That is a profound word of the Psalmist’s “Good and upright is the
Lord; therefore will he teach sinners in the way.” The more clearly we
see the perfect purity and goodness of God, the more conscious shall
we certainly be of our own unlikeness to him. But in that discernment
of his lustrous perfectness, and penitent recognition of our own
sinfulness, there lies hope, not despair. We may be sure that he loves
us too well to keep such sovereign completeness to himself and leave
his poor children stumbling here in the mud and mire. What he is,
he assuredly will desire to make us, so far as it may be. He is the
“giving God” and the poorest and most impure of men may be sure that
God does desire to give him purity of heart and life, and may lift up
the hopeful and bold prayer, “Thy spirit is good, lead me into the land
of uprightness.”
Surely, too, it needs but little experience of life to feel that, if
we are ever to be made good, a divine power is needed to do it. A very
small amount of honest attempt to mend our own characters might teach
each of us that the viper has got far too tight a hold on us for us to
shake it into the fire, and that its poison is in our blood. If you
have ever tried to cure a bad habit, you know how hard it is; and some
of us could tell how the sins that we loathe most hold us in a grip
none the looser because of our disgust at them and ourselves, and,
like a reefer’s knot, their cords are tied the tighter by the pressure
of our resistance against them. It is as impossible for a man to make
himself good, in the deepest sense of the word, as it is for him to
lift himself by his own hand laid on his own collar. There must be some
power outside him to raise. God only can strengthen us to cast out sin.
God only can enlighten our eyes to see lurking evil; he only can give
energy to our wills to root it up, though we drag bleeding fragments
of our hearts with it; he only can give the positive goodness which is
more than mere freedom from evil, and fill the empty chamber with a
guest strong enough to keep out the returning demon and all his crew.
So his Holy Spirit is given to us, if we will, to make us holy. We may,
if we will, have that divine guest in our inmost spirit, molding us
anew, purging the fountains of our will, enlightening our blindness,
fixing our love on all things pure and high, burning up all our evil,
with which in our own strength we have vainly fought, and kindling in
us a flame of self-forgetting love, in which, as in the central fire
of the earth, all the elements of the new nature to be formed within
us are molten together, ready to crystallize into beauty like precious
gems, or to consolidate into strength like the granite mountains. Any
man may, if he will, be “full of the Holy Ghost”—as a vessel is filled
with precious elixir poured into it. Any man may, if he will, have his
whole nature influenced and inhabited by that mighty spirit of whom
we may all be the temples, and which dwells in us not as the image of
the god abides in the shrine, but as our spirits animate our bodies,
being diffused through all our nature, the eye of our seeing, the heart
of our love, the will of our resolve, and in all of us the source of
our goodness, and the life of our better life. “If any man have not
the spirit of Christ, he is none of his.” Let us remember that this
penetration of all our nature with a divine spirit dwelling within us
is _the_ promise of Christianity to every man. No mere love of God
the Father, even if it were brought to us in the grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ would be enough without the communion of the Holy Ghost.
Calvary and Olivet are not sufficient for our victory over sin without
the upper room and the rushing mighty wind. And let us not forget that
the spirit thus given to all Christians is the spirit of illumination
indeed, the spirit of power, rich in his seven-fold energies, and the
source of every endowment of mind and hand and tongue and heart that
we possess, but that his highest and most universal office is to make
us good, and his best name the Holy Spirit. Let us court earnestly the
best gifts, but seek more earnestly still that gift which needs no
special capacity to receive nor any special circumstances to exercise,
but may be claimed by the poorest, and will ennoble the loftiest. Let
others seek for gifts; do you pray for graces. Let who will be great,
do you try to submit to the working of the good Spirit who makes you
good.
Our text carries the analysis a step farther, and shows us how Barnabas
came to be full of the Holy Ghost. It gives us the _condition of
goodness_. He was good because he was full of the spirit, and he was
full of the spirit because he was full of faith. That is the final
explanation of his character.
The spirit of God dwells in a man through his faith. One text speaks
of “the Holy Ghost which they that believe on him should receive,” and
everywhere similar language is held as to the connection between faith
and the dwelling of the spirit of goodness in our hearts. By the act
of trust in Christ, the Lord of the Spirit, we open our natures for
the entrance of the sanctifier, who ever waits to enter in. A man has
to shut his door and pull down his blinds to keep the light out. If we
open ever so minute a crevice, a beam will come in, and the wider we
open, the broader the stream that pours in. So in our simple faith, we
open the door and there pour into our hearts the quickening energies of
that good spirit. The amount of our faith measures the amount of our
possession of the Spirit who makes us good.
Thus faith becomes the condition of goodness, because it is the
condition of the Spirit of God dwelling in us. It brings us into
contact with the electric battery, completes the circuit, and as soon
as the circuit is completed the spark comes. It is also the condition
of goodness, because it implies self-oblivion and self-distrust, and is
the opposite of that self-regard which, as we have seen, is the root
of all evil. The germ of all holiness is in faith, not only because it
brings us under the operation of the divine power which makes holy, but
because it is itself the great antagonist of selfishness.
So Christian morality is the very opposite of the practical heathenism
which lies at the bottom of so much of the teaching of to-day. Trust
thyself, say many voices—it is the beginning of wisdom, strength,
freedom. Distrust thyself and trust Christ, says the Gospel—thereby
alone wilt thou be made pure and blessed. The Babel builders tried to
get up to the heavens by their own building. The Titans tried to storm
it by placing mountain on mountain, but “no man hath ascended up to
heaven.” Better for us to rise thither by that ladder which now binds
together heaven and earth, even Jesus Christ, our brother and our Lord,
by whom all bright-winged angels of help and cleansing will come to
minister to us purity and joy, and by whom we at last, perfected in
goodness, shall pass into that presence, of which the radiant purity
would blast all that had one taint of uncleanness.
Learn the conditions, then, on which you can be good. No goodness
without God’s Spirit—no Spirit without faith. You can not make yourself
better, can not hammer or pare your own nature into purity and
loveliness. But you can put your confidence in Jesus Christ, who will
take your nature into his hands and mold it into a fairest likeness to
himself. You can trust him, who will breathe into you his spirit to
make you holy. If my epitaph is ever to be, “He was a good man,” it
must first be said, “He was full of the Holy Ghost and of faith.” Let
us give up the weary, hopeless work of trying to make ourselves good,
and yield ourselves to him that he may make us like himself, and that
we may have a mightier power ever working in our natures till they are
full of beauty and “holy as God is holy.”
[_December 17._]
THE CONFLICTS OF LIFE.
By BISHOP EDWARD THOMSON, D. D., LL. D.
1. We can not escape difficulty. The air is tainted, the soil churlish,
the ocean tempest tossed. Whether we are in the field or in the
wilderness, on Persian plains or Alpine heights, amid equatorial heats,
or temperate climes, or polar solitudes, we are met by a thousand
obstacles. Earth is cursed, and everywhere she puts forth her thorn in
obedience to her Maker’s withering word. True, the curse is tempered
with the mercy which yields unnumbered blessings to the hand of toil;
nevertheless, it cleaves to all earth’s surface, and turns the key upon
her hidden treasures. We read of cloudless skies, and sunny climes, and
fields which need naught but the sickle; but who finds them? Paradise
is always ahead of the emigrant.
Man is born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward; that is, by a general
law of nature. Hence we find it in want and abundance, in toil and
indolence, in indulgence and restraint, in infancy, in manhood, and in
age. It waits on every pleasure, and every path, and every pursuit—it
dwells within. We can no more escape it than we can fly existence.
Take a few illustrations. A young man resolves to be eminent. Entering
the academy, he finds many difficulties in algebra, and becoming
discouraged he gives it up; but has he liberated himself? No, he has
plunged from great to greater difficulties. How can he unlock the
vaults of mathematics without algebra, their only key? Does he abandon
mathematics, another difficulty seizes him. How can he become educated
without a knowledge of the exact sciences? Does he relinquish his aim
at scholarship? How then, can he carry out his resolution to become
eminent? Will he rescind his resolution? Then challenge him to tame
the restless passions by which it was prompted. Like the fabled ships
of the ancients, “_Incidit in Scyllam qui vult vitare Charybdim_”—he
who endeavors to avoid Charybdis is drawn into the jaws of Scylla. How
many, because of difficulties in their pursuits, become idlers? But
who on earth has more trouble than the idler? A man becomes religious,
and enters the path of life; but he soon finds that the world opposes,
that his passions demur, that his secular plans come in conflict with
his religious efforts, that an invisible adversary stands in the path
to contend every inch of ground with him. He retreats. But now his
difficulties are ten thousand fold greater. He finds that an unseen
footstep treads upon his wandering heels, that an All-seeing eye
surveys his inmost soul, that an invisible hand writes his guilt in
characters indelible on all the objects around him. He must encounter
the stings of conscience, the upbraidings of reason, the admonitions
of the altar, the prayers of Zion, the cross of his dying Christ,
the intercession of his risen Jesus, the moving, mellowing, subduing
influences of the divine Spirit, the ten thousand warnings of a
merciful Providence, the unnumbered monitions of living, decaying,
dying, reviving nature, the very sympathies of heaven, yea, even the
moving entreaties of her compassionate king. The apostate deliberately
contends with conscience, reason, Providence, truth, Zion, men, angels,
God; and in addition to all these the enemies he had before, and
without a single auxiliary in earth, hell, or heaven! Verily, he has
gained.
2. Difficulties invigorate the soul. I do not mean the difficulties
of indolence and disobedience, these are withering curses, but the
difficulties of industry, of obedience.
They are conditions essential to strength. What gives power to the arm
of the smith? The weight of his hammer. What gives swiftness to the
Indian foot? The fleetness of the game. Thus it is with the senses.
What confers exquisite sensibility upon the blind man’s ear? The
curtain which, by hiding the visible universe from his sight, compels
him to give intense regard to the most delicate vibrations that play
upon his tympanum. Thus it is with the intellect. Who is the greatest
reasoner? He who habitually struggles with the worst difficulties that
can be mastered by reason. Some men have fruitless imaginations; but
who are they? Those who have never led their fancies out. The genial
oak planted in a dismal cellar, shut out from the light and air of
heaven, would not grow up and lift its branches to the skies. Plant
your imagination in the heavens, and let it be subject to the high and
holy influences of its pure ether, and its silent lights, and it shall
manifest vitality, and vigor, and upward aspirations.
The memory, too, is strong, if subjected to proper exercise. It
will yield no revenue to the soul that does not tax it; and just
in proportion as it is taxed, will it be found to have capacity of
production. I will add that it is thus with the moral powers. Envy,
jealousy, anger, those bitter fountains which so often tincture the
streams of private and domestic joy, deepen in proportion to the
obstacles through which they flow. Avarice and ambition, those demons
that have desolated the globe with war, derive their overwhelming power
from the difficulties which impede their progress. The daring lover
testifies that love becomes more wild and resistless as great and
romantic difficulties rise around him. What makes the good Christian?
Perpetual trial. He who has experienced the severest storms, and has
most frequently thrown out the Christian anchor, has the strongest
hope. Where shall we expect the firmest faith? At the gate of St.
Peter’s? or at the martyr’s stake? Who is compared to purified silver
or gold? That Christian around whose soul God hath kindled the fires of
his furnace, and kept them glowing till it reflected his own image.
Difficulties give a healthy tone and tendency to the powers. As a
body in a state of inaction becomes lethargic and diseased, so the
intellect, if not kept in vigorous exercise, becomes enfeebled, and
gradually sinks under the sway of the passions. Energetic action is
indispensable to preserve both the body from disease, and the soul from
the dominion of sense.
3. Difficulties develop resources. To prove this it is only necessary
to cite the aphorism—necessity is the mother of invention. She
levels forests, she rears cities, she builds bridges, she prostrates
mountains, she lays her iron pathway from river to river, and from sea
to sea, she baffles the raging elements, and extends her dominion from
earth to air and ocean, she ascends the heavens, and with fearless foot
treads round the zodiac.
4. There is scarce any difficulty that can not be overcome by
perseverance. Trace any great mind to its culmination, and you will
find that its ascent was slow, and by natural laws, and that its
difficulties were such only as ordinary minds can surmount. Great
results, whether physical or moral, are not often the offspring of
giant powers. Genius is more frequently a curse than a blessing. Its
possessor, relying upon his extraordinary gifts, generally falls into
habits of indolence, and fails to collect the materials which are
requisite to useful and magnificent effort. But there is a something
which is sure of success; it is the determination which, having entered
upon a career with full conviction that it is right, pursues it in
calm defiance of all opposition. With such a feeling a man can not but
be mighty. Toil does not weary, pain does not arrest him. Carrying
a compass in his heart, which always points to one bright star, he
allows no footstep to be taken which does not tend in that direction.
Neither the heaving earthquake, nor the yawning gulf, nor the burning
mountain can terrify him from his course; and if the heavens should
fall, the shattered ruins would strike him on his way to his object.
Show me the man who has this principle, and I care not to measure his
blood, nor brains. I ask not his name nor his nation—I pronounce that
his hand will be felt upon his generation, and his mind enstamped upon
succeeding ages.
This attribute is God-like. It may be traced throughout the universe.
It has descended from the skies—it is the great charm of angelic
natures. It is hardly to be contemplated, even in the demon, without
admiration. It is this which gives to the warrior his crown, and
encircles his brow with a halo that, in the estimation of a misjudging
world, neither darkness, nor lust, nor blasphemy, nor blood can
obscure. The bard of Mantua, to whose tomb genius in all ages makes
its willing pilgrimage, never presents his hero in a more attractive
light, than when he represents him, “_tot volvere casus_,” rolling his
misfortunes forward, as a river bearing all opposition before it.
I am well satisfied that it is a sure passport to mental excellence.
Science has no summit too lofty for its ascent—literature has no gate
too strong for its entrance. The graces collect around it, and the
laurel comes at its bidding. Talk not of circumstances. Repudiate
forever that doctrine so paralyzing, so degrading, and yet so general,
“Man is the creature of circumstances.” Rather adopt that other
sentiment, more inspiring to yourselves, more honorable to your nature,
more consonant with truth, Man the architect of his own fortune. I
grant that circumstances have their influence, and that often this is
not small; but there are impulses within, to which things external
are as lava to the volcano. Circumstances are as tools to the artist.
Zeuxis would have been a painter without canvas; Michael Angelo would
have been a sculptor without marble; Herschell would have been a
philosopher without a telescope, and Newton would have ascended the
skies though no apple had ever descended upon his head. One of the
most distinguished surgeons of modern times performed nearly all the
operations of surgery with a razor. West commenced painting in a
garret, and plundered the family cat for bristles to make his brushes.
When Paganini once rose to amuse a crowded auditory with his music,
he found that his violin had been removed, and a coarse instrument
substituted for it. Explaining the trick, he said to the audience, “Now
I will show you that the music is _not in my violin_, but _in me_.”
Then drawing his bow, he sent forth sounds sweet as ever entranced
delighted mortals. Be assured, the world is a coarse instrument at
best, and if you would send forth sweet sounds from its strings, there
must be music in your fingers. Fortune may favor, but do not rely upon
her—do not fear her. Act upon the doctrine of the Grecian poet,
“I seek what’s to be sought—
I learn what’s to be taught—
I beg the rest of heav’n.”
Talk not of genius. I grant there are differences in mind, originally,
but there is mind enough in every ordinary human skull, if its
energies are properly directed, to accomplish mighty results. Fear not
obstacles. What are your difficulties? Poverty? ignorance? obscurity?
Have they not all been overcome by a host well known to fame? But
perchance you climb untrodden heights. Nevertheless, fear to set down
any obstacle as insuperable. Look at the achievements of man in the
natural and moral worlds, and then say whether you dare set down any
difficulty as insurmountable, or whether you are ready to prescribe
boundaries to the operations of human power.
Are you destined to maintain the worship of the true God amid the
darkness of infidelity? Daniel in the den of lions, Shadrach, Meshech,
and Abednego, in the flames of the furnace, and a long line of
illustrious martyrs, shouting hosannas from the flames, put forth their
hands from the stake to beckon you onward. Are you destined to plant
the Gospel in heathen lands—an enterprise the most daring and glorious
in which mortals can engage? Do you imagine you can meet a difficulty
which the apostle Paul did not vanquish? But he was an apostle, yea,
and the most successful of all the apostles. And what was the secret of
his success? Was it his learning? The gift of tongues made the other
apostles his equals in this respect. Was it his eloquence? Doubtless
he was eloquent; but Apollos, too, was eloquent and mighty in the
Scriptures. Was it his inspiration? But were not others inspired, also?
It was his firmness and perseverance. When he preached Christ Jesus and
him crucified, nothing could drive or divert, or daunt him: “This one
thing I do,” etc.
Are you called to meet bigotry and superstition, armed with learning,
power, and wealth? See Luther braving the thunders of the Vatican, and
hear him say, “I would go to Worms were there as many devils there as
there are tiles on the houses,” and then affirm, if you dare, that
it is your duty to succumb to your difficulties. Are you destined,
which heaven forbid, to lead an army to resist invaders, or advance
to conquest? Ask Cæsar, Hannibal, Pyrrhus, Alexander, what kind of
difficulties may be overcome by decision of character. Have you
undertaken to ascend from poverty and obscurity to eminence and wealth?
Ask the field or the cabinet, any profession whatever, or either house
of Congress, whether there are any difficulties which will not yield to
firmness and perseverance, and ten thousand voices shall respond, in
animating accents, No.
[_December 24._]
CHRISTMAS SONGS.
THE BEAUTIFUL SONG.
There’s a song in the air,
There’s a star in the sky,
There’s a mother’s deep prayer,
And a baby’s low cry,
And the star rains its fire while the beautiful sing,
For the manger of Bethlehem cradles a King!
There’s a tumult of joy
O’er the wonderful birth,
For the Virgin’s sweet boy
Is the Lord of the earth.
Aye, the star rains its fire, and the beautiful sing,
For the manger of Bethlehem cradles a King!
In the light of the star
Lie the ages impearl’d;
And that song from afar
Has swept over the world:
Every hearth is aflame, and the beautiful sing
In the homes of the nations that Jesus is King!
We rejoice in the light,
And we echo the song
That comes down through the night
From the heavenly throng.
Aye, we shout to the lovely evangel they bring,
And we greet in his cradle our Savior and King.
J. G. HOLLAND.
THE NATIVITY OF CHRIST.
Night of wonder, night of glory,
Night all solemn and serene,
Night of old prophetic story,
Such as time has never seen:
Sweetest darkness, softest blue
That these fair skies ever knew.
Night of beauty, night of gladness,
Night of nights—of nights the best;
Not a cloud to speak of sadness,
Not a star but sings of rest:
Holy midnight, beaming peace,
Never shall thy radiance cease.
Happy city, dearest, fairest,
Blessed, blessed Bethlehem!
Least, yet greatest, noblest, rarest,
Judah’s ever-sparkling gem;
Out of thee there comes the Light
That dispelleth all our night.
Now thy King to thee descendeth,
Borne upon a woman’s knee;
To thy gates his steps he bendeth,
To the manger cometh he;
David’s Lord and David’s Son,
This his cradle and his throne.
He, the lowliest of the lowly,
To our sinful world has come;
He, the holiest of the holy,
Can not find a human home.
All for us he yonder lies,
All for us he lives and dies.
Babe of weakness, child of glory,
At thy cradle thus we bow;
Poor and sad thy earthly story,
Yet the King of glory thou:
By all heaven and earth adored,
David’s Son and David’s Lord.
Light of life, thou liest yonder,
Shining in thy heavenly love;
Naught from thee our souls shall sunder,
Naught from us shall thee remove:
Take these hearts and let them be
Throne and cradle both to thee!
HORATIUS BONAR.
CHRISTMAS HYMN.
O North, with all thy vales of green!
O South, with all thy palms!
From peopled towns, and fields between,
Uplift thy voice of psalms.
Raise, ancient East, the anthem high,
And let the youthful West reply.
Lo, in the clouds of heaven appears
God’s well-beloved Son;
He brings a train of brighter years,
His kingdom is begun.
He comes a guilty world to bless,
With mercy, truth, and righteousness.
Oh Father, haste the promised hour,
When at his feet shall lie
All rule, authority, and power,
Beneath the ample sky;
When he shall reign, from pole to pole,
The Lord of every human soul;
When all shall heed the words he said,
Amid their daily cares,
And by the loving life he led,
Shall strive to pattern theirs;
And he who conquer’d death shall win
The mightier conquest over sin.
ON CHRISTMAS EVE.
By the firelight’s quivering crimson,
While the winter sun sinks low,
Let us watch till the first vague star, wife,
Has dawned o’er the glooming snow;
For if ever our lost ones may wander from the realms of their rest,
I believe
That they seek us as visiting angels in the dusk of the Christmas
Eve.
And our lonelier anguish of longing,
Our thrills of in tenser despair,
Are born—who may tell?—of a viewless embrace
Or a shadowy hand on our hair!
O, the darlings are near us to-night, wife, as we watch the soft
hearth-glimmer weave
Strange pictures on ceiling and curtain in the dusk of the Christmas
Eve!
And pitiful memory’s enchantment
Has mingled the gloom round us cast,
With a glow as from ashes of embers
That crumble on hearths of the past!
And a note of boy-laughter, long vanish’d, or the gold of a ringlet,
each leaves
An echo—a gleam—that forever must haunt the dusk of our Christmas
Eves!