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diff --git a/28163.txt b/28163.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..edbfe0c --- /dev/null +++ b/28163.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6244 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Higher Powers of Mind and Spirit, by +Ralph Waldo Trine + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Higher Powers of Mind and Spirit + +Author: Ralph Waldo Trine + +Release Date: February 23, 2009 [EBook #28163] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HIGHER POWERS OF MIND *** + + + + +Produced by Thierry Alberto, Diane Monico, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + +THE HIGHER POWERS +OF +MIND AND SPIRIT + + +BY +RALPH WALDO TRINE + +AUTHOR OF "IN TUNE WITH THE INFINITE," ETC. + + +LONDON +G. BELL AND SONS, LTD. +1933 + + + + +First published May 1918 +Reprinted November 1918. +Reprinted 1919, 1923, 1927, 1933. + +PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO. LTD. +THE UNIVERSITY PRESS, GLASGOW + + + + +FOREWORD + + +We are all dwellers in two kingdoms, the inner kingdom, the kingdom of +the mind and spirit, and the outer kingdom, that of the body and the +physical universe about us. In the former, the kingdom of the unseen, +lie the silent, subtle forces that are continually determining, and with +exact precision, the conditions of the latter. + +To strike the right balance in life is one of the supreme essentials of +all successful living. We must work, for we must have bread. We require +other things than bread. They are not only valuable, comfortable, but +necessary. It is a dumb, stolid being, however, who does not realize +that life consists of more than these. They spell mere existence, not +abundance, fullness of life. + +We can become so absorbed in making a living that we have no time _for +living_. To be capable and efficient in one's work is a splendid thing; +but efficiency _can be made_ a great mechanical device that robs life of +far more than it returns it. A nation can become so possessed, and even +obsessed, with the idea of power and grandeur through efficiency and +organisation, that it becomes a great machine and robs its people of the +finer fruits of life that spring from a wisely subordinated and +coordinated individuality. Here again it is the wise balance that +determines all. + +Our prevailing thoughts and emotions determine, and with absolute +accuracy, the prevailing conditions of our outward, material life, and +likewise the prevailing conditions of our bodily life. Would we have any +conditions different in the latter we must then make the necessary +changes in the former. The silent, subtle forces of mind and spirit, +ceaselessly at work, are continually moulding these outward and these +bodily conditions. + +He makes a fundamental error who thinks that these are mere sentimental +things in life, vague and intangible. They are, as great numbers are now +realising, the great and elemental things in life, the only things that +in the end really count. The normal man or woman can never find real and +abiding satisfaction in the mere possessions, the mere accessories of +life. There is an eternal something within that forbids it. That is the +reason why, of late years, so many of our big men of affairs, so many in +various public walks in life, likewise many women of splendid equipment +and with large possessions, have been and are turning so eagerly to the +very things we are considering. To be a mere huckster, many of our big +men are finding, cannot bring satisfaction, even though his operations +run into millions in the year. + +And happy is the young man or the young woman who, while the bulk of +life still lies ahead, realises that it is the things of the mind and +the spirit--the fundamental things in life--that really count; that here +lie the forces that are to be understood and to be used in moulding the +everyday conditions and affairs of life; that the springs of life are +all from within, that as is the inner so always and inevitably will be +the outer. + +To present certain facts that may be conducive to the realisation of +this more abundant life is the author's purpose and plan. + + R. W. T. + +_Sunnybrae Farm, +Croton-on-Hudson, +New York._ + + + + +CONTENTS + + +Chapter Page + + I. The Silent, Subtle Building Forces of Mind and Spirit 9 + + II. Soul, Mind, Body--The Subconscious Mind That + Interrelates Them 19 + + III. The Way Mind Through the Subconscious Mind Builds Body 37 + + IV. The Powerful Aid of the Mind in Rebuilding Body--How + Body Helps Mind 50 + + V. Thought as a Force in Daily Living 63 + + VI. Jesus the Supreme Exponent of the Inner Forces and + Powers: His People's Religion and Their Condition 76 + + VII. The Divine Rule in the Mind and Heart: The Unessentials + We Drop--The Spirit Abides 89 + +VIII. If We Seek the Essence of His Revelation, and the + Purpose of His Life 113 + + IX. His Purpose of Lifting Up, Energising, Beautifying, + and Saving the Entire Life: The Saving of the Soul is + Secondary; but Follows 140 + + X. Some Methods of Attainment 152 + + XI. Some Methods of Expression 173 + + XII. The World War--Its Meaning and Its Lessons for Us 191 + +XIII. Our Sole Agency of International Peace, and + International Concord 213 + + XIV. The World's Balance-wheel 231 + + + + +THE HIGHER POWERS + +OF + +MIND AND SPIRIT + + + + +I + +THE SILENT, SUBTLE BUILDING FORCES OF MIND AND SPIRIT + + +There are moments in the lives of all of us when we catch glimpses of a +life--our life--that is infinitely beyond the life we are now living. We +realise that we are living below our possibilities. We long for the +realisation of the life that we feel should be. + +Instinctively we perceive that there are within us powers and forces +that we are making but inadequate use of, and others that we are +scarcely using at all. Practical metaphysics, a more simplified and +concrete psychology, well-known laws of mental and spiritual science, +confirm us in this conclusion. + +Our own William James, he who so splendidly related psychology, +philosophy, and even religion, to life in a supreme degree, honoured his +calling and did a tremendous service for all mankind, when he so +clearly developed the fact that we have within us powers and forces that +we are making all too little use of--that we have within us great +reservoirs of power that we have as yet scarcely tapped. + +The men and the women who are awake to these inner helps--these +directing, moulding, and sustaining powers and forces that belong to the +realm of mind and spirit--are never to be found among those who ask: Is +life worth the living? For them life has been multiplied two, ten, a +hundred fold. + +It is not ordinarily because we are not interested in these things, for +instinctively we feel them of value; and furthermore our observations +and experiences confirm us in this thought. The pressing cares of the +everyday life--in the great bulk of cases, the bread and butter problem +of life, which is after all the problem of ninety-nine out of every +hundred--all seem to conspire to keep us from giving the time and +attention to them that we feel we should give them. But we lose thereby +tremendous helps to the daily living. + +Through the body and its avenues of sense, we are intimately related to +the physical universe about us. Through the soul and spirit we are +related to the Infinite Power that is the animating, the sustaining +force--the Life Force--of all objective material forms. It is through +the medium of the mind that we are able consciously to relate the two. +Through it we are able to realise the laws that underlie the workings of +the spirit, and to open ourselves that they may become the dominating +forces of our lives. + +There is a divine current that will bear us with peace and safety on its +bosom if we are wise and diligent enough to find it and go with it. +Battling against the current is always hard and uncertain. Going with +the current lightens the labours of the journey. Instead of being +continually uncertain and even exhausted in the mere efforts of getting +through, we have time for the enjoyments along the way, as well as the +ability to call a word of cheer or to lend a hand to the neighbour, also +on the way. + +The _natural, normal life_ is by a law divine under the guidance of the +spirit. It is only when we fail to seek and to follow this guidance, or +when we deliberately take ourselves from under its influence, that +uncertainties arise, legitimate longings go unfulfilled, and that +violated laws bring their penalties. + +It is well that we remember always that violated law carries with it its +own penalty. The Supreme Intelligence--God, if you please--does not +punish. He works through the channel of great immutable systems of law. +_It is ours to find these laws._ That is what mind, intelligence, is +for. Knowing them we can then obey them and reap the beneficent results +that are always a part of their fulfilment; knowingly or unknowingly, +intentionally or unintentionally, we can fail to observe them, we can +violate them, and suffer the results, or even be broken by them. + +Life is not so complex if we do not so continually persist in making it +so. Supreme Intelligence, creative Power works only through law. Science +and religion are but different approaches to our understanding of the +law. When both are real, they supplement one another and their findings +are identical. + +The old Hebrew prophets, through the channel of the spirit, perceived +and enunciated some wonderful laws of the natural and normal life--that +are now being confirmed by well-established laws of mental and spiritual +science--and that are now producing these identical results in the lives +of great numbers among us today, when they said: "And thine ears shall +hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye +turn to the right hand and when ye turn to the left." + +And again: "The Lord is with you, while ye be with him; and if ye seek +him, he will be found of you; but if ye forsake him, he will forsake +you." "Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on +thee; because he trusteth in thee." "The Lord in the midst of thee is +mighty." "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall +abide under the shadow of the Almighty." "Thou shalt be in league with +the stones of the field, and the beasts of the field shall be at peace +with thee." "Commit thy way unto the Lord: trust also in him and he +shall bring it to pass." Now these formulations all mean something of a +_very definite nature_, or, they mean nothing at all. If they are actual +expressions of fact, they are governed by certain definite and immutable +laws. + +These men gave us, however, no knowledge of _the laws_ underlying the +workings of these inner forces and powers; they perhaps had no such +knowledge themselves. They were intuitive perceptions of truth on their +part. The scientific spirit of this, our age, was entirely unknown to +them. The growth of the race in the meantime, the development of the +scientific spirit in the pursuit and the finding of truth, makes us +infinitely beyond them in some things, while in others they were far +ahead of us. But this fact remains, and this is the important fact: If +these things were actual facts in the lives of these early Hebrew +prophets, they are then actual facts in our lives right now, today; or, +if not actual facts, then they are facts that still lie in the realm of +the potential, only waiting to be brought into the realm of the actual. + +These were not unusual men in the sense that the Infinite Power, God, if +you please, could or did speak to them alone. They are types, they are +examples of how any man or any woman, through desire and through will, +can open himself or herself to the leadings of Divine Wisdom, and have +actualised in his or her life an ever-growing sense of Divine Power. For +truly "God is the same yesterday, and today, and forever." His laws are +unchanging as well as immutable. + +None of these men taught, then, how to recognise the Divine Voice +within, nor how to become continually growing embodiments of the Divine +Power. They gave us perhaps, though, all they were able to give. Then +came Jesus, the successor of this long line of illustrious Hebrew +prophets, with a greater aptitude for the things of the spirit--the +supreme embodiment of Divine realisation and revelation. With a greater +knowledge of truth than they, he did greater things than they. + +He not only did these works, but he showed how he did them. He not only +revealed _the Way_, but so earnestly and so diligently he implored his +hearers to follow _the Way_. He makes known the secret of his insight +and his power: "The words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: +but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works." Again, "I can +of my own self do nothing." And he then speaks of his purpose, his aim: +"I am come that ye might have life, and that ye might have it more +abundantly." A little later he adds: "The works that I do ye shall do +also." Now again, these things mean something of a very definite nature, +or they mean nothing at all. + +The works done, the results achieved by Jesus' own immediate disciples +and followers, and in turn their followers, as well as in the early +church for close to two hundred years after his time, all attest the +truth of his teaching and demonstrate unmistakably the results that +follow. + +Down through the intervening centuries, the teachings, the lives and the +works of various seers, sages, and mystics, within the church and out of +the church, have likewise attested the truth of his teachings. The bulk +of the Christian world, however, since the third century, has been so +concerned with various theories and teachings _concerning_ Jesus, that +it has missed almost completely the real vital and vitalising teachings +_of_ Jesus. + +We have not been taught primarily to follow his injunctions, and to +apply the truths that he revealed to the problems of our everyday +living. Within the last two score of years or a little more, however, +there has been a great going back directly to the teachings of Jesus, +and a determination to prove their truth and to make effective their +assurances. Also various laws in the realm of Mental and Spiritual +Science have become clearly established and clearly formulated, that +confirm all his fundamental teachings. + +There are now definite and well-defined laws in relation to thought as a +force, and the methods as to how it determines our material and bodily +conditions. There are now certain well-defined laws pertaining to the +subconscious mind, its ceaseless building activities, how it always +takes its direction from the active, thinking mind, and how through this +channel we may connect ourselves with reservoirs of power, so to speak, +in an intelligent and effective manner. + +There are now well-understood laws underlying mental suggestion, whereby +it can be made a tremendous source of power in our own lives, and can +likewise be made an effective agency in arousing the motive powers of +another for his or her healing, habit-forming, character-building. There +are likewise well-established facts not only as to the value, but the +absolute need of periods of meditation and quiet, alone with the Source +of our being, stilling the outer bodily senses, and fulfilling the +conditions whereby the Voice of the Spirit can speak to us and through +us, and the power of the Spirit can manifest in and through us. + +A nation is great only as its people are great. Its people are great in +the degree that they strike the balance between the life of the mind and +the spirit--all the finer forces and emotions of life--and their outer +business organisation and activities. When the latter become excessive, +when they grow at the expense of the former, then the inevitable decay +sets in, that spells the doom of that nation, and its time is tolled off +in exactly the same manner, and under the same law, as has that of all +the other nations before it that sought to reverse the Divine order of +life. + +The human soul and its welfare is the highest business that any state +can give its attention to. To recognise or to fail to recognise the +value of the human soul in other nations, determines its real greatness +and grandeur, or its self-complacent but essential vacuity. It is +possible for a nation, through subtle delusions, to get such an attack +of the big head that it bends over backwards, and it is liable, in this +exposed position, to get a thrust in its vitals. + +To be carried too far along the road of efficiency, big business, +expansion, world power, domination, at the expense of the great +spiritual verities, the fundamental humanities of national life, that +make for the real life and welfare of its people, and that give also its +true and just relations with other nations and their people, is both +dangerous and in the end suicidal--it can end in nothing but loss and +eventual disaster. A silent revolution of thought is taking place in the +minds of the people of all nations at this time, and will continue for +some years to come. A stock-taking period in which tremendous +revaluations are under way, is on. It is becoming clear-cut and +decisive. + + + + +II + +SOUL, MIND, BODY--THE SUBCONSCIOUS MIND THAT INTERRELATES THEM + + +There is a notable twofold characteristic of this our age--we might +almost say: of this our generation. It is on the one hand a tremendously +far-reaching interest in the deeper spiritual realities of life, in the +things of the mind and the Spirit. On the other hand, there is a +materialism that is apparent to all, likewise far-reaching. We are +witnessing the two moving along, apparently at least, side by side. + +There are those who believe that out of the latter the former is +arising, that we are witnessing another great step forward on the part +of the human race--a new era or age, so to speak. There are many things +that would indicate this to be a fact. The fact that the _material +alone_ does not satisfy, and that from the very constitution of the +human mind and soul, it cannot satisfy, may be a fundamental reason for +this. + +It may be also that as we are apprehending, to a degree never equalled +in the world's history, the finer forces in nature, and are using them +in a very practical and useful way in the affairs and the activities of +the daily life, we are also and perhaps in a more pronounced degree, +realising, understanding, and using the finer, the higher insights and +forces, and therefore powers, of mind, of spirit, and of body. + +I think there is a twofold reason for this widespread and rapidly +increasing interest. A new psychology, or perhaps it were better to say, +some new and more fully established laws of psychology, pertaining to +the realm of the subconscious mind, its nature, and its peculiar +activities and powers, has brought us another agency in life of +tremendous significance and of far-reaching practical use. + +Another reason is that the revelation and the religion of Jesus the +Christ is witnessing a _new birth_, as it were. We are finding at last +an entirely new content in his teachings, as well as in his life. We are +dropping our interest in those phases of a Christianity that he probably +never taught, and that we have many reasons now to believe he never even +thought--things that were added long years after his time. + +We are conscious, however, as never before, that that wonderful +revelation, those wonderful teachings, and above all that wonderful +life, have a content that can, that does, inspire, lift up, and make +more effective, more powerful, more successful, and more happy, the life +of every man and every woman who will accept, who will appropriate, who +will live his teachings. + +Look at it, however we will, this it is that accounts for the vast +number of earnest, thoughtful, forward looking men and women who are +passing over, and in many cases are passing from, traditional +Christianity, and who either of their own initiative, or under other +leadership, are going back to those simple, direct, God-impelling +teachings of the Great Master. They are finding salvation in his +teachings and his example, where they _never could_ find it in various +phases of the traditional teachings _about_ him. + +It is interesting to realise, and it seems almost strange that this new +finding in psychology, and that this new and vital content in +Christianity, have come about at almost identically the same time. Yet +it is not strange, for the one but serves to demonstrate in a concrete +and understandable manner the fundamental and essential principles of +the other. Many of the Master's teachings of the inner life, teachings +of "the Kingdom," given so far ahead of his time that the people in +general, and in many instances even his disciples, were incapable of +fully comprehending and understanding them, are now being confirmed and +further elucidated by clearly defined laws of psychology. + +Speculation and belief are giving way to a greater knowledge of law. The +supernatural recedes into the background as we delve deeper into the +supernormal. The unusual loses its miraculous element as we gain +knowledge of the law whereby the thing is done. We are realising that no +miracle has ever been performed in the world's history that was not +through the understanding and the use of Law. + +Jesus did unusual things; but he did them because of his unusual +understanding of the law through which they could be done. _He_ would +not have us believe otherwise. To do so would be a distinct +contradiction of the whole tenor of his teachings and his injunctions. +Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free, was his own +admonition. It was the great and passionate longing of his master heart +that the people to whom he came, grasp the _interior meanings_ of his +teachings. How many times he felt the necessity of rebuking even his +disciples for dragging his teachings down through their material +interpretations. As some of the very truths that he taught are now +corroborated and more fully understood, and in some cases amplified by +well-established laws of psychology, mystery recedes into the +background. + +We are reconstructing a more natural, a more sane, a more common-sense +portrait of the Master. "It is the spirit that quickeneth," said he; +"the flesh profiteth nothing; the words that I speak unto you, _they_ +are spirit and _they_ are life." Shall we recall again in this +connection: "I am come that ye might have life and that ye might have it +more abundantly"? When, therefore, we take him at his word, and listen +intently to _his_ words, and not so much to the words of others about +him; when we place our emphasis upon the fundamental spiritual truths +that he revealed and that he pleaded so earnestly to be taken in the +simple, direct way in which he taught them, we are finding that the +religion of the Christ means a clearer and healthier understanding of +life and its problems through a greater knowledge of the elemental +forces and laws of life. + +Ignorance enchains and enslaves. Truth--which is but another way of +saying a clear and definite knowledge of Law, the elemental laws of +soul, of mind, and body, and of the universe about us--brings freedom. +Jesus revealed essentially a spiritual philosophy of life. His whole +revelation pertained to the essential divinity of the human soul and +the great gains that would follow the realisation of this fact. His +whole teaching revolved continually around his own expression, used +again and again, the Kingdom of God, or the Kingdom of Heaven, and which +he so distinctly stated was an inner state or consciousness or +realisation. Something not to be found outside of oneself but to be +found _only within_. + +We make a great error to regard man as merely a duality--mind and body. +Man is a trinity,--soul, mind, and body, each with its own +functions,--and it is the right coordinating of these that makes the +truly efficient and eventually the perfect life. Anything less is always +one-sided and we may say, continually out of gear. It is essential to a +correct understanding, and therefore for any adequate use of the +potential powers and forces of the inner life, to realise this. + +It is the physical body that relates us to the physical universe about +us, that in which we find ourselves in this present form of existence. +But the body, wondrous as it is in its functions and its mechanism, is +not the life. It has no life and no power in itself. It is of the earth, +earthy. Every particle of it has come from the earth through the food we +eat in combination with the air we breathe and the water we drink, and +every part of it in time will go back to the earth. It is the house we +inhabit while here. + +We can make it a hovel or a mansion; we can make it even a pig-sty or a +temple, according as the soul, the real self, chooses to function +through it. We should make it servant, but through ignorance of the real +powers within, we can permit it to become master. "Know ye not," said +the Great Apostle to the Gentiles, "that your body is the temple of the +Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your +own?" + +The soul is the self, the soul made in the image of Eternal Divine Life, +which, as Jesus said, is Spirit. The essential reality of the soul is +Spirit. Spirit--Being--is one and indivisible, manifesting itself, +however, in individual forms in existence. Divine Being and the human +soul are therefore in essence the same, the same in quality. Their +difference, which, however, is very great--though less in some cases +than in others--is a difference _in degree_. + +Divine Being is the cosmic force, the essential essence, the Life +therefore of all there is in existence. The soul is individual personal +existence. The soul while in this form of existence manifests, functions +through the channel of a material body. _It is the mind that relates the +two._ It is through the medium of the mind that the two must be +coordinated. The soul, the self, while in this form of existence, must +have a body through which to function. The body, on the other hand, to +reach and to maintain its highest state, must be continually infused +with the life force of the soul. The life force of the soul is Spirit. +If spirit, then _essentially one_ with Infinite Divine Spirit, for +spirit, Being, is one. + +The embodied soul finds itself the tenant of a material body in a +material universe, and according to a plan as yet, at least, beyond our +human understanding, whatever may be our thoughts, our theories +regarding it. The whole order of life as we see it, all the world of +Nature about us, and we must believe the order of human life, is a +gradual evolving from the lower to the higher, from the cruder to the +finer. The purpose of life is unquestionably unfoldment, growth, +advancement--likewise the evolving from the lower and the coarser to the +higher and the finer. + +The higher insights and powers of the soul, always potential within, +become of value only as they are realised and used. Evolution implies +always involution. The substance of all we shall ever attain or be, is +within us now, waiting for realisation and thereby expression. The soul +carries its own keys to all wisdom and to all valuable and usable +power. + +It was that highly illumined seer, Emanuel Swedenborg, who said: "Every +created thing is in itself inanimate and dead, but it is animated and +caused to live by this, that the Divine is in it and that it exists in +and from the Divine." Again: "The universal end of creation is that +there should be an external union of the Creator with the created +universe; and this would not be possible unless there were beings in +whom His Divine might be present as if in itself; thus in whom it might +dwell and abide. To be His abode, they must receive His love and wisdom +by a power which seems to be their own; thus, must lift themselves up to +the Creator as if by their own power, and unite themselves with Him. +Without this mutual action no union would be possible." And again: +"Every one who duly considers the matter may know that the body does not +think, because it is material, but the soul, because it is spiritual. +All the rational life, therefore, which appears in the body belongs to +the spirit, for the matter of the body is annexed, and, as it were, +joined to the spirit, in order that the latter may live and perform uses +in the natural world.... Since everything which lives in the body, and +acts and feels by virtue of that life, belongs to the spirit alone, it +follows that the spirit is the real man; or, what comes to the same +thing, man himself is a spirit, in a form similar to that of his body." + +Spirit being the real man, it follows that the great, central fact of +all experience, of all human life, is the coming into a conscious, vital +realisation of our source, of our real being, in other words, of our +essential oneness with the spirit of Infinite Life and Power--the source +of all life and all power. We need not look for outside help when we +have within us waiting to be realised, and thereby actualised, this +Divine birthright. + +Browning was prophet as well as poet when in "Paracelsus" he said: + + Truth is within ourselves; it takes no rise + From outward things, whate'er you may believe. + There is an inmost centre in us all, + Where truth abides in fulness; and around + Wall upon wall, the gross flesh hems it in, + This perfect, clear perception--which is truth. + A baffling and perverting carnal mesh + Binds it, and makes all error: and, to know + Rather consists in opening out a way + Whence the imprisoned splendour may escape, + Than in effecting entry for a light + Supposed to be without. + +How strangely similar in meaning it seems to that saying of an earlier +prophet, Isaiah: "And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, +This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand and when +ye turn to the left." + +All great educators are men of great vision. It was Dr. Hiram Corson who +said: "It is what man draws up from his sub-self which is of prime +importance in his true education, not what is put into him. It is the +occasional uprising of our sub-selves that causes us, at times, to feel +that we are greater than we know." A new psychology, spiritual science, +a more commonsense interpretation of the great revelation of the Christ +of Nazareth, all combine to enable us to make this occasional uprising +our natural and normal state. + +No man has probably influenced the educational thought and practice of +the entire world more than Friedrich Froebel. In that great book of his, +"The Education of Man," he bases his entire system upon the following, +which constitutes the opening of its first chapter: "In all things there +lives and reigns an eternal law. This all-controlling law is necessarily +based on an all-pervading, energetic, living, self-conscious, and hence +eternal, Unity.... _This Unity is God._ All things have come from the +Divine Unity, from God, and have their origin in the Divine Unity, in +God alone. God is the sole source of all things. All things live and +have their being in and through the Divine Unity, in and through God. +All things are only through the divine effluence that lives in them. The +divine effluence that lives in each thing is the essence of each thing. + +"It is the destiny and life work of all things to unfold their essence, +hence their divine being, and, therefore, the Divine Unity itself--to +reveal God in their external and transient being. It is the special +destiny and life work of man, as an intelligent and rational being, to +become fully, vividly, conscious of this essence of the divine effluence +in him, and therefore of God. + +"The precept for life in general and for every one is: _Exhibit only thy +spiritual, thy life, in the external, and by means of the external in +thy actions, and observe the requirements of thy inner being and its +nature._" + +Here is not only an undying basis for all real education, but also the +basis of all true religion, as well as the basis of all ideal +philosophy. Yes, there could be no evolution, unless the essence of all +to be evolved, unfolded, were already involved in the human soul. To +follow the higher leadings of the soul, which is so constituted that it +is the inlet, and as a consequence the outlet of Divine Spirit, Creative +Energy, the real source of all wisdom and power; to project its leadings +into every phase of material activity and endeavour, constitutes the +ideal life. It was Emerson who said: "Every soul is not only the inlet, +but may become the outlet of all there is in God." To keep this inlet +open, so as not to shut out the Divine inflow, is the secret of all +higher achievement, as well as attainment. + +There is a wood separated by a single open field from my house. In it, +halfway down a little hillside, there was some years ago a spring. It +was at one time walled up with rather large loose stone--some three feet +across at the top. In following a vaguely defined trail through the wood +one day in the early spring, a trail at one time evidently considerably +used, it led me to this spot. I looked at the stone enclosure, partly +moss-grown. I wondered why, although the ground was wet around it, there +was no water in or running from what had evidently been at one time a +well-used spring. + +A few days later when the early summer work was better under way, I took +an implement or two over, and half scratching, half digging inside the +little wall, I found layer after layer of dead leaves and sediment, dead +leaves and sediment. Presently water became evident, and a little later +it began to rise within the wall. In a short time there was nearly three +feet of water. It was cloudy, no bottom could be seen. I sat down and +waited for it to settle. + +Presently I discerned a ledge bottom and the side against the hill was +also ledge. On this side, close to the bottom, I caught that peculiar +movement of little particles of silvery sand, and looking more closely I +could see a cleft in the rock where the water came gushing and bubbling +in. Soon the entire spring became clear as crystal, and the water +finding evidently its old outlet, made its way down the little hillside. +I was soon able to trace and to uncover its course as it made its way to +the level place below. + +As the summer went on I found myself going to the spot again and again. +Flowers that I found in no other part of the wood, before the autumn +came were blooming along the little watercourse. Birds in abundance came +to drink and to bathe. Several times I have found the half-tame deer +there. Twice we were but thirty to forty paces apart. They have watched +my approach, and as I stopped, have gone on with their drinking, +evidently unafraid--as if it were likewise their possession. And so it +is. + +After spending a most valuable hour or two in the quiet there one +afternoon, I could not help but wonder as I walked home whether +perchance the spring may not be actually happy in being able to resume +its life, to fulfil, so to speak, its destiny; happy also in the service +it renders flowers and the living wild things--happy in the service it +renders even me. I am doubly happy and a hundred times repaid in the +little help I gave it. It needed help, to enable it effectively to keep +connection with its source. As it became gradually shut off from this, +it weakened, became then stagnant, and finally it ceased its active +life. + +Containing a fundamental truth deeper perhaps than we realise, are these +words of that gifted seer, Emanuel Swedenborg: "There is only one +Fountain of Life, and the life of man is a stream therefrom, which if it +were not continually replenished from its source would instantly cease +to flow." And likewise these: "Those who think in the light of interior +reason can see that all things are connected by intermediate links with +the First Cause, and that whatever is not maintained in that connection +must cease to exist." + +There is a mystic force that transcends any powers of the intellect or +of the body, that becomes manifest and operative in the life of man when +this God-consciousness becomes awakened and permeates his entire being. +Failure to realise and to keep in constant communion with our Source is +what causes fears, forebodings, worry, inharmony, conflict, conflict +that downs us many times in mind, in spirit, in body--failure to follow +that Light that lighteth every man that cometh into the world, failure +to hear and to heed that Voice of the soul, that speaks continually +clearer as we accustom ourselves to listen to and to heed it, failure to +follow those intuitions with which the soul, every soul, is endowed, and +that lead us aright and that become clearer in their leadings as we +follow them. It is this guidance and this sustaining power that all +great souls fall back upon in times of great crises. + +This single stanza by Edwin Markham voices the poet's inspiration: + + At the heart of the cyclone tearing the sky, + And flinging the clouds and the towers by, + Is a place of central calm; + So, here in the roar of mortal things + I have a place where my spirit sings, + In the hollow of God's palm. + +"That the Divine Life and Energy _actually lives in us_," was the +philosopher Fichte's reply to the proposition--"the profoundest +knowledge that man can attain." And speaking of the man to whom this +becomes a real, vital, conscious realisation, he said: "His whole +existence flows forth, softly and gently, from his Inward Being, and +issues out into Reality without difficulty or hindrance." + +There are certain faculties that we have that are not a part of the +active thinking mind; they seem to be no part of what we might term our +_conscious intelligence_. They transcend any possible activities of our +regular mental processes, and they are in some ways independent of them. +Through some avenue, suggestions, intuitions of truth, intuitions of +occurrences of which through the thinking mind we could know nothing, +are at times borne in upon us; they flash into our consciousness, as we +say, quite independent of any mental action on our part, and sometimes +when we are thinking of something quite foreign to that which comes to, +that which "impresses" us. + +This seems to indicate a source of knowledge, a faculty that is distinct +from, but that acts in various ways in conjunction with, the active +thinking mind. It performs likewise certain very definite and distinct +functions in connection with the body. It is this that is called the +_subconscious mind_--by some the superconscious or the supernormal mind, +by others the subliminal self. + +Just what the subconscious mind is no man knows. It is easier to define +its functions and to describe its activities than it is to state in +exact terms what it is. It is similar in this respect to the physical +force--if it be a physical force--electricity. It is only of late years +that we know anything of electricity at all. Today we know a great deal +of its nature and the laws of its action. No man living can tell exactly +what electricity is. We are nevertheless making wonderful _practical +applications_ of it. We are learning more _about it_ continually. Some +day we may know what it _actually is_. + +The fact that the subconscious mind seems to function in a realm apart +from anything that has to do with our conscious mental processes, and +also that it has some definite functions as both directing and building +functions to perform in connection with the body, and that it is at the +same time subject to suggestion and direction from the active thinking +mind, would indicate that it may be the true connecting link, the medium +of exchange, between the soul and the body, the connector of the +spiritual and the material so far as man is concerned. + + + + +III + +THE WAY MIND THROUGH THE SUBCONSCIOUS MIND BUILDS BODY + + +When one says that he numbers among his acquaintances some who are as +old at sixty as some others are at eighty, he but gives expression to a +fact that has become the common possession of many. I have known those +who at fifty-five and sixty were to all intents and purposes really +older, more decrepit, and rapidly growing still more decrepit both in +mind and body, than many another at seventy and seventy-five and even at +eighty. + +History, then, is replete with instances, memorable instances, of +people, both men and women, who have accomplished things at an age--who +have even begun and carried through to successful completion things at +an age that would seem to thousands of others, in the captivity of age, +with their backs to the future, ridiculous even to think of +accomplishing, much less of beginning. On account of a certain law that +has always seemed to me to exist and that I am now firmly convinced is +very _exact_ in its workings, I have been interested in talking with +various ones and in getting together various facts relative to this +great discrepancy in the ages of these two classes of "old" people. + +Within the year I called upon a friend whom, on account of living in a +different portion of the country, I hadn't seen for nearly ten years. +Conversation revealed to me the fact that he was then in his +eighty-eighth year. I could notice scarcely a change in his appearance, +walk, voice, and spirit. We talked at length upon the various, +so-called, periods of life. He told me that about the only difference +that he noticed in himself as compared with his middle life was that now +when he goes out to work in his garden, and among his trees, bushes, and +vines--and he has had many for many years--he finds that he is quite +ready to quit and to come in at the end of about two hours, and +sometimes a little sooner, when formerly he could work regularly without +fatigue for the entire half day. In other words, he has not the same +degree of endurance that he once had. + +Among others, there comes to mind in this connection another who is a +little under seventy. It chances to be a woman. She is bent and decrepit +and growing more so by very fixed stages each twelvemonth. I have known +her for over a dozen years. At the time when I first knew her she was +scarcely fifty-eight, she was already bent and walked with an +uncertain, almost faltering tread. The dominant note of her personality +was then as now, but more so now, fear for the present, fear for the +future, a dwelling continually on her ills, her misfortunes, her +symptoms, her approaching and increasing helplessness. + +Such cases I have observed again and again; so have all who are at all +interested in life and in its forces and its problems. What is the cause +of this almost world-wide difference in these two lives? In this case it +is as clear as day--the mental characteristics and the mental habits of +each. + +In the first case, here was one who early got a little philosophy into +his life and then more as the years passed. He early realised that in +himself his good or his ill fortune lay; that the mental attitude we +take toward anything determines to a great extent our power in +connection with it, as well as its effects upon us. He grew to love his +work and he did it daily, but never under high pressure. He was +therefore benefited by it. His face was always to the future, even as it +is today. This he made one of the fundamental rules of his life. He was +helped in this, he told me in substance, by an early faith which with +the passing of the years has ripened with him into a demonstrable +conviction--that there is a Spirit of Infinite Life back of all, +working in love in and through the lives of all, and that in the degree +that we realise it as the one Supreme Source of our lives, and when +through desire and will, which is through the channel of our thoughts, +we open our lives so that this Higher Power can work definitely in and +through us, and then go about and do our daily work without fears or +forebodings, the passing of the years sees only the highest good +entering into our lives. + +In the case of the other one whom we have mentioned, a repetition seems +scarcely necessary. Suffice it to say that the common expression on the +part of those who know her--I have heard it numbers of times--is: "What +a blessing it will be to herself and to others when she has gone!" + +A very general rule with but few exceptions can be laid down as follows: +The body ordinarily looks as old as the mind thinks and feels. + +Shakespeare anticipated by many years the best psychology of the times +when he said: "It is the mind that makes the body rich." + +It seems to me that our great problem, or rather our chief concern, +should not be so much how to stay young in the sense of possessing all +the attributes of youth, _for the passing of the years does bring +changes_, but how to pass gracefully, and even magnificently, and with +undiminished vigour from youth to middle age, and then how to carry that +middle age into approaching old age, with a great deal more of the +vigour and the outlook of middle life than _we ordinarily do_. + +The mental as well as the physical helps that are now in the possession +of this our generation, are capable of working a revolution in the lives +of many who are or who may become sufficiently awake to them, so that +with them there will not be that--shall we say--immature passing from +middle life into a broken, purposeless, decrepit, and sunless, and one +might almost say, soulless old age. + +It seems too bad that so many among us just at the time that they have +become of most use to themselves, their families, and to the world, +should suddenly halt and then continue in broken health, and in so many +cases lie down and die. Increasing numbers of thinking people the world +over are now, as never before, finding that this is not necessary, that +something is at fault, that that fault is in ourselves. If so, then +reversely, the remedy lies in ourselves, in our own hands, so to speak. + +In order to actualise and to live this better type of life we have got +to live better from both sides, both the mental and the physical, this +with all due respect to Shakespeare and to all modern mental +scientists. + +The body itself, what we term the physical body, whatever may be the +facts regarding a finer spiritual body within it all the time giving +form to and animating and directing all its movements, is of material +origin, and derives its sustenance from the food we take, from the air +we breathe, the water we drink. In this sense it is from the earth, and +when we are through with it, it will go back to the earth. + +The body, however, is not the Life; it is merely the material agency +that enables the Life to manifest in a material universe for a certain, +though not necessarily a given, period of time. It is the Life, or the +Soul, or the Personality that uses, and that in using shapes and moulds, +the body and that also determines its strength or its weakness. When +this is separated from the body, the body at once becomes a cold, inert +mass, commencing immediately to decompose into the constituent material +elements that composed it--literally going back to the earth and the +elements whence it came. + +It is through the instrumentality or the agency of thought that the +Life, the Self, uses, and manifests through, the body. Again, while it +is true that the food that is taken and assimilated nourishes, sustains +and builds the body, it is also true that the condition and the +operation of the mind through the avenue of thought determines into what +shape or form the body is so builded. So in this sense it is true that +mind builds body; it is the agency, the force that determines the +shaping of the material elements. + +Here is a wall being built. Bricks are the material used in its +construction. We do not say that the bricks are building the wall; we +say that the mason is building it, as is the case. He is using the +material that is supplied him, in this case bricks, giving form and +structure in a definite, methodical manner. Again, back of the mason is +his mind, acting through the channel of his thought, that is directing +his hands and all his movements. Without this guiding, directing _force_ +no wall could take shape, even if millions of bricks were delivered upon +the scene. + +So it is with the body. We take the food, the water, we breathe the air; +but this is all and always acted upon by a higher force. Thus it is that +mind builds body, the same as in every department of our being it is the +great builder. Our thoughts shape and determine our features, our walk, +the posture of our bodies, our voices; they determine the effectiveness +of our mental and our physical activities, as well as all our relations +with and influence or effects upon others. + +You say: "I admit the operation of and even in certain cases the power +of thought, also that at times it has an influence upon our general +feelings, but I do not admit that it can have any direct influence upon +the body." Here is one who has allowed herself to be long given to +grief, abnormally so--notice her lowered physical condition, her lack of +vitality. The New York papers within the past twelve months recorded the +case of a young lady in New Jersey who, from _constant_ grieving over +the death of her mother, died, fell dead, within a week. + +A man is handed a telegram. He is eating and enjoying his dinner. He +reads the contents of the message. Almost immediately afterward, his +body is a-tremble, his face either reddens or grows "ashy white," his +appetite is gone; such is the effect of the mind upon the stomach that +it literally refuses the food; if forced upon it, it may reject it +entirely. + +A message is delivered to a lady. She is in a genial, happy mood. Her +face whitens; she trembles and her body falls to the ground in a faint, +temporarily helpless, apparently lifeless. Such are the intimate +relations between the mind and the body. Raise a cry of fire in a +crowded theatre. It may be a false alarm. There are among the audience +those who become seemingly palsied, powerless to move. It is the state +of the mind, and within several seconds, that has determined the state +of these bodies. Such are examples of the wonderfully quick influence of +the mind on the body. + +Great stress, or anxiety, or fear, may in two weeks' or even in two +days' time so work its ravages that the person looks ten years or even +twenty years older. A person has been long given to worry, or perhaps to +worry in extreme form though not so long--a well-defined case of +indigestion and general stomach trouble, with a generally lowered and +sluggish vitality, has become pronounced and fixed. + +Any type of thought that prevails in our mental lives will in time +produce its correspondences in our physical lives. As we understand +better these laws of correspondences, we will be more careful as to the +types of thoughts and emotions we consciously, or unwittingly, entertain +and live with. The great bulk of all diseases, we will find, as we are +continually finding more and more, are in the mind before being in the +body, or are generated in the body through certain states and conditions +of mind. + +The present state and condition of the body have been produced primarily +by the thoughts that have been taken by the conscious mind into the +subconscious, that is so intimately related to and that directs all the +subconscious and involuntary functions of the body. Says one: It may be +true that the mind has had certain effects upon the body; but to be able +_consciously_ to affect the body through the mind is impossible and even +unthinkable, for the body is a solid, fixed, material form. + +We must get over the idea, as we quickly will, if we study into the +matter, that the body, in fact anything that we call material and solid, +is really solid. Even in the case of a piece of material as "solid" as a +bar of steel, the atoms forming the molecules are in continual action +each in conjunction with its neighbour. In the last analysis the body is +composed of cells--cells of bone, vital organ, flesh, sinew. In the body +the cells are continually changing, forming and reforming. Death would +quickly take place were this not true. Nature is giving us a new body +practically every year. + +There are very few elements, cells, in the body of today that were there +a year ago. The rapidity with which a cut or wound on the body is +replaced by healthy tissue, the rapidity with which it heals, is an +illustration of this. One "touches" himself in shaving. In a week, +sometimes in less than a week, if the blood and the cell structure be +particularly healthy, there is no trace of the cut, the formation of new +cell tissue has completely repaired it. Through the formation of new +cell structure the life-force within, acting through the blood, is able +to rebuild and repair, if not too much interfered with, very rapidly. +The reason, we may say almost the sole reason, that surgery has made +such great advances during the past few years, so much greater +correspondingly than medicine, is on account of a knowledge of the +importance of and the use of antiseptics--keeping the wound clean and +entirely free from all extraneous matter. + +So then, the greater portion of the body is really new, therefore young, +in that it is almost entirely this year's growth. Newness of form is +continually being produced in the body by virtue of this process of +perpetual renewal that is continually going on, and the new cells and +tissues are just as new as is the new leaf that comes forth in the +springtime to take the place of and to perform the same functions as the +one that was thrown off by the tree last autumn. + +The skin renews itself through the casting off of used cells (those that +have already performed their functions) most rapidly, taking but a few +weeks. The muscles, the vital organs, the entire arterial system, the +brain and the nervous system all take longer, but all are practically +renewed within a year, some in much less time. Then comes the bony +structure, taking the longest, varying, we are told, from seven and +eight months to a year, in unusual cases fourteen months and longer. + +It is, then, through this process of cell formation that the physical +body has been built up, and through the same process that it is +continually renewing itself. It is not therefore at any time or at any +age a solid fixed mass or material, but a structure in a continually +changing fluid form. It is therefore easy to see how we have it in our +power, when we are once awake to the relations between the conscious +mind and the subconscious--and it in turn in its relations to the +various involuntary and vital functions of the body--to determine to a +great extent how the body shall be built or how it shall be rebuilt. + +Mentally to live in any state or attitude of mind is to take that state +or condition into the subconscious. _The subconscious mind does and +always will produce in the body after its own kind._ It is through this +law that we externalise and become in body what we live in our minds. If +we have predominating visions of and harbour thoughts of old age and +weakness, this state, with all its attendant circumstances, will become +externalised in our bodies far more quickly than if we entertain +thoughts and visions of a different type. Said Archdeacon Wilberforce in +a notable address in Westminster Abbey some time ago: "The recent +researches of scientific men, endorsed by experiments in the Salpetriere +in Paris, have drawn attention to the intensely creative power of +suggestions made by the conscious mind to the subconscious mind." + + + + +IV + +THE POWERFUL AID OF THE MIND IN REBUILDING BODY--HOW BODY HELPS MIND + + +"The body looks," some one has said, "as old as the mind feels." By +virtue of a great mental law and at the same time chemical law we are +well within the realm of truth when we say: The body ordinarily is as +old as the mind feels. + +Every living organism is continually going through two processes: it is +continually dying, and continually being renewed through the operation +and the power of the Life Force within it. In the human body it is +through the instrumentality of the cell that this process is going on. +The cell is the ultimate constituent in the formation and in the life of +tissue, fibre, tendon, bone, muscle, brain, nerve system, vital organ. +It is the instrumentality that Nature, as we say, uses to do her work. + +The cell is formed; it does its work; it serves its purpose and dies; +and all the while new cells are being formed to take its place. This +process of new cell formation is going on in the body of each of us much +more rapidly and uniformly than we think. Science has demonstrated the +fact that there are very few cells in the body today that were there +twelve months ago. The form of the body remains practically the same; +but its constituent elements are in a constant state of change. The +body, therefore, is continually changing; it is never in a fixed state +in the sense of being a solid, but is always in a changing, fluid state. +It is being continually remade. + +It is the Life, or the Life Force within, acting under the direction and +guidance of the subconscious or subjective mind that is the agency +through which this continually new cell-formation process is going on. +The subconscious mind is, nevertheless, always subject to suggestions +and impressions that are conveyed to it by the conscious or sense mind; +and here lies the great fact, the one all-important fact for us so far +as desirable or undesirable, so far as healthy or unhealthy, so far as +normal or aging body-building is concerned. + +That we have it in our power to determine our physical and bodily +conditions to a far greater extent than we do is an undeniable fact. +That we have it in our power to determine and to dictate the conditions +of "old age" to a marvellous degree is also an undeniable fact--if we +are sufficiently keen and sufficiently awake to begin early enough. + +If any arbitrary divisions of the various periods of life were +allowable, I should make the enumeration as follows: Youth, barring the +period of babyhood, to forty-five; middle age, forty-five to sixty; +approaching age, sixty to seventy-five; old age, seventy-five to +ninety-five and a hundred. + +That great army of people who "age" long before their time, that +likewise great army of both men and women who along about middle age, +say from forty-five to sixty, break and, as we say, all of a sudden go +to pieces, and many die, just at the period when they should be in the +prime of life, in the full vigour of manhood and womanhood and of +greatest value to themselves, to their families, and to the world, is +something that is _contrary to nature_, and is one of the pitiable +conditions of our time. A greater knowledge, a little foresight, a +little care in _time_ could prevent this in the great majority of cases, +in ninety cases out of every hundred, without question. + +Abounding health and strength--wholeness--is the natural law of the +body. The Life Force of the body, acting always under the direction of +the subconscious mind, _will build, and always does build_, healthily +and normally, unless too much interfered with. It is this that +determines the type of the cell structure that is continually being +built into the body from the available portions of the food that we +take to give nourishment to the body. It is affected for good or for +bad, helped or hindered, in its operation by the type of conscious +thought that is directed toward it, and that it is always influenced by. + +Of great suggestive value is the following by an able writer and +practitioner: + +"God has managed, and perpetually manages, to insert into our nature a +tendency toward health, and against the unnatural condition which we +call disease. When our flesh receives a wound, a strange nursing and +healing process is immediately commenced to repair the injury. So in all +diseases, organic or functional, this mysterious healing power sets +itself to work at once to triumph over the morbid condition.... Cannot +this healing process be greatly accelerated by a voluntary and conscious +action of the mind, assisted, if need be, by some other person? I +unhesitatingly affirm, from experience and observation, that it can. By +some volitional, mental effort and process of thought, this sanative +colatus, or healing power which God has given to our physiological +organism, may be greatly quickened and intensified in its action upon +the body. Here is the secret philosophy of the cures effected by Jesus +Christ.... There is a law of the action of mind on the body that is no +more an impenetrable mystery than the law of gravitation. It can be +understood and acted upon in the cure of disease as well as any other +law of nature." + +If, then, it be possible through this process to change physical +conditions in the body even after they have taken form and have become +fixed, as we say, isn't it possible even more easily to determine the +type of cell structure that is grown in the first place? + +The ablest minds in the world have thought and are thinking that if we +could find a way of preventing the hardening of the cells of the system, +producing in turn hardened arteries and what is meant by the general +term "ossification," that the process of aging, growing old, could be +greatly retarded, and that the condition of perpetual youth that we seem +to catch glimpses of in rare individuals here and there could be made a +more common occurrence than we find it today. + +The cause of ossification is partly mental, partly physical, and in +connection with them both are hereditary influences and conditions that +have to be taken into consideration. + +Shall we look for a moment to the first? The food that is taken into the +system, or the available portions of the food, is the building material; +but the mind is always the builder. + +There are, then, two realms of mind, the conscious and the +subconscious. Another way of expressing it would be to say that mind +functions through two avenues--the avenue of the conscious and the +avenue of the subconscious. The conscious is the thinking mind; the +subconscious is the doing mind. The conscious is the sense mind, it +comes in contact with and is acted upon through the avenue of the five +senses. The subconscious is that quiet, finer, all-permeating inner mind +or force that guides all the inner functions, the life functions of the +body, and that watches over and keeps them going even when we are +utterly unconscious in sleep. The conscious suggests and gives +directions; the subconscious receives and carries into operation the +suggestions that are received. + +The thoughts, ideas, and even beliefs and emotions of the conscious mind +are the seeds that are taken in by the subconscious and that in this +great _realm of causation_ will germinate and produce of their own kind. +The chemical activities that go on in the process of cell formation in +the body are all under the influence, the domination of this great +all-permeating subconscious, or subjective realm within us. + +In that able work, "The Laws of Psychic Phenomena," Dr. Thomas J. Hudson +lays down this proposition: "That the subjective mind is constantly +amenable to control by suggestion." It is easy, when we once understand +and appreciate this great fact, to see how the body builds, or rather is +built, for health and strength, or for disease and weakness; for youth +and vigour, or for premature ossification and age. It is easy, then, to +see how we can have a hand in, in brief can have the controlling hand +in, building either the one or the other. + +It is in the province of the intelligent man or woman to take hold of +the wheel, so to speak, and to determine as an intelligent human being +should, what condition or conditions shall be given birth and form to +and be externalised in the body. + +A noted thinker and writer has said: "Whatever the mind is set upon, or +whatever it keeps most in view, that it is bringing to it, and the +continual thought or imagining must at last take form and shape in the +world of seen and tangible things." + +And now, to be as concrete as possible, we have these facts: The body is +continually changing in that it is continually throwing out and off, +used cells, and continually building new cells to take their places. +This process, as well as all the inner functions of the body, is +governed and guarded by the subconscious realm of our being. The +subconscious can do and does do whatever it is _actually_ directed to +do by the conscious, thinking mind. "We must be careful on what we allow +our minds to dwell," said Sir John Lubbock, "the soul is dyed by its +thoughts." + +If we believe ourselves subject to weakness, decay, infirmity, when we +should be "whole," the subconscious mind seizes upon the pattern that is +sent it and builds cell structure accordingly. This is one great reason +why one who is, as we say, chronically thinking and talking of his +ailments and symptoms, who is complaining and fearing, is never well. + +To see one's self, to believe, and therefore to picture one's self in +mind as strong, healthy, active, well, is to furnish a pattern, is to +give suggestion and therefore direction to the subconscious so that it +will build cell tissue having the stamp and the force of healthy, vital, +active life, which in turn means abounding health and strength. + +So, likewise, at about the time that "old age" is supposed ordinarily to +begin, when it is believed in and looked for by those about us and those +who act in accordance with this thought, if we fall into this same +mental drift, we furnish the subconscious the pattern that it will +inevitably build bodily conditions in accordance with. We will then find +the ordinarily understood marks and conditions of old age creeping upon +us, and we will become subject to their influences in every department +of our being. Whatever is thus pictured in the mind and lived in, the +Life Force will produce. + +To remain young in mind, in spirit, in feeling, is to remain young in +body. Growing old at the period or age at which so many grow old, is to +a great extent a matter of habit. + +To think health and strength, to see ourselves continually growing in +this condition, is to set into operation the subtlest dynamic force for +the externalisation of these conditions in the body that can be even +conceived of. If one's bodily condition, through abnormal, false mental +and emotional habits, has become abnormal and diseased, this same +attitude of mind, of spirit, of imagery, is to set into operation _a +subtle and powerful corrective agency that, if persisted in, will +inevitably tend to bring normal, healthy conditions to the front again_. + +True, if these abnormal, diseased conditions have been helped on or have +been induced by wrong physical habits, by the violation of physical +laws, this violation must cease. But combine the two, and then give the +body the care that it requires in a moderate amount of simple, wholesome +food, regular cleansing to assist it in the elimination of impurities +and of used cell structure that is being regularly cast off, an +abundance of pure air and of moderate exercise, and a change amounting +almost to a miracle can be wrought--it may be, indeed, what many people +of olden time would have termed a miracle. + +The mind thus becomes "a silent, transforming, sanative energy" of great +potency and power. That it can be so used is attested by the fact of the +large numbers, and the rapidly increasing numbers, all about us who are +so using it. This is what many people all over our country are doing +today, with the results that, by a great elemental law--Divine Law if +you choose--_many_ are curing themselves of various diseases, _many_ are +exchanging weakness and impotence for strength and power, _many_ are +ceasing, comparatively speaking, are politely refusing, to grow old. + +Thought is a force, subtle and powerful, and it tends inevitably to +produce of its kind. + +In forestalling "old age," at least old age of the decrepit type, it is +the period of middle life where the greatest care is to be employed. If, +at about the time "old age" is supposed ordinarily to begin, the "turn" +at middle life or a little later, we would stop to consider what this +period really means, that it means with both men and women a period of +life where some simple readjustments are to be made, a period of a +little rest, a little letting up, a temporary getting back to the +playtime of earlier years and a bringing of these characteristics back +into life again, then a complete letting-up would not be demanded by +nature a little later, as it is demanded in such a lamentably large +number of cases at the present time. + +So in a definite, deliberate way, youth should be blended into the +middle life, and the resultant should be a force that will stretch +middle life for an indefinite period into the future. + +And what an opportunity is here for mothers, at about the time that the +children have grown, and some or all even have "flown"! Of course, +Mother shouldn't go and get foolish, she shouldn't go cavorting around +in a sixteen-year-old hat, when the hat of the thirty-five-year-old +would undoubtedly suit her better; but she should rejoice that the +golden period of life is still before her. Now she has leisure to do +many of those things _that she has so long wanted to do_. + +The world's rich field of literature is before her; the line of study or +work she has longed to pursue, she bringing to it a better equipped mind +and experience than she has ever had before. There is also an interest +in the life and welfare of her community, in civic, public welfare lines +that the present and the quick-coming time before us along women's +enfranchisement lines, along women's commonsense equality lines, is +making her a responsible and full sharer in. And how much more valuable +she makes herself, also, to her children, as well as to her community, +inspiring in them greater confidence, respect, and admiration than if +she allows herself to be pushed into the background by her own weak and +false thoughts of herself, or by the equally foolish thoughts of her +children in that she is now, or is at any time, to become a back number. + +Life, as long as we are here, should mean continuous unfoldment, +advancement, and this is undoubtedly the purpose of life; but +age-producing forces and agencies mean deterioration, as opposed to +growth and unfoldment. They ossify, weaken, stiffen, deaden, both +mentally and physically. For him or her who yearns to stay young, the +coming of the years does not mean or bring abandonment of hope or of +happiness or of activity. It means comparative vigour combined with +continually larger experience, and therefore even more usefulness, and +hence pleasure and happiness. + +Praise also to those who do not allow any one or any number of +occurrences in life to sour their nature, rob them of their faith, or +cripple their energies for the enjoyment of the fullest in life while +here. It's those people _who never allow themselves in spirit to be +downed_, no matter what their individual problems, surroundings, or +conditions may be, but who chronically bob up serenely who, after all, +_are the masters of life_, and who are likewise the strength-givers and +the helpers of others. There are multitudes in the world today, there +are readers of this volume, who could add a dozen or a score of +years--teeming, healthy years--to their lives by a process of +self-examination, a mental housecleaning, and a reconstructed, positive, +commanding type of thought. + +Tennyson was prophet when he sang: + + Cleave then to the sunnier side of doubt, + And cling to Faith beyond the forms of Faith! + She reels not in the storm of warring words, + She brightens at the clash of "Yes" and "No," + She sees the Best that glimmers through the Worst, + She feels the sun is hid but for a night, + She spies the summer through the winter bud, + She tastes the fruit before the blossom falls, + She hears the lark within the songless egg, + She finds the fountain where they wailed "mirage." + + + + +V + +THOUGHT AS A FORCE IN DAILY LIVING + + +Some years ago an experience was told to me that has been the cause of +many interesting observations since. It was related by a man living in +one of our noted university towns in the Middle West. He was a +well-known lecture manager, having had charge of many lecture tours for +John B. Gough, Henry Ward Beecher, and others of like standing. He +himself was a man of splendid character, was of a sensitive organism, as +we say, and had always taken considerable interest in the powers and +forces pertaining to the inner life. + +As a young man he had left home, and during a portion of his first year +away he had found employment on a Mississippi steamboat. One day in +going down the river, while he was crossing the deck, a sudden stinging +sensation seized him in the head, and instantly vivid thoughts of his +mother, back at the old home, flashed into his mind. This was followed +by a feeling of depression during the remainder of the day. The +occurrence was so unusual and the impression of it was so strong that +he made an account of it in his diary. + +Some time later, on returning home, he was met in the yard by his +mother. She was wearing a thin cap on her head which he had never seen +her wear before. He remarked in regard to it. She raised the cap and +doing so revealed the remains of a long ugly gash on the side of her +head. She then said that some months before, naming the time, she had +gone into the back yard and had picked up a heavy crooked stick having a +sharp end, to throw it out of the way, and in throwing it, it had struck +a wire clothesline immediately above her head and had rebounded with +such force that it had given her the deep scalp wound of which she was +speaking. On unpacking his bag he looked into his diary and found that +the time she had mentioned corresponded exactly with the strange and +unusual occurrence to himself as they were floating down the +Mississippi. + +The mother and son were very near one to the other, close in their +sympathies, and there can be but little doubt that the thoughts of the +mother as she was struck went out, and perhaps _went strongly out_, to +her boy who was now away from home. He, being sensitively organised and +intimately related to her in thought, and alone at the time, +undoubtedly got, if not her thought, at least the effects of her +thought, as it went out to him under these peculiar and tense +conditions. + +There are scores if not hundreds of occurrences of a more or less +similar nature that have occurred in the lives of others, many of them +well authenticated. How many of us, even, have had the experience of +suddenly thinking of a friend of whom we have not thought for weeks or +months, and then entirely unexpectedly meeting or hearing from this same +friend. How many have had the experience of writing a friend, one who +has not been written to or heard from for a long time, and within a day +or two getting a letter from that friend--the letters "crossing," as we +are accustomed to say. There are many other experiences or facts of a +similar nature, and many of them exceedingly interesting, that could be +related did space permit. These all indicate to me that thoughts are not +mere indefinite things but that thoughts are forces, that they go out, +and that every distinct, clear-cut thought has, or may have, an +influence of some type. + +Thought transference, which is now unquestionably an established fact, +notwithstanding much chicanery that is still to be found in connection +with it, is undoubtedly to be explained through the fact that _thoughts +are forces_. A positive mind through practice, at first with very +simple beginnings, gives form to a thought that another mind open and +receptive to it--and sufficiently attuned to the other mind--is able to +receive. + +Wireless telegraphy, as a science, has been known but a comparatively +short time. The laws underlying it have been in the universe perhaps, or +undoubtedly, always. It is only lately that the mind of man has been +able to apprehend them, and has been able to construct instruments in +accordance with these laws. We are now able, through a knowledge of the +laws of vibration and by using the right sending and receiving +instruments, to send actual messages many hundreds of miles directly +through the ether and without the more clumsy accessories of poles and +wires. This much of it we know--_there is perhaps even more yet to be +known_. + +We may find, as I am inclined to think we shall find, that thought is a +form of vibration. When a thought is born in the brain, it goes out just +as a sound wave goes out, and transmits itself through the ether, making +its impressions upon other minds that are in a sufficiently sensitive +state to receive it; this in addition to the effects that various types +of thoughts have upon the various bodily functions of the one with whom +they take origin. + +We are, by virtue of the laws of evolution, constantly apprehending the +finer forces of nature--the tallow-dip, the candle, the oil lamp, years +later a more refined type of oil, gas, electricity, the latest tungsten +lights, radium--and we may be still only at the beginnings. Our finest +electric lights of today may seem--will seem--crude and the quality of +their light even more crude, twenty years hence, even less. Many other +examples of our gradual passing from the coarser to the finer in +connection with the laws and forces of nature occur readily to the minds +of us all. + +The present great interest on the part of thinking men and women +everywhere, in addition to the more particular studies, experiments, and +observations of men such as Sir Oliver Lodge, Sir William Ramsay, and +others, in the powers and forces pertaining to the inner life is an +indication that we have reached a time when we are making great strides +along these lines. Some of our greatest scientists are thinking that we +are on the eve of some almost startling glimpses into these finer +realms. My own belief is that we are likewise on the eve of apprehending +the more precise _nature_ of thought as a force, the methods of its +workings, and the law underlying its more intimate and everyday uses. + +Of one thing we can rest assured; nothing in the universe, nothing in +connection with human life is outside of the Realm of Law. The elemental +law of Cause and Effect is absolute in its workings. One of the great +laws pertaining to human life is: As is the inner, so always and +inevitably is the outer--Cause, Effect. Our thoughts and emotions are +the silent, subtle forces that are constantly externalising themselves +in kindred forms in our outward material world. Like creates like, and +like attracts like. As is our prevailing type of thought, so is our +prevailing type and our condition of life. + +The type of thought we entertain has its effect upon our energies and to +a great extent upon our bodily conditions and states. Strong, clear-cut, +positive, hopeful thought has a stimulating and life-giving effect upon +one's outlook, energies, and activities; and upon all bodily functions +and powers. A falling state of the mind induces a chronically gloomy +outlook and produces inevitably a falling condition of the body. The +mind grows, moreover, into the likeness of the thoughts one most +habitually entertains and lives with. Every thought reproduces of its +kind. + +Says an authoritative writer in dealing more particularly with the +effects of certain types of thoughts and emotions upon bodily +conditions: "Out of our own experience we know that anger, fear, worry, +hate, revenge, avarice, grief, in fact all negative and low emotions, +produce weakness and disturbance not only in the mind but in the body as +well. It has been proved that they actually generate poisons in the +body, they depress the circulation; they change the quality of the +blood, making it less vital; they affect the great nerve centres and +thus partially paralyse the very seat of the bodily activities. On the +other hand, faith, hope, love, forgiveness, joy, and peace, all such +emotions are positive and uplifting, and so act on the body as to +restore and maintain harmony and actually to stimulate the circulation +and nutrition." + +The one who does not allow himself to be influenced or controlled by +fears or forebodings is the one who ordinarily does not yield to +discouragements. He it is who is using the positive, success-bringing +types of thought that are continually working for him for the +accomplishment of his ends. The things that he sees in the ideal, his +strong, positive, and therefore creative type of thought, is continually +helping to actualise in the realm of the real. + +We sometimes speak lightly of ideas, but this world would be indeed a +sorry place in which to live were it not for ideas--and were it not for +ideals. Every piece of mechanism that has ever been built, if we trace +back far enough, was first merely an idea in some man's or woman's +mind. Every structure or edifice that has ever been reared had form +first in this same immaterial realm. So every great undertaking of +whatever nature had its inception, its origin, in the realm of the +immaterial--at least as we at present call it--before it was embodied +and stood forth in material form. + +It is well, then, that we have our ideas and our ideals. It is well, +even, to build castles in the air, if we follow these up and give them +material clothing or structure, so that they become castles on the +ground. Occasionally it is true that these may shrink or, rather, may +change their form and become cabins; but many times we find that an +expanded vision and an expanded experience lead us to a knowledge of the +fact that, so far as happiness and satisfaction are concerned, the +contents of a cabin may outweigh many times those of the castle. + +Successful men and women are almost invariably those possessing to a +supreme degree the element of faith. Faith, absolute, unconquerable +faith, is one of the essential concomitants, therefore one of the great +secrets of success. We must realise, and especially valuable is it for +young men and women to realise, that one carries his success or his +failure with him, that it does not depend upon outside conditions. +There are some that no circumstances or combinations of circumstances +can thwart or keep down. Let circumstance seem to thwart or circumvent +them in one direction, and almost instantly they are going forward along +another direction. Circumstance is kept busy keeping up with them. When +she meets such, after a few trials, she apparently decides to give up +and turn her attention to those of the less positive, the less forceful, +therefore the less determined, types of mind and of life. Circumstance +has received some hard knocks from men and women of this type. She has +grown naturally timid and will always back down whenever she recognises +a mind, and therefore a life, of sufficient force. + +To make the best of whatever present conditions are, to form and clearly +to see one's ideal, though it may seem far distant and almost +impossible, to believe in it, and to believe in one's ability to +actualise it--this is the first essential. Not, then, to sit and idly +fold the hands, expecting it to actualise itself, but to take hold of +the first thing that offers itself to do,--that lies sufficiently along +the way,--to do this faithfully, believing, knowing, that it is but the +step that will lead to the next best thing, and this to the next; this +is the second and the completing stage of all accomplishment. + +We speak of fate many times as if it were something foreign to or +outside of ourselves, forgetting that fate awaits always our own +conditions. A man decides his own fate through the types of thoughts he +entertains and gives a dominating influence in his life. He sits at the +helm of his thought world and, guiding, decides his own fate, or, +through negative, vacillating, and therefore weakening thought, he +drifts, and fate decides him. Fate is not something that takes form and +dominates us irrespective of any say on our own part. Through a +knowledge and an intelligent and determined use of the silent but +ever-working power of thought we either condition circumstances, or, +lacking this knowledge or failing to apply it, we accept the role of a +conditioned circumstance. It is a help sometimes to realise and to voice +with Henley: + + Out of the night that covers me, + Black as the pit from pole to pole, + I thank whatever gods may be + For my unconquerable soul. + +The thoughts that we entertain not only determine the conditions of our +own immediate lives, but they influence, perhaps in a much more subtle +manner than most of us realise, our relations with and our influence +upon those with whom we associate or even come into contact. All are +influenced, even though unconsciously, by them. + +Thoughts of good will, sympathy, magnanimity, good cheer--in brief, all +thoughts emanating from a _spirit of love_--are felt in their positive, +warming, and stimulating influences by others; they inspire in turn the +same types of thoughts and feelings in them, and they come back to us +laden with their ennobling, stimulating, pleasure-bringing influences. + +Thoughts of envy, or malice, or hatred, or ill will are likewise felt by +others. They are influenced adversely by them. They inspire either the +same types of thoughts and emotions in them; or they produce in them a +certain type of antagonistic feeling that has the tendency to neutralise +and, if continued for a sufficient length of time, deaden sympathy and +thereby all friendly relations. + +We have heard much of "personal magnetism." Careful analysis will, I +think, reveal the fact that the one who has to any marked degree the +element of personal magnetism is one of the large-hearted, magnanimous, +cheer-bringing, unself-centred types, whose positive thought forces are +being continually felt by others, and are continually inspiring and +calling forth from others these same splendid attributes. I have yet to +find any one, man or woman, of the opposite habits and, therefore, trend +of mind and heart who has had or who has even to the slightest +perceptible degree the quality that we ordinarily think of when we use +the term "personal magnetism." + +If one would have friends he or she must be a friend, must radiate +habitually friendly, helpful thoughts, good will, love. The one who +doesn't cultivate the hopeful, cheerful, uncomplaining, good-will +attitude toward life and toward others becomes a drag, making life +harder for others as well as for one's self. + +Ordinarily we find in people the qualities we are mostly looking for, or +the qualities that our own prevailing characteristics call forth. The +larger the nature, the less critical and cynical it is, the more it is +given to looking for the best and the highest in others, and the less, +therefore, is it given to gossip. + +It was Jeremy Bentham who said: "In order to love mankind, we must not +expect too much of them." And Goethe had a still deeper vision when he +said: "Who is the happiest of men? He who values the merits of others, +and in their pleasure takes joy, even as though it were his own." + +The chief characteristic of the gossip is that he or she prefers to live +in the low-lying miasmic strata of life, revelling in the negatives of +life and taking joy in finding and peddling about the findings that he +or she naturally makes there. The larger natures see the good and +sympathise with the weaknesses and the frailties of others. They realise +also that it is so consummately inconsistent--many times even humorously +inconsistent--for one also with weaknesses, frailties, and faults, +though perhaps of a little different character, to sit in judgment of +another. Gossip concerning the errors or shortcomings of another is +judging another. The one who is himself perfect is the one who has the +right to judge another. By a strange law, however, though by a natural +law, we find, as we understand life in its fundamentals better, such a +person is seldom if ever given to judging, much less to gossip. + +Life becomes rich and expansive through sympathy, good will, and good +cheer; not through cynicism or criticism. That splendid little poem of +but a single stanza by Edwin Markham, "Outwitted," points after all to +one of life's fundamentals: + + He drew a circle that shut me out-- + Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout, + But Love and I had the wit to win: + We drew a circle that took him in! + + + + +VI + +JESUS THE SUPREME EXPONENT OF THE INNER FORCES AND POWERS: HIS PEOPLE'S +RELIGION AND THEIR CONDITION + + +In order to have any true or adequate understanding of what the real +revelation and teachings of Jesus were, two things must be borne in +mind. It is necessary in the first place, not only to have a knowledge +of, but always to bear in mind the method, the medium through which the +account of his life has come down to us. Again, before the real content +and significance of Jesus' revelation and teachings can be intelligently +understood, it is necessary that we have a knowledge of the conditions +of the time in which he lived and of the people to whom he spoke, to +whom his revelation was made. + +To any one who has even a rudimentary knowledge of the former, it +becomes apparent at once that no single saying or statement of Jesus can +be taken to indicate either his revelation or his purpose. These must be +made to depend upon not any single statement or saying of his own, much +less anything reported about him by another; but it must be made to +depend rather upon the whole tenor of his teachings. + +Jesus put nothing in writing. There was no one immediately at hand to +make a record of any of his teachings or any of his acts. It is now well +known that no one of the gospels was written by an immediate hearer, by +an eye-witness. + +The Gospel of Mark, the oldest gospel, or in other words the one written +nearest to Jesus' time, was written some forty years after he had +finished his work. Matthew and Luke, taken to a great extent from the +Gospel of Mark, supplemented by one or two additional sources, were +written many years after. The Gospel of John was not written until after +the beginning of the second century after Christ. These four sets of +chronicles, called the Gospels, written independently one of another, +were then collected many years after their authors were dead, and still +a great deal later were brought together into a single book. + +The following concise statement by Professor Henry Drummond throws much +light upon the way the New Testament portions of our Bible took form: +"The Bible is not a book; it is a library. It consists of sixty-six +books. It is a great convenience, but in some respects a great +misfortune, that these books have always been bound up together and +given out as one book to the world, when they are not; because that has +led to endless mistakes in theology and practical life. These books, +which make up this library, written at intervals of hundreds of years, +were collected after the last of the writers was dead--long after--by +human hands. Where were the books? Take the New Testament. There were +four lives of Christ. One was in Rome; one was in Southern Italy; one +was in Palestine; one in Asia Minor. There were twenty-one letters. Five +were in Greece and Macedonia; five in Asia; one in Rome. The rest were +in the pockets of private individuals. Theophilus had Acts. They were +collected undesignedly. In the third century the New Testament consisted +of the following books: The four Gospels, Acts, thirteen letters of +Paul, I John, I Peter; and, in addition, the Epistles of Barnabas and +Hermas. This was not called the New Testament, but the Christian +Library. Then these last books were discarded. They ceased to be +regarded as upon the same level as the others. In the fourth century the +canon was closed--that is to say, a list was made up of the books which +were to be regarded as canonical. And then long after that they were +stitched together and made up into one book--hundreds of years after +that. Who made up the complete list? It was never formally made up. The +bishops of the different churches would draw up a list each of the books +that they thought ought to be put into this Testament. The churches also +would give their opinions. Sometimes councils would meet and talk it +over--discuss it. Scholars like Jerome would investigate the +authenticity of the different documents, and there came to be a general +consensus of the churches on the matter." + +Jesus spoke in his own native language, the Aramaic. His sayings were +then rendered into Greek, and, as is well known by all well-versed +Biblical scholars, it was not an especially high order of Greek. The New +Testament scriptures including the four gospels, were then many hundreds +of years afterwards translated from the Greek into our modern +languages--English, German, French, Swedish, or whatever the language of +the particular translation may be. Those who know anything of the matter +of translation know how difficult it is to render the exact meanings of +any statements or writing into another language. The rendering of a +_single word_ may sometimes mean, or rather may make a great difference +in the thought of the one giving the utterance. How much greater is this +liability when the thing thus rendered is twice removed from its +original source and form! + +The original manuscripts had no punctuation and no verse divisions; +these were all arbitrarily supplied by the translators later on. It is +also a well-established fact on the part of leading Biblical scholars +that through the centuries there have been various interpolations in the +New Testament scriptures, both by way of omissions and additions. + +Reference is made to these various facts in connection with the sayings +and the teachings of Jesus and the methods and the media through which +they have come down to us, to show how impossible it would be to base +Jesus' revelation or purpose upon any single utterance made or purported +to be made by him--to indicate, in other words, that to get at his real +message, his real teachings, and his real purpose, we must find the +binding thread if possible, the reiterated statement, the repeated +purpose that makes them throb with the living element. + +Again, no intelligent understanding of Jesus' revelation or ministry can +be had without a knowledge of the conditions of the time, and of the +people to whom his revelation was made, among whom he lived and worked; +for his ministry had in connection with it both a time element and an +eternal element. There are two things that must be noted, the moral and +religious condition of the people; and, again, their economic and +political status. + +The Jewish people had been preeminently a religious people. But a great +change had taken place. Religion was at its lowest ebb. Its spirit was +well-nigh dead, and in its place there had gradually come into being a +Pharisaic legalism--a religion of form, ceremony. An extensive system of +ecclesiastical tradition, ecclesiastical law and observances, which had +gradually robbed the people of all their former spirit of religion, had +been gradually built up by those in ecclesiastical authority. + +The voice of that illustrious line of Hebrew prophets had ceased to +speak. It was close to two hundred years since the voice of a living +prophet had been heard. Tradition had taken its place. It took the form: +Moses hath said; It has been said of old; The prophet hath said. The +scribe was the keeper of the ecclesiastical law. The lawyer was its +interpreter. + +The Pharisees had gradually elevated themselves into an ecclesiastical +hierarchy who were the custodians of the law and religion. They had come +to regard themselves as especially favoured, a privileged class--not +only the custodians but the dispensers of all religious knowledge--and +therefore of religion. The people, in their estimation, were of a lower +intellectual and religious order, possessing no capabilities in +connection with religion or morals, dependent therefore upon their +superiors in these matters. + +This state of affairs that had gradually come about was productive of +two noticeable results: a religious starvation and stagnation on the +part of the great mass of the people on the one hand, and the creation +of a haughty, self-righteous and domineering ecclesiastical hierarchy on +the other. In order for a clear understanding of some of Jesus' sayings +and teachings, some of which constitute a very vital part of his +ministry, it is necessary to understand clearly what this condition was. + +Another important fact that sheds much light upon the nature of the +ministry of Jesus is to be found, as has already been intimated, in the +political and the economic condition of the people of the time. The +Jewish nation had been subjugated and were under the domination of Rome. +Rome in connection with Israel, as in connection with all conquered +peoples, was a hard master. Taxes and tribute, tribute and taxes, could +almost be said to be descriptive of her administration of affairs. + +She was already in her degenerate stage. Never perhaps in the history of +the world had men been so ruled by selfishness, greed, military power +and domination, and the pomp and display of material wealth. Luxury, +indulgence, over-indulgence, vice. The inevitable concomitant +followed--a continually increasing moral and physical degeneration. An +increasing luxury and indulgence called for an increasing means to +satisfy them. Messengers were sent and additional tribute was levied. +Pontius Pilate was the Roman administrative head or governor in Judea at +the time. Tiberius Caesar was the Roman Emperor. + +Rome at this time consisted of a few thousand nobles and people of +station--freemen--and hundreds of thousands of slaves. Even her +campaigns in time became virtual raids for plunder. She conquered--and +she plundered those whom she conquered. Great numbers from among the +conquered peoples were regularly taken to Rome and sold into slavery. +Judea had not escaped this. Thousands of her best people had been +transported to Rome and sold into slavery. It was never known where the +blow would fall next; what homes would be desolated and both sons and +daughters sent away into slavery. No section, no family could feel any +sense of security. A feeling of fear, a sense of desolation pervaded +everywhere. + +There was a tradition, which had grown into a well-defined belief, that +a Deliverer would be sent them, that they would be delivered out of the +hands of their enemies and that their oppressors would in turn be +brought to grief. There was also in the section round about Judaea a +belief, which had grown until it had become well-nigh universal, that +the end of the world, or the end of the age, was speedily coming, that +then there would be an end of all earthly government and that the reign +of Jehovah--the kingdom of God--would be established. These two beliefs +went hand in hand. They were kept continually before the people, and now +and then received a fresh impetus by the appearance of a new prophet or +a new teacher, whom the people went gladly out to hear. Of this kind was +John, the son of a priest, later called John the Baptist. + +After his period of preparation, he came out of the wilderness of Judaea, +and in the region about the Jordan with great power and persuasiveness, +according to the accounts, he gave utterance to the message: Repent ye, +for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. Forsake all earthly things; they +will be of avail but a very short time now, turn ye from them and +prepare yourselves for the coming of the Kingdom of God. The old things +will speedily pass away; all things will become new. Many went out to +hear him and were powerfully appealed to by the earnest, rugged +utterances of this new preacher of righteousness and repentance. + +His name and his message spread through all the land of Judea and the +country around the Jordan. Many were baptised by him there, he making +use of this symbolic service which had been long in use by certain +branches of the Jewish people, especially the order of the Essenes. + +Among those who went out to hear John and who accepted baptism at his +hands was Jesus, the son of Joseph and Mary, whose home was at Nazareth. +It marks also the beginning of his own public ministry, for which he +evidently had been in preparation for a considerable time. + +It seems strange that we know so little of the early life of one +destined to exert such a powerful influence upon the thought and the +life of the world. In the gospel of Mark, probably the most reliable, +because the nearest to his time, there is no mention whatever of his +early life. The first account is where he appears at John's meetings. +Almost immediately thereafter begins his own public ministry. + +In the gospel of Luke we have a very meagre account of him. It is at the +age of twelve. The brief account gives us a glimpse into the lives of +his father and his mother, Joseph and Mary; showing that at that time +they were not looked upon as in any way different from all of the +inhabitants of their little community, Nazareth, the little town in +Galilee--having a family of several sons and daughters, and that Jesus, +the eldest of the family, grew in stature and in knowledge, as all the +neighbouring children grew; but that he, even at an early age, showed +that he had a wonderful aptitude for the things of the spirit. I +reproduce Luke's brief account here: + +"Now, his parents went to Jerusalem every year at the feast of the +passover. And when he was twelve years old, they went up to Jerusalem, +after the custom of the feast. And when they had fulfilled the days, as +they returned, the child Jesus tarried behind in Jerusalem: and Joseph +and his mother knew not of it. But they, supposing him to have been in +the company, went a day's journey; and they sought him among their +kinsfolk and acquaintances. And when they found him not, they turned +back again to Jerusalem, seeking him. And it came to pass that after +three days they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the +doctors, both hearing them and asking them questions. And all that heard +him were astonished at his understanding and answers. + +"And when they saw him they were amazed: and his mother said unto him, +Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? Behold, thy father and I have +sought thee sorrowing. And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought +me? Wist ye not that I must be about my father's business? And they +understood not the saying which he spake unto them. And he went down +with them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them: but his +mother kept all these sayings in her heart. And Jesus increased in +wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man." + +Nothing could be more interesting than to know the early life of Jesus. +There are various theories as to how this was spent, that is, as to what +his preparation was--the facts of his life, in addition to his working +with his father at his trade, that of a carpenter; but we know nothing +that has the stamp of historical accuracy upon it. Of his entire life, +indeed, including the period of his active ministry, from thirty to +nearly thirty-three, it is but fair to presume that we have at best but +a fragmentary account in the Gospel narratives. It is probable that many +things connected with his ministry, and many of his sayings and +teachings, we have no record of at all. + +It is probable that in connection with his preparation he spent a great +deal of time alone, in the quiet, in communion with his Divine Source, +or as the term came so naturally to him, with God, his Father--God, our +Father, for that was his teaching--my God and your God. The many times +that we are told in the narratives that he went to the mountain alone, +would seem to justify us in this conclusion. Anyway, it would be +absolutely impossible for anyone to have such a vivid realisation of his +essential oneness with the Divine, without much time spent in such a +manner that the real life could evolve into its Divine likeness, and +then mould the outer life according to this ideal or pattern. + + + + +VII + +THE DIVINE RULE IN THE MIND AND HEART: THE UNESSENTIALS WE DROP--THE +SPIRIT ABIDES + + +That Jesus had a supreme aptitude for the things of the spirit, there +can be no question. That through desire and through will he followed the +leadings of the spirit--that he gave himself completely to its +leadings--is evident both from his utterances and his life. It was this +combination undoubtedly that led him into that vivid sense of his life +in God, which became so complete that he afterwards speaks--I and my +Father are one. That he was always, however, far from identifying +himself as equal with God is indicated by his constant declaration of +his dependence upon God. Again and again we have these declarations: "My +meat and drink is to do the will of God." "My doctrine is not mine, but +his that sent me." "I can of myself do nothing: as I hear I judge; and +my judgment is righteous; because I seek not mine own will, but the will +of him that sent me." + +And even the very last acts and words of his life proclaim this +constant sense of dependence for guidance, for strength, and even for +succour. With all his Divine self-realisation there was always, +moreover, that sense of humility that is always a predominating +characteristic of the really great. "Why callest thou me good? There is +none good but one--that is God." + +It is not at all strange, therefore, that the very first utterance of +his public ministry, according to the chronicler Mark was: The Kingdom +of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel. And while this was +the beginning utterance, it was the keynote that ran through his entire +ministry. It is the basic fact of all his teachings. The realisation of +his own life he sought to make the realisation of all others. It was, it +is, a call to righteousness, and a call to righteousness through the +only channel that any such call can be effective--through a realisation +of the essential righteousness and goodness of the human soul. + +An unbiased study of Jesus' own words will reveal the fact that he +taught only what he himself had first realised. It is this, moreover, +that makes him the supreme teacher of all time--Counsellor, Friend, +Saviour. It is the saving of men from their lower conceptions and +selves, a lifting of them up to their higher selves, which, as he +taught, is eternally one with God, the Father, and which, when realised, +will inevitably, reflexly, one might say, lift a man's thoughts, acts, +conduct--the entire life--up to that standard or pattern. It is thus +that the Divine ideal, that the Christ becomes enthroned within. The +Christ-consciousness is the universal Divine nature in us. It is the +state of God-consciousness. It is the recognition of the indwelling +Divine life as the source, and therefore the essence of our own lives. + +Jesus came as the revealer of a new truth, a new conception of man. +Indeed, the Messiah. He came as the revealer of the only truth that +could lead his people out of their trials and troubles--out of their +bondage. They were looking for their Deliverer to come in the person of +a worldly king and to set up his rule as such. He came in the person of +a humble teacher, the revealer of a mighty truth, the revealer of the +Way, the only way whereby real freedom and deliverance can come. For +those who would receive him, he was indeed the Messiah. For those who +would not, he was not, and the same holds today. + +He came as the revealer of a truth which had been glimpsed by many +inspired teachers among the Jewish race and among those of other races. +The time waited, however, for one to come who would first embody this +truth and then be able effectively to teach it. This was done in a +supreme degree by the Judaean Teacher. He came not as the doer-away with +the Law and the Prophets, but rather to regain and then to supplement +them. Such was his own statement. + +It is time to ascend another round. I reveal God to you, not in the +Tabernacle, but in the human heart--then in the Tabernacle in the degree +that He is in the hearts of those who frequent the Tabernacle. Otherwise +the Tabernacle becomes a whited sepulchre. The Church is not a building, +an organisation, not a creed. The Church is the Spirit of Truth. It must +have one supreme object and purpose--to lead men to the truth. I reveal +what I have found--I in the Father and the Father in me. I seek not to +do mine own will, but the will of the Father who sent me. + +Everything was subordinated to this Divine realisation and to his Divine +purpose. + +The great purpose at which he laboured so incessantly was the teaching +of the realisation of the Divine will in the hearts and minds, and +through these in the lives of men--the finding and the realisation of +the Kingdom of God. This is the supreme fact of life. Get right at the +centre and the circumference will then care for itself. As is the +inner, so always and invariably will be the outer. There is an inner +guide that regulates the life when this inner guide is allowed to assume +authority. Why be disconcerted, why in a heat concerning so many things? +It is not the natural and the normal life. Life at its best is something +infinitely beyond this. "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His +righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you." And if +there is any doubt in regard to his real meaning in this here is his +answer: "Neither shall they say, 'Lo here' or 'Lo there' for behold the +Kingdom of God is within you." + +Again and again this is his call. Again and again this is his +revelation. In the first three gospels alone he uses the expression "the +Kingdom of God," or "the Kingdom of Heaven," upwards of thirty times. +Any possible reference to any organisation that he might have had in +mind, can be found in the entire four gospels but twice. + +It would almost seem that it would not be difficult to judge as to what +was uppermost in his mind. I have made this revelation to you; you must +raise yourselves, you must become _in reality_ what _in essence_ you +really are. I in the Father, and the Father in me. I reveal only what I +myself know. As I am, ye shall be. God is your Father. In your real +nature you are Divine. Drop your ideas of the depravity of the human +soul. To believe it depraves. To teach it depraves the one who teaches +it, and the one who accepts it. Follow not the traditions of men. I +reveal to you your Divine birthright. Accept it. It is best. Behold all +things are become new. The Kingdom of God is the one all-inclusive +thing. Find it and all else will follow. + +"Whereunto shall we liken the kingdom of God? Or with what comparison +shall we compare it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which, when it +is sown in the earth, is less than all the seeds that be in the earth; +but when it is sown, it groweth up, and becometh greater than all herbs, +and shooteth out great branches; so that the fowls of the air may lodge +under the shadow of it." "Whereunto shall I liken the kingdom of God? Is +it like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, +till the whole was leavened?" Seek ye first the Kingdom, and the Holy +Spirit, the channel of communion between God your source, and +yourselves, will lead you, and will lead you into all truth. It will +become as a lamp to your feet, a guide that is always reliable. + +To refuse allegiance to the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, is the +real sin, the only sin that cannot be forgiven. Violation of all moral +and natural law may be forgiven. It will bring its penalty, for the +violation of law carries in itself its own penalty, its own +punishment--_it is a part of law_; but cease the violation and the +penalty ceases. The violation registers its ill effects in the illness, +the sickness, of body and spirit. If the violation has been long +continued, these effects may remain for some time; but the instant the +violation ceases the repair will begin, and things will go the other +way. + +Learn from this experience, however, that there can be no deliberate +violation of, or blaspheming against any moral or natural law. But +deliberately to refuse obedience to the inner guide, the Holy Spirit, +constitutes a defiance that eventually puts out the lamp of life, and +that can result only in confusion and darkness. It severs the ordained +relationship, the connecting, the binding cord, between the soul--the +self--and its Source. Stagnation, degeneracy, and eventual death is +merely the natural sequence. + +With this Divine self-realisation the Spirit assumes control and +mastery, and you are saved from the follies of error, and from the +consequences of error. Repent ye--turn from your trespasses and sins, +from your lower conceptions of life, of pleasure and of pain, and walk +in this way. The lower propensities and desires will lose their hold +and will in time fall away. You will be at first surprised, and then +dumfounded, at what you formerly took for pleasure. True pleasure and +satisfaction go hand in hand,--nor are there any bad after results. + +All genuine pleasures should lead to more perfect health, a greater +accretion of power, a continually expanding sense of life and service. +When God is uppermost in the heart, when the Divine rule under the +direction of the Holy Spirit becomes the ruling power in the life of the +individual, then the body and its senses are subordinated to this rule; +the passions become functions to be used; license and perverted use give +way to moderation and wise use; and there are then no penalties that +outraged law exacts; satiety gives place to satisfaction. It was Edward +Carpenter who said: "In order to enjoy life one must be a master of +life--for to be a slave to its inconsistencies can only mean torment; +and in order to enjoy the senses one must be master of them. To dominate +the actual world you must, like Archimedes, base your fulcrum somewhere +beyond." + +It is not the use, but the abuse of anything good in itself that brings +satiety, disease, suffering, dissatisfaction. Nor is asceticism a true +road of life. All things are for use; but all must be wisely, in most +cases, moderately used, for true enjoyment. All functions and powers are +for use; but all must be brought under the domination of the Spirit--the +God-illumined spirit. This is the road that leads to heaven here and +heaven hereafter--and we can rest assured that we will never find a +heaven hereafter that we do not make while here. Through everything runs +this teaching of the Master. + +How wonderfully and how masterfully and simply he sets forth his whole +teaching of sin and the sinner and his relation to the Father in that +marvellous parable, the Parable of the Prodigal Son. To bring it clearly +to mind again it runs: + +"A certain man had two sons: and the younger of them said to his father, +Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth _to me_. And he +divided unto them his living. And not many days after the younger son +gathered all together, and took his journey to a far country, and there +wasted his substance with riotous living. And when he had spent all, +there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he began to be in want. +And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country; and he sent +him into his fields to feed swine. And he would fain have filled his +belly with the husks that the swine did eat: and no man gave unto him. +And when he came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my +father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! I +will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have +sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be +called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants. And he arose and +came to his father. + +"But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had +compassion, and ran, and fell upon his neck, and kissed him. And the son +said unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, +and am no more worthy to be called thy son. But the father said to his +servants, Bring forth the best robe and put it on him; and put a ring on +his hand, and shoes on his feet: and bring hither the fatted calf, and +kill it; and let us eat, and be merry; for this my son was dead, and is +alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry. Now +his elder son was in the field: and as he came and drew nigh to the +house, he heard music and dancing. And he called one of the servants, +and asked what these things meant. And he said unto him, Thy brother is +come; and thy father hath killed the fatted calf, because he hath +received him safe and sound. And he was angry and would not go in: +therefore came his father out, and entreated him, and he answering said +to his father, Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither +transgressed I at any time thy commandment; and yet thou never gavest me +a kid, that I might make merry with my friends: but as soon as this thy +son was come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast +killed for him the fatted calf. And he said unto him, Son, thou art ever +with me, and all that I have is thine. It was meet that we should make +merry, and be glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; +and was lost, and is found." + +It does away forever in all thinking minds with any participation of +Jesus in that perverted and perverting doctrine that man is by nature +essentially depraved, degraded, fallen, in the sense as was given to the +world long, long after his time in the doctrine of the Fall of Man, and +the need of redemption through some external source outside of himself, +in distinction from the truth that he revealed that was to make men +free--the truth of their Divine nature, and this love of man by the +Heavenly Father, and the love of the Heavenly Father by His children. + +To connect Jesus with any such thought or teaching would be to take the +heart out of his supreme revelation. For his whole conception of God the +Father, given in all his utterances, was that of a Heavenly Father of +love, of care, longing to exercise His protecting care and to give good +gifts to His children--and this because it is the _essential nature_ of +God to be fatherly. His Fatherhood is not, therefore, accidental, not +dependent upon any conditions or circumstances; it is essential. + +If it is the nature of a father to give good gifts to his children, so +in a still greater degree is it the nature of the Heavenly Father to +give good gifts to those who ask Him. As His words are recorded by +Matthew: "Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will +he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If +ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how +much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them +that ask him?" So in the parable as presented by Jesus, the father's +love was such that as soon as it was made known to him that his son who +had been lost to him had returned, he went out to meet him; he granted +him full pardon--and there were no conditions. + +Speaking of the fundamental teaching of the Master, and also in +connection with this same parable, another has said: "It thus appears +from this story, as elsewhere in the teaching of Jesus, that he did not +call God our father because He created us, or because He rules over us, +or because He made a covenant with Abraham, but simply and only because +He loves us. This parable individualises the divine love, as did also +the missionary activity of Jesus. The gospels know nothing of a national +fatherhood, of a God whose love is confined to a particular people. It +is the individual man who has a heavenly Father, and this individualised +fatherhood is the only one of which Jesus speaks. As he had realised his +own moral and spiritual life in the consciousness that God was his +father, so he sought to give life to the world by a living revelation of +the truth that God loves each separate soul. This is a prime factor in +the religion and ethics of Jesus. It is seldom or vaguely apprehended in +the Old Testament teaching; but in the teaching of Jesus it is central +and normative." Again in the two allied parables of Jesus--the Parable +of the Lost Sheep, and the Parable of the Lost Coin--it is his purpose +to teach the great love of the Father for all, including those lost in +their trespasses and sins, and His rejoicing in their return. + +This leads to Jesus' conception and teaching of sin and repentance. +Although God is the Father, He demands filial obedience in the hearts +and the minds of His children. Men by following the devices and desires +of their own hearts, are not true to their real nature, their Divine +pattern. By following their selfish desires they have brought sin, and +thereby suffering, on themselves and others. The unclean, the selfish +desires of mind and heart, keep them from their higher moral and +spiritual ideal--although not necessarily giving themselves to gross +sin. Therefore, they must become sons of God by repenting--by turning +from the evil inclinations of their hearts and seeking to follow the +higher inclinations of the heart as becomes children of God and those +who are dwellers in the Heavenly Kingdom. Therefore, his opening +utterance: "The time is fulfilled, and the Kingdom of God is at hand; +repent ye, and believe the gospel." + +Love of God with the whole heart, and love of the neighbour, leading to +the higher peace and fulfilment, must take the place of these more +selfish desires that lead to antagonisms and dissatisfactions both +within and without. All men are to pray: Forgive us our sins. All men +are to repent of their sins which are the results of following their own +selfish desires,--those of the body, or their own selfish desires to the +detriment of the welfare of the neighbour. + +All men are to seek the Divine rule, the rule of God in the heart, and +thereby have the guidance of the Holy Spirit, which is the Divine +spirit of wisdom that tabernacles with man when through desire and +through will he makes the conditions whereby it can make its abode with +him. It is a manifestation of the force that is above man--it is the +eternal heritage of the soul. "Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the +Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." And therein lies salvation. It +follows the seeking and the finding of the Kingdom of God and His +righteousness that Jesus revealed to a waiting world. + +And so it was the spirit of religion that Jesus came to reveal--the real +Fatherhood of God and the Divine Sonship of man. A better righteousness +than that of the scribes and the Pharisees--not a slavish adherence to +the Law, with its supposed profits and rewards. Get the motive of life +right. Get the heart right and these things become of secondary +importance. As his supreme revelation was the personal fatherhood of +God, from which follows necessarily the Divine sonship of man, so there +was a corollary to it, a portion of it almost as essential as the main +truth itself--namely, that all men are brothers. Not merely those of one +little group, or tribe or nation; not merely those of any one little set +or religion; not merely those of this or that little compartment that we +build and arbitrarily separate ourselves into--but all men the world +over. If this is not true then Jesus' supreme revelation is false. + +In connection with this great truth he brought a new standard by virtue +of the logic of his revelation. "Ye have heard that it hath been said, +Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, +Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate +you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; +that ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven." +Struggling for recognition all through the Old Testament scriptures, and +breaking through partially at least in places, was this conception which +is at the very basis of all man's relationship with man. + +And finally through this supreme Master of life it did break through, +with a wonderful newborn consciousness. + +The old dispensation, with its legal formalism, was an eye for an eye +and a tooth for a tooth. The new dispensation was--"But I say unto you, +Love your enemies." Enmity begets enmity. It is as senseless as it is +godless. It runs through all his teachings and through every act of his +life. If fundamentally you do not have the love of your fellow-man in +your hearts, you do not have the love of God in your hearts and you +cannot have. + +And that this fundamental revelation be not misunderstood, near the +close of his life he said: "A new commandment I give unto you, that ye +love one another." No man could be, can be his disciple, his follower, +and fail in the realisation of this fundamental teaching. "By this shall +all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye love one another." And +going back again to his ministry we find that it breathes through every +teaching that he gave. It breathes through that short memorable prayer +which we call the Lord's Prayer. It permeates the Sermon on the Mount. +It is the very essence of his summing up of this discourse. We call it +the Golden Rule. "Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye +even so to them." Not that it was original with Jesus; other teachers +sent of God had given it before to other peoples--God's other children; +but he gave it a new emphasis, a new setting. _He made it fundamental._ + +So a man who is gripped at all vitally by Jesus' teaching of the +personal fatherhood of God, and the personal brotherhood of man, simply +can't help but make this the basic rule of his life--and moreover find +joy in so making it. A man who really comprehends this fundamental +teaching can't be crafty, sneaking, dishonest, or dishonourable, in his +business, or in any phase of his personal life. He never hogs the +penny--in other words, he never seeks to gain his own advantage to the +disadvantage of another. He may be long-headed; he may be able to size +up and seize conditions; but he seeks no advantage for himself to the +detriment of his fellow, to the detriment of his community, or to the +detriment of his extended community, the nation or the world. He is +thoughtful, considerate, open, frank; and, moreover, he finds great joy +in being so. + +I have never seen any finer statement of the essential reasonableness, +therefore, of the essential truth of the value and the practice of the +Golden Rule than that given by a modern disciple of Jesus who left us +but a few years ago. A poor boy, a successful business man, straight, +square, considerate in all his dealings,--a power among his fellows, a +lamp indeed to the feet of many--was Samuel Milton Jones, thrice mayor +of Toledo. Simple, unassuming, friend of all, rich as well as poor, poor +as well as rich, friend of the outcast, the thief, the criminal, looking +beyond the exterior, he saw as did Jesus, the human soul always intact, +though it erred in its judgment--as we all err in our judgments, each in +his own peculiar way--and that by forbearance, consideration, and love, +it could be touched and the life redeemed--redeemed to happiness, to +usefulness, to service. Notwithstanding his many duties, business and +political, he thought much and he loved to talk of the things we are +considering. + +His brief statement of the fundamental reasons and the comprehensive +results of the actual practice of the Golden Rule are shot through with +such fine insight, such abounding comprehension, that they deserve to +become immortal. He was my friend and I would not see them die. I +reproduce them here: "As I view it, the Golden Rule is the supreme law +of life. It may be paraphrased this way: As you do unto others, others +will do unto you. What I give, I get. If I love you, really and truly +and actively love you, you are as sure to love me in return as the earth +is sure to be warmed by the rays of the midsummer sun. If I hate you, +ill-treat you and abuse you, I am equally certain to arouse the same +kind of antagonism towards me, unless the Divine nature is so developed +that it is dominant in you, and you have learned to love your enemies. +What can be plainer? The Golden Rule is the law of action and reaction +in the field of morals, just as definite, just as certain here as the +law is definite and certain in the domain of physics. + +"I think the confusion with respect to the Golden Rule arises from the +different conceptions that we have of the word love. I use the word +love as synonymous with reason, and when I speak of doing the loving +thing, I mean the reasonable thing. When I speak of dealing with my +fellow-men in an unreasonable way, I mean an unloving way. The terms are +interchangeable, absolutely. The reason why we know so little about the +Golden Rule is because we have not practised it." + +Was Mayor Jones a Christian? you ask. He was a follower of the +Christ--for it was he who said: "By this shall all men know ye are my +disciples, if ye love one another." Was he a member of a religious +organisation? I don't know--it never occurred to me to ask him. Thinking +men the world over are making a sharp distinction in these days between +organised Christianity and essential Christianity. + +The element of fear has lost its hold on the part of thinking men and +women. It never opened up, it never can open up the springs of +righteousness in the human heart. He believed and he acted upon the +belief that it was the spirit that the Master taught--that God is a God +of love and that He reveals Himself in terms of love to those who really +know Him. He believed that there is joy to the human soul in following +this inner guide and translating its impulses into deeds of love and +service for one's fellow-men. If we could, if we would thus translate +religion into terms of life, it would become a source of perennial joy. + +It is not with observation, said Jesus, that the supreme thing that he +taught--the seeking and finding of the Kingdom of God--will come. Do not +seek it at some other place, some other time. It is within, and if +within it will show forth. Make no mistake about that,--it will show +forth. It touches and it sensitises the inner springs of action in a +man's or a woman's life. When a man realises his Divine sonship that +Jesus taught, he will act as a son of God. Out of the heart spring +either good or evil actions. Self-love, me, mine; let me get all I can +for myself, or, thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself--the Divine law +of service, of mutuality--the highest source of ethics. + +You can trust any man whose heart is right. He will be straight, clean, +reliable. His word will be as good as his bond. Personally you can't +trust a man who is brought into any line of action, or into any +institution through fear. The sore is there, liable to break out in +corruption at any time. This opening up of the springs of the inner life +frees him also from the letter of the law, which after all consists of +the traditions of men, and makes him subject to that higher moral guide +within. How clearly Jesus illustrated this in his conversations +regarding the observance of the Sabbath--how the Sabbath was made for +man and not man for the Sabbath, and how it was always right to do good +on the Sabbath. + +I remember some years ago a friend in my native state telling me the +following interesting incident in connection with his grandmother. It +was in northern Illinois--it might have been in New England. "As a boy," +said he, "I used to visit her on the farm. She loved her cup of coffee +for breakfast. Ordinarily she would grind it fresh each morning in the +kitchen; but when Sunday morning came she would take her coffee-grinder +down into the far end of the cellar, where no one could see and no one +could hear her grind it." He could never quite tell, he said, whether it +was to ease her own conscience, or in order to give no offence to her +neighbours. + +Now, I can imagine Jesus passing by and stopping at that home--it was a +home known for its native kindly hospitality--and meeting her just as +she was coming out of the cellar with her coffee-grinder--his quick and +unerring perception enabling him to take in the whole situation at once, +and saying: "In the name of the Father, Aunt Susan, what were you doing +with your coffee-grinder down in the cellar on this beautiful Sabbath +morning? You like your cup of coffee, and I also like the coffee that +you make; thank God that you have it, and thank God that you have the +good health to enjoy it. We can give praise to the Father through eating +and drinking, if, as in everything else, these are done in moderation +and we give value received for all the things that we use. So don't take +your grinder down into the cellar on the Sabbath morning; but grind your +coffee up here in God's sunshine, with a thankful heart that you have it +to grind." + +And I can imagine him, as he passes out of the little front gate, +turning and waving another good-bye and saying: "When I come again, Aunt +Susan, be it week-day or Sabbath, remember God's sunshine and keep out +of the cellar." And turning again in a half-joking manner: "And when you +take those baskets of eggs to town, Aunt Susan, don't pick out too many +of the large ones to keep for yourself, but take them just as the hens +lay them. And, Aunt Susan, give good weight in your butter. This will do +your soul infinitely more good than the few extra coins you would gain +by too carefully calculating"--Aunt Susan with all her lovable +qualities, had a little tendency to close dealing. + +I think we do incalculable harm by separating Jesus so completely from +the more homely, commonplace affairs of our daily lives. If we had a +more adequate account of his discourses with the people and his +associations with the people, we would perhaps find that he was not, +after all, so busy in saving the world that he didn't have time for the +simple, homely enjoyments and affairs of the everyday life. The little +glimpses that we have of him along these lines indicate to me that he +had. Unless we get his truths right into this phase of our lives, the +chances are that we will miss them entirely. + +And I think that with all his earnestness, Jesus must have had an +unusually keen sense of humour. With his unusual perceptions and his +unusual powers in reading and in understanding human nature, it could +not be otherwise. That he had a keen sense for beauty; that he saw it, +that he valued it, that he loved it, especially beauty in all nature, +many of his discourses so abundantly prove. Religion with him was not +divorced from life. It was the power that permeated every thought and +every act of the daily life. + + + + +VIII + +IF WE SEEK THE ESSENCE OF HIS REVELATION, AND THE PURPOSE OF HIS LIFE + + +If we would seek the essence of Jesus' revelation, attested both by his +words and his life, it was to bring a knowledge of the ineffable love of +God to man, and by revealing this, to instil in the minds and hearts of +men love for God, and a knowledge of and following of the ways of God. +It was also then to bring a new emphasis of the Divine law of love--the +love of man for man. Combined, it results, so to speak, in raising men +to a higher power, to a higher life,--as individuals, as groups, as one +great world group. + +It is a newly sensitised attitude of mind and heart that he brought and +that he endeavoured to reveal in all its matchless beauty--a following +not of the traditions of men, but fidelity to one's God, whereby the +Divine rule in the mind and heart assumes supremacy and, as must +inevitably follow, fidelity to one's fellow-men. These are the +essentials of Jesus' revelation--the fundamental forces in his own +life. His every teaching, his every act, comes back to them. I believe +also that all efforts to mystify the minds of men and women by later +theories _about_ him are contrary to his own expressed teaching, and in +exact degree that they would seek to substitute other things for these +fundamentals. + +I call them fundamentals. I call them his fundamentals. What right have +I to call them his fundamentals? + +An occasion arose one day in the form of a direct question for Jesus to +state in well-considered and clear-cut terms the essence, the gist, of +his entire teachings--therefore, by his authority, the fundamentals of +essential Christianity. In the midst of one of the groups that he was +speaking to one day, we are told that a certain lawyer arose--an +interpreter of, an authority on, the existing ecclesiastical law. The +reference to him is so brief, unfortunately, that we cannot tell whether +his question was to confound Jesus, as was so often the case, or whether +being a liberal Jew he longed for an honest and truly helpful answer. +From Jesus' remark to him, after his primary answer, we are justified in +believing it was the latter. + +His question was: "Master, which is the great commandment in the law?" +Jesus said unto him, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy +heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first +and great commandment. And the second is like unto it. Thou shalt love +thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and +the prophets." + +Here we have a wonderful statement from a wonderful source. So clear-cut +is it that any wayfaring man, though a fool, cannot mistake it. +Especially is this true when we couple with it this other statement of +Jesus: "Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets; I +am not come to destroy, but to fulfil." We must never forget that Jesus +was born, lived, and died a Jew, the same as all of his disciples--and +they never regarded themselves in any other light. The _basis_ of his +religion was the religion of Israel. It was this he taught and +expounded, now in the synagogue, now out on the hillside and by the +lake-side. It was this that he tried to teach in its purity, that he +tried to free from the hedges that ecclesiasticism had built around it, +this that he endeavoured to raise to a still higher standard. + +One cannot find the slightest reference in any of his sayings that would +indicate that he looked upon himself in any other light--except the +overwhelming sense that it was his mission to bring in the new +dispensation by fulfilling the old, and then carrying it another great +step forward, which he did in a wonderful way--both God-ward and +man-ward. + +We must not forget, then, that Jesus said that he did not come to +destroy the Law and the Prophets, but to fulfil them. We must not +forget, however, that before fulfilling them he had to free them. The +freedom-giving, God-illumined words spoken by free God-illumined men, +had, in the hands of those not God-illumined, later on become +institutionalised, made into a system, a code. The people were taught +that only the priests had access to God. They were the custodians of +God's favour and only through the institution could any man, or any +woman, have access to God. This became the sacred thing, and as the +years had passed this had become so hedged about by continually added +laws and observances that all the spirit of religion had become crushed, +stifled, beaten to the ground. + +The very scribes and Pharisees themselves, supposed to minister to the +spiritual life and the welfare of the people, became enrobed in their +fine millinery and arrogance, masters of the people, whose ministers +they were supposed to be, as is so apt to be the case when an +institution builds itself upon the free, all-embracing message of truth +given by any prophet or any inspired teacher. It has occurred time and +time again. Christianity knows it well. It is only by constant vigilance +that religious freedom is preserved, from which alone comes any high +degree of morality, or any degree of free and upward-moving life among +the people. + +It was on account of this shameful robbing of the people of their Divine +birthright that the just soul of Jesus, abhorring both casuistry and +oppression under the cloak of religion, gave utterance to that fine +invective that he used on several occasions, the only times that he +spoke in a condemnatory or accusing manner: "Now do ye, Pharisee, make +clean the outside of the cup and the platter; but your inward part is +full of ravening and wickedness. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, +hypocrites! For ye are as graves which appear not, and the men that walk +over them are not aware of them.... Woe unto you also, ye lawyers! For +ye lade men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye yourselves touch +not the burdens with one of your fingers.... Woe unto you, lawyers! For +ye have taken away the key of knowledge: ye entered not in yourselves, +and them that were entering in ye hindered." + +And here is the lesson for us. It is the spirit that must always be kept +uppermost in religion. Otherwise even the revelation and the religion +of Jesus could be compressed into a code, with its self-appointed +instruments of interpretation, the same as the Pharisees did the Law and +the Prophets that he so bitterly condemned, with a bravery so intrepid +and so fearless that it finally caused his death. + +No, if God is not in the human soul waiting to make Himself known to the +believing, longing heart, accessible to all alike without money and +without price, without any prescribed code, then the words of Jesus have +not been correctly handed down to us. And then again, confirming us in +the belief that a man's deepest soul relation is a matter between him +and his God, are his unmistakable and explicit directions in regard to +prayer. + +It is so easy to substitute the secondary thing for the fundamental, the +by-thing for the essential, the container for the thing itself. You will +recall that symbolic act of Jesus at the last meeting, the Last Supper +with his disciples, the washing of the disciples' feet by the Master. +The point that is intended to be brought out in the story is, of course, +the extraordinary condescension of Jesus in doing this menial service +for his disciples. "The feet-washing symbolises the attitude of humble +service to others. Every follower of Jesus must experience it." One of +the disciples is so astonished, even taken aback by this menial service +on the part of Jesus, that he says: Thou shall never wash my feet. Jesus +answered him, "If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me." + +In Oriental countries where sandals are worn that cover merely the soles +of the feet, it was, it is the custom of the host to offer his guest who +comes water with which to wash his feet. There is no reason why this +simple incident of humble service, or rather this symbolic act of humble +service, could not be taken and made an essential condition of salvation +by any council that saw fit to make it such. Things just as strange as +this have happened; though any thinking man or woman _today_ would deem +it essentially foolish. + +It is an example of how the spirit of a beautiful act could be +misrepresented to the people. For if you will look at them again, Jesus' +words are very explicit: "If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with +me." But hear Jesus' own comment as given in John: "So after he had +washed their feet, and had taken his garments, and was set down again, +he said unto them, Know ye what I have done to you? Ye call me Master +and Lord: and ye say well; for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Master, +have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one another's feet. For I +have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you. +Verily, verily, I say unto you, The servant is not greater than his +lord; neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him. If ye know +these things, happy are ye if ye do them." It is a means to an end and +not an end in itself. The spirit that it typifies is essential; but not +the act itself. + +The same could be rightly said of the Lord's Supper. It is an observance +that can be made of great value, one very dear and valuable to many +people. But it cannot, if Jesus is to be our authority, and if correctly +reported, be by any means made a fundamental, an essential of salvation. +From the rebuke administered by Jesus to his disciples in a number of +cases where they were prone to drag down his meanings by their purely +material interpretations, we should be saved from this. + +You will recall his teaching one day when he spoke of himself as the +bread of life that a man may eat thereof and not die. Some of his Jewish +hearers taking his words in a material sense and arguing in regard to +them one with another said: "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" +Hearing them Jesus reaffirming his statement said: "Verily, verily, I +say unto you, except ye eat of the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink +his blood, ye have not life in yourselves.... For my flesh is meat +indeed, and my blood is drink indeed." His disciples, likewise, prone +here as so often to make a literal and material interpretation of his +statements, said one to another: "This is a hard saying; who can hear +him?" Or according to our idiom--who can understand him? Jesus asked +them squarely if what he had just said caused them to stumble, and in +order to be sure that they might not miss his real meaning and therefore +teaching, said: "It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth +nothing: the words that I speak unto you, _they_ are spirit, and _they_ +are life." + +Try as we will, we cannot get away from the fact that it was the words +of truth that Jesus brought that were ever uppermost in his mind. He +said, Follow me, not some one else, nor something else that would claim +to represent me. And follow me merely because I lead you to the Father. + +So supremely had this young Jewish prophet, the son of a carpenter, made +God's business his business, that he had come into the full realisation +of the oneness of his life with the Father's life. He was able to +realise and to say, "I and my Father are one." He was able to bring to +the world a knowledge of the great fact of facts--the essential oneness +of the human with the Divine--that God tabernacles with men, that He +makes His abode in the minds and the hearts of those who through desire +and through will open their hearts to His indwelling presence. + +The first of the race, he becomes the revealer of this great eternal +truth--the mediator, therefore, between God and man--in very truth the +Saviour of men. "If a man love me," said he, "he will keep my words: and +my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode +with him.... If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even +as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love." + +It is our eternal refusal to follow Jesus by listening to the words of +life that he brought, and our proneness to substitute something else in +their place, that brings the barrenness that is so often evident in the +everyday life of the Christian. We have been taught _to believe in_ +Jesus; we have not been taught _to believe_ Jesus. This has resulted in +a separation of Christianity from life. The predominating motive has +been the saving of the soul. It has resulted too often in a selfish, +negative, repressive, ineffective religion. As Jesus said: "And why call +ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?" + +We are just beginning to realise at all adequately that it was _the +salvation of the life_ that he taught. When the life is redeemed to +righteousness through the power of the indwelling God and moves out in +love and in service for one's fellow-men, the soul is then saved. + +A man may be a believer in Jesus for a million years and still be an +outcast from the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. But a man can't +believe Jesus, which means following his teachings, without coming at +once into the Kingdom and enjoying its matchless blessings both here and +hereafter. And if there is one clear-cut teaching of the Master, it is +that the life here determines and with absolute precision the life to +come. + +One need not then concern himself with this or that doctrine, whether it +be true or false. Later speculations and theories are not for him. +Jesus' own saying applies here: "If any man will do his will he shall +know of the doctrine, whether it be of God." He enters into the Kingdom, +the Kingdom of Heaven here and now; and when the time comes for him to +pass out of this life, he goes as a joyous pilgrim, full of anticipation +for the Kingdom that awaits him, and the Master's words go with him: "In +my Father's house are many mansions." + +By thus becoming a follower of Jesus rather than merely a believer in +Jesus, he gradually comes into possession of insights and powers that +the Master taught would follow in the lives of those who became his +followers. The Holy Spirit, the Divine Comforter, of which Jesus spoke, +the Spirit of Truth, that awaits our bidding, will lead continually to +the highest truth and wisdom and insight and power. Kant's statement, +"The other world is not another locality, but only another way of seeing +things," is closely allied to the Master's statement: "The Kingdom of +God is within you." And closely allied to both is this statement of a +modern prophet: "The principle of Christianity and of every true +religion is within the soul--the realisation of the incarnation of God +in every human being." + +When we turn to Jesus' own teachings we find that his insistence was not +primarily upon the saving of the soul, but upon the saving of the life +for usefulness, for service, here and now, for still higher growth and +unfoldment, whereby the soul might be grown to a sufficient degree that +it would be worth the saving. And this is one of the great facts that is +now being recognised and preached by the forward-looking men and women +in our churches and by many equally religious outside of our churches. + +And so all aspiring, all thinking, forward-looking men and women of our +day are not interested any more in theories about, explanations of, or +dogmas about Jesus. They are being won and enthralled by the wonderful +personality and life of Jesus. They are being gripped by the power of +his teachings. They do not want theories about God--they want God--and +God is what Jesus brought--God as the moving, the predominating, the +all-embracing force in the individual life. But he who finds the Kingdom +of God, whose life becomes subject to the Divine rule and life within, +realises at once also his true relations with the whole--with his +neighbour, his fellow-men. He realises that his neighbour is not merely +the man next door, the man around the corner, or even the man in the +next town or city; but that his neighbour _is every man and every woman +in the world_--because all children of the same infinite Father, all +bound in the same direction, but over many different roads. + +The man who has come under the influence and the domination of the +Divine rule, realises that his interests lie in the same direction as +the interests of all, that he cannot gain for himself any good--that is, +any essential good--at the expense of the good of all; but rather that +his interests, his Welfare, and the interests and the welfare of all +others are identical. God's rule, the Divine rule, becomes for him, +therefore, the fundamental rule in the business world, the dominating +rule in political life and action, the dominating rule in the law and +relations of nations. + +Jesus did not look with much favour upon outward form, ceremony, or with +much favour upon formulated, or formal religion; and he somehow or other +seemed to avoid the company of those who did. We find him almost +continually down among the people, the poor, the needy, the outcast, the +sinner--wherever he could be of service to the Father, that is, wherever +he could be of service to the Father's children. According to the +accounts he was not always as careful in regard to those with whom he +associated as the more respectable ones, the more respectable classes of +his day thought he should be. They remarked it many times. Jesus noticed +it and remarked in turn. + +We find him always where the work was to be done--friend equally of the +poor and humble, and those of station--truly friend of man, teaching, +helping, uplifting. And then we find him out on the mountain side--in +the quiet, in communion--to keep his realisation of his oneness with the +Father intact; and with this help he went down regularly to the people, +trying to lift their minds and lives up to the Divine ideal that he +revealed to them, that they in turn might realise their real relations +one with another, that the Kingdom of God and His righteousness might +grow and become the dominating law and force in the world--"Thy Kingdom +come, Thy Will be done on earth as it is in Heaven." + +It is this Kingdom idea, the Divine rule, the rule of God in all of the +relations and affairs of men on earth that is gripping earnest men and +women in great numbers among us today. Under the leadership of these +thinking, God-impelled men and women, many of our churches are pushing +their endeavours out into social service activities along many different +lines; and the result is they are calling into their ranks many able men +and women, especially younger men and women, who are intensely +religious, but to whom formal, inactive religion never made any appeal. + +When the Church begins actually to throw the Golden Rule onto its +banner, not in theory but in actual practice, actually forgetting self +in the Master's service, careless even of her own interests, her +membership, she thereby calls into her ranks vast numbers of the best of +the race, especially among the young, so that the actual result is a +membership not only larger than she could ever hope to have otherwise, +but a membership that commands such respect and that exercises such +power, that she is astounded at her former stupidity in being shackled +so long by the traditions of the past. A new life is engendered. There +is the joy of real accomplishment. + +We are in an age of great changes. Advancing knowledge necessitates +changes. And may I say a word here to our Christian ministry, that +splendid body of men for whom I have such supreme admiration? One of the +most significant facts of our time is this widespread inclination and +determination on the part of such great numbers of thinking men and +women to go directly to Jesus for their information of, and their +inspiration from him. The beliefs and the voice of the laymen, those in +our churches and those out of our churches, must be taken into account +and reckoned with. Jesus is too large and too universal a character to +be longer the sole possession, the property of any organisation. + +There is a splendid body of young men and young women numbering into +untold thousands, who are being captured by the personality and the +simple direct message of Jesus. Many of these have caught his spirit and +are going off into other lines of the Master's service. They are doing +effective and telling work there. Remember that when the spirit of the +Christ seizes a man, it is through the channel of present-day forms and +present-day terms, not in those of fifteen hundred, or sixteen hundred, +or even three hundred years ago. + +There is a spirit of intellectual honesty that prevents many men and +women from subscribing to anything to which they cannot give their +intellectual assent, as well as their moral and spiritual assent. They +do not object to creeds. They know that a creed is but a statement, a +statement of a man's or a woman's belief, whether it be in connection +with religion, or in connection with anything else. But what they do +object to is dogma, that unholy thing that lives on credulity, that is +therefore destructive of the intellectual and the moral life of every +man and every woman who allows it to lay its paralysing hand upon them, +that can be held to if one is at all honest and given to thought, only +through intellectual chicanery. + +We must not forget also that God is still at work, revealing Himself +more fully to mankind through modern prophets, through modern agencies. +His revelation is not closed. It is still going on. The silly +presumption in the statement therefore--"the truth once delivered." + +It is well occasionally to call to mind these words by Robert Burns, +singing free and with an untrammelled mind and soul from his +heather-covered hills: + + Here's freedom to him that wad read, + Here's freedom to him that wad write; + There's nane ever feared that the truth should be heared + But them that the truth wad indict. + +It is essential to remember that we are in possession of knowledge, that +we are face to face with conditions that are different from any in the +previous history of Christendom. The Christian church must be sure that +it moves fast enough so as not to alienate, but to draw into it that +great body of intellectually alive, intellectually honest young men and +women who have the Christ spirit of service and who are mastered by a +great purpose of accomplishment. Remember that these young men and women +are now merely standing where the entire church will stand in a few +years. Remember that any man or woman who has the true spirit of service +has the spirit of Christ--and more, has the religion of the Christ. + +Remember that Jesus formulated no organisation. His message of the +Kingdom was so far-reaching that no organisation could ever possibly +encompass it, though an organisation may be, and has been, a great aid +in actualising it here on earth. He never made any conditions as to +through whom, or what, his truth should be spread, and he would condemn +today any instrumentality that would abrogate to itself any monopoly of +his truth, just as he condemned those ecclesiastical authorities of his +day who presumed to do the same in connection with the truth of God's +earlier prophets. + +And so I would say to the Church--beware and be wise. Make your +conditions so that you can gain the allegiance and gain the help of this +splendid body of young men and young women. Many of them are made of the +stock that Jesus would choose as his own apostles. Among the young men +will be our greatest teachers, our great financiers, our best +legislators, our most valuable workers and organisers in various fields +of social service, our most widely read authors, eminent and influential +editorial and magazine writers as well as managers. + +Many of these young women will have high and responsible positions as +educators. Some will be heads and others will be active workers in our +widely extended and valuable women's clubs. Some will have a hand in +political action, in lifting politics out of its many-times low +condition into its rightful state in being an agent for the +accomplishment of the people's best purposes and their highest good. +Some will be editors of widely circulating and influential women's +magazines. Some will be mothers, true mothers of the children of others, +denied their rights and their privileges. Make it possible for them, +nay, make it incumbent upon them to come in, to work within the great +Church organisation. + +It cannot afford that they stay out. It is suicidal to keep them out. +Any other type of organisation that did not look constantly to +commanding the services of the most capable and expert in its line would +fall in a very few months into the ranks of the ineffectives. A business +or a financial organisation that did not do the same would go into +financial bankruptcy in even a shorter length of time. By attracting +this class of men and women into its ranks it need fear neither moral +nor financial bankruptcy. + +But remember, many men and women of large calibre are so busy doing +God's work in the world that they have no time and no inclination to be +attracted by anything that does not claim their intellectual as well as +their moral assent. The Church must speak fully and unequivocally in +terms of present-day thought and present-day knowledge, to win the +allegiance or even to attract the attention of this type of men and +women. + +And may I say here this word to those outside, and especially to this +class of young men and young women outside of our churches? Changes, +and therefore advances in matters of this kind come slowly. This is true +from the very nature of human nature. Inherited beliefs, especially when +it comes to matters of religion, take the deepest hold and are the +slowest to change. Not in all cases, but this is the general rule. + +Those who hold on to the old are earnest, honest. They believe that +these things are too sacred to be meddled with, or even sometimes, to be +questioned. The ordinary mind is slow to distinguish between tradition +and truth--especially where the two have been so fully and so adroitly +mixed. Many are not in possession of the newer, the more advanced +knowledge in various fields that you are in possession of. But remember +this--in even a dozen years a mighty change has taken place--except in a +church whose very foundation and whose sole purpose is dogma. + +In most of our churches, however, the great bulk of our ministers are +just as forward-looking, just as earnest as you, and are deeply desirous +of following and presenting the highest truth in so far as it lies +within their power to do so. It is a splendid body of men, willing to +welcome you on your own grounds, longing for your help. It is a mighty +engine for good. Go into it. Work with it. Work through it. The best +men in the Church are longing for your help. They need it more than they +need anything else. I can assure you of this--I have talked with many. + +They feel their handicaps. They are moving as rapidly as they find it +possible to move. On the whole, they are doing splendid work and with a +big, fine spirit of which you know but little. You will find a wonderful +spirit of self-sacrifice, also. You will find a stimulating and precious +comradeship on the part of many. You will find that you will get great +good, even as you are able to give great good. + +The Church, as everything else, needs to keep its machinery in continual +repair. Help take out the worn-out parts--but not too suddenly. The +Church is not a depository, but an instrument and engine of truth and +righteousness. Some of the older men do not realise this; but they will +die off. Respect their beliefs. Honest men have honest respect for +differences of opinion, for honest differences in thought. Sympathy is a +great harmoniser. "Differences of opinion, intellectual distinctions, +these must ever be--separation of mind, but unity of heart." + +I like these words of Lyman Abbott. You will like them. They are spoken +out of a full life of rich experience and splendid service. They have, +moreover, a sort of unifying effect. They are more than a tonic: "Of +all characters in history none so gathers into himself and reflects from +himself all the varied virtues of a complete manhood as does Jesus of +Nazareth. And the world is recognising it.... If you go back to the +olden time and the old conflicts, the question was, 'What is the +relation of Jesus Christ to the Eternal?' Wars have been fought over the +question, 'Was he of one substance with the Father?' I do not know; I do +not know of what substance the Father is; I do not know of what +substance Jesus Christ is. What I do know is this--that when I look into +the actual life that I know about, the men and women that are about me, +the men and women in all the history of the past, of all the living +beings that ever lived and walked the earth, there is no one that so +fills my heart with reverence, with affection, with loyal love, with +sincere desire to follow, as doth Jesus Christ.... + +"I do not need to decide whether he was born of a virgin. I do not need +to decide whether he rose from the dead. I do not need to decide whether +he made water into wine, or fed five thousand with two loaves and five +small fishes. Take all that away, and still he stands the one +transcendent figure toward whom the world has been steadily growing, and +whom the world has not yet overtaken even in his teachings.... I do not +need to know what is his metaphysical relation to the Infinite. I say it +reverently--I do not care. I know for me he is the great Teacher; I know +for me he is the great Leader whose work I want to do; and I know for me +he is the great Personality, whom I want to be like. That I know. +Theology did not give that to me, and theology cannot get it away from +me." + +And what a basis as a test of character is this twofold injunction--this +great fundamental of Jesus! All religion that is genuine flowers in +character. It was Benjamin Jowett who said, and most truly: "The value +of a religion is in the ethical dividend that it pays." When the heart +is right towards God we have the basis, the essence of religion--the +consciousness of God in the soul of man. We have truth in the inward +parts. When the heart is right towards the fellow-man we have the +essential basis of ethics; for again we have truth in the inward parts. + +Out of the heart are the issues of life. When the heart is right all +outward acts and relations are right. Love draws one to the very heart +of God; and love attunes one to all the highest and most valued +relationships in our human life. + +Fear can never be a basis of either religion or ethics. The one who is +moved by fear makes his chief concern the avoidance of detection on the +one hand, or the escape of punishment on the other. Men of large calibre +have an unusual sagacity in sifting the unessential from the essential +as also the false from the true. Lincoln, when replying to the question +as to why he did not unite himself with some church organisation, said: +"When any church will inscribe over its altar, as its sole qualification +of membership, the Saviour's condensed statement of the substance of +both law and gospel: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy +heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and thy neighbour +as thyself, that church shall I join with all my heart and soul." + +He was looked upon by many in his day as a non-Christian--by some as an +infidel. His whole life had a profound religious basis, so deep and so +all-absorbing that it gave him those wonderful elements of personality +that were instantly and instinctively noticed by, and that moved all men +who came in touch with him; and that sustained him so wonderfully, +according to his own confession, through those long, dark periods of the +great crisis, The fact that in yesterday's New York paper--Sunday +paper--I saw the notice of a sermon in one of our Presbyterian +pulpits--Lincoln, the Christian--shows that we have moved up a round +and are approaching more and more to an essential Christianity. + +Similar to this statement or rather belief was that of Emerson, +Jefferson, Franklin, and a host of other men among us whose lives have +been lives of accomplishment and service for their fellow-men. Emerson, +who said: "A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light +which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the +firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his +thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognise our own +rejected thoughts. They come back to us with a certain alienated +majesty." Emerson, who also said: "I believe in the still, small voice, +and that voice is the Christ within me." It was he of whom the famous +Father Taylor in Boston said: "It may be that Emerson is going to hell, +but of one thing I am certain: he will change the climate there and +emigration will set that way." + +So thought Jefferson, who said: "I have sworn eternal hostility to every +form of tyranny over the minds of men." And as he, great prophet, with +his own hand penned that immortal document--the Declaration of American +Independence--one can almost imagine the Galilean prophet standing at +his shoulder and saying: Thomas, I think it well to write it so. Both +had a burning indignation for that species of self-seeking either on the +part of an individual or an organisation that would seek to enchain the +minds and thereby the lives of men and women, and even lay claim to +their children. Yet Jefferson in his time was frequently called an +atheist--and merely because men in those days did not distinguish as +clearly as we do today between ecclesiasticism and religion, between +formulated and essential Christianity. + +So we are brought back each time to Jesus' two fundamentals--and these +come out every time foursquare with the best thought of our time. The +religion of Jesus is thereby prevented from being a mere tribal +religion. It is prevented from being merely an organisation that could +possibly have his sanction as such--that is, an organisation that would +be able to say: This is his, and this only. It makes it have a +world-wide and eternal content. The Kingdom that Jesus taught is +infinitely broader in its scope and its inclusiveness than any +organisation can be, or that all organisations combined can be. + + + + +IX + +HIS PURPOSE OF LIFTING UP, ENERGISING, BEAUTIFYING, AND SAVING THE +ENTIRE LIFE: THE SAVING OF THE SOUL IS SECONDARY; BUT FOLLOWS + + +We have made the statement that Jesus did unusual things, but that he +did them on account of, or rather by virtue of, his unusual insight into +and understanding of the laws whereby they could be done. His +understanding of the powers of the mind and spirit was intuitive and +very great. As an evidence of this were his numerous cases of healing +the sick and the afflicted. + +Intuitively he perceived the existence and the nature of the subjective +mind, and in connection with it the tremendous powers of suggestion. +Intuitively he was able to read, to diagnose the particular ailment and +the cause of the ailment before him. His thought was so poised that it +was energised by a subtle and peculiar spiritual power. Such confidence +did his personality and his power inspire in others that he was able to +an unusual degree to reach and to arouse the slumbering subconscious +mind of the sufferer and to arouse into action its own slumbering +powers whereby the life force of the body could transcend and remould +its error-ridden and error-stamped condition. + +In all these cases he worked through the operation of law--it is exactly +what we know of the laws of suggestion today. The remarkable cases of +healing that are being accomplished here and there among us today are +done unquestionably through the understanding and use of the same laws +that Jesus was the supreme master of. + +By virtue of his superior insight--his understanding of the laws of the +mind and spirit--he was able to use them so fully and so effectively +that he did in many cases eliminate the element of time in his healing +ministrations. But even he was dependent in practically all cases, upon +the mental cooperation of the one who would be healed. Where this was +full and complete he succeeded; where it was not he failed. Such at +least again and again is the statement in the accounts that we have of +these facts in connection with his life and work. There were places +where we are told he could do none of his mighty works on account of +their unbelief, and he departed from these places and went elsewhere. +Many times his question was: "Believe ye that I am able to do this?" +Then: "According to your faith be it unto you," and the healing was +accomplished. + +The laws of mental and spiritual therapeutics are identically the same +today as they were in the days of Jesus and his disciples, who made the +healing of sick bodies a part of their ministration. It is but fair to +presume from the accounts that we have that in the early Church of the +Disciples, and for well on to two hundred years after Jesus' time, the +healing of the sick and the afflicted went hand in hand with the +preaching and the teaching of the Kingdom. There are those who believe +that it never should have been abandoned. As a well-known writer has +said: "Healing is the outward and practical attestation of the power and +genuineness of spiritual religion, and ought not to have dropped out of +the Church." Recent sincere efforts to re-establish it in church +practice, following thereby the Master's injunction, is indicative of +the thought that is alive in connection with the matter today.[A] From +the accounts that we have Jesus seems to have engaged in works of +healing more during his early than during his later ministry. He may +have used it as a means to an end. On account of his great love and +sympathy for the physical sufferer as well as for the moral sufferer, it +is but reasonable to suppose that it was an integral part of his +announced purpose--the saving of the life, of the entire life, for +usefulness, for service, for happiness. + +And so we have this young Galilean prophet, coming from an hitherto +unknown Jewish family in the obscure little village of Nazareth, giving +obedience in common with his four brothers and his sisters to his father +and his mother; but by virtue of a supreme aptitude for and an +irresistible call to the things of the spirit--made irresistible through +his overwhelming love for the things of the spirit--he is early absorbed +by the realisation of the truth that God is his father and that all men +are brothers. + +The thought that God is his father and that he bears a unique and filial +relationship to God so possesses him that he is filled, permeated with +the burning desire to make this newborn message of truth and thereby of +righteousness known to the world. + +His own native religion, once vibrating through the souls of the +prophets as the voice of God, has become so obscured, so hedged about, +so killed by dogma, by ceremony, by outward observances, that it has +become a mean and pitiable thing, and produces mean and pitiable +conditions in the lives of his people. The institution has become so +overgrown that the spirit has gone. But God finds another prophet, +clearly and supremely open to His spirit, and Jesus comes as the +Messiah, the Divine Son of God, the Divine Son of Man, bringing to the +earth a new Dispensation. It is the message of the Divine Fatherhood of +God, God whose controlling character is love, and with it the Divine +sonship of man. An integral part of it is--all men are brothers. + +He comes as the teacher of a new, a higher righteousness. He brings the +message and he expounds the message of the Kingdom of God. All men he +teaches must repent and turn from their sins, and must henceforth live +in this Kingdom. It is an inner kingdom. Men shall not say: Behold it is +here or it is there; for, behold, it is within you. God is your father +and God longs for your acknowledgment of Him as your father; He longs +for your love even as He loves you. You are children of God, but you +are not true Sons of God until through desire the Divine rule and life +becomes supreme in your minds and hearts. It is thus that you will find +the Kingdom of God. When you do, then your every act will show forth in +accordance with this Divine ideal and guide, and the supreme law of +conduct in your lives will be love for your neighbour, for all mankind. +Through this there will then in time become actualised the Kingdom of +Heaven on the earth. + +He comes in no special garb, no millinery, no brass bands, no formulas, +no dogmas, no organisation other than the Kingdom, to uphold and become +a slave to, and in turn be absorbed by, as was the organisation that he +found strangling all religion in the lives of his people and which he so +bitterly condemned. What he brought was something infinitely +transcending this--the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, to which +all men were heirs--equal heirs--and thereby redemption from their sins, +therefore salvation, the saving of their lives, would be the inevitable +result of their acknowledgment of and allegiance to the Divine rule. + +How he embraced all--such human sympathy--coming not to destroy but to +fulfil; not to judge the world but to save the world. How he loved the +children! How he loved to have them about him! How he loved their +simplicity, and native integrity of mind and heart! Hear him as he says: +"Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the Kingdom of God +as a little child, he shall not enter therein"; and again: "Suffer the +little children to come unto me, and forbid them not; for of such is the +Kingdom of God." The makers of dogma, in evolving some three hundred +years later on the dogma of the inherent sinfulness and degradation of +the human life and soul, could certainly find not the slightest trace of +any basis for it again in these words and acts of Jesus. + +We find him sympathising with and mingling with and seeking to draw unto +the way of his own life the poor, the outcast, the sinner, the same as +the well-to-do and those of station and influence--seeking to draw all +through love and knowledge to the Father. + +There is a sense of justice and righteousness in his soul, however, that +balks at oppression, injustice, and hypocrisy. He therefore condemns and +in scathing terms those and only those who would seek to place any +barrier between the free soul of any man and his God, who would bind +either the mind or the conscience of man to any prescribed formulas or +dogmas. Honouring, therefore the forms that his intelligence and his +conscience allowed him to honour, he disregarded those that they did +not. + +Like other good Jewish rabbis, for he was looked upon during his +ministry and often addressed as Rabbi, he taught in the synagogues of +his people; but oftener out on the hillsides and by the lake-side, under +the blue sky and the stars of heaven. Giving due reverence to the Law +and the Prophets--the religion of his people and his own early +religion--but in spirit and in discriminating thought so far +transcending them, that the people marvelled at his teachings and +said--surely this a prophet come from God; no man ever spoke to us as he +speaks. By the ineffable beauty of his life and the love and the +winsomeness of his personality, and by the power of the truths that he +taught, he won the hearts of the common people. They followed him and +his following continually increased. + +Through it all, however, he incurred the increasing hostility and the +increasing hatred of the leaders, the hierarchy of the existing +religious organisation. They were animated by a double motive, that of +protecting themselves, and that of protecting their established +religion. But in their slavery to the organisation, and because unable +to see that it was the spirit of true religion that he brought and +taught, they cruelly put him to death--the same as the organisation +established later on in his name, put numbers of God's true prophets, +Jesus' truest disciples to death, and essentially for the same reasons. + +Jesus' quick and almost unerring perception enabled him to foresee this. +It did not deter him from going forward with his message, standing +resolutely and superbly by his revelation, and at the last almost +courting death--feeling undoubtedly that the sealing of his revelation +and message with his very life blood would but serve to give it its +greatest power and endurance. Heroically he met the fate that he +perceived was conspiring to end his career, to wreck his teachings and +his influence. He went forth to die clear-sighted and unafraid. + +He died for the sake of the truth of the message that he lived and so +diligently and heroically laboured for--the message of the ineffable +love of God for all His children and the bringing of them into the +Father's Kingdom. And we must believe from his whole life's teaching, +not to save their souls from some future punishment; not through any +demand of satisfaction on the part of God; not as any substitutionary +sacrifice to appease the demands of an angry God--for it was the exact +opposite of this that his whole life teaching endeavoured to make +known. It was supremely the love of the Father and His longing for the +love and allegiance, therefore the complete life and service of His +children. It was the beauty of holiness--the beauty of wholeness--the +wholeness of life, the saving of the whole life from the sin and +sordidness of self and thereby giving supreme satisfaction to God. It +was love, not fear. If not, then almost in a moment he changed the +entire purpose and content, the entire intent of all his previous life +work. This is unthinkable. + +In his last act he did not abrogate his own expressed statement, that +the very essence of his message was expressed, as love to God and love +to one's neighbour. He did not abrogate his continually repeated +declaration that it was the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, which +brings man's life into right relations with God and into right relations +with his fellow-men, that it was his purpose to reveal and to draw all +men to, thereby aiding God's eternal purpose--to establish in this world +a state which he designated the Kingdom of Heaven wherein a social order +of brotherliness and justice, wrought and maintained through the potency +of love, would prevail. In doing this he revealed the character of God +by being himself an embodiment of it. + +It was the power of a truth that was to save the life that he was +always concerned with. Therefore his statement that the Son of Man has +come that men might have life and might have it more abundantly--to save +men from sin and from failure, and secondarily from their consequences; +to make them true Sons of God and fit subjects and fit workers in His +Kingdom. Conversion according to Jesus is the fact of this Divine rule +in the mind and heart whereby the life is saved--the saving of the soul +follows. It is the direct concomitant of the saved life. + +In his death he sealed his own statement: "The law and the prophets were +until John; since that time the Kingdom of God is preached, and every +man presseth into it." Through his death he sealed the message of his +life when putting it in another form he said: "Verily, verily, I say +unto you, He that heareth my word and believeth on Him that sent me hath +everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation: but is passed +from death unto life." + +In this majestic life divinity and humanity meet. Here is the +incarnation. The first of the race consciously, vividly, and fully to +realise that God incarnates Himself and has His abode in the hearts and +the lives of men, the first therefore to realise his Divine Sonship and +become able thereby to reveal and to teach the Divine Fatherhood of God +and the Divine Sonship of Man. + +In this majestic life is the atonement, the realisation of the +at-one-ment of the Divine in the human, made manifest in his own life +and in the way that he taught, sealed then by his own blood. + +In this majestic life we have the mediator, the medium or connector of +the Divine and the human. In it we have the Saviour, the very +incarnation of the truth that he taught, and that lifts the minds and +thereby the lives of men up to their Divine ideal and pattern, that +redeems their lives from the sordidness and selfishness and sin of the +hitherto purely material self, and that being thereby saved, makes them +fit subjects for the Father's Kingdom. + +In this majestic life is the full embodiment of the beauty of +holiness--whose words have gone forth and whose spirit is ceaselessly at +work in the world, drawing men and women up to their divine ideal, and +that will continue so to draw all in proportion as his words of truth +and his life are lifted up throughout the world. + + + + +X + +SOME METHODS OF ATTAINMENT + + +After this study of the teachings of the Divine Master let us know this. +It is the material that is the transient, the temporary; and the mental +and spiritual that is the real and the eternal. We must not become +slaves to habit. The material alone can never bring happiness--much less +satisfaction. These lie deeper. That conversation between Jesus and the +rich young man is full of significance for us all, especially in this +ambitious, striving, restless age. + +Abundance of life is determined not alone by one's material possessions, +but primarily by one's riches of mind and spirit. A world of truth is +contained in these words: "Life is what we are alive to. It is not a +length, but breadth. To be alive only to appetite, pleasure, mere luxury +or idleness, pride or money-making, and not to goodness and kindness, +purity and love, history, poetry, and music, flowers, God and eternal +hopes, is to be all but dead." + +Why be so eager to gain possession of the hundred thousand or the +half-million acres, of so many millions of dollars? Soon, and it may be +before you realise it, all must be left. It is as if a man made it his +ambition to accumulate a thousand or a hundred thousand automobiles. All +soon will become junk. But so it is with all material things beyond what +we can actually and profitably use for our good and the good of +others--and that we actually do so use. + +A man can eat just so many meals during the year or during life. If he +tries to eat more he suffers thereby. He can wear only so many suits of +clothing; if he tries to wear more, he merely wears himself out taking +off and putting on. Again it is as Jesus said: "For what shall it profit +a man, if he gain the whole world and lose his own life?" And right +there is the crux of the whole matter. All the time spent in +accumulating these things beyond the reasonable amount, is so much taken +from the life--from the things of the mind and the spirit. It is in the +development and the pursuit of these that all true satisfaction lies. +Elemental law has so decreed. + +We have made wonderful progress, or rather have developed wonderful +skill in connection with things. We need now to go back and catch up the +thread and develop like skill in making the life. + +Little wonder that brains are addled, that nerves are depleted, that +nervous dyspepsia, that chronic weariness, are not the exception but +rather the rule. Little wonder that sanitariums are always full; that +asylums are full and overflowing--and still more to be built. No wonder +that so many men, so many good men break and go to pieces, and so many +lose the life here at from fifty to sixty years, when they should be in +the very prime of life, in the full vigour of manhood; at the very age +when they are capable of enjoying life the most and are most capable of +rendering the greatest service to their fellows, to their community, +because of greater growth, experience, means, and therefore leisure. +Jesus was right--What doth it profit? And think of the real riches that +in the meantime are missed. + +It is like an addled-brain driver in making a trip across the continent. +He is possessed, obsessed with the insane desire of making a record. He +plunges on and on night and day, good weather and foul--and all the time +he is missing all the beauties, all the benefits to health and spirit +along the way. He has none of these when he arrives--he has missed them +all. He has only the fact that he has made a record drive--or nearly +made one. And those with him he has not only robbed of the beauties +along the way; but he has subjected them to all the discomforts along +the way. And what really underlies the making of a record? It is +primarily the spirit of vanity. + +When the mental beauties of life, when the spiritual verities are +sacrificed by self-surrender to and domination by the material, one of +the heavy penalties that inexorable law imposes is the drying up, so to +speak, of the finer human perceptions--the very faculties of enjoyment. +It presents to the world many times, and all unconscious to himself, a +stunted, shrivelled human being--that eternal type that the Master had +in mind when he said: "Thou fool, this night shall thy soul be required +of thee." He whose sole employment or even whose primary employment +becomes the building of bigger and still bigger barns to take care of +his accumulated grain, becomes incapable of realising that life and the +things that pertain to it are of infinitely more value than barns, or +houses, or acres, or stocks, or bonds, or railroad ties. These all have +their place, all are of value; but they can never be made the life. A +recent poem by James Oppenheim presents a type that is known to nearly +every one:[B] + + I heard the preacher preaching at the funeral: + He moved the relatives to tears telling them of + the father, husband, and friend that was dead: + Of the sweet memories left behind him: + Of a life that was good and kind. + + I happened to know the man, + And I wondered whether the relatives would + have wept if the preacher had told the truth: + Let us say like this: + + "The only good thing this man ever did in his life, + Was day before yesterday: + _He died_.... + But he didn't even do that of his own volition.... + He was the meanest man in business on Manhattan Island, + The most treacherous friend, the crudest and stingiest husband, + And a father so hard that his children left home as soon as they were + old enough.... + Of course he had divinity: everything human has: + But he kept it so carefully hidden away that he might just as well not + have had it.... + + "Wife! good cheer! now you can go your own way and live your own life! + Children, give praise! you have his money: the only good thing he ever + gave you.... + Friends! you have one less traitor to deal with.... + This is indeed a day of rejoicing and exultation! + Thank God this man is dead!" + +An unknown enjoyment and profit to him is the world's great field of +literature, the world's great thinkers, the inspirers of so many through +all the ages. That splendid verse by Emily Dickinson means as much to +him as it would to a dumb stolid ox: + + He ate and drank the precious words, + His spirit grew robust, + He knew no more that he was poor, + Nor that his frame was dust; + He danced along the dingy days, + And this bequest of wings + Was but a book! What liberty + A loosened spirit brings! + +Yes, life and its manifold possibilities of unfoldment and avenues of +enjoyment--life, and the things that pertain to it--is an infinitely +greater thing than the mere accessories of life. + +What infinite avenues of enjoyment, what peace of mind, what serenity of +soul may be the possession of all men and all women who are alive to +the inner possibilities of life as portrayed by our own prophet, +Emerson, when he said: + + Oh, when I am safe in my sylvan home, + I tread on the pride of Greece and Rome; + And when I am stretched beneath the pines, + Where the evening star so holy shines, + I laugh at the lore and pride of man, + At the Sophist schools and the learned clan; + For what are they all in their high conceit, + When man in the bush with God may meet? + +It was he who has exerted such a world-wide influence upon the minds and +lives of men and women who also said: "Great men are they who see that +spirituality is stronger than any material force: that thoughts rule the +world." And this is true not only of the world in general, but it is +true likewise in regard to the individual life. + +One of the great secrets of all successful living is unquestionably the +striking of the right balance in life. The material has its place--and a +very important place. Fools indeed were we to ignore or to attempt to +ignore this fact. We cannot, however, except to our detriment, put the +cart before the horse. Things may contribute to happiness, but things +cannot bring happiness--and sad indeed, and crippled and dwarfed and +stunted becomes the life of every one who is not capable of realising +this fact. Eternally true indeed is it that the life is more than meat +and the body more than raiment. + +All life is from an inner centre outward. As within, so without. As we +think we become. Which means simply this: our prevailing thoughts and +emotions are never static, but dynamic. Thoughts are forces--like +creates like, and like attracts like. It is therefore for us to choose +whether we shall be interested primarily in the great spiritual forces +and powers of life, or whether we shall be interested solely in the +material things of life. + +But there is a wonderful law which we must not lose sight of. It is to +the effect that when we become sufficiently alive to the inner powers +and forces, to the inner springs of life, the material things of life +will not only follow in a natural and healthy sequence, but they will +also assume their right proportions. They will take their right places. + +It was the recognition of this great fundamental fact of life that Jesus +had in mind when he said: "But rather seek ye the kingdom of God; and +all these things shall be added unto you,"--meaning, as he so distinctly +stated, the kingdom of the mind and spirit made open and translucent to +the leading of the Divine Wisdom inherent in the human soul, when that +leading is sought and when through the right ordering of the mind we +make the conditions whereby it may become operative in the individual +life. + +The great value of God as taught by Jesus is that God dwells in us. It +is truly Emmanuel--God with us. The law must be observed--the conditions +must be met. "The Lord is with you while ye be with him; and if ye will +seek him, he will be found of you." "The spirit of the living God +dwelleth in you." "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that +giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given +him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering." That there is a Divine +law underlying prayer that helps to release the inner springs of wisdom, +which in turn leads to power, was well known to Jesus, for his life +abundantly proved it. + +His great aptitude for the things of the spirit enabled him intuitively +to realise this, to understand it, to use it. And there was no mystery, +no secret, no subterfuge on the part of Jesus as to the source of his +power. In clear and unmistakable words he made it known--and why should +he not? It was the truth, the truth of this inner kingdom that would +make men free that he came to reveal. "The words that I speak unto you +I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the +works." "My Father worketh hitherto and I work.... For as the Father +hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have life in +himself.... I can of mine own self do nothing." As he followed the +conditions whereby this higher illumination can come so must we. + +The injunction that Jesus gave in regard to prayer is unquestionably the +method that he found so effective and that he himself used. How many +times we are told that he withdrew to the mountain for his quiet period, +for communion with the Father, that the realisation of his oneness with +God might be preserved intact. In this continual realisation--I and my +Father are one--lay his unusual insight and power. And his distinct +statement which he made in speaking of his own powers--as I am ye shall +be--shows clearly the possibilities of human unfoldment and attainment, +since he realised and lived and then revealed the way. + +Were not this Divine source of wisdom and power the heritage of every +human soul, distinctly untrue then would be Jesus' saying: "For every +one that asketh, receiveth; and he that seeketh, findeth; and to him +that knocketh, it shall be opened." Infinitely better is it to know that +one has this inner source of guidance and wisdom which as he opens +himself to it becomes continually more distinct, more clear and more +unerring in its guidance, than to be continually seeking advice from +outside sources, and being confused in regard to the advice given. This +is unquestionably the way of the natural and the normal life, made so +simple and so plain by Jesus, and that was foreshadowed by Isaiah when +he said: "Hast thou not known? Hast thou not heard that the everlasting +God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth fainteth not, +neither is weary? He giveth power to the faint and to them that have no +might he increaseth strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, +and the young men shall utterly fall. But they that wait upon the Lord +shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; +they shall run, and not be weary; they shall walk, and not faint." + +Not that problems and trials will not come. They will come. There never +has been and there never will be a life free from them. Life isn't +conceivable on any other terms. But the wonderful source of consolation +and strength, the source that gives freedom from worry and freedom from +fear is the realisation of the fact that the guiding force and the +moulding power is within us. It becomes active and controlling in the +degree that we realise and in the degree that we are able to open +ourselves so that the Divine intelligence and power can speak to and can +work through us. + +Judicious physical exercise induces greater bodily strength and vigour. +An active and alert mental life, in other words mental activity, induces +greater intellectual power. And under the same general law the same is +true in regard to the development and the use of spiritual power. It, +however, although the most important of all because it has to do more +fundamentally with the life itself, we are most apt to neglect. The +losses, moreover, resulting from this neglect are almost beyond +calculation. + +To establish one's centre aright is to make all of life's activities and +events and results flow from this centre in orderly sequence. A modern +writer of great insight has said: "The understanding that God is, and +_all there is_, will establish you upon a foundation from which you can +never be moved." To know that the power that is God is the power that +works in us is knowledge of transcendent import. + +To know that the spirit of Infinite wisdom and power which is the +creating, the moving, and the sustaining force in all life, thinks and +acts in and through us as our own very life, in the degree that we +consciously and deliberately desire it to become the guiding and the +animating force in our lives, and open ourselves fully to its leadings, +and follow its leadings, is to attain to that state of conscious oneness +with the Divine that Jesus realised, lived and revealed, and that he +taught as the method of the natural and the normal life for all men. + +We are so occupied with the matters of the sense-life that all +unconsciously we become dominated, ruled by the things of the senses. +Now in the real life there is the recognition of the fact that the +springs of life are all from within, and that the inner always leads and +rules the outer. Under the elemental law of Cause and Effect this is +always done--whether we are conscious of it or not. But the difference +lies here: The master of life consciously and definitely allies himself +in mind and spirit with the great central Force and rules his world from +within. The creature of circumstances, through lack of desire or through +weakness of will, fails to do this, and, lacking guiding and directing +force, drifts and becomes thereby the creature of circumstance. + +One of deep insight has said: "That we do not spontaneously see and know +God, as we see and know one another, and so manifest the God-nature as +we do the sense-nature, is because that nature is yet latent, and in a +sense slumbering within us. Yet the God-nature within us connects us as +directly and vitally with the Being and Kingdom of God within, behind, +and above the world, as does the sense-nature with the world external to +us. Hence as the sense-consciousness was awakened and established by the +recognition of and communication with the outward world through the +senses, so the God-consciousness must be awakened by the corresponding +recognition of, and communication with the Being and Kingdom of God +through intuition--the spiritual sense of the inner man.... The true +prayer--the prayer of silence--is the only door that opens the soul to +the direct revelation of God, and brings thereby the realisation of the +God-nature in ourselves." + +As the keynote to the world of sense is activity, so the keynote to +spiritual light and power is quiet. The individual consciousness must be +brought into harmony with the Cosmic consciousness. Paul speaks of the +"sons of God." And in a single sentence he describes what he means by +the term--"For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the +sons of God." An older prophet has said: "The Lord in the midst of thee +is mighty." Jesus with his deep insight perceived the identity of his +real life with the Divine life, the indwelling Wisdom and Power,--the +"Father in me." The whole course of his ministry was his attempt "to +show those who listened to him how he was related to the Father, and to +teach them that they were related to the same Father in exactly the same +way." + +There is that within man that is illumined and energised through the +touch of His spirit. We can bring our minds into rapport, into such +harmony and connection with the infinite Divine mind that it speaks in +us, directs us, and therefore acts through us as our own selves. Through +this connection we become illumined by Divine wisdom and we become +energised by Divine power. It is ours, then, to act under the guidance +of this higher wisdom and in all forms of expression to act and to work +augmented by this higher power. The finite spirit, with all its +limitations, becomes at its very centre in rapport with Infinite spirit, +its Source. The finite thereby becomes the channel through which the +Infinite can and does work. + +To use an apt figure, it is the moving of the switch whereby we connect +our wires as it were with the central dynamo which is the force that +animates, that gives and sustains life in the universe. It is making +actual the proposition that was enunciated by Emerson when he said: +"Every soul is not only the inlet, but may become the outlet of all +there is in God." Significant also in this connection is his statement: +"The only sin is limitation." It is the actualising of the fact that in +Him we live and move and have our being, with its inevitable resultant +that we become "strong in the Lord and in the power of His might." There +is perhaps no more valuable way of realising this end, than to adopt the +practice of taking a period each day for being alone in the quiet, a +half hour, even a quarter hour; stilling the bodily senses and making +oneself receptive to the higher leadings of the spirit--receptive to the +impulses of the soul. This is following the master's practice and +example of communion with the Father. Things in this universe and in +human life do not happen. All is law and sequence. The elemental law of +cause and effect is universal and unvarying. In the realm of spirit law +is as definite as in the realm of mechanics--in the realm of all +material forces. + +If we would have the leading of the spirit, if we would perceive the +higher intuitions and be led intuitively, bringing the affairs of the +daily life thereby into the Divine sequence, we must observe the +conditions whereby these leadings can come to us, and in time become +habitual. + +The law of the spirit is quiet--to be followed by action--but quiet, the +more readily to come into a state of harmony with the Infinite +Intelligence that works through us, and that leads us as our own +intelligence when through desire and through will, we are able to bring +our subconscious minds into such attunement that it can act through us, +and we are able to catch its messages and follow its direction. But to +listen and to observe the conditions whereby we can listen is essential. + +Jesus' own words as well as his practice apply here. After his +admonition against public prayer, or prayer for show, or prayer of much +speaking, he said: "But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, +and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; +and thy Father which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly." Now +there are millions of men, women, and children in the world who have no +closets. There are great numbers of others who have no access to them +sometimes for days, or weeks, or months at a time. It is evident, +therefore, that in the word that has been rendered closet he +meant--enter into the quiet recesses of your own soul that you may thus +hold communion with the Father. + +Now the value of prayer is not that God will change or order any laws or +forces to suit the numerous and necessarily the diverse petitions of +any. All things are through law, and law is fixed and inexorable. The +value of prayer, of true prayer, is that through it one can so harmonise +his life with the Divine order that intuitive perceptions of truth and a +greater perception and knowledge of law becomes his possession. As has +been said by an able contemporary thinker and writer: "We cannot form a +passably thorough notion of man without saturating it through and +through with the idea of a cosmic inflow from outside his world +life--the inflow of God. Without a large consciousness of the universe +beyond our knowledge, few men, if any, have done great things.[C] + +I shall always remember with great pleasure and profit a call a few days +ago from Dr. Edward Emerson of Concord, Emerson's eldest son. Happily I +asked him in regard to his father's methods of work--if he had any +regular methods. He replied in substance: "It was my father's custom to +go daily to the woods--_to listen_. He would remain there an hour or +more in order to get whatever there might be for him that day. He would +then come home and write into a little book--his 'day-book'--what he had +gotten. Later on when it came time to write a book, he would transcribe +from this, in their proper sequence and with their proper connections, +these entrances of the preceding weeks or months. The completed book +became virtually a ledger formed or posted from his day-books." + +The prophet is he who so orders his life that he can adequately listen +to the voice, the revelations of the over soul, and who truthfully +transcribes what he hears or senses. He is not a follower of custom or +of tradition. He can never become and can never be made the subservient +tool of an organisation. His aim and his mission is rather to free men +from ignorance, superstition, credulity, from half truths, by leading +them into a continually larger understanding of truth, of law--and +therefore of righteousness. + +It was more than a mere poetic idea that Lowell gave utterance to when +he said: + + The thing we long for, that we are + For one transcendent moment. + +To establish this connection, to actualise this God-consciousness, that +it may not be for one transcendent moment, but that it may become +constant and habitual, so that every thought arises, and so that every +act goes forth from this centre, is the greatest good that can come into +the possession of man. There is nothing greater. It is none other than +the realisation of Jesus' injunction--"Seek ye first the Kingdom of God +and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you." It +is then that he said--Do not worry about your life. Your mind and your +will are under the guidance of the Divine mind; your every act goes out +under this direction and all things pertaining to your life will fall +into their proper places. Therefore do not worry about your life. + +When a man finds his centre, when he becomes centred in the Infinite, +then redemption takes place. He is redeemed from the bondage of the +senses. He lives thereafter under the guidance of the spirit, and this +is salvation. It is a new life that he has entered into. He lives in a +new world, because his outlook is entirely new. He is living now in the +Kingdom of Heaven. Heaven means harmony. He has brought his own personal +mind and life into harmony with the Divine mind and life. He becomes a +coworker with God. + +It is through such men and women that God's plans and purposes are +carried out. They not only hear but they interpret for others God's +voice. They are the prophets of our time and the prophets of all time. +They are doing God's work in the world, and in so doing they are finding +their own supreme satisfaction and happiness. They are not looking +forward to the Eternal life. They realise that they are now in the +Eternal life, and that there is no such thing as eternal life if this +life that we are now in is not it. When the time comes for them to stop +their labours here, they look forward without fear and with anticipation +to the change, the transition to the other form of life--but not to any +other life. The words of Whitman embody a spirit of anticipation and of +adventure for them: + + Joy, Shipmate, joy! + (Pleas'd to my soul at death I cry) + One life is closed, one life begun, + The long, long anchorage we leave, + The ship is clear at last, she leaps. + Joy, Shipmate, joy! + +They have an abiding faith that they will take up the other form of life +exactly where they left it off here. Being in heaven now they will be in +heaven when they awake to the continuing beauties of the life subsequent +to their transition. Such we might also say is the teaching of Jesus +regarding the highest there is in life here and the best there is in the +life hereafter. + + + + +XI + +SOME METHODS OF EXPRESSION + + +The life of the Spirit, or, in other words, the true religious life, is +not a life of mere contemplation or a life of inactivity. As Fichte, in +"The Way Toward the Blessed Life," has said: "True religion, +notwithstanding that it raises the view of those who are inspired by it +to its own region, nevertheless, retains their Life firmly in the domain +of action, and of right moral action.... Religion is not a business by +and for itself which a man may practise apart from his other +occupations, perhaps on certain fixed days and hours; but it is the +inmost spirit that penetrates, inspires, and pervades all our Thought +and Action, which in other respects pursue their appointed course +without change or interruption. That the Divine Life and Energy actually +lives in us is inseparable from Religion." + +How thoroughly this is in keeping with the thought of the highly +illumined seer, Swedenborg, is indicated when he says: "The Lord's +Kingdom is a Kingdom of ends and uses." And again: "Forsaking the world +means loving God and the neighbour; and God is loved when a man lives +according to His commandments, and the neighbour is loved when a man +performs uses." And still again: "To be of use means to desire the +welfare of others for the sake of the common good; and not to be of use +means to desire the welfare of others not for the sake of the common +good but for one's own sake.... In order that man may receive heavenly +life he must live in the world and engage in its business and +occupations, and thus by a moral and civil life acquire spiritual life. +In no other way can spiritual life be generated in man, or his spirit be +prepared for heaven." + +We hear much today both in various writings and in public utterances of +"the spiritual" and "the spiritual life." I am sure that to the great +majority of men and women the term spiritual, or better, the spiritual +life, means something, but something by no means fully tangible or +clear-cut. I shall be glad indeed if I am able to suggest a more +comprehensible concept of it, or putting it in another form and better +perhaps, to present a more clear-cut portraiture of the spiritual life +in expression--in action. + +And first let us note that in the mind and in the teachings of Jesus +there is no such thing as the secular life and the religious life. His +ministry pertained to every phase of life. The truth that he taught was +a truth that was to permeate every thought and every act of life. + +We make our arbitrary divisions. We are too apt to deny the fact that +the Lord is the Lord of the week-day, the same as He is the Lord of the +Sabbath. Jesus refused to be bound by any such consideration. He taught +that every act that is a good act, every act that is of service to +mankind is not only a legitimate act to be done on the Sabbath day, but +an act that _should_ be performed on the Sabbath day. And any act that +is not right and legitimate for the Sabbath day is neither right nor +legitimate for the week-day. In other words, it is the spirit of +righteousness that must permeate and must govern every act of life and +every moment of life. + +In seeking to define the spiritual life, it were better to regard the +world as the expression of the Divine mind. The spirit is the life; the +world and all things in it, the material to be moulded, raised, and +transmuted from the lower to the higher. This is indeed the law of +evolution, that has been through all the ages and that today is at work. +It is the God-Power that is at work and every form of useful activity +that helps on with this process of lifting and bettering is a form of +Divine activity. If therefore we recognise the one Divine life working +in and through all, the animating force, therefore the Life of all, and +if we are consciously helping in this process we are spiritual men. + +No man of intelligence can fail to recognise the fact that life is more +important than things. Life is the chief thing, and material things are +the elements that minister to, that serve the purposes of the life. +Whoever does anything in the world to preserve life, to better its +conditions, who, recognising the Divine force at work lifting life up +always to better, finer conditions, is doing God's work in the +world--because cooperating with the great Cosmic world plan. + +The ideal, then, is men and women of the spirit, open and responsive +always to its guidance, recognising the Divine plan and the Divine +ideal, working cooperatively in the world to make all conditions of life +fairer, finer, more happy. He who lives and works not as an individual, +that is not for his good alone, but who recognises the essential oneness +of life--is carrying out his share of the Divine plan. + +A man may be unusually gifted; he may have unusual ability in business, +in administration; he may be a giant in finance, in administration, but +if for self alone, if lack of vision blinds him to the great Divine +plan, if he does not recognise his relative place and value; if he gains +his purposes by selfishness, by climbing over others, by indifference to +human pain or suffering--oblivious to human welfare--his ways are the +ways of the jungle. His mind and his life are purely sordid, grossly and +blindly self-centred--wholly material. He gains his object, but by +Divine law not happiness, not satisfaction, not peace. He is outside the +Kingdom of Heaven--the kingdom of harmony. He is living and working out +of harmony with the Divine mind that is evolving a higher order of life +in the world. He is blind too, he is working against the Divine plan. + +Now what is the Divine call? Can he be made into a spiritual man? Yes. A +different understanding, a different motive, a different object--then +will follow a difference in methods. Instead of self alone he will have +a sense of, he will have a call to service. And this man, formerly a +hinderer in the Divine plan, becomes a spiritual giant. His splendid +powers and his qualities do not need to be changed. Merely his motives +and thereby his methods, and he is changed into a giant engine of +righteousness. He is a part of the great world force and plan. He is +doing his part in the great world work--he is a coworker with God. And +here lies salvation. Saved from self and the dwarfed and stunted +condition that will follow, his spiritual nature unfolds and envelops +his entire life. His powers and his wealth are thereafter to bless +mankind. But behold! by another great fundamental law of life in doing +this he is blessed ten, a hundred, a millionfold. + +Material prosperity is or may become a true gain, a veritable blessing. +But it can become a curse to the world and still more to its possessor +when made an end in itself, and at the expense of all the higher +attributes and powers of human life. + +We have reason to rejoice that a great change of estimate has not only +begun but is now rapidly creeping over the world. He of even a +generation ago who piled and piled, but who remained ignorant of the +more fundamental laws of life, blind to the law of mutuality and +service, would be regarded today as a low, beastly type. I speak +advisedly. It is this obedience to the life of the spirit that Whitman +had in mind when he said: "And whoever walks a furlong without sympathy +walks to his own funeral drest in his shroud." It was the full flowering +of the law of mutuality and service that he saw when he said: "I saw a +city invincible to the attacks of the whole of the rest of the earth. I +dream'd that it was the new City of Friends. Nothing was greater there +than the quality of robust love; it led the rest. It was seen every hour +in the actions of the men of that city and in all their looks and +words." It is through obedience to this life of the spirit that order is +brought out of chaos in the life of the individual and in the life of +the community, in the business world, the labour world, and in our great +world relations. + +But in either case, we men and women of Christendom, to be a Christian +is not only to be good, but to be good for something. According to the +teachings of the Master true religion is not only personal salvation, +but it is giving one's self through all of one's best efforts to +actualise the Kingdom of Heaven here on earth. The finding of the +Kingdom is not only personal but social and world-affirming--and in the +degree that it becomes fully and vitally personal will it become so. + +A man who is not right with his fellow-men is not right and cannot be +right with God. This is coming to be the clear-cut realisation of all +progressive religious thought today. Since men are free from the +trammels of an enervating dogma that through fear made them seek, or +rather that made them contented with religion as primarily a system of +rewards and punishments, they are now awakening to the fact that the +logical carrying out of Jesus' teaching of the Kingdom is the +establishing here on this earth of an order of life and hence of a +society where greater love and cooperation and justice prevail. Our +rapidly growing present-day conception of Christianity makes it not +world-renouncing, but world-affirming. + +This modern conception of the function of a true and vital Christianity +makes it the task of the immediate future to apply Christianity to +trade, to commerce, to labour relations, to all social relations, to +international relations. "And, in the wider field of religious thought," +says a writer in a great international religious paper, "what truer +service can we render than to strip theology of all that is unreal or +needlessly perplexing, and make it speak plainly and humanly to people +who have their duty to do and their battle to fight?" It makes +intelligent, sympathetic, and helpful living take the place of the tooth +and the claw, the growl and the deadly hiss of the jungle--all right in +their places, but with no place in human living. + +The growing realisation of the interdependence of all life is giving a +new standard of action and attainment, and a new standard of estimate. +Jesus' criterion is coming into more universal appreciation: He that is +greatest among you shall be as he who serves. Through this fundamental +law of life there are responsibilities that cannot be evaded or +shirked--and of him to whom much is given much is required. + +It was President Wilson who recently said: "It is to be hoped that these +obvious truths will come to more general acceptance; that honest +business will quit thinking that it is attacked when loaded-dice +business is attacked; that the mutuality of interest between employer +and employee will receive ungrudging admission; and, finally, that men +of affairs will lend themselves more patriotically to the work of making +democracy an efficient instrument for the promotion of human welfare. It +cannot be said that they have done so in the past.... As a consequence, +many necessary things have been done less perfectly without their +assistance that could have been done more perfectly with their expert +aid." He is by no means alone in recognising this fact. Nor is he at all +blind to the great change that is already taking place. + +In a recent public address in New York, the head of one of the largest +plants in the world, and who starting with nothing has accumulated a +fortune of many millions, said: "The only thing I am proud of--prouder +of than that I have amassed a great fortune--is that I established the +first manual training school in Pennsylvania. The greatest delight of +my life is to see the advancement of the young men who have come up +about me." + +This growing sense of personal responsibility, and still better, of +personal interest, this giving of one's abilities and one's time, _in +addition to one's means_, is the beginning of the fulfilment of what I +have long thought: namely, the great gain that will accrue to numberless +communities and to the nation, when men of great means, men of great +business and executive ability, give of their time and their abilities +for the accomplishment of those things for the public welfare that +otherwise would remain undone, or that would remain unduly delayed. What +a gain will result also to those who so do in the joy and satisfaction +resulting from this higher type of accomplishment hallowed by the +undying element of human service! + +You keep silent too much. "Have great leaders, and the rest will +follow," said Whitman. The gift of your abilities while you live would +be of priceless worth for the establishing and the maintenance of a +fairer, a healthier, and a sweeter life in your community, your city, +your country. It were better to do this and to be contented with a +smaller accumulation than to have it so large or even so excessive, and +when the summons comes to leave it to two or three or to half a dozen +who cannot possibly have good use for it all, and some of whom perchance +would be far better off without it, or without so much. By so doing you +would be leaving something still greater to them as well as to hundreds +or thousands of others. + +Significant in this connection are these words by a man of wealth and of +great public service:[D] + +"On the whole, the individualistic age has not been a success, either +for the individual, or the community in which he has lived, or the +nation. We are, beyond question, entering on a period where the welfare +of the community takes precedence over the interests of the individual +and where the liberty of the individual will be more and more +circumscribed for the benefit of the community as a whole. Man's +activities will hereafter be required to be not only for himself but for +his fellow-men. To my mind there is nothing in the signs of the times so +certain as this. + +"The man of exceptional ability, of more than ordinary talent, will +hereafter look for his rewards, for his honours, not in one direction +but in two--first, and foremost, in some public work accomplished, and, +secondarily, in wealth acquired. In place of having it said of him at +his death that he left so many hundred thousand dollars it will be said +that he rendered a certain amount of public service, and, incidentally, +left a certain amount of money. Such a goal will prove a far greater +satisfaction to him, he will live a more rational, worthwhile life, and +he will be doing his share to provide a better country in which to live. +We face new conditions, and in order to survive and succeed we shall +require a different spirit of public service." + +I am well aware of the fact that the mere accumulation of wealth is not, +except in very rare cases, the controlling motive in the lives of our +wealthy men of affairs. It is rather the joy and the satisfaction of +achievement. But nevertheless it is possible, as has so often proved, to +get so much into a habit and thereby into a rut, that one becomes a +victim of habit; and the life with all its superb possibilities of human +service, and therefore of true greatness, becomes side-tracked and +abortive. + +There are so many different lines of activity for human betterment for +children, for men and women, that those of great executive and financial +ability have wonderful opportunities. Greatness comes always through +human service. As there is no such thing as finding happiness by +searching for it directly, so there is no such thing as achieving +greatness by seeking it directly. It comes not primarily through +brilliant intellect, great talents, but primarily through the heart. It +is determined by the way that brilliant intellect, great talents are +used. It is accorded not to those who seek it directly. By an indirect +law it is accorded to those who, forgetting self, give and thereby lose +their lives in human service. + +Both poet and prophet is Edwin Markham when he says: + + We men of earth have here the stuff + Of Paradise--we have enough! + We need no other stones to build + The stairs into the Unfulfilled-- + No other ivory for the doors-- + No other marble for the floors-- + No other cedar for the beam + And dome of man's immortal dream. + + Here on the paths of every day-- + Here on the common human way, + Is all the stuff the gods would take + To build a Heaven; to mould and make + New Edens. Ours the stuff sublime + To build Eternity in time! + +This putting of divinity into life and raising thereby an otherwise +sordid life up to higher levels and thereby to greater enjoyments, is +the power that is possessed equally by those of station and means, and +by those in the more humble or even more lowly walks of life. + +When your life is thus touched by the spirit of God, when it is ruled by +this inner Kingdom, when your constant prayer, as the prayer of every +truly religious man or woman will be--Lord, what wilt Thou have me to +do? My one desire is that Thy will be my will, and therefore that Thy +will be done in me and through me--then you are living the Divine life; +you are a coworker with God. And whether your life according to accepted +standards be noted or humble it makes no difference--you are fulfilling +your Divine mission. You should be, you cannot help being fearless and +happy. You are a part of the great creative force in the world. + +You are doing a man's or a woman's work in the world, and in so doing +you are not unimportant; you are essential. The joy of true +accomplishment is yours. You can look forward always with sublime +courage and expectancy. The life of the most humble can thus become an +exalted life. Mother, watching over, cleaning, feeding, training, and +educating your brood; seamstress, working, with a touch of the Divine +in all you do--it must be done by some one--allow it to be done by none +better than by you. Farmer, tilling your soil, gathering your crops, +caring for your herds; you are helping feed the world. There is nothing +more important. + + "Who digs a well, or plants a seed, + A sacred pact he keeps with sun and sod; + With these he helps refresh and feed + The world, and enters partnership with God." + +If you do not allow yourself to become a slave to your work, and if you +cooperate within the house and the home so that your wife and your +daughters do not become slaves or near-slaves, what an opportunity is +yours of high thinking and noble living! The more intelligent you +become, the better read, the greater the interest you take in community +and public affairs, the more effectively you become what in reality and +jointly you are--the backbone of this and of every nation. Teacher, +poet, dramatist, carpenter, ironworker, clerk, college head, Mayor, +Governor, President, Ruler--the effectiveness of your work and the +satisfaction in your work will be determined by the way in which you +relate your thought and your work to the Divine plan, and coordinate +your every activity in reference to the highest welfare of the greater +whole. + +However dimly or clearly we may perceive it great changes are taking +place. The simple, direct teachings of the Christ are reaching more and +more the mind, are stirring the heart and through these are dominating +the actions of increasing numbers of men and women. The realisation of +the mutual interdependence of the human family, the realisation of its +common source, and that when one part of it goes wrong all suffer +thereby, the same as when any portion of it advances all are lifted and +benefited thereby, makes us more eager for the more speedy actualising +of the Kingdom that the Master revealed and portrayed. + +It was Sir Oliver Lodge who in this connection recently said: "Those who +think that the day of the Messiah is over are strangely mistaken; it has +hardly begun. In individual souls Christianity has flourished and borne +fruit, but for the ills of the world itself it is an almost untried +panacea. It will be strange if this ghastly war fosters and simplifies +and improves a knowledge of Christ, and aids a perception of the +ineffable beauty of his life and teaching; yet stranger things have +happened, and whatever the churches may do, I believe that the call of +Christ himself will be heard and attended to by a larger part of +humanity in the near future, as never yet it has been heard or attended +to on earth." + +The simple message of the Christ, with its twofold injunction of Love, +is, when sufficiently understood and sufficiently heeded, all that we +men of earth need to lift up, to beautify, to make strong and Godlike +individual lives and thereby and of necessity the life of the world. +Jesus never taught that God incarnated Himself in him alone. I challenge +any man living to find any such teaching by him. He did proclaim his own +unique realisation of God. Intuitively and vividly he perceived the +Divine life, the eternal Word, the eternal Christ, manifesting in his +clean, strong, upright soul, so that the young Jewish rabbi and prophet, +known in all his community as Jesus, the son of Joseph and Mary and +whose brothers and sisters they knew so well,[E] became the +firstborn--fully born--of the Father. + +He then pleaded with all the energy and love and fervour of his splendid +heart and vigorous manhood that all men should follow the Way that he +revealed and realise their Divine Sonship, that their lives might be +redeemed--redeemed from the bondage of the bodily senses and the +bondage of merely the things of the outer world, and saved as fit +subjects of and workers in the Father's Kingdom. Otherwise for millions +of splendid earnest men and women today his life-message would have no +meaning. + +To make men awake to their real identity, and therefore to their +possibilities and powers as true sons of God, the Father of all, and +therefore that all men are brothers--for otherwise God is not Father of +all--and to live together in brotherly love and mutual cooperation +whereby the Divine will becomes done on earth as it is in heaven--this +is his message to we men of earth. If we believe his message and accept +his leadership, then he becomes indeed our elder brother who leads the +way, the Word in us becomes flesh, the Christ becomes enthroned in our +lives,--and we become co-workers with him in the Father's vineyard. + + + + +XII + +THE WORLD WAR--ITS MEANING AND ITS LESSONS FOR US + + +Whatever differences of opinion--and honest differences of opinion--may +have existed and may still exist in America in regard to the great world +conflict, there is a wonderful unanimity of thought that has +crystallised itself into the concrete form--_something must be done in +order that it can never occur again_. The higher intelligence of the +nation must assert itself. It must feel and think and act in terms of +internationalism. Not that the feeling of nationalism in any country +shall, or even can be eradicated or even abated. It must be made, +however, to coordinate itself with the now rapidly growing sense of +world-consciousness, that the growing intelligence of mankind, aided by +some tremendously concrete forms of recent experience, is now +recognising as a great reality. + +That there were very strong sympathies for both the Allied Nations and +for the Central Powers in the beginning, goes without saying, How could +it be otherwise, when we realise the diverse and complex types of our +citizenship? + +One of the most distinctive, and in some ways one of the most +significant, features of the American nation is that it is today +composed of representatives, and in some cases, of enormous bodies of +representatives, numbering into the millions, of practically every +nation in the world. + +There are single cities where, in one case twenty-six, in another case +twenty-nine, and in other cases a still larger number of what are today +designated as hyphenated citizens are represented. The orderly removal +of the hyphen, and the amalgamation of these splendid representatives of +practically all nations into genuine American citizens, infused with +American ideals and pushed on by true American ambitions, is one of the +great problems that the war has brought in a most striking manner to our +attention. + +Not that these representatives of many nations shall in any way lose +their sense of sympathy for the nations of their birth, in times of +either peace or of distress, although they have found it either +advisable or greatly to their own personal advantage and welfare to +leave the lands of their birth and to establish their homes here. + +The fact that in the vast majority of cases they find themselves better +off here, and choose to remain and assume the responsibilities of +citizenship in the Western Republic, involves a responsibility that +some, if not indeed many, heretofore have apparently too lightly +considered. There must be a more supreme sense of allegiance, and a +continually growing sense of responsibility to the nation, that, guided +by their own independent judgment and animated by their own free wills, +they have chosen as their home. + +There is a difference between sympathy and allegiance; and unless a man +has found conditions intolerable in the land of his birth, and this is +the reason for his seeking a home in another land more to his liking and +to his advantage, we cannot expect him to be devoid of sympathy for the +land of his birth, especially in times of stress or of great need. We +can expect him, however, and we have a right to demand his _absolute +allegiance_ to the land of his adoption. And if he cannot give this, +then we should see to it that he return to his former home. If he is +capable of clear thinking and right feeling, he also must realise the +fundamental truth of this fact. + +There are public schools in America where as many as nineteen languages +are spoken in a single room. Our public schools, so eagerly sought by +the children of parents of foreign birth, in their intense eagerness +for an education, that is offered freely and without cost to all, can +and must be made greater instruments in converting what must in time +become a great menace to our institutions, and even to the very life of +the nation itself, into a real and genuine American citizenship. Our +best educators, in addition to our clearest thinking citizens, are +realising as never before, that our public-school system chiefly, among +our educational institutions, must be made a great melting-pot through +which this process of amalgamation must be carried on. + +We are also realising clearly now that, as a nation, we have been +entirely too lax in connection with our immigration privileges, +regulations and restrictions. We have been admitting foreigners to our +shores in such enormous quantities each year that we have not been able +at all adequately to assimilate them, nor have we used at all a +sufficiently wise discrimination in the admission of desirables or +undesirables. + +We have received, or we have allowed to be dumped upon our shores, great +numbers of the latter whom we should know would inevitably become +dependents, as well as great numbers of criminals. The result has been +that they have been costing certain localities millions of dollars every +year. But entirely aside from the latter, the last two or three years +have brought home to us as never before the fact that those who come to +our shores must come with the avowed and the settled purpose of becoming +real American citizens, giving full and absolute allegiance to the +institutions, the laws, the government of the land of their adoption. + +If any other government is not able so to manage as to make it more +desirable for its subjects to remain in the land of their birth, rather +than to seek homes in the land with institutions more to their liking, +or with advantages more conducive to their welfare, that government then +should not expect to retain, even in the slightest degree, the +allegiance of such former subjects. A hyphenated citizenship may become +as dangerous to a republic as a cancer is in the human body. A country +with over a hundred hyphens cannot fulfil its highest destiny. + +We, as a nation, have been rudely shaken from our long dream of almost +inevitable national security. We have been brought finally, and although +as a nation we have no desire for conquest or empire, and no desire for +military glory, and therefore no need of any great army or navy for +offensive purposes, we have been brought finally to realise that we do, +nevertheless, stand in need of a national strengthening of our arm of +defence. A land of a hundred million people, where one could travel many +times for a sixmonth and never see the sign of a soldier, is brought, +though reluctantly, to face a new state of affairs; but one, +nevertheless, that must be faced--calmly faced and wisely acted upon. +And while it is true that as a nation we have always had the tradition +of non-militarism, it is not true that we have had the tradition of +military or of naval impotence or weakness. + +Preparedness, therefore, has assumed a position of tremendous +importance, in individual thought, in public discussion, and almost +universally in the columns of the public press. One of the most vital +questions among us then is, not so much as to how we shall prepare, but +how shall we prepare adequately for defensive purposes, in case of any +emergency arising, without being thrown too far along the road of +militarism, and without an inordinate preparation that has been the +scourge and the bane of many old-world countries for so many years, and +that quite as much as anything has been provocative of the horrible +conflict that has literally been devastating so many European countries. + +It is clearly apparent that the best thought in America today calls for +an adequate preparation for purposes of defence, and calls for a +recognition of facts as they are. It also clearly sees the danger of +certain types of mind and certain interests combining to carry the +matter much farther than is at all called for. The question is--How +shall we then strike that happy balance that is the secret of all +successful living in the lives of either individuals or in the lives of +nations? + +All clear-seeing people realise that, as things are in the world today, +there is a certain amount of preparedness that is necessary for +influence and for insurance. As within the nation a police force is +necessary for the enforcement of law, for the preservation of law and +order, although it is not at all necessary that every second or third +man be a policeman, so in the council of nations the individual nation +must have a certain element of force that it can fall back upon if all +other available agencies fail. In diplomacy the strong nations win out, +the weaker lose out. Military and naval power, unless carried to a +ridiculous excess does not, therefore, lie idle, even when not in actual +use. + +Our power and influence as a nation will certainly not be in proportion +to our weakness. Although righteousness exalteth a nation, it is +nevertheless true that righteousness alone will not protect a +nation--while other nations are fully armed. National weakness does not +make for peace. + +Righteousness, combined with a spirit of forbearance, combined with a +keen desire to give justice as well as to demand justice, if combined +with the power to strike powerfully and sustainedly in defence of +justice, and in defence of national integrity, is what protects a +nation, and this it is that in the long run exalteth a nation--_while +things are as they are_. + +While conditions have therefore brought prominently to the forefront in +America the matter of military training and military service--an +adequate military preparation for purposes of defence, for full and +adequate defence, the best thought of the nation is almost a unit in the +belief that, for us as a nation, an immense standing army is unnecessary +as well as inadvisable. + +No amount of military preparation that is not combined definitely and +completely with an enhanced citizenship, and therefore with an advance +in real democracy, is at all worthy of consideration on the part of the +American people, or indeed on the part of the people of any nation. +Pre-eminently is this true in this day and age. + +Observing this principle we could then, while a certain degree of +universal training under some system similar to the Swiss or Australian +system is being carried on, and to serve _our immediate needs_, have an +army of even a quarter of a million men without danger of militarism and +without heavy financial burdens, and without subverting our American +ideas--providing it is an industrial arm. There are great engineering +projects that could be carried on, thereby developing many of our now +latent resources; there is an immense amount of road-building that could +be projected in many parts of, if not throughout the entire country; +there are great irrigation projects that could be carried on in the far +West and Southwest, reclaiming millions upon millions of acres of what +are now unproductive desert lands; all these could be carried on and +made even to pay, keeping busy a large number of men for half a dozen +years to come. + +This army of this number of men could be recruited, trained to an +adequate degree of military service, and at the same time could be +engaged in profitable employment on these much-needed works. They could +then be paid an adequate wage, ample to support a family, or ample to +lay up savings if without family. Such men leaving the army service, +would then have a degree of training and skill whereby they would be +able to get positions or employment, all more remunerative than the +bulk of them, perhaps, would ever be able to get without such training +and experience. + +An army of this number of trained men, somewhat equally divided between +the Atlantic and the Pacific seaboards, the bulk of them engaged in +regular constructive work, _work that needs to be done and that, +therefore, could be profitably done_, and ready to be called into +service at a moment's notice, would constitute a tremendous insurance +against any aggression from without, and would also give a tremendous +sense of security for half a dozen years at least. This number could +then be reduced, for by that time several million young men from +eighteen years up would be partially trained and in first-class physical +shape to be summoned to service should the emergency arise. + +In addition to the vast amount of good roads building, whose cost could +be borne in equal proportions by nation, state and county--a most +important factor in connection with military necessity as well as a +great economic factor in the successful development and advancement of +any community--the millions of acres of now arid lands in the West, +awaiting only water to make them among the most valuable and productive +in all the world, could be used as a great solution of our immigration +problem. + +Up to the year when the war began, there came to our shores upwards of +one million immigrants every twelve months, seeking work, and most of +them homes in this country. The great bulk of them got no farther than +our cities, increasing congestion, already in many cases acute, and many +of them becoming in time, from one cause or another, dependents, the +annual cost of their maintenance aggregating many millions every year. + +With these vast acres ready for them large numbers could, under a wise +system of distribution, be sent on to the great West and Southwest, and +more easily and directly now since the Panama Canal is open for +navigation. Allotments of these lands could be assigned them that they +could in time become owners of, through a wisely established system of +payments. Many of them would thereby be living lives similar to those +they lived in their own countries, and for which their training and +experience there have abundantly fitted them. They would thus become a +far more valuable type of citizens--landowners--than they could ever +possibly become otherwise, and especially through our present +unorganised hit-or-miss system. They would in time also add annually +hundreds of millions of productive work to the wealth of the country. + +The very wise system that was inaugurated some time ago in connection +with the Coast Defence arm of our army is, under the wise direction of +our present Secretary of War, to be extended to all branches of the +service. For some time in the Coast Artillery Service the enlisted man +under competent instruction has had the privilege of becoming a skilled +machinist or a skilled electrician. Now the system is to be extended +through all branches of the military service, and many additional trades +are to be added to the curricula of the trade schools of the army. The +young man can, therefore, make his own selection and become a trained +artisan at the same time that he serves his time in the army, with all +expenses for such training, as well as maintenance, borne by the +Government. He can thereby leave the service fully equipped for +profitable employment. + +This will have the tendency of calling a better class of young men into +the service; it will also do away with the well-founded criticism that +army life and its idleness, or partly-enforced idleness, unfits a man +for useful industrial service after he quits the army. If this same +system is extended through the navy, as it can be, both army and navy +service will meet the American requirement--that neither military nor +naval service take great numbers of men from productive employment, to +be in turn supported by other workers. Instead of so much dead timber, +they are all the time producing while in active service, and are being +trained to be highly efficient as producers, when they leave the +service. + +Under this system the Federal Government can build its own ordnance +works and its own munition factories and become its own maker of +whatever may be required in all lines of output. We will then be able to +escape the perverse influence of gain on the part of large munition +industries, and the danger that comes from that portion of a military +party whose motives are actuated by personal gain. + +If the occasion arises, or if we permit the occasion to arise, Kruppism +in America will become as dangerous and as sinister in its influences +and its proportions, as it became in Germany. + +Another great service that the war has done us, is by way of bringing +home to us the lesson that has been so prominently brought to the front +in connection with the other nations at war, namely, the necessity of +the speedy and thorough mobilisation of all lines of industries and +business; for the thoroughness and the efficiency with which this can be +done may mean success that otherwise would result in failure and +disaster. We are now awake to the tremendous importance of this. + +It is at last becoming clearly understood among the peoples and the +nations of the world that, as a nation, we have no desire for conquest, +for territory, for empire--we have no purposes of aggression; we have +quite enough to do to develop our resources and our as yet great +undeveloped areas. + +A few months before the war broke, I had conversations with the heads or +with the representatives of leading publishing houses in several +European countries. It was at a time when our Mexican situation was +beginning to be very acute. I remember at that time especially, the +conversation with the head of one of the largest publishing houses in +Italy, in Milan. I could see plainly his scepticism when, in reply to +his questions, I endeavoured to persuade him that as a nation we had no +motives of conquest or of aggression in Mexico, that we were interested +solely in the restoration of a representative and stable government +there. And since that time, I am glad to say that our acts as a nation +have all been along the line of persuading him, and also many other +like-minded ones in many countries abroad, of the truth of this +assertion. By this general course we have been gaining the confidence +and have been cementing the friendship of practically every South +American republic, our immediate neighbours on the southern continent. +This has been a source of increasing economic power with us, and an +element of greatly added strength, and also a tremendous energy working +all the time for the preservation of peace. + +One can say most confidently, even though recognising our many grave +faults as a nation, that our course along this line has been such, +especially of late years, as to inspire confidence on the part of all +the fair-minded nations of the world. + +Our theory of the state, the theory of democracy, is not that the state +is above all, and that the individual and his welfare are as nothing +when compared to it, but rather that the state is the agency through +which the highest welfare of all its subjects is to be evolved, +expressed, maintained. No other theory to my mind, is at all compatible +with the intelligence of any free-thinking people. + +Otherwise, there is always the danger and also the likelihood, while +human nature is as it is, for some ruler, some clique, or factions so to +concentrate power into their own hands, that for their own ambitions, +for aggrandisement, or for false or short-sighted and half-baked ideas +of additions to their country, it is dragged into periodic wars with +other nations. + +Nor do we share in the belief that the state is above morality, but +rather that identically the same moral ideals, precepts and obligations +that bind individuals must be held sacred by the state, otherwise it +becomes a pirate among nations, and it will inevitably in time be hunted +down and destroyed as such, however great its apparent power. Nor do we +as a nation share in the belief that war is necessary and indeed good +for a nation, to inspire and to preserve its manly qualities, its +virility, and therefore its power. Were this the only way that this +could be brought about, it might be well and good; but the price to be +paid is a price that is too enormous and too frightful, and the results +are too uncertain. We believe that these same ideals can be inculcated, +that these same energies can be used along useful, conserving, +constructive lines, rather than along lines of destruction. + +A nation may have the most colossal and perfect military system in the +world, and still may suffer defeat in any given while, because of those +unseen things that pertain to the soul of another people, whereby powers +and forces are engendered and materialised that make defeat for them +impossible; and in the matter of big guns, it is well always to remember +that no nation can build them so great that another nation may not build +them still greater. National safety does not necessarily lie in that +direction. Nor, on the other hand, along the lines of extreme +pacificism--surely not as long as things are as they are. The argument +of the lamb has small deterrent effect upon the wolf--as long as the +wolf is a wolf. And sometimes wolves hunt in packs. The most preeminent +lesson of the great war for us as a nation should be this--there should +be constantly a degree of preparedness sufficient to hold until all the +others, the various portions of the nation, thoroughly coordinated and +ready, can be summoned into action. Thus are we prepared, thus are we +safe, and there is no danger or fear of militarism. + +In a democracy it should, without question, be a fundamental fact that +hand in hand with equal rights there should go a sense of equal duty. A +call for defence should have a universal response. So it is merely good +common-sense, good judgment, if you please, for all the young men of the +nation to have a training sufficient to enable them to respond +effectively if the nation's safety calls them to its defence. It is no +crime, however we may deprecate war, to be thus prepared. + +For young men--and we must always remember that it is the young men who +are called for this purpose--for young men to be called to the colours +by the tens or the hundreds of thousands, unskilled and untrained, to be +shot down, decimated by the thoroughly trained and skilled troops of +another nation, or a combination of other nations, is indeed the crime. +Never, moreover, was folly so great as that shown by him or by her who +will not see. And to look at the matter without prejudice, we will +realise that this is merely policing what we have. It is meeting force +with adequate force, _if it becomes necessary_, so to meet it. + +This is necessary until such time as we have in operation among nations +a thoroughly established machinery whereby force will give place to +reason, whereby common sense will be used in adjusting all differences +between nations, as it is now used in adjusting differences between +individuals. + +Our period of isolation is over. We have become a world-nation. Equality +of rights presupposes equality of duty. In our very souls we loathe +militarism. Conquest and aggression are foreign to our spirit, and +foreign to our thoughts and ambitions. But weakness will by no means +assure us immunity from aggression from without. Universal military +training up to a reasonable point, and the joint sense of responsibility +of every man and every woman in the nation, and the right of the +national government to expect and to demand that every man and woman +stand ready to respond to the call to service, whatever form it may +take--this is our armour. + +All intelligent people know that the national government has always had +the power to draft every male citizen fit for service into military +service. It is not therefore a question of universal military service. +The real and only question is whether these or great numbers of these go +out illy prepared and equipped as sheep to the shambles perchance, or +whether they go out trained and equipped to do a man's work--more +adequately prepared to protect themselves as well as the integrity of +the nation. It is not to be done for the love or the purpose of +militarism; but recognising the fact that militarism still persists, +that with us it may not be triumphant should we at any time be forced to +face it. There are certain facts that only to our peril as well as our +moral degradation, we can be blind to. Said a noted historian but a few +days ago: + +"I loathe war and militarism. I have fought them for twenty years. But I +am a historian, and I know that bullies thrive best in an atmosphere of +meekness. As long as this military system lasts you must discourage the +mailed fist by showing that you will meet it with something harder than +a boxing glove. We do not think it good to admit into the code of the +twentieth century that a great national bully may still with impunity +squeeze the blood out of its small neighbours and seize their goods." + +We need not fear militarism arising in America as long as the +fundamental principles of democracy are preserved and continually +extended, which can be done only through the feeling of the individual +responsibility of every man and every woman to take a keen and constant +interest in the matters of their own government--community, state, +national, and now international. We must realise and ever more fully +realise that in a government such as ours, the people are the +government, and that when in it anything goes wrong, or wrongs and +injustices are allowed to grow and hold sway, we are to blame. + +Universal military training has not militarised Switzerland nor has it +Australia. It is rather the very essence of democracy and the very +antithesis of militarism. + + "Let each son of Freedom bear + His portion of the burden. Should not each one do his share? + To sacrifice the splendid few-- + The strong of heart, the brave, the true, + Who live--or die--as heroes do, + While cowards profit--is not fair!" + +Many still recall that not a few well-meaning people at the close of the +Civil War proclaimed that, with upwards of two million trained men +behind him, General Grant would become a military dictator, and that +this would be followed by the disappearance of democracy in the nation. +But the mind, the temper, the traditions of our people are all a +guarantee against militarism. The gospel, the hallucination of the +shining armour, the will to power, has no attraction for us. We loathe +it; nor do we fear its undermining and crushing our own liberties +internally. Nevertheless, it is true that vigilance is always and always +will be the price of liberty. There must be a constant education towards +citizenship. There must be an alert democracy, so that any land and sea +force is always the servant of the spirit; for only otherwise it can +become its master--but otherwise it will become its master. + + + + +XIII + +OUR SOLE AGENCY OF INTERNATIONAL PEACE, AND INTERNATIONAL CONCORD + + +The consensus of intelligent thought throughout the world is to the +effect that just as we have established an orderly method for the +settlement of disputes between individuals or groups of individuals in +any particular nation, we must now move forward and establish such +methods for the settlement of disputes among nations. There is no +civilised country in the world that any longer permits the individual to +take the law into his own hands. + +The intelligent thought of the world now demands the definite +establishment of a World Federation for the enforcement of peace among +nations. It demands likewise the definite establishment of a permanent +World Court, backed by adequate force for the arbitrament of all +disputes among nations--unable to be adjusted by the nations themselves +in friendly conference. We have now reached the stage in world +development and in world intercourse where peace must be +internationalised. Our present chaotic condition, which exists simply +because we haven't taken time as yet to establish a method, must be +made to give place to an intelligently devised system of law and order. +Anything short of this means a periodic destruction of the finest fruits +of civilisation. It means also the periodic destruction of the finest +young manhood of the world. This means, in turn, the speedy degeneration +of the human race. The deification of force, augmented by all the +products and engines of modern science, is simply the way of sublimated +savagery. + +The world is in need of a new dispensation. Recent events show +indisputably that we have reached the parting of the ways, the family of +nations must now push on into the new day or the world will plunge on +into a darker night. There is no other course in sight. I know of no +finer words penned in any language--this time it was in French--to +express an unvarying truth than these words by Victor Hugo: "There is +one thing that is stronger than armies, and that is an idea whose time +has come." + +Never before, after viewing the great havoc wrought, the enormous debts +that will have to be paid for between fifty and a hundred years to come, +the tremendous disruptions and losses in trade, the misery and +degradation stalking broadcast over every land engaged in the +war--scarcely a family untouched--never before have nations been in the +state of mind to consider and to long to act upon some sensible and +comprehensive method of international concord and adjustments. If this +succeeds, the world, including ourselves, is the gainer. If this does +not succeed, though the chances are overwhelmingly in its favour, then +we can proclaim to the assembled nations that as long as a state of +outlawry exists among nations, that then no longer by chance but by +design, we as a nation will be in a state of preparedness broad and +comprehensive enough to defend ourselves against the violation of any of +the rights of a sovereign nation. It is only in this way that we can +show a due appreciation of the struggles and the sacrifices of those who +gave us our national existence; it is only in this way that we can, +retain our self-respect, that we can command the respect of other +nations _while things are as they are_; that we can hope to retain any +degree of influence and authority for the diplomatic arm of our +Government in the Council of Nations. + +Every neutral nation has suffered tremendously by the war. Every neutral +nation will suffer until a new world-order among nations is projected +and perfected. + +We owe a tremendous duty to the world in connection with this great +world crisis and upheaval. Diligently should our best men and women, +those of insight and greatest influence, and with the expenditure of +both time and means, seek to further the practical working out of a +World Federation and a permanent World Court. Public opinion should be +thus aroused and solidified so that the world knows that we stand as a +united nation back of the idea and the plan. + +The divine right of kings has gone. It holds no more. We hear now and +then, it is true, some silly statement in regard to it, but little +attention is paid to it. The divine right of priests has gone except in +the minds of the few remaining ignorant and herdable ones. The divine +right of dynasties--or rather of dynasties to persist--seems to die a +little harder, but it is well on the way. We are now realising that the +only divine right is the right of the people--and all the people. + +Never again should it be possible for one man, or for one little group +of men so to lead, or so to mislead a nation as to plunge it into war. +The growth of democracy compelling the greater participation of all the +people in government must prohibit this. So likewise the close +relationship of the entire world now must make it forever impossible for +a single nation or a group of nations for any cause to plunge a whole +world or any part of it into war. These are sound and clear-visioned +words recently given utterance to by James Bryce: "However much we +condemn reckless leaders and the ruthless caste that live for war, the +real source of the mischief is the popular sentiment behind them. The +lesson to be learned is that doctrines and deep-rooted passions, whence +these evils spring, can only be removed by the slow and steady working +of spiritual forces. What most is needed is the elimination of those +feelings the teachings of which breed jealousy and hatred and prompt men +to defiance and aggression." + +Humanity and civilisation is not headed towards Ab the cave-man, +whatever appearances, in the minds of many, may indicate at the present +time. Humanity will arise and will reconstruct itself. Great lessons +will be learned. Good will result. But what a terrific price to pay! +What a terrific price to pay to learn the lesson that "moral forces are +the only invincible forces in the universe"! It has been slow, but +steadily the world is advancing to that stage when the individual or the +nation that does not know that the law of mutuality, of cooperation, and +still more the law of sympathy and good will, is the supreme law in real +civilisation, real advancement, and real gain--that does not know that +its own welfare is always bound up with the welfare of the greater +whole--is still in the brute stage of life and the bestial propensities +are still its guiding forces. + +Prejudice, suspicion, hatred, national big-headedness, must give way to +respect, sympathy, the desire for mutual understanding and cooperation. +The higher attributes must and will assert themselves. The former are +the ways of periodic if not continuous destruction--the latter are the +ways of the higher spiritual forces that must prevail. Significant are +these words of one of our younger but clear-visioned American poets, +Winter Bynner: + + Whether the time be slow or fast, + Enemies, hand in hand, + Must come together at the last + And understand. + + No matter how the die is cast, + Or who may seem to win-- + We know that we must love at last-- + Why not begin? + +The teaching of hatred to children, the fostering of hatred in adults, +can result only in harm to the people and the nation where it is +fostered. The dragon's tooth will leave its marks upon the entire nation +and the fair life of all the people will suffer by it. The holding in +contempt of other people makes it sometimes necessary that one's own +head be battered against the wall that he may be sufficiently aroused to +recognise and to appreciate their sterling and enduring qualities. + +The use of a club is more spectacular for some at least than the use of +intellectual and moral forces. The rattling of the machine-gun produces +more commotion than the more quiet ways of peace. All of the powerful +forces in nature, those of growth, germination, and conservation, the +same as in human life are quiet forces. So in the preservation of peace. +It consists rather in a high constructive policy. It requires always +clear vision, a constantly progressive and cooperative method of life +and action; frank and open dealing and a resolute purpose. It is won and +maintained by nothing so much in the long run as when it makes the +Golden Rule its law of conduct. Slowly we are realising that great +armaments--militarism--do not insure peace. They may lead away from +it--they are very apt to lead away from it. + +Peace is related rather to the great moral laws of conduct. It has to do +with straight, clean, open dealing. It is fostered by sympathy, +forbearance. This does not mean that it pertains to weakness. On the +contrary it is determined by resolute but high purpose, the actual and +active desire of a nation to live on terms of peace with all other +nations; and the world's; recognition of this fact is a most powerful +factor in inducing and in actualising such living. + +Our own achievement of upwards of a hundred years in living in +peaceable, sympathetic and mutually beneficial relations with Canada; +Canada's achievement in so living with us, should be a distinct and +clear-cut answer to the argument that nations need to fortify their +boundaries one against another. This is true only where suspicion, +mistrust, fear, secret diplomacy, and secret alliances hold instead of +the great and eternally constructive forces--sympathy, good will, mutual +understanding, induced and conserved by an International Joint +Commission of able men whose business it is to investigate, to +determine, and to adjust any differences that through the years may +arise. Here we have a boundary line of upwards of three thousand miles +and not a fort; vast areas of inland seas and not a war vessel; and for +upwards of a hundred years not a difference that the High Joint +Commission has not been able to settle amicably and to the mutual +advantage of both countries. + +I know that in connection with this we have an advantage over the +old-world nations because we are free from age-long prejudices, +hatreds, and past scores. But if this great conflict does not lead along +the lines of the constructive forces and the working out of a new world +method, then the future of Europe and of the world is dark indeed. +Surely it will lead to a new order--it is almost inconceivable that it +will not. + +The Golden Rule is a wonderful developer in human life, a wonderful +harmoniser in community life--with great profit it could be extended as +the law of conduct in international relations. It must be so extended. +Its very foundation is sympathy, good will, mutuality, love. + +The very essence of Jesus' entire revelation and teaching was love. It +was not the teaching of weakness or supineness in the face of wrong, +however. There was no failure on his part to smite wrong when he saw +it--wrong taking the form of injustice or oppression. He had, as we have +seen, infinite sympathy for and forbearance with the weak, the sinful; +but he had always a righteous indignation and a scathing denunciation +for oppression--for that spirit of hell that prompts men or +organisations to seek, to study, to dominate the minds and thereby the +lives of others. It was, moreover, that he would not keep silent +regarding the deadly ecclesiasticism that bore so heavily upon his +people and that had well-nigh crushed all their religious life whence +are the very springs of life, that he aroused the deadly antagonism of +the ruling hierarchy. And as he, witnessing for truth and freedom, +steadfastly and defiantly opposed oppression, so those who catch his +spirit today will do as he did and will realise as duty--"While wrong is +wrong let no man prate of peace!" + + Peace? Peace? Peace? + While wrong is wrong let no man prate of peace! + He did not prate, the Master. Nay, he smote! + + * * * * * + + Hate wrong! Slay wrong! Else mercy, justice, truth, + Freedom and faith, shall die for humankind.[F] + +Nor did the code and teachings of Jesus prevent him driving the +money-changers from out the temple court. It was not for the purpose of +doing them harm. It was rather to do them good by driving home to them +in some tangible and concrete form, through the skin and flesh of their +bodies, what the thick skins of their moral natures were unable to +comprehend. The resistance of wrongdoing is not opposed to the law of +love. As in community life there is the occasional bully who has +sometimes to be knocked down in order that he may have a due +appreciation of individual rights and community amenities, so among +nations a similar lesson is sometimes necessary in order that it or its +leaders may learn that there are certain things that do not pay, and, +moreover, will not be allowed by the community of nations. + +Making might alone the basis of national policy and action, or making it +the basis of settlement in international settlements, but arouses and +intensifies hatred and the spirit of revenge. So in connection with this +great world crisis--after it all then comes the great problem of +reorganisation and rehabilitation, and unless there comes about an +international concord strong and definite enough to prevent a recurrence +of what has been, it would almost seem that restoration were futile; for +things will be restored only in time to be destroyed again. + +No amount of armament we know now will prevent war. It can be prevented +only by a definite concord of the nations brought finally to realise the +futility of war. To deny the possibility of a World League and a World +Court is to deny the ability of men to govern themselves. The history of +the American Republic in its demonstration of the power and the genius +of federation should disprove the truth of this. Here we have a nation +composed of forty-eight sovereign states and with the most heterogeneous +accumulation of people that ever came together in one country, let alone +one nation, and great numbers of them from those nations that for +upwards of a thousand years have been periodically springing at one +another's throats. Enlightened self-government has done it. The real +spirit and temper of democracy has done it. But it must be the +preservation of the real spirit of democracy and constant vigilance that +must preserve it. + +Prejudice, suspicion, hatred on the part of individuals or on the part +of the people of one nation against the people of another nation, have +never yet advanced the welfare of any individual or any nation and never +can. The world war is but the direct result of the type of peace that +preceded it. The militarist argument reduced to its lowest terms amounts +merely to this: "For two nations to keep peace each must be stronger +than the other." + +Representative men of other countries do not resent our part in pressing +this matter and in taking the leadership in it. But even if they did +they would have no just right to. There is, however, a very general +feeling that the American Republic, as the world's greatest example of +_successful federation_, should take the lead in the World Federation. + +This is now going to be greatly fostered by virtue of one great good +that the world war will eventually have accomplished--the doom and the +end of autocracy. Dynasties and privileged orders that have lived and +lived alone on militarism, will have been foreclosed on. The people in +control, in an increasingly intelligent control of their own lives and +their own governments, will be governed by a higher degree of +self-enlightenment and mutual self-interest than under the domination or +even the leadership of any type of hereditary ruling class or war-lord. +In some countries autocracy in religion, through the free mingling and +discussions of men of various nationalities and religious persuasions, +will be again lessened, whereby the direct love and power of God in the +hearts of men, as Jesus taught, will have a fuller sway and a more holy +and a diviner moulding power in their lives. + +It was during those long, weary years coupled with the horrible crimes +of the Thirty Years' War that the science of International Law began to +take form, the result of that notable work, "De Jure Belli ac Pacis," by +Grotius. It is ours to see that out of this more intense and thereby +even more horrible conflict a new epoch in human and international +relations be born. + +As the higher powers of mind and spirit are realised and used, great +primal instincts impelling men to expression and action that find their +outlet many times in war, will be transmuted and turned from destruction +into powerful engines of construction. When a moral equivalent for war +of sufficient impelling power is placed before men, those same virile +qualities and powers that are now marshalled so easily for purposes of +fighting, will, under the guidance and in the service of the spirit, be +used for the conserving of human life, and for the advancement and the +increase of everything that administers to life, that makes it more +abundant, more mutual, and more happy. And God knows that the call for +such service is very great. + + * * * * * + +And even now comes the significant word that the long, the too long +awaited world's Bill of Rights has taken form. The intelligence and the +will of righteous men, duly appointed as the representatives of fourteen +sovereign nations, has asserted itself, and the beginning has been made, +without which there can be neither growth nor advancement. The +Constitution of the World League has taken form. It is not a perfect +instrument; but it will grow into as perfect an instrument as need be +for its purpose. Changes and additions to it will be made as times and +conditions indicate. Partisanship even with us may seek to defeat it. +There is no question, however, but that the sober sense of the American +people is behind it. + +One of the most fundamental results, we might say purposes of the great +world war, was to end war. It means now that the world's unity and +mutuality and its community of interests must be realised and that we +build accordingly. It means that the world's peace must be fostered and +preserved by the use of brains and guided by the heart; or that every +brute force made ghastly and deadly to the n_th_ degree that modern +science can devise, be periodically called in to settle the disputes or +curb the ambitions that will disrupt the peace of the world. + +The common people the world over are desiring as near as can be arrived +at, some surety as to the preservation of the world's peace; and they +will brook no interference with a plan that seems the most feasible way +to that end. The whole world is in that temper that gives significance +to the words of President Wilson when a day or two ago he said: "Any +man who resists the present tides that run in the world will find +himself thrown upon a shore so high and barren that it will seem as if +he had been separated from his human kind forever." Unless, he might +have added--he has and can demonstrate a better plan. The two chief +arguments against it, that it will take away from our individual rights +and that it will lead us into entangling alliances, no longer hold--for +we are entangled already. We are a part of the great world force and it +were futile longer to seek to escape our duties as such. They are as +essential as "our rights." + +It is with us now as a nation as it was with that immortal group that +gathered to sign our Declaration of Independence, to whom Franklin said: +"We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately." + +It is well for Americans to recall that the first League of Nations was +when thirteen distinct nationalities one day awoke to the fact that it +were better to forget their differences and to a great extent their +boundaries, and come together in a common union. They had their thirteen +distinct armies to keep up, in order to defend themselves each against +the other or against any combination of the others, to say nothing of +any outside power that might move against them. Jealousies arose and +misunderstandings were frequent. So zealous was each of its own rights +that when the Constitutional Convention had completed its work, and the +Constitution was ready for adoption, there were those who actually left +the hall rather than sign it. They were good men but they were looking +at stern facts and they wanted no idealism in theirs. Good men, some +animated by the partisan spirit, it is true, earnest in their +beliefs--but unequipped with the long vision. Their names are now +recalled only through the search of the antiquarian. + +Infinitely better it has been found for the thirteen and eventually the +forty-eight to stand together than to stand separately. The thirteen +separate states were farther separated so far as means of communication +and actual knowledge of one another were concerned, than are the nations +of the world today. + +It took men of great insight as well as vision to formulate our own +Constitution which made thirteen distinct and sovereign states the +United States of America. The formulation of the Constitution of the +World League has required such men. As a nation we may be proud that two +representative Americans have had so large a share in its +accomplishment--President Wilson, good Democrat, and Ex-President Taft, +good Republican. + +The greatest international and therefore world document ever produced +has been forged--it awaits the coming days, years, and even generations +for its completion. And we accord great honour also to those statesmen +of other nations who have combined keen insight born of experience, with +a lofty idealism; for out of these in any realm of human activities and +relations, whatever eventually becomes the practical, is born. + + + + +XIV + +THE WORLD'S BALANCE-WHEEL + + +It was Lincoln who gave us a wonderful summary when he said: "After all +the one meaning of life is to be kind." + +Love, sympathy, fellowship is the very foundation of all civilised, +happy, ideal life. It is the very balance-wheel of life itself. It gives +that genuineness and simplicity in voice, in look, in spirit that is so +instinctively felt by all, and to which all so universally respond. It +is like the fragrance of the flower--the emanation of its soul. + +Interesting and containing a most vital truth is this little memoir by +Christine Rossetti: "One whom I knew intimately, and whose memory I +revere, once in my hearing remarked that, 'unless we love people, we +cannot understand them.' This was a new light to me." It contains indeed +a profound truth. + +Love, sympathy, fellowship, is what makes human life truly human. +Cooperation, mutual service, is its fruitage. A clear-cut realisation of +this and a resolute acting upon it would remove much of the cloudiness +and the barrenness from many a life; and its mutual recognition--and +action based upon it--would bring order and sweetness and mutual gain in +vast numbers of instances in family, in business, in community life. It +would solve many of the knotty problems in all lines of human relations +and human endeavour, whose solution heretofore has seemed well-nigh +impossible. It is the telling oil that will start to running smoothly +and effectively many an otherwise clogged and grating system of human +machinery. + +When men on both sides are long-headed enough, are sensible enough to +see its practical element and make it the fundamental basis of all +relationships, of all negotiations, and all following activities in the +relations between capital and labour, employer and employee, literally a +new era in the industrial world will spring into being. Both sides will +be the gainer--the dividends flowing to each will be even surprising. + +There is really no labour problem outside of sympathy, mutuality, +good-will, cooperation, brotherhood. + +Injustice always has been and always will be the cause of all labour +troubles. But we must not forget that it is sometimes on one side and +sometimes on the other. Misunderstanding is not infrequently its +accompaniment. Imagination, sympathy, mutuality, cooperation, +brotherhood are the hand-maidens of justice. No man is intelligent +enough, is big enough to be the representative or the manager of +capital, who is not intelligent enough to realise this. No man is fit to +be the representative of, or fit to have anything to do with the +councils of labour who has not brains, intelligence enough to realise +this. These qualities are not synonyms of or in any way related to +sentimentality or any weak-kneed ethics. They underlie the soundest +business sense. In this day and age they are synonyms of the word +practical. There was a time and it was not so many years ago, when heads +and executives of large enterprises did not realise this as fully as +they realise it today. A great change has already taken place. A new era +has already begun, and the greater the ability and the genius the more +eager is its possessor to make these his guiding principles, and to +hasten the time when they will be universally recognised and built upon. +The same is true of the more intelligent in the rank and file of labour, +as also of the more intelligent and those who are bringing the best +results as leaders of labour. There is no intelligent man or woman today +who does not believe in organised labour. There is no intelligent +employer who does not believe in it and who does not welcome it. + +The bane of organised labour in the past has too often been the +unscrupulous, the self-seeking, or the bull-headed labour leader. +Organised labour must be constantly diligent to purge itself of these +its worst enemies. Labour is entitled to the very highest wage, or to +the best returns in cooperative management that it can get, and that are +consistent with sound business management, as also to the best labour +conditions that a sympathetic and wise management can bring about. It +must not, however, be unreasonable in its demands, neither bull-headed, +nor seek to travel too fast--otherwise it may lose more than it will +gain. + +It must not allow itself to act as a shield for the ineffective worker, +or the one without a sense of mutuality, whose aim is to get all he can +get without any thought as to what he gives in return, or even with the +deliberate purpose of giving the least that he can give and get away +with it. Where there is a good and a full return, there should be not +only the desire but an eagerness to give a full and honest service. Less +than this is indicative of a lack of honest and staunch manhood or +womanhood. + +It is incumbent upon organised labour also to remember that it +represents but eight per cent of the actual working people of this +nation. Whether one works with his brains, or his hands, or both, is +immaterial. Nor does organised labour represent the great farming +interests of the country--even more fundamentally the backbone of the +nation. + +The desirable citizen of any nation is he or she who does not seek to +prosper at the expense of his fellows, who does not seek the advancement +of his group to the detriment of all other groups--who realises that +none are independent, that all are interdependent. + +He who is a teacher or a preacher of class-consciousness, is either +consciously or unconsciously--generally consciously and intentionally--a +preacher of class-hatred. There is no more undesirable citizen in any +nation than he. "Do you know why money is so scarce, brothers?" the soap +box orator demanded, and a fair-sized section of the backbone of the +nation waited in leisurely patience for the answer. A tired-looking +woman had paused for a moment on the edge of the crowd. She spoke +shortly. "It's because so many of you men spend your time telling each +other why, 'stead of hustling to see that it ain't!" He is a fair +representative of the class-consciousness, class-hatred type. Again he +is represented by the theorist constitutionally and chronically too lazy +to do honest and constructive work either physically or mentally. Again +by the one who has the big-head affliction. Or again by the one +afflicted with a species of insanity or criminality manifesting of late +under the name of Bolshevism--a self-seeking tyranny infinitely worse +than Czarism itself. + +Its representatives have proved themselves moral perverts, determined to +carry out their theories and gain their own ends by treachery, theft, +coersion, murder, and every foul method that will aid them in reducing +order to chaos--through the slogan of rule or ruin. Through brigandage, +coersion, murder, it gets the funds to send its agents into those +countries whose governments are fully in the hands of the people, and +where if at any time injustice prevails it is solely the fault of the +people in not using in an intelligent and determined manner the +possessions they already have. Or putting it in another way, on account +of shirking the duties it is morally incumbent upon them as citizens of +free governments to perform. + +In America, whose institutions have been built and maintained solely by +the people, our duty is plain, for orderly procedure has been and ever +must be our watch-word. Vigilance is moreover nowhere required more than +in representative government. Whenever the red hand of anarchy, +Bolshevism, terrorism raises itself it should be struck so instantly and +so powerfully that it has not only no time to gain adherents, but has no +time to make its escape. It should be the Federal prison for any +American who allows himself to become so misguided as to seek to +substitute terrorism and destruction for our orderly and lawful methods +of procedure, or quick deportation for any foreigner who seeks our +shores to carry out these purposes, or comes as an agent for those who +would do the same. + +Organised labour has never occupied so high a position as it occupies +today. That the rank and file will for an instant have commerce with +these agencies, whatever any designing leader here and there may seek to +do, is inconceivable. That its organisations will be sought to be used +by them is just as probable. Its duty as to vigilance and determination +is pronounced. And unless vigilant and determined the set-backs it may +get and the losses it may suffer are just as pronounced. The spirit and +temper of the American people is such that it will not stand for +coersion, lawlessness, or any unfair demands. Public opinion is after +all the court of last resort. No strike or no lockout can succeed with +us that hasn't that tremendous weapon, public opinion, behind it. The +necessity therefore of being fair in all demands and orderly in all +procedure, and in view of this it is also well to remember that +organised labour represents but eight per cent of the actual working +people of this nation. + +The gains of organised labour in the past have been very great. It is +also true that the demands of organised labour even today are very +great. In true candor it must also be said that not only the impulse but +the sincere desire of the great bulk of employers is in a conciliatory +way to grant all demands of labour that are at all consistent with sound +economic management, even in many cases to a great lessening of their +own profits, as well as to maintain working conditions as befits their +workers as valuable and honoured members of our body politic, as they +naturally are and as they so richly deserve. + +For their own welfare, however, to say nothing of the welfare of the +nation, labour unions must purge themselves of all anarchistic and +destructive elements. Force is a two-edged sword, and the force of this +nation when once its sense of justice and right is outraged and its +temper is aroused, will be found to be infinitely superior to any +particular class, whether it be capital or whether it be labour. +Organised labour stands in the way to gain much by intelligent and +honest work and orderly procedure. And to a degree perhaps never before +equalled, does it stand in a position to lose much if through +self-deception on its own part or through unworthy leadership, it +deceives itself in believing itself superior to the forces of law and +order. + +In a nation where the people through their chosen representatives and by +established systems of procedure determine their own institutions, when +agitators get beyond law and reason and lose sight too completely of the +law of mutuality, there is a power backed by a force that it is mere +madness to defy. The rights as well as the power of all the people will +be found to be infinitely superior to those of any one particular group +or class--clear-seeing men and women in any democratic form of +government realise that the words mutuality and self-interest bear a +very close relationship. + +The greatest gains in the relations between capital and labour during +the coming few years will undoubtedly be along the lines of +profit-sharing. Some splendid beginnings are already in successful +operation. There is the recognition that capital is entitled initially +to a fair return; again that labour is entitled to a good and full +living wage--when both these conditions are met then that there be an +equal division of the profits that remain, between the capital and the +skill and management back of the capital invested on the one hand, and +labour on the other. Without the former labour would have no employment +in the particular enterprise; without the workers the former could not +carry on. Each is essential to the other. + +Labour being not a commodity, as some material thing merely to be bought +and sold, but the human element, is entitled to more than a living wage. +It has human aspirations, and desires and needs. It has not only its +present but its own and its children's future to safeguard. When it is +thus made a partner in the business it becomes more earnest and reliable +and effective in its work, less inclined to condone the shiftless, the +incompetent, the slacker; more eager and resolute in withstanding the +ill-founded, reckless or sinister suggestions or efforts of an +ill-advised leadership. + +Capital or employer is the gainer also, because it is insured that loyal +and more intelligent cooperation in its enterprise that is as essential +to its success as is the genius and skill of management. + +Taking a different form but proving most valuable alike for management +and capital on the one hand, and its workers on the other, is the case +of one of our great industrial plants, the largest of its kind in the +world and employing many thousands of workers, where already a trifle +over forty per cent. of its stock is in the hands of the workers. Their +thrift and their good judgment have enabled them to take advantage of +attractive prices and easy methods of payment made them by the company's +management. There are already many other concerns where this is true in +greater or less proportion. + +These are facts that certain types of labour agitators or even leaders +as well as special pleaders for labour, find it convenient to forget, or +at least not to mention. The same is true also of the millions that are +every year being paid out to make all working conditions and +surroundings cheerful, healthful, safe; in various forms of insurance, +in retiring pensions. Through the initiative of this larger type of +employer, or manager of capital, many hundreds of thousands both men and +women and in continually increasing numbers, are being thus +benefited--outside and above their yearly wage or salary. + +A new era in connection with capital and labour has for some time been +coming into being; the era of democracy in industry has arrived. The day +of the autocratic sway on the part of capital has passed; nor will we as +a nation take kindly to the autocratic sway of labour. It is obtaining +a continually fuller recognition; and cooperation leading in many lines +to profit-sharing is the new era we are now passing into. + +Though there are very large numbers of men of great wealth, employers +and heads of industrial enterprises, who have caught the spirit of the +new industrial age upon which we have already begun to enter, and who +are glad to see labour getting its fairer share of the profits of +industry and a larger recognition as partners in industry, there are +those who, lacking both imagination and vision, attempt to resist the +tide that, already turned, is running in volume. They are our American +Bourbons, our American Junkers. They are, considering the ominous +undercurrents of change, unrest and discontent that are so apparent in +the entire industrial and economic world today, our worst breeders and +feeders of Bolshevism and lawlessness. + +If they had their way and their numbers were sufficiently large, the +flames of Bolshevism and anarchy would be so fed that even in America we +would have little hope of escaping a great conflagration. They are the +ones who are determined to see that their immense profits are +uncurtailled, whose homes must have ten bathrooms each; while great +numbers of their workers without whom they would have to close up the +industry--hence their essential partners in the industry though not in +name--haven't even a single bath-room and with families as large and in +many cases larger. + +They are they who must have three or four homes each, aggregating in the +millions to build and to maintain. They are they who cannot see why +workmen should discuss such things among themselves, or even question +them, though in many cases they are scarcely able to make ends meet in +the face of continually advancing or even soaring prices, who never +enjoy a holiday, and are unable to lay up for the years to come, when +they will no longer be "required" in industry. They are they therefore +who have but little if any interest or care for even the physical +well-being of their workers, say nothing of their mental and spiritual +well-being and enjoyments--beyond the fact that they are well enough fed +and housed for the next day's work. + +They are they who when it is suggested that, recognizing the change and +the run of the tide, they be keen-minded enough to anticipate changing +conditions and organize their business so that their workers have some +joint share in its conditions and conduct, and some share in its profits +beyond a mere living wage, reply--"I'll be damned if I do." It doesn't +require much of a prophetic sense now however, to be able to tell +them--they'll be damned if they don't. + +There is reason to rejoice also that for the welfare of American +institutions, the number of this class is continually decreasing. Did +they predominate, with the unmistakable undercurrents of unrest, born of +a sense of injustice, there would be in time, and in a shorter time than +we perhaps realize, but one outcome. Steeped in selfishness, making +themselves impervious to all the higher leadings and impulses of the +soul--less than men--they are not only enemies of their own better +selves, but enemies of the nation itself. + +Bolshevism in Russia was born, or rather was able to get its hold, only +through the long generations of Czarism and the almost universal state +of ignorance in which its people were held, that preceded it. The great +preponderance and the continually growing numbers of men with +imagination, with a sense of care, mutuality, cooperation, brotherhood, +in our various large enterprises is a force that will save this and +other nations from a similar experience. + +I have great confidence in the Russian people. Its soul is sound; and +after the forces of treachery, incompetence and terrorism have spent +themselves, and the better elements are able to organize in sufficient +force to drive the beasts from its borders, it will arise and assert +itself. There will be builded a new Russia that will be one of the great +and commanding nations of the world. In the meantime it affords a most +concrete and valuable lesson to us and to all other nations--to strike +on the one hand, the forces of treachery and lawlessness the moment they +show themselves, and on the other hand, to see that the soil is made +fertile for neither their entrance nor growth. + +The strong nation is that in which under the leadership of universal +free education and equal opportunities, a due watch is maintained to see +that the rights of all individuals and all classes are nurtured and +carefully guarded. In such a government the nation and its interests is +and must be supreme. Then if built upon high ethical and moral standards +where mutuality is the watch-word and the governing principle of its +life, its motto might through right, power through justice, it becomes a +fit and effective member of the Society of Nations. + +Internationalism is higher than nationalism, humanity is above the +nation. The stronger however the individual nation, the stronger +necessarily will be the Society of Nations. + +Love, sympathy, fellowship, is not inconsistent with the use of force to +restrain malignant evil, in the case of nations as in the case of +individuals. Where goodness is weak it is exploited and becomes a victim +of the stronger, when, devoid of a sense of mutuality, it is +conscienceless. Strength without conscience, goodness, ungoverned by the +law of mutuality, becomes tyranny. In seeking its own ends it violates +every law of God and man. + +For the safety therefore of the better life of the world, for the very +safety and welfare of the Society of Nations, those nations that combine +strength with goodness, strength with good-will, strength with an +ever-growing sense of mutuality, which is the only law of a happy, +orderly, and advancing human life, must combine to check the power of +any people or nation still devoid of the knowledge of this law, lest +goodness, truth and all the higher instincts and potentialities of life, +even freedom itself perish from the earth. This can be done and must be +done not through malice or hatred, but through a sense of right and +duty. + +There is no more diabolical, no more damnable ambition on the part of +individuals, organizations or nations than to rule, to gain domination +over the minds and the lives of others either for the sake of power and +domination or for the material gain that can be made to flow therefrom. +As a rule, however, it is both. There is nothing more destructive to +the higher moral and ethical life of the individual or the organization +controlled by this desire, nothing so destructive to the life of the one +or ones so dominated, and as a consequence to the life of society itself +as this evil and prostituting desire and purpose. + +Where this has become the clearly controlling motive, malignant and +deep-seated, if in the case of a nation, then it is the duty of those +nations that combine strength with character, strength with goodness, to +combine to check the evil wrought by such a nation. If by persuasion and +good-will, well and good. If not, then through the exercise of a +restraining force. This is not contrary to the law of love, for the love +of the good is the controlling motive. It is only thus that the higher +moral law which for its growth and consummation is dependent upon +individuals, can grow and gain supremacy in the world. + +Intellectual independence and acumen, combined with a love of truth, +goodness, righteousness, love and service for others, is the greatest +aid there can be in carrying out the Divine plan and purpose in the +world. The sword of love therefore becomes the sword of righteousness +that cuts out the cancerous growth that is given from to by malignant +ill will; the sword of righteousness that strikes down slavery and +oppression; the sword of righteousness therefore that becomes the sword +of civilization. + +It is a weapon that does not have to be always used however; for when +its power is once clearly understood it is feared. Its deterrent power +becomes therefore infinitely more effective than in its actual use. So +in any new world settlement, any nation or group that is not up to this +moral world standard, that would seek to impose its will and its +institutions upon any other nations for the sake of domination, or to +rob them of their goods, must be restrained through the federated power +of the other nations, not by forcing their own beliefs or codes or +institutions upon it, but by restraining it and making ineffective any +ambitions or purposes that it may plan, or until its people whatever its +leadership may be, are brought clearly and concretely to see that such +methods do not pay. + +That Jesus to whom we ultimately go for our moral leadership, not only +sanctioned, but used and advocated the use of righteous force, when +malignant evil in the form of self-seeking sought domination, either +intellectual or physical, for its own selfish gain and aggrandizement, +is clearly evidenced by many of his own sayings and his own acts. + +So within the nation during this great reconstruction period, these are +times that call for heroic men and women. In a Democracy or in any +representative form of government an alert citizenship is its only +safety. With a vastly increased voting population, in that many millions +of women citizens are now admitted to full citizenship, the need for +intelligent action and attention to matters of government was never so +great. Great numbers will be herded and voted by organizations as well +as by machines. As these will comprise the most ignorant and therefore +the herdable ones, it is especially incumbent upon the great rank and +file of intelligent women to see that they take and maintain an active +interest in public affairs. + +Politics is something that we cannot evade except to the detriment of +our country and thereby to our own detriment. Politics is but another +word for government. And in a sense we the individual voter are the +government and unless we make matters of government our own concern, +there are organizations and there are groups of designing men who will +steal in and get possession for their own selfish aggrandizement and +gain. This takes sometimes the form of power, to be traded for other +power, or concessions; but always if you will trace far enough, eventual +money gain. Or again it takes the form of graft and even direct loot. +The losses that are sustained through a lowered citizenship, through +inefficient service, through a general debauchery of public +institutions, through increased taxation to make up for the amounts that +are drawn off in graft and loot are well nigh incalculable--and for the +sole reason that you and I, average citizens, do not take the active +personal interest in our own matters of government that we should take. + +Clericalism, Tammanyism, Bolshevism, Syndicalism--and all in the guise +of interest in the people--get their holds and their profits in this +way. It is essential that we be locally wise and history wise. Any class +or section or organization that is less than the nation itself must be +watched and be made to keep its own place, or it becomes a menace to the +free and larger life of the nation. Even in the case of a great national +crisis a superior patriotism is affected and paraded in order that it +may camouflage its other and real activities. + +When at times we forget ourselves and speak of rights rather than duties +in connection with our country, it were well to recall and to repeat the +words of Franklin: "The sun never repents of the good he does nor does +he ever demand a recompense." + +Not only is constant vigilance incumbent upon us, but realising the fact +that the boys and the girls of today are the citizens of tomorrow--the +nation's voters and law-makers--it is incumbent upon us to see that +American free education through American free public schools, is +advanced to and maintained at its highest possibilities, and kept free +from any agencies that will make for a divided or anything less than a +whole-hearted and intelligent citizenship. The motto on the Shakespeare +statue at Leicester Square in London: "There is no darkness but +ignorance," might well be reproduced in every city and every hamlet in +the nation. + +Late revelations have shown how even education can be manipulated and +prostituted for ulterior purposes. Parochial schools whether Protestant, +Catholic, Jewish, or Oriental, have no place in American +institutions--and whether their work is carried on in English or in a +foreign language. They are absolutely foreign to the spirit of our +institutions. They are purely for the sake of something less than the +nation itself. Blind indeed are we if we are not history-wise. Criminal +indeed are we to allow any boys or girls to be diverted to them and to +be deprived of the advantages of a better schooling and being brought +under the influences of agencies that are thoroughly and wholly +American. + +American education must be made for American institutions and for +nothing less than this. The nation's children should be shielded from +any power that seeks to get possession of them in order at an early and +unaccountable age to fasten authority upon them, and to drive a wedge +between them and all others of the nation. + +The nation has a duty to every child within its borders. To fail to +recognize or to shirk that duty, will call for a price to be paid +sometime as great as that that has been paid by every other nation that +did not see until too late. Sectarianism in education stultifies and +robs the child and nullifies the finest national instincts in education. +It is for but one purpose--the use and the power of the organization +that plans and that fosters it. + +Our government profiting by the long weary struggles of other countries, +is founded upon the absolute separation of church and state. This does +not mean the separation of religion in its true sense from the state; +but keeping it free from every type of sectarian influence and +domination. It is ours to see that no silent subtle influences are at +work, that will eventually make the same trouble here as in other +countries, or that will thrust out the same stifling hand to undermine +and to throttle universal free public education, and the inalienable +right that every child has to it. Our children are the wards of and +accountable to the state--they are not the property of any organization, +group or groups, less than the state. + +We need the creation of a strong Federal Department of Education of +cabinet rank, with ample means and strong powers to be the guiding +genius of all our state and local departments of education, with greater +attention paid to a more thorough and concrete training in civics, in +moral and ethical education, in addition to the other well recognized +branches in public school education. It should have such powers also as +will enable it to see that every child is in school up to a certain age, +or until all the fundamentals of a prescribed standard of American +education are acquired. + +A recent tabulation made public by a Federal Deputy Commissioner of +Naturalization has shown that a little over one tenth, in round numbers, +11,000,000, of our population is composed of unnaturalized aliens. Even +this however tells but a part of the story; for vast numbers of even +those who have become naturalized, have in no sense become Americanized. + +Speaking of this class an able editorial in a recent number of one of +our leading New York dailies has said: + +"Of the millions of aliens who have gone through the legal forms of +naturalization a very large proportion have not in any sense been +Americanized, and, though citizens, they are still alien in habits of +thought, in speech and in their general attitude toward the community. + +"There are industrial centres not far from New York City that are wholly +foreign. There are sections of this city that--except as the children +through the schools and association with others of their own age yield +to change--are intensely alien. + +"To penetrate these barriers and open new avenues of communication with +the people who live within them is no longer a task to be performed by +individual effort. Americanization is a work that must be undertaken and +directed on a scale so extensive that only through the cooperation of +the States and the Federal Government can it be successfully carried +out. It cannot longer be neglected without serious harm to the life and +welfare of the Nation." + +Some even more startling facts are given out in figures by the +Department of the Interior, figures supplied to it by the Surgeon +General's Office of the Army. The War Department records show that 24.9 +per cent. of the draft army examined by that department's agents were +unable to read and understand a newspaper, or to write letters home. In +one draft in New York State in May, 1918, 16.6 per cent. were classed as +illiterate. In one draft in connection with South Carolina troops in +July, 1918, 49.5 per cent. where classed as illiterate. In one draft in +connection with Minnesota troops in July of the same year, 14.2 per +cent. were classed as illiterate. In other words it means for example +that in New York State we have in round numbers 700,000 men between 21 +and 31 years of age who are illiterate. The same source reveals the fact +that in the nation in round numbers over 10,000,000 are either +illiterate or without a knowledge of our language. The South is the home +of most of the wholly uneducated, the North of those of foreign speech. +And in speaking of this class a recent editorial in another +representative New York daily, after making mention of one industrial +centre but a few miles out of New York City, in New Jersey, where nearly +16 out of every 100 cannot read English, has said: + +"Such people may enjoy the advantages America offers. Of its spirit and +institutions they can comprehend nothing. They are the easy dupes of +foreign agitators, unassimilable, an element of weakness in the social +body that might easily be converted into an element of strength. Many +of them have the vote, controlled by leaders interested only in designs +alien to America's welfare. + +"The problem is national in scope * * *. The best way to keep Bolshevism +out of America is to reduce ignorance of our speech and everything else +to a minimum. However alert our immigration officers may be, foreign +agents of social disorder are sure to pass through our doors, and as +long as we allow children to grow up among us who have no means of +finding out the meaning of our laws and forms of government the seeds of +discontent will be sown in congenial soil." + +Profoundly true also are the following words from an editorial in still +another New York daily in dealing with that great army of 700,000 +illiterates within the State, or rather that portion of them who are +adults of foreign birth: + +"The first thing to do is to teach them, and make them realize that a +knowledge of the English language is a prerequisite of first class +American citizenship. * * * The wiping out of illiteracy is a foundation +stone in building up a strong population, able and worthy to hold its +own in the world. With the disappearance of illiteracy and of the +ignorance of the language of the country will also disappear many of the +trouble-breeding problems which have held back immigrants in gaining +their fair share of real prosperity, the intelligence and self-respect +which are vital ingredients in any good citizenship. Real freedom of +life and character cannot be enjoyed by the man or woman whose whole +life is passed upon the inferior plane of ignorance and prejudice. Teach +them all how to deserve the benefits of life in America, and they will +soon learn how to gain and protect them." + +It is primarily among the ignorant and illiterate that Bolshevism, +anarchy, political rings, and every agency that attempts through +self-seeking to sow the seeds of discontent, treachery, and disloyalty, +works to exploit them and to herd them for political ends. No man can +have that respect for himself, or feel that he has the respect due him +from others as an honest and diligent worker, whatever his line of work, +who is handicapped by the lack of an ordinary education. The heart of +the American nation is sound. Through universal free public education it +must be on the alert and be able to see through Bourbonism and +understand its methods on the one hand, and Bolshevism on the other; and +be determined through intelligent action to see that American soil is +made uncongenial to both. + +Our chief problem is to see that Democracy is made safe for and made of +real service to the world. Our American education must be made +continually more keenly alive to the great moral, ethical and social +needs of the time. Thereby it will be made religious without having any +sectarian slant or bias; it will be made safe for and the hand-maid of +Democracy and not a menace to it. + +Vast multitudes today are seeing as never before that the moral and +ethical foundations of the nation's and the world's life is a matter of +primal concern to all. + +We are finding more and more that the simple fundamentals of life and +conduct as portrayed by the Christ of Nazareth not only constitutes a +great idealism, but the only practical way of life. Compared to this and +to the need that it come more speedily and more universally into +operation in the life of the world today, truly "sectarian peculiarities +are obsolete impertinences." + +Our time needs again more the prophet and less the priest. It needs the +God-impelled life and voice of the prophet with his face to the future, +both God-ward and man-ward, burning with an undivided devotion to truth +and righteousness. It needs less the priest, too often with his back to +the future and too often the pliant tool of the organisation whose chief +concern is, and ever has been, the preservation of itself under the +ostensible purpose of the preservation of the truth once delivered, the +same that Jesus with his keen powers of penetration saw killed the +Spirit as a high moral guide and as an inspirer to high and +unself-centred endeavour, and that he characterised with such scathing +scorn. There are splendid exceptions; but this is the rule now even as +it was in his day. + +The prophet is concerned with truth, not a system; with righteousness, +not custom; with justice, not expediency. Is there a man who would dare +say that if Christianity--the Christianity of the Christ--had been +actually in vogue, in practice in all the countries of Christendom +during the last fifty years, during the last twenty-five years, that +this colossal and gruesome war would ever have come about? No +clear-thinking and honest man would or could say that it would. We need +again the voice of the prophet, clear-seeing, high-purposed, and +unafraid. We need again the touch of the prophet's hand to lead us back +to those simple fundamental teachings of the Christ of Nazareth, that +are life-giving to the individual, and that are world-saving. + +We speak of our Christian civilisation, and the common man, especially +in times like these, asks what it is, where it is--and God knows that we +have been for many hundred years wandering in the wilderness. He is +thinking that the Kingdom of God on earth that the true teachings of +Jesus predicated, and that he laboured so hard to actualise, needs some +speeding up. There is a world-wide yearning for spiritual peace and +righteousness on the part of the common man. He is finding it +occasionally in established religion, but often, perhaps more often, +independently of it. He is finding it more often through his own contact +and relations with the Man of Nazareth--for him the God-man. There is no +greater fact in our time, and there is no greater hope for the future +than is to be found in this fact. + +Jesus gave the great principles, the animating spirit of life, not +minute details of conduct. The real Church of Christ is not an +hierarchy, an institution, it is a brotherhood--the actual establishing +of the Kingdom of God in moral, ethical and social terms in the world. + +Among the last words penned by Dr. John Watson--Ian Maclaren--good +churchman, splendid writer, but above all independent thinker and +splendid man, were the following: "Was it not the chief mistake and also +the hopeless futility of Pharisaism to meddle with the minute affairs of +life, and to lay down what a man should do at every turn? It was not +therefore an education of conscience, but a bondage of conscience; it +did not bring men to their full stature by teaching them to face their +own problems of duty and to settle them, it kept them in a state of +childhood, by forbidding and commanding in every particular of daily +life. Pharisaism, therefore, whether Jewish or Gentile, ancient or +modern, which replaces the moral law by casuistry, and the enlightened +judgment of the individual by the confessional, creates a narrow +character and mechanical morals. Freedom is the birthright of the soul, +and it is by the discipline of life the soul finds itself. It were a +poor business to be towed across the pathless ocean of this world to the +next; by the will of God and for our good we must sail the ship +ourselves, and steer our own course. It is the work of the Bible to show +us the stars and instruct us how to take our reckoning * * *. + +"Jesus did not tell us what to do, for that were impossible, as every +man has his own calling, and is set in by his own circumstances, but +Jesus has told us how to carry ourselves in the things we have to do, +and He has put the heart in us to live becomingly, not by pedantic +rules, but by an instinct of nobility. Jesus is the supreme teacher of +the Bible and He came not to forbid or to command, but to place the +Kingdom of God as a living force, and perpetual inspiration within the +soul of man, and then, to leave him in freedom and in grace to fulfil +himself."[G] + +We no longer admit that Christ is present and at work only when a +minister is expounding the gospel or some theological precept or +conducting some ordained observance in the pulpit; or that religion is +only when it is labelled as such and is within the walls of a church. +That belonged to the chapter in Christianity that is now rapidly +closing, a chapter of good works and results--but so pitiably below its +possibilities. So pitiably below because men had been taught and without +sufficient thought accepted the teaching that to be a Christian was to +hold certain beliefs about the Christ that had been formulated by early +groups of men and that had come down through the centuries. + +The chapter that is now opening upon the world is the one that puts +Christ's own teachings in the simple, frank, and direct manner in which +he gave them, to the front. It makes life, character, conduct, human +concern and human service of greater importance than mere matters of +opinion. It makes eager and unremitting work for the establishing of the +Kingdom of God, the kingdom of right relations between men, here on this +earth, the essential thing. It insists that the telling test as to +whether a man is a Christian is how much of the Christ spirit is in +evidence in his life--and in every phase of his life. Gripped by this +idea which for a long time the forward-looking and therefore the big men +in them have been striving for, our churches in the main are moving +forward with a new, a dauntless, and a powerful appeal. + +Differences that have sometimes separated them on account of differences +of opinion, whether in thought or interpretation,[H] are now found to be +so insignificant when compared to the actual simple fundamentals that +the Master taught, and when compared to the work to be done, that a +great Interallied Church Movement is now taking concrete and strong +working form, that is equipping the church for a mighty and far-reaching +Christian work. A new and great future lies immediately ahead. The good +it is equipping itself to accomplish is beyond calculation--a work in +which minister and layman will have equal voice and equal share. + +It will receive also great inspiration and it will eagerly strike hands +with all allied movements that are following the same leader, but along +different roads. + +Britain's apostle of brotherhood and leader of the Brotherhood Movement +there, Rev. Tom Sykes, who has caught so clearly the Master's own basis +of Christianity--love for and union with God, love for and union with +the brother--has recently put so much stimulating truth into a single +paragraph that I reproduce it here: + +"The emergence of the feeling of kinship with the Unseen is the most +arresting and revealing fact of human history. * * * _The union +with God_ is not through the display of ritual, but the affiliation and +conjunction of life. We do not believe we are in a universe that has +screens and folds, where the spiritual commerce of man has to be +conducted on the principle of secret diplomacy. The universe is frank +and open, and God is straightforward and honourable. _In making the +spirit and practice of brotherliness_ the test of religious value, we +are at one with Him who said: 'Inasmuch as ye do it unto one of the +least--ye do it unto me.' _We touch the Father when we help His child._ +Jesus taught us not to come to God asking, art Thou this or that? but to +call Him Father and live upon it. Do not admit that many of our +Brotherhood meetings are in 'neutral' or 'secular' halls and buildings! +'Where two or three gather in My name, there am I.' Where He is, there +is hallowed ground." + +We need a stock-taking and a mobilisation of our spiritual forces. But +what, after all, does this mean? Search as we may we are brought back +_every time_ to this same Man of Nazareth, the God-man--Son of Man and +Son of God. And gathering it into a few brief sentences it is this: +Jesus' great revelation was this consciousness of God in the individual +life, and to this he witnessed in a supreme and masterly way, because +this he supremely realised and lived. Faith in him and following him +does not mean acquiring some particular notion of God or some particular +belief about him himself. It is the living in one's own life of this +same consciousness of God as one's source and Father, and a living in +these same filial relations with him of love and guidance and care that +Jesus entered into and continuously lived. + +When this is done there is no problem and no condition in the individual +life that it will not clarify, mould, and therefore take care of; for +"[Greek transliteration: me merimnate te psyche hymon]"--do not worry about your +life--was the Master's clear-cut command. Are we ready for this high +type of spiritual adventure? Not only are we assured of this great and +mighty truth that the Master revealed and going ahead of us lived, that +under this supreme guidance we need not worry about the things of the +life, but that under this Divine guidance we need not think _even of the +life itself_, if for any reason it becomes our duty or our privilege to +lay it down. Witnessing for truth and standing for truth he again +preceded us in this. + +But this, this love for God or rather this state that becomes the +natural and the normal life when we seek the Kingdom, and the Divine +rule becomes dominant and operative in mind and heart, leads us directly +back to his other fundamental: Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. +For if God is my Father and if he cares for me in this way--and every +other man in the world is my brother and He cares for him in exactly the +same way--then by the sanction of God his Father I haven't anything on +my brother; and by the love of God my Father my brother hasn't anything +on me. It is but the most rudimentary commonsense then, that we be +considerate one of another, that we be square and decent one with +another. We will do well as children of the same Father to sit down and +talk matters over; and arise with the conclusion that the advice of +Jesus, our elder brother, is sound: "Therefore all things whatsoever ye +would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them." + +He gave it no label, but it has subsequently become known as the Golden +Rule. There is no higher rule and no greater developer of the highest +there is in the individual human life, and no greater adjuster and +beautifier of the problems of our common human life. And when it becomes +sufficiently strong in its action in this, the world awaits its +projection into its international life. This is the truth that he +revealed--the twofold truth of love to God and love for the neighbour, +that shall make men free. The truth of the Man of Nazareth still holds +and shall hold, and we must realise this adequately before we ask or can +expect any other revelation. + +We are in a time of great changes. The discovery of new laws and +therefore of new truth necessitates changes and necessitates advances. +But whatever changes or advances may come, the Divine reality still +survives, independent of Jesus it is true, but as the world knows him +still better, it will give to him its supreme gratitude and praise, in +that he was the most perfect revealer of God to man, of God in man, and +the most concrete in that he embodied and lived this truth in his own +matchless human-divine life; and stands as the God-man to which the +world is gradually approaching. For as Goethe has said--"We can never +get beyond the spirit of Jesus." + +Love it is, he taught, that brings order out of chaos, that becomes the +solvent of the riddle of life, and however cynical, skeptical, or +practical we may think at times we may be, a little quiet clear-cut +thought will bring us each time back to the truth that it is the +essential force that leads away from the tooth and the claw of the +jungle, that lifts life up from and above the clod. Love is the world's +balance-wheel; and as the warming and ennobling element of sympathy, +care and consideration radiates from it, increasing one's sense of +mutuality, which in turn leads to fellowship, cooperation, brotherhood, +a holy and diviner conception and purpose of life is born, that makes +human life more as it should be, as it must be--as it will be. + +I love to feel that when one makes glad the heart of any man, woman, +child, or animal, he makes glad the heart of God--and I somehow feel +that it is true. + +As our household fires radiate their genial warmth, and make more joyous +and more livable the lot of all within the household walls, so life in +its larger scope and in all its human relations, becomes more genial and +more livable and reveals more abundantly the deeper riches of its +diviner nature, as it is made more open and more obedient to the higher +powers of mind and spirit. + +Do you know that incident in connection with the little Scottish girl? +She was trudging along, carrying as best she could a boy younger, but it +seemed almost as big as she herself, when one remarked to her how heavy +he must be for her to carry, when instantly came the reply: "He's na +heavy. He's mi brither." Simple is the incident; but there is in it a +truth so fundamental that pondering upon it, it is enough to make many a +man, to whom dogma or creed make no appeal, a Christian--and a mighty +engine for good in the world. And more--there is in it a truth so +fundamental and so fraught with potency and with power, that its wider +recognition and projection into all human relations would reconstruct a +world. + + _I saw the mountains stand + Silent, wonderful, and grand, + Looking out across the land + When the golden light was falling + On distant dome and spire; + And I heard a low voice calling, + "Come up higher, come up higher, + From the lowland and the mire, + From the mist of earth desire, + From the vain pursuit of pelf. + From the attitude of self: + Come up higher, come up higher."_ + + _James G. Clark_ + + + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[Footnote A: The Emmanuel Movement in Boston in connection with Emmanuel +Church, inaugurated some time ago under the leadership and direction of +two well-known ministers, Dr. Worcester and Dr. McComb, and a well-known +physician, Dr. Coriat, and similar movements in other cities is an +attestation of this. + +That most valuable book under the joint authorship of these three men: +"Religion and Medicine," Moffat, Yard and Company, New York, will be +found of absorbing interest and of great practical value by many. The +amount of valuable as well as interesting and reliable material that it +contains is indeed remarkable.] + +[Footnote B: "War and Laughter," by James Oppenheim--The Century +Company, New York.] + +[Footnote C: Henry Holt in "Cosmic Relations."] + +[Footnote D: From a notable article in the New York "Times Magazine," +Sunday, April 1, 1917, by George W. Perkins, chairman Mayor's Food +Supply Commission.] + +[Footnote E: Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of +James, and Joses, and of Juda, and Simon? And are his sisters not here +with us?--Mark 6:3.] + +[Footnote F: From that strong, splendid poem "Buttadeus," by William +Samuel Johnson.] + +[Footnote G: "God's Message to the Human Soul"--_Revell_.] + +[Footnote H: The thought of the layman in practically all of our +churches is much the same as that of Mr. Lloyd George when he said: "The +Church to which I belong is torn with a fierce dispute; one part says it +is baptism _into_ the name of the Father, and the other that it is +baptism _in_ the name of the Father. I belong to one of these parties. I +feel most strongly about this. I would die for it, but I forget which it +is."] + + + + + * * * * * + + + + +Transcriber's Notes + + +Made minor punctuation, spelling, and hyphenation changes for +consistency. + +Corrected the following typos: + +Page 81: Changed Pharasaic to Pharisaic. + (come into being a Pharisaic legalism) + +Page 140: Changed subconsious to subconscious. + (the slumbering subconsious mind) + +Page 193: Changed independant to independent. + (guided by their own independant judgment) + +Page 217: Changed terriffic to terrific. + (What a terriffic price to pay to learn the lesson) + +Page 221: Changed symathy to sympathy. + (He had, as we have seen, infinite symathy for and forbearance) + +Page 232: Changed accompaniament to accompaniment. + (Misunderstanding is not infrequently its accompaniament.) + +Page 237: Changed viligant to vigilant. + (And unless viligant and determined) + +Page 245: Changed tyrany to tyranny. + (ungoverned by the law of mutuality, becomes tyrany.) + +Page 245: Changed malignent to malignant. + (the use of force to restrain malignent evil,) + +Page 253: Changed inaliable to inalienable. + (the inaliable right that every child has) + +Page 258: Changed impertinances to impertinences. + ("sectarian peculiarities are obsolete impertinances.") + +Page 259: Changed Chrisitianity to Christianity. + (Chrisitianity of the Christ) + +Page 260: Changed heirarchy to hierarchy. + (The real Church of Christ is not an heirarchy,) + +Page 262: Changed that to than. + (human service of greater importance that mere matters of opinion.) + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Higher Powers of Mind and Spirit, by +Ralph Waldo Trine + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HIGHER POWERS OF MIND *** + +***** This file should be named 28163.txt or 28163.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/8/1/6/28163/ + +Produced by Thierry Alberto, Diane Monico, and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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