boycotted by a single customer. Let all this go on and let us who are really Christian go still further and go out of our way to show sympathy and kindliness toward these people. We ought to do this all the more easily, since the government at Washington has publicly expressed its satisfaction that among all these thousands of Germans only a mere handful-about one hundred and forty in the whole nation-have been interned for doubtful conduct or for practicing machinations against this government. And some of these were spies who had been sent here by Germany long before America entered the war.

The fact that there are several millions of German Americans in this country also affords a splendid opportunity for the practice of Christian helpfulness. They are American citizens and very good ones on the whole. They are splendidly loyal at this time. They have volunteered with others. They will let themselves be drafted without protest. But if they evince sadness in their hearts over America being dragged into the war, let us be charitable toward them. They are in a position of great hardship. Thousands of them have relatives in the German army, some even have brothers. It is not easy to go forth, perhaps to shoot one's own brother or uncle. One of these men remarked recently that he was a good American and should do his duty as an American, but that he may be called upon to kill his own

brother. Such men deserve our most kindly sympathy and our pity. They are torn between conflicting emotions and their loyalty to America is praiseworthy beyond characterization under the circumstances and all Christians should recognize it.

Of one other thing I should like to speak here. There is now the greatest opportunity the Christian has had since the Civil War to show his faith in prayer. I find, from a very large correspondence, that there are many Christians who believe the United States is fighting the Lord's battle, is fighting to save the world to real Christianity, and they can pray for victory for American arms. I find, on the other hand, a great number whose idea of God and whose consciences will not let them ask God's blessing on the arms of the nation, nor beseech him to grant victory to our troops. Each Christian will have to decide these things for himself. But there are some things on which all Christians can unite in fervid and unceasing prayer at this time. Some of these have been set forth in the letter to the churches issued by The Federal Council of Churches at its recent meeting in Washington; some have received emphasis in the President's letter to the Russians; some I will suggest at this time. But for all these things the Christian should pray unceasingly:

1. That this war may issue in some new international political order that shall make wars un

necessary and impossible forever. The President of the United States has splendidly put this object of prayer in the following words:

"And then the free peoples of the world must draw together in some common covenant, some genuine and practical co-operation that will in effect combine their force to secure peace and justice in the dealings of nations with one another. The brotherhood of mankind must no longer be a fair but empty phrase; it must be given a structure of force and reality. The nations must realize their common life and effect a workable partnership to secure that life against the aggressions of autocratic and self-pleasing power."

2. That the world may be "made safe for democracy" by this war. Only in the achievement of some sort of League of Nations guaranteeing perpetual peace and of world-wide democracy can man ever be reconciled to the terrible price this war is costing the world. Was not Dr. William S. Rainsford right when he recently said: "The gospel of Jesus Christ and democracy go together, for the gospel is that all men are God's children and all men are brothers." If all men are children of God and brothers then no one man has the right to say how all men shall live.

3. That we keep our own hearts clear of all arrogance and selfishness and that our nation "seek no material profit or aggrandizement of any kind; that she seek no advantage or selfish object of her

own, but fight for the liberation of peoples everywhere from the aggressions of autocratic force"; that our own nation may be kept true to its professed aims of justice, liberty and brotherhood.

4. That we "testify to our fellow-Christians in every land, most of all to those from whom we are estranged, our consciousness of unbroken unity in Christ."

5. That "our Christian institutions and activities may be maintained unimpaired, that the soul of our nation may be nourished and renewed through the worship and service of almighty God."

6. That "men everywhere may rise to new obedience to the will of our Father God, who, in Christ, has given himself in supreme self-sacrifice for the redemption of the world, and who invites us to share with him his ministry of reconciliation."

7. That men and nations may learn out of the travail of this war the futility of force to accomplish lasting good, and that self-seeking ends only in disaster, that the nation which seeks only its own life shall lose it, that "not by might but by my spirit" is true national good to be achieved."

T

VII

HERE are some who are saying that this is no time to be talking of the world after the war; all our energies should now be applied to winning this war. After it has been won, then we will turn our thoughts to the new humanity, the new interpretation and application of Christianity, the new political and international order.

There could be no greater mistake than this. It is when the disaster is upon the world that the prophets should be preaching the new era. We had an illuminating instance of this last summer. It was when infantile paralysis was working its cruel havoc among our children that the doctors and the scientists set themselves to studying methods of safeguarding the country from its recurrence in this present summer. It is now while the war is upon us that every Christian should be devoting himself to the endeavor to find other ways of settling international disputes than by war, and should be asking whether some way can not be found of extending the principles of Christianity to the nations, whether the brotherhood of man taught by Jesus and all the apostles is not a possibility, whether the spirit of Chris