_THE FIRST STEPS_
The first movements of the awakened soul are difficult to trace.
Observation, painstaking and long-continued, alone can furnish the
desired information. In the attempt to recall our own experiences there
is always a possibility of inaccuracy. Bias counts for more in
self-examination than in an examination of others. There is also danger
of confusing religious preconceptions with what actually transpires.
What we have been led to imagine should be experienced we are very
likely to insist has taken place. The truth concerning the Ascent of the
Soul will be found in the conclusions of many observers in widely
different conditions.
The soul awakens to a consciousness of its responsibilities and to a
knowledge that it is in a moral order from which escape is forever
impossible. This is our point of departure in this chapter.
The new-born child has to become adjusted to its physical environment,
to learn to use its powers, to breathe, to eat, to allow the various
senses to do their work. In like manner the newly awakened soul has to
become adjusted to the moral order. The moral order is the rule of right
in the sphere of thought, emotion, and choice. It is the government of
the soul as the physical order is the government of the body. It may be
best explained by analogy. There is a physical order ruled by physical
laws. If those laws are obeyed, strength, health, sanity result; but if
they are disobeyed, the consequences, which are inevitable and
self-perpetuating, are weakness, disease, insanity. If one violates
gravitation he is dashed in pieces; if he trifles with microbes their
infinitesimal grasp will be like a shackle of steel. No one can get
outside the physical universe and the sweep of its laws.
There is also a right and a wrong way to use thought, emotion, will. The
mind which has hospitality only for holy thoughts will become clearer,
and its vision more distinct; but the mind which harbors impure
thoughts, gradually, but surely, confuses evil with good, obscures its
vision, and becomes a fountain of moral miasm. If we choose to recall
and to retain feelings that are animal, and are the relics of animalism,
the natural tendency toward bestiality will gather momentum; but if
emotion is turned toward higher objects, and we are thrilled from above
rather than lulled from below, the sensibilities become sources of
enduring joy. The moral order is like the physical order in its
universality and in the remorselessness of the consequences which follow
choices.
How does the soul become adjusted to the moral order? This question is
difficult to answer. At the first there is sight enough to see that one
course is right and another wrong, but the vision is indistinct.
Gradually the ability to make accurate discriminations increases, and,
with time and other growth, the faculty of vision is enlarged and
clarified.
The first step in the Ascent of the Soul is the development of ability
to discriminate between right and wrong. The powers of the soul are
enlarged and vivified with the bodily growth, but whether there is any
necessary connection between the growth of the one and that of the
other, we know not. This alone is sure--clearer vision, with
ever-increasing distinctness, reveals the certainty that moral laws are
universal and unchangeable. The process of adjustment to the moral
order is partly voluntary and partly involuntary. It is hastened by the
hidden forces of vitality, and it may be hindered by its own choices. As
a human being who refuses to eat will starve, so a soul which turns away
from truth will starve. The law in one case is as inexorable as in the
other. This consciousness of the moral order is sometimes dim even in
mature years because neglect always deadens appreciation. Paul said that
the law is a schoolmaster leading to Christ. By that he intended to
teach that we must realize that we are under moral law before we can
know that its violation will result in a state of ruin needing
salvation. First that which is natural, then that which is spiritual.
The phrase "natural law in the spiritual world" means that the
consequences following right and wrong are as inevitable and essential
in the realm of spirit as in that of matter.
The progress of the soul is dependent on the realization that there is
a moral quality in thoughts, emotions, choices; that the consequences
following them grow out of them as flowers from seed, and that they
determine not only the character but the happiness and welfare of the
one exercising them.
The next step in the upward movement of the soul is the realization of
its freedom. It is possible for one to know that he is under law,
without at the same time appreciating that he is free to choose whether
he will obey. I may see a storm sweeping toward me and know that behind
it is resistless force, and know, also, that to step outside the track
of that storm is impossible; and it is conceivable that a soul may know
itself as able to think, feel, act, and, at the same time, be under the
dominion of forces before which it is powerless. The practical question,
therefore, for all in this human world is not, are there spiritual
laws? but, may we choose for ourselves whether we will obey or disobey
them? Until the soul knows itself to be free to choose, there will be no
deep feeling of obligation, without which there can be no motive
impelling toward the heights. Here also we walk in the dark. The genesis
of the consciousness of freedom has never been observed. DuBois-Reymond
has called it one of "the seven riddles of science." We are no nearer
the solution of the problem than were our fathers a thousand years ago.
But one thing at least we do know: He who believes himself to be a
puppet in the hands of unseen forces will never fight them. If freedom
is a fiction the universe is not only unmoral, but immoral. The final
argument for freedom is consciousness. I know I could have chosen
differently from what I did. But how do I know? The process cannot be
pushed farther back. Consciousness is ultimate and authoritative. But
what then shall be said of heredity? A child when first born is little
but a bundle of sensibilities. Its growth seems to be but the unfolding
of inherited tendencies. Every man is what his ancestors have made him
plus what he has absorbed from his environment. How can we say then that
any are free? That man who is surly, uncomfortable, ugly, as hard to
endure as a March wind, is but the extension of his father. When one
knows the elder it is difficult to do otherwise than pity the younger.
He is but living the tendencies which were born in him and which are an
inseparable part of his nature. He cannot be genial and urbane. Are not
some born moral cripples as others are born with physical deformities?
Are not some spiritually deaf, dumb, and blind from birth? It cannot be
doubted. We are all more or less what our fathers were, but our
surroundings do much to modify us. Many men seem to be driven on wings
of passion, as leaves by tornadoes; and yet we know that we are free,
and that all life and conduct, individual and social, must be ordered on
that hypothesis. Teach men that they are not free, and anarchy and chaos
will quickly follow. No freedom? Then there is no obligation. No one
feels that he ought to do what he cannot do, and no one will try to do
what he does not feel that he ought to do. If men are but machines,
moving only as the power is turned on, there is no moral quality in any
action. If we live in a moral world, whether we can understand it or
not, we must be free to choose for ourselves. The possibility of the
soul's expansion depends on its freedom. There is no right and no wrong,
no truth and no error, if it is a slave to the inheritance with which it
was born. What gives to the invitations of Jesus a quality so serious
and so solemn is the fact that they may be rejected. The power of
choice is the most sublime endowment which man possesses. When we have
learned to know ourselves as free a long step forward has been taken.
The soul grows by a right use of the power of choice.
How may it be adjusted to this knowledge? It will undoubtedly grow to
it, but the process will be slow. It may, however, be hastened by a use
of the experience of others. No man should be allowed to begin the
battle of life as ignorant as his father was. Each new soul should have
the benefit of the experience of all who have lived before. Children
should be taught by example and conversation, in the home and the
school, that the beginning of wisdom is a right use of the experience of
others. However this lesson may be learned, and however swift may be the
process of growth, the next step in the soul's progress, after its
realization that it is in a moral order, must be its adjustment to the
fact that it is a free agent and sovereign over its own choices.
No man is ever forced into any course of conduct. Character is the
resultant of many choices rather than of necessity. The moral law may be
obeyed or it may be violated. Its seat is, indeed, in the bosom of God.
It is the only guarantee of individual progress and social harmony. Its
sway is without bound and without end. To know how to live in a moral
world, and how best to use the gifts of liberty, is a subject for an
eternity of study. That this consciousness of freedom comes slowly is an
immense blessing; otherwise the soul would be dazed as, for the first
time, it looked around on the solemnities and splendors of the spiritual
universe; and be overwhelmed as it realized, at the very beginning of
its career, that it was endowed with a sovereignty as mysterious and
potent as that of God.
The next step in the upward movement of the soul is appreciation of a
moral ideal. That is a solemn and sublime moment when the newly awakened
soul realizes that it dwells in a moral order and is free to make its
own choices. But another moment is equally thrilling--that in which, in
faint and scarcely audible accents, it catches the far call of the goal
toward which, henceforward and forever, it must move. It now knows not
only that there is a difference between right and wrong, but that there
are mysterious affinities between itself and truth and right. Later the
sound of that far-away voice will become more distinct. But in its
infancy the soul is more or less confused. It hears many sounds and does
not always know how to distinguish between siren voices and those which
prophesy its destiny. It also has to learn to distinguish truth and
right. The task of making moral discriminations is not easy at any time.
Amid a babel of noises to detect the one clear call which alone can
satisfy is almost impossible. The mistakes, therefore, are many, but
even by mistakes the soul learns to distinguish the true from the false.
But how is it to be taught to appreciate that one voice only in all that
confusion of strange sounds should be heeded, and all the rest
disregarded? The same answer as before must be given. This knowledge,
also, will come in large part with the years. It seems to be the cosmic
purpose to provide fresh light with every new step of progress. No one
is ever left in total darkness. As the soul advances it learns to
distinguish between the voices which speak to it. The necessity of
growth is the angel of the Lord whose ministries and prophecies are the
hope and glory of the race. Growth may be hindered, but it can never be
banished from the universe. It moved in chaos, and never faltered in its
march, until under its beneficent leading all things were seen to be
good. It led the cosmic movement until man appeared; and now it has
taken man in hand, with all the vestiges of animalism clinging to him,
and it will never leave him as he rises toward the perfection and glory
of God. The law of growth answers most if not all of our questions. The
soul of man must grow. With its growth will come vision, strength, and
progress toward its goal.
But growth is not all. The voices to which we choose to give heed will
sound most distinctly in our ears. Here we face a fact which is often in
evidence. The earth and animalism will never cease to make appeal to our
senses, while at the same time voices from above will call from their
heights to our spirits. To distinguish between desire and duty, between
truth and tradition, between the spiritual and the animal, is a step
which has to be taken, and which is taken whether we appreciate how or
not. By the pain which follows wrong choices, or by the intuitions of
the spirit, the soul comes to realize that its obligation is always in
one direction; that its choice ought to be in favor of the morally
excellent. But how shall it discern the morally excellent? The process
of learning will be a long one, and never fully completed on the earth.
This is a realm that poets and dramatists, who are usually the
profoundest and most accurate students of life, have not often tried to
enter. Such questions can be answered only after careful and
long-continued inductive study. Moralists are usually content to stop
short of this inquiry. How the soul comes to learn that it is obligated
to truth and right we may not fully know; but that it does learn, and
that no step in all its development is more important, there is no
doubt. In His dealing with this question Jesus preserves the same
attitude as toward all subjects of speculation. I came not to explain
how life adjusts itself to its environment, He seems to say, but to give
life a richness and a beauty which it never had before; I came not to
answer questions, but to save to the best uses that which already
exists. Nevertheless, the question as to how the soul is taught to
distinguish the morally excellent is of serious importance. If we do not
recognize the sanctity of truth and right we may not give them
hospitality; and we may not appreciate their sanctity if we are ignorant
of what gives them their authority. How, then, does it learn what truth
and right are? Are there any clearly defined paths by which this
knowledge may be reached? Is not truth a matter of education? And is
there any absolute right? A Hindoo Swami, of the school of the Vedanta,
lecturing in this country, solemnly assured an intelligent audience
that there is no sin; that what is called sin is only the result of
education; that what is vice in one place may be virtue in another; and
that in the sphere of morals all is relative and nothing absolute. Then
there is no wrong, for wrong and sin are closely related; and no right
because if right is not a dream it implies the possibility of an
opposite. There is little permanent danger from such shallow theories.
The peril from confusion is greater than from denial. But even confusion
at this point is not long necessary because in every soul there is a
voice which men call conscience, which never fails to impel toward the
true and the good. Conscience may be likened to a compass whose needle
always points toward the north. When it is uninfluenced by distracting
causes conscience always shows the way toward truth and right. The
Spartans believed that lying was a virtue if it was sufficiently
obscure; and a Hindoo woman who throws her child to the god of the
Ganges does so because she is deeply religious. Are not such persons
conscientious? Yet they perform acts which are in themselves wrong? Of
what value, then, is conscience? That they are both conscientious and
religious I have no doubt. It is their misfortune to be ignorant. The
light appears to be colored by the medium through which it passes, and
yet it is not colored; and conscience seems to approve what is wrong,
and yet it never does. It always impels toward the right, but men often
make serious mistakes because of their ignorance. The needle in the
moral compass is deflected by selfishness or false teaching. The Hindoo
mother might hear and, if she dared to listen to it, would hear a deeper
voice than the one calling her to sacrifice her child--even one telling
her to spare her child. She has not yet learned that it is always safe
to trust the moral sense. Superstitions are not conscience; they are
ignorance obscuring and deadening conscience. Every man is born with a
guide within to point him to paths of virtue and truth, and one of the
most important lessons which the growing soul has to learn is that when
it is true to itself it may always trust that guide. The call of his
destiny finds every man, and, when he hears it, he asks: How may I reach
that goal? It is far away and the path is confused. Then a voice within
makes answer, and, if he heeds that, he will make no mistake. That
voice, I believe, is the result of no evolutionary process, but is the
holy God immanent in every soul, making His will known. Evolution
gradually gives to conscience a larger place, but there is no evidence
that it is produced by any physical process. It may be hindered by
physical limitations, but it can be destroyed by none. Why are we so
slow in learning that conscience, being divine, is authoritative and may
be trusted? I know no answer except this: We so often confuse ignorance
with conscience that at last we conclude that the latter is not
trustworthy. But there we mistake. It is trustworthy. It never fails
those who heed its message. That realization may now and then come
early, but it seldom comes all at once. Nevertheless it is a step to be
taken before the progress of the soul can be either swift or sure.
The moment that the soul realizes that God is not far away, but within;
that all the divine voices did not speak in the past, but that many are
speaking now; that whosoever will listen may hear within his own being a
message as clear and sacred as any that ever came to prophet or teacher
in other times, it will begin to realize the luxury of its liberty, and
something of the grandeur of its destiny. Truth and right are not
fictions of the imagination, they are realities opening before the
growing soul like continents before explorers. They always invite
entrance and possession. They have horizons full of splendor and beauty
and music. They alone can satisfy. But the soul has not yet fully
escaped from the mists and fogs and glooms of the earth. It is
surrounded by those who still wallow in animalism, and the sounds of the
lower world are yet echoing in its ears. But at last its face is toward
the light; the far call of its destiny has been heard; it knows itself
to be in a moral order; it is assured that, however closely the body may
be imprisoned, no bolts and no bars can shut in a spirit; that before it
is a fair and favored land, far off but ever open; and, best of all,
that within its own being, impervious to all influences from without, is
a guide which may be implicitly trusted and which will never betray. Why
not follow its suggestions at once and press on toward that fair land
of truth and beauty which so earnestly invites? Ah! why not? Here we are
face to face with other facts. There are hindrances, many and serious,
in the pathway of the soul, and they must be met and forced before that
land can be entered. This is the time for us to consider them.