One may be a very weak brother or a very feeble brute, but each person is, consciously or unconsciously, controlled by the sympathetic spirit of brotherhood or he hunts for spoil with the savage hunger of a beast of prey.
I am not making a new classification; I am merely calling attention to a classification that has come down from the beginning of history. Many years ago I heard a man from New Zealand tell how a cannibal in that country once supported his claim to a piece of land on the ground that the title passed to him when he ate the former owner. I accepted this story as a bit of humour, but it accurately describes an historic form of title. Even among the highly civilized nations governments convey to their subjects or citizens land secured by conquest, the lands being taken from the conquered by the conquerors. A tramp, so the story goes, being ordered out of a nobleman's yard, questioned the owner's title. The latter explained that the title to the land had come down to him in unbroken line from father to son through a period of 700 years, beginning with an ancestor who fought for it. "Let's fight for it again," suggested the tramp.
To show how ancient is the distinction that I am trying to make clear, I remind you that both the Psalmist and Solomon used the word "brutish" in describing certain kinds of men, and one of the minor prophets calls down wrath upon those who build a city with blood. Christ, it will be remembered, denounced the hypocrites who devoured widows' houses and for a pretense made long prayers.
The devouring did not cease with that generation; it is to-day a menace to stable government and to civilization itself. In times of peace we have the profiteer who is guilty of practices which violate all rules of morality even when they do not actually violate statute law. In this "Land of the free and home of the brave," we have been compelled to enact laws to restrain brutishness—not only laws to prevent assault, murder, arson, the white slave traffic, etc., but also laws to restrain men engaged in legitimate business. Pure food laws prevent the adulteration of that which the people eat—men were willing to destroy health and even life in order to add to their profits. Child labour laws have become necessary to keep employers from dwarfing the bodies, minds and souls of the young in their haste to make larger dividends.
Usury laws are necessary to protect the borrowers from the lenders, and, from occasional violations, we can judge what the condition would be if the very respectable business of banking was not strictly regulated by law. We have an anti-trust law intended to prevent the devouring of small industries by large ones—law made necessary by injustice nation-wide in extent.
Congress and the legislatures of the several states are constantly compelled to legislate against so-called "business" enterprises that are being conducted on a brute basis—some are combinations in restraint of trade, others are merely gambling transactions. For a generation the agriculturists, who constitute about one-third of our entire population, have been at the mercy of a comparatively small group of market gamblers who, by betting, force prices up or down for their own pecuniary gain. An anti-option law has been recently enacted after an agitation of nearly thirty years, and also a law regulating the packers. These are only a few illustrations; they could be multiplied without limit. They show how unbrotherly society sometimes is even in this highly favoured nation.
How can Christ's teachings relieve the situation? Easily. He dealt with fundamentals, and gave special attention to the causes of evil. He taught, first, that man should love God—the basis of all religion; second, He taught that man should commune with the Heavenly Father through prayer—the basis of all worship; third, He proclaimed the existence of a future life in which the righteous shall be rewarded and the wicked punished. These three doctrines contribute powerfully to morality, the basis of stable government. In another address I have called attention to the destructive influence exerted by the doctrine of evolution, as applied to man, and have pointed out how Darwinism weakens faith in God, makes a mockery of prayer, undermines belief in immortality, reduces Christ to the stature of a man, lessens the sense of brotherhood and encourages brutishness. It is unnecessary, therefore, to dwell upon this subject in this address.
Christ warned against the sins into which man is sure to fall when the heart is not wholly devoted to the service of God. He shows how evil in the heart will manifest itself in the life. Greed is at the bottom of most of the wrong-doing with which government has to deal. The Bible says "the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil."
It surely is responsible for unspeakable ills. The case is so plain that human reason would seem sufficient to furnish a cure. It ought not to be difficult to agree upon the principles that should govern legitimate accumulations.
There are two propositions that cover the whole ground; one is economic and the other rests upon religion. Both are based upon the laws of God, but one can be enforced by the government, while the other is binding on the conscience alone.