Part 13

There is little to wonder at, after all, in the mournful fact that the religion which as it rose from the heart of Christ was supremely the religion of Divine Love became, as the centuries went by, colder and harder and more cruel, till the irony was complete, and the doctrine of the Mount of Galilee was illustrated by the fires of the Spanish Inquisition. _Who_, we may ask, were the teachers of Christianity during the intervening ages? Who were they through whose lips and writings the lessons gathered from the lilies and the sparrows, and the story of the Prodigal, were transmitted to each new-born generation? They were _men_, exclusively men; nay, men who, in taking their office, renounced those ties of natural affection through which the Author of Nature has caused the human heart to grow tender, and to be taught the practice of unselfishness. To fit themselves to convey to the hearts of their brethren the gospel of the Fatherhood of God, they began by renouncing the experience of human fatherhood for themselves. The Apostolic Succession, of which the great Churches still boast, was for fifteen centuries a school for the transmission of ideas about a Divine Parent down a long chain of childless celibates. We Protestants have corrected this mistake, and the men who tell to _us_ the story of the Prodigal are at least able to speak out of the abundance of their hearts when they say that, “like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord hath mercy on them that fear Him.” But is there not one step even further to be taken? Is not the compassion of “a mother for the son of her womb” a still profounder image of the Divine Love than the father’s pity? Ought it not also to be brought home to our comprehensions (if in any measure human words may so bring it) through the lips of mothers and motherly-hearted women?

The loss out of our religion of all those ideas which may be classed as the doctrine of the motherhood of God has been attended with evils innumerable. The Church of Rome, in obedience to a vehement popular instinct, has sought to make up for the defect by Mariolatry. The orthodox Protestant Churches, by sternly adhering to their masculine Trinity, have indeed preserved the awe and moral reverence which the Divine Kingship and Fatherhood demand, and which the paganism of virgin worship has obliterated. But how much have they not lost by excluding those sentiments which can only be given to One in whom we recognize not only justice, holiness, and beneficence, but also tenderness, sympathy, love? The truth is we are so constituted that great benefits received,--if we think of them as bestowed merely because it is right and good to give them, and not from love for ourselves,--so far from awakening in us spontaneous emotions of gratitude, have rather an opposite tendency, and seem to lay on us an obligation to be grateful, which is a sort of burden, and from which all minds save the most generous have a proclivity to escape. To hundreds of us, large donations from just and well-meaning but unaffectionate fathers have failed to waken the smallest throb of genuine gratefulness; while some mere trifle given by a loving mother--a flower from a well-remembered rose-tree, a scrap of her needlework--has filled our eyes with tears. In excluding, then, in a great degree from view that which I may presume to call the maternal side of religion, the Churches, so far as they have done it, have dropped the golden chain whereby human hearts may be drawn, and have kept in their hands the iron one which can only control the reason and the conscience. Is it possible to estimate the amount of loss to religion which this signifies, or how many thousands of souls might have been won by _love_ to a life of piety and holiness who have refused to obey the bit and bridle of sterner motives, and have wandered off and been lost in the wilderness of practical atheism?

If there be, then, as I humbly believe and trust, in the nature of our great Parent above, certain characters of tenderness and sympathy with His creatures which are more perfectly shadowed, more vividly reflected, in the love of human mothers for their children than by aught else on earth; if there be, in short, a real meaning in the old lesson that God created woman as well as man in His own image,--the image being only complete in the complete humanity,--then I think it follows that there is urgent need that woman’s idea of God should have its due place in all our teaching of religion. I think that there must be truths in this direction which only a woman’s heart will conceive and only a woman’s lips can teach,--truths, perchance, which have come to her when baby-fingers have clung round her neck in the dark while infant trust overcame infant terror, and she has asked herself was there anything in heaven or earth which could make her cast down to destruction, or even let slip from her clasp of care and guardianship, the helpless little child thus lying in her arms,--a living parable of all our race in the everlasting arms of God.

FOOTNOTES:

[27] It will be seen that I differ _toto caelo_ on this point from Mr. Mahaffy in his interesting recent essay on the _Decay of Preaching_. He seems to me only to recognize the _moral and intellectual_ forces which move men, and these compared with the spiritual are only what mechanical ones are to the electric.

[28] Ingoldsby’s rendering of this world-famous story, the favorite theme of so many eminent painters, is probably no very exaggerated reading of the general impression of the monastic mind respecting the fair sex:--

“There are many devils which walk this world, Devils great and devils small, Devils short and devils tall; Bold devils which go with their tails unfurled, Sly devils which carry them quite upcurled;

* * * * *

But a laughing woman with two bright eyes Is the worsest devil of all!”

[29] I know not on what authority the familiar jovial couplet has been attributed to the great Reformer:--

“Wer liebt nicht Wein, Weib, und Gesang Der bleibt ein Narr sein Leben lang.”

The ascetic spirit had very far departed, at all events, from the author who composed it.

[30] I. Cor. xiv., 26. If this graphic description had applied to a _female_ assembly, should we have ever been allowed to forget the circumstance?

[31] “The Hebrew Woman,” by Constance de Rothschild (Mrs. Cyril Flower).

[32] A sermon by this lady on “The Sacrament of Life,” preached and printed at Melbourne, would amply justify, I think, to every reader the above remark.

[33] In the case of the M.P., this would need to be a majority of _men_, seeing that the whole female contingent of qualified voters will only (if admitted) add about a fifth or sixth to the register.

[34] This at least is the impression left on me by the female speakers (some twenty perhaps) whom I have chanced to hear. I never knew one of them “hum” or “haw,” or stammer, or break down, even when (as in one very remarkable case) the gentle and learned speaker had never addressed an audience till the occasion, when she had already passed middle life. Among the most remarkable phenomena of the present day, I reckon the preaching of Mrs. Booth, the wife of the General of the Salvation Army. The combination of fervent zeal with practical good sense in her extempore discourses must be admired even by those who differ most widely from her views.

[35] A curious illustration of this is to be found in a passage in the first series of Mrs. Kemble’s charming autobiography published three years ago. She describes the late Lady Byron as often expressing envy of her (Mrs. Kemble’s) public readings, and her longing to have similar crowds in sympathy with her own impressions. “I made her laugh,” says Mrs. Kemble, “by telling her that more than once, when looking from my reading-desk over the sea of faces uplifted toward me, a sudden feeling had seized me that I must say something _from myself_ to all those human beings whose attention I felt at that moment entirely at my command, and between whom and myself a sense of sympathy thrilled powerfully and strangely through my heart as I looked steadfastly at them before opening my lips; but that on wondering afterwards what I might, could, would, or should have said to them from myself, I never could think of anything but two words--‘_Be good!_’” (Page 317.)

THE HOUSE ON THE SHORE OF ETERNITY.

AN ALLEGORY.

Two simple-minded men, who had dwelt all their lives in a country far inland, at last undertook a long journey together. This happened many ages ago, when there were no such things as printed books or village schools, and when the people in isolated districts saw no travellers, and knew nothing of the great world beyond the hills which closed their horizon.

Wolfgang and Athelstane, so our pilgrims were called, walked on over downs and heaths, and through the vast forests of oak which then overspread the land, till at last, after a night’s toilsome march, they came, in the early dawn, to a spot which seemed to them the strangest they had ever visited. Walls of rock shut out any distant view; but immediately before them on a gentle declivity there stood a structure, much larger than the humble cottages which Wolfgang and Athelstane had inhabited, and of a singularly different form. Instead of a pointed roof of thatch or tiles, there was, on the top, a flat floor of boards; while beneath, where there should have been a solid square foundation, there was a long thin wedge, almost like a roof which had been reversed and turned downward. Also, through the floor rose up two long, slender, tree-like erections, with all the branches carefully smoothed away. Crossbars were slung on these poles, and ropes connected them together; while a great roll of coarse woven stuff, like sackcloth, lay folded up beside them. At one end, and outside of the wooden structure, hung a huge beam, standing, as it seemed, in some unaccountable relation to the rest of the fabric, and connected with it by machinery passing into the interior. All these singular things were slowly and carefully noted by our two humble travellers, as they walked round the wooden building in the morning twilight. No one was near who could afford them an explanation of the use or purpose of what they saw; and their doubts and wonder grew every moment.

“What can it mean?” said Wolfgang. “What did the builder--whoever he can have been--intend by such a mansion as this?”

“It is clear enough,” answered Athelstane, thoughtfully, “that it is the work of some very ingenious hands. How soundly and skilfully it is all fitted together!”

“True,” replied his comrade; “and yet ought we to say it is well made before we can tell for what purpose it is constructed? To me it seems that our own old huts of wattled willow and turf were, after all, of a better shape for a house to stand on the ground.”

“Do you think this is a house, _only_ a house?” said Athelstane, suddenly looking up.

“Well, if it be not a house, what else can it be?” said Wolfgang. “Let us try to look inside of it, and examine it more closely.”

The two men soon contrived to enter the edifice which so puzzled them; and presently Wolfgang exclaimed triumphantly:--

“See! there can be no question more on the matter. This is only a house. Here are seats and tables for men to sit at, and beds for them to sleep in; and here is a fire-place and a great iron pot to cook food. Now, you can have no hesitation. It is just a wooden house, and rather stupidly planned.”

“I have no doubt,” said Athelstane, “that it is intended for a habitation; but is it not inexplicable that a builder who can work so cleverly should construct it so unsuitably for a common house? Why is it not made to stand squarely and steadily on the ground? What is the sense of these long soaring poles standing up through the middle, with the coils of ropes and bales of sacking? And this? This is the most mysterious thing of all,” said Athelstane, placing his hand on a wheel, which instantly stirred the great beam at the back.

“They are strange certainly,” replied Wolfgang,--“very strange and useless things, I should say, about a house which would be much more comfortable and answer its purpose better without them. I cannot agree with you that the builder was really a clever man, or knew what he was about, else he would never have erected those poles or made that senseless, upside-down roof, instead of a foundation; or, above all, have constructed that totally unmeaning apparatus behind the whole structure.”

“I differ from you,” said Athelstane, after some moments more of reflection. “I think it is we who are not clever or ingenious, and who cannot find out what the carpenter who made this building intends to do with it. I do not believe that singular form beneath (so little fit for a building only intended for a house), nor those poles and ropes and vast sheets of woven stuff, nor yet that mysterious great beam, were all added to a mere house for nothing,--for no purpose whatever. I think, Wolfgang,” and Athelstane laid his hand on his friend’s arm earnestly,--“I think what we are looking at is something _more than a house_. I think _it is not intended to stand always where we see it_.”

“You are dreaming, Athelstane,” said Wolfgang, with a short laugh. “Where on earth should a house go, if it is not to stand always where it is built? Who would want to move such a structure as this?”

“I do not know,” said Athelstane, humbly. “I do not profess to understand the mystery of it: only I see that the master carpenter who built it must have been a very great carpenter indeed; and I cannot believe that he has made all these things in vain, or for no important purpose. If he wanted only a house, why did he not simply build a house standing flat on the ground, and with no shafts piercing the air, and no vast guiding beam at the back? Trust me, friend Wolfgang, this is something more than the common abode of which alone you seem able to think.”

While the two simple-minded men yet talked together, the sun had risen, and there was a sound of many waters and of rising waves; and through an opening in the rocks, which the travellers had not perceived in the twilight, the great ocean became revealed to their eyes. Higher and higher rose the tide, till it almost reached where the strange wooden building still lay motionless; and the travellers retreated a little up the shore, and stood, awe-struck and breathless, watching what might happen. Then down from the cliff above ran a band of mariners, and leaped on board the vessel, and hauled in the anchor; and presently the waves lifted up the ship, and she floated bravely on the waters. Very soon, the mariners set the sails, which had lain idly on the deck, the pilot placed his hand on the rudder and guided the noble barque, and she was borne by the winds of heaven far off beyond the uttermost ken of the two poor travellers upon the shore.

Then, after a time, Wolfgang turned to his companion, and said: “Athelstane, you spoke truth. Yon House-of-the-Sea was made, as you foresaw, for other use than to stand upon the ground. It was planned for a different element,--the free world of waters. And now we see what was the purport of so many things which before seemed to us useless,--the keel, the masts, the sails, the marvellous and mysterious rudder. How wonderful it is! How wise and far-seeing the great carpenter who made the ship!”

As Wolfgang spoke, Athelstane lifted his head, which had drooped in heavy thought, and he saw the wide ocean leaping in the morning light stretched out before him, and the new-risen sun smote his face with glory. And Athelstane laid his hand on Wolfgang’s arm, and spoke as his friend had never heard him speak before, for it was as a man in whose soul a great new thought had sprung to life: “Aye, Wolfgang, aye,” he said; “but if that marvellous work of human hands was not made only for earth, do you think _we_ were made for nothing better than the life which now we lead,--to eat and drink, and marry, and toil, and sleep, and die, and be forgotten? Are not _we_ too, O Wolfgang, made for other things than these? Are we not fitted for some other element than that in which now we have our being, some other existence than that which yet we lead? If we were intended only to live our few years of animal life on earth and then perish, why were we given minds to plough the seas of thought, and aspirations to point to heaven, and love to swell beneath the breath of affection, and conscience to guide us on our way as the pilot lays on it his mighty hand? O Wolfgang! we could perceive that the ship was intended to float on the great ocean which we had never beheld. Can we not see that we and all our race are made to live in a world yet unseen, wider, freer, grander a thousand times than earth,--a world which we shall enter whensoever the tide of death shall lift us up and bear us away?”

THE PEAK IN DARIEN: THE RIDDLE OF DEATH.

It is somewhat singular that the natural longing to penetrate the great secret of mortality should not have suggested to some of the inquirers into so-called “Spiritual” manifestations that, before attempting to obtain communication with the _dead_ through such poor methods as raps and alphabets, they might more properly, and with better hope of gaining a glimpse through the “gates ajar,” watch closely the _dying_, and study the psychological phenomena which accompany the act of dissolution. Thus, it might be possible to ascertain, by comparison of numerous instances, whether among these phenomena are any which seem to indicate that the mind, soul, or self of the expiring person, is not undergoing a process of extinction, but exhibiting such tokens as might be anticipated, were it entering upon a new phase of existence and coming into possession of fresh faculties. It is at least conceivable that some such indications might be observed, were we to look for them with care and caution, under the rare conditions wherein they could at any time be afforded; and, if this should prove to be the fact, it is needless to dilate on the intense interest of even such semblance of confirmation of our hopes. I must earnestly protest, however, at starting, that, in my opinion, to regard anything which could be so noticed as being _more_ than such a confirmation, or, as if it could constitute an argument for belief in a future life, would be foolish in the extreme, seeing the great obscurity and the evanescent nature of all such phenomena. Our faith in immortality must be built on altogether different ground, if it is to be of any value as a part of our religion or of our philosophy. But, assuming that we are, individually, already convinced that the quasi-universal creed of the human race is not erroneous, and that “the soul of a man never dies,”[36] we may not unreasonably turn to the solemn scene of dissolution, and ask whether there does not sometimes occur, under one or two perhaps of its hundred forms, some incidents which point in the direction of the great fact which we believe to be actually in process of realization? According to our common conviction, there is a moment of time when the man whom we have known in his garb of flesh casts it aside, actually, so to speak, before our eyes, and “this mortal puts on immortality.” As in Blanco White’s beautiful sonnet, he is, like Adam, watching his first sunset, and trembling to lose sight of the world, and the question to be solved is whether darkness has enshrouded him, or whether

“Hesperus with the hosts of heaven came, And, lo! Creation widened in his view”;

and he may have asked himself,--

“Who would have thought such darkness lay concealed Within thy beams, O Sun? or deemed, While flower and leaf and insect stood revealed, That to such countless orbs thou mad’st us blind?”

and life, like light, had been only a deception and a veil.

We have walked in company with our brother, perchance for years, through the “wilderness of this world,” over its arid plains of toil and through its sweet valleys of love and pleasure; and then we have begun to climb the awful Andes which have always loomed before us at our journey’s end,--their summits against the sky,--and beyond them the undiscovered land. Onward, a little before us, as chance may decide, our companion perhaps mounts the last acclivity; and we see him slowly approach the mountain’s crown, while our lagging steps yet linger on the slopes below. Sometimes, ere he reach the hill-top, he is enveloped in cloud, and then we see him no more; but again, sometimes, he remains in the full sunlight, and though distant from us, and beyond the reach of our voice, it is yet possible for us to watch his attitude and motions. Now, we see him nearing the summit. A few steps more, and there must break on his vision whatever there may be of the unknown world beyond,--a howling wilderness or a great Pacific of joy. Does he seem, as that view bursts on him, whatsoever it may be,--does he seem to be inspired with hope or cast down with despair? Do his arms drop in consternation, or does he lift them aloft with one glad gesture of rapture, ere he descend the farther slope, and is lost to our sight forever?

It appears to me that we may, though with much diffidence, answer this question as regards some of our comrades in life’s journey, who have gone before us, and of whom the last glimpse has been one full of strange, mysterious, but most joyful promise. Let us inquire into the matter calmly, making due allowance both for natural exaggeration of mourning friends, who recall the most affecting scenes, and also for the probable presence of cerebral disturbance and hallucination at the moment of physical dissolution.

Of course, it is quite possible that the natural law of death may be that the departed always sink into a state of unconsciousness, and rather dip beneath a Lethe than leap a Rubicon. It is likewise possible that the faculties of a disembodied soul, whatever that may be, may need time and use, like those of an infant, before they can be practically employed. But there is also at least a _possibility_ that consciousness is not always lost, but is continuous through the passage from one life to another, and that it expands rather than closes at the moment when the bonds of the flesh are broken, and the man enters into possession of his higher powers and vaster faculties, symbolled by the beautiful old emblem of Psyche’s emancipated butterfly quitting the shell of the chrysalis.[37] In this latter case there is a certain _prima facie_ presumption that close observation ought to permit us occasionally to obtain some brief glimpse, some glance, though but of lightning swiftness and evanescence, revealing partially this transcendent change.