It is perhaps still possible for the race to learn enough from this period of strife and carnage for the resultant good to out-balance the total evil. But even then no one would have the right to credit the war with having been the means of greater good than _could_ have been accomplished without it. All its moral evil at any rate will be regrettable forever. And the only possible way of guaranteeing beforehand greater good than evil as an outcome of the war, even supposing the side of justice and liberty to be victorious, will be for individuals and groups so to relate themselves to truth, to right and to God that flagrantly immoral international relations will become practically impossible. The only safety of the race lies in an essentially Christian international morality, and the only adequate guarantee of this is an essentially Christian personal religion. The only failure of essential Christianity of which the war may fairly be regarded as evidence was its failure to be given an adequate trial; which means, of course, not a failure of Christianity as an ethical or as a religious system, but a failure of the human will to be adequately Christian. III THE CHRISTIAN HOPE IN TIMES OF WAR FRANK CHAMBERLIN PORTER Of Paul's three things that abide, hope is the one of which we are now most conscious of our need. Never before in our experience has hope been so much the center of our inner life and the heart of our religion. Our mood alternates between hope and depression, hope and fear; and we look to our religion to make hope strong, and turn to our sacred book to seek secure grounds and satisfying expressions for our hope. We hope for the winning of the war. We hope for the safety and the home-coming of those we love. We hope for a new world-order organized to make war impossible, inspired by a spirit of coöperation and good will between classes and between nations. We hope as never before for an assured and abundant life after death. We put these hopes in some relation to each other, weighing one against another, subordinating one to another. And when we seek their right relationship and look for their ultimate grounds, we ask what Christianity has to say and to do about them. What is Christian in these hopes that are filling the mind and heart of the world? The importance of this question is very great. The future of the world depends on the truth and the strength of the hopes that now inspire and direct men's purposes and efforts. The future of the Christian religion turns in no small measure on its ability now to keep the hope of mankind high and pure, free from self-seeking and from material interests, and true to the ultimate reality of things, and to give this hope confidence and prevailing strength.