The secret of life--The riddle of existence--Sought now as
ever--The whyness of things--Attempts to answer the riddle--The
Seekers--Fantastic creeds and queer philosophies--Revamping old
ideas--The story of the man and the stars--The answer to be found
within the soul.
"I laugh at the lore and the pride of man,
At the sophist schools and the learned clan,
For what are they all, in their high conceit,
When man in the bush with God may meet?"
--Emerson.
Man is trying to reason out now as in the past, the secret of
Life--the riddle of Existence. He seeks to know from whence he comes,
whither he goes, and what is the object of his existence. He wants to
know the _whyness_ of things--what it all means. He is like the
squirrel in the cage, which exhausts itself in traveling the long road
of the wheel, only to find itself at the end of its journey just where
it started. Or worse still, like the newly-caged wild bird, he dashes
against the bars of his prison, again and again, in his efforts to
regain his freedom, until at last he lies weak and bleeding, a captive
still.
It has ever been so, from the childhood of the race until the present
time. Sages, seers, prophets and philosophers have endeavored to
reason out the problem, but their labors have availed nothing, and the
riddle remains unanswered. Man has traveled over and over the circular
road of thought, only to discover that it has no beginning--no ending.
He thinks that he has explained things, but he has merely given them
names. All the scientific research, all the theological and
metaphysical speculation, has failed even to explain the sprouting of
the mustard seed. Life and Death is a mystery to the most brilliant
man of this civilization, as it was to the ignorant creature of the
stone age. Races, nations, civilizations rise and fall; creeds are
born, grow strong, weaken and die, but the secret remains a secret
still.
The present day seems to have reawakened the latent desire of man to
see behind the veil. The pendulum which carried so many thinkers to
the materialistic extreme is beginning to swing in the opposite
direction, and is causing a strange and wonderful revival of ancient
creeds and philosophies. Those who have long since turned their backs
upon the accepted creeds now find themselves in the company of those
who still claim allegiance to the church, but who feel themselves
cramped by the creeds fashioned for them by their fathers.
The leader of the New Thought, reaching the top of the mountain, often
finds himself face-to-face with a scientific _savant_ who has reached
the same place by climbing up the other side of the hill. And the
scientist and the New Thought man need not be surprised to find a
leader of advanced religious thought claiming a foothold on the top of
the same hill. But the trio, after they have congratulated themselves
upon reaching the summit and ending their journey look around them,
and lo! their mountain is but a foothill, and far above them, towering
higher and higher, rise range after range of the real mountains, the
highest peaks being hidden among the clouds!
One has but to look around him to see how strenuous has grown the
search for the answer to the riddle. New creeds, philosophies, cults
and schools confront us at every turn. The past has been ransacked for
its discarded philosophies, which have been renovated and trimmed anew
for modern use. The dust has been brushed off many an old and almost
forgotten creed, which is pushed to the front under a new name and
with new trimmings. Plato is worked overtime to furnish the twentieth
century creed promoters with material to be done over. The wildest
dreams of the ancients are toned down a little, and boldly offered to
the eager multitude as the long sought for solution of it all. Priests
and teachers of all the religions of all lands are among us vying with
the priests and priestesses of the new philosophies and creeds of our
own land, and bidding for public favor. And these new home-made
philosophies, how frightfully and wonderfully are they made! The old
philosophies of Greece and Rome are skilfully dovetailed with the
creeds of the Orient, and the result is a thing differing from
anything ever seen before by gods or men.
Brahmins, Buddhists, Confucians, Mahommedans and Sun Worshippers claim
thousands of followers in our land, and Isis and Osiris will before
long again be given a place and duly installed in the new Pantheon.
Thor and Odin will doubtless be revamped, and the rites of the Druids
revived. We are looking every day for the arrival on our shores of the
advance agent of the Joss propaganda from the Celestial kingdom.
And the home product is, if possible, more fantastic and _bizarre_
than the imported article. The wildest claims and statements are made
with an air of authority, and are accepted as "gospel" by the
adherents of the several sects. One does not know whether to sigh or
weep as he watches some of the modern prophets and prophetesses
strutting their little stage and cutting fantastic capers before high
heaven, thus adding to the gayety of the nations. The demand for these
things has been created, and nothing seems too highly spiced for the
devotees of the latter day creeds.
And the followers of those strange prophets, what of them? Many of
them are mere excitement hunters; others that class of people
possessed of a consuming thirst for something new; some are honest
seekers for the Truth; and others are those who have cut away from
their old moorings and are drifting about, rudderless and without an
anchor, at the mercy of any stray current which may sweep them along.
There are thousands of people who never heard of the philosophies and
creeds of the ancients, who are now dazzled by the revamped doctrines
expounded by the modern prophets, and who, being impressed with the
strangeness and novelty of the (to them) new truths, accept them as
inspired and emanating from the ABSOLUTE. New gods have
arisen and also new devils. The "Malicious Mental Magnetism" of the
Christian Scientists is as much a devil to them as was the orthodox
devil of one hundred years ago to our forefathers.
The new cults usually begin by performing cures by means of the power
of the mind and other natural laws, which they attribute to the
principles and teachings of their particular sects. Many of them now,
however, frankly admit that they are past the healing stage, and look
down upon the mere healing of disease as a thing too nearly allied to
the detested "material" plane to be seriously considered. The time of
the leaders is now principally occupied in announcing and elucidating
wonderful, high, spiritual truths for the seekers, soaring away up in
the clouds of transcendentalism, leaving their followers behind,
gaping upwards like a crowd at a country balloon ascension.
Once upon a time there was a reformer who attended a public meeting,
and took part in an exciting debate on an important question of the
day. At last, heated, wearied and disgusted by the fruitless struggle,
he left the hall and started for home. It was a beautiful, cold
winter's night, and the heavens were studded with stars shining bright
through the clear frosty atmosphere. Pausing for a moment in his rapid
walk, he glanced upward. The stars were twinkling away merrily. They
did not seem to be at all disturbed by what had been going on in the
meeting. They appeared just the same as when, in years past, as a boy
he had looked at them with wondering eyes. As he gazed, a peaceful
calm came over him, and his worry, doubts and fears seemed very petty.
At last one little star appeared to notice him, and he thought he
could see it cast a good-natured glance downward, saying, in a
cheerful voice, "Why so _hot_, little man?"
When we feel cast down with doubt, torn with anxiety, weak from loss
of faith, faint with fear, let us look aloft at the stars. When we see
those distant points of light, knowing them to be centers of solar
systems, knowing that beyond, beyond and beyond are countless other
suns and world, let us pluck up a little courage and realize that we
are a part of a mighty Law, a stupendous plan. Let us know that the
Power which called these things into life, and which is able to manage
them, and even greater things, has us in charge and will not allow us
to be destroyed. Let us know that we are but in the kindergarten stage
of existence and that we shall go on and on and on, from plane to
plane, ever onward and upward in the scale, until at last we shall be
able to spell out the lines of the primer of Life, and learn the
multiplication table of the Universe.
Let us in the meanwhile live on in trust and hope; one day at a time;
living our own lives; doing our best work; getting the joy which comes
from the simple, human life; lending a helping hand. Let us abolish
Fear and Hate, and replace them with Courage, Confidence and Love. Let
us look for Good rather than Evil. Let us know failure as merely a
lesson in Success. Let us look upon Death as Birth. Let us do the best
we can with this world, knowing that the next world will find us
prepared for its task. Let us know that we are in Eternity right NOW.
Let us know that God is not so far away as we have been taught, for is
it not true that in Him "we live and move and have our being!"
Let us preserve our sense of humor--for it will guard us against many
a fear, many a folly, many a delusion.
And, finally, let us keep out of the throng which is rushing wildly
hither and thither, after leaders, prophets, sages, seers. Let us look
within ourselves and see the little flame which burns steadily there.
Let us know that we have within us the Light of the Spirit which
naught can extinguish. And let us say with good old Newman:
"Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom
Lead thou me on.
The night is dark, and I am far from home;
Lead thou me on.
Keep thou my feet; I do not ask to see
The distant scene; one step enough for me.
Lead thou me on."