They could not find the way to be at once about their own business and about their Father's business. What is it that can restore the sense of unity to such divided lives? It is the spirit of service. To be able to look up out of the dust and uncleanness of the business world and honestly say, "I am here as one that serveth; I am not being ministered unto, but I am ministering; I accept my business responsibilities and my business limitations as indicating the place in this world where I am wanted, and the work in this world which I am called to do," that is what gives to many an obscure and tempted life its tranquillity, significance, and dignity. The soldier in the thick of the battle does not expect to know the whole plan of the campaign, nor has he enlisted for any dainty service. He is set in his own place, perhaps alone on the skirmish line, perhaps in the solid front of the main body, perhaps, like the centurion of the gospel, as a man of authority having soldiers under him, but in any case with the movement of the whole army depending at one point on him. When he is thus in the midst of active warfare he is just where a trained soldier desires to be, and he gives his life to his work with a high and solemn joy.

Is such a figure of speech merely a preposterous idealization of the scramble and greed of the world of industry? On the contrary, it is precisely such a campaign of human ingenuity and skill, enlisted to subdue and utilize the forces of nature, which

industrial life in reality represents; and it is in such a field of service that the good soldier of Jesus Christ finds his opportunity. Base stratagems and barbarous methods still abound in the campaign of industrial war and have their inevitable consequences in stirring disloyalty and revolution in the ranks; but these abuses of industrial opportunity only serve to indicate what the task of the follower of Jesus must be. The Christian man in the business world is not bewildered by its confusion or overcome by its temptations. He is held to his post by the spirit of service. He looks at business affairs from above, and perceives beneath their strenuous competitions the signs of a possible brotherhood of industrial peace. He approaches industrial problems from within, convinced that any economic millennium must be reached, first of all, through the consecrated initiative of competent individuals. Thus, in the world of business he sees one of the most effective agencies for perpetuating the teaching of Jesus, a place where integrity, fidelity, patience, thrift and consistency have immediate justification and large utility. He is alert for every sign of a more just organization of industry, but he is equally alert to make the most of those moral opportunities which are already in his hands. He views the economic world with hope and his fellow-men with faith, because he approaches both in the spirit of love.

Is such a habit of mind extremely rare in in

dustrial life? Have the kingdoms of this world been so persuasively presented by the devil to this generation that business men have as with one consent fallen down and worshipped him? On the contrary, behind the insatiable and unscrupulous commercialism which disfigures the face of modern industry there is a great mass of faithful life doing the real work of the world with unobserved and untempted devotion. The business world is like a building whose front is defaced by such conspicuously bad work that the whole structure seems to totter. Fortunately, however, the columns which support the whole are undisturbed. There may be grave reasons for shame that the building is not more consistent or beautiful, but there is no reason to believe that it will fall. The pillars of modern industrial life are securely set in the moral stability of the vast majority of business lives. Millions of such persons, as they scrupulously discharge their business obligations, are meeting the demand of Jesus, "Whosoever would be first among you shall be your servant";1 and as they stoop to their obscure duties are obedient to his example, "If I then, the Lord and the Master, have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one another's feet." The Christian problem of the industrial world is to multiply lives like these. If any revolution in the industrial order is to overthrow the existing economic system, the new order must 2 John xiii. 14.

2

1 Matt. xx. 27.

depend for its permanence on the principles of the teaching of Jesus; but if the principles of the teaching of Jesus should come to control the existing economic system, a revolution in the industrial order would seem to be unnecessary.

CHAPTER VII

THE CORRELATION OF THE SOCIAL QUESTIONS

Because I live, ye shall live also.

We have considered several of the modern social questions under the form of concentric circles environing the individual life. The radius of personal inquiry is prolonged until it reaches, first the problem of the family, then that of wealth and poverty, and finally that of the industrial order; and the area of each problem in succession is seen to be an essential part of a more comprehensive problem with larger circumference and content. This figure of speech, however, though convenient for consecutive chapters and entirely justified in point of fact, gives by no means an adequate picture of the real relationship among the various social questions. It is quite true that the problem of the family expands as one considers it until it is seen to be in large part a question of the uses of wealth or the effects of poverty; it is true again that wealth and poverty cannot be dealt with as independent or fixed conditions, but must be interpreted in terms of economic organization, progress, and reform; yet it is not less true that these outer circles of social relations change under our hands