The Reconciliation of Races and Religions

The Reconciliation of Races and
Religions

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Title: The Reconciliation of Races and Religions
Author: Thomas Kelly Cheyne
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[Illustration: _Lafayette, Manchester._ THE REV. T. K. CHEYNE, D.
LITT, D. D.]

THE RECONCILIATION OF RACES AND RELIGIONS
BY
THOMAS KELLY CHEYNE, D. LITT., D. D.
FELLOW OF THE BRITISH ACADEMY, MEMBER OF THE
NAVA VIDHAN (LAHORE), THE BAHAI COMMUNITY, ETC.
RUHANI; PRIEST OF THE PRINCE OF PEACE
To my dear wife in whose poems are combined an ardent faith, an
universal charity, and a simplicity of style which sometimes reminds
me of the poet seer William Blake may she accept and enjoy the
offering and may a like happiness be my lot when the little volume
reaches the hands of the ambassador of peace.

PREFACE
The primary aim of this work is twofold. It would fain contribute to the
cause of universal peace, and promote the better understanding of the
various religions which really are but one religion. The union of
religions must necessarily precede the union of races, which at present
is so lamentably incomplete. It appears to me that none of the men or
women of good-will is justified in withholding any suggestions which
may have occurred to him. For the crisis, both political and religious, is
alarming.

The question being ultimately a religious one, the author may be
pardoned if he devotes most of his space to the most important of its
religious aspects. He leaves it open to students of Christian politics to
make known what is the actual state of things, and how this is to be
remedied. He has, however, tried to help the reader by reprinting the
very noble Manifesto of the Society of Friends, called forth by the
declaration of war against Germany by England on the fourth day of
August 1914.
In some respects I should have preferred a Manifesto representing the
lofty views of the present Head of another Society of Friends--the
Bahai Fraternity. Peace on earth has been the ideal of the Babis and
Bahais since the Babs time, and Professor E. G. Browne has
perpetuated Baha-'ullah's noble declaration of the imminent setting up
of the kingdom of God, based upon universal peace. But there is such a
thrilling actuality in the Manifesto of the Disciples of George Fox that I
could not help availing myself of Mr. Isaac Sharp's kind permission to
me to reprint it. It is indeed an opportune setting forth of the eternal
riches, which will commend itself, now as never before, to those who
can say, with the Grandfather in Tagore's poem, 'I am a jolly pilgrim to
the land of losing everything.' The rulers of this world certainly do not
cherish this ideal; but the imminent reconstruction of international
relations will have to be founded upon it if we are not to sink back into
the gulf of militarism.
I have endeavoured to study the various races and religions on their
best side, and not to fetter myself to any individual teacher or party, for
'out of His fulness have all we received.' Max Müller was hardly right
in advising the Brahmists to call themselves Christians, and it is a pity
that we so habitually speak of Buddhists and Mohammedans. I venture
to remark that the favourite name of the Bahais among themselves is
'Friends.' The ordinary name Bahai comes from the divine name Baha,
'Glory (of God),' so that Abdu'l Baha means 'Servant of the Glory (of
God).' One remembers the beautiful words of the