world, well-nigh destroying the entire fabric of
civilization. How near we have come to that catastrophe, as a result
of the war and its evil progeny, they best know who have recently
visited the countries principally involved and most vitally affected.
Even now civilization is not out of danger, but is weak and unsteady
like a man beginning to recover from a terrible fever. Infinite care
and patience and wisdom must be exercised by statesmen and peoples
and by the molders of public opinion in every nation in order to make
recovery possible.

Never was there a moment when racial or religious antagonism was as
dangerous and so much to be feared as in this crisis. Never were the
citizens of all lands so solemnly warned to avoid the poison of
hatred. The passionate hatreds engendered by the war must be crushed
down and they who were foes, seeking to destroy one another, must now
work together for the preservation of the civilization that is their
common heritage. With the carnage and wrack and ruin of the war still
oppressing us, and our hearts still lacerated and bruised, a common
peril is compelling us to unite and to seek safety in fellowship and
co-operation. Yesterday we relied upon the destructive arts of the
warrior; to-day we must rely upon the conserving arts of the healer.
Yesterday we hailed Mars; to-day we hail the Christ in whose touch is
life and healing.

What perverse and malevolent genius it must be that chooses this
moment to open the flood gates and set free the pent passions of
anti-Semitism! How monstrous a thing it is that from a great historic
pulpit of the Christian Church which Beecher glorified by his
courageous idealism, the brutal and un-Christian appeals of
anti-Semitism should be made now when the world needs, above all
things, to be purged of the poison of hatred and strengthened by
fellowship! How great a tragedy it is that men like Mr. Ford and his
associates can find nothing to inspire them in the vast work of
restoration and reconstruction; that their energies and resources are
directed to the ignoble and dangerous end of inciting in the minds of
millions of our people fear and hatred of the Jew, as Jew!

I am not insensible of, or indifferent to, the problems incidental to
the presence in this country of more than three million Jews. Neither
am I insensible of, or indifferent to, the problems incidental to our
vast negro population, or to the presence of Europeans and their slow
and