,000 in money. In addition the young growth destroyed by fire is far more valuable than the merchantable timber burned.

We waste 350 lives and the cost of 2,700 accidents in transportation in New York City alone, with a proportionate loss in other cities throughout the country. These losses involve in addition great expenditures in litigation, the total of which is probably not less than $25,000,000 annually.

We waste $30,000,000 horse-power every year by failure to utilize our water power. At $20 per horse-power per annum, which is below the average price, being less than one per cent, horse-power per hour, this waste amounts to $600,000,000. This is far in excess of the value of all coal used annually, and if this power were utilized coal could be conserved for future uses, for heating and purposes where the power would not be serviceable.

We waste $238,000,000 in losses through floods and freshets. The most of this could be prevented by proper engineering in the erection of levees and dams.

We waste $500,000,000 a year in soil erosion. Through the neglect of farmers to properly work their land and to prevent the formation of gullies, the fertility of the soil is washed into the lowlands and seas.

We waste $659,000,000 a year through losses to growing crops, fruit trees, grain in storage, etc., by noxious insects, whose multiplication is largely due to careless methods of agriculture.

We waste $267,000,000 a year through the attacks of flies, ticks and other insects on animal life. A greater loss is caused by the enormous sacrifice of human life due to mosquitoes, flies, fleas and other germ carrying insects.

We waste $100,000,000 annually in losses to live stock and crops by wolves, rats, mice and other depredatory mammals.

We waste $93,000,000 a year in losses of live stock due to disease, of which $40,000,000 is chargeable to Texas fever, while tuberculosis, scabies and cholera are next in importance, all of which are largely preventable if not eradicable.

We waste $2,490,500 a year in the form of 1,465 lives (using the figure $1,700 as the economic value of a human life, the Governmental estimate later referred to) in coal mino accidents which are almost wholly preventable.

We waste 10,585 lives and the cost of 169,538 injuries in railroad accidents.

But who can stop this enormous loss? It must go on for it is mostly all the result of sin. Man cannot control these conditions. However, we know a better day is coming for this world when this waste will be stopped.

Religious Census of Japan. We have heard much in recent years about Japan being almost a "Christian nation." The Japanese Bureau of Religion has lately published an official list of the religious bodies in the empire. These statistics must be very disheartening to those who always speak about the "Gospel-leaven" doing its work rapidly in the conversion of the world. The religious Census is as follows:

Christians 140,000

Buddhists 29,420,000

Believing Buddhists 18,910,000

Shintoists 19,390,000

Believing Shintoists 710,000

Temples with priests 72,128

Temples without priests 37,417

The 140,000 Christians include Catholics, Greeks, Protestant sects, Christian Scientists, etc. Believing Buddhists and Shintoists mean such who practice these religions. The others simply call themselves Buddhists and Shintoists without believing these systems. They have abandoned these heathen rites and are nothing. This class numbers 29,190,000 souls. We heard it stated that Japan is rapidly becoming an infidel nation. The number of Christians is surprisingly small.

The Increase of Insanity. Attention has been called in several medical conventions to the frightful increase of insanity. The statistics show such an increase. Fifty years ago there was one lunatic in 575 of the population, now there is one in 236. If this rate should continue in a certain time there would be more insane than sane people in the world. Insane asylums in many parts of the country are filled to their utmost capacities. What is responsible for these sad conditions? Sin. Fast living, worry, anxiety, religious extravagances and numerous other things lead often to an unbalanced mind. How much the influence of demons has to do with insanity no one knows. May we remember that when the Lord Jesus came the first time He found large numbers possessed by demons. It will be so when He comes the second time.

The Outrageous Mrs. Pankhurst. As it is well known to all readers of the newspapers this woman belongs to a criminal class and is the leader of a number of women who delight in using the torch and the bomb. The New York Christian Advocate has an excellent editorial on her behavior in this country, which we pass on to our readers:

The moral obliquity of Mrs. Pankhurst and her absurd satellites makes it impossible any longer to ascribe their disorderly conduct to hysteria. Excessive nervous irritability might account for the smashing of windows, the hurling of bombs and the violation of ordinary propriety in public assemblies, but it will not explain the distribution of filthy printed matter in England or America.

A broad charity has led many persons to invest the militant suffragettes with a serious character, and to ascribe to them purity of motives, while none the less condemning their outbreaks against the public peace. Though by these preposterous antics they have retarded the movement for granting suffrage to women in their own country and in the United States, it was felt that something in their favor must be set down to the natural indignation aroused in their hearts by the refusal of the British government to make concessions to their appeals. But granting that publicity is an indispensable element to such a movement, there can be no justification for seeking notoriety through the issuing of publications that are or ought to be contraband in any civilized country.

This nastiness of the Pankhurst propaganda has created a revulsion of feeling which cannot miss even the dull moral consciences of its supporters. Criminal proceedings having been instituted in New York for the suppression of the malodorous stuff which the Pankhurst coterie has been striving to shovel upon the American public, the persons responsible for its distribution instantly withdrew from their contemptible task and shipped what remained of the putrid material to the West, where we trust it will receive the same sharp and ready rebuke which befell it here.

What sort of ethics must a woman have who, when she has been proffered the hospitality of a country by the interference of its chief magistrate with a law which would have barred her entrance, proceeds at once to abuse her privilege by peddling mental poison to the people of the first city she visits?

Increase of Iniquities and Corruption. Statistics show that there is a frightful increase all over this continent, both In the States and In Canada, of all kinds of crimes and Iniquities. Suicides have Increased over those of previous years. Suicides of children are no longer a rarity, but have become common. The papers contain dally the reports of robberies, murders and assaults. Unnatural crimes, crimes against women and small children, have become so frequent that they excite but little comment. Oppression and injustice are seen on all sides. Of late the so-called "white slave traffic" has been unearthed with all its abominable features. It seems clear that it flourishes through political corruptions. How much is being covered up, how many crimes never come to light and the corruption, which goes on in secret, only God knows. Surely the Lord's words, "iniquity shall abound," words which He spoke concerning the end of this present age, are being amply verified. The worst is yet to come. How our post millennial friends, with their optimistic dreams can dream on and continue to speak of the glories of the present age, and the increasing righteousness of the age, when all about us goes the other way, seems strange indeed.

Ye have Lived in Pleasure on the Earth. "Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton" (James v:5). A better translation is "Ye have lived luxuriously." Luxurious living is one of the signs of the last days.

The importation of luxuries into the United States was larger in the fiscal year 1910 than in any earlier year in the history of our commerce. Figures prepared by the Bureau of Statistics of the Department of Commerce and Labor covering the commerce of the full fiscal year show the importation of fully $250,000,000 worth of articles which may properly be classed as luxuries, that total exceeding by more than $25,000,000 the figures of the former high record year, 1907, and being actually more than double those of the year 1900.

Diamonds, jewelry, laces and embroidery, furs, feathers, bead* and perfumery on the one hand, and cigars and tobacco, wines and liquors and automobiles on the other are the principal articles forming the $250,000,000 worth of luxuries imported, though to these great groups must be added a third which includes art works, decorated china and bisque, musical instruments, toys and orchids, palms, etc.

What a wailing there will be some day when all these pleasant things perish. ''Go to now ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth eaten. Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rest of them shall be a witness against you and shall eat your flesh as if it were fire. Ye have heaped treasures together for the last days'' (James v:1-3).

The Appalling Increase of Suicides. The recent statistics of the United States concerning self-destruction tell a terrible tale. The Government report shows that during 1909 fourteen persons in every 100,000 killed themselves. A magazine gives on this the following information:

"The Government vita statistics for the registration area, which includes about one-half of the whole population, return 8,332 suicides for 1908, or 18.5 per 100,000 of population. The registration area, however, includes all of the large cities, in which the suicide rate is higher than in the rural districts, although the difference in the rate is not as pronounced as is generally assumed. Assuming that a rate of only 10 per 100,000 of population prevailed among the 41,845,000 of estimated population in the non-registration area (including a large negro population), the probable number of suicides in this area would be 4,185, which, in addition to the 8,332 in the registration area, gives a total of 12,517 suicides for the whole United States for 1909.

"Statistics show that poison is the favorite means for suicide, fire arms a second choice, and hanging a third, according to The Spectator.

"The method of suicide has an important bearing upon the subject in its larger aspects, for suicides are unquestionably, to a considerable extent, the result of suggestion. Granted convenient or easy facilities for self-murder, the deed is done before there has been time for reflection It is nothing short of an indictment of our sense of community responsibility that facilities for suicide should be as common as they are. Regardless of efforts which have been made to suppress the sale of poisons and weapons, there is nothing easier than to secure the means of self-murder at a convenient drugstore, hardware store, pawnshop, etc., as the case may be.

"In fact, an examination of the pistols or revolvers with which a very large number of suicides have been committed in Philadelphia, and which are on exhibition in the Coroner's office, proves that most of the weapons are cheap affairs, probably bought in pawnshops for a few dollars, including the necessary small amount of ammunition.

"The general suicide rate in the registration area for this period was 14.0 per 100,000."

And who is responsible for this frightful condition? That the influence of wicked spirits stands behind these suicides is beyond question. Unbelief, rejection of the Truth of God, the mad rush after material things, fast living and other matters are responsible for this increase. And it will not become better. If one watches in the larger cities the surging masses of humanity, without God and without hope, one wonders that the number of suicides is not larger.

Socialism and Crime. The increase of Socialism in Germany has been phenomenal. With the revival of the industrial conditions in that land, Socialism also gained in power. The increase of crime in Germany keeping step with Socialism is significant. We quote from a Berlin report:

Socialists are fond of proclaiming that their creed furnishes a complete substitute for religion and for morals as taught by religion in its law-abiding effect upon the people. German socialists, moreover, have asserted that criminality is due largely to the illusion and hypocrisy of religion, and that it decreases as socialism advances.

That contention is disproved by a series of statistical figures just made public, which show that criminality in Germany has increased in rapid ratio with the spread of socialism. In Prussia, where the socialist vote increased from seven per cent, in 1884 to twenty-six per cent, in 1907, criminality increased from 1,023 per 100,000 population to 1,215.

In Berlin, where there has been a socialist increase of from thirty-four per cent, to sixty-six per cent, in the same period, criminality has increased from 1,216 to 1,522. In the Rhine Province the socialist increase from seven per cent, to twenty per cent, has been accompanied by a growth in crime from 673 to 1,270.

In Bremen, where the socialist vote rose from twenty-three per cent, of the total population to fifty-one per cent., criminality jumped in the same period from 1,295 to 2,101. In Posen, on the other hand, where the socialist vote is only one per cent., crime shows a decrease from 1,679 to 1,449. In Saxony, where socialism increased from thirty-five per cent, to fifty-eight per cent., criminality shows but a slight increase, 928 to 960.

In all Germany the socialist vote in the period named has increased twenty-nine per cent, and crime twenty per cent. The statistics quoted show that instances of bodily injury inflicted increased fifty per cent, throughout the empire, while robbery, larceny and swindling increased seventy-five per cent., with a particularly large growth m strong socialist centres as against a comparatively small increase in places where religion is still a strong factor.

While it is not asserted that the increase in criminality is due to the spread of socialism, it is declared by students of these figures that they do show that socialism has failed to prove, in Germany at all events, that it is equal to or an adequate substitute for religion as a moral and law enforcing factor in the welfare of a nation.

This is not at all surprising if one takes into consideration that the German socialists are especially very bitter against the church and the truth of God. This increase in crime is a little sample of what is yet in store for this earth when the Lawless One will be in power.

Great Progress and Preparations. The wonderful way in which the ends of the earth are brought together through commerce and the great railroads which are in operation and others which are being planned is really astonishing and significant.

As the result of the Franco-German settlement of the Morocco-French Congo questions, a proposal is under consideration for the construction of a vast Trans-African railway, to do for the African Continent what the Union Pacific has done for the Western States of America. The Trans-African line would have two branches -- one running from the Desert of Sahara to Nigeria, joining West Africa with Algeria; and the other connecting the Western Mediterranean section of the continent with the Indian Ocean by means of the Uganda Railway. The British have already built 1,860 miles of the Cape-toCairo line, the Belgians have laid 310 miles of track, and the French in Algeria 372 miles. It is 6,572 miles from Algiers to the Cape. This leaves about 4,000 miles to be built. A distinguished ex-member of the French Chamber regards this as a perfectly feasible scheme, considering the Trans-Siberian Railway from Moscow to Vladivostok, which is 5,332 miles long.

We may well look upon this activity as being in preparation of that great world-wide preaching of the Gospel of the Kingdom before the end comes. However, the preaching of the final message, as every careful student of the Word knows, is not done by the church, but by a converted Jewish Remnant. The scaling of this remnant and their work is described in Revelation vii. All this takes place after the true church has left the earth. The great railroads will no doubt be put to good use at the end of the age for the heralding of the coming King and the coming judgments.

Unhappy China. What a terrible struggle has set in throughout the prominent provinces o\ the Chinese Empire! It is estimated that nearly 50,000 beings have been killed so far and there is no end in sight. The "Dragon," the emblem of China, is showing his power and in the little time which is left to him he is trying to fill that dark country with suffering, bloodshed and violence. But his time is short. A better day will dawn for China and the other heathen nations enslaved by Satan. The deceiver of the nations, the god of this age and prince of the power in the air will be chained by Him, who has conquered him; then he can deceive the nations no more (Rev. xx:3). He knows his time is short, that soon the King of Kings will come to dethrone him.

We should pray at this time earnestly for the missionaries in China and for the thousands of native Christians, whose lives are in danger and whom the Dragon hates in a special manner.

Dark Figures. In spite of the heroic work done by the Prohibition movement and its supposed victory, the sale of intoxicants is increasing at a rapid rate. The recent Internal Revenue report for 1911 is a revelation.

The annual report of Royal E. Cabell, Commissioner of Internal Revenue, given out, makes several startling declarations. All records were broken in the past fiscal year in the production of alcoholic liquors.

The smoking of opium is a widespread vice in this country, and opium "joints" exist in every city of considerable size.

The double system of taxing oleomargarine is corrupting grocers and gross frauds are being perpetrated on the butter-buying public.

The internal revenue receipts last year were $322,526,899, the greatest in the history of the government.

Corporations making returns under the new corporation tax law numbered 270,202, with an aggregate capital of $67,886,430,519. The aggregate net income to the stockholders was $3,306,250,642.

The year's production of distilled spirits amounted to 175,402,395 gallons, nearly 7,000,000 gallons more than in the previous banner year -- 1907. The production of beer, ale, etc., amounted to 63,216,851 barrels, nearly 4,000,000 more than in the previous record year -- 1910.

The amount of liquor held in bonded warehouses for ripening now reaches the enormous total of 249,279,346 gallons.

Things seem hopeless in this direction. The only hope is the Coming of the Lord. With that event the things which offend will be gathered out of this Kingdom. Violence and vice will terminate then. May the glorious day be hastened. Even so, Come Lord Jesus.

America's Darkest Crime. We have waited before commenting on the awful deed done several months ago in the town of Coatesville, Pennsylvania. A few weeks after this wicked crime a similar Satan-inspired mob, including five hundred women and children, in Oklahoma, burned also an unhappy negro to death. The terrible crime of Coatesville was one of the most fiendish ever perpetrated in the history of the United States. It is now time that the North should stop slandering the South. The crime was committed on Sunday evening. Every protestant preacher of the town (seven) was away on a vacation. When the mob rushed in the hospital to take the half dead victim only the nurses were there to shield the wounded negro. An investigator, who went a day or two after the crime to Coatesville, writes, "Nothing in the Coatesville conditions depressed me more than the city's apparent callousness to the enormity of its offence. Their talk was mostly of the business men's annual picnic on the morrow." Three days after this foul deed two train loads of people went on the picnic. The same man gives the following information:

"The one leading citizen who is actively indignant over the city's shame told me candidly that the most he thought should be done would be to put some of the young men in jail for a few years; and he was frankly troubled over the fact that certain members of prominent families are involved. At the suggestion that the lynchers might be indicted for murder, he promptly protested, and said he would use all his influence to prevent it."

We quote from two periodicals which have been outspoken in their condemnation. We endorse every word. The first is from the N. Y. Christian Advocate (Methodist).

"The sickening atrocity of the Coatesville lynching was enacted by white men in a Northern State, at the very moment when conventions of Southern Negroes were giving evidence of their rise from the conditions of bondage. At the hour of Sabbath evening worship a cowardly mob dragged a helpless colored man from the hospital and burned him with accompaniments of unspeakable horror. That the victim had slain a man does not excuse his murderers. Escape for him was impossible, and Pennsylvania justice would have been visited upon him, without delay. In taking the law into their own hands these American citizens -- for they were not aliens -- disgraced their State, and by the fiendish manner in which they wreaked their vengeance they put a blot upon common humanity. Negro-burning is an American white man's crime, and there is no worse under the sun.

"Shame upon Pennsylvania if her justice is too blind to discover the leaders of this foul mob, or her arm shortened so that she cannot punish those who have made a mockery of her laws."

The Continent (Chicago) entered more fully In this matter, showing the religiousness of the town and its inhabitants.

"Coatesvllle Is a more than ordinarily religious town. That fact is written not in cynicism but in sincerity. 'There is a strong and real spiritual life here,' one friend assured me. Thanks largely to the work of William H. Ridgway, the community is especially active along Sunday-School lines. One man's Bible-class has 200 members, another 100, two others fifty each. These men have been studying Jeremiah this month -- and practicing Zedekiah. In evangelistic work the town is notable. It is the home of the Huston brothers, both of whom were absent on black Sunday. There are seven Protestant churches and one Roman Catholic in the borough. In the hour of trial, they all failed. With deep sorrow it must be written of Coatesville, as doubtless of hundreds of other small cities in like conditions, that there was not enough vital Christian force in the community to withhold a majority of the American citizens from assenting to a most horrible violation of the commandment, *Thou shalt not kill.' There is blood upon the doorsteps of Coatesville's churches and schools and homes.

"Grim and ghastly, here is a symptomatic condition for the preachers of the gospel, for the Men and Religion Movement, for the organized adult Bible-classes, for the Young Men's Christian Association (the Coatesville association has 400 members and a $60,000 building), for Christian Endeavor, for the Presbyterian evangelistic committee, and for the American home to ponder. The situation calls for a season of fasting, rather than for a picnic, or for the despicable maneuvering of 'practical' politicians.

"Law failed in Coatesville. Our boasted American self-government collapsed completely when put to a test. The Chinese, Japanese, Hindu, Turkish, European, and British editors who comment upon this terrible tragedy as proof of the breakdown of the American system cannot easily be gainsaid."

Well said. It shows too plainly what is under the thin veneer of religious profession. It shows a great deal more. In spite of a boasted ''Christian civilization" there is the spirit of lawlessness. Some day it will break out in another form and the results will be of an indescribable nature. "And there went out another horse that was red and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth and that they should kill one another and there was given unto him a great sword" (Rev. vi:6). 

1 By Professor W. S. Davis, University of Minnesota.