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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/33635-8.txt b/33635-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..49861c6 --- /dev/null +++ b/33635-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2734 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Great Discovery, by Norman Maclean + +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 Great Discovery + +Author: Norman Maclean + +Release Date: September 4, 2010 [EBook #33635] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREAT DISCOVERY *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + +THE GREAT DISCOVERY + + +BY + +NORMAN MACLEAN + + + + +"Had I stood aside when in defiance of pledges to which my kingdom was +a party, the soil of Belgium was violated and her cities laid desolate, +when the very life of the French nation was threatened with extinction, +I should have sacrificed my honour, and given to destruction the +liberties of my Empire and of mankind." + +_Proclamation by King George V._ + + + + +GLASGOW + +JAMES MACLEHOSE AND SONS + +PUBLISHERS TO THE UNIVERSITY + +1915 + + + + +PUBLISHED BY + +JAMES MACLEHOSE AND SONS, GLASGOW + +Publishers to the University + + +MACMILLAN AND CO. LTD. LONDON + + New York ... The Macmillan Co. + Toronto .... The Macmillan Co. of Canada + London ..... Simpkin, Hamilton and Co. + Cambridge .. Bowes and Bowes + Edinburgh .. Douglas and Foulis + Sydney ..... Angus and Robertson + +MCMXV + + + + +_BY THE SAME AUTHOR._ + + DWELLERS IN THE MIST. + HILLS OF HOME. + THE BURNT OFFERING. + CAN THE WORLD BE WON FOR CHRIST? + AFRICA IN TRANSFORMATION. + + + + +TO + +J. P. CROAL + +TO WHOM THIS BOOK OWES + +ITS EXISTENCE + + + + +Preface + +Six articles which the writer contributed to _The Scotsman_ constitute +this book. Four of these, which appeared under the title "In Our +Parish," were, in response to requests, re-printed by _The Scotsman_ as +leaflets, and in that form had a circulation that reached an aggregate +of 100,000. One of the articles (now Chapter II.), which was published +on February 14, 1914, has been revised and somewhat enlarged. The rest +are reprinted substantially as they were originally written. + +In these last months there has come to the nation a spiritual and +ethical revival. Life will never again be what it was in the last long +summer days ere the guns began to speak. It will be a better world +than it has yet been. The nation is being saved as by fire, and in the +fire much dross will be consumed. The conscience of the State has been +stirred, and it cannot in the future acquiesce in the continuance of +the social evils which are gnawing at the nation's heart. The fate of +the Empire in the long years to come will depend more on the fight for +social renewal in the midst of the streets than on red battlefields. +To the men who have stood between the race and destruction the State +owes a debt which it can only repay by such measures of social +regeneration as will make possible for every man and woman to realise +the thrill and the joy of life. These pages only represent an effort +to portray the first stirring of that newly awakened consciousness of +God and of duty which was felt in every parish throughout the Empire, +and which is destined to transform the world. + + + + +Contents + + + I. THE GREAT DISCOVERY + II. THE REVIVAL OF PATRIOTISM + III. THE SHADOW OF THE CROSS + IV. THE POWER OF PRAYER + V. THE VICTORY + VI. THE CITIES OF THE PLAIN + + + + +I + +The Great Discovery + + + +I + +While the thing is still fresh in my mind I will try to put it down on +paper--the incredible thing that has happened in our parish. When we +had least thought about life's great things, we have come face to face +with the greatest. + +We had been for long years living on the surface of things. The sun +basked on the slopes of the hills, purple at eve; we came back from the +offices in town, plunged through the tunnel, and hastened to our +gardens. We lifted up our eyes to the hills, and our security seemed +as immovable as their crests soaring above the little dells that were +haunts of ancient peace around their foundations. + +Long years of ease dimmed our vision. The church bell rang in vain for +many of us. Those who had six whole days in the week to devote to +their own pleasure began to devote the seventh also to that same end. +The day of peace was becoming a day of unrest. + +Thus it was with us when, with the suddenness of a lightning flash, the +incredible overtook us. + +*** + +If only one could put it into words! But words can never express this +sudden meeting of man and God when that meeting was least expected. + +It was heralded by the booming of guns across the sea. The great city +lay slumbering between us and the shore, but over the turrets and +spires it came--boom, boom--under the stars. It was war. That +far-away echo might not itself be the grim struggle of death, but it +was its harbinger. Over all the seas death would soon be riding on the +billows. Faces became stern. Good-byes were spoken. + +Ah! that word "Good-bye," which we hear every day, and which, like +those old coins which have passed from hand to hand so long until at +last the image and superscription are gone, had lost all trace of its +original meaning, retaining nothing but a faint aroma of courtesy, +which sometimes vanished in the inflection of the voice until the word +became only a discourteous dismissal--that word was born for us anew. +We heard it on the lips of mothers clinging to the hands of their sons, +who were summoned away to join their regiments, and as white lips said +"Good-bye" to those whose blood was to water the fair fields of France, +we suddenly realised what it meant. The word, meaningless yesterday, +to-day expressed the greatest wish that the lips of man can utter--God +be with thee. On the mother's lips the word was the commitment of her +boy to the charge of the encompassing God. Then, when the harvest was +ripening on the slopes and the drum sounded "Come," and the young and +the strong went forth with a smile to the great harvesting of death, we +learned again the meaning of a phrase. But we were yet to learn the +meaning of a word. + +It is in the darkness that the stars appear and the immeasurable +abysses of the infinite universe, and it was when the dusk sank into +the deep night that the word rose high in the firmament of life and +burned red into our souls. And that word was God. + +It seemed so incredible to us that we should need that old word. We +were so powerful and so rich. Our faith was strong, but it was in the +reeking tube and in the smoking shard, and in the number of our +Dreadnoughts. Then all these things seemed to fail us. A nightmare +seemed to fall on us--a nightmare which lifted not night or day. Our +soldiers were driven back, back, back. They fought by day and marched +by night, and we heard in the night watches the beating of their +wearied feet, blood stained. + +Was there to be no end to that tramp, tramp of men yielding before +death? Was the Empire reared by the heroism of generations to crumble +under our feet? The ghastly deeds of shame--were they to come to our +doors! We looked at our children, and they could not understand the +light in our eyes. These deeds of hell--they might occur even now +under the shadow of our hills. It was then that the word began to +blaze in the heavens. And the word was--God. + +*** + +We had built a new church in our parish, that those who built pleasant +houses on the slopes, fleeing from the restless city that lay below, +might have room to worship. But the desire to worship seemed to be +dying of attrition. And the old church where the quarriers and farm +servants assembled and worshipped in an atmosphere that on a warm day +became so thick that one could cut it with a knife--that old church +would have been quite big enough to hold all who came, for the instinct +to pray seemed to be dying. And many, because the new church was now +too big, regretted the old. + +Then, suddenly, the new church was filled to the door. Men and women +discovered the road leading down to the hollow where the church stands +amid the graves of the generations. With wistful faces they turned +towards it. While the bell rang they stood in groups among the graves. +And if you listened there was but one word--war, war, war. Over and +over again just that one word. Until the bell was silent, and they +turned into the now crowded church. + +As I sat there and cast a glance around me, I felt a sudden amazement. +Those who never before had come down the steep brae when the bell was +ringing were sitting here and there just as if they had been there +every Sunday when the beadle, with head erect, ushers the minister to +the pulpit and snips him in. (Though the church is new, the minister +is yet snipped in by the beadle--a lonely prisoner there on his perch, +and it is an uncanny sound to hear the click of that snip shutting in +the solitary man.) + +In the pew in front of me sat a burly man with a head like a dome. He +never came to church. When I met him he would stand for an hour in the +lane among the hawthorns explaining his views. Prayer was mere +superstition. Cosmic laws unchanging and unchangeable held the +universe in their grasp. To ask that one of these laws should be +altered for a moment that a boon might be conferred on us was to ask +that the universe might be shattered. Prayer was immoral, the asking +for what could not be granted, and what we knew could not be granted. +If he went to church it would be hypocrisy on his part. + +And thus it came that when the farm servants came up the Gallows road +on their way to church on a summer morning, they often heard the whirr +of my friend's mowing machine as he mowed his lawn. It was the way he +took of letting the parish know that culture could have no dealings +with effete superstitions. + +*** + +And yet there he sat in front of me with a hymn-book which he picked up +from the shelf at the door, where such books are piled for the use of +camp-followers. The tune of the opening Psalm was Kilmarnock, and my +friend sang it in a way which showed that his mother had trained him +well. Then I forgot him, but after a while something like a stifled +sob in front of me brought him again to my consciousness. + +The minister began to pray for the King's forces "on the sea, on the +land, and in the air." My mind was playing round the words "in the +air," for they were an intrusion into the familiar order--an +innovation! Every invention of man seemed doomed to become a weapon in +the hand of the devil. But the prayer went on--for the sailors keeping +their watches in the darkness of the night that God might watch over +them, that through their unfaltering courage our shores might be +inviolate; for the soldiers now facing the enemy, grappling with death, +that God might succour them, covering their heads in the day of battle. +"Break Thou down the fierce power of our enemies," cried the minister +suddenly, "that with full hearts we may praise Thee, the God of our +fathers." + +A great hush fell on the crowded church. The shut eyes saw the red +battlefields, with the lines swaying to and fro, while the shrapnel +burst and the aeroplanes whirred in the smoke of the cannon. The cries +of men suddenly smitten smote on the inner ear. It was then that the +great thing happened. + +All of a sudden the voice broke, recovered, and broke again, and the +minister was swept away from the well-ordered, beautiful words he had +prepared. He began to speak of the stricken hearts at home, of fathers +and mothers to whom their sons would never return, of women in empty +houses with their husbands laid in nameless graves, of little children +who would never learn to say "Father" ... It was then that my friend +stifled a sob. There was Something after all, Someone greater than +cosmic forces, greater than law--with an eye to pity and an arm to +save. There was God. + +And my friend's son was with the famous regiment that was swaying to +and fro, grappling with destiny. He was helpless--and there was only +God to appeal to. There comes an hour in life when the heart realises +that instinct is mightier far than that logic which is, after all is +said, only the last refuge of the feeble-minded. There came like the +sudden lifting of a curtain the vision of a whole nation--nay, of races +girdling the whole earth--to whom the same high experience has come. +Everywhere the sanctuaries filled, the eyes turned upward, for instinct +is mightier than reason. The smoke of battle has revealed the face of +God. + +*** + +With us in the parish churches of Scotland the great thing is the +sermon. But to-day it is different; the great thing now is prayer. +And the minister preached about prayer. He set forth in clear and +ordered language, with a felicitous phrase now and then lighting up his +sentences, that prayer was not a mere relic of fanatical superstition +but a mighty power. He discussed with a wealth of learning whether God +had shut Himself in behind a prison-house of cosmic laws that made it +impossible for Him to answer prayer. He reasoned the worshippers cold. +But there in that hour reason was bound to give way before intuition. + +"If I am free," cried the preacher, "to rush to the help of my child +when he crieth in terror; and if, when the creatures of His hand cry to +God He is bound and cannot help or soothe, then He is poorer than I, so +great a thing is freedom." Prayer was not mere spiritual gymnastics. +A God immured in cold laws, barred for ever from the play of love or +tenderness, would be the one being in the universe most to be pitied. +The Creator did not sit deaf and dumb on the Throne of indifference +answering nothing, doing nothing. History was the proof that +Righteousness was throned at the core of the universe, for at the last +right ever prevailed. + +Then the measured tones went on to speak of the difficulty of believing +in the efficacy of prayer when Christians faced Christians in mortal +conflict, and they both cried for victory--both the children of the One +Father crying for victory over each other. But the difficulty was of +appearance only. For the only prevailing prayer was prayer in the name +of Christ. "Whatsoever ye shall ask _in My name_ that will I do." To +ask in His name was to ask in His spirit--the spirit of humility, +self-sacrifice, and love--the spirit of self-surrender to the _will_ +supreme. The question was which of the prayers for victory was prayer +in the name of Christ.... + +This was clear, convincing, but cold. Only at rare intervals does the +minister of our parish give way to passion. Suddenly there came a wave +of emotion. He flung his head back, and his eyes glowed. His voice +vibrated through the church. "When I think," he exclaimed, "of the +things that have been done with the name of God on men's lips; of +atrocities such as the unspeakable Turk never perpetrated; of war waged +not upon to-day but upon the centuries of faith that reared great +cathedrals now in flames; of women and children laid upon the reeking +altars of human passion; and all this in the name of culture, the +culture of the superman who deems himself superior to the Ten +Commandments--then, I say, may God grant that the culture which beareth +such fruit may perish from off the face of the earth. Prayer for the +triumph of such a cause cannot be in Christ's name...." + +But the preacher never got any further. + +This was what happened, and I am afraid some will not believe me, for a +Scotsman in church is a stoic, motionless and dumb, as he listens to +the Word. But all the traditions of the parish were snapped in a +second. In the side gallery sat the General, sitting as he always does +with his back to the minister. This he does that he may mark who are +in church of his servants and tenants, and who absent. + +When I read of the nobles in France who went to the scaffold with a +jest in the days of the Terror, I always think of the General. He is +that sort of man. To-day, little by little, as the sermon went on, he +turned round. At last he was facing the pulpit. His gleaming eyes +were fixed on the preacher. His son was dead. And when the words rang +through the church, may God grant that such culture may perish ... the +General sprang to his feet. "Amen" rang his voice through the church. + +There was a sudden movement; as one man they all rose to their feet. +Hands were lifted up to heaven. "Amen," "Amen," they cried--and then +there rose a cheer--muffled, but still a cheer. In the pulpit the +words died on the preacher's lips. He seemed as one suddenly stricken. +He gazed bewildered over the sea of faces. They sank back into the +pews as though suddenly ashamed. + +The last man to sit was my friend, who stood to the last with uplifted +hand. I think it was he who cried "Hear, hear"--the only sign he gave +of his long absence from church. The sermon was never finished. The +preacher in a low voice said, "Let us pray." And he humbled himself as +one who enters the valley of humiliation. And then he gave out this +psalm:-- + + Now Israel + May say, and that truly, + If that the Lord + Had not our cause maintained; + * * * * * + Then certainly + They had devoured us all. + * * * * * + But blessed be God, + Who doth us safely keep, + And hath not giv'n + Us for a living prey + Unto their teeth, + And bloody cruelty. + * * * * * + +This psalm as we sang it that day was a pæan of triumph. The clouds +suddenly broke. We heard our fathers singing it in their dark days. +The melody wedded to the words soared in exultant triumph, wailed like +the cry of the shingle swept by the surf; the sighing of the wind over +the heather was in it, and the hissing of the storm through the spray. +It was fierce as devouring death; it was gentle as a mother crooning +over her child. It put iron into the blood of our fathers as they sang +it. + +It was nerved by such a hymn that the sailors of Queen Elizabeth swept +the main, that the Puritans wrestled with principalities and powers, +that a handful of moors-men levelled despotism and tyranny to the +ground. It swept through our blood like flame as we in our day of +stress now sang it. We, too, would pull down strongholds and turn to +flight the armies of the alien. In all ages the cause of freedom +triumphed, and that cause was ours. We had entered on conflict with +clean hands and, God helping us, we would wage it with clean hands. +The clouds suddenly broke and the light of victory irradiated our +faces. There came overwhelmingly the realisation that there was a +power behind us mightier far than sword or shell--even the Lord God +Omnipotent. And that was how we made the greatest of all +discoveries--we found God. + +*** + +Yesterday morning I went early to the station, and there in the booking +office I found my friend talking to the ticket-collector. The +ticket-collector is a philosopher, and he comes to church, because he +loves the old psalm tunes. But when one of our parishioners who goes +now and then to Keswick comes to the booking office, the +ticket-collector calls him in and reasons with him gently. + +"Mahn, there's naething in it," he says; "I can tell you for a fact +there's naething in it--all a whack of fables." "Some day you'll find +out to your cost that there's something in it," flashes the man from +Keswick. "If ye wad only reid philosophee," says the ticket-collector, +"ye would ken better." But to-day my friend and the ticket-collector +had their heads close together, and I only heard the conclusion of +their argument. "Mahn," said the ticket-collector, "I am beginning to +think there may be something in it." + +And in the evening near the top of the brae I saw the General standing +erect with his little cane in his hand. He was talking to the +shoemaker, the greatest Radical in the parish--one of a party with +which the General has no dealings. But they talked like brothers. For +the shoemaker has a son fighting at the front, and his heart is sore +troubled within him. And the General's son is dead. And as I came up +the brae I saw the General putting his hand on the shoemaker's shoulder +and turn away, walking slowly up the brae. The old shoemaker saluted +and came down the brae. There was a tender look in the old man's eye +as he greeted me. + +In our parish we have truly made the greatest of all discoveries. We +have found God, and, finding Him, we have found each other. The man +who in his madness kindled the lurid flames of war little dreamed of +this fire which he kindled. + + + + +II + +The Revival of Patriotism + + + +II + +There has come to us in these days a revival of the spirit of +patriotism. That revival has come when it was sorely needed. In days +of unclouded prosperity other gods called forth our devotion and +enthusiasm, but the God of our Fathers who made us a great nation and +sent us to sow the seeds of righteousness beside all waters, bestowing +upon us empire and might, was well-nigh forgotten. + +For the new man "words like Empire, Patriotism, Duty, Honour, Glory and +God" had little or no meaning. Causes for which the fathers died could +not evoke an added heart-beat from their sons. They cared so little +for the mighty empire which they inherited that they contemplated the +bloodshed of civil war--so hot was their zeal for party and so cold +their love for the state. + +It was necessary that discipline should come. And that discipline +came, shaking the very foundations of our national life. Its first +fruit is that the smouldering fires of patriotism have broken forth +once more into bright flame; and that everywhere the hearts of the +people have been stirred by the call to arise and endure hardness that +the goodly heritage of empire perish not. And preachers in a thousand +pulpits have sounded the trumpet-note of duty and of patriotism. + +*** + +It has been said that preachers should aim at making the churches +sanctuaries of peace, within whose walls the echoes of the guns and the +cries of the perishing should not penetrate. Some have even said that +Christianity, so far from fostering the spirit of patriotism, is in +reality hostile to it. "Patriotism itself as a duty," says Lecky, "has +never found any place in Christian ethics, and strong theological +feeling has usually been directly hostile to its growth." + +No doubt there is something to be said for that view. The attitude of +the early Christians towards the Roman Empire was not that of +patriotism. The clear shining of the heavenly Jerusalem so dazzled +their eyes that this world, and the temporal empire occupying its +stage, seemed but as a shadow. Their devotion to the Unseen King left +little room for loyalty to the earthly ruler. In the glorious +consciousness of his citizenship in heaven, it was a small thing in the +estimation of St. Paul that he was also a Roman citizen--but he did not +forget it. But when the earthly ruler persecuted, and burnt, and threw +the Christians to the lions, or slaughtered them to make a Roman +holiday, then the poor victims cannot be blamed for not being patriots. + +And the Church in the mediæval period, organised in the mighty +hierarchy of Rome, did not tend to foster a national spirit of +patriotism. In those days when the Emperor Theodosius made penance in +the Cathedral of Milan and Ambrose declared that "the Church is not in +the empire, but the Emperor in the Church"; or in those later days when +Hildebrand promulgated the doctrine that the temporal power was subject +to the spiritual power, and kings and emperors were only vassals of the +Church, and Henry V. was left three days standing barefooted in the +snow waiting humbly to see the Pope at Canossa--in those days certainly +Christianity sought to foster not the sense of national loyalty, but +that of devotion towards that holy Catholic and universal Church whose +visible head was the Pope. Christianity placed the Pope on the throne +of the Cæsars, and sought to evoke towards him a patriotism which +transcended nationality. But the Reformation gave its death blow to +Hildebrandism, and the Pope no longer usurped the temporal Thrones of +Europe. And there came the throb of the awakening spirit of +nationality. The spirit of patriotism stirred once more the slumbering +races. + +*** + +The question whether patriotism is a fruit of Christianity must be +answered not by reference to what men did in the name of their +religion--for men are fallible--but by the precept and example of the +Founder of Christianity. He was a Jew, and of all races the Jew was +the most patriotic. An exile by the rivers of Babylon, the Israelite +refused to forget Zion. "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right +hand forget its cunning"--that was the cry wherewith his unconquerable +soul faced an overwhelming destiny. And in this respect Jesus Christ +was true to His race. He was a patriot. He worshipped in the +synagogues, and went on pilgrimages to Jerusalem, because He loved the +national institutions of His country. One note of true patriotism is +anguish. It is when love is great that the folly and sin of the person +beloved pierce the heart. + +The patriotism of the Founder of Christianity expressed itself in a cry +of agony which has reverberated through the centuries--"O Jerusalem, +Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them that are +sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, +even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! +Behold, your house is left unto you desolate." That cry is the measure +of His patriotism. + +Judged, then, by the example of its Founder, Christianity must produce +the spirit of love and loyalty towards one's own country. There was a +patriotism before Christianity, but it was that of arrogance, +aggression, and self-glorification. It was a patriotism which meted +out only contempt to other races. To the Jew the Greek was only a +Gentile dog; to the Greek the Jew was only a contemptible Barbarian. + +But the patriotism which is animated by the Christian spirit is far +other. It is not the vaunting of pride nor the shouting of vulgar +ditties. It seeks the glory of its own country, but the glory it seeks +is the glory of the greater service rendered to humanity. Conscious of +its own defects, it does not condemn others. With eyes cleansed from +prejudice, it beholds the good in other races. It seeks the first +place for its own nation because it acts the noblest, loves the best. +All the elements which make up the strong power of patriotism--love of +family, love of neighbours, love of race, love of country--Christianity +has purified them all. True patriotism is, then, a fruit of the +Christian religion, a virtue which falls to be inculcated by the +Church. If Christianity be the projection of the Christ-life into the +midst of every generation, then the life that reflects the beauty of +Christ must be a life animated by the deepest love of one's country. + +*** + +It was Dean Stanley who rendered God thanks in Paisley Abbey for that +Scotsmen were "citizens of an Empire so great, members of a Church so +free." In the building up of the Empire Scotsmen have borne a great +share of toil and peril. In other days the fires of patriotism burned +brightly. The cry of our fathers was "my country right or wrong." But +we feel not quite so sure of our country being always in the right. +The passion of Christianity is an ethical passion. Christian +patriotism demands national righteousness. To keep patriotism as an +ardent fire we must be convinced that our country stands for +righteousness. And in this day of our ordeal we have this certainty to +uphold us, that we are fighting for the right. + +It was not in defiance of Christianity, but in its defence, that we +drew the sword. For this war sprang from an unbridled lust of conquest +to which a whole nation surrendered itself. But before surrendering to +the passions of war the ideals of Christ were first forsaken by our +enemy. A new law was promulgated: "Become hard, O my brethren, for we +are emancipated and the world belongs to us." New beatitudes were +declared: "Ye have heard how ... it was said, Blessed are the meek ... +but I say unto you, Blessed are the valiant, for they shall make the +earth their throne ... Ye have read, Blessed are the peacemakers, but I +say unto you, Blessed are the war-makers, for they shall be called, if +not the children of Jehovah, the children of Odin, who is greater than +Jehovah." + +Out of this new gospel, the gospel of Odin, has sprung a war of +extermination--exiled nations, devastated kingdoms, desolated colleges, +ruined cathedrals, and multitudes of women and children "left nothing +but their eyes to weep with." The name of God has been invoked over +unspeakable barbarities--but the God thus invoked is not the Christian +God. It is Odin in whose name these things are done. What we are +fighting for is for the Christian ideal against Odin--for the law of +truth and mercy against the reign of falsehood of word and bond, and of +merciless barbarity. We have bared the breast to death that there may +sit on the throne of the world's soul, not a ruthless tribal god, but +the God of Fatherhood and Love whom Jesus Christ revealed. And in +waging that war we have ground to hope that the God of righteousness is +on our side. + +If we have not had the name of God constantly on our lips it is not +because we do not feel that we are fighting His battle, but because He +is so great, the Lord of Heaven and Earth before whom we are but as +dust, that we shrink from coupling His great name with ours. "Are you +sure that God is on your side?" Abraham Lincoln was asked in the dark +days of the American Civil War. "I have not thought about that," he +replied; "but I am very anxious to know whether we are on God's side." +And when the causes of this war are examined the assurance grows +stronger and stronger that we are on God's side. That is why the whole +nation has been welded into the unity and consistency of polished +steel; why the fire of patriotism burns in our midst with an intenser +heat than ever before. + +*** + +It is not merely from the righteousness of our cause in this war that +our patriotism draws inspiration, but also from the ideals for which +our Empire stands over all the world. As we look out to-day on the +Empire which our fathers bequeathed us, taking it all in all, it stands +for righteousness as no other on earth. It stands for the freedom of +the soul and the freedom of the body all over the world. + +Think of India, whose three hundred millions have been rescued from +tyranny and ceaseless bloodshed, whose widows have been saved from the +flames, whose starving have been fed in famine, and to whom the British +race brought security and peace. "When I think," said ex-President +Taft, "of what England has done in India ... how she found those many +millions torn by internecine strife, disrupted with constant wars, +unable to continue agriculture or the arts of peace, with inferior +roads, tyranny, and oppression; and when I think what the Government of +Great Britain is now doing for these alien races, the debt the world +owes England ought to be acknowledged in no grudging manner." + +No work ever done on earth for the elevation of humanity can compare +with that wrought in India by our race for the uplift of humanity; and +it is the same wherever the standard of Britain waves. In our own day +we have seen in Egypt a whole race rising out of the mud and clothed +anew in the garments of self-respect. Through Africa, wherever the +sway of Britain extends, though yesterday the land reeked with blood, +to-day mercy and kindness are healing the woes of men, and millions who +knew not when death lurked for them in the bush now sleep in peace +under the palms. It was the might of Britain that destroyed the slave +trade, and it is nothing except the might of Britain which prevents the +slave raider resuming his nefarious traffic, and slavery under the +guise of other names being imposed on the natives of Africa. Wherever +you go, to the tropics or the Orient, there the great power for +righteousness is the British Empire. It does not exploit inferior +races for gold; it is the trustee of the helpless native. + +When one thinks of these little islands floating in the western sea, of +the power that has gone forth from them to heal and bless, of the vast +multitudes to whom the King-Emperor is the symbol of justice and +security--his is a poor heart which cannot feel the thrill of gratitude +for citizenship in an Empire girdling the whole earth, whose +foundations are thus laid in righteousness. + +*** + +Patriotism is not, however, a mere sentiment. It was not sentiment +which built up the Empire. It was self-sacrifice--the spirit that +faced and endured death. For us, too, patriotism must be more than +sentiment; it must be action and the self-sacrifice which action +requires. + +What our fathers reared we must defend. And the startling thing is +that there are still so many of our people who shrink from the burden +which patriotism imposes. Many thousands refuse to prepare themselves +for war; who are as the Romans who could not leave their baths to go +and fight. + +Vast multitudes congregate to gaze on football matches and gamble on +the issue. The call of King and country falls on ears grown deaf. We +thank God for those who, hearing the call, have gone forth to fight, +counting everything but loss as compared to their country's gain. But +these others, they cannot have paused to think. They have not pictured +these fair lands, that have not heard the sound of war for seven +generations, given over to that devouring enemy which has made Belgium +a wilderness. + +They have not thought of Oxford and St. Andrews sharing the fate of +Louvain; of London and Edinburgh become as Brussels; of the millions of +Glasgow and Birmingham thrown on the mercies of the world, women and +children fleeing, driven by nameless fears, with no place to flee to +but the mountain fastnesses of Wales and the Highlands of Scotland--the +last refuge of the miserable and the broken. And yet these miseries +would surely befall were all the manhood of the race such as these. + +Think what it would mean were the walls of our defence broken down. +Supposing that a shattering blow were struck at the heart of the Empire +and our fleet crushed. What would follow? The crumbling of the Empire +in a week! It is not we alone, with our wives and children in these +little islands, who would be swept to ruin, and on whom despair would +fall. From the far north-west to the long wash of the Australasian +seas the shadow of devouring misery and death would fall on humanity. +The millions of India would be forthwith swept into the whirlpools of +war and mutiny. Egypt would be thrown back into chaos. Africa would +be left to Islam and the merciless rule of a nation which knows but how +to smite. Australia and New Zealand would be at the mercy of the +yellow races. + +It would not be a calamity for us in these islands alone. It would be +a calamity whose withering blight would be cast over all the world. +The ideals of righteousness which this Empire upholds would be trampled +everywhere under foot. Covetousness and the lust of gold would hold +the field of the world. + +There is only one thing to be done, one duty summoning us with an +irresistible call--the duty that calls us to stand between our country +and destruction. Were the fate which has overtaken the Low Country to +overtake us; were this fair land to be made a wilderness, our women and +children driven into the wilds, and the Empire wrested from our hands, +the men who failed in their duty would never be able to hold up their +heads again. + +What a terrible load would lie on him who, beholding the ruin of his +native land, could say, "This might not have happened if I, and others +like me, had done our duty." That would be a hell from which there +would be no escape. "Which way I fly is hell; myself am hell." + +There can be no limit to the sacrifice which patriotism requires, so +great a heritage is our native land. It does not require of us as +Christians to engage in wars of conquest for the gratification of pride +and greed, but it does require of us even the sacrifice of our lives in +the defence of our homes or in the defence of our brother's home. + +There are those who find themselves faced with difficulty. They are +called upon to fight with every force in their power, to slay, +withholding not their hand, while they hear the commandment, "Thou +shall not kill," ringing in their ears, and across the centuries the +voice of their Lord saying, "Resist not evil; whosoever shall smite +thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." They are +bewildered. Is not the attitude of non-resistance that which Jesus +Christ enjoins? If they fight with sword and shell are they not +lowering themselves to the level of Nietzsche, Bernhardi and Bülow, and +submitting to the arbitrament of the sword, which decides nothing +except its own sharpness. The call of patriotism summoning to resist +even unto blood comes to them, and they are uncertain whether to obey. + +But we must interpret the will of God, not by isolated sentences, but +by the whole content of the divine revelation. The commandment, "Thou +shalt not kill," does not mean that we are not to kill in any +circumstance whatever. If the commandment is to be taken literally, +then no limit is to be set to it, and we must not kill any animal--not +even the parasites of uncleanness. There is, moreover, another law +which runs: "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be +shed, for in the image of God created He him." So far from the mere +physical life being for ever sacred, the very altar of God Himself was +to be no sanctuary for the murderer. The man who owned a vicious ox +and knew him to be vicious, and the ox killed a man, the owner thereof +was to be slain. There are therefore circumstances in which the law, +"Thou shalt not kill," is abrogated, and its place is taken by the law, +"Thou shalt kill." + +The law demanding the conservation of life rests on this foundation, +not that physical life itself is sacred, but that human life bears the +image of God. There are things far more sacred than the physical +life--even those things which constitute the image of God stamped upon +man. There are things for which men in all ages have been content to +die--truth and loyalty to truth, the principles which are dearer than +life. Those things which God ordained that men might through them grow +more and more into His image, for these things man must be ready to +die, and among these things is nationality. + +Men cannot develop in isolation. What poor creatures men would be if +they were solitary units. They would be as the beasts that perish. It +is through the heritage of nationality that the soul is enriched. What +poor stunted lives would ours be if we had not behind us the great and +noble deeds which built up our Empire, if the words of the high souls +of many generations did not come thrilling to our hearts, if +Shakespeare and Wordsworth, Scott and Burns did not pour their +treasures into our laps. The soul grows into the image of God through +the riches of nationality. And whosoever warreth against nationality +warreth against the soul. And the men who warreth against the soul +must be resisted to the death. + +*** + +We dare not appeal to Jesus Christ to cloak our shrinking from +sacrifice. No doubt His gentleness has been the wonder of history; but +His strength also summons us to be strong. For Jesus Christ was not a +quietist. His religion is not a mere hospital for wounded souls. His +place is among the strong of the earth. He faced the evil of this +earth unflinching in His resistance. "Woe unto you Scribes and +Pharisees, hypocrites" is His denunciation of the oppressor; "Go tell +that fox" is His message to the tyrant. When we think of Him making +the whips, and falling, with holy anger in His eyes, on those who +desecrated the courts of the temple, overturning the tables of the +money changers, we know that the ideal of non-resistance is not His. + +No doubt He laid it down as the law for the individual that he should +turn the other cheek; but He did not lay it down as a law that a man +should turn another's cheek to the smiter. What the individual can do, +the nation may not do. It no doubt is the duty of the Ruler to turn +his own individual cheek to the insulter; it is not his duty to turn +the cheeks of the millions over whom he rules to those who would smite +them, committing their children to shame and their homes to devastation. + +No doubt Jesus Christ enjoined the law of forgiveness, but it was not +unconditional. "If he repent, forgive him," is His law, and until the +wrongdoer repents and ceases from his evil, it would be immoral to +forgive him. Duty demands that every means be used to bring the +evildoer to repentance; for only so is there a chance of his soul being +saved. It is manifest that Christianity is not a religion of +non-resistance to evil, but the religion of Him who Himself resisted +evil, and who resisted it even to the death. + +Patriotism, therefore, demands that we resist even to the shedding of +blood. When a hostile army would destroy a nation, as in Belgium, it +warreth against the soul, and it is as Christian to kill as it would be +to shoot a tiger which leapeth out of the jungle to devour a man. And +that Irish soldier whose face in the hospital in Paris was irradiated +with joy when he was told that the enemy was put to flight and Paris +saved, and who died with that gladness in his face, died in the spirit +of Jesus Christ. + +To say that the Founder of Christianity would not strike a blow for +home and kindred and truth is to forget that He struck a blow in +Jerusalem and wielded the thongs on the shoulders of those who polluted +His Father's house. It is His will that we should strike a blow in +defence of the house of our soul--the sanctuary of nationality. + +*** + +Patriotism must be vibrant with the spirit of religion if it is to be a +power rousing the nation to heroism and self-sacrifice. There never +was a nation so patriotic as the Jew. No city ever gripped a nation's +heart-strings as Jerusalem gripped the heart of the Jew. No suffering, +no defeat, no exile however far, could quench the fire of patriotism in +the heart. "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget +her cunning. Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth if I +remember thee not, if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy"--such +was the cry of the Jew by the rivers of Babylon, yearning after Sion. + +How was it that Jerusalem thus pulled at its children's heart-strings +until they hurried back to rebuild? It was because Jerusalem was the +seat of the worship of God. It was not the material stones or the +hills round about that thus compelled the heart. It was the light of +eternity shining over them. It was because of the "house of the Lord +our God" that the Jew counted no good worth his striving except the +good of Jerusalem. It is only when God standeth at the heart of a +nation that the heart cleaveth with all its fibres to its native land, +for then the whole of the man--not only the cravings of the body and +the heart and the mind, but also the deeper cravings of the soul--wind +themselves round the thought of the nation. + +Thus we find that the days when the fires of patriotism burned +brightest were ever those in which God held sway over the nation. It +was with God that the sailors of Queen Elizabeth swept the main, that +the soldiers of Wellington hurled the enemy far from the shores that +face England--they were fighting not only for England but for England's +God. + +The testimony of history is this, that patriotism cannot maintain its +power if once it be divorced from religion. Let God's face be veiled +and lost and everything is lost. "Without God nothing, with God +everything," says the ancient Celtic proverb, and all ages testify to +its truth. And the last proof of it is now before our eyes in the +condition of France. + +A hundred years ago France dominated Europe, erected thrones and +deposed kings at its will. But little by little France lost the vision +of God, until at last M. Viviani celebrated the final triumph over the +Church in 1907 by exclaiming: "With one magnificent gesture we have +extinguished the lights of heaven, which none shall rekindle." France, +in the words of its present Prime Minister, "extinguished the lights of +heaven," but in so doing it extinguished something else. For to-day +that nation, that not so long ago dominated Europe, can only protect +its capital city by the help of the two nations which have not yet +extinguished the lights of heaven. + +Without God patriotism becomes impotent, for God is the source of that +moral law, conformity to which means for a nation life, and defiance of +which means the degeneration that leadeth to destruction. With the +departure from God came moral decay and racial suicide. The hope of +France is this, that through the descent of the nation into the valley +of death the lights of heaven may be once more kindled; the hope of +Britain, that these same lights may shine more brightly. + +The spirit of patriotism will again vivify the nation when we seek +after God. In years of prosperity we have forgotten our high calling. +We have pursued vanities and forgotten the living God. When we again +realise our calling and our election as instruments in the hand of God +for the establishment of His Kingdom of Righteousness over all the +earth, our hearts will be filled with ardour, and we shall face +whatever perils may assail us strong in the assurance that the +Omnipotent God is in our midst and that nothing can resist His will. + +*** + +And this true patriotism will mean the salvation of the nation. For it +will strive to realise at home that righteousness which alone exalteth +a nation. Its first task will be to raise the life at home nearer to +God, for we cannot raise the world to higher levels than that on which +we ourselves stand. The vision of the new Jerusalem descending from +God out of heaven will again flame before our eyes. "And I, John, saw +the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, +prepared as a bride for her husband." + +That new Jerusalem is not a city remote in the inaccessible heights, +but a city which descends and permeates the material city now so +polluted by sin, until it becomes the "holy city," with the law of God +obeyed and the will of God done in it. Its citizens shall walk its +streets, pure in heart, seeing God everywhere. "And they shall bring +the glory and the honour of the nations into it." There the nations +shall be one in the streets of the city of God, all their contendings +forgotten in the sense of their brotherhood, following the one ideal, +obeying the one law, loving each other in the love of God. They will +strive then as to who shall bring the greatest glory within the compass +of its walls, and that will be the only striving. + +That is the ideal, that we should become a nation so permeated by the +spirit of God, so brought into obedience to His will, that our cities +shall become holy cities, even as the new Jerusalem coming down from +God out of heaven. When we shall set ourselves to realise that ideal +once more, then will the nation evoke the devotion of its citizens, for +devotion to the nation will also be devotion to God. + +It was that ideal which fired the patriotism of the Jew. The same +ideal alone will make our patriotism glow as a white flame. When the +vision of the Supreme Ruler whose throne is established in +righteousness once more blazes forth before the people, then once more +the throb of patriotism and the passion to make righteous law operative +to the ends of the earth will stir the heart, and the manhood of the +race will once more thrill with the call summoning to service and to +sacrifice. The answering shout will everywhere arise--For God and the +King. + + + + +III + +The Shadow of the Cross + + + +III + +The churchyard of our parish lies in a deep hollow, and a little river +half encircles it. In the midst of it stands the church beneath whose +shadow the parish has garnered its dead for centuries. There the +generations have lain down to sleep, their hearts reconciled one to +another, and the beadle has drawn the coverlet of green over them. As +he goes about his allotted task he pats a mound here and there gently +with the back of his spade--for roadman and belted earl are at one here. + +The last time I wandered down to the hollow it seemed as if eternal +peace brooded over the living and the dead. The leaves, russet and +gold, glowed in the sunlight. At the stirring of a gentle breeze, like +the dropping of a sea-bird's feather, leaf after leaf fluttered +silently down on the graves. The great bank of trees across the river +glowed with rivulets of dull flames running hither and thither. In its +stony bed the river sang its endless song. The immemorial yews, +beneath whose branches successive generations of children have played +with now and then a thrill of pleasing terror because of the +overhanging graves, stood regardless of the sun. The crows, sated with +the gleanings of harvest fields, fluttered in their rookeries with +scarcely a caw. It seemed as if no sound of discord or strife could +ever break in that enchanted hollow. + +*** + +As I turned away to retrace my steps through the gate I came on a woman +sitting on the mort-safe, a handkerchief moist with her tears in her +hand. She had come up from the quarries and she had visited her dead. +And she came because yesterday she received word that on the +battlefield of Marne her son was killed. He was her eldest. The +others were not old enough yet to fight. Her husband was killed in an +accident, and she had reared her children, refusing all help from the +parish. The pride of the blood sustained her. And now that her son +was dead she came hither, driven by an irresistible instinct to visit +her husband's grave. It was as if she wanted to tell him about John, +and how he died a hero, trying to carry a wounded comrade through the +hail of the shrapnel. + +She was weary, and from her husband's grave she turned to the church. +She would go and sit in the corner under the gallery, where John used +to sit. He had sat with her there at his first Communion. The +memories wrapped her round, and she would feel her son near her there. +But the door of the church was locked and barred. With an added ache +in her heart she turned away, and weariness compelled her to sit on the +iron mort-safe, which the parish provided in a former century to +protect their dead from sacrilegious hands. "But the church used to be +open," I said. "Aye," she replied tremulously, gathering up her +handkerchief into a round ball; "but some did-na like it; the boots on +the week-days are na sae clean, and they dirtied the kirk. That must +be why they lockit the door." It was not that she complained. Those +who locked the church were wise men, and no doubt they knew best. So +she sat on the mort-safe. + +"I have other sons, and when they are older they will go, too," she +said. "I'll no' keep them back. And if they die it'll be for God's +great cause." Her lips quivered as she spoke. The moist ball in the +right hand was clenched tight--there were no more tears to shed. + +And as I looked at the worn, lined face, the bent shoulders, the faded +rusty black mantle with its fringe, and the sunken lips that quivered +now and then, there came a sudden realisation. I saw no longer the one +grief-burdened figure sitting dejectedly on the mort-safe--I saw the +unnumbered host of mothers throughout the world who have given their +sons over to carnage, and who are as Rachel weeping for her children, +refusing to be comforted because they are not. Millions of men locked +in the death grapple means millions of mothers given tears to drink in +great measure, bound in affliction and iron. + +The song of the river went on ceaselessly, the russet-leaves fell +softly, and the sun shone on a world wrapped in peace--all nature +utterly regardless of the millions of Rachels that weep. (Ten million +hearts may break, but nature silences not one note of its joyousness.) +And as she sat there, behind her, under the campanile, showed the +church door, locked and barred. Nature was heedless of her; the church +shut its door upon her. She seemed to me the Mater Dolorosa. + +*** + +As I went up the brae there came the memory of a school lesson long +ago. Out of the subconscious it leaped as a diver might come up from +the depths of the sea with a gleaming coin in his hand. Among the +temples of ancient Rome there was one temple always kept open in time +of war. There the Roman General clashed the shield and the spear, +invoking the god ere he went to the battle-line, and its door was shut +not day or night. And I have no doubt but that the Eternal Ruler heard +that clashing of spear on shield, and marked that open door. But over +wide districts of Great Britain we have left these pagan habits far +behind us. We shut the doors of our temples alike in war and in +peace--excepting two hours on one day of the week, or in many cases one +hour in the week. Nor do I doubt but that the same Ruler marks these +doors now shut on the mothers of sorrow, and these sanctuaries locked +and silent. + +The glory was now gone from the day. I could not forget how the iron +mort-safe gave the rest that the Church refused. The shadow lay heavy +over the valley, and the mind tried to give the shadow a name. But it +could not. So up the long flight of stone steps I climbed, and turned +along a tree-shaded road. There, where three roads meet, stands a +little chapel within whose walls a small section of our parishioners +worship. I have passed it times out of mind without so much as +glancing at it. But to-day its open door arrested my eye, and I stood +in the roadway and gazed. And there came to me there a sudden sense of +thankfulness for that there is one open door in our parish which +witnesses to the fact that the power and solace of religion are not +shut in within the confines of only two hours of one day in the week. + +While I yet stood in the highway there came forth from the little +chapel an honoured parishioner, who is passing the golden evening of a +useful life in researches regarding Calvin and the Pope. Amazement +possessed me, for he is a power in the parish church, whose door is +locked and barred. We walked together towards the hills. There was a +trace of apology in his explanation. Since this dreadful cataclysm has +burst and the boom of the guns has come drifting from the sea across +the high-perched city, he has felt the need of quiet meditation. Thus +he has often on his walks slipped through the open door of the chapel +that stands by the roadside. + +"And you have locked the door of the parish church," I exclaimed, "and +you deny to the poor the privilege you yourself enjoy." He stopped and +faced me in the roadway, blinking at me. "We never locked the Church +door," he said. "It used to be open," I answered; "I remember being +glad to sit in it myself." "Oh! I remember," he exclaimed, "it was +open every day for a few years, but the authorities were never +consulted when it was thrown open--a most lawless proceeding!--and when +a suitable opportunity occurred the beadle locked it up. Law and order +have to be vindicated." + +"What you did then," I replied, "was to allow the beadle to deprive the +poor parishioners of a privilege which you and a few others enjoy +elsewhere." At that he started off walking along the road very +quickly, but I kept step with him. "You see," said he, waving a +deprecatory hand, "I am only one among many, and I was so absorbed in +these old Reformation controversies that I never gave it a thought, and +it is only since the war began that I realised...." And as he spoke I +felt that my old friend, learned in many controversies, had experienced +a revolution. The great tide had swept him past all controversies +right up to the fountain head. He had learned that man's high calling +is not to dispute, but to pray. + +As we walked under the darkling hills I told him of that shadow which +had so suddenly fallen upon me that day, and he at once gave it a name. +"It is the shadow of the Cross," said he. And thereupon he began to +explain out of the wisdom and ripened experience of seventy years how +across nineteen centuries the shadow of the Cross lies still over all +the world. One thinks so seldom of these things, and if occasionally +one hears them spoken of, familiarity with the words has deadened the +hearer to their significance. It was because I listened to him talking +in the lane that his words gripped me. They might have made no +impression if he were in a pulpit. + +*** + +We are accustomed to think of the greatest of all tragedies as an event +consummated in six hours. It is, however, far from consummated, for it +is an age-long tragedy. Its roots lay in self-interest. A degenerate +priesthood in an obscure Syrian town saw nothing in the Greatest of +Teachers but an unbalanced enthusiast, who struck at their ill-gotten +gains, and whose triumph would make an end of them and their system. +So self-interest cried "Crucify." And though the Roman Governor saw +through them and wanted to save Him, self-interest again was brought +into play, and when threatened with an awkward complaint to Rome, he +said "Crucify." And ever since then self-interest on innumerable lips +has cried Crucify, Crucify. Not only cried, but did it. + +For this Teacher identified Himself with His followers, saying that He +was the Vine and they the branches. It follows that whatever is done +to the branch is done to the vine. A branch cannot be cut and severed +from the vine without the vine bleeding. He declared it to be so. +"Whosoever receiveth you receiveth Me," and it follows that whosoever +crucifies you crucifies Me. And the history of the centuries is the +history of how the poor and unlearned and the toiling have been +persecuted, harried by war, driven to death and crucified. + +Generation after generation have raised the Cross anew, and in the +crucifying of the dumb multitudes have crucified Him. Along with His +own He fought with wild beasts, went through the flames, and suffered +many bloody and diverse persecutions, and He was with His people now. +He confronted to-day the mighty of the earth as He did that blinded +priesthood of old, and He declared that there is only one way of +conquering, and that by love; that gaining the whole world was a +miserable bargain if in exchange a man parted with truth and +righteousness and purity--those things that constitute the soul's very +breath. + +But self-interest answered with cold disdain: "What sickly +sentimentalist is this? Let Him be crucified." He faced to-day the +lust of conquest, and declared that the conquering of men's bodies was +nothing; that the only way of attaining power was to conquer men's +hearts and minds and wills, thus clasping them to us with hooks of +steel; that the will of God for His children was that they should love +their enemies and not pour upon them the vials of wrath, trampling them +under foot; but the arrogance of man answered with the hoarse cry, +"Crucify." + +And that humanity which named His name was driven once more to the +holocaust of war--ten millions of men consigned to the hell of reeking +trenches. In the midst of the world the Cross stands as never before, +bearing its awful woe. In the seeing of the whole world the Eternal +Love is crucified. It was its shadow that fell on her whose lips +trembled as she sat on the mort-safe over against the locked and barred +door of the House of God. + +*** + +The most wonderful thing in history is that from a peasant done +shamefully to death in a remote corner of the Eastern world there +should flow through the ages such an inexplicable power. And yet there +must be some explanation of it. Why should a passion for righteousness +be evoked in the human heart by the fact that a Galilean was crucified +by a petty Roman official? There can be no explanation but this--that +that deed of shame revealed to men the hatefulness of the power which +wrought so evil a deed. That power was self-interest--selfishness. + +The eyes of men turned to Jesus Christ, and they saw one holy, +harmless, undefiled, separate from sin, whose journeying was the +journeys of healing among the sons of men, whose words were words of +blessedness, declaring that God loved and pardoned His children, and +yet men reviled, scorned, scourged and at last crucified Him. The +power that moved men to this dread crime was sin, and thus the word sin +became a word of horror. (For the selfishness that crucified was only +one fruit of sin.) Out of that realisation of the horror of sin there +sprang an ethical passion--a passion which in the heart and in the +world waged ceaseless war on selfishness and all the devices of evil. +Thus humanity was lifted out of the mire. They girded themselves to +fight that dread and hateful power which crucified the Holy One. + +Like the wind blowing in from the sea that sweeps before it the foul +miasma that lies over the valleys, so that men look up and see the +heavens and feel a new vigour moving in their blood, so a breath from +the living God came stirring the foul places of humanity, and the eyes, +no longer blinded by the exhalations of evil passions, saw the ideal of +purity arise before their eyes, and they turned to climb towards the +clearer vision. Through the revelation of purity in the face of Jesus +Christ and the realisation of the awfulness of that power which crowned +that purity with thorns, there came to humanity the dawning of +deliverance from sin--a deliverance still going on to its fruition. + +*** + +History is for ever repeating itself, and to-day the process of +humanity's deliverance from evil will gather momentum and advance a +long way towards the final triumph. For just as men only realised the +hatefulness of sin when they saw it laid upon Jesus Christ, so will it +be also to-day. A generation that had lost the sense of sin beholds +sin laid upon millions of men, working woe unspeakable, and, beholding, +learns anew what sin is and the hatefulness of it. For these millions +of men grappling with death, what are they but humanity's sin-bearers. +On them is laid the burden of the sins of this generation. The +selfishness, greed, ambition, lust--all the passions which sweep men to +wars of conquest--have poured the vials of misery on their heads. The +son of the widow sitting on the mort-safe, who now lies in a nameless +grave, he bore it. The bearing of it killed him. + +And as humanity will realise its horror, the word sin will once more +burn red before men's eyes, and there will arise that passion for +righteousness which will lay sin low even as the dust. There will ring +round the world the compelling cry that this power of hell must not for +ever hold humanity in its grip--that ruthless ambition, militarism, +despotism must be made to cease from the face of the earth. Once more +the shadow of the Cross will mean salvation to men. + +*** + +There was another power also that stirred the world under the shadow of +the Cross, and that was the power of self-sacrifice. There came to men +an overwhelming realisation that at the heart of the universe was the +Spirit of self-sacrifice, and that the Cross was but the expression of +it. They realised that the greatest thing a man can do with his life +is to lay it down. And as men realise to-day that the Cross still +abides in the heart of God, so that in all their affliction He is +afflicted, there comes to them the feeling that the one way of coming +nearest to His heart is the way of self-sacrifice. + +Under the shadow of the Cross now lifted up, a nation that sought +life's pleasures has suddenly thrilled with the glory of +self-sacrifice. What is it that sustains the men who go down to the +earthly hell of ruthless war? It is just this--the consciousness, +newly wakened, of how glorious a thing it is to die for King and +country, for home and kindred. They are content to be blotted out if +only the race will live, to descend to the abyss that the nation may be +exalted. Under the shadow of the Cross self-sacrifice has become once +more the only rock on which our feet can stand secure. Men charge +across fields of death with the light of it in their eyes. They are +raised into the fellowship of the Cross. And we are raised with them. + +If I could only tell the bowed widow sitting there on the mort-safe the +glorious fellowship with which her son is numbered, she would again +lift up her face to the light. He has died that we may live. Greater +love hath no man than this--nor yet greater glory. But she needs not +to be told; she knows it already. She knows it far better than you or +I do, for she feels it. In the deep places of life where words are +meaningless, her dumb heart feels the mystery of sin-bearing and the +glory of self-sacrifice. + +By a faculty deeper and truer far than reason, in the depths of the +soul where the Unseen Spirit moves revealing the things that are of +lasting worth, she has learned in meekness and suffering that divine +wisdom which is hid from the wise. She knows that the road that goes +by Calvary up to the Cross is the one road along which the feet can +come to God. She knows that her son has walked along that road, and +that, because of his bearing the cross laid upon him, and his dying +while bearing it, God has brought him into that joy which all the +cross-bearers see shining beyond the darkness and the woe. And because +she has thus entered into the secret place of the Most High, and has +felt the touch of God, she is ready to greet the day of still greater +sacrifice. + +*** + +In the evening, when the curtains were drawn, I took up a magazine and +read an article. It was a bitter invective against Christianity and +the Church. Nineteen centuries of the religion of the Cross--and this +holocaust as the fruit. It is amazing the blindness of the jaundiced +eye. It would be as reasonable to blame the Founder of Christianity +for His own crucifixion as to blame Christianity for the fact that the +wicked have continued to crucify Him. These things are so not because, +but in spite, of Christianity. + +Grievous as war now is, yet it is not war as in the days before the +Cross was erected on Calvary. When Ulysses asked Agamemnon for +sanction to bury the body of Ajax, the King was greatly annoyed. "What +do you mean?" he answered, "do you feel pity for a dead enemy?" That +was the spirit of war in the old heathen world--the spirit which had no +mercy on the living and no pity for the dead. Slowly but surely the +spirit of Christ fettered the spirit of hate and dethroned the spirit +of revenge. We now minister to the wounded and bury the dead enemy +with the pity and the honour we render to our own. + +We can trace the evolution of peace through the centuries. Wars +between individuals have ceased. A century and a half ago warring +clans in Scotland dyed the heather red; to-day wars between tribes have +ceased. There remains only war between nations, and already there are +great nations between whom war is unthinkable. If we in these days +wage war with Germany, yet we in these days also celebrate the +hundredth anniversary of unbroken peace with the United States of +America. If we bewail the failure of Christianity in the former, let +us be grateful for the triumph of Christianity in the latter. + +Formerly war was the normal condition; now to the moral consciousness +of Christendom war is an outrage. We only need to look beneath the +surface to realise that Galilee is conquering Corsica, and will conquer +at the last. Beneath the shadow of the Cross men will at last find +healing for their grievous wounds. + +*** + +And as a symbol thereof the doors of the sanctuaries of peace will be +flung wide open, and no burdened heart will find the House of God +locked and barred against groping hands. One fruit of these grievous +days may well be that the Church will realise that it does not become +her to occupy a lower plane than that heathen temple in ancient Rome, +whose door was shut not day or night while men were dying in battle. + +In the coming days when the mothers of sorrow come to their dead, over +whose graves the falling leaves flutter as a benediction, they will not +be left sitting on the iron mort-safe. The open door will invite them +into the sanctuary of peace, and they will croon the coronach of their +woe in the holy place. For they are the priesthood of this generation, +offering up the most precious sacrifice--and the door of the holy place +must be open to them. And there, in the sanctuaries of peace, their +sorrow will be transmuted into joy. + + + + +IV + +The Power of Prayer + + + +IV + +For eight centuries the Church of St. Giles has been the centre of the +religious life of Scotland. At all times of sorrow the nation has +turned to it, and within its walls, consecrated by the prayers of so +many generations, the surcharged heart has voiced its woe in the +presence of the Unseen. But in all the years of the dim and fading +past there never was a day like this in which we now stand. Death has +come as a grim spectre, and has looked into our eyes. The winds carry +to our ears the moans of our perishing sons, dying gloriously for +freedom on the bloody fields of Flanders. The great ships guard our +shores, and we know that if that vigil failed, our cities and villages +and fair countryside would become as Louvain and the Low Country. +Death itself would be welcome rather than that. + +If there ever came to any nation a call to seek the refuge which eye +has not seen, that call soundeth persistently, compellingly in our +ears. And that call soundeth not in vain. To-day[1] the two great +Churches of Scotland met as one in St. Giles, the days of their +misunderstanding ended, to pray for King and country--for all the +things which make life beautiful. They have come through days of +alienation and isolation, but to-day they are with one accord in one +place. And in their hearts only one purpose--to seek the blessing of +God for their nation. + + +[1] November 18, 1914. + + +*** + +As one sat there, under the tattered flags on which many bloody fights +for freedom are emblazoned, and watched the stream of men flow into the +church, what memories came crowding through the echoing corridors of +time. + +Four hundred years ago there came to Edinburgh the news of Flodden, and +out of the closes the women rushed to St. Giles, until round all the +altars there was no room to kneel because of the great crowd wailing +for their dead. The moaning of their lamentation was as the sound of +the surf wailing on the shore, and their sobbing as the cry of the +grinding pebbles in the backwash of the tide. But the city fathers +could stand upright even in that most cruel day when the cloud of +destruction was creeping over the Pentlands; and there is the note of +the heroic in that resolution which called all the able-bodied men to +rally to the defence of the capital, and exhorted "the good women to +pass to the kyrk, and pray whane tyme requires for our Soveraine Lord +and his Army, and neichbouris being thereat." + +That proclamation stirs the blood! They are dust, these fathers of +ours, but their spirit is all alive, throbbing in the heart of +us--their far-away children. Never did a race meet its Sedan in a +sublimer spirit than that. The strong, at toll of bell and tuck of +drum, manned the ramparts, and the women filled St. Giles' and sent +heavenward their cries. The bodies of such a race may for a brief +season be brought to subjection, but their souls are invincible--and it +is the soul that always conquers. + +And here to-day it is the same. From every part of Scotland men have +come, and they passed "to the kirk to pray for our Sovereign Lord and +his Army." True, there has been no Flodden and no Sedan; but it is by +the good hand of God upon us that the enemy was frustrated in his +eagerness for another Sedan. And it is in part the prayer of +thanksgiving that is laid to-day upon His altar, and in part the +petition that His mercies may be continued to the nation in the cruel +days to come. + +*** + +What a sanctuary for a nation's prayers, this church, where Kings have +prayed and gone forth to die in battle; where Queens have wept as the +voice of judgment, grim and stern, untouched by tenderness or love, +sounded in the ear; where three thousand people dissolved in tears as +the good Regent, foully slain, was borne to his grave. Over it passed +wave after wave of fanaticism and barbarism; and at last it fell into +the hands of the restorers--more ruthless far than Goths or Vandals! +But, through it all, the house of God survived; and, apparelled once +more in some of its pristine glory, it opens its doors to a nation that +once more seek after its God. + +And above us, as we sit there, hang the colours of our Scottish +regiments stirring our patriotism, assuring us that the men who guarded +these flags on many bloody fields were guarded by God, and that we are +still in His keeping. + +What a place this is in which to set vibrating that note of patriotism +which now quivers from Maiden Kirk to John o' Groat's. These colours +there--they are the most eloquent things on earth, for they pertain to +the realm of symbols. Words are poor compared to tears, and that is +because tears belong to the world of symbols. That tattered banner +there belonged to the Gordon Highlanders, and was carried through the +Peninsula and the Crimea. Woven in faded letters you can read on it +still Corunna, Almarez, Pyrenees, Waterloo. Ah! these flags tell of a +devotion stronger than death, rekindle the memories of the day when +stern silence fell on the ranks, as the Highland Brigade breasted the +slopes of the Alma until Sir Colin Campbell lifted his hat and they +rushed on the foe with the slogan of victory; and that other day when +"the thin red line tipped with steel" rolled back the surge of the +Cossacks; aye, and of a hundred such days when men went down joyously +to death that the race might be free and live. + +Waterloo!--it is on many flags. And we remember how the Man of Destiny +himself, as he saw his ranks yield before the onslaught of the +Highlanders, did not restrain his admiration for his enemies, but +exclaimed with the true soldier's generosity, "Les braves +Ecossais"--"Brave, brave Scotsmen" (what a contrast to "French's +contemptible little Army"). The hands that carried, the hearts that +thrilled at the waving of these flags, their fame will never perish. + + "On the slopes of Quatre Bras + The Frenchmen saw them stand unbroken. + * * * * * + On the day of Waterloo + The pibroch blew where fire was hottest. + * * * * * + When the Alma heights were stormed + Foremost went the Highland bonnets. + * * * * * + As it was in days of yore, + So the story shall be ever. + * * * * * + Think then of the name ye bear, + Ye that wear the Highland tartan. + * * * * * + Zealous of its old renown, + Hand it down without a blemish." + +As the eye looks along the nave up into the choir and sees the gleam of +red, colours after colours, there comes the memory of words--"We have +heard with our ears, O God, and our fathers have told us what work Thou +didst in their days in the times of old.... Through Thee will we push +down our enemies...." The unseen God who has led His people through so +many and great dangers will not forsake them now. + +*** + +There is a tablet where formerly stood the door that led to Haddo's +Hole, and there hangs on a pillar the flag that pertains of truth to +the realm of romance. Men with their hearts hot with indignation +buried it in Pretoria in 1880, and put above it the inscription +"Resurgam." Afterwards the Colonel recovered it and brought it home. +When war broke out again his widow restored it to the regiment--the +Royal Scots Fusiliers. In 1881 that regiment was the last to leave the +Transvaal; in 1900 it was the first to enter the Transvaal--as the +inscription narrates. And by the direction of Lord Roberts, when +Pretoria was occupied, this identical flag was run up amid the shouts +of the victors. Now it rests here. "Resurgam"--it is the unquenchable +spirit of an invincible nation. + +If only the manhood of Scotland could be gathered into this Church, +under these flags, and the story they tell were put into words, +pulsating with passion--then the ranks of our Army would be filled up +in a week. What a lack of imagination we reveal! We teach dates, +thinking we are teaching history. The only way to teach history is by +flags, and all they stand for. When Douglas threw the heart of Bruce +among his enemies he cried, "Lead thou on as thou wast wont and Douglas +will follow thee or die." In the spirit of Douglas our fathers +followed the flags, and we will follow in the steps of our fathers and +face death with undaunted hearts as they were wont. There comes to us +the shouting of their triumph, and we cry: "Lead on; we will follow or +die." This grey church, St. Giles', is the temple of patriotism. +Therefore our feet turn towards it in dark days, and we say, "Our feet +shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem!" + +*** + +How the old words are born for us anew as we thus meet as one "to +entreat God for the broken peace of Christendom." We sing "God is our +refuge and our strength," but there is a note of intensity in the +singing now such as we never knew before. Men close their eyes, and +stand, the world blotted out, before their God, realising that He and +He alone is the one refuge, the only giver of victory. We hear the old +story read of Moses holding up his hands and Israel prevailing on the +plains below; but it is not Israel we see travailing in battle, but our +own brothers in the rain-sodden trenches, and we feel the uprising of +the ceaseless intercession of a nation that has anew found its God. It +is not the right hand that assureth victories; it is that spirit of +enthusiasm, that passion for righteousness which filleth the heart, and +that spirit is as the wind blowing where it listeth--and it cometh out +of the Unseen at the call of our prayers. + +When in other days we prayed for the King it was in the spirit of cold +formalism. But now a lump rises in the throat as we invoke the +blessing and protection of Heaven for the solitary man who is the +symbol of the unity of our Empire, and who watcheth over its destinies +day and night, and who has sent his son to face death with the meanest +of his subjects. We hear the glorious words: "If God be for us, who +can be against us?" and they are written for ourselves. We, who fight +for the truth of word and for the freedom and deliverance of the +oppressed, can feel that God is for us, and that all is well. + +And when we pray, our voices rising as one, "Thy kingdom come," we can +see that kingdom coming through blood and tears, cleansing the foul +places and establishing peace on everlasting foundations. It is a new +day that has dawned for us--a day in which we stand united as the +subjects of the one King, as the sons of the one God--and the things +that separated us one from another are swept away. What the conferring +of the wise found so difficult to achieve, the roaring of the guns has +accomplished. God teacheth his people by sending them through the +purifying fires. + +*** + +In these prayers in St. Giles' there is a directness which shows that +we are there for a definite purpose. We no longer use qualifying +words. We cry for victory. There is a bloodless form of prayer which +some use and which sends the worshipper away with an aching heart. It +is the prayer that never prays directly for victory. "Thy will be +done," it prays, in the spirit of submission. But prayer is not +submission; it is a wrestling. In other days our fathers wrestled in +prayer and prevailed. "I spent the night in prayer," wrote Oliver +Cromwell, in critical days; "I prayed God that He would guide us +against the enemy. We were simple fellows of the country, and they +were men of blood and fashion, but the Lord delivered them into our +hands. By His grace we killed five thousand. If He continues to show +mercy we will kill some more to-morrow." Such were the Ironsides, "men +of a spirit," who broke the charges of the Cavaliers, as the cliff +dashes back in white spray the rush of the billows. + +This was also the language of the Covenanters of old; and though we no +longer use such plainness of speech, we mean the same. There is a +place for tenderness; but when men are ground to powder by the judgment +of God, tenderness is not manifest then. When the heart whispers +"Spare" and justice says "Smite," men must obey the voice of justice, +stifling the voice of the heart. + +Our prayers are now for justice. Better far a righteous war than an +immoral peace. We have been compelled to unsheath the sword, and we +pray that no heart may falter, and no cry arise for the sheathing of +the sword, until justice be done. Thus our prayers have become a cry +for victory. + +*** + +As one sits in an ancient church such as this, there comes knocking at +the heart many questions regarding that service of prayer which within +its walls has linked the generations together. Can prayer really +prevail with God? Can it alter the will of the Unchangeable? If there +be no power in it, why should men go on praying? + +We must distinguish between the will of God which is unchangeable, and +His lower will which is his purpose towards us and His attitude to us. +The former is unalterable; the latter varies according to the varying +of our hearts. With that lower will we are called to wrestle. A man +is born in poverty and obscurity, and the will of God seems to be that +he should continue poor and obscure. But he wrestles with that lower +will until he prevails. He ultimately moves out into the great tide of +life and becomes a power. The will of God towards that man is changed. + +It is the same with a nation. Here is a nation sinking on its lees +with its ideals dimmed and the shrines of its fathers' God forsaken and +desolate. It has fashioned to itself other gods, and the multitudes +crowd the temples of the goddess of pleasure. The very race itself is +sacrificed on the altar of gross pleasure, and the laughter of little +children is being little by little silenced. The fires of patriotism +are dying low, and the love of country gives place to the love of +party. There are mean victories rejoiced over, but they are the +victories of the cynic and the sensualist. There is the sound of +shouting, but it is the shouting over the triumph of one self-seeking +politician over another self-seeking partisan. Saintliness, which +other generations held in awe and reverence, provokes now a pitying +smile. Mammon alone is held in high honour and sitteth in the high +places. What is the will of God towards that nation? It is this--ruin +and utter destruction. Over every nation that thus succumbed to the +gross and sensual, history shows the sword of God unsheathed, and at +last the devouring flames of judgment. + +But to such a nation there comes as if out of the silent heaven a call +as a trumpet sound, summoning it to the judgment-seat of God. Over the +sea comes the roar of guns. The foundations which the fathers laid in +righteousness, through long neglect and decay are crumbling. An empire +encircling the globe is tottering to destruction. The hay and the +stubble cannot come scathless through the flames. The writing is on +the wall, and as the eyes see the hand that writes, trembling seizeth +upon men. And then there cometh a sudden change. The nation in a day +rises out of the morass of its self-indulgence. It sets itself to lay +hold again upon the eternal law of righteousness. They seek once more +the shrines of their God. They set themselves to fast and to pray. +"Who can tell," they whisper one to another, "if God will turn and +repent, and turn away from His fierce anger, that we perish not?" + +The fields of their inglorious shouting over their games are deserted +for the fields of hardness and grim preparation. Once more they gird +themselves for conflict, as their fathers so often girded, that truth +and righteousness may prevail over all the earth. Sharply the choice +is presented to them between Christ or Odin, and though choosing the +Christ means agony and woe they make their choice unhesitatingly. A +new light shines in their eyes, and the work of their hands and the +devisings of their hearts become the spirit of prayer. Yesterday the +will of God towards that nation, sinking on its lees, was destruction; +to-day towards that same nation, thus risen out of the foul miasma that +was stifling its soul, the will of God is salvation. + +Because prayer is the greatest power in the world; because it can alter +the will of God towards us, because it can move the hand of the +omnipotent God and is thus endued with His omnipotence, our prayers as +we gather in the sanctuaries are no longer the submission of quietism, +but a wrestling with God--the crying of a soul as in agony for victory +based on the triumph of righteousness. It was such a cry that rose on +that day in St. Giles. + +*** + +As the second paraphrase was being sung there came the memory of words +spoken in the pulpit of the great Cathedral by Dr. Cameron Lees. It +was at evening service, when the shadows were gathering. "I have often +sat in this pulpit," said Dr. Lees, "on the edge of the evening, and +watched the shadows enveloping the Cathedral. They invaded the side +chapels first, and then the nave, creeping onwards through the +transepts, until the chancel was reached. After that they gathered in +strength, until the whole building was in darkness, with the exception +of the white figure of Christ in the great east window. I pray that +the last vision vouchsafed me on earth may be just that--the Saviour of +men. I can then close my eyes in the knowledge that He will lead me +through the dark valley that leadeth to the eternal home." + +It has been like that with the whole nation. Around our shores the +darkness gathered, until all the horizon was black with threatening +clouds. Then we lifted up our eyes and saw.... He will bring +deliverance and peace. As we moved along the crowded aisles towards +the door the white figure of Christ glowed in the great east window, +and we felt that He will bless His people at last with peace--the peace +not of death, but of life. + + "Down the dark future, through long generations, + The echoing sounds grow fainter and then cease, + And, like a bell, with solemn sweet vibrations, + I hear once more the voice of Christ say Peace. + Peace! and no longer from its brazen portals + The clash of war's great organ shakes the skies; + But beautiful as songs of the immortals, + The holy melodies of love arise." + + + + +V + +The Victory + + + +V + +The blinds were all drawn in the red-roofed house that stands at the +cross-roads. It was not empty, for the smoke arose from its chimneys +in the clear morning air. In other days the music of song and laughter +often floated from its open windows, but now it was stricken dumb. +From it two sons had gone to take their place in the line of soul and +fire that girdles these islands, warding them from destruction. + +In a moment the veiled windows flashed their meaning. In the long +lists of the dead I found the name I looked for. I had schooled myself +to look at these lists, thinking of them in the mass as force or power; +but that one name insisted on its individuality. They were all +individual lives, each throbbing with intensest self-realisation, each +with his love and hope and fear. There was none among them so poor but +some heart clung to them. They may die, no longer in units, but in +broad swathes, mown down by machine guns, but they are individual +hearts still. In masses the sea swallows them up, trenches are filled +with them, but however much we try we cannot narcotise our hearts by +sophistries. Some day a name stands out alone--and we realise. + +All over the land, in every parish, blinds are being drawn in houses +where music and laughter are silenced. There comes the surge of a wild +revolt. It is not these individual hearts alone that lie stricken, it +is the joy of the centuries yet to be. In nameless graves lie the +dream-children who will never now be born. This criminal sealing up of +the very fountain of life--how can we bear it? + +And yet we open not our mouths in protest. Is it because we are losing +our sensitiveness--becoming brutalised? It might be that. For nothing +coarsens the mind like that tide of hatred and passion which war sends +sweeping through the hearts of men. And yet it is not that. For when +they told the mother, breaking it gently as love alone can do, that her +son was dead, she bowed her head in silence, yielding herself to the +solace of tears; but in a little while she said brokenly: "It is good +to die so: I would not have my son shelter himself behind other +mothers' sons." + +No, it is not because we are already coarsened that the heart can bear. +It is rather because we have realised with the passing away of the old +world of the last long summer days (it seems already centuries remote) +that there are some things so great that they can transfigure even +death. When the loyalty to the highest can only be fulfilled through +death, we acquiesce in the sacrifice. In our parish we have not been +coarsened--we have been quickened. + +*** + +It seems as if it were in another era that my friend at the top of the +Gallows' Road proved to me convincingly that death alone was king. +With a keen irony he depicted this little globule of a world, a +third-rate satellite of a fifth-rate star, floating in the abysses, in +relation to the universe but as a mere grain of sand amid all the sand +on the world's shores; and on that puny speck of a world he pictured +the ephemeral generations, mere flashes of troubled consciousness--and +then darkness. + +It was reasonable when they thought this world the centre of all +things, with the sun and moon and stars circling it round as humble +ministrants, that they should believe in some high destiny for +themselves. But now that they know how miserably and unspeakably +insignificant the world is, it was but vanity and arrogance for any man +to think of himself as of any value whatever in the scheme of things. +His life was as the flashing of a midge's wings. His end was as a +candle blown out in the night. + +*** + +One evening, when the air was vibrant with the melody of birds and +laden with the perfume of the roses that filled the garden, he +developed another train of thought. He pictured the glut of life there +would be if all the generations on this and millions unnumbered of +worlds all survived. With vivid gestures he passed them all before the +eye--low-browed savages, cannibals, fetish-worshippers, Calvinists, and +at last the æsthetics of our day. "There would be no room for them--no +use for them at all--it would be a glut which baffles all imagination." +There was no way out but that the individual perished to prevent the +universe from being crowded out. + +And the cobbler at the top of the brae described to me how his dog was +run over in the street. "He gaed a bark--and he never gaed anither. +It'll be like that at the end with us a'. We'll gae out like my dawg." +It was a queer result of the glimpse which came to us of an illimitable +universe--this cheapening of ourselves. There was nothing at last but +the charnel-house of the crowded kirkyard, where the generations lay +layer upon layer, and where the opening of a grave reminded the old +clerk, as he quaintly declared, of nothing but a dentist's shop. The +teeth survived for unrecorded centuries--but that was all. + +It is strange the tricks the memory plays. For, sitting here, glancing +over the crowded sheet filled with the names of the dead, I remembered +these things. And there came the sense of the madness of the universe +and the intolerableness of life, if the end of all heroism was but +that--nothingness and corruption. A handful of bones thrown up by the +beadle to make room for the dead of to-day--is that all that is left of +those who handed down the lamp of life to us? Is that all that will be +left of us too at the last? + +In the ordinary day my friend at the top of the Gallows' Road and the +cobbler on the breast of the brae would have said that that was the +end. But the extraordinary day has come upon us unawares, and in the +extraordinary day this little, burdened, pain-racked life becomes +suddenly unendurable unless it lie in the bosom of eternity. If there +be no rainbow circling the heavens above the carnage heaps of the +stricken battlefields, if the farewell of death be a farewell for ever, +how can the heart endure? + +*** + +It certainly looks to the seeing of the eye as if destruction were the +end. With the perishing of the body everything seemeth to perish: all +love, all thought, all tenderness vanish for ever. But the eyes and +the ears are for ever playing us false; and here, too, they deceive us. +For the world is so ordered that nothing ever perishes. In nature +there is no destruction. A handful of ashes in a grate look like +annihilation, but what it represents is really resurrection. The +imprisoned sunrays of uncounted æons, stored up in the lumps of coal, +have been released from the prison-house, and gone forth again as heat +and as light. The physical body may seem to perish; what really +happens is that its constituent elements are re-grouped. + +But in the realm of beauty, is there not destruction possible there? +Through long centuries faith and devotion rear a great cathedral, every +line and curve of which is instinct with beauty. Every statue breathes +the love and hope and fears of men. In vaulted aisles and "windows +richly dight," it symbolises the Unseen--the beauty which the heart +yearns for. On that beauty materialised, ruthless Vandalism rains shot +and shell; the devouring flames consume it. Its gaunt walls are now a +monument of barbarism. Has nothing perished there? Is it not mockery +to speak of the conservation of the constituent elements there? For +loveliness has vanished there from off the face of the earth, and +beauty which no hand of man can ever restore has been annihilated. + +But it has not. For beauty is not in things, but in souls. The beauty +lay in the soul of the architects that planned, in the hearts of the +builders that carved the stones until they seemed to breathe--and +shells cannot destroy that. The loveliness was shrined in the souls of +the generations that gazed, and, gazing, were raised into the +fellowship of the hearts that planned and builded. Thus did the spirit +of beauty grow in the hearts of men--and shells cannot destroy that. + +And let these charred walls be left to the alchemy of time, and nature +will clothe them in richer loveliness. Lichen and moss will grow on +them, and the moonlight will etherialise them. One symbol of beauty +may seem to perish; but the spirit of beauty itself, dwelling in the +hearts of men and abiding at the core of the universe, is +indestructible. The thing which we deem perishable, no power on earth +can kill. + +*** + +There is on earth something infinitely more precious than the material +substance, indestructible though it be. The most beautiful thing the +world can show is a good man. Through the years forces play on him, +and each force adds its element of beauty. He has struggled with +adversity, and in the conflict he has learned patience, tolerance and a +wide charity. Waves of affliction have passed over him, and he has +learned tenderness and sympathy with human suffering, so that bruised +hearts come and lie down in his shadow, and there find healing. With +eyes cleansed from self, he looks out on the comedy and tragedy of +life, and he sees the hidden springs. The healing power that goes +forth from him grows with the years. At last he dies. + +Does nature conserve the shell while it consigns the jewel in the +shell--the man himself, with all his love and tender thought and +unselfish care--to annihilation? That is unthinkable. To know one +good man is to know that the human personality is imperishable. It was +through that knowledge that the soul of man triumphed over the terror +of death. + +There walked in Galilee a Teacher who made a handful of peasants feel +the possibilities of moral loveliness latent in the human heart, and +when He died they could not associate the thought of death with Him. +"It was not possible that He should be holden of it," they said one to +another. Everything was possible but that He could become as a clod in +the valley of corruption. Of course even that was possible if the +world were a chaos given over for sport to malicious demons. + +It would be possible, then, that the self-sacrificing love stronger +than death, and the spirit of unsullied purity should become mere dust. +But the possibility of the world being ruled by any except a Righteous +Power did not occur to the untutored Galileans. Therefore they faced +death with level eyes, refusing to believe in its triumph, saying to +their hearts, "It is not possible." + +And that is the rock on which to plant our feet in the day when the +world is given over to the wild welter of bloodshed. In every parish +over all the land blinds are pulled down, and hearts, wrapped round in +the dimness, sit still in the shadow of a dumb affliction. They will +never again hear the familiar footsteps coming to the door; they will +hear it in their dreams--only to awake and find silence. Never again +will the first question be when the door is opened, as it was through +all the days since the golden days of childhood, "Where is mother?" +But the great things which made life noble have not been destroyed by +bullet or shell. No man is worthy of freedom except the man who is +prepared to die for it. The heart, which in death proved itself +deserving of freedom, has entered into the fulness of freedom. The +heavens are again aglow when we realise that. + +*** + +It was the Professor who made me sure of those things. I met him at +the "Priory," where my old friend carries on his controversy with the +Pope--or used to. In that house of his one meets all sorts of +visionaries from the ends of the earth. A Waldensian pastor full of +the dream of a rejuvenated Italy; a leader of French Protestants, who +has forgotten his controversy with the Pope in the great upheaval +through which his race are finding their soul once more; a dreamer from +across the Atlantic, his eyes a-gleam with the vision of a reunited +Christendom--these are the men you will find drinking tea at the Priory +on any day in our parish. + +The original bond between them was their controversy with Rome, but +they have now forgotten all about that. There, in a happy hour, I met +the Professor. One phrase of his lit up for me the days of darkness. +"We see the alchemy of Providence at work all round about us," he +exclaimed, pushing his fingers through his hair until it stood up all +on end, an aureole of white. + +"It is the flower of our manhood that is perishing," said the "Prior," +while our hostess was nervously solicitous over the fate of a teacup +which the Professor was balancing in his left hand, utterly regardless +of its purpose. + +"Perishing!" exclaimed the Professor; "they are not perishing--they are +living. To talk of the wastage of life is mere cant." Our hostess +rescued the teacup, and the Professor had now the free use of both his +hands. The one hand clutched his hair and the other made sundry +gestures clinching his arguments. + +"Why should we rail at death?" said he; "for death has been the saviour +of humanity. It was death that made men of us. It was in the school +of death that man learned unselfishness, self-sacrifice, chivalry and +honour. There is nothing so ugly as the man whose heart is filled by +the world. It is death that has saved us all from that. Were man's +location here for ever, the world would be his god. A world without +death would be a world with no room for the Cross. Men climbed the +heights of nobility as they defied death. The crackling flames were +unable to silence the martyrs' song; the march of the hosts of +devouring tyranny could not move the hearts that chose death rather +than slavery; the generations sealed with their blood their testimony +that truth and loyalty to truth are more precious than life, and so met +death with a smile; it was through this wrestling with death that great +and noble character was forged on the anvil of life. Death was the +weapon which forged greatness of soul. Death cannot destroy what death +has created. That could only happen in an insensate world. What is +it--death--but just this--the slave of immortality?" + +If I could only write it down as the Professor spoke, if I could only +make you see his eyes glowing with little darts of flame as he saw the +whole world transformed into a mighty workshop in which the "alchemy of +Providence" is transmuting the soiled substance of our humanity into +living souls (over whom death can have no dominion) fashioned for +heavenly destinies--then you, too, would believe. Since that day my +old friend has not spoken a word about the "waste of the flower of the +race." + +*** + +The house with the drawn blinds stands at the cross-roads, and I must +come back to it. What is it that has happened to him who lies in a +nameless grave in France? The opportunity for winning glory and +earthly fame did not come his way; he just laid down his life along +with hundreds of thousands more. He has taken his place among the +undistinguished dead. + + "O, undistinguished dead, + Whom the bent covers or the rock-strewn steep + Shows to the stars, for you I mourn--I weep, + O, undistinguished dead. + + "None knows your name, + Blackened and blurred in the wild battle's brunt, + Hotly ye fell with all your wounds in front. + That was your fame." + +Not a line in the records of time for him. But there are other +records--those of eternity. He has lost nothing of the thrill of life. +He is being borne on that tide of self-surrender and heroism which has +flowed through the ages, and bears those who embark on it to the very +feet of God. He would not himself have it otherwise. "It is better +far to go out with honour than survive with shame," wrote a comrade +from the trenches, now united with him in death. There is a place for +sorrow in our land, but its place is by the hearth-stones of those +whose sons choose to survive with shame. He has taken his place among +those who, unseen, are leading on the embattled hosts of his race to +victory. He has discovered the treasures in store for the brave and +the true. When, amid the flutterings of flags and the shouting of the +people rejoicing in their deliverance, the great army will return home +at last--he, too, will come. + +At Kobé, when the bugles were welcoming the victorious Japanese home in +1895, Lafcadio Hearn spoke to an old man of those who would never +return. "Probably the Western people believe," answered the old man, +"that the dead never return. There are no Japanese dead who do not +return. There are none who do not know the way." It is a poor, +emasculated religion that does not believe that. When at the last the +bugles call in the quiet evening ... they will come back. They will +come crowned with glory and honour and immortality--with that victory +which overcometh the world. Let the blinds be rolled up, and the +windows be all flung open to the light. + + + + +VI + +The Cities of the Plain + + + +VI + +It was the old clerk, of whose services and devotion to our parish I +have previously written, who gave the Biblical name to the little +village that lies near the boundary of the great city that is steadily +creeping towards us, and ever threatening to engulf us. Its own name +is singularly pleasant to the ear and redolent of the sound of running +waters, but it is unnecessary to burden the memory with it. Though it +is now many years ago, I remember, as it were yesterday, the first time +I heard the word on the old clerk's lips. I was sitting warming myself +by the fire in the ticket-collector's office. The ticket-collector was +ostensibly waiting to provide tickets, but as everybody in our parish +has a season ticket, that part of his duty is almost a sinecure. + +Thus it happens that the ticket-collector has leisure, just before the +trains pass through, to give his friends the fruits of his researches +in the realms of philosophy. That particular day he was speaking of +the changes he had seen. "I was brought up," said he, closing his +argument, "on the Shorter Catechism and porridge. I dinna haud any +longer by the Catechism, but I havena lost my faith in porridge." + +It was then that the clink of coppers was heard on the sill of the +ticket window. In the aperture was framed the face of the clerk, with +the trimmed grey beard and the small twinkling eyes. He held three +pennies deftly in his thumbless hand. "Return, Sodom," said he. The +ticket-collector pushed back his cap, stretched out his right hand as +if he were beginning to speak, then thought better of it. Out of his +case, without a word, he produced a return ticket for Sodom, clinked it +in his machine, and passed it through the window. The old clerk +received it with a grim chuckle. + +Away below the bridge there came a rumble. "Train," said the +ticket-collector, closing the aperture with a snap, and making for the +door. And I have never forgotten the hoarse voice of the old clerk +with an acid edge to it as he clinked his three coppers, saying +"Return, Sodom." + +*** + +It is an amazing thing how within the circuit of the same parish, +removed by one mile from one another, there can live together two eras +so remote from each other in the order of human development, as the +world of the red-roofed houses on the slopes of the hills, and the +village at their base where the gorge, worn by the little river through +the travail of immemorial centuries, debouches on the great central +plain that runs across Scotland. + +Every morning the dwellers on the slopes are borne by the railway on a +great span of arches over the little village, and they look down on the +roofs of its houses. On the slopes there lies the world in which the +fringes of life are embroidered--a world where men and women talk of +books, pictures and plays. It is a world of hyphenated names. But in +all the village there is not so much as one hyphenated name. It is a +refuse-heap of humanity. Many diverse races are crowded in it. The +city fathers clean out slums without providing first for the +slum-dwellers, and, swept before the broom of so-called social +reformers, homeless men and women have drifted to the village, and +there reconstituted their slum. + +From the glens of the north broken Highlanders, driven out to make room +for sheep, have drifted hither to work in the quarries, and the speech +of their children's children still bears the trace of their ancient +language pure and clean; over the sea Irishmen have come to reap the +harvest fields of the Lothians, and they have been deposited by the +tide in the village. Stray Poles have come hither and straggling +Czechs; a man from Connemara neighbours a shaggy giant from Lewis; and +a dour stone-cutter from Aberdeen is door by door with an Italian who +sells what looks like a deadly mixture from a hand-cart. + +Here you can see humanity in its primitive state, before it began to +adorn the fringes of life, and make for itself sanctuaries of privacy. +Between the slopes and the base of the hill there yawns an invisible +chasm. Centuries separate them. Thus it comes that the slope-dweller +passes on the top of the arches, scanning his newspaper, without so +much as seeing the huddle of houses which constitute the village. + +It is only a week ago that, like the old clerk, I took out a return +ticket for the "Cities of the Plain." (For the old clerk had a +two-fold formula. When he was going to one village he said, "Return, +Sodom," but when he meant to go to the quarries beside the village he +said, "Return, Cities of the Plain.") It was to visit an old soldier +that I thus descended into the plains. He lives in a rookery in which +many families are crowded one on the top of the other--a rabbit-warren +infested by many and strange odours. He used to come up the slopes and +do odd jobs, tidying up gardens, and he loved to talk of + + "unhappy far-off things + And battles long ago," + +in a language which I also could speak. So I got to know him. And as +I sat by his bed I heard a moan from the adjoining room. It began in a +low cry, and then rose into a wail that seemed charged with all the +woes of humanity. The old man sat up in bed trembling. The cry of woe +now changed into a chorus; other voices swelled it. It was the act of +a moment to open the door, and in the dim landing find the door of this +other room. + +I opened it, and there I saw three children huddled before a grate +which contained nothing but ashes. On an iron bed, stretched on straw, +lay a woman sunk in sleep.... A foetid air was laden with the fumes of +alcohol.... There was no food.... A broken chair, a stool or two, and +a box that did duty for a table.... The old soldier told me what to +do, and I did it. A kindly woman brought coal and food, and the +wailing was silenced. The old man explained it all. The woman sunk in +the stupor is the wife of a soldier now in the trenches. She did not +belong to our parish; but only came a week or two before, swept before +the broom of the "social reformers" from the city. The mothers of the +Parish, the old soldier declared, were heroines. One such, when her +son asked her consent to enlist, said, "Eh, laddie, I dinna want ye to +gang; I dinna want ... but if I were ye I wud gang mysel'." Our own +wives and mothers were splendid--but those who came from the city, +flotsam and jetsam borne on the tide, staying for a little and then +carried away again, of whom there were three or four in the +village--these were different. They meet each other eager for news. +They are depressed, and feel the need for cheering. One suggests a +stimulant ... and the result is this. + +He is no Puritan--the old soldier lying on his bed, his campaigning +done--and he spoke out of an understanding heart. It was only poor +human nature, overtaken by thick darkness and misery, trying to open a +window towards the realm of sunshine. + +And I came out into the roadway and turned towards the station. I did +not see them before, but I saw them now. A few yards separating them, +I pass two shops licensed to sell the means for opening windows towards +this realm of happiness; and two houses with gaudy lights called the +villagers to enter the region where all cares and worries are +forgotten. In the street pale-faced, ill-clad children played at being +soldiers, marching with heads erect. The gorge was already dark with +the evening shadows, but the lamps in the village were lit. + +When the village was passed I stood and looked back. In the west the +setting sun had thrown over the heavens a glow. A well of liquid fire +glowed over Torfionn, and its rays spread fan-like, so that they +spanned the horizon, and, touching the rounded mass of Corstarfin, went +forth over the firth. Against this background stood silhouetted the +great arches that carry the railway across the hollow, and behind these +the arches that bear the canal. The piers stood as a gigantic forest. +These mighty arches might have been the work of the Romans. A soft, +luminous haze fell on the village. Window after window was lit up. +The door of a cottage near me was opened, and a flood of light streamed +out. A woman stood in the door, and looking up the road shouted "Jim," +and a little boy, leaving his fellow-soldiers, rushed to her, and she +clasped him in her arms and closed the door.... In that moment the +little village seemed to me as if it were an outpost of Paradise. +Nature threw as a benediction the mantle of its loveliness over it. +What nature meant to be a sanctuary of beauty, man had changed into +Sodom. + +*** + +The ticket-collector stood at his post and scanned the passengers as +they went through. He knew them all, and had only a stray ticket to +collect. I was last, and duly gave up my "return" from the "Cities of +the Plain." But he did not let me through the gate. "I want to show +you something," said the ticket-collector, and he led me into his +office and produced a pamphlet. + +"I got it from the man who goes to Keswick," said the ticket-collector; +"you know him." I knew him, the best of men. + +"Nae doubt," went on the ticket-collector; "nae doubt. He was always +giving me tracts. Tracts--faugh!--poor stuff, nae style, nae logic, +and nae philosophee in them. But I aye took them and thanked him--for +he is a nice man, though a perfect babe in matters of understanding. +And I found them useful for spills. The other day he handed me +this..." and he waved a blue paper-covered booklet. + +"Mahn," he exclaimed, pushing his peaked cap back from his grey head, +and sweeping his brass buttons down with his hand; "mahn, this has fair +hit me between the eyes." Then he opened the pamphlet and began to +read passages that he had heavily scored with blue pencil. The Czar +has abolished the sale of vodka for ever! What is the result? + +"The old women in the villages," read the ticket-collector, "can hardly +believe their own eyes, so changed are their menfolk.... Everywhere +peace, kindness and industry. War is said to be hell; but this is like +a foretaste of heaven." + +"Listen to this," cried the collector, his arm outstretched. "A +newspaper correspondent writes, since the sale of vodka stopped the old +night population (in the doss-houses) seems to have vanished." Every +passage he read bore the same testimony. + +"And what are we doing?" he exclaimed. "We have stopped nothing; we +surround our soldiers with the old temptations, and we leave their +defenceless wives exposed to the same temptations; I know all about it. +Mahn, it was Ruskin that said, 'There is no wealth but life,' and we +leave all our wealth of life at the mercy of every evil. It's a fair +scandal. Do you ken the conclusion I've come to! It is that the best +form of government is a benevolent despotism. Oor men are afraid of +this and that--losing votes--but an autocrat with a stroke of a pen can +sweep away the power of hell. If they would only make King George an +autocrat for a few years.... That would be grand!" + +He insisted on lending me the blue-covered pamphlet, and it being his +hour off he walked with me across the bridge. The valley was now dark. +The snuff-manufacturer's house down below was wrapped in gloom. Lights +twinkled on the slopes. Below a lamp-post at the far end of the bridge +two men stood. When he saw them the ticket-collector stood fast. + +"Mahn," said he, "I've come to a great resolution. I'm too old to +fight; and they canna get at me in ony way. No Income-tax for me; and +threepence on the tea is naething, for I never take it; I want to feel +that I am worth men dying for me; and I am going to be tee-total till +the end of the war. I'll give the money to help the soldiers' weans. +It's the weans that pull at my heart-strings." + +And he turned on his heel and walked rapidly back across the bridge. + +Under the lamp-post stood the roadman and the beadle, looking after +him. I spoke to them, for since the war began we all speak to each +other in our parish. + +"Has he forgotten ony thin'?" asked the roadman, waving a hand towards +the retreating form of the ticket-collector. + +"I don't think so," I answered, "he just said that he was going to be +tee-total till the end of the war." + +"Tee-total!" echoed the roadman mournfully; "there gangs anither lost +soul!" + +My two friends went sadly down the steep brae, and I turned up the long +flight of stone steps that leads to the road above. On the top of the +first flight I turned and looked after them. When they came opposite +the door of the village inn, they slowed down ... and then went +resolutely past, down into the hollow. The two of them have probably +resolved to join the company of the "lost souls." + +*** + +I have read the ticket-collector's pamphlet, and I feel a little dazed. +It is such an odd world, and the strange thing is that I never realised +its queerness before. A Grand Duke is murdered in a place of which I +never heard before, and whose name I cannot even now trust myself to +write down correctly, and here, a thousand miles away, the result is +that I am brought face to face for the first time with the problem that +lay twice a day under my feet--the problem of the Cities of the Plain. +A flood of light seems to have fallen on things which were aforetime +hazy. Events stand out luridly and arrestingly. Here is one. I was +in a far Hebridean isle when war broke out. All of a sudden there +sounded the drum, + + "Saying Come, + Freemen, come, + Ere your heritage be wasted! said the + quick alarming drum." + +And the manhood of the island sprang to their feet. Mothers gave their +sons, sending them away with sobs and tears, but in the name of God. + +On a drizzling morning the little steamer lay at the pier, crowded with +men and horses, going out to fight and die. The hawsers were loosed. +The steamer churned and backed and crept away. A girl stood near me +crying softly. A youth with clean-cut features, and the yearning no +tongue can utter shining in his eyes, leant over the taffrail and +called to her, "Not crying, Jessie?" And she wiped her cheek with the +moist handkerchief, and turned a smiling face to him and said, "No, I +am not crying." And the paddles churned faster, and they passed into +the drizzle and the haze. Weeks later I read how one man of that +regiment--the regiment of my own county--killed another ... and a few +days later I read that he had done so in a drunken brawl. He was not +from the island, that man, and I know not who he is. His mother +doubtless sent him forth to fight as a hero for his King, and he became +a murderer under the fostering of the State. + +Out of the clean countryside they were taken, these men, and the State +that summoned them, and whose call they answered, surrounded them with +temptations. Away from the influence of mother and sister and +sweetheart, wearied and worn with the hard toil of preparation, the +State opened the canteen and said, "Take your ease thus," and they did +so. The Secretary of War made appeals to them. "Be sober," said he, +"avoid alcohol, that the State, through your self-denial, may live." +But the State said, "See, I have made ample provision for you, so that +you may disregard the noble advice my servant gives you." They came in +their thousands across the Atlantic from the far North-West at the call +of their mother--clean and sober--and their mother opened the canteen +for their benefit on the plain. Such a world as that dwelt in the +imagination of Dean Swift--I never imagined that it could exist here +and now. And in that world of the cities of the plain, what reward are +we preparing for the men who are baring their breasts to the arrows, +standing between us and death? When they come back, war-worn, to what +will they return? To homes in which the fires are extinguished, the +candles burnt down to the socket; the cupboards bare, the children +famished and neglected? Is that to be the guerdon of their sacrifice; +is it for that that they have gone down into hell? Surely it cannot be +for that! A wave has passed over us, raising us to the realisation of +the higher values of things. Words live for us now which were dead +yesterday. A beam of light has fallen into the chamber of imagery, and +the word _Temperance_ has risen from the couch on which it lay dying, +and it claims us for its own. Through it we can make the world know +that we are worth fighting for--worth that the young, the strong, and +the brave should take everything they hold dear--their ideals, their +love, their little children unborn--and throw them into the trench, and +there give themselves and their dreams to death for us. We must see to +it that we are worthy the sacrifice. + +*** + +It seemed to me hitherto that I was a citizen of the country endowed +with the greatest freedom on earth. But the ticket-collector has +proved to me that that was a dream. Here in our parish I have no power +to control this thing that matters so vitally in the Cities of the +Plain. We have a Parish Council and a County Council, and I don't know +how many other dignified and honourable authorities, whom we elect. +But we elect nobody to control this. A body of unelected Justices, of +whom we know nothing, settle for us that down yonder in the Cities of +the Plain there shall be half a dozen State-regulated places for the +manufacturing of paupers and criminals. (The laws change with such +kaleidoscopic swiftness in those days that I may be wrong.) And here +am I, newly awakened by the ticket-collector to that enormity, and I am +not free to do anything. It is surely a mad world. We needed to be +awakened; and we have been awakened with the shriek of shells and the +crying of the perishing! And the result of the awakening will be +regeneration for the Cities of the Plain. + +*** + +The ticket-collector has deprived me for the time being of my peace of +mind. My conversion is so recent that I am afraid of falling into the +fanaticism of the newly converted. I followed the General the other +day into the railway carriage, and as we were passing over Sodom, lying +there under our feet, I spoke to him about it. He looked at me with +cold eyes. + +"Do you want to sacrifice the freedom of the individual?" he asked in +his curt military tones; "do you think that you can make saints of +people by Act of Parliament? They would be mere plaster-saints." + +I was reduced to silence. My new-born zeal seemed to ooze out at every +pore. There was a touch of amused scorn in the General's eye as he +glanced at me. The General is a man of experience, and he is quite +right. Acts of Parliament will never make saints of the people. But +the State can see to it that the people are not surrounded by +temptations through the operations of Acts of Parliament; that, if the +State is impotent to make saints, it shall not, on the other hand, set +itself deliberately to make devils. That, it seems to me, is what the +State is now doing in the Cities of the Plain. + +In ten thousand schools the State sanctions that its children be taught +to pray--"Lead us not into temptation," and that same State encircles +the path of its children by legalised temptations at every corner. It +is the maddest of worlds. I may be wrong and the General wholly right. +But as the ticket-collector said the last time I saw him--"I would like +to see the man who could convince me that I am wrong." And I don't +know whether to be grateful to the ticket-collector or not. He has +deprived me of some of my sleep; he has made my head ache with thinking +of problems which I am not fit to cope with; and, most unlooked for of +all, he has made a tee-totaler of me till the end of the war. There is +a plaintive note in the ticket-collector's voice, which strikes a chord +in my heart, when he invariably adds: "I hope the war won't last long." +For, if it does, there will be the danger of the ticket-collector and +myself becoming teetotalers for altogether. And it is such an ugly +word--tee-totaler! If only the ticket-collector would coin a new and +beautiful word to connote his new and beneficent state of mind! It is +a pity that great causes should be burdened by the weight of ugly words. + + + + + GLASGOW: PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS + BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO. LTD. + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Great Discovery, by Norman Maclean + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREAT DISCOVERY *** + +***** This file should be named 33635-8.txt or 33635-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/3/6/3/33635/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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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 Great Discovery + +Author: Norman Maclean + +Release Date: September 4, 2010 [EBook #33635] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREAT DISCOVERY *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +THE GREAT DISCOVERY +</H1> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +BY +</H4> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +NORMAN MACLEAN +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<P STYLE="margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 80%"> +"Had I stood aside when in defiance of pledges to which my kingdom was +a party, the soil of Belgium was violated and her cities laid desolate, +when the very life of the French nation was threatened with extinction, +I should have sacrificed my honour, and given to destruction the +liberties of my Empire and of mankind." +<BR><BR> +<I>Proclamation by King George V.</I> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +GLASGOW +<BR> +JAMES MACLEHOSE AND SONS +<BR> +PUBLISHERS TO THE UNIVERSITY +<BR> +1915 +</H4> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +PUBLISHED BY +<BR> +JAMES MACLEHOSE AND SONS, GLASGOW +<BR> +Publishers to the University +</H5> + +<BR> + +<PRE STYLE="margin-left: 10%; font-size: 80%"> +MACMILLAN AND CO. LTD. LONDON + +New York ... The Macmillan Co. +Toronto .... The Macmillan Co. of Canada +London ..... Simpkin, Hamilton and Co. +Cambridge .. Bowes and Bowes +Edinburgh .. Douglas and Foulis +Sydney ..... Angus and Robertson +</PRE> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +MCMXV +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>BY THE SAME AUTHOR.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent" STYLE="margin-left: 10%"> +DWELLERS IN THE MIST.<BR> +HILLS OF HOME.<BR> +THE BURNT OFFERING.<BR> +CAN THE WORLD BE WON FOR CHRIST?<BR> +AFRICA IN TRANSFORMATION.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +TO +<BR> +J. P. CROAL +<BR> +TO WHOM THIS BOOK OWES +<BR> +ITS EXISTENCE +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +Preface +</H3> + +<P> +Six articles which the writer contributed to <I>The Scotsman</I> constitute +this book. Four of these, which appeared under the title "In Our +Parish," were, in response to requests, re-printed by <I>The Scotsman</I> as +leaflets, and in that form had a circulation that reached an aggregate +of 100,000. One of the articles (now Chapter II.), which was published +on February 14, 1914, has been revised and somewhat enlarged. The rest +are reprinted substantially as they were originally written. +</P> + +<P> +In these last months there has come to the nation a spiritual and +ethical revival. Life will never again be what it was in the last long +summer days ere the guns began to speak. It will be a better world +than it has yet been. The nation is being saved as by fire, and in the +fire much dross will be consumed. The conscience of the State has been +stirred, and it cannot in the future acquiesce in the continuance of +the social evils which are gnawing at the nation's heart. The fate of +the Empire in the long years to come will depend more on the fight for +social renewal in the midst of the streets than on red battlefields. +To the men who have stood between the race and destruction the State +owes a debt which it can only repay by such measures of social +regeneration as will make possible for every man and woman to realise +the thrill and the joy of life. These pages only represent an effort +to portray the first stirring of that newly awakened consciousness of +God and of duty which was felt in every parish throughout the Empire, +and which is destined to transform the world. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Contents +</H2> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">I. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap01">THE GREAT DISCOVERY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap02">THE REVIVAL OF PATRIOTISM</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap03">THE SHADOW OF THE CROSS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap04">THE POWER OF PRAYER</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap05">THE VICTORY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap06">THE CITIES OF THE PLAIN</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +I +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Great Discovery +</H3> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +I +</H4> + +<P> +While the thing is still fresh in my mind I will try to put it down on +paper—the incredible thing that has happened in our parish. When we +had least thought about life's great things, we have come face to face +with the greatest. +</P> + +<P> +We had been for long years living on the surface of things. The sun +basked on the slopes of the hills, purple at eve; we came back from the +offices in town, plunged through the tunnel, and hastened to our +gardens. We lifted up our eyes to the hills, and our security seemed +as immovable as their crests soaring above the little dells that were +haunts of ancient peace around their foundations. +</P> + +<P> +Long years of ease dimmed our vision. The church bell rang in vain for +many of us. Those who had six whole days in the week to devote to +their own pleasure began to devote the seventh also to that same end. +The day of peace was becoming a day of unrest. +</P> + +<P> +Thus it was with us when, with the suddenness of a lightning flash, the +incredible overtook us. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +If only one could put it into words! But words can never express this +sudden meeting of man and God when that meeting was least expected. +</P> + +<P> +It was heralded by the booming of guns across the sea. The great city +lay slumbering between us and the shore, but over the turrets and +spires it came—boom, boom—under the stars. It was war. That +far-away echo might not itself be the grim struggle of death, but it +was its harbinger. Over all the seas death would soon be riding on the +billows. Faces became stern. Good-byes were spoken. +</P> + +<P> +Ah! that word "Good-bye," which we hear every day, and which, like +those old coins which have passed from hand to hand so long until at +last the image and superscription are gone, had lost all trace of its +original meaning, retaining nothing but a faint aroma of courtesy, +which sometimes vanished in the inflection of the voice until the word +became only a discourteous dismissal—that word was born for us anew. +We heard it on the lips of mothers clinging to the hands of their sons, +who were summoned away to join their regiments, and as white lips said +"Good-bye" to those whose blood was to water the fair fields of France, +we suddenly realised what it meant. The word, meaningless yesterday, +to-day expressed the greatest wish that the lips of man can utter—God +be with thee. On the mother's lips the word was the commitment of her +boy to the charge of the encompassing God. Then, when the harvest was +ripening on the slopes and the drum sounded "Come," and the young and +the strong went forth with a smile to the great harvesting of death, we +learned again the meaning of a phrase. But we were yet to learn the +meaning of a word. +</P> + +<P> +It is in the darkness that the stars appear and the immeasurable +abysses of the infinite universe, and it was when the dusk sank into +the deep night that the word rose high in the firmament of life and +burned red into our souls. And that word was God. +</P> + +<P> +It seemed so incredible to us that we should need that old word. We +were so powerful and so rich. Our faith was strong, but it was in the +reeking tube and in the smoking shard, and in the number of our +Dreadnoughts. Then all these things seemed to fail us. A nightmare +seemed to fall on us—a nightmare which lifted not night or day. Our +soldiers were driven back, back, back. They fought by day and marched +by night, and we heard in the night watches the beating of their +wearied feet, blood stained. +</P> + +<P> +Was there to be no end to that tramp, tramp of men yielding before +death? Was the Empire reared by the heroism of generations to crumble +under our feet? The ghastly deeds of shame—were they to come to our +doors! We looked at our children, and they could not understand the +light in our eyes. These deeds of hell—they might occur even now +under the shadow of our hills. It was then that the word began to +blaze in the heavens. And the word was—God. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +We had built a new church in our parish, that those who built pleasant +houses on the slopes, fleeing from the restless city that lay below, +might have room to worship. But the desire to worship seemed to be +dying of attrition. And the old church where the quarriers and farm +servants assembled and worshipped in an atmosphere that on a warm day +became so thick that one could cut it with a knife—that old church +would have been quite big enough to hold all who came, for the instinct +to pray seemed to be dying. And many, because the new church was now +too big, regretted the old. +</P> + +<P> +Then, suddenly, the new church was filled to the door. Men and women +discovered the road leading down to the hollow where the church stands +amid the graves of the generations. With wistful faces they turned +towards it. While the bell rang they stood in groups among the graves. +And if you listened there was but one word—war, war, war. Over and +over again just that one word. Until the bell was silent, and they +turned into the now crowded church. +</P> + +<P> +As I sat there and cast a glance around me, I felt a sudden amazement. +Those who never before had come down the steep brae when the bell was +ringing were sitting here and there just as if they had been there +every Sunday when the beadle, with head erect, ushers the minister to +the pulpit and snips him in. (Though the church is new, the minister +is yet snipped in by the beadle—a lonely prisoner there on his perch, +and it is an uncanny sound to hear the click of that snip shutting in +the solitary man.) +</P> + +<P> +In the pew in front of me sat a burly man with a head like a dome. He +never came to church. When I met him he would stand for an hour in the +lane among the hawthorns explaining his views. Prayer was mere +superstition. Cosmic laws unchanging and unchangeable held the +universe in their grasp. To ask that one of these laws should be +altered for a moment that a boon might be conferred on us was to ask +that the universe might be shattered. Prayer was immoral, the asking +for what could not be granted, and what we knew could not be granted. +If he went to church it would be hypocrisy on his part. +</P> + +<P> +And thus it came that when the farm servants came up the Gallows road +on their way to church on a summer morning, they often heard the whirr +of my friend's mowing machine as he mowed his lawn. It was the way he +took of letting the parish know that culture could have no dealings +with effete superstitions. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +And yet there he sat in front of me with a hymn-book which he picked up +from the shelf at the door, where such books are piled for the use of +camp-followers. The tune of the opening Psalm was Kilmarnock, and my +friend sang it in a way which showed that his mother had trained him +well. Then I forgot him, but after a while something like a stifled +sob in front of me brought him again to my consciousness. +</P> + +<P> +The minister began to pray for the King's forces "on the sea, on the +land, and in the air." My mind was playing round the words "in the +air," for they were an intrusion into the familiar order—an +innovation! Every invention of man seemed doomed to become a weapon in +the hand of the devil. But the prayer went on—for the sailors keeping +their watches in the darkness of the night that God might watch over +them, that through their unfaltering courage our shores might be +inviolate; for the soldiers now facing the enemy, grappling with death, +that God might succour them, covering their heads in the day of battle. +"Break Thou down the fierce power of our enemies," cried the minister +suddenly, "that with full hearts we may praise Thee, the God of our +fathers." +</P> + +<P> +A great hush fell on the crowded church. The shut eyes saw the red +battlefields, with the lines swaying to and fro, while the shrapnel +burst and the aeroplanes whirred in the smoke of the cannon. The cries +of men suddenly smitten smote on the inner ear. It was then that the +great thing happened. +</P> + +<P> +All of a sudden the voice broke, recovered, and broke again, and the +minister was swept away from the well-ordered, beautiful words he had +prepared. He began to speak of the stricken hearts at home, of fathers +and mothers to whom their sons would never return, of women in empty +houses with their husbands laid in nameless graves, of little children +who would never learn to say "Father" ... It was then that my friend +stifled a sob. There was Something after all, Someone greater than +cosmic forces, greater than law—with an eye to pity and an arm to +save. There was God. +</P> + +<P> +And my friend's son was with the famous regiment that was swaying to +and fro, grappling with destiny. He was helpless—and there was only +God to appeal to. There comes an hour in life when the heart realises +that instinct is mightier far than that logic which is, after all is +said, only the last refuge of the feeble-minded. There came like the +sudden lifting of a curtain the vision of a whole nation—nay, of races +girdling the whole earth—to whom the same high experience has come. +Everywhere the sanctuaries filled, the eyes turned upward, for instinct +is mightier than reason. The smoke of battle has revealed the face of +God. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +With us in the parish churches of Scotland the great thing is the +sermon. But to-day it is different; the great thing now is prayer. +And the minister preached about prayer. He set forth in clear and +ordered language, with a felicitous phrase now and then lighting up his +sentences, that prayer was not a mere relic of fanatical superstition +but a mighty power. He discussed with a wealth of learning whether God +had shut Himself in behind a prison-house of cosmic laws that made it +impossible for Him to answer prayer. He reasoned the worshippers cold. +But there in that hour reason was bound to give way before intuition. +</P> + +<P> +"If I am free," cried the preacher, "to rush to the help of my child +when he crieth in terror; and if, when the creatures of His hand cry to +God He is bound and cannot help or soothe, then He is poorer than I, so +great a thing is freedom." Prayer was not mere spiritual gymnastics. +A God immured in cold laws, barred for ever from the play of love or +tenderness, would be the one being in the universe most to be pitied. +The Creator did not sit deaf and dumb on the Throne of indifference +answering nothing, doing nothing. History was the proof that +Righteousness was throned at the core of the universe, for at the last +right ever prevailed. +</P> + +<P> +Then the measured tones went on to speak of the difficulty of believing +in the efficacy of prayer when Christians faced Christians in mortal +conflict, and they both cried for victory—both the children of the One +Father crying for victory over each other. But the difficulty was of +appearance only. For the only prevailing prayer was prayer in the name +of Christ. "Whatsoever ye shall ask <I>in My name</I> that will I do." To +ask in His name was to ask in His spirit—the spirit of humility, +self-sacrifice, and love—the spirit of self-surrender to the <I>will</I> +supreme. The question was which of the prayers for victory was prayer +in the name of Christ.... +</P> + +<P> +This was clear, convincing, but cold. Only at rare intervals does the +minister of our parish give way to passion. Suddenly there came a wave +of emotion. He flung his head back, and his eyes glowed. His voice +vibrated through the church. "When I think," he exclaimed, "of the +things that have been done with the name of God on men's lips; of +atrocities such as the unspeakable Turk never perpetrated; of war waged +not upon to-day but upon the centuries of faith that reared great +cathedrals now in flames; of women and children laid upon the reeking +altars of human passion; and all this in the name of culture, the +culture of the superman who deems himself superior to the Ten +Commandments—then, I say, may God grant that the culture which beareth +such fruit may perish from off the face of the earth. Prayer for the +triumph of such a cause cannot be in Christ's name...." +</P> + +<P> +But the preacher never got any further. +</P> + +<P> +This was what happened, and I am afraid some will not believe me, for a +Scotsman in church is a stoic, motionless and dumb, as he listens to +the Word. But all the traditions of the parish were snapped in a +second. In the side gallery sat the General, sitting as he always does +with his back to the minister. This he does that he may mark who are +in church of his servants and tenants, and who absent. +</P> + +<P> +When I read of the nobles in France who went to the scaffold with a +jest in the days of the Terror, I always think of the General. He is +that sort of man. To-day, little by little, as the sermon went on, he +turned round. At last he was facing the pulpit. His gleaming eyes +were fixed on the preacher. His son was dead. And when the words rang +through the church, may God grant that such culture may perish ... the +General sprang to his feet. "Amen" rang his voice through the church. +</P> + +<P> +There was a sudden movement; as one man they all rose to their feet. +Hands were lifted up to heaven. "Amen," "Amen," they cried—and then +there rose a cheer—muffled, but still a cheer. In the pulpit the +words died on the preacher's lips. He seemed as one suddenly stricken. +He gazed bewildered over the sea of faces. They sank back into the +pews as though suddenly ashamed. +</P> + +<P> +The last man to sit was my friend, who stood to the last with uplifted +hand. I think it was he who cried "Hear, hear"—the only sign he gave +of his long absence from church. The sermon was never finished. The +preacher in a low voice said, "Let us pray." And he humbled himself as +one who enters the valley of humiliation. And then he gave out this +psalm:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Now Israel<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">May say, and that truly,</SPAN><BR> +If that the Lord<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Had not our cause maintained;</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">* * * * *</SPAN><BR> +Then certainly<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">They had devoured us all.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">* * * * *</SPAN><BR> +But blessed be God,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Who doth us safely keep,</SPAN><BR> +And hath not giv'n<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Us for a living prey</SPAN><BR> +Unto their teeth,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And bloody cruelty.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">* * * * *</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +This psalm as we sang it that day was a pæan of triumph. The clouds +suddenly broke. We heard our fathers singing it in their dark days. +The melody wedded to the words soared in exultant triumph, wailed like +the cry of the shingle swept by the surf; the sighing of the wind over +the heather was in it, and the hissing of the storm through the spray. +It was fierce as devouring death; it was gentle as a mother crooning +over her child. It put iron into the blood of our fathers as they sang +it. +</P> + +<P> +It was nerved by such a hymn that the sailors of Queen Elizabeth swept +the main, that the Puritans wrestled with principalities and powers, +that a handful of moors-men levelled despotism and tyranny to the +ground. It swept through our blood like flame as we in our day of +stress now sang it. We, too, would pull down strongholds and turn to +flight the armies of the alien. In all ages the cause of freedom +triumphed, and that cause was ours. We had entered on conflict with +clean hands and, God helping us, we would wage it with clean hands. +The clouds suddenly broke and the light of victory irradiated our +faces. There came overwhelmingly the realisation that there was a +power behind us mightier far than sword or shell—even the Lord God +Omnipotent. And that was how we made the greatest of all +discoveries—we found God. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +Yesterday morning I went early to the station, and there in the booking +office I found my friend talking to the ticket-collector. The +ticket-collector is a philosopher, and he comes to church, because he +loves the old psalm tunes. But when one of our parishioners who goes +now and then to Keswick comes to the booking office, the +ticket-collector calls him in and reasons with him gently. +</P> + +<P> +"Mahn, there's naething in it," he says; "I can tell you for a fact +there's naething in it—all a whack of fables." "Some day you'll find +out to your cost that there's something in it," flashes the man from +Keswick. "If ye wad only reid philosophee," says the ticket-collector, +"ye would ken better." But to-day my friend and the ticket-collector +had their heads close together, and I only heard the conclusion of +their argument. "Mahn," said the ticket-collector, "I am beginning to +think there may be something in it." +</P> + +<P> +And in the evening near the top of the brae I saw the General standing +erect with his little cane in his hand. He was talking to the +shoemaker, the greatest Radical in the parish—one of a party with +which the General has no dealings. But they talked like brothers. For +the shoemaker has a son fighting at the front, and his heart is sore +troubled within him. And the General's son is dead. And as I came up +the brae I saw the General putting his hand on the shoemaker's shoulder +and turn away, walking slowly up the brae. The old shoemaker saluted +and came down the brae. There was a tender look in the old man's eye +as he greeted me. +</P> + +<P> +In our parish we have truly made the greatest of all discoveries. We +have found God, and, finding Him, we have found each other. The man +who in his madness kindled the lurid flames of war little dreamed of +this fire which he kindled. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Revival of Patriotism +</H3> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H4> + +<P> +There has come to us in these days a revival of the spirit of +patriotism. That revival has come when it was sorely needed. In days +of unclouded prosperity other gods called forth our devotion and +enthusiasm, but the God of our Fathers who made us a great nation and +sent us to sow the seeds of righteousness beside all waters, bestowing +upon us empire and might, was well-nigh forgotten. +</P> + +<P> +For the new man "words like Empire, Patriotism, Duty, Honour, Glory and +God" had little or no meaning. Causes for which the fathers died could +not evoke an added heart-beat from their sons. They cared so little +for the mighty empire which they inherited that they contemplated the +bloodshed of civil war—so hot was their zeal for party and so cold +their love for the state. +</P> + +<P> +It was necessary that discipline should come. And that discipline +came, shaking the very foundations of our national life. Its first +fruit is that the smouldering fires of patriotism have broken forth +once more into bright flame; and that everywhere the hearts of the +people have been stirred by the call to arise and endure hardness that +the goodly heritage of empire perish not. And preachers in a thousand +pulpits have sounded the trumpet-note of duty and of patriotism. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +It has been said that preachers should aim at making the churches +sanctuaries of peace, within whose walls the echoes of the guns and the +cries of the perishing should not penetrate. Some have even said that +Christianity, so far from fostering the spirit of patriotism, is in +reality hostile to it. "Patriotism itself as a duty," says Lecky, "has +never found any place in Christian ethics, and strong theological +feeling has usually been directly hostile to its growth." +</P> + +<P> +No doubt there is something to be said for that view. The attitude of +the early Christians towards the Roman Empire was not that of +patriotism. The clear shining of the heavenly Jerusalem so dazzled +their eyes that this world, and the temporal empire occupying its +stage, seemed but as a shadow. Their devotion to the Unseen King left +little room for loyalty to the earthly ruler. In the glorious +consciousness of his citizenship in heaven, it was a small thing in the +estimation of St. Paul that he was also a Roman citizen—but he did not +forget it. But when the earthly ruler persecuted, and burnt, and threw +the Christians to the lions, or slaughtered them to make a Roman +holiday, then the poor victims cannot be blamed for not being patriots. +</P> + +<P> +And the Church in the mediæval period, organised in the mighty +hierarchy of Rome, did not tend to foster a national spirit of +patriotism. In those days when the Emperor Theodosius made penance in +the Cathedral of Milan and Ambrose declared that "the Church is not in +the empire, but the Emperor in the Church"; or in those later days when +Hildebrand promulgated the doctrine that the temporal power was subject +to the spiritual power, and kings and emperors were only vassals of the +Church, and Henry V. was left three days standing barefooted in the +snow waiting humbly to see the Pope at Canossa—in those days certainly +Christianity sought to foster not the sense of national loyalty, but +that of devotion towards that holy Catholic and universal Church whose +visible head was the Pope. Christianity placed the Pope on the throne +of the Cæsars, and sought to evoke towards him a patriotism which +transcended nationality. But the Reformation gave its death blow to +Hildebrandism, and the Pope no longer usurped the temporal Thrones of +Europe. And there came the throb of the awakening spirit of +nationality. The spirit of patriotism stirred once more the slumbering +races. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +The question whether patriotism is a fruit of Christianity must be +answered not by reference to what men did in the name of their +religion—for men are fallible—but by the precept and example of the +Founder of Christianity. He was a Jew, and of all races the Jew was +the most patriotic. An exile by the rivers of Babylon, the Israelite +refused to forget Zion. "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right +hand forget its cunning"—that was the cry wherewith his unconquerable +soul faced an overwhelming destiny. And in this respect Jesus Christ +was true to His race. He was a patriot. He worshipped in the +synagogues, and went on pilgrimages to Jerusalem, because He loved the +national institutions of His country. One note of true patriotism is +anguish. It is when love is great that the folly and sin of the person +beloved pierce the heart. +</P> + +<P> +The patriotism of the Founder of Christianity expressed itself in a cry +of agony which has reverberated through the centuries—"O Jerusalem, +Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them that are +sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, +even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! +Behold, your house is left unto you desolate." That cry is the measure +of His patriotism. +</P> + +<P> +Judged, then, by the example of its Founder, Christianity must produce +the spirit of love and loyalty towards one's own country. There was a +patriotism before Christianity, but it was that of arrogance, +aggression, and self-glorification. It was a patriotism which meted +out only contempt to other races. To the Jew the Greek was only a +Gentile dog; to the Greek the Jew was only a contemptible Barbarian. +</P> + +<P> +But the patriotism which is animated by the Christian spirit is far +other. It is not the vaunting of pride nor the shouting of vulgar +ditties. It seeks the glory of its own country, but the glory it seeks +is the glory of the greater service rendered to humanity. Conscious of +its own defects, it does not condemn others. With eyes cleansed from +prejudice, it beholds the good in other races. It seeks the first +place for its own nation because it acts the noblest, loves the best. +All the elements which make up the strong power of patriotism—love of +family, love of neighbours, love of race, love of country—Christianity +has purified them all. True patriotism is, then, a fruit of the +Christian religion, a virtue which falls to be inculcated by the +Church. If Christianity be the projection of the Christ-life into the +midst of every generation, then the life that reflects the beauty of +Christ must be a life animated by the deepest love of one's country. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +It was Dean Stanley who rendered God thanks in Paisley Abbey for that +Scotsmen were "citizens of an Empire so great, members of a Church so +free." In the building up of the Empire Scotsmen have borne a great +share of toil and peril. In other days the fires of patriotism burned +brightly. The cry of our fathers was "my country right or wrong." But +we feel not quite so sure of our country being always in the right. +The passion of Christianity is an ethical passion. Christian +patriotism demands national righteousness. To keep patriotism as an +ardent fire we must be convinced that our country stands for +righteousness. And in this day of our ordeal we have this certainty to +uphold us, that we are fighting for the right. +</P> + +<P> +It was not in defiance of Christianity, but in its defence, that we +drew the sword. For this war sprang from an unbridled lust of conquest +to which a whole nation surrendered itself. But before surrendering to +the passions of war the ideals of Christ were first forsaken by our +enemy. A new law was promulgated: "Become hard, O my brethren, for we +are emancipated and the world belongs to us." New beatitudes were +declared: "Ye have heard how ... it was said, Blessed are the meek ... +but I say unto you, Blessed are the valiant, for they shall make the +earth their throne ... Ye have read, Blessed are the peacemakers, but I +say unto you, Blessed are the war-makers, for they shall be called, if +not the children of Jehovah, the children of Odin, who is greater than +Jehovah." +</P> + +<P> +Out of this new gospel, the gospel of Odin, has sprung a war of +extermination—exiled nations, devastated kingdoms, desolated colleges, +ruined cathedrals, and multitudes of women and children "left nothing +but their eyes to weep with." The name of God has been invoked over +unspeakable barbarities—but the God thus invoked is not the Christian +God. It is Odin in whose name these things are done. What we are +fighting for is for the Christian ideal against Odin—for the law of +truth and mercy against the reign of falsehood of word and bond, and of +merciless barbarity. We have bared the breast to death that there may +sit on the throne of the world's soul, not a ruthless tribal god, but +the God of Fatherhood and Love whom Jesus Christ revealed. And in +waging that war we have ground to hope that the God of righteousness is +on our side. +</P> + +<P> +If we have not had the name of God constantly on our lips it is not +because we do not feel that we are fighting His battle, but because He +is so great, the Lord of Heaven and Earth before whom we are but as +dust, that we shrink from coupling His great name with ours. "Are you +sure that God is on your side?" Abraham Lincoln was asked in the dark +days of the American Civil War. "I have not thought about that," he +replied; "but I am very anxious to know whether we are on God's side." +And when the causes of this war are examined the assurance grows +stronger and stronger that we are on God's side. That is why the whole +nation has been welded into the unity and consistency of polished +steel; why the fire of patriotism burns in our midst with an intenser +heat than ever before. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +It is not merely from the righteousness of our cause in this war that +our patriotism draws inspiration, but also from the ideals for which +our Empire stands over all the world. As we look out to-day on the +Empire which our fathers bequeathed us, taking it all in all, it stands +for righteousness as no other on earth. It stands for the freedom of +the soul and the freedom of the body all over the world. +</P> + +<P> +Think of India, whose three hundred millions have been rescued from +tyranny and ceaseless bloodshed, whose widows have been saved from the +flames, whose starving have been fed in famine, and to whom the British +race brought security and peace. "When I think," said ex-President +Taft, "of what England has done in India ... how she found those many +millions torn by internecine strife, disrupted with constant wars, +unable to continue agriculture or the arts of peace, with inferior +roads, tyranny, and oppression; and when I think what the Government of +Great Britain is now doing for these alien races, the debt the world +owes England ought to be acknowledged in no grudging manner." +</P> + +<P> +No work ever done on earth for the elevation of humanity can compare +with that wrought in India by our race for the uplift of humanity; and +it is the same wherever the standard of Britain waves. In our own day +we have seen in Egypt a whole race rising out of the mud and clothed +anew in the garments of self-respect. Through Africa, wherever the +sway of Britain extends, though yesterday the land reeked with blood, +to-day mercy and kindness are healing the woes of men, and millions who +knew not when death lurked for them in the bush now sleep in peace +under the palms. It was the might of Britain that destroyed the slave +trade, and it is nothing except the might of Britain which prevents the +slave raider resuming his nefarious traffic, and slavery under the +guise of other names being imposed on the natives of Africa. Wherever +you go, to the tropics or the Orient, there the great power for +righteousness is the British Empire. It does not exploit inferior +races for gold; it is the trustee of the helpless native. +</P> + +<P> +When one thinks of these little islands floating in the western sea, of +the power that has gone forth from them to heal and bless, of the vast +multitudes to whom the King-Emperor is the symbol of justice and +security—his is a poor heart which cannot feel the thrill of gratitude +for citizenship in an Empire girdling the whole earth, whose +foundations are thus laid in righteousness. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +Patriotism is not, however, a mere sentiment. It was not sentiment +which built up the Empire. It was self-sacrifice—the spirit that +faced and endured death. For us, too, patriotism must be more than +sentiment; it must be action and the self-sacrifice which action +requires. +</P> + +<P> +What our fathers reared we must defend. And the startling thing is +that there are still so many of our people who shrink from the burden +which patriotism imposes. Many thousands refuse to prepare themselves +for war; who are as the Romans who could not leave their baths to go +and fight. +</P> + +<P> +Vast multitudes congregate to gaze on football matches and gamble on +the issue. The call of King and country falls on ears grown deaf. We +thank God for those who, hearing the call, have gone forth to fight, +counting everything but loss as compared to their country's gain. But +these others, they cannot have paused to think. They have not pictured +these fair lands, that have not heard the sound of war for seven +generations, given over to that devouring enemy which has made Belgium +a wilderness. +</P> + +<P> +They have not thought of Oxford and St. Andrews sharing the fate of +Louvain; of London and Edinburgh become as Brussels; of the millions of +Glasgow and Birmingham thrown on the mercies of the world, women and +children fleeing, driven by nameless fears, with no place to flee to +but the mountain fastnesses of Wales and the Highlands of Scotland—the +last refuge of the miserable and the broken. And yet these miseries +would surely befall were all the manhood of the race such as these. +</P> + +<P> +Think what it would mean were the walls of our defence broken down. +Supposing that a shattering blow were struck at the heart of the Empire +and our fleet crushed. What would follow? The crumbling of the Empire +in a week! It is not we alone, with our wives and children in these +little islands, who would be swept to ruin, and on whom despair would +fall. From the far north-west to the long wash of the Australasian +seas the shadow of devouring misery and death would fall on humanity. +The millions of India would be forthwith swept into the whirlpools of +war and mutiny. Egypt would be thrown back into chaos. Africa would +be left to Islam and the merciless rule of a nation which knows but how +to smite. Australia and New Zealand would be at the mercy of the +yellow races. +</P> + +<P> +It would not be a calamity for us in these islands alone. It would be +a calamity whose withering blight would be cast over all the world. +The ideals of righteousness which this Empire upholds would be trampled +everywhere under foot. Covetousness and the lust of gold would hold +the field of the world. +</P> + +<P> +There is only one thing to be done, one duty summoning us with an +irresistible call—the duty that calls us to stand between our country +and destruction. Were the fate which has overtaken the Low Country to +overtake us; were this fair land to be made a wilderness, our women and +children driven into the wilds, and the Empire wrested from our hands, +the men who failed in their duty would never be able to hold up their +heads again. +</P> + +<P> +What a terrible load would lie on him who, beholding the ruin of his +native land, could say, "This might not have happened if I, and others +like me, had done our duty." That would be a hell from which there +would be no escape. "Which way I fly is hell; myself am hell." +</P> + +<P> +There can be no limit to the sacrifice which patriotism requires, so +great a heritage is our native land. It does not require of us as +Christians to engage in wars of conquest for the gratification of pride +and greed, but it does require of us even the sacrifice of our lives in +the defence of our homes or in the defence of our brother's home. +</P> + +<P> +There are those who find themselves faced with difficulty. They are +called upon to fight with every force in their power, to slay, +withholding not their hand, while they hear the commandment, "Thou +shall not kill," ringing in their ears, and across the centuries the +voice of their Lord saying, "Resist not evil; whosoever shall smite +thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." They are +bewildered. Is not the attitude of non-resistance that which Jesus +Christ enjoins? If they fight with sword and shell are they not +lowering themselves to the level of Nietzsche, Bernhardi and Bülow, and +submitting to the arbitrament of the sword, which decides nothing +except its own sharpness. The call of patriotism summoning to resist +even unto blood comes to them, and they are uncertain whether to obey. +</P> + +<P> +But we must interpret the will of God, not by isolated sentences, but +by the whole content of the divine revelation. The commandment, "Thou +shalt not kill," does not mean that we are not to kill in any +circumstance whatever. If the commandment is to be taken literally, +then no limit is to be set to it, and we must not kill any animal—not +even the parasites of uncleanness. There is, moreover, another law +which runs: "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be +shed, for in the image of God created He him." So far from the mere +physical life being for ever sacred, the very altar of God Himself was +to be no sanctuary for the murderer. The man who owned a vicious ox +and knew him to be vicious, and the ox killed a man, the owner thereof +was to be slain. There are therefore circumstances in which the law, +"Thou shalt not kill," is abrogated, and its place is taken by the law, +"Thou shalt kill." +</P> + +<P> +The law demanding the conservation of life rests on this foundation, +not that physical life itself is sacred, but that human life bears the +image of God. There are things far more sacred than the physical +life—even those things which constitute the image of God stamped upon +man. There are things for which men in all ages have been content to +die—truth and loyalty to truth, the principles which are dearer than +life. Those things which God ordained that men might through them grow +more and more into His image, for these things man must be ready to +die, and among these things is nationality. +</P> + +<P> +Men cannot develop in isolation. What poor creatures men would be if +they were solitary units. They would be as the beasts that perish. It +is through the heritage of nationality that the soul is enriched. What +poor stunted lives would ours be if we had not behind us the great and +noble deeds which built up our Empire, if the words of the high souls +of many generations did not come thrilling to our hearts, if +Shakespeare and Wordsworth, Scott and Burns did not pour their +treasures into our laps. The soul grows into the image of God through +the riches of nationality. And whosoever warreth against nationality +warreth against the soul. And the men who warreth against the soul +must be resisted to the death. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +We dare not appeal to Jesus Christ to cloak our shrinking from +sacrifice. No doubt His gentleness has been the wonder of history; but +His strength also summons us to be strong. For Jesus Christ was not a +quietist. His religion is not a mere hospital for wounded souls. His +place is among the strong of the earth. He faced the evil of this +earth unflinching in His resistance. "Woe unto you Scribes and +Pharisees, hypocrites" is His denunciation of the oppressor; "Go tell +that fox" is His message to the tyrant. When we think of Him making +the whips, and falling, with holy anger in His eyes, on those who +desecrated the courts of the temple, overturning the tables of the +money changers, we know that the ideal of non-resistance is not His. +</P> + +<P> +No doubt He laid it down as the law for the individual that he should +turn the other cheek; but He did not lay it down as a law that a man +should turn another's cheek to the smiter. What the individual can do, +the nation may not do. It no doubt is the duty of the Ruler to turn +his own individual cheek to the insulter; it is not his duty to turn +the cheeks of the millions over whom he rules to those who would smite +them, committing their children to shame and their homes to devastation. +</P> + +<P> +No doubt Jesus Christ enjoined the law of forgiveness, but it was not +unconditional. "If he repent, forgive him," is His law, and until the +wrongdoer repents and ceases from his evil, it would be immoral to +forgive him. Duty demands that every means be used to bring the +evildoer to repentance; for only so is there a chance of his soul being +saved. It is manifest that Christianity is not a religion of +non-resistance to evil, but the religion of Him who Himself resisted +evil, and who resisted it even to the death. +</P> + +<P> +Patriotism, therefore, demands that we resist even to the shedding of +blood. When a hostile army would destroy a nation, as in Belgium, it +warreth against the soul, and it is as Christian to kill as it would be +to shoot a tiger which leapeth out of the jungle to devour a man. And +that Irish soldier whose face in the hospital in Paris was irradiated +with joy when he was told that the enemy was put to flight and Paris +saved, and who died with that gladness in his face, died in the spirit +of Jesus Christ. +</P> + +<P> +To say that the Founder of Christianity would not strike a blow for +home and kindred and truth is to forget that He struck a blow in +Jerusalem and wielded the thongs on the shoulders of those who polluted +His Father's house. It is His will that we should strike a blow in +defence of the house of our soul—the sanctuary of nationality. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +Patriotism must be vibrant with the spirit of religion if it is to be a +power rousing the nation to heroism and self-sacrifice. There never +was a nation so patriotic as the Jew. No city ever gripped a nation's +heart-strings as Jerusalem gripped the heart of the Jew. No suffering, +no defeat, no exile however far, could quench the fire of patriotism in +the heart. "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget +her cunning. Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth if I +remember thee not, if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy"—such +was the cry of the Jew by the rivers of Babylon, yearning after Sion. +</P> + +<P> +How was it that Jerusalem thus pulled at its children's heart-strings +until they hurried back to rebuild? It was because Jerusalem was the +seat of the worship of God. It was not the material stones or the +hills round about that thus compelled the heart. It was the light of +eternity shining over them. It was because of the "house of the Lord +our God" that the Jew counted no good worth his striving except the +good of Jerusalem. It is only when God standeth at the heart of a +nation that the heart cleaveth with all its fibres to its native land, +for then the whole of the man—not only the cravings of the body and +the heart and the mind, but also the deeper cravings of the soul—wind +themselves round the thought of the nation. +</P> + +<P> +Thus we find that the days when the fires of patriotism burned +brightest were ever those in which God held sway over the nation. It +was with God that the sailors of Queen Elizabeth swept the main, that +the soldiers of Wellington hurled the enemy far from the shores that +face England—they were fighting not only for England but for England's +God. +</P> + +<P> +The testimony of history is this, that patriotism cannot maintain its +power if once it be divorced from religion. Let God's face be veiled +and lost and everything is lost. "Without God nothing, with God +everything," says the ancient Celtic proverb, and all ages testify to +its truth. And the last proof of it is now before our eyes in the +condition of France. +</P> + +<P> +A hundred years ago France dominated Europe, erected thrones and +deposed kings at its will. But little by little France lost the vision +of God, until at last M. Viviani celebrated the final triumph over the +Church in 1907 by exclaiming: "With one magnificent gesture we have +extinguished the lights of heaven, which none shall rekindle." France, +in the words of its present Prime Minister, "extinguished the lights of +heaven," but in so doing it extinguished something else. For to-day +that nation, that not so long ago dominated Europe, can only protect +its capital city by the help of the two nations which have not yet +extinguished the lights of heaven. +</P> + +<P> +Without God patriotism becomes impotent, for God is the source of that +moral law, conformity to which means for a nation life, and defiance of +which means the degeneration that leadeth to destruction. With the +departure from God came moral decay and racial suicide. The hope of +France is this, that through the descent of the nation into the valley +of death the lights of heaven may be once more kindled; the hope of +Britain, that these same lights may shine more brightly. +</P> + +<P> +The spirit of patriotism will again vivify the nation when we seek +after God. In years of prosperity we have forgotten our high calling. +We have pursued vanities and forgotten the living God. When we again +realise our calling and our election as instruments in the hand of God +for the establishment of His Kingdom of Righteousness over all the +earth, our hearts will be filled with ardour, and we shall face +whatever perils may assail us strong in the assurance that the +Omnipotent God is in our midst and that nothing can resist His will. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +And this true patriotism will mean the salvation of the nation. For it +will strive to realise at home that righteousness which alone exalteth +a nation. Its first task will be to raise the life at home nearer to +God, for we cannot raise the world to higher levels than that on which +we ourselves stand. The vision of the new Jerusalem descending from +God out of heaven will again flame before our eyes. "And I, John, saw +the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, +prepared as a bride for her husband." +</P> + +<P> +That new Jerusalem is not a city remote in the inaccessible heights, +but a city which descends and permeates the material city now so +polluted by sin, until it becomes the "holy city," with the law of God +obeyed and the will of God done in it. Its citizens shall walk its +streets, pure in heart, seeing God everywhere. "And they shall bring +the glory and the honour of the nations into it." There the nations +shall be one in the streets of the city of God, all their contendings +forgotten in the sense of their brotherhood, following the one ideal, +obeying the one law, loving each other in the love of God. They will +strive then as to who shall bring the greatest glory within the compass +of its walls, and that will be the only striving. +</P> + +<P> +That is the ideal, that we should become a nation so permeated by the +spirit of God, so brought into obedience to His will, that our cities +shall become holy cities, even as the new Jerusalem coming down from +God out of heaven. When we shall set ourselves to realise that ideal +once more, then will the nation evoke the devotion of its citizens, for +devotion to the nation will also be devotion to God. +</P> + +<P> +It was that ideal which fired the patriotism of the Jew. The same +ideal alone will make our patriotism glow as a white flame. When the +vision of the Supreme Ruler whose throne is established in +righteousness once more blazes forth before the people, then once more +the throb of patriotism and the passion to make righteous law operative +to the ends of the earth will stir the heart, and the manhood of the +race will once more thrill with the call summoning to service and to +sacrifice. The answering shout will everywhere arise—For God and the +King. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +III +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Shadow of the Cross +</H3> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +III +</H4> + +<P> +The churchyard of our parish lies in a deep hollow, and a little river +half encircles it. In the midst of it stands the church beneath whose +shadow the parish has garnered its dead for centuries. There the +generations have lain down to sleep, their hearts reconciled one to +another, and the beadle has drawn the coverlet of green over them. As +he goes about his allotted task he pats a mound here and there gently +with the back of his spade—for roadman and belted earl are at one here. +</P> + +<P> +The last time I wandered down to the hollow it seemed as if eternal +peace brooded over the living and the dead. The leaves, russet and +gold, glowed in the sunlight. At the stirring of a gentle breeze, like +the dropping of a sea-bird's feather, leaf after leaf fluttered +silently down on the graves. The great bank of trees across the river +glowed with rivulets of dull flames running hither and thither. In its +stony bed the river sang its endless song. The immemorial yews, +beneath whose branches successive generations of children have played +with now and then a thrill of pleasing terror because of the +overhanging graves, stood regardless of the sun. The crows, sated with +the gleanings of harvest fields, fluttered in their rookeries with +scarcely a caw. It seemed as if no sound of discord or strife could +ever break in that enchanted hollow. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +As I turned away to retrace my steps through the gate I came on a woman +sitting on the mort-safe, a handkerchief moist with her tears in her +hand. She had come up from the quarries and she had visited her dead. +And she came because yesterday she received word that on the +battlefield of Marne her son was killed. He was her eldest. The +others were not old enough yet to fight. Her husband was killed in an +accident, and she had reared her children, refusing all help from the +parish. The pride of the blood sustained her. And now that her son +was dead she came hither, driven by an irresistible instinct to visit +her husband's grave. It was as if she wanted to tell him about John, +and how he died a hero, trying to carry a wounded comrade through the +hail of the shrapnel. +</P> + +<P> +She was weary, and from her husband's grave she turned to the church. +She would go and sit in the corner under the gallery, where John used +to sit. He had sat with her there at his first Communion. The +memories wrapped her round, and she would feel her son near her there. +But the door of the church was locked and barred. With an added ache +in her heart she turned away, and weariness compelled her to sit on the +iron mort-safe, which the parish provided in a former century to +protect their dead from sacrilegious hands. "But the church used to be +open," I said. "Aye," she replied tremulously, gathering up her +handkerchief into a round ball; "but some did-na like it; the boots on +the week-days are na sae clean, and they dirtied the kirk. That must +be why they lockit the door." It was not that she complained. Those +who locked the church were wise men, and no doubt they knew best. So +she sat on the mort-safe. +</P> + +<P> +"I have other sons, and when they are older they will go, too," she +said. "I'll no' keep them back. And if they die it'll be for God's +great cause." Her lips quivered as she spoke. The moist ball in the +right hand was clenched tight—there were no more tears to shed. +</P> + +<P> +And as I looked at the worn, lined face, the bent shoulders, the faded +rusty black mantle with its fringe, and the sunken lips that quivered +now and then, there came a sudden realisation. I saw no longer the one +grief-burdened figure sitting dejectedly on the mort-safe—I saw the +unnumbered host of mothers throughout the world who have given their +sons over to carnage, and who are as Rachel weeping for her children, +refusing to be comforted because they are not. Millions of men locked +in the death grapple means millions of mothers given tears to drink in +great measure, bound in affliction and iron. +</P> + +<P> +The song of the river went on ceaselessly, the russet-leaves fell +softly, and the sun shone on a world wrapped in peace—all nature +utterly regardless of the millions of Rachels that weep. (Ten million +hearts may break, but nature silences not one note of its joyousness.) +And as she sat there, behind her, under the campanile, showed the +church door, locked and barred. Nature was heedless of her; the church +shut its door upon her. She seemed to me the Mater Dolorosa. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +As I went up the brae there came the memory of a school lesson long +ago. Out of the subconscious it leaped as a diver might come up from +the depths of the sea with a gleaming coin in his hand. Among the +temples of ancient Rome there was one temple always kept open in time +of war. There the Roman General clashed the shield and the spear, +invoking the god ere he went to the battle-line, and its door was shut +not day or night. And I have no doubt but that the Eternal Ruler heard +that clashing of spear on shield, and marked that open door. But over +wide districts of Great Britain we have left these pagan habits far +behind us. We shut the doors of our temples alike in war and in +peace—excepting two hours on one day of the week, or in many cases one +hour in the week. Nor do I doubt but that the same Ruler marks these +doors now shut on the mothers of sorrow, and these sanctuaries locked +and silent. +</P> + +<P> +The glory was now gone from the day. I could not forget how the iron +mort-safe gave the rest that the Church refused. The shadow lay heavy +over the valley, and the mind tried to give the shadow a name. But it +could not. So up the long flight of stone steps I climbed, and turned +along a tree-shaded road. There, where three roads meet, stands a +little chapel within whose walls a small section of our parishioners +worship. I have passed it times out of mind without so much as +glancing at it. But to-day its open door arrested my eye, and I stood +in the roadway and gazed. And there came to me there a sudden sense of +thankfulness for that there is one open door in our parish which +witnesses to the fact that the power and solace of religion are not +shut in within the confines of only two hours of one day in the week. +</P> + +<P> +While I yet stood in the highway there came forth from the little +chapel an honoured parishioner, who is passing the golden evening of a +useful life in researches regarding Calvin and the Pope. Amazement +possessed me, for he is a power in the parish church, whose door is +locked and barred. We walked together towards the hills. There was a +trace of apology in his explanation. Since this dreadful cataclysm has +burst and the boom of the guns has come drifting from the sea across +the high-perched city, he has felt the need of quiet meditation. Thus +he has often on his walks slipped through the open door of the chapel +that stands by the roadside. +</P> + +<P> +"And you have locked the door of the parish church," I exclaimed, "and +you deny to the poor the privilege you yourself enjoy." He stopped and +faced me in the roadway, blinking at me. "We never locked the Church +door," he said. "It used to be open," I answered; "I remember being +glad to sit in it myself." "Oh! I remember," he exclaimed, "it was +open every day for a few years, but the authorities were never +consulted when it was thrown open—a most lawless proceeding!—and when +a suitable opportunity occurred the beadle locked it up. Law and order +have to be vindicated." +</P> + +<P> +"What you did then," I replied, "was to allow the beadle to deprive the +poor parishioners of a privilege which you and a few others enjoy +elsewhere." At that he started off walking along the road very +quickly, but I kept step with him. "You see," said he, waving a +deprecatory hand, "I am only one among many, and I was so absorbed in +these old Reformation controversies that I never gave it a thought, and +it is only since the war began that I realised...." And as he spoke I +felt that my old friend, learned in many controversies, had experienced +a revolution. The great tide had swept him past all controversies +right up to the fountain head. He had learned that man's high calling +is not to dispute, but to pray. +</P> + +<P> +As we walked under the darkling hills I told him of that shadow which +had so suddenly fallen upon me that day, and he at once gave it a name. +"It is the shadow of the Cross," said he. And thereupon he began to +explain out of the wisdom and ripened experience of seventy years how +across nineteen centuries the shadow of the Cross lies still over all +the world. One thinks so seldom of these things, and if occasionally +one hears them spoken of, familiarity with the words has deadened the +hearer to their significance. It was because I listened to him talking +in the lane that his words gripped me. They might have made no +impression if he were in a pulpit. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +We are accustomed to think of the greatest of all tragedies as an event +consummated in six hours. It is, however, far from consummated, for it +is an age-long tragedy. Its roots lay in self-interest. A degenerate +priesthood in an obscure Syrian town saw nothing in the Greatest of +Teachers but an unbalanced enthusiast, who struck at their ill-gotten +gains, and whose triumph would make an end of them and their system. +So self-interest cried "Crucify." And though the Roman Governor saw +through them and wanted to save Him, self-interest again was brought +into play, and when threatened with an awkward complaint to Rome, he +said "Crucify." And ever since then self-interest on innumerable lips +has cried Crucify, Crucify. Not only cried, but did it. +</P> + +<P> +For this Teacher identified Himself with His followers, saying that He +was the Vine and they the branches. It follows that whatever is done +to the branch is done to the vine. A branch cannot be cut and severed +from the vine without the vine bleeding. He declared it to be so. +"Whosoever receiveth you receiveth Me," and it follows that whosoever +crucifies you crucifies Me. And the history of the centuries is the +history of how the poor and unlearned and the toiling have been +persecuted, harried by war, driven to death and crucified. +</P> + +<P> +Generation after generation have raised the Cross anew, and in the +crucifying of the dumb multitudes have crucified Him. Along with His +own He fought with wild beasts, went through the flames, and suffered +many bloody and diverse persecutions, and He was with His people now. +He confronted to-day the mighty of the earth as He did that blinded +priesthood of old, and He declared that there is only one way of +conquering, and that by love; that gaining the whole world was a +miserable bargain if in exchange a man parted with truth and +righteousness and purity—those things that constitute the soul's very +breath. +</P> + +<P> +But self-interest answered with cold disdain: "What sickly +sentimentalist is this? Let Him be crucified." He faced to-day the +lust of conquest, and declared that the conquering of men's bodies was +nothing; that the only way of attaining power was to conquer men's +hearts and minds and wills, thus clasping them to us with hooks of +steel; that the will of God for His children was that they should love +their enemies and not pour upon them the vials of wrath, trampling them +under foot; but the arrogance of man answered with the hoarse cry, +"Crucify." +</P> + +<P> +And that humanity which named His name was driven once more to the +holocaust of war—ten millions of men consigned to the hell of reeking +trenches. In the midst of the world the Cross stands as never before, +bearing its awful woe. In the seeing of the whole world the Eternal +Love is crucified. It was its shadow that fell on her whose lips +trembled as she sat on the mort-safe over against the locked and barred +door of the House of God. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +The most wonderful thing in history is that from a peasant done +shamefully to death in a remote corner of the Eastern world there +should flow through the ages such an inexplicable power. And yet there +must be some explanation of it. Why should a passion for righteousness +be evoked in the human heart by the fact that a Galilean was crucified +by a petty Roman official? There can be no explanation but this—that +that deed of shame revealed to men the hatefulness of the power which +wrought so evil a deed. That power was self-interest—selfishness. +</P> + +<P> +The eyes of men turned to Jesus Christ, and they saw one holy, +harmless, undefiled, separate from sin, whose journeying was the +journeys of healing among the sons of men, whose words were words of +blessedness, declaring that God loved and pardoned His children, and +yet men reviled, scorned, scourged and at last crucified Him. The +power that moved men to this dread crime was sin, and thus the word sin +became a word of horror. (For the selfishness that crucified was only +one fruit of sin.) Out of that realisation of the horror of sin there +sprang an ethical passion—a passion which in the heart and in the +world waged ceaseless war on selfishness and all the devices of evil. +Thus humanity was lifted out of the mire. They girded themselves to +fight that dread and hateful power which crucified the Holy One. +</P> + +<P> +Like the wind blowing in from the sea that sweeps before it the foul +miasma that lies over the valleys, so that men look up and see the +heavens and feel a new vigour moving in their blood, so a breath from +the living God came stirring the foul places of humanity, and the eyes, +no longer blinded by the exhalations of evil passions, saw the ideal of +purity arise before their eyes, and they turned to climb towards the +clearer vision. Through the revelation of purity in the face of Jesus +Christ and the realisation of the awfulness of that power which crowned +that purity with thorns, there came to humanity the dawning of +deliverance from sin—a deliverance still going on to its fruition. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +History is for ever repeating itself, and to-day the process of +humanity's deliverance from evil will gather momentum and advance a +long way towards the final triumph. For just as men only realised the +hatefulness of sin when they saw it laid upon Jesus Christ, so will it +be also to-day. A generation that had lost the sense of sin beholds +sin laid upon millions of men, working woe unspeakable, and, beholding, +learns anew what sin is and the hatefulness of it. For these millions +of men grappling with death, what are they but humanity's sin-bearers. +On them is laid the burden of the sins of this generation. The +selfishness, greed, ambition, lust—all the passions which sweep men to +wars of conquest—have poured the vials of misery on their heads. The +son of the widow sitting on the mort-safe, who now lies in a nameless +grave, he bore it. The bearing of it killed him. +</P> + +<P> +And as humanity will realise its horror, the word sin will once more +burn red before men's eyes, and there will arise that passion for +righteousness which will lay sin low even as the dust. There will ring +round the world the compelling cry that this power of hell must not for +ever hold humanity in its grip—that ruthless ambition, militarism, +despotism must be made to cease from the face of the earth. Once more +the shadow of the Cross will mean salvation to men. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +There was another power also that stirred the world under the shadow of +the Cross, and that was the power of self-sacrifice. There came to men +an overwhelming realisation that at the heart of the universe was the +Spirit of self-sacrifice, and that the Cross was but the expression of +it. They realised that the greatest thing a man can do with his life +is to lay it down. And as men realise to-day that the Cross still +abides in the heart of God, so that in all their affliction He is +afflicted, there comes to them the feeling that the one way of coming +nearest to His heart is the way of self-sacrifice. +</P> + +<P> +Under the shadow of the Cross now lifted up, a nation that sought +life's pleasures has suddenly thrilled with the glory of +self-sacrifice. What is it that sustains the men who go down to the +earthly hell of ruthless war? It is just this—the consciousness, +newly wakened, of how glorious a thing it is to die for King and +country, for home and kindred. They are content to be blotted out if +only the race will live, to descend to the abyss that the nation may be +exalted. Under the shadow of the Cross self-sacrifice has become once +more the only rock on which our feet can stand secure. Men charge +across fields of death with the light of it in their eyes. They are +raised into the fellowship of the Cross. And we are raised with them. +</P> + +<P> +If I could only tell the bowed widow sitting there on the mort-safe the +glorious fellowship with which her son is numbered, she would again +lift up her face to the light. He has died that we may live. Greater +love hath no man than this—nor yet greater glory. But she needs not +to be told; she knows it already. She knows it far better than you or +I do, for she feels it. In the deep places of life where words are +meaningless, her dumb heart feels the mystery of sin-bearing and the +glory of self-sacrifice. +</P> + +<P> +By a faculty deeper and truer far than reason, in the depths of the +soul where the Unseen Spirit moves revealing the things that are of +lasting worth, she has learned in meekness and suffering that divine +wisdom which is hid from the wise. She knows that the road that goes +by Calvary up to the Cross is the one road along which the feet can +come to God. She knows that her son has walked along that road, and +that, because of his bearing the cross laid upon him, and his dying +while bearing it, God has brought him into that joy which all the +cross-bearers see shining beyond the darkness and the woe. And because +she has thus entered into the secret place of the Most High, and has +felt the touch of God, she is ready to greet the day of still greater +sacrifice. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +In the evening, when the curtains were drawn, I took up a magazine and +read an article. It was a bitter invective against Christianity and +the Church. Nineteen centuries of the religion of the Cross—and this +holocaust as the fruit. It is amazing the blindness of the jaundiced +eye. It would be as reasonable to blame the Founder of Christianity +for His own crucifixion as to blame Christianity for the fact that the +wicked have continued to crucify Him. These things are so not because, +but in spite, of Christianity. +</P> + +<P> +Grievous as war now is, yet it is not war as in the days before the +Cross was erected on Calvary. When Ulysses asked Agamemnon for +sanction to bury the body of Ajax, the King was greatly annoyed. "What +do you mean?" he answered, "do you feel pity for a dead enemy?" That +was the spirit of war in the old heathen world—the spirit which had no +mercy on the living and no pity for the dead. Slowly but surely the +spirit of Christ fettered the spirit of hate and dethroned the spirit +of revenge. We now minister to the wounded and bury the dead enemy +with the pity and the honour we render to our own. +</P> + +<P> +We can trace the evolution of peace through the centuries. Wars +between individuals have ceased. A century and a half ago warring +clans in Scotland dyed the heather red; to-day wars between tribes have +ceased. There remains only war between nations, and already there are +great nations between whom war is unthinkable. If we in these days +wage war with Germany, yet we in these days also celebrate the +hundredth anniversary of unbroken peace with the United States of +America. If we bewail the failure of Christianity in the former, let +us be grateful for the triumph of Christianity in the latter. +</P> + +<P> +Formerly war was the normal condition; now to the moral consciousness +of Christendom war is an outrage. We only need to look beneath the +surface to realise that Galilee is conquering Corsica, and will conquer +at the last. Beneath the shadow of the Cross men will at last find +healing for their grievous wounds. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +And as a symbol thereof the doors of the sanctuaries of peace will be +flung wide open, and no burdened heart will find the House of God +locked and barred against groping hands. One fruit of these grievous +days may well be that the Church will realise that it does not become +her to occupy a lower plane than that heathen temple in ancient Rome, +whose door was shut not day or night while men were dying in battle. +</P> + +<P> +In the coming days when the mothers of sorrow come to their dead, over +whose graves the falling leaves flutter as a benediction, they will not +be left sitting on the iron mort-safe. The open door will invite them +into the sanctuary of peace, and they will croon the coronach of their +woe in the holy place. For they are the priesthood of this generation, +offering up the most precious sacrifice—and the door of the holy place +must be open to them. And there, in the sanctuaries of peace, their +sorrow will be transmuted into joy. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Power of Prayer +</H3> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +IV +</H4> + +<P> +For eight centuries the Church of St. Giles has been the centre of the +religious life of Scotland. At all times of sorrow the nation has +turned to it, and within its walls, consecrated by the prayers of so +many generations, the surcharged heart has voiced its woe in the +presence of the Unseen. But in all the years of the dim and fading +past there never was a day like this in which we now stand. Death has +come as a grim spectre, and has looked into our eyes. The winds carry +to our ears the moans of our perishing sons, dying gloriously for +freedom on the bloody fields of Flanders. The great ships guard our +shores, and we know that if that vigil failed, our cities and villages +and fair countryside would become as Louvain and the Low Country. +Death itself would be welcome rather than that. +</P> + +<P> +If there ever came to any nation a call to seek the refuge which eye +has not seen, that call soundeth persistently, compellingly in our +ears. And that call soundeth not in vain. To-day[<A NAME="chap04fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap04fn1">1</A>] the two great +Churches of Scotland met as one in St. Giles, the days of their +misunderstanding ended, to pray for King and country—for all the +things which make life beautiful. They have come through days of +alienation and isolation, but to-day they are with one accord in one +place. And in their hearts only one purpose—to seek the blessing of +God for their nation. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap04fn1"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap04fn1text">1</A>] November 18, 1914. +</P> + +<BR> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +As one sat there, under the tattered flags on which many bloody fights +for freedom are emblazoned, and watched the stream of men flow into the +church, what memories came crowding through the echoing corridors of +time. +</P> + +<P> +Four hundred years ago there came to Edinburgh the news of Flodden, and +out of the closes the women rushed to St. Giles, until round all the +altars there was no room to kneel because of the great crowd wailing +for their dead. The moaning of their lamentation was as the sound of +the surf wailing on the shore, and their sobbing as the cry of the +grinding pebbles in the backwash of the tide. But the city fathers +could stand upright even in that most cruel day when the cloud of +destruction was creeping over the Pentlands; and there is the note of +the heroic in that resolution which called all the able-bodied men to +rally to the defence of the capital, and exhorted "the good women to +pass to the kyrk, and pray whane tyme requires for our Soveraine Lord +and his Army, and neichbouris being thereat." +</P> + +<P> +That proclamation stirs the blood! They are dust, these fathers of +ours, but their spirit is all alive, throbbing in the heart of +us—their far-away children. Never did a race meet its Sedan in a +sublimer spirit than that. The strong, at toll of bell and tuck of +drum, manned the ramparts, and the women filled St. Giles' and sent +heavenward their cries. The bodies of such a race may for a brief +season be brought to subjection, but their souls are invincible—and it +is the soul that always conquers. +</P> + +<P> +And here to-day it is the same. From every part of Scotland men have +come, and they passed "to the kirk to pray for our Sovereign Lord and +his Army." True, there has been no Flodden and no Sedan; but it is by +the good hand of God upon us that the enemy was frustrated in his +eagerness for another Sedan. And it is in part the prayer of +thanksgiving that is laid to-day upon His altar, and in part the +petition that His mercies may be continued to the nation in the cruel +days to come. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +What a sanctuary for a nation's prayers, this church, where Kings have +prayed and gone forth to die in battle; where Queens have wept as the +voice of judgment, grim and stern, untouched by tenderness or love, +sounded in the ear; where three thousand people dissolved in tears as +the good Regent, foully slain, was borne to his grave. Over it passed +wave after wave of fanaticism and barbarism; and at last it fell into +the hands of the restorers—more ruthless far than Goths or Vandals! +But, through it all, the house of God survived; and, apparelled once +more in some of its pristine glory, it opens its doors to a nation that +once more seek after its God. +</P> + +<P> +And above us, as we sit there, hang the colours of our Scottish +regiments stirring our patriotism, assuring us that the men who guarded +these flags on many bloody fields were guarded by God, and that we are +still in His keeping. +</P> + +<P> +What a place this is in which to set vibrating that note of patriotism +which now quivers from Maiden Kirk to John o' Groat's. These colours +there—they are the most eloquent things on earth, for they pertain to +the realm of symbols. Words are poor compared to tears, and that is +because tears belong to the world of symbols. That tattered banner +there belonged to the Gordon Highlanders, and was carried through the +Peninsula and the Crimea. Woven in faded letters you can read on it +still Corunna, Almarez, Pyrenees, Waterloo. Ah! these flags tell of a +devotion stronger than death, rekindle the memories of the day when +stern silence fell on the ranks, as the Highland Brigade breasted the +slopes of the Alma until Sir Colin Campbell lifted his hat and they +rushed on the foe with the slogan of victory; and that other day when +"the thin red line tipped with steel" rolled back the surge of the +Cossacks; aye, and of a hundred such days when men went down joyously +to death that the race might be free and live. +</P> + +<P> +Waterloo!—it is on many flags. And we remember how the Man of Destiny +himself, as he saw his ranks yield before the onslaught of the +Highlanders, did not restrain his admiration for his enemies, but +exclaimed with the true soldier's generosity, "Les braves +Ecossais"—"Brave, brave Scotsmen" (what a contrast to "French's +contemptible little Army"). The hands that carried, the hearts that +thrilled at the waving of these flags, their fame will never perish. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"On the slopes of Quatre Bras<BR> +The Frenchmen saw them stand unbroken.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">* * * * *</SPAN><BR> +On the day of Waterloo<BR> +The pibroch blew where fire was hottest.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">* * * * *</SPAN><BR> +When the Alma heights were stormed<BR> +Foremost went the Highland bonnets.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">* * * * *</SPAN><BR> +As it was in days of yore,<BR> +So the story shall be ever.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">* * * * *</SPAN><BR> +Think then of the name ye bear,<BR> +Ye that wear the Highland tartan.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">* * * * *</SPAN><BR> +Zealous of its old renown,<BR> +Hand it down without a blemish."<BR> +</P> + +<P> +As the eye looks along the nave up into the choir and sees the gleam of +red, colours after colours, there comes the memory of words—"We have +heard with our ears, O God, and our fathers have told us what work Thou +didst in their days in the times of old.... Through Thee will we push +down our enemies...." The unseen God who has led His people through so +many and great dangers will not forsake them now. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +There is a tablet where formerly stood the door that led to Haddo's +Hole, and there hangs on a pillar the flag that pertains of truth to +the realm of romance. Men with their hearts hot with indignation +buried it in Pretoria in 1880, and put above it the inscription +"Resurgam." Afterwards the Colonel recovered it and brought it home. +When war broke out again his widow restored it to the regiment—the +Royal Scots Fusiliers. In 1881 that regiment was the last to leave the +Transvaal; in 1900 it was the first to enter the Transvaal—as the +inscription narrates. And by the direction of Lord Roberts, when +Pretoria was occupied, this identical flag was run up amid the shouts +of the victors. Now it rests here. "Resurgam"—it is the unquenchable +spirit of an invincible nation. +</P> + +<P> +If only the manhood of Scotland could be gathered into this Church, +under these flags, and the story they tell were put into words, +pulsating with passion—then the ranks of our Army would be filled up +in a week. What a lack of imagination we reveal! We teach dates, +thinking we are teaching history. The only way to teach history is by +flags, and all they stand for. When Douglas threw the heart of Bruce +among his enemies he cried, "Lead thou on as thou wast wont and Douglas +will follow thee or die." In the spirit of Douglas our fathers +followed the flags, and we will follow in the steps of our fathers and +face death with undaunted hearts as they were wont. There comes to us +the shouting of their triumph, and we cry: "Lead on; we will follow or +die." This grey church, St. Giles', is the temple of patriotism. +Therefore our feet turn towards it in dark days, and we say, "Our feet +shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem!" +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +How the old words are born for us anew as we thus meet as one "to +entreat God for the broken peace of Christendom." We sing "God is our +refuge and our strength," but there is a note of intensity in the +singing now such as we never knew before. Men close their eyes, and +stand, the world blotted out, before their God, realising that He and +He alone is the one refuge, the only giver of victory. We hear the old +story read of Moses holding up his hands and Israel prevailing on the +plains below; but it is not Israel we see travailing in battle, but our +own brothers in the rain-sodden trenches, and we feel the uprising of +the ceaseless intercession of a nation that has anew found its God. It +is not the right hand that assureth victories; it is that spirit of +enthusiasm, that passion for righteousness which filleth the heart, and +that spirit is as the wind blowing where it listeth—and it cometh out +of the Unseen at the call of our prayers. +</P> + +<P> +When in other days we prayed for the King it was in the spirit of cold +formalism. But now a lump rises in the throat as we invoke the +blessing and protection of Heaven for the solitary man who is the +symbol of the unity of our Empire, and who watcheth over its destinies +day and night, and who has sent his son to face death with the meanest +of his subjects. We hear the glorious words: "If God be for us, who +can be against us?" and they are written for ourselves. We, who fight +for the truth of word and for the freedom and deliverance of the +oppressed, can feel that God is for us, and that all is well. +</P> + +<P> +And when we pray, our voices rising as one, "Thy kingdom come," we can +see that kingdom coming through blood and tears, cleansing the foul +places and establishing peace on everlasting foundations. It is a new +day that has dawned for us—a day in which we stand united as the +subjects of the one King, as the sons of the one God—and the things +that separated us one from another are swept away. What the conferring +of the wise found so difficult to achieve, the roaring of the guns has +accomplished. God teacheth his people by sending them through the +purifying fires. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +In these prayers in St. Giles' there is a directness which shows that +we are there for a definite purpose. We no longer use qualifying +words. We cry for victory. There is a bloodless form of prayer which +some use and which sends the worshipper away with an aching heart. It +is the prayer that never prays directly for victory. "Thy will be +done," it prays, in the spirit of submission. But prayer is not +submission; it is a wrestling. In other days our fathers wrestled in +prayer and prevailed. "I spent the night in prayer," wrote Oliver +Cromwell, in critical days; "I prayed God that He would guide us +against the enemy. We were simple fellows of the country, and they +were men of blood and fashion, but the Lord delivered them into our +hands. By His grace we killed five thousand. If He continues to show +mercy we will kill some more to-morrow." Such were the Ironsides, "men +of a spirit," who broke the charges of the Cavaliers, as the cliff +dashes back in white spray the rush of the billows. +</P> + +<P> +This was also the language of the Covenanters of old; and though we no +longer use such plainness of speech, we mean the same. There is a +place for tenderness; but when men are ground to powder by the judgment +of God, tenderness is not manifest then. When the heart whispers +"Spare" and justice says "Smite," men must obey the voice of justice, +stifling the voice of the heart. +</P> + +<P> +Our prayers are now for justice. Better far a righteous war than an +immoral peace. We have been compelled to unsheath the sword, and we +pray that no heart may falter, and no cry arise for the sheathing of +the sword, until justice be done. Thus our prayers have become a cry +for victory. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +As one sits in an ancient church such as this, there comes knocking at +the heart many questions regarding that service of prayer which within +its walls has linked the generations together. Can prayer really +prevail with God? Can it alter the will of the Unchangeable? If there +be no power in it, why should men go on praying? +</P> + +<P> +We must distinguish between the will of God which is unchangeable, and +His lower will which is his purpose towards us and His attitude to us. +The former is unalterable; the latter varies according to the varying +of our hearts. With that lower will we are called to wrestle. A man +is born in poverty and obscurity, and the will of God seems to be that +he should continue poor and obscure. But he wrestles with that lower +will until he prevails. He ultimately moves out into the great tide of +life and becomes a power. The will of God towards that man is changed. +</P> + +<P> +It is the same with a nation. Here is a nation sinking on its lees +with its ideals dimmed and the shrines of its fathers' God forsaken and +desolate. It has fashioned to itself other gods, and the multitudes +crowd the temples of the goddess of pleasure. The very race itself is +sacrificed on the altar of gross pleasure, and the laughter of little +children is being little by little silenced. The fires of patriotism +are dying low, and the love of country gives place to the love of +party. There are mean victories rejoiced over, but they are the +victories of the cynic and the sensualist. There is the sound of +shouting, but it is the shouting over the triumph of one self-seeking +politician over another self-seeking partisan. Saintliness, which +other generations held in awe and reverence, provokes now a pitying +smile. Mammon alone is held in high honour and sitteth in the high +places. What is the will of God towards that nation? It is this—ruin +and utter destruction. Over every nation that thus succumbed to the +gross and sensual, history shows the sword of God unsheathed, and at +last the devouring flames of judgment. +</P> + +<P> +But to such a nation there comes as if out of the silent heaven a call +as a trumpet sound, summoning it to the judgment-seat of God. Over the +sea comes the roar of guns. The foundations which the fathers laid in +righteousness, through long neglect and decay are crumbling. An empire +encircling the globe is tottering to destruction. The hay and the +stubble cannot come scathless through the flames. The writing is on +the wall, and as the eyes see the hand that writes, trembling seizeth +upon men. And then there cometh a sudden change. The nation in a day +rises out of the morass of its self-indulgence. It sets itself to lay +hold again upon the eternal law of righteousness. They seek once more +the shrines of their God. They set themselves to fast and to pray. +"Who can tell," they whisper one to another, "if God will turn and +repent, and turn away from His fierce anger, that we perish not?" +</P> + +<P> +The fields of their inglorious shouting over their games are deserted +for the fields of hardness and grim preparation. Once more they gird +themselves for conflict, as their fathers so often girded, that truth +and righteousness may prevail over all the earth. Sharply the choice +is presented to them between Christ or Odin, and though choosing the +Christ means agony and woe they make their choice unhesitatingly. A +new light shines in their eyes, and the work of their hands and the +devisings of their hearts become the spirit of prayer. Yesterday the +will of God towards that nation, sinking on its lees, was destruction; +to-day towards that same nation, thus risen out of the foul miasma that +was stifling its soul, the will of God is salvation. +</P> + +<P> +Because prayer is the greatest power in the world; because it can alter +the will of God towards us, because it can move the hand of the +omnipotent God and is thus endued with His omnipotence, our prayers as +we gather in the sanctuaries are no longer the submission of quietism, +but a wrestling with God—the crying of a soul as in agony for victory +based on the triumph of righteousness. It was such a cry that rose on +that day in St. Giles. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +As the second paraphrase was being sung there came the memory of words +spoken in the pulpit of the great Cathedral by Dr. Cameron Lees. It +was at evening service, when the shadows were gathering. "I have often +sat in this pulpit," said Dr. Lees, "on the edge of the evening, and +watched the shadows enveloping the Cathedral. They invaded the side +chapels first, and then the nave, creeping onwards through the +transepts, until the chancel was reached. After that they gathered in +strength, until the whole building was in darkness, with the exception +of the white figure of Christ in the great east window. I pray that +the last vision vouchsafed me on earth may be just that—the Saviour of +men. I can then close my eyes in the knowledge that He will lead me +through the dark valley that leadeth to the eternal home." +</P> + +<P> +It has been like that with the whole nation. Around our shores the +darkness gathered, until all the horizon was black with threatening +clouds. Then we lifted up our eyes and saw.... He will bring +deliverance and peace. As we moved along the crowded aisles towards +the door the white figure of Christ glowed in the great east window, +and we felt that He will bless His people at last with peace—the peace +not of death, but of life. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Down the dark future, through long generations,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The echoing sounds grow fainter and then cease,</SPAN><BR> +And, like a bell, with solemn sweet vibrations,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I hear once more the voice of Christ say Peace.</SPAN><BR> +Peace! and no longer from its brazen portals<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The clash of war's great organ shakes the skies;</SPAN><BR> +But beautiful as songs of the immortals,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The holy melodies of love arise."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +V +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Victory +</H3> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +V +</h4> + +<P> +The blinds were all drawn in the red-roofed house that stands at the +cross-roads. It was not empty, for the smoke arose from its chimneys +in the clear morning air. In other days the music of song and laughter +often floated from its open windows, but now it was stricken dumb. +From it two sons had gone to take their place in the line of soul and +fire that girdles these islands, warding them from destruction. +</P> + +<P> +In a moment the veiled windows flashed their meaning. In the long +lists of the dead I found the name I looked for. I had schooled myself +to look at these lists, thinking of them in the mass as force or power; +but that one name insisted on its individuality. They were all +individual lives, each throbbing with intensest self-realisation, each +with his love and hope and fear. There was none among them so poor but +some heart clung to them. They may die, no longer in units, but in +broad swathes, mown down by machine guns, but they are individual +hearts still. In masses the sea swallows them up, trenches are filled +with them, but however much we try we cannot narcotise our hearts by +sophistries. Some day a name stands out alone—and we realise. +</P> + +<P> +All over the land, in every parish, blinds are being drawn in houses +where music and laughter are silenced. There comes the surge of a wild +revolt. It is not these individual hearts alone that lie stricken, it +is the joy of the centuries yet to be. In nameless graves lie the +dream-children who will never now be born. This criminal sealing up of +the very fountain of life—how can we bear it? +</P> + +<P> +And yet we open not our mouths in protest. Is it because we are losing +our sensitiveness—becoming brutalised? It might be that. For nothing +coarsens the mind like that tide of hatred and passion which war sends +sweeping through the hearts of men. And yet it is not that. For when +they told the mother, breaking it gently as love alone can do, that her +son was dead, she bowed her head in silence, yielding herself to the +solace of tears; but in a little while she said brokenly: "It is good +to die so: I would not have my son shelter himself behind other +mothers' sons." +</P> + +<P> +No, it is not because we are already coarsened that the heart can bear. +It is rather because we have realised with the passing away of the old +world of the last long summer days (it seems already centuries remote) +that there are some things so great that they can transfigure even +death. When the loyalty to the highest can only be fulfilled through +death, we acquiesce in the sacrifice. In our parish we have not been +coarsened—we have been quickened. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +It seems as if it were in another era that my friend at the top of the +Gallows' Road proved to me convincingly that death alone was king. +With a keen irony he depicted this little globule of a world, a +third-rate satellite of a fifth-rate star, floating in the abysses, in +relation to the universe but as a mere grain of sand amid all the sand +on the world's shores; and on that puny speck of a world he pictured +the ephemeral generations, mere flashes of troubled consciousness—and +then darkness. +</P> + +<P> +It was reasonable when they thought this world the centre of all +things, with the sun and moon and stars circling it round as humble +ministrants, that they should believe in some high destiny for +themselves. But now that they know how miserably and unspeakably +insignificant the world is, it was but vanity and arrogance for any man +to think of himself as of any value whatever in the scheme of things. +His life was as the flashing of a midge's wings. His end was as a +candle blown out in the night. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +One evening, when the air was vibrant with the melody of birds and +laden with the perfume of the roses that filled the garden, he +developed another train of thought. He pictured the glut of life there +would be if all the generations on this and millions unnumbered of +worlds all survived. With vivid gestures he passed them all before the +eye—low-browed savages, cannibals, fetish-worshippers, Calvinists, and +at last the æsthetics of our day. "There would be no room for them—no +use for them at all—it would be a glut which baffles all imagination." +There was no way out but that the individual perished to prevent the +universe from being crowded out. +</P> + +<P> +And the cobbler at the top of the brae described to me how his dog was +run over in the street. "He gaed a bark—and he never gaed anither. +It'll be like that at the end with us a'. We'll gae out like my dawg." +It was a queer result of the glimpse which came to us of an illimitable +universe—this cheapening of ourselves. There was nothing at last but +the charnel-house of the crowded kirkyard, where the generations lay +layer upon layer, and where the opening of a grave reminded the old +clerk, as he quaintly declared, of nothing but a dentist's shop. The +teeth survived for unrecorded centuries—but that was all. +</P> + +<P> +It is strange the tricks the memory plays. For, sitting here, glancing +over the crowded sheet filled with the names of the dead, I remembered +these things. And there came the sense of the madness of the universe +and the intolerableness of life, if the end of all heroism was but +that—nothingness and corruption. A handful of bones thrown up by the +beadle to make room for the dead of to-day—is that all that is left of +those who handed down the lamp of life to us? Is that all that will be +left of us too at the last? +</P> + +<P> +In the ordinary day my friend at the top of the Gallows' Road and the +cobbler on the breast of the brae would have said that that was the +end. But the extraordinary day has come upon us unawares, and in the +extraordinary day this little, burdened, pain-racked life becomes +suddenly unendurable unless it lie in the bosom of eternity. If there +be no rainbow circling the heavens above the carnage heaps of the +stricken battlefields, if the farewell of death be a farewell for ever, +how can the heart endure? +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +It certainly looks to the seeing of the eye as if destruction were the +end. With the perishing of the body everything seemeth to perish: all +love, all thought, all tenderness vanish for ever. But the eyes and +the ears are for ever playing us false; and here, too, they deceive us. +For the world is so ordered that nothing ever perishes. In nature +there is no destruction. A handful of ashes in a grate look like +annihilation, but what it represents is really resurrection. The +imprisoned sunrays of uncounted æons, stored up in the lumps of coal, +have been released from the prison-house, and gone forth again as heat +and as light. The physical body may seem to perish; what really +happens is that its constituent elements are re-grouped. +</P> + +<P> +But in the realm of beauty, is there not destruction possible there? +Through long centuries faith and devotion rear a great cathedral, every +line and curve of which is instinct with beauty. Every statue breathes +the love and hope and fears of men. In vaulted aisles and "windows +richly dight," it symbolises the Unseen—the beauty which the heart +yearns for. On that beauty materialised, ruthless Vandalism rains shot +and shell; the devouring flames consume it. Its gaunt walls are now a +monument of barbarism. Has nothing perished there? Is it not mockery +to speak of the conservation of the constituent elements there? For +loveliness has vanished there from off the face of the earth, and +beauty which no hand of man can ever restore has been annihilated. +</P> + +<P> +But it has not. For beauty is not in things, but in souls. The beauty +lay in the soul of the architects that planned, in the hearts of the +builders that carved the stones until they seemed to breathe—and +shells cannot destroy that. The loveliness was shrined in the souls of +the generations that gazed, and, gazing, were raised into the +fellowship of the hearts that planned and builded. Thus did the spirit +of beauty grow in the hearts of men—and shells cannot destroy that. +</P> + +<P> +And let these charred walls be left to the alchemy of time, and nature +will clothe them in richer loveliness. Lichen and moss will grow on +them, and the moonlight will etherialise them. One symbol of beauty +may seem to perish; but the spirit of beauty itself, dwelling in the +hearts of men and abiding at the core of the universe, is +indestructible. The thing which we deem perishable, no power on earth +can kill. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +There is on earth something infinitely more precious than the material +substance, indestructible though it be. The most beautiful thing the +world can show is a good man. Through the years forces play on him, +and each force adds its element of beauty. He has struggled with +adversity, and in the conflict he has learned patience, tolerance and a +wide charity. Waves of affliction have passed over him, and he has +learned tenderness and sympathy with human suffering, so that bruised +hearts come and lie down in his shadow, and there find healing. With +eyes cleansed from self, he looks out on the comedy and tragedy of +life, and he sees the hidden springs. The healing power that goes +forth from him grows with the years. At last he dies. +</P> + +<P> +Does nature conserve the shell while it consigns the jewel in the +shell—the man himself, with all his love and tender thought and +unselfish care—to annihilation? That is unthinkable. To know one +good man is to know that the human personality is imperishable. It was +through that knowledge that the soul of man triumphed over the terror +of death. +</P> + +<P> +There walked in Galilee a Teacher who made a handful of peasants feel +the possibilities of moral loveliness latent in the human heart, and +when He died they could not associate the thought of death with Him. +"It was not possible that He should be holden of it," they said one to +another. Everything was possible but that He could become as a clod in +the valley of corruption. Of course even that was possible if the +world were a chaos given over for sport to malicious demons. +</P> + +<P> +It would be possible, then, that the self-sacrificing love stronger +than death, and the spirit of unsullied purity should become mere dust. +But the possibility of the world being ruled by any except a Righteous +Power did not occur to the untutored Galileans. Therefore they faced +death with level eyes, refusing to believe in its triumph, saying to +their hearts, "It is not possible." +</P> + +<P> +And that is the rock on which to plant our feet in the day when the +world is given over to the wild welter of bloodshed. In every parish +over all the land blinds are pulled down, and hearts, wrapped round in +the dimness, sit still in the shadow of a dumb affliction. They will +never again hear the familiar footsteps coming to the door; they will +hear it in their dreams—only to awake and find silence. Never again +will the first question be when the door is opened, as it was through +all the days since the golden days of childhood, "Where is mother?" +But the great things which made life noble have not been destroyed by +bullet or shell. No man is worthy of freedom except the man who is +prepared to die for it. The heart, which in death proved itself +deserving of freedom, has entered into the fulness of freedom. The +heavens are again aglow when we realise that. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +It was the Professor who made me sure of those things. I met him at +the "Priory," where my old friend carries on his controversy with the +Pope—or used to. In that house of his one meets all sorts of +visionaries from the ends of the earth. A Waldensian pastor full of +the dream of a rejuvenated Italy; a leader of French Protestants, who +has forgotten his controversy with the Pope in the great upheaval +through which his race are finding their soul once more; a dreamer from +across the Atlantic, his eyes a-gleam with the vision of a reunited +Christendom—these are the men you will find drinking tea at the Priory +on any day in our parish. +</P> + +<P> +The original bond between them was their controversy with Rome, but +they have now forgotten all about that. There, in a happy hour, I met +the Professor. One phrase of his lit up for me the days of darkness. +"We see the alchemy of Providence at work all round about us," he +exclaimed, pushing his fingers through his hair until it stood up all +on end, an aureole of white. +</P> + +<P> +"It is the flower of our manhood that is perishing," said the "Prior," +while our hostess was nervously solicitous over the fate of a teacup +which the Professor was balancing in his left hand, utterly regardless +of its purpose. +</P> + +<P> +"Perishing!" exclaimed the Professor; "they are not perishing—they are +living. To talk of the wastage of life is mere cant." Our hostess +rescued the teacup, and the Professor had now the free use of both his +hands. The one hand clutched his hair and the other made sundry +gestures clinching his arguments. +</P> + +<P> +"Why should we rail at death?" said he; "for death has been the saviour +of humanity. It was death that made men of us. It was in the school +of death that man learned unselfishness, self-sacrifice, chivalry and +honour. There is nothing so ugly as the man whose heart is filled by +the world. It is death that has saved us all from that. Were man's +location here for ever, the world would be his god. A world without +death would be a world with no room for the Cross. Men climbed the +heights of nobility as they defied death. The crackling flames were +unable to silence the martyrs' song; the march of the hosts of +devouring tyranny could not move the hearts that chose death rather +than slavery; the generations sealed with their blood their testimony +that truth and loyalty to truth are more precious than life, and so met +death with a smile; it was through this wrestling with death that great +and noble character was forged on the anvil of life. Death was the +weapon which forged greatness of soul. Death cannot destroy what death +has created. That could only happen in an insensate world. What is +it—death—but just this—the slave of immortality?" +</P> + +<P> +If I could only write it down as the Professor spoke, if I could only +make you see his eyes glowing with little darts of flame as he saw the +whole world transformed into a mighty workshop in which the "alchemy of +Providence" is transmuting the soiled substance of our humanity into +living souls (over whom death can have no dominion) fashioned for +heavenly destinies—then you, too, would believe. Since that day my +old friend has not spoken a word about the "waste of the flower of the +race." +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +The house with the drawn blinds stands at the cross-roads, and I must +come back to it. What is it that has happened to him who lies in a +nameless grave in France? The opportunity for winning glory and +earthly fame did not come his way; he just laid down his life along +with hundreds of thousands more. He has taken his place among the +undistinguished dead. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">"O, undistinguished dead,</SPAN><BR> +Whom the bent covers or the rock-strewn steep<BR> +Shows to the stars, for you I mourn—I weep,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">O, undistinguished dead.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">"None knows your name,</SPAN><BR> +Blackened and blurred in the wild battle's brunt,<BR> +Hotly ye fell with all your wounds in front.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">That was your fame."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +Not a line in the records of time for him. But there are other +records—those of eternity. He has lost nothing of the thrill of life. +He is being borne on that tide of self-surrender and heroism which has +flowed through the ages, and bears those who embark on it to the very +feet of God. He would not himself have it otherwise. "It is better +far to go out with honour than survive with shame," wrote a comrade +from the trenches, now united with him in death. There is a place for +sorrow in our land, but its place is by the hearth-stones of those +whose sons choose to survive with shame. He has taken his place among +those who, unseen, are leading on the embattled hosts of his race to +victory. He has discovered the treasures in store for the brave and +the true. When, amid the flutterings of flags and the shouting of the +people rejoicing in their deliverance, the great army will return home +at last—he, too, will come. +</P> + +<P> +At Kobé, when the bugles were welcoming the victorious Japanese home in +1895, Lafcadio Hearn spoke to an old man of those who would never +return. "Probably the Western people believe," answered the old man, +"that the dead never return. There are no Japanese dead who do not +return. There are none who do not know the way." It is a poor, +emasculated religion that does not believe that. When at the last the +bugles call in the quiet evening ... they will come back. They will +come crowned with glory and honour and immortality—with that victory +which overcometh the world. Let the blinds be rolled up, and the +windows be all flung open to the light. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Cities of the Plain +</H3> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +VI +</H4> + +<P> +It was the old clerk, of whose services and devotion to our parish I +have previously written, who gave the Biblical name to the little +village that lies near the boundary of the great city that is steadily +creeping towards us, and ever threatening to engulf us. Its own name +is singularly pleasant to the ear and redolent of the sound of running +waters, but it is unnecessary to burden the memory with it. Though it +is now many years ago, I remember, as it were yesterday, the first time +I heard the word on the old clerk's lips. I was sitting warming myself +by the fire in the ticket-collector's office. The ticket-collector was +ostensibly waiting to provide tickets, but as everybody in our parish +has a season ticket, that part of his duty is almost a sinecure. +</P> + +<P> +Thus it happens that the ticket-collector has leisure, just before the +trains pass through, to give his friends the fruits of his researches +in the realms of philosophy. That particular day he was speaking of +the changes he had seen. "I was brought up," said he, closing his +argument, "on the Shorter Catechism and porridge. I dinna haud any +longer by the Catechism, but I havena lost my faith in porridge." +</P> + +<P> +It was then that the clink of coppers was heard on the sill of the +ticket window. In the aperture was framed the face of the clerk, with +the trimmed grey beard and the small twinkling eyes. He held three +pennies deftly in his thumbless hand. "Return, Sodom," said he. The +ticket-collector pushed back his cap, stretched out his right hand as +if he were beginning to speak, then thought better of it. Out of his +case, without a word, he produced a return ticket for Sodom, clinked it +in his machine, and passed it through the window. The old clerk +received it with a grim chuckle. +</P> + +<P> +Away below the bridge there came a rumble. "Train," said the +ticket-collector, closing the aperture with a snap, and making for the +door. And I have never forgotten the hoarse voice of the old clerk +with an acid edge to it as he clinked his three coppers, saying +"Return, Sodom." +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +It is an amazing thing how within the circuit of the same parish, +removed by one mile from one another, there can live together two eras +so remote from each other in the order of human development, as the +world of the red-roofed houses on the slopes of the hills, and the +village at their base where the gorge, worn by the little river through +the travail of immemorial centuries, debouches on the great central +plain that runs across Scotland. +</P> + +<P> +Every morning the dwellers on the slopes are borne by the railway on a +great span of arches over the little village, and they look down on the +roofs of its houses. On the slopes there lies the world in which the +fringes of life are embroidered—a world where men and women talk of +books, pictures and plays. It is a world of hyphenated names. But in +all the village there is not so much as one hyphenated name. It is a +refuse-heap of humanity. Many diverse races are crowded in it. The +city fathers clean out slums without providing first for the +slum-dwellers, and, swept before the broom of so-called social +reformers, homeless men and women have drifted to the village, and +there reconstituted their slum. +</P> + +<P> +From the glens of the north broken Highlanders, driven out to make room +for sheep, have drifted hither to work in the quarries, and the speech +of their children's children still bears the trace of their ancient +language pure and clean; over the sea Irishmen have come to reap the +harvest fields of the Lothians, and they have been deposited by the +tide in the village. Stray Poles have come hither and straggling +Czechs; a man from Connemara neighbours a shaggy giant from Lewis; and +a dour stone-cutter from Aberdeen is door by door with an Italian who +sells what looks like a deadly mixture from a hand-cart. +</P> + +<P> +Here you can see humanity in its primitive state, before it began to +adorn the fringes of life, and make for itself sanctuaries of privacy. +Between the slopes and the base of the hill there yawns an invisible +chasm. Centuries separate them. Thus it comes that the slope-dweller +passes on the top of the arches, scanning his newspaper, without so +much as seeing the huddle of houses which constitute the village. +</P> + +<P> +It is only a week ago that, like the old clerk, I took out a return +ticket for the "Cities of the Plain." (For the old clerk had a +two-fold formula. When he was going to one village he said, "Return, +Sodom," but when he meant to go to the quarries beside the village he +said, "Return, Cities of the Plain.") It was to visit an old soldier +that I thus descended into the plains. He lives in a rookery in which +many families are crowded one on the top of the other—a rabbit-warren +infested by many and strange odours. He used to come up the slopes and +do odd jobs, tidying up gardens, and he loved to talk of +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">"unhappy far-off things</SPAN><BR> +And battles long ago,"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +in a language which I also could speak. So I got to know him. And as +I sat by his bed I heard a moan from the adjoining room. It began in a +low cry, and then rose into a wail that seemed charged with all the +woes of humanity. The old man sat up in bed trembling. The cry of woe +now changed into a chorus; other voices swelled it. It was the act of +a moment to open the door, and in the dim landing find the door of this +other room. +</P> + +<P> +I opened it, and there I saw three children huddled before a grate +which contained nothing but ashes. On an iron bed, stretched on straw, +lay a woman sunk in sleep.... A foetid air was laden with the fumes of +alcohol.... There was no food.... A broken chair, a stool or two, and +a box that did duty for a table.... The old soldier told me what to +do, and I did it. A kindly woman brought coal and food, and the +wailing was silenced. The old man explained it all. The woman sunk in +the stupor is the wife of a soldier now in the trenches. She did not +belong to our parish; but only came a week or two before, swept before +the broom of the "social reformers" from the city. The mothers of the +Parish, the old soldier declared, were heroines. One such, when her +son asked her consent to enlist, said, "Eh, laddie, I dinna want ye to +gang; I dinna want ... but if I were ye I wud gang mysel'." Our own +wives and mothers were splendid—but those who came from the city, +flotsam and jetsam borne on the tide, staying for a little and then +carried away again, of whom there were three or four in the +village—these were different. They meet each other eager for news. +They are depressed, and feel the need for cheering. One suggests a +stimulant ... and the result is this. +</P> + +<P> +He is no Puritan—the old soldier lying on his bed, his campaigning +done—and he spoke out of an understanding heart. It was only poor +human nature, overtaken by thick darkness and misery, trying to open a +window towards the realm of sunshine. +</P> + +<P> +And I came out into the roadway and turned towards the station. I did +not see them before, but I saw them now. A few yards separating them, +I pass two shops licensed to sell the means for opening windows towards +this realm of happiness; and two houses with gaudy lights called the +villagers to enter the region where all cares and worries are +forgotten. In the street pale-faced, ill-clad children played at being +soldiers, marching with heads erect. The gorge was already dark with +the evening shadows, but the lamps in the village were lit. +</P> + +<P> +When the village was passed I stood and looked back. In the west the +setting sun had thrown over the heavens a glow. A well of liquid fire +glowed over Torfionn, and its rays spread fan-like, so that they +spanned the horizon, and, touching the rounded mass of Corstarfin, went +forth over the firth. Against this background stood silhouetted the +great arches that carry the railway across the hollow, and behind these +the arches that bear the canal. The piers stood as a gigantic forest. +These mighty arches might have been the work of the Romans. A soft, +luminous haze fell on the village. Window after window was lit up. +The door of a cottage near me was opened, and a flood of light streamed +out. A woman stood in the door, and looking up the road shouted "Jim," +and a little boy, leaving his fellow-soldiers, rushed to her, and she +clasped him in her arms and closed the door.... In that moment the +little village seemed to me as if it were an outpost of Paradise. +Nature threw as a benediction the mantle of its loveliness over it. +What nature meant to be a sanctuary of beauty, man had changed into +Sodom. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +The ticket-collector stood at his post and scanned the passengers as +they went through. He knew them all, and had only a stray ticket to +collect. I was last, and duly gave up my "return" from the "Cities of +the Plain." But he did not let me through the gate. "I want to show +you something," said the ticket-collector, and he led me into his +office and produced a pamphlet. +</P> + +<P> +"I got it from the man who goes to Keswick," said the ticket-collector; +"you know him." I knew him, the best of men. +</P> + +<P> +"Nae doubt," went on the ticket-collector; "nae doubt. He was always +giving me tracts. Tracts—faugh!—poor stuff, nae style, nae logic, +and nae philosophee in them. But I aye took them and thanked him—for +he is a nice man, though a perfect babe in matters of understanding. +And I found them useful for spills. The other day he handed me +this..." and he waved a blue paper-covered booklet. +</P> + +<P> +"Mahn," he exclaimed, pushing his peaked cap back from his grey head, +and sweeping his brass buttons down with his hand; "mahn, this has fair +hit me between the eyes." Then he opened the pamphlet and began to +read passages that he had heavily scored with blue pencil. The Czar +has abolished the sale of vodka for ever! What is the result? +</P> + +<P> +"The old women in the villages," read the ticket-collector, "can hardly +believe their own eyes, so changed are their menfolk.... Everywhere +peace, kindness and industry. War is said to be hell; but this is like +a foretaste of heaven." +</P> + +<P> +"Listen to this," cried the collector, his arm outstretched. "A +newspaper correspondent writes, since the sale of vodka stopped the old +night population (in the doss-houses) seems to have vanished." Every +passage he read bore the same testimony. +</P> + +<P> +"And what are we doing?" he exclaimed. "We have stopped nothing; we +surround our soldiers with the old temptations, and we leave their +defenceless wives exposed to the same temptations; I know all about it. +Mahn, it was Ruskin that said, 'There is no wealth but life,' and we +leave all our wealth of life at the mercy of every evil. It's a fair +scandal. Do you ken the conclusion I've come to! It is that the best +form of government is a benevolent despotism. Oor men are afraid of +this and that—losing votes—but an autocrat with a stroke of a pen can +sweep away the power of hell. If they would only make King George an +autocrat for a few years.... That would be grand!" +</P> + +<P> +He insisted on lending me the blue-covered pamphlet, and it being his +hour off he walked with me across the bridge. The valley was now dark. +The snuff-manufacturer's house down below was wrapped in gloom. Lights +twinkled on the slopes. Below a lamp-post at the far end of the bridge +two men stood. When he saw them the ticket-collector stood fast. +</P> + +<P> +"Mahn," said he, "I've come to a great resolution. I'm too old to +fight; and they canna get at me in ony way. No Income-tax for me; and +threepence on the tea is naething, for I never take it; I want to feel +that I am worth men dying for me; and I am going to be tee-total till +the end of the war. I'll give the money to help the soldiers' weans. +It's the weans that pull at my heart-strings." +</P> + +<P> +And he turned on his heel and walked rapidly back across the bridge. +</P> + +<P> +Under the lamp-post stood the roadman and the beadle, looking after +him. I spoke to them, for since the war began we all speak to each +other in our parish. +</P> + +<P> +"Has he forgotten ony thin'?" asked the roadman, waving a hand towards +the retreating form of the ticket-collector. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't think so," I answered, "he just said that he was going to be +tee-total till the end of the war." +</P> + +<P> +"Tee-total!" echoed the roadman mournfully; "there gangs anither lost +soul!" +</P> + +<P> +My two friends went sadly down the steep brae, and I turned up the long +flight of stone steps that leads to the road above. On the top of the +first flight I turned and looked after them. When they came opposite +the door of the village inn, they slowed down ... and then went +resolutely past, down into the hollow. The two of them have probably +resolved to join the company of the "lost souls." +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="20%"> + +<P> +I have read the ticket-collector's pamphlet, and I feel a little dazed. +It is such an odd world, and the strange thing is that I never realised +its queerness before. A Grand Duke is murdered in a place of which I +never heard before, and whose name I cannot even now trust myself to +write down correctly, and here, a thousand miles away, the result is +that I am brought face to face for the first time with the problem that +lay twice a day under my feet—the problem of the Cities of the Plain. +A flood of light seems to have fallen on things which were aforetime +hazy. Events stand out luridly and arrestingly. Here is one. I was +in a far Hebridean isle when war broke out. All of a sudden there +sounded the drum, +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">"Saying Come,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">Freemen, come,</SPAN><BR> +Ere your heritage be wasted! said the<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">quick alarming drum."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +And the manhood of the island sprang to their feet. Mothers gave their +sons, sending them away with sobs and tears, but in the name of God. +</P> + +<P> +On a drizzling morning the little steamer lay at the pier, crowded with +men and horses, going out to fight and die. The hawsers were loosed. +The steamer churned and backed and crept away. A girl stood near me +crying softly. A youth with clean-cut features, and the yearning no +tongue can utter shining in his eyes, leant over the taffrail and +called to her, "Not crying, Jessie?" And she wiped her cheek with the +moist handkerchief, and turned a smiling face to him and said, "No, I +am not crying." And the paddles churned faster, and they passed into +the drizzle and the haze. Weeks later I read how one man of that +regiment—the regiment of my own county—killed another ... and a few +days later I read that he had done so in a drunken brawl. He was not +from the island, that man, and I know not who he is. His mother +doubtless sent him forth to fight as a hero for his King, and he became +a murderer under the fostering of the State. +</P> + +<P> +Out of the clean countryside they were taken, these men, and the State +that summoned them, and whose call they answered, surrounded them with +temptations. Away from the influence of mother and sister and +sweetheart, wearied and worn with the hard toil of preparation, the +State opened the canteen and said, "Take your ease thus," and they did +so. The Secretary of War made appeals to them. "Be sober," said he, +"avoid alcohol, that the State, through your self-denial, may live." +But the State said, "See, I have made ample provision for you, so that +you may disregard the noble advice my servant gives you." They came in +their thousands across the Atlantic from the far North-West at the call +of their mother—clean and sober—and their mother opened the canteen +for their benefit on the plain. Such a world as that dwelt in the +imagination of Dean Swift—I never imagined that it could exist here +and now. And in that world of the cities of the plain, what reward are +we preparing for the men who are baring their breasts to the arrows, +standing between us and death? When they come back, war-worn, to what +will they return? To homes in which the fires are extinguished, the +candles burnt down to the socket; the cupboards bare, the children +famished and neglected? Is that to be the guerdon of their sacrifice; +is it for that that they have gone down into hell? Surely it cannot be +for that! A wave has passed over us, raising us to the realisation of +the higher values of things. Words live for us now which were dead +yesterday. A beam of light has fallen into the chamber of imagery, and +the word <I>Temperance</I> has risen from the couch on which it lay dying, +and it claims us for its own. Through it we can make the world know +that we are worth fighting for—worth that the young, the strong, and +the brave should take everything they hold dear—their ideals, their +love, their little children unborn—and throw them into the trench, and +there give themselves and their dreams to death for us. We must see to +it that we are worthy the sacrifice. +</P> + +<P> +*** +</P> + +<P> +It seemed to me hitherto that I was a citizen of the country endowed +with the greatest freedom on earth. But the ticket-collector has +proved to me that that was a dream. Here in our parish I have no power +to control this thing that matters so vitally in the Cities of the +Plain. We have a Parish Council and a County Council, and I don't know +how many other dignified and honourable authorities, whom we elect. +But we elect nobody to control this. A body of unelected Justices, of +whom we know nothing, settle for us that down yonder in the Cities of +the Plain there shall be half a dozen State-regulated places for the +manufacturing of paupers and criminals. (The laws change with such +kaleidoscopic swiftness in those days that I may be wrong.) And here +am I, newly awakened by the ticket-collector to that enormity, and I am +not free to do anything. It is surely a mad world. We needed to be +awakened; and we have been awakened with the shriek of shells and the +crying of the perishing! And the result of the awakening will be +regeneration for the Cities of the Plain. +</P> + +<P> +*** +</P> + +<P> +The ticket-collector has deprived me for the time being of my peace of +mind. My conversion is so recent that I am afraid of falling into the +fanaticism of the newly converted. I followed the General the other +day into the railway carriage, and as we were passing over Sodom, lying +there under our feet, I spoke to him about it. He looked at me with +cold eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you want to sacrifice the freedom of the individual?" he asked in +his curt military tones; "do you think that you can make saints of +people by Act of Parliament? They would be mere plaster-saints." +</P> + +<P> +I was reduced to silence. My new-born zeal seemed to ooze out at every +pore. There was a touch of amused scorn in the General's eye as he +glanced at me. The General is a man of experience, and he is quite +right. Acts of Parliament will never make saints of the people. But +the State can see to it that the people are not surrounded by +temptations through the operations of Acts of Parliament; that, if the +State is impotent to make saints, it shall not, on the other hand, set +itself deliberately to make devils. That, it seems to me, is what the +State is now doing in the Cities of the Plain. +</P> + +<P> +In ten thousand schools the State sanctions that its children be taught +to pray—"Lead us not into temptation," and that same State encircles +the path of its children by legalised temptations at every corner. It +is the maddest of worlds. I may be wrong and the General wholly right. +But as the ticket-collector said the last time I saw him—"I would like +to see the man who could convince me that I am wrong." And I don't +know whether to be grateful to the ticket-collector or not. He has +deprived me of some of my sleep; he has made my head ache with thinking +of problems which I am not fit to cope with; and, most unlooked for of +all, he has made a tee-totaler of me till the end of the war. There is +a plaintive note in the ticket-collector's voice, which strikes a chord +in my heart, when he invariably adds: "I hope the war won't last long." +For, if it does, there will be the danger of the ticket-collector and +myself becoming teetotalers for altogether. And it is such an ugly +word—tee-totaler! If only the ticket-collector would coin a new and +beautiful word to connote his new and beneficent state of mind! It is +a pity that great causes should be burdened by the weight of ugly words. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +GLASGOW: PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS<BR> +BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO. LTD.<BR> +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Great Discovery, by Norman Maclean + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREAT DISCOVERY *** + +***** This file should be named 33635-h.htm or 33635-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/3/6/3/33635/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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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 Great Discovery + +Author: Norman Maclean + +Release Date: September 4, 2010 [EBook #33635] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GREAT DISCOVERY *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + +THE GREAT DISCOVERY + + +BY + +NORMAN MACLEAN + + + + +"Had I stood aside when in defiance of pledges to which my kingdom was +a party, the soil of Belgium was violated and her cities laid desolate, +when the very life of the French nation was threatened with extinction, +I should have sacrificed my honour, and given to destruction the +liberties of my Empire and of mankind." + +_Proclamation by King George V._ + + + + +GLASGOW + +JAMES MACLEHOSE AND SONS + +PUBLISHERS TO THE UNIVERSITY + +1915 + + + + +PUBLISHED BY + +JAMES MACLEHOSE AND SONS, GLASGOW + +Publishers to the University + + +MACMILLAN AND CO. LTD. LONDON + + New York ... The Macmillan Co. + Toronto .... The Macmillan Co. of Canada + London ..... Simpkin, Hamilton and Co. + Cambridge .. Bowes and Bowes + Edinburgh .. Douglas and Foulis + Sydney ..... Angus and Robertson + +MCMXV + + + + +_BY THE SAME AUTHOR._ + + DWELLERS IN THE MIST. + HILLS OF HOME. + THE BURNT OFFERING. + CAN THE WORLD BE WON FOR CHRIST? + AFRICA IN TRANSFORMATION. + + + + +TO + +J. P. CROAL + +TO WHOM THIS BOOK OWES + +ITS EXISTENCE + + + + +Preface + +Six articles which the writer contributed to _The Scotsman_ constitute +this book. Four of these, which appeared under the title "In Our +Parish," were, in response to requests, re-printed by _The Scotsman_ as +leaflets, and in that form had a circulation that reached an aggregate +of 100,000. One of the articles (now Chapter II.), which was published +on February 14, 1914, has been revised and somewhat enlarged. The rest +are reprinted substantially as they were originally written. + +In these last months there has come to the nation a spiritual and +ethical revival. Life will never again be what it was in the last long +summer days ere the guns began to speak. It will be a better world +than it has yet been. The nation is being saved as by fire, and in the +fire much dross will be consumed. The conscience of the State has been +stirred, and it cannot in the future acquiesce in the continuance of +the social evils which are gnawing at the nation's heart. The fate of +the Empire in the long years to come will depend more on the fight for +social renewal in the midst of the streets than on red battlefields. +To the men who have stood between the race and destruction the State +owes a debt which it can only repay by such measures of social +regeneration as will make possible for every man and woman to realise +the thrill and the joy of life. These pages only represent an effort +to portray the first stirring of that newly awakened consciousness of +God and of duty which was felt in every parish throughout the Empire, +and which is destined to transform the world. + + + + +Contents + + + I. THE GREAT DISCOVERY + II. THE REVIVAL OF PATRIOTISM + III. THE SHADOW OF THE CROSS + IV. THE POWER OF PRAYER + V. THE VICTORY + VI. THE CITIES OF THE PLAIN + + + + +I + +The Great Discovery + + + +I + +While the thing is still fresh in my mind I will try to put it down on +paper--the incredible thing that has happened in our parish. When we +had least thought about life's great things, we have come face to face +with the greatest. + +We had been for long years living on the surface of things. The sun +basked on the slopes of the hills, purple at eve; we came back from the +offices in town, plunged through the tunnel, and hastened to our +gardens. We lifted up our eyes to the hills, and our security seemed +as immovable as their crests soaring above the little dells that were +haunts of ancient peace around their foundations. + +Long years of ease dimmed our vision. The church bell rang in vain for +many of us. Those who had six whole days in the week to devote to +their own pleasure began to devote the seventh also to that same end. +The day of peace was becoming a day of unrest. + +Thus it was with us when, with the suddenness of a lightning flash, the +incredible overtook us. + +*** + +If only one could put it into words! But words can never express this +sudden meeting of man and God when that meeting was least expected. + +It was heralded by the booming of guns across the sea. The great city +lay slumbering between us and the shore, but over the turrets and +spires it came--boom, boom--under the stars. It was war. That +far-away echo might not itself be the grim struggle of death, but it +was its harbinger. Over all the seas death would soon be riding on the +billows. Faces became stern. Good-byes were spoken. + +Ah! that word "Good-bye," which we hear every day, and which, like +those old coins which have passed from hand to hand so long until at +last the image and superscription are gone, had lost all trace of its +original meaning, retaining nothing but a faint aroma of courtesy, +which sometimes vanished in the inflection of the voice until the word +became only a discourteous dismissal--that word was born for us anew. +We heard it on the lips of mothers clinging to the hands of their sons, +who were summoned away to join their regiments, and as white lips said +"Good-bye" to those whose blood was to water the fair fields of France, +we suddenly realised what it meant. The word, meaningless yesterday, +to-day expressed the greatest wish that the lips of man can utter--God +be with thee. On the mother's lips the word was the commitment of her +boy to the charge of the encompassing God. Then, when the harvest was +ripening on the slopes and the drum sounded "Come," and the young and +the strong went forth with a smile to the great harvesting of death, we +learned again the meaning of a phrase. But we were yet to learn the +meaning of a word. + +It is in the darkness that the stars appear and the immeasurable +abysses of the infinite universe, and it was when the dusk sank into +the deep night that the word rose high in the firmament of life and +burned red into our souls. And that word was God. + +It seemed so incredible to us that we should need that old word. We +were so powerful and so rich. Our faith was strong, but it was in the +reeking tube and in the smoking shard, and in the number of our +Dreadnoughts. Then all these things seemed to fail us. A nightmare +seemed to fall on us--a nightmare which lifted not night or day. Our +soldiers were driven back, back, back. They fought by day and marched +by night, and we heard in the night watches the beating of their +wearied feet, blood stained. + +Was there to be no end to that tramp, tramp of men yielding before +death? Was the Empire reared by the heroism of generations to crumble +under our feet? The ghastly deeds of shame--were they to come to our +doors! We looked at our children, and they could not understand the +light in our eyes. These deeds of hell--they might occur even now +under the shadow of our hills. It was then that the word began to +blaze in the heavens. And the word was--God. + +*** + +We had built a new church in our parish, that those who built pleasant +houses on the slopes, fleeing from the restless city that lay below, +might have room to worship. But the desire to worship seemed to be +dying of attrition. And the old church where the quarriers and farm +servants assembled and worshipped in an atmosphere that on a warm day +became so thick that one could cut it with a knife--that old church +would have been quite big enough to hold all who came, for the instinct +to pray seemed to be dying. And many, because the new church was now +too big, regretted the old. + +Then, suddenly, the new church was filled to the door. Men and women +discovered the road leading down to the hollow where the church stands +amid the graves of the generations. With wistful faces they turned +towards it. While the bell rang they stood in groups among the graves. +And if you listened there was but one word--war, war, war. Over and +over again just that one word. Until the bell was silent, and they +turned into the now crowded church. + +As I sat there and cast a glance around me, I felt a sudden amazement. +Those who never before had come down the steep brae when the bell was +ringing were sitting here and there just as if they had been there +every Sunday when the beadle, with head erect, ushers the minister to +the pulpit and snips him in. (Though the church is new, the minister +is yet snipped in by the beadle--a lonely prisoner there on his perch, +and it is an uncanny sound to hear the click of that snip shutting in +the solitary man.) + +In the pew in front of me sat a burly man with a head like a dome. He +never came to church. When I met him he would stand for an hour in the +lane among the hawthorns explaining his views. Prayer was mere +superstition. Cosmic laws unchanging and unchangeable held the +universe in their grasp. To ask that one of these laws should be +altered for a moment that a boon might be conferred on us was to ask +that the universe might be shattered. Prayer was immoral, the asking +for what could not be granted, and what we knew could not be granted. +If he went to church it would be hypocrisy on his part. + +And thus it came that when the farm servants came up the Gallows road +on their way to church on a summer morning, they often heard the whirr +of my friend's mowing machine as he mowed his lawn. It was the way he +took of letting the parish know that culture could have no dealings +with effete superstitions. + +*** + +And yet there he sat in front of me with a hymn-book which he picked up +from the shelf at the door, where such books are piled for the use of +camp-followers. The tune of the opening Psalm was Kilmarnock, and my +friend sang it in a way which showed that his mother had trained him +well. Then I forgot him, but after a while something like a stifled +sob in front of me brought him again to my consciousness. + +The minister began to pray for the King's forces "on the sea, on the +land, and in the air." My mind was playing round the words "in the +air," for they were an intrusion into the familiar order--an +innovation! Every invention of man seemed doomed to become a weapon in +the hand of the devil. But the prayer went on--for the sailors keeping +their watches in the darkness of the night that God might watch over +them, that through their unfaltering courage our shores might be +inviolate; for the soldiers now facing the enemy, grappling with death, +that God might succour them, covering their heads in the day of battle. +"Break Thou down the fierce power of our enemies," cried the minister +suddenly, "that with full hearts we may praise Thee, the God of our +fathers." + +A great hush fell on the crowded church. The shut eyes saw the red +battlefields, with the lines swaying to and fro, while the shrapnel +burst and the aeroplanes whirred in the smoke of the cannon. The cries +of men suddenly smitten smote on the inner ear. It was then that the +great thing happened. + +All of a sudden the voice broke, recovered, and broke again, and the +minister was swept away from the well-ordered, beautiful words he had +prepared. He began to speak of the stricken hearts at home, of fathers +and mothers to whom their sons would never return, of women in empty +houses with their husbands laid in nameless graves, of little children +who would never learn to say "Father" ... It was then that my friend +stifled a sob. There was Something after all, Someone greater than +cosmic forces, greater than law--with an eye to pity and an arm to +save. There was God. + +And my friend's son was with the famous regiment that was swaying to +and fro, grappling with destiny. He was helpless--and there was only +God to appeal to. There comes an hour in life when the heart realises +that instinct is mightier far than that logic which is, after all is +said, only the last refuge of the feeble-minded. There came like the +sudden lifting of a curtain the vision of a whole nation--nay, of races +girdling the whole earth--to whom the same high experience has come. +Everywhere the sanctuaries filled, the eyes turned upward, for instinct +is mightier than reason. The smoke of battle has revealed the face of +God. + +*** + +With us in the parish churches of Scotland the great thing is the +sermon. But to-day it is different; the great thing now is prayer. +And the minister preached about prayer. He set forth in clear and +ordered language, with a felicitous phrase now and then lighting up his +sentences, that prayer was not a mere relic of fanatical superstition +but a mighty power. He discussed with a wealth of learning whether God +had shut Himself in behind a prison-house of cosmic laws that made it +impossible for Him to answer prayer. He reasoned the worshippers cold. +But there in that hour reason was bound to give way before intuition. + +"If I am free," cried the preacher, "to rush to the help of my child +when he crieth in terror; and if, when the creatures of His hand cry to +God He is bound and cannot help or soothe, then He is poorer than I, so +great a thing is freedom." Prayer was not mere spiritual gymnastics. +A God immured in cold laws, barred for ever from the play of love or +tenderness, would be the one being in the universe most to be pitied. +The Creator did not sit deaf and dumb on the Throne of indifference +answering nothing, doing nothing. History was the proof that +Righteousness was throned at the core of the universe, for at the last +right ever prevailed. + +Then the measured tones went on to speak of the difficulty of believing +in the efficacy of prayer when Christians faced Christians in mortal +conflict, and they both cried for victory--both the children of the One +Father crying for victory over each other. But the difficulty was of +appearance only. For the only prevailing prayer was prayer in the name +of Christ. "Whatsoever ye shall ask _in My name_ that will I do." To +ask in His name was to ask in His spirit--the spirit of humility, +self-sacrifice, and love--the spirit of self-surrender to the _will_ +supreme. The question was which of the prayers for victory was prayer +in the name of Christ.... + +This was clear, convincing, but cold. Only at rare intervals does the +minister of our parish give way to passion. Suddenly there came a wave +of emotion. He flung his head back, and his eyes glowed. His voice +vibrated through the church. "When I think," he exclaimed, "of the +things that have been done with the name of God on men's lips; of +atrocities such as the unspeakable Turk never perpetrated; of war waged +not upon to-day but upon the centuries of faith that reared great +cathedrals now in flames; of women and children laid upon the reeking +altars of human passion; and all this in the name of culture, the +culture of the superman who deems himself superior to the Ten +Commandments--then, I say, may God grant that the culture which beareth +such fruit may perish from off the face of the earth. Prayer for the +triumph of such a cause cannot be in Christ's name...." + +But the preacher never got any further. + +This was what happened, and I am afraid some will not believe me, for a +Scotsman in church is a stoic, motionless and dumb, as he listens to +the Word. But all the traditions of the parish were snapped in a +second. In the side gallery sat the General, sitting as he always does +with his back to the minister. This he does that he may mark who are +in church of his servants and tenants, and who absent. + +When I read of the nobles in France who went to the scaffold with a +jest in the days of the Terror, I always think of the General. He is +that sort of man. To-day, little by little, as the sermon went on, he +turned round. At last he was facing the pulpit. His gleaming eyes +were fixed on the preacher. His son was dead. And when the words rang +through the church, may God grant that such culture may perish ... the +General sprang to his feet. "Amen" rang his voice through the church. + +There was a sudden movement; as one man they all rose to their feet. +Hands were lifted up to heaven. "Amen," "Amen," they cried--and then +there rose a cheer--muffled, but still a cheer. In the pulpit the +words died on the preacher's lips. He seemed as one suddenly stricken. +He gazed bewildered over the sea of faces. They sank back into the +pews as though suddenly ashamed. + +The last man to sit was my friend, who stood to the last with uplifted +hand. I think it was he who cried "Hear, hear"--the only sign he gave +of his long absence from church. The sermon was never finished. The +preacher in a low voice said, "Let us pray." And he humbled himself as +one who enters the valley of humiliation. And then he gave out this +psalm:-- + + Now Israel + May say, and that truly, + If that the Lord + Had not our cause maintained; + * * * * * + Then certainly + They had devoured us all. + * * * * * + But blessed be God, + Who doth us safely keep, + And hath not giv'n + Us for a living prey + Unto their teeth, + And bloody cruelty. + * * * * * + +This psalm as we sang it that day was a paean of triumph. The clouds +suddenly broke. We heard our fathers singing it in their dark days. +The melody wedded to the words soared in exultant triumph, wailed like +the cry of the shingle swept by the surf; the sighing of the wind over +the heather was in it, and the hissing of the storm through the spray. +It was fierce as devouring death; it was gentle as a mother crooning +over her child. It put iron into the blood of our fathers as they sang +it. + +It was nerved by such a hymn that the sailors of Queen Elizabeth swept +the main, that the Puritans wrestled with principalities and powers, +that a handful of moors-men levelled despotism and tyranny to the +ground. It swept through our blood like flame as we in our day of +stress now sang it. We, too, would pull down strongholds and turn to +flight the armies of the alien. In all ages the cause of freedom +triumphed, and that cause was ours. We had entered on conflict with +clean hands and, God helping us, we would wage it with clean hands. +The clouds suddenly broke and the light of victory irradiated our +faces. There came overwhelmingly the realisation that there was a +power behind us mightier far than sword or shell--even the Lord God +Omnipotent. And that was how we made the greatest of all +discoveries--we found God. + +*** + +Yesterday morning I went early to the station, and there in the booking +office I found my friend talking to the ticket-collector. The +ticket-collector is a philosopher, and he comes to church, because he +loves the old psalm tunes. But when one of our parishioners who goes +now and then to Keswick comes to the booking office, the +ticket-collector calls him in and reasons with him gently. + +"Mahn, there's naething in it," he says; "I can tell you for a fact +there's naething in it--all a whack of fables." "Some day you'll find +out to your cost that there's something in it," flashes the man from +Keswick. "If ye wad only reid philosophee," says the ticket-collector, +"ye would ken better." But to-day my friend and the ticket-collector +had their heads close together, and I only heard the conclusion of +their argument. "Mahn," said the ticket-collector, "I am beginning to +think there may be something in it." + +And in the evening near the top of the brae I saw the General standing +erect with his little cane in his hand. He was talking to the +shoemaker, the greatest Radical in the parish--one of a party with +which the General has no dealings. But they talked like brothers. For +the shoemaker has a son fighting at the front, and his heart is sore +troubled within him. And the General's son is dead. And as I came up +the brae I saw the General putting his hand on the shoemaker's shoulder +and turn away, walking slowly up the brae. The old shoemaker saluted +and came down the brae. There was a tender look in the old man's eye +as he greeted me. + +In our parish we have truly made the greatest of all discoveries. We +have found God, and, finding Him, we have found each other. The man +who in his madness kindled the lurid flames of war little dreamed of +this fire which he kindled. + + + + +II + +The Revival of Patriotism + + + +II + +There has come to us in these days a revival of the spirit of +patriotism. That revival has come when it was sorely needed. In days +of unclouded prosperity other gods called forth our devotion and +enthusiasm, but the God of our Fathers who made us a great nation and +sent us to sow the seeds of righteousness beside all waters, bestowing +upon us empire and might, was well-nigh forgotten. + +For the new man "words like Empire, Patriotism, Duty, Honour, Glory and +God" had little or no meaning. Causes for which the fathers died could +not evoke an added heart-beat from their sons. They cared so little +for the mighty empire which they inherited that they contemplated the +bloodshed of civil war--so hot was their zeal for party and so cold +their love for the state. + +It was necessary that discipline should come. And that discipline +came, shaking the very foundations of our national life. Its first +fruit is that the smouldering fires of patriotism have broken forth +once more into bright flame; and that everywhere the hearts of the +people have been stirred by the call to arise and endure hardness that +the goodly heritage of empire perish not. And preachers in a thousand +pulpits have sounded the trumpet-note of duty and of patriotism. + +*** + +It has been said that preachers should aim at making the churches +sanctuaries of peace, within whose walls the echoes of the guns and the +cries of the perishing should not penetrate. Some have even said that +Christianity, so far from fostering the spirit of patriotism, is in +reality hostile to it. "Patriotism itself as a duty," says Lecky, "has +never found any place in Christian ethics, and strong theological +feeling has usually been directly hostile to its growth." + +No doubt there is something to be said for that view. The attitude of +the early Christians towards the Roman Empire was not that of +patriotism. The clear shining of the heavenly Jerusalem so dazzled +their eyes that this world, and the temporal empire occupying its +stage, seemed but as a shadow. Their devotion to the Unseen King left +little room for loyalty to the earthly ruler. In the glorious +consciousness of his citizenship in heaven, it was a small thing in the +estimation of St. Paul that he was also a Roman citizen--but he did not +forget it. But when the earthly ruler persecuted, and burnt, and threw +the Christians to the lions, or slaughtered them to make a Roman +holiday, then the poor victims cannot be blamed for not being patriots. + +And the Church in the mediaeval period, organised in the mighty +hierarchy of Rome, did not tend to foster a national spirit of +patriotism. In those days when the Emperor Theodosius made penance in +the Cathedral of Milan and Ambrose declared that "the Church is not in +the empire, but the Emperor in the Church"; or in those later days when +Hildebrand promulgated the doctrine that the temporal power was subject +to the spiritual power, and kings and emperors were only vassals of the +Church, and Henry V. was left three days standing barefooted in the +snow waiting humbly to see the Pope at Canossa--in those days certainly +Christianity sought to foster not the sense of national loyalty, but +that of devotion towards that holy Catholic and universal Church whose +visible head was the Pope. Christianity placed the Pope on the throne +of the Caesars, and sought to evoke towards him a patriotism which +transcended nationality. But the Reformation gave its death blow to +Hildebrandism, and the Pope no longer usurped the temporal Thrones of +Europe. And there came the throb of the awakening spirit of +nationality. The spirit of patriotism stirred once more the slumbering +races. + +*** + +The question whether patriotism is a fruit of Christianity must be +answered not by reference to what men did in the name of their +religion--for men are fallible--but by the precept and example of the +Founder of Christianity. He was a Jew, and of all races the Jew was +the most patriotic. An exile by the rivers of Babylon, the Israelite +refused to forget Zion. "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right +hand forget its cunning"--that was the cry wherewith his unconquerable +soul faced an overwhelming destiny. And in this respect Jesus Christ +was true to His race. He was a patriot. He worshipped in the +synagogues, and went on pilgrimages to Jerusalem, because He loved the +national institutions of His country. One note of true patriotism is +anguish. It is when love is great that the folly and sin of the person +beloved pierce the heart. + +The patriotism of the Founder of Christianity expressed itself in a cry +of agony which has reverberated through the centuries--"O Jerusalem, +Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them that are +sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, +even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! +Behold, your house is left unto you desolate." That cry is the measure +of His patriotism. + +Judged, then, by the example of its Founder, Christianity must produce +the spirit of love and loyalty towards one's own country. There was a +patriotism before Christianity, but it was that of arrogance, +aggression, and self-glorification. It was a patriotism which meted +out only contempt to other races. To the Jew the Greek was only a +Gentile dog; to the Greek the Jew was only a contemptible Barbarian. + +But the patriotism which is animated by the Christian spirit is far +other. It is not the vaunting of pride nor the shouting of vulgar +ditties. It seeks the glory of its own country, but the glory it seeks +is the glory of the greater service rendered to humanity. Conscious of +its own defects, it does not condemn others. With eyes cleansed from +prejudice, it beholds the good in other races. It seeks the first +place for its own nation because it acts the noblest, loves the best. +All the elements which make up the strong power of patriotism--love of +family, love of neighbours, love of race, love of country--Christianity +has purified them all. True patriotism is, then, a fruit of the +Christian religion, a virtue which falls to be inculcated by the +Church. If Christianity be the projection of the Christ-life into the +midst of every generation, then the life that reflects the beauty of +Christ must be a life animated by the deepest love of one's country. + +*** + +It was Dean Stanley who rendered God thanks in Paisley Abbey for that +Scotsmen were "citizens of an Empire so great, members of a Church so +free." In the building up of the Empire Scotsmen have borne a great +share of toil and peril. In other days the fires of patriotism burned +brightly. The cry of our fathers was "my country right or wrong." But +we feel not quite so sure of our country being always in the right. +The passion of Christianity is an ethical passion. Christian +patriotism demands national righteousness. To keep patriotism as an +ardent fire we must be convinced that our country stands for +righteousness. And in this day of our ordeal we have this certainty to +uphold us, that we are fighting for the right. + +It was not in defiance of Christianity, but in its defence, that we +drew the sword. For this war sprang from an unbridled lust of conquest +to which a whole nation surrendered itself. But before surrendering to +the passions of war the ideals of Christ were first forsaken by our +enemy. A new law was promulgated: "Become hard, O my brethren, for we +are emancipated and the world belongs to us." New beatitudes were +declared: "Ye have heard how ... it was said, Blessed are the meek ... +but I say unto you, Blessed are the valiant, for they shall make the +earth their throne ... Ye have read, Blessed are the peacemakers, but I +say unto you, Blessed are the war-makers, for they shall be called, if +not the children of Jehovah, the children of Odin, who is greater than +Jehovah." + +Out of this new gospel, the gospel of Odin, has sprung a war of +extermination--exiled nations, devastated kingdoms, desolated colleges, +ruined cathedrals, and multitudes of women and children "left nothing +but their eyes to weep with." The name of God has been invoked over +unspeakable barbarities--but the God thus invoked is not the Christian +God. It is Odin in whose name these things are done. What we are +fighting for is for the Christian ideal against Odin--for the law of +truth and mercy against the reign of falsehood of word and bond, and of +merciless barbarity. We have bared the breast to death that there may +sit on the throne of the world's soul, not a ruthless tribal god, but +the God of Fatherhood and Love whom Jesus Christ revealed. And in +waging that war we have ground to hope that the God of righteousness is +on our side. + +If we have not had the name of God constantly on our lips it is not +because we do not feel that we are fighting His battle, but because He +is so great, the Lord of Heaven and Earth before whom we are but as +dust, that we shrink from coupling His great name with ours. "Are you +sure that God is on your side?" Abraham Lincoln was asked in the dark +days of the American Civil War. "I have not thought about that," he +replied; "but I am very anxious to know whether we are on God's side." +And when the causes of this war are examined the assurance grows +stronger and stronger that we are on God's side. That is why the whole +nation has been welded into the unity and consistency of polished +steel; why the fire of patriotism burns in our midst with an intenser +heat than ever before. + +*** + +It is not merely from the righteousness of our cause in this war that +our patriotism draws inspiration, but also from the ideals for which +our Empire stands over all the world. As we look out to-day on the +Empire which our fathers bequeathed us, taking it all in all, it stands +for righteousness as no other on earth. It stands for the freedom of +the soul and the freedom of the body all over the world. + +Think of India, whose three hundred millions have been rescued from +tyranny and ceaseless bloodshed, whose widows have been saved from the +flames, whose starving have been fed in famine, and to whom the British +race brought security and peace. "When I think," said ex-President +Taft, "of what England has done in India ... how she found those many +millions torn by internecine strife, disrupted with constant wars, +unable to continue agriculture or the arts of peace, with inferior +roads, tyranny, and oppression; and when I think what the Government of +Great Britain is now doing for these alien races, the debt the world +owes England ought to be acknowledged in no grudging manner." + +No work ever done on earth for the elevation of humanity can compare +with that wrought in India by our race for the uplift of humanity; and +it is the same wherever the standard of Britain waves. In our own day +we have seen in Egypt a whole race rising out of the mud and clothed +anew in the garments of self-respect. Through Africa, wherever the +sway of Britain extends, though yesterday the land reeked with blood, +to-day mercy and kindness are healing the woes of men, and millions who +knew not when death lurked for them in the bush now sleep in peace +under the palms. It was the might of Britain that destroyed the slave +trade, and it is nothing except the might of Britain which prevents the +slave raider resuming his nefarious traffic, and slavery under the +guise of other names being imposed on the natives of Africa. Wherever +you go, to the tropics or the Orient, there the great power for +righteousness is the British Empire. It does not exploit inferior +races for gold; it is the trustee of the helpless native. + +When one thinks of these little islands floating in the western sea, of +the power that has gone forth from them to heal and bless, of the vast +multitudes to whom the King-Emperor is the symbol of justice and +security--his is a poor heart which cannot feel the thrill of gratitude +for citizenship in an Empire girdling the whole earth, whose +foundations are thus laid in righteousness. + +*** + +Patriotism is not, however, a mere sentiment. It was not sentiment +which built up the Empire. It was self-sacrifice--the spirit that +faced and endured death. For us, too, patriotism must be more than +sentiment; it must be action and the self-sacrifice which action +requires. + +What our fathers reared we must defend. And the startling thing is +that there are still so many of our people who shrink from the burden +which patriotism imposes. Many thousands refuse to prepare themselves +for war; who are as the Romans who could not leave their baths to go +and fight. + +Vast multitudes congregate to gaze on football matches and gamble on +the issue. The call of King and country falls on ears grown deaf. We +thank God for those who, hearing the call, have gone forth to fight, +counting everything but loss as compared to their country's gain. But +these others, they cannot have paused to think. They have not pictured +these fair lands, that have not heard the sound of war for seven +generations, given over to that devouring enemy which has made Belgium +a wilderness. + +They have not thought of Oxford and St. Andrews sharing the fate of +Louvain; of London and Edinburgh become as Brussels; of the millions of +Glasgow and Birmingham thrown on the mercies of the world, women and +children fleeing, driven by nameless fears, with no place to flee to +but the mountain fastnesses of Wales and the Highlands of Scotland--the +last refuge of the miserable and the broken. And yet these miseries +would surely befall were all the manhood of the race such as these. + +Think what it would mean were the walls of our defence broken down. +Supposing that a shattering blow were struck at the heart of the Empire +and our fleet crushed. What would follow? The crumbling of the Empire +in a week! It is not we alone, with our wives and children in these +little islands, who would be swept to ruin, and on whom despair would +fall. From the far north-west to the long wash of the Australasian +seas the shadow of devouring misery and death would fall on humanity. +The millions of India would be forthwith swept into the whirlpools of +war and mutiny. Egypt would be thrown back into chaos. Africa would +be left to Islam and the merciless rule of a nation which knows but how +to smite. Australia and New Zealand would be at the mercy of the +yellow races. + +It would not be a calamity for us in these islands alone. It would be +a calamity whose withering blight would be cast over all the world. +The ideals of righteousness which this Empire upholds would be trampled +everywhere under foot. Covetousness and the lust of gold would hold +the field of the world. + +There is only one thing to be done, one duty summoning us with an +irresistible call--the duty that calls us to stand between our country +and destruction. Were the fate which has overtaken the Low Country to +overtake us; were this fair land to be made a wilderness, our women and +children driven into the wilds, and the Empire wrested from our hands, +the men who failed in their duty would never be able to hold up their +heads again. + +What a terrible load would lie on him who, beholding the ruin of his +native land, could say, "This might not have happened if I, and others +like me, had done our duty." That would be a hell from which there +would be no escape. "Which way I fly is hell; myself am hell." + +There can be no limit to the sacrifice which patriotism requires, so +great a heritage is our native land. It does not require of us as +Christians to engage in wars of conquest for the gratification of pride +and greed, but it does require of us even the sacrifice of our lives in +the defence of our homes or in the defence of our brother's home. + +There are those who find themselves faced with difficulty. They are +called upon to fight with every force in their power, to slay, +withholding not their hand, while they hear the commandment, "Thou +shall not kill," ringing in their ears, and across the centuries the +voice of their Lord saying, "Resist not evil; whosoever shall smite +thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also." They are +bewildered. Is not the attitude of non-resistance that which Jesus +Christ enjoins? If they fight with sword and shell are they not +lowering themselves to the level of Nietzsche, Bernhardi and Buelow, and +submitting to the arbitrament of the sword, which decides nothing +except its own sharpness. The call of patriotism summoning to resist +even unto blood comes to them, and they are uncertain whether to obey. + +But we must interpret the will of God, not by isolated sentences, but +by the whole content of the divine revelation. The commandment, "Thou +shalt not kill," does not mean that we are not to kill in any +circumstance whatever. If the commandment is to be taken literally, +then no limit is to be set to it, and we must not kill any animal--not +even the parasites of uncleanness. There is, moreover, another law +which runs: "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be +shed, for in the image of God created He him." So far from the mere +physical life being for ever sacred, the very altar of God Himself was +to be no sanctuary for the murderer. The man who owned a vicious ox +and knew him to be vicious, and the ox killed a man, the owner thereof +was to be slain. There are therefore circumstances in which the law, +"Thou shalt not kill," is abrogated, and its place is taken by the law, +"Thou shalt kill." + +The law demanding the conservation of life rests on this foundation, +not that physical life itself is sacred, but that human life bears the +image of God. There are things far more sacred than the physical +life--even those things which constitute the image of God stamped upon +man. There are things for which men in all ages have been content to +die--truth and loyalty to truth, the principles which are dearer than +life. Those things which God ordained that men might through them grow +more and more into His image, for these things man must be ready to +die, and among these things is nationality. + +Men cannot develop in isolation. What poor creatures men would be if +they were solitary units. They would be as the beasts that perish. It +is through the heritage of nationality that the soul is enriched. What +poor stunted lives would ours be if we had not behind us the great and +noble deeds which built up our Empire, if the words of the high souls +of many generations did not come thrilling to our hearts, if +Shakespeare and Wordsworth, Scott and Burns did not pour their +treasures into our laps. The soul grows into the image of God through +the riches of nationality. And whosoever warreth against nationality +warreth against the soul. And the men who warreth against the soul +must be resisted to the death. + +*** + +We dare not appeal to Jesus Christ to cloak our shrinking from +sacrifice. No doubt His gentleness has been the wonder of history; but +His strength also summons us to be strong. For Jesus Christ was not a +quietist. His religion is not a mere hospital for wounded souls. His +place is among the strong of the earth. He faced the evil of this +earth unflinching in His resistance. "Woe unto you Scribes and +Pharisees, hypocrites" is His denunciation of the oppressor; "Go tell +that fox" is His message to the tyrant. When we think of Him making +the whips, and falling, with holy anger in His eyes, on those who +desecrated the courts of the temple, overturning the tables of the +money changers, we know that the ideal of non-resistance is not His. + +No doubt He laid it down as the law for the individual that he should +turn the other cheek; but He did not lay it down as a law that a man +should turn another's cheek to the smiter. What the individual can do, +the nation may not do. It no doubt is the duty of the Ruler to turn +his own individual cheek to the insulter; it is not his duty to turn +the cheeks of the millions over whom he rules to those who would smite +them, committing their children to shame and their homes to devastation. + +No doubt Jesus Christ enjoined the law of forgiveness, but it was not +unconditional. "If he repent, forgive him," is His law, and until the +wrongdoer repents and ceases from his evil, it would be immoral to +forgive him. Duty demands that every means be used to bring the +evildoer to repentance; for only so is there a chance of his soul being +saved. It is manifest that Christianity is not a religion of +non-resistance to evil, but the religion of Him who Himself resisted +evil, and who resisted it even to the death. + +Patriotism, therefore, demands that we resist even to the shedding of +blood. When a hostile army would destroy a nation, as in Belgium, it +warreth against the soul, and it is as Christian to kill as it would be +to shoot a tiger which leapeth out of the jungle to devour a man. And +that Irish soldier whose face in the hospital in Paris was irradiated +with joy when he was told that the enemy was put to flight and Paris +saved, and who died with that gladness in his face, died in the spirit +of Jesus Christ. + +To say that the Founder of Christianity would not strike a blow for +home and kindred and truth is to forget that He struck a blow in +Jerusalem and wielded the thongs on the shoulders of those who polluted +His Father's house. It is His will that we should strike a blow in +defence of the house of our soul--the sanctuary of nationality. + +*** + +Patriotism must be vibrant with the spirit of religion if it is to be a +power rousing the nation to heroism and self-sacrifice. There never +was a nation so patriotic as the Jew. No city ever gripped a nation's +heart-strings as Jerusalem gripped the heart of the Jew. No suffering, +no defeat, no exile however far, could quench the fire of patriotism in +the heart. "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget +her cunning. Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth if I +remember thee not, if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy"--such +was the cry of the Jew by the rivers of Babylon, yearning after Sion. + +How was it that Jerusalem thus pulled at its children's heart-strings +until they hurried back to rebuild? It was because Jerusalem was the +seat of the worship of God. It was not the material stones or the +hills round about that thus compelled the heart. It was the light of +eternity shining over them. It was because of the "house of the Lord +our God" that the Jew counted no good worth his striving except the +good of Jerusalem. It is only when God standeth at the heart of a +nation that the heart cleaveth with all its fibres to its native land, +for then the whole of the man--not only the cravings of the body and +the heart and the mind, but also the deeper cravings of the soul--wind +themselves round the thought of the nation. + +Thus we find that the days when the fires of patriotism burned +brightest were ever those in which God held sway over the nation. It +was with God that the sailors of Queen Elizabeth swept the main, that +the soldiers of Wellington hurled the enemy far from the shores that +face England--they were fighting not only for England but for England's +God. + +The testimony of history is this, that patriotism cannot maintain its +power if once it be divorced from religion. Let God's face be veiled +and lost and everything is lost. "Without God nothing, with God +everything," says the ancient Celtic proverb, and all ages testify to +its truth. And the last proof of it is now before our eyes in the +condition of France. + +A hundred years ago France dominated Europe, erected thrones and +deposed kings at its will. But little by little France lost the vision +of God, until at last M. Viviani celebrated the final triumph over the +Church in 1907 by exclaiming: "With one magnificent gesture we have +extinguished the lights of heaven, which none shall rekindle." France, +in the words of its present Prime Minister, "extinguished the lights of +heaven," but in so doing it extinguished something else. For to-day +that nation, that not so long ago dominated Europe, can only protect +its capital city by the help of the two nations which have not yet +extinguished the lights of heaven. + +Without God patriotism becomes impotent, for God is the source of that +moral law, conformity to which means for a nation life, and defiance of +which means the degeneration that leadeth to destruction. With the +departure from God came moral decay and racial suicide. The hope of +France is this, that through the descent of the nation into the valley +of death the lights of heaven may be once more kindled; the hope of +Britain, that these same lights may shine more brightly. + +The spirit of patriotism will again vivify the nation when we seek +after God. In years of prosperity we have forgotten our high calling. +We have pursued vanities and forgotten the living God. When we again +realise our calling and our election as instruments in the hand of God +for the establishment of His Kingdom of Righteousness over all the +earth, our hearts will be filled with ardour, and we shall face +whatever perils may assail us strong in the assurance that the +Omnipotent God is in our midst and that nothing can resist His will. + +*** + +And this true patriotism will mean the salvation of the nation. For it +will strive to realise at home that righteousness which alone exalteth +a nation. Its first task will be to raise the life at home nearer to +God, for we cannot raise the world to higher levels than that on which +we ourselves stand. The vision of the new Jerusalem descending from +God out of heaven will again flame before our eyes. "And I, John, saw +the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, +prepared as a bride for her husband." + +That new Jerusalem is not a city remote in the inaccessible heights, +but a city which descends and permeates the material city now so +polluted by sin, until it becomes the "holy city," with the law of God +obeyed and the will of God done in it. Its citizens shall walk its +streets, pure in heart, seeing God everywhere. "And they shall bring +the glory and the honour of the nations into it." There the nations +shall be one in the streets of the city of God, all their contendings +forgotten in the sense of their brotherhood, following the one ideal, +obeying the one law, loving each other in the love of God. They will +strive then as to who shall bring the greatest glory within the compass +of its walls, and that will be the only striving. + +That is the ideal, that we should become a nation so permeated by the +spirit of God, so brought into obedience to His will, that our cities +shall become holy cities, even as the new Jerusalem coming down from +God out of heaven. When we shall set ourselves to realise that ideal +once more, then will the nation evoke the devotion of its citizens, for +devotion to the nation will also be devotion to God. + +It was that ideal which fired the patriotism of the Jew. The same +ideal alone will make our patriotism glow as a white flame. When the +vision of the Supreme Ruler whose throne is established in +righteousness once more blazes forth before the people, then once more +the throb of patriotism and the passion to make righteous law operative +to the ends of the earth will stir the heart, and the manhood of the +race will once more thrill with the call summoning to service and to +sacrifice. The answering shout will everywhere arise--For God and the +King. + + + + +III + +The Shadow of the Cross + + + +III + +The churchyard of our parish lies in a deep hollow, and a little river +half encircles it. In the midst of it stands the church beneath whose +shadow the parish has garnered its dead for centuries. There the +generations have lain down to sleep, their hearts reconciled one to +another, and the beadle has drawn the coverlet of green over them. As +he goes about his allotted task he pats a mound here and there gently +with the back of his spade--for roadman and belted earl are at one here. + +The last time I wandered down to the hollow it seemed as if eternal +peace brooded over the living and the dead. The leaves, russet and +gold, glowed in the sunlight. At the stirring of a gentle breeze, like +the dropping of a sea-bird's feather, leaf after leaf fluttered +silently down on the graves. The great bank of trees across the river +glowed with rivulets of dull flames running hither and thither. In its +stony bed the river sang its endless song. The immemorial yews, +beneath whose branches successive generations of children have played +with now and then a thrill of pleasing terror because of the +overhanging graves, stood regardless of the sun. The crows, sated with +the gleanings of harvest fields, fluttered in their rookeries with +scarcely a caw. It seemed as if no sound of discord or strife could +ever break in that enchanted hollow. + +*** + +As I turned away to retrace my steps through the gate I came on a woman +sitting on the mort-safe, a handkerchief moist with her tears in her +hand. She had come up from the quarries and she had visited her dead. +And she came because yesterday she received word that on the +battlefield of Marne her son was killed. He was her eldest. The +others were not old enough yet to fight. Her husband was killed in an +accident, and she had reared her children, refusing all help from the +parish. The pride of the blood sustained her. And now that her son +was dead she came hither, driven by an irresistible instinct to visit +her husband's grave. It was as if she wanted to tell him about John, +and how he died a hero, trying to carry a wounded comrade through the +hail of the shrapnel. + +She was weary, and from her husband's grave she turned to the church. +She would go and sit in the corner under the gallery, where John used +to sit. He had sat with her there at his first Communion. The +memories wrapped her round, and she would feel her son near her there. +But the door of the church was locked and barred. With an added ache +in her heart she turned away, and weariness compelled her to sit on the +iron mort-safe, which the parish provided in a former century to +protect their dead from sacrilegious hands. "But the church used to be +open," I said. "Aye," she replied tremulously, gathering up her +handkerchief into a round ball; "but some did-na like it; the boots on +the week-days are na sae clean, and they dirtied the kirk. That must +be why they lockit the door." It was not that she complained. Those +who locked the church were wise men, and no doubt they knew best. So +she sat on the mort-safe. + +"I have other sons, and when they are older they will go, too," she +said. "I'll no' keep them back. And if they die it'll be for God's +great cause." Her lips quivered as she spoke. The moist ball in the +right hand was clenched tight--there were no more tears to shed. + +And as I looked at the worn, lined face, the bent shoulders, the faded +rusty black mantle with its fringe, and the sunken lips that quivered +now and then, there came a sudden realisation. I saw no longer the one +grief-burdened figure sitting dejectedly on the mort-safe--I saw the +unnumbered host of mothers throughout the world who have given their +sons over to carnage, and who are as Rachel weeping for her children, +refusing to be comforted because they are not. Millions of men locked +in the death grapple means millions of mothers given tears to drink in +great measure, bound in affliction and iron. + +The song of the river went on ceaselessly, the russet-leaves fell +softly, and the sun shone on a world wrapped in peace--all nature +utterly regardless of the millions of Rachels that weep. (Ten million +hearts may break, but nature silences not one note of its joyousness.) +And as she sat there, behind her, under the campanile, showed the +church door, locked and barred. Nature was heedless of her; the church +shut its door upon her. She seemed to me the Mater Dolorosa. + +*** + +As I went up the brae there came the memory of a school lesson long +ago. Out of the subconscious it leaped as a diver might come up from +the depths of the sea with a gleaming coin in his hand. Among the +temples of ancient Rome there was one temple always kept open in time +of war. There the Roman General clashed the shield and the spear, +invoking the god ere he went to the battle-line, and its door was shut +not day or night. And I have no doubt but that the Eternal Ruler heard +that clashing of spear on shield, and marked that open door. But over +wide districts of Great Britain we have left these pagan habits far +behind us. We shut the doors of our temples alike in war and in +peace--excepting two hours on one day of the week, or in many cases one +hour in the week. Nor do I doubt but that the same Ruler marks these +doors now shut on the mothers of sorrow, and these sanctuaries locked +and silent. + +The glory was now gone from the day. I could not forget how the iron +mort-safe gave the rest that the Church refused. The shadow lay heavy +over the valley, and the mind tried to give the shadow a name. But it +could not. So up the long flight of stone steps I climbed, and turned +along a tree-shaded road. There, where three roads meet, stands a +little chapel within whose walls a small section of our parishioners +worship. I have passed it times out of mind without so much as +glancing at it. But to-day its open door arrested my eye, and I stood +in the roadway and gazed. And there came to me there a sudden sense of +thankfulness for that there is one open door in our parish which +witnesses to the fact that the power and solace of religion are not +shut in within the confines of only two hours of one day in the week. + +While I yet stood in the highway there came forth from the little +chapel an honoured parishioner, who is passing the golden evening of a +useful life in researches regarding Calvin and the Pope. Amazement +possessed me, for he is a power in the parish church, whose door is +locked and barred. We walked together towards the hills. There was a +trace of apology in his explanation. Since this dreadful cataclysm has +burst and the boom of the guns has come drifting from the sea across +the high-perched city, he has felt the need of quiet meditation. Thus +he has often on his walks slipped through the open door of the chapel +that stands by the roadside. + +"And you have locked the door of the parish church," I exclaimed, "and +you deny to the poor the privilege you yourself enjoy." He stopped and +faced me in the roadway, blinking at me. "We never locked the Church +door," he said. "It used to be open," I answered; "I remember being +glad to sit in it myself." "Oh! I remember," he exclaimed, "it was +open every day for a few years, but the authorities were never +consulted when it was thrown open--a most lawless proceeding!--and when +a suitable opportunity occurred the beadle locked it up. Law and order +have to be vindicated." + +"What you did then," I replied, "was to allow the beadle to deprive the +poor parishioners of a privilege which you and a few others enjoy +elsewhere." At that he started off walking along the road very +quickly, but I kept step with him. "You see," said he, waving a +deprecatory hand, "I am only one among many, and I was so absorbed in +these old Reformation controversies that I never gave it a thought, and +it is only since the war began that I realised...." And as he spoke I +felt that my old friend, learned in many controversies, had experienced +a revolution. The great tide had swept him past all controversies +right up to the fountain head. He had learned that man's high calling +is not to dispute, but to pray. + +As we walked under the darkling hills I told him of that shadow which +had so suddenly fallen upon me that day, and he at once gave it a name. +"It is the shadow of the Cross," said he. And thereupon he began to +explain out of the wisdom and ripened experience of seventy years how +across nineteen centuries the shadow of the Cross lies still over all +the world. One thinks so seldom of these things, and if occasionally +one hears them spoken of, familiarity with the words has deadened the +hearer to their significance. It was because I listened to him talking +in the lane that his words gripped me. They might have made no +impression if he were in a pulpit. + +*** + +We are accustomed to think of the greatest of all tragedies as an event +consummated in six hours. It is, however, far from consummated, for it +is an age-long tragedy. Its roots lay in self-interest. A degenerate +priesthood in an obscure Syrian town saw nothing in the Greatest of +Teachers but an unbalanced enthusiast, who struck at their ill-gotten +gains, and whose triumph would make an end of them and their system. +So self-interest cried "Crucify." And though the Roman Governor saw +through them and wanted to save Him, self-interest again was brought +into play, and when threatened with an awkward complaint to Rome, he +said "Crucify." And ever since then self-interest on innumerable lips +has cried Crucify, Crucify. Not only cried, but did it. + +For this Teacher identified Himself with His followers, saying that He +was the Vine and they the branches. It follows that whatever is done +to the branch is done to the vine. A branch cannot be cut and severed +from the vine without the vine bleeding. He declared it to be so. +"Whosoever receiveth you receiveth Me," and it follows that whosoever +crucifies you crucifies Me. And the history of the centuries is the +history of how the poor and unlearned and the toiling have been +persecuted, harried by war, driven to death and crucified. + +Generation after generation have raised the Cross anew, and in the +crucifying of the dumb multitudes have crucified Him. Along with His +own He fought with wild beasts, went through the flames, and suffered +many bloody and diverse persecutions, and He was with His people now. +He confronted to-day the mighty of the earth as He did that blinded +priesthood of old, and He declared that there is only one way of +conquering, and that by love; that gaining the whole world was a +miserable bargain if in exchange a man parted with truth and +righteousness and purity--those things that constitute the soul's very +breath. + +But self-interest answered with cold disdain: "What sickly +sentimentalist is this? Let Him be crucified." He faced to-day the +lust of conquest, and declared that the conquering of men's bodies was +nothing; that the only way of attaining power was to conquer men's +hearts and minds and wills, thus clasping them to us with hooks of +steel; that the will of God for His children was that they should love +their enemies and not pour upon them the vials of wrath, trampling them +under foot; but the arrogance of man answered with the hoarse cry, +"Crucify." + +And that humanity which named His name was driven once more to the +holocaust of war--ten millions of men consigned to the hell of reeking +trenches. In the midst of the world the Cross stands as never before, +bearing its awful woe. In the seeing of the whole world the Eternal +Love is crucified. It was its shadow that fell on her whose lips +trembled as she sat on the mort-safe over against the locked and barred +door of the House of God. + +*** + +The most wonderful thing in history is that from a peasant done +shamefully to death in a remote corner of the Eastern world there +should flow through the ages such an inexplicable power. And yet there +must be some explanation of it. Why should a passion for righteousness +be evoked in the human heart by the fact that a Galilean was crucified +by a petty Roman official? There can be no explanation but this--that +that deed of shame revealed to men the hatefulness of the power which +wrought so evil a deed. That power was self-interest--selfishness. + +The eyes of men turned to Jesus Christ, and they saw one holy, +harmless, undefiled, separate from sin, whose journeying was the +journeys of healing among the sons of men, whose words were words of +blessedness, declaring that God loved and pardoned His children, and +yet men reviled, scorned, scourged and at last crucified Him. The +power that moved men to this dread crime was sin, and thus the word sin +became a word of horror. (For the selfishness that crucified was only +one fruit of sin.) Out of that realisation of the horror of sin there +sprang an ethical passion--a passion which in the heart and in the +world waged ceaseless war on selfishness and all the devices of evil. +Thus humanity was lifted out of the mire. They girded themselves to +fight that dread and hateful power which crucified the Holy One. + +Like the wind blowing in from the sea that sweeps before it the foul +miasma that lies over the valleys, so that men look up and see the +heavens and feel a new vigour moving in their blood, so a breath from +the living God came stirring the foul places of humanity, and the eyes, +no longer blinded by the exhalations of evil passions, saw the ideal of +purity arise before their eyes, and they turned to climb towards the +clearer vision. Through the revelation of purity in the face of Jesus +Christ and the realisation of the awfulness of that power which crowned +that purity with thorns, there came to humanity the dawning of +deliverance from sin--a deliverance still going on to its fruition. + +*** + +History is for ever repeating itself, and to-day the process of +humanity's deliverance from evil will gather momentum and advance a +long way towards the final triumph. For just as men only realised the +hatefulness of sin when they saw it laid upon Jesus Christ, so will it +be also to-day. A generation that had lost the sense of sin beholds +sin laid upon millions of men, working woe unspeakable, and, beholding, +learns anew what sin is and the hatefulness of it. For these millions +of men grappling with death, what are they but humanity's sin-bearers. +On them is laid the burden of the sins of this generation. The +selfishness, greed, ambition, lust--all the passions which sweep men to +wars of conquest--have poured the vials of misery on their heads. The +son of the widow sitting on the mort-safe, who now lies in a nameless +grave, he bore it. The bearing of it killed him. + +And as humanity will realise its horror, the word sin will once more +burn red before men's eyes, and there will arise that passion for +righteousness which will lay sin low even as the dust. There will ring +round the world the compelling cry that this power of hell must not for +ever hold humanity in its grip--that ruthless ambition, militarism, +despotism must be made to cease from the face of the earth. Once more +the shadow of the Cross will mean salvation to men. + +*** + +There was another power also that stirred the world under the shadow of +the Cross, and that was the power of self-sacrifice. There came to men +an overwhelming realisation that at the heart of the universe was the +Spirit of self-sacrifice, and that the Cross was but the expression of +it. They realised that the greatest thing a man can do with his life +is to lay it down. And as men realise to-day that the Cross still +abides in the heart of God, so that in all their affliction He is +afflicted, there comes to them the feeling that the one way of coming +nearest to His heart is the way of self-sacrifice. + +Under the shadow of the Cross now lifted up, a nation that sought +life's pleasures has suddenly thrilled with the glory of +self-sacrifice. What is it that sustains the men who go down to the +earthly hell of ruthless war? It is just this--the consciousness, +newly wakened, of how glorious a thing it is to die for King and +country, for home and kindred. They are content to be blotted out if +only the race will live, to descend to the abyss that the nation may be +exalted. Under the shadow of the Cross self-sacrifice has become once +more the only rock on which our feet can stand secure. Men charge +across fields of death with the light of it in their eyes. They are +raised into the fellowship of the Cross. And we are raised with them. + +If I could only tell the bowed widow sitting there on the mort-safe the +glorious fellowship with which her son is numbered, she would again +lift up her face to the light. He has died that we may live. Greater +love hath no man than this--nor yet greater glory. But she needs not +to be told; she knows it already. She knows it far better than you or +I do, for she feels it. In the deep places of life where words are +meaningless, her dumb heart feels the mystery of sin-bearing and the +glory of self-sacrifice. + +By a faculty deeper and truer far than reason, in the depths of the +soul where the Unseen Spirit moves revealing the things that are of +lasting worth, she has learned in meekness and suffering that divine +wisdom which is hid from the wise. She knows that the road that goes +by Calvary up to the Cross is the one road along which the feet can +come to God. She knows that her son has walked along that road, and +that, because of his bearing the cross laid upon him, and his dying +while bearing it, God has brought him into that joy which all the +cross-bearers see shining beyond the darkness and the woe. And because +she has thus entered into the secret place of the Most High, and has +felt the touch of God, she is ready to greet the day of still greater +sacrifice. + +*** + +In the evening, when the curtains were drawn, I took up a magazine and +read an article. It was a bitter invective against Christianity and +the Church. Nineteen centuries of the religion of the Cross--and this +holocaust as the fruit. It is amazing the blindness of the jaundiced +eye. It would be as reasonable to blame the Founder of Christianity +for His own crucifixion as to blame Christianity for the fact that the +wicked have continued to crucify Him. These things are so not because, +but in spite, of Christianity. + +Grievous as war now is, yet it is not war as in the days before the +Cross was erected on Calvary. When Ulysses asked Agamemnon for +sanction to bury the body of Ajax, the King was greatly annoyed. "What +do you mean?" he answered, "do you feel pity for a dead enemy?" That +was the spirit of war in the old heathen world--the spirit which had no +mercy on the living and no pity for the dead. Slowly but surely the +spirit of Christ fettered the spirit of hate and dethroned the spirit +of revenge. We now minister to the wounded and bury the dead enemy +with the pity and the honour we render to our own. + +We can trace the evolution of peace through the centuries. Wars +between individuals have ceased. A century and a half ago warring +clans in Scotland dyed the heather red; to-day wars between tribes have +ceased. There remains only war between nations, and already there are +great nations between whom war is unthinkable. If we in these days +wage war with Germany, yet we in these days also celebrate the +hundredth anniversary of unbroken peace with the United States of +America. If we bewail the failure of Christianity in the former, let +us be grateful for the triumph of Christianity in the latter. + +Formerly war was the normal condition; now to the moral consciousness +of Christendom war is an outrage. We only need to look beneath the +surface to realise that Galilee is conquering Corsica, and will conquer +at the last. Beneath the shadow of the Cross men will at last find +healing for their grievous wounds. + +*** + +And as a symbol thereof the doors of the sanctuaries of peace will be +flung wide open, and no burdened heart will find the House of God +locked and barred against groping hands. One fruit of these grievous +days may well be that the Church will realise that it does not become +her to occupy a lower plane than that heathen temple in ancient Rome, +whose door was shut not day or night while men were dying in battle. + +In the coming days when the mothers of sorrow come to their dead, over +whose graves the falling leaves flutter as a benediction, they will not +be left sitting on the iron mort-safe. The open door will invite them +into the sanctuary of peace, and they will croon the coronach of their +woe in the holy place. For they are the priesthood of this generation, +offering up the most precious sacrifice--and the door of the holy place +must be open to them. And there, in the sanctuaries of peace, their +sorrow will be transmuted into joy. + + + + +IV + +The Power of Prayer + + + +IV + +For eight centuries the Church of St. Giles has been the centre of the +religious life of Scotland. At all times of sorrow the nation has +turned to it, and within its walls, consecrated by the prayers of so +many generations, the surcharged heart has voiced its woe in the +presence of the Unseen. But in all the years of the dim and fading +past there never was a day like this in which we now stand. Death has +come as a grim spectre, and has looked into our eyes. The winds carry +to our ears the moans of our perishing sons, dying gloriously for +freedom on the bloody fields of Flanders. The great ships guard our +shores, and we know that if that vigil failed, our cities and villages +and fair countryside would become as Louvain and the Low Country. +Death itself would be welcome rather than that. + +If there ever came to any nation a call to seek the refuge which eye +has not seen, that call soundeth persistently, compellingly in our +ears. And that call soundeth not in vain. To-day[1] the two great +Churches of Scotland met as one in St. Giles, the days of their +misunderstanding ended, to pray for King and country--for all the +things which make life beautiful. They have come through days of +alienation and isolation, but to-day they are with one accord in one +place. And in their hearts only one purpose--to seek the blessing of +God for their nation. + + +[1] November 18, 1914. + + +*** + +As one sat there, under the tattered flags on which many bloody fights +for freedom are emblazoned, and watched the stream of men flow into the +church, what memories came crowding through the echoing corridors of +time. + +Four hundred years ago there came to Edinburgh the news of Flodden, and +out of the closes the women rushed to St. Giles, until round all the +altars there was no room to kneel because of the great crowd wailing +for their dead. The moaning of their lamentation was as the sound of +the surf wailing on the shore, and their sobbing as the cry of the +grinding pebbles in the backwash of the tide. But the city fathers +could stand upright even in that most cruel day when the cloud of +destruction was creeping over the Pentlands; and there is the note of +the heroic in that resolution which called all the able-bodied men to +rally to the defence of the capital, and exhorted "the good women to +pass to the kyrk, and pray whane tyme requires for our Soveraine Lord +and his Army, and neichbouris being thereat." + +That proclamation stirs the blood! They are dust, these fathers of +ours, but their spirit is all alive, throbbing in the heart of +us--their far-away children. Never did a race meet its Sedan in a +sublimer spirit than that. The strong, at toll of bell and tuck of +drum, manned the ramparts, and the women filled St. Giles' and sent +heavenward their cries. The bodies of such a race may for a brief +season be brought to subjection, but their souls are invincible--and it +is the soul that always conquers. + +And here to-day it is the same. From every part of Scotland men have +come, and they passed "to the kirk to pray for our Sovereign Lord and +his Army." True, there has been no Flodden and no Sedan; but it is by +the good hand of God upon us that the enemy was frustrated in his +eagerness for another Sedan. And it is in part the prayer of +thanksgiving that is laid to-day upon His altar, and in part the +petition that His mercies may be continued to the nation in the cruel +days to come. + +*** + +What a sanctuary for a nation's prayers, this church, where Kings have +prayed and gone forth to die in battle; where Queens have wept as the +voice of judgment, grim and stern, untouched by tenderness or love, +sounded in the ear; where three thousand people dissolved in tears as +the good Regent, foully slain, was borne to his grave. Over it passed +wave after wave of fanaticism and barbarism; and at last it fell into +the hands of the restorers--more ruthless far than Goths or Vandals! +But, through it all, the house of God survived; and, apparelled once +more in some of its pristine glory, it opens its doors to a nation that +once more seek after its God. + +And above us, as we sit there, hang the colours of our Scottish +regiments stirring our patriotism, assuring us that the men who guarded +these flags on many bloody fields were guarded by God, and that we are +still in His keeping. + +What a place this is in which to set vibrating that note of patriotism +which now quivers from Maiden Kirk to John o' Groat's. These colours +there--they are the most eloquent things on earth, for they pertain to +the realm of symbols. Words are poor compared to tears, and that is +because tears belong to the world of symbols. That tattered banner +there belonged to the Gordon Highlanders, and was carried through the +Peninsula and the Crimea. Woven in faded letters you can read on it +still Corunna, Almarez, Pyrenees, Waterloo. Ah! these flags tell of a +devotion stronger than death, rekindle the memories of the day when +stern silence fell on the ranks, as the Highland Brigade breasted the +slopes of the Alma until Sir Colin Campbell lifted his hat and they +rushed on the foe with the slogan of victory; and that other day when +"the thin red line tipped with steel" rolled back the surge of the +Cossacks; aye, and of a hundred such days when men went down joyously +to death that the race might be free and live. + +Waterloo!--it is on many flags. And we remember how the Man of Destiny +himself, as he saw his ranks yield before the onslaught of the +Highlanders, did not restrain his admiration for his enemies, but +exclaimed with the true soldier's generosity, "Les braves +Ecossais"--"Brave, brave Scotsmen" (what a contrast to "French's +contemptible little Army"). The hands that carried, the hearts that +thrilled at the waving of these flags, their fame will never perish. + + "On the slopes of Quatre Bras + The Frenchmen saw them stand unbroken. + * * * * * + On the day of Waterloo + The pibroch blew where fire was hottest. + * * * * * + When the Alma heights were stormed + Foremost went the Highland bonnets. + * * * * * + As it was in days of yore, + So the story shall be ever. + * * * * * + Think then of the name ye bear, + Ye that wear the Highland tartan. + * * * * * + Zealous of its old renown, + Hand it down without a blemish." + +As the eye looks along the nave up into the choir and sees the gleam of +red, colours after colours, there comes the memory of words--"We have +heard with our ears, O God, and our fathers have told us what work Thou +didst in their days in the times of old.... Through Thee will we push +down our enemies...." The unseen God who has led His people through so +many and great dangers will not forsake them now. + +*** + +There is a tablet where formerly stood the door that led to Haddo's +Hole, and there hangs on a pillar the flag that pertains of truth to +the realm of romance. Men with their hearts hot with indignation +buried it in Pretoria in 1880, and put above it the inscription +"Resurgam." Afterwards the Colonel recovered it and brought it home. +When war broke out again his widow restored it to the regiment--the +Royal Scots Fusiliers. In 1881 that regiment was the last to leave the +Transvaal; in 1900 it was the first to enter the Transvaal--as the +inscription narrates. And by the direction of Lord Roberts, when +Pretoria was occupied, this identical flag was run up amid the shouts +of the victors. Now it rests here. "Resurgam"--it is the unquenchable +spirit of an invincible nation. + +If only the manhood of Scotland could be gathered into this Church, +under these flags, and the story they tell were put into words, +pulsating with passion--then the ranks of our Army would be filled up +in a week. What a lack of imagination we reveal! We teach dates, +thinking we are teaching history. The only way to teach history is by +flags, and all they stand for. When Douglas threw the heart of Bruce +among his enemies he cried, "Lead thou on as thou wast wont and Douglas +will follow thee or die." In the spirit of Douglas our fathers +followed the flags, and we will follow in the steps of our fathers and +face death with undaunted hearts as they were wont. There comes to us +the shouting of their triumph, and we cry: "Lead on; we will follow or +die." This grey church, St. Giles', is the temple of patriotism. +Therefore our feet turn towards it in dark days, and we say, "Our feet +shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem!" + +*** + +How the old words are born for us anew as we thus meet as one "to +entreat God for the broken peace of Christendom." We sing "God is our +refuge and our strength," but there is a note of intensity in the +singing now such as we never knew before. Men close their eyes, and +stand, the world blotted out, before their God, realising that He and +He alone is the one refuge, the only giver of victory. We hear the old +story read of Moses holding up his hands and Israel prevailing on the +plains below; but it is not Israel we see travailing in battle, but our +own brothers in the rain-sodden trenches, and we feel the uprising of +the ceaseless intercession of a nation that has anew found its God. It +is not the right hand that assureth victories; it is that spirit of +enthusiasm, that passion for righteousness which filleth the heart, and +that spirit is as the wind blowing where it listeth--and it cometh out +of the Unseen at the call of our prayers. + +When in other days we prayed for the King it was in the spirit of cold +formalism. But now a lump rises in the throat as we invoke the +blessing and protection of Heaven for the solitary man who is the +symbol of the unity of our Empire, and who watcheth over its destinies +day and night, and who has sent his son to face death with the meanest +of his subjects. We hear the glorious words: "If God be for us, who +can be against us?" and they are written for ourselves. We, who fight +for the truth of word and for the freedom and deliverance of the +oppressed, can feel that God is for us, and that all is well. + +And when we pray, our voices rising as one, "Thy kingdom come," we can +see that kingdom coming through blood and tears, cleansing the foul +places and establishing peace on everlasting foundations. It is a new +day that has dawned for us--a day in which we stand united as the +subjects of the one King, as the sons of the one God--and the things +that separated us one from another are swept away. What the conferring +of the wise found so difficult to achieve, the roaring of the guns has +accomplished. God teacheth his people by sending them through the +purifying fires. + +*** + +In these prayers in St. Giles' there is a directness which shows that +we are there for a definite purpose. We no longer use qualifying +words. We cry for victory. There is a bloodless form of prayer which +some use and which sends the worshipper away with an aching heart. It +is the prayer that never prays directly for victory. "Thy will be +done," it prays, in the spirit of submission. But prayer is not +submission; it is a wrestling. In other days our fathers wrestled in +prayer and prevailed. "I spent the night in prayer," wrote Oliver +Cromwell, in critical days; "I prayed God that He would guide us +against the enemy. We were simple fellows of the country, and they +were men of blood and fashion, but the Lord delivered them into our +hands. By His grace we killed five thousand. If He continues to show +mercy we will kill some more to-morrow." Such were the Ironsides, "men +of a spirit," who broke the charges of the Cavaliers, as the cliff +dashes back in white spray the rush of the billows. + +This was also the language of the Covenanters of old; and though we no +longer use such plainness of speech, we mean the same. There is a +place for tenderness; but when men are ground to powder by the judgment +of God, tenderness is not manifest then. When the heart whispers +"Spare" and justice says "Smite," men must obey the voice of justice, +stifling the voice of the heart. + +Our prayers are now for justice. Better far a righteous war than an +immoral peace. We have been compelled to unsheath the sword, and we +pray that no heart may falter, and no cry arise for the sheathing of +the sword, until justice be done. Thus our prayers have become a cry +for victory. + +*** + +As one sits in an ancient church such as this, there comes knocking at +the heart many questions regarding that service of prayer which within +its walls has linked the generations together. Can prayer really +prevail with God? Can it alter the will of the Unchangeable? If there +be no power in it, why should men go on praying? + +We must distinguish between the will of God which is unchangeable, and +His lower will which is his purpose towards us and His attitude to us. +The former is unalterable; the latter varies according to the varying +of our hearts. With that lower will we are called to wrestle. A man +is born in poverty and obscurity, and the will of God seems to be that +he should continue poor and obscure. But he wrestles with that lower +will until he prevails. He ultimately moves out into the great tide of +life and becomes a power. The will of God towards that man is changed. + +It is the same with a nation. Here is a nation sinking on its lees +with its ideals dimmed and the shrines of its fathers' God forsaken and +desolate. It has fashioned to itself other gods, and the multitudes +crowd the temples of the goddess of pleasure. The very race itself is +sacrificed on the altar of gross pleasure, and the laughter of little +children is being little by little silenced. The fires of patriotism +are dying low, and the love of country gives place to the love of +party. There are mean victories rejoiced over, but they are the +victories of the cynic and the sensualist. There is the sound of +shouting, but it is the shouting over the triumph of one self-seeking +politician over another self-seeking partisan. Saintliness, which +other generations held in awe and reverence, provokes now a pitying +smile. Mammon alone is held in high honour and sitteth in the high +places. What is the will of God towards that nation? It is this--ruin +and utter destruction. Over every nation that thus succumbed to the +gross and sensual, history shows the sword of God unsheathed, and at +last the devouring flames of judgment. + +But to such a nation there comes as if out of the silent heaven a call +as a trumpet sound, summoning it to the judgment-seat of God. Over the +sea comes the roar of guns. The foundations which the fathers laid in +righteousness, through long neglect and decay are crumbling. An empire +encircling the globe is tottering to destruction. The hay and the +stubble cannot come scathless through the flames. The writing is on +the wall, and as the eyes see the hand that writes, trembling seizeth +upon men. And then there cometh a sudden change. The nation in a day +rises out of the morass of its self-indulgence. It sets itself to lay +hold again upon the eternal law of righteousness. They seek once more +the shrines of their God. They set themselves to fast and to pray. +"Who can tell," they whisper one to another, "if God will turn and +repent, and turn away from His fierce anger, that we perish not?" + +The fields of their inglorious shouting over their games are deserted +for the fields of hardness and grim preparation. Once more they gird +themselves for conflict, as their fathers so often girded, that truth +and righteousness may prevail over all the earth. Sharply the choice +is presented to them between Christ or Odin, and though choosing the +Christ means agony and woe they make their choice unhesitatingly. A +new light shines in their eyes, and the work of their hands and the +devisings of their hearts become the spirit of prayer. Yesterday the +will of God towards that nation, sinking on its lees, was destruction; +to-day towards that same nation, thus risen out of the foul miasma that +was stifling its soul, the will of God is salvation. + +Because prayer is the greatest power in the world; because it can alter +the will of God towards us, because it can move the hand of the +omnipotent God and is thus endued with His omnipotence, our prayers as +we gather in the sanctuaries are no longer the submission of quietism, +but a wrestling with God--the crying of a soul as in agony for victory +based on the triumph of righteousness. It was such a cry that rose on +that day in St. Giles. + +*** + +As the second paraphrase was being sung there came the memory of words +spoken in the pulpit of the great Cathedral by Dr. Cameron Lees. It +was at evening service, when the shadows were gathering. "I have often +sat in this pulpit," said Dr. Lees, "on the edge of the evening, and +watched the shadows enveloping the Cathedral. They invaded the side +chapels first, and then the nave, creeping onwards through the +transepts, until the chancel was reached. After that they gathered in +strength, until the whole building was in darkness, with the exception +of the white figure of Christ in the great east window. I pray that +the last vision vouchsafed me on earth may be just that--the Saviour of +men. I can then close my eyes in the knowledge that He will lead me +through the dark valley that leadeth to the eternal home." + +It has been like that with the whole nation. Around our shores the +darkness gathered, until all the horizon was black with threatening +clouds. Then we lifted up our eyes and saw.... He will bring +deliverance and peace. As we moved along the crowded aisles towards +the door the white figure of Christ glowed in the great east window, +and we felt that He will bless His people at last with peace--the peace +not of death, but of life. + + "Down the dark future, through long generations, + The echoing sounds grow fainter and then cease, + And, like a bell, with solemn sweet vibrations, + I hear once more the voice of Christ say Peace. + Peace! and no longer from its brazen portals + The clash of war's great organ shakes the skies; + But beautiful as songs of the immortals, + The holy melodies of love arise." + + + + +V + +The Victory + + + +V + +The blinds were all drawn in the red-roofed house that stands at the +cross-roads. It was not empty, for the smoke arose from its chimneys +in the clear morning air. In other days the music of song and laughter +often floated from its open windows, but now it was stricken dumb. +From it two sons had gone to take their place in the line of soul and +fire that girdles these islands, warding them from destruction. + +In a moment the veiled windows flashed their meaning. In the long +lists of the dead I found the name I looked for. I had schooled myself +to look at these lists, thinking of them in the mass as force or power; +but that one name insisted on its individuality. They were all +individual lives, each throbbing with intensest self-realisation, each +with his love and hope and fear. There was none among them so poor but +some heart clung to them. They may die, no longer in units, but in +broad swathes, mown down by machine guns, but they are individual +hearts still. In masses the sea swallows them up, trenches are filled +with them, but however much we try we cannot narcotise our hearts by +sophistries. Some day a name stands out alone--and we realise. + +All over the land, in every parish, blinds are being drawn in houses +where music and laughter are silenced. There comes the surge of a wild +revolt. It is not these individual hearts alone that lie stricken, it +is the joy of the centuries yet to be. In nameless graves lie the +dream-children who will never now be born. This criminal sealing up of +the very fountain of life--how can we bear it? + +And yet we open not our mouths in protest. Is it because we are losing +our sensitiveness--becoming brutalised? It might be that. For nothing +coarsens the mind like that tide of hatred and passion which war sends +sweeping through the hearts of men. And yet it is not that. For when +they told the mother, breaking it gently as love alone can do, that her +son was dead, she bowed her head in silence, yielding herself to the +solace of tears; but in a little while she said brokenly: "It is good +to die so: I would not have my son shelter himself behind other +mothers' sons." + +No, it is not because we are already coarsened that the heart can bear. +It is rather because we have realised with the passing away of the old +world of the last long summer days (it seems already centuries remote) +that there are some things so great that they can transfigure even +death. When the loyalty to the highest can only be fulfilled through +death, we acquiesce in the sacrifice. In our parish we have not been +coarsened--we have been quickened. + +*** + +It seems as if it were in another era that my friend at the top of the +Gallows' Road proved to me convincingly that death alone was king. +With a keen irony he depicted this little globule of a world, a +third-rate satellite of a fifth-rate star, floating in the abysses, in +relation to the universe but as a mere grain of sand amid all the sand +on the world's shores; and on that puny speck of a world he pictured +the ephemeral generations, mere flashes of troubled consciousness--and +then darkness. + +It was reasonable when they thought this world the centre of all +things, with the sun and moon and stars circling it round as humble +ministrants, that they should believe in some high destiny for +themselves. But now that they know how miserably and unspeakably +insignificant the world is, it was but vanity and arrogance for any man +to think of himself as of any value whatever in the scheme of things. +His life was as the flashing of a midge's wings. His end was as a +candle blown out in the night. + +*** + +One evening, when the air was vibrant with the melody of birds and +laden with the perfume of the roses that filled the garden, he +developed another train of thought. He pictured the glut of life there +would be if all the generations on this and millions unnumbered of +worlds all survived. With vivid gestures he passed them all before the +eye--low-browed savages, cannibals, fetish-worshippers, Calvinists, and +at last the aesthetics of our day. "There would be no room for them--no +use for them at all--it would be a glut which baffles all imagination." +There was no way out but that the individual perished to prevent the +universe from being crowded out. + +And the cobbler at the top of the brae described to me how his dog was +run over in the street. "He gaed a bark--and he never gaed anither. +It'll be like that at the end with us a'. We'll gae out like my dawg." +It was a queer result of the glimpse which came to us of an illimitable +universe--this cheapening of ourselves. There was nothing at last but +the charnel-house of the crowded kirkyard, where the generations lay +layer upon layer, and where the opening of a grave reminded the old +clerk, as he quaintly declared, of nothing but a dentist's shop. The +teeth survived for unrecorded centuries--but that was all. + +It is strange the tricks the memory plays. For, sitting here, glancing +over the crowded sheet filled with the names of the dead, I remembered +these things. And there came the sense of the madness of the universe +and the intolerableness of life, if the end of all heroism was but +that--nothingness and corruption. A handful of bones thrown up by the +beadle to make room for the dead of to-day--is that all that is left of +those who handed down the lamp of life to us? Is that all that will be +left of us too at the last? + +In the ordinary day my friend at the top of the Gallows' Road and the +cobbler on the breast of the brae would have said that that was the +end. But the extraordinary day has come upon us unawares, and in the +extraordinary day this little, burdened, pain-racked life becomes +suddenly unendurable unless it lie in the bosom of eternity. If there +be no rainbow circling the heavens above the carnage heaps of the +stricken battlefields, if the farewell of death be a farewell for ever, +how can the heart endure? + +*** + +It certainly looks to the seeing of the eye as if destruction were the +end. With the perishing of the body everything seemeth to perish: all +love, all thought, all tenderness vanish for ever. But the eyes and +the ears are for ever playing us false; and here, too, they deceive us. +For the world is so ordered that nothing ever perishes. In nature +there is no destruction. A handful of ashes in a grate look like +annihilation, but what it represents is really resurrection. The +imprisoned sunrays of uncounted aeons, stored up in the lumps of coal, +have been released from the prison-house, and gone forth again as heat +and as light. The physical body may seem to perish; what really +happens is that its constituent elements are re-grouped. + +But in the realm of beauty, is there not destruction possible there? +Through long centuries faith and devotion rear a great cathedral, every +line and curve of which is instinct with beauty. Every statue breathes +the love and hope and fears of men. In vaulted aisles and "windows +richly dight," it symbolises the Unseen--the beauty which the heart +yearns for. On that beauty materialised, ruthless Vandalism rains shot +and shell; the devouring flames consume it. Its gaunt walls are now a +monument of barbarism. Has nothing perished there? Is it not mockery +to speak of the conservation of the constituent elements there? For +loveliness has vanished there from off the face of the earth, and +beauty which no hand of man can ever restore has been annihilated. + +But it has not. For beauty is not in things, but in souls. The beauty +lay in the soul of the architects that planned, in the hearts of the +builders that carved the stones until they seemed to breathe--and +shells cannot destroy that. The loveliness was shrined in the souls of +the generations that gazed, and, gazing, were raised into the +fellowship of the hearts that planned and builded. Thus did the spirit +of beauty grow in the hearts of men--and shells cannot destroy that. + +And let these charred walls be left to the alchemy of time, and nature +will clothe them in richer loveliness. Lichen and moss will grow on +them, and the moonlight will etherialise them. One symbol of beauty +may seem to perish; but the spirit of beauty itself, dwelling in the +hearts of men and abiding at the core of the universe, is +indestructible. The thing which we deem perishable, no power on earth +can kill. + +*** + +There is on earth something infinitely more precious than the material +substance, indestructible though it be. The most beautiful thing the +world can show is a good man. Through the years forces play on him, +and each force adds its element of beauty. He has struggled with +adversity, and in the conflict he has learned patience, tolerance and a +wide charity. Waves of affliction have passed over him, and he has +learned tenderness and sympathy with human suffering, so that bruised +hearts come and lie down in his shadow, and there find healing. With +eyes cleansed from self, he looks out on the comedy and tragedy of +life, and he sees the hidden springs. The healing power that goes +forth from him grows with the years. At last he dies. + +Does nature conserve the shell while it consigns the jewel in the +shell--the man himself, with all his love and tender thought and +unselfish care--to annihilation? That is unthinkable. To know one +good man is to know that the human personality is imperishable. It was +through that knowledge that the soul of man triumphed over the terror +of death. + +There walked in Galilee a Teacher who made a handful of peasants feel +the possibilities of moral loveliness latent in the human heart, and +when He died they could not associate the thought of death with Him. +"It was not possible that He should be holden of it," they said one to +another. Everything was possible but that He could become as a clod in +the valley of corruption. Of course even that was possible if the +world were a chaos given over for sport to malicious demons. + +It would be possible, then, that the self-sacrificing love stronger +than death, and the spirit of unsullied purity should become mere dust. +But the possibility of the world being ruled by any except a Righteous +Power did not occur to the untutored Galileans. Therefore they faced +death with level eyes, refusing to believe in its triumph, saying to +their hearts, "It is not possible." + +And that is the rock on which to plant our feet in the day when the +world is given over to the wild welter of bloodshed. In every parish +over all the land blinds are pulled down, and hearts, wrapped round in +the dimness, sit still in the shadow of a dumb affliction. They will +never again hear the familiar footsteps coming to the door; they will +hear it in their dreams--only to awake and find silence. Never again +will the first question be when the door is opened, as it was through +all the days since the golden days of childhood, "Where is mother?" +But the great things which made life noble have not been destroyed by +bullet or shell. No man is worthy of freedom except the man who is +prepared to die for it. The heart, which in death proved itself +deserving of freedom, has entered into the fulness of freedom. The +heavens are again aglow when we realise that. + +*** + +It was the Professor who made me sure of those things. I met him at +the "Priory," where my old friend carries on his controversy with the +Pope--or used to. In that house of his one meets all sorts of +visionaries from the ends of the earth. A Waldensian pastor full of +the dream of a rejuvenated Italy; a leader of French Protestants, who +has forgotten his controversy with the Pope in the great upheaval +through which his race are finding their soul once more; a dreamer from +across the Atlantic, his eyes a-gleam with the vision of a reunited +Christendom--these are the men you will find drinking tea at the Priory +on any day in our parish. + +The original bond between them was their controversy with Rome, but +they have now forgotten all about that. There, in a happy hour, I met +the Professor. One phrase of his lit up for me the days of darkness. +"We see the alchemy of Providence at work all round about us," he +exclaimed, pushing his fingers through his hair until it stood up all +on end, an aureole of white. + +"It is the flower of our manhood that is perishing," said the "Prior," +while our hostess was nervously solicitous over the fate of a teacup +which the Professor was balancing in his left hand, utterly regardless +of its purpose. + +"Perishing!" exclaimed the Professor; "they are not perishing--they are +living. To talk of the wastage of life is mere cant." Our hostess +rescued the teacup, and the Professor had now the free use of both his +hands. The one hand clutched his hair and the other made sundry +gestures clinching his arguments. + +"Why should we rail at death?" said he; "for death has been the saviour +of humanity. It was death that made men of us. It was in the school +of death that man learned unselfishness, self-sacrifice, chivalry and +honour. There is nothing so ugly as the man whose heart is filled by +the world. It is death that has saved us all from that. Were man's +location here for ever, the world would be his god. A world without +death would be a world with no room for the Cross. Men climbed the +heights of nobility as they defied death. The crackling flames were +unable to silence the martyrs' song; the march of the hosts of +devouring tyranny could not move the hearts that chose death rather +than slavery; the generations sealed with their blood their testimony +that truth and loyalty to truth are more precious than life, and so met +death with a smile; it was through this wrestling with death that great +and noble character was forged on the anvil of life. Death was the +weapon which forged greatness of soul. Death cannot destroy what death +has created. That could only happen in an insensate world. What is +it--death--but just this--the slave of immortality?" + +If I could only write it down as the Professor spoke, if I could only +make you see his eyes glowing with little darts of flame as he saw the +whole world transformed into a mighty workshop in which the "alchemy of +Providence" is transmuting the soiled substance of our humanity into +living souls (over whom death can have no dominion) fashioned for +heavenly destinies--then you, too, would believe. Since that day my +old friend has not spoken a word about the "waste of the flower of the +race." + +*** + +The house with the drawn blinds stands at the cross-roads, and I must +come back to it. What is it that has happened to him who lies in a +nameless grave in France? The opportunity for winning glory and +earthly fame did not come his way; he just laid down his life along +with hundreds of thousands more. He has taken his place among the +undistinguished dead. + + "O, undistinguished dead, + Whom the bent covers or the rock-strewn steep + Shows to the stars, for you I mourn--I weep, + O, undistinguished dead. + + "None knows your name, + Blackened and blurred in the wild battle's brunt, + Hotly ye fell with all your wounds in front. + That was your fame." + +Not a line in the records of time for him. But there are other +records--those of eternity. He has lost nothing of the thrill of life. +He is being borne on that tide of self-surrender and heroism which has +flowed through the ages, and bears those who embark on it to the very +feet of God. He would not himself have it otherwise. "It is better +far to go out with honour than survive with shame," wrote a comrade +from the trenches, now united with him in death. There is a place for +sorrow in our land, but its place is by the hearth-stones of those +whose sons choose to survive with shame. He has taken his place among +those who, unseen, are leading on the embattled hosts of his race to +victory. He has discovered the treasures in store for the brave and +the true. When, amid the flutterings of flags and the shouting of the +people rejoicing in their deliverance, the great army will return home +at last--he, too, will come. + +At Kobe, when the bugles were welcoming the victorious Japanese home in +1895, Lafcadio Hearn spoke to an old man of those who would never +return. "Probably the Western people believe," answered the old man, +"that the dead never return. There are no Japanese dead who do not +return. There are none who do not know the way." It is a poor, +emasculated religion that does not believe that. When at the last the +bugles call in the quiet evening ... they will come back. They will +come crowned with glory and honour and immortality--with that victory +which overcometh the world. Let the blinds be rolled up, and the +windows be all flung open to the light. + + + + +VI + +The Cities of the Plain + + + +VI + +It was the old clerk, of whose services and devotion to our parish I +have previously written, who gave the Biblical name to the little +village that lies near the boundary of the great city that is steadily +creeping towards us, and ever threatening to engulf us. Its own name +is singularly pleasant to the ear and redolent of the sound of running +waters, but it is unnecessary to burden the memory with it. Though it +is now many years ago, I remember, as it were yesterday, the first time +I heard the word on the old clerk's lips. I was sitting warming myself +by the fire in the ticket-collector's office. The ticket-collector was +ostensibly waiting to provide tickets, but as everybody in our parish +has a season ticket, that part of his duty is almost a sinecure. + +Thus it happens that the ticket-collector has leisure, just before the +trains pass through, to give his friends the fruits of his researches +in the realms of philosophy. That particular day he was speaking of +the changes he had seen. "I was brought up," said he, closing his +argument, "on the Shorter Catechism and porridge. I dinna haud any +longer by the Catechism, but I havena lost my faith in porridge." + +It was then that the clink of coppers was heard on the sill of the +ticket window. In the aperture was framed the face of the clerk, with +the trimmed grey beard and the small twinkling eyes. He held three +pennies deftly in his thumbless hand. "Return, Sodom," said he. The +ticket-collector pushed back his cap, stretched out his right hand as +if he were beginning to speak, then thought better of it. Out of his +case, without a word, he produced a return ticket for Sodom, clinked it +in his machine, and passed it through the window. The old clerk +received it with a grim chuckle. + +Away below the bridge there came a rumble. "Train," said the +ticket-collector, closing the aperture with a snap, and making for the +door. And I have never forgotten the hoarse voice of the old clerk +with an acid edge to it as he clinked his three coppers, saying +"Return, Sodom." + +*** + +It is an amazing thing how within the circuit of the same parish, +removed by one mile from one another, there can live together two eras +so remote from each other in the order of human development, as the +world of the red-roofed houses on the slopes of the hills, and the +village at their base where the gorge, worn by the little river through +the travail of immemorial centuries, debouches on the great central +plain that runs across Scotland. + +Every morning the dwellers on the slopes are borne by the railway on a +great span of arches over the little village, and they look down on the +roofs of its houses. On the slopes there lies the world in which the +fringes of life are embroidered--a world where men and women talk of +books, pictures and plays. It is a world of hyphenated names. But in +all the village there is not so much as one hyphenated name. It is a +refuse-heap of humanity. Many diverse races are crowded in it. The +city fathers clean out slums without providing first for the +slum-dwellers, and, swept before the broom of so-called social +reformers, homeless men and women have drifted to the village, and +there reconstituted their slum. + +From the glens of the north broken Highlanders, driven out to make room +for sheep, have drifted hither to work in the quarries, and the speech +of their children's children still bears the trace of their ancient +language pure and clean; over the sea Irishmen have come to reap the +harvest fields of the Lothians, and they have been deposited by the +tide in the village. Stray Poles have come hither and straggling +Czechs; a man from Connemara neighbours a shaggy giant from Lewis; and +a dour stone-cutter from Aberdeen is door by door with an Italian who +sells what looks like a deadly mixture from a hand-cart. + +Here you can see humanity in its primitive state, before it began to +adorn the fringes of life, and make for itself sanctuaries of privacy. +Between the slopes and the base of the hill there yawns an invisible +chasm. Centuries separate them. Thus it comes that the slope-dweller +passes on the top of the arches, scanning his newspaper, without so +much as seeing the huddle of houses which constitute the village. + +It is only a week ago that, like the old clerk, I took out a return +ticket for the "Cities of the Plain." (For the old clerk had a +two-fold formula. When he was going to one village he said, "Return, +Sodom," but when he meant to go to the quarries beside the village he +said, "Return, Cities of the Plain.") It was to visit an old soldier +that I thus descended into the plains. He lives in a rookery in which +many families are crowded one on the top of the other--a rabbit-warren +infested by many and strange odours. He used to come up the slopes and +do odd jobs, tidying up gardens, and he loved to talk of + + "unhappy far-off things + And battles long ago," + +in a language which I also could speak. So I got to know him. And as +I sat by his bed I heard a moan from the adjoining room. It began in a +low cry, and then rose into a wail that seemed charged with all the +woes of humanity. The old man sat up in bed trembling. The cry of woe +now changed into a chorus; other voices swelled it. It was the act of +a moment to open the door, and in the dim landing find the door of this +other room. + +I opened it, and there I saw three children huddled before a grate +which contained nothing but ashes. On an iron bed, stretched on straw, +lay a woman sunk in sleep.... A foetid air was laden with the fumes of +alcohol.... There was no food.... A broken chair, a stool or two, and +a box that did duty for a table.... The old soldier told me what to +do, and I did it. A kindly woman brought coal and food, and the +wailing was silenced. The old man explained it all. The woman sunk in +the stupor is the wife of a soldier now in the trenches. She did not +belong to our parish; but only came a week or two before, swept before +the broom of the "social reformers" from the city. The mothers of the +Parish, the old soldier declared, were heroines. One such, when her +son asked her consent to enlist, said, "Eh, laddie, I dinna want ye to +gang; I dinna want ... but if I were ye I wud gang mysel'." Our own +wives and mothers were splendid--but those who came from the city, +flotsam and jetsam borne on the tide, staying for a little and then +carried away again, of whom there were three or four in the +village--these were different. They meet each other eager for news. +They are depressed, and feel the need for cheering. One suggests a +stimulant ... and the result is this. + +He is no Puritan--the old soldier lying on his bed, his campaigning +done--and he spoke out of an understanding heart. It was only poor +human nature, overtaken by thick darkness and misery, trying to open a +window towards the realm of sunshine. + +And I came out into the roadway and turned towards the station. I did +not see them before, but I saw them now. A few yards separating them, +I pass two shops licensed to sell the means for opening windows towards +this realm of happiness; and two houses with gaudy lights called the +villagers to enter the region where all cares and worries are +forgotten. In the street pale-faced, ill-clad children played at being +soldiers, marching with heads erect. The gorge was already dark with +the evening shadows, but the lamps in the village were lit. + +When the village was passed I stood and looked back. In the west the +setting sun had thrown over the heavens a glow. A well of liquid fire +glowed over Torfionn, and its rays spread fan-like, so that they +spanned the horizon, and, touching the rounded mass of Corstarfin, went +forth over the firth. Against this background stood silhouetted the +great arches that carry the railway across the hollow, and behind these +the arches that bear the canal. The piers stood as a gigantic forest. +These mighty arches might have been the work of the Romans. A soft, +luminous haze fell on the village. Window after window was lit up. +The door of a cottage near me was opened, and a flood of light streamed +out. A woman stood in the door, and looking up the road shouted "Jim," +and a little boy, leaving his fellow-soldiers, rushed to her, and she +clasped him in her arms and closed the door.... In that moment the +little village seemed to me as if it were an outpost of Paradise. +Nature threw as a benediction the mantle of its loveliness over it. +What nature meant to be a sanctuary of beauty, man had changed into +Sodom. + +*** + +The ticket-collector stood at his post and scanned the passengers as +they went through. He knew them all, and had only a stray ticket to +collect. I was last, and duly gave up my "return" from the "Cities of +the Plain." But he did not let me through the gate. "I want to show +you something," said the ticket-collector, and he led me into his +office and produced a pamphlet. + +"I got it from the man who goes to Keswick," said the ticket-collector; +"you know him." I knew him, the best of men. + +"Nae doubt," went on the ticket-collector; "nae doubt. He was always +giving me tracts. Tracts--faugh!--poor stuff, nae style, nae logic, +and nae philosophee in them. But I aye took them and thanked him--for +he is a nice man, though a perfect babe in matters of understanding. +And I found them useful for spills. The other day he handed me +this..." and he waved a blue paper-covered booklet. + +"Mahn," he exclaimed, pushing his peaked cap back from his grey head, +and sweeping his brass buttons down with his hand; "mahn, this has fair +hit me between the eyes." Then he opened the pamphlet and began to +read passages that he had heavily scored with blue pencil. The Czar +has abolished the sale of vodka for ever! What is the result? + +"The old women in the villages," read the ticket-collector, "can hardly +believe their own eyes, so changed are their menfolk.... Everywhere +peace, kindness and industry. War is said to be hell; but this is like +a foretaste of heaven." + +"Listen to this," cried the collector, his arm outstretched. "A +newspaper correspondent writes, since the sale of vodka stopped the old +night population (in the doss-houses) seems to have vanished." Every +passage he read bore the same testimony. + +"And what are we doing?" he exclaimed. "We have stopped nothing; we +surround our soldiers with the old temptations, and we leave their +defenceless wives exposed to the same temptations; I know all about it. +Mahn, it was Ruskin that said, 'There is no wealth but life,' and we +leave all our wealth of life at the mercy of every evil. It's a fair +scandal. Do you ken the conclusion I've come to! It is that the best +form of government is a benevolent despotism. Oor men are afraid of +this and that--losing votes--but an autocrat with a stroke of a pen can +sweep away the power of hell. If they would only make King George an +autocrat for a few years.... That would be grand!" + +He insisted on lending me the blue-covered pamphlet, and it being his +hour off he walked with me across the bridge. The valley was now dark. +The snuff-manufacturer's house down below was wrapped in gloom. Lights +twinkled on the slopes. Below a lamp-post at the far end of the bridge +two men stood. When he saw them the ticket-collector stood fast. + +"Mahn," said he, "I've come to a great resolution. I'm too old to +fight; and they canna get at me in ony way. No Income-tax for me; and +threepence on the tea is naething, for I never take it; I want to feel +that I am worth men dying for me; and I am going to be tee-total till +the end of the war. I'll give the money to help the soldiers' weans. +It's the weans that pull at my heart-strings." + +And he turned on his heel and walked rapidly back across the bridge. + +Under the lamp-post stood the roadman and the beadle, looking after +him. I spoke to them, for since the war began we all speak to each +other in our parish. + +"Has he forgotten ony thin'?" asked the roadman, waving a hand towards +the retreating form of the ticket-collector. + +"I don't think so," I answered, "he just said that he was going to be +tee-total till the end of the war." + +"Tee-total!" echoed the roadman mournfully; "there gangs anither lost +soul!" + +My two friends went sadly down the steep brae, and I turned up the long +flight of stone steps that leads to the road above. On the top of the +first flight I turned and looked after them. When they came opposite +the door of the village inn, they slowed down ... and then went +resolutely past, down into the hollow. The two of them have probably +resolved to join the company of the "lost souls." + +*** + +I have read the ticket-collector's pamphlet, and I feel a little dazed. +It is such an odd world, and the strange thing is that I never realised +its queerness before. A Grand Duke is murdered in a place of which I +never heard before, and whose name I cannot even now trust myself to +write down correctly, and here, a thousand miles away, the result is +that I am brought face to face for the first time with the problem that +lay twice a day under my feet--the problem of the Cities of the Plain. +A flood of light seems to have fallen on things which were aforetime +hazy. Events stand out luridly and arrestingly. Here is one. I was +in a far Hebridean isle when war broke out. All of a sudden there +sounded the drum, + + "Saying Come, + Freemen, come, + Ere your heritage be wasted! said the + quick alarming drum." + +And the manhood of the island sprang to their feet. Mothers gave their +sons, sending them away with sobs and tears, but in the name of God. + +On a drizzling morning the little steamer lay at the pier, crowded with +men and horses, going out to fight and die. The hawsers were loosed. +The steamer churned and backed and crept away. A girl stood near me +crying softly. A youth with clean-cut features, and the yearning no +tongue can utter shining in his eyes, leant over the taffrail and +called to her, "Not crying, Jessie?" And she wiped her cheek with the +moist handkerchief, and turned a smiling face to him and said, "No, I +am not crying." And the paddles churned faster, and they passed into +the drizzle and the haze. Weeks later I read how one man of that +regiment--the regiment of my own county--killed another ... and a few +days later I read that he had done so in a drunken brawl. He was not +from the island, that man, and I know not who he is. His mother +doubtless sent him forth to fight as a hero for his King, and he became +a murderer under the fostering of the State. + +Out of the clean countryside they were taken, these men, and the State +that summoned them, and whose call they answered, surrounded them with +temptations. Away from the influence of mother and sister and +sweetheart, wearied and worn with the hard toil of preparation, the +State opened the canteen and said, "Take your ease thus," and they did +so. The Secretary of War made appeals to them. "Be sober," said he, +"avoid alcohol, that the State, through your self-denial, may live." +But the State said, "See, I have made ample provision for you, so that +you may disregard the noble advice my servant gives you." They came in +their thousands across the Atlantic from the far North-West at the call +of their mother--clean and sober--and their mother opened the canteen +for their benefit on the plain. Such a world as that dwelt in the +imagination of Dean Swift--I never imagined that it could exist here +and now. And in that world of the cities of the plain, what reward are +we preparing for the men who are baring their breasts to the arrows, +standing between us and death? When they come back, war-worn, to what +will they return? To homes in which the fires are extinguished, the +candles burnt down to the socket; the cupboards bare, the children +famished and neglected? Is that to be the guerdon of their sacrifice; +is it for that that they have gone down into hell? Surely it cannot be +for that! A wave has passed over us, raising us to the realisation of +the higher values of things. Words live for us now which were dead +yesterday. A beam of light has fallen into the chamber of imagery, and +the word _Temperance_ has risen from the couch on which it lay dying, +and it claims us for its own. Through it we can make the world know +that we are worth fighting for--worth that the young, the strong, and +the brave should take everything they hold dear--their ideals, their +love, their little children unborn--and throw them into the trench, and +there give themselves and their dreams to death for us. We must see to +it that we are worthy the sacrifice. + +*** + +It seemed to me hitherto that I was a citizen of the country endowed +with the greatest freedom on earth. But the ticket-collector has +proved to me that that was a dream. Here in our parish I have no power +to control this thing that matters so vitally in the Cities of the +Plain. We have a Parish Council and a County Council, and I don't know +how many other dignified and honourable authorities, whom we elect. +But we elect nobody to control this. A body of unelected Justices, of +whom we know nothing, settle for us that down yonder in the Cities of +the Plain there shall be half a dozen State-regulated places for the +manufacturing of paupers and criminals. (The laws change with such +kaleidoscopic swiftness in those days that I may be wrong.) And here +am I, newly awakened by the ticket-collector to that enormity, and I am +not free to do anything. It is surely a mad world. We needed to be +awakened; and we have been awakened with the shriek of shells and the +crying of the perishing! And the result of the awakening will be +regeneration for the Cities of the Plain. + +*** + +The ticket-collector has deprived me for the time being of my peace of +mind. My conversion is so recent that I am afraid of falling into the +fanaticism of the newly converted. I followed the General the other +day into the railway carriage, and as we were passing over Sodom, lying +there under our feet, I spoke to him about it. He looked at me with +cold eyes. + +"Do you want to sacrifice the freedom of the individual?" he asked in +his curt military tones; "do you think that you can make saints of +people by Act of Parliament? They would be mere plaster-saints." + +I was reduced to silence. My new-born zeal seemed to ooze out at every +pore. There was a touch of amused scorn in the General's eye as he +glanced at me. The General is a man of experience, and he is quite +right. Acts of Parliament will never make saints of the people. But +the State can see to it that the people are not surrounded by +temptations through the operations of Acts of Parliament; that, if the +State is impotent to make saints, it shall not, on the other hand, set +itself deliberately to make devils. That, it seems to me, is what the +State is now doing in the Cities of the Plain. + +In ten thousand schools the State sanctions that its children be taught +to pray--"Lead us not into temptation," and that same State encircles +the path of its children by legalised temptations at every corner. It +is the maddest of worlds. I may be wrong and the General wholly right. +But as the ticket-collector said the last time I saw him--"I would like +to see the man who could convince me that I am wrong." And I don't +know whether to be grateful to the ticket-collector or not. He has +deprived me of some of my sleep; he has made my head ache with thinking +of problems which I am not fit to cope with; and, most unlooked for of +all, he has made a tee-totaler of me till the end of the war. There is +a plaintive note in the ticket-collector's voice, which strikes a chord +in my heart, when he invariably adds: "I hope the war won't last long." +For, if it does, there will be the danger of the ticket-collector and +myself becoming teetotalers for altogether. And it is such an ugly +word--tee-totaler! If only the ticket-collector would coin a new and +beautiful word to connote his new and beneficent state of mind! It is +a pity that great causes should be burdened by the weight of ugly words. + + + + + GLASGOW: PRINTED AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS + BY ROBERT MACLEHOSE AND CO. 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