y instinct, that greed
of gain which embodies itself everywhere in the spirit of plunder,
exploitation, and the impulse to gambling. He can have nothing but
condemnation for that great wave of money-love which has swept over
Christendom in our time, affecting all classes. It has fostered
self-indulgence, stimulated depraved appetites, corrupted business and
politics, oppressed the poor, materialised our ideals, and weakened
religious influences. 'From this craze of the love of money the voice
of Jesus calls the people back to the sane life in Ethics and religion
in which He is leader.'[26] What then ought to be the attitude of the
Church to the industrial questions of our day? While some contend that
the social question is really a religious question, and that the Church
is untrue to its mission when it holds itself aloof from the economical
problems which are agitating men's minds, others view with suspicion,
if not with hostility, the deflection of religion from its traditional
path of worship, and deem it a mistake for the Church to interfere in
industrial movements.

A recent writer[27] narrates that in his boyhood he actually heard an
old minister of the Church of Scotland declare in the General Assembly,
'We are not here to make the world better: we have only to pass through
it on the way to glory.' 'No grosser travesty,' adds the author, 'was
ever uttered. We _are_ here to make the world better. We have a
commission to stamp out evil and to prevent men from falling into it.
If this is not Christian work, what is?'

At the same time a portion of the clergy have gone to the opposite
extreme, identifying the kingdom of God with social propaganda, and
thus losing sight of its spiritual {241} and eternal, as well as its
personal, significance. There has been moreover a tendency on the part
of some to associate themselves with a political party, and to claim
for the Church the office of judge and arbitrator in industrial strife.
But surely it is one thing to degrade the Church to the level of a
secular society, and another, by witness and by effort, to make the law
of Christ dominant over all the relationships of life. Men are
impatiently asking, 'Has the Church no message to the new demands of
the age? Are Christians to stand apart from the coming battle, and
preach only the great salvation to individual souls? _That_ the
Christian minister must never cease to do; but the Gospel, if it is to
meet the nee