which concerns us all so deeply, and to suit the peculiar ease of many
of us here so entirely, that I thought they might well furnish us with
matter for farther consideration to-day. And though I noticed one
particular cause, which seemed to have acted mischievously, in the last
few years, upon the growth and freshness of the mind in youth, yet it
would be absurd to suppose that before this cause came into existence
all was well; or that if it could be removed, our progress even in
worldly knowledge would henceforth be unimpeded. There are many other
causes no doubt which oppose our growth in worldly wisdom; and still
more which oppose our growth in the wisdom of God.
One of these causes meets us at the very beginning; it exists at this
very moment; it makes it difficult even to gain your attention for what
is to be said. This cause is to be found in the want of sympathy between
persons of very different ages, between what must be, therefore, in the
common course of nature, different degrees of thoughtfulness. It is the
want of sympathy, properly speaking, which creates in these matters a
difficulty of understanding; for the attention and memory are alike apt
to be careless where the mind is not interested; and how can we
understand that to which we scarcely listened, and which we imperfectly
remember? Nature herself seems to lead the old and the young two
different ways: and when the old call upon the young to be thoughtful,
it seems as if they were but calling them to a state contrary to their
nature; and the call is not regarded.
Is it then that we have here an invincible obstacle, which renders all
attempts to inspire thoughtfulness utterly vain? and if it be so, what
use can there be in dwelling upon it? None, certainly, if it were
actually and in all cases invincible; but if it be every thing short of
invincible, there is much good in noticing it. There is much good surely
in trying to impress the great truth, that nature must be overcome by a
mightier power, or we perish. There is much good in meeting and allowing
to its full extent what we are so apt in our folly to regard as an
excuse, and which really is the earnest of our condemnation. It is very
true, and to be allowed to the fullest extent, that it is against the
nature of youth in all ordinary cases to be thoughtful; that it is very
difficult for you even to give your attention to serious things when
spoken of, more difficult still to remember them afterwards and always.
It is for the very reason because it is so difficult, because it is a
work so against nature, to raise the young and careless mind to the
thought of God; because it is so certain that, in the common course of
things, you will not think of Him, but will follow the bent of your own
several fancies or desires, that therefore He, who wills in his love to
bring us to himself, knowing that without the knowledge of Him we must
perish for ever, was pleased to give his only-begotten Son, that
through Him we might overcome nature, and might turn to God and live.
I wish that I could increase, if it were possible, the sense which, you
have of the difficulty of becoming thoughtful, so that you could but see
that out of this very difficulty, and indissolubly connected with it,
comes the grace of Christ's redemption. You have not strength of purpose
enough to shake off folly and sin; surely you have not, or else, why
should Christ have died? It is so hard to come to God; undoubtedly, so
hard that no man can come unto God except God will draw him. Nature
herself leads us to be careless, our very strength and spirits of
themselves will not allow us to reflect. Most true; for that which is
born of the flesh, is flesh; and we inherit a nature derived from him in
whom we all die.
I believe that it is not idle to dwell upon tins; for it is scarcely
possible but that good and earnest resolutions should often enter the
minds of many of you; or, if not resolutions, yet at least wishes,
wishes chilled but too soon, I fear, by the thought or feeling, that
however much to will may be present with you, yet how to perform it you
find not. Now, if this true sense of weakness might but lead any one to
seek for strength where it may be found, then indeed it would be a
feeling no less blessed than true; for it would urge you to seek God's
help and Christ's redemption, instead of desperately yielding to your
weakness, and so remaining weak for ever.
You may look at the prospect before you in all its reality: you may see
how much must be given up, how much withstood, bow much, endured; how
hard it is to alter old ways, not in itself only, but because the change
attracts attention, and is received, it may be, with doubts as to its
sincerity, with irony, and with sneers. There is all this before you: it
cannot be denied; it must not be concealed. The way to life is not broad
and easy; it is not that way which is most trodden. To pass from what we
are to what we may be hereafter, from an earthly nature to an heavenly,
cannot be an easy work, to be done at any time, with no effort, with no
pain. It is the greatest work which is done in the whole world, it is
the mightiest change; death and birth are, as it were, combined in it;
but the Lord of birth and of death is at hand, to enable us to effect
it. Think that this is so; and the more you feel how hard a task is set
before you, the more you will be able to understand the language of joy
and thankfulness with which the Scripture speaks of a human soul's
redemption.
This great work may be wrought for every soul here assembled; the want
of sympathy in sacred and serious things may be changed to sympathy the
most intense; the carelessness of fools may be changed into spiritual
wisdom. It may be wrought for all; but it is more happy to think that it
will be wrought for some;--for whom, no mortal eye or judgment can
discern; but it will be wrought for some. If many should yield in
despair to their enemy, yet some will resist him: if Christ be to many
no more than foolishness, if his name convey nothing more than a vague
sense of something solemn, which passes over the mind for an instant,
and then vanishes, yet to some undoubtedly, he will be found to be the
wisdom of God, and the power of God. There are some here, we may be
quite sure, who will be witnesses for ever to all the world of men and
angels, that what truly was impossible to nature, is possible to nature
renewed and strengthened by grace.
Without such a change, it is vain, I fear, to look for any thing like
wisdom or spiritual understanding; for how can such a seed be expected
to grow in a soil so shallow as common thoughtlessness? and how can
merely human motives have force to overcome so strong a tendency of
nature? nay, how can such motives be brought to act upon the mind? for
it is absolutely impossible that the middle-aged and the young should be
brought into entire sympathy with each other, unless Christ's love be
their common bond. Human wisdom in advanced life may be, and is to
persons of strong faculties of mind, naturally pleasant: but how can it
be made so to persons of ordinary faculties in early youth? There are
faults which society condemns strongly, while the temptation to them in
after life is slight. Persons in middle age may resist these easily, and
abhor them sincerely; but how can we make young persons do the same when
the temptation to commit them is strong, and the condemnation of them by
their society is either very slight, or does not exist at all? And,
therefore, we find that, do what we will, the same faults' continue to
be common in schools, the same faults both of omission and commission;
there is the same inherent difficulty of bringing persons of different
ages and positions to think and feel alike, unless Christ has become
possessed of the thoughts and feelings of both, and so they become one
with each other in him.
But it was our Lord's charge to Peter, "Thou, when thou art converted,
strengthen thy brethren." As sure as it is that some who hear me are
turned, or turning, or will turn, to God, so sure is it that these, be
they few or many, will do something towards the strengthening of their
brethren. Whatever good is to be done amongst us on a large scale, it
must be done only in this way, the many half despairing prayer may be,
"Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief;" but if any one is moved by
Christ's call, and feels within himself that he should like to follow
Christ, and to be with him always, let him cherish that work of the Holy
Spirit within him, which has given him if it be only so much of the will
to be saved. It is a spark which may be quenched in a moment; in itself
it can give no assurance; but if any one watches it carefully, and prays
that it may live and be kindled into a stronger spark, till at last it
break out into a flame, then for him it is full of assurance; God has
heard his prayer; and he has received the gift of the Holy Spirit, an
earnest of his eternal inheritance. Will he not then watch and pray the
more anxiously, lest the fruit which, is now partly formed should never
ripen? Will he not see and feel that there is some reality in the things
of God, that strength, and peace, and victory, are not vainly promised?
Will he not hold fast the things which he has now not heard only, but
known, lest by any means he should let them slip? May God strengthen
such, whoever they may be, with all the might of his Spirit; and may he
be with them even to the end.
But for those,--who they are, again, we know not, nor how many; but
here, also, there will too surely be some,--for those who hear now, as
they have often heard before, words which, they scarcely heed, which,
have at times partially caught their attention, but have not produced in
them the slightest real effect, for them the words are coming to an end;
they will soon be released from the irksome bondage of hearing them; and
another opportunity of grace will have been offered to them in vain.
Tomorrow, and the day after, they will walk as they have walked before,
the wretched slaves of folly and passion; half despairing prayer may
be, "Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief;" but if any one is moved
by Christ's call, and feels within himself that he should like to follow
Christ, and to be with him always, let him cherish that work of the Holy
Spirit within him, which has given him if it be only so much of the will
to be saved. It is a spark which may be quenched in a moment; in itself
it can give no assurance; but if any one watches it carefully, and prays
that it may live and be kindled into a stronger spark, till at last it
break out into a flame, then for him it is full of assurance; God has
heard his prayer; and he has received the gift of the Holy Spirit, an
earnest of his eternal inheritance. Will he not then watch and pray the
more anxiously, lest the fruit which is now partly formed should never
ripen? Will he not see and feel that there is some reality in the things
of God, that strength, and peace, and victory, are not vainly promised?
Will he not hold fast the things which he has now not heard only, but
known, lest by any means he should let them slip? May God strengthen
such, whoever they may be, with all the might of his Spirit; and may he
be with them even to the end.
But for those,--who they are, again, we know not, nor how many; but
here, also, there will too surely be some,--for those who hear now, as
they have often heard before, words which they scarcely heed, which have
at times partially caught their attention, but have not produced in them
the slightest real effect, for them the words are coming to an end; they
will soon be released from the irksome bondage of hearing them; and
another opportunity of grace will have been offered to them in vain.
Tomorrow, and the day after, they will walk as they have walked before,
the wretched slaves of folly and passion; leaving undone all Christ's
work, and greedily doing his enemy's. Yet even these Christ yet spares,
he still calls them, he has died for them. Still the word must be spoken
to them, whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear. It may
be, that they will some day turn; and if not, Christ has perfected his
mercy towards them; and Christ's servants have delivered their own souls
in warning them. May there be but few of us on whom this horrible
portion will fall; yet, is it not an awful thing to think of, that it
will, in all human probability, fall on some? and that whoever hardens
his heart, and resists the word spoken to him this day, he is one who
has done as much as in him lies to make himself among that number.
LECTURE VI.
* * * * *
COLOSSIANS iii. 3.
_Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God_.
When I have spoken, from time to time, of denying ourselves for the sake
of relieving others, although self-denial and charity are, in their full
growth, amongst the highest of Christian graces, yet I have felt much
hope that, up to a certain degree, in their lowest and elementary forms
at least, there might be many that would be disposed to practise them.
For these are virtues which do undoubtedly commend themselves to our
minds as things clearly good: so much so that I am inclined to think
that the much-disputed moral sense, the nature of which is said to be so
hard to ascertain, exists most clearly in the universal perception that
it is good to deny ourselves and to benefit others. I do not say merely
that there is a perception that it is good to deny ourselves in order to
benefit others; but that there is in self-denial, simply, something
which commands respect; an unconscious tribute, I suppose, to the truth,
that the self which, is thus denied is one which, if indulged, would
run to evil.
But a point of far greater difficulty, of absolutely the greatest
difficulty, is to impress upon our minds the excellence of
another quality, which is known by the name of spiritual or
heavenly-mindedness. In fact, this,--and this almost singly,--is the
transcendent part of Christianity; that part of it which is not
according to, but above, nature; which, conscience, I think, itself, in
the natural man, does not acknowledge. When Christianity speaks of
purity, of truth, of justice, of charity, of faith and love to God, it
speaks a language which, however belied by our practice, is at once
allowed by our consciences: the things so recommended are, beyond all
doubt, good and lovely. But when it says, in St. Paul's words, "Set your
affections on things above, not on things on the earth: for ye are dead,
and your life is hid with Christ in God," the language sounds so strange
that it is scarcely intelligible; and if we do get to understand it, yet
it seems to give a wrench, as it were, to our whole being, to command a
thing extravagant and impossible.
I am persuaded that this would be so, more or less, everywhere; but in
how extreme a degree must it hold good amongst us! Even in poverty, in
sickness, and old age, where this life would seem to be nothing but a
burden, and the command to "set the affections on things above" might
appear superfluous, still the known so prevails over the unknown, the
familiar over the incomprehensible, that hope and affection find
continually their objects in this world, there is still a clinging to
life, and an unwillingness to die. But in a state the very opposite to
this, in plenty, in health, in youth; with much of enjoyment actually in
our hands, and more in prospect; with just so much mystery over our
coming life as to keep alive interest, yet with enough known and
understood in its prospects to awaken sympathy; what deafest ear of the
deaf adder could ever be so closed against the voice of the charmer, as
our minds, so engrossed with the enjoyments and the hopes of earth, are
closed against the voice which speaks of the things of heaven?
Again, I have said, when speaking of other subjects, that I looked upon
the older persons among you as a sort of link between me and the
younger, who communicated, in some instances, by their language and
example, something of an impression of the meaning of Christian
teaching. But when we speak of a thing so high as spiritual-mindedness,
it seems as if none of us can be a link between Christ's words and our
brethren's minds: as if we all stand alike at an infinite distance from
the high and unapproachable truth. The mountain of God becomes veiled,
as it were, with the clouds which rested upon Sinai; we cannot approach
near it, but stand far off, for a moment, perhaps, in awe; but soon in
neglect and indifference.
Let any one capable of thinking, but in the full vigour of health of
body and mind, placed far above want, and with the prospect, according
to all probability, of many years of happy life before him, let such an
one go forth, at this season of the year above all, let him see the vast
preparation for life in all nature, amongst all living creatures, in
every tree, and in every plant of grass; let him feel the warmth of the
sun, becoming every day stronger and stronger; let him be possessed, in
every sense, with an impression of the vigour and beauty and glory
around him; and let him feel no less a vigour in himself, too, of body
and mind, and infinitely varied power of enjoyment in so many faculties
of repose and of energy,--and then let him calmly consider what St. Paul
could mean, when he says generally to Christians, "Set your affections
on things above, not on things on the earth; for ye are dead, and your
life is hid with Christ in God."
Let a person capable of thinking, and such as I have supposed in all
other respects, consider what St. Paul could mean by calling him "dead."
With an almost thrilling consciousness of life, with an almost bounding
sense of vigour in body and mind, he is told that he is "dead." And
stranger still, he is told so by one whose recorded life, and existing
writings declare that he too must have had in himself a consciousness of
life no less lively; that there was in him an activity and energy which
neither age nor sufferings could quell; that he wielded an influence
over the minds of thousands, such as kings or conquerors might envy. If
St. Paul could stand by our side, think we that he, any more than
ourselves, would be insensible to the power within him, and to the
beauty and the glory without? Yet his words are recorded; he bids us not
set our affections on things on the earth; he declares of himself, and
of us equally, if we are Christ's servants, that we are dead, and that
our life is hid with Christ in God.
I have put the difficulty in its strongest form, for it is one well
worth considering. What St. Paul here urges is indeed the highest
perfection of Christianity, and therefore of human nature; but it is not
an impossible perfection, and St. Paul's own life and character are our
warrant that it is nothing sickly, or foolish, or fanatical. But let us
first hear the whole of St. Paul's language: "If ye, then, be risen with
Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth at the
right hand of God. Set your affections on things above, not on things on
the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.
When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall we also appear
with him in glory. Mortify therefore your members which are upon the
earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil
concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry." "Mortify," I need
not say, is to make dead, to destroy. "Ye are dead;" therefore let your
members on earth be dead; "fornication, uncleanness, inordinate
affection," &c. As if he had said, By becoming Christians ye engaged to
be dead; and therefore see to it that ye are so. But what he requires us
to make dead or to destroy, are our evil affections and desires; it is
manifest, then, that it is to these that, by becoming Christians, we
engage to become dead.
This is true; and it is most certain that Christ requires us to be dead
only to what is evil. But the essence of spiritual-mindedness consists
in this, that it is assumed that with earth, and all things earthly,
evil or imperfection are closely mixed; so that it is not possible to
set our affections keenly upon, or to abandon ourselves to the enjoyment
of, any earthly thing without the danger of those affections and that
enjoyment becoming evil. In other words, there is that in the state of
things within and around us, which, renders it needful to be ever
watchful; and watchfulness is inconsistent with an intensity of delight
and enjoyment.
For, consider the case which I was just supposing; that lively sense of
the beauty of all nature, that indescribable feeling of delight which
arises out of the consciousness of health, and strength and power.
Suppose that we abandon ourselves to such impressions without restraint,
and is it not manifest that they are the extreme of godless pride and
selfishness? For do we not know that in this world, and close to us
wherever we are, there is, along with all the beauty and enjoyment which
we witness, a large portion also of evil, and of suffering? And do we
not know that He who gave to the earth its richness, and who set the sun
to shine in the heavens, and who gave to us that wonderful frame of body
and mind, whose healthful workings are So delightful to us, that He gave
them that we might use both body and mind in His service; that the
soldier has something else to do than to gaze like a child on the
splendour of his uniform or the brightness of his sword; that those
faculties which we feel as it were burning within us, have their work
before them, a work far above their strength, though multiplied a
thousand fold; that the call to them to be busy is never silent; that
there is an infinite voice in the infinite sins and sufferings of
millions which proclaims that the contest is raging around us; that
every idle moment is treason; that now it is the time for unceasing
efforts; and that not till the victory is gained may Christ's soldiers
throw aside their arms, and resign themselves to enjoyment and to rest?
Then when we turn to the words, "our life is hid with Christ in God,"
the exceeding greatness of Christ's promises rises upon us in something
of the fulness of their reality. Some may know the story of that German
nobleman[12], whose life had been distinguished alike by genius and
worldly distinctions, and by Christian holiness; and who, in the last
morning of his life, when the dawn broke into his sick chamber, prayed
that he might be supported to the window, and might look once again upon
the rising sun. After looking steadily at it for some time, he cried
out, "Oh! if the appearance of this earthly and created thing is so
beautiful and so quickening, how much more shall I be enraptured at the
sight of the unspeakable glory of the Creator Himself!" That was the
feeling of a man whose sense of earthly beauty had all the keenness of a
poet's enthusiasm; but who, withal, had in his greatest health and
vigour preserved the consciousness that his life was hid with Christ in
God; that the things seen, how beautiful soever, were as nothing to the
things which are not seen. And so, if from the feeling of natural
enjoyment we turn, at once thankfully and earnestly, to remember God's
service, and to address ourselves to his work; and sadly remember, that,
although we can enjoy, yet that many are suffering; and that, whilst
they are so, enjoyment in us for more than a brief space of needful rest
cannot but be sin; then there must come upon us, most strongly, the
impression of that life where sin and suffering are not; where not God's
works only, but God Himself is visible; where the vigour and faculties
which we feel within us are not the passing strength of a decaying body,
nor the brief prime of a mind which in a few years must sink into
dotage; but the strength of a body incorruptible and eternal, the
ripeness of a spirit which shall go on growing in wisdom and love
for ever.
[Footnote 12: The Baron Von Canitz.]