{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_10004/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_10004","id":"gutenberg_10004","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10004","summary":null,"tags":["Category: American Literature","Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Christianity"],"text":"THE WARRIORS\n\nBY ANNA ROBERTSON BROWN LINDSAY PH.D.\n\nAUTHOR OF\n\nWHAT IS WORTH WHILE?\nCULTURE AND REFORM\nTHE VICTORY OF OUR FAITH\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\nThis work was begun nearly five years ago. Since then, the whole face of\nAmerican history has changed. We have had the Spanish-American War, and\nthe opening-up of our new possessions. In this period of time Gladstone,\nLi Hung Chang, and Queen Victoria have died; there has also occurred the\nassassination of the Empress of Austria and of President McKinley. There\nhas been the Chinese persecution, the destruction of Galveston by storm\nand of Martinique by volcanic action. Wireless telegraphy has been\ndiscovered, and the source of the spread of certain fevers. In this time\nhave been carried on gigantic engineering undertakings,--the\nTrans-Siberian Railroad, the Trans-Balkan Railroad, the rebuilding of\nNew York. We have also looked upon the consolidation of vast forces of\nsteel, iron, sugar, shipping, and other trusts. We have witnessed an\nextraordinary growth of universities, libraries, and higher\nschools,--the widespread increase of commerce, the prosperity of\nbusiness, the rise in the price of food, and the great coal-strike of\n1902. Perhaps never before in the world's history have there been\ncrowded into five years such dramatic occurrences on the world-stage,\nnor such large opportunities for the individual man or woman.\n\nIt is interesting for me to notice that since the first outlines of the\nbook were written, many things then set down as prophecy have now been\nfulfilled. It was my purpose, in projecting the essays at what seemed\nto me to be the dawn of a great religious era, to help the onward\nmovement by a few earnest words. History itself has swept the world far\nbeyond one's dreams, and in completing them, I only ask that they may\nstand a further witness to the overwhelming majesty and influence of the\nChristian faith.\n\nANNA ROBERTSON BROWN LINDSAY\n\n_Philadelphia, November_ 1_st_, 1902\n\n\n\n\nTABLE OF CONTENTS\n\n  I. CHORDS OF AWAKENING:\n     THE HIGHER CONQUEST\n\n II. PRELUDE:\n     THE CALL OF JESUS\n\nIII. PROCESSIONAL:\n     THE CHURCH OF GOD\n\n IV. THE WORLD-MARCH:\n     OF KINGS\n     OF PRELATES AND EVANGELISTS\n     OF SAGES\n     OF TRADERS\n     OF WORKERS\n\n\n\n\nI. CHORDS OF AWAKENING: THE HIGHER CONQUEST\n\n     [CUTLER]\n\n     _The Son of God goes forth to war,\n           A kingly crown to gain:\n     His blood-red banner streams afar:\n           Who follows in His train?\n\n     Who best can drink his cup of woe,\n           Triumphant over pain;\n     Who patient bears his cross below,\n           He follows in His train!\n\n     They met the tyrant's brandished steel,\n           The lions gory mane;\n     They bowed their necks the death to feel:\n           Who follows in their train?\n\n     They climbed the steep ascent of heaven\n           Through peril, toil, and pain:\n     O God, to us may grace be given\n           To follow in their train!_\n\n     REGINALD HEBER\n\nThe universe is not awry. Fate and man are not altogether at odds. Yet\nthere is a perpetual combat going on between man and nature, and between\nthe power of character and the tyranny of circumstance, death, and sin.\nThe great soul is tossed into the midst of the strife, the longing, and\nthe aspirations of the world. He rises Victor who is triumphant in some\ngreat experience of the race.\n\nThe first energy is combative: the Warrior is the primitive hero. There\nare natures to whom mere combat is a joy. Strife is the atmosphere in\nwhich they find their finest physical and spiritual development. In the\nearly times, there must have been those who stood apart from their\ntribesmen in contests of pure athletic skill,--in running, jumping,\nleaping, wrestling, in laying on thew and thigh with arm, hand, and\ncurled fist in sheer delight of action, and of the display of strength.\nAs foes arose, these athletes of the tribe or clan would be the first to\nrush forth to slay the wild beast, to brave the sea and storm, or to\nwreak vengeance on assailing tribes. Their valor was their insignia.\nTheir prowess ranked them. Their exultation was in their freedom\nand strength.\n\nSuch men did not ask a life of ease. Like Tortulf the Forester, they\nlearned \"how to strike the foe, to sleep on the bare ground, to bear\nhunger and toil, summer's heat and winter's frost,--how to fear nothing\nbut ill-fame.\" They courted danger, and asked only to stand as Victors\nat the last.\n\nHence we read of old-world warriors,--of Gog and Magog and the Kings of\nBashan; of the sons of Anak; of Hercules, with his lion-skin and club;\nof Be\u00f3wulf, who, dragging the sea-monster from her lair, plunged beneath\nthe drift of sea-foam and the flame of dragon-breath, and met the clutch\nof dragon-teeth. We read of Turpin, Oliver, and Roland,--the\nsweepers-off of twenty heads at a single blow; of Arthur, who slew\nRitho, whose mantle was furred with the beards of kings; of Theodoric\nand Charlemagne, and of Richard of the Lion-heart.\n\nThere are also Victors in the great Quests of the world,--the Argonauts,\nHelena in search of the Holy Rood, the Knights of the Holy Grail, the\nPilgrim Fathers. There are the Victors in the intellectual wrestlings of\nthe world,--the thinkers, poets, sages; the Victors in great sorrows,\nwho conquer the savage pain of heart and desolation of spirit which\narise from heroic human grief,--Oedipus and Antigone, Iphigenia,\nPerseus, Prometheus, King Lear, Samson Agonistes, Job, and David in his\npenitential psalm. And there are the Victors in the yet deeper strivings\nof the soul--in its inner battles and spiritual conquests--Milton's\nAdam, Paracelsus, Dante, the soul in _The Palace of Art_, Abt Vogler,\nIsaiah, Teufelsdr\u00f6ckh, Paul. To read of such men and women is to be\nthrilled by the Titanic possibilities of the soul of man!\n\nThe world has come into other and greater battle-days. This is an era of\ngreat spiritual conflicts, and of great triumphs. To-day faith calls the\nsoul of man to arms. It is a clarion to awake, to put on strength, and\nto go forth to Holy War. If there were no fighting work in the Christian\nlife, much of the intense energy and interest of the race would be\nunaroused. There are apathetic natures who do not want to undertake the\ndifficult,--sluggish souls who would rather not stir from their present\nposition. And there are cowards who run to cover. But there is\nin all strong natures the primitive combative instinct,--the\nlet-us-see-which-is-the-stronger, which delights in contests, which is\nundismayed by opposition, and which grows firmer through the warfare\nof the soul.\n\nIt is this phase of the Christian life which is most needed to-day,--the\nwarrior-spirit, the all-conquering soul. In entering the Christian life,\none must put out of his heart the expectation that it is to be an easy\nlife, or one removed from toil and danger. It is pre\u00ebminently the\nadventurous life of the world,--that in which the most happens, as well\nas that in which the spiritual possibilities are the greatest. It is a\nlife full of splendor, of excitement, of trial, of tests of courage and\nendurance, and is meant to appeal to those who are the very bravest\nand the best.\n\nThere are two forms of conquest to which the soul of man is called--the\ninner and the outer. The inner is the conquest of the evil within his\nown nature; the outer is the struggle against the evil forces of the\nworld--the constructive task of building up, under warring conditions,\nthe spiritual kingdom of God.\n\nThe real world is far more subtle than we as yet understand. When we\ndive down into the deep, sky and air and houses disappear. We enter a\nnew world--the under-world of water, and things that glide and swim; of\nsea-grasses and currents; of flowing waves that lap about the body with\na cool chill; of palpitating color, that, at great depths, becomes a\nsort of darkness; of sea-beds of shell and sand, and bits of scattered\nwreckage; of ooze and tangled sea-plants, dusky shapes, and\nfan-like fins.\n\nOr if we look upward we reach an over-world, where moons and suns are\ncircling in the heights. What draws them together? What keeps a subtle\ndistance between them, which they never cross? How do they, age after\nage, run a predestined course? We drop a stone. What binds it earthward?\nUnder our feet run magnetic currents that flow from pole to pole. In the\nclouds above, there are electric vibrations which cannot be described\nin exact terms.\n\nThus also, in spiritual experiences, there are currents which we cannot\nmeasure or describe. The psychic world is the final world, though its\ntowers and pinnacles no eye hath seen. If we try to shut out for an hour\nthe outer world, and descend into the soul-world of the life of man, we\nfind ourselves in a new environment, and with an outlook over new forms\nand powers. We find ourselves in a world of images and attractions, of\nimpulses and desires, of instincts and attainments. It is not only a\nworld of separate and individual souls, but each soul is as a thousand;\nfor within each man there is an inner host contending for mastery, and\neverywhere is the uproar of battle and of spiritual strife.\n\nWhat is the Self that abides in each man? Is it not the consciousness of\nexistence, together with a consciousness of the power of choice? Our\nindividuality lies in the fact that we can decide, choose, and rule\namong the various contestant impulses of our souls. Herein is the\npossibility of victory and also the possibility of defeat.\n\nLooking inward, we find that Self began when man began. We inherit our\ndispositions from Adam, as well as from our parents and a long ancestral\nline. When the first men and women were created, forces were set in\naction which have resulted in this Me that to-day thinks and wills and\nloves. Heredity includes savagery and culture, health and disease,\nempire and serfdom, hope and despair. Each man can say: \"In me rise\nimpulses that ran riot in the veins of Anak, that belonged to Libyan\nslaves and to the Ptolemaic line. I am Aryan and Semite, Roman and\nTeuton: alike I have known the galley and the palm-set court of kings.\nUnder a thousand shifting generations, there was rising the combination\nthat I to-day am. In me culminates, for my life's day, human history\nuntil now.\"\n\nIndividuality is thus a unique selection and arrangement of what has\nbeen, touched with something--a degree of life--that has not been\nbefore. To rise above heredity is to rise above the downward drag of all\nthe years. It is not escaping the special sin of one ancestor, but the\nsin of all ancestors. _This is the first problem that is set before each\nman: to rise above his race--to be the culmination of virtue until now_.\n\n_The second problem is not greater, but different. It is to mould\nenvironment to spiritual uses_. The conditions of this struggle and the\nopportunities of this conquest are the content of this book. It is meant\nto deal with the more heroic aspects of the Christian life.\n\nWhat is environment? Is it the material horizon that bounds us? If so,\nwhere does it end? Our first environment is a crib, a room, our mother's\neyes. Sensations of hunger, heat, and motion beat upon the baby-brain;\nthere is a vague murmur of sound in the baby-ears. Yet it is this babe\nwho, in after days, has all the universe for his soul's demesne! His\nenvironment stretches out to towns and rivers, shore and sea. Looking\nupward into space, he can view a star whose distance is a thousand times\nten thousand miles. Beyond the path of his feet or of his sight, there\nis the path of thought, which leads him into new countries, new climes,\nnew years! His meditations are upon ages gone; his work competes with\nthat of the dead. In his reveries and imaginings, he can transport\nhimself anywhither, and can commune with any friend or god. Hence to be\nmaster of one's environment is really to have the universe within\none's grasp.\n\nWe are too much afraid of customs and traditions. We are put into our\ntimes, not that the times may mould us, but that we may mould the times!\nWays? Customs? They exist to be changed! The _tempora_ and the _mores_\nshould be plastic to our touch. The times are never level with our best.\nOur souls are higher than the _Zeitgeist_. Why should we cringe before\nan inferior essence or command? But society seals our lips: we walk\nabout with frozen tongues.\n\nEach asks himself at some time: How shall I become one of the Victors of\nthe race? Is it in me? Mankind is weighted by every previous sin. Where\nam I free? How am I free? Can I do as I choose? Or are there bourns of\nconduct beyond which I can never go? Am I foreordained to sin? Do the\nstars in their courses lay limitations on free will?\n\nThere are in man two forces working: a human longing after God, and, in\nresponse, God inly working in the soul. The Victor is he who, in his own\nlife, unites these two things: a great longing after the god-like, which\nmakes him yearn for virtue,--and the divine power within him, through\nwhich and by which he is triumphant over time and death and sin.\n\nWhatever our trials, sorrows, or temptations, joy and courage are ever\nmeant to be in the ascendant; life, however it may break in storms upon\nus, is not meant to beat down our souls. Unless we are triumphant, we\nare not wholly useful or well trained. Will and heart together work\nfor victory.\n\nAs there flashes and thrills through all nature a subtle electric\nvibration which is the supreme form of physical energy, so there runs\nthrough the history of mankind a current of spiritual inspiration and\npower. To possess this magnetism of soul, this heroism of life, this\nflame-like flower of character, is to be Victor in the great combats of\nthe race. It is the spirit of courage, energy, and love. Nothing is too\nhard for it, nothing too distasteful, nothing too insignificant. Through\nall the course of duty it spurs one to do one's best. Its essence is to\novercome. This is the indwelling Holy Spirit, wherein is freedom, power,\nand rest. To its final triumph all things are accessory. To joy, all\npowers converge.\n\n\n\n\nII. PRELUDE: THE CALL OF JESUS\n\n     [VOX DILECTI]\n\n     _I heard the voice of Jesus say\n       Come unto Me and rest;\n     Lay down, thou weary one, lay down\n       Thy head upon My breast.\n     I came to Jesus as I was,\n       Weary and worn and sad;\n     I found in Him a resting-place,\n       And He has made me glad._\n\n     _I heard the voice of Jesus say\n       Behold I freely give\n     The living water; thirsty one,\n       Stoop down and drink, and live.\n     I came to Jesus, and I drank\n       Of that life-giving stream;\n     My thirst was quenched, my soul revived,\n       And now I live in Him._\n\n     _I heard the voice of Jesus say\n       I am this dark world's light;\n     Look unto Me, thy morn shall rise,\n       And all thy day be bright.\n     I looked to Jesus, and I found\n       In Him my star, my sun;\n     And in that light of life I'll walk,\n       Till travelling days are done._\n\n     HORATIUS BONAR\n\nIt is a world of voices in which we live. We are daily visited by\nappeals which are ministering to our growth and progress, or which are\ntending to our spiritual downfall. There are the voices of nature, in\nsky, and sea, and storm; the voices of childhood and of early youth; the\nvoices of playfellows and companions,--voices long stilled, it may be,\nin death; the voices of lover and beloved; the voices of ambition, of\nsorrow, of aspiration, and of joy.\n\nBut among all these many voices, there is one which is most inspiring\nand supreme. When the _Vorspiel_ to _Parsifal_ breaks upon the ear it is\nas if all other music were inadequate and incomplete--as if a voice\ncalled from the confines of eternity, in the infinite spaces where no\ntime is, and rolled onward to the far-off ages when time shall be no\nmore. Even so, high and clear above the voices of the world, deeper and\ntenderer than any other word or tone, comes the voice of Jesus to the\nsoul of man.\n\nLook, if you will, upon the World of Souls, many-tiered and vast,\nstretching from day's end to day's end,--a world of hunger and of anger,\nof toiling and of striving, of clamor and of triumph,--a dim, upheaving\nmass, which from century to century wakes, and breathes, and sleeps\nagain! Years roll on, tides flow, but there is no cessation of the march\nof years, and no whisper of a natural change. Is it not a strange thing\nthat one voice, and only one, should have really won the hearing of the\nrace? What is this voice of Jesus, so enduring, matchless, and supreme?\nWhat does it promise, for the help or hope of man?\n\nThere are some who say that Jesus has held the attention and allegiance\nof the race by an appeal to the religious instinct; that all men\nnaturally seek God, and long to know Him. But if we try to define the\nreligious instinct, we shall find it a hard task. What might be called a\nreligious instinct leads to human sacrifice upon the Aztec altar;\ndirects the Hindu to cast the new-born child in the stream, the friend\nto sacrifice his best friend to a pagan deity.\n\nThere are others who say that Christ appeals to the gentler instincts of\nman,--to his unselfishness, his meekness and compassion. Yet some of the\nmost admirable Christians have been ambitious and aggressive. Others\nsay, He appeals to our need of help. But self-reliance is a Christian\ntrait. Others say, He appeals to our sense of sin--our need of pardon.\nBut many a Christian goes through life like a happy child, scarcely\nconscious at any time of deep guilt, and never overwhelmed by intense\nconviction or despair.\n\nThe truth seems to be that Christ appeals to our whole selves. He calls\nus by an attraction which is unique. In the universe there exists a\nforce which we must recognize--though we do not yet in the least\nunderstand it--which is gradually drawing the race Christward. The law\nof spiritual gravitation is, that by all the changing impulses of our\nnature we are drawn upward unto Him. Spohr's lovely anthem voices this\ncry of the soul:\n\n     \"_As pants the hart for cooling streams,\n       When heated in the chase,\n     So longs my soul, O God, for Thee,\n       And Thy refreshing grace.\n\n     \"For Thee, my God, the living God,\n       My thirsty soul doth pine;\n     Oh! when shall I behold Thy face,\n       Thou Majesty divine_?\"\n\n1. Jesus calls us by the mystery of life. There are hours of silence and\nmeditation when the great thought _I am_ beats in upon the soul. But\nwhat am I? Whence came I? A heap of atoms in some strange human\nsemblance--is that all? And so many other heaps of atoms have already\nbeen, and passed away! Blown hither and thither--where? The universe\nreels with change. Star-dust and earth-dust are alike in ceaseless\nwhirl. Little it profits to build the spire, the sea-wall, the dome, the\nbridge, the myriad-roofed town. A new era shall dawn upon them, and they\nshall fall away.\n\nNot only that, but each man who lives to-day has less possible material\ndominion than he had who preceded him. Only so many square feet of\nearth, and now there are more to walk upon them! The ground we tread was\nonce trodden by the feet of those long dead. I am taking up their room,\nand in due time I must myself depart, that there may be footway for\nthose who are to come after me. Only the under-sod is really mine--the\nlittle earth-barrow to which I go.\n\nThere is no question more baffling than this simple, ever-recurring one:\nWhat am I? If I should decide what I am to-day, I discover that\nyesterday I was quite a different person. To-day I may be six feet in\nheight, and climb the Alps; yesterday I lay helpless in swaddling\nclothes. Yesterday I was a thing of laughter and frolic; to-day I am\ngrave, and brush away tears. As a babe, was I still I? What is Myself?\nWhen did I come to Myself? How far can I extend Myself? My feet are\nhere, but in a moment my spirit can flee to Xanadu and Zanzibar. There\nis no spot in the universe where I may not go. Where, then, are the\nlimits of Myself?\n\nPersonality is never for a single moment fixed: it is as changing and\nevanescent as a cloud. We are whirlwind spirits, swept through time and\nspace, bearing within our souls hopes, fears, joys, sorrows, which are\nnever twice the same. Every aspect of the universe leaves new\nimpressions on us, and our wills, in their world-sweep, daily desire\ndifferent things.\n\nIncompleteness lies on life--restlessness is in the heart. True love has\nno final habitation on earth; there is no abiding-place for our deepest\naffection, our most tender yearning. It is curious how deeply one may\nlove, and yet feel that there is something more. In all our journeys,\nskyward and sunward, we never reach the End of All.\n\nOver against this vague and changing self, there stands out the figure\nof the changeless Christ, the same yesterday, to-day, and forever. In\nHim we find the environment of all our lives, and the sum of all\nour dreams.\n\n2. Jesus calls us by our earth-born cares. In Mendelssohn's _Elijah_,\nthere is a voice which sings: \"O rest in the Lord!\" This angel's message\nis the voice of Jesus to the human race.\n\nThe voice of Jesus calls us to awake to toil. We sometimes forget this,\nand imagine that if we follow Jesus, we shall never have anything to do.\nChrist does not still the machinery of the world, nor shut the mine, nor\ntake away the sowing and the reaping. The call of Jesus is not a call to\nrest from work, but to rest in work. The rest we receive is that of\nsympathy, of inspiration, of efficiency. Christ really increases the\ntoil-capacity of man. Man can do more work, harder work, and always\nbetter work, because of the faith that is in him. What makes the\nconfusion and fatigue of life is, that men are everywhere scrambling\nfor themselves, and trying to manage their own undertakings, instead of\nfalling into harmony with God, and through Him, with all that is. What\nwears the soul out is not the work of life itself--it is its drudgery,\nits monotony, its blind vagueness, its apparent purposelessness. We do\nnot wish to scatter our lives and spend our years in nothingness.\n\nChrist comes into the world and says: Over-fatigue is abnormal. There\nis not enough work in the universe to tire every one all out. There is\njust enough for each one to do happily, and to do well. I am come as the\ngreat industrial organizer. My mission is not to take away toil, but to\nredistribute it. My industrial plan is the largest of history--it is\nalso the most simple. I look down over the world, as a master upon his\nmen. My work is not to found an earthly kingdom, as some have thought;\nit is not primarily to set up industrial establishments, or syndicates,\nor ways of transport and trade. My work is to build up in the universe a\nspiritual kingdom of energy, power, and progress. To this kingdom all\nmaterial things are accessory. In My hand are all abilities, as well as\nall knowledge. Not a sparrow falls to the ground without My notice. Not\na lily blooms without My delight. Not a brick is laid, not a stone is\nset, not an axe is swung, except beneath My eye. I provide for My own.\nTo each man I assign his work, his task. If he takes upon him only what\nI give him to do, he will never be under-paid, or over-tired.\n\nHence the first step towards an industrial millennium is to arise and do\nwhat Jesus bids. Heaven is heaven because no one is unruly there, or\nidle, or lazy, or vicious, or morose. Each soul is at true and happy\nwork. Each energy is absorbed; each hour is alive with interest, and\nthere are no oppressive thoughts or ways.\n\nIf each heart and soul responded to the call of Jesus, there would be a\nnew heaven and a new earth--a Utopia such as More never dreamed of, nor\nPlato, nor Bellamy, nor Campanella in his _City of the Sun_. Each hand\nwould be at its own work; each eye would be upon its own task; each foot\nwould be in the right path. All the fear, the weariness, the squalor,\nand the unrest of life would be done away. The life of each man would be\na life of contentment, and of economic advance.\n\n3. Jesus calls us by the scourging of our sins. Flagellation is not of\nthe body--it is of the soul. Remorse is as a scorpion-whip, and memory\nbeats us with many stripes. The first sin that besets us is\nforgetfulness of God. Apathy creeps over the spirit, and sloth winds\nitself about our deeds. Nothing is more pathetic than the decline of the\nmerely forgetful soul. \"Be sleepless in the things of the spirit,\" says\nPythagoras, \"for sleep in them is akin to death.\"\n\nSin lifts bars against success: the root of failure lies in irreligion.\nPride, conceit, disobedience, malice, evil-speaking, covetousness,\nidolatry, vice, oppression, injustice, and lack of truth and honor fight\nmore strongly against one's career than any other foe. No sin is without\nits lash; no experience of evil but has its rebound. To expect a higher\nmoral insight in middle age because of a larger experience of sin in\nyouth, is as reasonable as to look for sanity of judgment in middle age\nbecause in youth a man had fits!\n\nLooking at ourselves in a mirror, do we not sometimes think how we would\nfashion ourselves if we could create a new self, in the image of some\nideal which is before us? Would we not make ourselves wholly beautiful\nif we could make ourselves?\n\nEven so, looking out upon our own spirits, do we not some day rouse to\nthe distortion and deformity of sin? Do we wish to retain these\ngrimacing phases of ourselves? Do we not yearn eagerly for the dignity\nand beauty of high virtue? Do we not long for the graces and perfections\nwhich make up a radiant and happy life? If we could be born again, would\nwe not be born a more spiritual being?\n\nIt is to this new birth that Jesus calls our souls. All around the babe,\nhid in its mother's womb, there lies a world of which it has neither\nsight nor knowledge. The fact that the babe is ignorant does not change\nthe fact that the world is there. So about our souls there lies the\ninvisible world of God, which, until born of the Spirit, we do not see\nor understand. It is a world in which God is everywhere; in which there\nis no First Cause, except God; in which there is no will, except the\nwill of God; in which there is no true and perfect love, except from\nGod; no truth, except revealed by God; no power, except from Him.\n\nConversion is the outlook over a world which is arranged, not for our\nown glory, but for the good of God's creatures; in which what we do is\nnecessary, fundamental, permanent--not because we ourselves have done it\nwell, nor, in truth, because we have done it at all--but because what we\nhave done is a part of the universe which God is building. We change\nfrom a self-centre to a God-centre; from the thought of whether the\nworld applauds to whether God approves; from the thought of keeping our\nown life to the thought of preserving our own integrity; from isolation\nfrom all other souls to a sympathy with them, an understanding of their\nneeds, and a desire to help their lives. It is a turning from a delight\nin sin, or an indifference to sin, or merely a moral aversion to it, to\na deep-rooted hatred of every thought and act of sin, to penitence, and\nto an earnest desire to pattern after God.\n\n4. Jesus calls us by our sorrows, Jesus calls us by our dreams. He\nthrills us by each high aim that life inspires. His voice is one of\nunderstanding, of tenderness, of human appeal. How could we love Jesus\nif He did not sympathize with our ideals? But here is a Divine One in\nwhose sight we are not visionary; who lovingly guards our least hope;\nwho welcomes our faintest spiritual insight; who takes an interest in\nour social plans, and points out to us the great kingdom that is to be.\nChrist lays hold of the divine that is in us, and will not let us go.\n\n5. Jesus calls us by our latent gifts and powers. Which of us has ever\nexhausted his possibilities? Which of us is all that he might be?\n\nIt is an impressive thought, that nothing in the universe ever gets used\nup. It changes form, motion, semblance,--but the force, the energy,\nneither wastes nor dies away. Air--it is as fresh as the air that blew\nover the Pharaohs. Sun--it is as undimmed as the sun that looked down on\nthe completion of Cheops. Earth--it is as unworn as the earth that was\ntrodden by the cavemen.\n\nNo generation can ever bequeath to us a single new material atom. The\nrace is ever in old clothes. Nor can we hand down to others one atom\nwhich was not long ere we were born. Yet the vitality of the universe is\nbeing constantly increased, and this increase is also permanent. God has\na great deal more to work with now than a thousand years ago.\n\nFor not all energy is material. With each birth there comes a new force\ninto the world, and its influence never dies. The body is born of ages\npast, of the material stores of centuries; but the soul, in its living,\nthinking, working power, is a new phase of energy added to the energy\nof the race.\n\nThis fact confers on each individual man a strange impressiveness and\npower. It gives a new significance to the fact that I am. I am something\ndifferent from what has been, or ever shall be. In the great whirling\nmyriads, I am distinguished and apart. I am an appreciable factor in\nuniversal development and a being of elemental power. By every true\nthought of mine the race becomes wiser. By every right deed, its\ninheritance of tradition is uplifted; by every high affection, its\nhorizon of love is enlarged. We can bequeath to others this new\nspiritual energy of our lives.\n\nThis thought gives us a new zest for life. There is an appetite which is\nof the soul. It is this wish for growth, for the development of our\npowers, for a larger life for ourselves and for those who shall\ncome after us.\n\nIs there any one who wishes to stay always where he is to-day?--to be\nalways what he is this morning? Beyond the hill-top lies our dream. Not\nall the voices that call men from place to place are audible ones. We\nhear whispers from a far-off leader; we are beckoned by an unseen guide.\nOut of ancestry, tradition, talent, and training each departs to\nhis own way.\n\nWhat calls is not largeness of place--it is largeness of ideal. To each\nof us, thinking of this one and that one who has taken a large part in\nthe shaping of the world, there comes a feeling: Beside all these I am\nin a narrow way! What can I think that shall be worth the consideration\nof the race? What can I do that shall be a stepping-stone to progress?\nWhat can I hope that shall unseal other eyes to the universal glory,\ncomfort others in the universal pain? We say: I do not want to be mewed\nup here, while others are out where thrones and empires are sweeping by!\nI do not want to parse verbs, add fractions, and mark ledgers, while\nothers are the poets, the singers, the statesmen, the rulers, and the\nwealth-controllers of the world! We wish to step out of the trivial\nexperience into that which is significant. Each day brings uneasiness of\nsoul. \"Man's unhappiness,\" says Carlyle, \"as I construe it, comes of his\ngreatness; it is because there is an infinite in him, which with all his\ncunning he cannot quite bury under the finite.\" Says Tennyson:\n\n     \"_It is not death for which we pant,\n      But life, more life, and fuller, that we want_.\"\n\nThese aspirations are prophetic. Does a clod-hopper dream? We move\ntoward our desires. The wish for growth is but the call of Jesus to our\nsouls. We sometimes hear of the \"limitations of life.\" What are they?\nWho set them? Man himself, not God. The call of Jesus urges the soul of\nman to possibilities which are infinite.\n\nA large life is the fulfilment of God's ideal of our lives--the life\nwhich, from all eternity, He has looked upon as possible for us. Could\nany career be grander than the one that God has planned for us? God does\nnot think petty thoughts: He longs for grandeur for us all.\n\n6. Jesus calls us by the spirit of the times. There is a growing\nrecognition of the affinity between God and the human soul. Religion has\nchanged in spirit as well as in form. It used to be considered a tract\nin one's experience, and now it is perceived to be all of life--its\nimpetus, its central moving force, the reason for being, activity,\ndevelopment, for ethical conduct, and for unselfish and joyous\nhelpfulness. Religion is more and more perceived to be, not a thing of\nfeeble sentiment, of restraint, of exaction, of meek subordination and\nresignation, but the unfolding of the free human spirit to the\nrealization of its highest possibilities and its allegiance to that\nwhich is eternal and supreme. The nineteenth century closes with the\nthinker who is also a man of meditation and devotion. We offer to Heaven\nthe incense of aspiration, hope, research, talent, and imagination.\n\nThe chief thing toward which we are moving is, I believe, the\nEnthronement of the Christ. Christ has always been, in the hearts of the\nfew, enthroned and enshrined. Even in the dark years of mediaeval\nsuperstition and unrest, there were the cloistered ones who maintained\ntraditions of faith and did works of mercy, as there were knightly ones\nwho upheld the ministry of chivalry, and followed, though afar, the\ntender shining of the Holy Grail. But now all the signs point to a great\nand general recognition of the Christ--Christ to be lifted high on the\nhands of the nations, to His throne above the stars!\n\nA new spiritual note is to be heard in modern subjects of study, is\nnoticeable in all paths of intellectual prestige. History is no more\nlooked upon as the story of the trophies of warriors, conquerors, and\nkings. History, rising out of dim mists, is seen to be the marching and\nthe countermarching of nations in the throes of progress and of social\nchange. It is not the story of princes alone, but of peasants as well;\nthe result of myriads of small, obscure lives; of changing conditions;\nof the movements of great economic, psychologic, and spiritual forces.\nLooking backward over the moving processional of the nations of the\nearth, we may see how, without rest, without pause, through countless\nages, the myriad legions of men have been passing across the scene of\nlife--passing, and fading away!\n\n   \"_All that tread\n   The globe are but a handful of the tribes\n   That slumber in its bosom_.\"\n\nEmpires have risen, and empires have decayed; dynasties have been\nburied, and long lines of kings, wrapping stately robes about them, have\nlain down to die. Thrones have been overturned, armies and navies have\nbeen mustered and scattered, land and sea have been peopled and made\ndesolate, as the thronging tribes and races have lived their little life\nand passed away. Babylon and Assyria, India and Arabia, Egypt and\nPersia, Rome and Greece,--each of these has had its lands and conquests,\nits song and story, its wars and tumults, its wrath and praise. Under\nall the tides of conquest and endeavor but one fact shines supreme: the\nsteady progress of the Cross.\n\nOne principle of growth and development is being slowly revealed,--an\napproach to symmetry and civic form, which is seen in freedom, justice,\npopular education, the rise of masses, the power of public opinion, and\na general regard for life, health, peace, national prosperity, and the\nindividual weal. The day has passed when men merely lived, slept, ate,\nfought; they are now involved in an intricate and progressive\ncivilization. Sociology, ethics, and politics are newly blazed pathways\nfor its development, its guidance, and its ideals. We are moving on to\nnew dreams of patriotism, of statesmanship, and of civil rule.\n\nLiterature, instead of being considered as merely an expression of the\nprimitive experiences of a race in its sagas, glees, ballads, dramas,\nand larger works and songs, is more and more revealing itself as an\nappeal to the Highest in the supreme moments of life. It is the\nunfolding panorama of the concepts of the soul in regard to duty,\nconduct, love, and hope. Literature asks: What do I live for? as well\nas, How shall I speak forth beauty? How ought the soul of man to act in\nan emergency? What is the best solution of the great human problems of\nduty, love, and fate? The voices of Dante, Milton, Shakespeare,\nTennyson, and Browning sweep the soul upward to spiritual heights, and\nanswer some of the deepest questionings of the soul of man. And hence\nliterature is no longer merely a thing of vocabulary, of phrase, of\nrhythm, of assonance, of alliteration, or of metrical and philosophical\nform. It is a revelation of the progress of the soul, of its standards,\nof its triumphs, its defeats, and its desires. It is the unfolding of\none's intellectual helplessness before the unmoved, calm passing of\nyears; of one's emotional inadequacy without God for adjudicator. It is\na direct search for God. One finds wrapped within it the mystery,\naspiration, and spiritual passion of the soul.\n\nScience, no longer a dry assembling of facts and figures, is an\nincreasing revelation of the imagination, the exactness, the\nthoroughness, and the great progressive plans of God. Evolution has\nbecome a spiritual formula. The scientist looks out over the earth and\nsky and sun and star. Against his little years are meted out vast\nprehistoric spans; against his mastery of a few forms of life, stands\nLife itself. Back of all, there looms up the great Figure of the\nOriginator of life, and of the forms of life; the Maker and Ruler of\nthem all. Each scientific fact helps exegesis and evidence. Each new\naspiration after truth becomes a form of prayer.\n\nYes, the whole world is being subtly and powerfully drawn to the worship\nof the Christ. Never before was there so deep, genuine, and widespread a\nRevival of Religion. It has not come heralded with great outcries, with\nflame and wind, and revolution and upheaval; it has come as the great\nchanges that are most permanent come, in stillness and strength.\nThroughout the world there is being turned to the service of religion\nthe highest training, the most intellectual power. Wars are being\nwrought for freedom; the Church and the university are joining hands;\nthe rich and the poor are drawing near together for mutual help and\nunderstanding; industry is growing to be, not only a crude force, brutal\nand disregarding, but a high ministry to human needs; the home is\nbecoming more and more the guardian of faith and the shrine of peace;\nbusiness houses are taking upon them a religious significance; commerce\nand trade are perceiving ethical duties. Armies are marching in the\nname of Jehovah, and a great poet has this one message: \"Lest\nwe forget!\"\n\n7. Jesus calls us by the future of the race. Life proceeds to life.\nEternity is what is just before. Immortality is a native concept for the\nsoul. Beyond this hampered half-existence, the soul demands life,\nfreedom, growth, and power.\n\nWe stand between two worlds. Behind us is the engulfed Past, wherein\ngenerations vanish, as the wake of ships at sea. Before us is the\nFuture, in the dawn-mist of hovering glory, and surprise. Looking out\nover eternity, that billowy expanse, do we not see rising, clear though\nshadowy, a vast Permanence, Completion, Realization, in which the soul\nof man shall have endless progress and delight? This is the Promise held\nout by all the ages, and the future toward which all the thoughts and\ndreams of man converge. It is glorious to be a living soul, and to know\nthat this great race--life is yet to be!\n\nAt the threshold of each new century stands Jesus, star-encircled, with\na voice above the ages and a crown above the spheres,--Jesus, saying,\nFOLLOW ME!\n\n\n\n\nIII. PROCESSIONAL: THE CHURCH OF GOD\n\n     [AURELIA]\n\n     _The Church's one foundation\n       Is Jesus Christ her Lord;\n     She is His new creation\n       By water and the Word:\n     From heaven He came and sought her\n       To be His Holy Bride;\n     With His own blood He bought her\n       And for her life He died.\n\n     Though with a scornful wonder\n       Men see her sore opprest,\n     By schisms rent asunder,\n       By heresies distrest;\n     Yet saints their watch are keeping,\n       Their cry goes up, \"How long?\"\n     And soon the night of weeping\n       Shall be the morn of song.\n\n     'Mid toil and tribulation,\n       And tumult of her war,\n     She waits the consummation\n       Of peace for evermore;\n     Till with the vision glorious\n       Her longing eyes are blest,\n     And the great Church victorious\n       Shall be the Church at rest._\n\n     SAMUEL JOHN STONE\n\n\nFIRST: RECONSTRUCTION\n\nThe subject that is being carefully considered by many thinking men and\nwomen to-day is this: the place and prospects of the Christian Church.\nAll about us we hear the cry that the Church is declining, and may\neventually pass away; that it does not gain new members in proportion to\nits need, nor hold the attention and allegiance of those already\nenrolled. Are these things true? If so, how may better things be brought\nto pass? To share in the civilization that has come from nineteen\nhundred years of the work of the Church, and to be unwilling to lift a\npound's weight of the present burden, in order to pass on to others our\nprecious heritage, is certainly a selfish and unworthy course. It is\nbetter to ask, What is my work in the upbuilding of the Church? What can\nI do to further the Royal Progress of the Church of God?\n\nThe root-failure of the organized Church to-day is its failure to share\nin the growing life of the world. A growing life is one that is full of\nnew ideas, new experiences, new emotions, a new outlook over life--that\nworks in new ways, and that is full of seething and tumultuous energy,\nenthusiasm, and hope. If we look out over the colleges, business\nenterprises, periodicals, agriculture, manufacturing, and shipping of\nthe world, we find everywhere one story--growth, impetus, courage,\nresources, vigorous and bounding life. Beside these things the average\nchurch services to-day are both stupid and poky. The forces of religion\nare neither guided nor wielded well. There is in most churches, however\nwe may dislike to own the fact, a decrease of interest and proportionate\nmembership, a waning prestige, a general air of discouragement, and a\ntale of baffled efforts and of disappointed hopes.\n\nThe Church--and by this word I here mean the organized body of both\nclergymen and laymen--is meant to be the supreme spiritual leader of the\nworld. It is meant to possess vigor, decision, insight, hope, and\nintellectual power. But before it can accomplish its high and holy work,\na great reconstruction must begin. To help in this reconstruction, to\naid in vivifying, co\u00f6rdinating, and ruling the varied processes of\norganized religion, is your work and mine.\n\n1. The Church must rouse to a sense of its noble duties and exalted\npowers. We underrate the Church. We are looking elsewhere for our\nhighest ideals, instead of claiming from the Church that spiritual\nguidance and inspiration which should be its right to give. One of the\nthings that is a monumental astonishment to me, is that when we need\nsupplication, intercession, prayer for the averting of great personal or\nnational calamity, we flee to the Church, but we seldom think of the\nChurch when we need brains!\n\nThe Church should lead, and not follow, the great dreams of the world.\nIn the midst of our new national life we are sending all over the\ncountry for the best-trained help and thought in every department of\ngovernment influence and control. Our problems of the day are\npre\u00ebminently spiritual ones. Colonial control is not a question of\nmaterial ascendancy--it is a rule over the minds, hearts, and ideals of\nmen. Its moral significance is patent. We are called upon, not only to\nimport provisions, clothing, and household and industrial goods into our\nnew possessions; we are called upon to develop a higher sense of honor,\ntruth, honesty, and every-day morality. Scholars, working-men, business\nmen, farmers, and merchants are being consulted in regard to different\nphases of our national advance, and every idea which their insight and\nexperience furnish is seized upon. But who is consulting the Church in\nthese concerns, except in reference to mere technical points? Who is\nlooking to the intellectual, moral, and spiritual standards of the\nChurch for guidance? We are to-day ruled spiritually, as well as\nintellectually, by laymen, and in a way which is quite outside the\norganized work of the Church.\n\n2. The Church needs a more business-like organization and way of work.\nIt needs a more military spirit and discipline. The Church is diffuse\nand loosely strung. There are in the United States alone about two\nhundred and fifty-six kinds of religious bodies. There is no centralized\ninterest or work; there is no economic adjustment of funds; there is no\ninternal agreement as to practical methods. The result is a most\nwasteful expenditure of force. Movements are not only duplicated, but\nreproduced a hundred times in miniature, in one denomination after\nanother; special talent is restricted to a narrow field; buildings and\nchurch-plants are multiplied, but lie largely disused; sects and\ncommunities are at loggerheads on unessential points; all this--and the\nworld is not being saved! The Church fails to see openings for\naggressive work; it fails to seize strategic points; it does not carry a\nwell-knit local organization, with a husbanding of economic force; it\ndoes not front the world in dead-earnest; it is not proud and honorable\nin meeting its local debts; it loses progressive force, from lack of\nknowledge as to how to judge men, and train them, and set them to work.\n\nIt also lacks greatly in office-force and in supplies. The gospel itself\nis without price, but in the nature of things it cannot be proclaimed,\nnor church-work efficiently carried on, without financial outlay. There\nshould be a more adequate equipment for this work. All other enterprises\nneed, without question, stationery, stenographers, literature for\ndistribution, office-rooms, office-hours, and a general arrangement\nlooking toward enlargement and progress. A busy pastor should have an\noffice-equipment just as much as a business man, and it should be\nsupported, as a business office is, out of the funds of the business\norganization, _i.e._ the local church.\n\nThere should be, first of all, a united spirit, and a general\nreorganization throughout the whole of evangelical Christendom, not\nnecessarily destroying denominational lines, with a view to quick\nmobilization of energy in any direction most needed. What would a\ngeneral do, who, in looking over his troops, should find two hundred and\nfifty-six provincial armies, not at ease or at peace with each other,\nand yet expected to make war upon a common foe? Shall we not endeavor to\nshare in some broadly planned, magnificently executed scheme of\nworld-advance?\n\nThe Church has reached a point where a vast constructive work is to be\ndone. Its scattered parts must be knit into a powerful and aggressive\nwhole, to turn a solid front upon the evil of the world. The times are\nripe for a successor of Peter the Hermit, of Luther, Knox, Calvin,\nZwingli, Savonarola, Whitefield, Finney, Moody. Whether a great\npreacher, theologian, or evangelist, he will certainly be a business\nman, a man of vast energy and executive capacity, who shall perform this\nmiracle of organization of which many dream, and who shall set the\nprogress of the Church for a full century to come!\n\nThis united spirit should prevail, not only through the smaller bodies,\nbut between the Roman Catholic and Protestant communions. There has been\na distinct division between these two bodies, much mutual suspicion,\njealousy, and antagonism: it is only quite lately that Protestant and\nCatholic leaders have been willing to work amicably together for great\ncommon causes.\n\nA new situation has arisen. In our new possessions we are confronted\nwith a large population who, whatever may be the reason, are\nunquestionably not, as a whole, progressive, enlightened, educated, or\nhighly moral. The problem now is, not for Catholic and Protestant to\nwaste energy and spiritual strength in contending for mastery over each\nother, but for them to unite in changing and bettering the condition of\nour island peoples. What is past is past. Our present duty is to bring\npeace, industry, intelligence, high ideals, and spiritual living to our\nnew countrymen. This is a work to fill the hands and heart of both\nchurches, and perhaps, in a common task, each may learn to understand\nand regard the other as those should understand and regard each other\nwho have one Lord, one hope, one heaven.\n\n3. The Church needs stronger and more gifted leaders. In every business\nor intellectual enterprise to-day, there is an effort to place at the\nhead of each organization the most powerful and resourceful man whose\nservices can be obtained. Nothing in this age works, or is expected to\nwork, without the leadership of brains. A primary step, in a\nfar-reaching ecclesiastical policy, is to endeavor to draw into both\nministry and membership the most active and intellectual class. All\nearnest souls can work, but not all can work equally effectively.\nParticularly in the ministry, north, south, east, and west, men are\nneeded who are really _men_. This does not necessarily mean the men with\nthe longest string of academic degrees, the men who can write the best\npoems or make the best speeches on public occasions; it means the\nthinking men who are brave, talented, spiritual, and warm-hearted.\n\nIn the Report of one of the missionary Boards, I have recently read the\nfollowing stirring words. They refer to the work of missionaries in the\nfar north, one of whom has lately travelled a thousand miles over the\nsnow in a dog-sled: \"He who follows that mining crowd must be more than\nthe minister, who would do well for towns in the west or elsewhere in\nAlaska. He must be a man who, when night overtakes him, will be thankful\nif he can find a bunk and a plate in a miner's cabin; he must travel\nmuch, and therefore cannot be cumbered with extra trappings--must dress\nas the miners do, and accept their food and fare. He must be no less in\nearnest in his search for souls than they in search for gold. He must be\nso 'furnished' that, without recourse to books or study-table, he can\nminister acceptably to men who under the guise of a miner's garb hide\nthe social and mental culture of life in Eastern colleges and\nprofessional days.\"\n\nIt is far from that land of frost and snow to the beautiful island of\nPorto Rico, washed by tropical seas, through the streets of whose\ncapital there passes every day the carriage of the Governor, with its\nwhite-covered upholstery and its livery of white. But I add this word:\nThe missionary sent to Porto Rico, be he Catholic or Protestant, must be\na man who can stand among statesmen and society men and women, as well\nas one who can live and work among the humblest folk who lodge in\nleaf-thatched huts along the roadside or far on lonely hills.\nRepresentative men of ability, health, culture, and courage are being\nchosen to carry on governmental work: it is idle to send provincial men\nto the Church. What is locally true of the Church in Porto Rico is\nfundamentally true all over the world, at home and abroad. Each\nministerial post to-day requires an imperial man. Not every post\nrequires the same sort of man, either in regard to general heredity or\neducation. Men are needed of the Peter-type, of the John-type, of the\nPaul-type; it suffices that, they be men of unusual power, and well\nfitted to their individual work.\n\n4. The Church needs a better system for the proper placing of men. No\nphase of the world's work can be carried on merely and simply because a\nman is pious. In every phase of life, there is a constant shifting of\nmen according to temperament, ability, and general influence and power.\nIn the Church we must have a quick and decisive recognition of a man's\nability, and he must be set where that talent can work easily and\neffectively. Churches are not all alike. There are no two alike. When we\nthink of it, what a ghoulish business \"candidating\" is! No scheme for\nthe right placing of men can be devised which does not place a great\ndeal of power in the hand of a few leading men. This power may be\nabused, but ought not to be, if it were really looked upon as under\ndivine direction and inspiration. Cannot a great leader be inspired to\nthe choice of a man, as well as a great author to the choice of a word,\na rhyme? Comparatively few men thoroughly understand how to rate other\nmen, and to these few men, as in all other great enterprises, must be\ngiven the power and authority to select and adjust. By this I do not\nmean that a set of ecclesiastics will alone be adequate. Ecclesiastical\nvision, like all other highly specialized vision, is partial, and does\nnot always see quite straight. There should also be called into play the\nbusiness ability and discernment of men of large business interests or\nadministrative gifts. Sooner or later the various religious\norganizations will have to meet, in some better way than any thus far\nformulated, this growing need.\n\n5. We need a release of pressure on the abler men. Many a minister\nto-day is a sort of community lackey. What other men are frankly too\nbusy to do, he is supposed to be cheerfully ready to do. The list of odd\njobs which fall to his lot would be ridiculous, were not their influence\nupon his life and work so retrogressive and so sad. He lives to serve\nothers, but this vow of service is greatly imposed upon. If he is to\nlead in intellectual and spiritual matters, he must be given fewer\nerrands to run, the financial burden of his church must be taken\nabsolutely from his shoulders, he must have a suitable salary, and his\ntime must be at least as carefully guarded as that of the average man.\nSome calls he is bound to obey, at whatever cost of time or\nstrength,--illness, certain public duties, and real spiritual\nneeds,--but his life must not be at the mercy of cranks, or of idle\npersons' whims.\n\n6. We need a reorganization of preaching traditions. It is a tradition\nthat a minister must, in general, preach two set sermons every week,\ngive one informal week-day lecture, and be prepared to deliver, at any\nmoment, funeral addresses, anniversary speeches, \"remarks,\" or to\nperform other utterly impossible intellectual feats. Anyone who writes,\nor who speaks in public, knows that the preparation of a half-hour\naddress which is worth anything requires a great deal of time. It\ncannot ordinarily be \"tossed off,\" and help men's souls. Only an\noccasional inspiration, the result of a lifetime of thought and\nexperience, is born in this sudden way. Usually excellence is the result\nof long and careful labor. The way to help this would seem to be a\nconstant interchange of preachers, not only in one denomination, but\namong the various denominations, so that a really fine sermon would be\nheard by many people, and fewer sermons would require to be written.\nThis is easily done in a large city or its vicinity. What congregations\nneed most is not altogether formal sermons, but thoughtful, helpful\ntalks containing a fresh, uplifting, and spiritual outlook over life,\nwith a practical bearing on the occasions and duties of life. The work\nof both Frederick Robertson and Horace Bushnell has this direct and\nvital tone.\n\nMinisters must study more. If they are freed from many tasks now put\nupon them, it is not unreasonable to ask that this time be put on more\ncareful thinking. Too many a minister of to-day is, intellectually,\nsomething of a flibbertigibbet. His sermons do not take hold, because\nthey have not the roots to take hold with. How many ministers possess,\nfor instance, a scholarly knowledge of human nature or of the deeper\naspects of redemption? Yet these things he ought to know. There is a\nlarge amount of intensely interesting, though spiritually undigested,\nmaterial for a minister in a book like William James's _Varieties of\nReligious Experience_.\n\n7. Greater care must be taken of the rural church. Any one interested in\na great ecclesiastical polity must surely recognize the ultimate\npossibilities of our rural regions. Here are growing up the leading men\nand women of to-morrow. Ideals and inspirations set upon their hearts\nwill bear fruit a thousand-fold. Hence there should be a definite\narrangement by which a certain portion of the preaching time of the\nreally able preachers shall be placed each year in some small and remote\nplace. Several scattered country churches might unite for these\nservices. Let such a man also make helpful suggestions for neighborhood\nsocial and intellectual life. While he is in the village, let the\ncountry pastor go to town, browse in libraries, art-collections, hear\nmusic, and get a general quickening of interest and inspiration. Let\neach compare notes with the other. They will both gain by this\ninterchange.\n\n8. There is too little recognition of individual talent in the Church.\nToo few workers are set at work which they know how to do, and the\nuntaught rush at tasks which angels fear to touch. We have myriads of\nSabbath-school teachers, but how many men or women really know how to\nteach a little child? The man is asked to speak or pray in\nprayer-meeting, who cannot possibly do it well, but no notice is taken\nof the fact that he thoroughly understands public accounts. A man is\nasked to subscribe ten dollars to a church affair, who cannot afford it,\nbut his spiritual insight might save the impending church quarrel.\nPeople come and go in the churches, and many, I am convinced, drift away\nbecause they are never asked for anything but money for the support and\ninterest of the Church. In no other sort of organization is this true.\nEven in the summer camp or mountain hotel or Atlantic liner, when any\npastime or entertainment is suggested, the first thing to discover is,\nWhat can each one _do_? One, who has the gift of organization and\nmanagement, \"gets it up\"; one sings; one reads or recites; one writes a\nbright bit of verse; another smooths out rising jealousies, or bridges,\nby a little tact, the abyss of caste. Why do we hide so many pretty\ntalents under a bushel, when the church-door swings behind us? Why do we\nsubstitute such strange and foolish tasks, particularly for women? What\nwould leading lawyers and doctors do, I wonder, if they were asked, as\nbusy women often have been, to spend a precious morning in a church-room\nsorting cast-off clothes?\n\nIn every church, large or small, there are both men and women who are\ntalented in a special way; who could bring gifts of training and\nexperience to bear upon the problems and opportunities of the Church.\nTell me, in prayer or speech-making, formal or social occasion, pastor\nor people, do we often bring our very deepest, tenderest, most inspiring\nemotional or intellectual life? It is not a whit more spiritual to be\nstupid than to be bright. This is what our church-meetings should\nbe--not a formal and very dull round of prayers and set remarks, more or\nless pointless; they ought to be a yielding-up of our heart's best life\nto others.\n\n9. We need, as a Church, a deeper spiritual life. We need the Power of\nthe Holy Ghost. In spite of all the sorrow of the world, sorrow both of\na personal nature and that which touches whole communities, there is\nonly one real burden upon the heart of earnest men and women: it is our\nown inadequate representation of Christianity,--the disheartening\ndifference between what we practise and what we profess. When the Church\nof God is in reality a powerful and hard-working body of sincere,\nhonest, and loving people, the world will soon be saved!\n\n\nSECOND: ADHERENCE\n\nBy the question, Why join the Church?--I do not mean alone, Why add my\nname to a church-roll? I mean, Why give myself, my powers, my education,\nmy love, my loyalty, to advance the progress of the Church?\n\nThere is nothing we resent more than a waste of ourselves. To attract\nour service, there must be in the Church an inner vitality, a moving\nand spiritual fire.\n\n1. The Church embodies the spiritual dreams of the world. Man does not\nlive by bread alone; he lives by imagination, and by religious powers.\nIn the Church of God, the spiritual imagination of man reached its\nhighest field of energy, and has brought forth its most triumphant\nworks. The great art of the world has centred about the Christian\nChurch--its architecture and much of its noblest speech. Imagine a world\nin which every work which was inspired by the Church, or by the concepts\nof religion embodied in it, should be left out. What would we then lack?\nWe would lack the greatest works of Michelangelo, Raphael, Titian,\nFrancesca, Botticelli, Murillo; we would not see the cathedrals of\nMilan, Strasburg, or Cologne; we would never read the poems of Caedmon,\nMilton, or Dante. The hamlet would be without a spire; philanthropy\nwould be almost unknown; there would be neither night-watch nor\nmorning-watch of united prayer. We should have no processional of\nmillions churchward on the Lord's Day, no hymns to stir our souls to joy\nand praise, no anthems or oratorios, no ministers, no ecclesiastical\ncourts and assemblies, no church conventions, no church-schools,\nreligious societies, nor religious press. All these works and\ninstitutions proclaim the glory of belief, and hand down the religious\ntraditions and the spiritual aspirations of the generations of men.\nShall we let others share in the mystery and triumph while we stand\napart, silent, unapproving, and alone?\n\nThe dreams of the Church are high and holy. There is the dream of\nFreedom, of the Freedom of the Soul. It is an inspiring thought this,\nthe essential democracy of the race. We do not find intellectual\nequality of souls. We see each man or woman differently circumstanced,\ndifferently gifted, differently trained. Yet each may say, I am\nspiritually free! To me also is given the opportunity of development, of\nmajesty of character, of high service. The soul is the thrall of none;\nnothing can bind it to spiritual serfdom.\n\nNext, there is the dream of Allegiance. Some one has well said: \"Wouldst\nthou live a great life? Ally thyself with a great cause.\" Allegiance is\ndevotion of the whole of ourselves to a leader, a cause. We can no more\ngo through the world without allying ourselves to something than we can\ngo through it and live nowhere. If the object of our allegiance be a\nhigh one, if the ideal be a grand one, our lives are in a constant\nprocess of development toward that height, that grandeur. Each act of\nfaith becomes an impetus to progress. We are daily enriched by the\nexperience of mere obedience. To obey and follow are acts in the\nuniversal process.\n\nIf, on the other hand, we ally ourselves to that which is lower than\nourselves, by the very act we are dragged down. No one can remain upon\neven his own level, who is in obedience and devotion to that which is\nbelow him. Allegiance to a Higher is one of the trumpet-calls of the\nworld. It has been the rally of all armies, of all legions, of all\ncrusades. The great commander is, by his very position, a grouper of\nother men, the ruler of their thoughts, their deeds, their dreams. His\npower to call and to sway is beyond his own ideas of it. How otherwise\ncould it be that out of one century one heart calls to another--out of\none age, proceeds the answer to the cry of ages gone?\n\nThe lover of music to-day allies himself to Bach, to Haydn, to Mozart,\nto Wagner, by his appreciation, his sympathy, his understanding of what\nthey have done. He acknowledges their control of his musical self by his\nefforts to interpret their work to others, and to create new works which\nshall be inspired by their ideals. Thus he acknowledges their control of\nhis own powers. Such control over the spirit of man is that of the\nChurch over the social body; it stirs the spiritual aspiration of man,\nit directs his ambition. It fixes upon a standard, the Cross; upon a\nHero, the Christ, and reaches unto all the world its arm of power,\ndrawing unto itself the loyalty, the faith, the affection, and the royal\nservice of successive generations of mankind.\n\nThe dream of Redemption. It is not technical creeds for which the\nChurch as a whole stands, but for certain vital principles which concern\nthe life of the soul, and its relation to God and man. Virtue has always\nbeen a dream of the heart. But how inaccessible is virtue, with a past\nof unforgiven sin! The height of our ideal of redemption is conditioned\nupon the depth of our realization of sin. To the shallow, redemption is\nan easy-going process, a way of healing the scratches which the world\nmakes. To the deep and serious-minded, redemption involves the\nregeneration of the race. Only the ransomed can truly work, love,\nor praise!\n\nThere is one sorrow which God never calls us to--the sorrow of a wasted\nlife. By redemption, the Church reveals not only a saving from\nrebellion, unbelief, and crime, but redemption from sloth, from\nindifference, from lack of purpose, and from low aims. Redemption looms\nup as the great economic force of Time--that which inspires and\npreserves our powers, directs our energies, creates opportunity, brings\nto pass our most high and holy desires, and fills life with satisfying\nand abiding things.\n\nBeauty, harmony, and affection are the natural laws of the moral world.\nThere is no despair where there has been no disobedience. _Christus\nSalvator_ stands out before the world in majesty and power. Virtue is\nenthroned in a universe which is beneficent.\n\nThe dream of Fellowship. The Church is the great social body. We can\nnever live our best life in the world, and stand outside the Church.\nThere is something vital in personal contact, and in social affiliation.\nIt strengthens the best and otherwise most complete work. The Christian\nChurch is a body of allies, whose work is the upbuilding of the kingdom\nof God. We do not realize how great a bond this is. We have our own\nchurch centre, our own denomination, our own local interests. But by and\nby a great occasion arises--a revival which sweeps the country, a\nreunion of two long-divided parties, an Ecumenical Council, a Chinese\npersecution--and suddenly there arises before the mind's eye a glimpse\nof that Church which girdles the world, whose emissaries are in every\ncountry, whose voices speak in every tongue. We perceive that\neverywhere are\n\n          \"_Swelling hills and spacious plains\n     Besprent from shore to shore with steeple-towers,\n     And spires whose silent finger points to heaven_.\"\n\nSays Wordsworth also:\n\n     \"_They dreamt not of a perishable home,\n        Who thus could build_.\"\n\nMany an ideal state has been thought out, in which fellowship should be\nthe root of social progress. But in what state is the proffered\nfellowship like that of the communion of saints? Each has his share of\nwork and dreams; each has his endowment of talent and of opportunity;\neach has his aspirations and supreme hope. The joys of one are the joys\nof all. The sorrows of one are the sorrows of all. The triumphs of one\nare the triumphs of all. The World-burden is the task set to be removed.\nThe World-upbuilding in love, joy, peace, and truth is the final\nendeavor. This community of interest is the strongest coalition the\nworld has yet known.\n\nThere are those who say, I prefer to worship by myself! One might as\nwell say, I prefer to fight in battle by myself! There is a time for\npersonal worship, and there is a time for social worship. Alone, the\nheart meets God. Alone, its prayers for individual needs and longings\nare offered up. Alone, it asks for blessings on the individual life and\nwork. But the personal life is only a fragmentary part of the life\nuniversal. Above the ages rings an Over-song of praise. From shrines and\ncathedrals, from chapels, churches, tents, and caves, there arises, day\nafter day, this incense of united prayer, from a vast and\nheaven-uplifted throng! Each of us would say, Canopied under\nworld-skies, I, too, would join this chorus of adoring love!\n\nThe dream of Permanence. The immortality of the Church is akin to the\nimmortality of the soul. It is a connection which is never severed. When\nwe enter the visible body of the Church on earth, we connect ourselves\nwith the invisible hosts of the Church on high. We enter a company\nwhich shall never be disbanded nor dismayed. Something subtle and\neternal seems to lay hold of our spirits, and to lift them even to God's\nThrone. For this Time has been, and for this Time now is: to present\nspotless before Him the innumerable company of the redeemed, the\nlion-hearted who, armed by faith and shod with fire, in robes of azure\nand with songs of praise, shall stand before Him even for evermore!\n\n2. The Church is the centre of a great circle of remembrance. One of\nConstable's famous paintings represents the Cathedral of Salisbury\noutlined against a storm-swept sky, with a lovely rainbow arched beyond\nit. So stands the Church athwart the landscape of our lives. In each\ncommunity the church is like a living thing! How every stone grows\nsignificant and dear! How the lights and shadows of its arches, the dim,\nfaint-tinted windows, the carvings and tracings, the atmosphere and\ncoloring, all sink into the heart, and make a background for memories\nthat never pass away! Who ever forgets the tones of the old organ, the\nvoice of the choir, the accent, look, and bearing of one's early pastor,\nthe rustle of the leaves without the window, the rush of the fresh\nsummer air, the soft falling of the rain?\n\nThe path to the church is worn by the feet of generations. Thither the\naged go up, and thither the laughing, romping children. Weary men and\nwomen bear their burdens thither; triumphant souls bring shining faces\nand uplifted brows; love and dreams cluster round the church, and the\nlife of the soul, silent and hidden, is subtly acted upon by persuasions\nand convictions that rule the heart amid the fiercest storms and\ntemptations of the world. The church is a sanctuary and shield; it is an\nemblem of strength and peace. Three angels stand before its altar: Life,\nLove, Death! Hither is brought the babe for the christening, hither\ncomes the wedding procession, and here are laid, with farewell tears,\nthe quiet dead. Day by day within that church, as one grows to manhood\nand womanhood, one enters into race-experiences, and feels, however\nvaguely, that the Holy Spirit abides within them all.\n\n3. The Church affords the best outlet for moral activity. Where shall we\nput our moral powers? In what work shall they centre? From what point\nshall they diverge? Scattered action is irresolute; it is the\ncentripetal powers that count.\n\nThe Church stands ready to engage, to the full, the moral powers of man.\nIt can rightly distribute the spiritual vitality of the world. It rouses\nthe moral emotions and affections, and gives scope for contrition,\nadoration, and thanksgiving,--the Trisagion of the heart.\n\nIn the press and stir of life we sometimes forget that the highest\nemotions of which we are capable are those of joy, praise, and prayer.\nJoy is a heavenward uplift of life--deep happiness of spirit. Praise is\nan appreciation of the greatness and mercy of the Infinite. Worship is\nthe outpouring of the whole nature, an ascription of blessing, glory,\nhonor, and power and majesty to God. It flows from the religious\nimagination, and is the supreme offering of the intellectual as well as\nof the emotional life.\n\nThe Church is a body ministrant: it has received the accolade of\nspiritual service. It stands among the world's forces, as one of giving,\nnot of gain. It holds within its scope both a teaching and a training\npower. It is the school of the soul, the illuminator of the meaning and\ndiscipline of life. Ab\u00e9lard is said to have attracted thirty thousand\nstudents to Paris by his teaching. But the Church to-day calls into its\nassemblies fully one-third of the millions of the world. They are held\nby its tenets, guided by its ideals, thrilled by its hopes, and set to\nits works of charity and mercy. The highest philanthropy is but a\nscientific renewal and adaptation of work which has had its start,\nprimarily, in the Christian Church. Wealth is its vicegerent, and from\nthe adherents to the Church fall largely the contributions to great\nphilanthropic causes.\n\nTake the work of Missions alone: Has there ever before been a body which\nattempted to bring the whole world into its fellowship, to make known\neverywhere its ideals, and to share with all living a spiritual\ninheritance? \"The Evangelization of the World by this Generation\" is\none of the most sublime thoughts which has come to the race.\n\n4. There is a large amount of ability in the world which the Church\nneeds, but which has not yet been thoroughly enlisted in church service.\nTake business energy, executive ability. It is a common saying, that\nbusiness men are not interested in the Church, and do not work well in\nit. Why? Because there is not yet in the Church enough of the active and\neconomic spirit to make a business man feel at home in it, or approve of\nits ways of work.\n\nThis weak spot in the Church, which business men mock at, or fret at,\nexactly reveals the work that is waiting for business men to do.\nBusiness to-day takes intellectual grasp and insight--promptness,\nenergy, enterprise, and common-sense. These qualities are needed at once\nin the conduct of the Church.\n\nA second class greatly needed by the Church is the university-bred. Many\ncollege graduates are church-members--some are even active workers. But\nuntil lately the universities as a whole have stood rather indifferently\napart from the Church. They have somewhat indulgently regarded it as one\nmore historic institution for preserving myth and legend. To them the\nChrist-life has meant little more than the Be\u00f3wa-myth, the Arthur-saga,\nthe Nibelungen cycle, the Homeric stories, the Thor-and-Odin tales!\nDruids, fire-worshippers, moon-dancers, and Christian communicants have\nbeen comparatively studied, with a view to understanding the\nrace-progress in rite and religious form.\n\nThis spirit is changing. The most remarkable aspect of the intellectual\nlife of to-day is the rise of faith in the universities. Like the\nincoming of a great tidal wave at sea is the wave of spiritual insight\nand religious aspiration that is rolling over the colleges of our land.\n\nThe whole intellectual structure of the Church is approaching\nreconstruction--its doctrines, creeds, tenets. This reconstruction\ncannot possibly be effected by schools of theology alone. At every point\nthe theologian needs assistance from the man of science. Philosophy,\npsychology, ethics, history, literature, sociology, language, natural\nscience, and archaeology are all bound up in an old creed and must be\nlooked into, ere a new statement can take form. Their data must be known\nat first-hand. Hence there is no intellectual specialty which may not be\nmade invaluable to the Church.\n\nToo often religion has been a matter of hearsay or dogma. A bitter\nconflict has always raged between theology and the latest word of\nscience. The Church cannot afford to be without the scientific thinkers\nof the race. The time has come when there is everywhere heard the call\nof Jesus to men of mind.\n\nWhat work awaits the university man or woman? It is to help free the\nChurch from traditions and superstitions which scholarship cannot\nuphold. It is to throw fresh vigor and intellectual vitality into the\nservices of the Church. It is to build up a hymnology which shall be\nnoble and poetic in expression; it is to contribute a great religious\nliterature to the world. It is the work of educated men and women to add\ntheir insight, their zeal for truth, their scholarship, their training\nand ideals to the Christian community: to sweep thought and practice out\nof ancient ruts, to clarify the spiritual vision of the world, and to\npresent new aspects of truth and new goals of human endeavor! Let\nResearch join hands with Prayer.\n\nA third class which the Church needs to-day is that of the working-man.\nThe hand of the working-man is the hand that has really moulded history.\nWorking-men lead a brave and self-sacrificing life. From their toil come\nthe necessaries and many of the comforts of the race. The man of labor\nknows the root-problems of the industrial world. While all his industry\nand skill, all his courage, heroism, and strong-armed life are so\nlargely alienated from the Church, the Church is deprived of one of the\nfundamental sources of inspiration and growth. The tree of progress can\nnever grow, except it has labor-roots. It is absolutely essential for\nthe health of the Church that every form of human energy be represented.\n\nSuppose that by some great revival a very large number of working men\nand women could suddenly be added to the membership of the Church. What\nwould happen? Would there not be at once a return to more simplicity of\nlife? There are two currents at work always in society--emulation and\nsympathy. Rightly used, each is for the social good. If all classes of\nmen and women worked side by side in the Church, many great social\ndifferences would become adjusted.\n\n5. It holds sway over the fortunes of the home. Where, outside of the\nChurch, will you find the ideal conception of marriage, and the really\nunited and happy home? The Church makes for domestic happiness, because\nit goes straight to the roots of life and plants happiness where\nhappiness alone can grow. More and more the Church is lifting the\nstandards of a noble, proud, pure, and rejoicing married life. Its ideal\nof human love is sacred, because founded on the deeper love of the soul\nin God. The Church is drawing hosts of young people under the shelter of\nits teaching, and is placing before men and women ideals which cannot\nfail to make their mark upon the social standards of the times. It\nstands for purity, for patience, for tenderness, for the love of little\nchildren, for united education and endeavor, for mutual hopes and\ndreams, for large public service.\n\n6. It is the militant force of time. We speak of the Church militant,\nand of the Church triumphant. For us, to-day, the Church militant.\nTo-morrow, triumph comes. Armies have been, and armies shall be, but the\nhosts of this world fight against material foes, and largely for\nmaterial ends. It is the glory of the Church militant that its conquests\nare spiritual and its victories are eternal. Its fight is chiefly\nagainst the inner, not the outer foe--against sin and wrong-doing,\nimpatience, strife, anger, clamor, meanness, evil-speaking, wrath. It is\nthe foe of tyranny and its heel is upon the head of the oppressor and\nthe avenger. Its banner flies over every country and has been carried\nthrough tribulation, through sorrow, through danger, and through death\nto the remotest parts of the yet-known world. Its troops are legion,\nmarching from the far distances of the past, and extending out to the\nfar confines of the eternal years.\n\n7. It is the ascendant force of the future. Rightly conducted, it will\nsurely absorb the vigor of the world. To stand apart from it is to be\nout of step with the march of nations. The processional of progress\nto-day is the processional of the historic influence of the Church. What\nforce has there been in time gone by, which has lived and so greatly\ngrown for nineteen hundred years? Nations have risen, and nations have\ndecayed. States, once prominent, have passed into the oblivion of the\nyears. Plato and Pericles, Socrates and Sophocles, Philip and Alexander,\nthe Caesars, the Georges, and the Louis have passed away. Their\npolitics have passed from our following; their empires are no more. But\nthrough these centuries of change, the Church of God has risen stronger,\nmore powerful year by year; stretching its arm out to the uttermost\nparts of the earth; levying tribute on the islands of the sea; enlisting\nall ages and conditions, and looking out over coming generations--not as\na waning, but as a growing and ever-increasing power. Think you that\nsuch a Church can die? Think you that any spiritual power aloof from\nthis Church can be as efficient as if it were allied with it?\n\nThese, you say, are the reasons why one's allegiance should be given to\nthe Christian Church. Let us now look back over the processional as it\nmarches across the dim years. Saints, martyrs, confessors, evangelists,\nand singing children have joined its historic train. Is there any other\nprocessional in the world's history which, numbering such millions and\nmillions, began with only one? When the Christ enters the arena of\nhistory, He comes as one to lead myriad deep-lived souls! Next, there\nfollow twelve. They, two by two, take up the marching line. Think of\ntheir deeds and influence, of their inspiring power! What would have\nbeen the record of those obscure fishermen of Galilee and of their\nsimple friends, had they refused to ally themselves with the leader who\ncalled for their allegiance and their obedient love?\n\nNext follow the early disciples. Tried by scourging, by stripes, by\npoverty, by imprisonment, by all manner of danger and trial, they yet\nremain true. Then follow the prophets, those whose clear vision looks\nout on things unknown and things unseen. To the prophet is intrusted the\nministry of hope and inspiration. Then follow the martyrs who yield life\nfor the cause they profess. In torture at the stake, and on the cross,\nby fire and by sword, they show forth an unshaken and undying faith.\nThen follow matrons and virgins, babes and children, reformers and\nmediaeval saints with a convoy of angels, singing as they march. These\nare the Church triumphant, the Church above. But to-day we have among us\nthe Church militant--the long processional of congregations, elders,\ndeacons, members, ministers and missionaries, young people, and workers\nin every phase of enterprise and reform. These all communicant on earth\nare the Church militant, whose work is to keep alive the traditions of\nthe past and to march onward to an endless victory and to an unceasing\npraise. Who, looking upon that processional, filing through the ages of\nthe years of man, would say that there may be a parliament of religions?\nA parliament of boasts and pomps, of good precepts and queries, of\nmisuses and half-truths, of superstitions and infinite idolatries, no\ndoubt; but there is but one religion, though it be perverted in many\nways and rightly revealed at divers times; and there is but one God,\ninfinite, true, holy, just, loving, and eternal. Where now are the gods\nof Hamath and of Arpad? Where are the gods of Sepharvaim? Bow thy head,\nO Buddha! and do thou, O Zoroaster! hang thy head. Isis and Osiris grow\ndim; Jove nods in heaven; the pipe of Pan is dumb; Thor is silent in the\nnorthern Aurora; the tree of Igdrasil waves in midnight; Confucius is\npale; Muhammad is dust. Darkness is over the skirts of the gods of the\npast--gloom receives them, Erebus holds outstretched arms. But the Lord\nGod, Jehovah, the Ancient of Days, encanopied in space and glory, leads\nonward to the end of years His people in a mighty train, to a rule and\nkingdom which shall know no end. May thou and I, dear friend-soul, in\nwhatsoever land thou be, may thou and I be numbered in that throng!\n\n\n\n\nIV. THE WORLD-MARCH: OF KINGS\n\n     [DIE WACHT AM RHEIN]\n\n     _Jesus shall reign where'er the sun\n     Doth his successive journeys run;\n     His kingdom stretch from shore to shore,\n     Till moons shall wax and wane no more.\n\n     People and realms of every tongue\n     Dwell on His love with sweetest song;\n     And infant voices shall proclaim\n     Their early blessings on His Name.\n\n     Blessings abound where'er He reigns;\n     The prisoner leaps to lose his chains,\n     The weary find eternal rest,\n     And all the sons of want are blest.\n\n     Let every creature rise and bring\n     Peculiar honors to our King;\n     Angels descend with songs again,\n     And earth repeat the loud Amen_.\n\n     ISAAC WATTS\n\nThe elemental force of some men is appalling. They lift their\neyes--thrones tremble; they wave a hand--empires rise or fall. It comes\nover the heart of many a man at times, Here am I, running my little\noffice, shop, factory, fire-engine, or professional circuit, with no\ninfluence that I can see, beyond my borough or my barn-yard. But in the\nworld there are other men, no taller than I, no older than I--men born\nwithin a stone's throw of where I was born--whose hand is on the fate of\nnations, and whose decrees are universal law!\n\nIt is deeply impressive, the way in which one man, born not above\nmyriads of his fellows, begins to rise until by and by he stands head\nand shoulders above his generation! What is the inner vitality which\npresses him upward? What is this hidden difference in men by which one\nremains in the by-eddies of life, and another sweeps out on the crest of\nthe rising tide of history?\n\nMuch of it is in the man himself. To be kingly is inborn. There is the\nnature that refuses to be shut up to the petty, that will not content\nitself with one street or town, that steps out into life from childhood\nwith the step of the conqueror, and walks among us; one who was born a\nking. To be a king, one must have the powers of organization,\ncombination, discipline, direction, statesmanship. These qualities\nenlarge as one passes from the particular to the general, from the\npersonal to the range of natural forces, emergencies, and wide pursuits.\n\nDominion is an inherent right of the soul. In all our hearts, did we but\nlisten and understand, there are adumbrations of kingly ancestors, and\nthe latent stirrings of kingly powers.\n\nWhich of us would want to be born at all, if we should be told in\nadvance, You shall never control anything? You shall never have the\nslightest chance of self-assertion, of impressing your own individuality\nupon the world? One might as well be born without hands or feet!\n\nKingship involves ascendancy and authority. Both are truly gained, not\nby chicanery, but by personal force. There is a natural gift of\nleadership, which is strengthened by endurance, perseverance, and\nceaseless hard work.\n\nKingship also involves a larger vision. One man looks at his\nshoe-strings; another man looks at the stars. The first step toward rule\nis to find a point of view from which one can look widely out over the\nrace. This is the primary value of education: it is not that books are\nimportant, but that men are--the men who have swayed history--and books\ntell of such men. Not the library is inspirational, but the life-spirit\nof mankind, bound up in even dusty papyrus-rolls, or set on\nclay-tablets of four thousand years ago. He who would serve his times\npolitically must first understand, so far as may be, all times.\n\nAnother basis of supremacy is conviction. Leadership belongs to those\nwho believe. The man who has a definite policy to propose, and a\ndefinite way of working for it, soon outstrips the man who is just\nlooking about.\n\nKingship involves an iron will. An iron will does not imply necessarily\nugliness of temper, obstinacy, or pig-headedness. It is simply a\nstraight-forward, dauntless, and invincible way of doing things. What I\nsay, you must do, is back of all successful leadership, whether in the\nhome or in the world-arena. The man who is master of the obedience of\nhis child, or of his fellows, is master of their fate. We are all at the\nmercy of the strong-willed.\n\nGrowth is development in right assertion; it is the assumption of\nlegitimate responsibility and command. To be lowly of heart does not\nmean to be inefficient; to be humble does not necessarily mean to be\nobscure. Luther and Lincoln were both of a childlike humility of heart.\n\nWhat Christianity has not emphasized in the past, but what it must now\nbegin to emphasize, is the reality of dominion--its value, and its\nrelation to the kingdom of God. For centuries, religion has too often\nbeen thought of, too often spoken of, as if it were the last resource of\nthe heart, A brilliant young professor of psychology not long ago\nreferred to religion as something to flee to, by those who were\ndisappointed in love! We have spoken so much of \"giving up,\" that the\nChristian life has wrongly seemed to mean the giving-up of one's\nindividuality, interests, powers. As well might we expert the deep sea\nto give up its rolling tides, or the air to give up its four winds, as\nto expect the heart of man to part with its human hopes!\n\nThis is not a right interpretation of life. When Nature plants an oak in\nthe forest, she does not say, Be a lichen, an _Eozo\u00f6n canadense_, a\nsmall ground-creeping thing! She says, Grow! Become a tall, strong,\nmountain tree! When we hold our baby in our arms, we do not say, My\nchild, be good for nothing! Neither does God say, Be nothing, do\nnothing! Just exist as humbly and meekly as you can! He says, \"Quit you\nlike men!\"\n\nEach of us is born for a sceptre and a crown. It gives a strange new\nthrill to life, to realize that we may be just as ambitious as we\nplease, that we may long earnestly for high things, and work for them,\nif our inmost desire is not for self but for God. This new idea of\nambition should be at the root of education and of religious teaching.\nPiety is not a namby-pamby sentiment; it is a great intellectual force.\nDesire is architectural: our dreams should be of prestige and power.\nTrue ambition is the reaching-out of the soul toward preordained\nthings. What else is the meaning of our love for excellence, our\ninsatiable yearning for perfection? \"What is excellent,\" says Emerson,\n\"is permanent.\" To excel in any work is to combine in that work the most\nenduring qualities of human labor; to excel in any place is to shine\nforth with the great qualities of the race. Hence, ambition has a\nrightful place.\n\nThe power of a king is the power of control. All about us are moving the\ngreat forces of the universe--physical, intellectual, moral, spiritual.\nWhat we can do with them is a test of our power. Life is in many ways a\nmajestic trial of one's power to command.\n\nThree men buy adjoining tracts of land. One man mines coal upon his\nacres. He amasses wealth and influence because he is in control of the\nCarboniferous age and the human need of light and heat. The second man\ntills his ground and raises wheat and corn. He is in command of living\nnature--of the rotation of seasons, of wind, frost, rain; he uses them\nto provide food for those that hunger and must be fed. The third man\nlies under the trees. He digs no mine. He plants and reaps no corn and\ngrain. He simply lies under the trees, gazes into the sky and dreams.\nMen call him idle, but he is not so. One day he writes a book. It lives\na thousand years. His control is over the spirit of man. He has entered\ninto its hopes and sorrows, its aspirations and its dreams.\n\nThis story is a Parable of Kings. Such is the power of control that is\ngranted to each new soul. Each child is bequeathed at birth a sceptre\nand a crown.\n\nThe first rule is parental. The primitive monarchy is in the home. A\nyoung baby cries. The trained nurse turns on the light, lifts the baby,\nhushes it, sings to it, rocks it, and stills its weeping by caresses and\nsong. When next the baby is put down to sleep, more cries, more soothing\nand disturbance, and the setting of a tiny instinct which shall some day\nbe will--the power of control.\n\nThe grandmother arrives on the scene. When baby cries, she plants the\nlittle one firmly in its crib, turns down the light, pats and soothes\nthe tiny restless hands that fight the air, watches, waits. From the\ncrib come whimpers, angry cries, yells, sobs, baby snarls and sniffles\nthat die away in a sleepy infant growl. Silence, sleep, repose, and the\nbuilding of life and nerve and muscle in the quiet and the darkness. The\nbaby has been put in harmony with the laws of nature--the invigoration\nof fresh air, sleep, stillness--and the little one wakens and grows like\na fresh, sweet rose. The mother, looking on, learns of the ways of\nGod with men.\n\nFirmness is the true gentleness. There is a form of authority which must\nbe as implacable as the divine decree. Mercy is the requiring of\nobedience to law; it is not a cajoling training in law-defiance, which\nshall one day break the mother's heart and upset the social relations of\nthe world.\n\nThe next rule is personal: the direction of one's own energy in the way\nof one's own will. The child moves his hands, his feet; he turns his\nrattle up and down, and shakes it about. He discovers that he can pull\nthings toward him and push them away; that he can reach things that are\nhigher than his head. He begins to creep. He touches things that are the\nother side of the world from him, that is, across the room. He plucks\nfibres from the rug or carpet; swallows straws, buttons, and little\nstrings. He pounds, and sets up vibrations of pleasant noise; he clashes\nten-pins, he blows his whistle, squeezes his rubber horse and man,\nrattles the newspaper, flings about his bottle and his blocks. He feels\nhimself a self-directing power, and at times asserts this power against\nthe will of those who would make him do what he does not want to do. The\nlove of rule is in him, and he lays his little hands on power.\n\nEducation determines whether this power shall be for good or for evil.\nWe cannot take away power from any child--he shall move the affairs of\nnations--but we can direct this love of power, or crush it; strengthen\nit, or weaken it; turn it toward the highest help of man, or deflect it\nto tyranny, cruelty, and crime.\n\nChild-training is guidance in the way of God's decrees. It is not the\nsetting of one's own ideas upon a little child; it is not the\ngratification of one's own love of power; it is not the satisfaction of\none's own self-conceit. It is a firm, humble striving to carry on the\nharmony of the universe: to bring up the child to love order, justice,\nmercy, and truth.\n\nEducation is the teaching of how to direct energy for the universal\ngood. It lays hold of a child and, out of his destructive instincts--the\ninstinct to bang, and pull, and tear to pieces--it develops creative\npower, the inventive genius that lies hid within him. It takes the pure\nlove of noise, and trains it to pitches, harmonies, intervals, and makes\na musician of the boy who used to whack his spoon. It takes the alphabet\nand the early pothooks, and the boy by and by combines them into\nliterature. The apples and the peaches which he is taught to exchange\njustly are by and by transmuted into trade and commerce. He brings\ncargoes from Cuba and Ceylon, trades with Japan and Hawaii, and the\nAsiatic isles. The energy of block-building is developed into sculpture,\narchitecture, and civil engineering. The stamping of his foot in anger\nis directed to determination, perseverance, the rule of the brave\nspirit, the unconquerable will. Nothing is more marvellous than this\ngrave upbuilding.\n\nThe next rule is social: the direction of personal energy that shall\nleave a distinct impress on other lives. It is long before we realize\nthat for each exertion we are responsible; that what we do is held\nagainst us in strict account, not only by fate, which builds our destiny\nfor us out of our own deeds, but by every other person with whom we come\nin contact. Our fellows check off daily against us so much vitality, so\nmuch magnanimity, so much idleness, cruelty, spite, goodness,\nselfishness, meanness, or loving-kindness. Life holds a record of our\nevery deed, and from no least responsibility can we make our escape. We\nare the prisoners of events which we ourselves have brought about.\n\nThe discipline of ethics, of home-training, of the Church, and of\nreligious teaching is addressed fundamentally to this social\nconsciousness of ours, this responsibility which we cannot evade. To\nbear rule aright is to go forth into the world to build up, in\nauthority, talent, and influence, the kingdom of God.\n\n1. There is the agricultural phase of social rule. A man tills a farm.\nIt has upon it trees, streams, woodland, and meadow-land. He may\nrule--to what end? If he rules it for his own personal ends--merely to\nfill his granaries, and lay up gold--he rules it for miserliness, with a\nsort of thrift that is as passing in inheritance as the flying\nApril rain.\n\nOr he may say: I will keep my land in trust for God. I will hold rain\nand frost, heat and cold, storm and sun, in fee simple for the race. My\ngrain shall pass out into the world's mart, sent forth with love and\nprayer. Such a farmer is the incarnation of moral grandeur. Let men\nlaugh, if they will, at his overalls and plough, his wide-brimmed hat,\nhis simple manners, and his homely, racy speech. His feet are by the\nfurrow, but his heart is in heaven, and his treasure is there also. Says\nthe author of _Nine Acres on the Hillside_, \"The agriculturist walks\nside by side with the Creator.\"\n\nThere is a fine integrity which lies in land. There is a resolution\nwhich is concerned with crops. There is a wisdom born of wind and\nweather. There is a power which comes from the constant revival of life\nin seed and fruit and flower. This man is King of God's Acres. Let him\nnot despise his kingdom, and may the succession not depart from\nhis house!\n\n2. There is a rule which is industrial. A man is sent into the world to\nwield a hammer, a saw, and run an engine. If his rule over his hammer is\nweak, if he does not know how to use it well, if its blow is uncertain\nand its result unskilled, then he passes from the line of kings, and is\nsubject, instead of in authority, in his own domain. He is captive to a\npiece of steel or wood. So with every tool of trade. Each man who\nconquers his tool is a ruler--is in control of elements of human\nhappiness and good. The roof-mender, the furnace-builder, the\ncloth-weaver, the yarn-spinner, the steel-worker, the miller--do not\nthese all keep the race warmed, and clad, and fed?\n\n3. The next rule is commercial. Trade itself is neither menial nor\ndemeaning. Rightly used, it is a high form of control. People have\nthings to buy and things to sell. The maker is handicapped. He cannot\ntravel elsewhere to dispose of what he has. The buyer is ignorant. He\ndoes not know where to go, or cannot go, at first-hand, for the shoes,\nthe hat, the reaper, the bricks, the lumber, the stationery which he\nmust use. There appears upon the scene the man of observation, of\ninvestigation, of capital, of shrewdness, of resources. With one hand he\ngathers the products of the Pacific and of the South Seas. With the\nother, he takes the output of the Atlantic seaboard, the Gulf States,\nthe Mississippi valley, the northern lakes and hills. He sets up an\nestablishment, he puts forth runners, advertisements, and show-windows.\nHe stocks shelves, decks counters, and employs clerks, packers,\nsalesmen, cash-boys, buyers, and department heads. The man who wants to\nbuy, buys from a man across the sea and yet is served in his own town.\n\nThe man of commercial power is a man of world-wide rule. He may lay up\nin banks a fortune which he intends to try to spend upon himself; or he\nmay say: I am accountable for the pocket-books of the world. I am in\nauthority over them. I open a market, or close it. I buy, dispense, and\ndisperse human labor. I create wants, and I satisfy them. I will\nestablish honest laws of trade. What I do shall be rated as commercial\nlaw. What I say shall be quoted as a way of equity and probity. That man\nis a King of Trade. His throne is set upon hills and seas. His subjects\nare all men with needs, and all men with products of the land, the\ncoasts, the sea, or brain, or skill. This is the lawful King of Trade.\nHe represents God's mart of exchange. Primarily, goods are not bought\nand sold in the market. They are first transferred in that man's brain.\n\n4. Another rule is of concerted works: the rule of the Engineer. Back of\nevery advance in our country, in facilities of trade and transportation,\nor of public health and safety, stands the man who thought it out. Take,\nfor instance, the development of the \"Great American Desert.\" Who\nprojected its irrigation, by which areas have been redeemed from\nbarrenness and waste? Who planned the economic use of the Niagara Falls?\nWho built the Brooklyn Bridge? Who projected the vast waterway from\nChicago to the Gulf? Who first thought of a cable across the depths of\nseas? Who bridged the Firth of Forth, the Ganges, the Mississippi? Who\nprojected the gray docks of Montreal? the Simplon Tunnel? Who wound the\niron rails across the Alleghanies, the Rockies, the Sierras? Who drew\nthe wall that has encircled China for a thousand years? Who projected\nthe Suez Canal? the Trans-Siberian Railway? Who sunk the mines of\nEldorado? Who designed the Esplanade at Hamburg? the stone banks of the\nSeine? the waterways of Venice? the aqueducts of Rome? the Appian Way?\nthe military roads of Chili and Peru? the Subway in New York?\n\nGravity, stress, strain, weight, tension, sag, cohesion,--a few\nmathematical formulas, and a knowledge of the primary laws of\nphysics,--upon such principles as these, the world is rapidly changing\nform and use.\n\nThe Engineer, in a strange and subtle way, stands near to God. His work\nis done hand-in-hand with God. He takes the forces of nature and the\nlaws of the material world, and bends them to the needs and use of man.\nSky and sea or desert may be about him. He knows the arctic cold, the\ntropic heat; the forest and the plain; the mountain and the marsh; the\nbrook and river; the peak and the precipice; the glacier and the tempest\nin their course. Out of the very elements he is daily building new paths\nfor man to tread. Soon he, too, must pass; laid after death, it may be,\nbeside some mighty water that his handiwork has spanned.\n\nIn loneliness and silence does he not often think, I wonder, of the God\nwith whom he deals? It is God who provides the river and the sea; God\nwho through endless ages has piled stone on stone, crust on crust, and\nhas crumpled the strata of the earth as tissue in His hand. It is God\nwho has bound every mote to the earth-centre; who has sent magnetic\ncurrents coursing through the globe, and has made tides and sea-changes,\nand the trade-winds to blow. It is the God of the Gulf Stream, the\nCaribbean Sea, the God of the Appalachians, the God of the Himalayas,\nthe God of the Cordilleras, of the Amazon, the Yukon, the Yang-tse-Kiang\nwith which he really deals.\n\nThe endless ages pass and go, but God abides. Little, daring man lifts\nhere and there a hand to mould the world which God has made--pricks the\nearth for gold or silver, iron or coal--but GOD is everywhere immanent\nand shines through every hour of change. Hence the March of Engineers is\nthe march of men whom God has trained; in a special sense His\nmaster-workmen, craftsmen whom He loves. It is theirs to say, We are the\nKings of Works: the Master-builders of the Most High!\n\n5. There are Kings of Academic Thought, men who lead in professions and\nin collegiate careers. The wise man is the true aristocrat. His court\nmay not be in a palace, but within its precincts are received and\nentertained the leaders of the race. To be provost, to be college\npresident or university professor, is to be seated on an\nintellectual throne.\n\nThe problem of academic rule is not to attract a large number of\nstudents, to put up imposing buildings, to have endowments, and fill\nchairs with learned specialists; to grant many degrees, and to keep the\nhum of a teaching staff and of a student body alive in the ears of a\ncommunity, marking the college group by flags and colors, cap and gown,\nprocessions and occasions. These things are right, but are mainly\naccessory. We have not all of a university when we have men and\nbuildings, money, students, brains. Back of a university there lies its\nfoundation-idea, that of academic control.\n\nWhat is academic rule? It is rule over the pride of man. A college is a\nplace whose chief power is to inculcate humility by the means of true\nlearning; to establish intellectual honor and integrity by searching out\nthe ways of God in nature, science, and philosophy, and in letters\nand in art.\n\nIt is the primary work of a university to make men humble. The Freshman\nis not teachable. The Sophomore is an intellectual upstart. But by the\ntime a man has been beaten and conquered by the great ideals of the\nworld, which have pierced his bones and humbled his conceit--by the time\nthe race-passions and the race-sorrows have crept across his spirit, by\nthe time that he has been confronted with the achievements of Homer,\nEmpedocles, Hippocrates, Michelangelo, Socrates, Buddha, Plato, Emerson,\nGladstone, Bismarck, Lincoln, and Carlyle--his self-exaltation drops\nfrom him like a garment. He--who knows how to construe a few pages of\nthe classics, who knows how to demonstrate a few mathematical problems,\nscan a few verses, recite a few odes, carry on a few scientific\nexperiments, undertake a small research--how shall he compete with these\nrulers of the thought of men?\n\nThen it is that the real rule of a university--its spirit of humility,\nand of reverence for antiquity--begins. The true university man, born\nand bred in the century, not in the years, in the race halls, not those\nalone in his Alma Mater, is neither a scoffer nor an atheist, nor a\ncritic, sceptic, or cynic. He is a man of simple and exalted faith. God,\nwho hath brought such great things to pass in science, nature, and art,\nin human character, in the destiny of nations, and the history of humble\nmen and women, is a God before whom there must be awe and reverence, and\nnot a flippant scouting of the ancient ideals. Man, who is so tried by\ntemptation and scourging of the spirit, is a creature to be loved,\nappreciated, understood; not a being to whom shall be shown arrogance,\naloofness, and pride. The university that makes snobs of its graduates\nhas not yet entered into its kingdom of control.\n\nA university also holds rule over truth. Absolute truth is in God's\nhand. But the university has class-rooms and libraries, apparatus and\nlaboratories, which are intended for the discovery and furtherance of\ntruth. The university is not a place to cry out for big salaries. The\nsalaries should be living salaries. The seeker after truth should not be\nleft without enough money for heat and shelter, for bread and meat, rest\nand summer-change; for the coming of children and their education. But\ntruth may lodge without shame in an humble dwelling and may be greatly\nfurthered without an elaborate bill of fare.\n\nThe university men of the times are the establishers of a kind of\nrighteousness that is not always found in books. Their individual value,\nas they go out into the world, is to set right values on social customs\nand decrees; to establish the law of freedom in the home; to lead men\nand women out of the thraldom of ignorance, vulgarity, hearsay, and\n\"style,\" into simplicity of living and a sane scale of household\nexpense. The university leader of the future is the man who shall set\nlaws over household accounts and who shall rule over such simple things\nas what best to eat and buy. He shall be an economist of the larger\nsort, providing for the spiritual necessities of men and their moral\nconduct, rather than for their balls, card-parties, and social\nside-shows, including church entertainments and philanthropic dances and\nbazaars. He shall pave the way to a larger view of wealth, influence,\nand reform; endue man with a keener sense of his own responsibilities,\nmake him a creature of larger desires and of more aspiring wants.\n\nIn particular, he shall pass down from generation to generation the high\nand noble learning of the past; he shall keep alive the flower of\ncourtesy and charity; he shall tell the dreams of past sages, and\ninterpret them; he shall review the thronging nations; and he shall so\nimbue the mind with a love of truth, of ideals, of excellence, of honor,\nthat a new race shall go out into a larger and a nobler world. And then\na better day shall dawn for men.\n\n6. The Kings of State. Says Milton, in his sonnet on Cromwell:\n\n                              \"_Yet much remains\n     To conquer still; Peace hath her victories\n     No less renowned than War: new foes arise,\n     Threatening to bind our souls with secular chains.\n     Help us to save free conscience from the paw\n     Of hireling wolves, whose gospel is their maw_.\"\n\nIn the third moon of the year 1276, Bayan, the conquering lieutenant of\nGenghis Khan, captured Hangchow, received the jade rings of the Sungs,\nand was taken out to the bank of the river Tsientang to see the spirit\nof Tsze-s\u00fc pass by in the great bore of Hangchow--that tidal wave which\nannually rolls in, and, dashing itself against the sea-wall of Hangchow,\nrushes far up the river, bringing, for eighteen miles inland, a tide of\nfresh, deep-sea splendor, and thrilling all who see or hear.\n\nIn the life of nations there are times and tides. Against the tide-wall\nof history, beaten by many a storm, and battered by many a thundering\nwave, there is about to sweep the incoming wave of a new life for the\nrace: there is about to pass a greater than the spirit of Tsze-s\u00fc,--even\nthe Spirit of God!\n\n     \"_We are living,-we are dwelling,\n        In a grand and awful time,\n     Age on age to ages telling,\n        To be living is sublime_!\"\n\nWe are moving out into a period of great statesmen, and of great\npolitical standards and ideals. The days before us are days which will\nmake the Elizabethan era pale in history. Upon the head of our nation\nare set responsibilities such as have never before rested on any\none man.\n\nThe day of the true statesman is here; the day of the demagogue is done!\nThe rule of the orator is over the ideals and hopes of men. The\ndemagogue prostitutes this power. His rule is over the passions,\nprejudices, and resentments of men. He cries aloud in the market-place,\nand rogues and ward-heelers, and evil-minded politicians, group\nthemselves around him. He waves his sceptre over the vulgar and the\nrascals of the town.\n\nThe vital problem of municipal reform is not the shattering of the ring,\nthe overturning of the boss, the gagging of a few loud tongues. It is\nthe problem of the training of better bosses; the education of men and\nwomen in social control; their enlightenment, from childhood up, in\ncivic duties, in national affairs, and the conduct of civil power.\nThereupon oratory turns to its higher ends. Through statesman, preacher,\nand political teacher, it cries aloud of righteousness. I look for the\ntime when the typical politician shall be an honorable man; when to be\n\"in the ring\" of municipal or national control shall mean to be an\nintegral and orderly part of the administration of God's great world;\nwhen city life shall be purified; and when international law shall be\nthe interpretation of the will of the Almighty for the rule of nations.\nWe have honest doctors, lawyers, tradesmen; shall we not have an honest\npolitician and an upright ward-boss?\n\nPublic service is a god-like service! Our Presidents shall more and more\nbe chosen, not alone for ideas, experience, or for party affiliations:\nthe President shall be chosen because he is a moral hero! Something has\nstirred in the heart of the American people, which shall not soon be\nstilled: a spiritual outlook upon political preferment. In the White\nHouse we long to have the great spiritual exemplars of our race. Not\nalone in church shall we offer up a \"Prayer before Election.\" The time\nis coming when each true ballot-slip shall be a prayer.\n\nWithin the next fifty years shall be determined some of the greatest\nquestions of history. Among them shall be questions of industrial\nadjustment and development, and of social progress. We must have in our\nCabinet not only the representatives of War and State, of Finance,\nTrade, Labor, and Agriculture; but also of Education and of Social\nHealth. This is not a dream. You and I may live to see the results of\nthis religious awakening: it is elemental and epochal.\n\nBack of all individual dominion there is rising a yet higher\ndominion--the dominion of the English-speaking race. We, having been\ncalled by the providence of God to stand at the head of the march of\nprogress, may well ask ourselves concerning our imperial powers. The\nline of progress for a nation is to allow no spiritual ideal to stagnate\nor to retrograde. The spiritual aspiration of a nation always dominates\nwhat is called the Social Mind. We grow toward what we worship. It is\nours to plant the dominion of civilization in foreign lands, and to\nsupplant a waning culture by a richer, truer, and nobler way of life.\nThe first thought of each of us, entering these new lands, whether\nmerchant, soldier, educator, or missionary, should be to hold Christ\naloft, that all tribes may come to His light, and kings to the\nbrightness of His rising.\n\nGod leads us on. Said Lincoln: \"I have been driven many times to my\nknees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go. My\nown wisdom, and that of all about me, seemed insufficient for that day.\"\nLike a vast Hand stretched against the sky of Time is the Hand of God--a\nHand writing, in these wondrous days, a destiny for generations yet to\nbe! Rising with us are all God-fearing nations--the Teutonic, Slav, and\nLatin peoples. Sitting yet in darkness, and massed against us, crouch\nsullenly the immemorial hordes of Asia, the wild blacks of the African\nswamps and jungles, and the dwellers of Polynesian seas. Occident and\nOrient, the world's battalions are forming for new encounters and new\ndismays. Never since the strong-limbed Goths changed the face of Europe\nhas there been a period of such tense anticipation, nor so great a\npossibility of volcanic change. We are entering an historic period of\nreconstruction, when new maps of the world will be drawn. The sceptre is\npassing into new hands: to-day the throne of civilization is being\narched above the seaway which joins London and New York. To-morrow, it\nmay be builded above Pacific tides, where our own shores look westward\nto the ports of Asiatic Russia. For, rising on the world-horizon, are\nthese two World-empires, Russia and the United States. The dictators of\nthese two countries will soon become the dictators of the human race.\nThey are brave and virile nations, with untold reserves of power! As\nthese two giants gird themselves for World-dominion, who but God shall\ngird the armor on, direct the onward course of change?\n\nMuch of the ancient wealth and beauty shall be done away. In a few\ngenerations the shrines of thirty centuries will be no more. Fane and\ntemple and pagoda will disappear; carvings, images, and Sikh-guarded\ncourts. Long lines of yellow-robed priests will chant their last\nprocessional hymn to Buddha, and the smoking incense to waning gods\nshall be quenched forever. Where Tao rites were celebrated, silence\nshall fall; where fakir and dervish tortured and immolated their lives,\nhappy children shall play. Instead of the lotos of the Ganges and the\nNile, there shall bloom the Rose of Sharon and the Lily of the Vale.\n\nBut as the empires of Buddha and Muhammad fall, a new Empire shall\nprevail!\n\n     \"_Kings shall bow down before Him,\n        And gold and incense bring;\n      All nations shall adore Him,\n        His praise all people sing.\n      To Him shall prayer unceasing\n        And dally vows ascend;\n      His kingdom still increasing,\n        A kingdom without end_.\"\n\n\n\n\nIV. THE WORLD-MARCH: OF PRELATES AND EVANGELISTS\n\n     [LYONS]\n\n     _O Majesty throned, O Lord of all Light,\n     Shine down on our spirits and scatter the night;\n     As Adam received his life-impulse from Thee,\n     Endued with all fulness, we quickened would be_\n\n     _Let all that we know--love, learning, and power--\n     Melt down in Thy Presence, and flame in this hour;\n     Anoint us and bless us and lift our desire\n     And grant us to speak as with tongues touched with fire_!\n\n     _Life flows as a dream--its pleasures are dear:\n     The world is about us--temptation is near;\n     Oh, guide us, and shew us the pathway to God\n     The feet of the prophets aforetime have trod_!\n\n     _The bells cease their chime,--the hosts enter in:\n     May many be purged of their sloth and their sin!\n     Cheer Thou the despondent, the weary, the sad,\n     Rouse all to rejoicing, that all may be glad_.\n\n     _And when life is o'er, and each must depart\n     In quaking and silence,--abide with each heart;\n     The songs of Thy saints then caught up to the skies,\n     As waves of great waters shall thunderous rise_!\n\n     ANNA ROBERTSON BROWN LINDSAY\n\nIn Malory's _Morte d'Arthur_ there is the legend of the Sword of Assay.\nIn the church against the high altar was a great stone, four-square,\nlike unto a marble stone. In the midst of it was an anvil of steel, a\nfoot high, and therein stood a naked sword by the point. About the sword\nthere were letters written, saying, \"Whoso pulleth out this sword of\nthis stone and anvil, is righteous king born of all England.\" Many\nassayed to pull the sword forth, but all failed, until the young Arthur\ncame, and, taking the sword by the handle, lightly and fiercely pulled\nit out of the stone! By this token he was lord of the land.\n\nEach man's life is proved by some Sword of Assay. The test of a man's\ncall to the ministry is his power to seize the Sword of the Spirit:\nwield the spiritual forces of the world, insight, conviction,\npersuasion, truth. To do this successfully at least five things appear\nto be necessary: a sterling education, marked ability in writing and in\npublic speaking, a noble manner, a voice capable of majestic\nmodulations, and a deep and tender heart. These phrases sound very\nsimple, but perhaps they mean more than at first appears. Have we not\nall met some one, in our lifetime, whose acquaintance with us seemed to\nhave no preliminaries?--some one who never bothered to say anything at\nall to us, until one day he said something that leaped and tingled\nthrough our very being? This is the power that a minister ought to have\nwith every soul with whom he comes in contact: his word should quickly\ntouch a vital spot. No one to-day cares much for mere oratory, literary\ndiscussion, polemics, or cursory exegesis; \"marked ability in writing\nand in public speaking\" means that grip on reality which makes people\nquiver, repent, believe, adore!\n\nSincerity is the basis of such power. At heart we worship the man who\nwill not lie; who will not use conventions or formulas in which he does\nnot believe; who does not give us a second-hand view of either life or\nGod; who does not play with our conscience because it is not politic to\nbe too direct; who does not juggle with our doubts, nor ignore our hopes\nand powers; who also frankly acknowledges that he, too, is a man.\n\nA call to the ministry also involves an over-mastering spiritual desire.\nTell me what a man wants, and I will tell what he is, and what he can\nbest do. If a man desires above all things to conduit a great business,\nhe is by nature qualified for trade; if he desires knowledge, he is\ndesigned for a scholar; if he is always observing form, rhyme, aesthetic\nbeauty, and striving to produce verse, he is a born poet. But if the one\nthing that rules his dreams is the longing for spiritual power--the\nthought of impressing God upon his generation, and leading men to a\nclearer view of life and duty--he is a born minister of the Spirit, and\nto the spirit of the sons of men. Along with this goes the great burden:\n\"Woe is me, if I preach not the Gospel!\"\n\nWherever, to-day, there is a young man in whose heart is stirring a\ngreat devotional dream for the race, who longs to project his life into\nthe most enduring and far-reaching influence, who craves the exercise of\ngreat gifts and powers, there is a man whose heart God is calling to\npossibilities such as no one can measure, and to triumphs such as no one\ncan forecast! The highest triumphs of these coming years are to be\nspiritual. The leader is to be the one who can carry the deepest\nspiritual inspiration to the hearts of his fellow-men. Do not let the\nhour go by! This day of vision is the prophetic day!\n\nBut if the call be answered, if certain high-spirited and noble-minded\nmen ask thus to stand as spiritual ministrants to the souls of men, how\nshall they be trained for the high office?\n\nThe old way will not do. Sweeping changes, in these last days, have come\nover the commercial, academic, and social world. We do not go back to\nthe hand-loom, the hand-sickle, the hand-press. What is true of these\naspects of life is true of the spiritual training. It must be larger,\nfreer, grander, than before. Time was when a theologian, it was\nthought, must be separated from the world--an ascetic working in the dim\nhalf-light of the old library, or scriptorium, or hall. To-day, he must\ngain much of his training from the great life of the world--learn how to\nmeet men and occasions, and be prepared to deal with modern forces and\nenergies with courage, knowledge, and decision.\n\nWe read of the earnest Thomas Goodwin: his favorite authors were such as\nAugustine, Calvin, Musculus, Zanchius, Paraeus, Walaeus, Gomarus, and\nAmesius. What Doctor of Theology takes the last six of these to bed with\nhim to-day?\n\nOur theological courses are too dry. Look carefully over the catalogues\nof thirty or forty of our own seminaries, and notice the curious, almost\nmonastic, impression which they make. Then realize that the men who\npursue these abstruse and mediaeval subjects are the men who go out into\nchurches where the chief topics of thought and conversation are crops,\nstocks, politics, clothes, servants, babies! There is a grim humor in\nthe thing, which seems to have escaped those who have drawn up the\ncurriculum.\n\nLife is not monastic. It is very lively. We scarcely get, in all our\npost-collegiate life, a chance to sit and muse. We go through\nsensations, experiences, and incongruities, which stir a sense of fun. A\nman reads (I notice) in his seminary, St. Leo, _Ad Flaeirmum_, and makes\nhis first pastoral call on a woman who proudly brings out her first\nbaby for him to see. _Ad Flaeirmum_ indeed! What does St. Leo tell the\nyouth to say?\n\nWhat should be breathed into a man in the seminary, is not the mere\nfacts of ecclesiastical history, but the warm pulsating currents of\nhuman life; the profound significance of the founding and the progress\nof the Church; a deep psychological understanding of human desires,\nmotives, joys, ambitions, griefs; the relentlessness of sin; the help\nand glory of Redemption; the quickening of the Christ; the vigor and the\ntenderness of faith. Coincident with these must be a growth in depth and\ndignity of life. No one likes to take spiritual instruction from men who\nare themselves crude, foolish, sentimental, or conceited. Many social\nsnags on which young ministers are sure to run, are simply the rudiments\nof social conduct, as practised by the world. Noble manners are one's\npersonal actions as influenced and guided by the great behavior of the\nrace. Under the impulse of ideals, much that is untoward or superficial\nin one's bearing will disappear. It is impossible to think as noble men\nand women have thought--to dream, love, and work as they have dreamed,\nloved, and wrought--and not have pass into one's mien the high\nexcellence of such lives.\n\nThe first education is spiritual. Until mind and heart are swept by the\nspirit of God, chastened, purified, ennobled, and inspired, vain is all\nthe learning of the schools! To this end, there should be a more deeply\nspiritual atmosphere in our seminaries, less of the mere academic\nimpulse. In every age, there are men just to come in contact with whom\nis a benediction and a help for years. Such a man was Mark Hopkins, Noah\nPorter, James McCosh. Such the leading men in every seminary should be.\n\nThe plan of education must be of principles, not of facts. The\nuniversity research-men gather facts, and scientific men everywhere\ncollect, analyze, and classify them. But each small department of human\nlearning--each minute branch in that department--needs a lifetime for\nthe mastery of that one theme. Hence the work of the college is quite\napart from that of the school of theology. It is the place of the school\nof theology, not to ignore the New Learning, but to group, upon the\nbasis of a thorough college training, certain great interests and\npursuits of mankind, in such a way as to afford, by means of them, a\nleverage for spiritual work.\n\nAfter all is said and done, it is not the grammar-detail of Latin,\nGreek, Hebrew, and Aramaic dialects that makes a minister's power. It is\nthe strange language-culture of the race which should enter in; the\ninner vitality of words, the beauty of poetic cadences, the strong flow\nof rhythm, noble themes, great thoughts, impressive imagery and appeal.\nWe should know the Bible as literature, not as one knows a story-book,\nor a dialect-exercise, but as one knows the melodies and memories of\nchildhood.\n\nThe vital thing is not a knowledge of the historical schisms and decrees\nof Christendom--not the external Evidences of Religion, Ecclesiastical\nHistory, Ecclesiastical Polity, monuments, texts, memorabilia--the vital\nthing is the power to think about God, and the problems of mankind. It\nis a heart-knowledge of the difficulties and questionings of a race that\nyearns for virtue.\n\nMan thirsts for God. No one is wholly indifferent to the Spirit. I fear\nthat some ministers do not know--and never will know--the heart-hunger\nof the world. When they rise to speak, there is always some one present\nwhose breath is hushed with longing to hear spoken some real word of\ntruth, or strength, or comfort. If he receive but chaff!--\n\nTheology is not a dry thing, and ought not be made so. It is quick with\nthe life of the race. Each dogma is a mile-stone of human progress. It\nis the sifted and garnered wisdom of the centuries, concerning God, and\nHis ways with men. Each student should feel, not that a system is being\ndriven into him, as piles are driven into the stream, but that he is\nbeing put in philosophic contact with the thought of the race on the\ngreat topic of Religion, with liberty himself to experiment, think, and\nadd to the store.\n\nHomiletics is not a series of nursery-rules for man--formal, didactic\ndroppings of a pedant's tongue. Homiletics is the appeal of man to man,\nfor the welfare of his soul, and the true progress of mankind. Exegesis\nis not a matter of Hebrew or Greek alone. It includes the spiritual\ninterpretation of the great problems of the race. Homer, Tennyson,\nBrowning, and Dante are exegetes, no less than Lightfoot, Lange,\nand Schaff.\n\nPastoral Divinity is not the etiquette of a polite way of making calls:\nit is an entering into the social spirit of the time; the learning of\nfriendliness, unreserve, sympathy, persuasion, and a way of approach. It\nis the mastery of spiritual _savoir-faire_.\n\nOutside of this group of technical subjects there are yet others of\nvital importance from a scientific understanding of the world, and of\none's work. They are Psychology, Ethics, Sociology, and Politics.\n\nSince we have known more of the psychological meaning of adolescence, a\nnew theory of Conversion has sprung up; and whether or not we accept it,\nthe whole outlook over the underlying principle of conversion has been\nchanged. We must at least recognize that conversion is a scientific\nprocess, as much as digestion is, or respiration; it is not a purely\nemotional occurrence.\n\nThe minister must learn what society really is, and how the far still\nforces of time act and react upon each other, producing group-actions,\ninstitutions, customs, ways. There are social fossils as well as\nphysical ones. Sociology is not a system of fads and reforms. It is the\nscientific study of society, of its constitution, development,\ninstitutions, and growth. He must also breathe largely of the great\ngovernmental life of the race--understand the primary principles of\npolitics and administration. He should have some knowledge of commercial\ninterests, of the formulas, incentives, and right principles of trade.\n\nThere should also be in the seminary an inspirational atmosphere of\nmusic, literature, and art. Literature is a revelation of the life of\nthe soul. The man who reads literature and comprehends its message is\nreceiving a fine training which shall fit him for a thorough\nunderstanding of the heart; of its practical, ethical, and spiritual\nproblems; of its domestic joys and sorrows; of its human cares and\nburdens; of the appeals that will come to him for sympathy; of the\ntemptations that beset the race; and of the hopes and trials of\nthe world.\n\nLiterature is one of the best tools a minister can have. He should be\nread in the great literary and sermonic literature, the work of Bossuet,\nMassillon, Chrysostom, Augustine, F\u00e9nelon, Marcus Aurelius, mediaeval\nhomilies, Epictetus, Pascal, Guyon, Amiel, Vinet, La Bruneti\u00e8re, Phelps,\nJeremy Taylor, Barrows, Fuller, Whitefield, Bushnell, Edwards, Bacon,\nNewman, Ruskin, Carlyle, Emerson, Davies, Law, Bunyan, Luther, Spalding,\nRobertson, Kingsley, Maurice, Chalmers, Guthrie, Stalker, Drummond,\nMaclaren, Channing, Beecher, and Phillips Brooks, yes, even John Stuart\nMill. All these men, by whatever name or school they are called, are\nwriters of essays or sermons which appeal to the most spiritual deeps\nof man.\n\nHe should read the novels of Richter, Thackeray, Dickens, Scott, Eliot,\nand Victor Hugo. He should know intimately the great verse which\ninvolves spiritual problems, and human strife and aspiration,--Milton,\nBe\u00f3wulf, Caedmon, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Spenser, ballads, sagas, the\nArthur-Saga, the Nibelungenlied, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats, Herbert,\nTennyson, Browning, Dante and Christina Rossetti, Whittier, Lowell,\nLongfellow, to say nothing of Goethe, Corneille, and the Greek, Roman,\nPersian, Egyptian, Hindu, and Arabian verse.\n\nIn music his heart should wake to the beauty of oratorios, symphonies,\nchorals, concert music, national and military music, and inspiring\nsongs, not to speak of hymns and of anthems, the progress of Christian\nsong! The _Creation_, the _Messiah_, the _Redemption_, Bach's _Passion\nMusic_, the _St. Cecilia Mass_, Spohr's _Judgment_, Stainer's\n_Resurrection_, the _Twelfth Mass_, Mendelssohn's _Elijah_,--these are\nmonumental works and themes.\n\nWhat is a hymn? We think of it as being some simple churchly words, set\nto a serious tune. A hymn is the rhythmic aspiration of the race. No one\ncan look through a good hymnal--through _Hymns Ancient and Modern_, for\ninstance, or the Church Hymnary--without feeling that therein is bound\nup the devotional life of the world. The spiritual outlook is cosmic.\nOur every mood of penitence, praise, and aspiration resounds in\nmelodious and time-defying strains.\n\nIn art, the religious spirit broods over the great work of the world. In\nAngelo, Francesca, Veronese, Botticelli, Titian, Raphael, Tintoretto,\nand Correggio, the brush of the painter has set forth the adoration of\nthe Church of God.\n\nThus, taken all in all, to be educated as a minister should be to be\neducated in the Higher Life of the race.\n\nFinally, above all else is the spiritual study and interpretation of the\nWord of God. A minister may be fearless of the investigations of\nscientific criticism. Every truth is important to him, but not all\ntruths are vital. When a man such as Caspar Rene Gregory speaks,\nsomething of the holy mystery and inspiration of biblical research, as\nwell as a scientific result, is presented, and one gains a new\nconception of what it really means to study and to understand the\nWord of God.\n\nUnder all is the life of ceaseless and prevailing prayer. By the life of\nprayer, many mean merely a way of learning to make public petitions, an\nobjective appeal to God. The true life of prayer is as simple, as\nunteachable, and as vital as the life of a child with its mother--the\nlittle lips daily learning new ways of approach to its mother's heart,\nand new words to make its wants and interests and sorrows known.\n\nPrayer is the true World-Power. Just as there are vast stretches in the\nworld where the foot of man has never trod, so there are unmeasured\nregions whereon prayer has never been. The more we pray, the more\nillimitable appears this spiritual realm. And all about us in the\nuniverse are also great hidden forces: nothing will lay hold of them\nbut prayer.\n\nEach prayer enlarges the soul. The measure of our praying is the measure\nof our growth. No man has reached his full possibilities of achievement\nwho has not completed the circuit of his possible prayers. Power is\nproportionate to prayer.\n\nAnd last of all, there is the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. What it\nis, who may say? But that it is real, who can doubt? To read the lives\nof Wesley, Whitefield, Finney, Moody, is to feel a strange, deep thrill.\nThey are men who spake, and men listened; who called, and men came to\nGod. Others, alas, so often call, and there is no response. They cannot\nmake headway through the indifference, the sloth, the materialism, and\nthe inherent vulgarity of the world.\n\nThe life itself is arduous. After all is said, it is not quite the same\ntask to examine and classify either protoplasm or the most highly\norganized forms of nature, that it is to analyze and understand the\nmysterious workings of the heart, the intricacies of conscience and\nconduct, the possibilities of spiritual development or of moral\ndownfall, and the many questionings, agonies, and ecstasies of the soul\nof man. And they are to be studied and understood with the definite and\npositive aim of the absolute reconstruction of the world-bound spirit--a\nchange of its motives, purposes, affections, ideals. More than this,\nthere must be at the heart of the more thoughtful minister a philosophic\nbasis for the reconstruction of society itself.\n\nYouth is not an adequate preparation for this task: a man must live and\ngrow. To deal with such themes and occasions, there must appear in the\nworld lives of such vigor that they can command; of such charm, that\nthey can attract; of such wisdom, that they can guide and comfort; of\nsuch vitality, that they can inspire. And hence there rises before the\nmind's eye a figure that is both knightly and kingly--a man earnest in\nthe redress of wrong, and who yet holds a subtle authority over the\nforces that make for wrong; a man burdened with the cares and sorrows of\nmany others, and yet conducting his own life with serenity, enthusiasm,\ndignity, and hope; a man to whose keen yet tender gaze a life-history\nis revealed by a word or tone, but whose own eyes receive their light\nfrom God. A prophet and a father, a priest and a counsellor, a brother,\nfriend, and judge, a sacrifice and an inspiration should he be who, in\nreverence and love, brings before a waiting congregation the very\nWord of Life!\n\n\nSECOND: OF SPIRITUAL RULE\n\n1. The primary rule is over conscience. The man who sways a conscience\nsways a human life. The man who sways a nation's conscience controls\nthat nation's life. To rule conscience, a man must himself be\nunprejudiced and well informed. He must strive, not to keep up an\nunhealthy excitement which shall make conscience introspective and\nmorbid, but to preserve a sane moral outlook, to encourage freedom of\nthought and judgment, and to develop a normal conscience which reacts\npromptly against wrong. Conscience measures our inner recoil from evil.\nThe power of a preacher is in direct proportion to the energy with which\nhe reveals sin in the heart of man, and wakes his whole nature against\nits insidious power.\n\nSin is. To-day, sin is thought a somewhat brusque word, lacking in\npolish. To use it frequently is a mark of lack of '_savoir-faire_!\nIndeed to speak of it at all is as archaic as to speak of the\nIchthyosaurus. But sin is a root-fact of the life of man. It is the\noffice of the spiritual teacher to pluck out sin; to pierce the heart\nwith a recognition of the enormity of sin, and of its far-reaching\nconsequences; to stir the seared conscience, rouse the apathetic life,\nthrill the spiritual imagination, and to quicken the heart to better\nlove and to nobler dreams. He rebukes the private sins of individuals\nand the public sins of nations. In the _Faerie Queene_, the\n\"soul-diseased knight\" was in a state\n\n     \"_In which his torment often was so great,\n      That like a lyon he would cry and rare,\n      And rend his flesh, and his own synewes eat_.\"\n\nBut Fidelia, like the faithful pastor, was both\n\n                         \"_able with her word to kill,\n     And raise againe to life the heart that she did thrill_.\"\n\nThis power has at times been misunderstood and misapplied. No human\nauthority can bind the conscience, nor set rules and regulations for the\nsoul of man. The prerogative of final direction belongs to God alone. No\nman may arrogate it--no pastor for people, no husband for wife, no wife\nfor husband, no parent for child. The sadness of the world has been,\nthat men have not always been spiritually free. Freedom has been a\nsocial growth--a phase of progress. It has taken wars and persecutions,\nrevolutions and reformations, the blood of saints and martyrs, the\nsorrow of ages, to plant this precept in the mind of man.\n\nThe evangelist warns. He speaks of sin, death, hell, and the judgment\nto come. It is for these things that he is sent to testify. These are\nnot the catch-words of a new sort of Fear King who uses oral terrors to\naffright the soul of man. Heaven and hell are not a new sort of\nghost-land: retribution is not a larger way of tribal revenge.\n\nNo. The latest facts of science present this universe as not only\nprogressive, but as retributive. There is a rebound of evil which makes\nfor pain. Each broken law exacts a penalty. Each deed of sin is a\nforerunner of personal and of social disaster. The generation that sins\nshall be cut off, while the stock of the righteous grows strong from\nage to age.\n\nThe scientific vista opening to the eye of man is impressive and\nappalling. Each man has within himself a future of joy or sadness for\nthe race. Do you remember the sermon of Horace Bushnell on the\n\"Populating Power of the Christian Faith\"? Do you recall the history of\nthe infamous Jukes family? That of the seven devout and noble\ngenerations of the Murrays? The Day of Judgment is not only the Last\nGreat Day--it is to-day and every day. \"Every day is Doomsday,\" says\nEmerson. Nature is unforgetful. Nature is accountant. Each iniquity must\nbe paid for out of the resources of the race.\n\nIt is of these grave omens that the Man of God must speak. He dare not\nbe tongue-tied by custom or by fear. He must proclaim hell in the ears\nof all mankind. For wherever hell may be, and we do not yet know, and\nwhatever hell may be, and we cannot even imagine, Hell _is_; and the\nsoul of man must be kept mindful of these great things.\n\nThe evangelist comforts and consoles. The heart of man is wayward and\ngoes oft astray. No one can be belabored into righteousness. The true\nlover of souls allows for the hereditary weaknesses of man, for his\ninfirmities of will and temper, for his excuses, wanderings, and tears,\nand presents to him Jesus, in whose sight no one is too wretched to be\nreceived, too wicked to be forgiven.\n\nWe must have forgiveness in order to know God. The most comforting\nthought in the world is that God knows all we do. There can be no\nmisunderstanding between us: He cannot be misinformed.\n\nThe evangelist must come close, in sympathy and counsel, to the personal\nand individual life of those whom he would help. Perhaps the best way to\nemphasize this point would be to insert here words written by a woman\nwho has been thinking on this subject.\n\nShe says: \"I have never had a pastor. It is the one good thing lacking\nin my life. I have grown up among ministers, and have had many friends\namong them--some of them have cared for me. But there has never been one\namong them all who stood in an attitude of spiritual authority and\nhelpfulness to my life. We church-going and Christian men and women of\nthe educated class are almost wholly let alone; apparently no one takes\nthought for our souls. We are not in the least infallible; we come face\nto face with fierce temptations; we have heart-breaking sorrows; we are\nburdened with anxiety and perplexity. But we are left to grope as blind\nsheep; there is no one to point out the path to us, however dimly; no\none to say, at any crucial moment of our lives, Walk here!\n\n\"Once, however,\" she continues, \"one of my friends, a minister, knelt\ndown by me and prayed. It was a simple and ordinary occasion--others\nwere present. But every word of that prayer was meant for the uplifting\nof my heart. In that hour, I was as if overshadowed by the Holy Ghost;\nnew aims and purposes were born within me. My friend loves me--that does\nnot matter--it is his spiritual intensity I care for. And this is his\nreward for his fidelity and tenderness: In the hour when I come to die,\nwhen one does not ask for father or mother, or husband or wife, or\nbrother or sister, or friend or child, but only for the strong comfort\nof the man of God--in that hour, I say, if I be at all able to make my\nwishes known, I shall send for that man to come to me. He, and no other,\nshall present my soul to God.\"\n\nReading the above words, more than one minister will cry out, his eyes\nblazing: \"I say the same to you! Who is there that tries to shield the\nminister from sorrow and from pain? Who is there to comfort and help\n_him_? You think we can just go on, and preach, preach, preach, standing\nutterly alone, and with no one on earth to keep our own hearts close to\nGod! I tell you, it is a lonely and weary work at times, this being a\nminister!\"\n\nYes, there must be a people, as well as a pastor. The relation is\nreciprocal. Wherever there is a strong man, leaning down in fire and\ntenderness to help the lives about him, there must be a loyal and loving\ncongregation, with here and there in it some one who more fully\nappreciates and understands. Nothing beats down and discourages a man\nmore than to feel that he is preaching to cold air and not to human\nfolks, and to get back, when he offers sympathy, a stare.\n\nA congregation is a mysterious and subtle social force. Its effect on a\nminister he can neither analyze nor explain. But he knows that its power\nis mesmeric and cannot be escaped. He goes into its presence from an\nhour of exalted and uplifted prayer, serene, happy, strong, and prepared\nto speak words of power and life. Gazing at his people--he can never\ntell why--the words freeze on his lips. An icy hand seems laid upon his\nheart, and he makes a cold and formal presentation of his glowing theme,\nand wonders who or what has done it all. Something satanic and\nrepelling has laid hold of his tongue and brain.\n\nOr again, he may have had a worried and troubled week, full of personal\nanxiety and sorrow. He has not had full time to study--he feels quite\nunprepared, and enters the pulpit with a halting step, and a choking\nfear of failure at his heart.\n\nIn a moment, the world changes. Something imperceptible, but sweet and\ncomforting, steals over him,--an uplifting atmosphere of attention,\nsympathy, affection. He begins to speak, very quietly at first, with\nquite an effort. But the congregation leads him on, to deeper thoughts,\nto nobler words, to modulations of voice that carry him quite beyond\nhimself. His voice rises, and every syllable is firm and musical. His\nlanguage springs from some far centre of inspiration. He is conscious of\nsuperb power, and as sentence after sentence falls from his\nlips----sentences that amaze himself more than any other----he enters\ninto the supreme height of joy, that of being a spiritual messenger to\nthe hearts of longing men and women. He and they together talk of God.\n\nThis sympathetic atmosphere makes great preachers and great men. In\nreturn, there flows from a pastor toward his people a love that few can\nknow or understand.\n\n2. His rule is also over spiritual enthusiasm. What is a revival? We\nconfound it with a local excitement, a community-sensation of an\nhysterical and passing type--with sensational disturbances, falling\nexercises, shouts, weeping, and the like. A revival is something far\ndifferent. A revival is an awakening of the community heart and mind. It\nis a quickening of dead, backsliding, or inattentive souls.\n\nMan as an individual is quite a different person from the same man in a\ncrowd. One is himself alone; the other is himself, plus the influence of\nthe Social Mind. A revival is a social state, in which the social\nreligious enthusiasm is stirred up. It is a lofty form of religion, just\nas the patriotism which breaks forth in tears and cheers as troops go\nout to war is a finer type than the mere excitement and fervor of one\npatriotic man. What would the Queen's Jubilee have been, if but one\nsoldier had marched up and down? A great commemoration! If we grant the\nreality of national rejoicing in the royal jubilees, commercial\nrejoicing in business men's processions, university enthusiasm on\nCommencement Day--shall we not grant the reality of the religious\ninterest and enthusiasm of a great revival, in which whole communities\nshall be led to a clearer knowledge of spiritual things?\n\nThe Crusades were a magnificent revival. The Reformation was a revival.\nThe Salvation Army movement is a revival. But the greatest revival of\nall times is even now upon us: it is a revival in the scientific\ncircles of the race. Time was when science and religion were supposed to\nbe at odds; to-day the intellectual phalanxes are sweeping Christward\nwith an impetus that is sublime! Thinkers are finding in the large life\nof religion a motive power for their thought, their growth--a reason for\ntheir existence--a forecast of their destiny. We are beginning to\nrealize the dynamic value of Belief. This revival is coming, not with\nshouts and noise, but with the quiet insistence of new ideas, of new\nfacts--with the still voice of scientific announcement. The atheist is\nbeing overcome, not by emotion, but by evidence; the scoffer is being\nput down by cool logic.\n\nHence the evangelist of to-day is more than a man who can popularly\naddress a public audience, and by tales and tears arouse a weeping\ncommotion. The evangelist is a man of intellect and prayer, who can\npreach the gospel to a scientific age, and to a thinking coterie--a\ncoterie of college men and mechanics, of society women and\nservant-girls, of poets and of mine-diggers, of convicts and of\nreformers. To-day calls for the utmost intellectual resources of the\nteacher of the truth, for a great imagination, great style, great\nsympathy with men, large learning, and unceasing prayer!\n\n3. His rule is over social ideals. He must be a man of social insight.\nThe social spirit is abroad in the world, but it is woefully erratic\nand misguided. Any one thinks he can be an altruist. Why not? Take a\nclass in a college settlement, make some bibs for a day nursery, give\ntramps a C.O.S. card, with one's compliments, and attend about six\nlectures a year on Philanthropy--the lectures very good indeed. One is\nthen a full-fledged altruist, _n'est-ce pas_?\n\nThe philanthropy of to-day has a bewildering iridescence of aspect. Each\npresent impulse is reformatory. Correction, like a centipede, shows a\nhundred legs and wants to run upon them all. Much of the so-called\nphilanthropy is not well balanced and is run by cranks. Cranks attach\nthemselves to any social movement, as a shaggy gown will gather burrs.\nIt is not all of philanthropy to classify degenerates, titter at\nignorance, and to go a-peeping through the slums! We have not yet\nrealized the fulness of redemption. Of what avail is it to save one\nstreet-Arab, or one Chinaman, if a million Arabs and Chinamen remain\nunsaved? Redemption is a race-savior: it seizes not only the individual,\nbut his environment, his friends, and his future state.\n\nThe true minister is a reformer. A reformer is one who re-crystallizes\nthe social ideals of man, who breaks up idols and bad customs, and\nsweeps away abuses. But we must first ask: What is an idol? What is a\nbad custom? What is an abuse? They are social standards which are out of\nharmony with true concepts of God, life, and duty. Behind the work of\nthe reformer is the dream of the reformer, the meditation of the mystic,\nthe seer. He must first have in mind a plain, clear conception of what\nthe relation is of man to God, of what man's environment should be, and\nof what the society of the Kingdom should be. The reformer is one who\nchanges an existing social environment for approximately this ideal\nenvironment of his own thought. When he breaks an idol, it is not the\nidol itself that he everlastingly hates, it is the materialistic concept\nof the community. What he wishes in place of the idol is a right\nconception. No man could break up every idol in the Sandwich Islands.\nBut a man went about implanting a spiritual idea of God, and the idols\ndisappeared.\n\nHence the work of the reformer is deep and heart-searching work. It\nmeans constant study of the spiritual needs of the age, continual\ninsight into the material forces which are moulding the age-images,\nmoney, conquest, or whatever they may be. He wishes to maintain a\nspiritual hold on civilization itself, so to transform the ideal within\na man, a community, a nation, in regard to custom, observance, belief,\nthat the outer rite shall follow.\n\nTo reform is not to rush through the slums, and then preach a\nsensational sermon about bad places in the slums, of which most people\nnever knew before! To reform is to know something of the conditions\nwhich produce the slums--it is not to scatter the slum-people broadcast\nelsewhere in the town; it is not alone to give them baths, playgrounds,\ncirculating libraries of books and pictures, dancing-parties, and social\nclubs. To reform the slums is to set up a new ideal of God, and of\nrighteous conduct in the heart of the slum-dwellers. One must know\nsomething of the slow processes of social change, of social\nassimilation, growth, and stability, to have an intellectual perception\nof the problem, as well as a spiritual one. One does not make an ill-fed\nchild strong by stuffing five pounds of oatmeal down its throat!\n\nThe reformer must not only be a man of energy, he must be a man of\npatience. Great reforms come slowly. As man has advanced, idleness,\nindolence, brutality, tyranny, drunkenness, cant, and social scorn are\ngradually being cast out. But behind these simple words lie hid\ncenturies of strife and endeavor, and limitless darkenings of\nhuman hope.\n\nTo fly against vice is merely to invite enmity and opposition. To\npresent a pure and noble ideal, to breathe forth a holy atmosphere for\nthe soul, are constructive works. The trouble is not, that the ministers\npreach on social themes--all themes that concern the life of man are\nsocial themes. It is that they do piece-work and patch-work of reform,\ninstead of plain, direct upbuilding work in the souls and consciences of\nmen. To preach upon horse-stealing is one thing. The horse-stealer may\nbe impressed, convicted, made penitent, and return the stolen horse. But\nnot until his heart is imbued with a spiritual conception of honesty, as\nthe law of God, will he steal a stray horse no more. Hence the first\nquestions in reform are not: How many groggeries are there in my parish?\nHow many corrupt polls? How many hypocrites on my church-roll? The\nquestion is: How is my parish society in enmity to the highest spiritual\nideal I know? Many men preach about saloons, when they ought to be\npreaching about Christ.\n\nThe force of this reform-energy is uncomputed. We hear of occasional\ngreat reformers, but forget that there has been a prevailing influence\nextending over the ages, of holy men of God, who have preached and\ntaught and prayed; who have preserved our social institutions of\nspiritual import, and have been a mighty and continuous force working\nfor righteousness and peace.\n\nMissions are a higher form of politics. To further missions is to\nfurther government, international comity, world-peace.\n\n4. His rule is over creed. He is inevitably a teacher of doctrine.\n\nWhat is doctrine? Doctrine is spiritual truth, formulated in a\nsystematic way. It is also, in church matters, a system of truth which\nhas been believed in, and clung to, by a body of believers constituting\nsome branch of the catholic Church.\n\nIt is a noble and serious office to hand down from generation to\ngeneration the faith and traditions of the Church of God. But this\nhanding-down must be upright. \"You must bind nothing upon your charges,\"\nsays Jeremy Taylor, \"but what God hath bound upon you.\" Conviction is at\nthe root of the lasting traditions of the Church. Only this--his\nconviction--can one man really teach another. If he try to speak\notherwise, he shall have a lolling and unsteady tongue.\n\nNo soul is finally held by the indefinite, or the namby-pamby. It begins\nto question, Upon what foundation does this phrase, this fine sentiment,\nrest? It must stand upon a proposition. This proposition rests either\nupon a scientific fact, or upon that which, for want of a more definite\nterm, we call the religious instinct of man. But a proposition cannot\nstandalone. It is connected with other propositions, arguments,\nconclusions. Hence a system of logic, of philosophy, of expressed\nbelief, of doctrine, inevitably grows up in a thinking community, a\nthinking Church.\n\nThe statement of an ecclesiastical system of doctrine may not be the\nabsolutely true one, nor the final one. Doctrine changes, even as\nscientific theories change with fuller information. Doctrine also\nexpands, with the growth of the human spirit and understanding. To-day,\nin one's library, one has a thousand books. They are shelved and\ncatalogued, for reference, in a special order. But years hence, one's\ngrandson, who inherits these books, may have ten thousand books. The\naspect of the library is changed. It is filled with new volumes, and new\nthought. Shall we give a liberty to a man's library which we refuse to\nhis belief? Must he--and his church--have only his grandfather's ideas,\nstandards, and decrees?\n\nThe tenets of a sect are the theological arrangement of belief which for\nthe present seems best; it is the systematic arrangement of facts so far\nexamined, determined, and classified. But no system of theology can be\nfinal. Thought is moving on. Experience is progressive. Providence is\ncontinually revealing. The race is a creed-builder, as well as a builder\nof pyramids, cathedrals, and triumphal arches.\n\nThe building-up of doctrine is superb. Into doctrine are woven the\nintellectual beliefs, the emotional experiences, and the spiritual\nstruggles of mankind. Doctrine is an attempt to classify the spiritual\nproblems of the race and to present a theory of redemption which shall\nbe adequate, spiritually progressive, and the exact expression, so far\nas yet revealed, of the will of God for man. All Christian doctrine is\ncentred about one point: the redemption of the race from sin. Dealing\nwith such great and fundamental themes, each system of doctrine is an\nintellectual triumph.\n\nDoctrine is an intellectual necessity. Christ is not sporadic, either in\nhistory or philosophy. To teach Christ, as the unlettered savage may\nwho has just learned of Christ the Saviour and turns to teach his\nfellow-savages, might do good or save a soul from death. But in order to\ncommand the intellectual respect of the race, there must be another form\nof teaching yet than this, a teaching which presents Christ in the\nhistoric and philosophic setting: the central Figure in a great body of\nassociated spiritual truth; Christ as the fulfilment of prophecy, the\nmeans of social adjustment and regeneration; the Finisher of our Faith,\nand the Source of eternal joy. We must be, not less spiritual\nChristians, but increasingly intellectual ones, as time rolls on.\n\nWho are the men who have built up doctrine? Men speak as if doctrine\nwere an ecclesiastical toy--to be shaken by priest or prelate, as one\nshakes a rattle, for noise, for play! A doctrine is not a toy; it is the\ncrystallized belief of earnest, thoughtful, and godly men--belief which\nhas passed into a church tradition, and is now received as an act\nof faith.\n\nShall doctrine be taught a child? Yes! To have a specific doctrine\nclearly in mind does not fetter the young soul, any more than to be\ntaught the apparent facts of geography and history, which may change\neither in reality or in his own interpretation as his mind matures. A\ndoctrine is a practical and definite thing to work with; in later life\nto believe, and to approve of, or disbelieve, and disapprove of. If a\nman wishes to build a house, does it fetter him to know square measure,\ncubic contents, geometry, mensuration, and mechanical laws? Yet when he\nbuilds his house, he builds it in his own individual way; he stamps it\nwith his own personality and ideas. While building it, perchance, he\ndiscovers some new relation or geometric law.\n\nDoctrine does not save from hell, but it does save from many a snare\nthat besets the feet of man. It is a steadier of life, a strengthener of\nhope, a stalwart aid to a practical, devout, and duty-doing life. A\ncatechism is a system of doctrine expressed in its simplest form.\nTherefore, for the intellectual and moral training of the Church, let us\nhave sound doctrine in the pulpit, and the catechism in the home and\nSabbath-school.\n\nIt is objected that doctrinal terminology is too hard for a child to\nunderstand. Is this not absurd, when the same child can come home from\nschool and talk glibly of a parallelepipedon, a rhombus, rhomboid,\npolyhedral angle, archipelago, law of primogeniture, the binomial\ntheorem, and of a dicotyledon! He also learns French, German, Latin,\nGreek, and the _argot_ of the public school!\n\nThe theological leader of to-day cannot be a creed-monger: he must be a\ncreed-maker. Side by side with the executive officers who will\nreorganize the Christian forces, there will stand great creed-makers,\ngiant theologians, firm, logical, scientific, and convincing, who, out\nof the vast array of new facts brought forth by modern science, will\nproduce new creeds, a new catechism, a new dogmatic series. It is worth\nwhile to live in these days--to know the possibility of such monumental\nconstructive work in one's own lifetime. The creed-makers must have a\nthorough literary training; no mere vocabulary of philosophy will\nanswer. Like the Elizabethan divines, they must rule the living word,\nwhich shall echo for a century yet to come.\n\nAs the great Ecumenical Council was convened for missionary progress, so\nthe times are now ripe for the assembling of a historic Theological\nCouncil, to revise and restate, not one denominational catechism, but\nthe creed of Christendom; to provide a new literary expression of the\nChristian faith. Together we are working in God's world, and for\nHis kingdom.\n\nIf doctrine be the crystallized thought and belief of godly men, what is\nheresy? What is schism? Who is dictator of doctrine? How far are the\nlimits of authority to be pressed? What are the bounds of ecclesiastical\ncontrol? of intellectual mandate in the Christian Church?\n\nIn the academic world, we do not cast a man out of his mathematical\nchair because he can also work in astro-physics or in psycho-physics. If\nhe can pursue advanced research in an allied or applied field, it will\nhelp him in his regular and prescribed work. We do not cast an English\nprofessor out of his chair, because he announces that there are two\nmanuscripts of Layamon's _Brut_, and that the text of Be\u00f3wulf has been\nmany times worked over, before we have received it in its present form.\nYet there are accredited professors of English who do not know these\nfacts, and who, if called upon, could neither prove them nor disprove\nthem. They have not worked in the Bodleian, in the British Museum, or in\nother foreign libraries, on Old English texts and authorities. They\nthink themselves well up in Old English if they can translate the text\nof Be\u00f3wulf fairly well, remember its most difficult vocabulary, and can\ntell a tale or two from the _Brut_.\n\nNot every man has Europe or Asia in his backyard, nor a lifetime of\nleisure for research, for special learning, on the moot questions of\nchurch-scholarship. Progress consists in each man's doing his best to\nadvance the interests of the kingdom of God in his own special sphere.\nFrom others he must take something for granted. The ear of the Church\nought always to be open to the sayings of the specialist. A Church\nshould grant liberty of research, of thought, of speech--to a degree.\n\nBut whatever may come out of twentieth-century or thirtieth-century\ncombats, one thing remains clear: A Church is an organization, a social\nbody, with a certain doctrine to proclaim, a certain faith to hand down\nto men. The doctrine is not in all details final--each phase of faith\nmay change. But the organization, to protect its own purity and\nintegrity--however generous in allowing individual research, and the\nexpression of individual ideas--must exert authority over the teachers\nin her midst, those who are called by her name, who have her children in\ntheir charge, and for whose teaching the Church, as a whole, is\nresponsible. There is doubtless a time when the man who is really in\nadvance of his times intellectually must be misunderstood, must be\ndisagreed with, must be cast out. But all truth may await the verdict of\ntime. If he has discovered something new, something true, the centuries\nwill make it plain. There remains a chance--and the Church dare not risk\ntoo great a chance--that he is mistaken, impious, presumptuous, or\nself-deceived. We dare not rush to a new doctrine or spiritual\nconception, merely because one man, who knows more of a certain kind of\nlearning than we do, has said so. One must be bolstered up by a\ngeneration of convinced and believing men, before he can draw a Church\nafter him. No other process is intellectually legitimate. In any other\nevent ecclesiastical anarchy would reign. To maintain the historic\nposition of the Church is a necessity, until that position is proven\nuntrue. So to maintain it is not bigotry, it is not lack of charity; it\nis merely common-sense.\n\nThe question, Where is the line between ecclesiastical integrity and\nindividual freedom? is therefore one which the common-sense of\nChristendom is left to solve--not to-day, not to-morrow, but gradually,\ngenerously, and conscientiously, as the centuries go on.\n\n\nTHIRD: OBSTACLES AND OPPORTUNITY\n\nIt is said that a minister is greatly handicapped to-day in all his\nefforts for two reasons: First, that the times are spiritually\nlethargic, that men are so engrossed by material aims, indifference, or\nsin that a pastor can get no hold upon their hearts. Second, that he is\nbound hand and foot by conditions existing in the organization and\npersonnel of his church, and hence is not free to act.\n\nWhat would we think of an electrician who would complain that a storm\nhad cast down his network of wires? Of a civil engineer who would lament\nthat the mountain over which he was asked to project a road was steep?\nOf a doctor who would grieve that hosts of people about him were very\nill? Of a statesman who would cry out that horrid folks opposed him? It\nis the work of the specialist to meet emergencies, and it is his\nprofessional pride to triumph over difficult conditions. The harder his\ntask, the more he exults in his power of success.\n\nIt is a glorious task that lies before the minister of to-day--to\nmaintain, develop, and uplift the spiritual life of the most wonderful\nepoch of the world's history; to place upon human souls that vital\ntouch that shall hold their powers subject to eternal influences and\naims. The times are not wholly unfavorable: our era, which spurns many\necclesiastical forms, is at heart essentially religious. _The World for\nChrist!_ How this war-cry of the spirit thrills anew as one realizes how\nmuch more there is to win to-day than ever before. The Warrior girds\nhimself and longs eagerly to marshal great, shining, active hosts\nfor God!\n\nIt is true that the conditions of work are more trying than they have\nusually been. A man goes out from the seminary. He has had a good\neducation, followed by perhaps a year or two abroad, and some practical\nexperience in sociological work. He has plans, ideas, ideals, a vigorous\nand whole-souled personality, a frank and generous heart.\n\nWhat does he find? He soon discovers that the battle is not always to\nthe strong, the educated, or the well-bred. Too often he is at the mercy\nof rich men who can scarcely put together a grammatical sentence; of\npoorer men who are, in church affairs, unscrupulous politicians; of\nwomen who carp and gossip; and of all sorts of men and women who desire\nto rule, criticise, hinder, and distrain. They, too, are the very people\nwho, in the ears of God and of the community, have vowed to love him and\nto uphold his work! The more intellectual and spiritual he is, the more\nhe is troubled and distressed.\n\nMany churches, too, are in a chronic state of internal war. As for\nthese rising church difficulties--try to put out a burning bunch of\nfire-crackers with one finger, and you have the sort of task he has in\nhand. While one point of explosion is being firmly suppressed, other\ncrackers are spitting and going off. Whichever way he turns, and\nwhatever he does, something pops angrily, and a new blaze begins! And\nthis business, incredibly petty as it is, blocks the progress of the\nChristian faith. Men and women of education and refinement, of a wide\noutlook and noble thoughts and deeds, are more and more unwilling to\nplace themselves on the church-roll; a minister sometimes finds himself\nin the anomalous position of having the more cultured, congenial, and\nphilanthropic people of the community quite outside any church\norganization.\n\nAll these things mean, not that a minister must grow discouraged, but\nthat he must set his teeth, and with pluck and endurance rise strong and\nmasterful and say, This shall not be! Let him not listen to the barking\nand baying: let him hearken to the great primal voices of man and\nnature. Love lies deeper than discord. The constructive forces of\nhumanity are stronger than the disintegrative. The right\nattraction binds.\n\nThere are some men who by the sheer force of their personality subdue\ntheir church difficulties. They hold the captious in awe. By a sort of\nmagnetic persuasion and lively sense of humor they soothe this one and\nthat, win the regard of the outlying community, attach many new members\nto the organization, and build up, out of discordant and erstwhile\ndiscontented elements, a harmonious and active church. This is the man\nfor these martial times! If there are born leaders in every other\ndepartment of the world's work, men who quietly but firmly assert their\nauthority and supremacy in the tasks in which they hold, by free\nelection or legitimate appointment, a place at the head--it ought to be\nso in the Church of God! I long to see arise in the ministry _a race\nof iron!_\n\nThere are other difficulties, seldom spoken of, of which one must write\nfrankly, though with the keenest sympathy, if one is to look deeply into\nthe modern church problem. First: Is a minister's environment favorable\nto his best personal development? Does he not miss much from the lack of\nthe world's hearty give-and-take? He gets criticism, but not of a just\nor all-round kind. Small things may be pecked at, trifles may be made\nmountains of by the disgruntled, but where does he get a clear-sighted,\nwhole-hearted estimate of himself and his work? Who tells him of his\nreal virtues, his real faults? Among all his friends, who is there, man\nor woman, who is brave enough to be true?\n\nOther men are soon shaken into place. Their personal traits continually\nundergo a process of chiselling and adjustment. They are told\nuncomfortable things how quickly! At the club, in the university, in\nthe market, the ploughing-field, the counting-room, they rub up against\neach other, and no mercy is shown by man to man until primary signs of\ncrudeness are worn off. Let a conceited professor get in a college\nchair! Watch a hundred students begin their delightful and salutary\nprocess of \"taking him down\" by the sort of mirth in which college boys\nexcel! Their unkindness is not right, but the result is, they never\nmolest a man who is merely eccentric.\n\nWatch a scientific association jump with all fours upon a man who has\njust read a paper before their body! How unsparingly they analyze and\ncriticise! He has to meet questions, opposition, comments, shafts of wit\nand envy, jovial teasing and correction. He goes out from the meeting\nwith a keener love of truth and exactness, and a less exalted idea of\nhis own powers. Watch the rivalry and sparring that go on in any\nbusiness. Men meet men who attack them; they fight and overcome them, or\nare themselves overcome.\n\nHuman friction is not always harmful. A minister should not be hurt or\nangered by disagreement and discussion. No one's ideas are final. Let\nhim expect to stand in the very midst of a high-strung, spirited, and\nhard-working generation. Let him be turned out of doors. Let him travel,\nlook, learn, meet men and women, and conquer in the arena of manhood.\nThen, by means of this undaunted manhood, he may the better guide the\nfiery enthusiasms of men, inspire their higher ambitions, and comfort\nthem in their bitter human sorrows!\n\nAgain, too often a minister is spoiled in his first charge by flattery,\npolite lies, and gushing women. He is sadly overpraised. A bright young\nfellow comes from the seminary. He can preach; that is, he can prepare\ninteresting essays, chiefly of a literary sort, which are pleasant to\nlisten to, though, in the nature of things, they can have scarcely a\nword in them of that deep, life-giving experience and counsel which come\nfrom the hearts of men and women who have lived, and know the truth of\nlife. He is told that these sermons are \"lovely,\" \"beautiful,\" \"_so_\ninspiring,\" and he believes every word of praise. No one says to him,\n\"When you know more, you will preach better,\" and his standard of\nexcellence does not advance. This man, who might have become a great\npreacher, remains, as years go on, alas! an intellectual potterer.\n\nHe is also socially made too much of, being one of the very few men\navailable for golf and afternoon teas, suppers, picnics, tennis,\ncharity-bazaars. Other men are frankly too busy for much of these\nthings, except for healthful recreation; and not infrequently one finds\nstray ministers absolutely the only men at some function to which men\nhave been invited.\n\nA minister is not a parlor-pet. How many a time an energetic man,\nsociety-bound, must long to kick over a few afternoon tea-tables, and\nsmash his way out through bric-\u00e0-brac and chit-chat to freedom\nand power!\n\nI should think that a real Man in the ministry would get so very tired\nof women! They tell him all their complaints and difficulties, from\nheadaches, servants, and unruly children, to their sentimental\nexperiences and their spiritual problems. Men tell him almost nothing.\nWatch any group of men talking, as the minister comes in. A moment\nbefore they were eager, alert, argumentative. Now they are polite or\nmildly bored. He is not of their world. Some assert that he is not even\nof their sex! Hence the lips of men are too often sealed to the\nminister. He must find some way not only to meet them as brother to\nbrother, but he must capture their inmost hearts. The shy confidence of\nan honorable man once won, his friendship never fails.\n\nThe question of a minister's relation to the women of his congregation\nand the community is not only curious and complex--it is a perpetual\ncomedy. How do other men in public life deal with this problem? They\nhave a genial but indifferent dignity, quite compatible with courtesy\nand friendly ways. They shoulder responsibility; they do not flirt; they\nsort out cranks; they flee from simpers; they put down presumption. If\nmarried, they laugh heartily with their wives over any letter or\nepisode that is comical or sentimental. If not married, they get out of\nthings the best way they know how, with a sort of plain, manly\ndirectness. If a minister would arrogate to himself his free-born\nprivilege of being a thorough-going man, many of his troubles would\ndisappear.\n\nLet him hold himself firmly aloof both from nonsense and from enervating\npraise. Let him dream of great themes, and work for great things! Let\nhim rely on more quiet friends who watch loyally, hope, encourage,\ninspire. By and by the scales drop from his eyes; he sees himself, not\nas one who has already achieved, but as one to whom the radiant gates of\nlife are opening, so that he, too, can one day speak to human souls as\nthe masters have done! He discovers that out of the heart's depths is\ngreat work born! This is a memorable day, both for this man and for his\nchurch. From that hour he has vision and power.\n\nAnother error in ministerial education and outlook is that too often\nministers forget that they compete with other men: they are not an\nisolated class of humanity. Competition underlies the energy and\nefficiency of the world's work. When men do not consciously compete with\nothers, they inevitably drop behind. What a minister was intended for,\nwas to stand head and shoulders above other men. God seems to have\nplanned the universe in such a way that everywhere the spiritual shall\nbe supreme. He was meant to be a towering leader. Who, in other realms,\nhas excelled Moses, Joshua, Elijah, David, Paul?\n\nBut if we consider the responsibilities which are now being laid upon\ndifferent classes of people, and carried by them, I think that we must\nacknowledge that the statesman is looming up as the most influential and\nupbuilding man to-day. He is the one who is adjusting the new\nworld-powers and the new world-relations, over-seeing the development of\nour country, and planning for its laws and commerce. Close to him comes\nthe physician, who is laying his hand on world-plagues, and is studying\nthe conditions and the forms of disease, with a view to striking disease\nat its root. The hand of the doctor is laid upon consumption, malaria,\nyellow fever, diphtheria, typhoid fever, and bubonic plague, and the\nadvance in medical research is marvellous.\n\nThe lawyer and the capitalist are together adjusting the industrial\nrelations of the country. We have trusts, syndicates, and\ncorporation-problems handled with a firm intellectual grasp and a wide\noutlook over human affairs.\n\nThe reading of the world is in the hands of editors of enterprise and\nsagacity. They daily bring wars, statecraft, business plans, political\nsituations, trade openings, scientific discoveries, forms of church-work\nand philanthropy, accidents, murders, and marriages, to our\nbreakfast-table. The press of to-day has a tremendous scope. When some\nof the magazines come to hand, one feels that he is in touch with the\naffairs of the universe and has reading of a cosmic order.\n\nThe day-laborer is discovering that to ingenuity, talent, and manliness,\nthe whole world swings open. Carnegie's Thirty Partners, most of whom\nhave come from the working-ranks, demonstrate that a man can rise from\nthe pick, the spade, the foreman's duties, to the control of great\nindustrial interests.\n\nBankers are thinking out the financial problems--currency, legal tender,\nthe best forms of money and authority; the whole monetary system of the\nworld is under consideration and analysis. The farmer is learning,\nthrough chemistry and other forms of science, new ways of making his\nfarm productive, and the educated agriculturist is rising to be an\nintellectual factor in the development of our country. Everywhere we see\nLife awakening--a great renaissance!\n\nHas the minister, as a thinker and active force of regeneration, kept\npace with this advance? Do many sermons thrill us in this large way?\nWhere does he rank among the world-masters of energy and power?\n\nThe ministry is supposed to be a work of saving souls. But if we could\nknow the direct effect of preaching, and the conversions which are\nreally due to preaching, I think we should find them comparatively few.\nWhat touched the boy or girl, man or woman, and led him or her to Christ\nwas not the sermon, or pastoral talk, though this one or another may\nhave united with the Church after a special sermon, revival, or personal\nappeal. It was the memory and influence of a mother's prayers; of early\nassociations; of a teacher, a lover, a friend. The conversion came\ndirect from God--the soul was acted upon by some special moving of the\nHoly Spirit. Or it was the death of a friend, an illness, an accident, a\ndisappointment, which turned the thoughts to heavenly things. Or it was\na book that searched the soul's depths, or some quickening human\nexperience. Is this quite as it should be? Is not professional\npride aroused?\n\nSuppose that New York City should suddenly be invaded by the bubonic\nplague or yellow fever. Would any one be to blame? Certainly! Such an\noutcry would go up as would echo across the country. Where were the\nquarantine officers? Where was the port physician? Where were the\nspecialists who attend to sanitation and disinfection?\n\nWe say that divorce and Sabbath-breaking are sweeping over our\ncountry--gambling, social drinking, and many other ills; a sensational\npress, a corrupt politics, a materialistic greed.\n\nAll the ministers under heaven cannot take sin out of the world, nor\nuproot sin altogether from the heart of man: the plague conies in at\nbirth. Neither can all the doctors living remove disease, so that no one\nwill get sick or die. But just as the doctor can, by study, by training,\nby counsel, by practice, and by the direction of wise law-making,\nprotect the health interests of his country or community, so the\nminister should stand, yet more largely than to-day, as a break-water\nbetween the world and the tides of sin! He should not only be able to\nkeep alive in a country an atmosphere of prayer, devotion, and unselfish\nservice--he should, by God's help, make piety the general estate of the\nland; he should not only be intellectually able to show the great\nadvantage of the upright Christian life, he should straight-way lead\nall classes into that life; he should be able to lay a hand on the moral\nmaladies of mankind, personal and national, and prescribe effectual\nremedies; take lame, halt, sinning souls, and by God's grace and Spirit,\nlift not only individuals, but whole communities, to a more\nspiritual plane.\n\nThis is a Titanic intellectual task, as well as a spiritual one. When a\ndoctor wishes to keep plague out of America, he goes to Asia, to see\nwhat plague is! He takes microscopes, instruments, and drugs; he buries\nhimself in a laboratory, and gives his whole mind to the problem, until\none day he can come forth and tell how to heal and help. More than this,\nhe risks his life. For every great discovery in medical practice,\ndoctors and nurses have died martyrs to their faithful work.\n\nMoral evil must be studied in an energetic and intellectual way. The\nvariations of humanity from righteousness must be deeply understood.\nLook at Booker T. Washington, or at Jacob A. Riis! What daring, what\nindefatigable toil, what insight, patience, and swerveless hope have\nbeen put into their task! Edison is said to have spent six months\nhissing S into his phonograph to make it repeat that letter, and many\ndays he worked seventeen hours a day. Have many ministers ever bent\nthemselves in this way to solve a special moral problem--that of, say, a\ndisobedient child in the congregation? Have they spent six months, hours\nand hours a day, to make the law of God, the word Obedience, ring in\nthat child's ears? Spiritual guidance is definitely and positively a\nscientific task. The mastery of one fact may lead to the correlation of\na psychic law. When a minister can help a soul to overcome temptation,\nand a parent to bring up a child, he is in touch with two final human\nproblems. As he gradually enlarges his careful and illuminating work,\nhis church becomes in time a body of spiritually well-educated\ncommunicants, thoroughly grounded in doctrinal, ethical, and social\nideals, well taught in public and in private duties. It is not\nself-centred or wholly denominational in spirit, but recognizes itself\nto be a part of a catholic body of believers, reaches out with friendly\nco\u00f6peration to near-by churches, extends its missionary efforts to\nother neighborhoods or lands, and partakes of a world-life, a\nworld-love!\n\nRuling religious thinkers should also, by and by, become leaders of\nnational thought and life. Great public questions should be open to\ntheir judgment and appeal; they should be moral arbiters, and spiritual\nguides in national crises. By a word they should be able to rouse the\nprayers of the country, and by a word to still widespread anger and\nuprising. If accredited spiritual leaders cannot help, who can?\n\nThere are a few men living who seem to hold, for the whole world, the\ntemporal balance. They control mines and shipping, banks and trade. Who,\nto-day, holds the spiritual destiny of the world in his hand? I long to\nsee men appear upon whom the eyes of the world shall be fastened, in\nrecognition of their spiritual preeminence, as they are now fastened on\nthese industrial giants.\n\nRise! Let some man, earnest and endowed, look forward into the future,\nand with the courage that comes from inborn power, assert himself among\nthe nations! Allay, O World-Evangelist, not only neighborhood disputes,\nbut international dissensions; project a creed that shall be profound\nand universal; sweep sects together, unite energy and endeavor, baptize\nwith fire, bring repentance, quicken the race-conscience, uplift the\nWorld-Hope! Erect and elemental, hold CHRIST before the race!\n\n\n\n\nIV. THE WORLD-MARCH: OF SAGES\n\n     [ADESTE FIDELES]\n\n     _Our Father in Heaven,\n       Creator of all,\n     O source of all wisdom,\n       On Thee we would call!\n     Thou only canst teach us,\n       And show us our need,\n     And give to Thy children\n       True knowledge indeed.\n\n     But vain our instruction,\n       And blind we must be,\n     Unless with our learning\n       Be knowledge of Thee.\n     Then pour forth Thy Spirit\n       And open our eyes,\n     And fill with the knowledge\n       That only makes wise.\n\n     From pride and presumption,\n       O Lord, keep us free,\n     And make our hearts humble,\n       And loyal to Thee,\n     That living or dying,\n       In Thee we may rest,\n     And prove to the scornful\n       Thy statutes are best._\n\n     THOMAS WISTAR\n\nIf we should be told that at birth a strange and wonderful gift had\nbeen bestowed upon us, one such that by means of it, in after life, we\ncould accomplish almost anything we wished, how we should guard it! With\nwhat delight we would make it work, to see what it would do! We should\nnever be tired of such a toy, because every day it would reveal new\npossibilities of power and delight.\n\nSuch a gift God has given us in our power to think. What a mysterious\nand deep-hid gift it is! Nerves and sensations, a few convolutions in\nthe brain, acts of attention and observation, certain reactions\nfollowing certain stimuli: the result, a world of worlds spread out\nbefore us; unlimited intellectual possibilities within our grasp!\n\nWhat is thinking? Thinking is an attempt to express infinite thoughts,\naffections, relations, and events, in finite terms. The child strings\nbuttons. The philosopher strings God, angels, devils, brutes, men, and\ntheir appurtenances and deeds. Hence no real thought will quite go into\nwords. Out beyond the word hangs the infinite remainder of our idea. The\nsearch for a vocabulary is the search for a clearer articulation\nof ideas.\n\nThinking is the power to take up life where the race has left off\nattainment, and to lead the race one step farther on, by a new concept\nor idea. It is a curious thing, this little turn in the brain, a\nthought. We cannot see it, or touch it, or handle it. Yet we can give\nit, one to another, or one man to the race. It has an infinite leverage.\nOne great thought moves millions onward. Plant the word _steam_, and\nglobe-transport changes. Plant _electricity_, and a hundred new\nindustries spring up. Plant _liberty_, tyrants fall. Plant _love_,\nchaotic angers disappear.\n\nIf we refuse to learn to think, we refuse to do our share of the world's\nwork. We are like a horse that balks and will not pull. While we sulk\nthe universe is at a standstill.\n\nSpelling and arithmetic, history, etymology, and geography, are not\ntasks set over school-children by a hard taskmaster, who keeps them from\nsunshine and out-of-door play. They are catch-words of the universe.\nThey are the implements by which each brain is to be trained to do great\nwork for the one in whom it lives. What every earnest soul asks is not\ngold, fame, or pleasure. It is: Let me not die till I have brought\nmillions farther on.\n\nWe cannot deliberately make thoughts. Thought is like life itself:\nscience has not found a formula which will produce it. But just as\nmarriage produces new lives, though we cannot say how, so study and\nmeditation produce thoughts. Something new appears: a concept which was\nnot with the race before.\n\nThe work of sages has been to rule the thinking of the race. They\nreceive the inspired ideas and spend their lives in teaching them to\nothers: in setting up intellectual vibrations throughout the world.\n\nSome day, I hope Sargent will paint a March of Sages, as gloriously as\nhe has painted the panels of the Prophets. Then we shall gaze upon the\ntrain of heavy-browed, noble-eyed, wise, gentle-mannered men, who have\nbeen the enduring teachers of the race,--thinkers, leaders, seers.\nConfucius, Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, the mediaeval\nphilosophers, the Egyptian, Persian, and Arabian thinkers, Roger Bacon,\nThomas Aquinas, Eckhart, William of Occam, Bede, Thomas \u00e0 Kempis,\nFrancis Bacon, Kant, John Stuart Mill, Spencer,--with what dignity the\nprocessional moves down the years! The sum of human knowledge is vast;\nbut how much more vast seem the achievements of each of these men, when\nwe realize how few his years, and how many the obstacles and impediments\nof his all too short career! There is ever a pathos in the life of\nthe wise.\n\nBy thinking, we pass from the gossip of the neighborhood into the\nconversation of the years. We do not know what Alcibiades said to his\nman-servant about the care of his clothes, baths, perfumes,--nor what\nhis man-servant retailed to other retainers of the eccentricities and\nvanities of his master. But we know what Pericles and Plato said to the\nrace. Here is the advantage of a thinking mind--that at any moment one\nmay enter into eternal subjects of thought, and have converse with those\nwho of all times have been the most profound.\n\nNothing teases the soul like the thought of the unfinished, the\nimperfect, the incomplete. And yet, when we have thought and planned a\nreally great and abiding work, whether we ever finish it or not--for\nmany things in life may intervene between conception and completion--to\nhave thought of it is to have had in our lives a pleasure that can never\ndie. For one blessed hour or year we have been lifted to the thoughts of\nGod and have entered into the great original Design. Hence it is that\nthe life of the real Thinker, however broken or disturbed, is at heart a\nlife of serenity and joy. What matters a conflagration, a\ndisappointment, to him whose thoughts are set upon the race?\n\nThinking is a form of vital growth. We all wish for growth. Is there any\none who wishes to stay always just where he is to-day? To be always what\nhe is this morning? The tree grows, the flower grows, the ideals of the\nrace grow--shall not I?\n\nWe are born to a destiny which has no limit of grandeur save the limit\nof the thought of God, The wish for growth is the wish to enter into the\nspiritual ideals of the universe,--to become one with its advancement,\none with its decrees.\n\nBut do not the secular look upon growth as a sort of chase--a chase for\nmore learning, more money, a bigger business, a higher degree, a better\nposition, a brilliant marriage,--a struggle for wealth, renown, acclaim?\nThese things are not in themselves growth, nor its real index. Growth is\nnot a form of avarice. Growth is a vital state of being. Growth is the\nassimilation of experience. Growth is development in the line of eternal\npurpose. Growth is the combination of our souls with the things that\nare, in such a way as to make a perpetual progress toward the things\nthat are to be.\n\nWe lose much because we lose avidity out of our lives, the eagerness to\ngrasp what spiritually belongs to us,--to share the universal\nenthusiasm, the universal hope. Day by day the world wheels about\nus--sunset and moonrise, wind, hail, frost, snow, vapor, care, anxiety,\ntemptation, trial, joy, fear. Whatever touches the sense or the soul is\nsomething by which, rightly used, we may grow. There is nothing we need\nfear to take into our lives, if it receives the right assimilation. Each\nexperience is meant to be a vital accession. We narrow our lives and\nenfeeble our powers when we try to reject any of these things, or\nunlawfully escape them, or are yet indifferent to them. Prejudice,\ncowardice, and apathy are death.\n\nExperience is what the race has been through. Each of us has his\npersonal variant of this common life. Thought is the power by which we\nmake it available for our own better living, and the future life of\nthe race.\n\nTo the early man, there existed earth, air, water, fire, heat, cold,\ntempest, and the growth of living things. He lived, ate, fought, but his\nthoughts were primitive and personal. Have _I_ had enough dinner? he\nasked, not, Is the race fed?\n\nBy and by some one arose who began to consider things in the abstract,\nand to relate them to his neighbor, and formulate conclusions about\nthem. He was the first real Thinker, Then air-philosophy and\nelement-philosophy grew up--beast-worship, animalism, fire-worship, and\nthe rudiments of simple scientific learning, as, for instance, when men\nfound that they could make a tool to cut, a spike to sew.\n\nSince then, what the sage has done is to teach men to see, read, write,\nthink, count, and to work; to love ideals, to love mankind and relate\nhis work to human progress.\n\nMan's first primer was near at hand. When he wished to write, he made a\npicture with a stick, a stone, on a leaf, or traced his idea in the mud.\nWhen he wanted to count, he kept tally on his fingers, or with pebbles\nfrom the beach or brook. When he wished to communicate an idea orally,\nit was with glances, shrugs, gestures, and imitative sounds. Once, in a\ngame of Twenty Questions, this was the question set to guess: Who first\nused the prehistoric root expressing a verb of action? Who, indeed?\n\nOut of that leaf-writing, and bark-etching, and later rune, have grown\nthe printed writings of mankind. Homer, Dante, Milton, and Shakespeare\nare the lineal descendants of the man who made holes in a leaf, or lines\non a wave-washed sand. Out of the finger-counting have grown up\nbook-keeping, geometry, mathematical astronomy and a knowledge of the\nhigher curves. Out of the prehistoric shrugs and sounds and grimaces we\nhave oral speech--much of it worthless, and not all of it yet wholly\nintelligible. We are still continually being understood to say what we\nnever meant to say: we are forever putting our private interpretation on\nthe words of other men. Even yet, we are all too stupid. In our\ndreariest moments does there not come to us sometimes a voice which\ncries: Up, awake! Cease blinking, and begin to see!\n\nLanguage is electric. Words have a curious power within themselves. They\nrain upon the heart with the soft memories of centuries of old\nassociations, or thoughts of love, vigils, and patience. They have a\npower of suggestion which goes beyond all that we may dream. Just as a\nman shows in himself traces of a long-dead ancestry, so words have the\npower to revive emotions of past generations and the experiences of\nformer years. The man of letters, the Thinker, strews a handful of\nwords into the air, breathes a little song. The words spring up and\nbring forth fruit. Their seed is human progress and a larger life for\nmen. Think, for instance, who first flung the word _freedom_ into\nspace!--_gravitation, evolution, atom, soul!_ There is no power like the\npower of a word: a word like _liberty_ can dethrone kings.\n\nWe get out of a word just what we put into it, plus the individuality of\nthe man who uses it. Some men read into noble words only their own\nsilliness, vulgarity, prejudice, or preconceived ideas. Another man\nreads with his heart open for new impressions, new insight, new fancies\nand ideals.\n\nWords have not only their inherent meaning; they have their allied\nmeanings. A word may mean one thing by itself. It may mean quite another\nthing when another word stands beside it; even marks of punctuation give\nwords a curiously different sound and shade. Literature is a mastery,\nnot only of the moods of men, but of the moods of words. Corot takes a\nstream, some grass and trees, a flitting patch of sky. By means of a few\nstrokes of his brush, he manages to present that tree, sky, stream, in a\nway which suggests the pastoral experience of the ages. Where did that\nmisty veil come from? the trembling lights and shadows, the half-heard\nsounds and silence of the woods, the changing cloud, the dim reflection,\nthe atmosphere of mystery and peace?\n\nSo each man goes to the dictionary. He takes a word here, a word there,\ncommon words that everybody knows. He puts them together: the result is\na presentation of the life of man, and lays hold of his inmost spirit.\n\n     \"_Our birth is but a deep and a forgetting;\n     The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,\n        Hath had elsewhere its setting\n           And cometh from afar;\n        Not in entire forgetfulness,\n        And not in utter nakedness,\n     But trailing clouds of glory do we come\n           From God, who is our home!_\"\n\nTo write, the soul chooses, and God stands ever by to help. That is why\ngreat work always impresses us as inspired. God did it. It is God who\nwhispers the deathless thought and phrase: the subtler collocations\nare divine.\n\nTake the word _star_. To the child it means a bright point that glitters\nand twinkles in the sky, and sets him saying an old nursery rhyme. To\nthe youth or maiden it suggests love, romance, a summer eve, or a frosty\nwalk under the friendly winter sky. To the rhetorician it suggests a\nfigure of speech--the star of hope. To the mariner it suggests guidance\nand the homeward port. To the astronomer it means the world in which he\nlives. His life is centred in that star. To the poet it means all these\nthings and many more. For the poet is the one who, in his own heart,\nholds all the meanings that words hold for the race. Read again the\nlines just quoted, and think of Wordsworth's outlook on the star!\n\nThe dictionary definition of a word can seldom be the real one, nor does\nit reveal the deeper sense it has. It blazes a path for the\nunderstanding, but individual thought must follow. Take the words _time,\nfriendship, work, play, heroism_. It took Carlyle to define Time for us.\nEmerson has defined Friendship. Let the lights and shadows of the\nthought of Carlyle and Emerson play upon these words, they are at once\nremoved from mechanical definition, and we dimly perceive that each word\nis larger than the outreach of the thought of man. Another generation\nthan ours shall define and refine them. In heaven, in some other aeon,\nwe shall find out what they really mean!\n\nThus knowledge is not permanent. It reels. It proceeds, it changes, it\nis iridescent with new significance from day to day.\n\nWhat is true of a word, and what we make of it, is true of every phase\nof learning. The black-board is not all. Learning is not tied to it, or\nto any one person, demonstration, interpretation, event, or epoch. No\nwise man can keep his learning to himself, and yet he cannot, though he\nteach a thousand years, transmit his deeper learning to another. The\natmosphere, the casual information, the spiritual magnetism of a great\nman, will teach better than the text-books, the lecture courses, and\nthe formal resources of academic halls. Thus Mark Hopkins is in himself\na university, given a boy on the other end of the log on which he sits.\n\nIt is the relativity of knowledge that dances before the eye, that\nbewilders, eludes, evades. Group-systems and electives seem like a\nmakeshift for the real thing. We cannot tie a fact to a pupil, because\nto the tail of the fact is tied history itself. Until a pupil gets a\nglimpse of that relation, that dependence of which we have just heard,\nwith all that has yet happened in connection with it, he is not yet\nquite master of his fact. He recites glibly the date of Thermopylae, and\ndoes not know that all Greece is trailing behind his desk. When, after\nsubsequent research, he knows something of Greece, he discovers Greece\nto be dovetailed into Rome and Egypt, and they lay hold upon the plain\nof Shinar and Eden, and the immemorial, prehistoric years.\n\nAh, no! We never really know. Every fact recedes from us, as might an\nebbing wave, and leaves us stranded upon an unhorizoned beach, more\ndespairing than before. Education does not solve the problems of\nlife--it deepens the mystery. What, then, may the sage know? Are there\nno sages? And have we all been misinformed?\n\nA sage is one who knows what, in his position of life, is most necessary\nfor him to know. The larger sage, the great Sage, is the one who knows\nwhat is necessary for the race to know.\n\nIt is a wrong idea of wisdom, that we must necessarily know what some\none else knows. Wisdom is single-track for each man. There are in the\nworld those who know how to build aqueducts, and to bake _charlotte\nrusse_, and to sew trousers. Aqueducts and tailor work may be alike out\nof my individual and personal knowledge, yet I may not necessarily be an\nignorant man. The primitive hunter stood in the forest. For him to be a\nhunting-sage, was to know the weather, traps, weapons, the times, and\nthe lairs and ways of beasts. He knew lions and monkeys, the coiled\nserpent and the serpent that hissed by the ruined wall; the ways of the\nwolf, the jackal, and the kite; the manners of the bear and the black\npanther in the jungle-wilds. Kipling is the brother of that early man:\nhe is a forest-sage, and would have held his own in other times.\n\nThe sea-sage was the one who could toss upon the swan-road without fear.\nHe knew the strength of oak and ash; the swing of oar, the curve of\nprow, the dash of wave, and the curling breaker's sweep. He knew the\nmaelstroms and the aegir that swept into northern fiords; the thunder\nand wind and tempest; the coves, safe harbors and retreats. To-day, the\nsea-sage rules the fishing-boat, the ocean liner, the coastwise\nsteamers, and the lake-lines of the world.\n\nThe fishing-sage knows the ways and haunts of fish. He is wise in the\nsalmon, the perch, the trout, the tarpon, and the muscalonge. He says.\nTo-day the bass will bite on dobsons, but to-morrow we must have frogs.\n\nNo sagacity is universal, but the love of sagacity may be. The man who\nstarts out to implant a new way of education has a noble task before\nhim, but is it a final one, or even a more than tolerably practical one?\nIs there such a thing as a place for Truth at wholesale, even in an\nacademy or college? Can a man receive an education outside of himself?\nHe may be played upon by grammars and by loci-paper, by electrical\nmachines, and parsing tables and Grecian accents, by the names of noted\nauthors and statesmen, and the thrill of historic battles and decisions.\nHe may be placed under a rain of ethical and philosophic ideas, and may\nbe forced to put on a System of Thought, as men put on a mackintosh. But\nhis true education is what he makes of these things. If he hears of\nTheodoric with a yawn, we say--the college-folk--He must be imbecile.\nNo, not imbecile! he may become a successful toreador, or snake-charmer,\nwhich things are out of our line! And a man may be an upright citizen, a\ngood husband, and a sincerely religious man, who has never heard of\nFrancesca, nor Fra Angelico, nor named the name of Botticelli!\n\nThe moment we set bounds to wisdom, we find that we have shut something\nout. Wisdom is the free, active life of a growing and attaching soul.\nWe must not only attach information to ourselves, we must assimilate it.\nElse we are like a crab which should drag about Descartes, or as an\nocean sucker which should hug a copy of Thucydides.\n\nEducation is the taking to one's self, so far as one may in a lifetime,\nall that the race has learned through these six thousand years.\nEducation is not a thing of books alone, or schools; it is a process of\nintellectual assimilation of what is about us, or what we put about\nourselves. At every step we have a choice. This is the real difference\nbetween students at the same school or university. One puts away Greek,\nand the other lays up football and college societies. A third gets all\nthree, being a little more swift and alert. One stows away\ninsubordination--another, order and obedience. One does quiet, original\nwork of reading and research; the other stows away schemes for getting\nthrough recitations and examinations. No two students ever come out of\nthe same school, college, or shop with the same education. Their\ntraining may have been measurably alike, but the result is immeasurably\nunlike. Education, in the last analysis, is getting the highest\nintellectual value out of one's environment and opportunities. There is\na cow-boy philosopher, a kitchen-philosopher, as truly as there is a\nphilosopher of the academic halls.\n\nConduct is the _pons asinorum_ of life. Wise men somehow cross it,\nthough stumblingly, and with tears. Fools, usurers, oppressors, and\nspendthrifts of life are left gaping and wrangling on the hellward side.\nThinkers have always been climbing up on each other's shoulders to look\nover into the Beyond. What they have seen, they have told. Some men\nclimb so high into the ethereal places of the Ideal, that they do not\nget down again. They are the impractical men. An impractical man is not\nnecessarily the educated man; he is the man at the top of some\nintellectual fence, who wishes to come down, but has absent-mindedly\nforgotten that he has legs. The legs are not absent, but his wit is. So\nwith the impractical man in every sphere. Education has not really\nremoved his common-sense, as some say, his power to connect passing\nevents with their causes, and to act reasonably; but it has set his\nthought on some other thought for the time being, and the dinner-bell,\nwe will say, does not detach him from his inquiry. His necktie rides up!\nHe goes out into the street without a hat! Let him alone till he proves\nthe worth of what he is about. The practical man, who hears the\ndinner-bell and prides himself upon this fact, may not hear sounds\nfar-off and clear, that ring in the impractical man's ear, and that may\nsometime tell him how to make a better dinner-bell, or provide a better\ndinner--a great social philosophy--for the race!\n\nThe really impractical man is not he who reaches out to the intellectual\nand ideal aspects of life; it is he who lives as if this life were all.\nThere are women who make pets of their clothes, as men make pets of\nhorse or dog. They have just time enough in life to dress themselves up.\nLooking back over their years, they can only say, I have had clothes! In\nthe same number of years, with no greater advantages or opportunities,\nother women have become the queenly women of the race. Some women are\ngirt with centuries, instead of gold or gems. Whenever they appear, the\nevent becomes historic; what they do adds new lustre to life.\n\nWe are all prodigals. We throw away time and strength, and years, and\ngold, and then weep that we are ignorant, and embeggared at the last.\nWho shall teach us wisdom, and in what manner may we be wise?\n\nWhat say the sages of the vast possibilities of the race? With one voice\nthey say: Be brave! Do not cower, shrink, or whine. Throw out upon the\nworld a free fearlessness of thought and word and deed. Courage,\nfreedom, heroism, faith, exactness, honor, justice, and mercy--these\ntraits have been handed down as the traditional learning of the heart\nof man.\n\nAnother ideal of the race is Law. We have given up a\nchaos-philosophy--the haphazard continuity of events--a cometary orbit,\nfor the world. There are fixed relations everywhere existent: the\nsuccession of cycles is orderly and prearranged.\n\nAnother ideal is Progress. We are moving, not toward the bottom, but\ntoward the top of possibility. We reject annihilation, because then\nthere is nothing left. And there must always be something\nleft--progress--a bigger something, a better something. Should\nannihilation be the truth of things, and all the race mortal, then some\nday there would be a Last Man. And after the Last Man, what? He would\ndie, and then all that any of the other stars could view of the vast\npanorama of our earthly generations would be an unburied corpse, with\nnot even a vulture hovering to pick it to freshness in the air!\n\nA Last Man? No. Instead, the seers have shown us a great multitude in a\nheavenly country, praising God, and singing forth His Name forever.\nImmortality broods over the great thought of the race. All great minds\nlook upward to it: it is the final consummation of our dreams.\n\nAnother ideal is social adjustment, and social service. We must do\nsomething for some one, or we cast current sagacity behind the back.\nPeople crowd each other to the wall. The weak of communities and nations\nare too often crushed. Redress is in the air. The longed-for wisdom of\nto-day shows a kaleidoscopic front, in which are turning the\nslum-dweller and the millionaire; the white man, the yellow, and the\nblack; the town and the territorial possession. The slave-colony,\ngarbage-laws, magistrates, and murderers are mixed in motley, and there\nare whirling vacant-lot schemes abroad, potato-patches, wood-yards,\norganized charity, Wayfarers' Lodges, resounding cries of municipal\nreform, and various other interests of the wisdom-scale.\n\nHence, wisdom has not yet been arrived at: we are still on the run. This\ntwentieth century will find new problems, new queries, new cranks, and\nnew dismays!\n\nOne thing, however, shines out clear: Wisdom is being recognized as\nhaving a moral aspect, and men are looking for a Religion which shall\nsum up the learning of the sages, the information of the race.\n\nWhen we look down into the physical universe, the primary thing that we\nfind there is gravitation. When we look into the moral universe, the\nprimary thing that we find there is also gravitation--a sinking to a\nLower. This is sin--a contrariness of things--which makes the world an\nevil place to live in, instead of a good; which wrecks character and\nstates, eats the hearts out of cultures and civilizations, destroys\nstrong races, leaves a stain upon even the youngest child, and which is\nconstantly drawing the race downward, instead of upward.\n\nSin, sin, sin! Everywhere the fact glares upon us, and cannot be hid, or\nput away. Sin is not an intellectual toy, for philosophers to play with\nor define as \"a limitation of being.\" Sin is a reality, for men to\nfeel, recoil from, and of which one must repent.\n\nSin is energy deliberately misplaced: energy directed against the course\nof things, the infinite development, the will of God. Sin is corruption,\nand desolation, and decay. Death broods over the spirit of man, unless a\nRedeemer come. The unredeemed ages hang over history like a pall. In\nthem there are monumental oppression, cruelties, and crimes. The breath\nof myriad millions went out in darkness, and there was none to save. A\nplague swept over all the race.\n\nHence, even scientifically considered, the final aim of thinking must\nbe, to arrive at some thought which will take hold of this primary fact\nof sin and uproot it; which will show how the world may be purged\nof sin.\n\nSlowly but inevitably we are moving to this great Thought. It is summed\nup in one word: Redemption. The watchword of a century ago was\ngravitation. It explained the poise of the universe by a great and\nhitherto undiscovered law. The watchword of yesterday was evolution. It\nexplains progressive change: the mounting-up of life \"through spires of\nform.\" The forms of the universe are seen in a series which is in the\nmain ascendant, and in which the survivor is supreme. The watchword of\nto-morrow is Redemption. The Thinker will some day live, who will make\nthat great word Redemption stand out in all its vast majesty and\nsignificance. This, I take it, is the work of our new century.\n\nRedemption is the explanation of the existence of man, of his present\nprogress, and his future destiny. It is the great mystery of joy in\nwhich the race partakes; the spiritual culmination of all things\nearthly; the forecast of eternal things yet to be.\n\nRedemption is not a dogma; it is a life. Redemption is a perpetual and\nascendant moral growth. It marks a world-balm, a world-change. It is in\nthe spirit of man that it works, and not in his outer condition, or\nexternal strivings. It is ultimately to root sin out of the world.\n\nThrough stormy sorrows and perpetual desolations comes the race to God.\nZion is the Whole of things--the encompassment of space, and time, and\nendless years,--an environment of immortality and peace.\n\nVirtue leads the race to Joy, and there is no byway to this height. The\nfinal aspect of the universe is joy. Joy is elemental--a vast vibration\nthat sweeps through centuries as years! A day in His courts is as a\nthousand, and a thousand years are as one day, because they thrill with\nan immortal and imperishable emotion. The seraphim and cherubim,\nSandalphon and Azrael, are angels of enduring joy. Joy is the soul's\nshare of the life of God.\n\nThus when the world has breathed to us the holy name of Christ, it has\ntold us the highest that it knows. The March of Sages is toward a\nRedeemer! The banner of Wisdom is furled about the Cross!\n\n\n\n\nIV. THE WORLD-MARCH: OF TRADERS\n\n     [AMSTERDAM]\n\n     _Lo, my soul, look forth abroad\n       And mark the busy stir:\n     Wouldst thou say, in pride and scorn,\n       Our God is not in her!\n     Nay, the bonds, the wares, the coin,--\n       These, in truth, are passing things;\n     Other treasures thrill the life\n       Of earth's great merchant kings!\n\n     We, they say, would wake the power\n       In mountain and in mine;\n     And transport, from sea to sea,\n       The cedar, oak, and pine:\n     Build the bridge, and plant the town,\n       Enter every open mart;\n     Make our nation's commerce flow,--\n       But this is not our heart!\n\n     Many a prayer uplifted springs\n       O'er desk, and din, and roar;\n     Many an humble knee is bent\n       When the rushed day is o'er;\n     Far within, where God may be,\n       All exists His Throne to raise;\n     Every triumph of our power\n       Becomes a form of Praise!\n\n     God of nations, hear our cry,\n       And keep us just and true;\n     Lay Thy hand on all our lives,\n       And bless the work we do:\n     Then from every coast and clime\n       Land and sea shall tribute bring;\n     Gold and traffic, world-domain\n       We offer to our King!_\n\n     ANNA ROBERTSON BROWN LINDSAY\n\nWe are all traders. Each of us is endowed with some faculty, ware, or\npossession which he is constantly exchanging for other things. We trade\ntime, talent, service, goods, acres, produce, counsel, experience,\nideals. The world is in reality a Bourse of Exchange. Each of us brings\nsome day his special product to the common mart.\n\nThere are traders and traders--the just and the unjust--the man of honor\nand the rogue. We set values on thoughts and on transactions, on\nmerchandise and on philanthropies, on ideas and on accounts; and there\nis a constant distribution of the affairs, as well as of the worldly\ngoods of men.\n\nBut in a restricted sense, we think of trade as the exchange of produce\nwhich is material and mobile,--which may be touched, handled, weighed,\ntransported, bought, and sold. The substance of the earth is constantly\ntaking new shape before our eyes, being rearranged in kaleidoscopic\ncombinations, and transported from port to port, from town to town, from\nsea to sea. One can look nowhere without seeing this ceaseless activity\nprogressing. Everywhere there is a whir of wheels, a plash of waves, a\ndin of assembly, as the new combinations take place.\n\nThere was a day when trade was a thing of here-and-there; a thing of\nsailing ships and caravans, of merchants of Bagdad, Cairo, Venice,\nAlexandria, Jerusalem, Tyre, and Damascus. Ivory, gold, gems, precious\nstuffs, teak and cedar wood, Lebanon pine, apes, peacocks, sandal-wood,\ncamel's hair, goat's hair, frankincense, pearl, dyes, myrrh, cassia,\ncinnamon, Balm of Gilead, calamus, spikenard, corn, ebony, figs, fir,\nolives, olive-wood, wheat, amber, copper, lead, tin, and precious stones\nwere the chief articles of exchange. A very little sufficed the poor;\nthe rich were housed in palaces and panoplied in gems.\n\nAs time went on, the processional of traders became a processional led\nout, in turn, by the merchants of one city after another. It is a\npicturesque study, that of the trade-routes of the Middle Ages! There\nwas the Mediterranean seaboard, and there were the Baltic towns and the\nHanse towns; the Portuguese mariners and traders; the Venetian merchant\nprinces. There was the Spanish colonial trade; the Dutch trade of the\nEast Indies; the trade of Amsterdam and London. There were the\nElizabethan sea-rovers. Then came the British trade in the East Indies,\nand the gradual growth of the trade of France, Germany, England, and the\nUnited States. This is a story of human wants reaching out as\ncivilization advanced, and of the extending of the earth-exchange.\nEverywhere there has been a correspondence between national prosperity\nand increasing trade.\n\nTo-day, each man demands more of the earth's products than ever before.\nHe reaches out a hand for comforts and luxuries, as well as for\nnecessities. He grasps not only the produces of his own and his\nneighbor's field and vineyard, but demands what lies across continents\nand seas. Instead of the ship, the camel, and the ass, we now have the\nocean freighter or liner, and the flying train of cars: new forces, oil,\nsteam, electricity, and water-power, do the carrying work of man. And\nhence trade has become Trade, and each trader is involved in the\ncomfort, success, and prosperity of many others. A single commercial\ntransaction to-day involves the lives of hundreds of thousands, competes\nfor their toil and life-blood, carries the decision of their destiny.\n\nA great merchant is the real Kris Kringle. He stands at the centre of\nexchange, distributes from the tropics and the arctic zones. He deals\nout fur and feathers, books, toys, clothing, engines; ribbons, laces,\nsilks, perfumes; bread-stuffs, sugar, cotton, iron, ice, steel; wheat,\nflour, beef, stone; lumber, drugs, coal, leather. He scatters\nperiodically the products of mills and looms, of shoe-shops and\nprint-works, fields, factories, mines, and of art-workers. He thus\nbecomes a social force of great power, a social law-giver, in fact.\nUnder his iron rule, the lives of the masses are uplifted or cast down.\n\nAs large eras open, the ethical ideals become higher. We are beginning\nto inquire, as never before, into the basis of trade, the place of the\ntrader, the right conduct of this vast problem of Distribution upon\nwhich hinges so much of human life and fate. All things look, not only\nto the integration of trade, but to its exaltation.\n\nTrade has ceased to be a thing of individual energy, talent, and\ncommercial alertness. It has risen to great proportions. The large\ntrader is in control of national conduit, as well as of national\nexpense. There is a great deal more in business than the art of making\nmoney. Business is, at the roots, a way of making nations; of developing\nthe resources of a country, of handling its industries, of protecting\nits commerce, of enlarging its institutions, of uplifting its training,\naspirations, and ideals. Traffic is educational. Imports influence the\nnational life. We may import opium or Bibles, whiskey or bread-stuffs,\nlocomotives or dancing pigs.\n\nThe sceptre held by Tyre and Venice is passing into our own hands. But\ntrade, to-day, is a matter of the imagination, as well as of the\nstock-book. 11 needs a great imagination to handle the present-day\nproblems of business and finance. The prosperity of a nation depends\nlargely on the intelligence, integrity, and magnanimity of its business\nmen. To be narrow-minded in business, is not only intellectual\nastigmatism, it is poor commercial policy. To make use of present\nopportunities to control present advantages needs a great education and\na large human experience. It is the man of insight, of sympathy, of\neconomic ideals, who will lastingly control our national prosperity and\nadvance our industrial wealth.\n\nWith all this demand, the business man still stands largely in a class\nby himself, a class apart from the great leaders of the world. He is not\nyet received into the spiritual circles of the race. He goes about the\nworld, sits on boards and committees, fills directorships and\ntrusteeships, pays pew-rent, and runs towns. But when the spiritual\nconclaves of the world take place, when the things of life and death are\ninquired into, when words are said of the higher conduct of the life of\nman, if he draw near inquiringly or unguardedly to the sacred place,\nscholar and poet, priest, saint, and proud hand-worker alike rise up and\nsay, Go away.\n\nIt wears upon the heart--this spiritual isolation of the business man.\nDoes not he often say sadly to himself, They only want my money?\n\nWhy must he go away? What has he done, that he must be waved down? If we\ndiscover why he must go away, we shall discover the meaning of that\ngreat caste-line which has long been drawn, and ought no longer to be\ndrawn, between trade and letters, trade and the Church, trade and\nsocial prestige.\n\nThe reason he must go away is this: He has never ruled the higher\nhistory of man; he does not yet quite belong to the ideal-makers of the\nrace. Understand, I am not now speaking of the new business man, the\nexceptional one, upright, cultured, altruistic, whom you and I may know;\nI am speaking of a broad class-line, a class distinction.\n\nIt is a strange concept that would bar the business man from the ideal;\nthat would limit his life to an account-book, a ledger, a roll of\nstocks, rents, and possessions, instead of granting him the freedom of\nthe universe, the privilege of ministering to the race. Singularly\nenough, the business class is the last class that Christianity has set\nfree. Slaves have been given liberty; women, social companionship and\nintellectual equality; manual labor has been lifted to dignity and\nhonor. But to break the shackles of the man of trade is the work of our\nera, or of an era yet to come. Thousands of young men are daily stepping\ninto counting-houses, or behind sales-counters, or into independent\nstores, who will never lift their eyes from their goods and\naccount-books, nor rise above the linen, hardware, groceries, or\nhouse-fixtures which they sell. Such a situation is suicidal of national\nprosperity, and blocks the high hopes of the world.\n\nLack of appreciation of the life of business is sinful and unjust. A\nhigh-principled businessman may be one of the noblest leaders of\nmankind. The world needs great business men--men who will know how to\nuse the resources of a country, how to plan for its industry,\nmanufactures, and commerce: men who understand the principles of\nproduction and exchange; ways of transportation; systems of credit and\nbanking: men who know the constitution of the country, and the history\nof its development; its strength and weakness, its possibilities and\nneeds: men who will deal honorably in business contracts, both with\nbuyers and employees, and also with law-making bodies: men who will\nsteadily try to advance international prosperity, as well as\npersonal wealth.\n\nBut to understand business on this plane, and to conduct it in this\nlarge way, needs a fine education, an education built, first of all, on\na practical basis, such as the education of our common schools. Then\nshould follow a course in the ideals of the race, the classic studies in\nlanguage, literature, history, science, and philosophy. Then should come\na technical course, graduate or undergraduate, such as the courses\noffered by the Universities of Pennsylvania, Chicago, Wisconsin, which\ninclude, in general, lectures and special studies in Public Law and\nPolitics, Business Law and Practice, Political Economy, Statistics,\nBanking, Finance, and Sociology. In addition to this, there should be a\nthorough knowledge of the Bible and of Christian Ethics, with a deep\nheart-experience of religion.\n\nEndowed with natural business talent, the young man who goes out into\nthe world with such preparation as this knows a great deal more than\njust how to make money; he knows how to make it honorably and how to\nspend it, in his business, family, and social life, for the public good;\nhe has in him the making of a statesman and a philanthropist, as well as\na man of wealth.\n\nTwo things take one into the inner circle of the ideal-makers of the\nrace--imagination and sympathy. Ideals cannot be bought with gold. The\nideal is always founded on integrity, progress, and common-sense. It is\npre\u00ebminently practical, as well: the thing that inevitably must be, now\nor hereafter, however men laugh it to scorn to-day.\n\nImagination is the faculty of perceiving the higher and final relations\nof life, the relation of one's work to the progress of the world, and of\none's conduct: to spiritual history. What the ideal-maker tries to do is\nto set holy standards that shall not pass away: to do abiding work, in\nthought, deed, word; work philosophically planned, and perseveringly\ncarried out; work which he shall do regardless of the outer\ncircumstances of his life--poverty or wealth, of threats,\nmisunderstanding, or hoots of scorn. He is unmoved, both by the rage of\nthe populace and by its most tumultuous applause. He lives for truth,\nnot for personal advance; for progress, not for wealth or honor. What\nhe lays down as a precept, that he tries to live up to, in the way that\nshall win the approval of the eternal years.\n\nSordidness in commercial life is not necessary: greed is\nnot foreordained. Christianity establishes a new system of\ntrading-philosophy, and a new basis of commercial ethics. There is a\ngod-like way of trade--Christ might Himself have bought and sold--else\nChristianity fails of its full mission, and there remains a class of the\nsocially lost, of the ethically unsaved. One reason why it is so hard to\nget business men into the Church, or to interest them religiously in any\nway, is that ministers, in general, do not understand or appreciate\nbusiness men. In one of the most stirring sermons I ever heard, occurred\nthis unjust sentence: \"Our country has been built up by the martyr, and\nnot by the millionaire.\" No! Our country has been built up by _both_ the\nmartyr and the millionaire!\n\nChristianity projects into the world new ideals of Trade, of Gain, of\nCompetition, Value, and Return for Toil.\n\nWhat is Trade? Is it merely a way of making money? Then there is no\nethical basis for it. \"The amount of money which is needed for a good\nlife,\" says Aristotle, \"is not unlimited.\"\n\nOne concept is: Trade is something which belongs to me. It is that part\nof the world's exchange which I can get under my personal control. It\nis the balance between human industries and human needs which I hold\nfor my part of the world, and which others are continually trying to\nwrest from me, and which I must keep by all means, fair or foul.\nCompetition is the battle of the strongest, the quickest, the meanest! I\nmust know tricks. I must get in with people, get hold of some sort of\npull, learn to dissemble, to flatter, manipulate, hedge, dodge. Success\nis a matter of being sly. Anything is allowable which comes out ahead,\nwhich adds to the dollar-pile, or which makes the loudest\nadvertising noise!\n\nTo buy at the least, and sell at the most, regardless of the conditions\nunder which least and most are attained--the man who enters life with\nthis idea of trade in his mind might just as well be born a shark and\nlive to prey. Every free dollar in the world will tease and fret him,\nuntil he sees it on its way to his own pocket. If this is all there is\nin trade, the noble-minded will let it alone: it gives no human outlook.\nIt not only undermines personal character, it is the root of national\nignominy and dishonor.\n\nWhat has Christianity to do with this shark-instinct? with the rapacity\nwhich looks on the world as a vast grabbing-ground, and upon all natural\nresources as mere commercial prey? The value of Christianity lies in its\nreasonable and intellectual appeal. It does not spring upon one like a\nhighwayman and say, Hands up! Give me your purse! It says gently, Son,\ngive me thy heart. It then proceeds to refashion that heart, to fill it\nwith new principles and with world-dreams.\n\nTrade is a just exchange of what one man has for what another man needs.\nIt may take place individually between man and man, in which transaction\na horse, an ox, or a tool may change hands. Or one man may assume a\nresponsibility for a number of people, and say: I will give this whole\ntown shoes, in return for which you may give me a house, market-produce,\nclothing, and an education for my children. The thing will come out\neven, if you and I are honest. Or a climate, a civilization, may give to\nanother that which the other lacks. We send school-books and machinery\nto China; she sends us tea, matting, and bamboo. The whole right theory\nof trade is a give-and-take between men and nations, based on a just\nprice, and with a deep law of Value, not yet wholly formulated,\nunderlying each transaction.\n\nBargains should not be one-sided. Trade, in a large sense, is a way of\nexchange in which each party to the trade receives an advantage. Not\nonly this, it is a process of distribution, by which each one receives\nthe greatest possible advantage. Money-making is a secondary result: in\ntrue trade it is not the final benefit.\n\nTake the case of a specially helpful and paying book. The author\nreceives a royalty, and has an income. The publisher receives his\nprofits, and makes a living. The public gains inspiration and ideals.\nWho is loser? This is sheer business, yet it means loving service for\nall concerned.\n\nTo illustrate further: A physician has a frail child, with which the\nordinary milk in the market does not agree. To build up its health, he\nbuys a country place and a good cow. The child thrives. In his practice,\nhe sees many other frail children, and it occurs to him that they, too,\ncan be benefited by the same kind of care and watchfulness that he is\ngiving his own child. He buys more cows, has them scientifically cared\nfor, and his agents sell the milk. He finds himself, in the course of\ntime, the owner of a dairy farm, and a man of increasing income. But his\ntrade is not trade for the sake of money! it is trade to make sick\nchildren strong and well. He exchanges professional knowledge, executive\nability, and human sympathy, for money; in return for which, children\nreceive health, parents joy, and the race a more athletic set of men and\nwomen. This is an instance of the inner spirit of the true trade: the\nspirit which may rule all trade, deny it, or discount it, or scorn it,\nas you will.\n\nPrice is a value set on material, on labor, on interest, on scarcity, on\nexcellence, on commercial risks; it is the approximate measure of the\ncost of production. The ethical price of a commodity is the price which\nwould enable its producer to produce it under healthful and happy\nconditions--which would insure his having what Dr. Patten calls his\n\"economic rights.\"\n\nThis joyous exertion is not harmful; it is tonic. Excellence is an\ninspiration, an intoxication. Let excellence, not Will-it-pass? be the\nstandard of exchange. From the very endeavor after excellence comes a\ncertain exaltation of spirit, which ennobles the least fragment of daily\ntoil. When the producer brings forth somewhat for sale, let him say:\nThere! That is the best that I can do! It is not what I tried to make of\nit--the thing of my dreams--but it is the very best which, under the\ngiven conditions, I could produce. Then the shoddy side of trade will\ndisappear.\n\nThe Law of Equity is the final law of trade. But in whose hands is\nequity? Who appraises value? Who sets price? In whose hand is the final\nprice of the necessaries of life--wheat, rice, sugar, soap, cotton,\nwool, coal, milk, iron, lumber, ice? The man who puts a price on an\narticle, as buyer or seller, enters an arena which is not only\ncommercial--it is judicial and ethical: he declares for what amount a\nman's life-blood shall be used.\n\nNo one absolutely sets price. It is determined by far-reaching\nindustrial conditions, and by economic law. War, weather, famine,\nstocks, strikes, elections, all have a say. Yet, to a certain degree,\nthere are those who rule price. As a representative of the ideal, as\nexecutors of social trust, how shall each one use his Power of Price?\nThe man who has control of a price--a price for a day's labor, for\nwages, for a cargo, or for any kind of product--has control of the\nliving conditions of the one who works for him. The question is not: How\nshall I grind down price to the lowest? It is: What price will be an\nethical return to this man for his social toil?--just to me for my\nbrains, my capital, my energy, my distributing power,--just to him for\nhis brains, his time, his skill, his artistic perceptions, his fidelity\nand honor? Each buyer must henceforth not only resolve: I will buy only\nwhat I can pay for, but, what I can pay for at a just rate. So far as\nlies in my power, I will make an adequate return to society for this\npersonal benefit.\n\nSome one says: Do you realize that you are making a moral laughing-stock\nof much of our system of trade? that you are setting an axe to that\nsystem, more cutting than the axe of any Socialist, Nihilist, or\nAnarchist in the world? Oh, no. I have simply set myself to answer the\nquestion: How can the business man stand among the ideal-makers of the\nworld, so that he shall no more, in spiritual assemblies, be told to\ngo away?\n\nWoman is the real economic distributer. The millionaire manufacturer\nimagines that he himself runs his business. Oh, no. It is run by\nfarmers' wives. When they do not care for yarn or calico, his looms\nstand idle for a year; the vast machinery of the world turns on woman's\nlittle word: _I want_. Hence the education of women should include this\nfactor: the desire to want the right things. Extravagance is not a part\nof woman's make-up; it is extraneous.\n\n_Gain is that which permanently enriches the life._ By every act of\ncharity, or justice, or insight, or right barter, the soul is made more\ngrand. True trade everywhere may be made a new method of inspiration,\ngrowth, and power.\n\nMoney is a makeshift of the race. God is the only real appraiser, and we\nnever get back a money-value for our soul's toil. Whether we pass\nwampum, or nickels, or taels, or bank-checks, we are not yet paid for\nour trade.\n\nThe higher value of money is its spiritual capacity. Not what it will\nbring me is primarily important, but what I can buy with it for the\nrace. Sometimes the question comes over me: What am I trading for money?\nMy time? My energy? My ideals? Part of my soul is passing from me: do\ndollars ever repay? Hence it comes about that all money transactions are\nfragmentary and symbolic.\n\nMoney may lead to poverty, or to spiritual wealth. The gift of trade is\na gift of God, as much as the gift of prophecy or song. In a right way,\nwe should all love gain. We are not born to go out of the world as poor\nas when we came into it. We should gain stature, wisdom, strength,\ninfluence, ideals. If our latent business capacity were more fully\naroused, we should get much more out of life. We would refuse to barter\na spiritual heritage for carnal things.\n\nWe trade thoughts and feelings. But it is very hard to trade fine\nimpulses with those who are intrinsically vulgar. Their treasury is\nempty of spiritual coin, and their storehouse contains no\nworld-thoughts. We can send a caravan across the desert, a ship across\nthe sea, but we cannot send a Thought into a flaccid or a pompous brain.\n\nWe trade position and influence. The evil of the spoils system is not\nthat one gets something for something,--it is that one gets something\nfor something less, or for nothing. Whatever we have to give may be\nrightly given; the wrong comes when we give it to the idle or unworthy.\nWhen we trade political preferment for high merit, both the\noffice-holders and the country are gainers by the exchange.\n\nMarriage is the great mart of exchange. Here the possessions of one sex\nare set up against those of the other. Everywhere marriage is spoken of\nas a good or a bad \"bargain.\" Each man shall say: \"Sweetheart, in Myself\nI offer you the treasures of manhood. I give strength, courage,\nmagnanimity, action, protection, and the indomitable will.\" Each wife\nshould say: \"Dear, in me are all gentleness, courtesy, beauty, grace,\npatience, mercy, and hope. I, too, am brave, but my courage is of the\nheart. I, too, am strong-willed, but my will is deep-set in love.\" As\nyears go on, there comes a time when Love says: \"Between us now there is\nneither mine nor thine. The universe is ours together!\"\n\nHuman love is not all. There is yet a higher impulse. The most\nbusiness-like question that ever touches the heart of man is this: For\nwhat shall I trade my soul? We hold our souls high: we perceive that\neternity itself is not too much to ask. And hence the highest barter is\nthat of the earthly for the spiritual; of the temporal for the unseen\nand eternal. We say, Give me God, give me heaven, give me divine and\nsacrificial Love, and I will give my heart. And thus the last\ntransaction is between God and the soul. Godliness is great Gain, and to\nexchange earth for heaven is a satisfying and unregretted Trade.\n\n\n\n\nIV. THE WORLD-MARCH: OF WORKERS\n\n     [ARMAGEDON]\n\n     Jesus, Thou hast bought us\n       Not with gold or gem,\n     But with Thine own life-blood,\n       For Thy diadem.\n     With Thy blessing filling\n       Each who comes to Thee,\n     Thou hast made us willing,\n       Thou hast made us free.\n          By Thy grand redemption,\n            By Thy grace divine,\n         We are on the Lord's side;\n            Saviour, we are Thine!\n\n     Not for weight of glory,\n       Not for crown or palm,\n     Enter we the army,\n       Raise the warrior psalm;\n     But for love that claimeth\n       Lives for whom He died,\n     He whom Jesus nameth\n       Must be on His side.\n         By Thy love constraining,\n           By Thy grace divine,\n         We are on the Lord's side;\n           Saviour, we are Thine!\n\n     FRANCES RIDLEY HAVERGAL\n\nWhat is work? Work is energy applied to the creation of either material\nor immaterial products. The digging of the soil preparatory to raising a\ncorn-crop is work; the making of brooms; the writing of fugues. There is\nno one who does not work, at one time or another, and a man's social\nvalue depends largely upon the amount of work that he can do.\n\nEven the energy which is seemingly applied to destructive tasks is\nreally subsidiary to a constructive ideal. Thus the hewing of timber is\na destructive task, but its object is not to scatter trees around, but\nto make a clearing on which to plant wheat; or to have lumber, in order\nto build a house. So, also, we blast rock, in order to get stones for a\nstone wall, or for the filling of a road-bed. And we rip up old clothes\nin order to have rags, and to make room in our homes for other things.\nDestructiveness from a sheer love of destructiveness is not work--it is\nvandalism. The true Man works. When Adam's crook-stick turned over the\nbrown earth to make it fertile, he began the industry of the world. The\nwhole horizon of man's endeavor is spanned by one word, Work. It has\nbuilt cities, bridged rivers, united continents, and sent the myriad\nspindles of trade whirring under a thousand changing skies.\n\nWork is the open-sesame of success. It is curious to see how uneasily\nsome men will roam from one end of the earth to the other, trying to\nfind an easy place, a place where work will not be needed or required.\nThere is no such place. The higher the honor, the harder the work. The\npower to work is ordinarily the measure of a man's possibilities of\nsuccess. Long hours, hard toil, lack of recognition and appreciation,\ndrudgery, a thousand attempts to one successful issue,--these are the\nways in which the colossal achievements of mankind have been built up.\nWork, as has well been said, is an ascending stairway. On its broad base\nare ranged all the multitudes of the earth. Those who can climb mount\nthe higher and ever-narrowing stair.\n\nThe great man can begin anywhere, or with any task. He says, If I am\ngoing into the giant-business, I may as well begin now! Born and bred in\nthe forest, he lays hand to his axe, and looking up at some tall oak,\ncries out, I will begin here! With the first stroke of the axe, success\nis not less sure than in his last endeavor. Success of the right kind is\na scientific achievement.\n\nThe line has not yet been drawn, and I doubt whether it ever can be\ndrawn, between productive and non-productive labor. There is a cleavage\nof tasks, however, which may be approximately expressed, as work that is\ndone for support, for daily bread, and work which is done because\ncertain faculties of mind and heart and soul demand expression,\ndevelopment, and scope. We all have powers which are willing to be set\nin action primarily for self-preservation--for personal, material, and\ntransitory ends. We are also endowed with faculties which react,\nprimarily, in behalf of universal aims, though that may not debar them\nfrom also bringing an advantage to ourselves. In proportion as we are\ntalented, magnanimous, and high-minded, we delight in spending a part of\nour lives in working for the race.\n\nThus Thoreau, when he, \"by surveying, carpentry and day-labor of various\nother kinds,\" had earned $13.34, was doing income-work, the work by\nwhich he had to live. For the same purpose, he worked at raising\npotatoes, green corn, and peas. When he wrote _Walden_, he did a kind of\nwork which also in time brought him an income. But he did not write\n_Walden_ for food or money; he wrote it primarily because he liked to\nwrite, and for the benefit of mankind.\n\nIn order to be contented and happy, each normal adult human being must\nhave at least the chance of doing these two kinds of work. Unless he or\nshe can do income-work, he or she is not economically independent;\nunless he can do universal work, he is not socially and\nspiritually free.\n\nMuch of the present-day discontent is owing to the fact that these two\nkinds of work are not represented, as they should be, in every\nworking-life.\n\nThe problem in regard to the working-man is not how to pet him, nor to\npatronize him, but how to educate him and inspire him! He is not a\nparasite to be fed by the capitalist, nor is the capitalist a parasite\nupon the working-power of the working-man. Both are men. The problem is,\nHow shall the capitalist lead the noblest, most public-spirited, and\nhelpful life in relation to those in his employ? How shall the\nworking-man lay hold on the best that life can give? How shall he find a\nwork which he is competent to do, and likes to do, and may be supported\nby doing--and at the same time have a chance to grow; to enter into the\nlarge, free culture-life of the world?\n\nThe complaint of the working-man, when really analyzed, runs down to\nthis: I do income-work, but it does not bring me bread enough to live.\nNot only that, but ground down as I am by toil, all possibility of the\nlarger, universal work is shut away from me. My faculties are\natrophied--paralyzed--and hence my soul smoulders with deep and angry\ndiscontent. This ceaseless and sordid anxiety for bread cuts me out of\nmy world-life, my world-toil. I cannot do scientific research-work, or\nwrite the books and papers that I ought. My universal labor is\ninterrupted: I cannot be happy until I can take up this larger\nwork again.\n\nAs the trade of civilization advances, the meaning of bread changes. The\nuniversity professor, no less than the day-laborer, finds his income\ntoo small for him, and says, \"I, too, do income-work which does not\nbring me bread, books, travel, society, a summer home, and surroundings\nwhich are not only decent and sanitary, but refined and beautiful.\"\n\nIs it not also the source of the discontent to-day, among almost all\nclasses of women, except the most highly educated and efficient? Women\nsay--our modern daughters, wives, and mothers: \"In the home, we do\nincome-work for which we do not receive income. When strangers do this\nwork, they are paid, and we are not.\" In addition, many a woman is so\nbound down by daily tasks, that her whole soul cries out, and we hear of\nthe high rate of insanity among farmers' wives, of nervous prostration\nof the housewives in our towns, and become accustomed to such\nexpressions as \"the death of a woman on a Kansas farm.\"\n\nThis discontent takes many restless forms. It leads daughters, who ought\nto be at home, out into morally dangerous but income-earning work; it\ntakes wives out into all manner of clubs, without regard to the fact: as\nto whether the particular club, in its atmosphere and influence, is good\nor bad; it brings discouragement, disorder, and unrest into the home,\ndissatisfaction with house-duties and home-tasks, and is sapping our\nlife where it should be best and strongest--in the home--taking out of\nit youth, spirit, enthusiasm, inspiration, and content.\n\nThe three questions asked in regard to each worker are: 1. What work\ncan he do? 2. Of what quality? 3. In what time? The difference between\nindustry and idleness is that work is one thing which no one may\nhonorably escape. Since it must be done, the problem of life is not how\nto escape work, but how to find the right work, and how best to do it,\nand most swiftly, when the choice is made.\n\n\"_Forth they come from grief and torment; on they wend\n   toward health and mirth,\nAll the wide world is their dwelling, every corner of the\n   earth.\nBuy them, sell them for thy service! Try the bargain what\n   'tis worth,\n          For the days are marching on.\n\n\"These are they who build thy houses, weave thy raiment,\n   win thy wheat,\nSmooth the rugged, fill the barren, turn the bitter into\n   sweet,\nAll for thee this day--and ever. What reward for them\n   is meet?\n          Till the host comes marching on._\"\n\n             WILLIAM MORRIS\n\nSECOND\n\nThe trade of toil for money has led to many problems and discussions.\nTo-day the trenchant question: \"What More than Wages?\" is a matter of\neager talk. Is this a living-wage?--Just enough warmth, not to freeze.\nJust enough clothing to be decent. Just enough food to go through the\nday without actual hunger. Just enough shelter to keep out the wind and\nrain and snow. Just enough education to learn to read and write\nand count.\n\nNo. As the theory of bodily freedom demands for each man life, liberty,\nand the pursuit of happiness, so the highest theory of to-day lays down\ndemands of economic freedom beyond the mere fad of possible existence.\nDr. Patten has formulated certain \"economic rights\" of man. Each\nemployer must say: Before I settle back with a serene belief that I have\ngiven my men a living-wage, let me ask: Have they sun? air? sanitary\nsurroundings and conditions? medical care? leisure? education? a chance\nto grow? Have they enough money for ordinary occasions, and a little to\ngive away? No man or woman has a living-wage, who has no money to\ngive away.\n\nEducation and comfort add to the value of the employed. The cook who has\na rocking-chair, a cook-book, and a housekeeping magazine in her kitchen\nwill do more work, and better work, other things being equal, than the\ncook who has none. The workman who lives in a clean, sunny, well-aired\nplace, where he can found a home, and bring up healthy children, will do\nmore work, and better work, than the workman who lives in a damp, dark,\nill-ventilated tenement, and who goes to his day's work with a heart\nsullen and broken because of avoidable illness and sorrow in his poor\nlittle home. Five thousand employees who have a night-school,\nluncheon-rooms, little houses and gardens, a savings-bank, and a library\nof books and pictures are worth more than those who are given no such\nadvantages of happiness, growth, and content. The Railroad Young Men's\nChristian Associations are said to be a good economic investment, as\nwell as an uplifting moral influence.\n\nThis appears to be a fundamental economic law: _Every physical, mental,\nor spiritual advantage offered to an honest working man or woman\nincreases his economic efficiency_. Therefore even the selfish policy of\nshrewd corporations to-day is to screw up, and not down; while the more\nphilanthropic are beginning to see, in their social power, a luminous\nopportunity to do a god-like service.\n\nBut the capitalist, however just or generous, cannot do for a man what\nhe cannot or will not do for himself. Too many workers imagine that a\nliving-wage is to be given to each man, no matter how he behaves or\nworks. This is a false assumption. Underlying all human effort, there\nruns a final law, that of Compensation: _What I earn, I shall some day\nhave_. This is a very different proposition from this: _What I do not\nearn, I want to have_! For every stroke of human toil, the universe\nassigns a right reward--a reward, not of money only, but of peace of\nheart, joy, and the possibilities of helpfulness. But when the work done\nhas not been done faithfully, or well, or honestly, or in the right\nspirit, the reward is lessened to that exact degree. To the end of time,\nthe idle and the lazy must, if they are dependent on their own\nexertions, be ill housed and fed. If a man wastes, or his wife does, he\nmust not complain that his income will not support him. If he lets\nopportunities of sustenance and advancement go by, the capitalist is not\nto be held to account.\n\nThere are two chief kinds of economic difficulties. One is the problem\nof the capitalist: How much ought I to pay? The second is that of the\nworking-man: How much service must I render? How much ought I to be\npaid? Of the second kind, nearly every phase of it begins right here,\nthat men and women demand for labor something which they have not\nearned. They do careless, indifferent, shiftless, reckless work, and\nthen demand a living-wage. The capitalist is not inclined to raise his\nscale of prices, knowing that he has built up his business by prudence,\nsagacity, and tireless application--the very qualities which his\ndissatisfied employees lack.\n\nWe need not pay--we ought not to pay--for incompetence, for\nimpertinence, for disobedience of orders, for laziness, for shirking,\nfor cheating, or for theft. To do so is a social wrong. It is the wrong\nthat lies back, not only of sinecures and spoils, but of employing\nincompetent and wasteful cooks and dressmakers.\n\nWhat we make of our lives through wages depends upon ourselves. For\ninstance, a man gives each of five boys twenty-five cents for sweeping\nsnow off his sidewalks. One boy tosses pennies, and loses his quarter by\ngambling. One boy buys cigarettes, and sends his money up in smoke. One\nboy buys newspapers, and sells them at a profit which buys him his\ndinner. A fourth boy buys seeds, plants them, and raises a tiny garden\nwhich keeps him in beans for a whole season, The fifth boy buys a book\nwhich starts him on the career of an educated man: he becomes an\ninventor and a man of means. The man who paid out the twenty-five cents\nto each boy is in no way responsible for the success or failure of their\ninvestment of this quarter. He is responsible only for the fact that he\ndid or did not pay a fair price for the work.\n\nGod, the great Paymaster, gives to each of us the one talent, the two\ntalents, or the ten talents, of endowment and opportunity: after that,\nwe are left to our own devices!\n\nThere are four things which every employee should constantly bear in\nmind, if he wishes to advance,--skill, business opportunity, loyalty,\nand control. Until a man has mastered what he has to do, he cannot be\nexpected to be accounted a serious factor in the economic world. The\nmoment he achieves skill in what he has to do--and this is a question of\nthoroughness, accuracy, and speed--he has achieved power, a possibility\nof dictation in the matter of hours and wages.\n\nThe next point is business opportunity. Two men, of exactly the same\nopportunities and endowments, take up the same task. One man idles and\nis surpassed by the other, or he does only what he is told to do,\nwithout further thought. The other performs his set task, but at the\nsame time he is examining into the principles of his engine, or into the\nconduct of the factory or business. In a few years he is the foreman, or\nan inventor, or a partner, with independent capital of his own. Again,\nthere is a blind way of doing skilled work, or of merely doing it\nwithout noticing where it is most needed, or how the market is going for\nthis special kind of work. The one who has his eyes open reads, notes\nthe state of the market, adds to his skill the power of counsel, and can\ngradually take a larger responsibility upon him, which will advance the\neconomic value of his time, as well as the work. There is a constant\nflux in the labor-world, which is the result largely, not of special\nopportunity, but of worth, application, and concentrated thought.\n\nThird, loyalty has a high mercantile value. Disloyalty is a sin.\n\nThe fourth point is control. Does it not strike wonder to think how some\nmen have under them, either in their industrial plant, or in their\nrailway systems, or in their syndicate-work, anywhere from a few hundred\nto ten, fifteen, or twenty thousand men? How do they maintain\ndiscipline, either themselves, or through their subordinates? This\nproblem of control is a serious one in business. Every angry threat,\nevery sullen hour, each case of insubordination, every strike, every\nwidespread dissatisfaction, means economic waste. It means expense both\nof time and money to send for Pinkertons to keep order and preserve\ndiscipline. The man who adds to his technical skill, and his knowledge\nof the market, the power of control adds great force and value to his\nwork. Higher yet is executive force, the power to adjust\nresponsibilities and duties in such a way as to get back a high economic\nreturn in the way of service. But above all, there is that force of\ncharacter which impresses itself on a company, on a decade, on a\ngeneration--so that some names are handed down in business from\ngeneration to generation, all men knowing that from father to son, and\nagain to his son, there will pass down that certain integrity, nobility,\nsteadfastness of purpose, fidelity, and honor which give credit\nthroughout the business world, and which promise health and happiness\nfor those who are happy to be in their employ.\n\nBefore a man complains of his wages, then, let him ask himself: Have I\nmastered my work? Am I loyal? Am I capable of larger responsibilities,\nand of wider control?\n\n\n\n\nTHIRD\n\nWILLIAM MORRIS says: \"_It is right and necessary that all men should\nhave work to do which shall be worth doing, and be of itself pleasant to\ndo: and which should be done under such conditions as would make it\nneither over-wearisome, nor over-anxious._\"\n\nThis theorem cannot be upheld in its entirety, though there is a deep\ntruth beneath it. There are many things, such as the collecting of\ngarbage, the washing of the dead poor, the cleaning of cesspools, the\nbutchery of cattle for the market, and the execution of capital\ncriminals, which can scarcely be called pleasant to do, and must yet be\ndone. As long as the world is the world, and there is in it sin, decay,\ndisease, and death, we cannot hope to make the work or the conditions of\nwork absolutely ideal: we _can_ make ideal the spirit in which work\nis done!\n\nA fine story is told that long ago, when the cholera once broke out in\nPhiladelphia, the hospitals fell into a fearful state. One day, a plain,\nquiet little man stepped into the chief hospital, looked about a moment,\nand set to work. No task was too dirty or disagreeable for him; no\ndetail was too disgusting. He did anything he saw to be done,--called in\nadditional doctors, organized the nurses, and himself waited on patients\nnight and day. He soon had the hospital in good shape again. When the\ncrisis passed, and every one began to demand, Who is this man?--they\nwere told: It is Stephen Girard. The work was not pleasant, but the\nspirit was kind, and the heart delighted in its self-appointed toil.\n\nWork in general, however, that has worth has several elements. First, It\nmust be individual. It must be joyfully done: there must enter into work\nthe vitality of a happy spirit. It must be spontaneous. This is why\nmachine-work can never be thoroughly beautiful: it lacks the spontaneity\nof life. The hand never makes two things alike. With the mood, the\nweather, the occasion, there are little touches added which a machine\ncannot give. Life always varies and thinks of new effects.\n\nWhen we try to realize what work is, when it is merely an amount of toil\nprodded out of man or woman by a hard taskmaster, we have only to look\nback to the bondage of Israel in Egypt, or to the time of Scylla, when\nthere were thirteen million slaves in Italy alone: slaves whose set\ntasks were of over two hundred and fifty kinds; who worked on the\nroad-building, on public works, and in rowing in the galleys of the\nslave-propelled ships. In Carthage agriculture was for a time largely\ncarried on by slave-labor. How different is this slave-labor from the\ncraft-work of mediaeval times, when, under the protection of the guilds,\nmanual labor became exalted to an artistic rank, and the workers at the\nloom, the metal-workers, the wood-carvers, the tapestry-weavers, and the\nworkers in pottery and glass produced objects whose beauty has never\nbeen either equalled or surpassed. Andrea del Sarto and Benvenuto\nCellini were workers, and their work remains.\n\nAgain, good work is born of affection. Love teaches more art than all\nthe schools. What we love, we instinctively beautify. The artist\nbeautifies the material on which he works. He loves his task, and from\nhis love there begins a gradual shaping of the ideal. The product gains\na touch of beauty. The needlework of Egypt and Byzantium, the laces of\nVenice and of Spain, are historic. It is said of Queen Isabella, that\nshe was one of the best needleworkers of her age; that \"her _motifs_\nwere the great events of the time.\"\n\nA peasant girl of Venice was once given a beautiful coral-branch and\nsome rare leaves and shells which her lover had gathered for her from\nthe sea-depths. She was untaught in art, and making fish-nets was her\nwonted work. Day by day as she wrought her nets, she looked upon the\nlovely sea-treasures, their beauty passed into her heart and mind, and\nshe began to copy, spray by spray, the coral-foliage, the leaves of the\nsea-grasses, and the curves of the sea-shells, until after a time, in\nthe meshes of her fish-nets, she had imprisoned forms of exquisite\nbeauty, and one saw there reproduced, in dainty and artistic grouping,\nwhat her very soul had loved and fed upon. Her fish-nets became works\nof art.\n\nWork of a high order is always based on high ideals and on great\nthoughts. It implies a vast amount of toil. The Capellmeister of the\nVatican choir to-day is that wonderful young genius, Perosi, who is\nstirring all Europe by the beauty of his musical work, and by the\nspirituality and fervor of his musical imagination. He has set himself\nto compose twelve oratorios, which shall body forth the whole life of\nthe Saviour. He believes that the music-lover and the church-lover may\nbe identical, and has set his hand to the uniting of all true\nmusic-lovers with the great offices and services and influences of the\nChurch. Here is Work exalted to its spiritual office: to carry out, not\nonly ideals of beauty and harmony, but to advance spiritual progress.\nThis is the final aim of all true work: it must be not only aesthetic,\nand honest, but spiritual. The prayer of the true workman is ever to\nmake himself a workman approved unto God. \"May the beauty of the Lord be\nupon us, and the work of our hands, establish Thou it!\"\n\nThe worker should have change of work. Nature never intended that a man\nshould do one thing all his life. This is in harmony neither with man's\ninfinite capacity, nor with her inexhaustible variety. Change is\ncultural, and a man's work Should, from time to time, engross every\nworking-power he has.\n\nWorking-surroundings should not only be sanitary, they should be\nbeautiful. What influences one most at college, and makes most for one's\nhappiness, is not the fact of the work in recitation-rooms, out of\nbooks, laboratories, and under teachers. The glory of college life is,\nthat wherever one goes, the eyes look out on beauty, and wherever one\nworks, there are those whom we love who work beside us.\n\nAs one passes down the long college corridors, the eyes fall upon palm\nand statue, upon frieze and fresco, and the carbon copies of immortal\npaintings. Everywhere there are the inspirations of sculpture and\narchitecture, of music, literature, and art. Beauty is in and about the\nplace in which one thinks and works. This is the undying charm of\nOxford--the gathering traditions of centuries, the gleaming spires, the\nage-worn walls and buttresses, the clinging vine, the tremulous light\nand shadow on the ancient halls, the sculpture of porch and clerestory,\nand the light that falls through richly tinted windows.\n\nThis beauty should not be monopolized by any one class. About the places\nwhere we work, we should have, as far as possible, something of the\nbeauty of the world. We should have wide, shaded streets and parks, even\nin great cities; towers and pinnacles; sky-lines of vigor, grace, and\nmassive strength. Cannot department stores be artistically fashioned and\nbuilt? Cannot market-houses have arches and arabesques? May not even the\nBourse have something about it suggestive of great art? Cannot our\nstreets have curves and storied cross-ways? Cannot porters and draymen\nhave somewhat to arouse and satisfy aesthetic instincts? Cannot our\nday-laborers be granted vision?\n\nWhy should we have the Gothic cathedral, with its exquisite traceries\nand carvings, pillars and reredos and screen, for men to pray in, one or\ntwo hours a week, and the hideous, grime-covered, foul-smelling,\noverheated factories, in which men and women spend their working-lives?\nThis is what Christianity must do: it must implant joy and beauty, as\nwell as honesty and fidelity, in the way, place, and thought of work!\nWhen religion, education, art, and brotherly affection have joined hands\nin a charmed circle, we shall have new ideas of working-places, as well\nas of praying-places, and of living-places! It is not enough that a\nfactory should be situated, as the best factories now are, in the open\ncountry, with sunshine and fresh air. The blockhouse parallelograms and\nsquares should be replaced by something that has intrinsic beauty and\nthe haunting completeness of memory and association, so that the place\nwhere a man works shall no more be to him a nightmare, but the\natmosphere and inspiration of his dreams!\n\nAnd those we love shall work beside us! Here is another thought: Shall\nall association in work be arbitrary? Is there not a more human way than\nthe chain-gang way? Could not friends work more together, so that one's\ndaily work should be, not a time of separation from all we love most,\nbut a time of intellectual sympathy and helpfulness, of companionship\nand true-hearted loyalty? This, and many other good things, it is not\ntoo much to hope for. Truly, as Morris writes, \"_The Day is Coming_.\"\n\n\"_Then a man shall work and bethink him, and rejoice in\n   the deeds of his handy\nNor yet come home in the even too faint and weary to\n   stand._\n\n\"_Men in that time a-coming shall work and have no fear\n   For the morrow's lack of earning and the hunger-wolf\n     anear._\n\n\"_And what wealth then shall be left us when none shall\n   gather gold\nTo buy his friend in the market, and pinch and pine the\n   sold?_\n\n\"_Nay, what save the lovely city, and the little house on the\n   hill,\nAnd the wastes and the woodland beauty, and the happy\n   fields we till_;\n\n\"_And the homes of ancient stories, the tombs of the mighty\n   dead;\nAnd the wise men seeking out marvels, and the poet's teeming\n   head;_\n\n\"_And the painter's hand of wonder; and the marvellous\n   fiddle-bow;\nAnd the banded choirs of music:--all those that do and\n   know._\n\n\"_Far all these shall be ours and all men's, nor shall any\n   lack a share\nOf the toil and the gain of living in the days when the\n   world grows fair_.\"\n\n\n\n\nFOURTH\n\nGood workers are trained in the home, the school, the shop, the wider\nworld. Every home is an industrial establishment. In it go on the\nindustrial processes of cooking, cleaning, sewing, washing; the care of\nsilver, glass, linen, and household stores; the activities of buying\nfood and clothing; the moral responsibilities of teaching and training\nservants and children. If any healthy member of the home is excused from\nat least some form of active work, he will inevitably be a shirker when\nhe grows up. Cannot almost all the problems of human training be run\ndown to this: How to teach a child to work? If he can work, he can be\nhappy; but if he does not want to work, he shall never be happy. No\nwork, no joy, is the universal dictum.\n\nThis is the great hardship of the children of great wealth: they are not\ntaught to work. To avoid this difficulty, in two very wealthy families\nthat I know, the boys were even obliged to darn their own stockings and\nmend their own clothes. One young hopeful once tore his clothes\na-fishing, and mended his trousers with a scarlet flannel patch! Some\nmothers do not allow their little girls to go to school until their beds\nare made up and their rooms in order. Other equally wise parents have\ntools in the house, and allow the boys to do all the repair work, the\ndaughters all the family mending, or to care for the linen; the boys to\nput in electric fixtures and bells, and keep the batteries in order.\nQueen Margherita of Italy, Queen Elizabeth of Roumania, Queen Alexandra\nof England, and the Empress Augusta of Germany are all women who have\nbeen from their childhood acquainted with simple and practical household\ntasks. This principle is a right one and underlies much after-success.\nEach child should, first of all, have a mastery of home-tasks. Then,\nwhether on the prairie or in the palace, he is free and independent.\n\nWhat makes the differences in the social privileges given to one class\nof workers above another? In reality, we are all workers. No one ought\nto live, if in health, who does not work. But for some forms of work,\nmen and women receive an income, and nothing more. For other work, men\nand women may or may not receive a large personal income, but their work\nis recognized, they are a part of the best social circles, and when they\ndie, a city or a nation grieves.\n\nThe essential difference is this: that one is honor-work, and one is\nnot. Wherever in the world work is done in a spirit of love and\nfidelity, it brings its own reward in recognition and in personal\naffection. Sooner or later, honor-work receives honor.\n\nAnother reason for exaltation of one form of work above another, is\nthat some kinds of work are so very hard to do. They involve the intense\nand complicated action of many and of complex powers. It may be hard\nphysical work to break stones for a road-way, but the task itself is a\nsimple one--the lifting of the arm and dropping it again with sufficient\nforce to split a rock apart. But the writing of a prose masterpiece,\nsuch as the _Areopagitica_, involves the highest human faculties in\nharmonious action. If we add to the requirements of prose, the rhythm,\nthe exalted imagery, and perhaps the assonance and rhyme of verse, we\nstill further increase the difficulty of the task, and the honor of its\nsuccessful achievement. The king-work of a powerful monarch, the\npresident-work of a republican leader, is serious work to do. Our honor\nis not all given to the king or president income, salary, or office; it\nis a tribute to hard and royal-minded work.\n\nHousehold service is personal service. It cannot be made a thing of set\nhours, and of measurably set tasks, as office-work maybe. We may talk of\n\"eight-hour shifts,\" but they are scarcely practicable. Not every baby\nwould go to successive \"shifts\"! House-demands vary, not only with every\nhousehold, but with every day.\n\nWhen love-making is wholly scientific, then domestic service will be.\nThere is in it the same delicate personal adjustment, the changing\nrequirements of weather, health, temper, and season, of emergency and\nstress, that are to be found in the most purely personal relation. When\nthere is a period of unusual sickness through the community, not only\nthe doctors have extra tasks, but all household servants as well.\n\nWhat social recognition can be given to servants who lie, steal, who\nshirk every duty that can be shirked, and who are both incompetent and\nunfaithful? The here-and-there one faithful helper receives her meed of\nappreciation and affection. The whole aspect of household work will\nchange when honor-work is given: when home-helpers come up to us, from\nthe truthful and honor-loving class.\n\nThe school-room is the place in which the principles of work are\nimplanted: thoroughness, grasp, speed, decision, and definite purpose.\nThe shop is the apprentice-place of work, before one takes up individual\nresponsibilities. The man who wishes to rise in the railroad service\ngoes into the shops and roundhouse. The man who wishes to take charge of\nan important department in a department store is put to tying packages.\n\nTeachers' work will not be rightly done until certain advantages are\ngiven to teachers that are now largely withheld. Teachers need more\nsociety, more hours of play, freer opportunity of marriage. Instead of\nbeing tied up to exercise-books and roll-books, in their home-hours,\nthey should have a chance to spend their time on the golf-links, at\nafternoon teas, in visiting and in entertaining friends. Take away\nsociety from any man or woman, and you take away the possibility of a\ngrowing, happy, and helpful life. We need friends just as we need air.\nTeachers need admiration and affection, just as much as the society\ngirl does.\n\nUniversities should have, in their faculties, men and women who\nrepresent the best social as well as the best intellectual life of the\nworld--who are not only, in the highest sense of the word, society men\nand women, but who are social leaders, inspiring truth, inculcating\nlarger social ideals of the best sort.\n\nThe problem between capitalist and laborer, however, only affects a\nportion of the world; that of domestic service a still smaller\nproportion; that of teachers affects only a class. There is another\nproblem, which affects nearly all married women, and therefore a large\nsection of the human race. It is the problem of mother-work. Here is\nwhere the economist should next turn his attention. First, What is\nMother-work? Second, What are the best economic conditions under which\nthis work can be done? When we have solved this question, we shall have\nsolved a great human problem.\n\nMother-work includes the bearing and the rearing of children, the\nconduct of a home, and the placing of that home in the right social\natmosphere and relations. It includes manual, intellectual, and\nspiritual labors. The one who lives and works, as God meant her to live\nand work, will never feel over-fatigue. Why do mothers often look so\ntired? It is because they too often do not have what every mother ought\nto have: education, rest, change, a Sabbath-day, individual income,\nintellectual interests, society.\n\nWhether in the simplest home or in the stateliest, there are certain\nmanual things to be done in regard to the care and bringing-up of\nchildren, and the conduct of a home. To make the conditions of a woman's\nlife easier, the very first thing is this: 1. _Women should be educated\nprimarily for home-life._ By this I do not mean that a woman should be\ntaught cooking, and not political economy; that she should be instructed\nin dressmaking and nursery-work, but not in chemistry and logic. I mean\nthat the very fullest education that schools, colleges, universities,\nand foreign travel can give, should be given to the woman who is\nfortunate enough to have them at command, and that every woman,\naccording to the degree of her possibilities of education and\nopportunity, should have the best. But always this education should be\nthought of as a part of her preparation for a woman's life. When boys\nare in a business college, the principal of that college does not forget\nthat among the boys there may be more than one who will never have a\nbusiness life, but who will go out into other interests and pursuits.\nYet he turns the thoughts of _all_ boys in his school specially toward\nbusiness problems. In schools and colleges for women, not all the girls\nwill marry, not all will be mothers, but most of them will be. Is not,\nthen, the normal education of a woman that which, while it does not\ncramp her life in one direction, nor mould her in a set way, yet keeps\nalways in mind the fact that the normal woman is being educated for a\nnormal woman's life?\n\nThis would not necessarily change the curriculum of our colleges in any\nway; it would change the spirit and atmosphere of some of them at once.\nInstead of the spirit being: \"My mind is just as good as a man's. What a\nman can study, I can learn! What a man can do, I can do!\"--the spirit\nwould be this: \"I am going out into a woman's life, and it is my\nbusiness now to take to myself all the wisdom, counsel, experience, and\ninspiration of past ages, that I may be the very grandest woman that\nhistory has yet seen! I will be a land-mark in time: I will be a pivot\nin history around which the earth shall turn. Because of my life, women\nto the end of time shall be able to live a truer, freer, better life!\"\n\nWith this thought in mind, all the academic subjects would still pass\ninto her mind and life, but they would be much more naturally set and\ntheir value would be greatly enhanced. Then we would not have the\ntoo-ambitious woman stepping out of college, or the restless and\ndiscontented one. We would have the large-minded, earnest, noble,\npublic-spirited one, who would go out into the world as a fine type of\nwoman, to live a woman's life and do a woman's work. Married or\nunmarried, she would still have a woman's interests, a woman's\ninfluence, a woman's charm.\n\nThis higher education may or may not include practical studies in\ndomestic science, nursing, and household emergencies, but she should\nlearn somewhere the elements of these studies, so that when she goes\ninto a home of her own her duties and responsibilities will not be met\nin a half-hearted and untrained way.\n\n2. Mothers should have rest-hours and rest-days. Is it not something\nextraordinary, from a purely economic point of view, that while it is\nwidely recognized that every one should have one day in seven for rest,\nthat while business men are expected to close up their offices on the\nSabbath, and all working men and women are given this day in the stores,\nthe factories, and mines--the cook and maids have their Sundays out, and\ntheir week-day afternoons--that nowhere on earth, so far as I know, has\nthere ever been a systematic arrangement by which mothers, as a class,\nhave any specially arranged hours or days for rest! A baby's care does\nnot stop on the Sabbath, and the average mother is practically on duty,\nat least over-seeing, day and night, twenty-four hours out of the\ntwenty-four, from one end of the year to the other, no matter how many\nmaids and nurses she may have in her employ!\n\n3. Personal income and its use. What we buy marks our own individuality,\nas well as what we do. The woman whose father or husband adjusts her\nexpenses and expenditures cannot by any possibility be the kind of woman\nthat the one is who chooses her own things, and spends her money\nabsolutely to suit herself. When a man buys cigars or fishing-tackle,\nhis wife may prefer to buy oratorios and golf-clubs.\n\n4. Mothers should have some interest outside of home-tasks, to keep them\nin touch with world-interests and world-tasks. Not all mother's duty is\ninside the four walls of her home. The race has demands upon her, as\nwell as her own child. She ought to be guarded from that short-sighted\nand selfish devotion which makes her look upon her child as the centre\nof the universe, and which leads her to sacrifice every hour, every\nthought, every talent, to him alone.\n\n5. Building up the place of a home in a community means much more than a\nrivalry with one's neighbors, as to which one shall have the cleanest\nhouse, the prettiest or most expensive curtains and furniture, who shall\nentertain the most, and whose children shall present the best appearance\nin the world! Making a social place for a family involves a very wide\nacquaintance with really great social ideals; with the best instincts\nand customs; with world refinement and manners, as well as those of\none's own town or village--with the social possibilities of life in\ngeneral, as well as the etiquette of Quinton's Corners! To give the\nright stamp upon her home, a mother must have a social life, as well as\ndomestic one. She must have time to enter somewhat into the activities\nof her own neighborhood, and must have society after marriage, as well\nas before.\n\nIt is a different sort of society that she then needs. It is not a\nboy-and-girl society, with its crude ways, and its adolescent ideas of\nlife. It is the society of earnest, cultured, and public-spirited men\nand women, each of whom is adding something to the general store of\ninterest and ideals; each of whom is doing some phase of social work,\naccording to his own talent and opportunity.\n\nWhen a mother steps out into life in this large way, makes education and\ntraining tributary to her mother-life, and does not stop growing\nintellectually or spiritually,--her charm as a woman increases, instead\nof diminishes, every year of her married life. Her looks mark her\neverywhere as a supremely happy woman, and she goes out into the world\nmarked with that strange, deep, grand impress of motherhood and\nwomanhood, which has always made the true woman not only a\nworking-mother, but a love-crowned queen!\n\nThese and many other thoughts flit over one's mind in looking at any\nphase of work, or any piece of work. In the right choice of work lies\nthe fullest use of one's capacities; in the right conditions of work\nlies the freest play of one's energies; in the right spirit of work lies\nthe way of one's lasting happiness, and the foretaste of eternal joys.\n\nThus the world is seen to consist of great cycles of workers, rising in\ntiers one above another. Those who do not work are quickly cut out from\nall participation in race-progress and in race-delights; those who work\nearnestly, but blindly, have their small reward. But those who work with\nspiritual energy and enthusiasm are weaving their handiwork into the\nvery fibre of the universal frame. It is for these spiritual workers\nthat the great eagerness of life is undying; for them there is no shadow\nof fatigue; for them there is the joy of mastery and accomplishment; for\nthem the peace of soul that comes from the triumphant achievement of\none's mission to mankind!\n\nTHE END","title":"The Warriors","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":48038}