ANOTHER HARVEST SIFTING REVIEWED. TWO PROPOSED CONVENTIONS. IN DEFENSE OF PEACE AMONG GOD'S PEOPLE. THE PURPOSES OF THE P. B. I. EXAMINED. 

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A YEAR and a half ago [written Aug., 1918] the wrong-doings of certain leading British brethren, who refused to desist from their course at private exhortation, and who, in hopes of crushing us, published misrepresentations abroad, forced us to appear before the British Church as the exposer of their evil course. Within a year the wrong-doings of the Society's leaders, who also refused to desist from their course at private exhortation, and who, in hopes of crushing us, also published misrepresentations abroad, forced us to appear before the whole Church as the exposer of their evil ways. And now, for the third time, we are forced to appear before the Church as the exposer of the wrong-doings of certain leaders among us who have refused to desist from wrong ways at private exhortation, and who in part, to crush us, published misrepresentations against us at the Asbury Park Convention after having, for some time past, carried on a "political" campaign of "whispering" against us, the fruit of which campaign it was designed to reap at the Convention in the ousting of three brothers (R.H. Hirsh, R.G. Jolly, who stood with us, and ourself) from the Pastoral Bible Institute Committee, etc. Doubtless the hearts of many friends were deeply grieved at the attacks made upon us by H.C. Rockwell and I. Hoskins, the former in his sermon, the latter as Secretary-Treasurer, officially reporting without the Committee's authorization, the majority of whom repudiated his utterances in his address to the Elders and Deacons, and in 

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his address before the whole Convention, Saturday, July 27, 1918, and then again the next day. Their general charges and spirit were so much like those of J.F.R. that for the most part those who witnessed these, and heard our answer, were by Monday convinced that we were being harvest-siftinged and unbetheled anew. Hence we consider this third attempt to crush us the same in spirit as the other two, and, accordingly, call it "Another Harvest Sifting." Therefore this chapter, which is a brief review of this third movement, is called "Another Harvest Sifting Reviewed." In brief, our loyalty to that Servant's ideals, arrangements, charter and will, and to the interests of the Church against the efforts of certain leaders to put some of them aside, have made us the target of this, a third widespread attack. 

Earnestly and long, but, of course, not perfectly, have we by kindness, long-suffering and reasoning, sought to hold these brothers back from their course; but seemingly it was all in vain! The responsibility of foisting this trouble on the Church is wholly theirs. As by the British and American "Society" leaders, the troubles were set afloat by a campaign of "whispering," and then by public attacks before large numbers of brethren, ourself keeping silent all the time, and trying to persuade them to do likewise; so has it been in this trouble, which was rudely thrust upon the recent Convention according to illy-thought-out preparations, despite the promises of the one mainly responsible for the publicity to keep the trouble from the Convention. Had the evil been limited to the Convention, we would, so far as exposures are concerned, rest content with what we answered there; but alas! the matters have been spread broadcast, and the wrongs and evil effects connected with them are so great, that duty to God and the Church forces us to place before the Church a brief summary of the wrongs that have been committed. If conditions would permit, gladly would we bury 

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the evils out of sight; for they are not told with pleasure, but with profound grief that such things could be privately and publicly committed among us. They are told in the hope that their recital will arouse in the Church the spirit of repentance; for the evil qualities out of which these wrongs have flown are, alas! not limited to the Committee members more or less involved. These qualities (of which the following are examples: grasping for power, lording it over God's heritage, the spirit of fear and compromising, assassinatory slander, contentiousness, partisanship, arbitrariness, legality and worldliness seeking to corrupt the Church's organization) are quite widespread among us, and the Lord calls upon us to set them aside. 

Our motive in reciting these things is not to chastise anyone, but to arouse the Church to a sense of danger from Satanic working on our weaknesses to our spiritual injury, to earnest, humble prayer and heart-searchings as preparatory to assemblying in solemn Convention to investigate these things, and to devise ways and means of helping all concerned to put these evils aside. Abundant are the evidences of God's displeasure upon us and of His withholding blessings from us for these wrongs. In God's name, therefore, let us assemble ourselves in Convention that unitedly we may learn to understand the spiritual diseases that are working havoc in our midst, and the treatment and remedy for their cure. If, in His spirit, we make the effort, He will surely bless us therein. What the situation requires is much humility, candor, honesty, love, and a clear view of the nature of the evils and means of putting them aside, combined with persistent determination, by God's grace, faithfully to use His Spirit, Word and Providence to make the diagnosis, prescribe the remedies and accept the treatment. Since the Convention some, with distress, learned what took place there. They have learned that there were, to put it 

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mildly, questionable acts committed, that the old Committee appointed by the Fort Pitt Convention was dissolved, because a group of four of its members wanted to get rid of the other three, who blocked their unscriptural, papistical and revolutionary course in certain particulars, that this was accomplished by questionable acts and methods, that the supporters of the Group, as well as some of the Group, used methods like those that J.F.R. used before and at the shareholders' meeting last January, that these same methods prospered unto the undoing of the old Committee, and unto the electing of a Committee consisting of about six members slated for the Committee by the Group, that some exposures were made Sunday, July 28; and as a result, the Convention, refusing longer to be bossed and driven by the Group and some of their partisans, and, becoming apprehensive that all was not gold that was given a glitter, not only refused to be clotured and stampeded into forming a new society and into adopting a program for what would be another spurious first smiting of Jordan; but also withdrew from the new Committee powers that the old one had, i.e., the power to publish a periodical and to have an Editorial Committee. Thus, those who came to the Convention seemingly to discredit others, left the Convention with their own credit far from being enhanced, and besides shorn of much of their power. Alas! that against these foretold results they refused to take kindly forewarning, which would have been heeded, if they had exercised the necessary meekness. 

By the Group are meant the following persons: I.F. Hoskins, I.L. Margeson, F.H. Magee and J.D. Wright, the first of whom committed in his attacks the added wrong of disparagingly mentioning names, i.e., of R.H. Hirsh, R.G. Jolly and ourself, though H.C. Rockwell started the attack with an attempt at assassination of us. Both in justice and charity we are glad to say of F.H. Magee that he, both to others and to us, 

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expressed strong disapproval of the attacks of I.F. Hoskins and H.C. Rockwell. We will not, we cannot, believe of J.D. Wright that he approves of their course. While not presuming to judge the hearts, in justice to all concerned, we ought to state on whom it seems to us the varying degrees of external responsibility rest. From our knowledge of the facts, the most guilty of the Group seems to be I.F. Hoskins, with I.L. Margeson as a close second. These two seem to have done the main part of the planning, whose climax and purpose were reached in the Convention business meetings, July 27. It is but fair to say of F.H. Magee that he is too honest a man, and too noble a Christian, knowingly to have entered into the plots of the other two. It seems to us that he has been measurably deceived into a course favorable to the plans of the other two, and has been skillfully used as a tool in the furtherance of their plans under the influence of some false impressions, which he honestly believed to be true. We do not believe that J.D. Wright entered into the plotting at all. But, unfortunately, like F.H. Magee, he generally supported the policies of the two on the vital questions of principle that divided the Committee. Of these four we use the word Group, not disparagingly, but to have a brief term to designate them in their working together. 

After he came on the scene, H.C. Rockwell seems to be almost on a par in the plotting and wrong-doing with the two. These three, in not a few particulars, closely resemble J.F.R., W. E. Van Amburgh and A. H. MacMillan, respectively, in the roles they played. The cunning and brutality of H.C. Rockwell's attack on us, on the Convention platform at Asbury Park, lasting over a half hour, and made Saturday morning in his sermon on "The Sevenfold Mission of the Church," with Is. 61:1, 2, as text, were in spirit and in main accusations, i.e., in charging "insanity," selfish ambition for leadership, etc., a reproduction of 

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J.F.R.'s "Harvest Sifting." This attack was a part of a deliberate plan to drive us out of the Pastoral Bible Institute Committee, and to destroy our influence among the brethren. These three and some of their supporters, by their words and acts, for quite a while before the Convention, gave R.H. Hirsh, R.G. Jolly and ourself enough clues of their plans to enable us to understand their main purposes in having called a Convention, though not before the Convention was voted for. The three main purposes of their arranging for the business features of the Convention were: first, to get rid of R.H. Hirsh, R.G. Jolly and ourself; second, to stampede the Convention into endorsing their policies of forming a Society with a Charter DIFFERENT from that of that Servant and of organizing the Church for what would be another SPURIOUS FIRST SMITING OF JORDAN; and third, to obtain from the Convention for their Committee all the Powers of the Society's Board of Directors; whereas the old Committee was limited in its sphere of activity, according to the instructions of the Fort Pitt Convention, to those features of work that the friends in general, by their responses to the Committee's letter, stated to be their understanding of the Lord's will as to the kinds of general service necessary for the Church, i.e., Pilgrim service, which, of course, includes conventions and a periodical. 

Deeply do we deplore the necessity of using names. We will not plead in our defense for mentioning names the fact that some of the Group and some of their supporters did this first, both before and during the Convention. All will bear us record that we did not speak of the facts and names until after they had told their interpretation of facts, and mentioned names PUBLICLY at the Convention. The names, thus being made widely public through the course of these three themselves, to use their names here will now do them no wrong. Then, again, not to use names would work 

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injustice, especially to F.H. Magee and J.D. Wright, as that would in the setting given to matters below impliedly set forth that they are as guilty as some others, whereas they are not. Then, again, the matter cannot be presented with the necessary clearness without giving names; still further, the right of publishing this paper, whose object is the calling of a diagnosal and remedial Convention, which all sober minds, after reading this paper, will recognize as a crying need, cannot reasonably be demonstrated without mentioning names. All will recall that under similar conditions last year, those who constitute the Group strongly advocated the calling of an investigative and curative shareholders' meeting. Therefore, they cannot consistently object to such a Convention under similar conditions now; nor were they blamable for using names and stating the acts of the Society's wrongdoers under like circumstances last summer. In fact, the use of names and the mention of evil deeds of those who wrong the entire Church is a duty, and is not to be confused with evil speaking. See "Manna" comments for July 14. 

IN OBEDIENCE TO THE DECISION OF THE MAJORITY OF THE OLD COMMITTEE, AND ALSO IN OBEDIENCE TO THE MAJORITY OF THE CONVENTION COMMITTEE, that sample copies of "The Bible Standard" be distributed Friday night, July 26, at the Convention, R.H. Hirsh announced to the conventioners the fact that he had the long-desired first issue of the paper for them. He then left it to a vote as to whether they desired it then. After an almost unanimous affirmative vote of the Convention, he invited them forward to receive the paper. This course greatly angered I.F. Hoskins and I.L. Margeson, whose rage almost caused them to make a counter-announcement, for they had for a long time been delaying the publication, partly for reasons best known to themselves. Then, in the little back room, they fell upon us, upbraiding us for our part in 

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the matter. Among other uncomplimentary remarks, by which they characterized the course of the majority of both Committees in this matter, I.F. Hoskins used, several times with heated emphasis, the expression, "This is Rutherfordism." Quickly seeing the similarity but in another sense than he meant, we replied to the following effect: "Yes, Brother Hoskins, it is Rutherfordism, just as two Board members, J.F.R. and W. E. Van Amburgh, and one not on the Board, A. H. MacMillan, sought to set aside the voted decision of the Board's majority, so you and I.L. Margeson, two members of the Committee, with the assistance of one not on the Committee, H.C. Rockwell, are now doing. It is Rutherfordism, indeed." In fact, it was Rutherfordism repeating itself; but, strange to say, this time it is among ourselves. 

The comparison was so complete and apparent that I.F. Hoskins did not answer us. Since that night, with his statement, "This is Rutherfordism," in mind, we have made a careful study of the history of our Committee since its appointment Jan. 6, 1918, comparing it with the history of Rutherfordism in the Society. As a result of this study, we have gathered together, under twelve divisions, or heads, one hundred and fifty particulars (to which we could add more, if necessary), wherein Rutherfordism in the Society finds its counterpart in Rutherfordism in the Committee. In this comparison J.F.R., or his representatives, correspond to the Group, or their representatives. It is sad to contemplate these points of comparison; because they prove that some of those who protested against J.F.R.'s wrong-doings have, in spite of having his example before their eyes as a warning, and in spite of their protest against it, imitated it so closely, as these twelve divisions and one hundred and fifty particulars indicate. Could these brothers have fallen into the same evils as J.F.R. while living close to the Lord? Do not their knowledge of, and protest against his wrong-doings increase 

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their own guilt? He, at least, did not have a similar example as a warning before his eyes. How are the mighty fallen! Let the daughter of Zion weep for the iniquity of the children of her people! In these correspondencies, not the number of persons involved, but the nature and quality of the acts are the points of comparison. Arranged in parallel columns, these twelve divisions, placed as heads over the one hundred and fifty particulars, are presented to the brethren for consideration, as follows: 

THE DEADLY PARALLEL. 

[After reading number 1 in the first column, please read 

number 1 in the second column, etc.] 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE 

SOCIETY. 

I. J.F.R. persisted in taking up and acting on subjects outside of the sphere of an executive and manager in the Society's affairs to the disruption of the Board of Directors. 

(1) He persisted in discussing the suppression of certain interpretations of the Lord's Word, e.g., "that Servant's" interpretation of the Parable of the Penny. 

(2) He sought to combine in various acts the Board of the Society and the Board of the People's Pulpit Association. 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

I. The group persisted in taking up and acting on subjects outside of the sphere of activity prescribed by the Fort Pitt Convention, even to the disruption of the old Pastoral Bible Institute Committee. 

(1) The Group persisted in discussing the suppression of certain interpretations of the Lord's Word, e.g., The Evil Servant, Elijah and Elisha, etc. 

(2) I.F. Hoskins and H.C. Rockwell, immediately after the conviction of the Society leaders, introduced, for the Committee's favorable action, a plan to make 

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(3) He planned securing legal action to drive the Board's majority and Bro. Johnson from Bethel. 

(4) He advocated a spurious first smiting of Jordan as an indispensable thing in the first book-publication of the Society, as the chief part of its program of work. 

(5) For months he insisted on dissolving the Society, i.e., making a one-man affair of the Society, despite the fact that "that Servant's" writings, will and charter made what, during his life, was a Society in name only, a Society in fact, at his death. 

(6) These acts sidetracked the consideration and accomplishment of some of the work that he was authorized to do. 

(7) The obtrusion of these matters divided the 

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overtures to effect a reunion with the Society. 

(3) These two planned securing legal action (through a firm of New York corporation lawyers) to recover control of the Society after the conviction of the Society's leaders. 

(4) Some of the Group and some of their supporters advocated, as an indispensable thing that our first periodical number set forth what would be a spurious first smiting of Jordan as a chief part of the Committee's future work. 

(5) For months these four insisted on forming a Society, i.e., dissolving the Committee, despite the fact that the Fort Pitt Convention voted down a motion to form a Society. 

(6) These acts sidetracked the consideration a n d accomplishment of some of the work that the Committee was authorized to do. 

(7) The obtrusion of these matters divided the 

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Board into two parts. 

II. False and wrong motives were charged, especially against Bro. Johnson, to the disruption of the old Board. 

(1) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of aspiring to control the work and the Board, whereas, he pushed J.F.R. ahead and advised against himself being made a Board member and President. 

(2) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of being led by the spirit of ruling or ruining. 

(3) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of trying to delay the work of the Society. 

(4) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of being in a clique with certain members of the Board (whereas, the accuser was thus guilty) to disrupt the work of the Society. 

(5) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of seeking 

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Committee into two parts. 

II. False and wrong motives were charged, especially against Bro. Johnson, to the disruption of the old committee. 

(1) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of aspiring to control the work and the Committee, whereas, he pushed others to the front and advised against his being elected an officer. 

(2) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of being led by the spirit of ruling or ruining. 

(3) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of trying to delay the work of the Committee, e.g., the publication of "The Bible Standard"; whereas, he pushed it at least as much as any other member of the Committee. 

(4) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of being in a clique with R.H. Hirsh and R.G. Jolly (whereas the accuser, with the Group, was thus guilty), to disrupt the work of the Committee. 

(5) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of seeking

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to divide the Church by J.F.R., who later did divide it. 

(6) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of seeking a following by J.F.R., who won a following. 

III. J.F.R. attempted to suppress the presentation of any Biblical thoughts to the Church, unless he favored them. 

(1) He did this among the Pilgrims by a resolution of his own to suppress what was new, apart from Vol. VII and what he favored, on pain of their being out of harmony. 

(2) This he did among the elders by requiring them to submit to Vol. VII end the Society policies' tests. 

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to divide the Church by those who are now dividing it. 

(6) Bro. Johnson was falsely accused of seeking a following by the Group that is winning one. 

III. Led by I.F. Hoskins, the Group attempted to suppress the presentation of Biblical thoughts to the Church, unless they favored them. 

(1) This was done by a resolution of the Committee forbidding Committee members to teach anything new, particularly on types, symbols and prophecy, not set forth in that Servant's writings, unless agreed to by the Committee, on pain of their being out of harmony with the Committee. 

(2) In harmony with this resolution, I.F. Hoskins largely created such a sentiment among a number of the elders of one of our largest Churches as led to the presentation of two resolutions in elders' meetings, and also one in the Church, calculated to prevent the presentation of uncensored new thoughts

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IV. J.F.R. insisted on setting up false standards of teaching authorization to the disruption of the old Board. 

(1) He advocated that nothing be taught additional to that Servant's writings except what the Churches (frightened into believing by his propaganda) had first approved, thus making the Church, not the Lord, at the mouth of the teachers "set in the body," the arbiter of what was meat in due season. 

(2) He advocated and decided that nothing be taught additional to that Servant's writings except what he sanctioned. 

(3) He advocated that nothing be anywhere taught additional to that Servant's writings, except what the Editorial Committee first approved. 

(4) He advocated that nothing be taught that might occasion disagreement among Truth people, 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

to that Church, which very wisely rejected the resolution. 

IV. The Group insisted on setting up false standards of teaching authorization to the disruption of the old Committee. 

(1) The Group advocated that nothing be taught additional to that Servant's writings except what the Churches had first approved, thus making the Church, not the Lord, at the mouth of the teachers "set in the body," the arbiter of what was meat in due season. 

(2) The Group advocated and decided that nothing be taught additional to that Servant's writings except what the Committee sanctioned. 

(3) Several of the Group advocated that nothing be anywhere taught additional to that Servant's writings, except what the Editorial Committee first approved. 

(4) The Group advocated that nothing be taught that might occasion disagree-ment among Truth people, 

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despite the fact that he admitted that we were in a sifting, which, of course, means that God wants, by disagreements, to separate the classes, i.e., Little Flock, Great Company, etc. 

(5) He attempted to boycott in Pilgrim work those Board members and others who stood for Biblical principles in these matters. 

(6) Reliable information proves that by July 29, 1917, he had discussed boycotting in Pilgrim work members of the Old Board and others. 

(7) Later information proved that he did boycott in Pilgrim work members of the old Board and others. 

V. He greatly exceeded his authority in grasping for power, largely treating the Society's work as though it were his private business, to the disruption of the old Board. 

(1) He signed his own name instead of that of the Society to the Society's 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

despite the fact that they admitted that we are in a sifting, which, of course, means that God wants, by disagreements, to separate classes. 

(5) Several of the Group attempted to boycott in Pilgrim work those Committee members and others who stood for Biblical principles in these matters. 

(6) Reliable information proves that by July 29, 1918, some, if not all, of the Group discussed boycotting in Pilgrim work two of the ousted Committee members. 

(7) Later information proves that they have boycotted in Pilgrim work some members of the old Committee. 

V. I.F. Hoskins greatly exceeded his authority in grasping for power, largely treating the Committee's work as though it were his private business, to the disruption of the old Committee. 

(1) I.F. Hoskins signed his own name, instead of that of the Committee, to

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Correspondence with which he was charged. 

(2) Unauthorized by and unknown to the Board, he made contracts, in some cases using donated private funds, of whose existence he said nothing to the Board, to meet the expenses. 

(3) He accepted some donations which he kept as a private fund, apart from the Society's funds, to meet expenses, unauthorized by the Board; all this being unknown to the Board as such, until about July 26, 1917, when some of them, by a seeming accident, found it out. 

(4) Apart from one time, he gave, and required to be given, no exact report of receipts, expenses and balance on hand; and when asked at various times to give or furnish information on these matters, he gave the Board no exact information. 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

The Committee's corre-spondence with which he was charged. 

(2) Unauthorized by, and not reporting it to, the Committee, I.F. Hoskins rented, and in part furnished, a room for office purposes, seemingly using a private fund, of whose existence he said nothing to the Committee, to meet expenses. 

(3) I.F. Hoskins accepted some donations, as treasurer, which he kept as a private fund, apart from the Committee's funds, to meet expenses unauthorized by the Committee; all this being unknown to the Committee as such, some of whom first found it out July 26, 1918, by a seeming accident. 

(4) Apart from one time, I.F. Hoskins has given the Committee no exact report on receipts, expenses and balance on hand; and when asked at various Committee meetings on these matters, gave the Committee no exact information. (While claiming to make a report to the 

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(5) Long after the Board had asked for such an accounting he continued to keep some of the Society's money deposited in his own name. 

(6) He insisted on signing some contracts in his own name. 

(7) Without authorization of the Board he paid for work which he was not authorized to have done. 

(8) He assumed authority to deal with class matters not given him as his duty. 

(9) In pursuance of such unauthorized acts he set Board members in an unfavorable light and caused 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

Convention as Secretary-Treasurer, unauthorized to do so by the Committee, he told the Convention that he did not have the figures with him, and therefore could not give more than an approximate report of the finances on hand, nor did he say anything of the amounts received and expended.) 

(5) Months after the Committee instructed I.F. Hoskins to transfer its funds in the bank to its name, he continued to keep the Committee's money in his own name in the bank. 

(6) I.F. Hoskins insisted on having the Committee's telephone taken out in his own name. 

(7) Without authorization of the Committee I.F. Hoskins paid for work which he was not authorized to have done. 

(8) I.F. Hoskins assumed authority to deal with matters in a class not given him as his duty. 

(9) Through the preceding act, through a letter which he wrote, and which was read in a class meeting

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injury to nearly all concerned. 

(10) He withheld from the Board important com-munications addressed to the Board. 

(11) Against repeated remonstrances he continued to control Pilgrim appointments without consulting the Board; and sought to prevent other than his Pilgrims from addressing classes. 

(12) He appointed many persons to the Pilgrim office without authorization of the Board. 

(13) He advocated and did things calculated to injure prominent brethren with the Church, including 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

I.F. Hoskins set one of the Committee members in an unfavorable light, to the injury of nearly all concerned. 

(10) I.F. Hoskins withheld from the Committee a communication (and information respecting it until it was eked out of him) addressed to it by our largest Church inviting the Committee to establish its headquarters in the city of that Church. 

(11) Against repeated remonstrance's I.F. Hoskins continued alone for two months to make Pilgrim appointments without consulting the brother who jointly with him was charged with the duty of making these appointments; and he sought to prevent at least one Church from having Pilgrim service unless he made the appointments. 

(12) I.F. Hoskins appointed persons to act as Pilgrims without authori-zation of the Committee. 

(13) I.F. Hoskins advo-cated and did things calculated to injure promi-nent brethren with the Church, 

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public attacks on them, mentioning their names. 

(14) In many instances he interfered in the private affairs of the Churches. 

(15) He used his office to make for himself a place in the Church. 

(16) He became the chief opponent of the brother who most favored him. 

(17) He publicly disparaged the presentations of Pilgrims with whom he did not agree. 

(18) He even publicly mentioned their names as the holders of opinions from which he dissented. 

(19) He continued to speak against them after being warned against the injustice. 

(20) He indulged in sarcasm at the expense of one of these. 

(21) He winked knowing-ly to his sympathizers and sneered in disparagement of others. 

(22) He wrongly told of 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

including public attacks on them, mentioning their names. 

(14) In more than one case he interfered in the private affairs of one of our Churches. 

(15) I.F. Hoskins used his office to make for himself a place in the Church. 

(16) I.F. Hoskins became the chief opponent of the brother who most favored him. 

(17) I.F. Hoskins publicly disparaged the presentations of Pilgrims with whom he disagreed. 

(18) I.F. Hoskins even publicly mentioned their names, as the holders of opinions from which he dissented. 

(19) I.F. Hoskins continued to speak against them after being warned against the injustice. 

(20) I.F. Hoskins, in one instance at least, indulged in sarcasm at the expense of one of these. 

(21) He winked know-ingly to his sympathizers and sneered in disparage-ment of one of them. 

(22) I.F. Hoskins 

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RUTHERFORDISM IN THE SOCIETY. 

his disagreement with the Board and Bro. Johnson to others. 

(23) At first for months in his public utterances, without mentioning names, He said things calculated to undermine various brethren. 

(24) These underhanded attacks also came out in "The Tower." 

(25) He tried to force through the Board cut-and-dried programs. 

(26) He doctored the minutes to suit himself, e.g., those of the People's Pulpit Association, so as to make them sanction the holding of an annual meeting adjourned from early in Jan., 1917, to July 27, 1917, the date on which he caused to be expelled R.H. Hirsh and I.F. Hoskins from the Association and its Board. 

(27) He unnecessarily used from the Society's contributions extravagant amounts of money to put up himself and some of his fellow conspirators at high 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

wrongly told of his disagreement with R.H. Hirsh, R.G. Jolly and P.S.L. Johnson to others. 

(23) At first for months in his public utterances, without mentioning names, I.F. Hoskins said things calculated to undermine various brethren. 

(24) These underhanded attacks also came out in "The Bible Standard." 

(25) I.F. Hoskins tried to force through the Committee cut-and-dried programs. 

(26) I.F. Hoskins doctored the Committee minutes so as to make motions favor things that he wanted, contrary to the majority's intentions in passing them, which procedure the Committee had repeatedly to correct. 

(27) During the Convention I.F. Hoskins unnecessarily used from the Committee's contributions extravagant amounts of money to put up himself, 

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priced hotels. 

VI. J.F.R. sought to lord it over God's heritage, to the disruption of the old Board. 

(1) He sought to with-hold from the Church the discussion of timely Scriptural subjects. 

(2) He sought to withhold properly authorized and revised Volume VII from the Church by disregarding the rights of the Board to control and of the Editors to revise it, and by disregarding the needs of the Church. 

(3) He claimed and sought to obtain for himself practically all the power of the Society's Board to control in the general work, which means that he 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

H.C. Rockwell and others of his supporters at a hotel where for each of them he, had to pay $6 a day. 

VI. A number of the Committee, usually the Group, sought to lord it over God's heritage, to the disruption of the old Committee. 

(1) The Group sought to withhold from the Church the discussion of timely Scriptural subjects (It is but fair to state that later F.H. McGee and I.L. Margeson voted to rescind the objectionable resolution.) 

(2) I.F. Hoskins, I.L. Margeson and H.C. Rockwell sought to withhold the properly authorized and revised "Bible Standard" from being published by disregarding the rights of the Committee's majority to control in the matter, and disregarding the needs of the Church. 

(3) They claimed and sought to obtain for the Committee (which would usually mean the Group) all the power of the Society's Board to control the 

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could introduce any feature of work that he desired. 

(4) He claimed and sought to obtain for the Editorial Committee, which he dominated, more power in the teaching office than that Servant received from the Lord, or ever used; i.e., power to exclude from the Church any teaching not sanctioned by "The Tower" Editorial Committee. 

(5) By forbidding the teaching of things unsanctioned by the Editorial Committee (dominated by himself), he arrogated to himself more power than that Servant received from the Lord, or ever used. 

(6) He attempted to withhold, and succeeded in withholding, the service of faithful Pilgrims from the Church, as far as he was able. 

VII. J.F.R. sought, in several "business" matters, to prevent carrying out the decision of the Board's majority, to the disruption of the old Board. 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

general work, which means that they could introduce any feature of the work that they desired. 

(4) They claimed and sought to obtain for the Editorial Committee more power in the teaching office than that Servant received from the Lord, or ever used; i.e., the power to exclude from the Church any teaching not sanctioned by "The Bible Standard" Editorial Committee. 

(5) By forbidding the teaching of things unsanctioned by the Committee, they arrogated to themselves more power than that Servant received from God, or ever used. 

(6) They attempted to withhold, and succeeded in withholding, the service of faithful Pilgrims from the Church, as far as they were able. 

VII. I.F. Hoskins and I.L. Margeson, supported by H.C. Rockwell, sought in several "business" matters, to prevent carrying out the decision of the Committee's majority

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(1) With the assistance of W. E. Van Amburgh and A. H. MacMillan, he sought to prevent the publication of the first reply of the Board's majority, wherein they defended themselves against their ousting and J.F.R.'s circular letter of July 19, 1917, to the Class Secretaries. 

(2) With the assistance of these two he sought to prevent the distribution of this same reply, July 26, 1917. 

(3) With the assistance of the same two, he sought to disparage the Board's majority relative to the publication and distribution of the reply, as well as to disparage the reply itself. 

VIII. Through misrepre-sentation and violation of confidence faithful and prominent brethren, 

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to the disruption of the old Committee. 

(1) These three sought to prevent the publication of The Bible Standard before the Asbury Park Convention, despite the votes of four members of the Committee, who voted that the paper be published in time to announce the Asbury Park Convention. 

(2) The same three sought to prevent the distribution of The Bible Standard at the time that the majority of the large Committee and of the Convention Committee decided that it be distributed, July 26, 1918. 

(3) These three, through I.F. Hoskins, their leader, sought publicly to disparage the course of the Committee's majority relative to the publication and distribution of The Bible Standard, as well as to disparage the paper itself. 

VIII. Through misrepre-sentation and violation of confidence faithful and prominent brethren, refusing 

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refusing to countenance wrong principles and acts, were, by J.F.R. and his supporters, privately and publicly discredited in the Church, to the disruption of the Society's old Board. 

(1) One of these was publicly and privately represented as an insane and fanciful speculator on types, symbols and prophecy, and as insanely aspiring to leadership. 

(2) Certain Directors were falsely represented as dominated by him. 

(3) These and he were falsely accused of obstructing the work of the Church. 

(4) These and he were falsely accused of dividing the Church. 

(5) These and he were falsely accused of advocating radical Scriptural teaching. 

(6) Without foundation in fact one of them was habitually accused of seeking to lord it over God's heritage. 

(7) Things that one of 

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to countenance wrong principles and acts, have, by some of the group and some of their supporters, been publicly and privately discredited in the Church, to the disruption of the old Committee. 

(1) One of these was privately and publicly represented as an insane and fanciful speculator on types, symbols and prophecy, and as insanely aspiring to leadership. 

(2) Certain Committee members were falsely represented as dominated by him. 

(3) These and he were falsely accused of obstructing the work of the Church. 

(4) These and he were falsely accused of dividing the Church. 

(5) These and he were falsely accused of advo-cating radical Scriptural teaching. 

(6) Without foundation in fact one of the three was habitually accused of seeking to lord it over God's heritage. 

(7) Things that one of 

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the five had told in sacred confidence were scattered broadcast. 

IX. J.F.R. and his supporters, July 27, 1917, tried to force through the People's Pulpit Association and the Bethel Family several matters without proper discussion, to the disruption of the old Board. 

(1) He accepted the program of a spurious first smiting of Jordan from a brother whose key and many other views of Revelation, etc., are vagarious and contrary to those of that Servant; and he insisted that all swallow his program and labor in harmony with it. 

(2) From the false viewpoint that that Servant clearly taught a future first smiting of Jordan, he sought, July 27, 1917, with almost no discussion to commit to this program the People's Pulpit Association under the new Board, which he was really organizing as the directorate of a new Society with what was in effect an altered 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

the three had told in sacred confidence were scattered broadcast. 

IX. The Group and their supporters, July 27, 1918, sought to force through the Asbury Park Convention several matters with-out proper discussion, to the disruption of the old Committee. 

(1) They accepted a program for a spurious first smiting of Jordan from a brother whose key and many other views of Revelation, etc., are vagarious and contrary to those of that Servant; and they insisted that all swallow their program and labor in harmony with it. 

(2) From the false viewpoint that that Servant clearly taught a future first smiting of Jordan they sought, July 27, 1918, to commit with almost no discussion the Convention to the policy of forming a Society with an altered Charter as indispensable to a future first smiting of Jordan. 

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Charter as indispensable for a future first smiting of Jordan. 

(3) He resorted, July 27, 1917, to parliamentary evasions and other questionable things to prevent discussing questions fundamental to his whole plan. 

(4) He also resorted, July 27, 1917, to cloture methods to prevent in the People's Pulpit Association and before the Bethel family sufficient discussion of his program. 

X. Privately and publicly J.F.R. advocated what was in fact setting aside some of, and adding others to, the clauses of that Servant's charter for his new society, unto the disruption of the old Board. 

(1) His advocacy of the principle contained in the letter of Brother Dabney that all the Church ought to have a vote in the election of the Directors proves that he preferred not to have shareholders. 

(2) His holding the "straw vote" proves that 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

(3) They resorted, July 27, 1918, to parliamentary evasions and other questionable things to prevent discussion of questions fundamental to their whole plan. 

(4) They also resorted, July 27, 1918, to cloture methods to prevent, in the Convention, sufficient discussion of their program. 

X. Privately and publicly the Group advocated setting aside some of, and adding others to, the clauses of that Servant's charter in the charter of their proposed society, unto the disruption of the old Committee. 

(1) They asked that there be no shareholders in the proposed new Society. 

(2) They advocated that the Directors be elected by

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he wanted the Directors elected by The Tower subscribers in the Truth. 

(3) By campaigning for and manipulating proxies he proved that he wanted the officers elected by the Directors of the Society. 

(4) He wanted the directors to be elected annually, contrary to that Servant's arrangement. 

(5) In his oration, written early in Nov., 1916, and published in the Memorial Tower, he professed the highest regard for that Servant's charter. 

(6) He was repeatedly entreated not to advocate these changes, as disloyal to that Servant's charter. 

(7) He was forewarned that for such advocacy thoughtful persons would be given good reason to fear that his published praise of the Charter would be open to the charge of insincerity and self-seeking. 

XI. J.F.R. arranged for and conducted, in the interests of his plan for three days, Jan. 3-5, 

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the subscribers of The Bible Standard. 

(3) They advocated that the officers be elected by the Directors. 

(4) They wanted the Directors to be elected annually, contrary to that Servant's arrangement. 

(5) They professed in Facts for Shareholders, written early in Nov., 1917, the highest regard for that Servant's charter as divinely given. 

(6) They were repeatedly entreated not to advocate these changes, as disloyal to that Servant's charter. 

(7) They were fore-warned that for such advocacy thoughtful persons would be given good reason to fear that their published praise of the Charter as Divinely given would be open to the charge of insincerity and self-seeking. XI. The Group arranged for and conducted, in the interests of their plan for three days, July 26-28, 

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1918, a thoroughly "bossed" convention. 

(1) He announced his plan beforehand. 

(2) He carried out much of his plan; and was prevented from carrying it out entirely, e.g., a unan-imous re-election, by some, previously unenlightened, becoming enlightened as to his purposes and methods. 

(3) One of the avowed purposes of the Convention was to unseat the four Directors who sought to hold in check his unscriptural and dangerous plans. 

(4) A widespread "political" campaign was waged creating much and general sentiment, particu-larly against Bro. Johnson, and generally against the Board members, inuring to their unseating. 

(5) He engineered a movement to use for his advantage an absent brother, A. N. Pierson, and used his opinions before the Convention to the discredit of the ousted Directors. 

(6) He had at least one 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

1918, a thoroughly "bossed" convention. 

(1) They announced their plan beforehand. 

(2) They carried out much of their plan; and were prevented from carrying it out entirely by some, previously unenlightened, becoming enlightened as to their purposes and methods. 

(3) One of the avowed purposes of the Convention was to unseat the three Committee brothers who held in check their unscriptural and dangerous plans. 

(4) A widespread "political" campaign was waged creating much and general sentiment, particu-larly against Bro. Johnson, and generally against all three of the Committee members marked for defeat, inuring to their unseating. 

(5) They engineered a movement to use for their advantage an absent brother, Menta Sturgeon, and used his opinions before the Convention to the discredit of the three rejected Committee members. 

(6) At least one brother

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special mouthpiece to present motions with suitable and sometimes untrue remarks to carry out his previously arranged plan. 

(7) In discourses and addresses he and some of his supporters sought to undermine, in the estima-tion of the conventioners, the brothers who were objectionable to him. 

(8) A special meeting of leaders (unannounced on the program) was called to oil the machinery to be set in motion in the Shareholders' meeting. 

(9) To the advantage of his plan the false statement was made that he had legally filled four vacancies with Directors with valid powers, until the next election, when all the Directors were to surrender their 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

acted as their special mouthpiece in presenting motions with suitable and sometimes untrue remarks to carry out their previously arranged plan. 

(7) In discourses and addresses some of them and some of their supporters sought to undermine, in the estimation of the conventioners, the brothers who were objectionable to them. 

(8) A special meeting of elders and deacons (unannounced on the program) was called before the announced Convention business meeting. Judging from the atmosphere, speeches and motions, the evident object of this special meeting was to work up the elders and deacons to support the plan of the Group for the business session following. 

(9) To the advantage of their plan the false statement was made that the Committee had been instructed at the Fort Pitt Convention to act until the next Convention, to which they should go and give up

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powers and stewardship. 

(10) Bro. Johnson pro-tested formally and sol-emnly against the proposed action of the Shareholders to elect directors without there being vacancies on the Board, according to the Charter. 

(11) To the advantage of his plan the false statement was circulated that the seven Directors had come to the Shareholders' meeting believing their places vacant. 

(12) So unfavorable to the four Directors had the atmosphere of the Share-holders' meeting become, through the "political" campaign, that they had very great difficulties put in the way of their proving that that Servant, having arranged their places on the Board, J.F.R. could not oust them, nor of right ask them to resign, nor take over the control of the stewardship that they had acquired under that Servant's arrangements. 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

their powers and steward-ship. 

(10) Bro. Johnson for-mally and solemnly pro-tested against the proposed action of the conventioners, unauthorized by the Fort Pitt Convention, to elect Committee members in a body appointed by another and independent convention. 

(11) To the advantage of their plan the false statement was repeatedly made that the seven Committee members had come to the Convention to resign. 

(12) So unfavorable to the three marked Committee members had the atmos-phere of the Convention become through the "political" campaign, that they had very great difficulties put in the way of their proving that the Fort Pitt Convention, having appointed and empowered the Committee, and not having made them subject to another Convention, the Asbury Park Convention, could neither depose them, nor of right ask their resignation, 

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(13) By arbitrary insistence in matters in which at most the Shareholders should have gone no further than to suggest, they would not permit an Arbitration Board sitting as a separate body to deliberate on the facts as to whether the Directors of the Society should surrender the rights of that Servant in his Will and Charter to a J.F.R.-controlled-meeting. 

(14) The demand was made by a majority vote that the Directors surrender the powers that that Servant gave them in his Will and Charter to a J.F.R.-controlled-meeting. 

(15) This demand, it was insisted upon, must be granted in that meeting without permitting appro-priate discussion. 

(16) This demand was enforced by the J.F.R.-RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

nor take over the property that they had acquired under commission of the Fort Pitt Convention. 

(13) By arbitrary insistence in matters in which the conventioners should have gone no further than to suggest, they would not permit the eighteen members of the Fort Pitt Convention present to withdraw in a body to deliberate on the question of surrendering the rights of the Fort Pitt Convention to a convention bossed by the Group. 

(14) The demand was made by a majority vote that these eighteen brethren vote the powers of the Fort Pitt Convention over the Committee to the Asbury Park Convention. 

(15) This demand, it was insisted upon, must be granted in the Convention's presence without permitting appropriate discussion or the withdrawal of the eighteen brethren for private deliberation. 

(16) This demand was enforced by a Convention

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bossed Convention without discussion on the part of the Directors and others. 

(17) This demand, so favorable to his plan, having been granted, they were, by a resolution, impliedly asked to accede to an election of their successors, i.e., they were in effect asked to resign. 

(18) They knew that the Shareholders would have voted them out of office, if they did not accept the situation demanded by him and his supporters; and therefore, under this stress, they ceased to object to the election proceeding; i.e., they in effect resigned. 

(19) The four Directors knew that they were marked for slaughter. 

(20) The surrender of the powers of the four Directors, conferred by that Servant's Charter, not only put the entire directorate into the hands of the J.F.R.-controlled Convention, but also the Society's other assets. 

(21) To say that the above-described course of this Shareholders' meeting 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

"bossed" by the Group without discussion on the part of the three and others. 

(17) This demand, so favorable to the plan of the Group, having been granted, the Committee was asked to resign. 

(18) They knew that the misinformed Convention would have ousted them, if they did not accept the situation demanded by the Group and their supporters; and therefore, under this stress, the three resigned. 

(19) The three knew that they were marked for slaughter. 

(20) The surrender of the powers of the Fort Pitt Convention to the Asbury Park Convention, not only put the Committee into the hands of a bossed Convention, but also the Committee's assets. 

(21) To say that the above-described course of the Convention's business 

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was coercive is putting matters mildly. 

(22) When brethren of spiritual discernment saw that in the course of his supporters the Lord's spirit was plainly lacking; and when they sought to have the proceedings stopped, just before the election of Directors was taken up; they were uncharitably accused of seeking to obstruct matters. 

(23) F.H. McGee, the proposer of the motion to delay matters for investigation, was treated with contempt and silenced by "a point of order." 

(24) Up to the time of balloting for new Directors, repeated efforts were made to change the purpose of the supporters of J.F.R's. plans. 

(25) All such efforts were in vain, because his "political" campaign had misled the majority of the shareholders, who seemed 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

meetings on Saturday, July 27, 1918, was coercive is putting the matter mildly. 

(22) When brethren of spiritual discernment saw that in the course of the supporters of the Group the Lord's spirit was plainly lacking; and when they sought, just before the election of a new Committee was taken up, to adjourn the meeting, they were uncharitably accused of seeking to obstruct matters. 

(23) Bro. Johnson, the proposer of the motion to delay matters, until more deliberation and prayer could be given matters, was treated with contemptuous catcalls of "shame" and silenced on "a point of order." 

(24) Up to the time of voting for the new Committee repeated efforts were made to change the purpose of the supporters of the Group's plans. 

(25) All such efforts were in vain, because the Group's "political" campaign, by July 27, 1918, had misled the majority of

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impatient with the efforts to enlighten them on the real merits of the case. 

(26) The shareholders, responding to motions favorable to his plans, elected six to membership on the new Board who were advocated for such membership before the election by him and his supporters. 

(27) The other new member of the Board was nominated by supporters of his plans. 

(28) The five Directors who had opposed his usurpations were not elected. 

(29) Before the election he made special efforts to separate A. N. Pierson from the four "opponent" Directors. 

(30) Without an election thereto, he assumed the chairmanship of the shareholders' meeting. 

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the conventioners, who seemed impatient with the efforts to enlighten them on the real merits of the case. 

(26) The Conventioners, responding to motions favorable to the plans of the Group, elected six to membership on the new Committee who, with one possible exception, were advocated for such membership before the election by the Group and their supporters. 

(27) The other new member of the Committee was nominated by supporters of the Group's plans. 

(28) The three brothers who had opposed the questionable efforts of the other members of the Committee were not elected. 

(29) Before the election the Group of four made special efforts to separate R.H. Hirsh from R.G. Jolly and P.S.L. Johnson. 

(30) The Group, without an election thereto, assumed in the person of their convention chairman, the chairmanship of the business sessions.

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(31) Throughout the Shareholders' meeting he, as chairman, ruled in favor of his plans, to the dis-advantage of the four ousted Directors. 

(32) At one point he signaled A. H. MacMillan to have a motion made advantageous to his plans. 

(33) Attacks were made on the four Directors and on several of their supporters, their names even being disparagingly mentioned. 

(34) These attacks were made preparatory to the business centering in the election. 

(35) The activity of certain interested sisters, before and during the Convention, helped to create the unhealthy atmosphere of the first business sessions of the Shareholders' meeting. 

(36) The Shareholders' meeting, controlled by J.F.R., permitted no discussion of certain vital issues. 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

(31) Throughout the business meetings the chairman of the Group ruled in favor of their plans, to the disadvantage of the three marked committee men. 

(32) At one point he signaled to Bro. Robbins to make a motion advantageous to the plans of the Group. 

(33) Attacks were made on the three committeemen, their names even being disparagingly mentioned. 

(34) These attacks were made preparatory to the business centering in the election. 

(35) The activity of certain interested sisters, before and during the Convention, helped to create the unhealthy atmosphere of the first business sessions of the Convention. 

(36) The business meetings of Saturday, July 27, 1918, controlled by the Group and their supporters permitted no discussion of certain vital issues.

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(37) To the last he sought to "boss" the Shareholders' meeting. 

(38) His tactics turned what should have been a feast into one of the few bad Conventions held among Truth people. 

(39) His general course made a division in the Church. 

(40) His general course greatly distressed the Church. 

(41) His general course undermined the Faithful's confidence in him. 

(42) His general course wrecked the Society's real work. 

(43) His general course called for the Faithful to question his leadership. 

(44) His general course called for an unbossed Convention for consultation and action relative to his acts and aims and the conditions in the Church. 

(45) Fearing an investigation, he refused to call an extra meeting of the 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

(37) To the last the Group sought to "boss" the business meetings of the Convention. 

(38) Their tactics turned what should have been a feast into one of the few bad Conventions held Truth people. 

(39) Their general course made a division in the Church. 

(40) Their general course greatly distressed the Church. 

(41) Their general course undermined the Faithful's confidence in them. 

(42) Their general course wrecked the Committee's real work. 

(43) Their general course called for the Faithful to question their leadership. 

(44) Their general course called for an unbossed Convention for consultation and action relative to their acts and aims and the condition of the Church. 

(45) Fearing an investigation they refused to call an early Convention, which

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shareholders, which he was asked to do. 

(46) He wrote to the Philadelphia Church that he had too much to do to arrange for a special meeting of the Society's shareholders; and that an extra meeting of the shareholders would be too inconvenient for them, and therefore he unanimously decided not to call them together. 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

they were asked to do. 

(46) The new Committee wrote to the Philadelphia Church that it has too much work to arrange for a general Convention (a Convention that might uncover matters?) and that the location of Philadelphia makes it too inconvenient for a convention to assemble there; therefore, it unanimously decided to disfavor the request of the Philadelphia Church for a general Convention. 

XII. A most impressive feature brought to light by a comparison of the wrong acts of J.F.R. and his supporters on the one hand, and of the Group and their supporters on the other hand, is the fact that in the main particulars both Groups committed the same kind of wrongs exactly to the day, one year apart. Many of the Faithful, scripturally regard the Spirit-begotten supporters of J.F.R. as of that class of antitypical Merarite Levites (Great Company, Vol. VI, page 129), typed by the Mahlite (Num. 3:20, 33), descendants of Merari. Some of these Faithful are beginning to have grave fears that the Group and their supporters may be of the antitypical Gershonite Levites (Great Company), typed by the Shimite descendants of Gershon. Does it not seem probable that the Lord allowed an exact year to elapse between the revelation (by actions) of the antitypical Mahlite and the antitypical Shimite Levites?

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(1) J.F.R. was voted into power, Jan. 6, 1917, by the passing of his bylaws, recommended by I.L. Margeson and two others. 

(2) A little later the Board was organized by the election of the Society's officers, Jan. 6, 1917. 

(3) J.F.R. defined his powers after his by-laws were spread on the Board's minutes, Jan. 20, 1917. 

(4) Bro. Johnson's statement, drawn up at London, Feb. 17, 1917, setting forth the wrongs of H. J. Shearn and W. Crawford, was reported to J.F.R. as injurious, Feb. 19, 1918. 

(5) His cable to the London Managers and to Bro. Johnson declared some of the latter's work to be "absolutely without 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

(1) The Committee was voted into power, Jan. 6, 1918, by I.L. Margeson's resolution, over which he seemed to consult two others (he succeeding a resigned member, helped largely to form the Group as separate from the other three brothers). 

(2) A little later the Committee was organized by the election of its officers, Jan. 6, 1918. 

(3) The Committee defined its powers after discussing its minutes and spreading upon them the powers conferred on them at the Convention, Jan. 20, 1918. 

(4) Bro. Johnson's statements on the "evil servant," Feb. 17, 1918, at Philadelphia, setting forth the wrongs of J.F.R. were reported to I.F. Hoskins as injurious, Feb. 19, 1918. 

(5) The Group's resolution of Feb. 23 (passed at night, therefore Feb. 24, God's time), discountenanc-ing any teachings not 

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authority," Feb. 24, 1917. 

(6) J. Hemery, in the interests of J.F.R.'s "ab-solutely-without-authority" cable, suspiciously watches Bro. Johnson as "unsafe," preparatory to and during the sessions of the Investigating Commission, March 2-5, 1917. 

(7) As the agent of J.F.R., J. Hemery tells members of the Investigating Commission of the "absolutely-without-authority" and "insanity" cables, with comments, March 3, 1917. 

(8) J. Hemery, as J.F.R.'s representative, at a special meeting, continues to slander Bro. Johnson, March 11, 1917. 

(9) J. Hemery, as J.F.R.'s representative, at another special meeting, still continues to slander Bro. Johnson, March 13, 1917. 

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approved by the Committee (which, of course, means the Group) declared Bro. Johnson's work on that evil servant, Elijah and Elisha, etc., "absolutely without authority," Feb. 24, 1918. 

(6) I.L. Margeson, in the interests of the Group's "absolutely-without-authority" preaching resolution, at Boston suspiciously watches Bro. Johnson as "unsafe," March 2-5, 1918. 

(7) Seemingly acting as the agent of M. Sturgeon (whose working program the Group has adopted), Hattie O. Henderson distributes her slanderous paper against Bro. Johnson, with comments, March 3, 1918. 

(8) Hattie O. Henderson, seemingly as M. Sturgeon's representative, at a special meeting continues to slander Bro. Johnson, March 11, 1918. 

(9) Hattie O. Henderson, seemingly as M. Sturgeon's representative, at another special meeting continues to slander Bro. Johnson, March 13, 1918. 

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(10) At a Board meeting Bro. Johnson is reproved by J.F.R. and several of his supporters for having supposedly acted "absolutely without authority" in the English affairs, April 13, 1917. 

(11) At this Board meeting Bro. Johnson protests against his English activity being treated as "absolutely without authority," April 13, 1917. 

(12) Just after reading his paper on conscientious objection to the Bethel family, J.F.R. said to Bro. Johnson that it was necessary for the safeguarding of the brethren from military service to claim that the Society and the Church were one; i.e., it was attempted to organize the Church otherwise than the Lord organized it, May 11, 1917. 

(13) Bro. Johnson's Scriptural objection to this plan is treated lightly by J.F.R., May 11, 1917. 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

(10) At a Committee meeting Bro. Johnson is reproved by the Group as having acted "absolutely without authority" in the Elijah and Elisha discourse delivered at Jersey City and Newark, where he spoke on this subject by request of the Classes, April 13, 1918. 

(11) At this Committee meeting Bro. Johnson protests against his preaching timely Truth being treated as "absolutely without authority," April 13, 1918. 

(12) A representative of the Group proposed the formation of a Society as necessary for the work; i.e., it was an attempt to organize the Church otherwise than the Lord organized it, May 11, 1918. 

(13) Bro. Johnson's Scriptural objection to this plan is treated lightly by the Group, May 11, 1918. 

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(14) Through the Board's compromising resolution on Bro. Johnson's English activity, J.F.R. succeeded in throwing a cloud over his English work, June 20, 1917. 

(15) J.F.R. and A. H. MacMillan, June 21, 1917, try to get rid of Bro. Johnson by attempting to send him on a transient Pilgrim trip, landing him at his home. 

(16) Bro. Johnson's refusal to go on a Pilgrim trip and his appeal to the Board against J.F.R.'s order for him to leave Bethel, blocked, temporarily, the effort to put him out of the Society's work, June 22, 1917. 

(17) By making affidavit to four vacancies in the Board, and by appointing four new directors; J.F.R. blocked efforts to 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

(14) Through the compromising course of some of the Committee members and their supporters relative to Bro. Johnson's course toward the Society's leaders on trial, his Elijah and Elisha teaching is placed under a cloud, June 20, 1918. 

(15) I.F. Hoskins' and H.C. Rockwell's plan (made at the conviction of the Society leaders) to form a reunion with the Society, based as it was on a denial that the division of last year was the separation of Elijah and Elisha, was logically an attempt to get rid of Bro. Johnson, June 21, 1918. 

(16) Bro. Johnson's objection to, and the majority of the Committee disapproving of, the projected reunion with the Society temporarily blocks what in reality was an effort to put him out of the Committee's work, June 22, 1918. 

(17) By finally preventing a meeting for July 13, 1918, several of the Group blocked efforts to interfere with their plans, July 12, 

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RUTHERFORDISM IN THE SOCIETY. 

interfere with his plans, July 12, 1917. 

(18) The ousting of the four Directors was fully decided upon and attempted, July 17, 1917. 

(19) The reaffirmation of the ousting was definitely made in a Board meeting, July 18, 1917. 

(20) Part of Bro. Johnson's basis of mediation was rejected July 18, 1917. 

(21) Many of the Bethel family, influenced by a "political" campaign, coldly received Bro. Johnson on his return from Cromwell, July 25-26, 1917. 

(22) Bro. Johnson was fiercely and cunningly attacked by J.F.R. in the 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

1918. 

(18) Several members of the Editorial and Pastoral Bible Institute Committees fully decided that R.H. Hirsh, R.G. Jolly and P. S. L. Johnson must be ousted, and a new Committee (whom for the most part they named) be elected; the plan for withholding the paper was a part of the attempt to put this into execution, July 17, 1918. 

(19) The reaffirmation of the ousting was definitely made in the meeting of the Committee, July 18, 1918. 

(20) Part of Bro. Johnson's basis of mediation of Committee's troubles; i.e., by dissolving the Editorial Committee, was rejected, July 18, 1918. 

(21) Many of the conventioners, influenced by a "political" campaign, coldly received Bro. Johnson, July 25-26, 1918. 

(22) Bro. Johnson was fiercely and cunningly attacked by H.C. Rockwell 

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morning meeting of the People's Pulpit Association, July 27, 1917. 

(23) The ousted Board members and Bro. Johnson were ordered out of Bethel, i.e., out of official relation to the Society, by order of J.F.R.'s Executive Committee, July 27, 1917. 

(24) Trickery and coercion were used, especially against Bro. Johnson, to put and keep him out of Bethel, July 27, 1917. 

(25) Bro. Johnson was made the target of hooting by J.F.R.'s supporters, July 27, 1917. 

(26) Bro. Johnson was actually, and the four ousted Board members were virtually, put out of Bethel, July 27, 1917. 

(27) J.F.R., in effect, appointed an unauthorized Editorial Committee when he and others arranged to send out his "Harvest Siftings" as Society literature unsanctioned by "The Tower" Editorial Committee, and unknown to a majority of its members, July 28, 1917. 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

in the morning meeting of the convention, July 27, 1918. 

(23) R.H. Hirsh, R.G. Jolly and P. S. L. Johnson were ordered out of the Committee by the Group's supporters, July 27, 1918. 

(24) Trickery and coercion were used, especially against Bro. Johnson, to put and keep him out of the Committee, July 27, 1918. 

(25) Bro. Johnson was made the target of hooting by supporters of the Group, July 27, 1918. 

(26) R.H. Hirsh, R.G. Jolly and P. S. L. Johnson were put out of the Committee, July 27, 1918. 

(27) The Group appointed an unauthorized Editorial Committee, when they and others elected such a Committee without authorization of the Convention, July 28, 1918. 

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RUTHERFORDISM IN THE SOCIETY. 

(28) The publication of J.F.R.'s "Harvest Siftings," an attempt to boycott the Board's majority and Bro. Johnson was sent first of all to the Boston elders and deacons, July 29, 1917. 

(29) J.F.R., directly and through W. E. Van Amburgh, at the Boston Convention, claimed that the four Directors and Bro. Johnson were misrepresenting him, Aug. 5, 1917. 

RUTHERFORDISM IN THE COMMITTEE. 

(28) The making of the untrue propaganda in opposition to the three Committee members solid-ified into the decision of the Group and others to boycott at least two of them, which boycott has been in force since the Convention, July 29, 1918. 

(29) The new Committee passed a resolution which was the next day sent to the Philadelphia Church intimating that R.G. Jolly and P. S. L. Johnson were misrepresenting them, Aug, 5, 1918. 

————— 

There are additional to those given under Division XII, many more year parallels under the preceding divisions. 

————— 

On Aug. 4 the Philadelphia Church requested the P.B.I. Committee to arrange for a General Convention at Philadelphia for Sept. 8-10. On Aug. 13 I.F. Hoskins, Secretary of the Committee, wrote that the Committee unanimously disfavored granting their request. As shown above, their reasons parallel those given by J.F.R. for declining the request of the Philadelphia Church last year for a special meeting of the Shareholders to regulate the situation. They feared to face an investigation, not only in the Convention of Sept. 8-10, but also at the one of Dec. 20-22. An influential brother 

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later asked I.F. Hoskins why the P.B.I. Committee declined to face the investigations at those two Conventions. For himself, he replied: "Every time I have a debate with Bro. Johnson he makes me look like thirty cents." 

When the P.B.I. refused to call a General Convention for Sept. 8-10, 1918, at Philadelphia, one was called by the writer. Immediately after the issue of this call a discussion before the Philadelphia Ecclesia, participated in by six members of the Old Committee, three on each side, took place Aug. 25. The Philadelphia Church was not by the discussion favorably impressed with the merits of the Group's contention; rather, the unfavorable impression made on most of its delegates at the Asbury Park Convention by the course of the Group was extended to almost the entire Philadelphia Church. Further, the New Committee enwrapped itself within the folds of the mantle of its claimed power to be alone "authorized" to call General Conventions among us. After the manner of the Romish and Anglican Church, the Committee refused either to take part in, or to recognize the validity of the Philadelphia Convention. We had impartially arranged the speaking program as follows: two from each side of the controversy, and two neutrals. Four of these six declined to serve at an "unauthorized" Convention. The Committee used its influence to boycott the Convention, which was not largely attended, though more largely than the September "Bulletin" states. Had the Committee attended they would have been treated at least as well as the Golden Rule requires. The announced program was carried out; i.e., mornings devoted to discourses, and afternoons, with one exception, and evenings, with one exception, to the business of investigating the Church conditions generally and the Committee conditions particularly, and of seeking a remedy for certain evils uncovered by the investigation. 

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We greatly regret that the Committee's course prevented its viewpoint from being fully given. The Lord's blessing rested, however, richly upon the Convention. At its last session, the great bulk of the brethren, fully convinced of the necessity of a remedy, passed as its understanding of what it believed was the Lord's will as to a remedy the following resolution (we omit its preamble and its first two clauses): "In view of many apparent evils at work throughout the Church in general, we appoint the following three brothers as an investigating committee: Bro. McGee, with Bro. Hirsh as alternate; Bro. Johnson, with Bro. Hoskins as alternate; and Bro. Newman, with Bro. Hollister, as alternate; it being understood that if any decline, their respective alternate shall have the privilege of serving in their stead, and in case any alternate shall decline to accept appointment, another shall be elected by the remainder of the Investigation Committee to fill such vacancy. The services of this Committee shall be freely offered to any ecclesia desiring the same, the general purpose being to give such assistance as shall seem necessary to help set aside evils that are wide-spread among us, as well as in the old and the new general Committees, in order that the purity of the Sanctuary and the unity of God's people be preserved." 

It was sought impartially to represent every interest in the controversy. Therefore, Bro. McGee was taken for the Committee's side, Bro. Newman from the neutrals and ourself from the other side. Confidence in Bro. McGee's honesty and interest in Zion's welfare, and not in any sense the thought of putting him into an inconsistent position, was responsible for his selection as a member of the Investigating and Curative Committee. Bro. Hirsh was selected as his alternate, not to put Bro. McGee into an inconsistent position, nor to unbalance, but to balance the Committee, the thought being that the fact that he

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was Bro. McGee's alternate would all the more influence the latter to accept, in order to prevent "upsetting the balance of the Committee." Bro. McGee, to our great disappointment, declined to serve; so did the two neutrals. Bro. Hirsh and the writer constituted the Committee, a third member was not elected because of the desire to have one who was both neutral in deed and at the same time influential enough to carry weight with the Church. Such an one could not be found. 

The unresponsive and boycotting attitude of the P.B.I. Committee, the unfavorable impression that its three speaking representatives made in the discussion of Aug. 25, 1918, with the three ousted Committee members on the minds of the large majority of the Church, the detailed exposures of Committee conditions made through the investigation during the Convention, and the agitated changes of Committee policy from that announced in the Committee's letter of March 1, 1918, moved the Philadelphia Church to withdraw its support from, and its invitation to, the P.B.I. Committee to send it speakers, and to ask for the return of such a proportion of its total donations as existed between the Committee's expenses and total receipts up to but not including the Asbury Park Convention, the special donation for this Convention made by a certain brother not counting as a part of such total receipts. The P.B.I. Committee by its chairman and secretary, for untenable reasons, declined to make such a return. It similarly refused to refund other proportionate donations, some of them, like that of the Philadelphia Church, being quite substantial. The Philadelphia Church stood apart from the P.B.I. Committee since Sept. 17, 1918. 

This Church invited the Investigating and Curative Committee to help it to recognize and to set aside in its midst any of the above-mentioned wrongs that may therein be existing. This work, delayed in part

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by the quarantine due to the influenza, was completed, and the report on it was soon thereafter made. There was very good evidence that this investigation has led to more earnest searching for, and purging out of leaven, and that it will result in a better keeping of the feast (1 Cor. 5:7, 8). The object of this Committee was not to foist itself on any church; for it respects the right of each church to control under our Head in its own midst, entirely apart from dictation of any and all outsiders, whether these be individuals or committees or Boards or "present managements," etc. Nor was its object to investigate matters of doctrine and interpretation, which seem to be the province of a self-constituted doctrinal clearing house, for which we do not stand. It was simply to serve such churches only as desire and ask its service in helping them to search for the leaven which is quite wide-spread among us, and by loving counsel and entreaty encourage all to purge it out for a better Passover keeping. It did not pronounce judgment. This Committee was ready for such service, which it was glad to render to any church desiring and requesting it. 

A P.B.I. Convention was held at Providence, NOV. 8-10. We were pleased to hear that the dear conventioners had a peaceful time and greatly enjoyed themselves. The more of blessings the Lord's people enjoy the happier the writer is. Nov. 15 a special delivery letter came to him that, apart from the discussion of the business matters treated of in the letter, mentioned some news items of the Providence Convention, to the effect that (1) the Convention authorized an organization, (2) authorized a periodical, and (3) appointed a Committee to seek to secure the support of the Philadelphia Church. This last item especially interested us. It gladdened us to see something of a conciliatory attitude on this matter. It moved us to decide to bring up the 

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matter before the Philadelphia Church and to write the first number of The Present Truth, on which that selfsame morning we began to work. To make the situation plain, let us say that the Philadelphia Church did not withdraw its support from the P.B.I. Committee for all time, but only until such time as it would set itself straight in the eyes of the Philadelphia Church. And if there were such a disposition on its part, it would have found that Church more than ready to go more than half way to help it so to do. Having this confidence in this Ecclesia, in addition to the labor involved in preparing the first number of The Present Truth as a means of helping to clear up the doctrinal aspects of the situation, we prepared and presented a pertinent resolution to the Philadelphia Ecclesia which was almost unanimously passed at a well attended meeting Dec. 1. We were invited by this church to call a Convention for Dec. 20-22, 1918 at Philadelphia, but in spite of cordial invitations to the P.B.I. Committee to participate and encourage their adherents to do likewise and the sending of a special messenger to this Committee, it refused to participate and it encouraged its followers to boycott it. Pertinent to the case we wrote an article, In Defense Of Peace Among God's People, for the second number of The Present Truth (Dec. 24, 1918) which we herewith reproduce. 

In the first number of The Present Truth, in the article, The Last Related Acts of Elijah and Elisha (reproduced in Vol. III, Chap. II), evidence was given that the Little Flock and the Great Company are separated, and that the mantle of power to be God's mouthpiece to Nominal Spiritual Israel is now in the hands of the antitypical Elisha, the Great Company. Much that belongs to this mantle centers in certain powers that the Great Company has through its control by its representatives over the affairs and business of the W. T. B. & T. Society, 

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the I. B. S. A. and the Peoples Pulpit Association. Further in that number, in the article, Withdrawal of Priestly Fellowship, we called attention to the fact that two of the divisions of the Levites, who for the Epiphany type the Great Company, were the Merarites and the Gershonites (Num. 3:17, 20, 33). The ardent supporters of the Society and of "Rutherfordism in the Society" antitype the Mahlite Merarites. If this is true, it seems that three of the antitypes of the four chariots or wagons (which type organizations: Berean Comments on Ex. 14:9; Isaiah 31:1) given to the Merarite Levites (Num. 7:8) are in the hands of the antitypical Mahlites; i.e., the Society and the two Associations named above. The Standfasts have the fourth. It would be Scriptural to conclude that the antitypical Gershonites would have the two organizations, otherwise they would be without symbolic chariots at all to assist them in their work. The Pastoral Bible Institute is one of these symbolic chariots, and the British Bible Students Committee is the other; we suggest this as a reasonable assumption because of many past happenings viewed from the standpoint of certain Scriptural teachings. 

In Num. 7:2-8 the Divine approval is given to the use of the typical chariots by the Merarite and Gershonite Levites. Accordingly, the inference seems fair that the Lord will approve of the antitypical six chariots, organizations, that the Great Company and the co-operating Youthful Worthies will use for the furtherance of the work that they are Divinely commissioned to do in connection with the antitypical Sanctuary. Hence, as long as these antitypical Levites limit their activities to the work that belongs to them, every faithful antitypical Priest will not only put no hindrance in their way, but will encourage them, pray for them, and in some respects lend them some assistance in their work. But such Priests, of course, would have to resist any effort of theirs to busybody in the 

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work of the antitypical Priests, or, to pervert the work of the antitypical Levites. If the antitypical Levites seek to teach the Priests, and to induce them to help attempt to sacrifice on the altar, they would be busybodying, as in the type, and this would bring upon them the opposition of the Priests. (Num. 18:2, 3; Lev. 10:1). Hence, they are not to attempt to help lead forth the Scapegoat to the Gate of the Court, i.e., to expose and resist the evil deeds of one another as against that altar, as this is busybodying in the work of the World's High Priest. Nor are they to seek to discover "new light" and spread it before the Church, as this would be attempting to go into the Holy, from which they have been excluded, and would result in their offering strange fire, as the Society, P.B.I. and other leaders have done in Vol. VII, "The Tower," The Herald Of The Kingdom, the Penny Parable tract, etc. Let the antitypical Levites perform Levitical work in connection with their "Chariot" services, but not hinder these Priests in their exclusive work connected with the altar. If the antitypical Levites do this, the antitypical Priests will have to resist them, and in this resistance their great Head will give them all the necessary help to drive them away from such busybodying. This will be necessarily our attitude toward the Great Company and the Youthful Worthies, if they do such busybodying. Let us hope that they will finally cease from so doing. 

Let us rather hope that they will confine their ministry (1) to one another according to the Truth that they have received and will yet receive from the Priests, and (2) to the nominal people of God to whom they have been made God's mouthpiece through their possession of the antitypical mantle and with reference to whom they will get some new light from the Priests. Toward these two classes they will have an honorable and Divinely approved service, as they do it in harmony with faith, righteousness and the 

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Truth; and this service will tax their time, talents and strength; for it has fallen to their lot to do these things at a time when great obstacles obstruct their performance of them. It will be the endeavor of The Present Truth to help them with the Lord's truths and to encourage them with the Lord's promises, as they serve faithfully in these two respects. We would be glad, if these were the only things necessary for us to do toward the antitypical Levites. It is largely in their hands to make these our only works toward them. 

Despite the shabby treatment that we have received from the Society leaders, our understanding of matters as above given has kept us in the love of God toward them. Daily do we pray for them; deeply do we sympathize with them; and gladly would we help them. In the future the Lord will open avenues for such help, and we assure the dear brethren that, as He does, we will cheerfully render it. We have long since learned how to forgive. But in this chapter we desire to offer some assistful suggestions to the dear brethren associated with the Pastoral Bible Institute. We believe that their organization is a chariot of the antitypical Gershonite Levites. We would not urge anyone to abstain from becoming a member or supporter of that Institution. We believe that each should do in this matter as he believes he will be best able to glorify the Lord. For our part we believe we can best glorify God by remaining apart from that and all other organizations, except the Body of Christ. We would, therefore, after making clear our understanding of matters as the Scriptures seem to us to set them forth, tell and encourage each to do in this matter what he thinks will best honor the Lord. The Lord lead each on to the choice best for Him! 

But The Present Truth does feel deeply on some matters that it desires earnestly and lovingly to bring to the attention of the Pastoral Bible Institute and of all who become identified with it. Will the dear

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brethren suffer us to set some thoughts before them for their consideration and responsiveness? The Lord, in harmony we believe with the expressed convictions of all the members of the Institute, in the charter of the W. T. B. & T. Society and will of our dear Pastor, gave the Divine arrangements for a controlling corporation that was to do the work that He intended should be done by a controlling corporation as a service of the sanctuary. It not being the Lord's intention that the other two corporations, the I. B. S. A. and the P. P. A. should control, the Lord was not so specific in setting forth arrangements with respect to them in that Servant's will. These facts move us to conclude that the charter of the W. T. B. & T. S. is the Divine sample for all other controlling corporations formed among the Lord's people; and that, therefore, the Pastoral Bible Institute will not please the Lord, if they make any alterations from the charter of the W. T. B. & T. S. other than in its name, in the draft of their own charter. We therefore earnestly bring this matter to the attention of this Institute and of all its supporters with the suggestion that they exercise all diligence to carry out this suggestion to the letter. The objections that Bro. F.H. McGee urged against adopting the W. T. B. & T. S. charter word for word except its name, we believe, are untenable for two reasons: First, there can be no mistake in following the Divine arrangements; seeming difficulties will yield to proper care in exercising the powers that the charter gives its Shareholders and Directors. Second, the dangers that he suggests are all provided against in the charter; e.g., the President elected by the shareholders usurping authority over the Board. This can be obviated by the facts: First, that the charter does not give the President any powers additional to the other Directors, except three, i.e., to preside at meetings, to appoint a Director, until the next annual election, in case 

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the Directors fail to fill a vacancy on the Board within thirty days, and to countersign the shareholders' certificates. Second, the Directors, controlling the bylaws, can make one providing for the appointment of an executive committee from which, if desirable, they could exclude the President or make him excludable as they think best. Again, his assumption that an injurious Director could be kept on the Board, whether the shareholders wished it or not, unless the Directors are annually elected, is unfounded; for the charter provides that any Director can be removed at any time by two-thirds vote of the shareholders, while an annual election of Directors is liable to introduce into the Institute and among its members "politics" of which we see too much in evidence, and which can by a "whispering campaign" or otherwise make it easy for ambitious and power-grasping Directors to rid themselves of efficient and unselfish Directors who oppose their course. Years of experience will add to the efficiency of Directors, who should not be made liable to such frequent changes, nor worried by the possibilities connected with annual elections. We believe that as that Servant arranged the charter in this respect he was wiser than are J.F.R. and F.H. McGee, who now agrees on advocating the same change that was the avenue of so great trouble last year in the Society; and the main reason that we believe that he was wiser than they in this matter is, because the Lord gave the charter through him, and certainly is not speaking through them to the brethren on this subject. We all, including F.H. McGee, thought so last year. Why the change? Was J.F.R. wrong, and were we right last year [written Dec., 1918]? And this year is he right and we—what? This change is not of the Lord! 

Again, we counsel that F.H. McGee's suggested change as to who should be members of the corporation; i.e., the subscribers to "The Herald," and not 

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voting shareholders, be not adopted. That Servant's shareholder-plan, which was the Lord's, is better; for it properly gives voting power, not in the Church, but in a business corporation, according to financial service rendered, while F.H. McGee's proposed change will prevent persons who do not want membership in the corporation from subscribing for the paper, and can bring many undesirable and unfit persons into membership in the Institute, while that Servant's arrangements makes the former evil impossible and the latter improbable. Let the Divine arrangements be followed; they are better than J.F.R.'s and F.H. McGee's. We fear that unhappy results will attend these and any other changes, as they did in the case of the Society leaders; while we believe the Divine blessing will rest upon a hearty compliance with the Lord's arrangements as to the charter. 

We suggest, further, that as soon as possible there be a Board of judgment constituted, as indicated in that Servant's will in the same way, of the same number, and for the same purpose. Let worthy and suitable sisters be chosen by the Institute Committee to whom and to their successors there shall be assigned perpetually the same proportion of voting shares to the Institution's total number of voting shares, as that Servant's voting shares at the time of his death were to the total number of voting shares in the Society, the number of the Sisters' shares to increase in the same proportion, until no longer those in their hands be less than the total number of those belonging to that Servant at his death. 

Another matter that we think desirable to bring to the attention of the Institute and its members: The desirability of so constituting the Committee, if possible, as to consist of brothers who were pilgrims during that Servant's life, and who live near to one another if possible, in one city, so as to be available for easy and economical consultation. While earlier

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in the Harvest brothers who were not pilgrims were put on the Board of Directors, this policy was later dropped; and since 1909 pilgrims only were on the directorate, and of these such only as lived at headquarters. This being the condition at the time that the Society became vitalized, at that Servant's death, it seems to be a hint as to what the Lord's will is in this matter. It was J.F.R. who changed this policy. The change of policy smacks too much of "politics." The policy now seems to be, whenever possible, to have brothers on the Committee who belong to large churches, or churches that are desired to be kept in line with the Committee. We think this is a mistake and has resulted, in part, in four of the seven Committee members being brothers whom the Lord did not honor with the office of "secondarily prophets." Such persons have not the experience with general Church problems to warrant their rightly solving them; thus they do not seem to have the qualification for directing a general work. Novices should not be given such responsible positions. 

Another thought: While that Servant suggested, and that on a secondary list, for Tower editorship but one who was not a pilgrim; i.e., one among eleven and that one exceptionally able in the Truth and an auxiliary pilgrim, The Herald's Editorial Committee has two on its staff who were neither regular nor auxiliary pilgrims under that Servant, neither of whom is of exceptional clearness in the Truth. Here, again, "politics" seems to have crept in. We therefore suggest that the Committee seek a reconciliation with Menta Sturgeon, to the end that he, with his known ability, might be made available for membership on the Pastoral Bible Institute and Herald editorial committees. Perhaps A. I. Ritchie and W. Hollister may be induced to serve on one or both committees. Though not favoring an organization, they could as logically serve on the Editorial Committee as they now do serve on the 

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pilgrim staff of the Pastoral Bible Institute. It would be to the advantage of the work, we believe, in every way to have the members of both of these committees, especially the Institute's Committee, living in Greater New York. Local rivalries should not exist among the Lord's people. We feel that we can offer these suggestions without the suspicion of selfish motives, inasmuch as our convictions, to mention nothing else, would prevent our considering for ourself any of these positions, even if we were desired, which, of course, is not the case. 

Of course, we do not mean to say that under no circumstances should others than pilgrims that the Lord appointed through that Servant ever serve on the Institute's Committee and its Editorial Committee. In some exceptional cases it may be well to have one of these, if specially qualified, on one or the other of these Committees. We have above simply indicated the ideal that it seems to us, should be striven for. That an exception to this rule is permissible is apparent from the fact that that Servant suggested on a secondary list such an one among eleven brothers for The Tower Editorial Committee. The Institute Committee, in part, has stretched this exception into the rule as respects membership in itself, and almost into the rule as respects membership on its Editorial Committee. It is against these conditions that we have made bold to offer the above suggestions. 

Another suggestion, conducive to good order and peace, we opine, is: that the entire direction of the policies and the work be in the hands of the seven members of the Pastoral Bible Institute's Committee with the Editorial Committee as such restricted entirely to the work of choosing subjects for, and selecting and writing articles to appear in The Herald, otherwise having no power in its policy and work. Of course, those editors who are on the Institute's Committee would as such, but not as editors, have to do 

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with the direction of the policy and work of the Institute and The Herald. One of the reasons for the eruption in the Committee last summer [that of 1918] was due to the attempts of several editors to dictate the policy of the paper to the Institute's Committee, even conspiring to break up the old Committee; in part, because three of its members opposed such dictation and busybodying. One of these editors, acting by appointment of three other editors as their mouthpiece, even declared that the first issue, ordered by the Institute, to appear before the Asbury Park Convention, must not appear without an article stating that it was the policy of the Institute to smite Jordan after the war. Another thing that they advocated through him was that there must appear in the first issue of "The Bible Standard" a "good hopes" appeal and for these reasons insisted on delaying publication despite the Institute's contrary decision. This, together with the question of forming a corporation, brought the old Committee to a deadlock. Such busybodying is wrong and is a usurpation of the privileges and prerogatives of the Institute's Committee, whose office it is to initiate and to declare, in harmony with its empowerment, the policies of the Institute, and to see that they are carried out. We respectfully suggest that the editors as such be restricted to editorial, and be kept from interfering with the controlling, executive and managerial work of the Institute. While under present circumstances the following suggestions in harmony with those given above could probably not now be carried out, because of lack of available brothers, yet we feel that it would be very well, if the proper brothers are or become available, to have membership on the Institute Committee bar one from membership on the Editorial Committee and vice versa. 

Another deviation from that Servant's arrangements, we have noticed, and that at conventions: Brothers who were not pilgrims are given leading

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parts, discourses, and chairmanships of conventions. This is in harmony with the course of the British managers (in that Servant's absence), but not with his course: He almost never gave one, not on the pilgrim staff, a discourse or a chairmanship at a Convention. In certain rare cases this was done for exceptionally able and spiritual brothers only. Here, again, "politics" seems to be working. Less discourses, and the almost exclusive use of pilgrims for them, will be better for the conventioners, and for the large majority of those, who were not pilgrims in Bro. Russell's day, but who are now with such frequency given discourses to deliver and chairmanships to fill at conventions. 

Our offering these suggestions, it is to be hoped, will not be regarded as busybodying in the Pastoral Bible Institute's business, nor as faultfinding, nor as "sour grapes." These suggestions are made in the interests of peace, prosperity and good will among the Truth people, all of whom, may our Gracious Heavenly Father richly bless according to their heart's attitude and standing before Him and His glorious Plan toward them! As far as possible, in harmony with the Word, let us "seek peace and ensue it" (1 Pet. 3:11; Rom. 12:18; Jas. 3:17, 18). This is written in defense of peace among the Lord's people. May the Lord fulfill among us His promise: "The Lord will bless His people with peace" (Ps. 29:11). 

In the Aug., 1918, Committee Bulletin (this word etymologically means a little papal bull), page six, under the title, "The Object of an Organization," an article is begun wherein the purposes which the Pastoral Bible Institute Committee had in mind, as calling for transforming the P.B.I. into a legal corporation, are given. The article states these purposes clearly; and as its subject matter concerns the whole Church, it would be very proper for us to examine it. In addition to the clear statements of this article, we have some explanatory utterances, acts, publications and 

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letters of the Committee, and of its most influential members and supporters. All of these will assist us to come to a better understanding of the objects of the P.B.I. Our object as Bible Students is, in the Spirit of the Lord, to measure these purposes with the Lord's Word, to end that we may be better able properly to judge of, and act toward the P.B.I. We deplore these conditions more than we can express, but feel that it is the duty of some one to stop to analyze them and lay them before the Church, that each may see and choose for himself. The Lord will to this end lend His assistance to the meek among His people (Ps. 25:7-10). After the manner of a commentary, we will quote and examine the article in question, numbering the points in each paragraph on which we will comment and giving after the quotation of each paragraph our comments as notes, their numbers and those in the paragraphs corresponding. Had the P.B.I. accepted our friendly offer to seek harmony on this and other things at the Hebron (friendship) Convention, it would not be necessary to discuss them before the whole Church. We trust by God's grace to do this "with charity to all, with malice to none," confining our remarks, as in the past, to the official acts of the persons involved, which of right the general Church should know, without any reference whatever to their private conduct. 

We herewith quote the first paragraph: "Recognizing the Divine principle of order, organization, exercised in all of the arrangements of our Heavenly Father (1), our greatly beloved Pastor endeavored to arrange the various lines of activity in the service of the Truth in the most efficient and systematic ways by forming a number of business organizations (2), such as the I. B. S. A. (3), the P. P. A. (4), the United States Investment Co. (5), and the W. T. B. & T. So. (6), all of which were singularly blessed of the Lord, 

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and accomplished a marvelous work over the whole earth (7).

NOTE 1: God organized the Little Flock for its work (Col. 1:18; Eph. 1:22, 23; 4:3-13; Rom. 12:3-8; 1 Cor. 12:12-28; Vol. VI, Chap. II); but He did not have Jesus and the Apostles form a legal corporation under Roman laws for the furtherance of its work, and they were engaging upon the most important work in the history of the Gospel-Age—the establishment of the Church of Christ upon an enduring basis. But God did for the end of the Age arrange for six organizations for the Great Company and their cooperating Youthful Worthies to assist them in carrying out their mission (Num. 7:1-8). 

NOTE 2: Our Beloved Pastor, after the manner of a single owner of a business, arranged the work systematically, not by controllership through corporations, but by his own individual controllership apart from, and usually not in harmony with the charters of his three religio-business corporations, only one of which he formed to control certain work, and that only after his death. 

NOTE 3: The following is the reason why he formed the I. B. S. A.: A number of years after he bought the London Tabernacle, whose deed he had made out in the name of the W. T. B. & T. S., he learned that all British real estate held in the name of unregistered foreign corporations was forfeitable to the Crown. Therefore he formed the I. B. S. A. as a holding corporation for the Tabernacle property. The three British managers under oath in the conscription litigation in 1916 and 1917 stated that the I. B. S. A. was a holding corporation only; that it was not in control of the British Truth work, and that it was not an agency of the work of that body of Christian people who the world over were called the I. B. S. A. During that Servant's life the I. B. S. A. corporation, apart from the fees of its twenty-three members (£23 in all), 

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never received nor spent any money; neither did it receive nor issue a check. Will the P.B.I. kindly inform us what was its marvelous, world-wide and Jehovah blessed work during that Servant's life? The I. B. S. A. corporation was nothing more or less than "a dummy corporation" with "dummy directors," and had absolutely nothing to do, apart from holding for Bro. Russell the Tabernacle property, while he controlled it and the property held in its name. 

NOTE 4: That Servant was told by J.F.R. that the W. T. B. & T. S. could not own property, nor do its business in New York State [this information, it has since been learned, is incorrect]; therefore he organized the P. P. A., whose charter expressly stipulated that as one of its officers it should have "a President who shall be elected by the Board of Directors at the first meeting thereof and shall hold office for life, and whose duties it shall be to preside at the meetings of the corporation, or of the Board of Directors; and have the general supervision and control and management of the business and affairs of said corporation." This clause proves that that Servant alone was meant to have the powers described therein; for of him alone could it be said that he was elected by the Board of Directors at their first meeting. This clause also proves that the P. P. A. was "a dummy corporation" with "dummy directors." Will the P.B.I. kindly tell us what was the world-wide, etc., work that the P. P. A. did?

NOTE 5: The United States Investment Company was a corporation absolutely controlled by that Servant, and in its work was entirely secular; i.e., it was in business to earn money, and did no religious work whatever; and was not an instrument for the Harvest Work any more than any other corporation or business controlled and owned by any others of the Lord's faithful people. As a consecrated child of God he gave the Tract Fund almost all of its profits, hiding them in

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the Annual Report among lump sums listed as donated "from other sources"; and this proves that he contributed to the work of the money that by it he earned, just as other consecrated brethren contributed of their earnings. Will the P.B.I. please tell us what its world-wide, etc., work was? Why did they not also mention others of his business companies and corporations organized under his control to earn money for himself and the Lord's cause? It would have been as much and as little to the point. 

NOTE 6: That our readers may learn from that Servant what the powers and functions of the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society really were, we refer them to Vol. VI, Chap. II, where will be found lengthy excerpts from a booklet that he published in 1894 entitled, "A Conspiracy Exposed" (pages 55-62). Consequently, according to this quotation and the facts mentioned in the paragraph that follows it, the Society was not during his life an instrumentality whereby the harvest work was done. 

NOTE 7: That Servant used all these corporations as a means of hiding himself. The Lord's people cooperating with him, his work, not these corporations' works, were "singularly blessed of the Lord, and accomplished a marvelous work over the whole earth"; for if there ever were "dummy corporations" these were such; and if there ever were "dummy directors," those of these corporations were truly such during his life. 

We now quote the next paragraph from the article under review: "The latter organization (W. T. B. & T. S.) was an especial instrumentality through which the great work was carried on during the life time of our Pastor (1), and as planned by him was to be the continued agency after his death (2). This evident purpose was interfered with by those who set aside Bro. Russell's arrangements and plans and substituted others (3). The result of these perturbations has 

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meant a general sifting, demonstrating those who are sincerely loyal to the Lord's arrangements as expressed through the Pastor, and those who profess to be and are not (4)." 

NOTE 1: This statement we consider thoroughly false to the facts of the case. For that Servant's and our understanding of this subject we refer our readers to Vol. VI, Chap. II. 

NOTE 2: It was not "to be the continued agency after his death." Rather after his death for the first time it became independent, with its directors coming "to the front." 

NOTE 3: We agree that, as to controllership of the work and as to many of his arrangements, his purposes were set aside by the Society leaders; but the full truth requires us to add that had certain members of the P.B.I. and one of their most influential supporters, all four of whom were then Directors of the W. T. B. & T. S., steadfastly refused in any way to permit J.F.R. to get the authority that they knew he sought, and that they either voted or permitted without protest to be voted to him; and had they steadfastly refused to permit him to keep his usurped power, exercised for months without their protesting to him, these subversions and substitutions would not have occurred. We may have more to say about this at another time. 

NOTE 4: It is true that the first and second phases of the present sifting did demonstrate that some were and some were not true to the Lord's arrangements given through that Servant; but it took a third phase of the sifting to demonstrate that some of those who seemed in its first and second phases to be loyal to the Lord's arrangements given in that Servant's charter and will, were in reality not true to them, as is demonstrated unanswerably by the fact that they and their followers have adopted for the P.B.I. a charter that changes, i.e., revolutionizes, some of that Servant's 

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charter and will arrangements in by far more and worse ways than the Society leaders changed these. This course of the P.B.I. Board will make all nonpartisan and sober-minded brethren doubt their sincerity and honesty, when in one breath, as in the paragraph that we are examining, they extol that Servant's arrangements as the Lord's arrangements, and at the same time advocate and set into operation a charter deviating in many particulars from the one of which they have all affirmed a Divine origin and obligatoriness. Is this not revolutionism and worse yet, considering that they have done this in the teeth of protests and warnings? 

We now quote the third paragraph of the article under examination: "It would seem that the time has now come, in the Divine providence, for the work to be taken up, as far as possible, where it was left at the time of the passing under the veil of Bro. Russell, and be carried on to whatever end or conclusion may please the Lord, until the last member of the Body of Christ has been glorified" (1). 

NOTE 1: To understand this paragraph let us refresh our minds with the fact that our beloved Pastor's last published statement on the subject was to the effect that he expected Jordan's first smiting in the future; but this does not prove, contrary to former statements, that he had not led the work of the first smiting of Jordan, any more than his then thinking the giving of the penny was yet future proves that he had not already given it, which penny, we all agree, he did give some considerable time before he died. We pointed out above how four members of the Editorial Committee, using H.C. Rockwell as their mouthpiece, appeared July 18, 1918, before the Pastoral Bible Institute Committee and, among other things, insisted on holding up issuing the first number of "The Bible Standard" until it could appear with a statement of the Committee's policies that, among other things, should 

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call for "the first smiting of the Jordan after the war." At that time F.H. McGee, in and out of the Committee meeting, also said that I.L. Margeson held up "The Standard." Three of these four editors are now on the P.B.I. Board; and all of them are on its Editorial Committee. Several hundred brethren who were at the Asbury Park Convention will recall that H.C. Rockwell explained that to take up the work where Bro. Russell at death left it meant a future first smiting of the Jordan, and that "after the war," and they sought very hard without proper discussion to force this program through the Convention. The P.B.I.'s insistence on a public ministry is in line with this thought. Their denial that the first smiting of the Jordan and the separation of antitypical Elijah and Elisha have occurred implies their belief in a future first smiting of Jordan. Lawyer, not Brother, McGee makes the following comment on this matter in his "Brief Review," page 1, col. 2, par. 2, written after he and his associates learned that the brethren at Asbury Park, as well as many not there, would not endorse their program of a future first smiting of Jordan: "The Committee, and we think the [Asbury Park] Convention, had no idea of inaugurating a plan to conduct a first smiting of Jordan." 

Certainly on Monday the Convention, after hearing our Sunday's exposures of Committee conditions and our Scriptural discussion on whether the Little Flock should form a corporation to carry out its work, did not favor "inaugurating a plan to conduct a first smiting of Jordan"; for on Monday, after they had more time to think over the matters, they voted down almost unanimously everything that smacked of a first smiting of the Jordan, including every feature of the P.B.I.'s program not yet voted on, holding some of these matters over for further consideration. The night before, just after the above-mentioned discussion, sixty-seven voted against and fifty-eight for the

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proposition that it is unscriptural for the Little Flock to organize a corporation as the medium through which its work should be done, while fully 125 abstained from voting at all; yet despite this the August Bulletin clearly gives the impression that a majority of the conventioners favored, but longsufferingly deferred to the minority's unreadiness, the forming of a corporation to carry out the Committee's work, which H.C. Rockwell, supported by I.F. Hoskins and others, there announced was among other things "a smiting of Jordan after the war." In the above-quoted statement we regret to be compelled to say that our F.H. McGee speaks as a special pleader, hiding, misstating and evading issues and facts against his clients, as we also regret to have to say that the August Bulletin and Lawyer McGee's published defenses, because of the same kind of methods and deceptions, are at least as misleading as "Lawyer Rutherford's Harvest Siftings." We desire to state candidly to the whole Church that this course of the P.B.I. forces us against our desires to doubt the candor of various of its members on their policy of a first smiting of Jordan; therefore we suggest that those not favoring such a work will do well to abstain from all co-operation with the P.B.I.'s work; but that those heartily approving of its ways and policies will heartily co-operate with it in its work, and that those in doubt of its ways and policies will do well to settle their doubts before acting. 

We herewith quote the fourth paragraph: "In order to do this the forming of a business corporation under the laws of New York State is proposed (1). This simple business corporation is to enable the different congregations (2) to co-operate along general lines (2), and be the means of preserving unity and harmony of thought and purpose (3). Without some such arrangement no concerted action on the part of the Lord's people would be possible (4). Each Ecclesia, acting locally, would develop into a faction (5), and its 

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efforts would necessarily have local limitations (6). In place of having one body (2), with the classes constituting the different members (2), and all working unitedly in the accomplishment of a broad and general work over the world (2), there would be innumerable bodies more or less in confusion and opposition to one another (7) with little or no work accomplished. 

NOTE 1: Under the conviction that that Servant, through the charter of the W. T. B. & T. S. and his will, had given the Divine arrangements along whose lines the work of the Little Flock was to operate after his death, the Editor of The Present Truth at the Fort Pitt Convention introduced, and then made several speeches in favor of, a motion to form and operate a corporation in word-for-word conformity with the will and charter of that Servant excepting, of course, the name and address of the corporation. He advocated as title the name I. B. S. A. and as address Philadelphia, Pa., where good headquarters were offered for an Association formed strictly on such lines. This motion was made the evening of Jan. 5, 1918. On account of several prominent brothers objecting to a Society and others to insufficient time for discussion, the motion was finally tabled until the next day for further discussion, when it was voted down. The Convention Secretary, who did not for weeks prepare his minutes, forgot, as he later on stated, to record this motion. Not a few others present at that Convention recall the facts above given on this motion. And the fact that the Convention, which gave the Committee its authorization, forbade the formation of a corporation was repeatedly used by us in the Committee as a reason forbidding its forming a corporation. It was not until Mar. 31, 1918, that we became convinced (from Num. 7:1-8) that the Priests were not to use a corporation or any other organization apart from their Divinely given organism as a medium through which they were to do their work. Therefore, when in 

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the Committee meeting, April 29, F.H. McGee, supported by three of his colleagues, in that and in all following Fort Pitt Convention Committee meetings (i.e., May 11, June 8, 22 and July 18), sought persistently against the consciences of R.H. Hirsh, R.G. Jolly and ourself to carry through the Committee his program for a corporation, the provisions of which he never made known to the Committee, we at once began to oppose his plan. In the process of our discussions we gave four reasons against it: (1) It was contrary to the expressed decision of those who constituted the Committee. (2) Many brethren would not favor and support an organization beyond a committee such as we were. (3) Without an organization we could do the work that we were commissioned to do; i.e., publish a periodical and conduct a pilgrim service, ourself advocating strongly that we limit our efforts to the exercise of these, the powers that were given us. (4) Such an organization for the Little Flock was contrary to the Scriptural organization of the Church. Therefore we herein publish to the whole Church that "the forming of a business corporation" was not proposed nor supported by R.H. Hirsh, R.G. Jolly and ourself; but was persistently proposed by F.H. McGee, and warmly supported by I.F. Hoskins, I.L. Margeson and J.D. Wright against the persistent opposition of the first three named brothers, whose consciences forbade their approving it for the Little Flock. 

NOTE 2: In the quotation given from "A Conspiracy Exposed," it was stated by that Servant that the Society was organized "to provide a channel or fund through which those [individuals—not congregations!] who wish can employ their money talent, whether small or great, to better advantage for the spread of the Truth than if each interested one [person—not congregation!] acted and published independently of the others." Bro. Russell understood the 

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Biblical organization of the Church too well to attempt to bring the Church, as the P.B.I. says, into an organization of "one body with the classes constituting the different members," "to co-operate along general lines," "and all working unitedly in the accomplishment of a broad and general work over the world!" Bro. Russell—not the P.B.I. as we see—believed in letting the Church remain organized just as the Lord originally formed it, without adding, after the manner of the Papacy, human organizational elements of any kind. But not so the P.B.I. for the paragraph under discussion, in its parts that we have marked (2), by a contrasted statement, a most emphatic way of putting it, proves that instead of holding to the Church as consisting of individual members, under Christ the Head, they are making a Church "having one body, with the classes constituting the different members, and all working unitedly in the accomplishment of a broad and general work over the world." Here we find a Church organized differently from the Body of Christ; and therefore it is a "Church which is" not "His Body," a counterfeit of "the Church which is His Body," thus an anti-Christ, instead of a Christ, body of which we should beware! 

NOTE 3: This paragraph and subsequent sections of the article, while not expressly using the term, the Head, clearly by its seven-claimed missions and powers shows what is the head of this new Church, "which is" not "His Body"; i.e., the P.B.I. the controlling, executive and managerial head, being its Board of Directors, and its teaching head being its Committee of Editors! For it is the function of Christ, our one Lord, to be God's "means of preserving unity and harmony of thought and purpose." He gives and preserves to the Church its one faith and baptism (Eph. 4:5). He alone is "to act as a kind of a clearing house of whatever doctrinal matters may be in circulation, or may be proposed for circulation, among the Lord's 

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people." He alone is "to act as a medium through which the Church collectively may execute business arrangements essential to the accomplishment of any enterprise" given her by the Lord to do. Most of the functions that the P.B.I. sets forth as theirs in the seven reasons for their corporation belong exclusively to our Lord, the Head, in His relation to the Church, His Body. Therefore the P.B.I. in its Board of Directors and in its Editorial Committee is a counterfeit of Christ, the Head of the "Church, which is His Body." Here, then, we have a counterfeit head and body—a complete anti-Christ. Here we find a transubstantiation. Their Church has been (counterfeitedly) transubstantiated and their P.B.I. Board of Directors and Committee of Editors have been (counterfeitedly) transubstantiated. Let the whole Church recognize this little Papacy, this little Babylon, this Little Antichrist! Surely a strong delusion has seized upon them! And this accounts for their "fanciful interpretations and wild speculations" on the organization of the Church. Loath as we are to speak of these things, dear brethren, are they not all true and should not attention be directed to them? Truly, "He catcheth the wise in his own craftiness!" 

NOTE 4: The history of the Harvests of the Jewish and Gospel Ages is a complete refutation of this claim, so gratuitously assumed and so boldly made. Without using a corporation, as a "means of preserving unity and harmony in thought and purpose," "to act as a kind of clearing house of whatever doctrinal matters may be in circulation, or may be proposed for circulation among the Lord's people," and "to act as a medium through which the Church collectively may execute business arrangements essential to the accomplishment of any enterprise of great or lesser magnitude," etc., the Lord himself by the oversight of one individual, that Servant, through the power of the Truth, attracted individuals and individual congregations— 

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which he never commissioned to engage collectively in the harvest work—and through their individual, and not collective, co-operation brought the reaping features of the Harvest to a completion. 

NOTE 5: This statement may or may not be true, the circumstances and characters of the classes and those dealing with them having much to do in the matter. We know from experience two sets of characters that can be depended upon under certain conditions to make some in a local class develop a faction. Let a class stand for Bro. Russell's ideals as against unholy grasping for power and lording it over God's heritage, as alas, the leaders of the W. T. B. & T. S. and the P.B.I. have been doing, and these will start their partisan campaigners to work on their supporters, who, responding to advice from "headquarters," will, if in the majority, drive or freeze out the faithful, or if in a minority, will make a division, all the time patting themselves on the back as suffering for righteousness and charging others as division makers, while their claims and conduct show them to be under the Adversary's influence. 

NOTE 6: Apart from individual congregations sending out missionaries and contributing to the support of the work of the servants of the general Church, and apart from a general deacon—not teaching—work, which the Church collectively may do (2 Cor. 8:16-24)—hat each Church in "its efforts would necessarily have local limitations"—is exactly the will of the Lord respecting each Church. As at present controlled, the W. T. B. & T. S. and the P.B.I. are responsible for advocating and setting into practice an opposite, an anti-Christ, view, of a local Church's scope of activity. 

NOTE 7: There will, of course, be but one "Church, which is His Body," no matter how many individual congregations there may be; and there will be as many counterfeits of "the Church, which is His 

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Body," as there are corporation and other heads who are able to deceive a following into believing that it is "the Church, which is His Body." Apart from what we have said in Note 5, we might add that in a sifting time such as has been, and bids fair for some time yet to be upon us, confusion and opposition are inevitable; for the Lord wants the fire to burn until all the wood, hay and stubble are burned, and the gold, silver and precious stones preserved in the fire (1 Cor. 3:11-15). Instead of a corporation preventing, it will increase the confusion, as corporations have hitherto done. The main points calling for emphasis, as taught in the paragraph on which we are commenting, are that the P.B.I. advocates (1) that the "collective" classes are the one Body, (2) that the individual classes (not, therefore, the faithful individuals) are the members of the one Body (their Church, not the Lord's), and (3) that certain functions that belong to Jesus alone the P.B.I. claims for itself and thus makes itself a head instead of Jesus. These three propositions are Papistical in the extreme. The following comparison will make this apparent. The P.B.I. Board and Editorial Committee correspond with the Pope in his two functions as controller and teacher; their collective classes, their Church, correspond with the entire Roman Catholic Church; the individual classes, with the Roman Catholic Nation Churches; their pilgrims, with the Cardinals; their leading local elders, with the national primates; the other elders, with the Bishops; the deacons, with the lower Clergy; the non-official class members, with the laity; while the advocates of the Scriptural conception of "the Church, which is His Body," and of that Servant's arrangements in his charter and will, as Divinely authorized and inviolable for controlling corporations among the Lord's people, correspond to the heretics, whose leaders correspond to the arch-heretics. This transubstantiation of the collective ecclesias (which at most might represent, symbolize, the 

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entire true Church, as the local members of the true Church are locally represented, symbolized, by, each local Ecclesia), corresponds with the papal doctrine of the (counterfeit) transubstantiation of the symbols of Christ's Body into His real Body. 

As though such teachings were not bad enough, the article under examination must specify seven reasons or purposes for the P.B.I.'s organization. That such purposes as these should be announced by the P.B.I. is not surprising, when one considers that they were not satisfied with the very limited powers given them by the Fort Pitt Convention; but sought to get and repeatedly claimed to have all the powers of the W.T.B. & T.S.'s Board. (Feb. 23, 1918, I.F. Hoskins even claimed for the Committee all of that Servant's powers, a claim that he later withdrew, we believe.) But that the publication of such purposes should have provoked so little and feeble dissent from so many who claim to be Bible Students, and to have the teachings and Spirit of the Lord as these shine out of that Servant's writings, is truly astounding. 

FIRST PURPOSE: We will quote and comment on each of these seven purposes in turn. "The specified reasons for this organization are: (1) To act as a kind of a clearing house of whatever doctrinal matters may be in circulation or may be proposed for circulation among the Lord's people." 

NOTE: Such a "doctrinal clearing house" is a "medium" by which religious instruction is censored. That which is approved by this "medium" is announced as "safe" and "true" and sanctioned for circulation by the P.B.I.'s "imprimatur," the name of the seal that the officials of "the doctrinal clearing house" of the Papacy impress on literature that they consider "safe" and "true" for circulation among Papists, who dutifully and trustfully may henceforth read it. That which is partially approved would be expurgated of features objectionable to the P.B.I. and 

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listed as such, even as is provided for in the kindred "Index expurgatorius" in the Catholic Church, and the faithful may read such books only after expurgated; and that which is inexpurgable is condemned entirely, as in the Catholic Church it is put on the kindred "Index Librorum Prohibitorum," the Index of Prohibited Books, which only theologians, and that only after special permission, may read. This is what the expression, "a doctrinal clearing house," suggests. Such an arrangement was before the war well adapted to Russia, Turkey and Spain, but among Truth people it could come from such only as are caught in a frenzy of delusion (2 Thes. 2:9-12, Diaglott). Its principle was well adapted to the Dark Ages, which it helped to produce. What the Scriptures inculcate as an opposite principle can be seen from 1 Thes. 5:20, 21; 1 John 4:1; 2 Tim. 2:15; Rom. 14:5; etc. What that Servant thought of it as a principle can be seen in "Studies" B, 319-322, and D, 64-66; and his avoidance of it in practice shines out by the way he directed (under the Lord) the harvest work. 

In proof that the P.B.I. by their doctrinal clearing house, means what we have said we will adduce five facts: 

(1) At Asbury Park, H.C. Rockwell, with the approval of I.F. Hoskins, etc., gave as a reason for a corporation having a Board of seven Directors and a Committee of five Editors, that it would provide twelve brothers capable to act as a commission to examine proposed new Scriptural interpretations to safeguard the Church from error. 

(2) The majority of the P.B.I. Board and Editorial Committee favored a resolution forbidding giving forth new thoughts on types, symbols and prophecies, particularly on Elijah and Elisha, J.F.R. as "that evil servant," the Penny and the Slaughter Weapons, unless by sanction of the Committee. While two of these later voted to rescind this motion, in issuing 

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the article here reviewed, they show that they rechanged their minds. On this point we quote a letter written, largely through the influence of a sister, to another sister, who could not at the time see eye to eye on two minor points with our discourse on "That Evil Servant." I.F. Hoskins wrote this letter two days before the resolution above referred to was passed: 

"MY DEAR SISTER:—Your letter just received, and it grieves me very much to learn what took place in Philadelphia last Sunday. Yours is the second report [no more] of this character, and I must say, dear Sister, that my patience with Brother Johnson is just about exhausted. I have heard him make those same silly, foolish and unwise statements repeatedly, and the brethren have often reproved him for it, and he has repeatedly promised [?] that he would desist and stop talking along those lines. Now, my dear Sister, I am so glad you wrote as you did; you have been going up like everything in my mind, [!] and this letter from you just helps all the more, too! Now no blarney about this either. [!] You sure do know how to say things nice. Now listen, the situation is going to be remedied. I think I can safely promise you that there will not be a repetition of last Sunday's experience. It grieves me unspeakably to know that those dear, blessed people there had to be subjected to that kind of thing. [!] [With but one negative vote a month later a vote of approval by this large Church was passed on that discourse, the two sisters who wrote against it to the Committee telling the Church that they believed it to be meat in due season. And seven months later, after months of the P.B.I.'s partisan activities in this Church, only eight, and they intense partisans of theirs, voted their disapproval of this discourse, while the vast majority of the Church voted its approval.] But now another thing, the Philadelphia Church are more responsible for this experience than you might think. They voted for Brother Johnson [terrible thing 

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for any Church to do without permission of the P.B.I.] to come and ignored the Committee here altogether. Why did they not deal with the Committee in the matter, if they wanted a Brother to come to Philadelphia? [!] Of course, I realize that it was done perhaps rather hastily, without really thinking. [!] Now, my dear Sister, if there is anything that I can help out, I will be only too glad to do it. Will go to Philadelphia next Sunday, if I could be of any service. Be sure and let me know, won't you, if there is any way in which I might offset the effect of what was done last Sunday. [!] So glad your faith is not shaken. [!] I am very confident that you and Brother are 'true blue'; yes, I fully understand your attitude on Brother Johnson and you are just right. I expect to see Brother Johnson next Saturday. Very much love to yourself and Brother. Num. 6:24-26. 

Yours faithfully in Christ, ISSAC F. HOSKINS." 

And this letter was written respecting a fellow Committee member, and that, one whose account of the matter had not yet been heard. (!) According to this letter "the doctrinal clearing house" and "medium for providing pilgrims" would rebuke Churches for asking pilgrims to serve them without consulting the P.B.I. 

(3) Under the subtle manipulation of I.F. Hoskins and H.C. Rockwell, as well as others, a certain elder who was then about two years in the Truth, and another elder who was then four and one-half years in the Truth, last spring felt themselves qualified to present each a resolution to a certain Board of Elders and one of them to the Church, intended to put a padlock on the mouths of R.G. Jolly and ourself, as far as the use of that Church's pulpit was concerned. Fortunately that Church as a whole had a sounder mind than the two above-mentioned committee members and a number of its elders. 

(4) The Boston elders (who have a P.B.I. Board and Editorial Committee member among them, who

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have the Committee's spirit, and who are among its staunch supporters) and deacons through their representative officially warned the Boston Church against The Present Truth. 

(5) Various members of the P.B.I. Board and Editorial Committee, and of their pilgrim staff, by letters, some of which are in our possession, and by discourses, have warned individuals and Churches against us as a false teacher. This charge we deny, and ask them to prove it. [Subsequent teachings show that the accusers have themselves departed from the Truth, while the accused has maintained it.] To carry out their "doctrinal clearing house" proposition would keep a large staff of eavesdroppers and heresy baiters very busy, with like helpers scattered all over the world, even as the Papacy has found it necessary, in order to operate her kindred institution. In harmony with that Servant's will the Editorial Committee should censor what appears in The Herald Of The Kingdom. And every other servant of God should most conscientiously censor his own teachings, endeavoring to speak as the oracles of God, according to the proportion of faith (1 Pet. 4:11; Rom. 12:6). And each of us individually should (Jude 3) seek to keep the Church free from error. But, alas, that such good activities are not meant by the "doctrinal clearing house" that the P.B.I. desires is evident from the five above-mentioned facts. That Servant never stood for such a "doctrinal clearing house." The kind of "a doctrinal clearing house" that the P.B.I. arrogates to itself the right to establish is an exclusive function of our Lord! And his ways of making it work are in harmony and in connection with a proper testing of the Lord's people; i.e., through their coming individually in contact with and weighing error, overcome it through the Truth, which He gives the faithful, as the above passages prove; while the P.B.I.'s "doctrinal clearing house" proposition would treat God's saints

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as babes and hot-house plants, exalt a hierarchy, develop priestcraft and heresy-hunting and heresy-baiting, form an inquisition, institute an Index Librorum Prohibitorum and Index Librorum Expurgatorum, enthrone a little Antichrist, palm off error, suppress the Truth, serve the Devil, hamper God's faithful servants, rob the Church of seasonal Truth, create for humans a debasing and impossible task, and set aside one of Jesus' exclusive functions. However, if any insist on having this "doctrinal clearing house," they may have it; for like likes like! 

We now will quote and comment on the P.B.I.'s second reason for forming a corporation: "(2) To form a reliable (1) and responsible (2) depository of all funds contributed and required for the advancement of the work." 

NOTE 1: Though we have been charged with insinuating that the P.B.I.'s Treasurer embezzled some of its funds, we desire to say that we have never done this; on the contrary, we do not believe that any member of the P.B.I. would be guilty of embezzling money; yet we are sad to have to say that its partial use of funds (which it solicited for furthering such forms of service as the bulk of the non-adherents of the Society thought to be the Lord's will to be established among them for their and not the public's help—see Committee's letter of Mar. 1, 1918, page 3, col. 1, par. 2 and page 4, par. 3), for different forms of service from what the bulk of the responses indicated, i.e., pilgrim service and a periodical—proves it not to be a reliable depository of funds. Almost no one asked for other forms of service than these. Therefore the Committee, according to its own letter, was limited to these two forms of service for the saints alone. 

It is well known that certain members of the old Committee agitated for a corporation with powers greater than the P.B.I. then had, for a public service and for a "smiting of the Jordan after the war." These

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and other facts moved the Philadelphia Church to ask for the return of a certain proportion of its donations. As a Church it had contributed $540.45 for the furthering of the above-mentioned forms of service to the saints in response to the Committee's appeal for support of the service generally desired. The Committee's appeal for help is found in its letter of March 1, 1918, page 3, col. 2, pars. 2, 3, and is implied in question 4: "If you favor some general service, do you desire to co-operate to further the same?" in the question blank at the bottom of page 3, col. 1, and page 4, col. 2. This Church requested the return of its proportion of unexpended money on hand up to but not including the Asbury Park Convention. The P.B.I.'s report (Aug. 3, 1918) indicates receipts as $3,820.89; expenses as $1,711.81 and balance as $2,109.08. Adding to the balance the convention expenses, i.e., $416.59, we have a total of $2,555.67, and subtracting the $416.59 from the total receipts (for this sum was specifically donated for the convention expenses), and we have $3,404.30. As $540.45 are to $3,404.30, so its proportion of the money unexpended before the convention is to $2,555.67; i.e., $402.75. This sum the Philadelphia Church asked and still asks the Committee to return, because the Committee agitated just before and at the Asbury Park Convention, and in the article under review, using its money for purposes not specified by the bulk of the responses to its March 1, 1918, letter, i.e., for public work. A recent "Herald" shows that they are engaging in public work. The Committee (Oct. 23, 1918) refused to make this refund, claiming (1) that it did not change its purposes [it certainly did by the formation of a corporation with greatly changed powers and objects and in the sense of adding to them, as the article under review clearly proves]; (2) that it had not solicited any donation from that Church [its letter, containing the solicitation, was sent by it to practically every member of that 

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Church, which responded to the solicitation collectively as a Church]; (3) that the Committee had placed in its treasury such gifts only as were absolutely unconditional [its letter of request for support conditioned it to use the money for such purposes only as were indicated by the bulk of the responses received, hence the gifts were not unconditional]; (4) that it was following Pastor Russell's example in refusing to refund donations [apart from the specially conditional donations made to the Tract Fund, he a number of times returned money to those who, losing sympathy with him and his work, requested such return of contributions]. 

Others for the same reasons, have requested a return of the same proportion of their donations. For example, a sister in Philadelphia sent $300.00 individually to the Committee in response to its letter. They refused to grant her request; a sister in Illinois did the same thing, with the same result. For aught we know there may be other similar cases. These facts move us to say that, since the Committee solicited and received at its solicitation money for certain specified objects, and now insists on using this money for other objects with which some of the donors are not in harmony, and refuses their requests to return a just portion of their contributions, it cannot honestly be said that the P. B. I. is a reliable depository for money entrusted to it for expenditure on specified work. Human laws, whose help, however; the Philadelphia Church would not invoke, forbid a course like the P.B.I.'s. We are sure the Divine Law does the same. From the bottom of our heart we deplore the attitude of the P.B.I. and call upon it in the Lord's Name to change on this and many other matters its course, as discrediting the Lord, injuring the Church and casting doubts on its own integrity. 

NOTE 2: A depository without economy and order in administration of money cannot be called responsible. 

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In "Another Harvest Siftings Reviewed" the thought was set forth that the Treasurer of the P.B.I. was extravagant in expenditures for hotel bills at Asbury Park. The answer of the Brief Review characteristically tells only some, and not vital, parts of the matter. It should additionally have said (1) that the Convention Committee considered that six Truth people were a sufficient number to stop at the hotel to satisfy its management, which charged $6.00 a day; (2) that after nearly twenty Truth people had already registered at that hotel, I.F. Hoskins insisted on gutting up H.C. Rockwell there; (3) that when repeated objection was made to this, I.F. Hoskins finally answered that he had a "private fund" (he did not say that he had money of his own, or money specifically donated for such a purpose, nor does the term "private fund" fit such thoughts) with which he was determined to gay H.C. Rockwell's $6.00 a day hotel bill; (4) that as late as Friday night, when H.C. Rockwell had already been registered at that hotel, I.L. Margeson and I.F. Hoskins wanted R.G. Jolly, R.H. Hirsh and ourself to leave their $2.00 and $2.50 a day hotels and stop at the $6.00 house; (5) that when I.L. Margeson suggested this plan, they refused to entertain it, stating that consecrated money should not be used so lavishly; and (6) that thereupon I.L. Margeson sought to argue the writer into stopping at the $6.00 a day hotel. It seems to us that an economical Treasurer would have first waited to see how many of the friends at their own expense would register at the $6.00 a day house, and then arrange for any deficiency up to six persons as per the Convention Committee's agreement. As a matter of fact one family alone, consisting of nine members, before the discussion on H.C. Rockwell, registered at the hotel, I.F. Hoskins being aware of this fact. When we made the criticism we did not have R. E. Streeter and wife and F.H. McGee's 

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donation for them in mind. We fail to see just why "the Treasure's handling the financial end of the convention" required him to stop at that hotel; or why his "giving all of his time to the Committee's work" justified his stopping there any more than should R.H. Hirsh have done so, who at that time also was devoting all his time to the Committee's work. This fact should, it seems to us, have prompted him to the reverse course; nor should the fact that a generous brother provided for all the convention expenses have made the Treasurer less careful. Again, the fact that the Treasurer spent money without authorization of the Committee when the Committee's rule was that he should not do so, and the fact that he is whitewashed in the "Brief Review," it seems to us, makes the P.B.I. not a responsible depository. "The Brief Review's" answer on the Treasurer's renting office space is misleading. Aside from the four, R.H. Hirsh was the only member of the Committee who was consulted about renting a room. This was April 14, just one day after a Committee meeting, where the matter should have been brought up, and where three of "the four" made known their decision against establishing headquarters at Philadelphia. Contrary to his repeatedly expressed desire, I.F. Hoskins and I.L. Margeson kept him out of the evening service of the New York Church, belaboring him for over an hour to get his consent to renting a room. Their plea that there was much work "in the way of correspondence," requiring a room, and his believing that they wanted to force an entering wedge to establish headquarters at New York, led him to ask how much mail was coming to the Committee. I.F. Hoskins answered from two to four letters a day! This was "the considerable amount of work" that "had accumulated for the Secretary in the way of correspondence,"' while from fifteen to twenty letters a day came in during much of March. (Then Philadelphia was 

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yet favorably regarded for headquarters by all the members of the Committee.) L F. Hoskins' home was not overcrowded by a "considerable amount of work" that "had accumulated for the Secretary in the way of correspondence." At none of the five remaining Port Pitt Committee meetings was a report made of the renting of the little office room. It was not orderly for the four members outside of a Committee meeting to arrange for this office space, and never report it to the Committee, nor even hint of it to two of the Committee. The other three members never did object to a reasonable expense. There being no need then for an office, it remained practically unoccupied for months. 

We are unable to see that a depository is reliable and responsible which whitewashes and co-operates with a Treasurer evidencing marked extravagance, and which, asking for support for limited purposes, refuses on request of donors to refund money that the depository is using for objects which were not told the donors, and which additionally are disapproved of by the donors for the use of their money. This, the second reason for transforming the P.B.I. into a corporation, like the first, in theory as well as in practice, as evidenced by the above facts, is quite Papistical. 

We now quote the third reason for transforming the P.B.I. Committee into a corporation. "(3) To act as a medium through which the Church collectively may execute business arrangements essential to the accomplishment of any enterprise of great or lesser magnitude (1)." 

NOTE 1: On this our reply will be very brief: Will the Pastoral Bible Institute kindly give us only one Bible passage proving that the Little Flock collectively is authorized by the Lord to appoint a committee, or even permit one, to execute its business arrangements, apart from a purely deacon work. 

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(2 Cor. 8:16-24)? I.F. Hoskins, though asked for Scriptures to prove his claims, failed to give even one at the Asbury Park Convention. In this proposition we have the Papal argument for the Papacy as necessary for the work of the collective Church, by the words "medium," "means," "agency," "arrangement," "organization," "representative," as they occur in the article under review, another "channel" is advocated, though the word is not used; and this accounts for the extraordinary claims made for the P.B.I. in the article under review and their consequent acts. 

The fourth reason for their corporation is as follows: "(4) To be endowed with legal authority to issue a classified publication (1), as a representative of the thoughts and sentiments of the Church (2), and to publish tracts, booklets and kindred forms of printed matter for the work of the ministry" (3). 

NOTE 1: Such a publication could be issued without a corporation or a company, as many publications are today and as for years that Servant did with "The Tower," which was only then put in the name of the Society, without the latter having any power over it whatever, when Mrs. Russell wanted to usurp the use of it; and as he in another case did when for good reasons he had the Sunday School Lessons published under the name of V. Noble, the B. S. M. alternately under the names of P. E. Thompson, C. W. Hek, W. H. Hudgings; and the Yiddish paper, "Die Stimme," under the name of R.H. Hirsh. Had the P.B.I. collectively or individually a fair degree of his good sense and sacrificing spirit they would have resorted, as we suggested to them July 18, 1918, to a similar thing, instead of forcing a division in the Church, rather than give up their pet idea of forming another corporation for the Church. The Committee could easily and safely, according to a plan based on Brother Russell's course on Sunday School Lessons and suggested to them July 18, 1918, have arranged

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this matter without any individual getting control, had it been disposed so to do. We suggested F.H. McGee's name to appear as publisher, subject to the Committee. This proves that we did not want a place which would give us even the appearance of controlling the paper. We never attempted to control the Committee or its affairs, the "Letter of Importance," with its misrepresentations, to the contrary notwithstanding. 

NOTE 2: A periodical that is the Lord's agency to give His message is a "representative of the Lord's thoughts and sentiments" to the Church, as "The Tower" was, and not "a representative of the thoughts and sentiments of the Church" in any other sense than that the Church accepts the thoughts and sentiments of a journal, truly representing Him, from conviction that they expressed the Lord's mind to them, not their mind to others. In this the P.B.I.'s fourth proposition, we find the Roman Catholic doctrine of the Church as the Source of Truth, speaking through its mouthpiece, the Pope. 

NOTE 3: For the reason and in the manner given under Note 1 this could be and has been well done in the Little Flock without a corporation or a business company. 

The fifth reason for their corporation is as follows: "(5) To serve as a means of unity of thought and action, without which a condition of confusion and inaction is sure to result, and just as we see slowly developing everywhere among the Lord's people (1 and 5). Would-be scribes, some of large and some of lesser mental caliber (2) are leading many off in different directions following after some pet theory or hobby, confusing the poor sheep who are unwary (3) and who no longer hear the advice and instruction of their beloved Pastor (4)." 

NOTE 1: This plea for the existence of the P.B.I. in the Church is exactly the same as that of

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Papacy, and has succeeded and will succeed just in the same way as the Papacy did (2 Thes. 2:3-8). Under (1) of the purposes of the P.B.I. we have shown how Jesus preserves, without the assistance of any organization apart from His Church, its unity of thought and action, and uses the confusion and inaction that the unfaithful may introduce as means of sifting them out and testing and proving the faithful. This method of His is now operating, and that with marked success. 

NOTE 2: Yes, indeed, "would-be [those desiring to be] scribes!" E.g., it was I.F. Hoskins who suggested to us the election of the three brothers among the Committee's supporters named in the will as editors or editorial eligibles, himself being one of these three! It was F.H. McGee who, misrepresenting us as aspiring to editorship of the P.B.I.'s paper, and putting the monitory caption over the misrepresentation, "Be not many masters," read a lecture full of misstatements and evil surmises to one of the "secondarily prophets"; whereas the Lord never honored F.H. McGee with the office of "secondarily prophets," which fact did not, however, deter him from "rushing in where angels fear to tread" and by "A Letter of Importance" usurping the office of "secondarily prophets," which office alone of those held by the living servants of the Truth gives its incumbents the authorization to address the general Church on questions of faith and practice. 

NOTE 3: Of course, we among others were meant by this; but really who have been leading the unwary off? The Church is fast learning the answer to this question and it will not be long before all will know. Have not the Society leaders misled many by Studies, Vol. VII, Harvest Siftings, Penny Parable Tract, etc.? And has not the P.B.I., through the August Committee's Bulletin, F.H. McGee's Brief Review, his Letter of Importance and his one-page 

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printed letter to J.D. Wright, led many of the "unwary" off, to the extent that they could publish the article under review, winning approval for it, and disapproval for us? And worse yet, have they not by these publications so completely "pulled the wool" over the eyes of the majority of the Truth people who are not adherents of the Society as to gain their endorsement for the Charter of the P.B.I., which more grossly violates Brother Russell's Charter than even J.F.R.'s usurpations? Alas! "would-be scribes!" 

NOTE 4: Who has violated our beloved Pastor's advice and instruction on his charter and will more than the P.B.I. in their charter? Has even J.F.R.? 

NOTE 5: The course of the P.B.I., like that of the Papacy, is marked at almost every step by acts and policies that must cause division; e.g., (1), they sought, and that even by resolution, to padlock the mouths of those who were giving meat in due season. Such a course must force the faithful to opposition; and persistence in such a course by the P.B.I. forced the faithful into a separation. They are the divisionists and not those who stood for right principles in this matter. 

(2) They boycotted from preaching appointments faithful pilgrims because they gave meat in due season; such a course forced the faithful to present the Truth that was due, apart from the P.B.I.'s auspices. 

(3) Some of them sought by a tricky resolution to be followed by tricky manipulation of pilgrim appointments to have faithful givers of meat in due season barred from a certain pulpit. 

(4) They untruthfully warned individuals, and by such tactics made many believe against faithful servants of the Truth, that the latter indulged in "fanciful interpretation and wild speculations." In their paper they published articles that they knew some and they hoped others would believe referred to the faithful servants of the Truth to the undoing of the latters' 

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influence. How could this do otherwise than cause division? 

(5) By a whispering campaign and wire-pulling of a most glaring kind they secured the overthrowal of the Fort Pitt Convention Committee, in order to have three of its members no longer on a Committee with them to interfere zenith their unscriptural policies. This conduct of theirs turned hundreds of brethren against the P.B.I. as improper leaders of the Little Flock. 

(6) By their misleading August Committee Bulletin, Brief Review, Letter of Importance and whispering and preaching campaign they have at least made proportionately as big a rent in the Church as J.F.R. and his supporters did a year before by the same methods, and all the time, like the Society leaders, they blame the others for making the division. 

(7) By their forcing into existence a corporation, and that with a charter violently different from Brother Russell's, they have in a number of cases split up classes; all the time they and their supporters have blamed locally the others for the division, but in their paper pretend that there is practically no division. Those who are guilty of such sectarianism are not qualified to be the "means of preserving unity of thought and action"; rather they are at fault for a part of a "condition of confusion, … just as we see slowly developing everywhere among the Lord's people at the present time." 

(8) By their busybodying in the internal affairs of various congregations they are making divisions. As an illustration of such divisional activities, we will recite to the general Church some further facts connected with the difference between the Philadelphia Church and the P.B.I. In No. 2 we pointed out that only after mailing Present Truth, No. 1, did we reliably find out that the Providence Convention did not appoint a Committee to seek to secure the cooperation of the Philadelphia and other Churches for 

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the P.B.I. In contrast with our efforts to use for the good of the Church the situation created, as we thought, by the resolution whose report came seemingly in a reliable way to us, we feel the Church must know how H.C. Rockwell, on the official paper of the P.B.I. and as one of its officers, wrote to the Secretary as such of the Philadelphia Church, for which reason his letter was read to that Church. The letter, which speaks for itself, follows: 

DEAR BROTHER:—Kindly permit me to address a few lines to you in response to some of the statements made in Brother Johnson's papers. Are you aware that some of the charges made by Brother J. in his first paper against a certain brother, a member of the Board of Directors, were characterized by an attorney here in this city as "criminal libel"? [!] Don't you know that if these matters were taken into court Brother J. would doubtless be branded as a criminal, or else be adjudged as being of unsound mind? [!] [Most lawyers will say anything to win a prospective client. The P.B.I. has our invitation to bring the matter into court; thereby things will be brought out on which they seem afraid to meet in discussion before conventions!] Are you not aware that the statement contained in his last paper, to the effect that a committee had been appointed by the Providence Convention to make overtures to the Philadelphia Church with a view of establishing harmony between the Church there and the Board of Directors of the Pastoral Bible Institute, is absolutely false, having no foundation in fact? Don't you know that that statement is such a palpable lie that all of the friends who were at that Convention, several hundred, are now wondering if the Philadelphia Ecclesia is still intending to endorse the lie by supporting the one who published the lie? Does the Philadelphia Church wish to be branded as false? In the eyes of the whole Church the country over the Philadelphia Class will merit the

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contempt of all decent people, if it continues to endorse one who slanders, libels, and falsifies to such a degree as the present traducer of the brethren there. Are you, may I ask, to continue lending your name as secretary of the Class to such fraudulent statements as that which has appeared? If so, do you think that honest brethren in Christ would care to fellowship you, or in fact, have anything to do with you? Some of the misguided friends of the Philadelphia Ecclesia have very glibly disfellowshipped us as priests [this had not yet been done]: Well, are you not fearful of what the Lord will do to you, unless you publicly renounce the lie that you have been endorsing (See Rev. 22:15)? You will be conferring a favor, if you will let me know at once what action you and your associates are to take in regard to these matters, that we may know just exactly what our attitude in the future towards you will be. Trusting that you still have a spark of manhood, and at least an atom of Christian principle about you, I am as ever rejoicing in the "holy." 

[Signed] H. CLAY ROCKWELL. 

A wise lover of Zion, realizing that merely a mistake which harmed no one was made, would have done with the situation what we did; i.e., use the occasion as an opening to seek to heal the wounds of the Church. I.F. Hoskins and H.C. Rockwell were the ones who sent the night letter of Dec. 21, declining "to take part in the Philadelphia meeting" (they would not say convention!), which sought in a just way to bring about a healing of the wounds in the Church. Is this the way to be "a means of preserving unity of thought and action" in the Church? Yes, if we want the kind of unity of thought and action that the Papacy has stood for as against its so-called "arch-heretics"; but a thousand times no, if we want the unity of thought and action for which Jesus prays in John 17:20, 21! 

Had the P.B.I. been as desirous of being "a means

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of preserving [Christian] unity of thought and action" as they so unctuously tell us on longsuffering paper, they would have found time between Dec. 10 (when most of them, in The Present Truth, No. 1, received the invitation to seek at the Hebron Convention a cure for the trouble) and Dec. 20 (when that Convention began) to arrange for a Committee meeting to consider attending that Convention. But with a punctiliousness like the Papacy's in insisting on groundless technicalities to the violation of God's commands, i.e., to "seek peace and ensue it," they could not come because "we was not invited," and because "the Convention was disorderly" (?!), not having been called by the P. B. I, which channel-like "RESERVES TO ITSELF the service granted to it" by the Asbury Park Convention—calling conventions! 

Since our last issue we have learned more about the Committee that was supposed to have been appointed by the Providence Convention: That the Church may better understand the peace-producing qualities of the P.B.I. we will tell it. It seems that a committee of two New York brothers and one Philadelphia brother was appointed, not quite a thousand miles away from the P.B.I. Headquarters, to assist some division-making brethren of the Philadelphia Church, who support the P.B.I., and who have been and are supported by it, to complete Nov. 17, 1918, the division that they had for months been fomenting under encouragement of the P.B.I., and "to secure the co-operation of the Philadelphia Church" that the divisionists would form immediately after the intended, though not then, but since forthcoming, split in the Philadelphia Church. The authority for this story is Bro. Sachtleber, of Newark, a most ardent P.B.I. supporter, and secretary and elder of the Newark Church. These are some of the acts of the P.B.I., a "would-be" "means of preserving unity of thought and action" in the Church. Alas! They 

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remind us of certain schismatical popes who revived the Church to death and united it to pieces! 

Now we cite the sixth reason for transforming the P.B.I. into a corporation: "(6) To be the agency through which General Conventions may be arranged for, and the time and place, together with the entertaining features to be decided and duly announced through its publication" (1). 

NOTE 1: As to our thought on the P.B.I., as such, calling, etc., general conventions for the Little Flock, we refer our readers to our discussion of this matter in the next chapter. We doubt that they have exclusive right to call a convention of Gershonite Levites! 

We now cite the seventh and last reason for their corporation: "(7) To arrange and develop the lecture or Pilgrim service, providing able brethren, sound in doctrine and faith, tried and true in character as well as in teaching, to serve the friends from place to place, as may be desired, and to give public ministration" (1). 

NOTE 1: In the next chapter, who has and who has not, as to the Pilgrim service, the power of "providing able brethren … to serve the friends from place to place as may be desired and to give public ministration" are Scripturally designated. Therefore, we totally and unqualifiedly deny that the P.B.I. has the power to appoint pilgrims, "the secondarily prophets," for the ministry of the Little Flock, and ask them to give us one Scripture for this claim. We doubt their right, as of Divine approval, to appoint pilgrims even for the Gershonite Levites. This claim also parallels the pope's claims of the right to appoint cardinals and their ministrations. This claim implies its groundlessness. 

Where has the P.B.I. Scripture for any of these seven purposes? Apart from the human authority of their character, of their supporters and of themselves, we know of nothing that they can give as proof for 

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their exercising these powers, even in their "Church which is" not "His Body." Should not the fact that the P.B.I. can adduce no Scripture to prove their extraordinary and papistical claims move us to question very seriously their leadership? Do not these seven powers that these seven directors by their propaganda appropriate to themselves unanswerably prove them to be graspers for power and lords over God's heritage? Do not these arrogant claims become the proof of their unfitness to be leaders in the Little Flock? And unless they change their theories and conduct, have we not reason to fear that they are unfit for leadership among any of the other classes of the Lord's people? 

Now the last paragraph of the article under review: "Which shall it be, ORGANIZATION, with its attendant conditions of order, harmony, efficiency, advancement and accomplishment of service to the honor of our Lord, in the interests of His Truth and the blessing of the faithful, watching saints, or DISORGANIZATION, with its concomitants of disorder, confusion, misapplied efforts and a gradual subsidence into obscurity and final disintegration (1)?" 

NOTE 1: Before answering this question we desire to state that the argument of this paragraph is not new. In fact, it is quite old. It is the argument of the Papacy, the Federation of Churches and of every other denomination and sect, set forth in the same self-assertive way, to justify their own organizations. Now for our answer to their question. Organization, not Disorganization, in the form of corporations—without, however, the unscriptural, self-exalting and arrogant claims of the P.B.I. and W. T. B. & T. S., and without violations of that Servant's charter and will—for both the Merarites and Gershonites of the Great Company and the Youthful Worthies (Num. 7:1-8)! 

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Organization—not Disorganization—free from human organizations—in the form of THE CHRIST, consisting of the one Head and one Body, with diverse and mutually related members in the Divinely ordered unity that is one and inseparable now and forever! This is the Organization which Jesus by faithfulness unto death established over 1900 years ago, and in the interest of which the Apostles laid down their lives. This is the Organization in the interest of which all the faithful have suffered throughout the Age. This is the Organization that is complete in itself, whose Charter (the Word of God) is sufficient thoroughly to furnish and perfect the man of God. Who among us will at any and every cost stand for this, the only proper Organization in and of The Christ? Who?