Part 4

When we consider the Diabolus character--his strength and opportunity, whereby he visits his vengeance upon a weak, susceptible race, we can readily understand that his make-up would be far from complete without a continuous outflow of slander. But his courage and audacity stand out in glaring relief when we find him an Accuser. It does not require large intelligence or bravery to be a slanderer--only baseness of character--but to be an accuser, face to face with false charges, especially in the presence of One who has power over all things, reveals an impudent bravery that dazes the judgment.

When questioned of God about his presence among devout spirits--as they were assembled for worship--he answered in the manner of a guilty boy: "Just going to and fro in the earth." Peter tells us that his mission of going to and fro is of seeking and devouring. He is then reminded of Job's character--how that this saint is perfect and just; Satan's blighting influence has not been able to touch and overthrow the aged Job. In his shrewd rejoinder Satan accuses God of two sins: _partiality and falsehood_.

Translated into its literal meaning, the language would be about as follows: "I deny that Job is perfect; but for the protection you have thrown around him he would be as other men. His pretended piety is hypocrisy; he serves you because you have blest him with abundance; he has not fallen into sin because you have hedged him about. If you treated Job as you treat others, his holiness would soon be about as genuine as mine."

Satan accuses God of protecting His servant and blessing him in material things in a special and partial manner, viz: "a respecter of persons." But the fiercest accusation is hidden in his reply to God's question, also put in the form of a question, and finished by an emphatic declaration: Job is not the man God said he was; "but put forth Thine hand and touch all that he hath, and he will curse Thee to Thy face." A being who can stand before the Lord God, of whom the hosts of heaven sing and shout--he, himself, once among the number--saying: "Holy, Holy, Holy," and accuse Him of being guilty of partiality and falsehood--what may _we_ expect from him? The Word says he accuses the saints day and night.

Observe that he accuses the _saints_, those who are striving in righteousness. The man who lies, cheats in business, accumulates a fortune, and lives all the vices without apology is not an object of malicious accusation. The scandals in select circles cause only a ripple, even though the offenses occupy much space of the associated press. The principles of such affairs are often staged as heroes and heroines for the entertainment of a morbid public taste. Satan accuses the saints; the presumption is shouted from the housetops: "There is none that doeth good, no not one."

The saints--every good man and woman--must at some time face charges against their moral or religious character. This hellish machination goes on day and night. It is reasonable to conclude that much of the unrest, depression, and backslidings among the people of God may be traced to this cause; innocent men and women have not only cast away their hope through rumoured accusations, but have been driven to desperation and suicide.

The reader must keep in mind the suggestion made in a former chapter: that while Satan has the power by his presence of himself, or his minions, to create an atmosphere, unfathomable, impenetrable, yet surcharged with horror and dread; but his activities are seldom apart from human instrumentalities. Just as he is the arch slanderer, through the word of mouth, so is he the accuser, both of God and saints, through human personalities under his control.

A flood sweeps away, or lightning destroys a man's possessions; he looks up, curses and accuses God of cruelty and injustice. Death enters the home; the mourners charge God falsely. His accusations are confined to no particular method; the one most suited to the case is used, whether self-condemnation or from another. Self-reproach, through memory and meditation, is a most powerful agency in carrying on this work. Once we begin to think on our ways--seeking to turn our steps unto the testimony of God--we face a life of sins and blunders mountain high and unsurmountable. But when faith takes wings and lifts the agonizing soul "out of the mire and clay," an everlasting reminder of the _past_ clings to us, often robbing us of peace and joy. How many Christians have grown weary and given up because of memories blackened by consequences of past sins--sins which God said, if we confess and forsake, He would "remember them against us no more forever."

If the truth, which can never be revealed until the Judgment Day, could be known! Our asylums are swarming with unfortunates who have lost mental balance because of remorse and condemnation, resulting from an accusing memory. Wherever Satan is unable to lure the saints into actual transgression their life and usefulness are often destroyed by tormenting spirits accusing them day and night The Book holds out no deliverance from this scourge until the Accuser is forever cast down by the wrath of God at the final shifting of the scene.

XIII

SATAN A SPY

"And the Lord said unto Satan, Whence comest thou? Then Satan answered the Lord, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it."--_Job i. 7._

The spy is the most dangerous man in the army; more is he to be feared than the genius of a Napoleon or a Lee. The sphere in which he operates has no duplicate in military activities; his bravery, boldness, and daring are unexcelled. Whether he be called from the ranks, or from among the commissioned officers, his counsel and suggestions get a hearing in the highest commandery of the army.

The movements of a spy are unknown even to his own corps, much less to the enemy. After receiving authority for such a perilous undertaking he is a free lance, going and coming at will. Not only does he go beyond the enemy's line, but mingles freely with them in the camp. There is nothing in his appearance to indicate who or what he is. To-day he is a civilian peddling fruits among the soldiers, or innocently driving a yoke of steers along the street or country road; to-morrow he is within the camp, dressed in their gay uniform, familiar with passwords and countersigns. Then he appears as a decrepit old woman, seeking a son who "run away to jine the solgers." In a few hours he is quietly resting or joking with the boys of his own regiment.

When a spy is captured all military courtesies are set aside; he is not even allowed the honour of a court-martial; but without trial he is executed at once.

It is of special interest, in view of the application to our subject, to notice the particular business of a spy. Just as his movements are unknown, so is his mission unknown. He hurries to and fro, gathering up such bits of information here and there as he deems important for the cause he represents. If he belongs to the Federal forces he appears clothed in the "butternut gray"; then by tactics of bravery and nerve he enters the Confederate gray lines. The slightest blunder is certain death. He takes a mental inventory of the whole situation, but in such a way as to attract the attention of no one. The strength of the fortifications, the size and number of the batteries, the commissary department, and the chances and probabilities of reinforcements. In a moment, under the cover of night, he fades out into the darkness and is gone. The budget of information is placed at the earliest possible moment into the war councils of his own army.

Satan plays the rôle of a crafty spy; he has access, by some mysterious power, to the heart life of men. At no point of the game for immortal trophies is he so dangerous as when he can take advantage because of his secret knowledge of men's weaknesses and sins. Only a vicious degenerate can be tempted into all the crimes known to the docket of the Bible; few beings on this planet but are fortified at some point of character. They may be weak in many ways--but early training or environment have helped them to become strong in some particulars.

The spy seeks to know when and where a blow may be struck in the enemy's lines, at a place of least resistance. The soul battles are exactly the same; we have no special battles where we are strong; things that might overcome another will mean nothing to us. Our battles are ever fought around the points of weak fortification; the enemy rarely, if ever, has the pleasure of shouting over our downfall from the best that is in us.

The victories of athletic games--the pugilistic bouts in the sporting arena, the mortal duel with rapiers, the battle-fields where thousands fell--have been lost and won by the application of this principle. The general with his field-glass sees a weakening in the enemy's line and orders a charge; the duelist observes a shortening of breath or an awkward movement and seizes the opportunity. It is the weak link in the chain of life that breaks; sins of the lower nature--sensuality--might not appeal to some who fall an easy victim to pride, ambition, or covetousness; others who are liberal, honest to the cent, unassuming, are helpless when tempted in the realm of lower passions. We are at an incalculable disadvantage when our enemy is familiar with our vulnerable points.

So long as the heart is unregenerated and unpurified by the cleansing power of the Holy Ghost, Satan has access to every nook and corner of our heart life. He enters and discovers every vulnerable and invulnerable section of the soul's fortification. The tempted and fallen are often unable to tell how it was done. "Why did you go there?" or, "Why did you do it?" Oh, so many, many times do we hear the answer: "I do not know." A friend once showed me a little iron safe in which he kept his valuable papers. This safe had a very ingenious lock; the combinations were such, and the mechanism so wonderful, that it was capable of _three hundred thousand combinations_.

Why and how are sane men and women overcome? They were met at a certain place, under peculiar circumstances; met by several--a word, a smile, an argument, a pressure of the hand. How was it done? They do not know. Somehow the attack came in a way which rendered them helpless to resist. One effort failed--a dozen failed; but as often as it failed the Expert changed the _combination_, until the door yielded, and an entrance into the citadel of Mansoul was effected. _Three hundred thousand combinations._

The spy has information from within; and, therefore, the most dangerous man in the army. Satan, by his supernatural powers directing his practice and experience for several millenniums, is a crafty, sagacious spy, acquainted with all the weaknesses and emotions of the human heart. Who is equal to such an enemy? Contending alone, _no one_ on this sin-burdened footstool.

XIV

THE QUACK DOCTOR

"Having the form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away."--_2 Timothy iii. 5._

We do not agree with some late views of the nature of sin--that it is a physical and mental disorder: the resultant of heredity, food, soil, climate and social environment. If the root of the difficulty springs from these primary causes, the whole problem of evil could be wiped out in one generation by the application of sanitary laws and social betterment. In the Bible sin is known by several disease terms, but always such diseases as were incurable by any treatment known in those days: leprosy, born blind, deadly poison, paralytic, etc. Sin is a disease, and the whole man, body, mind, and spirit, is more or less affected therefrom; but it is, in particular, a soul malady, going deeper than human remedies can reach, whether social or medicinal.

To cure this soul disease the race has sought eagerly from the day Cain and Abel built their altars. All the ramifications of civilization have had one all-absorbing desire: a readjustment of something fundamentally wrong within. This fight for an atonement with the Creator has been a long, heart-sore pilgrimage; it has painted the blackest pages of history and committed the bloodiest crimes. This human drama has been enacted in tragedy and tears. Why is it so? Because deeper than any other heart-throb is the consciousness of personal uncleanness, and the bitter anguish it has caused.

The dead civilizations, on their monuments and mausoleums, have left behind, carved indelibly, one story--whether on the banks of the Nile, the Areopagus of Greece, or the land of the Montezumas--it is the story of feeling in the dark after God. They had the disease and sought for a remedy. From the days of the astrologers and soothsayers, anxious souls have been victimized by every fad, fake and fanaticism in their search for relief. The venders of pulverized snake skins and lizard tongues, in their day, found as willing a patronage as the cultured proprietors of sanitariums to-day. The long-haired man on a goods box can do a flourishing business, if he has the gift of gab to convince the crowd his stuff will _cure_.

The quack doctor does not handle a variety of medicine; he knows just enough of anatomy and materia medica to make his speech sound scholarly--but his remedy, costing less than the price of one visit from a physician, will cure all the ills of the human body. Like De Soto, we are seeking the fountain of perennial youth--the elixir of life.

Just as the disease of the body and a passion to live open wide the door to charlatans, fakirs, and "healers" claiming powers direct from Gabriel to Beelzebub, so the disease of the soul, and a hunger for eternal life--"deep calling unto deep"--has opened the door of the heart to the religious doctor with his cure-all prescriptions. Out from unknown depths comes the yearning for readjustment and reconciliation with God.

No being, beside the Godhead, is more familiar with the secret hopes and impulses of the soul--than Satan. The long-haired quack on the street, bawling his "junk," is not half so anxious to defraud the crowd as Satan is to prescribe remedies that will not cure. His chief aspiration is to flood the land with bogus treatments which not only fail to cure, but they preempt the disease-infected spots so as to prevent the introduction of the genuine remedy.

The quack doctor is, no doubt, pleased when an imaginary cure has been wrought by his wares; but Satan is filled with wrath if some of his formulas strike deeper than he anticipated, and a soul emerges from darkness unto light. This, however, does not often occur; he is too cunning to advertise to a hungry, sin-sick world that which will bring permanent relief.

The beating of tom-toms by an upper Congo medicine man to drive away evil spirits has about the same efficacy as much that may be found in the esthetic circles of the world's religiosity. "A form of godliness," be it ever so beautiful and orderly, which does not seek and obtain the inner power is just another way of beating tom-toms.

We look with compassion upon the poor benighted heathen woman who trots around the temple of her god one hundred times on a moonlight night; but how much improvement over her plan of salvation do we find in the blaze of twentieth century Christian enlightenment, if our religion consists of just "doing something," rather than having _faith_ in a power that saves through the impartation of the Holy Ghost? At no time in the history of the Church have we done so many things as we are doing now--all good; but observe: the Church and the world go hand in hand. It is a rare exception when an essential difference can be seen in the life and business methods of the professor and non-professor. "They will have a form of godliness," says Paul, "but deny the power."

It was not a dream or hallucination which took the rich and poor, in the long ago, out from the world and caused them to give up even their lives cheerfully; it was an application of the power. They had tested the "fountain opened in the house of David for sin and uncleanness."

"Oh, that fountain deep and wide, Flowing from the wounded side, That was pierced for our redemption, long ago; In thy ever cleansing wave, there is found all power to save; It's the power that healed the nations long ago."

In the multitude of pretenses, makeshifts: forms, ceremonies, chantings, genuflections, ordinances, will worship, self-righteousness, "wondrous works,"--"form of godliness"--who is responsible? It is the great Quack Doctor that is deceiving the world; those who will not be dragged into sin and ruin he surfeits their lives with a "form of godliness, but deny the power" plan of salvation.

XV

THE DEVIL A THEOLOGIAN

"Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils."--_1 Timothy iv. 1._

Theology is defined as "the science which treats of God, His existence, character, government, and doctrines," or the science of religion--a system of truth derived from the Scriptures. The caption of this article--The Devil a Theologian--jars our spiritual nerve centres. There are three things necessary to produce a theologian: experience, information, ability. From every possible view-point the Devil is preëminently qualified to formulate a system of doctrinal statements having all the earmarks of genuineness and credentials of authenticity.

In our discussion of the Devil's theology we shall not, at the present, touch upon the theories and vile imaginations of demon-possessed men, but the finer phases of truth, beautifully presented by his apostles with a show of orthodox reasonableness. By the term Devil's theology--doctrines--we do not mean his beliefs--get the distinction--but what he wants us to believe. He is every whit orthodox; he believes the Old Book; he does not indorse the _new theology_, or the so-called higher learning, only as it may be turned to his advantage. The Word of God is a mighty reality to him; he has met its blazing truths, and has been burned by its power. He has millions of skeptics and doubters blindly following his delusions, but he is a believer in the "old school"; he "believes and trembles."

We call attention to the term "doctrines"--therefore religious beliefs: reasonable, plausible, satisfying beliefs. What are they? First: Ritualism is Religion; when we have gone through a certain proscribed programme--whether it be a chant, reading prayers, or burning a dim light--there you are. How do we know we are religious? We have gone the rounds, said the required number of Ave Maries, counted the rosary, etc., etc., therefore the work is done. It sounds harsh to place these beautiful ceremonies, which have doubtless comforted so many hearts, in the enemy's catalogue; but the Pharisees were rigid ritualists, yet Christ denounced them as miserable hypocrites--"whited sepulchres." Anything he can get us to adopt, having a semblance of reality, yet does not save--does not deal directly with the sin question, he shouts over our delusion. He appropriates Ritualism for Religion and it becomes his doctrine.

A second doctrine: Good Resolution for Regeneration. There has never been as much strenuous evangelism, of a certain quality, as we are having to-day. Great cities unite in stupendous revival effort; no expense is spared; the leading masters of assemblies are called as workers. The zeal and motives of it all are commendable; but the bane of such evangelism is this: the work stops at the resolution period. Men are brought under conviction, and the Devil at once proposes his compromise. Not until the "big meeting" closes do the convicted multitudes discover the deception. Herein is the explanation of the lethargy, depression, and utter indifference which so often obtain after a "sweeping revival." Faith is then shaken, and sometimes permanently, in the truth of a conscious, know-so salvation. If the Prodigal Son had stopped after passing a good resolution with himself he would have died at the swine pen without the knowledge of the father's love, the kiss, the robe, the ring, and the fatted calf. A sinner must not only "quit his meanness" but straighten out his meanness. Regeneration is not by the will of the flesh, the will of man, not of blood; but it is to be born of God--born from above--a new creature. Doctrines floating under the banner of evangelism which do not get believers into the kingdom must be listed with the enemy.

A third doctrine: Sentiment is Salvation. We are a sentimental people; esthetic and humanitarian developments of recent years have done much to soften our barbarian instincts. If sentiment were salvation, this land would be redeemed. Many think we are rapidly becoming a saved nation; those who enjoy such reflections should stand at the entrance of any theatre on Sunday, or a pleasure garden, or a ball park; then hurry around to the entrance of the finest, best equipped church in the city for comparison. Sentiment is educated emotion. Rome used to shout over the bloody scenes in the amphitheatre; now we can weep over the unfortunate girl who goes down in spectacular glory behind the footlights. Sentiment makes us rejoice with those who do rejoice, and weep with those who weep; it moves us to deeds of charity. Satan then has no difficulty in persuading us that we are religious--spiritually redeemed; if we weep over our loved ones, our emotions are very religious. The most grief we ever witnessed at a funeral was in the home of a saloon-keeper; the dead wife and mother, a depraved opium and morphine eater; the home was utterly irreligious, but the grief was hysterical, explosive. The sacrifices of God are a broken and a contrite heart--over sins committed, producing a godly sorrow, and not a sentiment.

Again, the Devil takes great delight in telling the unsaved and unchurched masses that religion is all selfishness; the poor are made to feel that the Church is the rich man's institution. Notwithstanding the efforts of God's people to reach and help the lost they are represented as mean and selfish, pretending a pious fraud, with no bread for the hungry and no helping hand for the needy. We build stately temples of worship to gratify our pride and vanity with money earned by the sweat and toil of the poor man; money that ought to be given to the poor. Judas protested against breaking the alabaster box. The church is a place for dress parade; the humble and meanly clad are not wanted. All such is malicious slander against God, His Church and His people; but as stereotyped as this may sound, it is being used effectually everywhere. If a church preaches salvation from sin, it is the poor man's best friend; but reference to the church and the preacher is often hissed in gatherings of toiling men. Unless there shall come to this land the establishment of the righteousness of Christ, as taught in His Gospel, we shall see another reign of terror; the fires of restlessness, hate, and discontent are smouldering in every shop, factory, and mine. "The Golden Age will never come until it is brought in by the Golden Rule of Christ." The Devil is busy keeping these facts from becoming known. The doctrine stated: we are in it to serve a selfish end; take away our hope of advantages, and our faith becomes religious junk.

XVI

THE DEVIL A THEOLOGIAN (_Continued_)