i>r V fiF r*? m 6a Oct ?n 1921 BV 4241 .W3 i Watkinson, W. L. 1838-1925| The shepherd of the sea, aj other sermons The Shepherd of the Sea By W. L. Watkinson, D.D. Each $i.oo Dr. S. Parkes Cadman says : " One of the few great preachers of the world. Science, art, fiction, poetry, psychology, philosophy, and essays have been collected by him and unified for clerical service." The Moral Paradoxes of St, Paul, Lifers Unexpected Issues and Other Papers on Character and Conduct. The Fatal Barter and Other Sermons. i2mo, cloth. The Duty of Imperial Thinking and Other Essays. i2mo, cloth. The Bane and the Antidote and other Sermons. i2mo, cloth. The Supreme Conquest and Other Sermons Preached in America. Frugality in the Spiritual Life and Other Themes for Meditation. The Blind Spot and Other Sermons. l2mo, cloth. The Education of the Heart and Other Essays on Character-Making. The Gates of Dawn, Devotional Readings for a Year. The Shepherd of the Sea AND OTHER SERMONS W. L. WATKINSON, D.D. With Introduction by S. PARKES CADMAN, D.D. New York Chicago Fleming H. Rcvell Company London and Edinburgh New York: 158 Fifth Avenue Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave. London: 21 Paternoster Square Eclinburgh: 75 Princes Street Introduction IT is an honor to be permitted to write a brief fore- word to these remarkable sermons by the Rever- end Dr. William Lonsdale Watkinson. This greatest of the surviving preachers of the Victorian pe- riod needs no introduction in any English-speaking land. His well-known volumes are to be found on thousands of bookshelves throughout the Empire and the Republic, and every clergyman who is fortunate enough to possess them can take full toll of the Gospel from their richly-stored pages. The last of the series, which we devoutly hope may not be the final book Dr. Watkinson will give to the Church, is in every respect equal to those which have preceded it. This is high praise, for the author's pen has been prolific and, in its influence for good, blessed far beyond the ordinary. While many celebrated preachers have stood aloof from the realm of con- temporary scientific knowledge, and contented them- selves with casual references to its amazing develop- ments. Dr. Watkinson has entered that realm in behalf of those evangelical doctrines of which he is a masterly exponent. The arguments of agnostics and of skeptical thinkers who are afflicted by specters of the mind are skilfully employed to vindicate and en- force the fundamental realities of revelation. In these homilies one discovers a delightful origi- nality which is reminiscent of Henry Ward Beecher 5 6 INTKODUCTION in his prime, and of the catholic intelligence of Horace Bushnell. Their titles support my statement ; they are treatises in brief, and suggest the strength and appo- siteness of the subject matter. The Shepherd of the Seas, The Magic of Grace, The Conquest of Invidious Circumstance, and The Table Lands of the Perfected Life, indicate that the reader approaches nothing trite or hackneyed in such sacred discourse. It is a first- class example of loyalty to the New Testament pro- gramme of life, combined with keen appreciation of whatever the humanities have to offer the Christian preacher. The style is the man, nothing more nor less, and characteristic of his fecundity of thought and cultured appreciation of the capital intimations of other leading intellects of the age. Dr. Watkinson is emphatically modern, but also balanced in his modernity: keenly aware that wisdom was not born with our generation, and that it will survive us. Sentences which leave music in the ear, and emotion in the memory, abound in The Shepherd of the Sea. They are an effectual protest against the colloquial manner of speech which has been popularized by too many speakers and writers upon religious questions. The affectation of the laboratory style, concise to bareness, and contemptuous of ornament, is discarded for a closely woven yet colorful rhetoric in which there is descriptive excellency, but nothing ornate or super- fluous. Painfully familiar quotations have no place here; the confessional moments of famous men and women are duly noted; the religious consequences of their concessions are set down. Above all else, these INTKODUCTION 7 sermons are to be valued for their fidelity to divine truth. The author deciphers the mysterious hiero- glyphics of the human heart, he unveils its incipient tendencies toward its Maker, and the struggles which these tendencies wage with its vanities and corruptions. Although Dr. Watkinson has passed fourscore years he yields nothing to pessimism. His survey of the centuries leaves him aflame with expectancy. The Kingdom of God is being built; steadily and perma- nently constructed, and will stand massively when much else upon which men lavish their labors is in ruins. His unusually large experience leaves our dear and venerable teacher and guide confirmed in the Christian Faith, in all it presupposes, and all it under- takes to accomplish. The minister who has to enter his pulpit beneath the clouds of doubt and fear should read The Shepherd of the Sea, and after it has borne its testimony, let him reflect upon the man who wrote it, and what he represents and embodies for our holy vocation. Surely we have nothing to gain by tem- porizing where eternal and redeeming verities are at stake ! Renewed zeal, courage and discretion are our chief necessities just now, and probably they point the moral of the history of preaching from its beginning. These virtues are displayed here in manifold and contagious ways, and he will be the fortunate and compensated preacher who realizes the spiritual vitality and literary merit of Dr. Watkinson's elucidation of the Evangel of the Son of God. S. Parkes Cadhan. Central Church, Brooklyn, Contents I. The Shepherd of the Sea Psalm 77 : 19, 20. II 11. The Unfailing Light .... Psalm 119 : 105 ; 2 Peter I : 19. 25 III. The Victory of Patience 2 Samuel 1 1 : i ; James 5 : 7. 41 IV. The Personal Equation in Christian Belief I Corinthians 15 : 32-34. 53 V. The Magic of Grace .... 2 Corinthians 5 ; 17. 67 VI. The Triumph of the Spring . Isaiah 32: 15. 81 VII. The Indwelling Spirit . . . , Ephesians 3 : 14-16. 96 VIII. The Law of Liberty .... Romans 8 : i, 2. III IX. The Principle of Spiritual Growth . Colossians 1:9, 10. 125 X. The Conquest of Invidious Circum- stance ...... Isaiah 58: 11. 138 XL The Chief Joy Philippians 4 : 4. 9 151 10 CONTENTS XII. The Table- Lands of the Perfected Life Ephesians i : 3, 4. 164 XIII. The Assurance of Hope Hebrews 6 ; 17-19. ^17 XIV. The Royalty of Service John 13:3-5. 190 XV. The Retarded Triumph Jeremiah 31 : 16. 203 XVI. The Snare of Unreality Luke 12:1. 215 XVII. The Blight of Unbelief Matthew 16:6. 230 XVIII. The Lure of Compromise Mark 8:15. 244 THE SHEPHERD OE THE SEA Thy way was in the sea, and Thy paths in the great waters, and Thy footsteps were not known. Thou leddest Thy people like a flock, by the hand of Moses and Aaron. — Psai,m 77 : 19, 20. IT is essential to our peace of mind that we be satisfied as to the rationality of life; that is, that life is ordered to some worthy end. We can never reconcile ourselves to the belief that Nature is the result of a " fortuitous concourse of atoms '* ; that history is a turbid flow of unrelated accidents ; or that our private life is aimless, purposeless. Whatever may be the fact as to the prevalence of chance or design in human life and terrestrial things, we certainly hope that it is the latter ; we find it difficult not to believe in order and purpose, and only when we have satisfied ourselves as to the existence and perfection of a pre- siding government are we at rest. We are never sin- cerely and deeply content until we arrive at the convic- tion that the world and life are dominated by a Provi- dence that is wise, just, and good. Carlyle, writing to Emerson, makes this confession: " My belief in a special Providence grows yearly stronger, unsubdu- able, impregnable." * Such a belief is essential to our peace of mind. Revelation justifies our intuition, teaching every- where that all creatures and events are subject to the * Correspondence, p. 69. II 12 THE SHEPHERD OF THE SEA will and purpose of an all-wise God. In the arrange^ ment of his library Napoleon placed the Bible in the political section, and so far we may admit the correct- ness of his judgment. A considerable portion of it contains a record of the mind and purpose of God in action, as disclosed in history; whilst the prophetic portion is occupied chiefly in the anticipation of the ultimate triumph of the Almighty's programme and design. From the Book of Genesis to that of the Revelation we witness the evolution of an all-com- prehending sovereignty; one that recognizes alike things great and small, and through a wise and just administration seeks the universal good. Yet, in the face of the world as it is, of things as they are and as they ever have been, we find it difficult to maintain this faith. The actual facts of history and of contemporaneous life seem often in violent collision with our creed, and greatly trouble us. From the very beginning history has progressed through the tumul- tuous, the destructive, the tragic; through the ship- wreck of empire and the travail of ages. " Thy way was in the sea, and Thy paths in the great waters." The primitive people had no history, their whole ex- istence being a blind and bitter striving; whilst the successive stages and scenes of subsequent history are crowded with episodes of strife and suffering. The story of the race is long and sorrowful. It has paid a severe price for whatever it has gained. Nothing has come to it easily or cheaply. Not a cell in our brain but was fashioned in the furnace ; not a fibre of our being but was wrought on the anvil ; not a trem- bling chord of our moral sense but was strung and tuned by the discipline of pain. The stair by which we have ascended, sloping through darkness up to God, is THE SHEPHERD OF THE SEA 13 no royal road, but a steep spiral that must be climbed with bleeding feet. " For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now" (Rom. 8: 22). Yes, "until now''; for never was the groan more deep, or the anguish more intense, than in our day. Such is the actual condition of things confronting us, which we are called upon to reconcile with opti- mistic doctrine. Frankly acknowledging the difficulty, let us see what solid ground yet remains for a confident faith. I. We recognize the difficulty attending belief in a divine purpose. If peace of mind is possible only whilst we assume that life is divinely ordered to some worthy end, it must be allowed that the existence of such a heavenly will, guiding and compelling man to a definite and an adequate result, often appears doubt- ful, and sometimes more than doubtful. No great thinker of our generation has felt the difficulty of recognizing design in Nature more acutely than Dar- win, or stated the case more fairly, and it is instructive to study his position. The general aspect of the glori- ous universe made it impossible for him to believe in chance. So he writes: " Another source of conviction in the existence of God, connected with the reason, and not with the feelings, impresses me as having much more weight. This follows from the extreme difficulty, or rather impossibility, of conceiving this immense and ^ wonderful universe, including man with his capacity of looking far backwards and far into futurity, as the result of blind chance or necessity." * Again, in a let- ter to Asa Gray, he writes: " I own that I cannot see as plainly as others do, and as I could wish to do, evi- * Life and Letters, so\. i., p. 312, 14 THE SHEPHEED OF THE SEA dence of design and beneficence on all sides of us. There seems too much misery in the world. . . . On the other hand, I cannot anyhow be contented to view this wonderful universe, and especially the nature of man, and to conclude that everything is the result of brute force. I am inclined to look at everything as resulting from divine laws, with the details, whether good or bad, left to the working out of what we may call chance. Not that this notion at all satisfies me." * And, once more, " I grieve to say that I cannot hon- estly go as far as you do about Design. I am con- scious that I am in an utterly hopeless muddle. I can- not think that the world, as we see it, is the result of chance; and yet I cannot look at each separate thing as the result of Design." "^ Is not this dilemma that of many thinking men, who, like Darwin, are not by any means atheistically in- clined? Whilst they contemplate Nature as a whole, they cannot do otherwise than admire its imity, mag- nificence, and goodness; yet they fail to reconcile " each separate thing " with the general aspect ; this, that, and the other detail are not in keeping with the larger and happier interpretation, — ^nay, they often seem directly to traverse it. Humboldt quotes Aris- totle to the effect that " In the unity of Nature there is nothing unconnected or out of place, as in a bad tragedy " ; yet certainly things often appear out of place, and otherwise incongruous with the prin- ciples and moral of the great drama, taken as a whole. But is there not a very real consolation and sug- gested hopefulness involved in this dilemma? The disturbing factor is the isolated detail, the general laws and their working being entirely satisfactory. *Ibid., vol. ii., p. 312. 'Ibid, p. 353. THE SHEPHEED OF THE SEA 15 Whatever may be the gaps and anomalies occasioned by the detail, the grand unity is maintained ; whatever may be the several discordances created by individual movements, they do not to any appreciable extent mar the vaster music; whatever may be the partial de- formities and discolorations which offend us, they are not sufficient to blemish the splendor of the master- piece. The things that puzzle and pain are the excep- tional details, not the essential, universal laws and their normal action. And is it not possible, nay, is it not probable, that these subordinate discords may be capable of an explanation that will leave free from the latest shadow of suspicion the one good and perfect Will that is so conspicuous in creation ? Darwin's perplexity was chiefly caused by the con- tradictions of the physical sphere ; yet a corresponding difficulty is suggested by social experience and history. In the individual life we have the consciousness, that, on the whole, things work together for good, yet many details are hard to bear and impossible to understand ; and whilst the philosophical historian finds sequence and progress in the history of the race, the signs of a prevailing and beneficent underlying purpose, there are yet ugly, chaotic, and painful incidents to be explained. Here, once more, the main aspects are satisfactory; and if not always so clear and convincing as in Nature, we may remember how seriously the development of the divine purpose in the fortunes of mankind has been disturbed and obscured by our ignorance, folly, and wickedness. There is no sufficient reason that we should infer with Darwin that the major part of Nature is governed by intelligent and beneficent law, whilst the rest is left to chance ; it seems much more logical to conclude with 16 THE SHEPHERD OF THE SEA Asa Gray that one supreme purpose runs through the whole creation and the ages, despite many appearances to the contrary. " For of Him, and through Him, and unto Him, are all things. To Him be the glory for ever. Amen" (Rom. 11: 36). n. The difficulty attending belief in the divine wisdom. How the regulation of mundane affairs is consistent with rationality is by no means always ap- parent; again and again we fail to follow God's method. Contradiction, discord, abortion, failure, or what appears to be such, occasion us painful perplexity. Our reason is confounded, as ages ago was that of Job. " Behold, I go forward, but He is not there ; and back- ward, but I cannot perceive Him: on the left hand, when He doth work, but I cannot behold Him: He hideth Himself on the right hand, that I cannot see Him" (23: 8, 9). And we are ready to complain with the psalmist, " How doth God know ? and is there knowledge in the Most High? " (73: 11). Some will even profanely dare to speak of Nature and of the government of the world as examples of colossal blundering. P~ Yet ought we, children of a day and knowing noth- ing, to be surprised that the universe exhibits works and movements surpassing our comprehension? When Michael Angelo was in the midst of building St. Peter's, the cardinals accused him of incompetence, and of destroying the work of his predecessors. But the artist declined to justify himself, and refused all discussion. Said he, " I am not obliged to communi- cate either to you or to any one that which I ought or wish to do. Your business is to look after the ex- penses. The remainder is my affair." When the workmen complained, he replied, " Your business is to THE SHEPHEKD OF THE SEA 17 build, to hew, to do joiner's work, and to carry out my orders. As to knowing what is in my mind, that you will never learn, for it would be against my dignity to tell you." How much more, then, shall the Architect and Builder of the universe surpass our knowledge and smile at our criticisms ? " For God is greater than man. Why dost thou strive against Him? For He giveth not account of any of His matters" (Job 33:12, 13J.^''"God k greater than man." How strange thjt it was ever necessary to say so! How astonishing our effrontery ! Seeing the marvel is that we understand anything, how can we presume to un- derstand everything? The truest sign of our great- ness is that we stand dumb before the mysteries of the majestic universe. But have we not the strongest reasons to confide in Him who stands within the darkness, ordering all things according to the counsel of His own will ? The Old Testament is never weary of celebrating the wis- dom of God as displayed in creation and providence; and the New Testament exults in the variegated wis- dom expressed in the nature and processes of redemp- tion. Naturally our attention is more directly fixed on the spiritual aspects and aims of the divine govern- ment, but we can never forget that the intelligence that presides over that government is as unerring as its design is sublime. Modem knowledge has given us no reason to doubt the perfection of creation, rather the contrary. The devout and famous men who lived before us were awed by the immensity of the universe, entranced by its loveliness, and amazed by its perfection. Said Balzac, looking over the landscape, " Oh ! that is true literature; there are no errors of style in a meadow." 18 THE SHEPHEKD OF THE SEA ** Nothing can exceed the beauty of the country ; it makes pictures appear sad trumpery/' was the con- fession of Constable. And hundreds of naturaHsts have testified with Douglas Dewar " Nothing shoddy is turned out in Nature's workshop. Even organs which will not be used but for an hour are finished with the utmost care. The May-fly, the winged life of which endures not a whole day, could not be more r accurately constructed were it intended to last for a thousand years. The mollusc, that spends its whole life buried in the mud at the bottom of the ocean, se- cretes for itself a most beautiful shell." It was a rare voice indeed that complained of Nature's shortcom- ings. But, say fifty years ago, it became quite the fashion with scientists to criticize and depreciate the structure and operations of the physical universe. In their eyes it seemed seriously at fault; they discov- ered, or thought that they did, irregularity, dishar- mony, defect, redundance, and failure. For a while it appeared as if this sinister interpretation of Nature was to be accepted by all clever observers for all time. Lately, however, the tone of criticism has quite changed, and the grand old doctrine of Nature's per- fection once more holds the field. A distinguished scientist thus recently rebuked his censorious brethren: " The tendency to assert that this or that character is useless, because the critic cannot find a use for it, is strongly to be deprecated. Every day naturalists are discovering the functions of the most insignificant- looking organs. He would he a rash man indeed who would now assert that any part of the human body is useless."^ So the latest science concludes with the * E. S. Goodrich, F. R. S., The Evolution of Living Organisms, p. 17. THE SHEPHERD OF THE SEA 19 psalmist, " In wisdom hast Thou made them all ** (104:24). This, then, is the point we labor: if God's works, despite all appearances to the contrary, are found, after severest examination, to be so exquisite, may we not reasonably expect one day to discover that, despite all appearances to the contrary, His ways are equally wise and good ? How deeply humiliated is the student of Nature when, after pronouncing some char- acter or other to be superfluous or injurious, he finds it to be of the essense of wisdom and beauty! And how deeply abased shall we be on the day when the secrets of God are made manifest, and it is seen that the providences we resented as untimely or harmful were exquisitely adjusted to our protection and per- fecting ! " Woe unto him that striveth with his Maker ! a potsherd among the potsherds of the earth ! Shall the clay say to him that fashioneth it. What makest Thou? or Thy work. He hath no hands " (Isa. 45:9). ni. The difficulty attending belief in the divine justice and goodness. Here emerges the bitterest problem of life. It is sufficiently trying to suspect caprice in the ordering of things; the sense of intel- lectual inadequacy and failure in the world's govern- ment is distressing ; but when events offend our moral sense, it is painful indeed. In spite of our conceit we are not altogether surprised that we cannot at once solve the intellectual difficulties which the universe suggests; but that brute force should prevail against right, duplicity against truth, and that innocence should be crushed by pride and truculence, threaten despair. The psalm before us loudly gives expression to this trouble. "Will the Lord cast off for ever? 20 THE SHEPHERD OF THE SEA And will He be favorable no more? Is His mercy dean gone for ever? Doth His promise fail for ever- more? Hath God forgottten to be gracious? Hath He in anger shut up His tender mercies ? " These dark days overtake the best of men in every genera- tion, and they bemoan themselves as they lose sight of justice and goodness in the tumult and darkness. " I remember God, and am disquieted: I complain, and my spirit is overwhelmed." " Thy way was in the sea, and Thy paths in the great waters, and Thy foot- steps were not known." Yet, even here, a little reflection may reassure us. That righteousness is the condition of the highest wel- fare of men and nations, and that God by strange in- struments and terrible visitations brings this truth home to those in peril of moral corruption and ruin, are two great lessons enforced by revelation. Vesu- vius is a lesser evil to prevent a greater; and tyrants, wars, and adversities may be overruled by heaven to saving moral issues. In the tenth chapter of the Book of Isaiah we learn how God used the Assyrians for disciplinary ends upon Israel, then again humbling them for their pride. " Ho Assyrian, the rod of mine anger, the staff in whose hand is mine indignation! I will send him against a profane nation, and against the people of my wrath will I give him a charge, to take the spoil, and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets" (vers. 5, 6). " Wherefore it shall come to pass, that when the Lord hath performed His whole work upon Mount Zion and on Jerusalem, I will punish the fruit of the stout heart of the king of Assyria, and the glory of his high looks " (v. 12). In His sovereign wisdom and power the Supreme selects the scourge, and having wrought THE SHEPHEKD OF THE SEA 21 its purifying work it is broken in turn for its own cleansing. Has not this method of arousing retrograde peoples, and stimulating them to a higher life, been followed through the centuries? Writing of the thirteenth cen- tury, Douglas Carruthers observes: "We in Europe 'scarcely realize the existence of the Mongols as a dom- inant factor in the world's history; it is difficult to be- lieve that the Mongols once represented the greatest human force that Providence made use of to kindle the dying West into a new life. There is no doubt that such great movements, and the disturbances that fol- low in their wake, bring fresh vitality and stimulus to countries sinking into a condition of lethargy, as instanced by China and Europe in those days. Na- ture realizes the necessity of periodically purifying the old, stagnant nations; and her plan is generally the ^same, namely, by war.'' * The forty-third and fifty- first chapters of Isaiah explicitly teach that a purer na- tional life may be made possible through national dis- aster. In the twenty-fourth chapter of St. Matthew's Gospel our Lord foretells the appalling scenes and suf- ferings that will attend the development of His King- dom. And, finally, the Book of the Revelation is crowded with awful imagery setting forth the world- tragedies amid which arises the City of God. The divine judgments have a constructive as well as a destructive side, although the former is the more likely to be overlooked. Whilst much Is destroyed and suffered, the inhabitants of the earth learn righteous- ness, and in this fact the severities of the divine gov- ernment find their justification. That war arises out of the basest passions of our fallen nature, and that it * Unknown Mongolia, 22 THE SHEPHEKD OF THE SEA is essentially one of the direst curses that can afflict those who delight in it, revelation never fails to teach ; yet once more He who chastens us through our pleas- ant vices converts our tragic sins into instruments of moral awakening and incitement. The sword has no less a diabolical signification because the Supreme from time to time uses it as a surgical instrument. And what is true in relation to the religious conse- quences of national calamity is equally true in re- lation to the overwhelming disasters which wreck individual prospects and appear so inexplicable. In describing the rare but terrible cyclones which periodically sweep North Queensland, E. I. Banfield writes: " Nature is rational even in her most passion- ate moments. These twenty-year-interval storms comb out superfluous leaves and branches, cut out dead wood, send to the ground decayed and weakly shoots, and scrub and cleanse trunks and branches of parasitic growths. All is done boldly, yet with such skill that in a few weeks losses are hidden under masses of clean, insectless, healthy, bright foliage. The soil has re- ceived a luxurious top-dressing. Trees and plants respond to the stimulus with magical vigor, for lazy, slumbering forces have been roused into efforts so splendid that the realism of tropical vegetation is to be appreciated only after Nature has swept and sweetened her garden." * '' Nature is rational even in her most passionate moments/' May we not believe that Provi- dence is equally rational in those whirlwinds that sweep society, and which, whilst they occasion painful confusions, also cleanse, stimulate, and beautify the life of nations? If the naturalist discerns rationality in the cyclone, can we be far wrong in our recognition * The Confessions of a Beachcomber. THE SHEPHEKD OF THE SEA 23 of an intelligent and a benign purpose controlling the tumult and fury of the people, and through discipline sweetening their life? The living God is Shepherd of the ocean as well as of the sweet sylvan mead; He is present and watch- ful over His flock in the days of storm and darkness, as in the days of prosperity and peace. It is in the storm that the shepherd is best understood; there specially does he reveal his strength and faithfulness and love. It is in the dark and dangerous crisis that we best prove the saving power of the Shepherd who gave His life for the sheep. The grandeur of the Lord Jesus is never so impressive as when He had the storm for a background. Let us not fear when all that we hold dear is strewn in wreck. When the work and hope of years disappear in all-enfolding ca- lamity, the Shepherd may be hidden, but He is there. "Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the Kingdom" (Luke 12: 32). He feeds and keeps amid foam and spray, as on green pastures and among the lilies. And in the hurricane that hurls the strength and glory of nations in the dust, the Shepherd still controls, remembering mercy in judgment. The trident is His crook. " The floods have lifted up their voice ; the floods lift up their roar- ing. Above the voices of many waters, the mighty breakers of the sea, the Lord on high is mighty. Thy testimonies are very sure" (Ps. 93: 3-5). Through all the uproar and shipwreck His " testimonies," His principles of truth and justice. His purpose of mercy and salvation, prevail. How full of anxiety, agita- tion, agony, is this seventy-seventh psalm! How full of thoughts of mystery, terror, and almost despair, and yet with that sweet, unexpected verse for its end- 24 THE SHEPHERD OF THE SEA ing ! " Thou leddest Thy people like a flock." In the very heart of the black tornado the green hills of mil- lennial years are in view upon which at last the Shep- herd shall feed His flock. To-day we are confused by a fearful tempest such as the world has never seen before; yet we may be sure that in due season God will vindicate Himself and His ways.' Mr. W. H. Hudson tells how he climbed a church tower that had a peal of eight big bejls. The effect of the chimes was too awful for words. In less than three minutes it became unendur- able. It was all terrible, shrieking, crashing, roaring, piercing the brain like a steel weapon, and it would have sent him out of his senses altogether if he had remained longer; yet at the distance the frightful dis- cord resolved itself into mellow music. To-day we are in the heart of a confused, roaring, hideous world that might well drive us to madness and despair; yet let us wait a while, obedient, trustful, patient, and the alarming noises that now affright the air shall prove Sabbatic music calling the race to a higher and holier life. They who have got the due distance hear " the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, Great and marvellous are Thy works, O Lord God, the Almighty; righteous and true are Thy ways, Thou King of the ages " (Rev. 15: 3). ( II THE UNFAILING LIGHT Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and light unto my path. — Psalm 119: 105. And we have the word of prophecy made more sure: where- unto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a lamp shining in a dark place.— 2 Peter 1 : 19. WE mortals tread a dim and perilous way, and most of us feel the need of guidance in the highest and most solemn matters of life. We anticipate a realm in which the essential truths of being will shine forth without the possibility of being misunderstood. "And there shall be night no more; and they need no light of lamp, neither light of sun; for the Lord God shall give them light " (Rev. 22: 5). But this is in sharp contrast with our present condition. Ours is " the night " ; sin, sorrow, and death prevail, wrapping the world in darkness, rendering life myste- rious, painful, perilous. We have sore need of what- ever light is available. As Oliver Cromwell puts it: " One beam in a dark place hath exceeding much re- freshment in it." The Scriptures claim to give the light that our situation demands, to be the " lamp shin- ing in a dark [or squalid] place," furnishing an ade- quate solution of the painful problems which oppress us, ** the master light of all our seeing." In the Bible we believe that we possess the truest clue to our personality. " Know thyself " is the first 25 26 THE UNFAILING LIGHT precept of philosophy, and in the sacred book we best learn this secret. Here we attain to the knowledge of the spirituality of our nature, of our relation to the Father of spirits, and of our citizenship in the spiritual and abiding universe. Again, on the sacred page we receive the glad news of our redemption from sin and condemnation in the Lord Jesus Christ. Here, too, we welcome the light that discovers the path of present duty. And, finally, in the foregleam of revelation we anticipate our destiny; so far as it has any practical significance, the mystery of the fu- ture is disclosed. We do not go to our Bible expect- ing it to furnish a key to the secret of the stars, or to le story of the earth, or to the treasures of Nature; )ut to consult it for what it really is, a directory of life. What the creature owes to the Creator, to him- self, and to his brother; how he shall fulfill his obli- gations and attain the perfection fitting him for his destiny in the redemptive grace, — ^here is the burden of revelation, and they misunderstand and misuse it who seek in it what pertains to science and philosophy. " Ponder the path of thy feet, and let all thy ways be established," or " ordered aright," is the counsel of the wise ; and the just response is that given by the psalm- ist, " Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and light unto my path." Very precious indeed in a life of perpetual anxiety like ours is the gracious light that shows where next we can set down our foot with safety. On the present occasion we propose to confine our reflections to two aspects of the divine guidance vouch- safed in revelation — its trustworthiness and its indis- pensableness. I. The trustworthiness of this golden lamp of the Church of God. THE UNFAILING LIGHT 27 i. The trustworthiness of the prophetic word. ** The word of prophecy " is the Old Testament. The words of Moses, Isaiah, and all the prophets, are re- garded as one and the same word, their entire testi- mony, and this St. Peter assumes is worthy of our absolute confidence. The Revised Version no longer describes the prophets as " holy," yet we know that such was their true character; in dealing with them we have not to do with men of uncertain reputation, but with men of profound sincerity and truthfulness, corresponding with their vocation, themselves burning and shining lights in dark generations. The purity and greatness of their character invite confidence in their message. And their message was divine. " For no prophecy ever came by the will of man: but men spake from God, being moved by the Holy Ghost." The things they taught were not evolved out of their own consciousness, not views and imaginations of their own, it was not any illumination to which they had attained by human wisdom; their knowledge of God and of His will and purpose was due to the authentic, personal action of God Himself. " They were moved by the Holy Spirit," carried out of them- selves, above and beyond themselves, penetrating to divine secrets outside the range of natural vision. " For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts" (Isa. 55: 8, 9). Into that supernal realm were the great prophets exalted, learning the thoughts and ways of God, that they might make known to the nations the way of salvation. Is there any reason to hesitate concerning this doc- 28 THE UNFAILING LIGHT trine of inspiration? We freely admit the doctrint so far as it relates to the intellectual world. A few elect souls possess extraordinary faculties of insight and expression. Victor Hugo writes, " The produc- tion of minds is the secret of the abyss," and it pleases the Supreme Spirit ever and anon to call forth spirits of rarest power and vision. We must remember that revelation recognizes the great poets, philosophers, and artists as being divinely inspired; and we have no /<)ther way to describe genius than to speak of Plato, '^Socrates, Virgil, Dante, Angelo, Shakespeare, and :heir peers as being inspired. And the greater the ordinary man may be, the more does he reverence these I exceptional spirits. In speaking of Isaac Newton, and referring to what he thought defective in Newton's manner of reasoning, Edmund Burke adds in a paren- thesis, "If in so great a man it be not impious to dis- ^^ cover anything like a blemish."^ Thus great men speak of the greatest. And we all do them singular homage, accepting them as lawgivers in the intellectual sphere, deferring to their lightest word. Why, then, if we thus acknowledge the operation of the Spirit in the mental world, should we stumble at His corresponding action in the moral world? Whatever may be our need of supernatural assistance in respect to the temporal life, we need instruction and guidance far more in regard to our moral life and duty. Such light is given in the " word of prophecy, whereunto we * do ' well that * we ' take heed." All who gave such heed have proved its verity and virtue. So far as the Jews have been loyal to the sacred book, it has secured to them unity and persistence through two thousand years, in spite of mighty injustice, perse- ^ Sublime and Beautiful THE UNFAILING LIGHT 29 cution, and calamity. In his defense Stephen reminds his accusers of " that Moses . . . who received Hving oracles to give unto us." That they were "living,'' the national history amply proves. There is divinity in an oracle that has wrought the stupen- dous miracle. And just as multitudes have acknowl- edged the intellectual greatness of the supreme mas- ters, and followed their guidance with thankfulness, so myriads have felt the spiritual truth and power of the prophetic word ; they have proved it to be the word of salvation here and hereafter. Strong indeed are the words of our Lord, and yet entirely justified, "And He said unto him. If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, if one rise from the dead " (Luke 16: 31). 2. Further, " We have the word of prophecy made more sure." That is, we have the confirmation of the Old Testament in the New. As Dr. George Adam Smith affirms : " We do not exaggerate if we say that the Bible of the Jews in our Lord's time was practically our Old Testament. For us its supreme sanction is that which it received from Christ Him- self. It was the Bible of His education and the Bible of His ministry. . . . We look to Christ as the chief Authority for our Old Testament." ' Whilst our Master, on a few points, used it with a certain dis- crimination. He found in it the prophecy of Himself and of His mission; by it His own life was nurtured. He quoted it with absolute confidence, and on every occasion enforced it as containing the words of eternal truth and life. Not on a single occasion, not for a moment, did He speak lightly or contemptuously of it, but invariably with confidence, sympathy, and rever- * The Preaching of the Old Testament. 30 THE UNFAILING LIGHT ence. Let us make Him our example in dealing with the Old Testament, and there will be no more flippant criticism of it. Neither let us attempt to weaken our Lord's sanction of the Bible, on which He set such store, by speaking of His earthly limitations, for in so doing we deny His essential glory and the basis of our hope. If Edmund Burke in alluding to Sir Isaac Newton was constrained to write apologetically, "If in so great a man it be not impious to discover any- thing like a blemish," shall we dare to suggest frailty in the majestic One in whom God speaks His final word to the race? Let us take the Old Testament reverently from the hand of the Master, with His sol- emn authentication; using it as He used it, for the knowledge of God, the strengthening of the soul, the ordering of life, and for the mighty hope that it im- plies and promises. What was good enough for the Redeemer is good enough for the redeemed. Those who clamor for the severance of the two Tes- taments may rest assured that they plead for the im- possible. Some complain that injustice is done to the Old by its being bound up with the New. " The old Jewish Testament is of so grand a nature that there is nothing with which we can compare it in other litera- ture. The New Testament, the book of * grace,* ap- peals more to the heart of little souls. To have joined the New Testament to the Old, as the Bible, the Book of Books, is perhaps the greatest audacity that literary Europe can have on its conscience." * Whilst, on the other hand, certain divines are troubled lest the claim of the New Testament should be prejudiced by its mar- riage with the Old. We may rest assured that this marriage was made in heaven. The Church of God, * Nietzsche. THE UNFAILING LIGHT 31 led by the Spirit of God, made no mistake in uniting the two, and what God has joined together no man can put asunder. The Old and the New Testaments are organically one, as the primeval earth and the tertiary constitute one complete and harmonious globe. As the geological world through many mutations gradu- ally reached more perfect types, dropping ruder forms, eliminating coarser life, until all became very beautiful and very good; so the redeeming purpose of God de- veloped through much imperfection until in the full- ness of time all the righteousness, faithfulness, and love of the Deity were revealed in the Messiah, and in His salvation; but the two dispensations are two stages of the one glorious drama. And as to-day we build our palaces with the marbles of the ancient world, enrich ourselves with its 'gold, diamonds, and precious stones, and draw from its depths fire and light, power and beauty, so from the documents of the ancient Church do we derive much of our best treasure for the enrichment of character, the en- lightenment of our understanding, and for the direc- tion of life. We consider, 11. The indispensableness of this revelation. "A lamp shining in a dark place." We were born in the night; we have lived in darkness; we are not without stars and moons, but we have never yet seen the light of day, only the twilight. Hence the indispensability and preciousness of God's most holy word to guide our feet into the way of peace. But it is objected that we have other sources of illumination making clear the path of life, and that these render us independent, increasingly independent, of any ancient book-revelation. In the recently pub- 32 THE UNFAILING LIGHT lished Journals of Emerson we find him complaining thfrtnpfeachers insisHng on a great truth are usually anxious to show how it corresponds with the life and teaching of Jesus, instead of showing how the life and teaching of Jesus corresponds with the truth. The truth of truths, Emerson contends, consists in the fact that truth is self-evident ; you do not need great names to substantiate it. It is light, and there is no need of a candle by which to see the sun. " Why must I obey Christ ? Because God sent Him. But how do I know God sent Him ? Because my own heart teaches the same thing He taught. Why, then, shall I not go to my own heart at first ? " * But the patent fact is here overlooked that much remains latent in the mind and heart until some rare genius discerns and gives it expression. All mathematical relations existed before Euclid came, and all men had some knowledge of them; yet it remained for Euclid to establish the science, to define and demonstrate the truths it com- prehends. Our intellect teaches the same thing that Euclid taught; had we gone to our own intellect first, we had been little the wiser. In all spheres thinkers of exceptional vision are necessary to put the multi- tude in possession of truths otherwise hidden from their eyes. A wealth of imagination and emotion ex- isted in the human heart before Shakespeare came; yet it needed the great poet to discern and distinguish its workings and make them intelligible. He made of the mystery of the heart an open secret, but had we first gone to our own heart, the result would not have been encouraging. If this reasoning be correct so far as it concerns the intellectual and emotional life, it is even more so 'Vol. ii., p. 516. THE UNFAILING LIGHT 33 in relation to the moral nature. After a Christian education and a ministerial period, it was easy for Emerson to find in his own heart essential truths ; but had he not first ploughed with the scriptural heifer, would he so readily have found out the riddle? Be- fore the Christian age and outside the Christian zone, it was not found easy to come to the knowledge of the eternal truths; on the contrary, able and sincere seekers sorrowfully complained that they could not order their speech aright because of the darkness. The great spiritual truths are kindred to the human mind and heart, and the faculty to appreciate them is latent in all ; but the anointed seers were indispensable to render the verities luminous and efificient. Pro- phetic spirits in Israel, and outside Israel, flashed upon the consciousness of the nations the truths by which we live ; out of what was to the vast majority an other- wise impenetrable nebulousness, they caused to shine the stars by which we may safely sail this mysterious sea. Emerson strikingly confutes his own doctrine of simply consulting our own heart for the truth, for no sooner has he repudiated Moses, Isaiah, and our Lord, rarely mentioning them again, than he proceeds (to sprinkle his pages thickly with the names and dicta of Homer, Plato, Plotinus, Shakespeare, Bacon, Goethe, and a multitude of minor stars. Having dis- 1 pensed with Him who is " the life and the light of men," he reminds us of the Brazilians who after sun- set read as best they may by the light of bottled fire- ' flies. It is very generally supposed that recent years have increased our knowledge outside revelation on the highest questions, whilst the fact is that rationalists themselves have lost confidence in several of the guid- 34 THE UNFAILING LIGHT ing lights which they once considered of first conse- quence. 1. The trust in reason upon which the old rational- ists placed such emphasis has been rudely shaken by their modern successors. That the chief use of reason is to convince us of our ignorance seems the general conclusion of these moderns. Consider the following from TyndalFs The Forms of Water: " It is worth pausing to think what wonderful work is going on in the atmosphere during the formation and descent of every snow-shower; what building power is brought into play ; and how imperfect seem the productions of human minds and hands when compared with those formed by the blind forces of Nature ! But who ven- tures to call the forces of Nature blind? In reality, when we speak thus we are describing our own condi- tion. The blindness is ours ; and what we really ought to say, and to confess, is that our powers are absolutely unable to comprehend either the origin or the end of the operations of Nature."' So, according to our scientist, Nature is not blind ; there is presumably a di- rective Spirit in the universe. The wheels are full of eyes ; but we are blind and utterly incapable of compre- hending the meaning of the earth; it is, indeed, pre- sumption in us to attempt. And if the agnostic thus assumes our blindness in relation to the origin and end of the operations of Nature, he none the less in- sists on our blindness in respect to our own being and destiny. " Everything in man is a mystery, and we can know nothing of what is not man. That is human knowledge ! " Such is the finding of Anatole France. According to these philosophers, the painful limita- tions of the intellect forbid that we can ever expect to ' Page 31. THE UNFAILING LIGHT 36 know the whence, the whither, or the way, and we must be content to remain in profound ignorance of what it most concerns us to know. If there is truth in this contention, a much-boasted Hght has waxed dim. 2. The confidence of our fathers that a close ac- quaintance with Nature would guide to right principles and ends has been seriously shaken. According to Adolf Wuttke, " The essence of Chinese morality is an effortless conformance to an eternally changeless world-order." ' Morality is " a mechanical adapting of self to universal Nature." Believing this, and be- lieving that the nearer people live to Nature the more they obey natural law, Rousseau sought to reverse civilization, and send us back to barbarism; the sav- age being supposed to live the ideal life of contentment and happiness, living as he does so much nearer Na- ture. A century ago how much pretty poetry and romance was written by the French in this strain! Yet the more austere naturalism of England was based on the same view; we were to drink in the spirit of J Nature, closely to study and imitate her, and by her light we should be unerringly guided. How far is all this from the present way of interpreting Nature! S3ne of the earlier naturalists writes: "Singular, in- deed, are the morals of flowers, and far from affording examples to be imitated by us. For in this respect to insure success Nature uses every possible artifice, every sort of deceit, every kind of cruelty; and flowers offer innumerable instances of what might well be termed the most vicious propensities." ' Later naturalists in a chorus join in this indictment of Nature, until Pro- * Christian Ethics, vol. i., p. 44, (\' Beccari, The Great Forests of Borneo, 36 THE mSTFAILING LIGHT fessor Huxley in his famous lecture, Bvolution and Ethics, threw Nature overboard altogether as a stand- ard of human duty. According to this leading ex- positor of the ethics of Nature, her guidance must not be accepted if we would reach a worthy goal. Her light leads astray. Her leading principle is no prin- ciple for us. Her process is repugnant to our higher instincts, fatal to our best interests, and, if we would escape damnation, we must at every step withstand her spirit and example. Here, then, another lauded lamp fails. 3. Conscience has long been reverenced, and con- sulted with confidence as an authoritative guide of life; most moralists have regarded it as in some sense a divine oracle whose judgments were dogmatic and obligatory. Conscience occupied the place in the moral sphere that the compass does in the natural. It was recognized as the supreme authority in the prin- cipal rationalistic systems of moral philosophy. But here again a crucial change has taken place in the esti- mate of the moral sense by many modern thinkers. When Nietzsche writes, " The prick of conscience is as foolish as the bite of a dog on a stone. Conscience is not the voice of God, but of other men in the heart of man," * he bluntly expresses the generally accepted opinion of the modern evolutionist. So far from the moral faculty being a golden heaven-lit lamp whose guiding ray may be implicitly followed, it turns out to be a greasy, smoky, battered old lantern, a relic of an- tiquity, to be used with suspicion. It can no longer be regarded as the trumpet of the eternal, but as a gramo- phone in which we hear the voices of men like our- selves, of a multitude inferior to ourselves — ^nay, too, *Mugge, p. 157. THE UNFAILING LIGHT 37 of strange wild notes of an inhuman past. The golden candlestick of the Jewish temple is said to be buried in the mud of the Tiber, and conscience at the hands of rationalism has suffered a similar degradation. So another standard light has gone ; conscience is stripped of its divinity; an extinguisher has been put on what the old deism honored as " the candle of the Lord." 4. The instinctive in human nature gives only a flickering light. It has been thought that as beasts and birds possess what is known as " a sense of direc- tion," so humanity will be guided into truth by an analogous sense. Instinct is the impulse that has been evolved through ages under the pressure of actuality, and influential systems of modern philosophy trust more to its promptings in the conduct of human life than to the reasoned conclusion. Yet those most in- clined to defer to the authority of instinct see reason to doubt it. Fabre in Insect Life has a chapter on "The Science of Instinct," in which he shows with what transcendent art insects act when guided by the unconscious inspiration of instinct. But in the follow- ing chapter on " The Ignorance of Instinct " he shows that a strange contradiction is characteristic of the in- stinctive faculties, and that with deep science is associ- ated ignorance not less deep. Fabre's conclusion on the whole matter is most instructive: " Instinct knows everything in the unchanging paths laid out for it ; be- yond them it is entirely ignorant. The sublime in- spirations of science, the astonishing inconsistencies of stupidity, are both its portion, according as the crea- ture acts under normal conditions or under accidental ones." We might well feel insecure in a life as full of strange situations as ours when the faculty on which our safety depends is liable to such serious aberrations; 38 THE UNPAILING LIGHT for it must be assumed that the errancy noted on the lower ranges of life will be repeated on the higher. So it would seem that another trusted lamp in the tem- ple of Nature burns but dimly, if, practically, it does not wholly fail. Let it, however, be distinctly understood that the believer in revelation is under no obligation to depre- ciate the natural sources of illumination, or to agree with these criticisms of them. Reason is not so blind as pictured; for if the forces of Nature are not blind, neither are we who are a part of Nature; if there is a supernatural element in Nature, which Tyndall allows, we by an inborn sense discern the supernatural work- ing, and everywhere the Scriptures do homage to that sense. Neither does revelation set at naught the light of Nature, but allows that it is sufficient to see God by, and to render authoritative the main fundamental moral truths. Whether or not the conscience is a gramophone charged only with human voices, the noblest rationalists have heard in it the trumpet Moses heard on Sinai; whilst the instincts and intuitions of the soul are constantly appealed to by revelation and incited to action. The truth is that justice must be done to all these organs. Each has its place and func- tion, and a serious error is made when any one of them is unduly depreciated. Only the point we make here is that no one of these, nor all of them combined, avails to meet the fullness of our need ; large room is left for further illumination. Whatever may be the value of natural signals and internal illumination amid the perplexities and perils of life, all impartial minds must acknowledge the unique advantage of revelation. Sin, selfishness, pas- sion, and irregularities of life have destroyed the in- THE UNFAILING LIGHT 39 tegrity of our nature, rendering largely unavailing all native lights ; extraordinary guidance is imperative if we are to find and walk in the path of life. The Old Testament, with its records of the law and government of God, interpreted by elect souls greatly gifted with spiritual insight, sheds marvellous light on the mystery of life and the way everlasting. The New Testament renders that light more marvellous still. The supreme Teacher of the ages opens His lips, and the obstinate problems are set in a confident and rejoicing light. The Angel standing in the sun is a dim metaphor of incarnate Truth and Love standing on the earth, mak- ing clear the dark enigmas which for ages had tortured our intellect and conscience. " God . . . hath at the end of these days spoken unto us in His Son" (Heb. 1:2). "Again therefore Jesus spake unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth Me shall not walk in the darkness, but shall have the light of life '' (John 8: 13). We may be reminded that of late years revelation has suffered at the hands of criticism equally with the moral faculty and natural theology. Our reply to that is that many accredited scholars who have subjected revelation to severest criticism retain their hold of it faster than ever ; they are satisfied that they have only taken the thief out of the candle, and henceforth walk in a purer light. As for the criticism that reviles and rejects revelation altogether, we turn from it to the unsophisticated million who in the fierce struggle of life prove the reality and preciousness of their Bible. Our attention is unduly fixed on those who in literature dispute revelation, and we forget the myriads of the sincere who in temptation, difficulty, and sorrow, in the stem strife of life and the blinding mystery of 40 THE UNFAILING LIGHT death and the grave, find in it assurance and peace, their strength, shield, and utmost salvation. We should, indeed, be forlorn without it. A while ago the object-glass of one of America's largest telescopes was stolen. Tremendous theft, it was like making off with the sky and stars! But who shall measure the catastrophe were one to filch away the Bible, that grandest glass of all that reveals the glory of the fir- mament of the soul? The eternal truths would abide, our faculty of vision in some degree remain; but how many of the great lights would be lost, how many more wax dim, and how nebulous and uncertain would be- come all our knowledge of the highest things! Ill THE VICTORY OF PATIENCE And it came to pass, at the return ef the year, at the time when kings go out to battle. — 2 SamueI/ ii: i. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient over it, until it receive the early^ and latter rain.—}AMts 5 : 7. TWO ways are open to us by which to realize the world; the one false and disappointing, the other legitimate and successful. The false method is expressed in our first text — the method of haste, violence, lawlessness ; the true method is de- scribed in the second, that of patience, industry, and virtue. " When kings go out to battle," they invade a country with the design of suddenly grasping power, seizing treasure, and covering themselves with glory, apart