ed so long ago, that this is God's world and that we can bring
to development the good that lies everywhere about us in men. When we
have done that we can discuss these problems in terms of understanding.
Until we have done it, we are merely beating the air.

We in the modern world need, above many things, a new understanding of
forgiveness. In spite of much that has been written by our really great
Christian thinkers who have been blessed with the child-like heart, and
in spite of the experience of the many who have tried it out,
forgiveness is still regarded by the great multitude as a somewhat
difficult Christian duty. It is the response which we have to make when
one who has wronged us comes repentant. Instead of exacting our rights,
we must generously call the debt off, although as we have heard lately,
these are some things which it would really be un-Christian to forgive.

But as Dr. Nash reminds us: "If man sinned against, draws back into his
innocence and waits until the offender comes to himself, he abandons
his little world to the devil. * * * Forgiveness alone makes a full
repentance possible." And Herbert Gray carries the thought still farther
when he says: "The secret of Christ's demand is in the fact that
forgiveness is the only ultimately successful way of overcoming evil.
* * * It ends evil because it wins the evildoer. It gets at the root
of evil and undermines the spirit which produces strife. It saves the
sinner because it makes its appeal to the good that is in him and calls
it into life."

Those who say that we must forgive our enemies, but that of course it
would be immoral to do so while they are still unrepentant, are as far
from understanding Christ's principle as a certain churchman, whom I
once heard say that he had no hope of our ever achieving Christian
unity, but that he was still praying for it. So far from being the
dutiful response to an attitude of repentance, it is rather the creative
power which brings out the latent possibilities which have been obscured
by sin and evil.

It is the basis of what might be called the divine process of getting
even. A group of boys were playing ball one time, and one of the number
in a spirit of exasperation threw the ball into a swamp, where it was
lost. The owner of the ball came in to his uncle fuming and declaring
that he was going to get even. "What are you going to do about it?"
asked his uncle. "How are you going to get even?"

"Oh, I'll fi