... and the domestic grain rates to New York should ordinarily be the same," but that "rates to other ports, including Boston, may perhaps be properly made lower on export than on domestic traffic, to enable them to compete for the export business." In other words, while the domestic miller must be given the same rates as the English miller, the domestic consumer may be charged half as much again as the English consumer. A great deal might be said, indeed, to show that such discriminations enable roads to increase their business without unfairly injuring the business of their competitors and without overcharging the patrons paying the higher rates; but, when all has been said, the feeling remains that domestic consumers are entitled to the same rate as foreign consumers, when the same service is rendered them. The Plague It is now admitted that genuine cases of the bubonic plague have occurred in Astrakhan, the chief town of the Russian province of the same name, and the Roumanian Government has in consequence put a quarantine guard on its Russian frontier. In China also the plague has some foothold— seventy-three deaths in four days are reported from New-Chang from the disease. In Oporto, Portugal, there have been a very few cases, but the demonstrations made by the people there against the enforcement of sanitary and precautionary measures augur badly for the future. Similar demonstrations have been made by mobs in Alexandria, Egypt, where the plague has existed, though in a mild form, for several months; in July it was thought that Alexandria had become free from the infection, and the sanitary precautions were relaxed, with the result that new cases at once appeared. Nowhere has the plague been so fatal as at Bombay and Mauritius, where the proportion of deaths to cases has been five out of six, while the epidemic continues this year to ravage whole streets in the lower quarters. The The general opinion of competent experts is that there is little or no danger of the infection gaining a hold in any city where the water, sewerage system, street-cleaning, and other conditions of living are according to modern hygienic standards. The President's Speech The report of President McKinley's address at Pittsburg printed in another place in this number of The Outlook has been submitted to the President and returned from him to the editors of The Outlook with emendations and corrections. It may therefore be accepted as absolutely authentic and exact. This address of the President is important, not because it contains any really new information, but because it states certain facts with an authority which no unofficial statement can possess, and with a frankness unusual in public addresses by the executive head of a great Nation. In this respect President McKinley has followed the example of President Lincoln, who was accustomed occasionally to puzzle politicians and confuse opponents by similar frankness in public speech. There has been in certain quarters a curious misapprehension of the facts of recent history, due, in our opinion, less to intentional misrepresentation than to a certain passionate doctrinairism which has forbidden a patient, open-minded inquiry into the facts. It has been assumed that the present war in the Philippines is a war of conquest, undertaken for our commercial profit, in which we have been the aggressors, and in which our soldiers whose term of service had expired have engaged reluctantly and under compulsion; then it has been argued with great seriousness that such a war is un-American. and unjust. No one doubts that such a war would be un-American and unjust; but there is no such war. The critics have proved with elaborate argument what they might have assumed, and have asattempted to prove. sumed as admitted what they should have Under these circumstances it is well that we have from the Chief Magistrate of the Nation a clear and concise statement of facts respecting recent events in the Philippine archipelago. He who desires to know whether the resolve "for the speedy suppression of the rebellion, the establishment of peace and tranquillity and a government under the undisputed sovereignty of the United States" is right or wrong should study that question in the light of the President's statement of the facts which have led to this resolve; and if that statement is questioned, the unprejudiced inquirer will require, to awaken his distrust in its accuracy, something stronger than unproved assumptions or newspaper reports of unknown correspondents, whether journalistic or military. The facts as stated by the President are that we purchased the archipelago from the only Government which had ever in its history been recognized in or over it; that the volunteers, after the term of their enlistment was over, remained in the islands, "cheerfully, uncomplainingly, patriotically," to maintain law and order and defend the flag; that, had they not done so, "chaos would have reigned, and whatever government there was would have been by the will of one man and not with the consent of the governed;" that for weeks they maintained their self-control under the most exasperating conditions. Subjected to the insults and duplicity of the insurgent leaders, they preserved the status quo, remembering that they were under an order from their Government to sacredly observe the terms of the protocol in letter and spirit and avoid all conflict, except in defense, pending the negotiations of the treaty of peace. They were not the aggressors. The first blow was struck by the insurgents, and it was a foul blow." there will be no useless parley, no pause, until the insurrection is suppressed and American authority acknowledged and established." The Transvaal Ever since the outrageous, though unauthorized, Jameson raid of January 1, 1896, with its insufficient penal consequences to the ringleaders, the Boers have been justly suspicious of the British. The raid, indeed, elicited universal sympathy for the Boers. It should not be forgotten, however, that their hands were hardly immaculate. In 1881 the Transvaal Government agreed with Great Britain (1) that no treaty into which it might enter with foreign States should be valid until it received the approval of the British Government; (2) that there should be a limit to the Transvaal's rights to deal with natives; and (3) that the Boers should not encroach on the boundaries of their neighbors. Yet in that very year a raid was made by the Boers into Bechuanaland, a movement suppressed by Sir Charles Warren and his men. Unsuccessful in the west, the Boers turned to the east, invaded Zululand, and actually annexed the best part of that country. The increasing numbers and importance of the British forces then kept the Boers well within their own borders, but the latter soon found a far more oppressive method of aggression. There is nothing in this statement of facts which will surprise any regular reader of The Outlook. He will find it abundantly verified by the history of events In 1881, five years before the discovas it has been continuously given in these ery of the gold-fields, when there were columns for the last year and a half. In comparatively few Outlanders (or forview of this statement, it is clear that the eigners) in the Transvaal, the franchise question for the Nation to decide is not was obtainable after a year's residence. whether a war of aggression on a free In the same year the agreement between people is to be sanctioned and sustained— Great Britain and the Transvaal provided a proposition which no intelligent Amer- that there should be equality of treatment ican will defend; but whether, having for all whites. The new form of aggressucceeded by treaty and purchase to sion consisted in an increasing burden put all the responsibilities of the only govern- upon the Outlanders, so that, until two ment which had ever existed in the islands, months ago, to obtain the franchise meant we have any right to surrender those re- for them a fourteen years' residence, the sponsibilities to a small minority of the consent of two-thirds of the Boer voters, inhabitants who, rifle in hand, endeavor and the approval of the Government. No to expel us and to assume authority over such restrictions were placed upon the the rest of the inhabitants. We believe Boers themselves. The result was that that America will, by an overwhelming the Outlanders, paying nine-tenths of the majority, reply to that question, whenever taxes, have had no voice in the levying of it gets the opportunity, in the words of taxation. So great has the recent British the President: menace of war been, however, that Presi "They assailed our sovereignty, and dent Kruger has receded step by step from his untenable position, until, last week, he offered an additional concession over the reform of two months ago. This last concession grants a five years' franchise to the Outlanders, and thus enfranchises one-third of them. The gaining of this "irreducible minimum," demanded by Sir Alfred Milner, British High Commissioner, in his recent interview with President Kruger, removes, however, but one of the causes of friction. Mr. Chamberlain, the British Colonial Secretary, now urges the appointment of a Commission of Inquiry to effect general reforms, including the franchise, for if that is the chief, it is only one of a dozen reforms demanded by the Outlanders. They also ask (2) such a redistribution of seats for the gold-fields in the Volks raad (or Transvaal Parliament) as will give to them a proper representation. At present there is none at all. none at all. Transvaal now offers one-fifth, but the Outlanders represent three fifths of the population. The Other demands are for a reorganization of the present corrupt civil service; (10) for an untrammeled press (11) for educational reform, and (12) for free trade in South African products. The Outlanders have long but vainly urged these reforms upon the Transvaal Government. When patience ceased to be a virtue, they appealed (last spring) to the British Government by a petition signed by twenty-one thousand Britons in the Transvaal. Even after the Jameson raid it seemed to many imperialists-Mr. Chamberlain, for instance that patience had not really been exhausted. In May, 1896, the Colonial Secretary said in one of his speeches, "To go to war with President Kruger to enforce upon him reforms in the internal affairs of his State .. would be immoral. That is not my policy and never will be.” Despite inconsistency, however, it now seems to him, and also to most Britons, irrespective of party, that, in pressing the complaint of inequality of treatment, they have taken time enough for sober second thought. The fact that, with the exception of the London "Chronicle" and the Manchester "Guardian," the Government has the support of every prominent newspaper, shows the earnestness and sincerity of the British sense of injustice. If a war be necessary, Britons know better than any others how to count the material cost. Aside from the loss of men and munitions, they realize that the flow of gold from the Transvaal (the world's largest producer of the metal) would be checked. During the past seven months no less than fifty-five million dollars' worth has been received in London from Johannesburg. Britons also know that such a war would be the signal for restiveness among the Dutch citizens at Cape Colony. They outnumber all the other whites. (3) The next demand is that for a Constitution safeguarded from sudden changes. At present an ordinary resolution of the Volksraad may change the existing Constitution. (4) A fourth demand is that the heads of the Government shall be responsible to the Volksraad. (5) A fifth demand is that for independence of the courts. At present, if a judge does not respect any chance vote of the Volksraad, he is dismissed from office. The Chief Justice was so dismissed. (6) Cancellation of monopolies constitutes the next demand. There has been much oppression from the railway, liquor, match, brush, and soap monopolies, and, above all, from that on dynamite, as mining is the great Outlander industry. In Cape Colony.dynamite is imported at a profit for sixteen dollars a case; in the Transvaal it costs twenty-five dollars to the mine-owner. (7) The Outlanders also ask that the English language shall be put upon the same plane of equality with the Dutch. Nine-tenths of the Transvaal's business is transacted in English, yet the official tongue is Dutch. (8) The eighth demand contemplates the removal of religious disabilities. Moreover, such a war might precipitate outbreaks among the natives, who outnumber the entire white population ten to one. The greatest difficulty of all may be the question of British suzerainty. The Boers base their protest on the fact that, in the Anglo-Boer Convention of 1881, the suzerainty of Great Britain was distinctly stated, but in the Convention of 1884 there was no mention of it. To this Great Britain. replies that, while it is true that the word Pastoral Letters To the Reluctant Skeptic I want to believe, but I cannot. It seems as though my faculties for believing divine truths were atrophied. For years I have been fighting this unbelief. What shall I do? These sentences, selected from a single letter, may serve to interpret the spirit of many letters, and the perplexities of many souls who never tell their perplexity to others. It is to such reluctant skeptics that I address this response. There are two methods of reaching the truth-the theological and the vital, or the theoretical and the practical. The former method assumes that thought precedes action, the latter that action precedes thought; the former makes ethics the foundation of morality and theology the foundation of religion, the other makes morality the foundation of ethics and religion the foundation of theology. The postulates of the first method are, I must know God before I can pray to him, I must understand Christ before I can trust in him, I must accept the Bible as a trustworthy guide before I can follow its guidance. The postulates of the second method are, I must pray to God in order to know him, I must trust in Christ in order to understand him, I must follow the guidance of the Bible before I can know that it is a trustworthy guide. The one method assumes that the light is the life of men; the other says, with John, that the life is the light of men. Doubtless this antithesis is here put somewhat too sharply; doubtless these two processes-the vital and the philosophical, the religious and the theological-in actual life go on together, and are really indistinguishable parts of healthful spiritual growth. But it is also certain that Christ laid his emphasis on the second method; that is, he put religion before theology, morality before ethics, life before an understanding of life. If one takes up the four Gospels and reads in them, or reads either one of them through, for the purpose of ascertaining what was Christ's method, the theological or the vital, one will probably be sur prised to find how little of direct instruct tion in theology Christ's instructions contain. He calls his disciples to follow him, and it is not until they have followed him for a year that he even asks them what they think of him. He speaks to them of God as a Father, but it is not in a definition of God; it is in counsel how to pray. He never argues the question of immortality, except to answer foolish objections brought against it by the Sadducees in a vain attempt to trip him up; t he simply talks to men as though they were immortal, and treats all the affairs of this life as though there were an eternal perspective behind them. He never once debates the question of the inspiration and authority of the Bible; he simply uses it to illustrate or to enforce his practical teachings concerning life and its duties. Nearly all his instructions point to some activity; they are addressed rather to the will than to either the intellect or the emotions. His unmistakable object is to induce men to take some action, rather than to possess some emotion or to entertain some opinion or conviction. I may refer briefly to three specific addresses to illustrate this principle, but I believe that it will be found to pervade equally all Christ's teaching. The first is the Sermon on the Mount. He begins this sermon with blessings pronounced, not upon sound opinions on even such fundamental topics as God and immortality, but upon the poor in spirit, the meek, the merciful, the peacemaker; that is, upon traits of character which inhere in the will and manifest themselves in action. Lowliness of spirit, meekness, mercifulness, peaceableness, are neither opinions. nor emotions; they are compatible with a great variety of creeds, and are to be found alike in emotive and unemotive men: they are dispositions to a certain type of activity. He goes on to urge on his disciples, not certain tenets, but certain courses of conduct-they are to let their D gi es Foll ONE the ot abode with him.. If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in his love. . . . Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you. Thus, in his last and most sacred discourse, in the intimacy of those last hours with his faithful friends, Christ lays the foundation of the deepest spiritual life on doing his commandments, as, in his inaugural address delivered before a great congregation, he laid the foundation of the social world-life of his followers. light shine, to seek kindly relations with offended brethren, to live purely in social and domestic relations, to keep from evil the tongue and the heart, out of whose abundance the mouth speaketh, to treat even their enemies with kindliness and to regard them with benevolence, to pray with simplicity and in secret, to give their lives wholly to God's service, not to worry, not to judge others, to treat all men with justice and good will, to measure other religious teachers by the kind of lives their teaching produces; and, finally, the Modern psychology, if I understand sermon ends with the remarkable declara- its teaching aright, confirms scientifically tion that "whosoever heareth these say- this method of character-building; for it ings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken teaches that action often precedes and unto a wise man who built his house upon produces both thought and feeling. The a rock." What is this but saying, by a man who spits out his momentary anger in figure impossible to misunderstand, that venomous or profane words does not get the foundation of character is not believ- rid of it; he intensifies it by expressing ing certain opinions, but doing certain it. On the contrary, if he suppresses the things? What is it but saying that deed expression, he does or may do something is the foundation and creed the superto suppress the impulse itself, and presstructure, not creed the foundation and ently even to regard intellectually the real deed the superstructure? are or fancied insult in quite a different fashThe second discourse is one delivered ion. Both his emotion and his intellect at the end of Christ's ministry, in which he get their color from his activity, and are portrays the final judgment. Here men modified, if not made, by it. Though on separated on the right hand and the the subject of physiological psychology I left, according to what they have done in speak with reserve, I believe that I am life ages theology should insist that this feeding accepted theory, if not a demonstrated the hungry, clothing the naked, and visit- fact, that every such activity reacts on the ing the sick and the imprisoned was based brain in molecular changes there, which upon a conscious faith in Christ which, in tend to harmonize it with the action and speaking to his disciples, Christ takes for granted, he makes it clear that neither in the future. to make the repetition of such action easier those who fulfilled the law of love nor This fact is illustrated by the well-known history of the battle-Christ in either what they did or what with reluctance, "uncommon stiff and those who failed to fulfill it thought of field, on which the soldier enters at first they omitted to do. slow," but, after the first shots have been the one which may, perhaps, be regarded becomes for the moment often wild with The third discourse of Jesus Christ, and fired and the first blood has been shed, as the most theological of any reported in the "revenge that knows no rein," partly the eleven at the Last Supper, reported rades and partly instigated thereto by his the four Gospels, is his conversation with inspired thereto by the passion of his comin the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth chapters of John. In this the same prin- that the practice in the Church of repeatciple that spiritual life is built on doing ing the Apostles' Creed together has done God's will, not on either opinion or emotion, is not less marked than in the other strengthen faith in the essential facts of own deeds of vengeance. I cannot doubt two. much, in accordance with this law, to Judas saith unto him (not Iscariot), Lord, pathy extending through the congregation, us, and not unto the world? Jesus answered phraseology of the faith embodied in that keep my words: and my Father will love him, and said unto him, If a man love me, he will and we will come unto him, and make our historic Christianity, partly by the sym creed. I have taken considerable space to |