natural beginnings in what passes daily before our senses. _Nihil
in fide nisi quod ante fuerit in sensu._ Man may for a time be
unheedful of these voices of nature; but they come again and again,
day after day, night after night, till at last they are heeded. And
if once heeded, those voices disclose their purport more and more
clearly, and what seemed at first a mere sunrise becomes in the end
a visible revelation of the infinite, while the setting of the sun
is transfigured into the first vision of immortality.
_Hibbert Lectures._
As the evolution of nature can be studied with any hope of success
in those products only which nature has left us, the evolution of
mind also can be effectually studied in those products only which
mind itself has left us. These mental products in their earliest
form are always embodied in language, and it is in language,
therefore, that we must study the problem of the origin, and of the
successive stages in the growth of mind.
_Science of Thought._
If language and reason are identical, or two names, or two aspects
only of the same thing, and if we cannot doubt that language had
an historical beginning, and represents the work of man carried on
through many thousands of years, we cannot avoid the conclusion
that before those thousands of years there was a time when the first
stone of the great temple of language was laid, and before that time
man was without language, and therefore without reason.
_Science of Thought._
MIRACLES
If once the human mind has arrived at the conviction that
_everything_ must be accounted for, or, as it is sometimes
expressed, that there is uniformity, that there is care and order in
everything, and that an unbroken chain of cause and effect holds the
whole universe together, then the idea of the miraculous arises, and
we, weak human creatures, call what is not intelligible to us, what
is not in accordance with law, what seems to break through the chain
of cause and effect, a miracle. Every miracle, therefore, is of our
own making, and of our own unmaking.
_Gifford Lectures, III._
It is due to the psychological necessities of human nature, under
the inspiring influence of religious enthusiasm, that so many of the
true signs and wonders performed by the founders of religion have
so often been exaggerated, and, in spite of the strongest protests
of these founders themselves, degraded into mere jugglery. It is
true that all this does not form an essential element of religion,
as we now understand religion. Miracles are no longer used as
arguments in support of the truth of religious doctrines. Miracles
have often been called helps to faith, but they have so often proved
stumbling-blocks to faith, and no one in our days would venture to
say that the truth as taught by any religion must stand or fall by
certain prodigious events which may or may not have happened, which
may or may not have been rightly apprehended by the followers of
Buddha, Christ, or Mohammed.
_Gifford Lectures, II._
Our Lord's ascension will have to be understood as a sublime idea,
materialised in the language of children. Is not a real fact that
happened, in a world in which nothing can happen against the will of
God, better than any miracle? Why should we try to know more than we
can know, if only we firmly believe that Christ's immortal spirit
ascended to the Father? That alone is true immortality, divine
immortality; not the resuscitation of the frail mortal body, but the
immortality of the immortal divine soul. It was this rising of the
Spirit, and not of the body, without which, as St. Paul said, our
faith would be vain. It is the Spirit that quickeneth, the flesh
profiteth nothing.
_Gifford Lectures, III._
It will be to many of the honest disciples of Christ a real day of
Damascus, when the very name of miracle shall be struck out of the
dictionary of Christian theology. The facts remain exactly as they
are, but the Spirit of truth will give them a higher meaning. What
is wanted for this is not less, but more, faith, for it requires
more faith to believe in Christ without, than with, the help of
miracles. Nothing has produced so much distress of mind, so much
intellectual dishonesty, so much scepticism, so much unbelief, as
the miraculous element forced into Christianity from the earliest
days. Nothing has so much impeded missionary work as the attempt to
persuade people first not to believe in their own miracles, and then
to make a belief in other miracles a condition of their becoming
Christians. It is easy to say 'You are not a Christian if you do
not believe in Christian miracles.' I hope the time will come when
we shall be told, 'You are not a Christian if you cannot believe in
Christ without the help of miracles.'
_Gifford Lectures, III._
MUSIC
Music is the language of the soul, but it defies interpretation. It
means something, but that something belongs not to this world of
sense and logic, but to another world, quite real, though beyond
all definition.... Is there not in Music, and in Music alone of all
the arts, something that is not entirely of this earth?... Whence
comes melody? Surely not from anything that we hear with our outward
ears and are able to imitate, to improve, or to sublimise.... Here
if anywhere we see the golden stairs on which angels descend from
heaven and whisper sweet sounds into the ears of those who have ears
to hear. Words cannot be so inspired, for words, we know, are of the
earth, earthy. Melodies are not of the earth, and it is truly said,
'Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard are sweeter.'
_Auld Lang Syne._
NATURE
There is nothing so beautiful as being alone with nature; one sees
how God's will is fulfilled in each bud and leaf that blooms and
withers, and one learns to recognise how deeply rooted in one is
this thirst for nature. In living with men one is only too easily
torn from this real home; then one's own plans and wishes and fears
spring up; then we fancy we can perfect something for ourselves
alone, and think that every thing must serve for our own ends and
enjoyments, until the influence of nature in life, or the hand of
God, arouses us, and warns us that we live and flourish not for
enjoyment, nor for undisturbed quiet, but to bear fruit in another
life.
_Life._
When one stands amid the grandeur of nature, with one's own little
murmurings and sufferings, and looks deep into this dumb soul,
much becomes clear to one, and one is astounded at the false ideas
one has formed of this life. It is but a short journey, and on
a journey one can do without many things which generally seem
necessary to us. Yes, we can do without even what is dearest to our
hearts, in this world, if we know that, after the journey we shall
have to endure, we shall find again those who have arrived at the
goal quicker and more easily than we have done. Now if life were
looked upon as a journey for refreshment or amusement, which it
ought not to be, we might feel sad if we have to make our way alone;
but if we treat it as a serious business-journey, then we know we
have hard and unpleasant work before us, and enjoy all the more the
beautiful resting-places which God's love has provided for each of
us in life.
_Life._
In the early days of the world, the world was too full of wonders
to require any other miracles. The whole world was a miracle and a
revelation, there was no need for any special disclosure. At that
time the heavens, the waters, the sun and moon, the stars of heaven,
the showers and dew, the winds of God, fire and heat, winter and
summer, ice and snow, nights and days, lightnings and clouds, the
earth, the mountains and hills, the green things upon the earth, the
wells, and seas and floods--all blessed the Lord, praised Him and
magnified Him for ever. Can we imagine a more powerful revelation?
Is it for us to say that for the children of men to join in praising
and magnifying Him who revealed Himself in His own way in all the
magnificence, the wisdom and order of nature, is mere paganism,
polytheism, pantheism, and abominable idolatry? I have heard many
blasphemies, I have heard none greater than this.
_Gifford Lectures, II._
OBSCURITY
There may be much depth of wisdom in all that darkness and
vagueness, but I cannot help thinking that there is nothing that
cannot be made clear, and bright, and simple, and that obscurity
arises in all cases from slovenly thinking and lazy writing.
_MS._
OLD AGE
Sharing the happiness of other people, entering into their feelings,
living life over once more with them and in them, that is all
that remains to old people. I suppose it was meant to be so, the
principal object of life being the overcoming of self, in every
sense of the word.
_Life._
This is a lesson one has to learn as one grows older, to learn to
be alone, and yet to feel one in spirit with all whom one loves,
whether present or absent.
_MS._
You cannot escape from old age, whether it comes slowly or suddenly,
but it comes unawares, and you suddenly feel that you cannot walk
or jump as you used to do, and even the muscles of the mind don't
hold out as they used. Well, so it was meant to be, and it will
be pleasant to begin again with new muscles, and to take up new
work. After seeing a good deal of life, I still think the greatest
satisfaction is work: I do not mean drudgery, but one's own findings
out.
_Life._
As one is getting old, and looks forward with fear rather than with
hope to what is still in store for us, one learns to appreciate more
and more the never-failing pleasure of recalling all the bright and
happy days that are gone. Gone they are, but they are not lost.
Ever present to our calling and recalling, they assume at last a
vividness, such as they hardly had when present, and when we poor
souls were trembling for every day and hour and minute that was
going and ever going, and would not and could not abide.
_Life._
RELIGION AND RELIGIONS
God is not far from each one of those who seek God, if haply they
may feel after Him. Let theologians pile up volume upon volume of
what they call theology, religion is a very simple matter, and that
which is so simple and yet so all-important to us, the living kernel
of religion, can be found, I believe, in almost every creed, however
much the husk may vary. And think what that means! It means that
above and beneath and behind all religions there is one eternal, one
universal religion, a religion to which every man belongs, or may
belong.
_Last Essays._
True religion, that is practical, active, living religion, has
little or nothing to do with logical or metaphysical quibbles.
Practical religion is life, is a new life, a life in the sight of
God, and it springs from what may truly be called a new birth.
_Last Essays._
Our senses can never perceive a real boundary, be it on the largest
or the smallest scale: they present to us everywhere the infinite as
their background, and everything that has to do with religion has
sprung out of this infinite background as its ultimate and deepest
foundation.
_Silesian Horseherd._
I cannot bring myself to take much interest in all the controversies
that are going on (1865) in the Church of England.... No doubt the
points at issue are great, and appeal to our hearts and minds, but
the spirit in which they are treated seems to me so very small. How
few men on either side give you the impression that they write face
to face with God, and not face to face with men and the small powers
that be. Surely this was not so in the early centuries, nor again at
the time of the Reformation?
_Life._
We live in two worlds; behind the seen is the unseen, around the
finite the infinite, above the comprehensible the incomprehensible.
There have been men who have lived in this world only, who seem
never to have felt the real presence of the unseen: and yet they
achieved some greatness as rulers of men, as poets, artists,
philosophers, and discoverers. But the greatest among the great have
done their greatest works in moments of self-forgetful ecstasy,
in union and communion with a higher world: and when it was done,
such was their silent rapture that they started back, and could
not believe it was their own, their very own, and they ascribed
the glory of it to God, by whatever name they called Him in their
various utterances. And while the greatest among the great thus
confessed that they were not of this world only, and that their
best work was but in part their own, those whom we reverence as the
founders of religions, and who were at once philosophers, poets,
and rulers of men, called nothing their own, but professed to teach
only either what their fathers had taught them, or what a far-off
voice had whispered in their ear.... The ancient religions were
not founded like temples or palaces, they sprang up like sacred
groves from the soil of humanity, quickened by the rays of celestial
light. In India, Greece, Italy, and Germany, not even the names of
the earliest prophets are preserved. And, if in other countries
the forms and features of the authors of their religious faith and
worship are still dimly visible amidst the clouds of legend and
poetry, all of them, Moses as well as Zoroaster, Confucius, Buddha
and Mohammed, seem to proclaim with one voice that their faith was
no new faith, but the faith of their fathers, that their wisdom was
not their own wisdom, but, like every good and perfect gift, given
them from above. What should we learn from these prophets who from
distant countries and bygone ages all bear the same witness to the
same truth? We should learn that though religions may be founded
and fashioned into strange shapes by the hand of man, religion is
one and eternal. From the first dawn that ever brightened a human
hearth or warmed a human heart, one generation has told another
that there is a world beyond the dawn; and the keynotes of all
religion--the feeling of the infinite, the bowing down before the
incomprehensible, the yearning after the unseen--having once been
set to vibrate, have never been altogether drowned in the strange
and wild music of religious sects and sciences. The greatest
prophets of the world have been those who at sundry times and in
divers manners have proclaimed again and again in the simplest words
the simple creed of the fathers, faith in the unseen, reverence for
the incomprehensible, awe of the infinite, or, simpler still, love
of God, and oneness with the All-Father.
_Life._
I have endeavoured to make clear two things, which constitute the
foundation of all religion; first, that the world is rational, that
it is the result of thought, and that in this sense only is it the
creation of a being which possesses reason, or is reason itself (the
_Logos_); and secondly, that mind or thought cannot be the outcome
of matter, but on the contrary is the _prius_ of all things.
_Silesian Horseherd._
Religion is not philosophy; but there never has been a religion,
and there never can be, which is not based on philosophy, and does
not presuppose the philosophical notions of the people. The highest
aim towards which all philosophy strives, is and will always remain
the idea of God, and it was this idea which Christianity grasped in
the Platonic sense, and presented to us most clearly in its highest
form, in the Fourth Gospel.
_Silesian Horseherd._
There has been no entirely new religion since the beginning of the
world. The elements and roots of religion were there, as far back
as we can trace the history of man; and the history of religion
shows us throughout a succession of new combinations of the same
radical elements. An intuition of God, a sense of human weakness
and dependence, a belief in a Divine government of the world, a
distinction between good and evil, and a hope of a better life,
these are some of the radical elements of all religions. Though
sometimes hidden, they rise again and again to the surface. Though
frequently distorted, they tend again and again to their perfect
form. Unless they had formed part of the original dowry of the human
soul, religion would have remained an impossibility, and the tongues
of angels would have been to human ears but as sounding brass, or as
tinkling cymbals.
_Chips._
In lecturing on the origin and growth of religion, my chief object
has been to show that a belief in God, in the immortality of the
soul, and in a future retribution, can be gained, and not only can
be, but has been gained, by the right exercise of human reason
alone, without the assistance of what has been called a special
revelation. In doing this, I thought I was simply following in the
footsteps of the greatest theologians of our time, and that I was
serving the cause of true religion by showing, by ample historical
evidence, gathered from the Sacred Books of the East, how, what St.
Paul, what the Fathers of the Church, what mediæval theologians,
and what some of the most learned of modern divines had asserted
again and again, was most strikingly confirmed by the records of all
non-Christian religions which have lately become accessible to us. I
could not have believed it possible that, in undertaking this work,
I should have exposed myself to attacks from theologians who profess
and call themselves Christians, and who yet maintain that worst of
all heresies, that during all the centuries that have elapsed and
in all the countries of the world, God has left Himself without a
witness, and has revealed Himself to one race only, the Jews of
Palestine.
_Gifford Lectures, III._
If there is one thing which a comparative study of religions places
in the clearest light, it is the inevitable decay to which every
religion is exposed. It may seem almost like a truism that no
religion can continue to be what it was during the lifetime of its
founders and its first apostles. Yet it is but seldom borne in mind
that without constant reformation, _i.e._ without a constant return
to its fountain head, every religion--even the most perfect, on
account of its very perfection, more even than others--suffers from
its contact with the world, as the purest air suffers from the mere
fact of being breathed.
_Chips._
To each individual his own religion, if he really believes in it,
is something quite inseparable from himself, something unique,
that cannot be compared to anything else, or replaced by anything
else. Our own religion is, in that respect, something like our
own language. In its form it may be like other languages; in its
essence, and in its relation to ourselves, it stands alone and
admits of no peer or rival.
_Chips._
Three of the results to which, I believe, a comparative study of
religion is sure to lead, I may here state:--
1. We shall learn that religions, in their most ancient form, or
in the minds of their authors, are generally free from many of
the blemishes that attach to them in later times.
2. We shall learn that there is hardly one religion which does
not contain some truth, some important truth; truth sufficient
to enable those who seek the Lord, and feel after Him, to find
Him in their hour of need.
3. We shall learn to appreciate better than ever what we have
in our own religion. No one who has not examined patiently
and honestly the other religions of the world can know what
Christianity really is, or can join with such truth and
sincerity in the words of St. Paul, 'I am not ashamed of the
gospel of Christ.'
_Chips._
Many are the advantages to be derived from a careful study of
other religions, but the greatest of all is that it teaches us to
appreciate more truly what we possess in our own. Let us see what
other nations have had and still have in the place of religion, let
us examine the prayers, the worship, the theology even, of the most
highly civilised races, and we shall then understand more thoroughly
what blessings are vouchsafed to us in being allowed to breathe
from the first breath of life the pure air of a land of Christian
light and knowledge. We are too apt to take the greatest blessings
as matters of course, and even religion forms no exception. We
have done so little to gain our religion, we have suffered so
little in the cause of truth, that however highly we prize our own
Christianity, we never prize it highly enough until we have compared
it with the religions of the rest of the world.
_Chips._
The spirit of truth is the life-spring of all religion, and where it
exists it must manifest itself, it must plead, it must persuade, it
must convince and convert.
_Chips._
As there is a faculty of speech, independent of all the historical
forms of language, there is a faculty of faith in man, independent
of all historical religions. If we say it is religion which
distinguishes man from the animal, we do not mean the Christian
and Jewish religion: we do not mean any special religion: but we
mean a mental faculty or disposition, which, independent of, nay in
spite of, sense and reason, enables man to apprehend the Infinite
under different names, and under varying disguises. Without that
faculty, no religion, not even the lowest worship of idols and
fetishes, would be possible; and if we will but listen attentively,
we can hear in all religions a groaning of the spirit, a struggle
to conceive the inconceivable, to utter the unutterable, a longing
after the Infinite, a love of God.
_Science of Religion._
Like an old precious metal, the ancient religion, after the dust
of ages has been removed, will come out in all its purity and
brightness: and the image which it discloses will be the image
of the Father, the Father of all the nations upon earth; and the
superscription, where we can read it again, will be, not in Judæa
only, but in the languages of all the races of the world, the Word
of God, revealed where alone it can be revealed--revealed in the
heart of man.
_Science of Religion._
If we granted that all religions, except Christianity and Mosaism,
derived their origin from those faculties of the mind only which,
according to Paley, are sufficient by themselves for calling into
life the fundamental tenets of natural religion, the classification
of Christianity and Judaism on one side as _revealed_, and of the
other religions as _natural_, would still be defective, for the
simple reason that no religion, though founded on revelation, can
ever be entirely separated from natural religion. The tenets of
natural religion, though they never constituted by themselves a real
historical religion, supply the only ground on which even revealed
religions can stand, the only soil where they can strike root, and
from which they can receive nourishment and life.
_Science of Religion._
The intention of religion, wherever we meet it, is always holy.
However imperfect, however childish a religion may be, it always
places the human soul in the presence of God: and however imperfect
and however childish the conception of God may be, it always
represents the highest ideal of perfection which the human soul, for
the time being, can reach and grasp. Religion therefore places the
human soul in the presence of its highest ideal, it lifts it above
the level of ordinary goodness, and produces at last a yearning
after a higher and better life--a life in the light of God.
_Science of Religion._
I suppose that most of us, sooner or later in life, have felt how
the whole world--this wicked world, as we call it--is changed as if
by magic, if once we can make up our mind to give men credit for
good motives, never to be suspicious, never to think evil, never to
think ourselves better than our neighbours. Trust a man to be true
and good, and, even if he is not, your trust will tend to make him
true and good. It is the same with the religions of the world. Let
us but once make up our minds to look in them for what is true and
good, and we shall hardly know our old religions again. There is no
religion--or, if there is, I do not know it--which does not say,
'Do good, avoid evil.' There is none which does not contain what
Rabbi Hillel called the quintessence of all religions, the simple
warning, 'Be good, my boy.' 'Be good, my boy,' may seem a very short
catechism, but let us add to it, 'Be good, my boy, for God's sake,'
and we have in it very nearly the whole of the Law and the Prophets.
_Science of Religion._