profit mh TLoasi ^ ^torp of » I Sermon bp . STulp 14, 1918 at pilgrim Cturcf), Clebelanb profit ant ILos^sJ a ^torj) of 0UV tlTimeg ? I I i i .Sermon hy Julp 14, 1918 at ^tlsrim Ci]urci). CUbelanb ^ Gift Author -Text — Matthew XVI: 26 — "For what shall a man be profited, if he shall gain the whole world and forfeit his life" (soul). There is a great cartoon by the famous Dutch- man, showing the Emperor of Germany and the King of Belgium standing; and the former, glaring angrijy at the younger man, shows him the wreck and ruin of his little kingdom, and says:, "See what you have lost." But the j^ounger man, unterrified, faces the older and the stronger, and replies: "But not my soul." It is one of the most striking arith- metical figures in all human history. Albert the brave, may well turn and ask William the Robber, "See, what have you lost? For what shall a man, or a nation, or an Emperor be profited if he shall gain the whole world and forfeit his soul." Espe- cially as in this terrific world struggle, in which all humanity is engaged, as the fourth year is drawing to an end, there is beginning to be an accounting, by all prudent men, in Central Europe as well as elsewhere, as to what has come of profit to the great people who once, in the ways of peace, were making a steady conquest of the world, in scholarship, in in- dustry, in commerce, in those impalpable influences, those "imponderables," as Bismarck called them, that constituted the German achievements in our twen- tieth century civilization. What has Germany prof- ited, what has she lost, by drawing the sword against the whole world ? A little more than one hundred ^ears ago, there ex- isted in Central Europe, from the Baltic to the Danube, over three hundred independent States, some of them large, like Prussia, some of them sin- gle towns, like Hanover, free and independent, wnth their own governments, laws, customs and culture. They were of the same blue-eyed, light-haired stock that had existed as free and home-loving people, when the Roman civilization first came in contact with them, and found it necessary to send to the Rhine the finest legions and the sturdiest soldiers, like Germanicus, to keep them back within their own forests, and behind their own rivers. A little over 100 years ago, that greatest of all fighting men the world has known, overran all this region, defeated and scattered the armies, assembled to defend their ancient rights and placed his own henchmen in con- trol of the German States; and levied upon their young men to raise armies, to carry on his nefarious plans in Spain and in Russia. Incidentally Napol- eon combined many of these smaller States, so that when the German people rose and with the help of Great Britain and Austria and Russia, defeated the Grand Army, and sent the Corsican adventurer to dream and despair and die, on the lonely island of St. Helena, the three hundred German States had become only thirty-nine. From the days of Napol- eon's fall, for fifty years, until the close of our Civil War, these thirty-nine German states were in con- stant political turmoil, the people endeavoring to se- cure larger liberty, and the princes endeavoring to hold them back. Two States contested for the lead- ership of the German people, — Austria, under the Hapsburgs, and Prussia, under the HohenzoUerns. In 1849 the German Diet, or General Council of the Germanic people, offered to Frederick Hohenzol- lern of Prussia, the Emperorship of Germany. But Frederick was a gentle prince, without ambition to so difficult a crown, and the matter lapsed. At last in 1866, Austria and Prussia clashed, and in a six weeks' war, Prussia found herself victorious, and at the head of the North German Confederation of some thirty German States, with Prussia the undis- puted leader; and Austria, who had been the leader for 250 years, ceased to belong to the German system. Meanwhile in the troubles of these times, thousands and hundreds of thousands of good Ger- mans, having no interest in these squabbles, left the fatherland, and came to America, to Canada, the United States, to South America, to Mexico, and to the ends of the earth. They brought with them the old German virtues of thrift, love of home, in- dependence, and unwillingness to interfere with the rights and privileges of other peoples. They also brought with them their religion, and wherever they went, they established their churches, — Lutheran, Reformed, Evangelical, Baptist, and several scores of varieties of pietism, all of which flourished ex- ceedingly, especially in the United States, where we have no less than fifty-nine different denominations of German Protestants^ — to say nothing of the hundreds of thousands of German Catho- lics. These Germans, of course, brought with them the traditions of their homeland ; they sang their chil- dren to sleep with the old German luUabys; they told them the stories of the fairies and gnomes, that were told to the little German folk in the Rhineland and in Swabia; they organized their young people into athletic societies called Turn Vereins; they had their sinking societies, and their annual festivals and picnics, and they also gathered in their beer-gardens, to pass away the hours of leisure. But they were loyal to the land of their adoption. When slavery raised its hateful head in the civil war, they saved Missouri from seceding; they held Cincinnati firm for the Union, and in Cleveland the Germans were the first people to speak out for the fight to the fin- ish, against secession. They did more, — they en- listed, and fought and died. Siegel and Rosecrans, Osterhous and Carl Schurz, trained soldiers in Ger- many some of them, gave their military skill to fol- low Lincoln and destroy slavery. Meanwhile, in the old country, there came on a steady development. The most dangerous man in the world in the 3^ear 1870 was Napoleon the Third, usurper of the throne of France, the man who, when we were at war with the south, sent an army to Mexico, and proposed to set up a throne on Ameri- can soil, and crown Maximilian an American Em- peror, owning allegiance to himself. Napoleon "the little," Victor Hugo called him, — the man with the ambitions of his uncle, but without his genius; a shrewd, cunning, crafty despot, who ruled France with the bayonet and the Bastile. In 1870 the Germans and the French came into conflict. The French had no interest in their cor- rupt government, which was tainted with oppres- sion, and corrupted with the same kind of disloyal graft, that brought the armies of Russia so recently to ruin. The brave French soldiers found their bayonets made of cheap, soft Iron, that bent in the charge. They found their powder made of sawdust. Their Generals like Bazaine, in Metz, betrayed them, and their Emperor surrendered his huge army at Sedan, while the French officers broke their own swords against their knees, and the privates threw their guns into the open cisterns and wells, in impo- tent rage at the cowardice of their leaders. France in 1870 was a nation betrayed by its leaders. But Napoleon the bloody, and all his ilk, passed from the history of France forever. After the Commune, — the French Bolsheviki, — of 40 years ago, the Re- public came, and France paid off her terrible ia- demnity of five milliard francs, from the savings of her peasant people, and began the patient toil of a generation, to recover her position among the fami- lies of men, by the steady development of freedom in the State and the Church, and began to make her great place once more in the realm of the spirit^ in music, and art, and science and books. The Germans had at last won their freedom and their unity. The Emperor was crowned in the old Royal palace at Versailles, in 1871, and the French indemnity paid for the war, and Germany was with- out a military rival upon the planet. Then began a wonderful era of civil development. Secure from any foe, Germany built great seaports as at Hamburg and Bremen. From these ports the ships began to sail to all the seven seas. And they did not go emp- ty. German organization at home built great fac- tories, that were organized with the skill of chemist and physicist, and managed by great Masters of busi- ness. And the ships went laden to the ends of the earth, with the product of German patience, and German skill, and German integrity. In advance of these cargoes also, the missionaries of commerce went, neglecting no part of the globe to prepare the way for German trade, to secure raw materials that should fill the holds of German boats with re- turn cargoes, of articles necessary to carry on the manufacturing concerns. The whole German nation was so organized, its manpower was so put to work, that Germans did not need to go away from home to secure a chance to earn a living. Meanwhile the cit- ies were not neglected, and paved streets, and sew- ers, and water supply, and light, and municipal com- fort was made possible, by this intensive organiza- tion. The German city became the model city, in its housing, in its police, in its parks and playhouses. If cheap labor was needed, it was imported from Austria and Russia, for a specific time, and was thereafter returned again, without becoming a part of the German citizenship. So there grew a great nation unified, compacted, homogeneous; taking pride in itself ; speaking the same language ; un- mixed with foreign elements, that were not Ger- man. In time, the finest ships afloat carried the passengers and freight of Americans and British and French. To take passage on a German boat, was to have the best accommodations, at the lowest figure, in the Indian Ocean, on the South American coast, in the China sea. To put up at a German hotel in Palestine or Syria Avas a luxury. This was the great industrial and commercial fact of the latter part of the nineteenth century — this splendid industrial development of Germany. For with it went the cultivation of mine and soil. Iron and sfeel leaped forward in their output, increasing far beyond any other nation. The Germans raised more beet sugar than any other more favored peo- ple. They sought to become independent in the pro- duction of meat and cereals. They made other smaller nations dependent upon them for the neces- sities of their development. Their potash w^as de- manded for the fields of America. Their beetseed for the farmers of Michigan and Utah. Our chem- icals came from their laboratories, our textile indus- tries depended upon their dyes. They laid the world under obligations to them, for the things that made industry profitable. Our children's Christmas- time was made glad by German toys. Back of this industry w^as a splendid fiscal sj'S- tem. The German had never toyed with fiat or in- ferior money. He knew the value of an honest Standard of money. The German vote in the West- ern States,- had defeated Bryan's stupid 16 to 1 propa- ganda in 1896. So back of his commerce was a strong, sound money system, and credit system, based on the latest and best science. Moreover he knew how to tax where the burden could most easily be borne, and when people are prosperous and have a steady wage, and are insured against old age and dis- ability, and are provided with unceasing employ- ment, they are ivilling to pay taxes, and endure any other hardship put upon them by a paternal govern- ment, that protects and cares for them. That is the secret of Germany's strength, to endure the terri- ble ravages of this war, — a contented, prosperous common-people. But these people did not confine their energies and their conquests to the realm of the material. They led the world, apparently, in the things of the spir- it. A wonderful educational system gave ever}^ German child an education. It was defective edu- cation, as we now know, because it was planned to deliberately educate the multitude just enough, and no more, and then educate the picked and chosen people, very highly, to be their Masters. Neverthe- less it was a real, universal education, in which as a result, there was no illiteracy, and a general intelli- gence. Above this, was a vast, secondary Technical and University education, for scholars and the offi- cial class. And so efficient were these universities, that the whole world was drawn to them, to find out the last word of German scholars, in philosophy, in physics, in mathematics, in history, in language. There were certain lines of study that you could not pursue anywhere, except in a German University. So it came to pass that we hesitated to appoint anj^- one to a chair in any of our first-class Universities, of England or America unless they had first stud- ied and secured a degree in Germany. I r^^cali feel- ing disgusted, when President of a western College, that my Faculty resisted the appointment of any one, to a chair in the College, who had merely studied at Harvard or Johns Hopkins. In the realm of phil- osophy, particularly, if you could not speak from actual knowledge of German philosophy, you held your peace in the company of scholars. German scholars also dominated entirely the realm of history. I recall, when graduating from College, a proposition, that I should take up the teaching of history at Oberlin and first of all go to Germany at the expense of the College, under a fel- lowship, to learn something about the subject. No one thought it possible to know anything about his- tory, without consulting the German scholars, in their own class rooms. I shudder now, when I think how narrowly I escaped by going into the Ministry. When the war broke out, the Universities of Ger- many were crowded with Foreign students. — the majority from America. Moreover in the study of Music, in the study of Art, Germany was the shrine. The Dresden Gallery contains the greatest painting ever put on canvass," Raphael's Sistine Madonna. The musicians of Germany have easily led the world. In 1914 thousands of good people were spending their money in Germany — school teachers on their vacations; business men studying business methods; political leaders going to the sources of political thought ; merchants, specialists, experts, thousands, found themselves stranded in the Empire. The rep- utation of Germany was at its height. She had every thing a nation could wish, in the way of pres-^ tige. The great powers feared her, and the last thing they would think of doing was to start a quar- rel with Germany. She could have gone on indefi- nitely absorbing the best things of this planet. For in these years from 1870 to 1914 she had secured colonies all over the earth ; in North and South America alone, the Monroe doctrine had kept her from colonizing, but in Africa she had gained, in the South and in the East and in the Northwest, valuable territories, many times larger than the en- tire area of Germany in Europe. Here was virgin soil for the cultivation of all the raw material she needed. Not only there, but on the mainland of China, she had established a fortress, with a colony back of it, to be the nucleus of holdings and com- merce, in China, as England had at Hong Kong, and France in Tonquin, and the United States at Ma- nila. In the Pacific she had valuable islands, sold her by Spain. In Samoa, she shared with us, and with the British. In New Guinea, the largest island in the world, she had a tropical territory twice as large as the State of Ohio. Moreover just before the war broke out, according to the revelations of Prince Lichnowski, the German Ambassador to Lon- don, Great Britain had agreed to give her a free hand in the Turkish Empire, to develop her railroad to the Persian Gulf, from Constantinople, and to co- operate with her in policing the difficult regions of Asia. She had everything coming her way — with the rest of the world willing to give her more and more opportunity, as she appeared to be helping on the causes of civilization. Surely we all believed that if Germany could enter Turkey fully, as she had partially, she might cleanse that Augean stable of the world, and bring peace and happiness to a multitude of oppressed people. But some grim Satan had taken the Kaiser up to the top of the mountain and showed him the king- doms of the world, and tempted him, and he yielded. He wanted all the earth. He was not content with the portion that had been secured, and which was being steadily enlarged, under the evolution of peace. Moreover he was coming to be a man past middle life. There were only about fifteen more 5Aears to his reign. And he had not yet acquired the title of military conqueror. He had achieved victories of peace, — that is, his nation had, and he had shared the acclaim of all the earth, for those victories; but his fathers had been soldiers, and they had military victories emblazoned on their records, both his father, the beloved "Unser Fritz," and his grandfather, the victor of Sadowa and Sedan. And when that temp- tation came, and the Satanic insanity possessed him, the assassination in Bosnia gave him the opportunity. Making his people believe that they were being at- tacked, he let loose the dogs of war, and the whole world is shedding its blood as a consequence. Four years of it, — and what has that madman gained for his people? The prosperity piled up by years of faithful toil on the part of the industrious German people, has been swallowed up in the flames of war. Besides that, upon the backs of future generations of the German people, has been fastened a huge debt, the mere in- terest charges for which, w^ill exhaust the entire rev- enue to be received by taxation for a century to come. But to meet that debt, and the interest charges, there will be several millions less of effective man power; the taxpayers are dead men; and who can measure the destruction of brain power! ]\Iore- over Germany, w^hich had prospered beyond all rec- ords, because of her trade, has lost all her custo- mers, and there is no disposition on their part, and will not be for years to come, any disposition, to re- sume that trade. From that point of view the war, especially the war upon Britain and America, her best customers, was the act of a madman. For not only has she kindled the fires of deep resentment on the part of her enemies, but she has compelled them to provide for themselves the goods she formerly furnished. The little children of five continents will no longer play wath German toys. The pharmacists of the larger part of the world will no longer look to Germany for their essential drugs. The rest of the world is making its own dye-stuffs, and the tropical islands are raising the sui^ar which Germany formerly pro- vided. The people who in other days traveled for business and for pleasure in the floating palaces of the North German Lloyd and the Hamburg Ameri- can steamers, will hereafter sail on American boats to all the ends of the e^arth. And ever}' step that Germany has taken has been a blunder. It thought to subdue Belgium ; but Bel- gium, after four years, is as rebellious as ever; for It was a great man who once said, "you can do every- thing with a bayonet except sit on it." It shot Edith Cavell to put down the Belgian spirit, and Edith Cavell joined Joan of Arc among the immortal women. It proposed to starve Britain by the ruth- less submarine, but it only aroused America to wrest away the command of the sea, by an enormous navy and a still more huge merchant marine. Every in- sult it sent out has been sharpened and poisoned and sent back into its own bosom, with redoubled venom. It tried to conquer Russia by deceit, and it only opened a Pandora's box of evil spirits, that will re- turn to torture its autocracy, and strip it finally of all power. It would make its way to the Nile and the Indus, by its cultivation of the unspeakable vil- lainies of the Turk, but it only doomed the Turk to extinction. It united itself with Austria to push to the Aegean Sea; but it only brought upon Austria misery upon misery, and probably dissolution. It proposed to plunder the world, to enrich itself, — and its children cry for bread, in the streets of Berlin and Munich. And from the seats of the mighty, in the realm of 14 the spirit, German}- has been cast down from her throne. The wreath of laurel and the wreath of bay have been torn from her brow. No man will hereafter go to Germany for his philosophy ; for her scholars have made themselves contemptible by their justification of injustice. Her Universities will be deserted by the youth of the whole civilized world, for they have involved themselves in her barbaric cruelties. And even her place of leadership in music and art will pass to others; for who can be musical in a land that has been given over to the discords of bandits! The deepest wound that Germany has in- flicted upon herself is the moral w^ound. Men thought her free of spirit, wedded to truth and honor, lov- ing justice and mercy, seeking with passion the veri- ties that set men free. They have found her bereft of honor, craven in spirit, torturing innocent women and helpless children, with no regard for truth on her own confession, putting her trust in lies, and showing no mercy even to the victims of war in Hospitals and Hospital ships. They esteemed her as given to religion, and to those high ideals that v/cre brought into the w^orld by our Saviour; but they hnd her delighting in sending her bombs into sanctuaries, and desecrating the shrines dedicated to the Christ. The old Prophet once asked, "Is there no balm in Gilead ; is there no physician there?" He asked it hopelessly ; for the w^ound of his people was incur- able and he cried out. "O that my head were waters and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for my people!" Surely men and women mHo have loved Germany for all she was, 15 might well quote the old prophet; for there ;s no balm in Gilead that will heal her wound. "What shall a nation be profited, if it shall gain the whole world, and lose its soul?" Still more, what shall it be profited if it fail to gain the world and also loses its soul? The lesson is not only for Germany. It is a les- son for humanity for all time. The law of the world is the law of Jesus, the law of the Golden Rule. That wins. That brings happiness. To defy it — to trample upon it, is utter madness. "Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap." LIBRftRY OF CONGRESS ■M 021 547 722 8 ^