I believe it to be positively and literally true that he that seeketh,
findeth. I do not mean that a man will always find what he seeks. I
do not know that the promise implies that. I fancy it covers a far
wider range, and embraces a much ampler truth. Yes, I doubt if any man
ever yet sought without finding. When I was a boy I lost my peg-top.
It was a somewhat expensive one, owing partly to the fact that it would
really spin. I noticed this peculiarity about it whilst it was still
the property of its previous possessor. I had several tops; indeed, my
pockets bulged out with my ample store, but none of them would spin.
After pointing out to the owner of the coveted top the frightful
unsightliness of his treasure, and in other ways seeking to lower the
price likely to be demanded as soon as negotiations opened, I at length
secured the top in return for six marbles, a redoubtable horse
chestnut, and a knife with a broken blade. My subsequent alarm, on
missing so costly a possession, can be readily imagined. I could not
be expected to endure so serious a deprivation without making a
desperate effort to retrieve my fallen fortunes. I therefore
proclaimed to all and sundry my inflexible determination to ransack the
house from the top brick of the chimney to the darkest recesses of the
cellar in quest of my vanished treasure. I began with a queer old
triangular cupboard that occupied one corner of the kitchen. And in
the deepest and dustiest corner of the top shelf of that cavernous old
cupboard, what should I find but the cricket ball that I had lost the
previous summer? My excitement was so great that I almost fell off the
table on which I was standing. As soon as the flicker of my candle
fell on the ball I distinctly remembered putting it there. I argued
that it was the only place in the house that I could reach, and that my
brother couldn't, and consequently the only place in the house that was
really safe. The fact that the ball had remained there, untouched, all
through the cricket season abundantly demonstrated the justice of my
conclusion. My jubilation was so exuberant that it drove all thought
of the peg-top out of my mind. There is such a thing as the expulsive
power of an old affection as well as the expulsive power of a new
affection. My delight over my new-found cricket ball entirely
dispelled my grief over my missing peg-top. Indeed, I am not sure to
this day whether I ever saw that peg-top again. I may have
inadvertently deposited it on a shelf that my brother could reach; but
after the lapse of so many years I will endeavour to harbour no dark
suspicions. In any case, it does not matter. What is a paltry peg-top
compared with a half-guinea cricket ball? I had sought, and I had
found. I had not found what I had sought, nor had I sought what I had
found. Perhaps if I had continued my search for the peg-top with the
enthusiasm and assiduity with which I had lugged the kitchen table up
to the corner cupboard, I should have found it. Perhaps if I had
searched for the cricket ball with the same zest that marked my quest
of the peg-top, I should have found it. But that is not my point. My
point is the point with which I set out. I do not believe that a case
of a really unsuccessful search has ever been recorded. He that
seeketh, findeth, depend upon it.
The days of the peg-top and the cricket ball seem a long way behind me
now, and I am glad that the fate of the queer old corner cupboard has
been mercifully hidden from my eyes. But, by sea and land, the
principle that I first discovered when I stood on tiptoe on the kitchen
table has followed me all down the years. The secret that I learned
that day has acted like a talisman, and has turned every spot that I
have visited into an enchanted ground. Even my study table is not
immune from its magic spell. A more prosaic spectacle never met the
eye. The desk, the pigeon-holes, the drawers, and the piles of papers
might have to do with a foundry or a fish-market, so very unromantic do
they appear. And yet, what times I have whenever I manage to lose
something! It is almost worth while losing something just for the fun
of looking for it! If a catalogue or a circular will only go astray,
all the excitements of a chase lie open before me. And the things that
I shall find! I shall come on letters that will make me laugh and
letters that will make me cry. Hullo, what's this? Dear me, I must
write to so-and-so, or he will think I have forgotten him! And just
look here! I must run round and see what's-his-name this afternoon,
and fix this matter up. And so I go on. The probability is that I
shall no more find the catalogue that set me searching than I found the
peg-top in the days of auld lang syne; but what has that to do with it?
Look at the things I have found, the memories I have revived, the tasks
that have been suggested! Life has been incalculably enriched by the
fruits of this search through the papers on my study table. If I do
not find the peg-top-papers for which I sought, I have found
cricket-ball-papers immensely more valuable, and the rapture of my
sensational discoveries renders the fate of my poor peg-top-papers a
matter of comparative indifference. The series of thrills produced by
such a search is reminiscent of the emotions with which I enjoyed my
first magic-lantern entertainment. On they came, one after another,
those wonderful, wonderful pictures in the darkness. On they came, one
after another, these startling surprises from out these musty-fusty
piles of papers. A search is really a marvellous experience. The
imagination flies with lightning rapidity from one world of things to
another and another as the papers rustle between the fingers. John
Ploughman used to say that, even if the fowls got nothing by it, it did
them good to scratch. I am not a poultry expert, as I am frequently
reminded, but I dare say that there is a wealth of wisdom in the
observation. At any rate, I know that, in my own case, the success or
failure of my search expeditions stand in no way related to the
original object of my quest. I never remember having set out to look
for a thing, and afterwards regretted having done so.
I was wondering the other day if the same principle applied to other
people, and I cruelly determined on a little experiment. My girls
collect orchids, and much of their time in the city is spent in
recounting the foraging expeditions that they have conducted in happy
days gone by, and in anticipating similar adventures in the golden
times before them. Some of the pleasantest holidays that we have
enjoyed together have been spent away in the heart of the bush where
Nature runs riot and revels in undisturbed profusion. It is delightful
to see them come traipsing along the track through the bush, their
faces flushed with the excitement of their foray, and their arms filled
with the booty they have gathered. They are tired, evidently, but not
too tired to run when they catch sight of us. 'Look at this!' cries
one; and 'Isn't that a pretty colour?' asks the other. 'Did you ever
see one that shape before?' 'Fancy finding one of these!' And so on.
And then the evening is spent in pressing and classifying the treasures
they have gathered.
One day they came back, earlier than usual, and showed us their
discoveries.
'But, oh, father, it was an awful shame! You know that kind that Ella
Simpson showed us once, and told us they were very rare? Well, we
found one of those, a real beauty, away over in that valley beyond the
sandhills; and on the way home we lost it. Wasn't it a pity?'
'Do you mean the little pale blue one, with the orange fringe?' I
inquired.
'Yes, and it was just in full flower, and ready for picking.'
'It was a pity,' I confessed, 'for, do you know I specially want one of
those. Do you think you could go back and try hard to find one?'
They agreed. I advised them to search with the greatest care, and to
poke into places that they had not disturbed before. They returned an
hour later with no further specimen of the blue and orange variety,
although on a subsequent date they succeeded in unearthing one, but
they were rejoicing over a number of very rare specimens that are now
considered among the most valuable in their collection.
In _It is Never Too Late to Mend_, Charles Reade has a story that is
right into our hands just here. 'Once upon a time,' he makes one of
his characters say, 'once upon a time there was an old chap who had
heard about treasure being found in odd places, a pot full of guineas
or something; and it took root in his heart. One morning he comes down
and says to his wife, "It is all right, old woman; I've found the
treasure!" "No, have you, though?" says she. "Yes," says he;
"leastways, it is as good as found; it is only waiting till I've had my
breakfast, and then I'll go out and fetch it in!" "La, John, but how
did you find it!" "It was revealed to me in a dream," says John, as
grave as a judge; "it is under a tree in the orchard." After breakfast
they went to the plantation, but John could not again recognize the
tree. "Drat your stupid old head," cried his wife, "why didn't you put
a nick on the right one at the time?" But John was not to be beaten.
He resolved to dig under every tree. How the neighbours laughed! But
springtime came. Out burst the trees. "Wife," says he, "our bloom is
richer than I have known it this many a year; it is richer than our
neighbours'!" Bloom dies, and then out come about a million little
green things quite hard. In the autumn the old trees were staggering,
and the branches down to the ground with the crop; and so the next
year, and the next; sometimes more, sometimes less, according to the
year. The trees were old, and wanted a change. His letting in the air
to them, and turning the subsoil up to the frost and sun, had renewed
their youth.' And so poor John found his treasure. It was not exactly
the pot of guineas that he sought; but it was just as valuable, and
probably afforded him a deeper gratification. He did not find what he
sought, but who shall say that his search was unsuccessful? He that
seeketh, findeth. There is no case on record of a really fruitless
search.
Mr. Gilbert West and Lord Lyttelton once undertook to organize a
campaign to expose the fictitious character of the biblical narrative.
In order to make their attack the more damaging and the more effective
they agreed to specialize. Mr. West promised to study thoroughly the
story of the Resurrection of Jesus. Lord Lyttelton selected as the
point of his assault the record of the conversion of Paul. They
separated; and each began a careful and exhaustive search for
inaccuracies, incongruities, and contradictions in the documents. They
were engaged in exposing error, they said, and in searching after
truth. Yes, they were searching after truth, and they sought with
earnestness and sincerity. They were searching after truth, and they
found it. For when, at the appointed time, they met to arrange the
details of their projected campaign, each had to confess to the other
that he had become convinced of the authenticity of the records and had
yielded to the claims of Christ! Here was a search! Here was a find!
They sought what they never found, and they found what they never
sought. Was the search unsuccessful? Seekers after truth, they
called themselves; and did they not find the Truth? Like the Magi,
they followed a star in the firmament with which they were familiar.
But, to their amazement, the star led them to the Saviour, and neither
of them ever regretted participating in so astonishing a quest.
'And thus,' as Oliver Cromwell finely says, 'to be a seeker is to be of
the best sect next to a finder, and such an one shall every faithful
humble seeker be at the end.' It always seems to me that the old
Puritan's lovely letter to his daughter, the letter from which I have
just quoted, is the gem of Carlyle's great volume. Bridget was
twenty-two at the time. 'Your sister,' her father tells her, 'is
exercised with some perplexed thoughts. She sees her own vanity and
carnal mind, and, bewailing it, she seeks after what will satisfy. And
thus to be a seeker is to be of the best sect next to a finder, and
such an one shall every faithful humble seeker be at the end. Happy
seeker; happy finder! Dear heart, press on! Let not husband, let not
anything, cool thy affections after Christ!'
With which strong, tender, fatherly words from an old soldier to his
young daughter we may very well take leave of the subject. 'Happy
seeker; happy finder! Dear heart, press on!' Oliver Cromwell knew
that there is no such thing as a fruitless search. If we do not come
upon our shining treasure in the exact form that our ignorance had
fancied, we discover it after a similitude that a much higher wisdom
has ordained. But the point is that we do find it. That was the
lesson that I learned as I peered into the abysmal darkness of the
mysterious old cupboard in my childhood, and the longer I live the more
certain I become of its truth.
VII
WITH THE WOLVES IN THE WILD
I
I like to think that Jesus spent forty nights of His wondrous life out
in the Wild with the wolves. 'He was with the wild beasts,' Mark tells
us, and the statement is not recorded for nothing. Night is the great
leveller. Desert and prairie are indistinguishable in the night.
Night folds everything in sable robes, and the loveliest landscape is
one with the dreariest prospect. North and South, East and West, are
all alike in the night. Here is the Wild of the West. 'A vast silence
reigned,' Jack London tells us. 'The land itself was a desolation,
lifeless, without movement, so lone and cold that the spirit of it was
not even that of sadness. There was a hint in it of laughter--the
masterful and incommunicable wisdom of eternity laughing at the
futility of life and the effort of life. It was the Wild--the savage,
frozen-hearted Northern Wild!' Here, I say, is the Wild. And here is
the life of the Wild: 'Bill opened his mouth to speak, but changed his
mind. Instead, he pointed towards the wall of darkness that pressed
about them from every side. There was no suggestion of form in the
utter blackness; only could be seen a pair of eyes gleaming like live
coals. Henry indicated with his hand a second pair and a third. A
circle of the gleaming eyes had drawn about their camp. Now and again
a pair of eyes moved, or disappeared to appear again a moment later.'
What did it mean--those restless flashing eyes, like fireflies breaking
across the surface of the darkness? It simply meant that they were in
the Wild at night, and they were with the wild beasts. And what does
it mean, this vivid fragment from my Bible? It means that _He_ was in
the Wild at night, night after night for forty nights, and _He_ was
with the wild beasts. He heard the roar of the lion as it awoke the
echoes of the slumbering forest. He saw the hyena pass stealthily near
Him in the track of a timid deer, and watched the cheetah prowl through
the brushwood in pursuit of a young gazelle. He heard the squeal of
the hare as the crouching fox sprang out; and the flutter of the
partridge as the jackal seized its prey. He heard the slither of the
viper as it glided through the grass beside His head; and was startled
by the shrieking of the nightbirds, and the flapping of their wings, as
they whirled and swooped about Him. And He too saw the gleaming eyes
of the hungry wolves as they drew their fierce cordon around Him. For
He was out in the Wild for forty nights, and He was with the wild
beasts.
II
And yet He was unhurt! Now why was He unharmed those forty nights with
the scrub around Him alive with claws and talons and fangs? He was
with the wild beasts, Mark tells us, and yet no lion sprang upon Him;
no lone wolf slashed at Him with her frightful fangs; no serpent bit
Him.
'Henry,' said one of Jack London's heroes to the other, as they watched
the wolfish eyes flashing hither and thither in the darkness, 'it's an
awful misfortune to be out of ammunition!'
But _He_ was unarmed and unprotected! No blade was in His hand; no
ring of fire blazed round about Him to affright the prowling brutes.
And yet He was unharmed! Not a tooth nor a claw left scratch or gash
upon Him! Why was it? It will never do to fall back upon the
miraculous, for the very point of the story of the Temptation is His
sublime refusal to sustain Himself by superhuman aid. By the
employment of miracle He could easily have commanded the stones to
become bread, and He might thus have grandly answered the taunt of the
Tempter and have appeased the gnawings of His body's hunger at one and
the same time. But it would have spoiled everything. He went into the
Wild to be tempted 'like as we are tempted'; and since miracle is not
at _our_ disposal He would not let it be at _His_. It is impossible,
therefore, to suppose that He scorned the aid of miracle to protect Him
from hunger, but called in the aid of miracle to protect Him from the
beasts.
Now in order to solve this problem I turned to my Bible, beginning at
the very beginning. And there, in the very first chapter, I found the
explanation. 'Have dominion,' God said, 'over the fish of the sea, and
over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon
the earth.' There was nothing really miraculous in Christ's authority
over the fish. I never see a man dangling with a line without a sigh
for our lost dominion. There was nothing really miraculous in Christ's
immunity from harm. The wolves did not tear Him; He told them not to
do so. He was a man, just such a man as God meant all men to be. And
therefore He 'had dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl
of the air, and over every living thing that creepeth upon the earth.'
He was unscathed in the midst of the wolves, not because He was
superhuman, but because He was truly human. We are something less than
human, the wrecks and shadows of men. Having forfeited the authority
of our humanity, the fish no longer obey us, and we have perforce to
dangle for them with hooks and strings. The wolves and the tigers no
longer stand off at our command, and we have to fall back upon
camp-fires and pistols. It is very humiliating! The crown is fallen
from our heads, and all things finned and furred and feathered mock us
in our shame. But Thine, O Man of men, is the power and the dominion,
and all the creatures of the Wild obey Thee! 'He was with the wild
beasts.'
III
What did those wild, dumb, eloquent eyes say to Jesus as they looked
wonderingly at Him out there in the Wild? As they bounded out of the
thicket, crouched, stared at Him, and slunk away, what did they say to
Him, those great lean wolves? And what did He say to them? Animals
are such eloquent things, especially at such times. 'The foxes have
holes,' Jesus said, long afterwards, remembering as He said it how He
watched the creatures of the Wild seek out their lairs. 'And the birds
of the air have nests,' He said, remembering the twittering and
fluttering in the boughs above His head as the feathered things settled
down for the night. 'But the Son of Man hath not where to lay His
head,' He concluded, as He thought of those long, long nights in the
homeless Wild. Did He mean that the wolves were better off than He
was? We are all tempted to think so when the conflict is pressing too
hardly upon us. There seems to be less choice, and therefore less
responsibility, among the beasts of the field; less play of right and
wrong. 'I think,' said Walt Whitman--
I think I could turn and live with animals, they are so
placid and self-contained;
I stand and look at them sometimes an hour at a stretch.
They do not sweat and whine about their condition,
They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins,
They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God,
Not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with the mania
of owning things,
Not one kneels to another, nor to his kind that lived
thousands of years ago,
Not one is respectable or industrious over the whole earth.
Was some flitting, hovering thought like this part of the Temptation in
the Wild? Is that what Mark means when he says so significantly that
'He was with the wild beasts'? Surely; for He was tempted in _all_
points like as we are, and we have all been tempted in this. 'Good old
Carlo!' we have said, as we patted the dog's head, looking down out of
our eyes of anguish into his calm, impassive gaze. 'Good old Carlo,
you don't know anything of such struggles, old boy!' And we have
fancied for a moment that Carlo had the best of it. It was a black and
blasphemous thought, and He struck it away, as we should strike at a
hawk that fluttered in front of our faces and threatened to pick at our
eyes. But for one moment it hovered before Him, and He caught its ugly
glance. It is a very ugly glance. Our capacity for great inward
strife and for great inward suffering is the one proof we have that we
were made in the image of God.
IV
Was He thinking, I wonder, when He went out to the wolves in the Wild
of those who, before so very long, would be torn to pieces by hungry
beasts for His dear sake?
'To-day,' said Amplonius, a teacher of the persecuted Roman Christians,
'to-day, by the cruel order of Trajan, Ignatius was thrown to the wild
beasts in the arena. He it was, my children, whom Jesus took, when as
yet he was but a little child, and set him in the midst of the
disciples and said, "Except ye be converted, and become as little
children, ye cannot enter the kingdom of heaven." And now, from the
same Lord who that day laid His sacred hands upon his head, he has
received the martyr crown. But Ignatius did not fear the beasts, my
children. I have seen a letter which he wrote but yesterday to the
aged Polycarp, the angel of the Church of Smyrna. In it he says that
the hungry creatures have no terrors for him. "Would to God," he said,
"that I were come to the beasts prepared for me. I wish that, with
their gaping mouths, they were now ready to rush upon me. Let the
angry beasts tear asunder my members so that I may win Christ Jesus."
Thus Ignatius wrote but yesterday to the beloved Polycarp; and to-day,
with a face like the face of an angel, he gave himself to the wolves.
We know not which of us shall suffer next, my children. The people are
still crying wildly, "The Christians to the lions!" It may be that I,
your teacher, shall be the next to witness for the faith. But let us
remember that for forty days and forty nights Jesus was Himself with
the wild beasts, and not one of them durst harm Him. And He is still
with the wild beasts wherever we His people, are among them; and their
cruel fangs can only tear us so far as it is for our triumph and His
glory.' So spake Amplonius, and the Church was comforted.
And at this hour there is, in the catacomb at St. Callixtus, at Rome, a
rude old picture of Jesus among the untamed creatures of the Wild. The
thought that lions and leopards crouched at His feet in the days of His
flesh, and were subject unto Him, was very precious to the hunted and
suffering people.
V
Sometimes, too, I fancy that He saw, in these savage brutes that harmed
Him not, a symbol and a prophecy of His own great conquest. For they,
with their hateful fangs and blooded talons, were part of His vast
constituency. 'The whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain
together,' Paul declares. Richard Jefferies pointed to a quaint little
English cottage beside a glorious bank of violets. But he could never
bring himself to pluck the fragrant blossoms, for, in the cottage, the
dreaded small-pox had once raged. 'It seemed,' says Jefferies, 'to
quite spoil the violet bank. There is something in disease so
destructive; as it were, to flowers.' And as the violets shared the
scourge, so the creatures shared the curse. And as they stared dumbly
into the eyes of the Son of God they seemed to half understand that
their redemption was drawing nigh. 'In Nature herself,' as Longfellow
says, 'there is a waiting and hoping, a looking and yearning, after an
unknown something. Yes, when above there, on the mountain, the lonely
eagle looks forth into the grey dawn to see if the day comes not; when
by the mountain torrent the brooding raven listens to hear if the
chamois is returning from his nightly pasture in the valley; and when
the rising sun calls out the spicy odours of the Alpine flowers, then
there awake in Nature an expectation and a longing for a future
revelation of God's majesty.' Did He see this brooding sense of
expectancy in the fierce eyes about Him? And did He rejoice that the
hope of the Wild would in Him be gloriously fulfilled? Who knows?
In his _Cloister and the Hearth_, Charles Reade tells of the temptation
and triumph of Clement the hermit. 'And one keen frosty night, as he
sang the praises of God to his tuneful psaltery, and his hollow cave
rang with his holy melody, he heard a clear whine, not unmelodious. It
became louder. He peeped through the chinks of his rude door, and
there sat a great red wolf moaning melodiously with his nose high in
the air! Clement was delighted. "My sins are going," he cried, "and
the creatures of God are owning me!" And in a burst of enthusiasm he
sang:
Praise Him, all ye creatures of His!
Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord!
And all the time he sang the wolf bayed at intervals.' Did Jesus, I
wonder, see the going of the world's sin and the departure of its
primal curse in the faces of the wild things that howled and roared
around Him? As the fierce things prowled around Him and left Him
unharmed, did He see a symbol of His final subjugation of all earth's
savage and restless elements? Who shall say?
VI
'He was with the wild beasts,' says Mark, 'and the angels ministered
unto Him.' Life always hovers between the beasts and the angels; and
however wolfish may be the eyes that affright us in the day of our
temptation, we may be sure that our solitary struggle is watched by
invisible spectators, and that, after the baying of the beasts, we
shall hear the angels sing.
VIII
DICK SUNSHINE
Dick Sunshine was not his real name; at least so they said. But the
thing that they called his real name did not describe him a scrap; it
seemed to abandon all attempt at description as hopelessly impossible;
but when you called him Dick Sunshine it fitted him like a glove. That
is the immense advantage that nicknames possess over real names. Of
all real things, real names are the most unreal. There is no life in
them. They stand for nothing; they express nothing; they reveal
nothing. They bear no kind of relationship to the unfortunate
individuals who are sentenced to wear them, like meaningless badges,
for the term of their natural lives. But nicknames, on the other hand,
sparkle and flash; they bring the man himself vividly and palpitatingly
before you; and without more introduction or ado, you know him at once
for what he is. That is the reason why we prefer to be called by our
real names. We know in our secret souls that our nicknames are our
true names, and that our real names are mere tags and badges; but we
prefer the meaningless tag to the too candid truth. There are obvious
disadvantages in being constantly spoken of as Mr. Grump, Mrs.
Crosspatch, or Miss Spitfire; whereas Mr. Smith, Mrs. Robinson, or Miss
Jones are much safer and more non-committal. But, for all that, the
nicknames, depend upon it, are the true names. Nicknames reveal the
man; real names conceal the man. And since, in the case of my present
hero, I desire to reveal everything and to conceal nothing, it is
obviously desirable to speak of him by his nickname, which is his true
name, rather than by his real name, which is a mere affectation and
artificiality. He was always Dick Sunshine to me, and I noticed that
the children always called him Dick Sunshine, and children are not
easily deceived. Besides, he _was_ Dick Sunshine, so what is the use
of beating about the bush?
Who was Dick Sunshine? It is difficult to say. He was partly a grocer
and party a consumptive. He spent half his time laughing, and half his
time coughing. He only stopped laughing in order to cough; and he only
stopped coughing in order to laugh. You could always tell which he was
doing at any particular time by taking a glance at the shop. If the
shop was open, you knew that Dick was behind the counter laughing. If
it was closed, you knew that he was in bed coughing. A fine-looking
fellow was Dick, or would have been if only his health had given him a
chance. Fine wavy golden hair tossed in naïve disorder about his lofty
forehead; and a small pointed golden beard set off a frank, cheery,
open face. Somehow or other, there was a certain touch of chivalry
about Dick, although it is not easy to say exactly how it made itself
felt. It was a certain knightly bearing, perhaps, a haughty contempt
for his own suffering, a rollicking but resolute refusal of anything in
the shape of pity. Coughing or laughing, there was always a roguish
little twinkle in the corner of his eye, a kind of danger signal that
kept you on constant guard lest his next sally should take you by
surprise.
The church at North-East Valley has had its ups and downs, like most
churches, but as long as Dick was its secretary it never had a gloomy
church meeting. However grave or unexpected might be the crisis, he
came up smiling, and greeted the unseen with a cheer. When things were
going well, he always made the most of it, and drew attention to the
encouraging features in the church's outlook. If things were so-so, he
pointed out that they might have been a great deal worse, and that the
church was putting up a brave fight against heavy odds. If anybody
criticized the minister, Dick was on his feet in a minute. Could the
minister do everything? Dick wanted to know. Was he solely
responsible for the unsatisfactory conditions? Why, anybody who
watches the minister can see that the poor man is doing his best,
which, Dick slyly added, is more than can be said for some of us! And
the ministers of North-East Valley used to tell me that when they
themselves got down in the dumps, Dick treated their collapse as a
glorious joke. He would come down to the Manse and laugh until he
coughed, and cough until he could laugh again, and, by the time that he
stopped laughing and coughing, the masses of his golden hair were
tumbled about his high forehead like shocks of corn blown from the
stocks by playful winds in harvest-time; and when he went home to
finish his coughing, the Manse was flooded with the laughter and the
sunshine that he had left behind him.
I was sitting one morning in my study at Mosgiel, when there came a
ring at the front door bell. On answering it, I found myself standing
face to face with Dick. He was laughing so violently that he could at
first scarcely salute me. He followed me into the study, and assured
me as he sank into a chair that it was the fun of the world. I asked
him to explain the cause of his boisterous merriment.
'Had to give it up!' he gasped. 'The doctors told me that I should die
in a week if I remained in the shop any longer. So I've left it to
look after itself, and come away. No fun in dying in a week, you know!'
I admitted that there was something in that, and inquired what he was
going to do now.
'That's the joke!' he roared, between laughter and coughing. 'I've
come to stay with you.'
There was nothing for it but to let him take his time, so I patiently
awaited further explanation. At length it came.
'Just as I was locking up the shop,' he said, presently, 'I heard that
the temperance people wanted a lecturer and organizer to work this
district. Except the lecturing, it will be all open-air work, so I
applied for it, and got it!'
'But, my dear fellow,' I remonstrated, 'I never knew that you could
lecture. Why, outside the church meeting, you never made a speech in
your life!'
'That's part of the joke!' he cried, going off again into a paroxysm of
laughter. 'But I told them that you would help me at the first, and
they appointed me on that condition. So this is to be my head
quarters!'
His duties were to commence the following week, and we arranged that he
should make his debut as a lecturer at a place called Outram, about
eight miles across country from Mosgiel. I promised to accompany him,
and to fill up such time as he found it impossible or inconvenient to
occupy. In the meantime he got to work with his visiting and
organizing. The open air suited him, his health improved amazingly,
and the Mosgiel Manse simply rocked under the storms of his boisterous
gaiety. Sometimes the shadow of the coming ordeal spread itself
heavily over his spirit, and he came to the study with unwonted gravity
to ask how this or that point in his maiden effort had better be
approached. To prevent his anxiety under this head from becoming too
much for his fragile frame, I lent him a book, and sent him out on to
the sunlit verandah to read it. It chanced to be _The Old Curiosity
Shop_. He had never read anything of Dickens, and it opened a new
world to him. I have never seen anybody fall more completely under the
spell of the magician. From the study I would hear him suddenly yell
with laughter, and come rushing through the hall to read me some
passage that had just captivated his fancy. Whenever he came stealing
along like a thief, I knew it was to talk about the lecture; when he
came like an incarnate thunderstorm, I knew it was about the book.
One passage in the famous story especially appealed to him. It was the
part about Codlin and Short, the Punch and Judy men. In the middle of
dinner, without the slightest provocation or warning, he would suddenly
drop his knife and fork, throw himself back in his chair, slap his leg
a sounding blow with his hand, and shriek out, 'Codlin's your friend,
not Short,' and then go off into ecstasies of glee as he told the tale
all over again.
Well, Monday--the day of his opening lecture--came at last. During the
day he was unusually quiet and taciturn, although, even in face of the
grim test that awaited him, the Punch and Judy men haunted his memory
and led to occasional subdued outbursts of fun. After tea we set out.
It was a delicious evening. Few things are sweeter than the early
evenings of early summer. The sunset is throwing long shadows across
the fresh green grass, and the birds are busy in the boughs.
Everything about us was clad in its softest and loveliest garb. We
drove on between massive hedges of fragrant hawthorn, and up huge
avenues of stately blue gum trees, scattering the rabbits before us.
Then we caught sight of the river, and drove over the bridge into the
quiet little town in which such unsuspected adventures awaited us.
Dick was pale and quiet; his sunshine was veiled in banks of cloud, and
I found it difficult to rouse him. On arrival at the hall we found it
crowded. I was naturally delighted; his pleasure was more restrained.
Indeed, he confided to me, with a look that, for him, was positively
lugubrious, that he would have been more gratified if the horrid place
had been empty. However, there was nothing for it. Not a soul, except
myself, knew that Dick was lecturing for the first time in his life;
the chairman led us to the platform; and, after a brief introduction
relative to the renown of the speakers, he called upon Dick to address
the townsfolk. As a maiden effort it was a triumph; his native good
humour combined with careful preparation to produce a really excellent
effect; and he sat down amidst a thunder of applause. I filled in an
odd half-hour, and then the chairman nearly killed Dick at one blow.
'Would anybody in the audience care to ask either of the speakers a
question?' he gravely inquired.
Poor Dick was the picture of abject dismay. This was a flank attack
for which he was totally unprepared. An elderly gentleman, in the body
of the hall, rose slowly, adjusted his spectacles, and, with grave
deliberation, announced that he wished to submit a question to the
first speaker. Dick looked like a man whose death-warrant was about to
be signed. The problem was duly enunciated, and it turned out to be a
carefully planned and decidedly awkward one. I wondered how on earth
poor Dick would face the music. He paused, as though considering his
reply. Then a sudden light mantled his face. A wicked twinkle
sparkled in his eye. He rose smartly, looked straight into the face of
his questioner, and exclaimed confidently:
'Codlin's your friend, not Short!'
The audience was completely mystified. The answer had no more to do
with the question than Dutch cheese has to do with the rings of Saturn.
For a fraction of a second you could have heard a pin drop. I saw that
the only way of saving the situation was by commencing to applaud, and
I smote my hands together with a will, and laughed as I have rarely
allowed myself to laugh in public. The sympathetic section of the
audience followed suit. A general impression seemed to exist that,
somehow, Dick had made a particularly clever point. The old gentleman
who had asked the question was manifestly bewildered; he gazed
helplessly round on his cheering fellow citizens, and evidently
regarded the answer as some recondite allusion of which it would never
do to display his ignorance. He resumed his seat, discomfited and
ashamed. When the applause and laughter had somewhat subsided, I rose
and moved a vote of thanks to the chairman, which Dick seconded,
though, I fancied, without much show of enthusiasm. Thus the meeting,
which Dick never forgot, came to an eminently satisfactory end,
although I heard privately long afterwards that, as the people took
their homeward way along those country roads, many who had applauded
vigorously inquired confidentially of their neighbours the exact
bearing of the cryptic reply on the particular matter in hand.
If Dick lacked laughter on the way across the plains to the meeting, he
amply atoned for the deficiency on the way home. How he roared, and
yelled, and screamed in his glee!
'I had to say something,' he exclaimed. 'I hadn't the slightest idea
what the old gentleman was talking about; and the only thing I could
think of was the Punch and Judy!'
He laughed and coughed his way through that campaign. Everybody grew
wonderfully fond of him, and looked eagerly for his coming. He did a
world of good, and shamed scores of us out of the gloom in which we
bore our slighter maladies. My mail from New Zealand tells me that, at
last, his cough has proved too much for him, so he has given it up.
But I like to fancy that, in the land where coughing is no more heard,
Dick Sunshine is laughing still.
IX
FORTY!
Life moves along so smoothly with most of us that there seems to be
very little difference between one birthday and another; but to this
rule there is one brilliant and outstanding exception. There is one
birthday on which a man should certainly take a holiday, go for a quiet
stroll, and indulge in a little serious stock-taking. That birthday
is, of course, the fortieth. A man's fortieth birthday is one of the
really great days in his life's little story; and he must make the most
of it. I live in a city which boasts a comparatively meagre
population. The number of people who reach their fortieth birthday
simultaneously must be very small. But in a city of any size some
hundreds of people must daily become forty. And if I dwelt in such a
place, I should feel tempted to conduct a service every now and again
for men and women who were celebrating their fortieth birthday. People
so circumstanced, naturally impressed by the dignity and solemnity of
the occasion, would welcome such a service, and the preacher would have
a chance of sowing the seed in ground that was well prepared, and of
the greatest possible promise. The selection of a text would present
no difficulty. I can think of two right off--one in the Old Testament,
and one in the New--and there must be scores of others equally
appropriate. At forty a man enters upon middle life. What could be
more helpful to him, then, than a short inspiring word on such a text
as Habakkuk's prayer: '_O Lord, revive Thy work in the midst of the
years, in the midst of the years make Thyself known!_'
I have been recalling, this morning, some painful memories. In my time
I have several times known that peculiarly acute species of anguish
that only comes to us when we discover a cherished idol in ruins.
Men--some of them ministers--upon whose integrity I would cheerfully
have staked everything I possessed, suddenly whelmed themselves in
shame, and staggered out into the dark. It is an experience that makes
a man feel that the very earth is rocking beneath him; it makes him
wonder if it is possible for a good man to be somehow caught in a hot
gust of devilry and swept clean off his feet. But the thing that has
impressed me as I have counted such names sadly on my fingers is that,
without an exception, they were all in the forties, most of them in the
early forties. Youth, of course, often sins, and sins grievously; but
youth recovers itself, and frequently emerges chastened and ennobled by
the bitter experience; but I can recall no instance of a man who fell
in the forties and who ever really recovered himself. Wherefore let
him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall. I remember that,
some time ago, Sir W. Robertson Nicoll quoted a brilliant essayist as
saying that 'the most dangerous years are the forties--the years when
men begin to be rich, when they have opportunities of gratifying their
passions, when they, perhaps, imagine that they have led a starved and
meagre existence.' And so, as I let my mind play about these old and
saddening memories, and as I reflect upon the essayist's corroboration
of my own conclusion, I fancy I could utter, from the very heart of me,
a particularly timely and particularly searching word to those who had
just attained their fortieth birthdays. Or, if I felt that the
occasion was too solemn for speech, I could at least lead them in
prayer. And when I led them in prayer, it would certainly be
Habakkuk's prayer: 'O Lord, revive Thy work in the midst of the years;
in the midst of the years make Thyself known!' It is a prayer for
revival and for revelation.
The real significance of that prayer lies in the fact that the supreme
tendency of middle life is towards prosiness. Young people write
poetry and get sentimental: so do old people. But people in the
forties--never! A man of forty would as soon be suspected of picking
his neighbour's pocket as of writing poetry. He would rather be seen
walking down the street without collar or necktie than be seen shedding
tears. Ask a company of young people to select some of their favourite
hymns or songs. They will at once call for hymns about heaven or songs
about love. So will old people. But you will never persuade
middle-aged people to sing such songs. They are in the practical or
prosy stage of life. The romance of youth has worn off; the romance of
age has not arrived. They are between the poetry of the dawn and the
poetry of the twilight. And midway between the poetry of the dawn and
the poetry of the twilight comes the panting perspiration of noonday.
When, therefore, I find myself face to face with my congregation of
people who are in the very act of celebrating their fortieth birthday,
I shall urge them to pray with the old prophet that, in the midst of
the years, the youthful romance of their first faith may be revived
within them, and that, in the midst of the years, the revelations that
come at eventide may be delightfully anticipated.
I said just now, however, that I had an alternative text from the New
Testament. I have an idea that if my first service is a success, I
shall hold another; and, for the sake of variety, I shall address
myself to this second theme. Concerning the very first apostolic
miracle we are expressly and significantly told that '_the man was
above forty years old on whom this miracle of healing was showed_.'
Now I cannot imagine why that particular is added unless it is to tell
those of us who are now 'above forty years old' that we are not beyond
the reach of the sensational. We have not outlived the romance of the
miraculous. We are not 'too old at forty' to experience all the marvel
and the wonder of the grace divine. And, even as I write, I
confidently anticipate the sparkle that will light up the eyes of these
forty-year-olds as I remind them that that man was above forty years of
age upon whom this first triumph of the Church was wrought.
But there are worse things than prosiness. The mere change from the
poetry of youth to the prose of middle life need not in itself alarm
us. Some of the finest classics in our literature are penned in prose.
But within this minor peril lies the germ of a major peril. The
trouble is that prosiness may develop into pessimism. And when
prosiness curdles into pessimism the case of the patient is very grave.
I heard a young fellow in his teens telling a much older man of his
implicit faith in the providence of God. 'Yes,' said the senior, with
a sardonic smile, 'I used to talk like that when I was your age!' I
heard a young girl telling a woman old enough to be her mother of the
rapture of her soul's experience. 'Ah!' replied the elder lady, 'You
won't talk like that when you have seen as much of the world as I
have!' Here, then, at last we have put our finger on the tragedy that
threatens us in the forties. Why is it?
The reason is not far to seek. The fact is that at forty a man must
drop something. He has been all his life accumulating until he has
become really overloaded. He has maintained his interest in all the
things that occupied his attention in youth; and, all the way along the
road, fresh claims have been made upon him. His position in the world
is a much more responsible one, and makes a greater drain upon his
thought and energy. He has married, too, and children have come into
his home. There has been struggle and sickness and anxiety. Interests
have multiplied, and life has increased in seriousness. But,
increasing in seriousness, it must not be allowed to increase in
sordidness. A man's life is like a garden. There is a limit to the
things that it will grow. You cannot pack plants in a garden as you
pack sardines in a tin. That is why the farmer thins out the turnips;
that is why the orchardist prunes his trees; and that is why the
husbandman pinches the grapebuds off the trailing vines. Life has to
be similarly treated. At forty a man realizes that his garden is
getting overcrowded. It contains all the flowers that he planted in
his sentimental youth and all the vegetables that he set there in his
prosaic manhood. It is too much. There must be a thinning out. And,
unless he is very, very careful, he will find that the thinning-out
process will automatically consist of the sacrifice of all the pansies
and the retention of all the potatoes.
Now, when I address my congregation of people who are celebrating their
fortieth birthday, I shall make a most fervent appeal on behalf of the
pansies. Potatoes are excellent things, and the garden becomes
distinctly wealthier when, in the twenties and thirties, a man begins
to moderate his passion for pansies, and to plant a few potatoes. But
a time comes when he must make a stand on behalf of the pansies, or he
will have no soul for anything beyond potatoes. Round his potato beds
let him jealously retain a border of his finest pansies; and, depend
upon it, when he gets into the fifties and the sixties he will be glad
that, all through life, he remained true to the first fondnesses of
youth.
Not that he will have to wait for the fifties and the sixties. As soon
as a man has faced the situation, taken his stand, and made his
decision, he begins to congratulate himself upon it. That is one of
life's most subtle laws. Let us, then, see how it operates in another
field. Sir Francis Jeune, the great divorce judge, said that the
eighth year was the dangerous year in wedded life. More tragedies
occurred in the eighth year than in any other. And Mr. Philip Gibbs
has recently written a novel entitled _The Eighth Year_, in which he
makes the heroine declare that, in marriage, the eighth year is the
fatal year.
'"It's a psychological fact," said Madge. "I work it out in this way.
In the first and second years a wife is absorbed in the experiment of
marriage and in the sentimental phase of love. In the third and fourth
years she begins to study her husband and to find him out. In the
fifth and sixth years, having found him out completely, she makes a
working compromise with life and tries to make the best of it. In the
seventh and eighth years she begins to find out herself. Life has
become prosaic. Her home has become a cage to her. In the eighth year
she must find a way of escape--anyhow, anywhere. And in the eighth
year the one great question is, in what direction will she go? There
are many ways of escape."' And so comes the disaster.
All this seems to show that the eighth year of marriage is like the
fortieth year of life. It is the year in which husband and wife are
called upon to make their supreme stand on behalf of the pansies. And
supposing they do it? Suppose that they make up their minds that
everything shall not be sacrificed to potatoes; what follows? Why, to
be sure, the best follows. Coventry Patmore, in his _Angel in the
House_--the classic of all young husbands and young wives--says that
the years that follow the eighth are the sweetest and the fullest of
all. What, he asks--
What
For sweetness like the ten years' wife,
Whose customary love is not
Her passion, or her play, but life?
With beauties so maturely fair,
Affecting, mild, and manifold,
May girlish charms no more compare
Than apples green with apples gold.
Ah, still unpraised Honoria, Heaven,
When you into my arms it gave,
Left naught hereafter to be given
But grace to feel the good I have.
Here, then, is the crisis reached; the stand successfully made on
behalf of the pansies; and all life fuller and richer for ever
afterwards in consequence. Every man and woman at forty is called upon
for a similar chivalrous effort. At forty we become the knights of the
pansies, and if we let them go we shall find that at fifty it will be
difficult to find even a sprig of heartsease anywhere.
Whether I take as my text the prophet's prayer for a revival and a
revelation in the midst of the years, or the story of the man who was
more than forty years old when he fell under the spell of the
miraculous, I know how I shall close my sermon. I shall close by
telling the story of Dr. Kenn and Maggie Tulliver from _The Mill on the
Floss_. It will convince my hearers that folk in the forties have a
great and beautiful and sacred ministry to exercise. Maggie was young,
and the perplexities of life were too much for her. Dr. Kenn was
arrested by the expression of anguish in her beautiful eyes. Dr. Kenn
was himself neither young nor old, but middle-aged; and Maggie felt a
childlike, instinctive relief when she saw that it was Dr. Kenn's face
that was looking into hers. 'That plain, middle-aged face, with a
grave, penetrating kindness in it, seeming to tell of a human being who
had reached a firm, safe strand, but was looking with helpful pity
towards the strugglers still tossed by the waves, had an effect on
Maggie at this moment which was afterwards remembered by her as if it
had been a promise.' And then George Eliot makes this trite and
significant remark. 'The middle-aged,' she says, 'who have lived
through their strongest emotions, but are yet in the time when memory
is still half-passionate and not merely contemplative, should surely be
a sort of natural priesthood, whom life has disciplined and consecrated
to be the refuge and rescue of early stumblers and victims of
self-despair. Most of us, at some moment in our young lives, would
have welcomed a priest of that natural order in any sort of canonicals
or uncanonicals, but had to scramble upwards into all the difficulties
of nineteen entirely without such aid.'
And after hearing that fine story my congregation of folk on the
threshold of the forties will return from the quiet church to the busy
street humming the songs that they sang at nineteen; vowing that, come
what may, the potatoes shall not elbow out all the pansies; and
congratulating themselves that the richest wine in the chalice of life
still waits their thirsty lips.
X
A WOMAN'S REASON
"Will you go with me?"
'"No, indeed; you must go alone. I shall not appear at all."
'"Why, mother?"
'"_Because!_"'
I came across the above passage near the beginning of one of Myrtle
Reed's stories--_The Master's Violin_--and, towards the end, I found
this:
'"Iris, I have been miserable ever since I told you I wrote the
letters."
'"Why, dear?"
'"_Because!_"'
And then, in quite another book--Maurice Thompson's _Sweetheart
Manette_--I came upon this:
'"Why can't you tell me?" asked Rowland Hatch.
'"I don't know that I have the right," replied Manette.
'"Why?"
'"_Because!_"'
Now, that word '_because_' is very interesting. 'It is a woman's
reason,' Miss Reed confides to us. That may, or may not, be so. I
know nothing about that. It is not my business. I only know that it
is the oldest reason, and the safest reason, and by far the strongest.
Now, really, no man can say why. As Miss Reed says in another passage
lying midway between the two quoted: 'We all do things for which we can
give no reason.' We do them _because_. No man can say why he prefers
coffee to cocoa, or mutton to beef. He likes the one better than the
other _because_. No man can say why he chose his profession. He
decided to be a doctor or a carpenter _because_. No man can say why he
fell in love with his wife. It would be an affectation to pretend that
she is really incomparably superior to all other women upon the face of
the earth. And yet to him she is not only incomparably superior, and
incomparably lovelier, and incomparably nobler, but she is absolutely
the one and only woman on the planet or off it. No other swims into
the field of vision. She is first, and every other woman is nowhere.
Why? '_Because!_' There is no other reason.
The fact is that we get into endless confusion when we sail out into
the dark, mysterious seas that lie beyond that 'because.' Nine times
out of ten our conclusions are unassailable. And nine times out of ten
our reasons for reaching those conclusions are absurdly illogical,
totally inadequate, or grossly mistaken. Everybody remembers the fable
of the bantam cock who assured the admiring farmyard that the sun rose
every morning because of its anxiety to hear him crow! The fact was
indisputable; the sun did certainly rise every morning. It was only at
the attempt to ascribe a specific reason for its rising that the
argument broke down. It is always safer to say that the sun rises
every morning _because_. Ministers at least will recall the merriment
that Hugh Latimer made of Master More. The good man had been appointed
to investigate the cause of the Goodwin Sands. He met with small
success in his inquiries. At last he came upon an old man who had
lived in the district nearly a hundred years. The centenarian knew.
The secret sparkled in his eyes. Master More approached the prodigy.
'Yes, sir,' the old man answered, 'I know. Tenterden Steeple is the
cause of Goodwin Sands! I remember when they built the steeple.
Before that we never heard of sands, or flats, or shallows off this
haven. They built the steeple, and then came the sands. Yes, sir,
Tenterden Steeple is the cause of the destruction of Sandwich Harbour!'
When we wander beyond that wise word 'because' circumstances seem
malicious; they conspire to deceive us. I remember passing a window in
London in which a sewing-machine was displayed. The machine was
working. A large doll sat beside it, its hand on the wheel. The
doll's hand appeared to be turning the handle. As a matter of fact,
the machine was electrically driven, and the wheel turned the hand of
the doll. In the realm of cause and effect we are frequently the dupes
and victims of a very dexterous system of legerdemain. The resultant
quantity is invariably clear; the contributing causes are not what they
seem.
I find myself believing to-day pretty much what I believed twenty years
ago; but I find myself believing the same things for different reasons.
As life goes on, a man learns to put more and more confidence in his
conclusions, and to become more and more chary of the reasons that led
to those conclusions. If a certain course seems to him to be right, he
automatically adopts it, and he confidently persists in it even after
the reasons that first dictated it have fallen under suspicion. 'More
than once in an emergency at sea,' says Dr. Grenfell, the hero of
Labrador, 'I have swiftly decided upon a certain line of action. If I
had waited to hem my reason into a corner before adopting that course,
I should not be here to tell the tale.' We often flatter ourselves
that we base our conclusions upon our reasons. In reality, we do
nothing of the kind. The mind works so rapidly that it tricks us. It
is another case of legerdemain. Once more, it is the machine that
turns the doll, and not the doll that turns the machine. Our thinking
faculties often play at ride-a-cock-horse. We recall Browning's lines:
When I see boys ride-a-cock-horse,
I find it in my heart to embarrass them
By hinting that their stick's a mock horse,
And they really carry what they say carries them.
The rugged truth is, that we first of all reach our conclusions. That
is the starting-point. Then, amazed at our own temerity in doing so,
we hasten to tack on a few reasons as a kind of apology to ourselves
for our own intrepidity, a tardy concession to intellectual decency and
good order. But whether we recognize it or not, we do most things
_because_. As Pascal told us long ago, 'the heart has reasons which
the reason does not know. It is the heart that feels God, not the
reason.' When old Samuel Wesley lay dying in 1735, he turned to his
illustrious son John, saying: 'The inward witness, son, the inward
witness! That is the proof, the strongest proof of Christianity!' 'I
did not at the time understand him,' says John, in quoting the words
with approval long afterwards. But the root of the whole matter lies
just there.
My reference to Dr. Grenfell reminds me. The good doctor was
questioned the other day as to his faith in immortality. 'I believe in
it,' he replied, 'because I believe in it. I am sure of it, because I
am sure of it.' Precisely! That is the point. We believe _because_.
And then, on our sure faith, we pile up a stupendous avalanche of
Christian evidences. Emerson tells us of two American senators who
spent a quarter of a century searching for conclusive evidence of the
immortality of the soul. And Emerson finishes the story by saying that
the impulse which prompted their long search was itself the strongest
proof that they could have had. Of course! Although they knew it not,
they already believed. They believed _because_. And then, finding
their faith naked, and feeling ashamed, they set out to beg, borrow, or
steal a few rags of reasons with which to deck it. It is the problem
of Professor Teufelsdrockh and _Sartor Resartus_ over again. It all
comes back to Carlyle's 'Everlasting Yea.' The shame is mock modesty;
and the craving is a false one. A woman's reason is the best reason.
As the years go by, we become less and less eager for evidence. We are
content to believe _because_. 'I was lately looking out of my window,'
Martin Luther wrote from Coburg to a friend, 'and I saw the stars in
the heavens, and God's great beautiful arch over my head, but I could
not see any pillars on which the great Builder had fixed this arch; and
yet the heavens fell not, and the great arch stood firmly. There are
some who are always feeling for the pillars, and longing to touch them.
And, because they cannot touch them, they stand trembling, and fearing
lest the heavens should fall. If they could only grasp the pillars,
then the heavens would stand fast.'
'"But how do you know that there is any Christ? You never saw Him!"
said poor Augustine St. Clare, the slave-owner, to Uncle Tom, the slave.
'"I feel it in my soul, mas'r--feel Him now! Oh, mas'r, the blessed
Lord Jesus loves you!"
'"But how do you know that, Tom?" said St. Clare.
'"I feels it in my soul, mas'r; oh, mas'r, the love of Christ that
passeth knowledge."
'"But, Tom, you know that I have a great deal more knowledge than you;
what if I should tell you that I don't believe your Bible? Wouldn't
that shake your faith some, Tom?"
'"Not a grain, mas'r!" And St. Clare felt himself borne, on the tide
of Tom's faith and feeling, almost to the gate of heaven.
'"I like to hear you, Tom; and some time I'll talk more."'
Uncle Tom's argument was the strongest and most convincing after all;
if only all we arguers, and debaters, and controversialists could come
to recognize it. He believed _because_. And, now that I come to think
of it, Miss Myrtle Reed is wrong in calling it a woman's reason. It is
a divine argument, the oldest, and sweetest, and strongest of all
divine arguments. I said just now that a man loves a woman just
_because_ he loves her, and he could not in a thousand volumes give an
intelligent and convincing explanation of his preference. And--let me
say it in a hushed and reverent whisper--God loves in much the same
way. Listen, and let me read: 'The Lord did not set His love upon you
because ye were more in number than any people, for ye were the fewest
of all people; but _because_ the Lord loved you!' He loved _because_
He loved. He loved _because_.
I intend, therefore, to proclaim the magnificent verities of the
Christian gospel. I shall talk with absolute certainty, and with
unwavering confidence, about the sin of man, the love of God, the Cross
of Christ. If my message is met with a 'why' or a 'wherefore,' I have
only one reply--'_Because!_' There is nothing else to be said. The
preacher lives to tell a wonderful love-story. And a love-story is
never arguable. 'God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten
Son!' Why? _Because!_