{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_52854/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_52854","id":"gutenberg_52854","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/52854","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Christian life","Soldiers -- Religious life"],"text":"Produced by Al Haines.\n\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: KING ARTHUR _From a drawing by L. A. Hume-Williams._]\n\n\n\n\n                          *KNIGHTS IN ARMOUR*\n\n\n                       _By_ EDWARD S. WOODS, M.A\n\n                            Chaplain of the\n                   Royal Military College, Sandhurst\n                               Author of\n             \"Modern Discipleship and What It Means,\" etc.\n\n\n\n                              Foreword by\n                     GENERAL SIR WILLIAM ROBERTSON,\n                       K.C.B., K.C.V.O., D.S.O.,\n                  Chief of the Imperial General Staff\n\n\n\n                          LONDON: ROBERT SCOTT\n                            ROXBURGHE HOUSE\n                         PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.\n                                 MCMXVI\n\n                         _All rights reserved_\n\n\n\n\n                                   To\n                   Many Officers and Gentlemen Cadets\n               of the Royal Military College, Sandhurst,\n               who by unvarying friendliness end goodwill\n                     made easier their Padre's task\n                            this little book\n                      is affectionately dedicated\n\n\n\n\n                               *FOREWORD*\n\n\nA feature of peace manoeuvres used to be the \"sham fight.\"  In war there\nare no sham fights.  One has to deal then with stern realities, and to\ncarry burdens which seem to be quite beyond one's powers to sustain.\nEspecially is this the case with those in the position of leaders.  In\nwar, more perhaps than in any other business, men feel the need of\nsomething more than the mere knowledge of their profession, no matter\nhow complete that knowledge may be.\n\nI therefore commend this little book to all soldiers, and more\nparticularly to the younger ones, who desire to go into battle properly\nprepared, for I am satisfied that definite and practical religious\nconvictions form an essential part of every soldier's equipment.\n\nW. R. ROBERTSON.\n_August_ 14, 1916.\n\n\n\n\n                               *CONTENTS*\n\n\nI\nINTRODUCTORY\n\nII\nCOURAGE\n\nIII\nCHIVALRY\n\nIV\nPURITY\n\nV\nLOYALTY\n\n\n\n\n                             *INTRODUCTORY*\n\n\n\"Be strong in the Lord.... Put on the whole armour of God.\"--EPHESIANS\nvi. 10, 11.\n\n\"More than conquerors through Him that loved us.\"--ROMANS viii. 37.\n\n\n\n                          *KNIGHTS IN ARMOUR*\n\n                                  *I*\n\n                             *INTRODUCTORY*\n\n\nTo every Englishman there is something that stirs the blood and fires\nthe imagination in the ancient legends of King Arthur and his Knights of\nthe Round Table, the legends that Tennyson has immortalized in his\n_Idylls of the King_.  It was a splendid vision that gripped the men who\nbound themselves--\n\n    \"To reverence the King, as if He were\n    Their conscience, and their conscience as their King,\n    To break the heathen and uphold the Christ,\n    To ride abroad redressing human wrongs,\n    To speak no slander, no nor listen to it,\n    To honour his own word as if his God's,\n    To lead sweet lives in purest chastity,\n    To love one maiden only, cleave to her,\n    And worship her by years of noble deeds,\n    Until they won her.\"\n\n\nWho, if not soldiers, should be the inheritors and transmitters of these\nnoble traditions?  The highest meaning of a soldier's vocation has many\npoints of contact with this Knightly ideal; and some of the greatest\nsoldiers of our history have been men who were also Knights of the\nCross.  Knights are held to higher ideals and charged with harder tasks\nthan lesser men.  And for you who serve our English King and are not\nunmindful of your allegiance to the King of Kings, I would fain try and\ndraw a picture of what Christian Knighthood may mean.  I think I see, at\nthe least, four qualities, or virtues, which must needs distinguish a\nChristian Knight.  These qualities are Courage, Chivalry, Purity,\nLoyalty.\n\n\n\n\n                               *COURAGE*\n\n\n    He who would valiant be\n    'Gainst all disaster,\n    Let him in constancy\n      Follow the Master.\n    There's no discouragement\n    Shall make him once relent\n    His first avowed intent\n      To be a pilgrim.\n\n    Who so beset him round\n    With dismal stories,\n    Do but themselves confound--\n      His strength the more is.\n    No foes shall stay his might,\n    Though he with giants fight:\n    He will make good his right\n      To be a pilgrim.\n\n    Since, Lord, Thou dost defend\n    Us with Thy Spirit,\n    We know we at the end\n      Shall life inherit.\n    Then fancies flee away!\n    I'll fear not what men say,\n    I'll labour night and day\n      To be a pilgrim.\n\n    JOHN BUNYAN.\n\n\n\n                                  *II*\n\n                               *COURAGE*\n\n\nA wounded Highlander was describing one day to his ward Sister, in a\nburst of confidence, the circumstances in which he was hit.  \"We were\nadvancing a wee bit through a cornfield and the corn was bonny, thick\nand tall.  Then they turned their machine-guns on us, and I saw the corn\ncut and flicker, and the men fall and fall!  God forgive me!  I couldn't\nface it! ... I turned aside, mem, and I _hid_ on my face in the uncut\ncorn.\"\n\nThere was a pause.  He moistened his lips with his tongue and went on:\n\"Well, I lay there and lay I there, and I could hear the bullets going\nswish, swish through the corn. Then something said to me 'Jock! will ye\nlie here to be shot like a rabbit in the harvest? Get up, and take your\ndose like a man!'  So I got up, mem, and I got it right enough!\"[1]\n\n\n[1] _Time and Talents_, July, 1916, p. 81.\n\n\nThe brave man--and that Scotchman was brave indeed--is not necessarily a\nman who doesn't feel fear; he is one who doesn't yield to it.  Even that\nhero General Gordon used to say he felt afraid when in action.  Most of\nus would like to run away; but most manage, somehow, to \"stick it out.\"\nThere are other situations where it is just as important, and almost as\ndifficult, to \"stick it out\" as in a shell-plagued trench.  There is\nanother War on hand, and the man who takes his place on this front will\nneed all the pluck that he can muster.\n\nIt is useless to disguise the fact that to be a Christian means you are\nin for a fight--and a stiff one at that.  Some people seem to think of\nthe Christian religion as if it were a kind of Sunday Club, or a rest\ncure, or a mutual benefit society.  But Christianity is not a passive\nthing at all. If you are going to be a Christian you have got to take\nsides in the eternal war of Right against Wrong; and a man cannot take\nsides without taking hard knocks too. We sometimes speak of War as if it\nwere a kind of great game.  Here is the greatest Game of all.  And, as a\nChristian, you are not spectator, linesman or referee: you are one of\nthe team; and it's \"up to\" you to strip and get going and play the game\nfor all you are worth.\n\nAnd what of the fight?  Who is the enemy, and how are we to fight him?\nYou won't need field glasses to see his front line.  \"A soldier's first\nand last battle is with himself.\"  The enemy outside owes much of his\nstrength and success to his traitorous ally within the gates.  Many a\nman's worst foe is in his own heart and life. There are things that\nstart from within, habits of thought or word or deed, which definitely\nmilitate against a man being a true Knight and a Christian gentleman.\nThere can be no truce with these things. The Christian Knight has got to\nstand up against them.  And if he feels--and who does not?--that he is\nwoefully lacking in the needed strength and courage, then let him turn\nonce more to the living Son of God, Who alone can make weak men strong,\nand Who loves to do it.\n\nBut the man who wants to \"fight the good fight with all his might\" is\ncalled to tilt against the evil without as well as the evil within.  It\nis a caricature of Christianity which makes it out to be simply a\nprovision for each man to save his own skin and qualify for heaven.\nChrist did indeed come to save men; but He did it, not to ensure their\npersonal safety and exempt them from fighting, but to enlist them for\never on the side of God and Righteousness.  The dimensions and issues of\n_this_ War are such as to demand the utmost from every Christian\nsoldier.  On all sides of us Evil is everywhere entrenched, and in\npositions that often seem impregnable; his worldwide forces are knit in\nclose alliance, and fight with the veteran skill of age-long experience.\nHere in the England that we love, in any town, or village, in any school\nor regiment, on any day, the Enemy is visibly, incessantly striving to\nwork grievous hurt on our manhood and womanhood.  Who, if not Knights of\nthe Cross, shall withstand him and fight him to the death?  William\nBlake's well-known lines might well serve as a motto for the Christian\nsoldier:\n\n    \"I will not cease from mental fight,\n      Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand,\n    Till we have built Jerusalem\n      In England's green and pleasant land.\"\n\n\nThere is, in this campaign, no question of travelling to some distant\ntheatre of operations, nor of waiting for a selected moment.  You begin\nat once, and just where you are.  Perhaps that is why the fighting needs\nsome stiff courage.  \"To ride _abroad_ redressing human wrongs\" would\nhave all the glamour of a great adventure.  But to strike a blow for\nTruth and Right, and keep lifted high the Colours of the King of Kings,\nin your own immediate circle, where you know the others and the others\nknow you--that needs real grit.  All the more because if you do that you\nmay easily find yourself alone.  Most people make no attempt to swim\nagainst the stream, they float down with it.  The line of least\nresistance, and the path of popularity, are barred to the Christian\nKnight. As _Christian_ said to _By-ends_ in the _Pilgrim's Progress_:\n\"If you will go with us, you must go against Wind and Tide: you must\nalso own Religion in his rags, as well as when in his silver slippers;\nand stand by him too when bound in irons, as well as when he walketh the\nstreets with applause.\"\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\nAgain and again, in Flanders, in Gallipoli, and on every front, courage\nhas shown itself to be a contagious thing.  Fired by an undaunted\nleader, cheered by stout hearts at his side, many a man has proved\nhimself braver than he ever thought to be. In one of his campaigns the\nDuke of Wellington happened, on one occasion, to be absent from the army\nand rode up just as it was retreating.  A soldier saw him and shouted\nout, \"Yonder is Lord Wellington. God bless him.\"  The shout was taken up\nby the whole force; the retreating army was inspired to a fresh effort,\nturned and drove the enemy headlong.  Jesus Christ has a like effect on\nthose who get near enough to Him to feel the magic of His influence. It\njust makes you a _man_ to be in His company.\n\n    \"I have a Captain,\n    And the heart of every valiant man\n    Has drunk in valour from His eyes\n    Since first the War began.\n    He is most merciful in fight.\n    And of His scars a single sight\n    The embers of our failing might\n      Into a flame can fan.\"\n\n\n\n\n                               *CHIVALRY*\n\n\n\"He saved others: Himself He cannot save.\"--ST. MATTHEW xxvii. 42.\n\n\"Ye ought to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how He Himself said,\nIt is more blessed to give than to receive.\"--ACTS xx. 35.\n\n    \"Follow the Christ, the King,\n    Live pure, speak true, right wrong, follow the king--\n    Else, wherefore born?\"--TENNYSON.\n\n\n\n                                 *III*\n\n                               *CHIVALRY*\n\n\nIn the Middle Ages the lesser nobles used to follow their chiefs on\nhorseback; they were called _Knights_ (the word originally meant\nservants, in German _Knechte_) and the system of knightly rules and\ncustoms was called chivalry (French _chevalerie_). The order of\nknighthood was only bestowed after many years of training and\ndiscipline. In later times the movement lost its early meaning and\nusefulness; but for many centuries the traditions and ideals of\nknighthood did much to keep alive the Christian standard of a pure and\ncourageous manhood.\n\nOn one of the last days of His earthly life Jesus Christ did a thing\nthat astounded the men who saw it.  At the close of a supper with the\ninner circle of His followers, He took water and a towel and went round\nthe little company washing each man's feet in turn.  And then He\nexplained to them His acted parable.  He told them that they, like\nHimself, were put in the world to _serve_: \"not to be ministered unto\nbut to minister.\"  They learnt their lesson; and for the rest of their\nlives every man, save one, spent himself ungrudgingly in serving others.\n\nThe word knight, as we saw, means \"servant\"; and it is not for nothing\nthat the Army and Navy are called \"The Services.\"  Taught by stern\ndiscipline, the soldier and the sailor know that self counts nothing,\nand others everything.  That is perhaps the biggest truth in life.  Many\npeople had forgotten it before the War; but we have learnt it now.  That\ngreat host who have laid down their lives for their friends, and those\ncountless others who have learnt to hold the nation dearer than safety\nand comfort, than pleasure and money--all these have shown it to be\nstartlingly true that a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of\nthings that he possesseth; and that it is verily \"more blessed to give\nthan to receive.\"  Chivalry is re-born; Honour has come to its own\nagain.  As that young poet sang so truly and beautifully, shortly before\nhe gave his own life:[1]\n\n\n[1] Rupert Brooke died in the Aegean, April, 1915, aged 28.  From _1914\nand Other Poems_.\n\n\n    \"Blow out, you bugles, over the rich Dead!\n      There's none of these so lonely and poor of old,\n      But, dying, has made us rarer gifts than gold.\n    These laid the world away; poured out the red\n      Sweet wine of youth; gave up the years to be\n      Of work and joy, and that unhoped serene,\n      That men call age; and those who would have been,\n    Their sons, they gave, their immortality.\n\n    \"Blow, bugles, blow!  They brought us, for our dearth,\n      Holiness, lacked so long, and Love, and Pain.\n    Honour has come back, as a king, to earth,\n      And paid his subjects with a royal wage;\n    And Nobleness walks in our ways again;\n      And we have come into our heritage.\"\n\n\nTrue knights are called to chivalrous service, not in war-time only, or\njust for a temporary Cause, but always, and everywhere, on behalf of\nall.  If Christians generally lived up to this Christian ideal, and\ncared little for _getting_, but everything for _giving_, the world would\nrapidly become a very different place.  Selfishness is the cause of\nnearly all our ills; and chivalry is just the opposite of selfishness.\nThere is no chivalry in the man who is wrapped up in his own affairs,\nand who turns a cold eye on all except his own particular friends. It is\nchivalry that makes you interested in that other fellow who happens to\nbe less fortunately situated than yourself, and sets you wondering how\nyou would like it if you were in his shoes, until at last you feel you\nmust somehow find some way of being a friend to him and giving him a\nhelping hand.  And it is chivalry that is always on the watch to protect\nthe defenceless.  In every group of people, in all sections of society,\nthere are always some individuals who seem curiously unable to fend for\nthemselves and invariably get pushed to the wall.  Do you do your share\nin the general pushing?  Or do you, with Christian chivalry, try and\nstand up for those who cannot or do not stand up for themselves?\n\nThe chivalrous man, moreover, is never unfair nor unmerciful.  War-time\nmakes a big demand on the qualities of fairness and mercy.  Thank God\nour Nation has, on the whole, and despite terrible provocation, shown\nitself to be a chivalrous foe to the enemy.  If you are going to be\nchivalrous, there is no room for vengeance or retaliation. Soldiers and\nsailors know this by instinct, and act accordingly.  I always notice\nthat it is newspaper people, and people who sit snug in their arm-chairs\nat home, who talk so loud about reprisals and retaliation.  In the\ntrenches it's quite different.  When Thomas Atkins takes a prisoner he\ngenerally offers him a cigarette.  As an Officer said the other day,\n\"Tommy's only idea, when he catches these fellows, is to feed them.\"  At\nleast that is his usual practice, whatever his theories are about what\nhe will do to the \"blanked Hun\" when he catches him. A recent number of\n_Punch*[2] had a lovely description of Thomas Atkins' vengeance. A\nCavalry outpost in Egypt, sweltering in the heat, devoured by\nmosquitoes, in a temper reflecting the choice surroundings, decides that\nthe only thing to do with wandering parties of the treacherous Arabs is\nto shoot them at sight.  Sudden report from the sentry: \"Corporal, I can\nsee 'alf-a-dozen of them blighters coming along about a mile away.\nShall I give 'em one?\"  \"No, you idiot,\" says the Corporal, \"Let's 'ave\na look at 'em first.\"  There arrives on the scene a middle-aged Arab,\ndressed in indescribable rags, and in the last stage of exhaustion, and\ndecidedly populous as to his person; various members of his family are\nhovering about a short distance away. He falls flat on his face at the\nsight of the Corporal, crying, \"Bimbashi, bimbashi, mongeries,\nmongeries.\"  \"Yes, I'll bash yer all right,\" says the Corporal,\n\"Grey-'eaded old reprobate, you ought to know better.\"  \"Lor',\" comments\none of the Troopers, \"'e do look thin, pore beggar, *Mongeries_--that\nmeans food, don't it?  'E looks as if 'e hadn't eaten nothing for weeks.\n'Ere, 'ave a biscuit, old Sport.\"  \"Try 'im with some bully,\" suggests\nanother Trooper; \"they say they won't eat that, though.\"  \"Won't 'e!\"\nsays the first, \"I never seen the stuff go so quick.  'Ere, old fellow,\ndon't eat the tin.\"  \"Don't give him any more,\" says the Corporal, \"or\n'e'll kill 'isself.  Let's see if his family can do the disappearing\ntrick as quick as he can.  Poor devils they've been through something.\n'Ere, you family, _mongeries_.\"  The family are brought up and fed on\nthe day's rations.  \"Take 'em back to camp now,\" orders the Corporal,\n\"and 'and 'em over.  Come on, old boy; you're all right.  Lor', ain't\nthey pretty near done. Lucky they found us when they did.\"  Such is the\nway of Thomas ... and it is the way of chivalry; and that is the way of\nChrist. \"If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirsts, give him\ndrink.\"\n\nAnother mark of the chivalrous man is the stainless honour of all his\nrelations with women.  In the days of our fathers and grandfathers it\nwas thought very important that the relations between men and women\nshould always be what was called \"proper,\" with the result that they\noften became self-conscious, stilted, affected, and even stupid. In our\nday there is a strong reaction against those Victorian ideas and\nmanners.  This reaction is very natural, and much of it is sane and\nsound.  The relation between the sexes to-day is often that of a\nhealthy, happy, easy comradeship, born of sport or some other rational\njoint interest, a thing of the open air, metaphorically as well as\nliterally.  And there are many men who have cause to bless a blameless\nfriendship with a good woman.  But if some profit by this new liberty,\nothers, it must be confessed, have shown themselves less worthy of it.\nIt is all too easy for the man of to-day to fall below the standard\nwhich is planted in the conscience and instinct of every true gentleman.\nThere is much--too much--in modern life to make men think that women are\nin the world just to minister to their amusement and gratification, and\nto make women acquiesce in that idea. There are those who deliberately\ngive effect to that degraded conception.  There are others who, without\ndescending to vice, have half-unconsciously allowed their thought of the\nman and woman relationship to be lowered and coarsened.  Influenced by\nthe presentment of life which they see at most theatres and cinemas, and\nin a certain type of novel, they learn to think of love as something\neasy, exciting, pleasurable, irresponsible, unfettered by ordinary\nrestraints, something to be gazed at, feasted on, dissected, toyed with;\nand so perhaps they come to play with love in their own experience, and\nthus both work grievous hurt on other lives, and, for themselves,\nfritter away in little bits, cheaply and unthinkingly, that which is the\nvery highest thing in all the capacity and heritage of their manhood.\nFar otherwise is it with the man who is mindful of the dictates of true\nchivalry. His whole thought of womanhood is on a different level,\nbreathes another atmosphere. For him, Love is a high and holy thing, to\nbe revered, not played with.  For him, all that womanhood is and may be,\nthe tender grace and charm, the beauty of form and face, the appeal of\nher dependence, the subtle surprises of her companionship, the\nministries of her sympathy, the wonder of her friendship, the selfless\nglory of her love--all this he sees to be God's sheer gift for the\nblessing of humanity.  Something of this vision, this instinct, will be\nat the back of his mind in all his contact with the women he knows and\nsees.  And, therefore, his one guiding principle as he meets and mixes\nwith them will be--_reverence_.  A deep reverence for womanhood is the\nhall-mark of true chivalry.\n\n\n[2] May 10, 1916.\n\n\nDoes this seem an impossibly high standard for a man who has to live his\nlife in modern society?  Perhaps it would be out of reach of us ordinary\nmen, if it were not for a new and mighty spiritual stimulus which, if we\nwill, we may make our own. The secret of chivalry, like the secret of\ncourage, may be learned in the companionship of the one perfect\nchivalrous Gentleman that the world has seen--Jesus of Nazareth. He,\nborn of a human mother, acquainted with family love.  Friend of gentle\nwomen, for ever blessed and sanctified the friendship and love of men\nand women.  From the Manger to the Cross He lived out and taught the\nfirst law of all chivalry, the great guiding principle of all human\nrelationships, the highest glory both of manhood and womanhood, that it\nis ever more blessed to give than to receive.  As Charles Kingsley,\nhimself a most chivalrous gentleman, sung of his Master in lines noble\nand true:\n\n    \"He taught mankind on that first Christmas Day\n    What 'twas to be a man; to give, not take;\n    To serve, not rule; to nourish, not devour;\n    To help, not crush; if need to die, not live.\"\n\n\n\n[Illustration: SIR GALAHAD _Photo F. Hollyer G. F. Watts, R.A. by\npermission of Mrs. Watts_]\n\n\n\n\n                                *PURITY*\n\n\n\"And I saw ... and behold a white horse; and He that sat upon him was\ncalled Faithful and True... And His armies followed Him upon white\nhorses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean.\"--REV. xix. 11, 14.\n\n\"Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost?\"--1 COR.\nvi. 19.\n\n    God who created me\n      Nimble and light of limb,\n    In three elements free,\n      To run, to ride, to swim:\n    Not when the sense is dim,\n      But now from the heart of joy,\n    I would remember Him:\n      Take the thanks of a boy.\n\n    Jesu, King and Lord,\n      Whose are my foes to fight.\n    Gird me with Thy sword,\n      Swift and sharp and bright.\n    Thee would I serve if I might;\n      And conquer if I can.\n    From day-dawn till night,\n      Take the strength of a man.\n\n    Spirit of Love and Truth,\n      Breathing in grosser clay,\n    The light and flame of youth.\n      Delight of men in the fray.\n    Wisdom in strength's decay;\n      From pain, strife, wrong to be free.\n    This best gift I pray,\n      Take my spirit to Thee.--HENRY CHARLES BEECHING\n\n\n\n                                  *IV*\n\n                                *PURITY*\n\n\nOne of the old legends of King Arthur and his Knights concerns that\nwhich men called the \"Holy Grail.\"  The story ran that the Holy Grail,\nwhich was the cup used at Christ's last supper with His disciples, was\ntreasured carefully by Joseph of Arimathaea and brought by him,\nultimately, to Glastonbury.\n\n    \"And there awhile it abode; and if a man\n    Could touch or see it, he was healed at once,\n    By faith, of all his ills.  But then the times\n    Grew to such evil that the holy cup\n    Was caught away to heaven and disappeared.\"\n\n\nLater, in the days of King Arthur, the vision of the cup returned again.\nIt was a memorable day.  The seat at the Round Table, the \"Siege\nPerilous,\" left ever empty for the coming of one who should, be worthy\nto sit therein, was filled at last by the young and fair and pure Sir\nGalahad, brought thither by the \"ancient clothed in white.\"  He was clad\nin white armour, with no sword or shield save only an empty scabbard\nhanging by his side.  Thereupon the second marvel of that day took\nplace. The fair sword, stuck fast in the great stone of red marble,\nwhich no other Knight had been able to move, was lightly and easily\ndrawn by Sir Galahad, who said as he took it, \"For the surety of this\nsword I brought none with me; for here by my side hangeth the scabbard.\"\nThat same evening, after even-song in the great minster at Camelot, they\nwere all at supper in Arthur's Hall.  \"And all at once,\" runs the old\nlegend, retold in Tennyson's verse,\n\n    \"And all at once, as there we sat, we heard\n    A cracking and a riving of the roofs,\n    And rending, and a blast, and overhead\n    Thunder, and in the thunder was a cry.\n    And in the blast there smote along the hall\n    A beam of light seven times more clear than day.\n    And down the long beam stole the Holy Grail\n    All over cover'd with a luminous cloud,\n    And none might see who bare it, and it past.\n    But every Knight beheld his fellow's face\n    As in a glory, and all the Knights arose....\"\n\n\nAll saw the light, and heard the sounds, but Sir Galahad alone had sight\nof the Grail itself.  Whereupon all the rest took solemn vows to ride a\ntwelvemonth and a day in quest of it.  And the legend goes on to tell\nhow they fared and what adventures they had in their quest.\n\nIt is a beautiful and significant story. G.F. Watts, the artist, caught\nthe spirit of it in his well-known picture of Sir Galahad standing by\nhis white horse, with purity of vision and strength of high resolve\nwritten on every line of his uplifted face.  Both legend and picture\nseem to catch and illumine an idea that was fundamental in the whole\nconception of Knighthood, the idea that the true Knight must be pure in\nheart.  Sir Galahad stands forth as the type and embodiment of strong\nand pure manhood.\n\nSermons on sin and exhortations to holiness may leave us cold, but this\nKnightly ideal carries an appeal that is permanent and powerful; it\ncannot fail to find some response in the heart of anyone who is a real\nman.  For the point is that Sir Galahad, with all his purity, was no\nmilksop, no untempted saint; he was uncommonly strong in the right arm,\nas other men found to their cost.  But there was, and is always, a\ndeep-down connexion between what a man is and what he does.  A man's\nwhole life is the product and expression of the real quality of the\nhidden self.  The nature of the tree determines the fruit.  The question\nof purity has its roots in these secret places of a man's being that lie\nhid from any human eye.  \"There is nothing,\" insisted Christ, \"from\nwithout a man that entering into him can defile him, but the things\nwhich come out of him, from within, out of the heart ... those are they\nthat defile the man.\"[1]\n\n\n[1] St. Mark vii. 15, 21.\n\n\nPsychologists tell us that below the level of our conscious thought\nthere are large subterranean places where the things we hear and read\nand think about are being stored up.  The things that come up to the\nsurface, whether we produce them voluntarily--'remember' them, or\nwhether they come up unbidden when our upper minds are empty and\nreceptive, naturally are of the stock that is stored below.  What sort\nof stock are you accumulating in your mental underground?  What sort of\npictures hang in the most private galleries of your mind?  What kind of\nthoughts come floating up from those mysterious depths, and what are the\nthoughts that you most enjoy thinking?  There is many a man who is often\nvisited by thoughts that he would rather be without; they seem to catch\non to some part of him that has a sneaking liking for them, and he\ncannot dislodge these unwelcome guests. He is almost conscious of a sort\nof dual personality: part of him wants what is clean and good, but the\nrest of him seems a very odd mixture which he is powerless to regulate\nor alter.  He feels that he would make a better affair of life if only\nall the parts of him would push together in the right direction.  Is\nthere any way of achieving such a state of affairs?  I know of no other\ncertain way but one.  There is only one power I ever heard of that could\nplumb the depths of a human soul and transform the quality of all the\nstuff that lies down there, and clean out all the refuse, and stiffen\nthe dethroned will and put it back in its place of power--and that is\nthe \"Spirit\" of Jesus Christ.  It is said of the great John Nicholson,\nthat wonderful leader of men, that, however desperate the circumstances,\nhis presence could put new heart into a whole camp.  It is just that,\nwith yet deeper result, that Christ does for those who trust Him.  He\ntold His followers that if they would open their hearts to receive Him,\nHe would give them His Spirit; by which He meant that, inspired by His\ninfluence, they would actually become like Him, and think His thoughts,\nand will His will, and live the kind of life He lived. What He said\nwould happen _does happen_; and not just \"Saints\" but ordinary people\nfind that _He_ can make them true and pure in a way that nothing else\ncan.\n\n    \"Spirit of purity and grace.\n    Our weakness pitying see;\n    Oh make our hearts Thy dwelling place\n      And worthier Thee.\"\n\nThose words contain not a beautiful aspiration but a literal\npossibility.\n\nOnce a man begins to make this great discovery, all sorts of results\nensue.  Lost things are found again, among them that happy, guileless\ncertainty of God which is childhood's heritage and which so often slips\naway when men grow older.  Life gets crowded and men lose sight of God;\nsome men even think He is not there because they have lost the knack of\nlooking for Him. If you cannot see properly through a telescope it is\nrash to conclude that the object you are looking for is not there; it\nwould be better to clean the lens.  It is not God who deserts us; it is\nwe who, blinded by sin, miss Him.  \"Blessed are the pure in heart, for\nthey shall see God.\"  Here again it is not the \"Saints\" only who are\ngifted with this capacity for spiritual vision.  It is the birthright of\nevery man and woman born into the world.  The path of purity is a right\nof way, and the place of vision has no fences round it; all who will may\nenter there, and there is none to forbid them but themselves.  I believe\nthere are numbers of men who have a dim consciousness of these great\npossibilities but who, from one cause or another, have never really\nbegun to explore them.  The one thing needful, for many a man, is simply\nthat he should _give his soul a chance_.  Early in the War there was\nkilled in France at the age of twenty, a man of brilliant endowments and\nhigh promise--Charles Sorley, of Marlborough and University College,\nOxford. A few months before his death he wrote these lines, which put\ninto winged words this haunting sense of unexplored spiritual\npossibilities,--\n\n    \"From morn to midnight, all day through,\n    I laugh and play as others do,\n    I sin and chatter just the same\n    As others with a different name.\n\n    And all year long upon the stage\n    I dance and tumble and do rage\n    So vehemently, I scarcely see\n    The inner and eternal me.\n\n    I have a temple I do not\n    Visit, a heart I have forgot,\n    A self that I have never met,\n    A secret shrine--and yet, and yet\n\n    This sanctuary of my soul\n    Unwitting I keep white and whole,\n    Unlatched and lit, if Thou should'st care\n    To enter or to tarry there.\n\n    With parted lips and outstretched hands\n    And listening ears Thy servant stands;\n    Call Thou early, call Thou late,\n    To Thy great service dedicate.\"\n\n\nThe War is creating a hunger for reality, and above all for spiritual\nreality.  \"Break me, O God, destroy me if you will, but save me from\nself-complacency and little interests and little successes and the life\nthat passes as the shadows of a dream.\"\n\nIf purity is the condition of vision, it is also the secret of strength.\n\n    \"My strength is as the strength of ten\n    Because my heart is pure.\"\n\nSir Galahad had made the discovery which true men always make.  Sin is a\nsource of weakness.  Purity is a fount of strength. Unclean men are\nnever conquerors--they have lost the first and most important of\nbattles, that with themselves.  It was not for nothing that Lord\nKitchener emphasized the supreme importance of self control in his\nfamous letter to the troops at the beginning of the War.  \"Success in\nWar,\" says the Field Service Regulations, \"depends more on the moral\nthan on the physical qualities.\"  Foremost among moral forces is that\nwonderful thing, all powerful though difficult to define, which men call\n_discipline_.  Of the many qualities which make up discipline, there is\none of unrivalled importance, which it partly evokes and partly creates,\nand that is self-control.  It is of the essence of discipline that a man\nshould learn entirely to subordinate his own wish or pleasure or safety\nto a larger common purpose.  Standing in the ranks he must control the\ndesire to move his head or fidget with his hands. In the face of the\nenemy he must control his desire to run away.  At all times and in all\nplaces he must control his desire to consult his own comfort or\nconvenience. Such self-control involves a considerable measure of moral\nstrength.  Will a man be strong here, where strength is so needed, if\nall the while he is gravely weak in the region of his inner life?  Is it\nlikely that he will be able to inspire others with cheerful fortitude in\nface of hardships and death if the very source is fouled whence his own\nstrength must be drawn?\n\nWith all possible emphasis I would press this point upon you, that there\nis a vital connexion between purity and moral strength. And I urge it,\nnot simply for your own sakes, but even more because of what you may be\nand do for others.  \"For their sakes I consecrate myself.\"  The motive\nof that one perfect life is the only adequate motive for us who try to\nbe His followers.  How can I serve others, if my own soul is shackled in\niron bonds?  How can I fight for righteousness, in this War or in the\nGreater War, if in my own heart and life I have secret dealings with the\nenemy?\n\nThe Knights of Christ are men who have no use for dirt of any kind.\n\"And I beheld a white horse, and He that sat upon him was called\nFaithful and True, and in righteousness He doth judge and make War ...\nand the armies which were in heaven followed Him upon white horses,\nclothed in fine linen, white and clean.\"[2]  There is nothing so unclean\nbut that Christ can cleanse it; and to all who would be His Warriors He\ncan, and He does, give the white armour which they must have.  Here is\nthe greatest soldiering of all.  It is worth the struggle to be a better\nman, it is worth the effort of faith which will let Him re-make your\nlife, if thereby you may be fit to take your place in His Army and go\nafter Him as He rides forth to conquer in the Holy War.\n\n\n[2] Revelation xix. 11, 14.\n\n\n\n\n                               *LOYALTY*\n\n\n\"Not every one that saith unto Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the\nKingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of My Father which is in\nheaven.\"--ST. MATTHEW vii. 21.\n\n\"Be Thou the King, and we will work Thy will Who Love Thee.\"--TENNYSON.\n\n    \"Jesus shall reign where'er the sun\n    Does his successive journeys run;\n    His Kingdom stretch from shore to shore,\n    Till moons shall wax and wane no more.\"--ISAAC WATTS.\n\n\n\n                                  *V*\n\n                               *LOYALTY*\n\n\nThe Coronation Service of His Majesty King George V. is still a\ncomparatively recent event.  The whole ceremony is, as many will\nremember, full of beautiful symbolism.  One of the most moving and\ndramatic moments is that when, after the King has been crowned, his\nchief subjects come forward to kneel down and do him homage.  One after\nanother the Archbishops, the Princes of the Blood Royal and the Peers of\nthe Realm, kneel down, putting off their coronets, and pronounce the\nwords of homage: \"I do become your liege man of life and limb, and of\nearthly worship; and faith and truth I will bear unto you, to live and\ndie, against all manner of folks. So help me God.\"  And then, proceeds\nthe rubric, \"the Peers having done their Homage, the first of each\nOrder, putting off his coronet, shall singly ascend the throne, and\nstretching forth his hand, touch the Crown on His Majesty's head, as\npromising by that ceremony for himself and his Order to be ever ready to\nsupport it with all their power; and then shall he kiss the King's\ncheek.\"  This sense of owing loyal service to a King is an immemorial\ninstinct in men.  And it is a deep-rooted tradition that those who are\nhis \"Knights\" are bound to him in the closest ties of honourable\nobligation.  In the earliest centuries of our national history the King\nused to have his \"war band,\" bound personally to him by their free\nchoice, and sworn to fight for him to the death.  He was their \"lord,\"\nthey his \"thegns.\"\n\nMost of us call ourselves \"Christians.\"  Have you realized that to be a\nChristian, in the true sense of the word, means nothing less than that\nyou are Christ's \"liege man of life and limb,\" and that you are utterly\ncommitted \"faith and truth to bear unto Him, to live and die, against\nall manner of folks?\"  This personal devotion to the living Christ is\nthe most central thing in Christianity.  If a man is going to be a real\nChristian it will mean more than just assenting to the Creed, and going\nto Church, and \"feeling religious\" at favourable moments.  It will mean\nentering into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and letting Him\nbe in command, not on specified occasions, but every day and all the\ntime. The difficulty with many people is that Christianity only touches\nthe circumference of their existence and never seems to get established\nright at the centre of heart and life.  It simply makes the whole\ndifference when once you discover that Jesus Christ is a real Person\nWho, on His side, is interested in you and loves to help you and go\nabout with you, and Whom you, on your side, can talk to and lean on and,\ngradually, begin to love.  It is always in this personal way that God in\nChrist offers Himself to men.  He is the Redeemer Who will release you\nfrom the iron bonds of sin, the Friend Who will stand by your side, the\nKing Who would have your loyal service.  And, in order to break for good\nand all the power of sin and death, and that He might found His Kingdom\non the free loyalty of love, _He died_....  It is a common thing for men\nto lay down their lives for king and country; but here is a King dying\nfor His subjects.  Have you ever tried to realize what _sin_ means?  It\nmust mean at least this: that when you and I do wrong we are doing\nsomething that hurts God, something that inevitably puts a barrier\nbetween Him and us.  And is it not premature to speak of love and\nloyalty to Him as long as that barrier is there?  Now, however amazing\nit may seem, there has proved to be no other way but one in which that\nbarrier could be utterly and finally broken down--and God chose that\nway, the way of the Cross.  Deliberately, gladly, the Son of God _died_.\nThat which is a lasting puzzle to theologians and philosophers, is just\nsheer good tidings, and tidings found to be true, to ordinary people who\nare hungry in soul. I always think that at once the simplest and\nprofoundest statement of the meaning of the death of Christ is that\ncontained in the old children's hymn:\n\n    \"He died that we might be forgiven,\n      He died to make us good;\n    That we might go at last to heaven,\n      Saved by His precious blood.\"\n\nCan we withhold our loyalty from Him Who stands before us, not only as a\nKing demanding our rightful allegiance, but as One Who loves us so much\nthat He died for us?\n\n    \"Were the whole realm of Nature mine,\n      That were an offering far too small;\n    Love so amazing, so Divine\n      Demands my soul, my life, my all.\n\n\nOnce you get fairly hold of this idea of Christianity being largely a\nmatter of personal loyalty to Jesus Christ, then your \"religion\" will\nbegin to become alive in all sorts of unsuspected ways.  Prayer will\ncease to be a more or less formal duty which you hardly like to give up,\nand will become instead a real intercourse with God which you find you\ncannot do without.  The Bible, too, will no longer be, what it too often\nis, a mere adjunct of conventional religion, but will become instead a\nliving book, a book which makes you see, as nothing else can, the mind\nand character and purposes of the King you are trying to serve.  Public\nworship will be a pleasure instead of a bore, because you have\ndiscovered its point and meaning.  And the Holy Communion, instead of\nbeing either a religious \"extra\" beyond your reach or else an occasional\neffort out of touch with your ordinary life, will take its place as an\nindispensable means of bringing new life to your soul, as a wonderful\npledge of His amazing love and of all that you long to give Him in\nresponse.\n\nNow there are two things which this loyalty to the King of Kings will\nnecessarily involve.  To be loyal to Him will mean being loyal to the\nChristian Brotherhood and loyal to the Christian Cause.  Loyalty to a\nbrotherhood is a thing that should come naturally to a soldier, or\nindeed to anyone who has imbibed the highest traditions of our Public\nSchools and Universities and Services.  \"Comradeship,\" says a soldier\nwho ought to know, \"Comradeship is the saving characteristic of the\nBritish Army.\"  A man has learnt one of the greatest lessons of life\nwhen he realizes that the honour of the Regiment is of far greater\nmoment than his own personal success, than his life even. As a senior\nsubaltern said to a junior brother officer, when giving him some homely\nadvice on the day that he passed his recruits' drills and was finally\n\"off the square\":--\"All that you've got to remember is that it's the\nRegiment which counts; and you've got to make yourself a credit to\nit.\"[1]  Again and again in this war it has been shown what a wonderful\nforce there is in this Regimental _esprit de corps_.  There can be no\ndoubt--to cite one instance only--that this spirit, this tradition, was\na vital factor in the glorious achievements of the immortal 29th\nDivision at Gallipoli.\n\n\n[1] \"The Making of an Officer.\"  _The Times_, June 8, 1916.\n\n\n\"It's the Regiment which counts.\"  The Christian Church could do with\nmore of this spirit of mutual loyalty.  We are \"members one of another,\"\nurged St. Paul; and yet how little there is of real brotherliness among\nus Christians!  When we find a man is a fellow-Christian, whatever his\nsocial position may be, we ought to have that kind of feeling towards\nhim that we should have if he had been at our school, or belonged to our\nRegiment.  There is no free-masonry like that which links together those\nwho have a common love for Jesus Christ and a common interest in His\npurposes.  Moreover, this sense of being one of a great Brotherhood is a\nspiritual safeguard and incentive.  When you and I fail, it is not just\nour own Christianity that suffers: we are \"letting down\" the whole\nBrotherhood, we are lowering great and immemorial traditions, we are\nproving unworthy of the unnumbered multitude of Christian heroes who, in\nevery generation, have fought the good light of faith. \"_Therefore_,\nsurrounded as we are by such a vast cloud of witnesses let us fling\naside every encumbrance and the sin that so readily entangles our feet,\nand let us run with patient endurance the race that lies before us,\nfixing our gaze on Jesus our Prince Leader in the Faith.\"[2]\n\n\n[2] Hebrews xii 1, 2.  _Weymouth's_ Version.\n\n\nAny genuine loyalty to our \"Prince Leader\" carries with it, of\nnecessity, loyalty to His Cause.  I have said something, in a previous\nChapter, about the call to Christians to do some fighting in the real\nHoly War.  I would urge, once more, that the true Knight of Christ\ncannot do less than place himself, and all that he has, at the disposal\nof his Master's Cause.\n\n\"A Christian,\" says a recent writer, \"is one who believes in _and\nsupports_ the claim of Christ to universal Sovereignty.\"  Christ needs\nmen who will spend themselves in His Cause with the same splendid\ndevotion that men show when they are fighting for their country.  In the\nrecent advance,[3] as the Newfoundland Regiment was pushing along\nthrough a storm of lead, a corporal turned to the man by his side and\nsaid, \"If I go down you take charge and go straight ahead.\"  A minute\nafterwards a bullet hit him in the chest and he dropped.  The man he had\nspoken to tried to lift him up, but he was done for, and his last words\nwere \"Push on with it.\"\n\n\n[3] July, 1916.\n\n\nThose words might serve as a motto for all those who are beginning to\nsee that the greatest Enterprise of all, and one most worth serving, is\nthat of extending the Kingdom of God over the face of the whole earth.\nThe time is ripe indeed for a general Christian offensive.  The war has\nlaid bare, as never before, the moral need of the world, and now is the\nopportunity to begin afresh the task of giving men Christianity, and to\n\"_push on with it_.\"  It is to a mighty Adventure, with big risks and\ngreat sacrifices, that Christ is calling us; and that is the kind of\ncall that a real man always loves to hear.  At the supreme crisis of his\nfortunes, after the capitulation of Rome, Garibaldi, the Saviour of\nItaly, called for volunteers to go after him.  \"I am going out from\nRome,\" he cried; \"I offer neither quarters, nor provisions, nor wages.\nI offer hunger, thirst, forced marches, battles, death.  Let him who\nloves his country with his heart, not with his lips only, follow me.\"\nAnd men streamed out after him into the hills.  That is the spirit in\nwhich Christ summons men to serve _His_ Cause.  \"If any man will come\nafter Me, let him deny himself, and take up his Cross daily, and follow\nMe.\"  And the curious thing is that when men at last cut loose from a\nsnug religion and fling themselves with a certain recklessness into the\nservice of Christ and His Kingdom, then they begin to taste the real joy\nof life.  As at a Coronation, as soon as the homage is accomplished, the\ntrumpets blow.  When a man, at whatever cost, \"does his bit\" in a mighty\nenterprise, then he begins to enjoy \"the top of the fulness of life.\"\nIn one of the battles of history, when in an advance a soldier was\nmortally wounded, a comrade bent over him and cheered him with the\ntidings, \"They have taken the position: the flag is planted on it.\"  A\nfilm was on the eyes of the dying man, and he could see nothing; but\nwith a smile on his face he murmured, \"I helped to put it there.\"  Will\nyou and I be able to say that when the flag of the triumphant Christ is\nunfurled in His final victory?\n\n        \"And the King sat\n    Crown'd on the dais, and his warriors cried,\n    'Be Thou the King, and we will work Thy will\n      Who love Thee.'\"\n\n\nHave you taken these vows?  Christ the King would have your services and\nmake you His Knight.  He _wants_ you, for Himself and for His Cause.  To\nbe wanted by Jesus Christ--who can hold back from a call such as that?\n\n    \"He hath sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call\n            retreat,\n    He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment-seat;\n    Oh! be swift, my soul, to answer Him, be jubilant, my feet:\n      Our God is marching on!\"\n\n\n\n                               *A PRAYER\n                      OF S. RICHARD OF CHICHESTER\n                               1240 A.D.*\n\n    Thanks be to Thee, my Lord Jesus Christ\n      For all the benefits which Thou hast given me,\n      For all the pains and insults, which Thou hast borne for me.\n    O most merciful Redeemer, Friend and Brother,\n      May I know Thee more clearly,\n      Love Thee more dearly,\n      And follow Thee more nearly.  Amen.\n\n\n\n                _Printed for_ ROBERT SCOTT, _Publisher_,\n                  PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON, E.C., _by_\n                        BUTLER & TANNER, FROME.","title":"Knights in Armour","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":8486}