remonstrate with Great Britain for this, even though the regular use of the American flag on British passenger vessels carrying great numbers of Americans might be of greater advantage than disadvantage to us; and such remonstrance implies no reproof or complaint. We did have a cause of complaint against Great Britain when she planted mines in the North Sea, but we made no protest. On this question of the use of a neutral flag, however, we have no cause for grievance; though we have every reason for making known to Great Britain what we think a due regard for our interests will induce her to do. This, however, is a very different thing from the sort of communication that we have directed to Germany. And the reason for the difference lies not in any attitude of friendliness to one country and unfriendliness to another, but in the fact that the nature of the act which has called forth the one note is fundamentally different from the nature of the act which called forth the other. In the case of Great Britain the act was one which seemed to us not lawless but unaccommodating and inconsiderate; in the case of Germany the act complained of was lawless, not to say piratical. Moreover, the note to Great Britain is based on reports derived from Great Britain's enemies; while the note to Germany is based on information supplied by Germany herself. The American communication to Great Britain is therefore of service in making more emphatic by its very difference in tone and subject-matter America's solemn warning to Germany concerning the possible serious consequences of her proposed breach of international law and international morals.

If there was anything needed to make clearer than it now is the spirit of Germany which has led her to issue her war zone decree, with its threat against the lives of non-combatants and neutrals, it has been supplied by Germany herself in interrupting the communications of our Minister to Holland and Luxemburg. Both Holland and Luxemburg are neutral countries. While Holland has had the self-respect as well as the power to enforce the observance of her neutrality, Luxemburg, whether or not it had the self-respect, had not the power to do so. As a consequence Holland is free from German invaders, while Luxemburg, which made merely a pathetic protest against German occupation of her territory, is now under the domination of German soldiers. This fact, however, makes no difference in the status

of our Minister to the two countries. There is warrant neither in international law nor in common sense for Germany to interrupt our communications with the Grand Duchy of Luxemburg. It happens that whoever is sent to represent the United States at Holland is also designated to represent the United States at the Grand Duchy. At present our Minister to both these countries is Dr. Henry van Dyke. He has had, of course, occasion to send mail from Holland to Luxemburg. On its way the official mail of the American Legation was interrupted by German military authorities at the German city of Trèves, or, as it is known in German, Trier. It is reported that some of this mail was not only held up but actually returned to The Hague because it was sealed with the seal of the American Legation. This is a plain invasion of the diplomatic privileges of the American Minister; and he did right to protest. Dr. van Dyke would not be the worthy representative of the United States that he is if he did not feel as he does feel, that the rights of the American Minister to Luxemburg must be observed as strictly and respected as completely as if Luxemburg were a great empire. Dr. van Dyke's conviction on this point, we are sure, is shared by Secretary Bryan and President Wilson. The American State Department, believing that the interruption of official mail between the American Legation at The Hague and at Luxemburg was unauthorized, requested the American Ambassador at Berlin to present the matter to the German Foreign Office, and to ask that instructions be issued to the proper authorities in order to insure hereafter prompt delivery of mail. The assumption that this act of disregard for the American Minister's rights was due to the ignorance of a local commander is one which our Government is bound, of course, to make. We hope that it will prove justified by the events. It is hardly conceivable that the German Government should have deliberately undertaken to flout the rights of an American diplomat with whom she has no official relations whatever. The incident, nevertheless, is quite as significant of Germany's spirit as the issuance of her war zone decree, though it has no such tragic possibilities. We are glad to say that our Government has been as prompt and as firm in dealing with this as with the other, and perhaps graver, matter.

These two events, both of them big with

grave possibilities, are not the only ones that have occasioned charges of the violation of international law. Germany, for instance, accuses England of virtually turning her merchantmen into privateers by arming them and giving them instructions to ram and sink German submarines. That is a subject that at best is open to debate. We do not think that the right of merchant vessels to carry guns for their own protection, or to take measures to sink any vessel that commits piracy on the high seas, can properly be questioned. Germany also accuses England of violating international law by attempting to starve the German civil population. We do not believe that there is any ground for this accusation. It is true that England is using all her efforts to prevent foodstuffs from going into Germany; but those extreme efforts on England's part have been undertaken only since the German Government officially took over the foodstuffs now in the Empire. It is plain that any belligerent has the right to prevent, if possible, foodstuffs from going to the enemy's army; and England's action, in view of Germany's action, is defensible on that ground and cannot be condemned as an act against non-combatants. If now England establishes a close blockade, she is also well within her rights. Such a blockade the North established against the South in our own Civil War. On the other hand, what Germany has done and proposes to do in the sinking of merchantmen without warning and in endangering even neutral vessels within the war zone is patently and undeniably lawless. The only grounds on which such acts have even been attempted to be justified have been the grounds of retaliation. But But retaliation has its limits, as we ourselves learned in our Civil War. There were threats then in the North to execute Southern prisoners in return for the abuses from which Northern prisoners suffered in Libby Prison; but good sense as well as honor and decency prevailed. And yet that was a war of life and death. Jefferson Davis, when a plan was laid before him to assassinate certain Northern leaders, said: "The laws of war and morality as well as Christian principles and sound policy forbid the use of such means of punishing even the atrocities of the enemy." James Ford Rhodes, the historian, says: "More than once each side was seemingly on the brink of retaliatory executions which would have been followed by stern reprisals. From such shedding of blood and

its bitter memories we were spared by the caution and humanity of Abraham Lincoln, General Lee, and Jefferson Davis." It is because Germany has allowed herself to be governed by the spirit of reprisal that she has lost the sympathy of all neutral nations whose sympathy is worth having, and is now endangering even the continuance of their friendly relations.

If anything could make Germany's attitude more offensive, it is her proposal to the United States that if we want her to recede from her position we should do her work for her. She suggests that we should furnish our merchant ships with a naval convoy to protect them against German submarines, and that if we do not want our merchantmen to run in danger from her submarines we should induce England to raise her blockade of the German coast. In other words, Germany suggests that we, and not she, should prevent her submarines from sinking our boats, and that we, and not she, should make of no effect the superiority of the British navy. Great Britain might just as well ask that we should induce Germany to withdraw her armies from the western front and that we should send American soldiers over to prevent English soldiers from running amuck and killing indiscriminately any Americans who happen to be on Belgian soil. Germany must know that we cannot take her proposal seriously.

This whole situation, brought about by Germany's war zone decree, and made more serious by the Luxemburg mail episode and by Germany's own remedial proposals, ought to be a lesson to us and to all other nations concerning the sacredness of international law and the inevitable and terrible consequences of disregard for its violation.

She

It ought to be a lesson to Germany. has said by the mouth of her Chancellor that necessity knows no law; that when a nation is fighting for its life it will not regard rules and precedents and international principles. She has believed and has acted on the belief that ultimately there is only one guide for a nation, and that is its own self-interest. Germany is now learning, let us hope, that even her own self-interest has failed to justify her disregard for the public law of nations. Belgium, Louvain, Rheims, Scarborough. Yarmouth, one after the other, have turned from her those who wished to be her friends; and now her war zone decree-not to mention the episode at Trèves-has made of

us.

every powerful neutral and of most other maritime neutrals possible enemies. The violation of the moral law, even though it be international moral law, invites punishment. And this situation ought to be a lesson to Our failure to protest against the violation of the rules of civilized warfare has now been brought home to us. No man lives unto himself alone. No nation lives unto itself alone. To act as if the descent of a belligerent into savagery or piracy concerns only the offender's enemy is to invite general disaster. When Belgium was invaded in defiance not only of explicit pledges but of the very moral sense of civilization, when mines were sown in the North Sea in defiance not only of international conventions but of the common interest of humanity, the offense was directed not only and not even chiefly against an enemy, but against the civilized world. In our aloofness we may have imagined that it was no concern of ours. We have now seen that we were mistaken.

And we Americans-most of us-have been so aghast at war, so horrified at death and suffering, that we-at least some of the most idealistic of us-have been prone to put all acts of war into one category of condemnation. There is no one that can be so cruel as the sentimentalist can be, and it is the sentimentalist that has been inclined to say that war is so awful that it is idle to have rules of warfare; that if the nations of Europe are going to fight they might as well fight in any way they see fit; that war is so wicked that there can be no alleviation of it; that if Belgium is going to be invaded her women and children might as well be slain indiscriminately; that if naval battles are to be fought at sea the seas might as well be mined. Now we hope that even those who have been tempted to think in this way have begun to see what such thoughts lead to. International law after international law has been broken, and we have kept quiet. We have not been faithful to our duty as a civilized Power. Now we are beginning to feel the consequences of the disregard of international law. If some day

in the future we ourselves are forced to become a belligerent, and an enemy, casting away all bonds of law, should begin to violate the rules of warfare, we should find the lesson driven home again. Our protest to the world would invite the reply: "When you were safe you kept silent; now that you are in danger your words mean nothing."

Fortunately, it is not too late; and fortunately at last our voice has been heard. In its reply to the German decree the Administration deserves, and will have, the support of the American people.

THE PERIL TO GOVERNMENT MERCHANTMEN

In an article upon another page Senator Lodge states his emphatic objections to the Ship Purchase Bill. As Senator Lodge points out, it is impossible to bring a detailed indictment against this measure, for, like the Old Man of the Sea in the grip of Hercules, the Shipping Bill, in its endeavor to escape from the clutch of the powerful Senate minority, undergoes almost an hourly change of form.

The difficulty of bringing in such an indictment grows when it is remembered that the country has not yet heard any authoritative and itemized statement as to what ships the Administration intends to buy, how these ships are to be used when bought, or what is to be their fate when the present emergency has passed into history. Surely these are questions to which the Nation has the right to an explicit answer.

Senator Lodge rightly places his chief emphasis upon the danger to the peace of our country that lies in the purchase of belligerently owned steamers and in the transfer of these vessels to the possession and control of our Government. This is indeed a peril upon which it would be difficult to put too great stress. It must not for an instant be forgotten, however, that this danger adheres to the whole project of launching a Government merchant marine at this time of turmoil. The purchase of interned or belligerently owned steamships entirely aside, a merchant fleet sailing under Government control, carrying cargoes to the warring nations, would be a sure invitation to foreign distrust and sooner or later would involve the menace of war.

At best the position of a neutral country at a time like this is difficult enough. The seizure of an American merchant vessel is a source of irritation, even though it is privately owned. The sinking of an American. merchant vessel would, to put it mildly, be full of peril to our peace, even though the vessel were owned privately.

Can those who are backing this bill have

Society has become partially Christianized; there is now no authority on earth which can compel men to choose between loyalty to their faith and death; there are no longer pagan gods to whom Christians must offer sacrifices or go into the arena. There are martyrs in every country in the world. but martyrdom is no longer dramatized; the victim dies after long suffering hidden from the world.

There is no longer a place of torment luridly pictured and of a visible and haunting terror; and many people seem to think that there is no longer any hell, and that men can now live as they choose, with no thought of a broken law, a righteous judge, and an unescapable penalty impartially imposed and inevitably borne. And yet what men call hell, a place or state of remorse, of moral degeneration, of agony of mind and body, was never so obvious and tragic a reality as to-day. It is no longer necessary to open Dante's "Inferno to find it; it is only necessary to unfold the morning newspaper. Its first page is crowded with reports of the misery which follows fast and sure on every violation of the laws of life. Disease and death wait, not as specters, but as the executioners of the laws of science on every offender; murder in every possible form is so familiar to the reporter that unless circumstances or persons are unusual it finds only a brief space; men fleeing from justice and women from disgrace are figures so familiar that they attract scanty attention; loss of integrity, betrayal of honor, blighting of home, loss of reputation and influence, are part of the history of the day.

And with whatever bravado men and women face these penalties, sooner or later, if one follows their careers, the inevitable tragedy is revealed. Unless and until there comes a place and an hour of repentance, these unhappy victims of passion, violators of

honor, betrayers of their own souls, are in a hell of which Dante drew but a faint picture.

The man who was asked if he believed in hell, and answered that he was in it, brought out clearly a radical change of thought. The ignorant or literal-minded once thought of hell as a place of fiery torment prepared by an offended God for the future punishment of evil-doers; we know that it is an experience of suffering involved in the very structure of our natures, which begins here and now, and is an expression of divine love. The suffering of which men think when they think of hell is of to-day; it waits for no future, it begins now, and it will continue until the offender is purified.

The issue which every man must face is precisely what it was when Christ faced it in the wilderness: Shall a man save his soul? Words and symbols have changed, but the battle of life is as inevitable, as fateful, as desperate, as it was a thousand years ago.

THE PREACHING WANTED FOR TO-DAY

What do congregations want of their preachers to-day?

We do not think they want war sermons. The congregations are weary of conflicting reports from Petrograd of Russian victories, from Vienna of Austrian victories, from Berlin of German victories, from Paris of French victories; it is only unhappy Belgium which reports no victories. Weary

of the perpetual discussions as to who is responsible for the war, who to blame for bringing it on, while still interested in new aspects of the war and discussions respecting them, they desire relief from them on Sabbath morning.

And yet they are in no mood to listen to discussions of abstract theology, of questions of the Trinity, vicarious atonement, the reconciliation of divine sovereignty and free will, and the like, in which congregations were interested a hundred years ago. The minister who meets the needs of his congregation must preach to the times, but must not take his text from the times.

It is easier to illustrate than to define the wants of the congregation of to-day. Let four illustrations serve instead of definition.

the world giveth, give I unto you." And then he went out into the darkness and the tempest: to be deserted by his disciples; to be arrested and brought before a fraudulent tribunal for a mock trial; to pass from condemnation by that court to another trial before a cowardly judge who believed him innocent but dared not acquit him; to hear the voices of the mob crying for his blood; to be scourged, spit upon, insulted; to be crowned with thorns and clothed with purple in derision of his loyalty; to see the sword piercing the heart of his own mother, and an unspeakable dread settling down upon the heart of his beloved disciple. And in it all he was the one serene, unperturbed spirit, facing calmly the taunts of his enemies and the torturing sorrows of his friends, speaking hope to the penitent brigand at his side, and comfort to the weeping mother at the foot of his cross.

This was his peace; this the peace which he gave to his disciples. Tell us, O preacher, how, in this hour when the very foundations of Christian faith are shaking, we can possess in our souls the serene, comfort-giving peace which characterized the last hours of Jesus of Nazareth. What was this peace of his ? How can we possess it?

Paul wrote to his readers: "We glory in tribulations also; knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope; and hope maketh not ashamed."

If so,

Is this experience possible for us? tell us, O preacher, how we can attain it.

The world is still divided into stoics and epicureans: stoics, who grit their teeth and courageously endure the trouble which they cannot escape; epicureans, who flee from it when flight is possible, or laugh it off by forced, if not mock, merriment.

But here is a prophet who tells us that trouble is real, is not to be fled from but welcomed, not to be stoically or even submissively endured but to be converted into a glory. And this prophet is the follower of One who came into the world that he might be crowned with the glory of tribulation, and who bade his disciples follow him, walking in the same path, inspired by the same spirit.

Tell us, O preacher, next Sunday how we can convert our sorrows into joys, our tribulations into glories. Impossible? No, you are wrong. It is not impossible. The book of Revelation was written in the darkest

period in the history of the Christian Church; written in the time of Nero; written when Christians were thrown into the arena to be devoured by wild beasts or bound about with inflammable material soaked in oil and set on crucifixes, to be hideous torches; written when the Church of Christ would have seemed to a historian looking at it from without to be going to its death, as did its Master-a lingering, painful, but unescapable death. And yet this book of Revelation has more Hallelujah choruses in it than any other book in the Bible except the Hebrew Psalter.

Tell us, O preacher, how we can make the night of sorrow vocal with such songs of praise.

In the passage in which Paul declares that he glories in tribulation he also declares that the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts. How can we keep the love of God in our hearts when life seems all awry ?

Those who have been looking outside of themselves for evidences of God's love are dazed when disaster comes upon them. If God be love, they say, how can he suffer the earthquake to swallow his children up? How can he suffer the tempest of rage and hate, crueler than the earthquake? But Paul finds the love of God shed abroad in his heart in the time of trouble. No adverse circumstance, be it what it may-neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creation-is able to separate him from God's love. So Browning says: "Thou, God, art love. I build my faith on that." Faith in the love of God is to him a foundation, not a superstructure; a premise, not a conclusion.

Tell us, O preacher, how we can find our way to this premise, how we can lay deep in our spirits this foundation, how we can have so shed abroad in our hearts the love of God that no untoward circumstance, material or spiritual, can destroy or darken it.

These are not easy problems to solve, not easy questions to answer, not easy sermons to preach. But he who out of his own experience can tell his fellow-men how they can keep the love of God in their hearts, how they can find a divine joy in earthly sorrow, how they can maintain a serene spirit in the midst of the tempest, will give to his congregation the message which congregations are eager to hear.