REVOLUTIONARY CHRISTIANITY 37 



twenty shillings to the pound ♦ But honesty is never 

 mentioned in the Gospel except as part of the teaching 

 of John the Baptist* When we have to give to thieves 

 and share our last crust with the undeserving, honesty 

 is not worth the mention. No wonder Jesus said, '' Of 

 those that are born of woman there hath not arisen a 

 greater than John the Baptist ; yet he that is least in the 

 Kingdom is greater than he/* 



When speaking to a brother of mine, recently returned 

 from Australia, he described to me the communistic 

 practices of the aboriginal savages ♦ '' Then what do 

 the missionaries teach them ? '' I asked, '' The sacred- 

 ness of private property,'' was his answer I 



That the disciples fully understood the social implica- 

 tions of our Lord's teaching is well shown by the fact 

 that the first thing they did when they got to work, was 

 to form themselves into a communism. It is often said 

 that the communism was not a success ; but there is 

 not a word in the Acts of the Apostles to suggest that it 

 was not, and it is spoken of with evident approbation. 

 It was part, and an essential part, of their scheme for 

 the inauguration of the Kingdom of Heaven, 



A Kingdom of Universal Brotherhood is bound to 



be communistic. But this does not necessarily mean 



that the Communism of the Kingdom will be exactly the 



same thing as the communism of the savage and that the 



human race will get back to exactly the same position 



as that from which it started. The progress of the 



human race is not in a circle ; it is in a spiral. Many of 



us no doubt have been through the circular tunnels in 



Switzerland, The train rushes into a tunnel and, after 



some time, emerges in what might appear to be exactly 



the same place. But it is not really the same place. 



It has come out at a far higher level, with wider views 



and more extensive horizon. And so it is with human 



progress. The race has rushed into a tunnel of selfish 



