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GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Septembee, 1917 



w 



HILE I 



w rite on 

 this 7th 

 day of August 

 the whole wide 

 world more or 

 less is talking' 

 war. Just about 

 a year ago there 

 were three Home 

 papers in which 

 we d i s c u s sed 

 more or less 

 "war on Chris- 

 tian principles." 

 Just after these 

 talks quite a few 

 of our old and 



good friends wrote me that they were sur- 

 prised to see the author of the Home papers 

 justifying war. You may recall that I gave 

 as an illustration the Morgan raid that oc- 

 cuiTed here in Ohio in 1863. Let me repeat 

 the circumstances. 



This band of raiders without the author- 

 ity of the Southern Confederacy crossed the 

 Ohio River, came into Ohio, robbed banks 

 and looted stores, and for a time our Ohio 

 people seemed to feel themselves helpless. 

 They helped themselves to everything 

 they wanted. But whatever God's holy 

 book may have to say in regard to this 

 matter of war^ our men and boys here in 

 Ohio decided among them.selves that under 

 the circumstances war, and bloody war, was 

 the Christian thing to do. They armed 

 themselves with guns, pistols, and, if I am 

 not mistaken, some of them had only 

 hatchets and axes. They eventually sur- 

 rounded the Morgan gang and took them 

 prisoners, and succeeded in enforcing law 

 and order. 



I said a year ago that, under such cir- 

 cumstances, my belief was that they did the 

 proper thing for Christian men to do, even 

 to the killing of the bandit Morgan himself, 

 especially when it came to protecting their 

 wives and daughters and the little ones at 

 home. 



In yesterday's Plain Dealer (the day 

 after Sunday, August 5) in four different 

 places there were hold-ups and murders 

 where drunken men had in their possession 

 revolvers. Some of these things happened 

 in the big city of Akron, only twenty miles 

 from where I sit writing. Somewliere in 

 our state — I think it was in one of the big 

 cities, a policeman was called to quell a 

 drunken row. The policeman ordered one 

 of the drunken men to surrender and hand 

 over his revolver. Instead of doing so, 

 howevei', lie shot the offioer. This paper 



OUR HOMES 



A. I. ROOT 



Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt 

 love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy. But I say 

 unto you, Love your enemies. — Matt. 5:43. 



But I say unto you which hear. Love your ene- 

 mies, do good to them which hate you, bless them 

 that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully 

 use you. — lAike 6:27. 



says the police- 

 man may live, 

 but it is doubt- 

 ful. He was one 

 of our best men, 

 old in the busi- 

 ness, and uni- 

 versally beloved. 

 After the police- 

 man had been 

 shot, the man 

 with the pistol 

 frightened ev- 

 erybody else who 

 attempted to in- 

 t e r f e r e with 

 him ; and the 

 community had 

 quite a time to get him arrested and make 

 him give up his weapon. Non-resistance 

 is a nice thing to talk about, and we are 

 sending out a little tract by the tens of 

 thousands that recommends such a course 

 among neighbors. But shall we let a 

 drunken man go on 1 



I am sorry to say there are other things 

 that make men crazy besides intoxicating 

 liquors, or suppose we say cigarettes. Th? 

 little tract I have mentioned hits the point 

 exactly where it speaks of letting your mind 

 run and dwell on real or fancied wrongs. 



There have been two murders in Medina 

 County recently because of grievances be- 

 tween two persons, and because the matter 

 was allowed to grow and fester like a I'un- 

 ning sore. The first one was between two 

 town officers. The second one was a very 

 sad case of where a boy deliberately shot 

 and killed his father. I presume this father 

 "''«s a drinking man, and liad been cruei to 

 his family. But the trouble that caused the 

 murder was a quarrel over so small a mat- 

 ter as a few seed potatoes. 



Let us now consider the present war that 

 confronts the United States. I confess it 

 has troubled and worried me, in regard to 

 this whole matter of drafting and sending 

 people to war, especially along the line I 

 have been alluding to, "war on Christian 

 principles." I have been so much helped by 

 an account in the Association Neics (a Y. 

 M. C. A. periodical) that I want to give the 

 article here. It appeared recently, I am 

 told, in the North American Student for 

 May, 1917. Dean Bosworth is an old es- 

 teemed professor of the Oberlin Theological 

 Seminary. Here is what he says about it. 

 I have read it over several times; and T 

 hope, my good friends, you will find it 

 worth while to do the same : 



THK CHBLSTIAN WITNESS IN WAR. 



The great majority of the American people believe 



