Part 5

Bring on the spices! Let us be more affectionate one toward another. The eldest son of a large family was kneeling at his mother’s deathbed saying, “You have been such a good mother.” The dying woman opened her eyes and faintly whispered, “You never said so before, John, you never said that before.” Let this be our motto as we meet all men: “I would cause you to drink spiced wine.”

XII

THE FEVER OF HEALTH

One of man’s richest possessions is the feeling of restlessness and discontent that ever pushes onward seeking something new. It is the secret of discovery. Beholding the sunset, like a thousand camp fires flashing their beams upon the crimson and purple curtained tents of ever-encamping angels, man determined to enter into and share their quiet place of rest and luxury. Hastening forward, he easily found the hills that yester-night formed the mystic camping ground, but nowhere would a torn leaf or trampled grass-blade betray a single footprint; while, looking farther westward than he had traveled, he saw the same crimson-and-purple tents stretched upon other hilltops bathed with sunset’s golden light. Month followed month while man continued journeying westward in fruitless quest for peace, but in his effort to reach the cherished goal he discovered new lakes and rivers, hills and valleys, plains and forests, until a mighty continent lay ready for his children’s children to build cities rivaling in power and splendor the mystic camps of sunset’s unseen hosts.

Restlessness and dissatisfaction are the secret of invention. Satisfied with their condition, China, India, and Africa yield no inventions. Their people carry water in flasks of skin, travel upon weary-footed beasts of burden, and bequeath their children nothing but tradition. Such once was all the world until some individuals of courage and determination caught the fever of health. Dissatisfied and restless, man became weary of carrying water and would not rest until he had perfected the Holly Engine that presses a cup of cool water to every thirsty lip within the city. Tired of slow travel, he compelled the locomotive to give fleetness to his feet, and the telephone to give rapid transit to his voice. Restless because the singer’s voice must fade in silence, man built the phonograph to give the human voice, the frailest of all man’s possessions, everlasting life. Dissatisfaction with things as they are gives invention her rich achievements.

Art follows only in the footsteps of restlessness. Every painting and tapestry hanging on palace wall, every anthem that thrills the templed throngs, and every melody that wafts its sweet cadence upon the trembling, vibrant air, exists because some sensitive soul refused to know contentment until he had given perfect expression to the beauty that dwelt within his soul.

Only through the contagion of the divine fever can there be any reform. It was only when the restless soul of John Howard began to express its contempt for the foul floors and vitiated air of England’s jails and aroused the slumbering conscience of an indifferent people that the cruel prison systems of the world were changed. Reform in England’s colonial policy that made possible the unity of Canada and the founding of our own government came only when men began to chafe and grow restless under unjust treatment, and finally found expression in the burning, blazing, nervous eloquence of Patrick Henry, “Give me liberty, or give me death!”

Because men were satisfied with things as they were, the city slums became deeper, fouler depths of misery entombing thousands of human beings in inexcusable death-traps, robbing parents of hope and childhood of its lawful inheritance of health and goodness. These things continued until one poor lad grew divinely restless. A little immigrant boy of poetic temperament and lofty aspirations, by the name of Jacob Riis, cried out in protest against the injustice of foul air and darkened homes. Restless himself, he made the city restless, until New York transformed her tenements, purified her slums, and reformed her government until she became one of the cleanest cities of the world--in many ways a worthy example for the cities of the Old World to follow. The restlessness of Livingstone redeemed Africa. The restlessness of Morris saved China. The restlessness of Thoburn is working miracles in India. When men found it impossible to sit at ease while their brothers were in chains slavery disappeared. Because men became weary with drunkenness and tired listening to the pathetic pleading of drunkards’ wives and children, an aroused nation closed the open saloons and placed a ban upon the sale of alcoholic drink. Men are now becoming tired of war. They believe that the world has drunk its fill of human blood. The hour for world-wide disarmament has come, and rulers must be made to think before sacrificing their people’s lives.

Here also we find the secret of mental development. So long as the human mind is satisfied with tradition it cannot grow; but let it once become uneasy under the deadening power of superstition, its very restlessness will make the mountains unlock their secrets, the plants yield tribute of health-creating medicines, the clouds unbosom their mystery, and even the starlight becomes a pencil of gold to write upon the tablet of the sky the marvelous story of man’s growing intellectual power.

No one of God’s gifts is to be valued more than this feeling of unrest that he inspires within the heart, making us dissatisfied with ourselves and our surroundings, and forcing us forward to become skillful in discovery, art, invention, reform, and intellectuality.

But the beneficent influence of health’s fever does not end here, for it is also the secret of spiritual development. We have all experienced these seasons of holy manifestation. Our friends said that we had the fidgets; the physician diagnosed our case as one of nervousness; we insisted that we had the blues; but all were wrong. The restlessness was a sign of health. We were not satisfied with ourselves but longed for nobility. The dust-made body was refusing to grovel in the dust. The spiritual life was beginning to assert itself through these tissues of flesh. The chrysalis had lost its desire to crawl along the ground, for new life within claimed its right to rise upon joyous wing and cleave the sunlit air. It was not a thing to be despised, to mar and gnaw the budding leaf, but something to be admired and loved of man, something sylphlike to sip from chalices of gold and silver, porphyry and lapis-lazuli. The old man of sin was dying, and through the power of Christ a new man was coming into life; from now on he can never be satisfied with things as they were.

One of the hopes of the world’s salvation is the fact that sin never satisfies the soul. Its promises are never fulfilled. Its obligations are never met at maturity. Men become restless in their sin, and through their restlessness are being led to God. Here alone can satisfaction be found, for only Christ supplies the soul with what it needs for the journey set before it. He offers guidance, saying, “I am the way.” Following him no soul has ever been lost amid the bewildering maze of sin. He offers sustaining power saying, “I am the bread of life” and “I am the water of life.” The dusty ashes of sin no longer choke, but for the hunger there is life-giving bread, and for the parched lip there is water. He gives illumination, saying, “I am the light,” and the terrors of darkness and the dangers of the night flee away. He offers an open way, saying, “I am the door,” and through him one passes out of the cramped prison house of past sins into untrammeled, unmeasured freedom. He offers immortality, saying, “I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.” The deadening power of sin loses its hold, and one tastes the unspeakable joy of living a life that is life indeed.

Then be not confounded by the feeling of restlessness that ever creeps upon the healthy soul. What a tragedy our lives would be had we been satisfied with our first achievements! How terribly pathetic it is to become satisfied with ourselves now, while we are so far short of what we might be, and so lamentably short of what God meant our lives to be! Curb not the spirit of restlessness as though it were a fever of death. It is health’s fever. It is the call of the soul for its Creator who longs to lead us into better things.

To-morrow will be a beautiful day because to-day is so restless.

XIII

THE WISDOM OF THE UNLEARNED

The pathway of true brotherly love is bordered with deformed social conditions which must be faced and remedied. Entering the temple at the hour of prayer, Peter and John had their pious meditations interrupted by the appealing cry of a crippled beggar, who was crouching helplessly at the temple door. His haggard face, his wistful eye, his bony, outstretched hand, pleaded so passionately that the singing of the Levites was drowned and the temple call to prayer unheeded. The eyes of Peter and the beggar met, and Christlike spirituality stood face to face with the practical aspect of the world’s need. Instantly the great-hearted, impetuous Peter took notice of the helpless man, whose wan face began to brighten with hope. Taking him by the right hand, Peter said: “Silver and gold have I none. I cannot meet the requirements that you ask, knowing that it is not money that you need, so much as health and strength, with which to earn a livelihood for yourself and for your loved ones. Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have, give I thee. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk.” The cripple did not have time to waver, nor to debate, for the warm handclasp and the strong arm of the enthusiastic servant of Christ was lifting him to his feet and teaching him how to leap, and run, and sing the praises of God. Peter and John felt that they could not enter the temple to pray until they had proven their right to worship by practically meeting whatever part of the world-wide social needs chanced, at that moment, to confront them.

But their benevolence was misinterpreted by those who should have been the most appreciative. Overzealous religionists, who usually mistake the form for the spirit of worship, had the two benefactors arrested, accused of violating their law concerning the observance of the Sabbath day. After a night spent upon the cold, damp stones of the inner prison, the two disciples were brought before the learned magistrate to explain their conduct.

There is nothing more interesting than these unfriendly scholarly investigations of religious phenomena, conducted for the purpose of securing a rational psychological explanation. The high priests, the scribes, the rulers of city and province were seated in state, when the two humble followers of the Social Christ, with common garb, and net-calloused hands, stood at the judgment bar and heard the question: “By what power have ye done this?” A more modern phraseology of the question would be, “State to the Court what is the psychological explanation of this purported miracle?”

It was a critical moment to these judges, for scholarship, with much ado, was studying and analyzing ignorance. But the Peter of Pentecost was not to be dismayed. He knew that the service of Christ is not formal but practical, and that his conduct in curing a lame beggar was more important to God than the observing of a thousand man-made forms and ceremonies. He knew from his former experience that ignorance need have no fear of the scoffer’s sneer, or the scholar’s questioning, when once the heart has been fully consecrated to the service of God. With confidence they faced the inquirers saying, frankly: “The power is not ours. This miracle was performed through the power of Christ, which you, in your learning, threw aside, and which we, in the simplicity of our untutored hearts, have accepted as the gift of God.” The power of Pentecost was with the preacher again, and the judges were filled with fear and wonderment. Against their most earnest desires they liberated the men, wondering why they, as learned men, should be influenced by men of such untrained intellects.

While Christianity has always waged warfare against ignorance in all forms, and has been the leader in founding schools and colleges, the fact remains that many of our greatest achievements have been wrought by untrained men. God often takes the weak things of this world to confound the mighty.

When an unorganized and badly scattered people needed a wise ruler, God passed by the palace doors and over the seats of learning that, in the open fields, he might crown David, a shepherd lad. When Jerusalem was a ruined city, overgrown with weed and briar, God ignored commanding generals and ruling monarchs, to honor Nehemiah, whose conquering courage rebuilt the city. When mad with power and wild excesses of sin, a mighty nation needed restraint, God stepped over the royal houses as though they were playthings upon the nursery floor, and lifted Daniel, an exile, to become the condemning conscience for them who had slain their consciences, and to become a radiant hope for those who were enslaved and had lost all courage. When the time had fully come for the kingdom of Christ to be preached to the cultured and aristocratic, he chose these two men of the fisher-craft, who, though ignorant and unlearned, made the scholars and statesmen dumb with wonderment, while the crowned power of the age was humiliated, unable to cope successfully against the growing faith.

Christianity, while not encouraging ignorance, recognizes what the world often overlooks, that learning, in itself, has woeful limitations. When rightly employed, mental training multiplies one’s powers and talents, as the circling moon gives strength and swiftness to the rising tides; but misapplied book-learning has little value. In the crises of life the general information gleaned from books counts for but very little. The knowledge that water, when reduced in temperature to thirty degrees or less, freezes, so that a dangerous river is changed into a solid highway over which one can walk in safety, is of small value to a man who is drowning in the summer time, and very few drowning men would call for a thermometer to take the temperature of the water in which they were sinking. Standing beneath a falling wall, no man is going to begin to calculate the specific gravity of the falling elements or estimate the force of impact upon his head. All learning is good, and nothing in the line of information should be ignored, for, along the more or less narrow line of its own application, each truth is of inestimable value. Each added truth that one learns pulls up the tent stakes of the horizon and widens the world just so much, but no man can save himself with learning alone. Success depends, not upon scholarship, but upon a spotless love for God and a boundless love for man. Herein is the wisdom of life, and the weakest man or woman may possess it. All men may not become learned, but all men may become great and enthusiastic lovers of their fellow man. The little child that bends its arms in fervent hugs to show the measure of its affection; the struggling youth that stops to help a wounded companion; the widow, fighting against poverty in the tenement; the old man, patiently looking for the coming day--all these may possess the secret of royal living.

The world will be saved, not by the scholar, as a scholar, but by the loving heart; not by platitude, but by kindly deeds. Goodness is such an easy thing to acquire, that it is within the reach of all. A little London newsboy was seen to daily follow an unknown man for many blocks. When asked by an observer why he did so he responded, “When he buys a paper from me, he always smiles, and calls me his boy. He is the only one who ever called me that, and I just love to see him.” Here was a life brightened and perhaps redeemed because a busy man of wealth took time to say what any one of us is able to say each day. When King Humbert would have lost his nation he saved it, not by scholarly exhortations or startling state papers, but by visiting the hospitals of Naples and ministering with genuine affection a plague-smitten people. It was a task of love that the weakest person might be able to perform, but it saved a nation for a king.

The world will be saved. Righteousness shall ultimately prevail. The kingdoms of this world shall become the kingdom of our Christ. There are no failures in God’s mighty plans. We may vary in our beliefs, and differ greatly as to the process by which he shall accomplish his wise designs, but this is true: when this world is brought ultimately to the feet of Christ, it will have been accomplished not by prayer alone but by work and prayer, not by the scholar as a scholar but by the men, learned or unlearned, who have discovered the compelling and transforming power of a boundless, undying love.

XIV

THE STRENGTH OF WEAKNESS

An old man was once opening the treasury of his experience to enrich the young people of Corinth. Youth ever needs such a benefactor, for life’s most difficult problem is to definitely determine upon which element or elements of life the emphasis should be placed. Like a river, life has so many contributing streams of large volume that it is difficult to decide unto which one we are most indebted for our power. There is only one way to ascertain this fact, and that is to trace the current of life-power to its source and stand, with reverent feet, at its utmost gurgling spring. But this task is hard and is fraught with danger. What youth, standing at the joining of the currents, can tell to a certainty which is the real current and which the contributing stream of influence? Among the most pathetic incidents of history are those portraying some of our richest and most favored sons of genius mistaking a contributing element of life for life itself and spending their days within the narrow winding ways of mediocrity. Youth needs the open treasury of the past, therefore it is a rare privilege to have Paul thus open the treasure chest of his varied and triumphant experiences and tell us what is the secret source of life’s richest endowment. Looking over a life of many years, covering an intense and diversified experience, enriched with mental and spiritual training, he declared to the young people of Corinth that the source of personal power is weakness.

That is the last place in the world that we would naturally look for strength, for we have always been taught that weakness is the absence of strength. To be enduring we believed that we should possess the rigidity and firmness of the rocks, forgetful that long after the red stone walls of Kenilworth have tottered into complete ruin the fragile ivy, planted by unknown hands, will still live to cover the rough, broken heap of weather-beaten stones with the graceful folds of its swaying branches. We have believed that stability depended upon rigid strength, not realizing that, in nature, the strong are the most fragile, while the weak are the most enduring.

The source of triumphant living is not the adamantine will that refuses to bend or budge, but is the will that yields itself to higher power. Only when one finds that a feeling of weakness is creeping over him, and realizes that, in his own strength alone, he is inadequate for the task, does he possess true conquering power. One of the best hours of a man’s life is when, through sickness, toil, or persecution, he feels his physical powers giving way, and his soul rises to claim the occasion for God and his humanity. Knowing that while he himself is weak, the needed power is within easy reach, a man is strong. In such a crisis, to become self-confident is to be like the hunted partridge which, seeking escape, confidently enters the trap set for his destruction. Strength comes when, overwhelmed with a sense of unutterable weakness, one flings himself at the feet of Christ, and prays as did the sinking disciple, “Lord, save me.”

How very true this is in the hours of our severe temptation! No man ever sought refuge from temptation in self-confidence who, in the strain of battle, did not find his fortress crumbling into dust, while he himself suffered humiliating defeat. Simon Peter learned this truth. Strong and boastful in his self-assertiveness, he stood amid the gathering shadows of the world’s darkest and most tragic night, and smiled as one who gladly greets the dawning of his wedding day. He was confident, beyond question, that he was equal to any emergency that might arise. It was easy for him to boast and proclaim loudly what he would do. Beholding the same fast-deepening shadows, Christ fell to his knees in prayer, and with broken voice and heavy, blood-stained sweat, pleaded for his Father to remove this cup of suffering. Christ, the everlasting Conqueror, prays for escape from trial, while Peter, filled with self-assurance, bids the coming of the worst with defiant spirit, saying, “Though all men should forsake the Master, yet will not I.” He boasted bravely that he was ready to die for Christ. There was a marked contrast between the ways these two met the same struggle, but the whole world knows the outcome. In the presence of trial Peter’s strength was scattered like heaps of withered autumn leaves. When he was strong then was he weak. Without the passing of the cup Christ walked forth strong enough to win a world from sin, while Peter sank in shame. But when, a few hours later, we find the defeated disciple, all alone, in midnight darkness, weeping like a little child over his weakness, we rejoice, for we know now that Pentecost has found its preacher, and the world has found a mighty champion for God.

Temptation is a terrible thing. It is a band of armed brigands, storming the citadel of the soul to carry away everything that is of value. To yield is to have the soul ransacked and burned as though by fire. To face it confidently in one’s own strength is gravest folly. There is only one possibility of victory. In that hour of peril, when eternal destinies are at stake, let one feel his own weakness, and fall helplessly at the feet of Christ, and call with all the earnestness and pathos of his frightened soul, “Lord, save, or I perish!” and victory shall fill his heart with joy and crown his brow with the light of heaven.