worse than that they are spiritually sick. Such slumbering, spiritually sick persons should benefit now by the warning advice: “Jehovah’s day is coming exactly as a thief in the night. So, then, let us not sleep on as the rest do.”—1 Thess. 5:2, 6, NW.

Keeping Integrity in Communist Poland

The facts herein related have been taken from two documents submitted to the general state attorney of Poland at Warsaw by the presiding minister of Jehovah’s witnesses in that land.

“THE rule of the Soviets knows neither freedom nor justice. It is built up consciously on the destruction of every individual will, on unconditional submission. But the masters are we. The repression is entrusted to us. Utter harshness is our duty. And in fulfilling this duty utter cruelty means highest merit.”—Lenin.

This could be the language of only one who has the very spirit of the Devil himself. Of course, Lenin, the leader of the Russian revolution of 1917, did not believe in superhuman powers, either good or bad. He was an atheist, as are all orthodox Communists. For such men Darwin’s theory of evolution has been and still is a most welcome explanation for the existence of life and man, making unnecessary the giving of any credit to an almighty and all-wise Creator. The Communist conception of man as a product of evolution explains why man is valued so little. For them man is but an animal that has reached a higher evolutionary plane than the rest of the animals and that can be dealt with just as the interests of the Communist cause require.

The proof of this can be found in the history of the Soviet Union of the past four decades, in the millions of slave laborers it has kept in hundreds of camps and in the countless numbers who have perished miserably. It can also be seen in what has happened and is happening in Hungary, and it can be seen in the persecution that Jehovah’s witnesses have suffered under Communist rule since the end of World War II, such as that in Poland.

PERSECUTION BEGINS

In the fall of 1905 a dedicated Christian minister, a “Bible student,” moved from Switzerland to Warsaw, there becoming the manager of a lace factory. As do all such Christian ministers, he made known to others the hope he had regarding God’s kingdom, having to do this at first by means of an interpreter. Some heard, believed, dedicated themselves also to serve