Studies in Eschatology – Zechariah

Direction of History

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Religious studies

Lesson: 7-15

Genre: Lecture

Track: 145

Dictation Name: RR127D7

Location/Venue:

Year: 1960’s-1970’s

Our Scripture is from the 6th chapter of the book of the prophet Zechariah. The direction of history.

“6 And I turned, and lifted up mine eyes, and looked, and, behold, there came four chariots out from between two mountains; and the mountains were mountains of brass.

2 In the first chariot were red horses; and in the second chariot black horses;

3 And in the third chariot white horses; and in the fourth chariot grisled and bay horses.

4 Then I answered and said unto the angel that talked with me, What are these, my lord?

5 And the angel answered and said unto me, These are the four spirits of the heavens, which go forth from standing before the Lord of all the earth.

6 The black horses which are therein go forth into the north country; and the white go forth after them; and the grisled go forth toward the south country.

7 And the bay went forth, and sought to go that they might walk to and fro through the earth: and he said, Get you hence, walk to and fro through the earth. So they walked to and fro through the earth.

8 Then cried he upon me, and spake unto me, saying, Behold, these that go toward the north country have quieted my spirit in the north country.

9 And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying,

10 Take of them of the captivity, even of Heldai, of Tobijah, and of Jedaiah, which are come from Babylon, and come thou the same day, and go into the house of Josiah the son of Zephaniah;

11 Then take silver and gold, and make crowns, and set them upon the head of Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest;

12 And speak unto him, saying, Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Behold the man whose name is The Branch; and he shall grow up out of his place, and he shall build the temple of the Lord:

13 Even he shall build the temple of the Lord; and he shall bear the glory, and shall sit and rule upon his throne; and he shall be a priest upon his throne: and the counsel of peace shall be between them both.

14 And the crowns shall be to Helem, and to Tobijah, and to Jedaiah, and to Hen the son of Zephaniah, for a memorial in the temple of the Lord.

15 And they that are far off shall come and build in the temple of the Lord, and ye shall know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me unto you. And this shall come to pass, if ye will diligently obey the voice of the Lord your God.”

This past Wednesday, October the 12th, 1966, the University of California at Los Angeles student daily paper, the Daily (Bruant?) carried a long editorial, the title of it was simply: “God is a fraud.” The first few sentences of this editorial read as follows: “The most despicable mountebank of all time is not William Jennings Bryan as you may have supposed, or Billy Graham, or Miss Velma, or even one of the long line of kings or popes, but is none other than that most illustrious of personages, that holy of holies, that giver of life and love, of laws and retribution, that forgiver of sin, that virgin impregnating and son sacrificing father of fathers, the wondrous, the almighty, namely and in short, His reverent God. From time immemorial this master charlatan has mascaraed as the way and the light, when in fact He is actually darkness and a dead end. He has preached humility, subservience, and explained that the meek shall inherit the earth, while working hand in hand with whatever oppressive and dictatorial regime currently is the seat of his will.” And so on.

The reaction of many people to statements and actions such as this is: “Why doesn’t God do something about it? When will Gods judgement strike them?” And then when we read that the persecution in the Soviet Union against Christians is more severe than it has ever been before, since the days of the beginning of the revolution, and less is said in the press about this persecution than ever before. Again, many ask: “When will God act in judgment upon them?” Again when we see the blasphemy that parades as the word of God from pulpit after pulpit, Sunday after Sunday, men preaching socialism, unbelief, men occupying high places in the church who are known to be alcoholics and immoral men, and yet protected by the church and by the state. People ask: “Why doesn’t God act? When will we see judgment?”

This was the feeling of people in ancient times, and we find it repeatedly in the Bible. In fact we are told that the cry of the suffering saints as they saw the power and the prevalence of wickedness was: “How long oh Lord, how long?” And this too was the cry and the feeling of the people in Zechariahs day.

In the first vision that Zechariah narrates, he sees the four horses of judgment and the four horsemen in the shadows, watching the world, waiting to move. The time has past. The world continued to prosper in its wickedness, and the only ones who seemed to be in trouble were God people, Gods cause. And so the word of the Lord came again to Zechariah. He saw again the horses of judgement, but this time harnessed to war chariots. And it must have gladdened his heart as he saw this. But they went forth. They went forth to the North to Babylon, and to the route to the Medo Persian empire, they went south to Egypt, they went throughout all the world. And what was the result? Instead of judgement, God expressed himself as content with what had happened. And especially those that went to the North where he expected certainly judgment must strike, “behold these that go toward the north country have quieted my spirit in the north country.”

God was content to let things continue. And his dismay, no doubt, at this, was very great. Zechariah heard this and wrote this. But this was not the end of the visitation. The word of the Lord came further unto Zechariah, telling him to take those pilgrims who had come from Babylon and from other points in captivity, who had come with their little gifts. They as yet were not able to afford the journey homeward, but their hearts were with the pilgrims in Jerusalem. With those who had begun to rebuild. And so they had sent their gift to further the work. But God said instead of using this for the construction work, for the temple, take, and make crowns. “and set them upon the head of Joshua the son of Josedech, the high priest.” Now this in itself was s startling thing, because a crown is a symbol of state sovereignty, of power, of authority, of rule, kingship over a state. It does not belong to a priest. Speak unto him, unto Joshua the High Priest, saying: “Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts saying: “Behold the man whose name is the branch. He shall build the temple of the Lord.”

Joshua the High Priest was s substitute for Christ. Christ whose name over and over again is the branch. The root and offspring of David, the promised one. The branch of promise out of whom the great kingdom of God was to come. He shall come as the true high priest, as the true prophet and as the true king, and he shall build the true temple of the Lord, a temple not made with hands, a temple that is the true kingdom of God, the true church of God. An invisible entity. But Gods purpose and plan through the ages.

Even he shall build the temple of the Lord and he shall bear the glory and shall sit and rule upon his thrown, and he shall be a priest upon his thrown and the council of peace shall be between them both, between both offices, king and priest. One of the strictest principles of the old testament, of the whole Bible, is that as far as this world and human orders are concerned, there must be a union of the faith and of the state, but a separation of the church and of the state. Never was it permitted for a civil ruler to have authority in both realms. The king could not assume any function of a priest, and a priest could not become the king. The two offices had to be separate, because the two institutions were separate. One the state was the ministry of justice, the other the church was the ministry of the word, of the sacraments, the proclamation of salvation. And these two had to be distinct.

Thus for example when king Uzziah was tempted to usurp priestly prerogatives God struck him with leprosy, and he lived out his days as a leper. But in the person of Christ, the supernatural, the eternal king, very God of very God and very man of very man, that the two offices are to be combined. And they that are afar off shall come, those who are outside of the state, from the far off lands, continents, and islands of the world, and build in the temple of the lord, they shall come and find their place, and build in terms of their place in Gods kingdom, “and ye shall know that the Lord of Hosts has sent me unto you, and this shall come to pass, if ye will diligently obey the voice of the Lord your God.”

What is the meaning of this vision for us today? Like the people of old, our hearts often cry: “Why doesn’t God act? Why isn’t there judgment, why the delay?” And what this vision declares is that history moves not in terms of judgment upon evil doers, but in terms of the purposes of God. There is judgment in history, and God declares concerning the ungodly that: “I will overturn over turn, over turn, until He comes whose right it is. I will destroy all kingdoms in order to establish he kingdom of Him who is by right, king of kings and Lord of Lords.”

But history is not determined by evil doers. If history were determined by evil doers, if history moved in terms of time only and what happens in time. It would mean the total enslavement and helplessness of man, and the triumph of the Babel builders, the dreamers of a one world tyranny.

If history moved only in terms of that which is in history, who would have over thrown the ancient empires? Who would ever overthrow the growing tyranny around us today? Who would overthrow the communist empire with which we are in virtual alliance today? Or the powers of Fabian Socialism, which is entrenched in our midst today? Who would over throw these things? But history is not determined by evil doers, nor by the wicked. And if we concentrate our attention upon evil doers, and feel: “here is the heart, the center of history”, what the communists are doing, what the Fabian Socialists are doing, what the evil doers are doing of any generation. We are first of all, missing the point of history. They are not Gods, they do not make history. God sent out his chariots, his war chariots, and they marched throughout the length and the breadth of the whole world, and they returned with having no word concerning judgement at the moment. The time was not right.

Because judgement comes not in terms of man’s desire to see evil destroyed, but in terms of Gods purpose, and is the time right for the fulfilling of His purpose. And His purpose is the establishing first of establishing Christ in His kingship, through His victory over sin and death. Through His atoning death and resurrection. The establishing of Christ’s kingdom in and through His true church.

The time was not right. The Medo-Persian Empire was still needed to protect the little colony, even though it was evil. They needed to grow up under its shadow. Occasionally frowned upon and slapped down, but for the most part quietly progressing. God delayed His judgment not because He had any favor to the evil doers, but because He purposed to accomplish His purpose. And He was protecting those things which He had planted. The purpose of time moves therefore not in terms of the world, and the judgments of God move not in terms of the evil doers, but in terms of God’s purpose which is revealed in and through Christ and His church, so that we cannot understand history by looking at evil doers, they are not the Gods of history; but only by looking at Christ and his work, and the responsibilities which He gives to us.

The four horses, the four chariots of judgment go forth, but only in Gods time, and the whole world is going to be shaken over and over again, but not in such a way as to hinder the true church of God and His work. For the temple, the true temple, which is here spoken of is the kingdom of God, Gods throne. And the vision sees Jerusalem surrounded by mountains of brass, so that God says “Though outwardly you are helpless and vulnerable, inwardly you are beyond peril, because you are in my hands.” And the division of this chapter summed up for us in a beautiful song, the hymn of Israel, Psalm 125: “They that trust in the Lord shall be as mount Zion which cannot be removed but abideth forever. As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about His people, from hence forth even forever; for the rod of the wicked shall not rest upon the lot of the righteous, lest the righteous put forth their hands unto iniquity. Do good oh Lord unto those that be good, and to them that are right in their hearts. As for some to turn aside unto their crooked ways, the Lord shall lead them forth with the workers of iniquity. But peace shall be upon Israel.”

Even the evil doers will be compelled to serve God. As the scripture declares: “Even the wrath of man shall praise Him. For all things work together for good, to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose.”

How will tomorrow, and the next year and the year after be determined? By the evil doers, or in terms of the necessary judgment that must come upon them? No. In terms of the purposes of God, in terms of Jesus Christ, and His true church, whose members ye are.

Before we have our questions, there are a couple of things I would like to tell you about, first of all; recently I read through very carefully and very appreciatively this textbook: Land of the Free Written by three men, (Coffee Franklin and Maye?) it has been recommended as the 8th grade textbook for history in the state of California. It will almost certainly be used not only in California, but very widely throughout the United States. It is a very thoroughly pro-Negro book. The hundred or so errors in it that have been pointed out by Doctor (Raffatee?) and others can be taken out and it won’t affect the book. It sees as the fulfillment of American history the Civil Rights movement and socialism. Its perspective from start to finish is religious humanism. It will be the best instrument for brainwashing the children of America and making humanists and socialists out of them we have had.

I said I read this book appreciatively. Why? Because this is the kind of textbook, from one perspective, that we should have had in the schools from our side a long time ago, and we have never had it. This is a thoroughly religious book, but the religion of this book is anti Christianity, it is humanism. The heroes of this book and there are about 20-30 one page biographies, are mostly people you have never heard of. A Sizeable percentage of them Negro’s. Insignificant people that have no real part, or at best an exceedingly minor, minute roll in history. But these are the heroes. This book tells children what to believe. In other words this book rests from start to finish on faith. Now how are you going to teach American history from our perspective if all you do is to give the administrations of the presidents and the wars, and never say anything about the faith, the Christian faith that made American history? Now here is a book that says that the faith from the beginning was humanism, and it goes back and picks up all these insignificant figures, and says: “These are the real heroes, and this is the scarlet thread, as it were, throughout American history. From the little rivulets at the beginning now coming to this great and mighty stream. And the hope of the world is the UN.” This they are very clearly telling. It is a religious book. And ultimately history either has a religious perspective or it ceases to be valid history.

Men move in terms of a faith. These writers are writing in terms of a faith, and the books the conservatives are offering to the schools don’t have any faith, just a collection of dates and events, and they are dull reading compared to this. This is excellent reading. It is going to be the most powerful textbook we have seen. And there is no getting around that fact. This is why we have to have Christian textbooks, and the only place we can have them is in Christian Schools.

Then, a couple of other items, I have at different times commented on some of the bits of evidence concerning the re-writing of history, how we have completely upside down reporting, a totally falsified perspective. I was interested this past week to read a very simple little book, the title: Rasputin, neither Devil nor Saint by Doctor Elizabeth (Jude’s?) and this book has a very plausible and a very simple story to tell. Her husband was an officer in the Russian secret police during the revolution. He had access to all the files on everything regarding Rasputin and all the figures around him.

Who was he? He was a lay teacher, he was not a monk or a priest, he was a married man, with a family, who had a great deal of popularity, who was not an immoral wretch or a member of any occultist group, who was not a miracle worker, he did not miraculously heal the heir to the throne, what he did was very quietly, being a shrewd and knowing peasant in the background but from a wealthy family of peasant stock, was to discover that the young Czar was being quietly poisoned by a top ranking member of the royal family. The succession of the throne was at stake. And these same persons were also responsible for his murder, subsequently. And the communists found it useful for themselves to present this vicious picture of Rasputin, and all the evidence, or so called evidence, comes from Communist sources. And she is the one person, who having access to the files through her husband, and at her husband’s request wrote this book, first privately circulated, some years ago, and now published.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Doctor Elizabeth Judas. This was reported in, or reviewed in last month’s American Opinion, and it can be ordered from Allied Publishers, 621 Union Street, Allen Town Pennsylvania. I don’t recall the price.

Then two or three people recently were asking me about falsification, and they said: “Well of course this doesn’t extend to everything, because you can’t, for example, falsify literature, because after all the classics are the classics.” Well, I thought for more general information I would answer that question here. There are many things I think of a classic nature that are totally neglected. And there are some like Sir Fulke Greville who come close to being of major rank as a poet, who are virtually unknown, he was from Shakespeare’s day.

Then certainly I think among the minor poets of real stature, one young man who died, David Gray, I think no more than 21 or 23, nevertheless wrote a series of sonnets which I think are of very, very great beauty. I think I would like to read just 2 of them to give you an idea. This is superior poetry, it should be in the textbooks rather than a lot of trifling literature that you do find. And certainly in Walt Whitman is called a great poet—whose writings--- the greatest American Poet we are told, whose writings are trifling and trash. This young man writing a hundred years ago in England certainly deserves a place. From one of his sonnets, the 5th sonnet:

“Last night, on coughing slightly with sharp pain,

There came arterial blood, and with a sigh

Of absolute grief I cried in bitter vein,

That drop is my death-warrant; I must die.

Poor meager life is mine, meager and poor!

Rather a piece of childhood thrown away,

An adumbration faint; the overture,

To stifled music; year that ends in May;

The sweet beginning of a tale unknown;

A dream unspoken: promise unfulfilled,

A morning with no noon, a rose unblown.

All its deep rich vermilion crushed and killed

I’ th’ bud by frost. Thus in false fear I cried,

Forgetting that to abolish death Christ died.”

His 19th sonnet. Perhaps the 20th, it is hard to choose there are so many beautiful ones here.

“Bow down, dismal day, and let me live.

And come, blue deeps! magnificently strewn

With colored clouds large, light, and fugitive

By upper winds through pompous motions blown,

Now it is death in life a vapor dense

Creeps round my window till I cannot see

The far snow-shining mountains, and the glens

Shagging the mountain-tops. Oh God make free

This barren, shackled earth, so deadly cold

Breathe gently forth Thy spring, till winter flies

In rude amazement, fearful and yet bold,

While she performs her customed charities.

I weigh the loaded hours till life is bare

Oh God for one clear day, a snowdrop, and sweet air.”

Then to give you another example because this is not unusual, and with this I will cease, but another young man who wrote a hundred years ago or so, about 150 years ago, Sydney Dobell in England. And more than a hundred years ago in a poem, which is a little long, but I think well worth waiting all of, he expressed what had been his own experience. He had grown up in a family that was a member of a cult, quite fanatical, and it was a case of too much, to oppressive a kind of care and love, if you could call it love. And he expressed this in a poem of his own experience, which he wrote in his early 20’s. He became a very successful man, a very devout Christian, he wrote a very small amount of poetry, when the response was not good to his second little book he quit writing, and spent the rest of his life very quietly as a businessman. This one is titled orphans song:

“I had a little bird, I took it from the nest,

I pressed it and blessed it, and nursed it in my breast;

I set it on the ground, I danced round and round

and sang about it so cheerily, with hey my little bird,

and ho my little bird, and ho but I love thee dearly.

I made a little piece of food soft and sweet,

I hold it in my breast and coax it to eat,

I sit and I pat, I call it this and that,

and sing about it so cheerily, with hey my little bird,

and ho my little bird, and ho but I love thee dearly.

I may kiss, I may sing, but I can’t make it feed.

It taketh no heed of any present thing.

I scold and I scoff, but it minded not a wit,

its little mouth was locked and I could not open it.

though with a kiss and with a pat, and with this and with that,

I sang about it so cheerily, with hey my little bird,

and ho my little bird, and ho but I love thee dearly.

But when the day was done and the room was at rest,

And I sat all alone with my birdy in my breast,

and the light had fled and not a sound was heard,

Then my little bird lifted up its head, and the little mouth loosed it sullen pride,

and it opened it opened with a yearning strong and wide.

Swifter than I speak I brought it food once more,

but the poor little beak was locked once more.

I sat down again and not a creature stirred,

I laid the little bird again where it had lain,

and again when nothing stirred and not a word I said,

then my little bird lifted up its head, and it little beak loosed its stubborn pride,

and it opened it opened with a yearning strong and wide.

It lay in my breast it uttered no cry,

twas famished, twas famished, and I could tell why.

I couldn’t tell why, but I saw that it would die,

for all that I kept dancing round,

and singing about it so cheerly, with hey my little bird,

and ho my little bird, and ho but I love thee dearly.

I never looked sad, I hear what people say;

I laugh when they are gay and they think I am glad.

my cheer is never starved, I never say a word,

But I think that my heart is like that little bird;

Every day I read and I sing and I play,

but through the long day it taketh no heed;

It taketh no heed at any present thing,

I know it doth not read, I know it doth not sing.

With my mouth I read with my mouth, with my hands I play.

My shut heart is shut, coax it how you may.

You may coax it how you may while the day is broad and bright,

but in the dead night when the guests are gone away,

and no more the music sweet at the house doth pass,

nor the dancing feet shake the nursery glass,

And I heard my aunt along the corridor,

and my uncle lock his chamber door,

And upon the stairs all is hushed and still,

and the last wheel is silent in the square;

and the nurses snore and the dim sheets rise and fall,

and the lamplight is on the wall, and the mouse is on the floor;

and the curtains of my bed are like a heavy cloud,

and the clock ticks loud and sounds are in my head;

and little Lizzy sleeps softly at my side,

It opens, it opens, with a yearning strong and wide,

It yearns in my breast, it utter no cry,

It is famished, tis famished, and I feel that I shall die.

I feel that I shall die and none shall know why,

though the present life is dancing round and round,

and singing about me so cheerly, with hey my little bird,

and ho my little bird, and ho but I love thee dearly.”

Now those are just a few examples, I could go on by the week. We have so much of a storehouse of great writings that are completely locked, completely unknown. And I don’t think people are well educated on the kind of nonsense that is in the textbooks today, in the literature books, and in all the books. They are not being given the real culture of the past.

Well, I took a little longer than I expected, are there any questions now? Yes.

[Audience Member] …?... I would like to hear you comment on the statement that is so many times made, and that is …?... rewrite our history, now we rewrite our textbooks …?…

[Rushdoony] We already have not had a correct picture of history for a hundred years, almost. Or better. Since the Civil war. Our history has been progressively falsified. When the Civil war began, one of the first things that had to be done was to rewrite the story of the War of Independence. Because the south was standing for the same kind of thing the colonies had in 1776, no interference from a central government, the right of local self-government. And all some of the southern states did was to take the tract that the people in New York and Philadelphia and Boston had written in 1776, and simply reprint them and say: “For George the 3rd and Parliament, read Washington D.C.”

Well now, the effect of that was quite marked on the writing of American history, they couldn’t give an accurate account of what happened in 1776, because if they did it would mean that 1860 was wrong. So they began to falsify the past then and there. And it has proceeded steadily.

Now, a state supported school is going to teach statism. It is not going to teach something that denies itself. So state supported education has taught statism, it is teaching socialism, it is teaching humanism. So we don’t really know our past. We don’t know. In short, our establishing Christian school and a Christian college and research center, and here I am playing my song again, but it is necessary, how else short of going back and digging up these things can you find this is true? Can you find what the past of this country was? Because it is not reported. We are not told the truth about it. It isn’t intended that we should know.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] I hope in 5-10 years we will have the truth told about American history again. It is true that history is over and over again falsified and perverted in order to destroy the meaning of the past. Because if for example we plan to be the future tyrants of this country, what we want to do is to rewrite history to point to us as the fulfillment of history. So, what do you do? Instead of seeing history in terms of Christ and in terms of what has happened, you are going to re-write history as this book does: Who is the savior? The state, and the UN ultimately. And everything is a prophecy, everything points to it, everything leads to it you see. You are writing history in terms of your simple truth, and if your truth is a one world order, then you are going to write all of history as pointing to that great culminating event. But if your truth is God and Christ, then you are going to see history realistically, and you are going to see it in terms of God and of His purpose. You are not going to be afraid of facts, because you are not looking at something in history and saying: “This is the truth and everything else is a lie, and here is the culmination of history in something man is building.” No, you see it all in the perspective of Gods truth, so all of history is judged by something outside of it. But when you judge history in terms of something within it, then you rewrite it. Yes?

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Well, the Christian history is not intended to be anything like this, what it is, is a compilation of documents, a source. And there is a difference between a source book which is a collection of documents, and a history. Because the history narrates the events in terms of a perspective, in terms of movement, but a source book simply gives you documentation, it doesn’t narrate. So a source book is material for history rather than a history per se. Yes?

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] On the purpose of these books? Well, these books have one thing in common, I have read parts or all of four or five of them, maybe six. Substantially when you finish them, the thing they do is to obscure for you the reality of what happened. What did happen, what we do know happened, that a communist shot Kennedy. Others may have been in it with him, it certainly seems likely, but all these books tend to obscure that fact. Supposedly they come out with new evidence and so on, but they obscure the link between the assassination and communism, and this is the purpose for them, and this is why liberals are writing them. When this is all over, people will no longer be able to associate the assassination of an American president with international communism.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] All those purposes may well be in there, but Is ay the basic purpose throughout is the obscuring of the facts. Yes?

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] There have been several such things …?... I think they are questionable, frankly. And I think again because they have such a sensational thesis, they obscure the reality. It was done by communists. These things are very appealing, and they are very successful in getting attention. Yes?

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Well, in most biographies of Washington today we are told that he was not a Christian, one Methodist scholar wrote a book to prove he was a Unitarian or a skeptic, college textbooks refer to him as being rather cynical and dubious of religion; when you go back to Washington’s works, the collected works, he was a man of great reserve, but the very real faith he expresses is very clear, and if you transplant him into the present he would be kicked out of the army as a religious fanatic. Because any man in the ranks, or an officer, who was guilty of taking the name of the Lord in vain was immediately whipped. It was 20 or 40 lashes, I forget which. And he was very strict about this, because he felt that blasphemy was a fearful sin for any soldier who expected to have God’s blessing on his side. Now this does not sound like the person you read about in the textbooks.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Naturally he became a very successful lawyer, he became a very well to do man, both through the land holdings he had, and his properties, as well as through his law practice, so he had a sizeable estate. Moreover we are not told that Patrick Henry was one of the most devout men in American in his day. A very zealous Christian who sometimes spoke of himself as a kind of a travelling monk, because he would carry Christian books in his saddle bags if he went to one place or another, and to give them to other lawyers and to judges. He was by the way a very thorough and intense Calvinist. He also, even when he was on his death bed was speaking about his faith to his doctor who was an agnostic. And in his last will and testament, he told his children after making his bequests that the greatest bequest he could leave to them was a knowledge of Jesus Christ. And when he spoke of the United States he said that the greatest bequest that could be left to them was a Christian heritage. And he prayed the people would maintain that heritage. This was Patrick Henry, the real Patrick Henry.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] I’m glad to know of that, I a few years ago read his life and letters, speeches and what not, and was very deeply moved. I think one beautiful thing which he wrote which certainly ought to be reprinted, it’s a letter perhaps 10-15 pages long, to his daughter who was getting married, to give her advice on how to be a good wife and how to please her husband, and above all, in every area to be a Godly woman. A beautiful letter and a very homely one. Yes?

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Not many, I have of course written a couple of books here, two on American History, This Independent Republic: the Nature of the American System, and on education, The Messianic Character of American Education, Dr. (Roban?) has one on the myth of the new history, that is, the reinterpretation of American history by the contemporary historians. Dr. (Zinger?) has one on A Theological Interpretation of American History, there are a few other things but not much, and certainly they are widely neglected by scholars. This is why there is such a crying need for a place where documents can be collected, and scholars subsidized to work and to write textbooks along this line. There is available right now, and this is something I feel very strongly about, (Micro film slides?) of all the printed books in the United States in every field, facts, history, theology, everything. To 1800. And you can get also the most of the newspapers, to 1815, and the whole will cost you less than $20,000. And you can house it in a room perhaps the size of this with the office part included, and you have the viewing machines so that several people can sit at them and read these as they are magnified in the viewer, and here you have what otherwise would take a few libraries to collect, none of this is available in bound volumes in any single library in the United States. How long these will continue to be available I don’t know, but before this disappears, because they made only so many copies of these microfilms, it is certainly a necessity to have this in Christian hands, because it isn’t anywhere now where it is readily available for Christians to use and to work with night and day.

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Be glad to start one here now. Both for the purchase of that and the building to house it, because this is a tremendous opportunity, and there is so much like this. This is something that needs to be done, because if it isn’t done before too long, the knowledge of some of these things will disappear. There are some books that have totally disappeared; for example, one of the most important sources of knowledge about what happened really, 1860 to 1864, it’s a Northern Democratic newspaper, or a magazine, a monthly, and this paper was giving you facts about what was going on in those years that you get nowhere else. It was published for 7 years. And there are most of those bound volume that were at the time some democrats subsidized having it bound and sent to newspaper editors across country so they would know the facts. Well, most of the volumes, there are only 7 known copies in existence. I have 3 of the volumes, I don’t have more, but I have 3 of the (?). Now, these things are going to disappear, or are virtually unknown, and they need to be collected. Yes?

[Audience Member] …?...

[Rushdoony] Yes. This is the thing that is preserving a lot of these, but of course it is just (?) in a bound form. But the microfilm and the Xeroxing, and the various means of duplicating are preserving a lot of these things. [Tape Ends]