PEACE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 193, 4 January 1913, Page 6

PEACE.

SOME STRIKING THOUGHTS. On the Sunday before Christmas the vicar of St. Mary's (Rev. A. H. Col vile) preached a sermon on the text, '"Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God," and expressed some thoughts which were as striking as they were convincing. He saicl:—■ What is the peace-loving temper t-lmt enables a man to become a peace-maker * It is not at all the same tiling as the peace-at-any-price disposition that is so often the outcome of mere slackness and flabbiness, the product of a false sentimental humanitarkuiism, which assumes that pain and hardship are the greatest evils in the world, and that we should accept any humiliations rather than incur these uncomfortable things for ourselves or Dring them on others. Now, I am

NO APOLOGIST FOR WAR. It is a horrible thing even at its best. We who sit at home and read the war i.;bles in the newspapers can gain but a faint conception of what it actually means. All sincere Christians will pray this Christmas-time that "wars throughout the world may cease," and that a way may be found for bringing about; a just, honorable and lasting, peace in Europe at the present time. For when one, so to speak, takes war to bits, and thinks what it is and what it involves, of the fierce and brutal passions that it stimulates, of the hatred which it inspires, of the deadly ingenuity about the means of killing and maiming which it promotes, of the multitude of innocent and helpless people who have to suffer' for it- when one-lakes it a)), to bits, and looks at each piece separately without the false glamoi; of romance that, success so often casts over the general idea; when one strips it of the fine phrases that cling about it, and remembers how often in the past men have been butchered like sheep and their homes made desolate for the whim of .sqipo tyrant, or the greed of some noble, or .the personal ambition of some great general, it is hard to usderetand how suqh a tiling so apparently inconsistent with the teaching of Christ should have been tolerated by Christians; and not only tolerated, but even glorified by some who seem to love to stir up strife between nation and nation, who have sought to turn the blessing Christ pr«,nounced upon the peacemakers into this, "Blessed are the war-makers, for they shall be called patriotic."

A FALSE IDEA. But while we pray for peace, and work for peace as much as it is in our power its do so, I believe that the peace-at-any-price disposition is the last thing in the world that will help to bring it about. To begin with, the trim peacemaker will look facts in the face—the facts of history and the facts of human character, and not try. like the ostrich, to hide his head in the - sands of a false sentiment. He will understand that there may be greater evils in the world than war, that there are cases in which it may be the lesser of two evils, that it is better to fight bravely for health and home and liberty than to tamely submit to injustice and cruelty and wrong. Whs, for example, woukl say that the Balkan peoples were not justified, after long years of oppression, iu their vigorous and desperate efforts for liberty and relief? THINGS WE SHOULD DEPEND.

There arc things so great and precious, so intimately bound up with our strongest and 711031 sacred feelings—e.g., t.he integrity of out homes, the liberty of our consciences, the l«onor of our women, the safety of our children —that in the last resort they must l>e defended by forcfc of arms. There is nothing in the teaching of the Prince of Peace that urges us to give iip our most cherished find sacred beliefs and sit down quietly while they are taken from us. Xay, there is much that would urge us to do the opposite. He Himself, as lie said, came Upon earUi to bring not peace but a sword. It was the sword of the spirit (and even a. modern engine of war may baconic in a good cause the "sword of tiie spirit"), which all true men must wield in defence of 'their faith and the hope that is in them. We who love pwice must recognise ihat. We must count no sacrifice too hard to be made, no hardship too great t» be pirtlured if we would preserve all that is best <in life for ourselves and those dear to us. The ''peoce-at-any-price" individual ig nores this. He is too oftt>n

A SELF-DECE-IVIXO EGOTIST. He does not want personally to put himself to any inconvenience or lo make any ,sacrifice, and therefore he throws the eJoak of hiuiiaititananism over the rags of his own egotism. He is ''in advance of his age" only because he runs away from present facts, but Unreal peaee-lorer faces them, and because he lovos liis own country which he has seen and is ready himseff to make sacrifices for that country, so he tawins to ffain an intelligent understanding of the feedings. hope* and aims of people who live in countries that he has not s< en. To raidod-slaiHl all is at lc«*t to forgive nmcli. and to know how to forgive is to beeonfe "a child of Ood," as real a maker of peace as it is possible to become or this earth.