To Infidelity and Back

by Henry F. Lutz

An Arabic proverb says: "Mankind are four. He who knows not and knows not he knows not; he is a fool, shun him. He who knows not and knows that he knows not; he is simple, teach him. He who knows and knows not that he knows; he is asleep, wake him. And he who knows and knows that he knows; he is wise, follow him." The trouble is to know who "knows not and knows not that he knows not," and who "knows and knows that he knows." For they both speak with absolute assurance that they are right.

Illustrations of how blissfully ignorant of truth we can be are found in the facts that Capt. John Smith sailed up the James River to reach India and that the Indians planted gunpowder.

It is said that on Lookout Mountain there is a building with windows so constructed that if you look out through the one you see a snowstorm; through another, you see it raining; while through a third, the sun is shining. Thus it is that we look at truth through the colored glasses of prejudice and selfish interests, and see what is not.

Probably you have heard about the two Irishmen who get into a fist-fight over a soap sign. One insisted that it read "Ivory Soap," and the other, "It Floats." They saw it from a different angle, and that often accounts for differences of opinion.

How expectant attention can deceive us was illustrated a few years ago when Crystal Palace, London, was on fire. A large throng of people were in distress because they saw a favorite monkey burning on the roof. The monkey was later found safe in an adjoining building. It was an old coat that the imagination of the crowd had transformed into a monkey. Thus it is that people see ghosts, and almost anything they are looking for, through a vivid imagination.

In multitudes of cases people are divided because they use words in a different sense, or misunderstand their significance. Years ago, when I was keeping my father's books, there used to come into the office a bright young man who had more natural ability than education. We were both fond of discussion, and often had informal debates. One day we debated on "Woman suffrage." I opened up on the subject and as I proceeded my opponent got restless to reply. When he took the floor he exploded something as follows: "I am opposed to 'Woman Suf-fer-age' with every drop of vitality within my skin. I will use hand, tongue and purse against 'Woman Suf-fer-age.' In short, I am so bitterly opposed to 'Woman Suf-fer-age' for the all-sufficing reason that I don't want women to suffer." I said, "Amen!" and we were agreed for once. You smile, and yet three-fourths of our differences would vanish if we patiently conferred together long enough to understand each other clearly.

The courts recognize that the best of people are blinded when their own interests are involved, and reject jurymen on this basis. Who expects parents to be perfectly impartial in their judgment when their own children are involved?

The difference of opinion on the slavery question was largely a matter of geographical location, and 90 per cent, of us belong to the political or religious party to which our parents belonged or to the one to which our associations or environment drew us. Had we been born in the Catholic Church most of us would be good, faithful Catholics, as all history demonstrates, and as our own lives in other directions abundantly prove. In a series of articles entitled "Why I Am What I Am," one of the most noted preachers in this country candidly admits that his church relationship is a mere matter of birth. This truth is not very congenial to our boasted independence of thought and investigation, but it is the truth nevertheless. The power of the above-named fetters to hold us in bondage to error is illustrated in all history, sacred and secular. It took Peter about ten years after Pentecost, with special miraculous manifestations, to see that Gentiles were creatures as well as Jews, and that therefore he was commissioned to preach to them also. Paul, the pious, earnest and conscientious, "verily thought he was doing God service" in persecuting the Saviour who had been pointed out as the Christ by many infallible proofs. The Jews crucified the Lord of glory largely through ignorance, due to their being blinded by their traditions, or inherited religious ideas, and therefore Jesus prayed on the cross, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Luther was mighty in throwing off his inherited ideas, and yet he retained so many of them that any church that would to-day practise and teach just as Luther did, would be considered very near to the Roman Catholic Church. Cotton Mather, one of the most enlightened men that ever lived, believed in witches and hung them, and many of the pious and enlightened people of New England shared this belief with him. Good, pious neighbors will give testimony in court, as to what they saw and heard, of the most contradictory character. In nine cases out of ten, we find in the Bible just what we bring to it; and thus the most pious and best educated see the most contradictory doctrines in the same passages of Scripture and fight for them with the greatest tenacity, all in the name of conscience. And the saddest thing about it all is that all these people show by their consecrated lives that they love God and are sincerely trying to serve him. In politics, we see the same pitiable state of affairs. In 1896 about one-half of our good Christian men voted for the free coinage of silver to save their country, and the other half voted for a gold standard for the same reason. It does not require any argument to prove that at least half of these voters were so blinded by ignorance and party bias that they did not see the truth, and possibly all of them were. What a great pity that the good Christian people should be thus divided through party bias and prejudice and go to slaughtering each other, like the enemies of Israel; so that they simply neutralize each other's influence and power, while the enemy of right runs off with the victory and spoil. It is this mixture of the good with the bad in two political parties that enables evil to hold its own; while if all the good were united, through the truth, into one political party, arrayed against all the bad in another political party, they could carry this country for Jesus Christ at every election.

Having considered the causes that lead to differences of opinion, how, in the light of these facts, should we treat those who differ from us?

In the first place, we should deal with them in humility. When we see how the great and good men of all history have been hindered from seeing the plainest and simplest truths by their inherited and preconceived ideas, it should take the conceit out of us and make us very fearful lest we are suffering with the same dread disease. For it is to be noted that hardly any one who suffers from this malady is aware of it. Cromwell's words to Parliament will bear a universal application, when he said, "I beseech you, by the bowels of the Lord, that you conceive it possible that you may be mistaken." Not only is it possible, but it is probable, that we are mistaken in a great many of our ideas. Therefore we should approach others in an humble, teachable spirit. Let us not imagine that we know it all, and treat those who differ from us with self-righteous scorn and contempt.