CHAPTER VIII.

THE RELATION OF EVOLUTION TO THE IDEA OF THE CHRIST.

What think ye of Christ? This is indeed in many ways a test-question, and we ought frankly to meet it. I have feared heretofore to touch this question. I now only throw out some brief suggestions--scatter some seed-thoughts. Does Evolution have anything to say on this also? I think it does. This I proceed to show:

As organic evolution reached its goal and completion in _man_, so human evolution must reach its goal and completion in the _ideal man_--i. e., the Christ. According to this view, the Christ is the ideal man, and therefore--(mark the necessary implication)--and therefore the Divine man. We are all as men (as contradistinguished from brutes)--we are _all_, I say, _sons of God_; the Christ is the well-beloved Son. We are _all_ in the image of God; he is the express and _perfect image_. We are all partakers in various degrees of the Divine nature; in him the Divine nature is completely realized. It is not necessary that the ideal man--the Christ--should be perfect in knowledge or in power; on the contrary, he must grow in wisdom and in stature, like other men; but he must be _perfect in character_. _Character is essential spirit._ All else, even knowledge, is only environment for its culture. In the dazzling light of modern science we are apt to forget this. Character is the _attitude_ of the human spirit toward the Divine Spirit. If I should add anything to this definition, I would say it is spiritual _attitude_ and spiritual _energy_. In the Christ this attitude must be wholly right; the harmony--the union with the Divine--must be perfect. This perfect union gives, of necessity, also fullness of spiritual energy.

Now, I wish to show that, although the Christ as thus defined must be human--yes, even more intensely human than any one of us--yet by the law of evolution we ought to expect him to differ from us in an inconceivable degree, and especially in a superhuman way. This I do by a series of illustrations.

We have said that the Christ is the ideal and therefore the Divine man--that he is the goal and completion of humanity. But in evolution a goal is not only a completion of one stage, but also the beginning of another and higher stage--on a higher plane of life with new and higher capacities and powers _unimaginable from any lower plane_. Let me illustrate:

1. As man is the ideal--the goal and completion of animal evolution, and yet is he also a birth into a higher plane of life--the spiritual; so the Christ, the ideal man, may be only the goal and completion of human evolution, and yet is he also a birth into a new and higher plane--_the Divine_.

2. As the human spirit pre-existed in embryo in animals, slowly developing through all geological times, until it came to birth and immortality in man, so the Divine spirit is in embryo in man in various degrees of development, and comes to birth and completion of Divine life in the Christ.

3. As animals reached, finally, _conscious relations_ with God in man, even so man reaches _union_ with God in the Christ. As man, the ideal animal, is a union of the _animal_ with the _spiritual_; so the Christ, the ideal of human evolution, is a union of the _human_ and the _Divine_.

4. Finally: As with the appearance of man there were introduced new powers and properties unimaginable from the animal point of view, and therefore from that point of view seemingly supernatural--i. e., above their nature--so with the appearance of the Christ we ought to expect new powers and properties unimaginable from the human point of view, and therefore to us seemingly supernatural--i. e., _above our nature_.

The Christ as defined above--i. e., as the _ideal man_--is undoubtedly a true object of rational worship. There are two and only two fundamental moral principles, viz., love to God and love to man. Both of these must be embodied in a rational worship. The one must be embodied in the worship of an Infinite Spirit--God; the other in the worship of the ideal man--the Christ.

But some one will object that, admitting all this, it is impossible that the goal, the ideal, should appear until the _end of the course_ of evolution. To him I answer: This is indeed true of animal evolution, but not of human evolution. We have already seen (see p. 88 _et seq._) that there is an essential difference in this regard between these two kinds of evolution. In addition to all the factors of organic evolution, in human progress there is a new and higher factor added, which immediately takes precedence of all others. This factor is _the conscious voluntary co-operation of the human spirit in the work of its own evolution_. The method of this new factor consists essentially in the formation, and especially in the _voluntary pursuit, of ideals_. In organic evolution _species_ are transformed by the _environment_. In human evolution _character_ is transformed by _its own ideal_. Organic evolution is by _necessary_ law--human evolution is by voluntary effort, i. e., by _free_ law. Organic evolution is _pushed_ onward and upward from behind and below. Human evolution is _drawn_ upward and forward from above and in front by the attractive force of ideals. Thus the ideal of organic evolution can not appear until the end; while the attractive ideals of human evolution _must_ come--whether only in the imagination or realized in the flesh--but must come somehow _in the course_. The most powerfully attractive ideal ever presented to the human mind, and, therefore, the most potent agent in the evolution of human character, is _the Christ_. This ideal must come--whether in the imagination or in the flesh I say not, but--must come somehow _in the course_ and not at the end. At the end the whole human race, drawn upward by this ideal, must reach the fullness of the stature of the Christ.

But it will be again objected that all ideals are relative and temporary; that we are in fact drawn onward and upward by many successive ideals, one beyond another, in the course. Ideals are but mile-stones which we put successively behind us while we press on to another; they are successive rounds of an infinite ladder which we put successively beneath us while we rise higher. This one also we shall eventually put behind us and pass on.

To this I have two answers: Admitted that in many ways such is the course of progress; but who has been able to reach this ideal and conceive a higher? When this one is reached and completely realized in our personal character, it will be time enough to propose another.

Again, it is true that in many ways we have advanced and are still advancing by the use of partial ideals; but this use of partial and relative ideals is itself in only a temporary stage of evolution. At a certain stage we catch glimpses of the _absolute_ moral ideal. Then our gaze becomes fixed, and we are thenceforward drawn upward forever. The human race has already reached a point when the absolute ideal of character is attractive. This Divine ideal can never again be lost to humanity.