A Sermon by Henry George.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 386, 20 July 1889, Page 4

A Sermon by Henry George.

'•THY KINGDOM COME." On" Sunday night, May 12, Mr Henry George delivered a sermon in the Oily Hall, Glas govv, on " Thy Kingdom Come." The hal was ; crowded to suffocation long before the a dvertised hour. Rev. Mr Cruickshanks occup'ed the chair. Mr Henry George, received with loud cheers, said : . We have become accustomed to think that God's kingdom is not intended for this world, that'virtually this is the devil's world, and that God's kingdom is some other sphere to which He is to take- good pcoplo when they die, just as it is that when good Americans die they go to Palis. (Laughter.) If that be so, what is the us«e of pinying for the advent of His Kingdom ? Is God the Christain's God, the Almighty and loving Father of whom Ohrift told ? Is He such a monster asTa God of that kind would be - a God who in this world ?ee-> sufferings and miseries, sees high faculties aborted, lives stunted, innocence turned into vice and crime, and heartstrings strained and broken, and yot who, having it in His power will not bring that Kingdom ? Is he some selfwilled despot whom we must coax? 1 say it with je\ erence, the Almighty could not bring that kingdom by His own efforts. What is the kingdom ot God — the kingdom which we arc to-night to pray for V It is in doing God's -will — not by automata, not by animals who were compelled, but by intelligent beings made in His Image, clothed with free will, knowing good from evil.

"Anyhow it's all Right." Oar laws say that this Gcd's earth is net here for use of all His chilrhen, bub only for the use of a piivileged few. There was a little dialogue published in the United States some time ago Possibly you may have seen it. It is between a boy and his father, who go to a brick-yaid. The boy looks at the men malting bricks, and he asks who those dirty men are, why they are making up the clay, and what they are doing it for ? He learns, and then he asks about the owner of the brick-yard. "He don't make any bricks ; he gets his income from letting tbeee other men make bricks." (Laughter.) Then he asks about ■nhab title there is to those bricks, the men having made it, and then he wants to know how the m.in who owns the brick-yard gets his title to the brick-yard — whether he made it? "No, he didn't make it. God made it." Was it God made it for him ? Whereat his father tells him that he must not ask such questions as f ;hat— (laughter) — but that, anyhow, it's all right — (laughter) — and it is all in accoi dance with Gcd's law. Then the boy — who, oi course, was a Sundaypchool boy and had been to church — goes oil" mumbling to himself that God so loved the vroild that Pie jravc Ri« only begotten Son to die for mankind, but that God so loved the ov. ner of this brick-yard that he cave him nob merely His only begotten Son, bub the brick-yard too. (Laughter.) That story has a blasphemous sound. I don't like to speak lightly of sacred subjects, but nevertheless there is a deep meaning in that, and it is well sometimes that we should be fairly shocked into thinking.

WOKbJ: THAN AtHISISM". Betber is the atheist who says theie is no God than the professed Christian who, prating: of the goodness and Fatherhood ot (Jod, tell us in words, as some do, that millions and millions of human creatures are being brought into the woi Id daily by the creative fiat, and no place in this world provided for them. (Applause.) Aye, tell us that by the laws of God the poor aie created in order that the lich may have the unctuous satisfaction of dealing out chority to them — (laughter) — tell us that a fctate of things like that which exists in this city of Glasgow as in ot her great cities on both sides of the Atlantic, where little children are dying every day, dying* by hundieds and by thousands because having come into this world — these children of God, coming heie with His fiat, by His decree, find chat there is not space on the earth sufficient for them to live, and driven out of j life and out of the world because they cani not get loom enough, cannot getairenough, cannot get sustenance enough. I belie\ em no such God. ( Applau&e. ) Ti I did, though I might bend before him in fear, I would hate Him in my heart. (Hear, hear.) Not room enough for the little children heie ! Look around at any country in the civilised is there not room enough and to spare ? >> r ot food enough ? Look at the unemployed labour, look at the idle acies, look thiough eveiy country and see the natural opportunities going to waste. (Applause,) That Christianity that puts on a Creator the evil, the injustice, the RiuTeiing, the degradation that are due to a man's injustice is far worse than atbei&m. That is blasphemy, and if there be a siu against the Holy Ghost, that is the unpardonable tin. "Gheusthic, day our daily bread."

A KiMtDcm oi Equality. If Adam when he gob out of Eden had commenced to pray, and prayed till this time, he would have got nothing to eat unless he worked. Yet iood is God's bounty. He doe? nob bring the meat all cooked, vegetables all prepared, nor lay the plates and spread the cloth. Whab lie gives are the opportunities of producing these things by labour. It i& written in Holy Wrib and graven in cverv fact of nature that by labour we shall bring torbh these things. Yet in all civilised counbnes whab do we? Men, as they say in California, have coralled fche?e bounties. Thus it comes that all over the eh ilised world the labouring class is the poor class, and that men who do no labour, who pride themselves in saying thab , neither they nor their grand tabhers ever did an honest day's woik, enjoy and revel in the superabundance of the things that labour brings forth. It is impossible to imagine heaven treated as we now treat this? earth without seeing that no matter how balubrious its air, how bright its light, I how magnificent its vegetative growth, there would bo poverty, suffering, and division if heaven wore parcelled oub as we have parcolled out this earth. No one could think of the Kingdom ior which he prays without the feeling that it must be a kingdom of justice, equality — nob necessarily equality in condition, bub of equality in opportunity. No one could think of it without seeing that the very kingdom of God might be brought on this earth if men would bub seek to do jusbice, would but acknowledge bhe essential principle of Christianity — thab of doing to others as ' we u ould have others do to us — and of recognising that we are all here equally bhe children of one Father, and equally entitled to share Kis bounty — to live our lives, develop our faculties, and apply our labour to the raw materials that He has provided.

A Pittsburgh girl named Katherino is very expert at predicting the weather. . Her friends call her Prognosti Kate. Ono of the worst of nuisances is The chap who's up at earljr dawn Making the lawn-mower ziziziziz, Rasping tho whiskers off the lawn. > - The office-seeker has been weighed in the balance and found wanting— anything' he can get. It is botter to bo born handsome than wise. At, all events, it is wiio to be bom hand some •■ '