fP^v /iir{' />H^' U^ ^^^U^j^^^^" pT/T-./U.^^, ^:^€uu4S, 4^^^*?-^^^^ ^Cc^-^^ccT ^ 2}, Jr. M'^^i^- GIFT OF THOMAS RUTHERFORD BACON MEMORIAL LIBRARY ^AUTIFUL THOUGHTS FROM HENRY DRUMMOND ARRANGED BY ELIZABETH CUEETON The invisible things of God from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made.— Rom. i. 20. NEW YORK JAMES POTT & CO., PUBLISHERS 1893 Copyright, 1892, by JAMES POTT & CO. TROl* DIRECTORY PRINTING AND BOOKBINDING COMPANY NEW YORK 4 MY DEAR FRIEND HELEN M. ARCHIBALD THIS BOOK IS AFFECnONATELY INSCRIBED 272586 PREFACE. My first tliought of writing out this little book of brief selections sprang from the desire to assist a dear friend to enjoy the Author's helpful books. The epigrammatic style lends itself to quotation. Taste of the spring brings the traveller back to the same fountain on a day of greater leisure. Many times these " Beautiful Thoughts " have en- lightened my darkness, and I send them forth with a hope and prayer that they may find echo in other hearts. E. C. Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2007 with funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/beautifulthoughtOOdrumrich JANUARY. January ist. Christianity wants nothing so much in the world as sunny people, and the old are hungrier for love than for bread, and the Oil of Joy is very cheap, and if you can help the poor on with a Gar- ment of Praise it will be better for them than blankets. The Programme of Christianity , p. 33. January 2d. No one who knows the content of Christianity, or feels the universal need of a Eeligion, can stand idly by while the intellect of his age is slowly di- vorcing itself from it. Natural Law^ Preface, p. 23. 10 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS January ^d, A Science without mystery is un- known; a Eeligion without mystery is absurd. However far the scientific method may penetrate the Spiritual World, there will always remain a re- gion to be explored by a scientific faith. Natural Law^ Introduction, p. 28. January 4th. Among the mysteries which compass the world beyond, none is greater than how there can be in store for man a work more wonderful, a life more God- like than this. Tlie Programme of Ghristianity^ p. 62. January ^th. The Spiritual Life is the gift of the Living Spirit. The spiritual man is no FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 11 mere development of the Natural man. He is a New Creation born from Above. Natural Law, Bio-genesis, p. 65. January 6th. Love is success, Love is happiness, C Love is life. God is Love. Therefore love. The Greatest Thing in the World. January yth. Give me the Charity which delights not in exposing the weakness of others, but " covereth all things." TJie Greatest Thing in the World. January 8th. There is a sense of solidity about a Law of Nature which belongs to nothing 12 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS else in the world. Here, at last, amid all that is shifting, is one thing sure; one thing outside ourselves, unbiassed, unprejudiced, uninfluenced by like or dislike, by doubt or fear. . . . This more than anything else makes one eager to see the Reign of Law traced in the Spiritual Sphere. Natural Law, Preface, p. 28. January gth. With Nature as the symbol of all of harmony and beauty that is known to man, must we still talk of the supernat- ural, not as a convenient word, but as a different order of world, . . . where the Keign of Mystery supersedes the Eeign of Law? Natural Law^ Introduction, p. 6. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 13 January loth. The Eeign of Law has gradually crept into every department of Nature, trans- forming knowledge everywhere into Science. The process goes on, and Nature slowly appears to us as one great unity, until the borders of the Spiritual World are reached. Natural Law, Introduction, p. 13. January nth. No single fact in Science has ever discredited a fact in Eeligion. Natural Law, Introduction, p. 30. ^ January i2th. I shall never rise to the point of view which wishes to " raise " faith to knowl- edge. To me, the way of truth is to 14 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS come through the knowledge of my ignorance to the submissiveness of faith, and then, making that my starting-place, to raise my knowledge into faith. Natural Law^ Introduction, p. 28. Quota- tion from Beck : Bih. Psychol. January i^th. If the purification of Religion comes from Science, the purification of Science, in a deeper sense, shall come from Ee- ligion. Natural Law, Introduction, p. 31. January 14th. With the demonstration of the natu- ralness of the supernatural, scepticism even may come to be regarded as un- scientific. And those who have wrestled long for a few bare truths to ennoble life FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 15 and rest their souls in thinking of the future will not be left in doubt. Natural Law^ Introduction, p. 32. January i^th. The religion of Jesus has probably al- ways suffered more from those who have misunderstood than from those who have opposed it. Natural Law, Bio -genesis, p. 67. January i6th. It is impossible to believe that the amazing successions of revelations in the domain of Nature, during the last few centuries, at which the world has all but grown tired wondering, are to yield nothing for the higher life. Natural Law, Introduction, p. 33. { 16 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS January 17th. Is life not full of opportvmities for learning love? Every man and woman every clay has a thousand of them. Greatest Tiling in the World. January i8th. What is Science but what the Natural World has said to natural men ? What is Eevelation but what the Spiritual World has said to Spiritual men ? JVatural Law, Bio-genesis, p. 73. January igth. Life depends upon contact with Life. It cannot spring up out of itself. It can- not develop out of anything that is not Life. There is no Spontaneous Genera- tion in religion any more than in Na- ture. Christ is the source of Life in the FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 17 Spiritual Worid ; and he that hath the Son hath Life, and he that hath not the Son, whatever else he may have, hath not Life. Natural Laic, Bio-genesis, p. 74. January 20th. It is a wonderful thing that here and there in this hard, uncharitable w^orld, there should still be left a few rare souls who think no evil. Greatest Thing in the World. January 21st, The physical Laws may explain the inorganic world; the biological Laws may account for the development of the organic. But of the point where they meet, of that strange borderland between the dead and the living. Science is silent. It is as if God had placed everything in 3 18 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS earth and heaven in the hands of Nature, but reserved a point at the genesis of Life for His direct appearing. Natural Law ^ Bio-genesis, p. 69. January 22d. Except a mineral be born "from above" — from the Kingdom just above it — it cannot enter the Kingdom just ^ above it. And except a man be born " from above," by the same law, he can- not enter the Kingdom just above him. Natural T^aw^ Bio genesis, p. 72. January 2^d. J If we try to influence or elevate others, ( we shall soon see that success is in pro- / portion to their belief of our belief in / them. ' Greatest Thing in the World. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 19 January 24th. The world is not a play-ground ; it is a school-room. Life is not a holiday, but an education. And the one eternal lesson for us all is how better we can love. Greatest Thing in the World. January 2^th. What a noble gift it is, the power of playing upon the souls and mils of men, and rousing them to lofty purposes and holy deeds. Greatest Thing in the World. January 26th. The test of Religion, the final test of Religion, is not Religiousness, but Love. Greatest Thing in the World. y 20 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS January 2yth. There are not two laws of Bio-genesis, one for the natural, the other for the Spiritual ; one law is for both. Where- ever there is Life, Life of any kind, this same law holds. Natural Law^ Bio genesis, p. 75. January 28th. The first step in peopling these worlds with the appropriate living forms is vir- tually miracle. Nor in one ease is there less of mystery in the act than in the other. The second birth is scarcely less perplexing to the theologian than the first to the embryologist. Natural Law, Bio-genesis, p. 76. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 21 January 2gth, There may be cases — they are prob- ably in the majority — where the moment of contact with the Living Spirit, though sudden, has been obscure. But the real moment and the conscious moment are two different things. Science pronounces nothing as to the conscious moment. If it did, it would probably say that that was seldom the real moment. . . . The moment of birth in the natural world is not a conscious moment — we do not know we are bom till long afterward. Natural Law^ Bio-genesis, p. 93. January ^oth. The stmnbling-block to most minds is perhaps less the mere existence of the unseen than the want of definition, the 22 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS. apparently hopeless vagueness, and not least, the delight in this vagueness as mere vagueness by some who look upon this as the mark of quality in Spiritual things. It will be at least something to tell earnest seekers that the Spiritual World is not a castle in the air, of an architecture unknown to earth or heaven, but a fair ordered realm furnished with many familiar things and ruled by well- remembered Laws. Natural Law^ Introduction, p. 26. January 31st. Character grows in the stream of the world's life. That chiefly is where men are to learn love. The Greatest Thing in tlie World. FEBRUARY. February ist. If a man does not exercise his arm he develops no biceps muscle ; and if a man does not exercise his soul, he ac- quires no muscle in his soul, no strength of character, no vigour of moral fibre, nor beauty of Spiritual growth. Tlie Greatest Thing in the Woiid. February 2d. A Religion without mystery is an ab- surdity. Even Science has its mysteries, none more inscrutable than around this Science of Life. It taught us sooner or later to expect mystery, and now we enter its domain. Let it be carefully marked, however, that the cloud does 26 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS not fall and cover us till we have ascer- tained the most momentous truth of Re- ligion — that Christ is in the Christian. Natural Law, Bio-genesis, p. 88. February ^d. ' Religion in having mystery is in an- alogy with all around it. Where there is exceptional mystery in the Spiritual World it will generally be found that there is a corresponding mystery in the natural world. Natural Law, Bio-genesis, p. 91. February 4th. Even to earnest minds the difficulty of grasping the truth at all has always proved extreme. Philosophically, one scarcely sees either the necessity or the possibility of being born again. Why a FROM HENRY DRUMMOND, 27 virtuous man should not simply grow better and better until in his own right he enter the Kingdom of God is what thousands honestly and seriously fail to understand. Natural Law^ Bio-genesis, p. 80. February ^th. Lavish Love upon our equals, where it is very difficult, and for whom perhaps we each do least of all. Tlie Greatest Thing in iJie World, February 6th. Spiritual Life is not something outside ourselves. The idea is not that Christ is in heaven and that we can stretch out some mysterious faculty and deal with Him there. This is the vague form in which many conceive the truth, but it is 28 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS contrary to Christ's teaching and to the analogy of nature. Life is definite and resident; and Spiritual Life is not a visit from a force, but a resident tenant in the soul. Natural Law, Bio genesis, p. 87. February yth. If we neglect almost any of the domes- tic animals, they will rapidly revert to wild and worthless forms. Now, the same thing exactly would happen in the case of you or me. Why should man be an exception to any of the laws of nature ? Natural Law, Degeneration, p. 99. February 8th. The law of Eeversion to Type runs through all creation. If a man neglect himself for a few years he will change FROM HENRY DRUMMOND, into a worse and a lower man. If it is his body that he neglects, he will deteriorate \) ^ into a wild and bestial savage. . . •• ^ V If it is his mind, it will degenerate into ^j imbecility and madness. . . . If hes^ ^ neglect his conscience, it will run off into lawlessness and vice. Or, lastly, if it is^ his soul, it must inevitably atrophy, drop .« off in ruin and decay. — ^t4^^^^^^I^^X.^ ^ Natural Law^ Degeneration, p. 99. February gth. Three possibilities of life, according to Science, are open to all living organisms — Balance, Evolution, and Degeneration. Natural Law, Degeneration, p. 100. February loth. The life of Balance is difficult. It lies on the verge of continual temptation, its 30 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS perpetual adjustments become fatiguing, its measured virtue is monotonous and uninspiring. Natural Law^ Degeneration, p. 101. February nth. More difficult still, apparently, is the life of ever upward growth. Most men attempt it for a time, but growth is slow ; and despair overtakes them while the goal is far away. Natural Law^ Degeneration, p. 101. February 12th. Degeneration is easy. Why is it easy ? Why but that already in each man's very nature this principle is supreme: He feels within his soul a silent drifting mo- FROM HENRY DRUMMOND, 31 tion impelling him downward with irre- sistible force. Natural Law^ Degeneration, p. 101. February 13th. This is Degeneration — that principle by which the organism, failing to de- velop itself, failing even to keep what it has got, deteriorates, and becomes more and more adapted to a degraded form of life. Natural LaiD, Degeneration, p. 101. February 14th. It is a distinct fact by itself, which we can hold and examine separately, that on purely natural principles the soul that is left to itself unwatched, imcultivated, 32 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS unredeemed, must fall away into death by its own nature. Natural Law^ Degeneration, p. 104. February i^th. If a man find the power of sin furi- ously at work within him, dragging his whole life downward to destruction, there is only one way to escape his fate — to take resolute hold of the upward power, and be borne by it to the opposite goal. Natural Law^ Degeneration, p. 108. February i6th. Neglect does more for the soul than make it miss salvation. It despoils it of its capacity for salvation. Natural Law^ Degeneration, p. 110. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND, 33 February 17th. Give pleasure. Lose no chance in giving pleasure. For that is the cease- less and anonymous triumph of a truly- loving spirit. Greatest Thing in the Wmid, February i8th. If there were uneasiness there might be hope. If there were, somewhere about our soul, a something which was not gone to sleep like all the rest; if there were a contending force anywhere ; if we would let even that work instead of neglecting it, it would gain strength from hour to hour, and waken up, one at a time, each torpid and dishon- oured faculty, till our whole nature be- came alive with strivings against self, 34 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS and every avenue was open wide for God. Natural Law^ Degeneration, p. 112. February igth. Where is the capacity for heaven to come from if it be not developed on earth? Where, indeed, is even the smallest appreciation of God and heaven to come from when so little of spirituality has ever been known or manifested here? Natural Law^ Degeneration, p. 116. February 20th. Men tell us sometimes there is no such thing as an atheist. There must be. There are some men to whom it is true that there is no God. They can- not see God because they have no eye. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 35 They have only an abortive organ, atro- phied by neglect. Natural Laic^ Degeneration, p. 115. February 21st. Escape means nothing more than the gradual emergence of the higher being from the lower, and nothing less. It means the gradual putting off of all that cannot enter the higher state, or heaven, and simultaneously the putting on of Christ. It involves the slow completing of the soul and the development of the capacity for God. Natural Law, Degeneration, p. 117. February 22d. If, then, escape is to be open to us, it is not to come to us somehow, vaguely. We are not to hope for anything start- 36 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS ling or mysterious. It is a definite open- ing along certain lines which are definite- ly marked by God, which begin at the Cross of Christ, and lead direct to Him. Natural Law^ Degeneration, p. 117. February 2jd. Each man, in the silence of his own soul, must work-out this salvation for K %. himself with fear and trembling — with ^ fear, realizing the momentous issues of V tis task; with trembling, lest, before the \ tardy work be done, the voice of Death should summon him to stop. i Natural Law, Degeneration, p. 118. February 24th. So cultivate the soul that all its pow- ers will open out to God, and in behold- ing God be drawn away from sin. Natural Law, Degeneration, p. 118. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 37 February 2^th. There is a Sense of Sight in the re- ligious nature. Neglect this, leave it un- developed, and you never miss it. You simply see nothing. But develop it and you see God. Natural Law, Degeneration, p. 118. February 26th. Become pure in heart. The pure in heart shall see God. Here, then, is one opening for soul-culture — the avenue through purity of heart to the spiritual seeing of God. Natural Law, Degeneration, p. 119. February 2yth. There is a Sense of Sound. Neglect this, leave it undeveloped, and you never y 38 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS, miss it. Develop it, and you hear God. And the line along which to develop it is known to us. Obey Christ. Natural Law, Degeneration, p. 119. February 28th He who loves will rejoice in the Truth, rejoice not in what he has been taught to believe ; not in this Church's doctrine or in that ; not in this issue, or in that issue ; but " in the Truth." He will ac- cept only what is real ; he will strive to get at facts ; he will search for Truth with a humble and unbiassed mind, and cherish whatever he finds at any sacri- fice. TJie Greatest Thing in the World. MARCH. March ist " Consider the lilies of the field how they grow." Christ made the lilies and He made me — both on the same broad principle. Both together, man and flow- er ... ; but as men are dull at study- ing themselves He points to this com- panion-phenomenon to teach us how to live a free and natural life, a life which God will unfold for us, without our anx- iety, as He mifolds the flower. Natural Law, Growth, p. 133. March 2d, Our efforts after Christian growth seem only a succession of failures, and, instead of rising into the beauty of holiness, our 42 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS life is a daily heart-break and humilia- tion. Natural Law, Growth, p. 125. March ^d. The lilies grow, Christ says, of them- selves; they toil not, neither do they spin. They grow, that is, automatically, spontaneously, without trying, without fretting, without thinking. Natural Law, Growth, p. 126. March 4th. Violent efforts to grow are right in earnestness, but wholly wrong in prin- ciple. There is but one principle of growth both for the natural and spirit- ual, for animal and plant, for body and soul. For all growth is an organic thing. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 43 And the principle of growing in grace is once more this, " Consider the lilies how they grow." Natural Lam, Growth, p. 125. March ^th. Earnest souls who are attempting sanc- tification by struggle, instead of sanctifi- cation by faith, might be spared much humiliation by learning the botany of the Sermon on the Mount. Natural Law^ Growth, p. 127. March 6th. There is only 'one thing greater than , happiness in the world, and that is holi- \ ness ; and it is not in our keeping ; but what God has put in our power is the happiness of those about us, and that is / y ;/ Ly^Ml'K'CV'L^ ' < ' / . ' " 44: BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS largely to be secured by our being kind to them. The Greatest Thing in the World. March yth. We have all felt the brazenness of words without emotion, the hoUowness, the unaccountable unpersuasiveness of eloquence behind which lies no love. The Greatest Thing in the World. March 8th. Patience; kindness; generosity; hu- mility ; courtesy ; unselfishness ; good- temper ; guilelessness ; sincerity — these make up the supreme gift, the stature of the perfect man. The Greatest Thing in the World. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND, 45 March gtk We hear much of love to God ; Christ spoke much of love to man. We make a great deal of peace with heaven ; Christ spoke much of peace on earth. The Greatest Thing in the World. March loth. K God is spending work upon a Chris- tian, let him be still and know that it is God. And if he w^ants work, he will find it there — in the being still. Natural Law, Growth, p. 137. March nth. If the amount of energy lost in trying to grow were spent in fulfilling rather the conditions of growth, we should have many more cubits to show for our stature. Natural Law, Growth, p. 137. 46 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS March 12th. The conditions of growth, then, and the inward principle of growth being both supplied by Nature, the thing man has to do, the little junction left for him to complete, is to apply the one to the other. He manufactures nothing ; he earns nothing; he need be anxious for nothing ; his one duty is to be in these conditions, to abide in them, to allow grace to play over him, to be still and know that this is God. Natural Law, Growth, p. 138. March ijtk A man will often have to wrestle with his God — but not for growth. The Christian life is a composed life. The Gospel is Peace. Yet the most anxious FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 47 people in the world are Cliristians — Christians who misunderstand the nat- ure of growth. Life is a perpetual self-^ condemning because they are not grow- ing. Natural Law, Growth, p. 139. March 14th. All the work of the world is merely a taking advantage of energies already there. Natural Law, Growth, p. 140. March i^th, Eeligion is not a strange or added thing, but the inspiration of the secular life, the breathing of an eternal spirit through this temporal world. The Greatest Thing in the Wo7id. 48 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS March i6th. The stature of the Lord Jesus was not itself reached by work, and he who thinks to apj)roach its mystical height by anxious effort is really receding from it. Natural Law, Growth, p. 127. March lyth. For the Life must develop out accord- ing to its type ; and being a germ of the Christ-life, it must unfold into a Christ. Natural Law, Growth, p. 129. March i8th. The sneer at the godly man for his im- perfections is ill-judged. A blade is a small thing. At first it grows very near the earth. It is often soiled and crushed FROM UENRT BRUMMOND. 49 and downtrodden. But it is a living thing, . . . and " it doth not yet ap- pear what it shall be." Natural Law, Growth, p. 129. March igtK Christ's protest is not against work, but against anxious thought. Natural Laic, Growth, p. 136. March 2oth. If God is adding to our spiritual stat- ure, unfolding the new nature within us, it is a mistake to keep twitching at the petals with our coarse fingers. We must seek to let the Creative Hand alone. " It is God which giveth the increase." NatU7'al Laic, Growth, p. 137. 50 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS March 21st. { Love is Patience, This is the normal \ attitude of Love ; Love passive, Love j waiting to begin ; not in a hurry ; calm ; / ready to do its work when the summons comes, but meantime wearing the orna- ment of a meek and quiet spirit. vj The Greatest Thing in the World. 1 March 22d. Have you ever noticed how much of Christ's life was spent in doing kind things ? The Greatest Thing in the World. March 2^d. I wonder why it is we are not all kind- er than we are ! How much the world needs it. How easily it is done. How FROM HENRY DRUMMOND, 51 instantaneously it acts. How infallibly it is remembered. How superabund- antly it pays itself back — for there is no debtor in the world so honourable, so superbly honourable as Love. Tfw Greatest 2 Mug in the World. March 24th. To love abundantly is to live abund- antly, and to love forever is to live for- ever. Hence, eternal life is inextricably bound up with love. The Greatest Thing in the World. March 2^th, Man is a mass of correspondences, and because of these, because he is alive to countless objects and influences to which 52 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTB lower organisms are dead, he is the most ^ 1 living of all creatures. ^ J '^ Natural Law^ Death, p. 155. ^ , All organisms are living and dead — V 3 living to all within the circumference of ^ ^ their correspondences, dead to all be- T yond. . . . Until man appears there ^ is no organism to correspond with the , whole environment. /^^ 7^tic> h^JL^^^ (^ -^^ Natural Law, Death, p. 155. . "^ Is man in correspondence with the whole environment or is he not? . . . He is not. Of men generally it cannot be said that they are in living contact FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 53 with that part of the environment which is called the spiritual world. Natural Law^ Death, p. 156. March 28th The animal world and the plant world are the same world. They are different parts of one environment. And the nat- ural and spiritual are likewise one. Natural Law^ Death, p. 157. March 2gth. "What we have correspondence with, that we call natural ; what we have little or no correspondence with, that we call spiritual. Natural Law^ Death, p. 157. 54 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS. March ^oth. Those who are in comnmnion with God live, those who are not are dead. - Natural Law^ Death, p. 158. March ^ist. This earthly mind may be of noble calibre, enriched by culture, high-toned, virtuous, and pure. But if it know not God ? Wliat though its correspondences reach to the stars of heaven or grasp the magnitudes of Time and Space? The stars of heaven are not heaven. Space is not God. Natural Law, Death, p. 158. APRIL. April I St. We do not picture the possessor of this carnal mind as in any sense a monster. We have said he may be high-toned, vir- tuous, and pure. The plant is not a monster because it is dead to the voice of the bird ; nor is he a monster who is dead to the voice of God. The conten- tion at present simply is that he is Dead. Natural Law^ Death, p. 159. April 2d. What is the creed of the Agnostic, but the confession of the spiritual numbness of humanity? Natural LaWy Death, p IGO. 58 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS April 3d, The nescience of the Agnostic philoso- phy is the proof from experience that to be carnally minded is Death. Natural Law^ p. 161. April 4th The Christian apologist never further misses the mark than when he refuses the testimony of the Agnostic to him- self. When the Agnostic tells me he is blind and deaf, dumb, torpid, and dead to the spiritual world, I must believe him. Jesus tells me that. Paul tells me that. Science tells me that. He knows nothing of this outermost circle ; and we are compelled to trust his sincer- ity as readily when he deplores it as if, being a man without an ear, he professed FBOM HENRY DRUMMOND. 59 to know nothing of a musical world, or being without taste, of a world of art. Natural Law^ Death, p. 160. April 5//;. It brings no solace to the unspiritual man to be told he is mistaken. To say he is self-deceived is neither to compli- ment him nor Christianity. He builds in all sincerity who raises his altar to the Unknown God. He does not know God. With all his marvellous and com- plex correspondences, he is still one cor- respondence short. Natural Law, Death, p. 161. April 6th. Only one thing truly need the Chris- tian envy, the large, rich, generous soul which " envieth not." The Greatest Tiling in the World, 60 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS April jth. Whenever you attempt a good work you will find other men doing the same kind of work, and probably doing it bet- ter. Envy them not. The Greatest Thing in the World. April 8th. I say that man believes in a God, who feels himself in the presence of a Power which is not himself, and is immeasura- bly above himself, a Power in the con- templation of which he is absorbed, in the knowledge of which he finds safety and happiness. Natural Law^ Death, p. 162. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 61 April gth What men deny is not a God. It is the correspondence. The very confes- sion of the Unknowable is itself the dull recognition of an Environment beyond themselves, and for which they feel they lack the correspondence. It is this want that makes their God the Unknown God And it is this that makes them dead. Natural Laic, Death, p. 163< April loth God is not confined to the outermost circle of environment. He lives and moves and has His being in the whole. Those who only seek Him in the further zone can only find a part. The Chris- tian who knows not God in Nature, who does not, that is to say, correspond with 62 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS the whole enYironment, most certainly is partially dead. Natural Law^ Death, p. 163. April nth. After you have been kind, after Love has stolen forth into the world and done its beautiful work, go back into the shade again and say nothing about it. The Greatest Thing in tlie World. April 1 2th The absence of the true Light means moral Death. The darkness of the nat- ural world to the intellect is not all. What history testifies to is, first the par- tial, and then the total eclipse of virtue that always follows the abandonment of belief in a personal God. Natural Law, Death, p. 167. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 63 April 1 3th. f The only greatness is unselfish love. \ ' . . . There is a great difference between ( y trying to please and giving pleasure. ) The Oreatest Thing in the World. April 14th The conception of a God gives an alto- gether new colour to worldliness and vice. Worldliness it changes into heathenism, vice into blasphemy. The carnal mind, the mind which is turned away from God, which will not correspond with God — this is not moral only but spiritual Death. And Sin, that which separates from God, w^hich disobeys God, which can not in that state correspond with God — this is hell. Natural Law, Death, p. 169. 64 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS April i^th. If sin is estrangement from God, this very estrangement is Death. It is a want of correspondence. If sin is sel- fishness, it is conducted at the expense of life. Its wages are Death — " he that loveth his life," said Christ, " shall lose it." Natural Law, Death, p. 170. April 1 6th. Obviously if the mind turns away from one part of the environment it will only do so under some temptation to corre- spond with another. This temptation, at bottom, can only come from one source — the love of self. The irreligious man's correspondences are concentrated upon himself. He worships himself. Self- FROM BENRY DRUMMOND. 65 gratification rather than self-denial; in- dependence rather than submission — these are the rules of life. And this is at once the poorest and the commonest form of idolatry. Natural Law, p. 170. April 17th. You will find . . . that the peo- k pie who influence you are people who j believe in you. The Greatest Thing in the World. April 1 8th. The development of any organism in any direction is dependent on its envi- ronment. A living cell cut off from air will die. A seed-germ apart from moist- ure and an appropriate temperature will 5 66 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS make the ground its grave for centuries. Human nature, likewise, is subject to similar conditions. It can only develop in presence of its environment. No matter what its possibilities may be, no matter what seeds of thought or virtue, what germs of genius or of art, lie latent in its breast, until the appropriate envi- ronment present itself the correspond- ence is denied, the development dis- couraged, the most splendid possibilities of life remain unrealized, and thought and virtue, genius and art, are dead. Natural Laic, p. 171. April igth. The true environment of the moral life is God. Here conscience wakes. Here kindles love. Duty here becomes heroic ; FROM HENRY DRUMMOND, 67 and that righteousness begins to live which alone is to live forever. But if this Atmosphere is not, the dwarfed soul must perish for mere want of its native air. And its Death is a strictly natural Death. It is not an exceptional judg- ment upon Atheism. In the same cir- cumstances, in the same averted relation to their environment, the poet, the mu- sician, the artist, would alike perish to poetry, to music, and to art. Natural Law^ p. 171. April 2otb. Every environment is a cause. Its effect upon me is exactly proportionate to my correspondence with it. If I cor- respond with part of it, part of myself is influenced. If I correspond with more, 68 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS more of myself is influenced ; if with all, all is influenced. If I correspond with the world, I become worldly; if with God, I become Divine. Natural Law^ Death, p. 171. April 2 1st, You can dwarf a soul just as you can dwarf a plant, by depriving it of a full environment. Such a soul for a time may have a " name to live." Its charac- ter may betray no sign of atrophy. But its very virtue somehow has the pallor of a flower that is grown in darkness, or as the herb which has never seen the sun, no fragrance breathes from its spirit. Natural Law^ p. 173. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 69 April 22d. I shall pass through this world but once. Any good thing, therefore, that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any human being, let me do it now. Let me not defer it or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again. The Greatest Thing in the World. April 2)d, There is no happiness in having and getting, but only in giving . . . half the world is on the wrong scent in the pursuit of happiness. The Greatest Thing in the World. April 24th. No form of vice, not worldliness, not / greed of gold, not drunkenness itself, ) 70 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS does more to un-Christianize society than evil temper. The Greatest Thing in the World. April 2^tK How many prodigals are kept out of the Kingdom of God by the unlovely character of those who profess to be in- side ! The Greatest Tiling in the World. April 26th A want of patience, a want of kind- ness, a want of generosity, a want of courtesy, a want of unselfishness, are all instantaneously symbolized in one flash of Temper. TJie Greatest Thing in the World. FROM HENRY DRVMMOND. 71 April 27th. Souls are made sweet not by taking ^ the acid fluids out, but by putting some- thing in — a great Love, a new Spirit — the Spirit of Christ. The Greatest Thing in tfie World. April 28th. Christ, the Spirit of Christ, inter- penetrating ours, sweetens, purifies, transforms all. This only can eradicate what is wrong, work a chemical change, renovate and regenerate, and rehabili- tate the inner man. Will-power does not change men. Time does not change men. Christ does. Tlie Greatest Thing in the World. 72 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS, April 2gth. Guilelessness is the grace for sus- picious people. And the possession of it is the great secret of personal influ- ence. You will find, if you think for a moment, that the people who influence you are people who believe in you. In . an atmosphere of suspicion men shrivel up ; but in that atmosphere they expand, and find encouragement and educative fellowship. The Greatest Thing in the World, April ^oth. Do not quarrel . . . with your lot in life. Do not complain of its never-ceasing cares, its petty environment, the vexations you have to stand, the small and sordid souls you have to live and work with. 77ie Greatest Thing in the World. MAY. May 1st. The moment the new life is begun' there comes a genuine anxiety to break with the old. For the former environ- ment has now become embarrassing. It refuses its dismissal from consciousness. It competes doggedly with the new En- vironment for a share of the correspon- dences. And in a hundred ways the former traditions, the memories and pas- sions of the past, the fixed associations and habits of the earlier life, now com- plicate the new relation. The complex and bewildered soul, in fact, finds itself in correspondence with two environ- ments, each with urgent but yet incom- patible claims. It is a dual soul living 76 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS in a double world, a world whose inhab- itants are deadly enemies, and engaged in perpetual civil war. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 179. May 2d, How can the New Life deliver itself from the still-persistent past? A ready solution of the difficulty would be to die. ... If we cannot die altogether, . . . the most we can do is to die as much as we can. . . , To die to any environ- ment is to withdraw correspondence with it, to cut ourselves off, so far as possible, from all communication with it. So that the solution of the problem will simply be this, for the spiritual life to reverse continuously the processes of the natural life. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 180. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 77 May )d. The spiritual man having passed from Death unto Life, the natural man must next proceed to pass from Life unto Death. Having opened the new set of correspondences, he must deliberately close up the old. Regeneration in short must be accompanied by Degeneration. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 181. May 4th The peculiar feature of Death by Sui- cide is that it is not only self-inflicted but sudden. And there are many sins which must either be dealt with sud- denly or not at all. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 183 78 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS May ^th. If the Christian is to "live unto God," he must " die unto sin." If he does not kill sin, sin . will inevitably kill him. Recognizing this, he must set himself to reduce the number of his correspon- dences — retaining and developing those which lead to a fuller life, uncondition- ally withdrawing those which in any way tend in an opposite direction. This stoppage of correspondences is a vol- untary act, a crucifixion of the flesh, a suicide. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 182. May 6th. Do not resent temptation ; do not be perplexed because it seems to thicken round you more and more, and ceases FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 79 neither for effort nor for agony nor prayer. That is your practice. That is the practice which God appoints yon ; and it is having its work in making you patient, and humble, and generous, and unselfish, and kind, and courteous. The Greatest Thing in the World. May yth. It is a peculiarity of the sinful state, that as a general rule men are linked to evil mainly by a single correspondence. Few men break the whole law. Our nat- ures, fortunately, are not large enough to make us guilty of all, and the re- straints of circumstances are usually such as to leave a loophole in the life of each individual for only a single habitual sin. But it is very easy to see how this 80 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS reduction of our intercourse with evil to a single correspondence blinds us to our true position. Natural Law^ Mortification, p. 186. May 8th. One little weakness, we are apt to fancy, all men must be allowed, and we even claim a certain indulgence for that apparent necessity of nature which we call our besetting sin. Yet to break with the lower environment at all, to many, is to break at this single point. Natural Law, p. 186. May gth There may be only one avenue between the new life and the old, it may be but a small and subterranean passage, but this FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 81 is sufficient to keep the old life in. So long as that remains the victim is not '' dead mito sin," and therefore he can- not " live unto God." Natural Law, p. 187. May loth. Do not grudge the hand that is mould- ing the still too shapeless image within you. It is growing more beautiful, though you see it not, and every touch of temptation may add to its perfection. Therefore keep in the midst of life. Do not isolate yourself. Be among men, and among things, and among troubles, and difficulties, and obstacles. T/ie Greatest 'Thing in the World, 82 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS May nth. Contemplate the love of Christ, and you will love. Stand before that mirror, reflect Christ's character, and you will be changed into the same image from ten- derness to tenderness. There is no other way. You cannot love to order. You can only look at the lovely object, and fall in love with it, and grow into like- ness to it. The Greatest Thing in the World. May 1 2th, In the natural world it only requires a single vital correspondence of the body to be out of order to ensure Death. It is not necessary to have consumption, diabetes, and an aneurism to bring the body to the grave, if it have heart disease. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND, 83 He who is fatally diseased in one organ necessarily pays the penqjjby with his life, though all the others be in perfect health. And such, likewise, are the mysterious unity and congelation of functions in the spiritual organism that the disease of one member may involve the ruin of the whole. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 187. May rjth. To break altogether, and at every point, with the old environment, is a simple impossibility. So long as the regenerate man is kept in this world he must find the old environment at many points a severe temptation. Natural Law^ Mortification, p. 190. 84 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS May 14th. Power over Tery many of the common- est temptations is only to be won by de- grees, and however anxious one might be to apply the summary method to every case, he soon finds it impossible in prac- tice. Natural Law^ Mortification, p. 190. May i^th The ill-tempered person . . . can make very little of his environment. How- ever he may attempt to circumscribe it in certain directions, there will always re- main a wide and ever-changing area to stimulate his irascibility. His environ- ment, in short, is an inconstant quantity, and his most elaborate calculations and FROM HENRY DRVMMOND. 85 precautions must often and suddenly fail him. Natural Law^ Mortification, p. 191. May 1 6th. What the ill-tempered person has to deal with, . . . mainly, is the corre- spondence, the temper itself. And that, he well knows, involves a long and humil- iating discipline. The case is not at all a surgical but a medical one, and the knife is here of no more use than in a fever. A specific irritant has poisoned his veins. And the acrid humours that are breaking out all over the surface of his life are only to be subdued by a gradual sweet- ening of the inward spirit. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 191. 86 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS May lyth. The man whose blood is pure has noth- ing to fear. So he whose spirit is puri- fied and sweetened becomes proof against these germs of sin. "Anger, wrath, malice and railing" in such a soil can find no root. Natural LaWy Mortification, p. 192. May 1 8th, The Mortification of a member . . . is based on the Law of Degeneration. The useless member here is not cut off, but simply relieved as much as possible of all exercise. This encourages the gradual decay of the parts, and as it is more and more neglected it ceases to be a channel for life at all. So an organism " mortifies " its members. Natural Law^ Mortification, p. 193. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 87 May igth. Man's spiritual life consists in the number and fulness of his correspond- ences with God. In order to develop these he may be constrained to insulate them, to enclose them from the other correspondences, to shut himself in with them. In many ways the limitation of the natural life is the necessary condi- tion of the full enjoyment of the spirit- ual life. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 195. May 2oth. No man is called to a life of seK-de- nial for its own sake. It is in order to a compensation which, though sometimes difficult to see, is always real and always proportionate. No truth, perhaps, in practical religion is more lost sight of. 88 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS We cherish somehow a lingering rebel- lion against the doctrine of self-denial — as if our nature, or our circumstances, or our conscience, dealt with us severely in loading us with the daily cross. But is it not plain after all that the life of self- denial is the more abundant life — more abundant just in proportion to the am- pler crucifixion of the narrower life ? Is it not a clear case of exchange — an ex- change, however, where the advantage is entirely on our side ? We give up a cor- respondence in which there is a little life to enjoy a correspondence in which there is an abundant life. What though we sacrifice a hundred such correspond- ences? We make but the more room for the great one that is left. Natural Law^ Mortification, p. 195. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 89 May 2ist. Do not spoil your life at the outset with unworthy and impoverishing cor- respondences ; and if it is growing truly rich and abundant, be very jealous of ever diluting its high eternal quality with anything of earth. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 196. May 22d. To concentrate upon a few great cor- respondences, to oppose to the death the perpetual petty larceny of our life by trifles — these are the conditions for the highest and happiest life. . . . The penalty of evading self-denial also is just that we get the lesser instead of the larger good. The punishment of sin is inseparably bound up with itself. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 196. 90 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS May 2^d, Each man has only a certain amount of life, of time, of attention — a definite measurable quantity. If he gives any of it to this life solely it is wasted. There- fore Christ says. Hate life, limit life, lest you steal your love for it from some- thing that deserves it more. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 197. May 24th To refuse to deny one's self is just to be left with the self undenied. When the balance of life is struck, the self will be found still there. The discipline of life was meant to destroy this self, but that discipline having been evaded — and we all to some extent have opportunities, FROM HENRY DRUMMOND, 91 and too often exercise them, of taking the narrow path by the shortest cuts — its purpose is baulked. But the soul is the loser. In seeking to gain its life it has really lost it. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 196. May 2^fh. Suppose we deliberately made up our minds as to what things we were hence- forth to allow to become our life ? Sup- pose we selected a given area of our en- vironment and determined once for all that our correspondences should go to that alone, fencing in this area all round with a morally impassable wall? True, to others, we should seem to live a poorer life ; they would see that our environ- ment was circumscribed, and call us nar- 92 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS row because it was narrow. But, well- chosen, this limited life would be really the fullest life ; it would be rich in the highest and worthiest, and poor in the smallest and basest, correspondences. Natural Law^ Mortification, p. 199. May 26th. The well-defined spiritual life is not only the highest life, but it is also the most easily lived. The whole cross is more easily carried than the half. It is the man who tries to make the best of both worlds who makes nothing of either. And he who seeks to serve two masters misses the benediction of both. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 199. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 93 May 27th. You will find, as you look back upon your life, that the moments that stand out, the moments when you have really lived, are the moments when you have done things in a spirit of love. As memory scans the past, above and be- yond all the transitory pleasures of life, there leap forward those supreme hours when you have been enabled to do unno- ticed kindnesses to those round about you, things too trifling to speak about, but which you feel have entered into your eternal life. The Greatest Thing in tlie Worlds p. 60. May 28th. No man can become a saint in his sleep; and to fulfil the condition re- 94 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS quired demands a certain amount of prayer and meditation and time, just as improvement in any direction, bodily or mental, requires preparation and care. Address yourselves to that one thing ; at any cost have this transcendent char- acter exchanged for yours. The Greatest Thing in the Worlds p. 60. May 2gth. He who has taken his stand, who has drawn a boundary line, sharp and deep, about his religious life, who has marked off all beyond as for ever forbidden ground to him, finds the yoke easy and the burden light. For this forbidden environment comes to be as if it were not. His faculties falling out of corre- spondence, slowly lose their sensibilities. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 95 And the balm of Death numbing his lower nature releases him for the scarce disturbed communion of a higher life. So even here to die is gain. Natural Law^ Mortification, p. 199. May ^oth. Remain side by side with Him who loved us, and gave Himself for us, and you too will become a permanent mag- net, a permanently attractive force ; and like Him you will draw all men unto you, like Him you will be drawn unto all men. That is the inevitable effect of Love. Any man who fulfils that cause must have that effect produced in him. Tlie Greatest Tiling in the Worlds p. 45. 96 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS, May ^ist. Try to give up the idea that religion comes to us by chance, or by mystery, or by caprice. It comes to us by natural law, or by supernatural law, for all law is Divine. Th€ Greatest Thing in the Worlds p. 46c JUNE. ^ ^^-i-tjl^^^ June /s/.^4^'5-/^ %i5: "^ ' We love others, we love everybody, we ^^\ "^ *, love our enemies, because He first loved ^^ ^ us. . . . And that is how the love of God melts down the unlovely heart in man, and begets in him the new creature, who is patient and humble and gentle and unselfish. The Oreateat Thing in the World, p. 46. June 2d. The belief in Science as an aid to faith is not yet ripe enough to warrant men in searching there for witnesses to the high- est Christian truths. The inspiration of Nature, it is thought, extends to the humbler doctrines alone. And yet the '^ 100 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS reverent inquirer who guides his steps in the right direction may find even now, in the still dim twilight of the scientific world, much that will illuminate and in- tensify his sublimest faith. Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 204. June )d. Life becomes fuller and fuller, richer and richer, more and more sensitive and responsive to an ever- widening Environ- ment as we rise in the chain of being. Natural Lawy Eternal Life, p. 207. June 4th. Before we reach an Eternal Life we must pass beyond that point at which all ordinary correspondences inevitably FROM HENRY IjMMMOND. 101 cease. We must find an organism so high and complex, that at some point in its development it shall have added a correspondence which organic death is powerless to arrest. Natural Law, Eternal Life, p. 313. June ^th. Uninterrupted correspondence with a perfect Environment is Eternal Life, ac- cording to Science. " This is Life Eter- nal,' said Christ, ''that they may know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent." Life Eternal is to know God. To know God is to " correspond " with God. To cor- respond with God is to correspond with a Perfect Environment. And the organ- ism which attains to this, in the nature 102 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS of things, must live forever. Here is " eternal existence and eternal knowl- edge." Natural Law, Eternal Life, p. 215. June 6th To find a new Environment again and cultivate relation with it is to find a new Life. To live is to correspond, and to correspond is to live. So much is true in Science. But it is also true in Religion. And it is of great importance to observe that to Eeligion also the conception of Life is a correspondence. No truth of Christianity has been more ignorantly or wilfully travestied than the doctrine of Immortality. The popular idea, in spite of a hundred protests, is that Eternal Life is to live forever. . . . We are FBOM HENRY DBUMMOND. 103 told that Life Eternal is not to live. This is Life Eternal— ^o know. Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 216. June yth. From time to time the taunt is thrown at Keligion, not unseldom from lips which Science ought to have taught more caution, that the Future Life of Christianity is simply a prolonged ex- istence, an eternal monotony, a blind and indefinite continuance of being. The Bible never could commit itself to any such empty platitude ; nor could Chris- tianity ever offer to the world a hope so colourless. Not that Eternal Life has nothing to do with everlastingness. That is part of the conception. And it 104 BE A UTIFUL THO UGHTS is this aspect of the question that first arrests us in the field of Science. Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 216. June 8th, Science speaks to us indeed of much more than numbers of years. It defines degrees of Life. It explains a widening Environment. It unfolds the relation between a widening Environment and increasing complexity in organisms. And if it has no absolute contribution to the content of Beligion, its analogies are not limited to a point. It yields to Immortality, and this is the most that Science can do in any case, the broad framework for a doctrine. Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 217. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND, 105 June gth. To correspond with the God of Sci- ence, the Eternal Unknowable, would be everlasting existence ; to correspond with ** the true God and Jesus Christ," is Eternal Life. The quality of the Eternal Life alone makes the heaven; mere everlastingness might be no boon. Even the brief span of the temporal life is too long for those who spend its years in sorrow. Natural Law, Eternal Life, p. 220. June loth. To Christianity, "he that hath the Son of God hath Life, and he that hath not the Son hath not Life." This, as we take it, defines the correspondence which is to bridge the grave. This is 106 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS the clue to the nature of the Life that lies at the back of the spiritual organ- ism. And this is the true solution of the mystery of Eternal Life. Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 227. June nth. The relation between the spiritual man and his Environment is, in theo- logical language, a filial relation. With the new Spirit, the filial correspondence, he knows the Father — and this is Life Eternal. Natural Law, Eternal Life, p. 229. June 1 2th. It takes the Divine to know the Di- vine — but in no more mysterious sense than it takes the human to understand FROM HENBY DRUMMOND. 107 the human. The analogy, indeed, for the whole field here has been finely ex- pressed already by Paul : "What man," he asks, " knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him ? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. Now w^e have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God ; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God." — I. Cor. ii. 11, 12. Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 229. June i^th To go outside what we call Nature is not to go outside Environment. Nature, the natural Environment, is only a part of Environment. There is another large 108 BEAUTIFUL THOUOHTS part, which, though some profess to have no correspondence with it, is not on that account unreal, or even unnatural. The mental and moral world is imknown to the plant. But it is real. Natural Law, Eternal Life, p. 232. June 14th. Things are natural or supernatural simply according to where one stands. Man is supernatural to the mineral; God is supernatural to the man. Wlien a mineral is seized upon by the living plant and elevated to the organic king- dom, no trespass against Nature is com- mitted. It merely enters a larger Envi- ronment, which before was supernatural to it, but which now is entirely natural. When the heart of a man, again, is FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 109 seized upon by the quickening Spirit of God, no further violence is done to natu- ' ral law. It is another case of the inor- ganic, so to speak, passing into the or- ganic. Natural Law, Etern&l Life, p. 232. June i^th. Correspondence in any case is the gift of Environment. The natural Environ- ment gives men their natural faculties ; the spiritual affords them their spiritu- al faculties. It is natural for the spir- itual Environment to supply the spiritu- al faculties ; it would be quite unnatural for the natural Environment to do it. The natural law of Bio-genesis forbids it ; the moral fact that the finite cannot comprehend the Infinite is against it; 110 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS the spiritual principle that flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God renders it absurd. Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 233. June J 6th. Organisms are not added to by accre- tion, as in the case of minerals, but by growth. And the spiritual faculties are organized in the spiritual protoplasm of the soul, just as other faculties are or- ganized in the protoplasm of the body. Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 233. June lyth. It ought to be placed in the forefront of all Christian teaching that Christ's mission on earth was to give men Life. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND, 111 " I am come," He said, " that ye might have Life, and that ye might have it more abundantly." And that He meant literal Life, literal spiritual and Eternal Life, is clear from the whole course of His teaching and acting. Natural Lawy Eternal Life, p. 235. June 1 8th. The effort to detect the living Spirit must be at least as idle as the attempt to subject protoplasm to microscopic exam- ination in the hope of discovering Life. We are warned, also, not to expect too much. " Thou canst not tell whence it Cometh or whither it goeth." Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 237. 112 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS June ipth. Many men would be religious if they knew where to begin ; many would be more religious if they were sure where it would end. It is not indifference that keeps some men from God, but igno- rance. " Good Master, what must I do to inherit Eternal Life?" is still the deepest question of the age. Natural Law, Eternal Life, p. 237. June 2oth. The voice of God and the voice of Nature. I cannot be wrong if I listen to them. Sometimes, when uncertain of a voice from its very loudness, we catch the missing syllable in the echo. In God and Nature we have Voice and Echo. When I hear both, I am assured. FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 113 My sense of hearing does not betray me twice. I recognize the Voice in the Echo, the Echo makes me certain of the Voice ; I listen and I know. Natural LaWy Eternal Life, p. 238. June 2 1 St. The soul is a living organism. And for any question as to the soul's Life we must appeal to Life-science. And what does the Life-science teach ? That if I am to inherit Eternal Life, I must culti- vate a correspondence with the Eternal. Natural Law, Eternal Life, p. 239. June 22d. All knowledge lies in Environment. Wlien I want to know about minerals I go to minerals. When I want to know 114 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS about flowers I go to flowers. And they tell me. In their own way they speak to me, each in its own way, and each for itself — not the mineral for the flower, which is impossible, nor the flower for the mineral, which is also impossible. So if I want to know about Man, I go to his part of the Environment. And he tells me about himseK, not as the plant or the mineral, for he is neither, but in his own way. And if I want to know about God, I go to His part of the En- vironment. And He tells me about Himself, not as a Man, for He is not Man, but in His own way. Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 239. June 2^d, Just as naturally as the flower and the mineral and the Man, each in their own FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 115 way, tell me about themselves, He tells me about Himself. He very strangely condescends indeed in making things plain to me, actually assuming for a time the Form of a Man that I at my poor level may better see Him. This is my opportunity to know Him. This incar- nation is God making Himself accessi- ble to human thought — God opening to Man the possibility of correspondence through Jesus Christ. Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 240. June 24th Having opened correspondence with the Eternal Environment, the subse- quent stages are in the line of all other normal development. We have but to continue, to deepen, to extend, and to 116 BEAUTIFUL THOUGHTS enrich the correspondence that has been begun. And we shall soon find to our surprise that this is accompanied by an- other and parallel process. The action is not all upon our side. The Environ- ment also will be found to correspond. Natural Law, Eternal Life, p. 241. June 2^th. Let us look for the influence of Envi- ronment on the spiritual nature of him who has opened correspondence with God. Beaching out his eager and quick- ened faculties to the spiritual world around him, shall he not become spirit- ual? In vital contact with Holiness, shall he not become holy? Breathing now an atmosphere of ineffable Purity, shall he miss becoming pure ? Walking FROM HENRY DRUMMOND. 117 with God from day to day, shall he fail to be taught of God ? Natural Law, Eternal Life, p. 242. June 26th. J^ ^' ^' Growth in grace is sometimes de- scribed as a strange, mystical, and unin- telligible process. It is mystical, but neither strange nor unintelligible. It proceeds according to Natural Law, and the leading factor in sanctification is In- fluence of Environment. Natural Law^ Eternal Life, p. 242. June 2yth. Will the evolutionist who admits the regeneration of the frog under the modi- fying influence of a continued correspon- dence with a new environment, care to V 4 lis BEAVTIFTX THOVBHTS qQetstkin tlie possibOitT of tiie soul ;ms qfoiiiiig ^^neli ;i £»eoUT ais flat of P»T