\ THOUGHTS AND THEORIES OF LIFE AND EDUCATION ISg 23tsf)0p .Spatoms. THOUGHTS AND THEORIES OF LIFE AND EDUCATION. i6mo. $1.00. EDUCATION AND THE HIGHER LIFE. 12010. $1.00. THINGS OF THE MIND, jarno. $1.00. MEANS AND ENDS OF EDUCATION. i2tno. $1.00. SONGS: CHIEFLY FROM THE GERMAN. i6rao, gilt top. $1.25. A. C. McCLURG AND CO. CHICAGO. THOUGHTS AND THEORIES OF LIFE AND EDUCATION BY J. L. SPALDING J3tsl)op of Hope like a star gleams in the breast Of him who labors without rest, In Truth's sweet service and in Love's CHICAGO A. C. McCLURG AND COMPANY 1897 COPYRIGHT BY A. C. MCCLURG AND Co. A.D. 1897 CONTENTS. CHAPTER PAGE I. THOUGHTS AND THEORIES 7 II. THOUGHTS AND THEORIES \45 III. THOUGHTS AND THEORIES ...... 91 IV. THOUGHTS AND THEORIES 132 V. BOOKS 165 VI. THE TEACHER AND THE SCHOOL . . . 209 OF UHIV.T THOUGHTS AND THEORIES OF LIFE AND EDUCATION. CHAPTER I. THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. When the rose is fair it makes the garden fair, When the soul is fair its beauty all may share. IN the course of ages there have been a few in whose company it is possible to think high thoughts in a noble spirit; but there has been and is but one with whom it is possible to lead the life of the soul and feel that it is like the life of God, he is the Master, Christ Jesus, who alone makes us understand and realize that God is our Father, and that our business on earth is to grow into the divine image by right loving and doing. To know God is to transcend the contradictions and dark mysteries of human existence, and to taste the pure joy and peace which children feel when their father is near. 8 LIFE AND EDUCATION. So long as thou canst believe, with all thy heart, in thy heavenly Father, nothing can trouble thy deepest soul; for, since He is, nothing is hard to bear, and all will be well. As there is no stable equilibrium in the life of an individual, there is none in that of a community, a state, or a church. The inexorable command is, Go forward or fall back, grow or decay. Thy life is possible only through communion with God, with nature, and with thy fellowman ; and thou canst educate thyself only by holding thy mind and heart in conscious and sympathetic contact with God, with nature, and with thy fellowmen. Separation is mutilation, isolation is death. To attempt to gain knowledge without the faith and feeling that God lives within His universe, that nature is His vesture and thou thyself a member of the whole human organism, is to take the path which leads to hopeless doubt, to intellec- tual despair. After however much labor and pain, thou shalt at last be forced to cry out with the poet, that it breaks thy heart to know that man can know nothing. But if, with yearning thought and tireless effort, thou reachest forth to all that is divine, and natural, and nobly human, thou shalt surely gain new access of life, new strength of mind and heart, and little by little come to feel that the arms of the Eternal are twined lovingly about thee. The Divine THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 9 Power is manifest in what lives, grows, and ful- fils itself, rather than in what is finished and complete. We cannot comprehend what awakens the purest and profoundest emotions. They who feel God's presence inquire not into the nature of His being, as a child reposing on a mother's breast asks not how or why she is fair. " It is not always necessary," says Goethe, " that truth take definite shape; it may be enough that it hover about us like a spirit and produce har- mony." God is before all, within all, above all, eternal, immanent, transcendent. The deeper and purer one's religion, the higher and richer his moral life ; and as moral worth increases, faith in God is confirmed. Truth and love are the best, though all men should fall away from them; and faith in the love of God is the life of the soul, however few there be who drink from this fountain head. Believe, then, and love ; and so live that they who come near to thee may feel the divine influence. When we think of the vast bulk of the earth ; of the unimaginable force with which it turns on its axis ; of the velocity with which it circles around the sun, fully one-and-a-half million miles a day, and then add to this the forces of the innumerable heavenly bodies, as they 10 LIFE ANf) EDUCATION. revolve in swiftest motion, the power of God from which all this springs so overwhelms us that we seem to cease to be. As man's strength vanishes into nothingness in the presence of the Divine Power, so in the presence of the Divine Wisdom, Goodness, and Love, his knowledge, goodness, and love become as though they were not. Thou alone art, O my God ! and I but exist; do with me as Thou wilt; it is enough for me to have been conscious, for a moment even, of Thy almighty power and goodness. " If in us dwelt not God's own might How could the godlike give delight ? " We live in God ; and since He lives eternally, why shall not we also who are partakers of His life? It is with life as with evil, the mystery lies in its being at all, not in its never ending. As in the presence of some great calamity, which destroys cities and lays waste whole provinces, we bow to the inscrutable will of God, feeling that explanation is hopeless, so let us behave in all the happenings of life, in the small as in the great. He hides in dark clouds of mystery, and his ways are unsearchable ; but He watches over us, and what He does is rightly done. We seek only what we have in a way already found, at the least, as a longing and aspiration ; and if we seek God, it is because we THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. II feel within the inmost heart the need of Him to save us from falling into nothingness. He Himself is in our yearning for Him and in our seeking ; and therefore when we ask, we receive ; when we seek, we find ; when we strive to know Him, He is near ; when we love Him, He is ours. They whose souls this truth has penetrated are not disturbed by doubts and difficulties. They have found their Father and are at peace. Live with thy soul, and find God there, and thou shalt not need to pray for miracles. All things fulfil the law of their being, the flowers bloom and scatter fragrance, the tree bears its fruit, the stars keep their appointed places. Let thy will hold thee too, steadfast and true. What lesser creatures will-less do, do thou willingly. What is far is also near. Ninety million miles away, the sun is still close to us and keeps us alive. So God, who seems infi- nitely remote, is within our inmost being, im- pelling us to thought and love. We know only as we are affected; and our thoughts of God and the Universe are but the expression of their influence on us. That which is not within us is for us as though it were not. To those alone who feel God's presence in the soul as the su- preme reality, do nature and history proclaim His infinite power and goodness. We never comprehend what we adore ; for to comprehend 12 LIFE AND EDUCATION. is to dominate, and we cannot adore that which is subject to us. Hence, God and all the deep realities of life are mysteries which we feel and accept, but cannot understand. Hence, too, we never lay hold of the truths of religion with the firmness and definiteness with which we grasp the truths of science. We know them only so far as we feel them; and, therefore, right disposition and right life are essential to the maintenance of wholesome and vigorous faith. Strive ceaselessly to increase thy power of admiration, enthusiasm, reverence, and awe ; for God is with thee and is in all thou beholdest and knowest ; and if thou be great enough and pure enough, thou shalt feel His presence, and rejoice in Him and His work. He is not an abstraction, but the infinite reality; and the process of abstraction leads from, not to Him. He cannot be deduced from phrases or confined in formulas. If thou wouldst know Him, feel after Him with thy whole being, yearning, hoping, believing, loving, and doing; and He shall become as real for thee as thy very self. The love of God is the only love which is not a chain. Make Thou me, O God ! Mould and fashion me as Thou knowest and wiliest, and not as I think and desire. Virtue is beauty ; in a noble mind Whatever is most fair thou 'It surely find. THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 13 Without God, thou canst do nothing; but in thy struggle for wisdom and virtue, look to thy- self; for, if thou do thy part, His help will not be lacking. If religion is true, the religious gain all ; if it is false, they lose nothing ; for their joys, even here, are higher and purer than any- thing worldlings know. Let there be light within thy mind, and thy life shall become a light-irradiating centre for others. We cannot honor God by making man appear worse than he is, since to serve Him rightly we must make ourselves and others better. We feel our de- pendence, not on nature, for we are conscious of our superiority to matter, but on the Infinite Spirit; arid thus self-consciousness is a confes- sion of God's existence. With me there dwells one greater than I. Whether I think or hope, I am conscious of His presence. He is behind all I see or hear or touch. It is He who makes me know that I live ; it is He who makes me feel that death is apparent only. The creation is not finished. My Father, says the Divine Master, works even until now. Since God is still busy with His task, how shall we be idle? Or is it not a godlike thing to work with the Almighty? The light dawns from within the mind and heart. What has not been seen and felt there, will not body itself forth in right words or deeds. No one can do more than 14 LIFE AND EDUCATION. show thee the way to the highest. Thou must thyself walk therein, if thou wouldst reach the end. Thy misery is within thyself. Become other and higher, and life will be good enough for thee. However great the darkness in thy mind, the world is still full of light, and God is over all. Be not discouraged by thy past, but know that, whatever it has been, the best may still be thine. Seek truth for thyself; for if thou think- est of others, thou art not thinking of truth. The power to know more and more, without end, gives us kinship with the Eternal Wisdom. It is God who fills us with the craving to know yet more what we know, and to love yet more what we love. A pure heart is better than a strong mind ; and honesty, whether or not the best policy, is better than all policy. Think not that God exists to make thee happy. He exists for Himself, and thou canst find happiness only in giving thyself wholly to Him. Thou canst not improve others, unless thou continue to improve thyself. If thy words are to have efficacy, thy life must give it to them. Thy proper business is to make thyself worthy; but thou canst do this only by holding thyself in communion with God, and in helpful harmony with the best in- terests of those with whom thou livest. In this way alone canst thou find peace and content- ment ; for if thou live not with God and for thy THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 15 fellowmen, thy life shall grow to be barren and burdensome to thee. Though thou thyself fail, rejoice that it has been given to another to do nobly ; for if thou art capable of envy, thou art incapable of wisdom. Since truth is the highest, being the centre of goodness and love, truthful- ness is the best. If God has made thee capable of doing any real thing, thou must do it, or in all eternity it will not be done. The highest is for thee, since God wills to give Himself to thee. Thy whole business is to make thyself worthy. Under all our knowledge of things lie the ideas of force, substance, space, and time, which are beyond our comprehension. In the same way above, behind, within the world, as it appears to us, there is an infinite reality, a power which makes the world what it is, and which we can- not comprehend, but which we call truth, good- ness, beauty, absolute life, God, feeling certain that the more nobly we think of this essential Being, the more nearly we approach His un- fathomable nature. The scientific process is not so much a rising from facts to principles, as it is a transformation of the world of the senses into a world of forces and laws. Thought-powers for such are force and law lie at the heart of the universal fact. In the more practical phases of science also, that which most attracts us is not the having and holding and sensual enjoyment 1 6 LIFE AND EDUCATION. of things, but the dominion over them, the ability to turn them to increase the power and quality of our life. The centre of gravity of all thinking and striving lies not in what the world is or may be made, but in what man is and may become. A single human soul outweighs the whole material universe ; for matter has meaning and value only for souls. When the inner life becomes a world for itself, it cannot be shaken by what comes from without. Truth lies not abroad, but in the deeps ; and when the soul is driven back upon itself by the flaming walls of space, it finds its true home, where even that which in the external world it recognizes as apparent only, becomes real as part of its expe- rience. We live, indeed, in time and place ; but the more profound our soul-life becomes, the better do we. understand that it cannot be con- fined in space or supported by ideas that are not eternal Truth, Truth which we can never fully possess, but which is the motive and end of all our striving. The stream of life flows not from the present to the future, but from the present to eternity. The future shall never be ours, shall never be, at all, as the future ; but we may, if we will, live always with what is eternal, with truth and love, with God. He who lives rightly in the present, lives for and in eternity, which is the proper home of the spirit, THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. I/ whose life is at once in the past, the present, and the future. In the midst of transitory and ap- parent things, it is conscious of a world which is real and permanent. Rising above the lapses of time, it sees the nothingness of all that passes away. The minute thou hast lost or misused, eter- nity shall not make good for thee. The primary duty is not to make life pleasant and beautiful, but to make it true and good, by holding it in communion with the Infinite Spirit from whom it springs. If it be true and good, it will be also pleasant and beautiful. Learn to live in the divine world, and thy life will be- come divine. Self-improvement is, at bottom, moral improvement, development of character ; for it is this that makes a man, and without this intellectual and aesthetic culture is a futile thing. It requires time and pains to learn to do what it is most profitable to do. If, therefore, thou wouldst do well any useful thing, spare not labor, nor think a lifetime long. Our action is feeble and ineffectual unless it spring from our innermost being, from the thought and love which make us what we are. Become a living soul and utter thyself, and thy words and deeds shall kindle life in others. Hold thyself aloof from those who think in herds, who estimate all things at the value the crowd puts upon them. 1 8 LIFE AND EDUCATION. To think is to make an inner conquest of the objects of thought. What we know we have overcome. Knowledge, like love, triumphs over all things. Bring forth within thyself higher truth and love, and thou shalt find thyself a new being in a new world. From within, from within, springs life's deep source And backward to its fountain circles its course. Thy whole strength is in God; in Him all thy power of faith, hope, and love. From Him and to Him all thy thinking and striving move. Without Him thou wert nothing ; and with Him all divine things are possible for thee. It is a mistake to assume that it is harder to know the whole than the parts, the invisible than the visible, the eternal than the temporal. We know ourselves and God as wholes; and this is the most immediate knowledge. When we strive to grasp matter, it melts into the in- visible, becomes atoms and ether, a system of forces. Eternity is plain; time and space are the puzzle. It is the radical vice of our present philosophy and education that they teach young souls to doubt that of which they are most certain, thus banishing them from their true home, and leaving them helpless and hopeless in a God-forsaken universe. When we affirm that duty is the supreme law of life, that all ideals are subject to moral ideals, we THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 19 doubtless utter a great truth; but duty, even when it is reverenced, is associated with stern and chilling thoughts; it does not raise and cheer us like the voice of love. The mother watching by the side of her sick child would shrink from the thought that she is doing what duty bids : duty is swallowed in love. The Saviour spoke not of duty, but of love; and millions of hearts respond to his appeal for hundreds who are swayed by the cold and imperative command of duty. Duty is mo- rality, love is religion, transforming morality into righteousness, which is life. Loving is the only true living. God sees all things and is not disturbed. Canst thou not retain com- posure, and work in thy little world with a calm spirit, however much the storms buffet thee and men fret and complain? It is but for a moment. Unimaginable lengths of time pre- cede each man's birth and follow his death. Between these two immensities the longest life shrivels to the point of vanishment. He who in youth labors to improve himself in knowledge and virtue is cheered and upborne by a high and joyful spirit ; and in old age he will look back on a life rich in good deeds and in happy memories. ' T is sweet to think of labors past When now the haven 's gained at last. 20 LIFE AND EDUCATION. Fix thy thought and desire solely upon the best ; then if fame and wealth become thine also, thou shalt know how to enjoy them in innocence and purity. So think and act as to be what thou wouldst have men consider thee. What the youth most yearns for is the surest indication of what the man shall attain. Be thy own best friend, which thou canst be, if thou art a stead- fast friend to truth and virtue. Look upon life as a succession of opportunities for improving thyself and for doing good ; so shall its every moment, whether of pleasure or of pain, of suc- cess or of failure, bring thee profit ; and little by little thou shalt come to know many things and to love much. Thou shalt learn to suffer with fortitude and to enjoy with moderation, to be helpful to thy friends and just to thy foes. Thy sympathies shall widen, thy thoughts grow nearer truth; and thy gratitude to God, the giver of all good, become as much a part of thyself, as the breath which feeds the flame of thy life. Turn resolutely from whatever weakens or discourages. The best strength is strength of mind; the best wealth, a loving heart. Who- ever may have wronged thee, wrong not thyself by complaining. If thou art a lover of virtue rather than of thyself, thou shalt not be tempted to envy the superiority of others. To be with- THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 21 out evil thoughts, says ^Eschylus, is God's best gift. Think not of profit, whether to thy name or thy purse; but live in thy work, glad and thankful that thou art able to do and love it. Better not be spoken of at all than to be praised with lies. The microscope makes marvellous revela- tions ; but if things appeared so to the naked eye, the world would be a place of horrors. So Science teaches profitable truth ; but if the mind were fitted to a purely mechanical scheme of things, life would be unbearable. It is not difficult to know truth, if by constant exercise we keep the mind open and the heart pure, as athletes perform their feats with ease when they keep themselves in proper training. To be rich in love, in wisdom, in knowledge, in well doing, in friends to whom we have brought joy and strength, is to be rich indeed. What hot dis- putes, mingled with anathemas, once raged about the existence of the antipodes ; but when the fact of their existence was made palpable, to accept it was no longer a sin against ortho- doxy. Let us seek truth in the spirit of mild- ness and humility, and learn to possess our souls in peace. We imagine that we need not give heed to the commonplaces; but the best wisdom lies in them, and a real mind will strive to rethink them and to clothe them anew, thus giving them fresh meaning. 22 LIFE AND EDUCATION. That which distinguishes great minds from the common is not so much a difference in ideas as a difference in the way they are held. Ideas take possession of great minds and transform themselves into their substance; while in ordi- nary minds their presence is casual and transi- tory. In men of genius we rarely meet with anything original; but we find in them truths with which we are more or less acquainted, grasped with fresh power and set forth with new meaning and beauty. The Kingdom of God is within. Renounce thyself; love, and be meek and humble of heart, and thou shalt find it, this is the method and secret of Jesus. Culti- vate the power of going out of thyself that thou mayst be able to see and appreciate what is good and fair in others. Thus shalt thou ac- quire an open mind and a large heart, which are better than all the gifts of fortune ; " for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things he possesseth." As infirm health or defects of body, by barring the way to the common pursuits, have impelled some to cultivate their spiritual en- dowments, and thus have been for them the occasions of worth and distinction ; so is there hardly any misfortune or disadvantage which the wise will not convert to opportunities of larger and truer life. The reality within and THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 23 around us is more beautiful and more wonder- ful than all that the fairy tales tell of, than the enchanted regions of which poets have sung; but its divine perfections are hidden from us, because we are heedless, dull, and unawakened, and like mere animals move about in worlds unrealized. It is the business and purpose of religion, as it is of culture, to rouse and thrill us with the consciousness that God and all the divine things to which we aspire, are with us, even here, if we would but look and hearken. Therefore the lovers of perfection are busy striving to teach us that the Kingdom of God is within; and that to hope to win joy and peace by getting money, and surrounding our- selves with the things money buys, is a delusion, is as though we should expect to find home in foreign lands and those we love among strangers; as though we should imagine that possessions are more precious than life, which alone gives them value. To be one of a crowd, in brilliant parlors, where men and women wear fine clothes and say silly nothings; to sit at tables laden with rich meats and wines, for which one has no appetite; to ride in showy equipages merely to see and be seen ; to breathe the foul air of theatres, to look at the poor acting of poor plays, or at vulgar exhibitions of the human body ; to travel 24 LIFE AND EDUCATION. because one is tired of home; to buy books which one does not read, and pictures for which one does not care ; to make great display in which there is little enjoyment; to seek com- pany to escape the dreariness and monotony of one's own thoughts, this is the life of the idle rich, this the boon which money brings. The case of those who are intent on getting money is hardly better than that of those who are busy spending it. They waste their powers in accu- mulating what they cannot enjoy; and, while they heap up gold, their minds are starved, their hearts are withered, and their consciences made callous. They become the victims of their suc- cess, and die great capitalists, but stunted men. To be thought indifferent to what is called civilization is a matter of small moment for one who knows that the good of life lies in the right disposition of mind and heart, and not in the things a man possesses, which, if they are desired and sought after as though they were paramount, are a hindrance. The two laws of which St. Paul speaks the law of the mind and the law of the members is what is meant by the higher and the lower self. Wisdom and peace are found by those who succeed in bringing the inferior and intermittent sell into subjection to the higher and permanent self. In other words, the re- THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 2$ ward of righteousness is life, and the wages of sin is death. The right disposition purity of intention, simplicity of aim, modesty, teachable- ness, and the desire to do right helps us to insight into the highest and holiest truth better than much learning. It is this which sometimes makes plain to the lowly-minded what is hidden from great philosophers. If we could but sweeten our temper, overcome our hardness and pride, and annul our sensuality whatever else is needful would easily be found. They who bring us peace and joy, who calm and invigor- ate our minds, are not merely spiritual benefac- tors ; they impart a sense of physical comfort, and help us to triumph over bodily infirmities. Happiness is a poor word to express our deepest need. The child is happy when it has cakes and toys ; the maid when she can marry her sad lover ; the mother when her baby is fat and fair ; the laborer when his wages are high ; the farmer when his crops are good ; the miser when his pile of gold is growing ; but all this is hardly better than the happiness of animals in the midst of rich and abundant pasture ; and if we take the word in this sense, we may say that only the unhappy know and yearn for the best, for that which makes us human and akin to God. If I lived in a great city, or in a palace, or wore costly habiliments, or drank delicious 26 LIFE AND EDUCATION. wines, I should not love more or know more or be more ; and since the hope of purer love, truer knowledge, and diviner power of life, is what refreshes and upholds me in all my long- ing and striving, why should I desire and seek the things which certainly cannot strengthen, but may weaken and destroy this hope? As they who do not speak the same language cannot understand one another, so neither can they whose thoughts and aims make them inhabit- ants of different worlds. In vain they agree to use the same words, to accept the same for- mulas ; so long as their world is not the same, no real union of mind and heart is possible. Truth and love rejoice together, Bu'. each is sad without the other. They do not know and love who feel that they know and love enough ; and they are not grate- ful who believe they have done enough. Be not led astray by the desires, ambitions, and thoughts which are prevalent among those who hope to find peace and joy in high place, or in much wealth, or in a multitude of friends, or in sensual indulgence ; for they are not to be found in these things, but are the blessings of those whose hearts are pure and loving, and whose minds are luminous with truth. Tranquillity of mind, which if not happiness THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 2J is inseparable from it, belongs only to those who follow the example and the teaching of the Saviour, to the lowly minded, the pure hearted, the peace loving, the truth seeking, and the God trusting. Neither poverty nor wealth, neither obscurity nor fame, neither dulness nor genius, neither love nor its absence, neither knowledge nor ignorance, can secure this inner blessedness for which all yearn, and which only they who become as little children find. The worst enemies of religion are the formalists, they who ban and bar for a phrase or a ceremony, but are careless of truth and love. They are the children of the Scribes and Pharisees whom Christ denounced and who crucified him. Thy private opinion, if honestly and seriously formed, has for thee more vital worth than the public opinion of thy country or of many countries. A little is enough. A single dish is all that is needful, the Saviour said to Martha, busy with preparing a feast: and when we have learned to be content with little, fair Freedom comes with a smile to welcome us to the inner world where Truth leads Liberty by the hand, and the soul tastes delights which the senses can never give. The lover of truth, like a fresh-hearted boy, looks to each new day as to a new life, in which he shall find he knows not what of joy and 28 LIFE AND EDUCATION. beauty. Like lovers and friends who watch for the coming of those they love, he is alert to catch the faintest stirrings of the winged mes- sengers who draw near to bring him high and holy thoughts; and if but a single celestial visitant make glad the day, his mind is filled with light and his heart with thankfulness ; and so for him every day is God's day, given him that he may learn to know and love. Once we have learned the secret of labor, which never wearies and never loses heart, all the mysteries of the success of heroes and saints, of philosophers and poets, are made plain to us. Nothing but ceaseless effort is difficult, and nothing else achieves aught of permanent value. Only the habitually thought- ful are prepared to take advantage of the mo- ments of inspiration which come to all, but which for the most depart unnoticed and un- used. It is the welcome given to these heavenly messengers by saints and by poets that makes them a race apart. The truth which with in- audible flutterings and magnetic thrills circles near me to-day, like a humming-bird among the flowers, may, if unheeded, take flight and nevermore return. For me it emerges for briefest space, from the bosom of the eternal ; but, if I care not for it, it seeks again its ever- lasting home. THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 2Q When I was younger I longed to meet with great minds that I might learn from them the secret of the mysteries which haunt the soul ; but at last I came to understand that nothing but patient watching and solitary study can lead us where divine worlds break upon the view. The lower our sympathy descends, the more human are we, and the more godlike ; for God's mercy is over all His works. What do we know diviner than the love of mothers and of all true lovers, which stoops to the humblest service with a sense of joy and exaltation? They who mount to whatever heights must still dwell in spirit in the lowly vales where life begins, on penalty of losing the best and holiest which life can give. Amid endless variety of circumstance, in cities and in deserts, in palaces and in huts, on sea and on land, in arctic and in tropic regions men live and relish life. They adapt them- selves to all situations, and are brave and hearty everywhere, if only there is inner health and harmony. He who breathes the air of the in- tellect and swims in a current of ideas, is rich enough, though poor. The wide earth is his home, and whatever he knows and cherishes is his property. God who sees the universe sees that all is well, and if we were great enough, life would be good enough ; but we sojourn in 3O LIFE AND EDUCATION. the senses, and the real world is hidden from us though it is close to every mind. Be not overawed or discouraged by the noise made about popular names; nor by the pomp with which men of wealth and official eminence are surrounded. These things are a hindrance to right life, to growth of mind, to integrity of character, to elevation of thought and purity of soul ; and those w r ho are perked in a glitter- ing show seldom have any other distinction than that which is conferred by circumstances; whereas thou, hidden from the world, art left free to live within, with God and with all that the noblest and greatest of thy race have thought and loved. The impulse to utter what is deep- est in us is irresistible ; but when he who builds or writes or speaks or sings or paints, thinks of the praise or the money his work shall bring, he acts in the spirit of a hireling, and the divine mood dies within him. The cause of all our shallowness and insincerity is that our ear is turned to catch the rumor of the world, or the approval of one or several, and is not lowered to the still whisperings of the soul. We cannot know what worth there is in our words and deeds, nor is it important that we should know. It is our business to think and to do with what- ever power God has given us; and while we so act, our life is good and healthful. Of well THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 31 doing as of health we are but feebly conscious ; for, by right action, self is merged in the infi- nite world of truth and goodness. We do not ' know the worth of our words and deeds, nor can we know whether we have yet thought and done the best possible for us ; and it is, therefore, the part of wisdom to continue striving for higher knowledge and virtue, even to the verge of the grave, that we may not only live, but that we die, still hoping and learning. Fear is our great enemy, fear of the world, of wicked men and wicked tongues; fear of unpopularity, of loss in business or in social standing; fear of the disapproval of the ignorant and prejudiced, of liars and fools ; fear of friends and servants, of wives and children ; and so we walk trem- bling, as though we picked our way amid jungles where venomous reptiles and beasts of prey haunt. We have no heart, no courage to be ourselves; to think our thoughts and live our lives, with a noble scorn of whoever would les- sen our liberty, or bid us halt in the way which God has opened for us. The life of dissipation, that of gamblers, drunkards, and libertines, kills the soul ; the life of business, that of merchants, manufacturers, and money-lenders, stifles it ; the life of toil, that of laborers and drudges, holds it in the prison of semi-consciousness ; the life of society, that of 32 LIFE AND EDUCATION. the idle rich, gives it but leave to show itself like a pet or a clown ; the life of the family, that of husbands, wives, and children, clips its wings and reduces it to the condition of a barn-yard fowl. Only in communion with God, with nature, and with great minds, yet here or passed beyond, can the soul prosper and know the in- finite worth of its divine being. When every- where there is pretension and mere seeming, be thankful that thou art permitted to stand aside from the clamorous and blind rushings of the crowd, to dwell with thy own soul, in the pres- ence of what is eternally true and good, that so thou mayst become a real and not an apparent man. Let that prevail which brings the highest good to men, which bears them nearer to infinite truth and love ; and if thy private interests and prejudices stand a hair's breadth in the way, let them be shattered as by the breath of God. We here in America are the most prodigious example of success which history records. In little more than a century we have subdued a continent to the uses of civilized man ; we have built cities, railways, and telegraphs ; we have invented all kinds of machines to do all kinds of work ; we have established a school and a news- paper in every hamlet ; our wealth is incalculable ; our population is counted by tens of millions; and yet in spite of all we are a disappointment THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 33 to ourselves and to the world, because we have failed in the supreme end of human effort, the making man himself a wiser, nobler, diviner being. We have uttered no thoughts which have illumined the nations ; we have not felt the thrill of immortal loves ; we are not buoyed by a faith and hope which are as firm rooted as the rock- ribbed mountains. We have had no prophet, no poet, no philosopher, no saint, no supreme man in any art or science. We have trusted to mat- ter as the most real thing; we have lived on the surface, amid shows, and our souls have not drunk of the deep infinite source of life. Our religion and our education are cherished for the practical ends which they serve; for the sup- port they give to our political institutions, while these institutions themselves are made a kind of fetish. The people have become less disinter- ested, less high-minded, less really intelligent; and among their leaders it is rare to find one who is distinguished either by strength and cul- tivation of mind or by purity and integrity of character. Are we destined to become the most prodigious example of failure as of success, recorded by history? Politics and practical life have indispensable uses, but they are not everything; and those who speak to the soul, who thrill it with nobler thoughts, with higher views of truth and visions 3 34 LIFE AND EDUCATION. of a more celestial beauty, do also necessary work, for without it man would be little more than a shrewder kind of animal ; and in the world by which we are surrounded, the spiritual sense, the sense for things which have no mate- rial uses, needs cultivation far more than the faculty for contriving and getting. Our educa- tion is, as Emerson says, a system of despair. It is a device to help us to gain a livelihood, to prepare the young to become clerks or mer- chants or mechanics or lawyers or preachers, a key which unlocks the world of story-books and newspapers; but in education as a divine force, whereby a nobler race may be formed, we have no faith. We have confidence that our machinery shall be made more and more per- fect, but no hope that it shall be put in the hands of more godlike men and women. We are influenced by climate, by the quality of the soil we till, by the implements we use, by the kind of work we do, and by whatever encom- passes us ; but a good climate will not of itself make good men, nor will good machines. The dwellers in our fine houses are ordinary people, and show no tendency to become equal to the splendor of their habitations. The travellers in our luxurious cars and steamships have vulgar thoughts and aims, and long not for anything higher. THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 35 It seems doubtful whether the environment which civilization has created tends to improve men, however superior the civilized man be to the savage. He reaches a certain point, and then his wealth and machinery become hin- drances to further progress. Shall we never see such men and women as the knights and fair ladies with whom the rich imagination of youth peoples the castles of the centuries that are gone? The kind of man the young so easily imagine and steadfastly believe in must be pos- sible. Shall we not yet redeem the promise which gleams in the stars, laughs in the flowers, leaps in the heart of childhood, and is current with the thoughts and loves of poets and virgins? We crave for wealth and sensual delights, be- cause we have not made ourselves capable of knowledge and love. The truthseeker in his narrow room is happy enough; the youth and maid find a paradise simply in loving each other. They who mock the scholar and the lover are but barbarians who think the good of life is found in display or in the gratification of appetite. The bliss of poets, the rapture of saints, the tranquil mind of the wise, the sweet heart of virgins and mothers, are beyond their imagining. They own not the stars and the clouds, but only the things they touch or taste or wear or flaunt before the envious eyes 36 LIFE AND EDUCATION. of the vulgar. How shall they understand that only what we know and love and can do, is ours ; that genuine titles of ownership are written on the mind and heart, and not on parchment and paper? The misfortunes which throw us back upon ourselves, upon the inner source of life, thereby driving us nearer to God, are blessings, however unwelcome or rudely given. The friend who has forsaken me was a distraction, the money which I have lost a hindrance. The disagree- able surroundings in which I find myself compel me to live in a higher sphere, as lack of recogni- tion from the world reminds me that approval is wisely sought only in one's own mind and conscience. Make thy heart pure and listen to the voice within, and thou shalt not need to ask for proof of God's existence. He is with thee, and the the- ories and disputations of the learned cannot ban- ish Him. The earth is not an immovable centre, as was believed of old ; and yet the sun and the stars keep their places and nothing is changed, and so God abides, however the thoughts of men widen and diverge. He is with thee, the God of thy fathers, thy own Father ; not an All-nothing, not a stream without whence or whither, rising and ending nowhere; but the Infinite Power who makes thee, who makes thee capable of THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 37 faith and hope, of truth and love, and saves thee from the abyss of despair and death. To live habitually in the company of great thoughts and under the impulse of generous emotions is as near the blessed life as one may hope to approach on earth, while petty thoughts and selfish desires attend the weak and miserable. They drive them to envy, hate, and sensuality; for, so long as they are possessed by such thoughts and desires, they are displeasing to themselves, and seek self-forgetfulness in dwell- ing on the sins and misfortunes of others, or in yielding to their animal nature, or they dwindle and harden until they become mere getters or hoarders of money. That we may escape such a fate let us refresh ourselves day by day with rethinking some vital truth, with reviving some noble sentiment, that these heavenly powers may guard us at our work and keep us worthily active and beneficent. If we have not the ability to do this unassisted, let us have recourse to a genuine book, choosing what will suit our purpose from the Gospels or the Imitation, or from the life of a saint or a sage, or from the pages of an inspired poet. No formality is necessary and little time is required ; and if we persevere we shall find ourselves rising to higher and serener worlds, where pettiness and baseness fall away, and God's presence is revealed. Merely to know 38 LIFE AND EDUCATION. that God is, fills me with such joy and confidence that the ills of life seem vain and transitory. The conviction that all which I most desire and admire has its source in the Eternal, who makes truth and love the most real things, gives me such contentment, that my ignorance and doubts, my weakness and faults, cease to disturb my peace of soul. Whatever confusion may arise in the world around me, whatever direction the course of events may take, I rest in the thought that, above and within all, there is a living Power who guides the whole to ends diviner than I can conceive. This is enough ; I throw all my little weight of care on Him ; a sense of security takes possession of me, and I am as unafraid as a child rocked by a mother's hand. I look away from sorrow and death, and all the agonies of bruised hearts and despairing souls, to where, behind the veil of sense, God lives and loves forever ; and I feel that with Him are things unknown to mortal minds, full of divine meaning and benevolence, into which the miseries of man enter, and are transformed into peace and joy, falling into the tranquil bosom of the Eternal, like tears of repentant children on the white and tender breasts of mothers. When I see flowers bending their fair heads in the pleasant air, they seem to me to be souls, who in adoring God blossom into beauty and fra- THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 39 grance. We live on the fat earth which breaks into myriad forms of life, and we feel that it is good to be here. We call it our mother, our country, our home; but it hardly occurs to us that, if the sun's heat were withdrawn but for a day, it would become a frozen rock, rolling life- less through endless space. So we live in our thoughts and loves. The soul takes wings and flies to the uttermost bounds of space. It dis- ports in infinitude ; hope bears it on forever and forever, and love crowns it with joy and gladness. But we forget that, if God withdrew from us but an instant, we should vanish utterly in the inane. The sun is millions of miles away, and yet as close as the throbbings of our hearts ; and God seems infinitely remote, but He is in truth the life of our life, and the light of all our ways. If God's being were plain, faith in Him would not be a primary virtue. If science could make all things intelligible, knowledge would swallow faith here, as St. Paul declares it shall hereafter. But the more we learn, the deeper the mystery grows. Why is knowledge difficult and faith easy? Because faith has the mightier power to impel to action, without which growth is impossible. They who are persuaded that their faith is true, are driven to implant it in the hearts of their children ; for they feel that upon the very young alone can 4O LIFE AND EDUCATION. the most lasting impressions be made; that what in this tender period is brought home to us as sacred, we shall hardly ever come to look on as profane. The whole world is suffused with the light of those early moods; and reli- gion, rightly learned in childhood, is as fair and full of promise as the dawn, as mellow and sooth- ing as the twilights that gathered about us, while a mother's kisses fell upon our cheeks. Who can doubt that God reveals Himself in the thoughts of the wise and the deeds of the good? A noble mind manifests His wisdom and power in a higher way than the orbs which sparkle in the limitless expanse. Agnosticism which teaches that man can know nothing of the most profoundly interesting subjects, would thereby turn the mind from speculations, which, to take merely this view, have not only the subtlest charm, but the highest educational value. It is by struggling with the unknown, with what, it may be, we cannot know, that we grow in intel- lectual vigor and suppleness. It is the wrest- ling of Israel with God, till He bless him. The arguments for the being of God, as distinct from the physical universe, may be logically incon- clusive; but the fact remains that the mind is irresistibly driven to look on life, in a godless and soulless world, as a mockery or a curse. We may bear it bravely, may take what it has THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 41 to offer with a kind of satisfaction ; but we clearly perceive all the while, that, if the Eternal is but an idea, life is an affair of hucksters, in which the profits and pleasures fall below the expenses and pains ; a business whose only pos- sible issue is bankruptcy. If thou believest in God's love, thou shalt be slow to believe that any one is excluded from His boundless sympathy. If not from His, then not from thine, if thou art His servant. "When it is asked," says St. Augustine, "whether one be a good man, there is not question of what he believes or hopes, but of what he loves. For he who loves rightly, rightly believes and rightly hopes ; but he who loves not, believes in vain, hopes in vain." Again : " Little love is little righteousness ; great love is great righteousness; perfect love is perfect righteousness." If I should be willing to travel around the earth to talk with a man of original insight, I should more gladly make the journey to open my heart to one who, in spirit even, had leaned upon the bosom of Christ and known and felt the infinite love of God. A music-box plays the works of the great composers, but it is, after all, only music-box music. So any self- sufficient man may re-utter the words of Christ ; but spoken by such an one they cease to be words of light and life. It is not enough that 42 LIFE AND EDUCATION. the sun is the centre of intensest heat; if it is to make a habitable world, it must have a proper medium for the diffusion of its energy. The soul never loses what has been once clearly per- ceived or deeply felt. In whatever recesses it may lie hidden, it remains for good or evil part of its life, and will, under proper provocation, again emerge in consciousness. " One accent of the Holy Ghost The heedless world has never lost." Teach me, O God ! to be happy in all the good which thou givest to my fellowmen, in all their joy and striving for better things, in all their sympathy and love, in all their courage and endurance of what is hard to bear. Credulity is not faith, superstition is not reverence, intolerance is not love of truth, fanaticism is not zeal, and ceremony is not the worship of God in spirit and in truth; but all these things are so blended and commingled in the mind and heart of man that their separation is difficult. Hence the incredulous find faith hard, they who have no superstition easily fail in reverence, they who are without intolerance become indifferent, they who have no piety fall victims to callousness, and they who have no fixed form of worship scarcely worship at all. The best, however, keep careful watch over THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 43 themselves, lest they confuse means with ends, or be blinded by the apparent to the infinite hidden reality, or permit unworthy passions to obscure the presence of God in the soul. They throw the whole weight of their lives on Him, and strive day by day to draw nearer to Him through obedience, service, and love ; seeing Him in all things, and feeling after Him with all the powers of their being. It is easy to follow a ritual, as it is easy to show that ritualism is insufficient. The beautiful is not the holy, and art is not religion. A pure soul is dearer to God than the splendors of the heavens, than whatever fairest things the hand of man has wrought. But, nevertheless, love will clothe itself with beauty, will find symbols for its worship, in the sun and the stars, and the flowers, and the many tinted shades of light; it will utter itself in melodious sounds and in whatever else speaks of its gladness and exulta- tion, its faith and reverence, its hope and yearn- ing. It will build for itself a tabernacle wherein it may minister with joyful service ; and the vesture wherewith it clothes itself shields the flame which is its life. Hence the most genuine and spiritual religion is not found in those who feel no need of a form of worship, but in those who, like the Psalmist, call upon heaven and earth, the mountains and the rivers, the birds 44 LIFE AND EDUCATION. and the beasts and their fellowmen, to join with them to help them show their love and longing for God. Religion is love ; and love is humble, reverent, devout, and serviceable. When it does much, it thinks it little ; when it gives all, it deems it naught. But i{ the heart is dead, if the soul has fled, the ceremony is but mockery, the temple but a tomb; and, in prescribed observances, there is always a danger lest they become formal and mechanical, lest we rest in them ; forgetting that, if they are not the ex- pression of living faith and love, they are but superstitious rites. Whether our suggestions come from the contemplation of nature or of the world, from the study of history or the conver- sations of men, from our own experience or the dreams of poets, they will be of many and often conflicting kinds ; and it is for us to choose which we shall cherish and which we shall reject. But, if we are wise, we shall receive and hold those alone which make for strong, brave, and joyful life ; for, since life is the best, the supreme truth in God Himself, whatever enriches and purifies life is good ; while what weakens and degrades it is false and hurtful. CHAPTER II. THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. In life's fair garden still there are So many plots which fallow lie, So many flowers which soon will die Unless true workers death's steps bar. And each of us may also find In his own heart so many a spot Where truth and love are cherished not, To blank indifference resigned. EDUCATION is mightier than man; in other words, evolution, directed by con- scious will, is capable of doing more than any man is capable of becoming. Believe, then, in education ; and let thy faith give thee con- fidence in thyself when thou strivest to upbuild thy being. The young ask with impatience how long it will take to finish their education ; the wise are happy in the knowledge that while life lasts theirs cannot end. Faith in what we do can alone guide us to perfect work. Who shall forbid a man to help his fellowman? Who, then, shall forbid him to teach, to educate? To communicate facts is easy ; but the educator's business is to create dispositions, and this is 46 LIFE AND EDUCATION. difficult. His aim is not to make learning easy, but to accustom the pupil to labor, since nothing but a man's own industry can develop his facul- ties or give him strength and grasp of mind ; and this, and not mere knowing, is the end of education. The teacher's main purpose is to form habits of industry, which will assert them- selves, not in the school alone, but in the home as well ; for unless the young are trained to study at home, they will soon cease to study at all; and this means degeneracy or ruin. The teacher who knows his business, and is at the same time industrious and morally blameless, can accomplish incredible things if he give him- self wholly to his task. Like all true workers he does the best he can, for love of the work ; as a mother devotes herself, looking for no other reward than the character her life and counsels shall form in her child. Faith in love, in its worth as the great humanizing power, makes the mother the highest earthly source of educa- tion ; and it is the characteristic of all genuine teachers. " Love," says Pestalozzi, " is the only, the eternal foundation of the training of our race to humanity." " Love," says Goethe, "does not rule, but it educates, and this is more." The educator is an enthusiast, not noisy or shallow, but deep and self-impelled. His ideal is that of human perfection. He is in love with noble THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 47 men and women, and he feels that it Is a joy to be alive when one is permitted to labor to bring forth the divine image in himself and in others. To think of education as a means of preserv- ing institutions, however excellent, is to form a wrong conception of its purpose, which is to mould and fashion men, who are more than institutions, who create, outgrow, and recreate institutions. Education concerns every one, not for the reason chiefly that it is a matter of vital general interest, having an immediate bearing on the welfare and progress of every people and of the whole race ; but because each one, if he is to become a true man, must make his own education his life work, to which whatever he undertakes or does or suffers, must be auxiliary. It is, therefore, a subject not for philosophers and schoolmasters, for parents and citizens alone, but for whoever cherishes his human nature, or aspires to perfection, which is attain- able only through the development of the facul- ties wherewith God has endowed him. Every man, therefore, should be an educator, an educator of himself; and how shall he hope to perform this task wisely, if he remain ignorant of what education means and requires. The matter, indeed, seems to be simple, but is deep as heaven, as wide as the world, and as 48 LIFE AND EDUCATION. complex as life. It is the art of right living, the science of whatever influences man. The knowledge which we acquire from a desire for knowledge, enters into our mental life and be- comes an enduring part of ourselves; while what we learn from vanity or emulation, or as a means to a livelihood, does not form character or remain as a permanent gain. Education is a process of life-development. Life is developed by nutrition and exercise. The teacher's busi- ness, therefore, is to rouse in the pupil a desire for spiritual nourishment and to supply him with it in a way which will impel him to self- activity. What does a wise teacher strive to develop in his scholars? Ability, the power to grapple with whatever questions and difficulties, to face whatever temptations and sufferings, and to overcome them by doing and bearing; or, shall I say, that it is his aim to give insight into the meaning and worth of life, and to form the faculties whereby man asserts himself as an in- telligent, moral, and religious being. Learning about things is of small importance; while to learn to use the senses, and to turn the mind on things, is all-important The young, to be deeply roused, require spiritual ideals ; and they are fortunate when, in the light of these ideals, they are led to understand what is prac- THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 49 tical, that their enthusiasm for the good and the great may be sustained by delight in their work. There are few words more abused than " en- thusiasm, " which, when rightly understood, is one of the best we have. As the Greeks used it, it meant the state of one who is possessed and inspired by a god. It implied, therefore, the gathering of all the powers of the soul into a higher unity, and the turning them, with intenser energy, whether to contemplation or to action. In this sense it is the symbol of a mental or moral condition, which is indispensable to the achievement of aught that is excellent. It alone supplies the impulse which steadies the view, fixes the thought, and leads to life-long labor for the accomplishment of a worthy pur- pose. It does not manifest itself in ebullitions of sentiment or rhetoric ; it is a deep glowing fire rather than a flame ; it utters itself in deeds more than in words. It makes one capable of infinite patience and endurance, and holds him true in the face of whatever difficulties, stead- fast, though a world cry out against him. It is what Christ sought in his disciples; and what, above all else, he demanded of them as the natural and necessary result of a living hope, faith, and love. To understand a word we should know its history; be able to trace it 4 5