A correspondent of a semi-official journal published at St. Petersburg reports Prince Bismarck as saying,

"If the millionaire is not satisfied, how are you going to satisfy the workingman, when God has not implanted in him the faculty of contentment? Today you find it possible to meet his wishes; to-morrow new and fresh wants will arise, and so there is no end."

If these words were merely an expression of the platitude that Socialism is not a panacea for human ills no sensible man would criticise them, and we may be sure Prince Bismarck would never have uttered them. They are intended as a criticism upon the Emperor's recent Labor Conference, whose efforts the Prince characterizes as a coup d'épée dans l'eau, and they oppose in spirit all endeavors to bring about more equitable relations between workingmen and capitalists. Even the London "Times" is constrained to protest against such a misuse of contentment. "Rational discontent," it says, "is the root of all progress. 'If some very sensible persons had been listened to,' said Luttrell, 'we should all still be champing acorns.' Prince Bismarck's perversion of the principle of contentment, if it had ruled, would have defeated every beneficent act on our statute books for the protection of labor. Prince Bismarck is a Protestant, and has recently, we believe, been made a Doctor of Divinity by a German Protestant University. He owes his Protestantism and his Bible to the righteous discontent of the son of a German miner.

...

Some advocates of the oppressive and inquisitorial policy still dominant at the Rooms of the American Board have recently invoked in its behalf the sacred virtue of contentment. They have associated with themselves a very few others who seem not to have understood fully the nature of the procedure, and who have doubtless been moved solely by a desire to promote the cause of Foreign Missions. A pamphlet has been sent out entitled "Increased Contributions for the Work of Foreign Missions." Under the head of "Special Suggestions to the Churches," the proposal is made of a "special effort" to raise money for the Board, and for this purpose also to sell the aforesaid pamphlet at cost, so that "not less than one copy for each pewholder" may be distributed by each church. Referring to the present controversy respecting the management of the Board the pamphlet says:

"There may be a difference of opinion as to the sending of those who hold certain opinions to the foreign missionary field; but there is no difference of opinion as to the sending of those who do not hold these opinions. . . . Let us, therefore, having attained to that, act up to it and then if in anything we be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto us.' Controversy is better settled by acting on what we believe than by debating on things concerning which we are divided. . . . The din of controversy will be most swiftly and most surely drowned by the hearty doxology which will be evoked by the success of that forward movement in the interests of which these articles are circulated."

These opening suggestions and explanations are followed by thirteen articles. Of these, two appear to be editorials from the "Independent," one is a letter from Dr. Storrs published in the same paper, and the rest communications to it from friends of the Board. Among these are several very pronounced promoters of the present policy, such as Cyrus Hamlin, D. D., A. H. Plumb, D. D., Edwards A. Park, D. D., LL. D.

There is no paper from any one of the opponents of this policy.

One of

It lays

mass of

the papers, the longest and most studied, is largely theological. down the doctrine that without knowledge of the gospel the men perish everlastingly. Practically the old dogma of the universal damnation of the heathen is made a cardinal principle for the administration of the Board.

What now is the appeal? It is this. So far, the liberals who support the Board have not objected to the appointment of candidates who accept Dr. Alden's dogma. The conservatives, of course, do not object. Here is a beautiful agreement. Let us walk by this rule. Let us be contented with it. Let us all unite in filling the treasury with our gifts. Let us drown controversy by such action.

How beautifully this rule would have worked when Paul was stirring up such an agitation in the primitive church over circumcision! All the apostles agreed that circumcision might be practiced. Paul himself circumcised Timothy. Why should he not have consented that all other missionaries should be circumcised, and thus have permitted the discord of that strenuous conflict to be drowned in the doxologies of the churches of Judea. What a discontented man Paul was, who yet knew so well how in all things to be content!

We suspect that the pamphlet in question is more fitted to increase controversy and dissension than to diminish it. Men do not relish such a method of approach. A straight out appeal for men and money for missions they respect, even if they do not respond to it. But this one wears another aspect.

If the pamphlet simply said: "Let us not stop working for missions while we are engaged in this debate," we could heartily respond. But this is just what it does not say, and it plainly points to something very different. It says: "Let us work more earnestly than ever for missions under the present policy, and 'the din of controversy will be drowned.'" In plain English, join in this movement, and the dissatisfaction which now exists will be unable to make itself heard. It is claimed, indeed, that the success of the proposed plan will prove to be "the shortest road to agreement," but in what respect the end is to differ from the beginning is not explained. All that is proposed is, that there should be a great increase of gifts to sustain an administration conducted solely by one party. If the subject were not so serious we should be more impressed by the humor of the proposal than by anything else about it. We wonder if its authors perceive of what a blessed reign of peace they

are the illustrious heralds. All that is necessary for the happy adjustment of any controversy is that debate should stop and all unite in sustaining those who hold office.

We regret that gifts should be asked for in the use of such a plea. If the effect of increased giving is to be the drowning of discussion, the question at once arises whether it is right to contribute to the treasury of the Board with such a result in view? Those who dissent from the present policy do so from conscientious convictions. They believe it to be wrong in principle, unequal and unjust in application, repressive of missionary enthusiasm, injurious to the service in quality as well as in numbers, harmful in its effect on those to whom the gospel is offered, and derogatory to the universal and absolute claim of Christianity. They ask for a change as a matter of justice and right. The administration not longer adequately represents its constituency. At this juncture this constituency is asked to swell the receipts of the Board and stop criticism of its policy, because this is the best way of settling the controversy or, as the pamphlet suggests, somewhat in the vein of Prince Bismarck, it is "God's way of settling controversies." At the least, such an appeal embarrasses more than it helps conscientious contributors to the treasury of the Board. It seems to say, Give more freely than ever, and your demand for justice will be drowned in the consequent acclamations. History is a vain teacher if "agreement" and contentment can come by such a method.

Whatever obligations may exist as to contributions, the pamphlet suggests a very serious question, namely, how long our churches should consent to being represented abroad solely by men whom the present administration will appoint? The argument addressed to the liberals is, that all agree to send conservatives. But when this means that all are to agree to send conservatives only, we have a new platform, the platform of a party, and one which stirs up at once a righteous discontent. For there is an ever-increasing number of believers in our churches who repudiate the dogma which is thereby made a test. They disbelieve in presenting it to the world as a necessary part of Christianity. They cannot long consent to have Christianity thus held up. They are willing to cooperate with men who think differently, and to send out missionaries who think differently, but they are unwilling to let this go forth as the one voice and united testimony of our American Congregational Christianity. And if giving to the Board means that all discussion is to be suppressed, and no liberals are to be appointed, there will be anything but contentment in giving and agreement in coöperation. The tendency of this pamphlet, therefore, is to increase the dissatisfaction which already exists. For what is proposed? It is that the only Christianity the Congregational churches of the United States shall send through the Board to the votaries of other religions is one which includes as fundamental and essential the dogma that practically all who do not hear of Christ in

this life perish without hope in their sins, and which insists that a personal conviction of this truth is indispensable not only for appointment as a foreign missionary, but to the existence of a true missionary spirit. "It is time for us," says the pamphlet, "to stop our disputes on the minor details of the missionary work, to stop our effort for making our catholic Board a sectarian one." Catholicity, we should explain, in the⚫ mind of the writer of these words, requires a belief in the dogma that "all men who die impenitent will pass at once into their eternal penalty," and a conviction that without the gospel "the vast majority," practically the entire mass, of men do thus perish everlastingly. Our comment on this can only be: It is time to press all the harder, on account of such an utterance, for a true catholicity and a more Christian conception of the meaning and motive of Christian missions.

a content

We have illustrated the nature of a spurious contentment, ment with wrong that can be rectified, with a partisanship that arrays itself in the guise of catholicity.

The counterfeit is, after all, only a witness that there is a true coin. A firm faith in the moral order of the Universe gives a peace which no temporary oscillations in history, nor protracted conflicts between good and evil, can disturb. It is simply unmanly and ignoble to wish to be contented when there is opportunity for increased good. Beyond the peace of a Puritan submission to the divine supremacy, beyond the contentment of a child in the good that comes to it day by day, is the freedom of a son in the Father's house, and the joy of fellowship with the Divine.

The annual season of rest has come to many of our readers. Life more than ever before has become concentrated and intense. The demands of professional responsibilities, the pressure of multiplied cares, grow apace. What refreshment and calm are found on mountain heights, in Nature's solitudes, before the ocean's vastness, and by still waters. Yet he comes closest to the peace at the heart of Nature who has a peace the world cannot give; and contentment at any season, or in any special relation, is most truly his who has learned its secret for all times and for life in its totality.

THE REIGN OF THE MODERATES.

EVERY theological movement which affects the interests of a denomination or of any organized body reaches a stage when it comes under the control of the moderates - the men who are distinctively not conservative or progressive. If the movement is a vital one this stage is soon passed, but for the time being the controlling influence is manifest. Two religious bodies in this country, the Congregational and Presbyterian, are now illustrating this stage in the progress of theological opinion and belief. We confine ourselves chiefly to the later illustration, premising only that

the outcome of the Presbyterian Assembly at Saratoga was in general a repetition of the result of the American Board meeting at New York.

mean.

The discussions on Revision in the various Presbyteries were characterized by great clearness and frankness, and by a marked resoluteness of aim and purpose. We have seldom read the reports of more outspoken debate, though our Presbyterian brethren have the habit of saying what they But the preliminary discussion once over, the revisionists seemed to have settled upon the policy of concession to the moderates, in contrast with the policy of the anti-revisionists. Princeton sent President Patton to the Assembly. New York did not send Professor Briggs. The choice of moderator indicated the utmost liberality on the part of the revisionists. When the committees were appointed 'it was seen where the leadership of the Assembly was. The resolutions which prescribed the method and limits of revision were much more. satisfactory to the opponents than to the friends of the movement. And between the resolutions and the committee chosen to carry them out, revision was left in the hands of its opponents rather than of its friends, although the numerical advantage in the committee is on the side of the revisionists. Without doubt much was gained to Presbyterianism by the nearly unanimous action of a General Assembly pronouncing in favor of revision. It was an admission that the Confession is not doctrinally infallible. But in return for that concession the revisionists seem to have temporarily delivered over the movement, through the moderates, into the hands of the conservatives.

Of course the immediate result is not the final result. No revision carried on within the lines of the resolutions adopted can satisfy the advocates of theological progress. The utmost that could be accomplished by such a revision would be to bring the Presbyterian Church up to the past level of the more progressive churches of the reformed faith. It would only relieve it of certain points of attack, especially inviting to the enemies not only of Calvinism, but of Christianity. Those who followed the correspondence between Dr. Field and Mr. Ingersoll saw the difficulty which an apologist had in defending or escaping the standards. From the nature of the case the work would be negative, partial, possibly inconsistent, and, at best apologetic. It would not avail to give the Presbyterian Church any influential part in the theological questions now pending. Presbyterianism, as such, could have nothing to say, for example, about the great problems which lie in the region of eschatology, the whole of which Dr. Henry B. Smith said needed to be 'Christologized." What contribution could a Confession make to the solution of these deep and mysterious but human problems, which does not throb in every part with the mighty working of God's redemptive love?

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It is already evident that any revision accomplished by the conservatives through the moderates will utterly fail to satisfy the real revision