Christian nations

“ While exact figures for the non-Christian world cannot be given, the significant fact is that there has been a marvelous expansion of Christian nations within the last one hundred years, far outstripping the expansion of other parts of the world. The nations which know most of Christ and his gospel have increased in numbers as well as in power out of all proportion to the rest of mankind. ”

“ But let us look the facts solemnly in the face that the Christian religion has now been in effect for nearly two thousand years; that the nations now warring are Christian nations, in the very foremost rank of Christendom; that never in history has there been so much bloodshed in such wide-spread areas and so much hate, and that we see no signs that Christianity is employing any influence that she has not been employing for nearly two thousand years. ”

“ Admit them disciples; do your utmost to make the nations Christian nations;" not, "Go to the nations, and denounce the judgments of God against them, as Jonah against Nineveh, and as the other Old-Testament prophets" (though they had reason enough to expect it for their wickedness) , "but go, and disciple them." Christ the Mediator is setting up a kingdom in the world, bring the nations to be his subjects; setting up a school, bring the nations to be his scholars; raising an army for the carrying on of the war against the powers of darkness, enlist the nations of the earth under his banner. ”

“ Here we have nations arrayed against nations, and yet in every one of these nations are so-called Christian peoples professing to worship the same God, professing to possess belief in the same divine Redeemer, many of them professing to be teachers of God's word, and ministers of life and salvation to the children of men, and yet these nations are divided one against the other, and each is praying to his God for wrath upon and victory over his enemies and for his own preservation. ”

“ Christianity has now been in the world upwards of One Thousand Eight Hundred Years. For more than a thousand years the European nations have arrogated to themselves the title of Christian! some of their monarchs, those of most Sacred and most Christian Kings! We have long laid to our souls the flattering unction that we are a civilized and a Christian people. We talk of all other nations in all other quarters of the world, as savages, barbarians, uncivilized. ”

“ Though the Gospel has been preached for about 1900 years yet we do not know of any converted nation on the earth to-day. The nations which we term Christian nations are at present engaged in the most bloody war of all history. Yet in as much as the Lord finds converted nations on the earth when He comes back and receives His throne, these nations must have been converted previous to His coming. It is therefore an important and interesting question, When and how were the nations converted which the Lord at the judgment of nations calls blessed, and bids to enter the Kingdom on earth? ”

“ The Christian nations, by the agreement of their sentiments and their passions, showed the world all that can be done by enthusiasm, which increases by communication, and that lively faith, which, spread among men, is a miraculous power, since the Gospel accords it the faculty of moving mountains. In proportion as people, united by one same spirit, separated, and ceased to make one common cause, it became more difficult to collect together the forces of the West, and pursue those gigantic enterprises of which our age can scarcely perceive the possibility. ”

“ It is not the nations that have the largest armies and navies that are the greatest blessing to the world, but the nations that work out the best Christian civilization for the world to imitate and send over the earth the best farmers to show other nations and tribes how to cultivate the earth, the best teachers, preachers and authors to train the people, the best medical skill to relieve human suffering, the best mechanics and servants, the greatest philanthropists, the best Christians. ”

“ For more than seventeen hundred years the Christian nations have been struggling, striving, praying, and seeking to know and understand the mind and will of God. Why have they not had it? Can you tell me why it is there has not been a succession of the Apostleship from one to another through all these seventeen centuries, by which the people might have been led, guided, and directed, and have received wisdom, knowledge, and understanding to enable them to build up the Kingdom of God, and to give counsel concerning it until the whole earth should be enveloped in the knowledge of God? ”

“ These different races of Europe and the United States, constituting the body of the most civilized nations of the world, united in an intelligent appreciation of the divine character of the church, with their varied capacities and the great agencies at their disposal, would be the providential means of rapidly spreading the light of faith over the whole world, and of constituting a more Christian state of society. ”

“ They succeeded at length in propagating and realizing among the Christian nations of the West the idea of one vast spiritual community, under the headship of one spiritual ruler, who, instead of destroying national diversity and independence, protected and favored them. ”

“ We are all Christian nations, who live the same spiritual life, so that every good, fruitful thought, which springs up in one corner of the earth, is at once communicated to the whole Christian world, evoking similar sensations of joy and pride, independently of nationality; we, who not only love the thinkers, benefactors, poets, scholars of other nations, but also pride ourselves on the exploit of a Damien, as though it were our own; we, who just love the men of other nationalities,—the French, the Germans, the Americans, the English ”

“ After having seen the inutility and even danger of the perfections, virtues, and duties proposed by the Christian religion, let us enquire whether its political influences be more happy, and whether it can in reality promote the welfare of nations among whom it is established and faithfully observed. We at once find, that wherever this religion is admitted, two opposite legislations, ever at variance with each other, establish themselves. ”

“ If ever there was a quarter of the globe distinguished by its quarrels, its jealousies, its everlasting wars and bloodshed, it is Europe. Since these soi-disant Christian nations have risen into any degree of strength, what single evidence of Christian3ity have they, as nations, exhibited? ”

“ What has Europe, with its divided peoples, its worn-out kings, its indolent Church, and exhausted fields, to oppose to this compact phalanx of united blood, burning with fanatical faith, submissive to one rule, and supported by all the wealth of Asia and Africa; whose fleets sweep the sea, and whose myriads are every day increased by the accession of fresh nations of Berbers, Mauritanians, and the nameless children of the desert?
This is the hopeless century. Manhood, patriotism, [168] Christianity itself, are all at the lowest ebb. ”

“ Just so the Christian nations answer the question which life puts to them, as to which they will choose, patriotism or peace, they answer "Both patriotism and peace," [470] though it is as impossible to unite patriotism with peace, as at the same time to go out driving and stay at home. ”

“ I believe that the greatest benefits can come from close associations between the nations, industrially and politically, from very frequent and close associations in the way of visiting and of travelling and of international co-operation, so that good traits, good qualities, noble attainments of each nation may be as widely spread as possible among the other nations. I believe also that the Christian spirit of recognition of these good qualities and of the individual excellencies of all nations should be recognized. ”

“ It is simply a nucleus of light, of intelligence, of truth, of virtue, of correct principles, of the holy Priesthood, of the revelations of God, and of something that has got to spread and to grow, increase and expand until it becomes a great nation and fills the whole earth ”

“ Do you think the Gentile Christian nations have rebelled? I know they have. Take, for instance, the sayings of Jesus of Nazareth, the Savior of the world, as found in this book—the Bible. He commanded His Apostles to go to all the world and preach the gospel to every creature, and he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved. ”

“ That the Church conferred incalculable benefits upon western Europe, few will question. To say nothing of its chief mission,—the moral uplifting of mankind through the Christian religion,—we have seen how, under its auspices, the barbarians were civilized and brought into the family of nations, how violence was checked by the "Truce of God," and how an educated class was maintained during the centuries when few laymen could either read or write. These are only the more obvious of its achievements ”

“ By the tenth century Christianity was fully organised, and all the peoples of Europe were Christian; by the thirteenth century the power of the Church was enormous and the nations of Europe were settled and civilised. ”

“ Nations of men selling themselves to do murder, that ruthless kings might ravish each other's crowns — nations of men, standing with jealous eyes on the perpetual watch against each other, with arms in their hands, oaths in their mouths, and curses in their hearts; — are those Christian? Yet there is not a man acquainted with the history of Europe that will even attempt to deny that that is the history of Europe. ”

“ But under Christian faith and culture, the various nations of Europe became assimilated, and the peculiar national characteristics under Gentilism were in a measure obliterated. They also revive as the nations under Protestantism recede from Christianity and return to Gentilism, and are held in check only by the reminiscences of Catholicity, and by the mutual intercourse of nations kept up by trade and commerce, literature and the arts. ”

“ Among the many vexatious problems occasioned in modern times by the increased intercourse of Western nations with the Orient, those which arise in connection with the advent and development of Christian missions are of no small importance. In general, in this quarter of the world the diplomats and business men are upon one side of most of the controverted questions; the missionaries and their supporters upon the other. ”

“ It proves that there was no nation, no people, no kindred, no tongue, upon the face of the whole earth that had the everlasting Gospel when the angel should come; because, if there had been any people, however obscure they might be, however distant they might be from what are termed civilized nations, if there had been any people on the earth who had the Gospel, they would have a Christian Church, with Apostles and Prophets and all the gifts of the spirit therein. ”

“ And that the nations of those which are saved and redeemed to God by the blood of Christ, out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation, will be made kings and priests unto God, to reign forever on the earth. ”

“ By experience and science the nations which by name are Christian have reached ways which are better fitted, on the whole, for well living than those of the Mohammedan nations, although this superiority is not by any means so complete and sweeping as current opinion in Christian countries believes. ”

“ A day of grace is yet held out to us. Both North and South have been guilty before God; and the Christian church has a heavy account to answer. Not by combining together, to protect injustice and cruelty, and making a common capital of sin, is this Union to be saved,—but by repentance, justice and mercy; for, not surer is the eternal law by which the millstone sinks in the ocean, than that stronger law, by which injustice and cruelty shall bring on nations the wrath of Almighty God! ”

“ Sound education I know will civilize them, make them wise, useful, powerful, and secure amongst their neighbours; and the better they are educated, the more clearly will they see that the principles of the Bible are the best principles for the government of individuals, of families, of tribes, and of nations."
Not only governors but philosophers may listen to this African chief with advantage. Some splendid reputations have been made in Europe by merely taking up some one great principle of the Christian code and vaunting it as a wonderful discovery. ”

“ While exercising all due courtesy and exhibiting every care possible for the feelings of those in attendance, it should still have the Christian courage to face the facts as they have been and as they are, and to insist upon it that all the nations 154 present see those facts and, basing their actions upon those facts, adopt so far as possible the Christian methods that will promote the welfare of all the peoples of the Far East, including Japan, so far as these problems of the Conference are concerned. ”

“ Moreover, the Bible recognizes the importance of national relations in the position it assigns to nations in the historic and prophetic development of the plan for man's redemption. Before the advent of our Saviour, God was in covenant with a nation. ”

“ It was not to be split up into a multitude of national churches in every part of the world, but was to spread itself by degrees over the whole face of the earth, and all nations were to be gathered into its fold. ”

“ But you, the rejected of nations, yourself reject all nations and forbid your sacraments to those who are not bom of your household. You are the Chosen People, whose religion is the nation and whose nationhood is religion. ”

“ They are more zealously supported from America, than we are from England.—The church of Christ on earth, and also in heaven, is from all nations, and kindreds, and peoples, and tongues. It should know nothing of earthly nationalities. The kingdom under the whole heaven belongs to Christ, our blessed Saviour, of which I hope, my dear—we are citizens. I love the land of my descent, 'Canny Scotland;' the land of my birth, 'Old England;' and the land of my sojourn—my adoption, although not recognized by it—China. ”