Chapter 10

They drift away--Ah, God! they drift for ever. . . . . . . I watch them drift--the old familiar faces, Till ghosts, not men, fill old beloved places. . . . . . . Shores, landmarks, beacons drift alike. Yet overhead the boundless arch of heaven Still fades to night, still blazes into day. Ah, God! My God! _Thou_ wilt not drift away!

_A Fragment_. 1867.

Our Father. December 3.

Take your sorrows not to man, but to your Father in heaven. If that name, Father, mean anything, it must mean that He will not turn away from His wandering child in a way in which you would be ashamed to turn away from yours. If there be pity, lasting affection, patience in _man_, they must have come from Him. They, above all things, must be His likeness. Believe that God possesses them a million times more fully than any human being.

_Letters and Memories_.

Circumstance. December 4.

Our wanton accidents take root, and grow To vaunt themselves God's laws, until our clothes, Our gems, and gaudy books, and cushioned litters Become ourselves, and we would fain forget There live who need them not.

_Saint's Tragedy_, Act ii. Scene v. 1847.

Duty. December 5.

When a man has once said _honestly_ to himself, "It is my duty;" when that glorious heavenly thought has risen upon his soul, like the sun upon the earth, warming his heart and enlightening it, and making it bring forth all good and noble fruits, then that man will feel a strength come to him and a courage come from God which will conquer all his fears, his selfish love of ease and pleasure, and enable him to bear pain and poverty and death itself, provided he can do what is right, and be found by God working His will where He has put him.

_Sermons_.

Humanity and the Bible. December 6.

He who has an intense perception of humanity must know that Christianity is divine, because it is the only religion which has a perfect perception of human relations, wants, and feelings. None but He who made the heart could have written the Bible.

_MS. Note-book_. 1843.

Music. December 7.

There is music in heaven, because in music there is no self-will. Music goes on certain laws and rules. Man did not make those laws of music, he has only found them out, and if he be self-willed and break them, there is an end of his music instantly; all he brings out is discord and ugly sounds.

Music is fit for heaven. Music is a pattern and type of heaven, and of the everlasting life of God which perfect spirits live in heaven; a life of melody and order in themselves; a life of harmony with each other and with God.

_Good News of God Sermons_. 1859.

Waiting. December 8.

Ay--stay awhile in peace. The storms are still. Beneath her eider robe the patient earth Watches in silence for the sun: we'll sit And gaze up with her at the changeless heaven, Until this tyranny be overpast.

_Saint's Tragedy_, Act iii. Scene iii. 1847.

True or False Toleration? December 9.

"One thing at least I have learnt," he said, "in all my experiments on poor humanity--never to see a man do a wrong thing without feeling I could do the same in his place. I used to pride myself on that once, fool that I was, and call it comprehensiveness. I used to make it an excuse for sitting by and seeing the devil have it all his own way, and call that toleration. I will see now whether I cannot turn the said knowledge to a better account, as common sense, patience, and charity, and yet do work of which neither I nor my country need be ashamed."

_Two Years Ago_, chap. xxiii. 1856.

Success and Defeat. December 10.

In many things success at first is dangerous, and _defeat_ an excellent medicine for testing people's honesty--for setting them honestly to work to see what they want, and what are the best modes of attaining it. Our sound thrashing, as a nation, in the first French war was the making of our armies; and it is good for an idea, as well as for a man, to bear the yoke in his youth.

_Lectures on Ancien Regime_. 1867.

Passing Emotions. December 11.

Beware of depending on your own _emotions_, which are often but the fallings and risings of the frail flesh, and mistaking them for spiritual feelings and affections!

* * * * *

Think less of what you _feel_--even of trying _to be_ anything. Look out of yourself at God. Pray and praise, and God will give you His Spirit often when you feel most dull.

_MS. Letter_. 1842.

Christ's Church. December 12.

. . . What a thought it is that there is a God! a Father, a King! a Husband not of individuals, that is a Popish fancy, which the Puritans have adopted--but of the Church--of collective humanity. Let us be content to be members; let us be, if we may, the feet, lowest, hardest worked, trodden on, bleeding, brought into harshest contact with the evil world! Still we are members of Christ's Church! . . .

_Letters and Memories_. 1843.

Confound me not. December 13.

Have charity, have patience, have mercy. Never bring a human being, however silly, ignorant, or weak, above all, any little child, to shame and confusion of face. Never by petulance, by suspicion, by ridicule, even by selfish and silly haste, never, above all, by indulging in the devilish pleasure of a sneer, crush what is finest, and rouse up what is coarsest in the heart of any fellow-creature.

_Westminster Sermons_. 1872.

The Divine Hunger and Thirst. December 14.

God grant us to be among "those who really hunger and thirst after righteousness," and who therefore long to know what righteousness is, that they may copy it--those who long to be freed not merely from the punishment of sin after they die, but from sin itself while they live on earth, and who therefore wish to know what sin is that they may avoid it.

_Preface to Tauler's Sermons_. 1854.

Religion or Godliness? December 15.

This is the especial curse of our day, that religion does not mean, as it used, the service of God--the being like God and showing forth God's glory. No, religion means nowadays the art of getting to heaven when we die, and saving our own miserable souls, and getting God's wages without doing God's work--as if that was godliness, as if that was anything but selfishness, as if selfishness was any the better for being everlasting selfishness!

_Village Sermons_. 1849.

Christ's Coming. December 16.

Christ may come to us when we are fierce and prejudiced, with that still small voice--so sweet and yet so keen, "Understand those who misunderstand thee. Be fair to those who are unfair to thee. Be just and merciful to those whom thou wouldst like to hate. Forgive and thou shalt be forgiven." He comes to us surely, when we are selfish and luxurious, in every sufferer who needs our help, and says, "If you do good to one of these, my brethren, you do it unto Me."

_Last Sermon_. _MS._ 1874.

God's Nature. December 17.

When will men open their eyes to the plain axiom that nothing is impossible with God, save that He should transgress His own nature by being unjust and unloving?

_Preface to Tauler_. 1854.

Educators of Men. December 18.

There are those who consider--and I agree with them--that the education of boys under the age of twelve years ought to be entrusted, as much as possible, to women. Let me ask--of what period of youth and manhood does it not hold true? I pity the ignorance and conceit of the man who fancies that he has nothing left to learn from cultivated women. I should have thought that the very mission of woman was to be, in the highest sense, the educator of man, from infancy to old age; that that was the work towards which all the God-given capacities of women pointed.

_Lecture on Thrift_. 1869.

The Earthly Body. December 19.

Let us remember that if the body does feel a burden now (as it must at moments), what a happiness it is to have a body at all: how lonely, cold, barren, would it be to be a "disembodied spirit." As St. Paul says, "Not that we desire to be unclothed, but to be clothed upon"--to have a spiritual, deathless, griefless life instilled into the body.

_MS. Letter_. 1842.

Home at Last. December 20.

When all the world is old, lad, And all the trees are brown, And all the sport is stale, lad, And all the wheels run down; Creep home and take your place there, The spent and maimed among: God grant you find one face there You loved when all was young.

_The Water Babies_. 1862.

The Bible. December 21.

The hearts and minds of the sick, the poor, the sorrowing, the truly human, all demand a living God who has revealed Himself in living acts; a God who has taught mankind by facts, not left them to discover Him by theories and sentiments; a Judge, a Father, a Saviour, an Inspirer; in a word, their hearts demand the historic truth of the Bible--of the Old Testament no less than the New.

_Sermons on Pentateuch_. 1863.

Shaking of Heaven and Earth. December 22.

"Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but heaven" (Hebrews xii. 26- 29). This is one of the royal texts of Scripture. It declares one of those great laws of the kingdom of God which may fulfil itself once and again at many eras and by many methods; which fulfilled itself most gloriously in the first century after Christ; again in the fifth century; again at the time of the Crusades; and again at the great Reformation in the sixteenth century,--and is fulfilling itself again at this very day.

_Westminster Sermons_. 1872.

Self-Respect the Voice of God. December 23.

Never hurt any one's self-respect. Never trample on any soul, though it may be lying in the veriest mire; for that last spark of self-respect is as its only hope, its only chance; the last seed of a new and better life; the voice of God which still whispers to it, "You are not what you ought to be, and you are not what you can be. You are still God's child, still an immortal soul. You may rise yet, and fight a good fight yet, and conquer yet, and be a man yet, after the likeness of God who made you, and Christ who died for you." Oh! why crush that voice in any heart? If you do the poor creature is lost, and lies where he or she falls, and never tries to rise again.

_Good News of God Sermons_. 1859.

Christmas Eve. December 24.

We will have no sad forebodings on the eve of the blessed Christmas-tide. He lives, He loves, He reigns; and all is well; for we are His and He is ours.

_Two Years Ago_, Introduction. 1856.

The Miracle of Christmas Night. December 25.

After the crowning miracle of this most blessed night all miracles are possible. The miracle of Christmas night was possible because God's love was absolute, infinite, unconquerable, able to condescend to anything that good might be done. . . . This Christmas night is the one of all the year which sets a physicist on facing the fact of miracle, and which delivers him from the bonds of sense and custom by reminding him of God made Man.

_Letters and Memories_. 1858.

Redemption. December 26.

All things are blessed now, but sin; for all things, excepting sin, are redeemed by the life and death of the Son of God. Blessed are wisdom and courage, joy and health and beauty, love and marriage, childhood and manhood, corn and wine, fruit and flowers, for Christ redeemed them by His life. . . . Blessed is death, and blest the unknown realms where souls await the Resurrection Day, for Christ redeemed them by His death. Blessed are all days, dark as well as bright, for all are His, and He is ours; and all are ours, and we are His for ever.

_National Sermons_. 1848.

Fellow-workers with Christ. December 27.

To abolish the superstition, the misrule, the vice, the misery of this world. That is what Christ will do in the day when He has put all enemies under His feet. That is what Christ has been doing, step by step, ever since that day when first He came to do His Father's will on earth in great humility. Therefore, that is what we must do, each in our place and station, if we be indeed His subjects, fellow-workers with Him in the improvement of the human race, fellow-soldiers with Him in the battle against evil.

_All Saints' Day Sermons_. 1867.

The bright Pathway. December 28.

There is a healthy ferment of mind in which one struggles through chaos and darkness, by means of a few clues and threads of light--and--of one great bright pathway, which I find more and more to be _the_ only escape from infinite confusion and aberration, _the_ only explanation of a thousand human mysteries--I mean the Incarnation of our Lord--the fact that there really is--a God-Man!

_MS. Letter_. 1844.

New Worship. December 29.

Blessed, thrice blessed, is it to find that hero-worship is not yet passed away! that the heart of man still beats young and fresh; that the old tales of David and Jonathan, Damon and Pythias, Socrates and Alcibiades, Shakespeare and his nameless friend, of love "passing the love of woman," ennobled by its own humility, deeper than death and mightier than the grave, can still blossom out, if it be but in one heart here and there, to show man still how, sooner or later, "he that loveth knoweth God, for God is love."

_Miscellanies_. 1850.

Links in the Chain. December 30.

The heart will cry out at times, Oh! blissful future! Oh, dreary present! But let us not repine. What is dreary need not be barren. Nothing need be barren to those who view all things in their real light, as links in the great chain of progression both for themselves and for the Universe. To us all Time should seem so full of life: every moment the grave and the father of unnumbered events and designs in heaven and earth, and the mind of our God Himself--all things moving smoothly and surely in spite of apparent checks and disappointments towards the appointed end.

_Letters and Memories_. 1844.

Past, Present, Future. December 31.

Surely as the years pass on they ought to have made us better, more useful, more worthy. We may have been disappointed in our lofty ideas of what ought to be done, but we may have gained more clear and practical notions of what can be done. We may have lost in enthusiasm, and yet gained in earnestness. We may have lost in sensibility, yet gained in charity, activity, and power. We may be able to do far less, and yet what we do may be far better done. And our very griefs and disappointments--have they been useless to us? Surely not. We shall have gained instead of lost by them if the Spirit of God has been working in us. Our sorrows will have wrought in us patience, our patience experience, and that experience hope--hope that He who has led us thus far will lead us farther still, that He who has taught us in former days precious lessons--not only by sore temptations but most sacred joys--will teach us in the days to come fresh lessons by temptations, which we shall be more able to endure; and by joys which, though unlike those of old times, are no less sacred, but sent as lessons to our souls by Him from whom all good gifts come.

_Water of Life Sermons_.

Out of God's boundless bosom, the fount of life, we came; through selfish, stormy youth, and contrite tears--just not too late; through manhood, not altogether useless; through slow and chill old age, we return whence we came, to the bosom of God once more--to go forth again, it may be, with fresh knowledge and fresh powers, to nobler work. Amen.

_The Air Mothers_. 1869.

SAINTS' DAYS, FASTS, & FESTIVALS.

DECEMBER 21. St. Thomas, Apostle and Martyr.

The spirits of just men made perfect, freed from the fetters of the gross animal body, and now somewhere in that boundless universe in which this earth is but a tiny speck, doing God's will as they longed to do it on earth, with clearer light, fuller faith, deeper love, mightier powers of usefulness! Ah, that we were like unto them!

_All Saints' Day and other Sermons_.

DECEMBER 25. Christmas Day.

Thank God, that One was born, at this same time, Who did our work for us: we'll talk of Him: We shall go mad with thinking of ourselves-- We'll talk of Him, and of that new-made star, Which, as He stooped into the Virgin's side, From off His finger, like a signet-gem, He dropped in the empyrean for a sign. But the first tear He shed at this His birth-hour, When He crept weeping forth to see our woe, Fled up to Heaven in mist, and hid for ever Our sins, our works, and that same new-made star.

_Saint's Tragedy_, Act iv. Scene iv.

DECEMBER 26. St. Stephen, the Martyr.

These are the holy ones--the heroes of mankind, the elect, the aristocracy of grace. They are those who carry the palm branch of triumph, who have come out of great tribulation, who have dared and fought and suffered for God and truth and right; who have resisted unto blood, striving against sin. What should easy-going folk like you and me do but place ourselves with all humility, if but for an hour, where we can look afar off upon our betters, and see what they are like and what they do.

_All Saints' Day and other Sermons_.

DECEMBER 27. St. John, Apostle and Evangelist.

And what do they do, these blessed beings? They longed for, toiled for, it may be died for, the true, the beautiful, and the good; they entered while on earth into the mystery and glory of self-sacrifice, and now they find their bliss in gazing on the one perfect and eternal sacrifice, and rejoicing in the thought that it is the cause and ground of the whole universe, even the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world.

_All Saints' Day and other Sermons_.

DECEMBER 28 Holy Innocents' Day.

Christ comes to us in many ways. But most surely does Christ come to us, and often most happily, and most clearly does He speak to us--in the face of a little child, fresh out of heaven. Ah, let us take heed that we despise not one of these little ones, lest we despise our Lord Himself. For as often as we enter into communion with little children, so often does Christ come to us. So often, as in Judaea of old, does He take a little child and set him in the midst of us, that from its simplicity, docility, and trust--the restless, the mutinous, and the ambitious may learn the things which belong to their peace--so often does He say to us, "Except ye be changed and become as this little child, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me. For I am meek and lowly of heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls."

_MS. Last Sermon_, _Westminster Abbey_, _Nov._ 30, 1874.

INDEX.

ABSENCE, 209

Acorn, 223

Action, 146, 167

Affections, 79, 179, 217, 279

Age, old, 63, 285

--reverence for, 81

Anarchy, 165

Angels, 175, 217, 218, 219, 269

Anger, God's loving, 195

Animals, dumb, 81, 181

Antinomies, 159

Anxiety, 211

Aristocracy, ideal, 167

Art, 31, 71, 119, 141, 151

Ascension, 93, 123, 211

Asceticism, 185, 189, 233, 263

Ascetic painters, 39

Atonement, the, 83

Attitude, language of, 155

Augustine, St., 155

Autumn, 51, 221

BARBARISM, 109

Beatific Vision, 73, 196, 295

Beauty, 15, 39, 73, 101, 175, 196, 213

--moral, 196, 213

--spiritual, 159

Bible, the, 103, 141, 167, 249, 259, 275, 285

Birds, 53, 77, 99, 101, 103, 125, 127, 137, 271

Blessedness, 218, 245

Body, sacredness of, 63, 67, 185, 229, 244, 285

--the spiritual, 159

Books, 57, 85, 169, 259

Book-learning, 151

Butler's Analogy, 237

CALMNESS, 55, 263

Character, 98, 175, 191

Charity, 37, 281

Cheerfulness, 149, 223, 227

Childhood and wonder, 179

Childlikeness, 31, 183, 187, 235

Children, 48, 109, 295

Chivalry, 139, 153, 179, 181

Christ-child, the, 48

Christ's life, 45, 97, 267

--Church, 121

--compassion, 251

--descent into hell, 98

--resurrection, 95, 98, 211

--the Word, 37, 127

Christianity, Divine, 273

Christmas, 271, 287, 289, 294

Chrysalis state, 171

Church, the, 75, 77, 121, 157

--Catechism, 47, 255

Civilisation, 105, 155, 261

Clergy, the, 215

Coming of Christ, 21, 23, 183, 283, 295

Communion of saints, 141, 193

--Holy, 193

Contemplation, 87, 146

Content, 59

Courage, 275

Cowardice, 207, 265

Creeds, the, 141, 151, 215, 273

Critical spirit, 165, 203

Cross, the, 83, 96, 97, 122, 185, 189, 237, 245

Crucifix, the, 123, 189

Custom, 31

Cynicism, 191

DARK days, 19, 201, 211, 233, 249, 289

Day of the Lord, 3, 195

Dead, the blessed, 21, 49, 95, 139, 193, 249, 253, 289

--prayers for, 24, 81

--work of, 95, 139, 249

Death, 17, 113, 135, 253

--sudden, 89

--and hell, 7, 195

Defeat, 279

Dignity, 137

Discontent, Divine, 165

Disease, 233, 244

Distrust, 165

Doctrines, 157

Doubt, poetry of, 233

Drifting away, 273

Duty, 5, 13, 65, 105, 129, 147, 165, 181, 201, 275

Dying, to live, 13, 55, 93, 97, 117, 217, 295

EARNESTNESS, 35, 139, 293

Earth, God's, 101, 149, 153, 247

Earthly and heavenly, 179

Easter, 93, 98

Eclecticism, 65

Education, 67

--of character, 85

--Divine, 91, 133, 135, 149, 209

--self, 215

--of boys, 283

--after death, 171, 249

Emotions, 5, 49, 79, 85, 179, 189, 203, 259, 279

Enthusiasm, 35

Epiphany, 24

Eternal life, 11, 43

Eternity, 43, 69, 167

Eucharist, the, 21, 65, 185

Excitement, 79, 163

FACTS of life, 103, 113, 207, 285

Failure, 143

Faith, 11, 59, 85, 127, 163, 191, 199, 227, 229

Fasting, 49

Fatherhood of God, 103, 107, 115, 133, 135, 149, 181, 223, 265, 273

Fear, 137, 265, 275

Fellowship of sorrow, 109, 111, 279

Fire of God, 195

--cleansing, 195, 225, 237

Flesh and spirit, 189

Flowers, 15, 99, 101, 105, 127, 151, 221

Fool's paradise, 111, 267

Forgiveness, 169

Forward, 3

Francis, St., 103

Friendship, 19, 61, 291

Future, the, 129, 195

--identity, 19, 253

--life, 57, 65, 71, 81, 113, 171, 237, 253, 293

GENIUS, 105, 175, 215

Gifts, 83, 111, 129

Gilbert, Sir Humphrey, 203

God, the Living, 7, 101, 103, 111, 133, 193, 243, 285

--the Ideal, 73

--an indulgent, 15

--of Nature, 103, 131, 151, 183

God's character, 33, 87, 111, 181, 195, 253, 273, 283

--countenance, 131

Godliness, 91, 281

Good, the eternal, 35, 171, 253

Good in all, 9, 287

Good deeds, 187, 263

Good Friday, 93, 97

Goodness, 5, 105, 113, 199, 245

Gratitude, 89

Greeks, the old, 67, 107, 133, 155, 229

HAPPINESS, 29, 59, 245, 265

Harmony, 5, 67, 83, 127, 161, 277

Hearts and streams, 119, 197

Heaven, 109, 167

Hell, 96, 98, 109, 195, 265

--keys of, 7

--a present, 43

Hero worship, 291

Heroism, 41, 61, 71, 207, 239, 294

History, philosophy of, 63

Hope, 39, 111, 145, 149, 237, 247

Hospitals, 263

Humanity, 275

Humility, 13, 41, 169, 193

I AM I, 55, 89, 185, 199

Ideal, the, 63, 73, 117

Ideals, high, 77

Idleness, 91, 157, 207

Impunity, 217

Incarnation, the, 146, 253, 291

Influence, silent, 139, 259

Intermediate state, 98, 245, 289

JOHN the Baptist, 147

John, St., 45, 53, 63, 113

Justification, 43

KINDNESS, 181, 205

Kingdom, coming, 21, 179; of God, 45, 185

Knowledge, 53, 79, 131, 135, 163, 177, 183

LAMP race, 133

Laws of God, 98, 117, 163, 169, 229, 277, 287

Lesson of life, 61, 293

Liberty, 215

Life everlasting, 11, 113, 219, 277

--long, 133

--value of, 61

Light, 33, 177, 249, 291

Liturgies, 249

Love, 9, 37, 41, 53, 55, 79, 117, 201, 209, 235, 251, 289, 219

--Divine, 117

--and beauty, 201

MAN in God's image, 89, 127, 199, 229

March, 51, 53

Martyrs, 17, 98, 172, 218, 294, 295

Masses, the, 177

May, 99

Melancholy, 137, 183, 233, 253

Melody, 5, 127, 277

Men and women, 39, 91, 93, 153, 259, 283

Metre, 119

Midsummer, 125

Miracles, 31, 99, 289

Moderation, 69

Monotony, 163

Morality, 29, 147, 255

Morbid mind, 233

Morning, 19, 125, 201, 249

Mother earth, 247

Mothers, 61, 74, 213

Music, 23, 107, 127, 161, 277

Mystery of life, 117, 155, 185, 291

Mystics, 55, 185, 251

NATURALIST, 175

Nature, 141, 183, 187, 221, 241, 247, 253

--study of, 7, 105, 131, 141, 175, 183, 187

Nature's worship, 131

Night, 201, 211

Nineteenth century, 3, 151, 257

Noble life, 5, 9

Noble studies, 63

North-east wind, 1

Novel reading, 85, 169, 259

OCTOBER, 221

Old truths, 151

Opinions, 215

Originality, 239