The destruction of the commonplace Cathedral of Cologne could never
recompense the damage done to the glorious Cathedral of Rheims. Nor
could the slaughter of a million German women and children restore the
innocent victims of Belgium, France, Servia, and Armenia to life. We do
not thirst for blood. We desire justice.
No doubt the ends of justice demand that the principal brigands who are
responsible for the atrocities of this war should be tried before an
international court If convicted they should be duly punished. But not
by mob-law or violence. Nothing could be less desirable than the
assassination of William Hohenzollern. It would be absurd and horrible
to give a martyr's crown to a criminal. Vengeance belongeth unto God. He
alone is wise and great enough to deal adequately with the case. It is
for us to keep our righteous indignation free from the poison of
personal hatred, and to do no more than is needed to uphold and
vindicate the eternal law.
William Hohenzollern, and his fellow-conspirators who are responsible
for the beginning and the conduct of the dreadful war from which all
the toiling peoples of earth have suffered, must be brought to the bar
of justice and sentenced; otherwise the world will have no defense
against the anarchists who say that government is a vain thing; and the
bloody Bolshevists who proclaim the Empire of the Ignorant,--the
Boob-Rah,--as the future rule of the world, will have free scope.
It is evident that a league of free, democratic states, pledged by
mutual covenant to uphold the settlement of international differences by
reason and justice before the use of violence, offers the only hope of a
durable peace among the nations. It is also the only defense against
that deadly and destructive war of classes with which Bolshevism
threatens the whole world. The spirit of Bolshevism is atheism and
enmity; its method is violence and tyranny; its result would be a reign
of terror under that empty-headed monster, "the dictatorship of the
proletariat." God save us from that! It would be the worst possible
outcome of the war in which we have offered and sacrificed so much, and
in which God has given us the opportunity to make "a covenant of peace."
How vast, how immeasurable, are the responsibilities which this great
victory in righteous war has laid upon the Allies and America. God help
us to live up to them. God help us to sow the future not with dragon's
teeth, but with seeds of blessed harvest. God paint upon the broken
storm-cloud the rainbow of eternal hope. God help us and our friends to
make a peace that shall mean good to all mankind. God send upon our
victory the light of the cross of Christ our Saviour, where mercy and
truth meet together, righteousness and peace kiss each other.
III
The Power of an Endless Life
_Who is made, not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the
power of an endless life._
--Hebrews 7:16.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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