THE KING’S BUSINESS
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narily the advertisements are two, three and four columns wide, extend ing the full length of a page. Of course the advertisements created a sensation. They were con spicuous, and yet they did not rely for their effect upon display type. The method plainly was to be the use of the artillery of facts and principles. Bald, hideous facts about the social evil in Atlanta were cited without qualification or circumlocution. Then to these conditions was applied the clear word of Scripture. No harm will be done to betray at this day the fact that one of the offi cials of the Men and Religion con gress said, when he saw the first copies of the Atlanta advertisements: “There! those Atlanta men have gone off at half-cock. They have queered the whole idea of Christian publicity. They have not followed the directions in the Book. The South will never stand for such a bald statement of social conditions as these men are printing. There will be a reaction against this that will injure the entire work of Christian publicity.” Therein the Men and Religion leader was not as expert as his title credited him with being. The Atlanta men knew their task and their method better than the man at headquarters. They were not taking orders or di rections from New York but were working out their own problem in their own way. Actually and officially, the Men and Religion Movement had gone out of existence with the adjournment of the congress. No so in Atlanta. To this day the advertise ments still appear with the name of the Men and Religion Forward Movement. Undisturbed by a n y criticisms from the metropolis, even if they so much as heard them, the Atlanta men kept serenely at their task, with a quiet patience that fore
boded ill for the intrenched evil of the city. Advertisements Stir City and State. Week by week the advertisements grew stronger and stronger. The en tire city of Atlanta and, state of Georgia were set to humming with this sensation. Instead of revolting from the brutal truth, the cultivated and Christian people of the South rose to the emergency in soldier fashion. The executive committee of the Men and Religion Movement found behind them the united senti ment of the churches of Atlanta and the Christian people of the city. Their way- grew easier the farther they traveled it. The advertisements were marvels of effectiveness. Their logic was as straight as a running noose. The style was brilliant, epigrammatic, puncturing. At times it rose to the loftiest heights. These messages were literature. Hysteria and fanaticism never crept into the presentations. There were no muddled generalties. The-writer clearly had a knowledge of the world. He not only knew At lanta, but he gathered his ammunition from the capitals of Europe—Berlin, Madrid, London—and from the other great cities in America. He was quick to seize the news of the day and feather his barbs with it. With rare adroitness he took advantage of Jew ish and Roman Catholic pronounce ments and actions upon the subject to show the solidarity of moral attack upon the evil. Most remarkable of all, in this long succession of advertising, was the pertinent application of the words of Jesus. In the serene assurance that this was the court of last appeal, the gospel of Christ was quoted where it fitted. A better blending of the law and the gospel could not be imagined. The tone of the advertisements re-
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