Imagini ale paginilor
PDF
ePub

The nation which in 1914 forced us to grasp this implement of stark barbarism has been shown that the world will no longer tolerate such crude and cruel stupidity.

Germany now lies prostrate, and utterly bereft of her former splendid prosperity. No more striking lesson has ever been taught in history.

When a nation transgresses and sins against light and knowledge it must suffer. Evil does not pay for the nation any more than it does for the individual. The laws of righteousness will, in the end be vindicated, even though the triumph of might over right may seem victorious.

There is always cause behind every effect, and no change, whether wrought by insurrection or war can be without a meaning in the life of a people. The cause of the German preparedness and declaration of war was patriotism gone mad. An excess of the tribal spirit which is patriotism writ large.

The strength and weakness of the government of a People is simply the strength and weakness of the governed. Their consent to it is their willingness to endure it. This unvarying law brings home responsibility alike in national and individual affairs. The People find their punishment or award to be the consequence of their own acts.

How well the words of James Russell Lowell in his "Ode to France" might apply to the present state of Europe :

Writing of the French Revolution he says:

"As flake by flake, the beetling avalanches

Build up their imminent crags of noiseless snow,
Till some chance thrill the loosened ruin launches
In unwarned havoc on the roofs below.

So grew and gathered through the silent years
The madness of a People wrong by wrong,
There seemed no strength in the dumb toilers' tears,
No strength in suffering, but the past was strong;
The brute despair of trampled centuries
Leaped up with one hoarse yell and snapped the bands,
Groped for its right with horny callous hands,
And stared around for God with bloodshot eyes.”

No nation can permanently hold in subjection the soul of a People, therefore one must sorrow most over those who, in this life sow actions that must bear bitter fruit. The enmity in Central Europe, and its consequences overshadow every other, problem in world politics.

The soul of a People, the creative power of mankind is not separate, but one with the nation which, in itself is but an aggregate of men.

Life, and its first born child, Desire never stands still. The whole Creation works ever at top speed, from the mightiest planet to the tiniest atom. Nothing is ever exactly reproduced by the pulsing evolution of Divinely seeking Life. The impulse is always towards freedom.

An appeal, with every outward appearance of success can be made to the God of Battles, to the God of the biggest battalions whose strategy is so constantly at fault, but in the ultimate the balance is re-adjusted by " that law which executes itself " and which man is powerless to thwart. It teaches the illusion of Shadows.

The operations of finance and commerce are international, yet it is still a question whether two more civilisations shall mingle with the ashes of the past and be submerged, not in a wave of barbarism

but in a fog of stark stupidity and violent reaction.

A nation that determines to hold another in the dust must remain there herself and share a common fate.

We have reached a stage in evolution in which our behaviour to God's creatures committed to our care must be radically changed if we are to continue to progress. It is beginning to dawn upon thoughtful people that something is very wrong with our treatment of the animal kingdom.

Those who are in touch with the great teachers in the world are assured that our callous indifference to animal suffering is greatly retarding our progress in evolution, and is having a very serious effect, in more ways than one, upon humanity in general. Whenever we separate ourselves in consciousness from Infinite Life we become the sport of a multitude of warring elements. We are deliberately drawing upon ourselves a retribution which is expressing itself in malignant disease. "With what measure ye mete it is meted unto you."

There is a lesson to be learned by the vivisector and all who support him. The vivisector hopes that through experiments upon live animals he may discover how to cure certain diseases of the human body, also through innoculation he hopes to immune humanity from certain diseases.

No vivisector pretends that his experiments are for the good of the immortal soul. He frankly concedes that he is a materialist. He is out to cure man made disease, and thereby enable humanity to continue with greater impunity its present ignorant course of living.

Does God send disease?

If we answer "Yes" then it is utterly useless to vivisect an animal or pray for a cure.

If you answer "No" you acknowledge that man brings disease upon himself, and your business is to attack the cause and not the effect, to amend your mode of life and adopt the laws of health in place

of sickness.

Vivisection is an acknowledgment that God does not send us disease. It also states its conviction that no help is to be expected from God, who is either annoyed with us for being diseased, or utterly indifferent to the fact.

Subconsciously we are always aware that the responsibility for sickness lies with us. We would never "catch" anything if there was not within us something akin to the wrong conditions about us. How often we hear it said of a friend's illness " I am not surprised, for a long time he has been so depressed. Inherited diseases are but dead men's legacies which, if we would but realise the truth, we can accept or reject according to our desires and our power of thought building.

[ocr errors]

We really do know that disease comes from a perverted mode of living, from breaking the Divine laws of nature.

Sickness is the result of ignorance, some form of sin, though not necessarily moral sin. Sometimes ill-health is actually enjoyed. At other times it is accepted with resignation, a form of disease in itself. Sometimes a sufferer cries "would I not gladly throw off this sickness if I could?" He does not see yet that he cannot help himself in the condition he is expressing.

What can be the thoughts of The Almighty Ruler of the Universe upon vivisection? Let those who practise it, let those who support it ask themselves this question, if they dare.

No vivisector can have any belief in a God or a hereafter. He may indignantly retort that he believes in both.

Then ask yourself if it is in the very least likely that any believer, outside Bedlam, would so deliberately and certainly jeopardise his future for the sake of keeping alive for a few weeks longer the old coat we discard at the grave.

Would you do it?

Would anyone in their senses, who believed in a future life, so terribly offend the Creator as to torture, for any reason whatsoever, the work of His hand, the form that contains the Divine breath?

Ask yourself, is the human body really so precious that we can afford to risk the punishment we are promised? Is it probable that the Creator will aid you in this attempt to prolong life?

What is life? The breath of God which animates all creation.

Can you really be foolish enough to imagine that God is going to give you an extension of His life through calculated cruelty practised on his helpless creatures?

Surely the very fact that your faith is in the vivisector and not in God will absolutely debar you from any benefit you may hope for.

What vivisection really does is to increase disease a thousand fold.

God is not mocked, and humanity has now reached a stage in evolution when it is being called

« ÎnapoiContinuă »