“Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord” (Hosea vi. 3).) The mysteries of Christ are not learned in a day. Some are in good mood, maybe, and they will look unto the Bible and read a chapter or two, and away they go for a week, and never practise it more; like some boys, if at school one day, truant all the week after. Is it any wonder such thrive not in knowledge? It is a good speech of Bernard: “The study of the Word and the reading of it, differs as much as the friendship of such who every day converse lovingly together doth from the acquaintance one hath with a stranger at an inn, or whom he salutes as he passeth by in the street. If you will get knowledge indeed, you must not only salute the Word now and then, but walk with it, and enter into daily converse with it.”—Gurnall.
Notes and Comments.
The Morning Star of the Reformation.—This year marks the Sexcentenary of John Wycliffe’s birth, and it is well that the work done by this early Reformer should be recalled to mind. While it cannot be said that he got rid of some of the most pernicious of the doctrines of Rome, he deserves to be remembered, as Bishop Ryle says because (1) he was one of the first Englishmen who maintained the sufficiency and supremacy of Holy Scripture as the only rule of faith and practice; (2) he was one of the first Englishmen who attacked and denounced the errors of the Church of Rome; (3) he was one of the first, if not the very first, in England to revive the apostolic ordinance of preaching; (4) he was the first
Englishman who translated the Bible into the English language. The standard biography of Wycliffe is Professor Lechler’s, published by the Religious Tract Society, and Professor Lechler makes it clear that Wycliffe accepted whole-heartedly the scriptural doctrine of election.
The Prohibition of the Carfin Corpus Christi Procession.—The London correspondent of the “Glasgow Herald” says that the Scottish Socialist group appointed a deputation consisting of Messrs Campbell Stephen, John Robertson, Wright and Martin to interview the Secretary for Scotland with regard to the annual Corpus Christi procession in Carfin, Lanarkshire. A Unionist, Mr Blundell, put a question in the House of Commons on the same subject, and received the reply that the matter was being looked into.
Illegality of Corpus Christi Processions in Scotland.
—In connection with the prohibition of the above procession, the law as set forth in “The Roman Catholic Relief Act (1829)” says:—”If Ecclesiastics officiating or wearing any of the Orders, Communities, or Societies hereinafter mentioned shall exercise any of the rites or ceremonies of the Roman Catholic Religion, or wear the habits of the order save within the usual place of worship of the Roman Catholic Religion or any private house, such Ecclesiastic or other persons shall, being thereof convicted by due course of law, forfeit for every such offence the sum of £50.” These processions were instituted at Carfin in 1921, when the pervert, Bishop Gray Graham, formerly a minister of the Established Church, led the procession, and were continued since annually.
The Church of Scotland (Property and Endowments) Bill.—This Bill dealing with the temporalities of the Church of Scotland passed the Committee stage in the House of Lords on the first of July. The Bill deals with very intricate financial arrangements necessitated by the Union movement of the Established and the United Free Churches. The situation bristled with difficulties, but owing to the agreement reached with the heritors, whose interests the Bill affected, the measure had an easy passage in the House of Lords. The stumbling block was the commutation of teinds, which in the Haldane Committee’s recommendation was compulsory. The representatives of the heritors and the Church of Scotland had come to an agreement which modified the earlier arrangement considerably, and this took away the opposition on the part of the heritors.
Seditious and Blasphemous Teaching to Children
Bill.—This Bill passed the second reading in the House of Lords by a majority of 102 to 20 votes. Lord Danesfort, in moving the second reading of the Bill, said the object of the measure was to prevent the teaching of sedition and blasphemy to children under 16. It in no way interfered with the teaching of Socialism or any other political propaganda conducted on constitutional lines. It aimed only at stopping the teaching of sedition and blasphemy which were illegal by common law. The Bill did not in any way touch propaganda amongst adults. Its sole object was to protect children against teaching which had been described by Mr W. Churchill as the vilest garbage of atheism and revolution, the avowed object of which was to destroy the existing Constitution and order, by force if necessary, and to establish a revolution on the Russian model.
The Debasement Teaching of the Communist Schools.
—During the debate on the above Bill in the House of Lords, the Duke of Atholl said:—”The Lord Chancellor had carefully avoided everything that had to do with the Communist and the Proletariat Sunday schools. There was no intention of interfering with schools whatever their shade of politics, but what they wanted to do was to stop these schools in which evil teaching was given to children. Surely it was for their Lordships to say that they would not allow the teaching of pernicious doctrines which were turning liberty into licence. The schools which he had in mind wanted a great deal of watching, and some of the publications connected with the movement were of the most pernicious kind. He had knocked about the world a good deal, and he could say that for sheer, downright filth he had never read anything that came anywhere near the publications of proletarian schools for boys and girls. Some of these were produced in book form. That was the sort of thing they wanted to stop. Young people were being urged to revolution and immorality. Owing to the extreme secrecy with which these things were being done it was extremely difficult to find out the facts, but they had got enough information to show that the movement was widespread, and that it was permeating the minds of the young.”
The Breach in Islam.—We have already called attention to the epoch-making decision of the National Assembly at Angora to rid itself of the Khalifate. Since
then the Nationalist leaders make it clear that it is their policy to conserve Nationalist rather than Moslem interests. The far-reaching effect of Turkey’s decision may not yet be discernible, but already this breach in the Moslem unity is having a disturbing effect in the Moslem world. The Nizam of Hyderabad has granted a pension to the ex-Khalif, and the Sultan of Nejd has referred to the “greedy haste” of the King of the Hejaz (Hussein) in assuming the title of Khalif. It has been well said by a leader writer in one of the dailies that it is not too much to say that the blow inflicted upon Islam will prove a paralysing one, and that other potential causes of religious disagreement which, latent perhaps at the moment, may later produce extended strife. Turkey, according to this writer, has already driven a great wedge into Moslem unity, and it behoves Christians to watch with profound interest an event so unexpectedly and mysteriously brought about in the over-ruling providence of God.
Canadian Church Union.—The Church Union Bill passed its third reading in the House of Commons on 4th July, after the defeat of the final amendments seeking the non-operation of the Bill in respect of the Presbyterian Church until the Supreme Court of Canada has decided the legal issue as to the powers of the General Assembly to agree to union, and, further, providing that votes on the question of union should be taken by a circulated ballot instead of at a meeting of the congregation. Whether the Bill will become law this session now depends on the action of the Senate.
Suggested Withdrawal of the Envoy to the Vatican.—Mr J. A. Kensit, in the course of a letter to the Prime Minister on the question of a British Envoy to the Pope, says that the diplomatic mission to the Vatican was sent as a purely war-time expedient, and surely ought no longer to be maintained. “Might it not be well for you as Prime Minister,” he asks, “to announce that, in line with the French Government, Great Britain will also cease diplomatic representation at the Vatican? The Pope, not now being a sovereign, has no right to expect such representation to be longer maintained.”
Reformed Episcopal Church of England.—The Annual Convocation of the Free Church of England, and the Annual Synod of the Reformed Episcopal Church of England, held their gatherings this year (June 16-18) together at St John’s Church, Tottington, near Bury, in response to the invitation of the Free Church of England. The united gatherings were the
outcome of steps which have been taken to bring together these sister Churches, standing as they do for the same principles and purposes. The work of the two Churches was reported to be growing, new causes were opening, congregations were growing, and the financial returns showed an increase. Many difficulties had to be faced during the year that was ended, but that the work was appreciated by those who desire plain, unvarnished services, where the Word of God was truly preached free from Modernism and Sacerdotalism, was evidenced from the reports from whole-hearted clergy and laity. The Reformed Episcopal Church unanimously passed a resolution that no monies should be raised for their churches by means of whist drives, dancing, raffles, etc. One speaker testified that he had refused to allow a whist drive for his church, and a few weeks later a lady, who had never attended his church, and whom he did not know previously, had forwarded a cheque of £25 to his church funds as an appreciation of their stand against these methods of money raising for the churches.
The New Geology.—Prof. George McCreedy Price has been contributing a series of important articles to the “Sunday School Times” (Philadelphia), in which he is combating the theories of evolutionary geologists that early fossilized human remains indicate a lower state of development than the present. This is necessary if their theory of an ape ancestry is to stand. Prof. Price, however, holds that there is evidence that wherever genuine ante-deluvian human remains will be found they will show a race much larger than the race existing. In concluding his paper on the fossil remains found in Nevada, California, and Idaho, he says:—
“We may well look forward with keenest interest, not only to other future discoveries in this western country, but also to the pronouncements of leading scientists regarding those discoveries already made. For many years the world has not had a square deal in connection with such discoveries as these. There has been a conspiracy of silence, by which all discoveries that did not accord with the popular theory of evolution have been systematically ignored and put on the top shelf, while every little item of evidence tending to support this theory has been proclaimed from the house-tops, and broadcasted over the world by a syndicated press. I do not believe that this condition is destined to continue much longer. It seems to me that in the very nature of the case the great God of heaven
must soon arise to vindicate that record of the early days of our world which has so long been ignored or ridiculed. And just as the discoveries in Babylonia, Egypt, and other parts of the Near East have long since vindicated the record of Old Testament history; just as the geological discoveries have already proved the accuracy of the record of a universal Deluge; so we may well believe that before long archaeology will prove that the men of that ancient world were not sub-men, or a little better than brutes, but genuine though somewhat degraded, descendants of him who at the beginning was made after the image of God.”