IS ■■■■■■■■Q ' ^^ ^u r ..Mki,,^ i^'^Q^rS^^^ 1^ '^ 1 mm r;))\ r J ^fa ^ % ■S ^■lil'^i^^i'wv (li^B^^^ ^ mi ■■ ^ ^MfV^^HH •^'V^ ^ ^ /* 1^^^^ H 4y^ '"w f ^ 0-rvViiA^ fefi \7~ 1 ^^^1 > ^^i^ij^^S^ i^ ^«^nl^ w ^j^^P^^TPfJIH '•Tr"""r^T1^ir^ "li -^.T. is^^sn :^T\ HfiSMiiiMilMnmi!^ IV /.2-cr.2.^ LIBRARY OF THE THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY PRINCETON, N. J. Division. ....s^.—' Section .<^J^ ' I ,.,. ^ lA" • /I I / / h^f/r THEPASTOR'SBEQUEST, THE PASTOR'S BEQUEST. SELECTIONS FROM THIil SER]y£ON^S EEV. HENRY BACON. EDITED BY MRS. E. A. BACON. " A volume precious with thy name, And latest records — all that love can save.' BOSTON: PUBLISHED BY ABEL TOMPKINS. 38 & 40 CORNHILL. 1857. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the 3'ear 1857, BY MRS. E. A. BACON, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts. Bazin & Chandt-kr, Pbiktxbs, 37 CornhiU. TO S^lje WinibtxsRlUt ^acittitB IN EAST CAMBRIDGE, HAVERHILL, MARBLEHEAD, PROVIDENCE AND PHILADELPHIA, OF WHICH MR. BACON WAS PASTOE, THIS VOLUME IS RESPECTFULLY AND AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED. PREFACE The following Sermons are presented to the reader as the last work of the author, and as a memorial of his ministry. Unaccomplished though the work may- have seemed, when no guide was left for its arrange- ment, save a Prospectus dictated when the sands of life were running low, and a list of about half the contents found among his papers, his choice of sub- jects decided the tone and spirit of the book, and has been my guide in completing it. Those who were interested in his life and labors may receive this volume as an interpreter of his thoughts on life and duty, his cheerful views of death and his unclouded hope of immortality. Continually " looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith," a peculiar tone was imparted to his ministry ; and one has truly said, " He was not a Vlll PREFACE. theological or a reformatory preacher, though the- ology and reform were a large staple of his material ; but he was eminently a ' spiritual preacher ;' one whose religious life underlies, forms, colors and per- meates all his opinions and forms of utterance." May those who once received the Gospel in its ful- ness from his living voice, accept these gleanings from the harvest of thought that he has left, as peculiarly their heritage. E. A, B. May, 185T. CONTENTS I. The Golden Rule Vitalized 13 11. Unwasting Power 23 III. Young America 31 IV. No Sympathy among the Guilty 41 V. Spiritual Relationship 60 VI. Invisible Benefactors 59 Vn. Labor the Price of Excellence 68 VIII. The Battle of Thought 78 IX. Law of Liberty 85 X. Belief is a Work 94 XL Jesus the Son of God 102 Xn. Christ made a Phantom 110 XIII. Unbelief Helped 122 XIV. Personating Jesus 131 XV. The Silence of Jesus 139 X CONTENTS. XVI. Immortality not Incredible 150 XVII. Immortality Revealed 161 XVIII. Palm Sunday 176 XIX. The Greatness of Charity 188 XX. The Resurrection of Christ 200 XXI. Unclouded Glory of the Resurrection. .210 XXII. Life a Cloud 219 XXIII. Hidden Life 230 XXIV. The Great City 237 XXV. Present Privileges of the Christian 250 XXVI. Go Home to thy Friends 257 XXVII. Visitations of God 265 XXVIIL Prayer 278 XXIX. The Minuteness of Divine Providence. . .286 XXX. Forgiveness 295 XXXI. Christian Law of Use 306 XXXII. Religion a Necessity 316 XXXIII. Religion is Life 326 XXXIV. Imitating Christ 343 XXXV. Reunion 351 SERMON I. THE GOLDEN RULE VITALIZED. Thekefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them; for this is the law and the PROPHETS. — Matt, vii: 12. This is called the Golden Rule, because it embod- ies a principle of action most precious in its results to society. It is an indirect assertion of Human Brotherhood, leading us beyond nations, clans and classes, to our simple humanity whatever its form or condition. It is an argument against isolation, nar- rowness, selfishness, and makes the necessity of sympathy apparent — that sympathy by which we make another's situation our own, and thus discover our duty to him. And yet farther: this precept makes Christian duty a matter of thought, reflection, careful deduction from principles, so that if, in any given case, we do not find a precept made for us pointing out our duty, we can make one for ourselves. This answers the objection which some Christians have to a new form of moral action when they say, " tliere 2 14 THE GOLDEN RULE VITALIZED. is no precept in the New Testament which demands this." It is unreasonable, we answer, to suppose that Christianity goes no further in its precepts than what are laid down in the New Testament. The farther the age of the Apostles extended, the more questions came up, and all of them were answered by the appli- cation of the vital principles of the Gospel ; and had that age been miraculously continued to the present day, new precepts would have been drawn from a like application of Christian doctrine to Christian duty as circumstances and exigences required. So with our law books and new questions in law. It would seem that every possible case might be covered by some specific law, or decision of some Court or Judge, but it is not so. On this ground many a criminal escapes ; many a simple case is long protracted by the subtleties of legal argument ; and many an assumption of power is made by Judge and Jury. Paley has well said, '' had the same particu- larity which obtain in human laws, so far as they go, been attempted in the Scriptures, throughout the whole extent of morality, it is manifest they would have been by much too bulky to be either read or cir- culated, or rather, as St. John says, ' even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written.' " This is true, and it should awaken us to consider more the culture demanded by Christianity, that we guard ourselves against that consei;yatism which seems to suppose that every case of human duty has been legistated upon by either the Saviour or his Apostles. THE GOLDEN RULE VITALIZED. 15 The true compreliensivencss of Christian duty is, to be as cautious not to refuse to apply great principles to neiu questions of moral action, as not to ivithdraw from the principles themselves. Like the mariner or shipmaster, we must not only be careful that our compass is right, that the ship's course may be cor- rectly steered night and day, but we must also be cautious that nothing be in the way to cause a local derangement of the Magnet, lest that upon which we depend for guidance should lead to rocks and shoals and shipwreck. The text, then, must ever vindicate Christianity as a Religion of Culture — a Religion that prompts to a perpetual vigilance against the power of custom, the appeal of precedent, and demanding of us the moral heroism that says, we will make a precedent if there is none, we will be faithful to our light though the ages have been blind ; for of all the things we would have men do, fidelity to principle is the most import- ant — principle in its application to present exigences, showing new methods of progress, and opening new discoveries of eternal things. Two things are now to be noticed in reference to the text — this Golden Rule : — First, in some form, this precept is found among many nations. Heathen and Jewish. It is one of those great ideas which appear to be common property of humanity, and in all ages to witness to a common feeling of rectitude, a universal sense of honor and right. In Wetsteins' Notes there are given many examples of the presence of this nrecept among 16 THE GOLDEN BULE VITALIZED. strangely diversified nations. Quotations may be made from classic and Rabbinical writings which contain a similar thought ; and it is beautiful to see how grand ideas of Right and Duty vindicate the eternal rectitude of human nature, and show that, despite " the Fall," the image of God is still in the soul. And it is this which makes the popular form of Christianity abhorent to the thoughtful and sympa- thetic soul. It outrages the universal sentiment of honor and right. It presents the Diety as acting on a lower principle than he holds up for man, and makes the law of Heaven the iron rule of doing to others as they have done to us. And while the senti- ment of our text is the common property of our race, witnessing to an idea of rectitude as inherited from the Creator, we can always hope for the advance of our liberal religion, as it is in harmony therewith. Men holding to the dogmas of Total Depravity, of the arbitrary Election of some and Reprobation of others, and the condemnation of our race to endless wrath because of the sin of Adam, must have awful contests with the intuitive principles or sentiments of honor and right, or of what the great law of Equity demands. It will not do to ask of men to act on a high plane of generous sympathetic regard, and then present them, as the Diety of such a religion, a God who renders evil for evil and smites with the sceptre of endless wrath. And eloquently, and truthfully as eloquently, has the autlior of " The Conflict of Ages," in speaking of the principles of honor and right com- mon to all, said, " It has been the great evil of other THE GOLDEN RULE VITALIZED. 17 ages, that principles like these, although avowed, have not been consistently carried out. They need to be exalted, made prominent, and insisted on. If true at all, they are to all created beings the most momen- tuous truths in the universe of God. They are like a full orbed sun, in the centre of all created existence. No system can be truly seen but in their light. No system can be true which really contravenes them. For God is all glorious, all holy, all just, all honorable, all good. He cannot but observe the principles of honor and right. For though he often dwelleth in thick darkness, and deep clouds are his pavilion, yet now and evermore righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his throne." The second consideration I designed to present in reference to the text is this : Misbblievers or Infidels erect on their basis of the universality and antiquity of the idea of the text, an argument against honor to Jesus. In one of our Daily papers, the past week, in a correspondence on " Christianity a Failure," a writer speaks of the good precepts and sentiments which may be culled and presented as Christianity, and then adds : " Suppose I find the same or similar notions in Zoroaster, Confucius, Pythagoras, Plato, or Socrates, long before Christianity was dreamt of, can I help the conviction that these good precepts and sentiments were stolen from the Heathen ? They are not the integral part of Christianity, and are only put in to give value to the rest." This is common talk on the part of modern unbe- 2* 18 THE GOJ.DEN RULE VITALIZED. lieyers. The most learned among the early Chris- tians labored to show that Christianity was not some- thing entirely novel, but in harmony with the best things of the best minds in all ages, and now these things are put forward as an argument that Chris- tianity is made up of patch-work — its good precepts and sentiments are not an integral part — that is, do not belong to its wholeness, but are put on, as the painter puts on certain jewels to his picture of Venus which he was not able to make handsome ; or they were as the jewels the children of Israel took with them when they went out of Egypt. Now there are at least three answers to this com- mon objection to Christianity. It is not the preceptive portion of Christianity which gives it its highest value. To speak of '' good sentiments and precepts put in to give value to the rest," is preposterous, inasmuch as the Doctrines of Christianity have a pre-eminent value in and of them-, selves. They inevitably suggest good sentiments and precepts. If all the precepts and sentiments of all the philosophers named had died with them, the doctrines of Christianity would have re-created all that was good and true. Take Democracy, as an illustrations. Suppose all the good sentiments which ever were put forth under all other forms of govern- ment had perished when Democracy was born bright and beautiful to the apprehensions of men. Would it not, as a doctrine, or principle, or as a combination of doctrines and principles, have suggested sentiments and precepts as good as ever met the eye or ear of THE GOLDEN RULE VITALIZED. 19 humanity in any age, among any people ! That a Democracy has laws and institutions which have been adopted or originated under other governments, is no argument that these are not an integral part of Demo- cracy. They arc not pvt in as a mechanical addition, but absorbed as something made for its life ; and this but shows that the ages have been a unity — that humanity is an organic whole — tliat the labors of one age are for another, and Democracy, as we have it, is the flower and consummation of Political Econo- my — the aggregate wisdom of all thoughts of free institutions. So with Christianity. It never claimed to stand apart from the preceding ages. Man had not only dreamed of, but prophecied it. It claimed an organic, a final union with them. " I came not," said Jesus, " to destroy^ but to fnlfilP What was old and decriped died of natural decay ; but what- ever was good, that had any element of eternal fresh- ness, lived ; and Christianity became the flower and consummation of all religious truth. Hence, the New Testament is always appealing to the Old ; the Apostles are always venerating whatever is good among the Heathen ; and at Athens the centre of Philosophy, Paul, when speaking of the divine Father- hood and against the worship of idols, joyfully used the Heathen poets as he said, '' As certain also of your own poets have said, ' For we are also his off- spring.' " This sentiment is in Aratus and Cleanthes, and Paul quoted what the former wrote three hundred years before. To make the good sentiments and precepts of 20 THE GOLDEN RULE VITALIZED. Cliristianity stolen jewels gives to the New Testament writers a range of learning that cannot be claimed for them. It supposes them to have had a key to every cabinet from Egypt to Greece, and to be greater masters of Mosaic work than the world ever knew. No, the sentiments and precepts of Christianity flowed out of the inspired soul of Christ. If they were gathered from all times and peoples, then it was God who gathered them, as the Sun is supposed to draw back the rays of light which have illuminated the globe, and to pour them down again in the sunshine of to-day. But again : Because we can hunt up sentiments and precepts by searching the literature of the world, that is no reason for accusing any person of theft because that person publishes the like. Children, who never read a single author, are frequently found uttering the most profound maxims ; and the ancient reverence for a little child was prompted by the idea that it came fresh and uncontaminated from the Diety ; and old philosophers thought that this wisdom could be accounted for on no other ground than the hypothesis, that knowledge in this life was but the memory of a former existence. It is a narrow criticism that makes resemblances proofs of theft ; and it is astonishing to see what some critics call resemblances, not having power to pene- trate to the fulness of the significance of one expres- sion in contrast with the limit of another. It is with authors as with inventors : — Authors publish the same THE GOLDEN RULE VITALIZED. 21 idea in a book as Inventors do in a machine or pro- cess of art, unknown to each other. Any scientific work which records the doings of inventors in differ- ent countries, will furnish many instances of the same invention in widely separated countries. A learned man has asserted that the only original portion of the Lord's prayer is the petition relating to forgiveness ; but before this can be proved, the previous question must be settled, " Had Jesus access to these Rabbini- cal writings and did he use them ?" What was original with Christ, and what might be hunted up among all the writings of the laws, are quite different matters. But admitting the existence of the parts, is the symmetrical whole not an originality ? This brings me to the last proposition : — Whatever may have been anticipated of the good sentiments and precepts of Christianity by master spirits before Christ, the originality of Christianity holds good on the ground of the symmetrical harmony of its parts, its perfection as a whole, and the vitality imparted to all sentiments and percepts by the doc- trines and life of Jesus Christ. Here was originality to a grand degree. The doctrines of Jesus in their fulness were no stolen jewels put into the ears of a corpse ; and from whence did he steal that Divine Life of his ? It is a humiliating process for the unbe- liever to go through his famous ranks of Philosophers and see with what absurd superstitions they united the fine sentiments and good precepts which are so much applauded. Their doctrines did not uphold 22 THE GOLDEN RULE VITALIZED. these precepts any more than the doctrines of the popular Church can support the Golden Rule. In Jesus we see something peculiar. He vitalized his precepts. The words that he spake were " spirit and life." Whatever of sentiment or precept that existed before his time, were as the elements of modern dis- coveries or inventions which are by no means new ; but the combination of them, the forms given them, by which they minister to the advance of Civilization and the progress of Society, are new. Men of modern times have regulated and directed these elements as they have never been regulated and directed before ; and the spirit of our humane religion is finely seen in the fact, that the glory of inventive skill lies now in ministering to what contributes to the general good. Say then, if men will, that Jesus taught nothing new — that, like the Golden Rule, all the good senti- ments and precepts of Christianity are jewels worn before the time of Christ, still it is low talk to speak of them as stolen ; and it is a poor compliment to a man's range of thought for him to say, he cannot help the conviction that they were stolen. Nay, these things were, when Christ came, almost without power. He breathed into them new life, and they had power, as when God breathed into the lifeless clay the breath of life and Adam rose to go into the Garden to dress and to keep it. SERMON II UNWASTING POWER. Thoit hast the dkw of thy youth.— Psalm ex.: 3. The grass is greenest, and the flower is sweetest, where the dew lies longest ; and to be said to have, in manhood, the dew of one's youth, is to he said to retain freshness of life, its buoyant energy, and its beautiful prophecies. The text is connected with a magnificent promise which all Christians apply to the Saviour. David com- mences with a high strain, sweeping all the chords of his harp at once, and says, " The Lord said unto my Lord'' that is, Jehovah, in the great purposes of redemption, spake unto the Messiah, the great hope of David ; and to David's Lord, Jehovah said, " Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool y And then comes the grand promise, clothed in the richest oriental imagery : " The Lord shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion : rule thou in the 24 UNWASTING POWER. midst of thine enemies. Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power, in the bounties of holiness from the womb of the morning : Thou hast the dew of thy youth." Here, in the language of sublime poetry, four things are presented, the Messiah's people ; the wil- lingness of the Messiah's people at a certain time ; that certain time is set forth on the day of the Mes- siah's power ; and the glory of the result is pictured as the beauties of holiness, which beauties are imaged by the rising dews of the morning, glittering in the light of the early sun, like orient pearls. There is a fine gradation of thought as we reverse the order of these ideas and ascend from the last to the first. The beauties of holiness are imaged in the purity and loveliness of the dew, and the dew is never any where more beautiful or plentiful than in the land of the Psalmist. These beauties are to attend the Messiah's day of power. His power is unto holiness, the beauties of holiness — that perfection of result which shall leave nothing wanted in the completeness of the redemption. The results of his power shall be as perfect as the globes of the morning dew — as crystally pure — as prismatic to the great central Light. This power, producing such results shall be in har- mony with the willingness of the people. There is power spoken of in connection with David's Lord, God's Messiah ; and there is willingness spoken of in connection with the Messiah's people ; and God sees UNWASTING POWER. 25 the harmony between this power and willingness, whether man can search it out or not. And then, also, this people who are to become willing in the day of the Messiah's power, must be recognized as not his in character in the light of this prophecy. This prophecy speaks of their being willing when the day of power comes, so that the people spoken of, must embrace those who were intended, where it is written, " Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool." And also, where in the context, we read, " The Lord shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion ; rule thou in the midst of thine enemies. That rod or sceptre of strength shall be swayed, and that rule exercised, to the bringing in of the beauties of holiness wherever the hideousness of sin has been and is. The footstool of the Messiah shall be glorious, because it shall be made of prostrate kings and humbled princes ; the great and the mighty shall submit ; the masses shall become united in sub- jection to truth and holiness ; but that footstool shall not be as a thing to tread upon, to stamp with the heal of violence ; for this is not the use to which the kings place a footstool ; — their use of it is to give dignity and ease as they sit enthroned in the majesty of state. As the dews beautify, in the morning, the earth, God's footstool, so shall the redemption of all souls make a footstool for Christ all beautiful with the beauties of holiness. But the text, which is a brief portion of the pro- phecy thus dwelt upon, has an attraction peculiar to itself: " Thou hast the dew of thy youth.'' 8 26 UNWASTING POWER. It seems to be a rapt expression of the sacred poet, suggested by the image previously used, where the dews of the morning were employed to set forth the beauties of holiness. The earth seems still fresh and young as the dews rise and impearl the leaves and flowers, and so the blessed Redeemer loses no virtue by the victories he achieves. The circuits of the vapors are ever supplying to the earth the material for its dews, and the eternal pro- vidence of God is the full fountain of the Saviour's fulness. The grand summing up of the Gospel is, " God in Christ reconciling the world unto himself," and now, as in any portion of the Redeemer's career, he is fresh for his work, and the beauties of holiness attest his power, as the dew drops now sparkle in the light of the morning, as when Adam blessed Eve, or Jacob found the fleece wet, or the Psalmist beheld in their beauty the purity of the holy soul and the regenerated heart. God's agencies never lose by activity. They have an eternal youth. Jesus is a priest, not according to a changing and perishing priesthood, " but after the power of an endless life ;" and so with his kingship ; for he sits on no throne of succession, but on the right hand of the Father, according to the purpose of ages — the plan of God " before the foundation of tlie world," and by which came the promise in Eden, and the prophecies that fell from the harp of David, and rung from the trumpet of Isaiah. UNWASTING POWER. 27 Such a priest and king — such a Saviour cannot be defeated ; and to read the text, " Thou hast the dew of thy youth ^^ is to read of the eternal freshness and sameness of the Redeemer's power in producing the beauties of holiness. what a power was that whicli, by his truth and his miracles, Jesus exhibited in the morning of his great mission ! And have we yet to learn, that his Truth remains the same, though his miracles are ended ? To him, the work of his truth on the soul^ was a greater result than the deed of healing which he performed for the body. These deeds of healhig were but expressions or types of what his truth could do for the faculties of the mind, as he seemed to intimate when he met the blind man, and declaring himself " the Light of the World," opened the sealed eyes of the kneeling suppliant and permitted him to behold the sun, the beauties of nature, the face of his fellow man and his benefactor. Thou hast, Saviour ! the dew of thy youth — thy glorious morning. The freshness of the Almighty power is ever thine. The baptism of the Highest has lost none of its unction ; and the dews of Hermon but faintly picture the plentifulness of the conquests of thy redeeming grace, and the perfect beauty of the result — the beauties of holiness. But another application of our text attracts us now. Where the dew lies longest, there the grass is green- est, and the flowers are sweetest. The dews are greatly enriching to the soil where tliey are distilled, and the flower that is plucked that has kopt till the 28 UNWASTING POWER. noon tide the dew of the morning, is most beautiful to the eye and sweetest to the sense that inhales its perfume. How eloquently this speaks of the benefits of early religious education ! Eminent piety, presenting an unspotted name, a symmetrical character, a uniform testimony to the greatness of virtue and the royalty of Right, — what is it but the retaining of " the dew of youth" — the fresh beauty of light's morning ! There is nothing more attractive than the beauty of youth seen in old age — something that says life is ever new, that the years have their blessing and their favors as parts of a Providential period. To see such a one, is like going into the fields where, as you wander, you see nothing but the half- wilted grain and bent grass, till you come to where the dew has lingered and the freshness of the grass and the grain is delightful to behold. "We say of such a one, and we say truly, " He is enjoying a green old age !" and hardly any of us can help sympathizing with the poet who sung : " How I love the mellow sage, Smiling tlirough the veil of age ! A^Q is on his temples hung, But his heart — Ids heart is young /" And what will contribute most to this — this pos- session of the dew of youth in a green old age ? I answer, that which will best preserve the heart's fresh- ness in every period of life, and that is, the Religion of Jesus, This is the guardian of the whole being; UNWASTING POWER. 29 and they who imagine that religion may be put oil to some special period in life when sadness or sorrow may have come, when the heart is torn and shattered like a broken lute, may learn something better from the dew of the morning. " My doctrine shall drop as the rain, and distil as the deiv, as the small rain on the tender herb," said Moses in the opening of a sub- lime ode. "• The small rain on the tender herb !" what is that but a sweet image to speak of the appropriate influence of religion on the young ? Only by the culture of religion in the morning of thy years. young man ! young woman ! can it be thy happi- ness to hear, in the year of thy manhood or AYoman- hood, and of old age, " Thou hast the dew of thy youth !" a freshness that tells of unwasted power. Too many good Christians can go back no farther than to the rain that fell upon their hearts when youth was passed ; and too many, alas, can turn back no farther than when their way of life begun to " fall into the sere and yellow leaf," and religion was accepted because the earth has lost its charm, and, like a criminal condemned to die, a preparation was [ought for the march to the tomb. To God is given the dregs of life ; and prayer is but a lightning rod to avert the stroke of heaven's shafts of fire. Religion is something for youth. " The earth affords no lovelier sight, Then a religious youth.'^ Religion binds year to year with the band of '' natural piety." It is the dew of morning that shall leave an 3* 80 UN WASTING POWER. influence that will be seen in the sunset of mortality. It is the protector of innocence. It is the shield of virtue. It is the herald of noblest aims. It is the inspiration of loftiest courage. It is strength and power, resolution and energy, struggling and achieve- ment for life's grandest meaning. It is the serenity of the spirit amid trial ; the repose of the heart when circumstances seem to mock, and life threatens to be a failure. It is the life of God in the soul. Let then, the morning of life have its dew. Let the distillations of the truths of the Bible fall on your hearts. Let the overshadowing presence of God in the soul be as the cloud that drops dew, and then wilt thou say of one who is more than an earthly king, " His favor is as dew upon the grass." Far better, parents and guardians ! is it to use Religion in fonning' the character in the first efforts of the soul upon itself, than to wait till it must be used to refashion and adorn. The dew that helps the opening of the bud and rolls its blessing down deep into the heart of the flower, is more to be prized than the dew that only glosses the withered leaf and keeps the flower from speedily dying. " They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength ; they shall mount upon wings as eagles " — eagles that are replumed, and that spread their wing, and fasten their eye on the sun, in all the energy and freshness of their first soaring amid the clouds, when above where the thunder rolls, they rejoiced in the clear blue of heaven's serenity and that they had passed the light- ning's path. SERMON III YOUNG AMERICA. I HAVE WRITTEN UKTO YOU, YOUNG MEN, BECAUSE YE ARE STRONG. 1 Johu ii. : 14. The Bible is the most inspiring book for the young man. It speaks to him as capable of the highest aims, the loftiest purposes, and the grandest achieve- ments ; and wherever jou may turn for similitudes of strength, vigor, elasticity and hope, you meet with references to the young man. He rises up to the imagination as the spring-time abounding with forces which Fliall change the year from winter to summer beauty and autumn richness ; while every suggestion of the need of care in pruning, training, and foster- ing, is but a hint of the native wealth yielding its resources. It is a grand sight to behold St. John in advanced life addressing young men and giving as his reason for so doing, their strength^ placing them in the mili- tant position, and trusting the victory to their achieve- ments. 6'Z YOUNG AMERICA. And, first, tlie young are strong in numbers. In the various educational institutions in the coun- try three millions of the male, and one million of the female youth are receiving educational privileges, and what a mighty army would these make to show that the young are strong in numbers ! What a mass of mind is thus receiving impressions, beyond any contrast which any portion of the world can furnish. Young America cannot turn to any point where it will not find itself addressed with most spirit stirring appeals to be strong in thought, in self development, in the harmony of appetite and aspira- tion, in the consecration of the whole being to personal purity and exalted patriotism. I would do something, while considering the vast number of the youth of America, to redeem from low and rowdyish associations the name of Young America as denoting the freshest efforts for progress in con- nexion with public matters. Whenever there is an outljurst of mere passion — an overriding of all law, and the worst spirit of boy- ish sportiveness is united with the violence of the brutal man, the common remark is, " There is Young America in full bloom !" And in accordance with this, lengthy orations are delivered, sad sermons are preached, and mournful lamentations are sung, decry- ing the spirit of the age, despairing of the success of our free institutions ; and the worst pictures of the worst parts of crowded city life are set forth as speci- mens of the Spirit of the Times. Now, nothing is more disastrous than to depreciate YOUNG AMEEICA. 33 tlie young. It discourages them in reference to good effort ; it encourages them in the wilfulness of appe- tite and passion ; it infuses no redeeming element into the forces of character ; and it makes the future of our country dark to the vision of the anxious patriot. It prevents any just discernment of the different classes in the community, and makes us blind to the fact, that in the social and business world, as in nature, the most powerful forces are the most invisible ; and that, though now and then we have the outbursting thunder with the electric flash, yet con- stantly diffused and active is the vital electricity silent in the atmosphere. It is true, the young are strong in passions, in impe- tuous desires, in appetites, in hopes that ask not for the means of fulfilment, and aspirations which have yet to be freed from too exuberant growth. But is it not good to see this fresh life ? to behold the evidence, that born upon the bosom of the old Earth, every thing wears a youthful appearance to the eye of wonder, and the stars that gazed on Abraham and lighted the desert home of Hagar's son, seem new creations, through which the glory of Eternal Beauty comes to the sight of man. In ancient times new life was put into the old blood and shrunken veins of a royal per- sonage by contact with the young, and so is it in every department of society where there is any cordial sympathy with youthful buoyancy and exuberant hope. Grand is the thought of the poet, when look- ing out on the awful tyranny of the Papal States while war was raging against Liberty, she saw a child 34 YOUNG AMERICA. lifted up and smiling in the crowd, and received it as a token not to despair, saying, Who said we should be better if like these ? And ice — des])ond we for the future ; though Posterity is smiling at our knees, Convicting us of folly ?" A recent Association formed in Boston for the erection of a Monument to Franklin, have embraced in the picture on their certificate of Membership the figure of Franklin with a kite leaning against him, and a view of the Telegraph. The kite employed by the Philosopher in his experiments is a plaything of the young, and the experiment it served to make so successful, is but a type of the aspirations of Young America ; and there are as grand connections between those aspirations and the results of the Future, as between the kite experiment of Franklin and the Telegraphic wonders of the present day. Yes, here is the next thought, the young are strong in Hope, in trust in God's future, putting the Janus face of the New Year to soften the sombre effect of the countenance of the Old Year, bidding us listen for the music which is soon to wake in the woodland, on the hill side, and by the streams. And this we need. It comes in amid our darker musings as the young David entered the presence of Saul, and made him smile with his expressions of daring towards the proud giant of tlie Philistines. It was a grand day when young Israel thus rose to view ; and though his elder brother told him he had deserted the sheep he YOUNG AMERICA. 35 was only fitted to tend, his deeds showed that youth- ful expertness is more than a matcli for giant unwieldi- ness, and David, holding in his little plump hand the gory head of Goliath, symbolizes the fresh spirit of Young America, the victor over profane might. But this freshness of spirit is only to be cherished as David cherished it — at the fountains of God. He did not meet the giant in his own name ; he was not strong in self-reliance ; but he spoke the name of God, and felt his power in the swing of his arm, the aim of the stone, and heard his voice in the whiz of the sling, as it whirled through the air, and sent the smooth stone to its mark. Hence the pertinency of St. John's added words after he wrote, "I have writ- ten unto you, young men, because ye are strong," for he did add, " and the word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one." This is the crowning strength of humanity, and no demon can possess the soul while, with its own overcoming pow- er, the word of God abideth in the young man. Young America thus possessed would prove more ter- rible than an army with banners, more victorious than a thousand of the mightiest armies. Young America would thus re-produce Washington, and would move to the battle of Progress the most effectually for the liberty of the world. How shall the youth of the States and the domains of this country be impelled to the putting on of this noble, patriotic spirit ? Scolding will not do it, nor ridicule, nor deprecia- tion, nor anathema, nor solemn warning, nor impa- 36 YOUNG AMERICA. tient reformers ; for spirit answers only to kindred spirit, and repels whatever is antagonistic. The real demand is, for that recognition of the goodness of human nature which admits noble aims to be in har- mony with our Maker, and which labors to do for the soul what Adam did for the garden of Eden — to dress and to keep the exuberant vines, that the force of growth, which must find expression, need not run to waste. In our judgment of the young, we forget what an age of stimulation this is — what a hot-house it is to the plants that otherwise might unfold more perfectly and enduringly, and we charge upon human nature what only belongs to the exciting influence of the steam engine and the telegraph. The common rep- resentations of the old and young changing places, are as effectual against the old as against the young ; for why, with their immense advantage, did they not keep the junior behind the senior? for the enemy in the parable, sowed tares in the field while slumber was on the eyes of those who should have been awake. Aged Eli was told that the reason why young Israel had been made iniquitous, was the sin of his own sons at the very door of the tabernacle ; and said the Al- mighty, " They made themselves vile, and you re- strained them not." Easy old man ! hardly waking to see the inspired face of Samuel, and not noting the contrast of Hannah's child and his own sons. We are too ready to speak of Eli's children with- out remembering Hannah's son. The ludicrous caricatures of Young America are, YOUNG AMERICA. 37 I repeat, as censurable to tlie old as to the young ; and we should be cautious, lest while we call the radi- cal to a proper reverence for the past, we show there is no past to reverence, because the character of the present shows no happy work wrought by it. Con- servatives who depreciate the present, do, most effect- ually, decry the past, for a degenerate stock shows degeneracy in the sires. The fact is, all ages are linked together, and the truest strength of the young is derived from a vital connection with the past. They stretch out their hand and connect themselves with the electric chain which runs through age after age, winding through infinite circuits among the nations and peoples of the earth, till it reaches Adam under the tree of life in Eden. It is a mighty spirit — this spirit of associa- tion, this union with all ages, making the individual man unite himself with his nation in far-off times, as the Greek of the present time talks of the victory we gained at Marathon, and impels the Psalmist to make the generation around him to have lived, as it were, through all ages, as he addressed God by saying, "Thou hast been our dwelling place in all genera- tions !" 0, Young America must never loosen these vital connections with the past. They must be felt with their good and evil. The dark shades of disaster must be seen to blend with the gorgeous lights of victory, and tlie soul stand up amid tlie whole with something of the feeling which creeps over us in a vast forest, where the swaying trees are constantly 4 38 YOUNG AMERICA. changing the chequered floor of that great cathedral, and where we see such wonderful blending of age and youth — the oak and the violet. How gladly amid the young growth, and the springing of the blue-edged yiolet, do we catch sight of some of the old landmarks, where "A darker moss Coats the rough outside of the old grey rock ; Some broad arm of the oak is wrenched away; By storm and thunder — thro' the hillside wears A deeper furrow — and the streams descend, Sometimes in wilder torrents than before, — But slill they serve as guides o'er ancient paths, To wearied wanderers." Yes, there is much to bind us to the past. Our fathers reverenced the past, revolutionary as they were ; but they gave to it no honor that belonged to their present and future. While appeals to charters and history, to laws and edicts, to constitutions and monumental things, could promise any good, or were right, they made the appeal ; but when they could send no root out into the future, and the river must stop flowing, they yielded to the other portion of their nature, which made them heirs of the future, men of progress, champions of daring innovation ; and to the stone of stumbling and rock of offence which they could not remove, they applied a touch that dissolved it, so that the free winds bore it away as dust. High thinking, broadening sympathy, activity that can give way to healthy repose, plainer living, are the great duties of the present. AVe must bear as strong YOUNG AMERICA. 39 a testimony against that gilded vulgarity which shines amid the silks and satins of the fasliionable drawing- room, as against the naked and loathsome rowdyism of the lower strata of society. Sometimes I think there is no less a need for philanthropic efforts in respect to the children of the rich, than in reference to the children of the poor. Vice appears another thing in brocades and laces, fine apparel and polished manners, and Satan does his worst, when he trans- forms "himself into an angel of light." While the new clothes of iniquity last, her snares are most fatal; and how awful is the fact, that pride shrinking from contact with the poor and lowly when the object is good, can humble itself when the purpose is to betray and ruin. The same low thinking by which the poorer classes are kept to their vicious modes of wast- ing life, rules the richer classes, where they are pos- sessed by the love of dress, the showy equipage, the dazzling display, the apeing of foreign manners and customs, and the longing for travel for the mere sake of saying, '^ When I was in Paris, or London, or Flor- ence, or Rome." What we want is a spirit truly American — a spirit that shows something fresh to the world ; a spirit of progressive wisdom applied to laws, institutions, and every form of political, commercial, and moral action; a spirit that upholds the rights and privileges of every citizen, and rings the "Three Bells" of rescue every- where — fidelity to the interests of freedom at home, protection to the Americans abroad, and sympathy with the oppressed throughout the world. 40 YOUNG AMERICA. There is such a Young America. I feel the fresh breathings of its reverence for the fathers, its appre- ciation of the grandeur and might of the Union, its breadth of patriotism that discards the usurpation of mere local interests, and while mourning over the delinquencies which stain our country's fame, yields not an iota of hope to the prophets of despair. It shows itself strong — strong in principles of right and Liberty's might ; strong in the God of our fathers, and the only God of their children ; strong to say we •' Will go onward to extinguish With our fresh souls our younger hope, And God's maturity of purpose." SERMON lY. NO SYMPATHY AMONG THE GUILTY. And they said, "What is that to us ? see thou to that.— Matt, xxvii. 4. No one of the disciples watched the proceedings against Jesus after his betrayal, with any thing like the intensity of Judas. He was the only one who could do it with impunity. By the act of betrayal, he had placed himself on the popular side, and could watch the whole movement without impediment. A history of those few hours in the experience of Judas would be worth the reading. They would open the secrets of the prison-house of conscience, and tell us that the silent condemnation which the betrayer felt, was more terrible than the loud, crashing thunders of any public indignation. He watched the issue of the trial. He saw the whole of the malice and cruelty of the enemies of his Master ; he beheld the meek sub- mission of his Lord, and his own iniquity was fully revealed to his soul. He flew to where those who 4* 42 NO SYMPATHY AMONG THE GUILTY. had hired him were assembled, and bearing the thirty pieces of silver, he entered the hall ; he attempted to do something for Jesus ; and throwing the silver down before the astonished priests and elders, he ex- claimed, "I have sinned, in that I have betrayed the innocent blood." It was a noble vindication of Christ. It was made directly to those who had purchased his blood, and the price of that blood was given up. Could Judas have found anything in the life and character of Je- sus that was evil, he would not have done as he did. But he had betrayed "the innocent blood," and there he stood, shaken to the centre of his being by the horror of his deed. AVhat a contrast was seen in that trembling, horror- stricken man, and those wily priests and cool elders ! They take very quietly his exclamation, and they re- ply, " What is that to us? see thou to that.^^ What did they care about the innocence of their victim, seeing he was at last in their power ? What had they to do with the responsibiUttj of the deed ? They had bargained for a betrayal, they had paid the price, and what more had they to do with it ? Judas saw at once with what characters he had to deal. He could hope to impart none of his own repentings to them. He could set in motion no means to ' recover Jesus from the cruelty that was about to scourge and crucify him, and, desperate with anguish, he threw upon the floor of the temple the accursed silver, and rushed out and horridly died. The ciders and priests, with a flexible conscience, NO SYMPATHY AMONG THE GUILTY. 43 gathered up the silver, and said it was not lawful to put the money into the treasury, because it was the price of blood. They bought with it a piece of ground for a burial-place for strangers — the Potter's Field, which, by reason of the source from whence the price came, was called "The field of blood." And thus was it called at the time Matthew wrote his Gospel. The answer of these priests and elders to Judas is worthy of our attention. "What is that tons? see thou to that." How could he see to it ? He had no power to act — no in- fluence. He could only see to it — his sin — as it stood before him an overwhelming shadow, and in the utter darkness of which he died. We condemn these priests and elders. We utter strong words against them ; and it is well. We do but obey the simplest moral sense in so doing. But do we do it as a matter of principle, ready to see the principle as it may be involved in matters of business, in the daily commerce of man with man ? I fear there are many who have purchased the betrayal of innocence, and who disavow responsibility for the agency they created. No precept deserves more to be pondered than that which the apostle gave, where, in speaking of hastily introducing a person into the sacked office, he says, "Be not partakers of other men's sins." How much unheeded is this ! And yet how common is the re- mark, that the most guilty, in perfecting some swind- ling or thieving expedition, are apt to escape, and 44 NO SYMPATHY AMONG THE GUILTY. the immediate instruments are detected. By this form of expression we recognize the true principle, we assert the guiltiness of those who furnish the mo- tives to wickedness, who stand back and cheer on those who brave tlie danger. But too little is thought of this class. Judas is denounced. His utter mis- ery, through unending ages, is declared to be certain, and men hate his name, and abhor his memory. But the guilt of priests and elders — what is said of that ? Little, very little. Hundreds of sermons echo the iniquity of Judas, and his repentance, his tears and death, are but little considered ; but the malicious in- difference of the priests and elders has no vivid paint- ing by the rhetoric of the pulpit, and the great lesson of their cool wickedness is too much passed by. If by our influence a man works out good, we take praise to ourselves according to the measure of influ- ence we think we exerted ; and this is right. We honor the man whose advice and encouragement have secured good to others, and we envy the happiness of those who have great power over others for good- power to persuade to virtuous resolves and deeds, whose presence seems a spirit of success, and whose smile is more than the applause of the crowd. But the reverse of this is just as reasonable. If a man employs his influence for evil ; if he puts tempt- ation in the way of evil doers ; if he furnishes the silver for a Judas wlio is to perform the act, there is no reasoning that can free him from the guilt of the transaction. We do not accuse the last actor in the finale of an iniquitous drama, as though he was the NO SYMPATHY AMONG THE GUILTY. 45 only guilty one, but we call into judgment the whole of the characters in the vile play. Tliis is the method of God. AVhen Adam attempted to throw off the sin he had committed, and accused Eve, and Eve accused the serpent, God made them both to feel the terror of his judgment. When the cities of the plain were denounced, the worth of the influence of a few is seen in the offer, that if ten righteous persons could be found in the cities, should the cities be saved. When Nathan came to David, he denounced him as a murderer ; not because his hand had slain the devo- ted Uriah, but because his letter to Joab led Joab to place Uriah in the fore-front of the battle, in the hot- test of the fight, that he might surely be killed. And so when Ahab desired the possession of Na- both's vineyard, though Jezebel, his wife, performed all the work that led to the death of Naboth, and the confiscation of the vineyard to king Ahab, yet he had no sooner stepped in to possess the vineyard, than he lifted his eyes and beheld the prophet Elijah, and cried only, "0, mine enemy, hast thou found me?" "I have found thee," was the answer, ''because thou hast sold thyself to work evil in the sight of the Lord." And so throughout the Bible, wherever influence has been exerted to promote an evil work, there the Almighty fastens his judgment. As evil is committed into other hands, the transmission docs not cleanse the hand that transmits it ; and if the bold criminal 46 NO SYMPATHY AMONG THE GVTLTY. asks, "What is that tome?" when the preparation for sin has ripened into the infamous deed, God's reply answers the fooUsh soul and convicts it of trans- gression. It took but one to put Joseph into the pit, and but one was needed to bargain with the Ishmaelites ; yet all the brethren felt the guilt. I could wish that this important matter might be solemnly pondered. I fear there are many who do not regard as they should the responsibility which presses upon them by virtue of their influence over others. Where we have thrown our weight of influence, we are bound to be interested in the issue ; the issue is partly ours ; and so far as our aid has fashioned it, we must take glory or shame to ourselves. It was not simply the money that influenced Judas, by any means. It was doubtless the position and inflnr- ence of the high priests and elders that gave force to their offer. It would be interesting to know the details of that transaction — how the scruples of Judas were met, what promises were made, what assurances were given, what patronage was offered. But we can imagine it all. History abounds with such matters, and even around us, in daily life, in religion, politics, business, friend sells friend far cheaper than Judas sold Jesus. The bond of honor, that ouglit to be better than gold, is as nothing ; and the confiding, the truthful, the frank and friendly, find themselves often grievously betrayed. Private NO SYMPATHY AMONG THE GUILTY. 47 friendship receives the utterance that only friendsliip could be entitled to, and transmits the communica- tion where it knows it will be perverted, misapplied, abused. Evils, great in magnitude, result ; and all that the guilty one has to say is, "What is that to me ? see thou to that." It would be well to so see to it as to remember the lesson, and deal with men ac- cording to their likeness or unlikeness to the double- sided, two-tongued, flexible conscience chief priests and elders. But let us consider the second suggestion of our text — the miserable dependence of the guilty on the sympathy of their companions in guilt. We hear a great deal about '' honor among thieves," but it is a thieving kind of honor. What lessons of history are plainer to the point than those which teach the miser- able dependence of the guilty on the sympathy of those who have wrought with them in sin ? See a band of rogues surprised in their work of darkness, and who is generally the victim? The least unsuspecting of the whole, who has gone into danger with confidence in the ready sympathy of his companions in guilt. The brave and terrible things they promised to do, are left undone. They are afar. See for an opposite illustration, a band of firemen, or mechanics, or sailors, engaged in their honorable employment. Let one of their number by bravery, that ventures much for them, become involved in some danger. What heroic efforts are made ! what noble sacrifices are witnessed ! what deeds are per- formed, which nothing but the enthusiasm of the time and the nature of the deed could have inspired. 48 NO SYMPATHY AMONG THE GUILTY. No one is heard to say, "What is that to us ?" as they see the anguish of their workmate. They send no insulting answer — ''See thou to that.*' They feel a brother's interest ; and 0, it is grand to behold the gigantic labors which feebleness itself can perform to show the sympathy of true souls. We need sympathy. The changes of life, its expo- sures, the smallness of our personal experience, cre- ate demands for sympathy. We cannot live wisely and happily without it. But our wisdom and our happiness are in seeking sympathy from virtuous sources. We lose our strength as Samson lost his, if we trust where virtue is not. We tread on glass easily broken, and springs of torture lie beneath the brittle surface. We turn away to die as poor Judas did. The scattered silver, the price of sin, is as the glittering fragments of a broken mirror, each portion of which throws back to our sight the horror of a disappointed and desolate soul. If Judas could have gained courage to have thrown himself at the Master's feet and craved forgiveness, it might have been well ; but he, poor man, imagined that the horror of his soul would draw out sympathy for him from priest and elders, and he might bear to his Master some relief from his peril. But, alas for him ! they threw by all responsibility — sympathy was dead, and what could he do but die ? What sympathy did she who sold her innocence to Amnon find when the fatal hour was past? And how is it now all around us ? Wrecks and ruins of beauty and virtue, homes desolated and hearts NO SYMPATHY AMONG THE GUILTY. 49 cruslicd, grey hairs sent in sorrow to the grave, only because the misguided trusted in sympathy from com- panions in guilt. The secret of the chang-e ivhich guilt ivorks is not understood. It is not always that deliberate mali- ciousness or recklessness of consequences is at work. Both are deceived. Guilt changes the whole ground of thought and feeling, as in the case of Amnon, who "hated Tamar exceedingly, so that the hatred wherewith he hated her was greater than the love wherewith he had loved her." He hated the memo- rial of his guilt ; he desired the absence of that which reminded him that he was one of the " fools in Israel." This fact is but little regarded. Human nature cannot be trusted to nourish that sympathy in guilt which only belongs to innocence and virtue. The vicious are cautious of reposing trust in their guilty companions, but they will pour out their souls into the good man's breast. Sympathy comes purest and truest from hearts that lie open to heaven, as streams of water ; while guilty hearts are as the stagnant pool, to drink of whose waters is death. The soul goes out from thence as Judas went forth with the fever of disappointment, and relief is found only in dying to all such communion with wickedness and sin. SERMON Y. SPIRITUAL RELATIONSHIP. And he ATfSWERED AND SAID UNTO THEM, MY MOTHER AND MT BRETHREN ARE THESE WHICH^HEAR THE WORD OF GOD AND DO IT. — Luke viii. : 21. All four of the Evangelists have sketched the inci- dent with which the text is connected, for it presents our Saviour performing one of those impulsive acts w^iich let the observer at once into the innermost of the man's being. At this time he was surrounded with a great multi- tude, and was absorbed in teaching them. His mother and brethren were outside the throng, and for some reason desired to approach him, imagining, perhaps, that he was going beyond his strength and was in danger of becoming fanatical. Their desire was seen, and from one after another the word went, till it came to Jesus and he was told that his mother and brethren desired to speak with him. At this he stretched forth his hands, and gazing around him, exclaimed, " Who is my mother and my brethren ! My naother and my SPIRITUAL RELATIONSHIP. 51 brethren are these which hear the word of God and do it." There is notliing that bespeaks a noble and generous nature more than these sudden onsets of feeling that sweep through the world to seek and embrace what- ever is kindred with itself. Spiritual relationship is highest and best. It is kindredness of soul. It is an affinity of mind that travels on from men to angels, and, through all possible ranks of Spirits as one family, to Christ and God. It longs for companion- ship and cannot bear to be cooped up in any narrow- ness, nor to have it thought that it loves the few without regard to the many. Something like this was, perhaps, the experience of Jesus when he uttered the text. Glowing with the great truths of his mission he desired the best thought of who were kindred with him — that like father or mother, brother or sister, seemed to him each soul that looked as he looked on the things of Duty and Hope. To hear God's word and to do it, created a unity most sublime ; and to this the heart could look amid all contrariety of opinion and creeds, as some- thing genial and pleasant, as the open Arctic sea must have loomed up to those of the Kane Expedition who beheld it amid a world of icebergs. And may we not catch this spirit of sympathy with the good and true of all sects and parties and have our resort for comfort when the narrowness of sect is too much about us — when it galls like fetters, and seems to make the domain we occupy too small a place to breathe in ? If we have not any tiling of this impul- 52 SPIRITUAL RELATIONSHIP. sive breaking forth from a part to the whole, if we have no desire to see any spiritual unity where there is dogmatic difference, and insist on making a frag- ment of the Church all the Church to us, — then we have yet to learn the noljle and generous nature of Clu'ist. His character must remain like some magni- ficent work of Art before one whose eye can read but little of its excellence. It could be lioped that they are few who thus live in the smallest circles, girdled with contracting narrowness. For myself I love to see new evidences of spiritual unity amid dogmatic differences ; and it appears to me that there is one basis of union too little appreci- ated — I mean, The Character of Christ. They are as our mother and our brethren who pay homage there — who thrill as we do at Christ's great acts of divine mercy, and looking from one point of view, with one interpreting heart, say, " He hath done all things well." This recognition of Christ as the Moral Image of God, forms a sublime unity in Chris- tendom. Though it has not prevented corruptions of his religion, yet it has been its best preservative and is constantly a most efficient reformer of dogmatic abuses, as when nothing could be preached against the voluptuous Pope pretending to be Christ's vicar, two pictures were painted, presenting the simplicity of Jesus and the splendor of the Papacy, and crowds gatliered to see. As His touch healed the ear wliich Peter's sword had severed, so his character comes in amid the pursuasion of his words to impart the inter- preting spirit. SPIRITUAL RELATIONSHIP. 53 It is a great thing to be able to stretch forth our hands and point to the more numerous spiritual kind- red than gather in our own home, as we thus turn to the universal homage to the Spiritual Jesus. In one sense, already, as far as known, all knees are bowed in homage to his excellence, and the heart feels his searching eye resting ou its sin, demanding that we be pure as he is pure. Perhaps it may be well to give a few moments to consider how valuable to us is this greater than sec- tarian kindred in Christ. In the first place. What a mighty influence ahvays comes with the fact that ages have contributed to build up the fame of some great soul. To us it is like some of the wonderful cathedrals of the Old World whose building, century after century, was an act of faith and worship. The creed and liturgy of the cathe- dral, however we may object to them, do not prevent our recognition of the identity of faith, the true de- votion, the lofty aspiration which kept on building up the great thought of the soul that would build to God, till the pinnacles glitter in the one light of the sun as the foundations rest on the same earth that sustains us all. A certain intellectual sceptic once set up a country- man of his as more perfect than Christ ; but how unlike must be his experience in the use of his ideal of excellence to that of the Christian who sees mil- lions of eyes streaming with a common reverence to one point, and beholds there the Being towards whom has flowed the best love of the best souls for eighteen 6* 54 SPIRITUAL RELATIONSEIP. centuries ! How painful to contemplate excellence in utter loneliness, — to be conscious of no heart beating any where as ours beats, and that the perfection of beauty to us is no perfection to any one else. But not so with the Christian. He lays his ear, as it were, at the tube of the great wliispering gallery of the past, and the names of Christ are syllabled all along the centuries as the echoes of an undying song. The homage of millions comes swelling and deepening, and his heart is thrilled as it could not be with any less general strain . James Martineau has well written, that " the established power of a soul over multitudes of others, — its historic greatness, its productiveness through season after season of this world, in the fruits of sanctity, must inevitably enter as an element of our veneration." This is too little thought of ; and because of this indifference, religious controversies have made the Christian world seem as divided in heart as in creed. The early disciples did not feed their homage of their Master with simply what he was as he acted before them, but they brought from the prophecies a light and glory which made him appear the Man of the Ages ; as thus to us he assumes a peculiar moral greatness as we see in him the Christ of the centuries, every where owned as the image of God. Again : When we stand in our sectarian lot, criti- cising the creeds which we believe are but perverted Christianity, there seems to be no possible chance of union, so radically opposite are the chief points of SPIRITUAL RELATIONSHIP. S<5 doctrine and discipline ; but when we rise above all walls of partition and look over the vast field to see how the character of Christ fares, we see at once there is union and there may be more. This is like going from the irritation occasioned by- some song that wakes all kinds of tempers and moods in an audience, to the delight occasioned by another that makes all souls kindred and summons applause from all. Here is something superior to all the rest, for that which sounds the universal heart — that lays at the base line of its electric current, and brings from all the same response, must be the greatest. We thus see one moral nature, and demonstrated is the fact, that there are univeisal sentiments in Christendom, and however strange it may seem, the many sects in the one Church do, really, stand around Christ, as " a belt of mirrors round a single flame." Is there not encouragement in this ? Can it be that creeds will always be so diverse while the minds that maintain them cherish such a moral unity ? And is it not sweet to think that even Christians denying the one to the otlier, the Christian name, after all, may be one in spirit ! Gliding away from dogmatic controversies, and dwelling it may be on some Christian picture or statuary, they look alike, they talk alike, and for the while there is the intercom- munication of tender and harmonious feeling, notwith- standing the picture or statuary may be suggestive of knotty points in the controversies of the Church. What is the source of more oppositions in doctrine then the crucifixion, and yet how alike do all the varieties of con- 56 SPIEITUAL RELATIONSHIP. trovertists receive the moral sentiment of Christ on the Cross ! And is it not a dear thought, that they all bear away from the sight of the touching picture or symbol of our Redeemer's sufferings and glory, like feelings of tender reverence and aspiring love ; and may it not be good for us to remember that such things were when it seems as though there could be nothing in common among the contending characters. Still farther : We are indebted for the best aids to religious meditation to the spirit that has wrought when it felt the greater kindred, and thought more of humanity than of sects and party. How ditferant — how superior is that literature which has been written for the classes embraced in the moral unity, in dis- tinction from the Church unity ! What a breadth of view, what a sweep of thought, what nobleness of candor, what a richness of material, what a geniality and glow of soul, is there in contrast with the secta- rian author ! In this spirit Church History is now, in some degree, written ; and the consequence is, that instead of dry, repulsive details concerning strifes and divisions, with little or no insight to the real matters of interest, we find a living picture of the struggles of the human mind for the best expression of its religious nature and culture. What a vast library of Christian books — books in which Christ is morally venerated, we can gather from the writings of those who would, perhaps, scorn our liberal creed ; and yet there would be nothing in tliose books to reject, but, on the other hand, we should feel the pre- SPIRITUAL RELATIONSHIP. ST sence of a co-operating spirit. In all our homes are works of this character. By onr estimate of them we own our kindred in spirit in the author ; and when we pass from these works to the theology of the same authors, it seems like a discussion of differences with our brother, and our tone of criticism will be better tempered from that fact. But once more : How this greater kindred in Christ reveals itself in the chamber of death ! There the debates and discussions of theology lose their charm, and the soul cries, " If thou be Christ, bid me to come unto thee !" and feels most the reality when the hand of Jesus saves him from sinking in the fearful waves. There the soul says, like Howard, " My Hope is in Christ," and wants to deal in no metaphysics concerning his nature and rank ; and they who have fought the boldest and bravest for creeds, and those who have marked out a severe form of sanctity as essential to hope, have alike dropped their last anchor into the universal sentiment of Christ as the image of Divine Love. Once a dying neighbor, with whom I was familiar, but who never entered my church, sent for me, and as I entered the room where she was breathing her last, she stretched her hand to me and said, " In this hour we are one — there's no differ- ence." She meant no difference of creed, for the soul rested only on the universal sentiment towards the Redeemer. I ministered by prayer and word to her, and, by her request, conversed till the ear was too dull to hear and the delicate frame was rigid. 68 SPIRITUAL EELATIONIHIP. And who does not know scenes like these, and where can you look into the biographies of Christians with- out multiplying evidences that a beautiful unity lives amid all our diversities — a unity towards which we should stretch our hands not only in acknowledge- ment of our kindred, but also in prayer to Heaven that we may value more the holy comfort, the strengthening encouragement, and the divine fervor which spring therefrom. SERMON YI. INVISIBLE BENEFACTORS. For he that was healed wist not who it was. — John v., 13. That is, he knew not who it was that had healed him. The healer was really Jesus, and by his method of procedure he threw not a little of dramatic interest around this incident — his design evidently being to draw out the character of the Jewish leaders, and demonstrate that they cared more for ceremony than for man. The incident with which the text is connected took place at the time, probably, of the Feast of Taberna- cles, when Jerusalem wore a peculiarly rural appear- ance, in consequence of the multitudes dwelling in tents or booths made of the branches of trees, in memory of the fathers in the wilderness. Jesus min- gled in the mighty throng unknown. He walked as one of the mass, an obselwer, not the observed ; and as he took his way by the pool of Bethesda, he 60 INVISIBLE BENEFACTORS. noticed the multitudes of diseased people who lay iii the porches around the water, waiting for its moving, it evidently being a medicinal spring, whose flowing was intermittent. At certain times the waters bubbled up from some chemical cause, and whoever bathed in them first, received great benefit from them. The commotion of the waters was attributed to the descent of an angel, from whose wing was imparted a healing virtue. This idea, it may be, originated from the mystery at that time encompassing the cause of the medicinal virtues of the waters ; or from the proneness of the Jews to attribute every uncommon effect to the ministry of angels, so that the Law given direct to Moses, was by them said to have been given by the ministry of angels. As Jesus looked on the groups about the pool, many of the poor expectant souls being accompanied by some person to aid them to enter the waters the moment they began to move, he saw one lonely crea- ture, whom he had known to have been baffled many times in attempting to get amid the charmed bubbles, and to this most pitiful of all expectants Jesus addressed himself, and asked, " Wilt thou be made whole ?" Supposing the reference to be made to the virtue of the waters, the man answered that he was baffled, like many a soul in the every-day affairs of life — some one steps in before him, and the kiss of Fortune is taken. He had no one to lift him up and put him into the water when it was troubled, and while he was crawl- INVISIBLE BENEFACTORS. 61 ing to the steps, a more favored one stepped off into the buoyant waves, and shook off his languor and ilhiess in the friendly waters, joyous as the glad swim- mer in the summer time, when his stroke " Flings the billows back from his drenched hair, And laughing from his lip the audacious brine, Which kissed it like a wine-cup, rising o'er The waves as they arose, and prouder still, The loftier they upHfted him." A pitiful condition was that of him who had seen, time after time, the healed go forth leaving him still expectant, with hope deferred that maketli the heart sick. To this man Jesus spoke — "Take up thy bed and walk" — and departed. Immediately wholeness came, and the man, with his little bed, a mere cushion, was walking at ease. He was an object of public charity — well known, and his appearance now was something for remark. Instead of giving him joy, the Jews showed that form was more than substance^ and so they gravely told him that as it was the Sabbath, it was not lawful for him to carry any burden. Doubtless the man had not thought of any thing but using the new life which coursed through his veins, as he was hastening to the Temple to pay wor- ship to the great Source of all good. His answer was to the point — ''He that made me whole, the same said unto me, Take up thy bed and walk." Would that all of us were as ready to do the com- mandments of Him who has, by his truth and life, 6 62 INVISIBLE BENEFACTOES. healed us of many an error, many a sickness of heart and soul ! Whether the skeptic can see it or not, the vaduwfelt there was some connection between Miracle and Com- mandment, and instinctively he used what the mira- cle gave, to do what the Miracle-Worker commanded. But who was it that had healed him ? Whose word had been so potent ? He could not tell. It is doubt- ful whether the man had strength to look up when he answered the question of Jesus, "Wilt thou be made whole ?" Despondency was in his reply. He had no one to help him. Somebody had always proved more fortunate than he, and with a downcast look he still sat and mourned. Jesus spoke and departed, as a star shoots its light and vanishes. In his surprise, the poor man had no glimpse of his Benefactor, and so he takes his way at once to the place of worship, there to offer some token of his gratitude for the blessing received. It was in the Temple where Jesus met him again ; and as there was no mistaking the tones of that voice, the healed one, relieved of an infirmity he had suffered thirty-eight years, knew his Benefactor, and received this admonition: "Behold, thou art made whole ; sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee." And then, with the generosity of a soul that thinks more of gratitude than of all opposition, the man went forth and proclaimed that it was Jesus who had made him whole. Now the point that at present seems to me very INVISIBLE BENEFACTORS. 63 suggestive, is this. How modified must have been the happiness of that man had he been kept in ignor- ance of his benefactor. Of course, at the first, the pleasure of relief from an infirmity he had endured nearly forty years would overcome all other feelings ; but when this was past — when sober thought took the place of mere emotion ; when he meditated on the past, as we all do more or less, he could not but be haunted with the desire to know who was his friend in the great hour of need, and whose word was better than any arm on which others had leaned as they stepped into the pool. A weight must have been at his heart when he could not tell who had befriended him, and he must have gazed around him, as he went from place to place, to see if some token might not reveal his invisi- ble benefactor. If this is not a probable picture of the man, then he was selfish indeed. His heart was still impotent, his spirit needed a moral bath to invigorate its pulses of gratitude. But let us be cautious in this judgment, for this man is a representative man. More or less he stands for every one of us. Humanity, part and parcel of which are we, has many a time laid impotent. The pool of society has been moved, has been troubled by one angel after another, and all the benefit has been taken by the privileged ones. They have stepped down before the poor commoners could move because they had so much help. And who has done the best things for 64 INVISIBLE BENEFACTORS. humanity but those who, Christ-like, have stood out- side the charmed circle, — who have made original effort, and helped where there was none to help. All places are haunted by the spirits of such. The poet has rightly said : " All houses wherein men have lived and died Are haunted houses. Through the open doors The harmless phantoms on their errands glide, With feet that make no sound upon the floors. We meet them at the doorway, on the stair, Along the passages th?y come and go ; Impalpable impressions on the air, A sense of something moving to and fro. And as the moon from some dark gate of cloud Throws o'er the sea a floating bridge of light. Across whose trembling planks our fancies crowd. In the realm of mystery and night ; So from the world of spirits there descends A bridge of light, connecting it with this, O'er whose unsteady floor that sways and bends, Wander our thoughts above the dark abyss." And shall we let them go to mingle among invisi- ble things ? Shall we not ask after them, try to dis- cern their merits, and see them, as it were, coming out like glorious shades from the dimness, wearing the beauty of goodness and the glory of truth upon their brows ? Shall we not rise to their coronation, and celebrate their greatness with triumph ? There are more invisible benefactors than we can ever know. It should be the endeavor of every person to know INVISIBLE BENEFACTORS. 65 as far as he can his Benefactors — to add to the visible friends of his progress, the invisible — to know what a vast assemblage is that of the contributors to all that is liberal, progressive and humanizhig in the laws, institutions and customs of society. A marked dis- tinction between the past and the present in reference to History is, it is now read rather for the pictorial power by which the world's story seems like a pano- rama, than for acquaintance with the Benefactors of Humanity — the men who in the hour of social im- potency spake the word, or did the deed of healing. The consequence is, there is less valuation put on the blessings we enjoy than would otherwise be the case. It is one thing to be free from an old infirmity, and quite another to know the Divine Agent that accom- plished the work. The latter knowledge may present the return of the infirmity, or the approach of some- thing worse. And, therefore, I deem those who speak of accept- ing all the good there is in the world without regard to men or names as the foes of society. They care not who did this or that ; they will not quarrel over rival claims ; they will take the product of human toil as coolly, as they take any refreshment, and are really relieved by the invisibility of the doer. This runs into the things of every day life, and we find genius and talent feeding indolence and luxury, and men grasp the benefaction and turn away from the Benefactor. Our times demand more of attention to the great Healers of humanity. 6* 66 INVISIBLE BENEFACTORS. Young men should be called to the study of their country's history, that they may know how to fill up the present with the glory of the past — how to invoke from their obscurity the benefactors of mankind who served Liberty, who made life the glorious thing it now is, and catch the spirit of their self-denial and heroism. And thus will it be seen how we are linked to the land of our forefathers, and through what noble souls, that never dreamed of this Union, have come down to us invaluable benefactors. There is nothing more sublime in the visions of thought than the crowding Irom all ages into the horizon of the present the great benefactors of humanity. They form an ocean before which Bethesda dwindles into nothingness. God's angels did indeed trouble them. They were moved that healing from a thousand plagues might be imparted. Men of the Ages! how like phantoms ye crowd upon oar vision — how majestic is your march, ye royal souls ! ye kingly intellects ! ye imperial hearts ! let us know ye more, that we may see from what words and deeds we have such a Sabbath as to-day. And as emphatically must the call be made to a broader history — the History of the world, that we may know the real progress which has been made through the Ages. Foremost in this array comes the Bible — unparal- leled as a Book, and before which the philosophy of man is but as the fire-fly's lamp in contrast with the noon-day sun. Not by efforts to get at every little INVISIBLE BENEFACTORS. 67 blemish — to twist and turn every obscure passage, can our Benefactors in the Bible be made to come out from their invisibility. A fool can babble at a blem- ish where a wise man is absorbed in wonder at a per- fection. Nothing is more to be deplored than that littleness of mind which passes the stupendous miracle to carp and cavil at some neglect of precise form, and that asks that every record of the most magnificent mar- vellous acts in all History shall be given to us per- fectly daguerreotyped without variation — which, could it be accomplished, would be rejected as manu- factured by collusion of minds. The man that is any thing for Humanity is a man of broad views. He, having greatness in his soul, brings out greatness where it exists, like the Apostle in the Epistles to the Hebrews, when in speaking of Faith and its power, summoning up the vast army of those who had shown its virtue, till the multitude became so great he could not name them. Let us return again to the many of whom our text speaks, and let this be the lesson of the hour, — He who feels his infirmity will go to where he has heard of virtue being imparted, and there, it may be, he may find something better than he went for. The most erroneous Church is better than Infidelity. Whosoever heard of that being a Bethesda ? a house of Mercy ? Ye followers of Voltaire and Hume and Paine, come out from your invisibility and show us the men whom you have made whole. SERMON YII. LABOR THE PRICE OF EXCELLENCE. Am? Joshua answered them, Ip thou be a great people, then get THEE UP TO the WOOD COUNTRY, AND CUT DOWN FOR THYSELF THERE IN THE LAND OF THE I'ERIZZITES AND OP THE GIANTS, IF MOUNT Ephraim be too NARROW FOR THEE. — Joshua xvii. 15. This was said to a people who murmured against the limit of land granted them in the division of the promised land, and is to be used in the present dis- course only as suggestive of the fact that Labor, and not Endowment, is the patron of Greatness. All uncommon excellence, in every department of human effort, is to be attributed more to laborious endeavors than to any mysterious gifts of genius. The tribe of Joseph came to the successor of Moses and considered themselves straitened by their allotment of land, for they were, as they said, a great people. Joshua was no flatterer, and simply answered their speech by bidding them show their greatness by their labors — to enter the wood country in the land of the Perizzites and of the giants, if Mount Ephraim was too narrow for them. " Cope with difficulty," he seems to say, " and that will show your greatness. LABOR THE PRICE OF EXCELLENCE. 69 Measure strength with the Perizzites, in their unwalled towns defended by the valor that is better than gates of brass, and let your axe swing and its echo sound where its conquering force shall be heard by the ears of the giants. Make your domain larger by courage- ous deeds, by determined endeavors, and thus shall your greatness be shown by the conquests it achieves." This is the voice of God's providence to every soul that has dreamed of greatness, or of the possession of unfolded powers and abilities. By labor show your talent. Express what you are by what you do. Ge- nius is the stimulus of effort, rather than the spontane- ous activity of endowment ; and man is blinded to the toil that has procured the beautiful or astonishing results of well directed art, because he sees "no part of study but the grace." The blast that brought the rough block of marble from the quarry, he heard not ; and inaudible to him were the blows of the hammer that clove portions of that block away till the rude outline of a human form was seen. And then the days and nights spent by anxious toil, with mallet and chisel, carving out the embodiment of a beauti- ful ideal, were not known ; and when the product is seen, it stands apart from the labor that produced it, as though it had come into existence like Minerva springing from the brain of Jupiter, or Venus rising from the foam of the sea. Michael Angelo once exhibited a rare specimen of his art, and it was pro- nounced beautiful and wonderful. Months passed, and visitors saw nothing more in his studio, and when he was asked what he had been doing, Angelo 70 LABOR THE PRICE OF EXCELLENCE. answered that he had been at work on the same statue, reducing this feature and developing that; and his visitors said those were but trifles, and he should be engaged on something great. To this he replied, " Trifles make perfection, and perfection itself is no trifle." That was a noble answer. Indeed, genius may be defined as that power which best magnifies trifles. It sees the worth of everything. It glorifies the small because of their relation to the great. It goes search- ing for the minute, because these are the mustard seed from which the tree with its wide spreading branches is to spring. It best imitates the God who lets no sparrow fall without his notice, lest it might jar some nerve in the universe whose vibration might be felt for evil throughout the realms of matter and spirit. The most finished actor of our age, on retiring from his profession, and on receiving a public testi- monial as having made the best impression on his age in reference to his art, made the memorable remark, " Whatever is excellent in art must spring from labor and endurance." That sentiment may well be writ- ten on the shield of every aspiring young man. It ought to live as a watchword in his memory. It ought to fix as an all-illuminating truth, the idea in his soul, that uncommon excellence is no lucky acci- dent, no product of circumstances, but the fruit of labor and endurance. Greatness is from culture, rather than from genius ; and if it had a voice for the world, it would sing of " The high endeavors and the LABOR THE PRICE OF EXCELLENCE. 71 glad success." The commoii idea about genius is pernicious. It sets up insurmountable barriers to the masses, and they set down in the conviction that they are nothing, and efifort is useless. This is no less discouraging to those who are dispirited by it, than it is unjust to the great. But let me deal with this subject in proper order ; that this treatment of it may be recalled, and there- fore, that there is an aptitude in minds for some art or profession, I do not deny, though the common arguments are many times weak. There are, unques- tionably, some instances of that original intensity of a mental faculty by which the mind springs, as it were, at a leap, to the results it desires. It is genius that cannot communicate itself. It helps our idea of Providence to recognize original aptitude for the different occupations of life which are essential to civilization and progress ; but it is certain that many of the most remarkable men have attributed to patient labor what the world have attributed, in them, to endowment. That Newton attributed his success to greater patience with the minute, is well known, and Sir Joshua Reynolds held that superiority resulted from intense and constant application of the strength of intellect to a specific purpose. "Genius," he said, "is the art of making repeated efforts." The first effort he made with his pencil was the perspec- tive of a book-case from sheer idleness ; but his father saw it, encouraged him, and he went on by labor to success. Benjamin West, when he drew the babe's face as he watched it in the cradle, was kissed by his mother for his effort, and was wont to say, " That kiss 72 LABOR THE PRICE OF EXCELLENCE. made me a painter." And to every department of artistic, mechanical, and professional life, the advice of Sir Joshua Reynolds to his scholars is adapted, where he said, " Make no dependence on your own genius. If you have great talents, labor will improve them ; if you have poor talents, labor will increase them. Nothing is denied to well directed labor. Nothing is to be obtained without it." Napoleon well said, when once asked to create a Marshal out of a man who belonged to a noble family, but who had no other claim, " It is not I that makes Marshals, but victory." It is a fine illustration of our position to see the progress which has been made in the application of the name of genius. To draw a rude likeness was once genius ; but when this was learned as an art, then genius was the power that could add to it — that could render the effect greater — the picture more life- like — the style more remarkable. So in mechanics, and equally so in poetry, music and oratory. Genius ceased to be recognized as soon as labor could equal the result once attributed to nature's gift, acting unaided. Genius has kept its name by doing all its work in secret — by keeping up the show of the Jug- gler that makes us think his tricks are real, notwith- standing he tells us he but deceives the eye. Demos- thenes standing by the sea and declaiming with peb- bles in his mouth, in his study, with the sword sus- pended over his shrugging shoulders, and three years in the cave at his studies, shows us the labor that produced the results which were attributed only to genius — a mysterious and irresistible force. LABOR THE PRICE OF EXCELLENCE. 73 " Genius," said the illustrious BufFon, " is patience ;" and a mighty man answered the question just the same in spirit, when he said, "You ask what is gen- ius, and I can only say, if you have not felt it, I can- not defme it." Many of the best men in all depart- ments of life define genius as a habit rather than a quality of mind ; and perhaps it may be best spoken of as an intense, persistent, concentrated activity. What but a definition of genius was given, wheii Webster said, "A man is not educated till he has the ability to summon, in case of emergency, all his men- tal power in vigorous exercise to effect his object?" What we attribute to some gift may be traced to the kindling and concentrating power of feeling or passion, as is illustrated in that orator's reply to Hayne, and in the many instances where the greatest mental effort has sprung from passion. Scorched and stung by a Scottish Reviewer, Byron wrote a poem, and he who was deemed but a simple rhymester became a poet, as he himself once said, "I went to bed one night, and woke up to find myself famous." So in sharp debates, in violent controversy, the most remarka])le things have been uttered: men have gone beyond themselves and have astonished the world. A mighty intensity of thought has burned within them, and they have brought the whole stock of intellectual attainment to bear upon the matter before them. The best things of many men in all departments of effort have been unpremeditated ; but this gives no argument against labor, study and fore- cast, because these men have been made capable of 7 74 LABOR THE PRICE OF EXCELLENCE. these great or uncommon efforts by the wealth of mind stored up. Great discoveries have not been made so mnch by accident, as many suppose, as by that habit of mind that will not let any thing pass unnoticed. It is not to a light and frivolous mind that the fall of an apple will suggest a thought in reference to the great laws or forces of nature, and no dream of the pendulum floats before the eye of the careless thinker as the lamp is seen to swing or oscillate in the church. The ripe things of nature fall into hands prepared to receive them ; and in a profound sense may the wise man's words be applied beyond religion, where he says, "The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him." A thousand times the same advice may fall on the ears of the prodigal in vain, but at another it may come as a regenerating force, and he be made to start as the warrior at the sound of the battle trumpet. The learned and famed Dr. Paley was an unambitious student, careless of his opportunities, till one day a collegian said to him, *'You area fool, Paley, to squander your time so. If you would arouse yourself, you may be famous. I have wealth, and need not exert myself; but you have no such dependence. Now wake up." He did go, and milHons have reaped the benefits of his activ- ity. And so with many dull intellects, who loved fun more than books and study, like the youthful Chal- mers, have been started by some new turn of thought — some attractive subject, and they have sprung at once into glorious mental activity, blazing lil^e t;h@ dull fire on which oil has been poured. LABOR THE PRICE OF EXCELLENCE. 75 Genius, therefore, is really intensity of thought, feeling, emotion, activity. All the faculties of the man are in earnest. The wliole man is glorified by the intensity of the determined spirit, and what is done is done with every energy — with a resoluteness that means ; with persistence of effort to conquer if such a thing can be. The great object glorifies each portion of labor, and the passion of the mind seems to be that which would " Scorn low delights and live laborious days." If we were to consult specific cases of superiority in the spheres where genius may be said to shine, we shall find that labor and culture, not endowment and luck, have gained the palm of renown. Take an illustration from oratory. I have spoken of Demosthenes, who held the Athenian crowd at will, and in addition to what I have said, I may remark, that his first effort was jeered at and scorned, and only by the advice of an actor, who met him in his despondency, was he encouraged to try again. Cicero, who uttered so irresistibly ''the deep, clear cadence of the Roman tongue," had an oratory that was the fruit of countless labors ; and coming to mod- ern times, it is quite remarkable, that the three most brilliant specimens of the orator in the British Senate, at the bar, and in the pulpit, were men whose first efforts were evidences that energy makes the man. The first is Sheridan, whose maiden speech was so inferior, that it was deemed a kindness to advise him to desist from further attempts ; but his reply was, "It's in me, and by Heaven it shall come out." It 76 LABOR THE PRICE OF EXCELLENCE. did come out, and he became the wittiest, most spark- ling, and persuasively brilliant orator of the British Parliament. So at the Bar. Lord Erskine, whose career was most brilliant as a lawyer, and especially as a pleader. When making his first effort, he felt his nothingness — that he had no ability, and just as the tears were springing to his eyes, and he was about to yield to despair, he says he felt, as it were, his little boy pull- ing at his gown. Thoughts of home and the dear ones there rushed into his mind, his heart was on fire, and he burst forth into an effort of which he never dreamed he was capable. Fifteen cases, with the appropriate fees, were immediately after that vic- tory placed in his hand. So m the pulpit. Robert Hall was for fifty years the prince of preachers. He did not know that the Princess Charlotte was dead till he entered his church, and the sermon he preached then was the richest and most eloquent of all the hundreds delivered in the realm. His first three efforts were failures — terrible failures ; and when he went to his chamber the last time, he was heard to say, "If this don't cure me, the devil must have me." It did cure him of depending on other things than toil and preparation, and he was for fifty years at the head of pulpit orators. Take example from moral characters, such as Socrates, William Penn, or Washington, who have shown the most difficult of attainments — a calm, dig- nified, impressive demeanor that says, in silence that is as eloquent as the stars, that the soul has in its hands the reins of passion with a perfect mastery. LABOR THE PRICE OF EXCELLENCE. 77 Take up any man's life who has risen to real, per- manent eminence, and you see there the marks of labor ; so that it may be said of many, as was said of Piso, " What he withdrew of application, he deducted from glory." Goethe said truly, "What is genius but the faculty of seeing and turning to advantage everything that strikes us ?" And so thought the celebrated French landscape painter, Poussin, who, when asked how he was able to give such an effect to his paintings, simply answered, "I have neglected nothing." All that has thus been said of art may be said of religious character — the superiority of virtue and holiness. We must "endure hardness as good sol- diers of Jesus Christ," if we would wear the laurels of victory. I know not what continuance may be given to art in the future, the realm of immortality, but I am sure that all advancement in virtue will cling to us. Every habit of the mind, however gained, that helps holiness of heart, will be ours for- ever ; and there where we shall shake off many errors of theory and belief, we shall put on new advances in holiness and love, by the forces that here we cultivate. The price of excellence, then, is labor. What most we need is to intensify our love of God and his gos- pel — to make faith more a fire — a fire that rouses up to action every inmate of the house, and shows what wonders can be wrought. A fire that demands more and more fuel, when it is rightly confined to its place, and that bids us go out of our Mount Ephraim, into the land of the giants, and cut wood. 7* SERMON VIII. THE BATTLE OF THOUGHT. For we wrestle not AGAI^-ST flesh Ajntp blood, but against princi- palities, AGAIKST POAVERS, AGAINST THE RULERS OF THE DARKNESS OF THIS WORLD, against SPIRITUAL WICKEDNESS IN HIGH PLACES. — Eph. vi. 12. How different is the battle of Arms and the battle of Thought ! the warfare where flesh and blood wrestle, and the struggle where mind is in conflict with mind. There is no comparison of appearances ; for in the one case, there is the roll of the drum, the pealing of the fife, the shrill call of the bugle, the clash of swords, the glittering bayonets, the floating banners, the thril- ling shouts of the combatants, till amid the shock of arms and the roar of artillery, the dreadful scene is shrouded by the vast columns and sea of smoke. As this clears away, the power of the opposing forces is seen in the dead strewed upon the field ; and over the river of blood which then flows, goes up the wail of the dying and wounded, blended with the shouts of the victors. THE BATTLE OF THOUGHT. 79 This is to be followed by the removal of the mutilat- ed bodies that for years must bear with them the sad evidences how terrible is the conflict when flesh and blood wrestle against flesh and blood. Such is the conflict that has so often been resorted to, to settle the simplest and most insignificant ques- tion as well as the most stupendous of all the demands of man on man. But how in contrast with this is the conflict where Thought battles with Thought — where the contest is " not against flesh and blood, hut against principali- ties, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places." All the show in a case like this is seen in the pic- ture of Paul on Mar's Hill, when his spirit was stirred within him to see Athens wholly given to idolatry. There at his feet lay Athens the pride of Greece, with her thousand splendid temples and ten thousand gods. Exulting in the glory of her Arts, boasting of the greatest refinement, concentrating all that was beautiful in the triumphs of genius, Athens spread out the attractions that made her envied by every city in the world. But the whole of this beauty, all these triumphs of Art and Genius, Music, Painting, Sculp- ture, Eloquence, were vitiated to the Apostle's mind by the presence and power of Idolatry. He had no armament of States and people to bring against it. What would it avail though he should, \\dth a Samson's might, become an Iconoclast and smite from their foundations the ten thousand gods and goddesses of 80 THE BATTLE OP THOUGHT. Athens. What though he should wield a destructive war against the worshippers of marble and silver and gold idols ? No advantage would accrue. No victory such as he desired would be obtained. He, therefore, stands alone on Mar's Hill and trusts the issue to a few words solemnly and earnestly spoken. He stands there a stranger. There is little in his appearance to prepossess the crowd in his favor. But as he is not to wrestle with flesh and blood, he thinks not of the show of outward strength, but stretches forth his hand simply to beckon the people into silence. All is still. The Epicurean has hushed his laughter ; the Stoic has wrapped his mantle more closely to his form ; the Scholar has smothered his face for a placid reception of the new speculation ; the Artist is ready to study a new attitude, while the Curious observer is eager to be amused with any thing that " the babbler " may have to say, and the Sorrow stricken asks for Light on the darkest things of life. Paul speaks. He utters sublime truths respecting the universal Creator, Benefactor, Governor and Judge, and thus sends forth immortal forces to do battle for Him whose right it is to rule — to rule in the indivi- dual heart and in society throughout its manifold relations — in all its laws and its institutions, modes of life and its customs. Tiiere was no noise, no confusion, no clash of arms, no floating banners, no garments and chariots rolled in blood ; and yet a stupendous battle then began — a battle with principalities and powers — a battle with THE BATTLE OE THOUGHT. 81 the forces that lay back of the superstition that held the most cultivated portion of the world loyal to Idolatry. Then commenced the battle in which Paul's simple thought, vindicated by appeals to Nature, Rea- ♦son and the human Heart, was on the one side, and all the powers of learning and philosophy were on the other — the thoughts embodied in the twenty thou- sand gods that thronged the streets and groves and temples of the grand city of Greece. That battle is to go on, till what ? Till outward subjection to Christ shall be obtained ? lip loyalty secured ? the homage of bent knee and loud applause ? No, no ! The con- quest contemplated is far greater than this. The vic- tory proposed in the Gospel is the most stupendous, the most magnificent ever contemplated, and no one but Jesus could have inspired it. That victory is, the casting down of Imaginations and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and the bringing into captivity every thought to the obedi- ence of Christ ! Here it is — the knowledge of God — the true con- ception of the Divine character and economy is to change the vast picture gallery of the soul — to remove the images of Idolatry — all the forms of error and sin, and place there the beauty and glory that find their types and symbols in Nature — in the changes by which with the enthusiasm of the poet of the sea- son we say, — " These as the> change Almighty Father! these Are but the varied God ! The rolling year Is full of Thee !" 82 THE BATTLE OF THOUGHT. Yes, the victory contemplated is, the bringing every thought into captivity — the glorious captivity of obedience to Christ — captivity like that which holds the stars in their courses, so that they shine and sing, and swing not from their lAace in the choir of immortal harmony. What does this theme teach us ? Most obviously it teaches, that we should be more interested in the battles of Thought than in the battles of Arms. The battles of Thought precede and must follow the battles of Arms. They are like the electricity that forms the terrible thunder cloud, and that pre- vades the atmosphere when the roar of the thunder has ceased. The battles of Thought preceded one Revolution, and when Independence was achieved — when the Confederation was established — when once and again the majestic Washington had adorned the Presidential chair, there began a battle in which Young America led ; and in which even Washington could not have had power to have been successful. He was taken just at the time when he could best go and leave an unbroken track of light and success behind him. And now we are to wrestle, not with flesh and blood, not with muscle and nerve, skill of warfare and phy- sical bravery, but with principalities and powers — with powerful principles that rule too much the des- tinies of tlie people and take too much attention from THE BATTLE OF THOUGHT. 88 men to measures — from the country to party — from the future to the present — that repudiates the con- servatisms of God by which the good of the past is held fast as a security for good in the future. So in moral and religiovis matters. We live in an age of the most contending theories and speciilations, and even where we might expect to see nothing but a rigid adherence to old creeds and formulas, we do behold the most antagonistic forces, and professor wars with professor in the same department of the Church. We stand in the attitude of David when he could go down and help the king that sought his life, and then retreat to our own fortress and pursue our own defences and victories. The times demand what Liberal Religion alone can grant, — Intellectual and Moral Courage — Mental and Moral challenge of Opinion. We are fortified by one expectancy of the highest good and of new developement of God — we are forti- fied against the fear of Error. We are willing to meet it. We have confidence in the superiority of the for- ces of Truth ; and when we are equally fearless in declaring the Truth — in maintaining its claims — its rights — its interests — its protests against principali- ties and powers, against wickedness in high places — the places of thought, of ideas that rule the multi- tude, when we are thus fearless, our life will speak for our noble and rational and scriptural religion. This, this is one duty to ourselves, our time, our race, — To tell what we wrestle with — to own what 84 THE BATTLE OP THOUGHT. our souls, in all the energy of conviction, do oppose. 'Tis not with men that we are called to war, but with the opinions that rule them ; that make them narrow and bigoted — that blind them to virtue outside of their Church — that impel them to imagine that no flame rises from any altar to Heaven save where their priests stand with the sacrifice. SERMON IX. LAW OF LIBERTY. So SPEAK AND SO DO, AS THEY THAT SHALL BE JUDGED BY THE LA"W OF LIBERTY. — James ii. 12. The light of the Sabbath has a peculiar beauty as it shines to hallow the incoming, on the morrow, of our national anniversary. It thus intimates what is the great truth of history, that the religion which gave our Sabbath gave also the principles by which has been wrought out the proud structure of the American Government. Christianity and Republi- canism is one or identical ; and to this theme we may direct our attention, that we may render just tribute to the source of all true liberal government, the vital- izing spirit of all progress, and the grand directory in the pursuit of means to build up the unparalleled greatness of this Empire, whose su.n rises from the Atlantic and gives the glory of its setting to the wa- ters of the Pacific. 8 86 LAW OF LIBERTY. Seventy-seYen years yesterday the grand vote was passed declaring that the united colonies were, and of a right should be, free and independent States ; and this day is the anniversary of the thorough, earnest, sol- emn debate concerning all the details of. the form of declaration, which was to give the grand reasons for the step taken, so astounding to the world. Every word was measured ; every redundant ex- pression was omitted ; whatever bore the appearance of passion rather than of fact was laid aside ; and as prepared for adoption on the fourth, it was, as it is, one of the ablest State papers which the history of nations can furnish. And what is the spirit of that grand Declaration of Independence ? It is no less Law than Liberty ; and it is most admirable to see that the most impassioned of all the minds concerned in the enacting of that instrument, spake and did as conscious that they should be judged l)y the law of liberty. They acted religiously, and their hope of success was a religious hope; and wise is it for their descendants to itudy with a like spirit the history of those influences which contributed to final success. Such a study, I think, will inevitably send us to the New Testament. There is the true source of Repub- licanism. There shine tlie great truths which as inevi- ta])ly suggest popular liberty — the denial of the divine right of kings, and the right and duty of self-govern- ment, as the sun gives light and heat. And it is a glorious truth to the republican Chris- tian, that in proportion as men have been the success- LAW OF LIBERTY. 8T fill champions of popular rights and liberties, tliey have cherished the Bible as the grand armory of weapons, the magazine of the battle-field, the encour- agement of victory. The duty of the Pulpit, then, is, to show what was the Consecration of the great struggle of our fathers, and that they were successful because they fought un- der tlie aegis of the Almighty and obeyed the impul- ses of Destiny. This will impose on us, as the great lesson of the time, that while we do and must discard a religion for the government, or a governmental re- ligion, the union of Church and State, we must seek for a religious government, as the exponent of that which has vitalized republicanism, and which can alone develop it in full beauty and perfection. To the highest and the lowest, to each and all, the ex- hortation comes, " So speak and so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty." In the New Testament, Liberty is a great word — an expansive word. The whole work of Christ is spoken of as a liberation ; he who is liberated by His truth is declared to be free indeed ; and the crowning act of the redemption is the introduction of humanity into " the glorious liberty of the children of God." Hence the summing up, in our text, of all that Christianity is, as the law of liberty, or, as the same Apostle has written, " the perfect law of liberty." Here two ideas are implied. Liberty and Law — but mark you, the law comes of liberty, and not liberty of the law ; for the expression is, the law of liberty — the law having the same relation to liberty as the law of 88 LAW OF LIBERTY. any State has to that State. It is Liberty suggesting Law for its own protection, as the genius of our gov- ernment is Liberty protected or regulated by Law. The inference seems irresistible, that whatever may be the character of local institutions, every thing of a national character must favor Liberty. To Liberty and its progress we are committed ; and the law of liberty demands that our advance as a nation be for no aims disassociated with Freedom. To some this truth of Liberty and Law appears par- adoxical. Liberty and Law are antagonistical in their speculations ; and so the idea of self-government is supposed to be incompatible with any thing like a re- gard to the essentials of Social Order. But this arises from a wrong heginning in the spec- ulations of such theorists. He who begins with God and his own religious na- ture can have no licentious views of liberty, nor can he put self above the social. The text has special reference, it would seem, to one law, " Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself;" and therefore the re- sponsibility seems to be, as the responsibility must ever be, in reference to serving self in view of our social relations. Whatever liberates us from a nar- row religion increases the extent of the law of broth- erhood or neighborhood. The higher we magnify self the more we obtain for the individual our theory of liberty, the more grand becomes our view of socie- ty — our relations to man — our obligations to serve the race. The law of liberty is, after all, the law of service ; and it teaches this splendid idea, that the more a man LAW OF LIBERTY. 89 serves his race, the more shall he know of the highest and nohlest freedom — the expansion of a generous soul — the liberty of affections and sympathies enfran- chised from the bondage of selfishness and sin. There is no such freedom as is known by the Lord's free man ; and yet he is Christ's servant, and being Christ's servant, he must serve the race. To what, then, do we owe our national greatness ? Allowing, in the answer, all credit due to man, noble and pure, we must say. Our liberties come of God's gift in Christianity. Christianity came to the common people, to the masses. It made them the critics of their rulers. It told them, by the appeals it made to them, that they were capable of solving for themselves the greatest questions ; and in so many words it said, " Why even of yourselves judge ye not what is right?" When Jesus said to John's disciples, as the crowning evi- dence of his Messiahship, •' The poor have the Gospel preached to them^'^ he struck a mighty chord Avhose music shall yet fill the world with harmony. It has been well said by an English radical writer, " This preaching of the Gospel to the poor assvimes that the poor have faculties for the appreciation of the profoundest of moral truths ; that there is nothing too good to be given to them ; that the enlightening of their understandings, the awakening of their feel- ings, the guiding of their aspirations to spiritual beauty, truth and good, is a work worthy of the high- est intelligence." It is this that makes Christianity the great fact in 8* 90 LAW OF LIBERTY. the philosophy of the Rights of Man. It was direct- ly opposed to the common test, " Have any of the rulers beheved on him ? " No man can sneer at the " common people " and look Christianity in the face as its believer ; and it is that low view of the masses which Jesus rebuked, that has given the only founda- tion for anti-republican governments. And the world has yet to learn how much Jesus meant when, on the ears of the masses, he poured the great truths of his religion, and favored Man rather than Philosophers and Scholars. His gospel was " hid from the wise and prudent, and revealed unto babes." How our freedom came from Christianity is seen by the briefest reference to the History of Political free- dom. We need not go back farther than the Reforiuation, — that bursting of light out of midnight darkness. Then came the struggle between the Claim for su- premacy in behalf of the Church, and in behalf of the State ; and it was the exaltation of the Individual that settled that controversy and established the right of private judgment in the use of the Scriptures. That was, unconsciously, an allowance of every thing which the broadest idea of Liberty required. If the Soul is adequate to decide, and must decide for itself, on the import of the Sacred Directory, then it has capacities for deciding, and has the right to decide, on the application of that import of the Scrij> turcs to the form of government under which it is to live luid to which it is expected to pay obedience. LAW OF LIBERTY. 91 Men began to catch this idea and to think over it and to speak it and to debate it, till the idea of Despotism was given up for the idea of the Divine Right of Kings — that kings inherited an absolute and irre- sponsible authority, to which their subjects must yield passive obedience. The whole of the awe of government then came from Power. Milton and Locke argued with sound reason and keen logic against this proud assumption ; but following this controversy was the idea of the So- cial Compact — an undefined something gave a basis to authority. Then came the struggle for a written Constitution — for defined limits to Sovereign and Subject — the ''Magna Cliarta " and the "Bill of Rights." Then it was that the time came for the opening of a new theatre — not a " Hippodrome," where old tricks of antiquity were to be played over again, but where new things were to be thought and wrought, and the foundations of an empire were to be laid that was to astonish the world by the rapidity of its growth, the stupendousness of its resources, and the magnificence of its enterprise and achievements. Here to this new world an humble body of Colo- nists came, and here, in the fear of God and in loyal- ty to conscience, grew up the grand truth of the right of a people to govern themselves. This was a march beyond the liberalism of tlie old world. Circumstances forced it upon our fathers ; and when they sought in their Bibles to know its sanctions, they found them in abundance ; and they 92 LAW OF LIBERTY. refused to look into any Compact to know their rights and duties, for they found in themselves the right to say, What will we do ? What do we feel to be our duty ? How shall we speak and do as they who shall be judg- ed, — not by kings, this and that unbased and tradition- ary compact, but by the law of liberty that is of God. " No taxation without representation " became the rallying cry. It was the protest of mind working its way to the grandest ideas of government and society. It denied absolutely the assumption of power on any basis ; and what a need there was of this is seen, most awfully pictured in the indictment against the Crown read before the world in the Declaration of Indepen- dence. Its awfulness lies in its truth. And when I hear intelligent Americans say it is time that the reading of that State Paper, that unparalleled docu- ment, should be done away with on this great anni- versary, because we are at peace with the mother country, I can only say, Every argument for the erec- tion of monuments can be set aside on the same prin- ciple. The Declaration Qf Independence contains a truthful history — the awful summing up of the wrongs of our fathers — their justification for appeal- ing to decisive measures — the proof of what irre- sponsible power will do. It should be read to stir the blood into sympathy with the spirit of '76. It should be read to show how in advance of the mother country young America was — what shackles were placed upon the growing limbs of the young giant, and how petty selfishness will throw itself in LAW OF LIBERTY. 93 the way of the onward sweep of a wing powerful as truth and as nTesistiblo as destiny. Blind, blind to the great social law that executes the providence of God, were those who tried to subdue, where they should have co-operated. On what an Empire will to-morrow's sun dawn ! Every return of the great Anniversary that comes when the country, as now, is rejoicing in prosperity, is a matter for devout thanksgiving — not only on our own account — not only because we can still afford an asylum for the oppressed everywhere, but because clearly burns the light of hope for the struggling mil- lions of Europe. Still more clearly and brightly will that light burn when we remember, as a great people, that we should so speak — so vote, enact and resolve ; and so do — perform, execute faithfully our laws and promises, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty — re- sponsible for the use of the privileges which are secured by Liberty, regulated by Law. If the sentiment of this discourse be true — if Christianity and Republicanism are identical — the latter being but a form for the spirit of the other, then one thing is certain, the more the form has of the spirit it embodies, the better it will be. SERMON X. BELIEF IS A WORK. The:n said they itnto him, What shall we do, that we may work THE WORK OF (jiOD? JeSUS AXSwERED, ThIS IS THE WORK OF GoD, THAT TE believe ok him whom he HATH SENT.— Joliu vi. 28, 29. There are certain admissions made by all Christians however much they may differ in reference to the me- ritoriousness of works. They all admit that works are the expression of faith — they make it manifest, as a word spoken to tell what thought is in our minds. They all admit that works test the quality of faith, and, therefore, there are earnest efforts on all sides to claim the best characters as the fruits of the best faith. It is also admitted, that works are a test of the depth and slreng-th of faith ; also of its continuity in the soul, as a living, vital force always makes itself known in some way. BELIEF IS A WORK. 95 Hence there is a constant demand for works in con- nection with faith. This is common to all sects, par- ties and clans ; and amid all the diversity of creeds and ordinances, platforms and bases, the cry is, Show the excellence and powers, the holiness and beauty, the depth, breadth, and continuity of your faith, by your works. But the idea suggested by the text differs from all these. It stands by itself. It is worthy of our special notice and regard. That idea is, that Belief, Faith, is itself a " work." It is so to be regarded ; and only as we so look upon it, shall we be able to attach a just meaning to the expression of " saving faith." There is a demand now pressing upon us for special notice of this, because there is a constant cry against faith as not to be considered a work ; and when the question is now put and pressed, " What shall I do to be saved ?" the answer of the Apostle is utterly passed by, and something else is substituted as the essential doing. When that question was first put, it was by the jailor, and the answer was " Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.^^ That was Paul's answer in reference to what constituted saving doing. " What shall I do ?" is answered by, '' Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ !" It is the answer of the New Testament. Belief is a work, so says our text and says it grandly. To work as God demanded, was to believe on Christ ; and we never rise to a true perception of this matter till we see that Belief is a work as well as 96 BELIEF IS A WORK. a working power, as the Steam Engine is a work as well as a working thing. It fills you with admira- tion to look ax it, as to see it operate. The Engine, and what the Engine does, are two distinct matters ; so with Belief as a work, and Belief as a Working Force. It is the neglect of this that makes so much of tra- ditionary belief in the world — an absence of any thing like a real, profound, heart-searching and soul- struggling conviction or experience. When belief becomes a matter of work of toil, of reasoning, prayer, and study, it is laid away, and the soul is told, " Take thine ease — be a babe in the School of Christ — remain submissive and keep on the safe side." I have been told by scores that when they began to make belief a work — begun to see whether they were on the right basis or not, they found, first, that they inwardly trembled to pursue the work ; and, second, their religious teachers advised them to abandon the effort. And what do such things prove ? They prove that tlie force of education, and the policy of the exclusive Church, tend to draw away the mind from its appro- priate work — from searching to the root of the mat- ter of belief, and testing the difterence between a per- sonal and inherited thing. Instead of honoring the man who proves he has made Ijclicf a matter of mental and moral toil, he is treated as a suspicious and dangerous personage. The prompting that impelled him to look up the rea- BELIEF IS A WORK. 97 sons for his traditionary faith, and test their vahie and scriptural claims, are considered and denounced as the suggestions of Satan. But, on the other hand, he who goes the treadmill round of the Church, who treats the matter of belief as something settled for him by the Baptism he received in infancy, or the Catechism he learned in childhood, is regarded as a true servant of Christ and is honored as such, when there is every reason to conclude, that had he lived in the day of Jesus, he would not have been moulded by his precepts. That Christians do, notwithstanding this course, honor in their hearts, the man of free and independ- ent mind, who uses his mind to work out for himself the religious problem, is evident from the respect paid to historical personages who have illustrated the stupendous benefits that may flow from one man's making belief a work — taking the popular faith to pieces — examining its parts and the relation of the parts as a machinist does a machine with a skill that is on the alert for improvements and discoveries. When Luther glanced with an eye of fire on the text, " Tiie Just shall live by Faith," and the thought went searchingly into his soul, that all the ceremonials of the Church could take no rank with faith, and facts and penances and bodily mortifications, could not be what they were maintained to be, belief became a work indeed. It summoned every energy of his mind ; and when the bugle blast of the Reformation roused the people to independent thought — to a demand for the Scripture — to the claim for the Right of Private 9 98 BELIEF IS A WORK. Judgment, what was it but the voice of a soul that told the agony of its questioning — its toil at think- ing — the intense labor in the laboratory of the mind — the wasting work of the refiner as he separated the gold from the dross. So too when a mind has taken the attention of the world by rising above the nothingness of Infidel- ity and entering the realm of everlasting realities in the light of Christianity, the Church cannot but admire the work which belief required. It points to the story of such a life as though it were an image of the resurrection from death to glory. It shows what a gloom and bitterness, what a desolation and barren- ness surround the mind in the domain of Infidelity ; and it says, " See the grandeur and magnificence into which the soul hath wrought its way ! that gran- deur and magnificence Avell repays the toil." So, too, when the mind has been overshadowed with doubt, and like Dr. Pay son, has had times of unbelief when it hardly had faith in the existence of God while writing sermons on his sovereignty, the happier moods into which the soul vnorked its way, are dwelt upon as beautiful encouragements for the desponding and doubtful. And there is on all sides of us, an applauding voice for the mind that is at work to get out from beneath the doubts that oppress, with the exulting word, " Why art tliou cast down, my soul ?" &c. But all this goes for nothing if the belief worked out is opposite to the reigning creed ; and this, there- fore, is the test of the liberality of any man, or party, BELIEF IS A WORK. 99 or sect. It is the mind that is honored because of its work, or the results at which the mind arrives — those results being favorable to the creed received by the applauder ? The former is the better stand, because it is only by honoring the independent mind, separate from the results at which it aims or achieves, that we afford any encouragement to vigorous efforts to help the race in its progress. It is nothing but selfishness that accepts results where results are clearly worked out — when the mind has by arduous toil solved the problem and lit the light of glory. The honoring of mind is seen in upholding the earnest thinker in his wearisome toil — in cheering him on in the applications essential to success ; and it is on this ground that I claim for Liberal Christianity the highest friendliness for mind, because it makes the approval of God to rest upon efforts and their quality, and not on results according to a given standard. It does not fasten moral turpi- tude to mental error. So with the Saviour. All through the story of the Evangelists there breatlies the spirit of liberal thought. Christ struck all shackles from the working powers of the mind, and the grand moral of the fact, that the Regenerator of the World came forth from among the common people and out from the carpen- ters' shop, appears to be, to set forth the dignity of mind separate from all social position. " Whence hath this man this wisdom! How knoweth he the great things of the soul, of religion and of God, hav- ing never entered the school of the Prophets !" 100 BELIEF IS A WORK. No matter liow lie learned, no matter whence he de- rived his wisdom ; the question is, " Is he the Messiah of God ?" As Christ worked out a belief in the divine origin of his mission, so is a vital, quickening, saving faith in him to be wrought out. His union with God was the perfection of faith. He found his first work for God in the toil of soul that alone could lead him from the poverty and ob- scurity of his birth and youth, to the sublime heights of that Mount wherefrom he pronounced the Beati- tudes. " Cold mountains and the midnight air, Witnessed the fervor of his prayer ; The desert his temptation knew, His conflict, and his victory too." A work — a mighty work — a work of prayer and study — of logic and the heart ' — of brain and soul, — of day and night is before us, ere we shall rise to the full height of belief in him whom God sent to be the Saviour of the World. And with the New Testament open before us, we may boldly say, The more we work out in our minds a clear faith in Christ, the more shall we know of salvation. To do unto salvation is first of all, to believe in^hc'Lord Jesus Christ. God will own this as a work — because it is the union of forces that move the man, and verifies morally the saying of the Redeemer respecting faith removing mountains. BELIEF IS A WORK. 101 Let US encourage, what Jesus demanded in liis time on earth, — free, independent, personal thinkhig ; and where this is scorned because of some of its results, we can answer with the poet : — " One indeed I knew In many a subtle question versed, Who touched a jarrinjr lyre at first, But ever strove to make it true: Perplexed in faith, but pure in deeds, At last he beat his music out — There lives more faith in honest doubt, Believe me than in half the creeds. He fought his doubts and gathered strength, He would not make his judgment, bHnd, He faced the spectres of the mind And laid them : thus he came at length To find a strono;er faith his own." SERMON XI JESUS THE SOX OF GOD. Dost thott believe ois the Son or God ? — John ix. 35. This was the question of the Saviour to the Blind Man to whom Sight had been given. That man knew not who had healed him, but he stoutly maintained that whoever it was who had heal- ed him, came from God ; and when nothing else could be obtained from him, the Jews of his synagogue de- clared he was altogether born in sin, and they were not to be taught by him. And they cast him out. When Jesus heard of this, he had peculiar sympa- thy for the man and he sought him. That man had suffered in his cause. He had met reproach and in- sult, had been scorned and expelled from the religious associations of his whole life, because he would not relinquish the logical connection between the Miracle and the Character of him who wrought it. When Jesus found him, he asked him, '' Dost thou believe on the Son of God ? '* JESUS THE SON OF GOD. 103 The man seems to have been impressed by tlie ap- pearance and tone, or something in the manner of Jesus, for he called him " Lord," and said, " Who is he, Lord, that I might believe ? " He was ready to believe. He only wanted the Son of God pointed out in a convincing manner, to insure the flowing of his heart towards him. His soul had been elevated by the deed wrought upon him, and he had readiness of mind for things sacred. Jesus said, " Thou hast both seen him, and it is he that talketh with thee." Doubtless, this was accompanied with the resump- tion of that unction with which Jesus spake the di- rection to wash in the pool of Siloam, or by something else which convinced the man beyond question of the identity of the Miracle Worker and the Speaker, for he threw himself prostrate before him, in the form of Oriental homage, and said, ^' Lord, I believe ! " There are many like this man when he was enjoy- ing the blessing of the gift of sight, and knew not to whom he was indebted. The finger of Power which Christianity now stretches forth is potent to give sight where otherwise would be blindness. Many see who know not that it was Jesus who gave this power of sight, and they attribute to Natural Religion what never was enjoyed till Christ came. A cheerful study of Nature was never entered into before ; and the balmy breath of summer no more truly changes the atmosphere from the chill and cold of winter and early spring, than Christ has made more genial to the human mind the very atmosphere of common thought. 104 JESUS THE SON OF GOD. Some care not to wake from this ignorance. It is enough to them that they see, and they are willing to rejoice in benefits which cost discoverers much, with- out heeding in the least the demand for acknowl- edgment and gratitude towards their benefactors. But there are others, who, like the man addressed in the text, are ready to know and to pay homage to their benefactors. They will not shrink from discus- sion, or any duty that belongs to the honor of what they know is good. And as the man addressed by the Redeemer doubtless found from the religion of Christ what was better than physical sight, so the common benefactions of Christianity are outweighed by those blessings into which the soul enters by that belief which is a work — a matter of personal thought and investigation. Here, then, is the question, " Dost thou believe on the Son of God ? " Are the blessings which are thine in the very atmosphere of mental, moral, social and domestic existence, which had their origin in the Ministry of Jesus, — are they connected distinctly with a personal Saviour ? and is thy faith in the Son of God, while thine eyes are drinking in the light of the moral universe as only his truth could enable thee to do? There are many who shake off these questions. Christianity is to tliem a living fact. It can no more be blinked out of existence than sight can be blind- ness ; but as to any process of thought by which they are to settle the personal claim of Christ — what he was, and is, and will be, is too much work for them. JESUS THE SON OF GOD. 105 Whether Christ is merely a myth, or a historical personage, they cannot say. "Whether he ended his personal and official relation to onr race at his death, or not, they will not decide. And, therefore, the great questions of his Resurrection and his Mediation are less to them than ■whether Cuba will he annexed, or intervention or non-intervention prevail in tlie na- tional policy. " Dost thou believe in the Son of God ? " is to them a question not pertinent to the times ; and they have too much work to do, to work out the greatest of all problems. It is needful, then, to get, if possible, some short and easy method of presenting the claim of Christ, that the work may not appear too great in the way of those who should receive his Sonship, as the heir of all things, in the divinest sense. I treat now of those who acknowledge the blessing of Christianity, who see its forces in the history of civilization and in the institutions that are monu- ments of its power ; but who go no farther. They enjoy sight where, without Christianity, they would be blind ; but they know not who it is that sent abroad the powers of healing and made the atmos- phere sight-giving, instead of contributing to the con- tinuance of human moral blindness. Now, the grand evidence of the Sonship of Christ, in the divinest sense, is the evidence of Christianity as something more than Deism — as really a Revela- tion from God. That evidence is this : Christ and Christianity are the fulness of ages. They are the Great Sea into 106 JESUS THE SON OF GOD. wliicli all streams of wisdom and prophecy flowed. Christ might have said, " Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon me." He thus stands amid the ages — a central object of the provi- dence of the Besetting God. Ages pointed forward to Him, as centuries point back to Him ; and new forces were promised in Him, as new forces have flow- ed from Him. Tlie same process of thought that makes me believe in God intellectually, makes me believe in Christ as the Son of God in the divinest sense ; and as my spirit seems from its own self, as by intuition or instinct, to believe in God, when I commune with his works and ways with more of prayer than logic, so when I muse on the works and ways of Christ, as prefigured in the oracles of proph- ets and recorded in the trutbful pages of the Evan- gelists, my heart goes out after him as the Sent of God. " While I muse, the fire burns ; " and there is nothing of undue claims where he says, " Ye believe in God, believe also in me." As I try to analyze my convictions and see where they come from, I find, in the first place, that the soul is greater than logic — that we have sentiments that logic never gave — affections and sympathies, as well as reasoning faculties and argumentative powers ; and something of my belief in Christ and Christian- ity is to be attributed to the power of these affections and sympathies, that make the heart " fall in love" with some things which God has made for it. I find, next, in the life of Jesus — in the facts giv- en of his career, evidence that God was with him in JESUS THE SON OF GOD. 107 the highest sense ; and then, too, the structure of Christianity itself, as a Religion, unfolds the most convincing evidence that he who built it was of God, and his claims are divine. I then read those claims and find Him connecting himself with his religion, its growth and power, as the stock and root of the vine are connected with, and are the vitality of, the branches. Around his Personality, through the ages of progress, as while he lived on earth, I find the mission of his religion con- nected ; and I cannot receive Christianity — I cannot see it any wiiere, without seeing Christ and the claims of his sublime personal relation to our race. But, as I have said, the one grand evidence of the Sonship of Jesus in the divinest sense, is, that he is the fulness of the ages, and from his fulness ages yet to be, are to derive their noblest power — the grand- est forces for progress. The first of these positions is proved by the annals of the world — not the Bible only, but human histo- ries bear witness to the fact, that Christ is the One Being needful for our race — the Mighty Power of God, " made unto us wisdom and righteousness, sanc- tification and redemption." No matter what our views may be of the Jews as a people, the fact lies plain on the pages of history, that through them the divinest things given for human progress, before the advent of Christ, were bestowed, and the wine is consecrated, though the chalice be earthen. Their religion stands out in bold relief; and their literature, while it is the oldest, is yet the most inspiring of the nations of antiquity. 108 JESUS THE SON OF GOD. And this religion which is thus standing out and so marked of God, points beyond itself. It is not complete. Its excellence, above all others, does not banish a loftier ideal, and its sublimest bards sing of a Promised Being ; and just where the Prophet as- sumes the most unequivocal attitude of prophecy, he speaks the clearest of the Coming and Fate of One whose fulfilment is Jesus Christ. This is seen by reading the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah, and compar- ing therewith the life and death of Jesus and the testimonies of his Apostles. Philip might well preach Jesus from this prophet, to the Ethiopian Eunuch, who read in the book of Isaiah without discernment of the meaning. But if you receive the prophecies of the Old Testa- ment, and read them with a less strict adherence to the letter and become mindful only of their spirit — taking the sweep of the prophetical wing rather than the detail of its feathers, you shall feel there is a mighty current of prophecy bearing on towards the Coming of such a personage as Christ ; as the land- breeze fans the mariner to his great delight till he sees the land, and hears the bells ring from the sacred towers. The need of such a Being was confessed by the condition of other portions of the world outside of Judaism ; and when Christ came, there was some- thing symbolical in the Greek who came to Philip and said, " Sir, we would see Jesus." To him, the best things of modern progress are to be traced ; and the wonderful rapidity with which Christianity JESUS THE SON OF GOD. 109 was spread among the nations, with no element of conformity to the world, can only be accounted for on the ground of the ages of preparation for its ad- vent and the necessity for it, and that Jesus was in- deed the Son of God. 10 SERMON XII. CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. Every spirit that conpesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in THE flesh, is not OF GoD.— 1 John iv. 2. And did ever human folly go so far as this, assert- ing the unreality of Christ's bodily presence, and making him but a phantom ? Even so is the testi- mony of history. The apostle was not " as one that beated the air," in his opposition so frequently expressed in his epistles. He had been with Jesus. He had leaned upon his breast. He had felt the heaving of that breast, the beating of that heart, and he arrayed himself firmly and intelligibly against the philosophy of his times, that really, in effect, made Jesus Christ a phantom — an existence without bodily proportions and substantiality. And what a great error is that, in any form, that makes Jesus but as a vision of the night — something like the ghost in Hamlet, when Hamlet cried, "He is here ! he is here ! he is gone !" Truth affects us in proportion as it is distinct in our apprehension, stand- CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. Ill ing out in bold relief; and to give the highest truth the noblest embodiment, so that it might in the fair- est and most glorious proportions be takei\ into the mind, God sent his Son, a living, human, tempted, struggling, conquering being, a representative or image of liimself. Dear as the support of our grand- est hope should be the argument for his reality as having come in the flesh — the seed of Abraham, the son of Mary, the perfect man, the conscious, willing, and disinterested sacrifice. But there were those in the time of John the Apos- tle who maintained the inherent evil of matter, and that all spirit, or mind, was good. They recog- nized all intelligences as so many emanations — rays thrown out from the Great Spirit, as scintillations are thrown from the sun, retaining the purity of their source. To exalt the purity of Christ, to make him the illustrious soul they desired to recognize him, they were forced to deny the reality of his bodily presence, and maintain that it was but show, without substance. That he actually died upon the Cross they could not allow, and some argued that when the cross was taken by Simon the Cyrenean, a change was made, and the Cyrenean was actually crucified, while, in his shape and appearance, Jesus passed away. How absurd the conclusions to which theories drive men ! for this gives to the Cyrenean the glory of the death on the cross, which is really the crowning of Christ's life on earth. Against these ideas the apostle protested. He that confesseth not that Christ was really a man, a proper 112 CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. substantiality, is not of God — is not instructed by the divine Spirit — hath not the truth. John's opposition to this vagary of the Gnostics intimates or suggests to us that we must be careful that we do not, in effect, make Christ a phantom, a poetic vision, a dreamy something, a sublime ideal unrealized in flesh and blood ; a mythological crea- tion, that vanishes at the touch of philosophical criti- cism. We must do nothing to undermine the actual- ity of Jesus, removing him from the proper personal- ities of history, lest in hours of mortal need we find, that where we Want something as palpable as Thomas found when he put his hand into the pierced side of Jesus, we have really but a phantom, whose lips of air melt ere a word drops on our hearing. There are many who do not weigh well this mat- ter. They deem it of little consequence whether they have an ideal or an historical personage as the embodiment of excellence. They say the idea is sufhcient, and rest satisfied with that. They talk of Christianity being as old as creation ; that it is but the growth of the idea of the race ; but they overlook the essential difference between the effect of a mere idea and an actual person, and that if by any subtlety of metaphysics, or play of poetic fancy, or theological vagary, we make Jesus not to have labored and suf- fered, died and rose, as the Gospels represent him, the real, regenerating power of his example is gone ; there is no reality in that example ; it is but as fine poetry, or fine music, and the whole of Christ's resist ance of evil is less than the actor's performance. Like the frost-work on the whidow pane, so beautiful CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. 113 in the dawn, one warm touch of sunlight carries it all away. The real affects us far differently from the unreal. Two portraits equal in beauty would affect us differ- ently, were one from a real face, and the other but a fancy sketch. We should be more apt to say, in refer- ence to the former, "I should like to see her," than of the latter, "I should like to see some one like her." How different is the effect upon different travellers when they come in sight of certain localities in the Holy Land. They will be moved much alike by un- deniable facts, such as the elevation where the holy city stood, the Mount of Olives, Bethany and Bethle- hem, with their hill-tops and sides ; but very differ- ent when the matter in hand refers to the geographi- cal localities of the details in the life of Jesus — the spot where he was born, the sepulchre where he lay. Alike they feel the poetry, the sentiment, the sacred teachings of all the incidents referred to, but only in proportion as they are sure that they are not dealing with/cmcT/, but with reality^ are they moved by stand- ing on hallowed ground. We cannot regard what we fear is a phantom, as we can what we know is a me- morial of the hallowed past. We stand in fear of the coming of some proof, some reasoning, some new incident, that will take away our former conviction, and all the poetry and beauty over which we were growing sentimental, leaves us like Hamlet's ghost again. " It was about to speak, when the cock crew, And then it started like a guilty thing Upon a fearful summons." 10* 114 CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. Shakspeare and his works afford an illustration. Not long since, there was a sharp criticism in one of the literary journals of our country on some of the attempts to clear up some of the obscurities that hang around portions of the life of him who has added great worth to existence by his works. "Little, very little," it is said, "is to be gained by such labors; and instead of wearying ourselves in researches and studies upon such matters, we ought to be enjoying the works which arc in themselves a reality, a visible substance." But is this reasonable ? Can we enjoy those really visible works as well, as deeply, without any fixed ideas respecting Shakspeare himself, as with some ? Are the works the reality they would be, or have they the same visibility they would have ? I trow not. That beautiful work, "The Artist's Mar- ried Life," has another reality, another visibility, when you read it not merely as a beautiful, touching and instructive fiction, but as the picture of a real life -^ the life of Albrecher Durer, the German painter. So with the works of Shakspeare. It is worthy of any man's attention to ask. Were these works the product of a single mind ? Did the Almighty ever pour such affluence of genius into one human soul ? Did great- ness like this spring up amid humble circumstances, and what were those circumstances ? So wedded are men to the admiration of greatness in distinction from the works of greatness, that it is vain to tell them not to waste their time in removing obscurities from the memory of the man. We cannot admire what is the product of many nnnds as we can CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. 115 what is equally great, and that was produced by one. It is absurd to say that the victories of Napoleon would be the same to us if we divided the genius that wrought them between his Marshals, rather than attrib- uted them to that magnificent, though terrible soul. There is a poor philosophy that pulls down the greatness of individuals by its talk ol their being but reservoirs of the ages, whereas greatness is really in- dividuality — something as distinct and personal as the head of Webster, or the eye of Clay, or the dig- nity and majesty of Washington. Our admiration of beauty, truth, power in ideas, is a different thing from our admiration of the same in persons. Socrates and William Penn affect us far differently than the ideas which they represented, acted, lived, however beautifully the idea may be set forth by orator, divine, or poet. And yet it is said that it is not the Shakspeare of flesh and blood that we should be concerned about, but that other being who has come down to us robed in poetry, and who speaks to us — a spiritual essence addressing the thought and the divine image we bear within us. This is he of whom it is worth our while to take any note. But this will not do. It will not do for those who think, of whence comes the genius we meet in those wonderful works ? Did a being capable of all this ever come in the flesh ? What did such a soul, if such a soul there was, do witli common life ? AVhen genius cries out against his sphere, his lowly life, his small means, the removal of learning's aids from him, 116 CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. is he rebuked or mocked by what Shakspeare had ? Aje, the book and the man are two things. Milton wrote poetry ; in that poetry he speaks of losing his sight in the cause of liberty. Did he do so ? He did, and the thrill that comes to the heart as that sonnet on his blindness is read, is a shaft of fire from the undeniable fact that despite the physician's warn- ing, Milton wrote because liberty was imperilled, and he had a word to speak for her cause. I asked a blind man once what was his conception of his mother. ^' She is," said he, "a beautiful thought." 1 regarded the answer as beautiful ; but he confessed that if he could have but one moment of sight, he would choose to use it in seeing a human face. How different to him — what a greater reality and more beautiful visibility — would be the sight of his moth- er's face, than was his beautiful thought ! No, no, it will not do to set up that kind of criti- cism that says, what the man has done is what we want, not the man. It is base ingratitude. It lowers most shamefully the estimate of men. Men are to be valued for what they have been^ as well as for what they have done. I value Sir Walter Scott for his character as seen in his efforts to retrieve his fortunes, more than I value his novels, great and immortal as they are. I deprecate the efforts so abundant in our day to depreciate the importance of historical Chris- tianity, that says, '' Perhaps Jesus lived, and perhaps he did not. He may have lived ; he may have been a good man, but it matters little or nothing. Let us take what he taught that is good, and live it.'^ CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. IIT I pity those who thus dismiss Christ as a phantom that has spoken. Dream or reaUty, fable or histori- cal fact, it is all the same to them. Not so with John's estimate of what man would need. He that confesseth not that the Christ of whom my gospel treats, who is there portrayed as I saw him ; he who denies that that excellence came in the flesh, is not of God. He denies God's greatest benefaction. He accepts not the grandest thing ever done for human- ity. He does not believe that the highest ideal of character has been realized ; the best of all possible revelations of God has been lived, to see which, is to see the Father. But to us who receive him, his words are spirit and life, for they were lived ; they were the spirit of the most beautiful life. Our reverence for our nature is concerned in this matter. We judge human nature as it appears for judgment in personalities. We say it is the saddest thing in all history that we find virtue so fragmenta- ry as illustrated in characters. Our grief is that it takes so many geniuses to make one perfect man. But in Jesus we find all virtues comprehended. In him the balance is perfected, and we see the glory of an harmonious development of our nature. To make this a phantom — to take this away from among be- ings once clothed in flesh, is a robbery of humanity — is a despoiling of History of its crowning character, its chief moral glory. It is because of this that I reject with moral loath- ing that rationalistic criticism that makes Jesiis only an Historical Myth or hardly that, — that attributes 118 CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. to exaggerated admiration or homage of seen or sup- posed excellence the exceeding beauty of the charac- ter of Christ, as given by the Evangelists. It makes the Idea form the Man, instead of allowing that the Man formed the Idea ; and sets up the most remarka- ble of all suppositions, — that is, that while directly opposite to Avhat Christ was, was the desire and ex- pectation of the Jews, yet men fashioned that charac- ter out of what they had been cherishing. The Idea was, this theory says, in the Mass before it appeared in the Individual. But where is the proof ? Where is the evidence that such an Idea existed before Christ lived and thus gave it to the world ? No, it will not do to lose the flesh and blood ani- mated by the noblest of all souls, and go floating away witli a phantom Idea. It is not something that may be, but something that has been that is ours in the character that makes the centre and the glory of the New Testament. Aspiring man is not mocked in his hour of grandest moral effort by his Example of All Excellence passing into nothingness by the thought. " No one ever lived thus ! " but as the traveller climbs the steep rock, and hangs dizzy in the air at a peril- lous height, and is animated to greater effort to climb the crags by the traces of some one having gone be- fore him and a name written above him, so the fact that Christ has conquered — really, truly — has a mighty influence to encourage to the noblest efforts to reach the highest of Christian character. It is because of this that I deem it a matter of Practical Religion to oppose the doctrine of the Trin- CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. 119 ity that effectually makes Christ a phantom. If He was the very God, it is impossible, in the nature of things, that he should be the tempted, struggling being he is represented, as the Evangelists picture him. Theologians describe him as having a life with- in a life — as acting a part, and they will enter into de- tail to show how nicely he regarded prophecy, and how many things he did with sole reference to the fulfilment of some ancient word. They even express astonish- ment that he did not burst from the cloud that veiled his Godhead, and blast those who insulted his last hours ! It is not possible that to such a view can be attach- ed the moral power that belongs to " the simplicity of Christ." If behind seeming sensibility and suffering I know there is a superhuman power, the power of the Example is gone. There is behind the outward seeming a calm, mighty and sovereign Spirit that re- views the whole and contemplates it, as Plato's God is represented contemplating the eternal Ideas and working through them in the creation of the world. No, Christ is a distinct and subordinate Mind. He went away into solitude, on the mountain top and by the sea shore, to pray. He lived with God in a more intimate companionship than any other, and while we accept him as the New Testament presents him, we do not have to play at shadows — now seeing one Deity and anon another, but the Father is enthroned in undivided supremacy, and to Jesus we look as the Mediator and Redeemer, who, " by the grace of God, tasted death for every man." But are there not those who cling to all that John 120 CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. wrote and that Paul believed, and yet nevertheless make Christ a Phantom — visiting them in time of feverish excitement, of entrancing devotion, or when the imagination is wrought upon by some affecting incident. To them Christ might well say, " A little while and ye shall not see me. And again, a little while and ye shall see me." He is a transient guest in their hearts. They do not follow him as a soldier his leader, the poet his theme, the artist his grand ideal. Christ to them is away off in the Palestine of the past, or in the far off future waiting to take the throne of Judg- ment. Christ a Phantom ! Alas, that I should say it, but it is so — it is so to thousands who ought to know the difference between passionate enthusiasm and a steady, strong and obedient love. What we want is such a sight of Jesus as will ex- ert a transforming power. It was this kind of seeing Jesus that wrought the vast change which took place in the first centuries of the Christian Church. It gave new elements to thought. It made life more to be desired. It poured into the channel of human activity new forces of civilization and progress, and every department of social life felt the power of the grandest of all lives. Phantom though he may be to many, Jesus has filled the world with his Presence. It cannot be de- nied. It is a moral, spiritual power. It has its judg- ment seat in our midst, and men of the world, of the bar and the senate, instead of attempting to set aside his Authority when it crosses their path, try their power to bring his consecrated name to the support CHRIST MADE A PHANTOM. 121 of tlieir position. Christ is no Phantom. He is be- fore us in social usages, laws, institutions, — in the best blessings of our homes, the best aids to social improvement, the happiest tendencies of the wondrous activities of the world. He repeats his miracles by the beneficence he inspires, and breathes a reverence for man that gives an interest to every form of hu- manity and makes the effort for the most debased an acceptable act of worship. He addresses our immor- tal nature, and still repeats, " I am the Light of the world — I am the Resurrection and the Life. If any man thirst let him come unto me and drink. I am the Bread of God. Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest ; take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of heart ; and ye shall find rest to your souls." Accept him, ye who are in constant unrest. Let him be more than the Phantom of the devotional hour. Adopt no theory that dissolves him into a thin shade — that denies him present existence and activity, his Mediatorial and Redeeming mission. He lives. We may know him, and over our souls may come the power of his love, as we feel the coolness of the air reviving our languid energies ; though the fountain that thus ministers to our comfort is unseen and shines in its rainbowed glory afar. 11 SERMON XIII UNBELIEF HELPED. And stkaightway the father of the child cried out attd said WITH tears, Lord, I believe! help thou my unbelief.— Mark ix. 14. Where the confession of unbelief is made with tears and made to Christ, the smallness of belief will be compassionately dealt with. He made no unreasonable demands. " I have," said he, " many things to say unto yon, bnt ye can- not bear them now ;" and in this spirit Panl treated those who were to him but babes, and were to be fed with the milk of the word. " Him that is weak in faith receive ye," he said ; and honest doubts were more respected than the credulity that swallows with- out tasting. The scene with which the text is connected is one of peculiar impressivcness. A lad was brought to the Saviour who was terribly diseased, so that he was subject to epileptic fits, and soon as he came into the presence of Jesus, he fell on the ground, and wallowed, foaming. It was awful to UNBELIEF HELPED. 123 see him. He was dumb, and tore about like some ravishing beast, gnashing liis teeth, so that no wonder the Apostles or the seventy were affrighted and could not heal him. Jesus accepted the case as one of those where the outward appearance had beguiled away faith, and to calm the father and the multitude, doubtless he asked how long the lad had been thus afflicted, and the ans- wer of the father was, " Of a child." Then he went on to tell how the poor creature had suffered, and how into the fire and into the water he had been thrown by the contortions and agonies he suffered ; " but if," said this father, " thou canst do any thing, have compassion on us, and help us." There was something here that might indicate a want of confidence in the power of Jesus. One thing was certain, the Disciples could not do any thing. Hope was all baffled by their effort, and the poor father of the writhing and tossing lad might think that the hope of having the son healed was " too good to be true." And then too his language only betoken- ed the wish for something to be done. He was not lifted up to the great desire for the complete cure of his son, and all his thought was. Help us, if thou canst do any thing. Calm as the moon that rises to move upon the tide and control them, Jesus looked into the face of that father and said, " If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth." Instantly the father cried out, and with gushing tears, too, " Lord, I believe ! help thou mine unbelief!" 124 UNBELIEF HELPED. Then, while the people were running to the spot where the lad lay, Jesus healed him — he lay still as if dead — exhausted, so that many said, " He is dead!" But Jesus stepped forward — took the boy by the hand and lifted him up, and he arose. When the disciples were in private with the Saviour, they asked him, why they could not heal this case ? His answer was significant, " This kind can come forth by nothing, but by prayer and fasting." By this, I recognize our Master as making faith de- pendent on severe spiritual exercise for its noblest energy and most triumphant power. Here, then, we have an important matter connected with Belief. It teaches most plainly, as the whole tenor of the New Testament teaches, that faith is a matter of culture — a thing to be nursed and tended, — to be fed and exercised — to be disciplined and fit- ted for the most frightful exigencies of life. " Lord, I believe ! help thou my unbelief." Christ compassionates unbelief — the unbelief that tells its story with tears — that sees what it would have remedied, but has too little hope that it can be realized. He did not array his force against the poor father who spake as though he doubted the power of Christ, because he saw how honest and simple that doubt was. The man had caught the impotency of the Disciples. Their ill-success had weakened his hope, and he writhed with his son who wallowed, foaming at the mouth, on the ground. Here, then, is the great lesson. We must not attempt to catch the spirit of belief from other Chris- tians, but from self-discipline under the guidance of UNBELIEF HELPED. 125 the Saviour. Thus he can, and will, help our unbelief. He says, " I am the Way, the Truth, and Life." He and His Religion are identified. The distinguishing glory of Christianity is, that it is a Religion mani- fested in a Life. It has been lived. Christ is tlie revelation of God. We see God as we see him. He is as a word which clearly expresses an invisible thought. He is spoken of, therefore, as such, and there is a sublime meaning in the Scripture, " And the word was made flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth." St. John in saying this, also said, " And we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father." there is the grand help for unbelief to behold the glory of Christ — to see and appreciate the beauty and power of his life — the matchless symmetry of his character — the budding, blossoming and perfection of the flower of his being. Hence the grand language of St. Paul to the Corinthians : " God, who command- ed the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, in the face of Jesus Christ." There is something remarkable in this passage. Paul had been treating of the giving of the law when a vail was on the face of Moses, in mercy to the people, who were dazzled by the brightness of his luminous countenance : and in describing the privil- eges of the Christian, Paul spoke of Christ's face, that face unveiled — that face unveiled and shining, shin- ing not with a corporeal light, but with the light of the knowledge of God's glory. 11* 126 UNBELIEF HELPED. This light did not dazzle the eye, as in the case of Moses and the people, but illumined the hearts of the Christians ; so that the contrasts here made are highly instructive, to show the relation of Christ to us, as the great help for unbelief. The knowledge of God is glory's given in the char- acter of Christ. His face is put for his character. In that character, as light in a mirror, is concentrated the highest and best knowledge of God ; from that character, as light from a mirror by a lens, that know- ledge is transmitted to our hearts ; and that know- ledge thus shining in our hearts, lights up all the beauty and glory of immortal love and eternal life — it touches every affection and sympathy, every desire and passion, as light touches the objects in a room into which it is brought ; and we learn to appreciate the moral grandeur of that declaration which says, " Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also ; knowing that tribulation worketh patience ; and pa- tience, experience ; and experience, hope ; and hope maketh not ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which is given unto us." — Rom. v. 1 — 5. It is not then by the manner in which Christians live, that we are to be helped in our unbelief. Christ lives, and to him must we go. He only hath the power we need. He only has fasted and prayed till UNBELIEF HELPED. 127 the " fulness " of the Divine gift came, and he no longer had it "by measure." It is indeed well to help our faith — to strengthen and cheer it by appreciating what Christians have done. Just in that degree in which they have let their light shine before men, that men, by their good works, are led to glorify the God of the religion that so works, — just in that degree the lives of saints are valuable as helps to faith. So the Apostle presents a grand catalogue of the examples of faith before the times of Christ, and represents these examples as presenting an array of personages who look down on the Christian racer bent on running the full course of duty, " looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of faith." To return, then, to the text and its connection. Beautiful to the eye of the father was the lad brought to Jesus, when the spasm was not on him. So is a true faith in Christ. It is the child of the heart. It is the image of all that is parental and divine in the human soul. The affections so naturally fasten upon it as upon the child given to the arms and the bosom — to the kiss and fondnesses of maternal and paternal love. We so speak of a favorite idea of an author, an artist, a schemer, — we say. It is the child of his heart. It stands out, as it were, to his eye as a child bor'i to him, in whom he has garnered up great hopes, and with whom is linked all the happiness of life. More justly may this be regarded the Christian's faith in immortality, with the light it sheds on present 128 UNBELIEF HELPED. duty, joy and sorrow ; so did Socrates regard his fainter and less beautiful hope of life beyond death. When Socrates held his last conversation with his scholars, it seemed at one time that all the arguments for the immortality of the soul had been overthrown, and as it was a custom for the Greeks to cut off their hair and throw it into the tomb at the time of the burial of a friend, Socrates took hold of the long, drooping locks of one of his disciples, and asked if that pretty hair would not be cut off on the morrow, — the time he should be dead. He was answered " Yes ;" and then he added, " If you take my advice, you will not stay so long !" and explained his mean- ing, that it was more fit that the death of a great hope be mourned than the death of a friend. But the beautiful faith of many a heart does not so much die as it may be said to be affected with spasms. It is tortured. Its harmonies are untuned, and it is a mournful thing. It is as uncontrollable as the poor lad to whom the Apostles or Disciples could bring no help, so that the sorrow of that father is but a picture of the troubles of him whose faith is not healthy, strong and happy. There is just enough of life in their faith for them to say, '' I believe !" but there is weakness enough to make them add, with tear?, the confession, ''Help my unbelief!" To Christ must the heart come, and the result of patient waiting upon him sliall be, the lanquid pulse of faith shall be quickened — the " veins shall feel the rosy tide," and as Christ lifted up the lad and he arose to tremble and to fall no more, so shall belief be UNBELIEF HELPED. 129 released of all the spasms of unbelief and the fire and the flood be feared no more. Take to Christ thy faith. Its weakness will not be despised. Thy tears will be pearls in the Treasury of Christ. Bring to him thy soul by adopting the simple rule, to try by the spirit of his life all doctrines and theories, all creeds and articles. Test the Trinity by this and it is seen to be an error ; for the life of Christ was the life of a subordinate, humble, prayerful, tempted being. Test Native Depravity by this, and it cannot be received as Christ is seen taking children in his arms as heirs by birth of the kingdom of heaven. The great question pertaining to the death and after hap- piness of infants are all answered ; and there is something approaching to blasphemy in the acts of those portions of the Church which will not admit the unbaptized infant into consecrated ground for burial, but must place them apart and speak of them as " These that in trembling hope are laid apart." Test by the Spirit of the Saviour's life that doctrine of the exclusive Church that stamps no virtues as good save those which blossom within its own special boundaries, and see it refuted by Christ's conduct to the Gentiles — his picture of the Samaritan — his readiness to approve goodness in every form, telling his disciples it was no reason for denying excellence to one wlio used his name with reverence because he followed not them. Test by this standard the application of the great principle of Love, that is so often limited by the sys- 130 UNBELIEF HELPED. terns of men, and you find it has a sweep of infinity. The example of Christ pours inexhaustible light on the meaning and the extent of the commands to love God and to love our neighbor. There is no limit in either ; for Christ, by the spirit of his life, showed that the character of God as humanity's father is to be ever kept in view, both in reference to the prodigal and the mysteries of life ; and when the lawyer would mystify the command to love our neighbor by asking, " Who is my neighbor ?" Christ answered by a par- able that did but harmonize with the spirit of his own life, and which such a spirit could alone have originated. And so with the monstrous doctrine of Endless Punishment : test it by the spirit of the life of Jesus and it is seen to be false. The assertion of that idea and the prayer of Christ on the Cross, are as incom- patible as hatred and love. The first is like the vul- ture pouncing on the flesh of Saul's seven sons ; and the other like Rizpah scaring them away. In her spirit of undying love we see the image of the love of God, and Christ is the grand help to cast away unbelief. SERMON XIY PERSONATING JESUS. But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ. — Rom. xiii. 14. Literature abounds with references to the Stage. Poetry has much animation and beauty which it owes to the Theatre ; and there are no metaphors more beautiful employed even by divines than those which send the imagination where the Actor treads, and the scene shifts, and the story of years is told in the few acts of the changing drama. Man loves mimic life — the reproduction of the Past ; and the theatre addresses the eye and ear as the writer addresses the imagination. Separated from its unessential adjuncts, a tremendous power might be exerted by the Drama to give emphasis to Paul's allusion to it where he says, " The fashion of this world passeth away," intimating the need of stretch- ing our grasp for something permanent and fitting an immortal nature. In Paul's time, the theatre was the grand entertain- 132 PERSONATING JESUS. me lit. It was the great arena of literary ambition. The most famous orators at the Bar and in the Sen- ate sought the aid of the Actor ; and the Poet's grandest inspiration found there a fit impersonation. But it is to a single custom of the theatre that Paul, in the text, alludes, and that is, the changing dresses, whereby the character personated is present- ed in appropriate costume. Dress strangely changes the person, and strangely affects the character of the Man. He is, in some de- gree, as he may clothe himself: and how clothes rep- resent the character is easily seen in slip-shod actions where there is the slip-shod dress, and politeness of manner where there is elegance of clothes. This serves to open in some degree the meaning of the Apostle's exhortation : " But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ." And it illustrates also that reference made to the personation of the theatre in Col. iii. 9, 10 ; and also in Eph. iv. 22 — 24, where the Apostle speaks of putting off the old man, and putting on the new man, or throwing aside one character for anoth- er by a change in the spirit of the mind, showing that the grand change demanded by the Gospel is not a change in Nature, but of Action, Development and Restraint, as he who walks the stage a Beggar may tread with the royal step and seem " every inch a king," by a change of personation demanded of liim. But costume is not every thing. Dress does not make the man, " For 'tis the mind that makes the body rich," PERSONATING JESUS. 138 and pj'ofessions of virtue, holiness, religion, are but dress — they suggest a character to be sustained, a part to be performed, an end to be reached in carrying out the design of Him who called us to the theatre of God, the drama of Love, " to virtue and to glory." Here, then, is the important point of the text : The impersonation of Christ ; or the Christian an Actor. " All the world," we are told by the great Drama- tist, " is a stage, and all the men and women — mere- ly players. Every man in his time plays many parts." This is true. But there is one part man should be most studious to perform, and that is, To be a Chris- tian — a true Impersonation of Jesus. Every true Actor has one favorite part. He will generally play that on his ''Benefit Night." He thinks it best suited to him ; if he have genius, that part will fit him as a garment, and his effort is so com- pletely to put it on as to be lost in it — to be the character he personates for the time being, as the in- sane man is the king or beggar he declares himself to be. It is grand to see the enthusiasm of genius in the enacting of some favorite part — where melancholy Hamlet ; ambitious, murderous, conscience-haunted Macbeth; sorrow-stricken and kingly Lear ; or gloomy Richard, pass before the eye as in reality. You see there acted poetry. The great thoughts of the Dramatist are incarnated for the hour. The performer throws himself, as it were, into the very experience of the character he has chosen, as the poet, thrills with the joy or sorrow, the horror or remorse of 12 134 PERSONATING JESUS. the character he reproduces in his poem ; as Shak- speare rioted with Falstaff and wept with Cordelia and Juhct. The vast distinction between Talent and Genius is seen in the transcendent power of the latter to be what it represents — to make the allusion complete, so that the fire of the soul is contagious, and we feel the cold storm that beats around the defenceless head of King Lear, yet not so cold as his daughter's neglect that prompts the prayer from the old father's lips that they " may know how much sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless child ! " It is in this sense that we are to put on the Lord Jesus Christ. " Eat his flesh and drink his blood" — high wrought metaphors for entering into his most vital experience and living as he lived, by the spirit of filial loyalty to God, as he lived the life of God and said, " I and the Father are one." We are to accept him as a character in which we are to transform ourselves — to feel as he felt, to tliink as he thought, to resolve as he resolved, to en- dure as he endured, and to infuse into our whole being the spirit tliat moulded his beautiful character. There is nothing unnatural here. The exhortation of the text is reasonable ; for there is no influence grander than the power of an assumed character. We see this everywhere in life. Every successful man is the result of this power. He set l^efore him- self what lie would be — he lived it — he wrought for it ; and whatever his choice was, wliether to be a Mer- chant or Minister, Mechanic or Artist, Poet or Fainter, PERSONATING JESUS. 135 the character he loved he assumed — lie did his best to be it — lie magnified his office — he put on the character till he felt the soul beating in accordance with the dress. Whatever helps to the feeling of any character which is to be personated or acquired, aids the per- fection of the efforts of the man. We see this in the Fireman's dress, and the various symbols that belong to that character's employments. We see this in the costume of the Soldier — the gay coat, the cap, with its graceful plume, the epaulet and sword, the glitter- ing gun, the adornments that speak'of War, Bravery and Victory. The man seems a different being having put on this or that character ; and he is following an ideal as tru- ly as the student at his books, the painter at his easel, the sculptor at his marble, or the poet with his pen, " with eye in fine frenzy rolling." Here is the great justification for a man's professing to be a Christian, though he is not, in character or life, in all things, a Christian. There is no hypocrisy in this act. He is putting on the Lord Jesus Christ ; he is personating a character in order to catch the spirit and genius of that char- acter ; he is a Christian Actor in the great drama of the Redemption, and a voice says : " Honor and shame from no condition rise; act well your part; there all the honor lies." The aim makes the Man. The expression, " to put on," in the sense of the text, did not originate with Paul. It was common among Greek writers. We read of those who were thus and 136 PEESONATING JESUS. SO, " haying put on, or clothed themselves with, Tar- qiiin." So the disciples of Pythagoras are represent- ed as having put him on ; and so too Plato is said to have been put on, as also his master, Socrates, by those who received them as their instructors m phi- losophy. So in the text, Jesus is to be put on in like manner, as a guide and example opposite to the char- acters referred to in the immediate context. The Apostle did not call, in the text, to the putting on of the Lord Jesus Christ as though it was some- thing to be taken as clothes are taken. He referred to no mystical ideas concerning the vicariousness of Christ's sufferings or righteousness ; but his idea was precisely what the idea of a great lover of the Drama is when he calls on the Actor to put on more com- pletely the character he is to personate. In other words, seek a right conception of the character to be sustained ; study it ; enter into it more and more ; become more and more possessed of its spirit ; seek every means that will help to the possession of the passions and emotions that sway such a personage, and that are to be expressed in the representation. The theatre-goer follows up the representation of the same character a score of times by the same actor, expecting to see that character put on more and more — new points made — new beauties brought out, the freshness of original thought exhibited — so that the Handet, or Lear, or Richard of the same ac- tor is a far more perfect thing at one time than at another, if he have the genius of his Art. All that the Man professes to do, is to have the PERSONATING JESUS. 137 Character in view, and to labor to personate it. So when I say I am a Christian, I do not take that name in vain — I do not mean that I am like Christ. I only say I pnt him on — 1 feel there is no glory attainable by man like the glory of acting well that part. What I have assumed to be, helps me to be the Character desired ; and it may be that some little stroke in every day's performance may aid the reali- zation of the sublime ideal. " Practice makes perfect," is the familiar proverb ; and only by practice can any worthy end in the way of Character be achieved . I meet frequently in the city of my residence an Actor I used to see on the Stage in my boyhood, who is re garded as one of the most successful in putting on the line of characters he personates. I remember when he began and how he was laughed at ; but he determined to put on the characters with which, I am told, he now finely clothes himself, and he assumed to be certain personations till he acted his part well. A woman died in France, not many years ago, of premature old age, in consequence of the zeal and genius with which she put on the Character of the old and decrepit. The effort of the mind went into the very marrow of the bone, and she became what she assumed to be. We cannot be Jesus — we can only put him on — only aim for the spirit of his life and infuse it into others. Here is acting, on a real and not a mimic stage. Here is a personation worthy of our highest effort. 12* 138 PERSONATING JESUS. Success here makes us to reproduce Jesus, and to be owned by Him. While Jesus lived on earth certain Greeks came to his disciple Philip and said, " Sir, we would see Jesus." They were led to him. We cannot so answer a request. Let the Master be seen in his servants. " Put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ." SERMON XV THE SILENCE OF JESUS. And he answered him to never a word ; insomuch that the GOVERNOR MARVELLED GREATLY.— Matt. XXvii. 14. The theme suggested to me by this text is the silence of Jesus. His silence was as marvellous as his speech ; and there is no method of studying character that affords better results than to notice the restraining of speech — the eloquence of silence. Much is said, and well said, on the teaching of Jesus — his manner and method as a speaker; how independent he was of times and circumstances ; and how, in his peasant's garb, and by the hill-side or the river-shore, he forced the confession from his hearers, "Never man spake like this man !" "He taught as one having authority, and not as the scribes," and the people marvelled at his teaching — at what he said, and how he said it. His eloquence was from a divine impulse, from a heart that spake its utmost conviction, and rolled out the burden of love for the world. 140 THE SILENCE OF JESUS. He was troubled by no interruption. He was always ready to bear questionings, and no teacher was ever so patient to repeat himself so long as repe- tition promised anything. But there was the limit. When speech was useless he was silent. When God could speak best with his "still small voice," he asked for no rumbling earth- quake, no surging and roaring wind, no flashing and terrific fire. I have read and heard many sermons and essays on the speech of Jesus, but not one on his silence. And yet, as I have said, his silence was as marvellous as his speech. It gives us fine revelations of his charac- ter. It presents us valuable lessons for social and domestic life. It furnishes an example we ought not to forget ; for the prophet Amos has this reference to an evil tirne — "Therefore the prudent shall keep silence in that time." The prudence of Jesus is seen in his keeping silence ; and never more so than where he answered no more questions, or thrusts, and the governor marvelled greatly. Tlie text refers to the interview between Jesus and Pilate, after Pilate had shown that he was not gov- erned by principle in any form. He vascillated be- tween what he knew was justice to the accu.sed and the favor he desired to obtain from the Jews. Jesus had been submitted to insult upon insult. The Jews had no power of life and death over any criminal, and knowing that any cliarge involving merely matters of religion would avail nothing before a Gentile magistrate, they changed their ground and THE SILE>XE OF JESUS. 141 accused Jesus of a political offence against the au- thority of Rome, asserting a direct and unequivocal falsehood. ''We found this fellow/' said they to Pilate, '" perverting the nation, and forbidding to pay tribute unto Caesar, saying that he himself is Christ a king." They knew this was a falsehood, for he had answered them on a former occasion, when they attempted to entrap him, "Render unto Caesar the things that are Ci^sar's." And he, himself, had paid tribute. When the accusation was made, Pilate came in and asked Jesus the question, *■" Ai-t thou the king of the Jews ?" Jesus answered that he was a kmg. but ex- plains and limits his meaning by stating that his king- dom is spiritual, his throne is the truth. Pilate seemed satisiied at this. He goes out and tells the Jews that Jesus is an innocent man. He finds no fault with him. and to the last he maintains the same idea, but renders it a nuUity by his conduct in yielding to the people. He tried to shift the responsibility by sending Jesus to Herod, and became reconciled to Herod for the purpose, and sent Jesus to him as a Gahlean, and therefore coming under the jurisdiction of Herod. Herod sent him back to Pilate, and Judas sees that his Master has no design to deUver himself by mira- cle, and he goes to confession, restitution and death. Jesus stands again before Pilate. The clamor is loud and strong against him from the chief priests and elders, and to their accusations he answers noth- ing. Pilate speaks to him — ''Hearest thou not how 142 THE SILENCE OF JESUS. many things they witness against thee ? And he an- swered him to never a word ;" i. e. he spake nothing ; he uttered not one word. He stood Hke a lamb dumb before his slaughterers, and at this silence the gover- nor marvelled greatly. Pilate marvelled because he knew Jesus could speak. He knew the power with which he could plead the cause of truth. He knew the influence he had exerted by his eloquence. He knew these accu- sations came because of the power which the wonder- ful teacher had exerted by his speech. He did not keep dumb because he had no words, nor because he was unused to discussion ; nor because he could not bear the presence of these ecclesiastical dignitaries. Discussion and they were familiar to him ; but he had to practice the instructions he had given to his disci- ples. He had enjoined on them silence, vvhen speech was vain. He had forbidden them to throw pearls where they would find no gold setting ; and wherfe there was only talk and no heart, he bade them leave the place and go elsewhere. He had not only taught this, but he had practiced it. At Nazareth they marvelled at his teachings and his wisdom, but they brought up his humble origin against liim, and he wasted there no more words. Many such instances you will find which illustrate, that so soon as he discovered that the disposition of the people was wrong, he retired, and in silence found confidence and strength. How eloquent was the silence that followed his words — ''Let him that is without sin among you cast THE SILENCE OF JESUS. 143 the first stone at her." He stooped and wrote as it were on the ground. One by one, slinkmg behind the pillars of the temple, the accusing throng went out, "being convicted of their own consciences." He left, that thought to burn its own way to the seared conscience, to arouse sensibility ; and where most teachers would have kept on talking, he kept silence, and conscience rose in the soul with that sol- emn and awful grandeur with which the full moon rises from the sea. So also when the Jews had accused him of break- ing the Sabbath, because he had performed works of healing on that day. He was in a synagogue, and the day was the Sabbath. There was a man present who had a withered hand, and he was bidden to stand forth in the sight of all those who were watching to see if Jesus would heal that day any one. Jesus asked them, "Is it lawful to do good on the Sabbath day, or to do evil ?" and they held their peace. That silence was ominous. It was a revelation of disposi- tion and character ; and never w^as Jesus so moved as at that time. He looked round about on all the per- sons in the synagogue. There they were in their seats of power, ranging from the most distinguished to the humblest. Not a soul of them had pity for the man with a withered hand, because they were opposed to Jesus ; and it is reasonable to suppose that the history of the man was pitiful. An humble peas- ant, with that hand withered, that, if made whole, would enable him to minister to his own needs and those of others. All was silence. The very breath- 144 THE SILENCE OF JESUS. ing of the people seemed suspended, and among all those godly people, so anxious for the honor of reli- gion, there was not one to say, "It is right to do good on any day." All was silence, and Jesus, in anger, looked round on all. His anger was just. It showed the energy of his religious feelings against this foul mockery of religion, and this pretended piety. His anger was right, and showed him human ; yes, and it showed him divine : divine in spirit, for our irrascible emo- tions and feelings are exponents of the moral sense and stern duty. His anger was right, because its quality is indicated in the testimony that it sprung from his "being grieved for the hardness of their hearts," and he broke the silence with no argument for the Jews, but with the command to the poor ob- served of all observers, " Stretch forth thine hand !" and it was restored whole as the other. There was no use of speech with those enemies, and the silence of Jesus was justified by the fact that followed, for these Pharisees who could not have the Sabbath violated by an act of mercy, went forth and straightway took counsel with the Herodians to de- stroy Jesus ! The silence of Jesus was therefore perfectly in char- acter when he answered his accusers and Pilate "to never a word." In silence where speech was vain, he could nourish the moral forces of the soul. "In quietness and in confidence shall be your strength," was to him, as to us, a prophetic word ; and there in Pilate's hall, accused and scorned, he who could wake THE SILENCE OF JESUS. 145 the dead and still tlie sea, who could blast the unpro- ductive fig-tree whose life was expressed only in leaves, and who could open the deaf ear and bid the dumb to speak — he in the hour of mortal peril was silent. There he stood, still as the stars dropping their crystal light. Still as the grass springs and the blossoms unfold. Still as the subtlest forces of nature speed on their way. Still as the footsteps of God, when he visits specially the human soul. Still as the spirit goes to the resurrection. Pilate would arouse him from this silence, and he said to him, " Speakest thou not unto me ? Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to release thee ?" Then it was time to speak, and Jesus replied, "Thou couldst have no power at all against me, ex- cept it were given thee from above ; therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin." There was something in that answer that made Pilate eager to release Jesus, but he was defeated by the appeal of the people — '' If thou let this man go, thou art not Caesar's friend !" And then Jesus was exposed in mock apparel to the populace, and Pilate said, "Behold the man!" Jesus was silent. Why should he speak as though reasoning ruled the world, when passion is too often the master of thrones and authority ? "Why should he speak, when he had fore- told the issue that had begun, and which was unfold- ing every hour ? He kept silence. He was great in doing so. Speech under the circumstances would be a luxury, could it be indulged innocently ; but the 13 146 THE SILENCE OF JESUS. nobility of Jesus was seen in that unbroken silence which he preserved while Pilate washed his hands as symbolical that he was free from guilt in yielding a just parson to be crucified by popular passion ; while he saw a notable robber given up to freedom in his place ; while he was scourged at tlie pillar ; mocked within the fortress by the soldiers ; and insulted in various ways till he was given to the death by cruci- fixion. They had put a crown of thorns on his head; they had put on a mock robe of royalty ; they had placed a reed as a sceptre in his right hand ; and then they had bowed the knee, crying, " Hail, king of the Jews !" He kept silence ; and then they spat upon him, struck him on the head with the reed they had used as a sceptre, and tore the robe off with violence. He kept silence. There was no dignity in speak- ing. Speech was vain. It would only have added new material for insult ; and not till some good was to be done was he to speak. And what a revelation was that when he did speak ! He was bearing, on his lacerated and inflamed back, the cross on which he was to be hung, and as he was too weak to bear it, and might die ere he reached the spot of execution, the load was taken from him, and laid on one Simon, a Cyrenean. Jesus was now re- lieved, and he heard the rush of the multitude, and the voices of women bewailing his fate. It was the first voice of pity since Pilate's wife told her dream and implored her husband to have nothing to do with Jesus ; and now that mournful lament, THE SILENCE OF JESUS. 147 that cry of bewailing as for the dead, came from woman's voice to his ear, and he paused a moment on the rising ground, and turned his face to the lament- ing tlrong. All haggard was that face of Jesus. The pure was going to the execution with two crimi- nals. The miracle-worker would use none of his wealth of power to buy his own safety. He was sub- missively in the hands of God, as well as in the power of the people, and towards those mournful, pityhig women, he gazed and said : — " Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for yourselves and your children. For behold, the days are coming, in the which they shall say, Blessed are the childless ! Then shall they begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us ; and to the hills, Cover us. For if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry ?" He spake to turn the minds of those women from himself to their own duties, and the great lesson of the future ; of that impending judgment which should tell of the iniquity of that people as full, who that day were to crucify him. And that day he made no addresses ; nothing came from his lips but brief sentences — a prayer for his murderers, as he was lifted on the Cross ; his word to the penitent thief ; his regard to his mother, and his commendation of her to John ; then the exclamation of overwhelming agony, thus resolved into "I thirst," and the triumph of returning consciousness, " It is finished !" ending with the exclamation of filial piety, "Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit." 148 THE SILENCE OF JESUS. How significant was the speech of Jesus after he had preserved marvellous silence ! It is in silence that great thoughts grow. It was so when David said, " Thus was I as a man that heareth not, in whose mouth are no reproofs. For in thee, Lord, do I hope." Instead of holding discussions, and making speeches, he wrote psalms. The cave was the sanctuary of God ; and though at times his thoughts were as fire shut up in his bones, he mused and let the fire burn till there was some moral use in speaking. The example of Jesus in reference to the time to keep silent, must not be lost upon us. His silence was eloquence. He fulfilled the prophecy, "He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth ; he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth." His example in reference to speech is frequently set forth — that we should speak the truth, speak it boldly, speak it for our own soul's growth, and the good of others ; speak it in charity as well as firm- ness ; but as important is his example in reference to silence, and we need it as much. We sometimes forget that the world is not wholly ruled by talk ; that it is not possible at all times to find an unper verting hearing ; and we need the disci- pline of silence. holy silence ! out of thy calm depths what strength can come ! How still doth the Almighty carry on the stupendous operations in na- ture ; and where do we feel his presence more than THE SILENCE OF JESUS. 149 when, like Christ, we are alone on the mountain? Then has the beauty and power of some blessed truth been made more apparent, and we have felt " Like some watcher of the skies, When a new planet swims into his ken ; Or like stout Cortez, when with eagle eyes He stared at the Pacific — and all his men Looked at each other with a wild surmise — Silent, upon a peak in Darien." But equally so do we find the good of silence in social life. We talk too much ; and if on this ground the argument for silent worship was based, it would be the most reasonable. To Jesus let us go for an example in reference to the times and seasons of silence ; and then in the difficult passes of life, we shall say our word calmly, solemnly, truthfully, and leave the issues with God, not doubting the fidelity of his providence. 13^ SERMON XYI. BIMORTALITY NOT INCREDIBLE. Why should it be thought a THIIfO IlfCREDIBLE WITH TOU THAT GOD SHOULD KAISE THE DEAD? — Acts XXvi. 8. Paul said this to Agrippa, when with great pomp Agrippa, accompanied by his sister Bernice, and FeUx, had come to the judgment seat at Cesarea, to hear the case of the Apostle, a prisoner of State. To Felix the case seemed to be one of the Hebrew Relig- ion rather than of State, and he would rather have sent him to Jerusalem than forward to Rome, but while Paul was pursuing his rights as an individual, Providence was working by him unto great ends. The real germ of Paul's case was a controversy of " one dead Jesus, whom Paul affirmed to be alive ;" and standing now before all the array of royalty, Paul felt only one impulse, and that was, to press home the claims of his cause as a religious teacher. As though every thing turned on one point he asked Agrippa, " Why should it be thought a thing incredible with you that God should raise the dead ?" He did not go at once to the Resurrection of Christ to prove that, or to ask why that should be deemed IMMORTALITY NOT INCREDIBLE. 151 incredible; but he went to the question that lies beyond — to the dead as a general term — to the idea of a revival of life where existence seemed ended. In other words, what is there essentially incredible in the idea of God's renewing a life that once burned, a flame of intellect, sensibility, affection ? Here the question is brought on the ground of pure reason. It is made a question of credibility, which is the first question in all reasoning on subjects of this character ; and it is always well to keep before us the stirring appeal which God makes to mind where he says, " Come, now, let us reason together." Let us look into the resonableness of these things, and see whether there is any thing incredible about them. " Is it possible .^" is the first question, and then comes, " Is it probable ?" and next, " Is it certain ?" and nothing has been the cause of so much scepticism on matters of Religion as the idea, that the mind must submit its faculties to resolution as it does not, and is not called to submit them, in other domains of thought and study. Never did a gallant ship unfurl its sails to the free winds of the ocean more bravely than the Scriptures offer themselves to the mind of man ; and as Jesus said, " Search the Scriptures," so Paul ex- horted, " Prove all things," and the inspired historian records, no doubt, the estimate Paul formed of the Berean Jews, as " more noble " than the Thessalonian Jews, because they heard with readiness of mind and searched the Scriptures to test the accuracy of the new exposition of the Sacred Orders. So, in the text, the appeal is. What is there incredible in the idea that God should raise the dead ? 152 IMMORTALITY NOT INCREDIBLE. But mark here, Paul does not say, Why is the im- mortality of the soul deemed an incredible thing ? Why do you deem it incredible that spirit should sur- vive matter ? No ; he went into no questions of this nature. He came forward with no new philosophy, with no subtle metaphysics, with no weapons for argu- mentation on the qualities of matter and mind. He did not say, Why should it be thought a thing incre- dible with you that the dead should rise, should enter upon another existence ; for the great thought that ruled all his ideas was that of God — his relations to man — what might be expected under his government of the world. This, as I have before said, brings the matter in a different shape before the judgment seat of mind, than the Ancients had it. The question is about God, and not about Man ; and we may quote with solemn pertinency the language of the Apoetle where he says : " We had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raisetli the dead." — 2 Cor. i. 9. And more or less, every thoughtful mind is overpowered by this sentence of death, and instead of looking up the evidence of a great hope in ourselves, we should look to God. And I hold one of three things to be logically binding on all sceptical of Immortality. They must accept bald Atheism, or a mean idea of the Diety, or the immor- tality of man. I see no escape from this when we stand in the field of our common reason — when we look at this matter on the simple grovmd of logic. I can waive the question of matter and mind — spiritu- IMMORTALITY NOT INCREDIBLE. 153 alism and materialism — the union of thought with the brain or its independency ; and on a simpler basis I am willing to build. That basis is this : Any worthy idea of God necessitates the immortality of man. It is not a thing incredible that God should raise the dead. And here is one of the great benefits which Chris" tianity has bestowed — by giving us nobler ideas of God, it has given us new intimations from reason of our immortality. It has made that stupendous hope more credible on grounds of common reasoning ; and the clear-headed thinker can no more escape this conclu- sion, than he can escape from the conviction that the more he exalts the character of any father, the more he is made conscious that that father's family is con- stantly cared for and protected. When I reason on the credibility of an immortal life, I find myself saying. It is no more incredible that I shall continue to be, than that I should exist at all. I was not ; I am ; I may hope to be. I say also to myself, — The body has wasted and changed from time to time, and still the soul, or some- thing, retains all the life of the two score years, and as I think of the future, either of earth or beyond, I see no necessity for a new soul, or this something that holds the year together as a memory, or experience, or identity ; the same mind or spirit, or whatever you may call the continuous man, will do for all the bodies that may yet be given me ; and I can conceive of no other want than for an incorruptible body. I say, yet farther, I can conceive ot no reason why 154 IMMORTALITY NOT INCREDIBLE. mind should be extinguished, and thus become so iinhke any thing else in the universe. Every where a Divine Economy is seen. There is no waste ; and every advance of science is but an increase of the evi- dences that nothing is lost — even Avlien multitudes are fed by the great miracle, the fragments are care- fully gathered up, that nothing be lost. But to what would the punishing of mind contribute ? The dust of Virgil may keep green the bays above his grave, but to what would the annihilation of Virgil's mind con- tribute ? And when I think of the noble minds of all ages — when I see them more in the majesty of more than kingly greatness — when, as in some vast area, they gather in a glorious congregation, I feel our common reason is insulted by the idea, that all these, like taper lights, have gone out into nothingness ! And then I cry for God ! — then I ask, is God dead ? And I to be driven into the cold, icy waters of Athe- ism ? How can I escape it but by those thoughts of the Deity which forbid such notions of the perishing of mind, and which give to mind a place amid the universe of imperishable things. Now I ask the Deist to look at this. You say you are no Atheist — no ! not that. You say you believe in God — you believe in the sovereign of the universe, and that he rules the nations. But you own to scepticism on all else ; all is doubt and misgiving as to the future beyond the close we call death ; and you do not marvel that men wait on the Rapping or Tipping or strange Moving Plienomena, questioning, if happly some report may come from that land which IMMOKTALITY NOT INCREDIBLE. 155 has no returning pathway. Well, brother, licrc is one great step. Yon believe in God. You arc no Athe- ist, you are a Deist. And now comes the question, Have you a worthy idea of God, or a mean one ? Deists usually claim that they have sublime views of God, and without any definite idea of what the purpose of the Creation is, or the end to which Providence is directing its government, they will tell of an experience like that which Chalmer records when he was really but a Deist and said, " I spent nearly a twelvemonth in a sort of mental elysium, and the one idea which minis- tered to my soul all its rapture was the magnificence of the Godhead, and the universal subordination of all things to the one great purpose for which he evolved and was supporting creation." In other years he longed to be so inspired again, but it could not be, as he had ideas of revelation which cramped the soul in its attempts to get at the full glory of God. But it is not to be denied that the Deist has had and may have lofty ideas of God. • God is known by his works. The heavens declare his glory, the earth is full of his riches, the sea has its revelations of him, and a thou- sand voices, with sweetest echo, speak to the soul of God ; and while the Deist can know nothing of the Covenants and cannot rejoice with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, witli Moses, David, Jesus, yet we allow to him some of the dearest music in the vast world of harmony — some of the richest poetry of Religion. Revelation does not ask the denial of Deism ; it ac- cepts it, and plants a starry ladder up which the spirit 156 IMMORTALITY NOT INCREDIBLE. may run to heights in the infinite which Deism can never reach. Here then is the issue : Accept the immortality for man which Deism necessitates, or yield your Deism. Pertinent here is the word of Jesus, " Ye believe in God, believe also in me." The one necessitates the other when the great subject is seen in its comprehen- siveness ; but only of immortality would we now pur- sue the thought. As good an idea of God as Jesus taught necessitaties immortality for man ; and there is a natural and inevitable connection between the first and last of the four articles in which Jefferson summoned up his estimate of the doctrines of Jesus, in a letter to Dr. Rush. In the first article he said, of Jesus, " He corrected the Deism of the Jews, con- firming them in their belief of one only God, and giv- ing them juster notions of his attributes and govern- ment." In the concluding article he says: "He taught emphatically the doctrine of a future state, which was either doubted or disbelieved by the Jews, and weilded it with efficacy at an important incentive supplementary to the other motives to moral conduct.'' Here is the true thought — an improvement of Deism is an improvement of the intimations and uses of the idea of immortality ; and I put the question as one of solemn moment. How can the Deist hold to a worthy idea of God, and not follow it till it assures him of, at least, the credibility of immortality ? A noble idea of God has infinite relations — it shoots out as when the frost first touches the shim- mering lake and unnumbered crystals are seen every IMMORTALITY NOT INCREDIBLE. 157 where, and the wondering mmd searches with delight the manifold variety of beauty before it. It is not enough to say, " I believe in God, I believe he is good, I will submit to whatever He shall ordain, I will be thankful for this life, and not imagine because a friend has given me silver, he is bound therefore to give me gold." This is brave talk, but it will not do for life's sternest hours. There is something in true reverence for God, that longs for his endless love — that says, " If loved once, why not loved forever ?" — that, if it must, lies dumb at his feet, but cannot keep down the hope that He will break the silence and speak as only God can speak. I fear it is a doubt about God, after all, that feeds the scepticism of immortality. The light of that great idea, God is, is not held enough to send its rays far ahead and to shoot over the cold stream to the deathless shore. We do not feed it enough with the beaten oil of solemn, midnight thought ; we do not go away from the world, and in the awful solitude, where no star shines and no light glimmers, look up to see what smile may steal down through the dark- ness, as a mother's kiss to her babe when no form can be seen. To think worthily of God is to take hold of a chain along whose living links we may go from every possible shipwreck to the eternal shore. Do you ask how I reason on tliis point ? I answer : Mind or Man seems out of harmony with their order- ly universe when he is considered only as a creature of Time ; God seems to have failed in his grandest 14 158 IMMORTALITY NOT INCREDIBLE. work ; all is incomplete, and mind, if it goes into nothingness, is the best thing extinguished. Here properly comes np the thonght of the pro- gressive faculties of man — his capacity for endless improvement — his ever enlarging desire for new dis- coveries of God. If a man were to make a machine and to discover it to possess a capacity, so to speak, for endless improvement, affording the means of a perpetual display of the inventor's genius, I cannot conceive how he could ever have a heart to destroy it. Phidias threw his mallet at his statue because it would not speak — the cold marble put out the fire of genius that could go no farther ; but when another sculptor saw enough in his work to proclaim him to all ages, he cried, " Kill me, but not my thought !" And however others may think, I cannot see any credibility in the idea, that the Godlike mind shall be killed. 0, it is too bad a thought to cherish of the great Deity, that we are " Thus to pass away ; To live but for a hope that mocks at last — To agonize, to strive, to watch, to fast. To waste the li