about it? We thought there were principles involved.

Take it in the economic world, the individualist here with his theory,
the socialist here with his; theories outlined like those in Edward
Bellamy's "Looking Backward"; a hundred advancers of these different
schemes, each contending for mastery. And we feel that the welfare of
civilization is at stake; and we stand for our great principles. Take
it in politics. What difference does it make whether the theories
embodied in the reign of the Czar of Russia prevail, or these here in
the United States which we are so foolish as to laud and pride
ourselves so much about? What did we have a Civil War for, wasting
billions of money and hundreds of thousands of lives? Are these great
human contests about nothing at all?

Friends, think one moment. Either man is a child of God or he is not.
Man fell at the beginning of his history, and came under the wrath and
curse of God, or he did not. God has sent angels, breaking into his
natural order of the world, or he has not. He has created an infallible
book or he has not. He has organized an infallible church that has
authority to guide and teach the world or he has not. He himself came
down to earth in the form of a man once and for all, and was crucified,
dead and buried and ascended into heaven, or he did not.

These are questions of historic fact. Does it make no difference what
we believe about them? If man is a fallen being, condemned to eternal
death, and God has provided only one way for his escape and salvation,
then it makes an infinite and eternal difference as to whether we know
it or believe it or act on it or not. If the majority of the human race
is doomed to eternal torture unless it escapes through certain
prescribed conditions, does it make any difference whether we know it