of democracy-Joseph Mazzini. It is true, also, that there were good Christians, such as William Wilberforce and Lord Shaftesbury, who broke in upon the accepted assumptions of our political and industrial life with the insistent and imperious demand for mercy and justice. And a kindly and Christian human nature was always and everywhere mitigating the remorseless dogmas of philosophers and economists even in the region of trade or politics.

"But the spirit of the age was against them. The philosophy of individualistic competition was the dominant spirit; and the most remarkable feature of the whole situation was that the Christian Church, in the main and in all countries, was to be silent, drugged by the dogmatic assurances of a false philosophy into acquiescence in principles which practically excluded the fundamental Christian maxims from any application to the world of industry and to the relations of nations to one another.

"As we contemplate the history of the world during what may be called the period of industrialism, which is the period also when the idea of the balance of power held sway amongst nations, the silence of the Christian Church-the absence of any corporate protest in favour of the fundamental principles of human fellowship and peace-the acquiescence of the Church in economic selfishness and a narrow patriotism appears as one of the most remarkable instances of moral blindness which his

tory presents to us, at least as remarkable as the earlier blindness of the Church to the sinfulness of persecution and torture as instruments for disseminating or defending the religion of Jesus Christ, or again as remarkable as the blindness of the postReformation Church to the iniquity of slavery. But it is not too late for the Christian Church to recover its true voice. The old dominant notes are now hushed. A great change of mind and ideals has come over the world, both the world of industry and the world of international politics."

4. Jesus was sympathetic. He radiated sympathy as the sun sends forth warmth and light, and the lonely, the sick, the sorrowful, the erring and the oppressed crowded about Him. As acting chaplain at the Third Aviation Center and later on as organizing director of religious work in a large area I visited thousands of men in many hospitals. There were four things they craved above everything else, tenderness, sympathy, an encouraging happy smile and a sense of the presence of a strong, healing Christ. I remember a young aviator who had fallen several hundred feet. Both legs and arms were broken as were several of his ribs. His face was like a piece of raw steak, he could neither see nor speak for several days. I used to sit by his bedside and hold his hand. Later on he came to the communion table for the first time. One day he said to me: "It was not what you said so much as the grip of your hand that helped me. It made me feel that Christ was strong and close by me."

5. Jesus was morally clean and above reproach. He was tempted, terribly tempted, just as all great, sensitive, passionate souls conscious of power are tempted; yet He was without sin. He demanded holines of all who would follow Him and every true man, who came near Him and watched His life, instinctively granted to Him the absolute right to make that claim. Today men are just as ready to acknowledge the moral power of the Risen Christ as they were in the days of His flesh. There is that in the character of Jesus which makes Him the embodiment of the moral ideal for all time and never was the moral ideal in all men's lives so quickened and elevated as it is today. Consequently there was never a time when Jesus should make a stronger appeal to the red-blooded, idealistic youth of the world than to-day. The following extract from the letter of a superior officer regarding one of his lieutenants is convincing evidence of all that we have been saying: "He is physically and morally as clean as a hound's tooth and at the same time there is nothing of the Puritan about him. Although he is much younger than I am, I always feel that he is exercising a peculiar influence over me. Every time I do anything wrong I feel a certain amount of shame when I look into his face. I shall always regard my association with him as being extremely beneficial to me."

6. Jesus saves from sin. I have lived with thousands and thousands of soldiers; I have seen them toil, and fight, and pray; I have seen them sin like

a demon and suffer and love like God. All men have a conscience and they have a moral ideal and they instinctively discern in the face of Christ, the reflection of that conscience and the embodiment of that ideal. In the hour that immediately follows sin, men have the clearest vision of Calvary. In the depth of the soul of man there resides the moral conviction that somehow Jesus was nailed to the Cross because of the sin of the world, and that He was nailed there just because He was holy and because He regarded too deeply the moral integrity of all men to betray His own character. Hence every time a man sins or even thinks sin, he cannot escape the feeling that he has crucified afresh the Son of God and put Him to open shame. The heart backs the conscience and the appeal of the ideal and man turns in loathing from his sin to hunger for a cleaner life. Whether he knows it or not, every man, every day of his life turns from his evil propensities to the eternal goodness just as surely as the morning glory turns toward the rising sun. The tragedy of life is just this: somebody or something is forever getting between him and the Light. He needs Christ and he wants Christ, but he does not know where or how to find Him.

7. Jesus intercedes for man. There are many strong men who are willing, if necessary, to pay the full penalty of the sin they dare not forgive. They have no use for the whimpering cur who tries to beguile God, into mercy apart from genuine repentance. They despise and pity the poor, deluded fool

who sins in order that grace may abound. They instinctively feel that somehow there is involved in the problem of sin an elementary justice and love which if rightly presented both to the sinner and to the Judge makes the Divine mercy available. Men want a great captain who understands them and who will go and intercede with the colonel. There are millions of men today who have not grasped fully the fact that the strong, sympathetic and holy Christ whom they have offended by their disobedience will intercede for them at the throne of God, and because of this uncertainty they turn away and grow hard in their sin.

8. Jesus paid the supreme sacrifice. Men who fall out in "No Man's Land" where nobody cares, want a captain who will go out and search for them in the darkness and the rain and the mud and the danger of death and save them for a new life. It was in doing just this very thing that Jesus gave His life, not for one but for all. In Jesus who went out beyond the city walls into the "No Man's Land" of Golgotha men have a real Captain. He is searching for men today that He might save them from a life of selfishness. The war has vindicated the law of the Cross in the life of the world, and because of this, men realize that they have much more in common with the sacrifice, and death of Christ than they thought. They understand it better and so are prepared to consider His claims upon their lives more thoughtfully.