his own flesh, than he that hath abounded in all pleasure and delight. 15. Then shall the poor attire shine gloriously, and the precious robes seem vile and contemptible. 16. Then shall be more commended the poor cottage than the gilded palace. 17. Then shall a good and clear conscience more rejoice a man than the learning of philosophy. 18. Then shall the contempt of riches weigh more than all the worldling's treasure. 19. Then will good works avail more than many goodly words. 20. A brighter morn awaits the human day, When every transfer of earth's natural gifts 21. When poverty and wealth, the thirst of fame, 22. Shall live but in the memory of time, Who like a penitent libertine shall start, 23. Out of the dark the circling sphere Is rounding onward to the light; 24. I follow, follow, sure to meet the sun, THE CHURCH IS RENEWING ITS LIFE THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH IS 1. Now once again, by all concurrence of signs, and by the general instinct of holy and devout men, as they daily and solemnly express their thoughts, God is decreeing to begin some new and great period in His church, even to the reforming of Reformation itself. ASTIR 2. It is not the unfrocking of a priest, the unmitring of a bishop, and the removing him from off the Presbyterian shoulders, that will make us a happy nation. 3. No; if other things as great in the church, and in the rule of life, be not looked into and reformed, we have looked so long upon the blaze that Zuinglius and Calvin have beaconed up to us, that we are stark blind. 4. Perhaps in religion, as in politics, the age of the symbol is passing away, and a solemn manifestation may be approaching of the idea as yet hidden in that symbol. 5. Methinks I see in my mind a noble and puissant nation rousing herself like a strong man after sleep, and shaking her invincible locks : 6. Methinks I see her as an eagle mewing her mighty youth, and kindling her undazzled eyes at the full midday beam purging and unscaling her long abused sight at the fountain itself of heavenly radiance; 7. While the whole noise of timorous and flocking birds, with those also that love the twilight, flutter about, amazed at what she means, and in their envious gabble would prognosticate a year of sects and schisms. 8. The age is marked by doubt, perplexity, and hesitation. It is disconcerted by the apparent baselessness of the forms and institutions upon which society has hitherto seemed to rest: the moral law, the fabric of the constitution, religion itself, seem shaken to their foundations. FROM DOUBT 9. The only choice seems to be either to close one's eyes to the contradictions of the present, and seek refuge in the old habits of faith, or to set forward on a new, untried path of revolution and anarchy. 10. It is at this stage that recourse is had to Ethics, which opens a third alternative between simple acceptance and simple rejection of the morality and institutions of the past. 11. Ethics proposes to try to understand them; it asks whence they came and what they mean; it blinks no difficulty which the spirit of scepticism suggests, it ignores no claim which tradition puts forward. 12. But it goes its own way, regardless of both, with a deeper doubt than scepticism, because it doubts the conclusions of scepticism, and a deeper faith than traditionalism, because it believes in the reason which traditions embody, and which is the source of what power they still possess. 13. In man's self arise 14. For men begin to pass their nature's bound, And find new hopes and cares which fast supplant Their proper joys and griefs; 15. They grow too great 16. We shall advance from the church of the past to the church of the future, from the dead to the living church. 17. The old world waits the time to be renewed, Towards which new hearts in individual growth Must quicken, and increase to multitude In new dynasties of the race of men, Developed whence, shall grow spontaneously Excluding falsehood. 18. There will be a new church, founded on moral science; at first cold and naked, a babe in a manger again, the algebra and mathematics of ethical law, ETHICAL NITY 19. The church of men to come, without shawms or psaltery or sackbut; 20. But it will have heaven and earth for its beams and rafters, science for symbol and illustration; it will fast enough gather beauty, music, picture, poetry. 21. Stoicism, always attractive to the intellectual and cultivated, has now no temples, no academy, no commanding Zeno or Antoninus. 22. It accuses us that it has none: that pure ethics is not now formulated and concreted into a cultus, a fraternity with assemblings and holy days, with song and book, with brick and stone. 23. Why have not those who believe in it and love it left all for it, and dedicated themselves to write out its scientific scriptures to become its vulgate for millions? |