Of this also I have described the result. The moral
sentiment of Europe has greatly improved, and there is at least a
widespread revolt against warfare and a prospect of abolishing it. For
this God, the more than human, scorched Europe with the horrible flames
which Archbishop Carr thinks he keeps in his arsenal of
torture-implements. The Archbishop says that infidelity has not spread
so much in Australia. I should, if I were not well acquainted with the
Commonwealth, be disposed to see in that the reason why eminent prelates
can still utter such gross medieval nonsense in that country.
In England this particularly crude type of nonsense is not usually
uttered by preachers of distinction,[2] though it is common enough among
less responsible preachers; but there is a dangerous approach to it in
some of the sermons which the religious periodicals regard as
important. Looking over the current issues of the religious press, I
notice a sermon on the war by Professor Clow, in which the Allies are,
in harmony with his test, described as "the vultures of God." Germany,
it seems, is the prey, and Germany's sins are painted black. Professor
Clow, it is true, shrinks from the very natural implication of his
words, but he clearly intimates that he sees the action of God in the
military conduct of the Allies, and to that extent he is hardly less
revolting, in view of his culture, than the archbishop.
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