all fours; mewling and whining, its face turned down, its eyes turned
back. It must be full of the brave, manly spirit of the day, keeping
also the good of times past. There is a terrific energy in this age, for
man was never so much developed, so much the master of himself before.
Great truths, moral and political, have come to light. They fly quickly.
The iron prophet of types publishes his visions, of weal or woe, to the
near and far. This marvellous age has invented steam, and the magnetic
telegraph, apt symbols of itself, before which the miracles of fable are
but an idle tale. It demands, as never before, freedom for itself,
usefulness in its institutions; truth in its teachings, and beauty in
its deeds. Let a church have that freedom, that usefulness, truth, and
beauty, and the energy of this age will be on its side. But the church
which did for the fifth century, or the fifteenth, will not do for this.
What is well enough at Rome, Oxford or Berlin, is not well enough for
Boston. It must have our ideas, the smell of our ground, and have grown
out of the religion in our soul. The freedom of America must be there
before this energy will come; the wisdom of the nineteenth century
before its science will be on the churches' side, else that science will
go over to the "infidels."
Our churches are not in harmony with what is best in the present age.
Men call their temples after their old heroes and saints--John, Paul,
Peter, and the like. But we call nothing else after the old names; a
school of philosophy would be condemned if called Aristotelian,
Platonic, or even Baconian. We out-travel the past in all but this. In
the church it seems taught there is no progress unless we have all the
past on our back; so we despair of having men fit to call churches by.
We look back and not forward. We think the next saint must talk Hebrew
like the old ones, and repeat the same mythology. So when a new prophet
comes we only stone him.
A church that believes only in past inspiration will appeal to old books
as the standard of truth and source of light; will be antiquarian in its
habits; will call its children by the old names; and war on the new age,
not understanding the man-child born to rule the world. A church that
believes in inspiration now will appeal to God; try things by reason and
conscience; aim to surpass the old heroes; baptize its children with a
new spirit, and using the present age will lead public opinion, and not
follow it. Had Christ looked back for counsel, he might have founded a
church fit for Abraham or Isaac to worship in, not for the ages to come,
or the age then. He that feels he is near to God, does not fear to be
far from men; if before, he helps lead them on; if above, to lift them
up. Let us get all we can from the Hebrews and others of old time, and
that is much; but still let us be God's free men, not the Gibeonites of
the past.
Let us have a church that dares imitate the heroism of Jesus; seek
inspiration as he sought it; judge the past as he; act on the present
like him; pray as he prayed; work as he wrought; live as he lived. Let
our doctrines and our forms fit the soul, as the limbs fit the body,
growing out of it, growing with it. Let us have a church for the whole
man: truth for the mind; good works for the hands; love for the heart;
and for the soul, that aspiring after perfection, that unfaltering faith
in God which, like lightning in the clouds, shines brightest, when
elsewhere it is most dark. Let our church fit man, as the heavens fit
the earth!
* * * * *
In our day men have made great advances in science, commerce,
manufactures, in all the arts of life. We need, therefore, a development
of religion corresponding thereto. The leading minds of the age ask
freedom to inquire; not merely to believe, but to know; to rest on
facts. A great spiritual movement goes swiftly forward. The best men see
that religion is religion; theology is theology, and not religion; that
true religion is a very simple affair, and the popular theology a very
foolish one; that the Christianity of Christ is not the Christianity of
the street, or the state, or the churches; that Christ is not their
model-man, only "imputed" as such. These men wish to apply good sense to
matters connected with religion; to apply Christianity to life, and make
the world a better place, men and women fitter to live in it. In this
way they wish to get a theology that is true; a mode of religion that
works, and works well. If a church can answer these demands, it will be
a live church; leading the civilization of the times, living with all
the mighty life of this age, and nation. Its prayers will be a lifting
up of the hearts in noble men towards God, in search of truth, goodness,
piety. Its sacraments will be great works of reform, institutions for
the comfort and the culture of men. Let us have a church in which
religion, goodness towards men, and piety towards God, shall be the main
thing; let us have a degree of that suited to the growth and demands of
this age. In the middle ages, men had erroneous conceptions of religion,
no doubt; yet the church led the world. When she wrestled with the
state, the state came undermost to the ground. See the results of that
supremacy--all over Europe there arose the cloister, halls of learning
for the chosen few, minster, dome, cathedral, miracles of art, each
costing the wealth of a province. Such was the embodiment of their ideas
of religion, the prayers of a pious age done in stone, a psalm petrified
as it rose from the world's mouth; a poor sacrifice, no doubt, but the
best they knew how to offer. Now if men were to engage in religion as in
politics, commerce, arts; if the absolute religion, the Christianity of
Christ, were applied to life with all the might of this age, as the
Christianity of the church was then applied, what a result should we not
behold! We should build up a great state with unity in the nation, and
freedom in the people; a state where there was honorable work for every
hand, bread for all mouths, clothing for all backs, culture for every
mind, and love and faith in every heart. Truth would be our sermon,
drawn from the oldest of Scriptures, God's writing there in nature, here
in man; works of daily duty would be our sacrament; prophets inspired of
God would minister the word, and piety send up her psalm of prayer,
sweet in its notes, and joyfully prolonged. The noblest monument to
Christ, the fairest trophy of religion, is a noble people, where all are
well fed and clad, industrious, free, educated, manly, pious, wise and
good.
* * * * *
Some of you may now remember, how ten months and more ago, I first came
to this house to speak. I shall remember it forever. In those rainy
Sundays the very skies looked dark. Some came doubtingly, uncertain,
looking around, and hoping to find courage in another's hope. Others
came with clear glad face; openly, joyfully, certain they were right;
not fearing to meet the issue; not afraid to be seen meeting it. Some
came, perhaps, not used to worship in a church, but not the less welcome
here; some mistaking me for a destroyer, a doubter, a denier of all
truth, a scoffer, an enemy to man and God! I wonder not at that.
Misguided men had told you so, in sermon and in song; in words publicly
printed and published without shame; in the covert calumny, slyly
whispered in the dark! Need I tell you my feelings; how I felt at coming
to the town made famous by great men, Mayhew, Chauncy, Buckminster,
Kirkland, Holley, Pierpont, Channing, Ware--names dear and honored in my
boyish heart! Need I tell you how I felt at sight of the work which
stretched out before me? Do you wonder that I asked: Who is sufficient
for these things? and said: Alas, not I, Thou knowest, Lord! But some of
you told me you asked not the wisdom of a wiser man, the ability of one
stronger, but only that I should do what I could. I came, not doubting
that I had some truths to say; not distrusting God, nor man, nor you;
distrustful only of myself. I feared I had not the power, amid the dust
and noises of the day, to help you see and hear the great realities of
religion as they appeared to me; to help you feel the life of real
religion, as in my better moments I have felt its truth! But let that
pass. As I came here from Sunday to Sunday, when I began to feel your
spirits prayed with mine a prayer for truth and life; as I looked down
into your faces, thoughtful and almost breathless, I forgot my
self-distrust; I saw the time was come; that, feebly as I know I speak,
my best thoughts were ever the most welcome! I saw that the harvest was
plenteous indeed: but the preacher, I feel it still, was all unworthy of
his work!
* * * * *
Brothers and Sisters: let us be true to our sentiments and ideas. Let us
not imitate another's form unless it symbolize a truth to us. We must
not affect to be singular, but not fear to be alone. Let us not
foolishly separate from our brothers elsewhere. Truth is yet before us,
not only springing up out of the manly words of this Bible, but out of
the ground; out of the heavens; out of man and God. Whole firmaments of
truth hang ever o'er our heads, waiting the telescopic eye of the
true-hearted see-er. Let us follow truth, in form, thought or sentiment,
wherever she may call. God's daughter cannot lead us from the path. The
further on we go, the more we find. Had Columbus turned back only the
day before he saw the land, the adventure had been worse than lost.
We must practise a manly self-denial. Religion always demands that, but
never more than when our brothers separate from us, and we stand alone.
By our mutual love and mutual forbearance, we shall stand strong. With
zeal for our common work, let us have charity for such as dislike us,
such as oppose and would oppress us. Let us love our enemies, bless them
that curse us, do good to them that hate us, and pray for such as
despitefully use us. Let us overcome their evil speech with our own
goodness. If others have treated us ill, called us unholy names, and
mocked at us, let us forgive it all, here and now, and help them also to
forget and outgrow that temper which bade them treat us so. A kind
answer is fittest rebuke to an unkind word.
If we have any truth it will not be kept hid. It will run over the brim
of our urn and water our brother's field. Were any truth to come down
to us in advance from God, it were not that we might forestall the
light, but shed it forth for all His children to walk by and rejoice in.
"One candle will light a thousand" if it be itself lighted. Let our
light shine before men so that they may see our good deeds, and
themselves praise God by a manly life. This we owe to them as to
ourselves. A noble thought and a mean man make a sorry union. Let our
idea show itself in our life--that is preaching, right eloquent. Do
this, we begin to do good to men, and though they should oppose us, and
our work should fail, we shall have yet the approval of our own heart,
the approval of God, be whole within ourselves, and one with Him.
* * * * *
Some of you are venerable men. I have wondered that a youthful ardor
should have brought you here. Your silvery heads have seemed a
benediction to my work. But most of you are young. I know it is no aping
of a fashion that has brought you here. I have no eloquence to charm or
please you with; I only speak right on. I have no reputation but a bad
name in the churches. I know you came not idly, but seeking after truth.
Give a great idea to an old man, and he carries it to his grave; give it
to a young man, and he carries it to his life. It will bear both young
and old through the grave and into eternal Heaven beyond.
Young men and women, the duties of the world fall eminently on you. God
confides to your hands the ark which holds the treasures of the age. On
young shoulders He lays the burden of life. Yours is the period of
passion; the period of enterprise and of work. It is by successive
generations that mankind goes forward. The old, stepping into honorable
graves, leave their places and the results they won to you. But
departing they seem to say, as they linger and look back: Do ye greater
than we have done! The young just coming into your homes seem to say:
Instruct us to be nobler than yourselves! Your life is the answer to
your children and your sires. The next generation will be as you make
it. It is not the schools but the people's character that educates the
child. Amid the trials, duties, dangers of your life, religion alone can
guide you. It is not the world's eye that is on you, but God's; it is
not the world's religion that will suffice you, but the religion of a
Man, which unites you with truth, justice, piety, goodness; yes, which
makes you one with God!
Young men and women--you can make this church a fountain of life to
thousands of fainting souls. Yes, you can make this city nobler than
city ever was before. A manly life is the best gift you can leave
mankind; that can be copied forever. Architects of your own weal or woe,
your destiny is mainly in your own hands. It is no great thing to
reject the popular falsehoods; little and perhaps not hard. But to
receive the great sentiments and lofty truths of real religion, the
Christianity of Christ; to love them, to live them in your business and
your home, that is the greatest work of man. Thereby you partake of the
spirit and nature of God; you achieve the true destiny for yourself; you
help your brothers do the same.
When my own life is measured by the ideal of that young Nazarene, I know
how little I deserve the name of Christian; none knows that fact so well
as I. But you have been denied the name of Christian because you came
here, asking me to come. Let men see that you have the reality, though
they withhold the name. Your words are the least part of what you say to
men. The foolish only will judge you by your talk; wise men by the
general tenor of your life. Let your religion appear in your work and
your play. Pray in your strongest hours. Practise your prayers. By
fair-dealing, justice, kindness, self-control, and the great work of
helping others while you help yourself, let your life prove a worship.
These are the real sacraments and Christian communion with God, to which
water and wine are only helps. Criticize the world not by censure only,
but by the example of a great life. Shame men out of their littleness,
not by making mouths, but by walking great and beautiful amongst them.
You love God best when you love men most. Let your prayers be an
uplifting of the soul in thought, resolution, love, and the light
thereof shall shine through the darkest hour of trouble. Have not the
Christianity of the street; but carry Christ's Christianity there. Be
noble men, then your works must needs be great and manly.
* * * * *
This is the first Sunday of a new year. What an hour for resolutions;
what a moment for prayer! If you have sins in your bosom, cast them
behind you now. In the last year, God has blessed us; blessed us all. On
some his angels waited, robed in white, and brought new joys; here a
wife, to bind men closer yet to Providence; and there a child, a new
Messiah, sent to tell of innocence and heaven. To some his angels came
clad in dark livery, veiling a joyful countenance with unpropitious
wings, and bore away child, father, sister, wife, or friend. Still were
they angels of good Providence, all God's own; and he who looks aright
finds that they also brought a blessing, but concealed, and left it,
though they spoke no word of joy. One day our weeping brother shall find
that gift and wear it as a diamond on his breast.
The hours are passing over us, and with them the day. What shall the
future Sundays be, and what the year? What we make them both. God gives
us time. We weave it into life, such figures as we may, and wear it as
we will. Age slowly rots away the gold we are set in, but the
adamantine soul lives on, radiant every way in the light streaming down
from God. The genius of eternity, star-crowned, beautiful, and with
prophetic eyes, leads us again to the gates of time, and gives us one
more year, bidding us fill that golden cup with water as we can or will.
There stand the dirty, fetid pools of worldliness and sin; curdled, and
mantled, film-covered, streaked and striped with many a hue, they shine
there, in the slanting light of new-born day. Around them stand the sons
of earth and cry: Come hither; drink thou and be saved! Here fill thy
golden cup! There you may seek to fill your urn; to stay your thirst.
The deceitful element, roping in your hands, shall mock your lip. It is
water only to the eye. Nay, show-water only unto men half-blind. But
there, hard by, runs down the stream of life, its waters never frozen,
never dry; fed by perennial dews falling unseen from God. Fill there
thine urn, oh, brother-man, and thou shalt thirst no more for
selfishness and crime, and faint no more amid the toil and heat of day;
wash there, and the leprosy of sin, its scales of blindness, shall fall
off, and thou be clean for ever. Kneel there and pray; God shall inspire
thy heart with truth and love, and fill thy cup with never-ending
joy![2]
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Rev. John Pierpont.
[2] See note at the end of this volume.
III.
A SERMON OF WAR, PREACHED AT THE MELODEON, ON SUNDAY, JUNE 7, 1846.
EXODUS XV. 3.
"The Lord is a Man of War."
1 JOHN IV. 8.
"God is Love."
I ask your attention to a Sermon of War. I have waited some time before
treating this subject at length, till the present hostilities should
assume a definite form, and the designs of the Government become more
apparent. I wished to be able to speak coolly and with knowledge of the
facts, that we might understand the comparative merits of the present
war. Besides, I have waited for others, in the churches, of more
experience to speak, before I ventured to offer my counsel; but I have
thus far waited almost in vain! I did not wish to treat the matter last
Sunday, for that was the end of our week of Pentecost, when cloven
tongues of flame descend on the city, and some are thought to be full of
new wine, and others of the Holy Spirit. The heat of the meetings, good
and bad, of that week, could not wholly have passed away from you or me,
and we ought to come coolly and consider a subject like this. So the
last Sunday I only sketched the back-ground of the picture, to-day
intending to paint the horrors of war in front of that "Presence of
Beauty in Nature," to which with its "Meanings" and its "Lessons," I
then asked you to attend.
* * * * *
It seems to me that an idea of God as the Infinite is given to us in our
nature itself. But men create a more definite conception of God in their
own image. Thus a rude savage man, who has learned only the presence of
power in Nature, conceives of God mainly as a force, and speaks of Him
as a God of power. Such, though not without beautiful exceptions, is the
character ascribed to Jehovah in the Old Testament. "The Lord is a man
of war." He is "the Lord of Hosts." He kills men, and their cattle. If
there is trouble in the enemies' city, it is the Lord who hath caused
it. He will "whet his glittering sword and render vengeance to his
enemies. He will make his arrows drunk with blood, and his sword shall
devour flesh!" It is with the sword that God pleads with all men. He
encourages men to fight, and says, "Cursed be he that keepeth back his
sword from blood." He sends blood into the streets; he waters the land
with blood, and in blood he dissolves the mountains. He brandishes his
sword before kings, and they tremble at every moment. He treads nations
as grapes in a wine-press, and his garments are stained with their
life's blood.[3]
A man who has grown up to read the Older Testament of God revealed in
the beauty of the universe, and to feel the goodness of God therein set
forth, sees him not as force only, or in chief, but as love. He worships
in love the God of goodness and of peace. Such is the prevalent
character ascribed to God in the New Testament, except in the book of
"Revelation." He is the "God of love and peace;" "our Father," "kind to
the unthankful and the unmerciful." In one word, God is love. He loves
us all, Jew and Gentile, bond and free. All are his children, each of
priceless value in His sight. He is no God of battles; no Lord of hosts;
no man of war. He has no sword, nor arrows; He does not water the earth
nor melt the mountains in blood, but "He maketh His sun to rise on the
evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and the unjust." He
has no garments dyed in blood; curses no man for refusing to fight. He
is spirit, to be worshipped in spirit and in truth! The commandment is:
Love one another; resist not evil with evil; forgive seventy times
seven; overcome evil with good; love your enemies; bless them that
curse you; do good to them that hate you; pray for them that
despitefully use you and persecute you.[4] There is no nation to shut
its ports against another, all are men; no caste to curl its lip at
inferiors, all are brothers, members of one body, united in the Christ,
the ideal man and head of all. The most useful is the greatest. No man
is to be master, for the Christ is our teacher. We are to fear no man,
for God is our Father.
These precepts are undeniably the precepts of Christianity. Equally
plain is it that they are the dictates of man's nature, only developed
and active; a part of God's universal revelation; His law writ on the
soul of man, established in the nature of things; true after all
experience, and true before all experience. The man of real insight into
spiritual things sees and knows them to be true.
Do not believe it the part of a coward to think so. I have known many
cowards; yes, a great many; some very cowardly, pusillanimous and
faint-hearted cowards; but never one who thought so, or pretended to
think so. It requires very little courage to fight with sword and
musket, and that of a cheap kind. Men of that stamp are plenty as grass
in June. Beat your drum, and they will follow; offer them but eight
dollars a month, and they will come--fifty thousand of them, to smite
and kill.[5] Every male animal, or reptile, will fight. It requires
little courage to kill; but it takes much to resist evil with good,
holding obstinately out, active or passive, till you overcome it. Call
that non-resistance, if you will; it is the stoutest kind of combat,
demanding all the manhood of a man.
I will not deny that war is inseparable from a low stage of
civilization; so is polygamy, slavery, cannibalism. Taking men as they
were, savage and violent, there have been times when war was
unavoidable. I will not deny that it has helped forward the civilization
of the race, for God often makes the folly and the sin of men contribute
to the progress of mankind. It is none the less a folly or a sin. In a
civilized nation like ourselves, it is far more heinous than in the
Ojibeways or the Camanches.
War is in utter violation of Christianity. If war be right, then
Christianity is wrong, false, a lie. But if Christianity be true, if
reason, conscience, the religious sense, the highest faculties of man,
are to be trusted, then war is the wrong, the falsehood, the lie. I
maintain that aggressive war is a sin; that it is national infidelity,
a denial of Christianity and of God. Every man who understands
Christianity by heart, in its relations to man, to society, the nation,
the world, knows that war is a wrong. At this day, with all the
enlightenment of our age, after the long peace of the nations, war is
easily avoided. Whenever it occurs, the very fact of its occurrence
convicts the rulers of a nation either of entire incapacity as
statesmen, or else of the worst form of treason; treason to the people,
to mankind, to God! There is no other alternative. The very fact of an
aggressive war shows that the men who cause it must be either fools or
traitors. I think lightly of what is called treason against a
government. That may be your duty to-day, or mine. Certainly it was our
fathers' duty not long ago; now it is our boast and their title to
honor. But treason against the people, against mankind, against God, is
a great sin, not lightly to be spoken of. The political authors of the
war on this continent, and at this day, are either utterly incapable of
a statesman's work, or else guilty of that sin. Fools they are, or
traitors they must be.
* * * * *