BOLSHEVISM.

Press, Volume LV, Issue 16550, 16 June 1919, Page 7

BOLSHEVISM.

SERMON BY REV. PERCY KNIGHT.

At the Durham street Methodist Church last night, among the congregation were the Mayor and Mayoress (Dr. and Mrs Thacker), and Councillors F. Burgovne, E. H. Andrews, J. A. A. Flesher, A. S. "Williams, E. Peek, J. W. Bcanland, H. T. Armstrong, and the Town Clerk (Mr H. R. Smith), in response to a special invitation issued by the Rev. P. Knight, to the Mayor and councillors. I Mr Knight's address was on the subject of Bolshevism and its antidote, and his text was Romans 12, 20: "Therefore, if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if ho thirst, give him drink, for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head." Theorotically, Bolshevism was the rule of the masses, but in practice it was something very different. Winston Churchill had said that it was not a creed but a pestilence, not a tlieorv, but a disease, and in Russia it had proved that it was anarchy, pure nnd simple.' Bolshevism pushed society back" to the age of the club, and as an economic system it maintained tho right of those who had nothing to seize the goods of those who had, if they were able to do so. After dealing with the gradual revolt against absolutism in England, the. speaker pointed out that in all these movements for reform and liberty no attempt had been mado to rob one class or another of its rights and liberties—right and liberty for all was the ideal aimed at. Now, for the first time, there had been a revolution, not towards democracy, but towards a narrow, cast-iron autocracy, that arrogated towards itself all powers and privileges. It was the onthronement of chaos and the dethronement of C4od. Bolshevism was tho onlv system that said that the industrious, thriftv, and honest worker, who created property, did not own it, and that it belongea, instead, to idlers, thieves, and murderers. The spread of this doctrine was most alarming, and to-day it had become a menace to the world. What, therefore, wns the antidote for this crazy social and industrial" suicide ? He believed that if the world was to be saved from revolution it must return (1) to Christ's doctrine of work, (2) it must adopt Christ's idea of property and its obligations—for Him property was a means of philanthropy. Property was not truly possessed until it was properly used. Strength and wealth and genius were not only privileges and possessions, but debts to society as well. Finally, love would bo tho'redfimntive force, and he believed that tha bitter experiences of the past were not to be in vain. Optimism had become an obligation, and the question of the hour was, would the people, chastened and informed, with renewed minds and high resolve, turn their bn"ks on the agitation of revolution, and choose instend Christ's oonopptinn of the sacredness of work, and the obligations of property and the law of love? This was the dream and hope and aim of the Christian Church.