the loss of functions, the decay of organs, the atrophy of the spiritual
nature. It is well known that the recovery of the backslider is one of
the hardest problems in spiritual work. To reinvigorate an old organ
seems more difficult and hopeless than to develop a new one; and the
backslider's terrible lot is to have to retrace with enfeebled feet each
step of the way along which he strayed; to make up inch by inch the
leeway he has lost, carrying with him a dead-weight of acquired
reluctance, and scarce knowing whether to be stimulated or discouraged by
the oppressive memory of the previous fall. Natural Law, p. 346.
October 1st. He who abandons the personal search for truth, under
whatever pretext, abandons truth. The very word truth, by becoming the
limited possession of a guild, ceases to have any meaning; and faith,
which can only be founded on truth, gives way to credulity, resting on
mere opinion. Natural Law, p. 352.
October 2d. It is more necessary for us to be active than to be orthodox.
To be orthodox is what we wish to be, but we can only truly reach it by
being honest, by being original, by seeing with our own eyes, by
believing with our own heart. Natural Law. p. 364.
October 3d. Better a little faith dearly won, better launched alone on
the infinite bewilderment of Truth, than perish on the splendid plenty of
the richest creeds. Such Doubt is no self-willed presumption. Nor, truly
exercised, will it prove itself, as much doubt does, the synonym for
sorrow. Natural Law, p. 365.
October 4th. Christianity removes the attraction of the earth; and this
is one way in which it diminishes men's burden. It makes them citizens of
another world. Pax Vobiscum, p. 47.
October 5th. Then the Christian experiences are our own making? In the
same sense in which grapes are our own making, and no more. All fruits
GROW--whether they grow in the soil or in the soul; whether they are the
fruits of the wild grape or of the True Vine. No man can MAKE things
grow. He can GET THEM TO GROW by arranging all the circumstances and
fulfilling all the conditions. But the growing is done by God. Pax
Vobiscum, p. 56.
October 6th. Men may not know how fruits grow, but they do know that they
cannot grow in five minutes. Some lives have not even a stalk on which
fruits could hang, even if they did grow in five minutes. Some have never
planted one sound seed of Joy in all their lives; and others who may have
planted a germ or two have lived so little in sunshine that they never
could come to maturity. Pax Vobiscum, p. 51.
October 7th. There is no mystery about Happiness whatever. Put in the
right ingredients and it must come out. He that abideth in Him will bring
forth much fruit; and bringing forth much fruit is Happiness. The
infallible receipt for Happiness, then, is to do good; and the infallible
receipt for doing good is to abide in Christ. Pax Vobiscum, p. 56.
October 8th. Spend the time you have spent in sighing for fruits in
fulfilling the conditions of their growth. The fruits will come, must
come. . . . About every other method of living the Christian life there
is an uncertainty. About every other method of acquiring the Christian
experiences there is a "perhaps." But in so far as this method is the way
of nature, it cannot fail. Pax Vobiscum, p. 58.
October 9th. The distinctions drawn between men are commonly based on the
outward appearance of goodness or badness, on the ground of moral beauty
or moral deformity--is this classification scientific? Or is there a
deeper distinction between the Christian and the not-a-Christian as
fundamental as that between the organic and the inorganic? Natural Law,
p. 374.
October 10th What is the essential difference between the Christian and
the not-a-Christian, between the spiritual beauty and the moral beauty?
It is the distinction between the Organic and the Inorganic. Moral beauty
is the product of the natural man, spiritual beauty of the spiritual man.
Natural Law, p. 380.
October 11th. The first Law of biology is: That which is Mineral is
Mineral; that which is Flesh is Flesh; that which is Spirit is Spirit.
The mineral remains in the inorganic world until it is seized upon by a
something called Life outside the inorganic world; the natural man
remains the natural man, until a Spiritual Life from without the natural
life seizes upon him, regenerates him, changes him into a spiritual man.
Natural Law, p. 381.
October 12th Suppose now it be granted for a moment that the character of
the not-a-Christian is as beautiful as that of the Christian. This is
simply to say that the crystal is as beautiful as the organism. One is
quite entitled to hold this; but what he is not entitled to hold is that
both in the same sense are living. "He that hath the Son hath Life, and
he that hath not the Son of God hath not Life." Natural Law, p. 382.
October 13th. Man is a moral animal, and can, and ought to, arrive at
great natural beauty of character. But this is simply to obey the law of
his nature--the law of his flesh; and no progress along that line can
project him into the spiritual sphere. Natural Law, p. 382.
October 14th. If any one choose to claim that the mineral beauty, the
fleshly beauty, the natural moral beauty, is all he covets, he is
entitled to his claim. To be good and true, pure and benevolent in the
moral sphere, are high and, so far, legitimate objects in life. If he
deliberately stop here, he is at liberty to do so. But what he is not
entitled to do is to call himself a Christian, or to claim to discharge
the functions peculiar to the Christian life. Natural Law, p. 382.
October 15th. In dealing with a man of fine moral character, we are
dealing with the highest achievement of the organic kingdom. But in
dealing with a spiritual man we are dealing with THE LOWEST FORM OF LIFE
IN THE SPIRITUAL WORLD. To contrast the two, therefore, and marvel that
the one is apparently so little better than the other, is unscientific
and unjust. Natural Law, p. 385.
October 16th. The spiritual man is a mere unformed embryo, hidden as yet
in his earthly chrysalis-case, while the natural man has the breeding and
evolution of ages represented in his character. But what are the
possibilities of this spiritual organism? What is yet to emerge from this
chrysalis-case? The natural character finds its limits within the organic
sphere. But who is to define the limits of the spiritual? Even now it is
very beautiful. Even as an embryo it contains some prophecy of its future
glory. But the point to mark is, that "it doth not yet appear what it
shall be." Natural Law, p. 386.
October 17th. The best test for Life is just LIVING. And living consists,
as we have formerly seen, in corresponding with Environment. Those
therefore who find within themselves, and regularly exercise, the
faculties for corresponding with the Divine Environment, may be said to
live the Spiritual Life. Natural Law, p. 390.
October 18th. That the Spiritual Life, even in the embryonic organism,
ought already to betray itself to others, is certainly what one would
expect. Every organism has its own reaction upon Nature, and the reaction
of the spiritual organism upon the community must be looked for. In the
absence of any such reaction, in the absence of any token that it lived
for a higher purpose, or that its real interests were those of the
Kingdom to which it professed to belong, we should be entitled to
question its being in that Kingdom. Natural Law, p. 390.
October 19th. Man's place in Nature, or his position among the Kingdoms,
is to be decided by the characteristic functions habitually discharged by
him. Now, when the habits of certain individuals are closely observed,
when the total effect of their life and work, with regard to the
community, is gauged, . . . there ought to be no difficulty in deciding
whether they are living for the Organic or for the Spiritual; in plainer
language, for the world or for God. Natural Law, p. 391.
October 20th. No matter what may be the moral uprightness of man's life,
the honourableness of his career, or the orthodoxy of his creed, if he
exercises the function of loving the world, that defines his world--he
belongs to the Organic Kingdom. He cannot in that case belong to the
higher Kingdom. "If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not
in him." After all, it is by the general bent of a man's life, by his
heart-impulses and secret desires, his spontaneous actions and abiding
motives, that his generation is declared. Natural Law, p. 393.
October 21st. The imperious claim of a Kingdom upon its members is not
peculiar to Christianity. It is the law in all departments of Nature that
every organism must live for its Kingdom. And in defining living FOR the
higher Kingdom as the condition of living in it, Christ enunciates a
principle which all Nature has prepared us to expect. Natural Law, p.
395.
October 22d. Christianity marks the advent of what is simply a new
Kingdom. Its distinctions from the Kingdom below it are fundamental. It
demands from its members activities and responses of an altogether novel
order. It is, in the conception of its Founder, a Kingdom for which all
its adherents must henceforth exclusively live and work, and which opens
its gates alone upon those who, having counted the cost, are prepared to
follow it if need be to the death. The surrender Christ demanded was
absolute. Every aspirant for membership must seek FIRST the Kingdom of
God. Natural Law, p. 394.
October 23d. Until even religious men see the uniqueness of Christ's
society, until they acknowledge to the full extent its claim to be
nothing less than a new Kingdom, they will continue the hopeless attempt
to live for two Kingdoms at once. And hence the value of a more explicit
Classification. For probably the most of the difficulties of trying to
live the Christian life arise from attempting to half-live it. Natural
Law, p. 396.
October 24th. Two Kingdoms, at the present time, are known to Science--
the Inorganic and the Organic. The spiritual life does not belong to the
Inorganic Kingdom, because it lives. It does not belong to the Organic
Kingdom, because it is endowed with a kind of Life infinitely removed
from either the vegetable or animal. Where, then, shall it be classed? We
are left without an alternative. There being no Kingdom known to Science
which can contain it, we must construct one. Or, rather, we must include
in the programme of Science a Kingdom already constructed, but the place
of which in Science has not yet been recognized. That Kingdom is the
KINGDOM OF GOD. Natural Law, p. 397.
October 25th. The goal of the organisms of the Spiritual World is nothing
less than this--to be "holy as He is holy, and pure as He is pure." And
by the Law of Conformity to Type, their final perfection is secured. The
inward nature must develop out according to its Type, until the
consummation of oneness with God is reached. Natural Law, p. 403.
October 26th. Christianity defines the highest conceivable future for
mankind. It satisfies the Law of Continuity. It guarantees the necessary
conditions for carrying on the organism successfully, from stage to
stage. It provides against the tendency to Degeneration. And finally,
instead of limiting the yearning hope of final perfection to the
organisms of a future age--an age so remote that the hope for thousands
of years must still be hopeless--instead of inflicting this cruelty on
intelligences mature enough to know perfection and earnest enough to wish
it, Christianity puts the prize within immediate reach of man. Natural
Law, p. 404.
October 27th. No worse fate can befall a man in this world than to live
and grow old alone, unloving and unloved. To be lost is to live in an
unregenerate condition, loveless and unloved; and to be saved is to love;
he that dwelleth in love dwelleth already in God. For God is Love. The
Greatest Thing in the World, p. 59.
October 28th. "Love suffereth long, and is kind; love envieth not; love
vaunteth not itself." Get these ingredients into your life. Then
everything that you do is eternal. It is worth doing. It is worth giving
time to. The Greatest Thing in the World, p. 60.
October 29th. The final test of religion at that great Day is not
religiousness, but Love; not what I have done, not what I have believed,
not what I have achieved, but how I have discharged the common charities
of life. The Greatest Thing in the World, p. 62.
October 30th. The words which all of us shall one Day hear sound not of
theology but of life, not of churches and saints, but of the hungry and
the poor, not of creeds and doctrines, but of shelter and clothing, not
of Bibles and prayer-books, but of cups of cold water in the name of
Christ. The Greatest Thing in the World, p. 63.
October 31st. The world moves. And each day, each hour, demands a further
motion and re-adjustment for the soul. A telescope in an observatory
follows a star by clockwork, but the clockwork of the soul is called the
Will. Hence, while the soul in passivity reflects the Image of the Lord,
the Will in intense activity holds the mirror in position lest the
drifting motion of the world bear it beyond the line of vision. To
"follow Christ" is largely to keep the soul in such position as will
allow for the motion of the earth. And this calculated counteracting of
the movements of a world, this holding of the mirror exactly opposite to
the Mirrored, this steadying of the faculties unerringly, through cloud
and earthquake; fire and sword, is the stupendous cooperating labour of
the Will. The Changed Life, p. 60.
November 1st. All around us Christians are wearing themselves out in
trying to be better. The amount of spiritual longing in the world--in the
hearts of unnumbered thousands of men and women in whom we should never
suspect it; among the wise and thoughtful; among the young and gay, who
seldom assuage and never betray their thirst--this is one of the most
wonderful and touching facts of life. It is not more heat that is needed,
but more light; not more force, but a wiser direction to be given to very
real energies already there. Pax Vobiscum, p. 14.
November 2d. Men sigh for the wings of a dove, that they may fly away and
be at Rest. But flying away will not help us. "The Kingdom of God is
WITHIN YOU." We aspire to the top to look for Rest; it lies at the
bottom. Water rests only when it gets to the lowest place. So do men.
Hence, be lowly. Pax Vobiscum, p. 30.
November 3d. The kingdom of God is righteousness, peace, joy.
Righteousness, of course, is just doing what is right. Any boy who does
what is right has the kingdom of God within him. Any boy who, instead of
being quarrelsome, lives at peace with the other boys, has the kingdom of
God within him. Any boy whose heart is filled with joy because he does
what is right, has the kingdom of God within him. The kingdom of God is
not going to religious meetings, and hearing strange religious
experiences: the kingdom of God is doing what is right--living at peace
with all men, being filled with joy in the Holy Ghost. First, p. 11.
November 4th. The man who has no opinion of himself at all can never be
hurt if others do not acknowledge him. Hence, be meek. He who is without
expectation cannot fret if nothing comes to him. It is self-evident that
these things are so. The lowly man and the meek man are really above all
other men, above all other things. Pax Vobiscum, p. 30.
November 5th. Keep religion in its place, and it will take you straight
through life, and straight to your Father in heaven when life is over.
But if you do not put it in its place, you may just as well have nothing
to do with it. Religion out of its place in a human life is the most
miserable thing in the world. There is nothing that requires so much to
be kept in its place as religion, and its place is what? second? third?
"First." Boys, carry that home with you today--FIRST the kingdom of God.
Make it so that it will be natural to you to think about that the very
first thing. First, pp. 15, 16.
November 6th. The change we have been striving after is not to be
produced by any more striving after. It is to be wrought upon us by the
moulding of hands beyond our own. As the branch ascends, and the bud
bursts, and the fruit reddens under the cooperation of influences from
the outside air, so man rises to the higher stature under invisible
pressures from without. The Changed Life, p. 21.
November 7th. Every man's character remains as it is, or continues in the
direction in which it is going, until it is compelled by IMPRESSED FORCES
to change that state. Our failure has been the failure to put ourselves
in the way of the impressed forces. There is a clay, and there is a
Potter; we have tried to get the clay to mould the clay. The Changed
Life, p. 21.
November 8th. Character is a unity, and all the virtues must advance
together to make the perfect man. This method of sanctification,
nevertheless, is in the true direction. It is only in the details of
execution that it fails. The Changed Life, p. 14.
November 9th. We all reflecting as a mirror the character of Christ are
transformed into the same Image from character to character--from a poor
character to a better one, from a better one to one a little better
still, from that to one still more complete, until by slow degrees the
Perfect Image is attained. Here the solution of the problem of
sanctification is compressed into a sentence: Reflect the character of
Christ, and you will become like Christ. The Changed Life, p. 24.
November 10th. There are some men and some women in whose company we are
always at our best. While with them we cannot think mean thoughts or
speak ungenerous words. Their mere presence is elevation, purification,
sanctity. All the best stops in our nature are drawn out by their
intercourse, and we find a music in our souls that was never there
before. The Changed Life, p. 33.
November 11th. Take such a sentence as this: African explorers are
subject to fevers which cause restlessness and delirium. Note the
expression, "cause restlessness." RESTLESSNESS HAS A CAUSE. Clearly,
then, any one who wished to get rid of restlessness would proceed at once
to deal with the cause. Pax Vobiscum, p. 20.
November 12th. What Christian experience wants is THREAD, a vertebral
column, method. It is impossible to believe that there is no remedy for
its unevenness and dishevelment, or that the remedy is a secret. The
idea, also, that some few men, by happy chance or happier temperament,
have been given the secret--as if there were some sort of knack or trick
of it--is wholly incredible. Religion must ripen fruit for every
temperament; and the way even into its highest heights must be by a
gateway through which the peoples of the world may pass. Pax Vobiscum, p.
15.
November 13th. Nothing that happens in the world happens by chance. God
is a God of order. Everything is arranged upon definite principles, and
never at random. The world, even the religious world, is governed by law.
Character is governed by law. Happiness is governed by law. The Christian
experiences are governed by law. Pax Vobiscum, p. 17.
November 14th. We ARE CHANGED, as the Old Version has it--we do not
change ourselves. No man can change himself. Throughout the New Testament
you will find that wherever these moral and spiritual transformations are
described the verbs are in the passive. Presently it will be pointed out
that there is a rationale in this; but meantime do not toss these words
aside as if this passivity denied all human effort or ignored
intelligible law. What is implied for the soul here is no more than is
everywhere claimed for the body. The Changed Life, p. 19.
November 15th. Rain and snow do drop from the air, but not without a long
previous history. They are the mature effects of former causes. Equally
so are Rest, and Peace, and Joy. They, too, have each a previous history.
Storms and winds and calms are not accidents, but are brought about by
antecedent circumstances. Rest and Peace are but calms in man's inward
nature, and arise through causes as definite and as inevitable. Pax
Vobiscum, p. 18.
November 16th. Few men know how to live. We grow up at random, carrying
into mature life the merely animal methods and motives which we had as
little children. And it does not occur to us that all this must be
changed; that much of it must be reversed; that life is the finest of the
Fine Arts; that it has to be learned with life-long patience, and that
the years of our pilgrimage are all too short to master it triumphantly.
Pax Vobiscum, p. 31.
November 17th. Christ's life outwardly was one of the most troubled lives
that was ever lived: Tempest and tumult, tumult and tempest, the waves
breaking over it all the time till the worn body was laid in the grave.
But the inner life was a sea of glass. The great calm was always there.
At any moment you might have gone to Him and found Rest. Pax Vobiscum, p.
35.
November 18th. The creation of a new heart, the renewing of a right
spirit is an omnipotent work of God. Leave it to the Creator. "He which
hath begun a good work in you will perfect it unto that day." The Changed
Life, p. 57.
November 19th. To become like Christ is the only thing in the world worth
caring for, the thing before which every ambition of man is folly, and
all lower achievement vain. Those only who make this quest the supreme
desire and passion of their lives can even begin to hope to reach it. The
Changed Life, p. 57.
November 20th. A religion of effortless adoration may be a religion for
an angel but never for a man. Not in the contemplative, but in the
active, lies true hope; not in rapture, but in reality, lies true life;
not in the realm of ideals, but among tangible things, is man's
sanctification wrought. The Changed Life, p. 58.
November 21st. Nothing ever for a moment broke the serenity of Christ's
life on earth. Misfortune could not reach Him; He had no fortune. Food,
raiment, money--fountain-heads of half the world's weariness--He simply
did not care for; they played no part in His life; He "took no thought"
for them. It was impossible to affect Him by lowering His reputation; He
had already made Himself of no reputation. He was dumb before insult.
When He was reviled, He reviled not again. In fact, there was nothing
that the world could do to Him that could ruffle the surface of His
spirit. Pax Vobiscum, p. 36.
November 22d. Life is the cradle of eternity. As the man is to the animal
in the slowness of his evolution, so is the spiritual man to the natural
man. Foundations which have to bear the weight of an eternal life must be
surely laid. Character is to wear forever; who will wonder or grudge that
it cannot be developed in a day? The Changed Life, p. 55.
November 23d. To await the growing of a soul is an almost Divine act of
faith. How pardonable, surely, the impatience of deformity with itself,
of a consciously despicable character standing before Christ, wondering,
yearning, hungering to be like that? Yet must one trust the process
fearlessly, and without misgiving. "The Lord the Spirit" will do His
part. The tempting expedient is, in haste for abrupt or visible progress,
to try some method less spiritual, or to defeat the end by watching for
effects instead of keeping the eye on the Cause. The Changed Life, p. 56.
November 24th. The Image of Christ that is forming within us--that is
life's one charge. Let every project stand aside for that. "Till Christ
be formed," no man's work is finished, no religion crowned, no life has
fulfilled its end. Is the infinite task begun? When, how, are we to be
different? Time cannot change men. Death cannot change men. Christ can.
Wherefore PUT ON CHRIST. The Changed Life, p. 62.
November 25th. Christ saw that men took life painfully. To some it was a
weariness, to others a failure, to many a tragedy, to all a struggle and
a pain. How to carry this burden of life had been the whole world's
problem. It is still the whole world's problem. And here is Christ's
solution. "Carry it as I do. Take life as I take it. Look at it from My
point of view. Interpret it upon My principles. Take My yoke and learn of
Me, and you will find it easy. For My yoke is easy, works easily, sits
right upon the shoulders, and THEREFORE My burden is light." Pax
Vobiscum, p. 44.