God of all Life; Thou Divine source of all being; Thou Guide and Ruler over all; Infinite Wisdom, Infinite Love, Eternal Knowledge, we bend to Thee in praise and adoration. From the innermost shrine of the spirit Thy children would bless Thee, and Thou, Who perceivest all, will understand their petitions and their prayers.  They praise Thee for all life; for every visible manifestation of Thy love; for all tokens of Thy Divinity; for Thy power revealed in the physical universe whereby the atom and the sun alike proclaim the majesty of Thy government; they praise Thee for the beauties of the earth and sky, and for that harmony that attunes them to the one purpose of life in outward form; they praise Thee for the majesty and grandeur of Thy moral law revealed unto the conscience of man, and made manifest in all ages, and which each life is made aware of by the voice that is from within; they praise Thee for that majesty and power which makes nations bend to the divine behest of justice, and kings and rulers yield up their scepters to the voice of humanity; which makes even individual lives turn from the outward to the inward, from pride and ambition and self seeking, to the conquest over self, and which forevermore speaks with trumpet tongue unto all the children of earth; they praise Thee for that spiritual perception that beyond all thought of human love and human justice knows of Thy love and [craves] the potency of its power; that all conquering, all manifesting, Divinity that, revealing itself to the children of men, makes the voice of the spirit the quickening power of love, and the government of all the worlds; unto each mortal by the perception of this Divine and potent sway, and unto all nations may the voice of Thy truth be made manifest, whether it be in trumpet tongue of war, in the sweet influence of peace, or, in those Diviner and more perfect words revealed in the love of the spirit. May all praise Thee without ceasing.  Amen. ________

 

DISCOURSE.

Contemporaneously with biblical history, and known to those who traced in that cord the origins of human thought, were the God's of so called heathen nations; and among those who followed in the wake of these deities were the Ammonites, who worshipped the God Moloch, to whom was sacrificed human lives. The place of this sacrificial worship was named Tophet, and this name has come to be the symbol of that which corresponds, almost, to Hades. The whole history of this nation is a record of people worshiping the God of material power, of individual tyranny and despotism, of such greed that he was not satisfied with other than the sacrifice of human lives; and whose sway, was the sway of an absolute and fiendish tyrant. The Moloch whose name is handed down to you in this record is the symbol of that  "Prince of the world," of that "power of darkness,  of that principle of evil which was to hold sway for a thousand years.  The term a "thousand years" meaning one of the cycles of the ancients, which being interpreted, is until the dawn of peace, until another dispensation.

The great giant Moloch is abroad in the world like a gigantic octopus; he is in every portion of the civilized world, and with his many arms of strength he absorbs from every department of human life, and from all conditions of human existence, the substance and sustenance of his life through his all devouring maw.

While it is not lawful, and was not even in the Hebraic age, to sacrifice human lives to the God Moloch, it nevertheless has been customary, as we shall prove to you, to sacrifice human lives to this typical Moloch throughout all christendom; and christian history is filled with evidences of these violent sacrifices, and the whole world bears testimony to the record of this all-devouring worldliness.

When Rome was the empire of the civilized world, she represented as did ancient Egypt, the Moloch of material power; into her all conquering hand all the wealth of the Orient came, and through Byzantium, (now Constantinople) from the far east, the Argosies laden with the treasures of the world poured into Rome under the Caesars as they had into Egypt under the Pharaohs; the God Moloch was fed from all the resources of the world. Peasants, slaves and kingdoms paid tribute unto the imperial power of Rome. Extending her influence eastward Jerusalem was subject to her sway; extending her influence southward Egypt was subject to her sway; extending her influence through the "Pillars" and beyond the "Gates of Hercules" what is now modern Europe was subject to her sway; and wherever the visible earth was known, Rome was the all conquering and all devouring power.  Yet that shrine of Moloch fell, that representation of hell's power, by corruption, was overthrown, and thence scattering into western Europe fastened its manifold tentacles upon the nations of western Europe.

What Rome was, France under imperial power became; and what France was, the nations of Europe are emulating each in their own way.  But chiefly the Moloch of the world is expressed.  First, in the warfare of Christian nations one with the other, who have absorbed the best life blood, the best energies of the people, and the best industries in the service of arms.  Second,  in the all devouring tribute which must be paid by humanity to the Moloch of Mammon.

Paris, under Napoleon, the most perfect city in the world sapped the vitality of France to up build that beautiful Capitol, that beautiful metropolis, that beautiful haunt of Moloch.  Peasant, laborer, merchant, and mechanic alike gave their offerings and industry to the sustenance of this gigantic shrine of Mammon, and when France rose up from the two fold despotism of the Bourbons and Napoleons, it was with the life born of the instinct of self preservation, that not always could the vitality thus be absorbed; not always could the genius of France thus yield her victims unto the shrine, of Moloch.

Today London, not because of political despotism, nor yet because of monarchical sway, but because London represents the monetary power of the world, is the shrine of Moloch, and wherever, in the crowded centers of civilization, there is a lessor power of a similar kind, there again is the tribute that is demanded of human lives; thousands of victims annually yield their offerings, their life blood and their life breath unto this shrine, not because it is demanded by any patriotism; not because it is required to preserve any nation; not because any cause for humanity claims it, but because between the toiler for bread and the shrine of Moloch is a tribute that makes it impossible for daily bread to be obtained without human sacrifice.

You have but to visit any crowded city; you have but to witness that which transpires in the different states of human society, to know, that without any individual or any class of individuals being to blame for this, there is a continued sapping of the life blood of the poor.  There should be no paupers in any Christian land, and there are millions of paupers in Christian lands, and the reason is that Moloch is the god instead of God, and Mammon is the power instead of Christ.

It sounds like strong language, but if you have toiled for your daily bread, if you have striven to unfold your energies of life in any mental way; if you have been compelled to meet and grapple with the problems of daily existence day after day, you know that just in proportion as you pay tribute to this Moloch you are prosperous, and just in proportion as you do not you are impoverished. If you have led the life of an ordinary business man, beginning in this country with nothing, and having just the broad acres of this wonderful country to draw your resources from, you know there is something that prevents you, as a farmer, from winning the price of your daily toil; that there is something although the fields are teeming with abundance, that prevents you from being independent, when year after year you have given the fullness of your best days of labor.

If you are an artisan of any kind, if you labor with your hands for any purpose you know that between you and whatever power it is that dispenses the blessings of prosperity, there is a barrier or wall that is erected that as yet you have been unable to surmount, and if you have surmounted it, if you have placed yourself in the current of that nameless river that bears men on to prosperity, notwithstanding the misfortunes of their fellowmen, then you know by what means you have won it.  It is not for us to accuse you, but you know that the labor of the hands alone has not accomplished it; you know that the labor of the mind alone in that which brings for daily labor its daily bread has not accomplished it; you know you have taken advantage of the methods that Moloch provided in the beginning of this history, wherein commerce had the seal of this deity placed upon human traffic, whether in the slaves brought from the Orient or in the life blood that is often bartered for gold now, you know that there is the same spirit prevailing in the world.  We do not say it was not inevitable, we do not say you could have avoided it, we do not say any class of human beings is responsible for it, but what we do say is, that whatever human greed and human avarice, or human ambition, have paid their utmost tribute to this god, then the empire which has been thus up builded has fallen.  Wherever in Egypt man bowed before this deity or symbol of it, there was ruin and destruction, and Egypt ceased to be.  Wherever in Rome the tribute of life was brought to lay upon the sacrificial altar, ruin inevitably came.  Not all the learning of Greece, not all the statesmanship, not all the prowess of the armies of Rome could avert this final destruction.

You are perhaps aware of that wonderful Spartan law giver, Lycurgas, who because he detected in gold the symbol of that which Moloch required, made laws that gold should not be introduced into his country, and made those laws to last for a certain term of years, then he expatriated himself that he might not be appealed to.  Consulting the oracles and finding there laws in keeping with the Divine voice he died in a distant land, a martyr to the perfect government of his country.  But when gold returned, the power of Moloch also was restored.  He forgot with all the surpassing wisdom of his mind and heart that it was not the glittering coin or dross itself that could affect man in this way, but the love of it in the human heart; and he forgot that all generations of time must be educated to rise above paying tribute to the selfishness of individual power, before the power of gold or its representative could be diminished.

The day and the hour in every nation and among all people, where Moloch has survived draweth nigh, when that power draweth unto an end.  Whatever nation pays the most tribute to this surpassing power of evil, that nation is nearest destruction as a nation. In Germany it is the tribute of human lives, all men must be soldiers, and all must be ready at the nod or command of the King to serve their country whether it be for patriotism or greed.  In Russia it is the Imperial command of a despot, and if you follow the history of the nihilists in exile and understand the meaning of the word Siberia, you know what Moloch has claimed there.  In England it means deprivation, a lethargy in industrial pursuits and the paralysis which has seized all kinds of trade, because of the ever greedy tribute demanded by this ever increasing tyrant.  The paralysis that sits alike upon commerce, manufactories, and agriculture, and which makes the land of less value in that over populated country than it is here in a country where there are millions of acres unoccupied.  It means paralysis in the government of England, that even now the most splendid statesman on the earth is not able to compete with the contingencies of the hour, and stands half reluctant between paying further tribute to Moloch or serving his God and his people.  It means that which is stealing steadily and constantly over your own country, a deep ever- brooding and all-pervading unrest, something that knows that somewhere is a power that, even in this land of freedom, keeps men from the knowledge of their highest and divinest rights and privileges and holds its sway like the silent sway of despotism over them.  No capitalist is to blame, no individual or syndicate is to blame, but it is the entire system of Moloch, which is your inheritance from the Ammonites, and from that nation all these nations have inherited the power of the "Prince of darkness."

The secret votaries of Moloch are in every human life, the secret well-springs are fed from every human existence and wherever selfishness, pride and worldly ambition have over weening power to shape your lives to disregard your follow man, you are paying tribute to Moloch and offering your neighbor as a victim.  The secret streams that feed this vast, tide that is poured out every day and every hour upon this shrine are to be found in all those silent, subtle relations that constitute to day human society, human commerce and human civilization; and although this is the proudest period in the world's history, although there is the greatest strength to day of the moral forces that promote the advancement of the world.  Still you are all aware what wonderful tribute you must pay to the monster whom we have named, even in the nineteenth century of the Christian era! You pay it in long weary hours of labor, you pay it in the haste, turmoil and confusion of twelve or sixteen hours of labor or of thought.  You pay it in the deprivation from all ease and leisure; you pay it in the pursuit of mammon in order to compete with one another, robbing yourself frequently of your rest, because you have no time to take for your sleep, because your over weary brain refuses to sleep, you pay this tribute in all the wealth. fashion and pride of the crowded cities of the world, and what the metropolis requires is that every man who is competing with the world for the prize of Mammon, must lay his offerings upon the shrine of Moloch.  The millions on the counting room desk, in the vaults of banks, in the treasure houses of the earth are every one of them counted from his hearts blood, and no matter if he rises as a millionaire he knows at what cost, he has given Moloch the best of his life, he has bartered, not his soul for that is in the keeping of God, but all else that lies between his soul and his mortal form he has neglected or refused to listen to for the sake of the one success.

The one great throe of agony and pain is in the world today, the one voice that like the moaning of the sea far out from the shore is heard by those who listen, it is a low monotone,  it sounds afar off, but it comes in ever increasing waves in one splendid grand deepening tide, it is the groan of the death agony of this mighty monster. Ancient Egypt is stirred, the cycles of the earth have called her from her slumber of ages to listen to this death groan; the whole orient is made alive; from the east the nations that seemed to slumber have been awakened into activity in this latter day of civilization that they may also hear this death agony; while all through Italy and central Europe, through western Europe, the British Kingdom, France, Austria, through northern Europe, Germany, Russia, all the nations feel the mortal agony of this giant monster that has taken their wealth, that has destroyed their lives, that has won the priceless inheritance of their freedom; that has sapped the foundation of their industry, that has sent the best life blood from their nations to found again other altars of Mammon and Moloch in the far countries of the globe.  Far over the sea are Australia and America, these also hear the death groan and feel the mighty throes of this giant monster, and as his power has been, such will be the proportionate effect that it will have when he shall perish; some nations will perish with him, others will rise weakened, and their lives imperiled, others will be found strong enough to meet the emergencies of the hour and free themselves from the death pangs of this monster, even you who are in the western world, free from much of the despotism of the east, are still imperiled in the very heart's blood by this power of Moloch, of Mammon; but here there is strength to rise above it, and here there may be potency to withstand this terrible struggle that is now imminent.

For we declare to you that the days of selfishness, of the activity of the selfish powers of the world, and the strong grasp of this minotaur are numbered, and you are on the eve of such an awakening, such a wonderful dawn, such a power as the world has never known.  As the elements that rage around you now, and within twenty four hours have given voice to the thunder peals that awaken the voices of spring time, shall give way to the sunshine and sweet air and the blossoms of spring, so the turbid turbulent clouds that are all around the social and political horizon of the world, expending their pent up thunders, giving expression to their voices, the accumulated darkness of all the powers that Moloch can summon; greed, avarice, tyranny, despotism, warfare, striving, and the selfishness of all nations, these are making haste to serve their king and conqueror, they are rallying like the clouds that rush through the sky when the raging of the tempest is abroad; they are hastening as armies hasten to the voice of the commander, they are meeting, they are preparing for the death struggle.  And who are they warring against, who shall meet them and overcome them?  All of the forces of might in the world are on their side, all of the power of despotism is theirs.  Moloch can command the armies of the world, the fleets belong to him, the navies are at his command, the whole voice of power and authority of governments must be his.  Mammon is his own.

Who are to meet this wonderful array?  Who is it that witnesses the death struggle of Moloch and his power?  We answer, it is the heart of humanity; it is the arisen and rising spirit of the voice of God in your midst;  it is the power of the people stimulated and inspired from within the temple of the soul; it is the grand array of all the martyred victims whom Moloch has claimed from every battle field; from every place of starvation, want and misery in the world; the arisen children who through poverty and want have been led to death; the arisen youths and maidens who through the oppression of this mighty tyrant, have been won first to ruin and then to the grave; the arisen voice of martyrs, of saints who in all ages under the oppression of this mighty power, have passed into the world of spirits; the arisen conscripts and soldiers compelled to fight, not when their hearts sent them forth, but because of Imperial power.

The arisen slaves of every nation, who have passed from bondage into the freedom of the life eternal; and the arisen lives of all the patriots, sages philosophers, poets and prophets that the world has ever known.  This invisible array, this moving and all potent army, this power that without the form and armament of battle array still comes on with over whelming, over weening force and touches the lives of men until they rise.  They rise as the waves rise when the spring tides are upon them; they rise as thousands of blades of grass rise when the airs of spring and the sunshine have won them from the darkness of winter; they rise as the forest trees adorned with the splendor of the summer's growth, not with the swords, not with the instruments of battle, not with the ornaments of despotism, not with the physical powers of the world, but with the one great moral voice that appeals unto all nations and all people now, the voice of unselfishness, the cry for humanity.  These powers and potencies are working in your midst, the battle field is not far away, nor the day of battle distant.  The life of this great hydra headed monster is even now in its last agonies, and you who feel the death struggle,  you who are in some measure imperiled, will free yourselves from the toils just in proportion as your spirits are strong, just in proportion as your love for humanity is great, just in proportion as your lives are unselfish, far better that the whole material world should perish, then that the spirit of man shall be longer imperiled by this existence.

Today it is the tempest that precedes the calm;  today it is the thunder storm that betokens that winter is gone; today it is the lashing of the waves on the great ocean of human life to declare that God's spirit has descended and troubled the waters; today in all the dismal pools of human life, in all the turbid streams of misery want and pain, in all the darkened alleys of your crowded cities, this angel, this avenging angel of God's might, this Nemeses has touched the life that was destroying humanity; and here and now you are in the midst of this gigantic struggle, and here and now you may listen to the voice of  peace that is coming.  It will be no peace that is simply the lulling to rest of the storm to break forth again; it will be no peace that is the result of bartering man's conscience for the sake of temporarily stilling the storm; it will be no compromise with error, wherein conscience consents to turn aside, so that the traffic of the world can go on; it will be no peace that consents for the sake of quietude and stillness that the wheels of commerce shall not be staid, that there shall be a temporary suspension of this warfare; it is the peace that comes from man's conscience, it is the stirring of the waters that is the purifying of them, it is the breaking forth of spiritual elements and powers long suppressed to set individual lives free from the bondage of that which oppresses them.

Remember this is no material warfare, it is no physical conflict, it is the battle in the kingdom of the spirit between right and wrong, between matter and soul, between the alluring powers of worldliness and the claims of the Divinity that must be within the soul, and you individually represent in a degree this same conflict, every day you meet it, and face it, you yield your spiritual convictions or you are governed by them; Mammon wins you day by day or you are won by humanity, you know yourself that it does not require the voice of priest nor prophet, nor spirit to tell you; each individual life is aware upon which altar his or her offerings are placed, you each know where you bend, you know whether it is to Moloch or to God, whether it is to Mammon or to the Christ that is within you; and this conflict, the stirring of the waters of each individual life, and the reaching forth of the Spiritual powers that are within you for recognition find their outermost expression in the conflict of the world, and their innermost expression is in the life of the spirit of man; and it is this life that being quickened and stirred by all these strong winds from Heaven, will put forth its blossoming and yield its fruitage of peace.  It is this life that like a gigantic tree shaken by every tempest that makes you tremble, will in a few short weeks put forth its armament of green heralding in the advent of spring.

So as the storm king now sweeps over you, as the mighty breath of this Destroyer of Moloch, this Savior of the world, is, upon you, as it kindles into new life all the slumbering blossoms of your spiritual existence, lo! then shall be the advent of peace. When the great and all devouring god has yielded his breath, when all his ships, and his armies, and his navies, and his centers of power are broken and scattered, when demolished is his every instrument, and broken every weapon of his hand, then upon this ruin of material things, the spirit of man will rise chastened and subdued but purified in this contest.  Beginning at the basis of life and making the foundation of existence no longer the ego, the selfish man, but making it the brotherhood of humanity, then will come the dawn of the day of peace, what you claim for yourselves, to do for others, what you, seek for yourselves, to seek for others, and from that basis, the new world, the new society will spring. The temples dedicated to the worship of God will no longer be but the echoes of the temples of Mammon, and the places where are inscribed the messages of Christ and the, golden rule will no longer be violated by the thoughts and deeds of Moloch.

The power of human love, the strength of human justice, the integrity of the human conscience, the all pervading power of that spirit of unselfishness will then begin to be felt.  This spring time is upon you, its heralding hours are in the air; its balmy breeze is felt in the voice of the tempest, and the sound of its voice is like the song of birds that lately have sung in paradise; it brings you all the sweet blossoms of home; it releases you from the thralldom of Mammon and restores you to the estate of Heaven; it makes the new kingdom of Heaven on earth by your devotion to one another, your exaltation of human life, your preparation for the Eden time that is to be; it whispers that which conquers death; it destroys again and again that shadowy realm which Moloch has fastened upon you--the fear of death and the darkness of the grave--for it gives you face to face, when the wall of materialism and Mammon is removed, the light of your loved ones, their eyes beaming upon you, their voices speaking to you, their presence making itself manifest in your very lives and homes and the great and the wise and the good restored once more to the councils of men because the world is made an altar and shrine that is worthy of their coming.  God's temple will then be the human heart.  The voice of God will then be in every individual life, and your worship will be your deeds of love for mankind, your song of praise, the angel voice of that Divinity that is within, and that makes over all the desolation that Moloch has reared the one divine and perfect temple of human justice through human love.