I am not permitted to have a text, because I am not a preacher. As a
naturalist, I am speaking here by invitation of the Bishop and the Dean
of this Cathedral on the life of James Bryce as a student of man and of
nature. I find in the opening of the beautiful hymn sung by the choir on
entering this Cathedral the words which I cannot resist paraphrasing as
the central thought of what I am about to say: Lead, Kindly Light, amid
the encircling confusion.
“Lead, Kindly Light,” was the inner motive of the life of James
Bryce—the kindly light of the genial nature of a man of faith and
confidence, of a man of rugged resolution and constant determination,
who never faltered in his efforts, whether it was a physical, or social,
or intellectual, or political problem, to throw upon it the light of
most careful and thorough examination.
Then another line of the same beautiful poem of John Henry Newman,
O’er moor and fen, o’er crag and torrent,
reveals the other aspect of the life of James Bryce which will impress
you if you will read his four volumes as a traveler and explorer. When
confused by the world and by the strife of political parties, Bryce
would go off quietly on one of these great journeys of his, borne by his
stout Scotch heart and by his indomitable energy as a mountain-climber.
Brought up in a climate which brings out the best qualities in a
man—that hardy nursery of strong Britons; born in northern Ireland,
where the kindly qualities and genial nature of the Irish blend with the
sturdy persistence of the Scotch, he was equipped by birth as well as by
the early training of a remarkable father to enter life along many paths
which opened out before him.
Follow him, no doubt somewhat confused, at the age of thirty-nine, after
a period of political service in Parliament and lectureship in Oxford
University, on that remarkable journey through and beyond the countries
which he studied in his “Holy Roman Empire,” into and through Asia
Minor, into the region on the borderland of Armenia, in search of Mount
Ararat, and you observe an event in his life most typical and
characteristic. Every one told him it was impossible to ascend Mount
Ararat. One after another the parties that started with him fell behind,
until, finally, about four or five thousand feet from the summit, he was
entirely alone, and from that point he pushed on to the hollow between
the twin peaks where the Bible myth tells us the Ark of Noah rested. He
did not find any traces of the Ark, but he seems to have found, in that
ascent and in the wonderful survey which the ascent gave him of the
great tides of human history which have ebbed and flowed around the base
of that mountain, a new and fresh perspective for all his future
historical works. There, also, at the turning-point in life, when
according to some men the critical age of forty is reached, James Bryce
reversed the natural order of things, and until the age of
eighty-three—during the latter part of which period I had the honor of
making his acquaintance—became a younger man, a larger man, a greater
man every year to all those who had the pleasure and privilege and
inspiration of knowing him.
What a contrast his thoroughness with the superficiality of other men
who have treated the same broad periods of human history, of human
activity, and to whom many people appeal for light and guidance! Wells,
writing his “Outline of History” from his armchair, guided by the work
of all the authors upon whom he could lay his hand; Bryce, seeking out
the fountains, the origins, the beginnings of these wonderful movements
of peoples which are summed up in the words “Human History.” Himself
retreading the paths worn by men for centuries, observing that wonderful
variety of races of men where, in entering Transcaucasia, he came on the
borders between Turkey and the Russian Dominions; again, when in South
Africa, he touched the life of the Kaffirs, of the Hottentots, and of
that race of Bushmen which stands at the very bottom of the human scale;
finally, in South America, at the age of seventy-four, he entered the
intimate life of a people he had not touched before, of the Spanish, the
Portuguese, the native Indians of the South American Continent—always
traveling with the same genial attitude, the same kindliness, the same
lack of criticism, which distinguished his life and writings throughout.
Small wonder that, having as a boy and young man been brought up among
the British people, among the Scotch, the Irish, the English, the
Scotch-Irish, who are the fountains of our own American life, when he
came to America he understood the Americans and was welcomed as one of
us, as a man who could interpret our life, our institutions, who could
tell us the truth about ourselves without our being offended, the most
difficult message that any one coming from any other part of the world
can give to the American!
Now we find that Bryce is not dead! James Bryce is not dead! James Bryce
is living! He will live! Out of his inspiration, from those penetrating
eyes, from that wonderful intellect, from those profound and unbiassed
and unprejudiced studies, out of the fruits of years of personal
experience, he finally surveys our American institutions in the last,
and one of the greatest, of his works, “Modern Democracies.” Nothing
could attest the truthfulness of his nature more clearly than the fact
that the note of that volume is so different from the note of his early,
confident writings as a young ardent Liberal, almost Radical. He found
in our midst, and in the new democracies everywhere, so many confusing
thoughts, so many unexpected counter-currents, that he comes out, as
does every great and profound student of human life and human affairs
who approaches the matter from the scientific standpoint of profound
knowledge, with a clear warning of the dangers which surround us if we
do not take heed and if we lose the art of choosing our leaders, our
spiritual leaders, our intellectual leaders, our political leaders.
Leadership! Leadership is the last note, to my mind, of Bryce’s life. He
is leading. He himself will lead because he has become now, and I
believe for all time, the Kindly Light which will guide us through the
interpretation of our American institutions.
[Illustration:
_From a painting by A. Edelfelt_
LOUIS PASTEUR
]
LOUIS PASTEUR
1822–1895
To my mind Louis Pasteur is the greatest benefactor of mankind since
the time of Jesus Christ, and as he was inspired by religious
sentiment I claim that he should be enrolled among the saints and
enshrined in our cathedrals. It is of this aspect of his life that
“The New Order of Sainthood” deals. Contemplation of this aspect of
his life led me to reflections upon Nature and Religion, in which I
was greatly aided by my previous studies in the natural philosophy of
the Greeks and of Augustine and was guided to the wonderful passages
of Dante in “The Divine Comedy” by Bishop Boyd-Carpenter. The sequel
to this address is to be found in “Evolution and Religion,” my reply
to William Jennings Bryan.