The Wanganui Herald. [PUBLISHED DAILY.] SATURDAY, DECEMBER 4, 1909.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXXIV, Issue 12941, 4 December 1909, Page 4

The Wanganui Herald. [PUBLISHED DAILY.] SATURDAY, DECEMBER 4, 1909.

THE GOSPEL OF AGITATION.

Vn analysis of Mr Will Crooks' addresses nice he came to New Zealand must have ■aused a good many people to moderate heir views as to the incendiary character f tlio British labour leader. The convenioii.il conception of people of his class s hat of men who boast of their atheism reclaim in raucous tones their contempt; or all tilings ancient and their undying ostihty io everything that savours of levity to monarchy. Mr Crooks does not oniply with these specifications one little at He is a Baptist local preacher. ll>> •: not a bit ashamed of God, even in pubic. He asserts that King Edward is a very me fellow and an excellent King 1 . What "s he matter with Mr Crooks is that he )oor. He had an extra allowance of hunanity worked into his ' composition ri'jf.naUy, and it keeps him pitying eople- and helping mople v.ho need pity vnd help. It must not be supposed that he I'eds tears over the fate of the poor Oukes, whose groans just now are exciting ach other's pity. His solicitude seems 1o each as low as the deepest slums, but ;ets no higher than the five-roomed houso. vnd there is plenty of room for the hu maiutie--. of multitudes of men within the imitations of that area, as well as those if W. Crooks. But although Mr Crooks is an ideal .ibour leader there are plenty of men in he van of the great labour movement in Jreat Britain who are as reverent of good hings as himself. Many years ago we renember a prayer meeting being held at by the delegates of a niners' conference. Many opprobrious •pitliets have been lavished upon the pioners of Unionism. Vituperation and perse•ution of a more material kind have beea lealt out to them in generous measure. The isms have had their martyrs. People aye been burned at the stake for slight ariants of personal opinion, but there yfas generally the compensation that the nartyrdom was dramatic and spectacular, abour agitation has also had its martyrs, ..nd in a holier cause than mere persona! •onviction — the cause of the poor — and here has been nothing dramatic or spec acular in the hounding down they have uffered. There are mistaken men in the lovement for the uplifting of the masses, ;nd many blunders are made, but all the insofar as they are honest and onscientious, are duly accredited preach- . rs of a gospel as sacred as that of salvalion. They don't need the laying on of > ands nor the donning of sacerdotal millinery to bs able to say: —

"The spirit of the Lord God is upon me; because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; He hath sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that arc bound." For they are aiming after all these things and more. They have the drink-sodden nasses to elevate, to sweep fcway slums, o make the conditions of life more tolerible for the poor, to put the taxes upon he shoulders of those best able to bear them, to re-create rural England by a nore equitable distribution of ownership >f land and many other things that God would like to sco done. And the great mission needs good men', not flippant, irreverent and reckless men.