LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. Shelf rt , UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 'V.* Y m -.v N Unitarian Catechism BY M. J. SAVAGE WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY E. A. HORTON Price, Paper, per Copy, . " Do{. . " Cloth, " Copy, . " Do%. . 20 cents $i. 5 o 30 cents. $2.50 INTRODUCTION. The preface by Mr. Savage gives the reasons, clearly and concisely, why a book like this is needed. It answers a great demand, and it will supply a serious deficiency. Having had the privilege of reading the contents very thoroughly, I gladly record my satisfaction in the character of the work, my hope of its wide acceptance and use, my appreciation of the author's motives in preparing it. The questions and answers allow of supplementing, of individual handling, of personal direction. It is not a hard-and- fast production. There is a large liberty of detail, explanation, and unfolding. The doctrinal positions are in accord with rational religion and liberal Christianity, the criti- cal judgments are based on modern scholarship, and the great aim throughout is to assist an inquirer or pupil to a positive, permanent faith. If any one finds comments and criticisms which at first sight seem needless, let it be remembered that a Unitarian cat- echism must give reasons, point out errors, and trace causes : it cannot simply dogma- tize. I am sure that in the true use of this book great gains will come to our Sunday- schools, to searchers after truth, to our cause. Edward A. Horton. AUTHOR'S PREFACE. This little Catechism has grown out of the needs of my own work. Fathers and mothers have said to me, " Our children are constantly asking us questions that we can- not answer." Perfectly natural ! Their reading and study have not been such as to make them familiar with the results of critical scholarship. The great modern revolu- tion of thought is bewildering. This is an attempt to make the path of ascertained truth a little plainer. This is the call for help in the home. Besides this, a similar call has come from the Sunday-school. Multitudes of teachers have little time to ransack libraries and study large works. This is an attempt, then, to help them, by putting in their hands, in brief compass, the principal tilings believed by Unitarians concerning the greatest subject. The list of reference books that follows the questions and answers will enable those who wish to do so to go more deeply into the topics suggested. It is believed that this Catechism will be found adapted to any grade of scholars above the infant class, provided the teacher has some skill in the matter of interpretation. GEO. H. ELLIS, Publisher, 141 Franklin St., Boston, Mass. Mr. Savage's Books. Religious Reconstruction. i2mo $1.00 These Degenerate Days. Small i6mo. Flexible 50 My Creed. i2mo 1.00 Poems. i6mo. Full gilt. With portrait 1.50 Light on the Cloud. i6mo. Full gilt 1.25 Social Problems. i2mo 1.00 The Religious Life. i2mo 1.00 Belief in God. i2mo . . . . 1.00 Beliefs about Man. i2mo 1.00 Beliefs about the Bible. 1.00 The Modern Sphinx, nmo 1.00 The Morals of Evolution, nmo 1.00 Talks about Jesus. i2mo 1.00 Man, Woman and Child, nmo 1.00 Christianity the Science of Manhood. i2tno 1.00 The Religion of Evolution. i2mo 1.50 Life Questions. i6mo 1.00 Bluffton: A Story of To-day. i2mo 1.50 Helps for Daily Living. i2mo 1.00 The Signs of the Times. i2mo 1.00 Life. i2mo 1.00 The Minister's Hand-book. For Christenings, Weddings, and Funerals. Cloth 75 Sacred Songs for Public Worship. A Hymn and Tune Book. Edited by M. J. Savage and Howard M. Dow. Cloth 1.00 Leather 1.50 Unitarian Catechism. With an Introduction by E. A. Horton. Price, Paper, per copy, .... 20 cents. Per doz., 1.50 " Cloth, " .... 30 " 2.50 Mr. Savage's weekly sermons are regularly printed in pamphlet form in " Unity Pulpit." Subscription price, for the season, $1.50; single copies, 5 cents. GEO. H. ELLIS, Publisher, 141 Franklin St., Boston, Mass. LIFE M. J. SAVAGE OF r<** copyrigh NOV 19 ' / BOSTON GEO. H. ELLIS, 141 FRANKLIN STREET 1890 ^ ^ Copyright By George H. Ellis 1890 CONTENTS. I. Nature and Origin of Life, 9 II. Is Man more than Animal? 23 III. The Method of Evolution, 37 IV. The Problem of Pain, 54 V. The Individual Soul under Law, 73 VI. Goodness and Moral Evil, 89 VII. My Life's Meaning, 103 VIII. A Human Life, 116 IX. Work and Play, 129 X. Wealth and Poverty, 142 XI. Mr. Bellamy's Nationalism, 158 XII. Other Social Dreams, 177 XIII. Moralities and Morality, 195 XIV. Religions and Religion, 211 XV. What is it all for? 224 NATURE AND ORIGIN OF LIFE. I begin this morning a series of sermons on " Life." My purpose in it will be to take up and consider some of those difficulties, practical problems, which weary the brain of so many and burden the heart. It may seem at first sight an ambitious project ; and yet I do not claim any unusual, any peculiar source of knowledge on any of these great themes, — only, out of the careful study of many years, a study, earnest, loving, hopeful, it is possible that there may come to you some thoughts with which you are not entirely familiar, some suggestions that will be of practical help. So, in a simple quiet way, I undertake to oifer you what aid I can in settling some of these difficulties that environ our thinking and our living. My subject this morning is " The Nature and Origin of Life." You will not think me presumptuous enough to sup- pose that I can settle off-hand a question like this, which has been the great sealed question of all the ages. And yet, as the world gets older and a little wiser, it does approach nearer, I believe, to the solution. For I am one of those who do not believe in any unknowable, — I only believe in the Unknown. We are finite beings in an infinite universe, and this is at once our despair and our hope, — our despair, so far as solving all questions this year or the next is con- cerned; our hope, as showing spread out before us an infi- io Life nite field for study, an endless road along which we may advance. What, then, is life ? I will begin by calling your attention to one of the lowest and most simple forms of organic life with which we are familiar. If you will take a small bit of fresh and healthy substance, either animal or vegetable, and place it in a little wineglass of water and let it be there for some time in a sunny place, in a warm room, you will find that, after a few days, it will be swarming with life, — little forms of organic life that are called amoebae. An amceba is only a little jelly-like globule ; but it possesses most wonderful powers, and has within itself the promise and the potency of such development as that of which we cannot even yet dream the end. This little creature, hardly to be called organic in the ordinary sense at all, is yet endowed with certain marvellous faculties. Let me describe it, so far as the main distinctions are concerned between it and the other kind of matter which we call dead, which I prefer to call inorganic, because, as we shall see very soon, we have outgrown the use of the word " dead " as applied to anything in this universe. This little creature, then, in the first place, can feel. It possesses this wondrous something called sensation. In the next place, it possesses the power of spontaneous movement. It does not necessarily remain in the place where you put it or where you first see it, as ordinary matter does. It has the power of assimilating food, which no inorganic matter possesses. Matter, as we know it, in its forms that we ordi- narily call lifeless, may grow by accretion, by crystallization ; but it does not grow by assimilation. Only a living thing can take of something outside itself, and by a process of assimilation or digestion make it a part of its own organic being. Then, through this process of taking into itself sub- Nature and Origin of Lift n stances and making them its own, it possesses that other quality of life which we speak of as growth. And, then, it possesses that marvellous power of reproduction, so that the line of life is continued day after day, year after year, age after age. These are the main essential qualities that separate what we call dead matter from living things, or the inorganic from the organic. I wish, however, to refer briefly to one or two other peculiarities. All living things pass through the cycle represented by the words "birth," "growth," "death." And, then, there is one more peculiarity, which will constitute the starting-point for further investigation as to what this strange thing is that we call life. It has a chemical constitution pe- culiarly its own, — entirely unlike the substance of any inor- ganic matter. And, though chemists may take it to pieces as much as they please, though they may discover its com- ponent parts, every element that enters into it, no man has ever yet succeeded in putting it together again. No chemist has ever created the most infinitesimal particle of living sub- stance. So here, then, the difference between a live amoeba and a dead one is the difference between materialism and spiritualism, the difference between a dead world and a liv- ing one. And right in there is the centre, the crucial point of the great problem that has faced all the ages, and which, when solved, will contain within itself the key to the meaning of the universe. Let us now, then, raise the question, What is the difference between the live amoeba and the dead amoeba ? Where did the life come from ? Can we trace anything in regard to its origin ? There are two or three so-called theories that it is worth our while for a few moments to consider, though one of them — and that which is most commonly in people's minds, the popular theory, so to speak, of the last eighteen 12 Life hundred years, perhaps of most of the past history of man — cannot, in the proper use of language, be spoken of as a theory at all. People have been accustomed to say that life originated on this planet by the direct creative act of God, God being looked upon as a being outside the world, with a certain substance called dead matter as the material with which he was to work. So the naive story in Genesis represents God coming down to earth, shaping some of this dead matter into the likeness of bird, animal, plant, and man, and breathing into these what is called the breath of life, — that is, suddenly taking something which is dead and conferring life upon it, — a something added to its substance, or something incorporated in it, somehow and somewhere. And yet, — though, as I said, this is called a theory, — if you stop and consider it a moment, it is no theory at all. For what is a theory? A theory is an attempt to explain or account for certain facts. But here we have no fact, only a supposed or assumed fact, for which an explanation is also supposed or assumed. All assumption from beginning to end. And even though we knew that God in some mysteri- ous way simply said, " Let man be," and, where it was blank a moment before, a full-grown man stood, — even that would be no explanation ; for an explanation enters into the process, tells something as to the how. The ordinary theory of creation, then, as it is called, is no true theory at all, and is no explanation of what still remains the same mystery that it was before. There is another theory that has been advanced as to the origin of life on this planet. You are familiar, I suppose, with the fact that there are thousands of meteors falling on this earth from somewhere in the sky, as we are on our cyclic journey every year. What are they ? They are little broken fragments of other planets, asteroids. It has been Nature and Origin of Life 13 supposed by some that life might have been sown, so to speak, on this planet of ours by these broken fragments of another planet on which life had existed before it was destroyed. All this is conceivable ; it is possible ; it is a theory. And yet it does not help us one whit ; for the ques- tion still arises, Though life came to this planet from some other planet in space, how did it come on that other planet? And, though we have a line of planets reaching back into the past, through millions of ages, still the question confronts the investigating thought of the inquirer as to where the first life came from ; for life must have begun on some planet, or else it must have always existed. Another theory is that of " spontaneous generation." In- genious tests have been made by many scientific men. But no life has yet been obtained except from previous life. So this theory, so far, is entirely wanting in proof. I shall not assume so much as an attempt at answering this great question this morning, any further than by way of suggestion. I believe it has been proved beyond all rational doubt that the gulf ordinarily assumed between dead matter and living matter is purely imaginary. There is no such thing as dead matter. There is matter which is beyond the range of your consciousness, and which so seems uncon- scious to you. And yet there is not one single infinitesimal particle or atom of matter throughout this infinite universe that is not pulsing with a part of the infinite life. There is no dead matter. Everywhere tireless, age-long, almighty activity, — nothing at rest, nothing dead. And what does this mean ? I believe, friends, that it means the one God and Father of all, in all, through all, — everywhere living, everywhere active, everywhere creative, so that, in all parts of the universe where anything lives, it is the natural out- blossoming of this infinite life, — as natural as the bursting 14 Life of the soil in the spring by the green blade of grass. Life everywhere outflowering as a part of the manifestation of this infinite, one, eternal life, — our God, our Father. This I offer you, friends, not as demonstrated science, but as the most rational thought which I can frame, and — mark you this — as being contradictory to no science, to no knowl- edge, that is possessed by any one in the world. Rational, and in accord with all that we know, is this theory as to the origin of life. Now, what is this life ? I will call your attention to it in this, one of the lowest life forms, the amceba. Here is a little creature that has no hands, and yet that can suddenly protrude a part of its own body to serve as a hand, which is absorbed again into the general mass. It has no mouth, and yet any part of its substance suddenly becomes a mouth when the call is made for it, so that it can take into itself other substance as food. A creature that has no legs or fins or wings, and yet can protrude parts of its substance to serve the purpose of legs or fins or power of locomotion. Here is this little creature, then. I wish now to ask you to note some of the steps in the onward and upward movement of this mysterious thing, life, that we may get some hint as to the overmastering wonder of it all. Trace now this life : what does it do ? It has no eyes at first. But the life goes on in process of time to create eyes ; and so this universe, dark before, becomes all alive with light, glorious with color, more than even we have ever imagined or dreamed. That is to say, in some way the pul- sating movements of this ether that surrounds all forms of life create in the brain of those that have first created for themselves eyes all these marvellous sensations of color. This lowest form of life has no ears ; but it goes on, and in the process of time creates ears, — ears which come out to Nature and Origin of Life 15 respond to these rhythmic wave-motions of the ether again, until all the cries and sounds and songs, all the harmonies of the world, echo in these wonderful chambers of the brain. This sensitive creature has no nervous system at first, no brain, no spinal cord, of course ; but it goes on, and in the process of time this life creates the spinal cord and the nervous system and the brain, and so comes into contact with all the wonderful life of the world, receiving its de- spatches from the farthest star, from the deepest mines, from all over the universe, and translating them into thought, into meaning, in these wondrous brains. Of course you know there was a long period in the life of this planet when the highest form of life was to be found in the fishes and in the sea. But this same one life that we found in the amoeba and which had climbed up into the fish did not stop there. It went on, until all the manifold forms of reptilian life covered the globe, and everywhere creatures that we now hardly know how to classify, — creatures with reptilian characteristics, creatures with wings, who could live partly in the water, partly on the land, partly in the air. But still the life was not content : it went on climbing still, until it took on all the million forms of birdlike beauty. And these wonderful creatures flew and sang between the green of the earth and the blue of the far-off sky. But still the life was not content. It climbed up into mammalian forms, — all the wonderful animals of the world that have trodden its forests, that have ranged its vast steppes and plains. But still not content. By and by, in some far-off aeon, so distant and dim that we cannot trace it, the forms that were prostrate had climbed up until at last a creature stood on its feet : its fore feet had become arms ; and there was the first manifestation of that form of life that we have come to call human. There was a man on the earth. 1 6 Life However crude, however ignorant, however savage, hov/ever brutal in his characteristics, however unlike that which we attach to the word now, a man stood upon the earth and lifted his face towards heaven, and began to wonder what those far-off points of light might mean, and began to say "I," to wonder what sort of a being he was, what the great life must be that was manifested in all external forms and movements of nature outside himself. And then this life seized the brain and developed it until it has become the dominant power of the world. And what has this life achieved through the ministry of man ? This life that we saw in this lowest, tiniest creature climbed into man and did what ? Organized himself first into the family, then into the tribe, and then, seizing upon the idea of a vast social order, created kingdoms and peo- ples, — a world-wide empire like that of Rome, the embodi- ment of law, of order ; changing the face of the earth, building roads to the most distant provinces, establishing communication between tribe and tribe and people and people, and carrying on that idea of government, of the social order until, mightier than Rome and freer than man ever was before since the morning stars sang together, we have our own grand Republic. Here is one thing that this mysterious life has done. What else ? This life that started without eye or ear caught a glimpse of that infinite vision of the world's beauty ; and, first through crude scratchings upon stones or upon smooth pieces of bone or ivory, and through rude statues, coarse imitations of the human shape, it climbed, at last, until it blossomed out into all the art of Greece, the Renaissance of Italy, all the painting and statuary of the modern world. Here is another thing that this life has done. What else ? The life that started without ears caught a far-off echo of Nature and Origin of Life 17 sound, which grew until, from the first rude cries, the sough of the wind in the tree-tops, the sob of the wave on the shore, there has been developed all the magnificent work of all the masters, creating symphonies and oratorios and operas that voice and give expression to that which cannot be expressed in the heart and fear and hope of man. What else ? This life dreamed of a right and a wrong, and morality is born, — born first as a little social fact of the relation of one man to another, until to-day the universe is to our thought the embodiment and the eternal consecra- tion of morality, — of all that is good and fair and sweet and true. What else did this life do ? This life first stood in awe of something outside itself, — a curious stick, a stone, the lightning zigzagging across the skies, the wind drifting a cloud before it over the blue, — no matter what. There dawned upon the consciousness of this life the thought of another life that was not itself, that was in and through the things that were about it. And out of this have come all the religions of the world, — this life, on bended knee and with uplifted face, daring to think that there is a father-life in the things above and beyond itself, and reaching up its helpless hand in the darkness to touch this life, to be helped, be led by it. This life has done one more thing. It has not only cre- ated all that we see of true and noble, fair and good, but it has dared to dream, — where did it get its dream ? — dared to dream of a fairer world than it ever saw, dared to dream of a better humanity than it ever saw, dared to dream of a higher truth than it ever saw, of a grander justice than it ever saw, has dared to dream of a perfect world. Where did it get its dream ? Did it come out of the dirt at one's feet? 1 8 Life What, then, is this wondrous life ? Friends, it seems to me that, when we trace it from its lowest manifestations until we gain some feeble glimpses of its highest, it is ab- surd to think that this life is anything less or anything else than a part of the infinite Life itself ; for that which we see in the grass-blade, that which you see in one of these flowers, that which you see in one of the stars over our heads, is also that which you see in the man of Galilee, which you see in the brain of Shakspere, — the one life from lowest to highest, and not yet through, only en route, — to where ? This life, friends, I believe to be only manifesta- tions as the years go by, out-blossomings everywhere of that life which is God, — the mystery and yet the explanation of all things. I shall have something further to say next Sunday morn- ing as to the difference in kind or degree — a difference in degree, which perhaps amounts to a difference in kind — between this life as manifested in the lower forms and in man, so I will leave it where it is for to-day. I wish now, after so much of hinting as to the origin, the nature, the wonder, the glory, of this great thing that we call life, to hint to you a little as to the probable distribution — quantity — of this life in the universe. It means very little to us that everything is alive. But, when you consider that every drop of water which you drink when you are athirst is a little world crowded with life, when you reflect that there is not an inch of the surface of this globe that is not thrill- ing, thronging, with countless forms of life, when you reflect, as Lowell sings in " Sir Launfal," that " There is not a leaf or blade too mean To be some happy creature's palace," when you reflect that the world is all one grand manifesta- tion of innumerable forms of life, from those that are too Nature and Origin of Life 19 small for the microscope to discover to those that are the mightiest in structure and organization, — then you get a starting-point, so far as this little world of ours is concerned. But is this world the only one that is alive or is peopled with forms of life ? Friends, it was a rational speculation a few years ago to consider as to whether or not there was more than one inhabited world. But it is no longer reason- able even to raise the question. We are practically sure that there are countless inhabited worlds. We have learned, at last, that the substance which goes to the making of the most distant suns is precisely the same as that which enters into the composition of this poor old earth underneath our feet. So we know it is one substance and one life every- where ; and we know, furthermore, that every one of these points of light that dot the blue at night is not a planet, but it is a sun, and each of these suns is surrounded by its own little group and family of planets and moons, precisely as is our sun. Not all the worlds that surround these distant suns are peopled. We know concerning our own, for example, that there are probably only one or two planets in this group that are in such a condition as to be habitable by the kind of life which there is here. I say the kind of life ; for it is quite possible for us to imagine different kinds of creatures to inhabit planets in a condition such as we cannot now con- ceive of easily, just as we know there are creatures here that can live underground and in water just as well as in air. But there are probably in these distant heavens that we gaze at so wonderingly, so lovingly at night, countless worlds in process of growth, not yet ready to be peopled. Then there are others containing only the lowest forms of life, as our earth did some millions of years ago. Then there are others, perhaps, that have reached the stage where fishes can live 20 Life and find their home, others that have reached the reptilian stage, others still that have reached the point where birds fly and sing and are at home ; others that have gone a step higher, until animals roam the forests ; others, perhaps, where, if we could only reach that far-off world, we might find the much-speculated-about creature, primeval man, — life first taking on the shape that we are accustomed to call human. And then, for aught we know, there may be worlds that have progressed thousands of years beyond where we are to-day. It is not an unreasonable speculation to suppose that they may have reached a height of spiritual attainment so that there is open communion between themselves and the other spiritual creatures that inhabit eternity. I say it is not an unreasonable speculation. I do not advance it as a fact. This universe, then, is all alive, thrilling and throb- bing with countless forms of being, more wonderful than we can yet imagine. And now, at the end, I wish only to suggest one or two points, which, though not practical in the ordinary, small, petty way of what we commonly call practical, yet seem to me to be practical in the grandest sense of the term. We have been endowed with this wonderful thing called life, or rather we have been called into being as expressions or manifestations of this wonderful thing called life. And we are in a universe infinite in range and infinite in outlook and alive all through. With what ringing power, then, ought to come to you the challenge of those words uttered hun- dreds and hundreds of years ago by one of the sacred writers, when he says, " Seeing we are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and run with patience the race that is set before us" ! Think what a magnificent thing it means merely to be alive in a universe like this ! No matter where you are now, Nature and Origin of Life 21 how much you may have attained or not attained, through what failures you may have passed or what successes, whether you be poor or rich, whether you be ignorant or wise, you have set your foot upon the highway of the King; and that highway, running out and out along the star-lighted vista, loses itself from sight, from thought, even from dream, but does not end, so far as you can see. What may not be, then, for any of us who have started on this grand journey ? Do not be impatient, then, with the conditions of life, its troubles, its trials. Let us rise to a comprehension of its grandeur, and determine that we will play our part worthily in a calling high as this. I wish to read to you at the close a few lines, familiar already to many of you j but I read them because they are a simple, unpretending attempt to give voice to the wonder of this great fact of life : — O wonder of the world, whose surface bright Fills wide-eyed childhood with a fresh delight Beneath the surface, to exploring eyes Deep yawns to deep, and heights on heights arise. Each grass-blade and each gaseous atom holds An infinite mystery that his thought enfolds, Who knows each molecule the kinsman is Of every star ray piercing the abyss. And not one lily blossom in the vale But to the instructed ear can tell a tale Whose opening chapter was the eternal past, And is not done while endless ages last. Short is his fathom line who thinks he sounds — And finds it shallow — being's dread profounds ! The emptiness is in the pool that lies Too shoal to hold the stars and boundless skies. 22 Life Oh, when I look upon the laughing face Of children, or on woman's gentle grace, Or when I grasp a true friend by the hand, And feel a bond I partly understand, — When mountains thrill me, or when by the sea The plaintive waves rehearse their mystery, Or when I watch the moon with strange delight, Treading her pathway mid the stars of night, — Or when the one I love, with kisses pressed, I clasp with bliss unspoken to my breast, — So strange, so deep, so wondrous life appears, I have no words, but only happy tears. To-day I think and hope, and so for this, If it must be, for just so much of bliss, — Bliss threaded through with pain, — I bless the power That holds me up to gaze one wondrous hour. IS MAN MORE THAN ANIMAL? " Is man more than animal ? " asks the nameless old He- brew singer. "Know thyself," as if this were the begin- ning and end of all knowledge, echoes the wise old Greek. Let it be our purpose, then, this morning, so far as we are able, to consider a little carefully what sort of beings we are, what our place is in nature. For, if we can find out this, the resulting obligations will be plain to any thoughtful mind. Whatever else we are, it is plain to even the most super- ficial observation that we are animals. On whatever theory we may consider the subject, whether we take the old idea of outright creation or whether we accept the scientific doc- trines of Mr. Darwin and his fellow-laborers, it makes no difference as to this point, — we are animals. Whether we were created outright in a second of time or whether man is the outblossoming of the topmost twig of a tree of life that is millions of years old, still this is plain, — we are animals. I wish to call your attention again — I have done it before more than once, maybe — to what, to my mind, is a striking, significant fact as indicating the place that man occupies in relation to the other forms of animal life. The lowest creat- ures that live and crawl over the earth or float in the waters are, as you know, horizontal in position, of very simple structure, of a very low type of nervous organization, — pos- sessing no brain, in the proper sense of the word. But, as life develops, a striking change appears. The nervous sys- tem becomes more complex ; there is a stronger and stronger 24 Life tendency towards the development of a brain ; there is a gradual lifting of the very form itself, up through the reptile, bird, mammal, until at last man stands, by contradistinction to the lowest forms of life, perpendicular, with his feet upon the earth and his head pointing to the far-off heavens. And, in the course of this development, not only have there gone on appropriate accompanying changes of physical structure, but such a development of brain, of the organ of intelli- gence, as leaves all other creatures hopelessly behind in the race of development. But still, standing on his feet, having turned what were the fore feet of the animal into hands, having developed this wondrous power of thought, so that he looks before and after and questions all things and dreams all things, — still he remains an animal. Let us see now for a moment what it is that he shares with his fellow-animals beneath and about him. In the first place, his physical structure and constitution ; in the next place, consciousness, or the power of feeling ; and once more still, a power of thought, — for animals think as truly as do men. And, then, animals possess the power of memory. They carry somewhere in the bram or mind the recollection of yesterday, of last year, so that they become attached to persons, to places with which they are associated, and have almost a human gladness in rediscovering again these places endeared to them by old associations. Animals also have the power of forelooking, or anticipa- tion. They can expect something that is to come this after- noon or to-morrow, and take their animal delight in this anticipation. Any one who has ever gone out with a keen- scented dog on the hunt needs no further argument than to watch the kindling of the eye and how alive he is all over in expectation of the joy which he shares with his master hunter. Is Man more tJian Animal 25 And, then, animals have the power to dream. This is one of the great mysteries of human nature that no science has yet solved. What is this dream ? What is this activity of the mind while all the senses are asleep, — that lives over the past, that anticipates the future, that makes journeys quick as a flash of thought ? We do not know what it is, but we know that animals share it with us. Animals, again, share with us a certain kind and degree of the power of loving. They love their young ; they love their companions, their mates, their associates ; and they carry this love so far, sometimes, that it develops that which we are accustomed to think of generally, perhaps, as purely human, — a power of self-sacrifice, of patient suffering, of long waiting and endurance for the sake of the object loved. Animals have the power of friendship. They become at- tached to some of their companions in a way that might shame the faith of our human associations. And then, again, they often possess at least the rudiments of what we are accustomed to think of as morality. I shall show you in a moment how wide the gulf is between this morality that is possible to the animal life and that ideal and higher moral- ity which characterizes only the highest type of the human. But animals are capable of becoming so dominated by the ideas, the wishes, the will, of a master whom they not only fear, but love, that, when they have transgressed this master- ful will, — when they have done that which they have been taught, not to be wrong, — for an animal can have no sense of what we mean by the abstract term wrong, — but that which the master desired to be done or refrained from, — they are capable of showing fear, shame, almost penitence (sorrow, at any rate) that they have grieved and disobeyed the master that they love. 26 Life Animals share with us, then, all these faculties, qualities, characteristics. I turn now, however, to raise the question as- to what peculiarities and characteristics we possess that separate us by a gulf that, so far as we can see, the animal possesses no power to bridge or leap. What is it that makes us men above and beyond the animal world ? This question I ask, and now proceed to answer. i. I have said that the animal possesses a rudimentary kind of morality. But morality in the highest sense — that which deserves the name, that which constitutes the high- est and noblest quality and characteristic of humanity — the animal does not share with us. What is that ? We need to be educated and lifted somewhat in this realm of thought and life ourselves before we can appreciate the distinction that separates us from our lower neighbors. If any man be moral merely because he is afraid of a master, whether that master be on earth or in the heavens, — whether the whip- ping that he expects be anticipated here or in some far-off world, — if that be his conception of what it is to be moral, then, in that particular, he is not above the animal. He shares his morality only with his horse and his dog. Moral- ity, in the true sense of the word, means a clear conception of that which is just and right in our relations with our fel- low-men, and the desire to measure out to our fellows, not a patronizing benevolence, not to give them what they can take because we are not strong enough to keep it, but care- fully and earnestly to give to them that which is theirs by right, — theirs as equal sons of God, theirs as equal sharers with us of the earth, its opportunities and its hopes of the future. This is morality, and this only is worthy of the name. And here, when we have risen to this, is one of the grand points of separation between us and the animal world. Is Man more than Animal 2J There is no possibility of our conceiving even that any animal, however highly developed, should attain to this ab- stract idea of right, to this sense of justice. An animal, out of love for its offspring, may deny itself food ; for the sake of a friend — I have known such cases — it may put itself to inconvenience and suffering. But this is following the in- stinctive leading of love. There is no thought between one dog and another that "this belongs to you and does not belong to me, — it is just and right that I should treat you so and so, and that you should treat me after this or that manner." This conception of justice, of essential right, — this idea of the abstract relationships in which we stand to others, so that they have claims upon us and we have obliga- tions towards them, — this is peculiarly, distinctively human. And, as I said, there seems no conceivable way by which the animal can ever become a sharer with us in this pecul- iarly human characteristic. For, if once an animal should be found to possess a quality like this, we should say, " Here is no longer a dog or a horse : here is, no matter in what shape, something that is human." 2. The second characteristic that I will mention as sepa- rating us from all of the lower forms of life on earth is the simple ability to say "I." I called your attention to the fact that the animals are conscious. But there is a gulf between that and this other thing that is stated only by add- ing a word with a hyphen, — self-conscious. Only man has this self-consciousness which says, " I," — which asks, "What am I?" — which raises the question, "Where did I come from?" — which considers the nature of man, the relation in which he stands to the world around us, to other beings whether visible or invisible. This power of saying "I," of questioning all the world, — this is human, and be- longs only to man and those possible orders of being which 28 Life are above man. It belongs to nothing that is beneath the level of humanity. 3. And then there is another characteristic which marks us off by an impassable gulf from the animal world ; and that is the fact that man is by nature a religious animal. I wish you to mark what I mean by this word " religious," its essence, its significance, — not merely to glance superficially over the world and see men bowed down and burdened, as they too frequently are, by the grossest and most supersti- tious fears under the name of religion. But the lowest, the crudest, the poorest, the most cruel type of religion that the world has ever seen, even that marks man off as above and beyond all possible types of life beneath him. What would you think if you saw an animal bowing its head in reverence, — an animal in the attitude or act of worship, of admiring something that he thought of as above and beyond him ? No matter, I say, in whatever crude, ignorant, super- stitious, cruel way a quality like this might manifest itself, — you see at a glance without any argument that it would lift the creature, so manifesting, infinitely, unspeakably, above all the lower forms of life on the planet. What does it mean ? It means the recognition on the part of man of a Power, a Being, that is not himself, — that he conceives of, however barbaric his notions may be, as higher than he, as mightier than he, as stronger, grander, finer, better than he ; a Being that he is intimately con- nected with in some way, so that his destiny depends on the relation in which he stands to him. Here is the essence of religion. It is this thought of a Being, a Power, not myself, that was here before I was, that will be here when I am dust again, that manifests itself in the far-off heavens, that swings the old earth in her orbit, — whose power in some way gives us the light of the sun, the change of seasons, that is in and Is Man more than Animal 29 back of and through all this marvellous panorama of life. This is the essence of religion, and this, as I said, even in the poorest and most barbaric peoples, lifts the man infi- nitely above all his fellow-animals on the globe. 4. And then there is another characteristic, and that is one that I have called your attention to often, but need to emphasize here again in this present relation j and that is the power of the ideal. You do not half realize, friends, what a wonderful, mighty, far-reaching, all-shaping thing it is, — this power of yours to dream. Suppose you found a flock of birds dreaming about a better way of living, puzzling their brains as to how to construct for themselves better homes, raising the question as to the conditions of health and dis- ease among birds, as to how they could build themselves a city, a civilization, in which the evils of their present condi- tion should be outgrown, left behind, — suppose you should find the slightest hint of anything like this in the midst of any of the lower forms of life, you would take your shoes from off your feet and bare your head with reverence as in the presence of something so much above and beyond what you had ever imagined there as to make you feel that you were in the presence of the Divine. Man, and man alone, then, has this power of dreaming, this power of imagining a better condition of things than he ever saw. Did you ever ask yourselves the question, Where did he get it? You find yourselves overwhelmed with the impossibility of an answer this side the foot of the Throne. Did this dream of a better thing blossom out of the worse, the poorer things ? Does the sense of cleanliness blossom out of filth ? of health out of disease ? of happiness out of pain ? of morality out of wrong ? Do these higher, finer qualities inhere in the dust, in molecules, in aggregations of matter, — this intangible, invisible, — this thing that cannot 3° Life be weighed, that cannot be measured, — this that is of no color, unlike anything in all the physical universe, and yet that is mightier than the power of gravity, that is able to lift, to lure, to lead the thoughts, the consciences, the hearts, the fears, the hopes of man ? Here is something that puts us unspeakably above and beyond any form of animal life that the world has ever seen. 5. One other thing closely linked with this. Perhaps some of you will be a little startled at my mentioning it as one of the signs of human glory ; but I do mention it fear- lessly as the one thing, perhaps, above almost all others, that has in it the promise and potency of all that it is pos- sible for man to become. I mention the fact of sin. It is usually spoken of as the one hopeless, disgraceful thing of the race. And yet, friends, right in that one word, interpret it how you will, lies the hope of man. What is this being who climbs up into the high places of his own nature and looks down upon himself, and says, "I was wrong there ; I ought to be ashamed of myself ; I am ashamed ; I will turn away from it, and do it no more " ? What is this strange thing ? It means, friends, that man is growing. It means that he is rec- ognizing imperfections, that he is putting his old self behind and beneath him, using it as stepping-stone on which to climb. Find me a race of beings, if you can, anywhere in the uni- verse, that has no sense of sin, no sense of its own imper- fection, no conscience, no self-condemnation, and I will point you to a race that will be forever stationary, that must stay just as it is in hopeless undevelopment. There is no hope for a man who is contented and satisfied with himself. There is no hope for an artist who has no longer an ideal beyond that which he has attained. There is hope only in this fact of self-condemnation and in this dream of the Is Man more than Animal 31 better, and the determination that the present imperfect shall be turned into the future perfect. 6. One more characteristic do I need to mention to com- plete the list; and that is that man has the power of abstract thought and besides of expressing this thought by artificial symbols and signs. An animal may be quite capable of noticing the fact that there is a difference between two things, — that one is longer than the other, or that one thing is sweet and another sour, — to be attracted by one color, to be repelled by another. But there is no trace anywhere of any animal's being capable of thinking the abstract thing, length, — that one thing is longer than another, — or the abstract quality of square or round, or red or blue, or high or low, of detaching thus the thought of these qualities from the things themselves. Much more is there no trace of their ability to express these thoughts by artificial words, signs, by written characters, so that speech and language shall be the result. And do you notice, friends, how this develops until it becomes a mightier distinction still than that which I have indicated, and how it helps in the development and the attainment of these other things that I have already noted ? For when man has attained this power of thought, and then of expressing that thought by a sound, and then ex- pressing that sound by an arbitrary symbol, — a mark which he may make with a pencil or a pen, or even with his finger in the sand, — then what ? He has the power of embodying not only his individual memory, but a world-memory, — cre- ating history ; and what does that mean ? It means writing the biography of the human race, so keeping trace of where we came from, by what steps we have advanced, to what end we are likely to attain. This no other race on earth can do. And in man's ability to do this lies the possibility 32 Life of a race education, the possibility of remembering past errors, past mistakes, past failures in experiment, — the pos- sibility of leaving behind these errors, seeing them forever written there in memory as warning, and going on to the creation of the higher and finer things beyond anything we can now imagine. These, then, are some of the things that distinguish us from the lower, the animal life of the world. But now I come to raise another question, which, I know, from the many times it has been put me, is a practical difficulty with many in the thought of the modern world. They say : " If man is a soul or has a soul, where did he get it, and when, on the Darwin- ian theory ? Where does the soul come in ? " It always strikes me as curious when people ask this question in such a naive way, as though the difficulty never existed before ; for there is no more difficulty on the Darwin- ian theory of human nature and origin than there is on any other. The old traditional story is, you know, that man was made out of the dust ; and, after he was complete from head to foot, he was simply a lifeless form of dust, and his soul was breathed into him. Is there any more difficulty in having a soul breathed into a man after it has taken several thousands of years to create him than as though he were created in five minutes ? I cannot see that the problem is in the slightest degree changed, so far as any essential or natural difficulty is concerned. And, to show that there was a difficulty in the thought of the Old World, I will remind you that these things have been discussed, and thought over, time out of mind. The old theologians of the Middle Ages, the Church Fathers, had the question up for discussion repeatedly. There was one the- ory which they called Traducianism, — that is, the theory that the soul was derived from the parent in the act of gen- Is Man more than Animal 33 eration, the same as the body was. Another was that of creationism, as they called it, — that a new soul was created for each new body at some time during its prenatal growth. A third theory was that of pre-existence, — that the souls had always existed, or at any rate had existed for millions of years, and that at the proper time a soul is furnished for a body when it is ready to receive it. These are the different theories that have been held and discussed in years gone by. I wish now to hint to you what seems to me a much more rational thought than either of these. I do not offer it to you as settled science. I offer it to you as the best thinking that, so far as I know, has been done on the subject. I told you last Sunday that no life has ever been dis- covered in this world that did not originate in pre-existing life. That is, so far as this planet is concerned, life pre- cedes form and creates form. I believe that this is an eter- nal and universal truth ; that, in the words of the old poet Spenser, — " For of the soul the body form doth take, For soul is form, and doth the body make." I believe that it is one life from the lowest manifestation to the highest, — that it is everywhere God, — the one life in the tiny blade of grass, the one life in the amceba, the one life in the fishes, in the reptiles, in the birds, in the mammals, in man. And when people ask me on this theory of the origin and development of life from the lowest forms why it is not necessarily true that all animals and all creatures that have ever lived are immortal, or else that man is not, I have what seems to me, at any rate, a reasonable answer. I have pointed out to you already that the one grand distinction be- 34 Life tween man and the lower forms of life is the fact that man says," I," — that he is conscious of himself, — comes to be an ego, an entity. I believe, then, that, in all the lower forms of the world, the one life blossoms out and manifests itself in grass or flowers or insect or bird, and then that it falls back into the great life of the All, for the simple reason that it has not yet attained that which constitutes it an indi- vidual entity ; but that when in man the life does come to self-consciousness, and is able to say, "I," to think "God," to call him Father, — that then the immortal is born, then this self-conscious individuality becomes mighty enough to con- tinue, to look death in the face without fear, to change the body, the form which it has made for its temporary use, and shape to itself other body, other form, to fit it for other spheres of life and thought and activity. I offer you this, I say, not as settled knowledge, but as what seems to me the most reasonable thinking on this subject that I can anywhere discover. Now, then, at the end, one or two considerations. In what relation does this place us to the lower world beneath us ? There are two or three errors that it seems to me we ought to avoid. There have been, as you know, and there are still, people in the world who, believing in the pre-exist- ence and the transmigration of souls, look upon all animal life as sacred, — not because, as animal, it has any rights — un- derstand what attitude they really assume on this subject, — but only because, in looking upon a cat or a dog or a horse or a bird, they think they may be looking upon the tempo- rary housing of a human soul. Animal life, then, becomes sacred to them, not as animal life, but as possibly human life in disguise. Sometimes they worship these animal forms as being mysterious manifestations of divinity. We ourselves, it seems to me, are in danger of some errors in this direc- Is Man more than Animal 35 tion, — either cruelty on the one hand and thoughtlessness concerning the rights of the lower world or else of an over- sensitiveness, endowing animals with nervous systems which they do not possess, with brain power which they do not pos- sess, and so standing in awe of our own mental creations, and not of the realities with which we ought to deal. We ought to reverence these lower forms of life as our undevel- oped brothers ; for it is the same one divine life in animals that is in us. And while we should not let them or their supposed rights stand in the way of the growth of civiliza- tion, — as some are disposed to do, I think, — still we should see to it that we measure out to them, not our generosity merely, not our pity, not our beneficence, but our justice, the same as we would to our fellow-men. They have rights as relating to us, and particularly when we take them into our companionship and make them our servants. And we ought to be as scrupulously just to our horse cr our dog as we are to a friend that has the gift of speech. But, on the other hand, let us consider, in the light of these differences between the animal and the man, what it means to be a man. Noblesse oblige, we say : nobility is ob- ligation. Change the phrase a little, and say, Ability is obligation. We demand of the lower world that they should come up to the measure of what is possible. We do not expect the dog to sing, but we do expect the bird to. We do not expect the dog to fly, but we do expect the bird to. The bird has these gifts of flight and song. We ex- pect a watch-dog to be faithful according to his breed and capacity, — to become what he is capable of becoming, in other words. Let us measure ourselves by no lesser, no poorer, no lower standard. And what will that mean for us ? It will mean that we take all of this part of us which we share with 36 Life the animal world and place it in its proper relation to that which is higher, making it serve it. It will mean that we climb up into this self-consciousness of humanity, — into the ethical, into the religious, into the ideal, into the just, into the dream of that which shall be. To be a man, then, means thought, means justice, means reverence and worship, means love of all that is high and fair, means truth, means devotion to all those things on which the welfare of the world depends. And then, in view of the fact that we are growing, — en route, in process, not yet complete, — it means that we shall order each day of our lives in such a way that what we think and what we do shall make this afternoon and to-morrow fairer, easier, better, so that the world shall lift and rise ever towards something better, because this is of the nature of a man. Let us make this, then, our ideal. Let us constantly aim towards this. So shall the world grow finer year by year, And, lifting Godward, man be more divine, Until injustice, fading all away, Shall leave the old earth true and sweet and fair, As are the dreams we have of Paradise. THE METHOD OF EVOLUTION. In a conversation with an intelligent gentleman the other day, a business man, I was impressed anew with the fact that there needed more and more to be made clear the basis of this theory of evolution in the understanding and thought of the world. The popular impression seems to be something like this : Here is an old theory as to the origin of life on this planet, and as to the method by which the different forms of life have successively appeared as it has lifted upward stage by stage to man. This theory, it is thought, is not only old, but represents some indefinable wisdom of the ancient world. At any rate, it occupies the field. It is regarded as an intelligent and an intelligible theory, — venerable in the respect and reverence of ages. Evolution — or, in the narrower sense of the term, as applied to biology or the forms of life, Darwinism — is, on the other hand, looked upon as a sort of parvenu, an upstart that has, perhaps, a few facts seemingly in its favor, but that is not well established, and that comes to claim the thought, the recognition of the world, as displacing the old-time rever- enced, venerable ideas. And it is supposed, also, that the old theory is religious, has about it something of piety that the new has not, which is regarded as merely an intellectual or scientific speculation. I wish, therefore, to present be- fore you as clearly as I can at the outset this morning the comparative claims of these two theories. It will need only a word to do it. 38 Life I say of these two theories in regard to which there is a popular misconception. One is the creation theory. I use the term purely by courtesy, and to save myself the trouble of roundabout expressions ; for, properly speaking, the crea- tion theory is not a theory at all, and has not one particle of claim for a moment's consideration in the court of the world's intelligence. How many people stop to think what it means or what it implies? What is the creation theory? Why, it means, to give you a concrete illustration, that God, — of course he does not do it with visible hands, for God is now, at any rate, not thought of as possessing parts and pas- sions like a man, but, — by the exercise of some mysterious power, God is supposed, for example, to bring together, scrape together, or get together in some fashion, particles of earth or dust that become shaped, let us say, into the form of a turtle or a bird, or whatever it may be ; and that, after it is shaped or formed, he confers life upon it. At the out- set, nothing : in a few moments, a fully formed animal, a bird, living. Brought into being, how ? Suddenly, instantaneously, by a fiat of will. It is utterly inconceivable, in the first place ; and, in the next place, — and this is the crucial point of the whole matter to which I ask your earnest and intelligent attention, — it is no theory at all ; for what is a theory ? A theory is a supposition, an hypothesis, a method by which to account for certain facts. Before you can have that which can properly be called a theory, then, you must have at least one fact ; and most men, before they proceed to the construction of a theory, have quite an assemblage of facts that the theory is supposed to account for or explain. Now, is there on the face of the earth, or has there ever been, a man who has witnessed an act of creation ? Did anybody ever look at blank air or blank earth, and suddenly see an animal or bird appear, as it were, out of nothing ? Even if The Method of Evolution 39 such a thing were possible, — if I were looking at blank air, and then a moment afterwards saw a bird flying across the field of my vision, — how would I know that that bird had been suddenly created out of dust or out of nothing by the fiat of Almighty Power? You see, then, that, in favor of this supposition or so-called creation theory, there is not one single fact in all the world, — there never has been a fact in support of it observed by anybody. In the nature of things, there could not be a fact of this sort observed by anybody. It is, then, as I said, no theory, and utterly baseless : not one rag or shred, one single thread of fact, in support of it, has ever been observed from the beginning of the world. On the other hand, let us turn to evolution, or what is called "Darwinism," and see the standing of that. It means what ? It starts with the universally observed fact that never yet has any form of life been seen that was not derived from some preceding form, born from it, developed from it, grown out of it. And, from the beginning of the world, facts of this kind have been observed all over the world and every- where ; so that every fact that exists as touching this ques- tion is in favor of evolution, or Darwinism; and there are multitudes of facts increasing every year that have been observed bearing on this theory and supporting it ; so that, as between the two theories, the truth is here : one of them has absolutely nothing in its favor ; the other has all the knowledge that anybody possesses in its favor. Suppose you say, then, for the sake of the argument, — I would not admit it, however, — that it has not been demonstrated as true. As between two possible theories, one of which has no evidence and the other has even a little, what would be the choice of an intelligent and unprejudiced man ? Not only one of them has no evidence, but the other has a mass of evidence that it would take years to study and comprehend. 40 Life How stands the problem, then ? Why, plainly here we are facing two, — let us say possibilities, for I do not know that the act of creation is impossible, — here we are, facing these two possiblities : one of them has no proof; the other has all the proof there is. Whether, then, it be demon- strated or not, every intelligent, every competent thinker must accept it at least as provisionally true. I wish now to note one further point. I said a moment ago that one of these theories was regarded as religious, and the other as only scientific. What is the explanation of this state of mind on the subject ? It is perfectly natural. We have inherited certain traditional religious ideas born out of the mental conditions of the world's childhood, accepted be- cause inherited, not proved, not capable of proof ; and among these ideas is this traditional account as to how the world, how animal and bird and man, came into being. It is purely traditional, then, and regarded with reverence and as sacred merely because it is associated with our religious ideas, part of our inheritance from the past; but, if God indeed be the life in all things that are, if the forces of this universe are the presence and activity of God, if what science calls the laws, the methods by which these forces work, are indeed the methods of God, then the only thing that deserves the name of religion would compel us to accept this which the higher, finer, more comprehensive intelligence of the modern world has discovered to be true. In dealing, then, with the methods by which life has evolved from its lowest forms to its highest, we are dealing with the present, active, working God. Do not think of it, then, as intellectual speculation merely. Do not think of it as science. It is the framework of the intelligent religion of to-day and of the future. Let us now raise the question as to what is the central The Method of Evolution 41 thought of evolution, or Darwinism, as to what it means, a hint as to the method by which it works. You are familiar with its catchwords, — "natural selection," "the struggle for life," " the survival of the fittest." It is what these mean that I propose now to make as clear to you as I can in a few words. There are two forces, two tendencies at work. There is the tendency, as life is propagated generation after generation, to repeat the parental forms, whether of plant or animal or man. This is called the " law of heredity." There is along with this observable a tendency to vary, to branch out this way and that, and to develop some peculiarity, some new type or some new form ; and this the scientific men talk about as the " tendency to variation." Now, we need to note the fact that the forms of life, in- stead of being, as men used to suppose, hard and fast and fixed, are really elastic, — capable of being changed, capable of being wrought upon, not only by the force that is within while blossoming out this way and that, but of being shaped by environing forces, by the power of circumstances. In regard to plants and animals, they are subject to changes wrought by climate, by soil, by food, — by a hundred differ- ent forces that environ their life and make up the condition in the midst of which they pursue their career. Now come in the meaning and power of the principle of the struggle for life that is everywhere going on. Men recognize it in their business ; political parties recognize it in their conflicts for supremacy. We notice it in the affairs of human life and its relationships ; but we do not comprehend the tre- mendous significance and power of it as manifested through- out the entire field of the world's life. Consider, for exam- ple, a field of grasses in the spring,— thousands, millions, perhaps, of seeds are sown, more than there is room for, more than there is soil for, more than there is dew and rain 42 Life and sunshine for, more than there is food for in the air and in the soil. What is the result ? All these seeds try to grow; and there ensues a struggle as real, if not as san- guine, as ever was seen on a human battle-field, — a struggle on the part of those millions of seeds for foothold, for light, for air, for food, — for life. Only a very small part of them can live. Which will live ? Why, of course, those best adapted to the soil, those that get the first start, those which are best situated, those that, for one of a thousand reasons, have the advantage as to all those conditions on which the life of a single blade of grass depends. Thus it will be the fittest that will survive. But right here let me take occasion, before I go any fur- ther, to define that term, the survival of the fittest; for I suppose there is no catchword of modern science that is more misunderstood and misinterpreted than that. Some of the leading thinkers and speakers of the world show them- selves children, incompetent, uneducated, the minute they attempt to touch or deal with this phrase. Some years ago, for example, I remember that Mr. Talmage adduced, as an illustration of what he supposed to be the fact, that the law of the survival of the fittest did not hold in the assassination of President Garfield. He said, " Here a man like Garfield dies, and a man like Guiteau is able to put him to death, and continues to live. Is that the survival of the fittest ? " And he appeared to think that he had demolished all of modern science by merely asking that question. He simply showed his own lack of intelligence as to what the real law of the survival of the fittest meant. It does not at all mean, in the first instance, it has no sort of relationship to, any question as to whether it is the fittest morally, — that is, the morally best, — whether it is the good always that survives. That has nothing to do with it in the first instance. In the The Method of Evolution 43 case of a blade of grass, it is that which is best adapted to its conditions, best adapted to its circumstances, that lives. That is all it means. In the case of a herd of antelope that is being pursued by some enemy, it is the one that is best fitted to escape that survives, and the others perish. So, in any great struggle in any part of the wide world that is going on, the fittest, in the scientific use of that term, are those that are best adapted to exist in the given set of cir- cumstances. It has nothing whatever to do with the ques- tion as to whether they are good or bad or indifferent : it is simply that they are fitted to survive where they are, and the others are not. That is all. As to whether, however, the world over and the ages through, it is the morally best fitted that survive is another question, and one with which we shall deal before our course is finished. But here is what the law means : in every department of life, in every kingdom of being over the wide world, there is this struggle for existence going on ; there is the dying out and being left behind of those that for one reason or another cannot keep up; there is the survival of those best adapted to the conditions which surround them. This is the central thought of evolution, of Darwinism. I ask you now to consider it with me a little while, not as to whether it is good or bad, not as to whether it is moral or immoral or unmoral, not as to whether it is tender or cruel, but simply to note some of the effects in the different departments of life, and see what are the actual results of this struggle that is going on. It is absolutely universal so far as the intelligence of man can reach. Perhaps you are not aware of the marvellous work that is going on to-day in the fields of astronomy over our heads. The process of the growth of solar systems is not only taking place, we not only feel sure that that which has been going on here must be 44 Life going on somewhere else, but we are able to study to-day the growth of solar systems in the deeps of space, by means of the telescope and of the spectroscope, — for the tele- scope alone would not be enough : we are able to see aggre- gations of matter which by and by are going to be suns and worlds and moons, complete systems like that which is our home ; and this process that I speak of now — the struggle for life and the survival of the fittest — is going on there just the same as here. That aggregation which happens to-day to be the larger, which has the stronger attractive pull, which has the advantage of situation over the other masses, draws all these to itself until it becomes the nucleus of a system and the nucleus of a sun that is to light and warm and develop future forms of life on the different members of that system. Then, when we come to our old planet, our world, when it has sufficiently cooled so that the first forms of life can be developed on it, then that marvellous prodigal- ity that pours out infinite, countless forms of life in every direction continues its gigantic work. Thousands and thou- sands, millions on millions more forms of life than continue to live are developed on every hand. Just as one tiny illus- tration : There are certain species of flies that produce so rapidly that, in the course of three months, if none of them were destroyed, there would be hundreds of millions of millions produced by one single pair. And yet the num- ber relatively does not increase from year to year, — perhaps it might diminish in the case of any particular species. This hints to you the enormous struggle for life and the enormous slaughter that is going on, and how out of this struggle the few fittest only survive. You are aware of the fact that there are certain kinds of fishes in the sea that, if they should propagate unhindered and none of their progeny be de- stroyed, would in time fill the basin of the ocean itself, and The Method of Evolution 45 that in only a very few years, if such a thing were possible. And so in every direction is this display of an almost incon- ceivable prodigality ; and thus the struggle goes on. Now, let us see some of the results. Go to the grass-field I spoke of a moment ago. What particular kinds of grass will develop, come to the front, and succeed in this battle ? Why, of course, the strongest, the finest, the best specimens. What is the result of that ? Would it be better if there were some power to interfere, so that the poorest specimens lived and the best died ? Would that be an improvement on the present method ? In the grass-fields, at any rate, it is better that this power should work on unhindered just as it is working to-day. Let us come into the realms of flowers. You enjoy the beautiful tint of a rose, the fragrance of a pink or a lily. Do you ever stop to think that this fragrance, this exquisite tinting, is the result of relentless and age-long battle on the part of flowers, — a battle as fierce as was ever Thermopylae or Waterloo ? Many of the flowers are fertilized by insects. Insects have a taste not only as to food, but perfume and color. They choose instinctively, and select the fairest, finest specimens ; and so, day after day, beautiful color and exquisite odors are developed for the delight of our senses, by agencies blindly at work, so far as any consciousness of our care for the results are concerned. And now would it be better if there were an interference, so that the homeli- est flowers and those with the least attractive scent were pre- served, and the most beautiful, the most exquisite ones were destroyed ? No, friends, whatever we may say about natural selection, the struggle for life and the survival of the fittest in any other department, we will let it woik on still among the flowers. Let us come up to the animal world. I spoke a moment 46 Life ago, by way of illustration, of a herd of antelope. Do you not see how necessarily all the fine, beautiful, fleet, graceful characteristics of the antelope can be the result of this struggle for life and the survival of the fittest ? They all are pursued by some kind of animals that hunt them, for their prey ; and the one that is naturally the fleetest has the ad- vantage and escapes. This one of course propagates and becomes the parent of a race that tend to be like itself de- veloped and intensified, with its own peculiarities and char- acteristics ; and so from age to age, as the result of this struggle, of this survival of the fittest, the fleetest and most beautiful and most graceful are the outcome. It is better to leave it as it is, so far as these animals are concerned. Consider the case in regard to the birds. As the result of this age-long struggle, beauty of plumage and finest quality of song are the natural, the necessary outcome. I cannot go into the detail here this morning for lack of time ; but it would be easy to show you that every admirable quality, — those that delight and please us on the part of the birds of the air that make music at our windows in the morning, — that these are the results of this inevitable struggle for life and the survival of those that are fittest. In this case, it means those that are fittest according to our taste, you will see ; and yet, scientifically speaking, it means the survival only of those that are best adapted to survive in the midst of the conditions where they carry on their conflict. And, when we come to other animals, it is precisely the same there. In the whole wide world, as the creatures roam over the earth, this battle is going on ; and it is the finest and strongest, the best specimens, that survive and that propagate their kind to people the world, and it is the poor- est, the weakest, the feeblest, that are left behind. And here, again, would it be better if there were some interference with The Method of Evolution 47 this law, so that all the strong and the beautiful should die, and only the diseased and deformed, the poorest specimens, should survive ? Now I wish to note, — I touched on this before, but I need to touch on it again, to make clear to you the grand sweep of this power up the ages, — I wish to note the three great stages in the evolution of life on this planet, so that you may see what this struggle really comes to. I am not talking now, you will understand, for the sake of its ethical effect at all. I am keeping myself to the severe, hard line of facts. There were ages during which the mightiest power on this globe was the power of brute force, when muscle was king, when might was right, — not only seemed right, but it was. Why not ? At any stage in the history of the world when the grandest thing on the planet is muscle, why should not muscle be king? And it lasted for ages. Then the force of evolution does — what? Exalts brain, develops intelligence; first, perhaps, in the lower form of cunning, or ability to out- wit an enemy, to get an advantage of some one not quite so quick or shrewd; but at last reaching up into the higher realms of intelligence until brain became king. Muscle, the might of the world, knelt at the foot of the throne on which intelligence sat and held its sceptre. Man, — just notice what it means, — man, particularly in his infancy, the weakest, feeblest of almost all creatures that are born on the earth; and yet simply by the power of this intangible thought that has its seat in the brain, — though all the mighty king- doms beneath might annihilate him in a week if only they were intelligent enough to know their power, — he rules all. But there is something in this world not only better, there is something mightier than brain ; for I do not wish you to think that I am losing sight of my principle, and bringing now an illustration of something to the front because it is 48 Life better than brain. I am keeping myself to the hard and fast line of reality. What came and dethroned intelligence ? The moral ideal. To-day, conscience is mightier not only than brute force ; it is mightier than intelligence. Shrewd cunning, intelligence, as well as muscle, — these now kneel at the foot of the throne on which sits the moral ideal of the world, wielding its sceptre. Take one illustration : Five hundred years ago it would have been simply impossible for us to have won in our great Civil War between the North and South. For what turned the balance ? Not the strength of our armies so much, though, if the world would only con- sent to let us alone, we were the stronger. But, had it not been for the moral idea and its supremacy, reigning over the muscles and brains of England, there would have been in- terference that would have decided the conflict against us. It was the moral sense of England that fought against its prejudices, against its monarchical system, against its shrewdness in the money market, — the moral idea that made that far-off nation suffer for the sake of seeing the throned right of man come to the front, and win in that great struggle. So it was this moral ideal that was mightier than generals, mightier than cannon, in that war, and to-day. Another striking and startling illustration, if you realize its significance. There is one frail-looking, quiet gentleman liv- ing in this country, who is writing a series of articles about Russia and Siberia. And he, to-day, if prophecy is worth anything, is wielding a power that may have more to do with the future destinies of Russia than all the armies of the Czar. Why? Simply because he is speaking the truth, — the truth of humanity, of human rights, — and appealing to the moral ideal of the world against the barbarism of the Middle Ages. And that barbarism must go down just as truly as did the The Method of Evolution 49 feeble walls of Jericho before the Hebrews' breath that was blown into their rams' horns. So the breath of this one man, voicing the moral ideal of the world, threatens to change the external structure and policy of an empire. As a matter of fact, — and this is the only point I care to empha- size, — the moral ideal in the free and open conflict of the world has shown itself not only the best, but the mightiest, so that in the struggle for life, and under the natural working of the law of the survival of the fittest, the conscience of man is at the front, and is to shape and rule the future. The great questions of the world that are to come up in the future are not to be settled by the whim of kings or the passions of legislators, not by cunning, not by swords, but by intelligence, dominated and guided by the moral ideal. Would it have been well in this great, world-wide struggle to have inter- fered with the working of this law? Could you have pro- duced any grander, any better outcome ? I must hasten now, and crowd what might take me an hour into ten minutes, simply hinting the working of this law in some other departments of life. Take it in the case of the world's art. What has it done there ? Beginning with the crudest attempts to imitate the shape of the human body either in marble or its apparent shape on some level surface, the world's art has grown \ and, in the free competition of the world, you have the highest ideals and forms of beauty that have been developed, and it is the poor that goes down inevitably. It might have a transient popularity, according to the false and passing judgments of a particular day ; but time tries all things, and sets its stamp at last only on that which is worthy of the highest approval. Precisely the same thing is true in music. Out of the crudest sounds of the world there have gradually been devel- oped, in the midst of this free, fearless, relentless competition. 50 Life all the musical instruments and all the mighty works of musi- cal composition that we have yet attained ; and the highest, the finest, the grandest, the best, have beaten in the struggle every time. Would you have it otherwise ? Take it in the field of literature. Men try to write, to express their thoughts either in prose or verse. And this goes on age after age. Nobody but is free to try his hand at it. If he can give ex- pression to something that goes down deep enough or lifts high enough to touch and hold a world-wide interest, he has created a work that shall live. If not, no help of friends can bolster up the products of his pen. They are doomed to decay. Mr. Pope hurled his thunders at the little army of dunces that surrounded him and snapped and snarled at his heels ; but he might have saved himself the trouble. All he had to do was to go on creating something that England wished to preserve, and literature preserved it; and that which is not worth keeping, whether or not he condemns it, is thrown one side and left behind. And so in industrial affairs, in spite of all the lamenta- tions in regard to our condition and tendencies in the modern world, it is that which is best so far in the history of man which has come to the front. Among the millions of inven- tions, which live ? Those that do the work in the best and quickest and cheapest manner; that is, which serve the world the best. The others are forgotten. The industrial systems of the world are under the same law. First there were slaves who did the work ; next there were serfs ; then the feudal system came, and servants were tied to their lord and to the land on which they happened to be born. At last has come our wage system, — a system nominally, at any rate, of free competition, in which the laborer is at liberty to work for whom he will and where he will, so far as he has the strength to carry out his wishes. Whether or not there The Method of Evolution 51 is anything better ahead of us, certainly, there is nothing better behind. As the result of the struggle so far in the history of man, that is the best that has come to the front, and is reigning over the destinies of the peoples to-day. Take it, again, in regard to the matter of politics and methods of government. I wish to show you how universal this is. Naturally, at first, the most muscular tribe would come to the front, and the man who was strongest would be leader. Would it be better to have weak men for leaders ? It would mean annihilation for the tribe inevitably. Self- interest is best for the life of him and his people under those circumstances ; and they do that which, under the condi- tions, under the circumstances, is always best. Then con- sider all the changes that the world has seen from the days of the tribal chief until the development of modern democ- racy. The same law has held and the same force has been at work. People said, when our war started, "You know that a democracy might prosper in time of peace, but it is not strong enough for war " ; and " People would die through loyalty to a man or woman, king or queen, through loyalty to a throne, but not for a flag or a cold, abstract principle." But we gathered the largest armies that the world has ever seen, and fought the grandest battles of all the world in the interest of these same ideas and the old flag that stood for them. So that, out of the struggles be- tween the different types of government, democracy has come to the front to-day, not because it is morally best, — because it is strongest. It satisfies the thought and the ideal as to largest opportunity of developing an intelligent people, and so wins an allegiance that no other type of government can equal. And now, at last, one more illustration. Precisely the same is true in religion. We have no right to find fault with 52 Life the fact that there have been one hundred or one thousand religions in the world, and that they continue still. Relig- ions spring out of the mental, moral, and spiritual condition of the people at the time, and are necessary to represent and feed the wants of that particular age. If they did not, they would die like leaves in the fall. Religions continue to-day because they meet and match the intelligence and moral ideals, the conditions, dreams, and hopes of most of the peo- ple ; and you cannot expect the highest, the noblest, and purest type of religion to be sought after by crude, animal, undeveloped, ignorant men and women. The Catholic Church, for example, will rule over its thousands and mill- ions in the world just so long as the people have not out- grown it, so long as it feeds, helps, comforts, and stimulates people in the proper state of mind to be thus appealed to and helped ; and the higher, finer, truer types of religious life are naturally and necessarily held by the few who are the leaders. But these few represent the future ; and they must stand for and work for the coming ; but it is free, or ought to be, and world-wide competition. Let people find that which feeds, helps, comforts, uplifts them, — though not somebody else. Seek that which is true, that which is real, true to the reality of the nature of God, the laws of his universe, the nature of man. That which is true must win and dominate just so fast as men become wise enough to see and feel and hunger after the truth. The truth is real ; and, just as men come into accord with the truth, — i.e., come into accord with the Almighty, — just so fast and so far will they become strong like those that wield the power almighty, and thus, in the conflicts with weaker, poorer, and less true ideas, they will win, while the others go to the wall. And note, friends, one thing always : wherever that which is true, wherever that which is good and best, wins, it wins not The Method of Evolution 53 for the sake of the victor alone, but it wins in the interest and for the sake of all men everywhere ; for it is for uni- versal human interest that that which is true and right and best in every department of life and thought should win. I have been discussing, friends, you have discovered, nothing less than that law against which so much is said in the modern world particularly, and as to its bearing on industrial affairs, — the law of free competition. I can carry the discussion no further. I simply note the fact that this, — whether we like it or not, — this apparently is God's method. At any rate, it has been his method for the countless millions of years in all the past. Whether he is about to reverse his method and adopt a new one is for some one wiser than I to say. This is his method, at any rate, up to the present hour; and next Sunday morning I shall raise the question as to the ethical significance of it. There is no time to touch it to-day. THE PROBLEM OF PAIN. Last Sunday we considered, waiving the moral bearing of the fact, simply the fact that, whether we like it or not, the method of evolution, of growth, of the lifting and the advance of all the forms of life on this planet, involves a world-wide warfare, a struggle for life, — the slaughter of countless numbers that fail in this struggle, and so the sur- vival only of the fittest. I am to ask you to consider with me this morning, for a little while, whether this method is consistent with the sup- posed wisdom, goodness, and love of the power that is responsible for it. It is charged on every hand that it is inconsistent. Newspapers, reviews, lecture platforms, repeat to us over and over again the statement that, in the light of modern knowledge, and from the point of view of modern science, it is impossible for man to believe in the good- ness and the mercy of God. This is made the point of attack on the part of those that seek to prove to us that religion is only a superstition, that it is to be antiquated and outgrown. It is the cause, on the part of those who wish to believe in it, of no end of heart- ache and of brain perplexity; and many, who instinctively cling still to their faith, are yet so troubled by these objec- tions that they hardly dare face them, saying to those who press them, " We cannot answer you ; but we must still believe, in order that we may live." The Problem of Pain 55 This is, friends, one of the largest and most important themes that I shall consider in this series of sermons ; and I shall ask your patience for whatever time is necessary, that I may treat it adequately and fairly. I shall condense, how- ever, and be as brief as possible. I wish here, on the threshold, — because I do not know where else the problem is so fully stated, — to read to you words very familiar, I know, from Lord Tennyson's " In Memoriam " : — " Oh, yet we trust that somehow good Will be the final goal of ill, To pangs of nature, sins of will, Defects of doubt, and taints of blood ; " That nothing walks with aimless feet ; That not one life shall be destroyed, Or cast as rubbish to the void, When God hath made the pile complete ; " That not a worm is cloven in vain ; That not a moth with vain desire Is shrivelled in a fruitless fire, Or but subserves another's gain. " Behold, we know not anything ; I can but trust that good shall fall At last,— far off,— at last, to all, And every winter change to spring. " Are God and Nature then at strife, That Nature lends such evil dreams ? So careful of the type she seems, So careless of the single life ; " That I, considering everywhere Her secret meaning in her deeds, And finding that of fifty seeds She often brings but one to bear, 56 Life " I falter where I firmly trod, And falling with my weight of cares Upon the great world's altar-stairs That slope through darkness up to God, " I stretch lame hands of faith, and grope, And gather dust and chaff, and call To what I feel is Lord of all, And faintly trust the larger hope. " ' So careful of the type ? ' but no ; From scarped cliff and quarried stone She cries, ' A thousand types are gone : I care for nothing, all shall go. " ' Thou makest thine appeal to me : I bring to life, I bring to death : The spirit does but mean the breath : I know no more.' And he, shall he, "Man, her last work, who seemed so fair, Such splendid purpose in his eyes, Who rolled the psalm to wintry skies, Who built him fanes of fruitless prayer, " Who trusted God was love indeed, And love Creation's final law, — Though Nature, red in tooth and claw With ravin, shrieked against his creed, — " Who loved, who suffered countless ills, Who battled for the True, the Just, Be blown about the desert dust, Or sealed within the iron hills ? " No more ? A monster then, a dream, A discord. Dragons of the prime, That tare each other in their slime, Were mellow music matched with him." Here is the problem with which we are to deal this morn- ing. Grant the facts, every one of them, — grant more than The Problem of Pain 57 you can understand or picture by the force of imagination. Then — what ? I wish to divide my answer this morning, and ask you to consider with me, first, the problem of pain, of suffering, of death, as related to the lower orders of life beneath man. This first : man afterwards. I. (1) Consider, then, at the outset, this. So far as I can understand, it is merely the question, at the start, as to whether there shall be life or not. For life — conscious, sensitive life — carries with it of necessity the possibility of some pain. Anything that can feel, can feel that which is disagreeable as well as that which is pleasant. So that it is a question, as I said, as to whether any conscious, sentient life shall exist. As between the two, I, for one, — I will not stop now to give you my reasons : they will develop as we go on, — I, for one, as between life with some pain, and no life, with neither pain nor pleasure, choose life. (2) We have taken that step, then j grant the existence of life, and with it the possibility of suffering. Next, let us raise the question that seems to me very relevant indeed, but which, so far as I observe the discussions on the subject, is almost never raised at all, — as to whether any particular individual among all the lower forms of life has any claim as against the universe for something it has not received. Here is no life at all : some power, by some process, no matter what, proposes to bring an individual — let it be a fish or a reptile or a bird or a mammal — into being. Now, at the outset, has this particular creatune any claim on the universe for any special length of life, «for any particular amount of satisfaction, for any quantity of happiness ? It seems to me, if we waive all sentimental considerations and treat it as a mere matter of justice, we shall be obliged to say that whatever is given is an outright beneficence, not on 58 Life the basis of claim at all, and that the creature which is receiving has no right to appeal to any court, real or imag- inary, as against this power because more has not been given. (3) Take now the third step. The considerations that I am about to adduce now will reflect backward over those that have already been stated, — will color them, modify them, will justify them. In old times, — because they, I suppose, had not developed a very large amount of sensitive- ness themselves as compared with that which exists to-day, — men were at least thoughtless, in many cases positively cruel, perhaps almost always selfish, in their dealings with the lower forms of life. And yet, friends, I believe that, if we face this question frankly and try to find out precisely what are the facts, we shall be obliged to confess that, springing out of the sensitiveness, the tenderness, the love of the modern world, there has come an enormous exaggeration of our thought and feeling as to the real amount of pain suf- fered by the lower forms of life. I believe this exaggeration is so great as to amount to positive distortion, and that, purely as a fiction of our own fancies, we build up that which does not exist, and then charge it against the Creator as an indictment of his goodness. Mark one thing, friends. Do me no injustice here. I would not have what I am saying to-day perverted into a plea for thoughtlessness, for selfishness, for cruelty towards any form of life that lives. Wanton, causeless infliction of pain on anything that can feel is, to my mind, unmanly. And, when I find a man, true and noble and honorable in all other departments of life, capable of it, I know it is only thoughtlessness with him, and not purpose. But let us consider a few facts. Where is the seat of sen- sation ? Modern science has revealed it to us clearly The Problem of Pain 59 enough : it is in a certain definite section of the brain, so far as man is concerned. I am referring to man now, not because I have forgotten that I am dealing with the lower world, but merely by way of illustration. It is situated in a certain definite part of the brain, and is connected with the nervous system. If a surgeon could uncover some other part of the brain except this one, he might cut it with his knife ad libitum, and you might be entirely unconscious of the fact that he was at work. There would be no pain connected with it. The lower forms of life have only the most elementary nervous systems, and no brain in the true sense of the word at all, — only certain little knots in the nerve cords that are called "ganglia," which are, so to speak, incipient brains. The lower forms of life, then, do not possess anything like the quantity of sensation with which we, standing up here and looking down upon them, imaginatively endow them. They have neither the capac- ity for pleasure nor the capacity for pain that we dream of as possible on their part. Let me give you one or two typical illustrations. The horse is one of the most highly developed animals below man. And yet cases are on record similar to this, — of a horse with his leg broken, broken short off, turned into a pasture, walking about on this broken and bleeding stump, and comfortably eating the grass that was within his reach, as though nothing had happened. This is enough to show that on the part of the horse there simply cannot be any- thing like the sensitiveness to pain that you would find on the part of man. When you consider that there are certain types of life, certain worms, for example, which can be cut right in two, and when you consider that these two parts, instead of dying or appearing to suffer any inconvenience, proceed to manu- 60 Life facture for themselves the part which is lost, so that there are two whole worms instead of one, you cannot think that there was any great amount of pain or any great disaster suffered in the process of its being cut in two. And when you know that certain lobsters and crabs, even as highly organized as they are, when frightened, will even fling off certain parts of themselves, certain whole limbs, members, — as though a man, for example, should fling an arm off, — and then that they proceed in a very short time to grow new ones, you know that there can be no such suffering as there would be in the case of a man under such circumstances. And when a beetle has been secured in the case of a naturalist with a pin driven through his body, but in some way has managed to get free from his bonds, to loosen the pin, and when you see him walking around in his case and devouring with a good appetite all the other kinds of creatures with which he can come in contact, making a very happy dinner with the pin still through him, you must understand that the beetle is not suffering any such amount of pain as we frequently give the lower world credit for be- ing able to suffer. These simply as illustrations of the fact that where there is no highly organized, complex, developed nervous system, there can be no such pain as there is in the case of those where the nervous system and the brain are highly developed and complex. (4) Then note one other thing: that pain, in almost all cases in regard to the lower world, and the higher, too, is merely preventive, guardian ; that it stands on the border line of what it is not safe to transgress, warning people not to step over. You see that the beneficence even of pain may begin to become apparent. Almost all the pain that a person suffers in a surgical operation is pain at the surface. The Problem of Pain 61 If a surgeon could get at the organs within the body or the muscles within the body without inflicting any wound on the surface, there are many of them that might be carved and cut at his leisure without any conscious inconvenience in the way of pain on the part of his subject. There is, then, no such amount of pain in the lower world as we are accustomed to imagine. And so the indictment against the goodness of God that is brought concerning the relations of the lower animals to each other falls for want of proof, simply goes by default. The supposed facts on which it is based do not exist. (5) Then again, if animals are going to die, it is prob- ably true that, in spite of Tennyson's graphic picture of dragons tearing each other in their slime, and of " Nature, red in tooth and claw With ravin," — in spite of all these, it is probably true that there is less pain connected with the common method of mutual pursuit and devouring of each other than there would be with these elements left out. If a thing is to live at all, then it must either keep on living forever or it must die. And, if it is to leave the world, there must be some doorway by which it is to go out. What would be left if the lower forms of life were not destroyed as they are now ? What would be the next alternative ? It would be growing old, getting infirm, losing the ability after a while to provide themselves with food, and then, perhaps, perishing by lingering starvation. Would that be more merciful ? (6) Then we need to consider another fact, which is not a guess or speculation, but which has been fairly demonstrated. It is probably true that the creatures which die as the result of being preyed upon by other creatures suffer in the process 62 Life almost no pain at all. I have told you how absurd it is to suppose they would suffer as much as a man under similar circumstances. And then, furthermore, it is undoubtedly true — in many cases, at any rate — that the mere fact, after pro- longed and useless flight, that the creature is caught, produces a sort of numbness or stupefaction, so that it is not conscious of pain. At any rate, we know that this is true in some cases even concerning so highly and sensitively organized a creature as man. Dr. Livingstone has given us a most graphic picture of his own experience when one day he was caught by a lion. The lion suddenly sprang upon him ; and he says from the moment the lion's paw struck him and he fell, though perfectly conscious that he was in the lion's power, that this king of the forest was bending over him, and that he contemplated the possibility, the almost cer- tainty, of being devoured within a few moments, there was absolutely no fear and no pain. The nervous system, as the result of the shock of being caught thus, seemed to have suspended its operations so far as pain was concerned. And if Livingstone had at that moment been torn limb from limb instead of living to tell us about it, while we should have pictured the horrors of dying thus, he would have actually suffered no horror at all. It is probably true, I say, that what is true in the case of so highly organized and sensitive a creature as man is even more true in the case of the lower orders of life. (7) Remember also that the lower forms of life beneath man have no dread of death, — they do not know what death means, are never found thinking about it or troubling themselves over it. We suffer more, as you know, with the thought of death, a million times over, than we ever do in dying. They are spared all this. They have no superstitious terrors as to any horrors that may follow the act of dying. The Problem of Pain 63 They are spared all this. And then, in a general way, note that almost all the things that constitute the great mass of human suffering all the lower world is spared. The anxieties about to-morrow, the social rivalries, the broken ideals, the defeated ambitions, — they suffer none of these things. (8) One other consideration only will I offer as bearing on this phase of the problem. The question might be asked, " Why did not the Creator, or whoever planned this present condition of things, create just enough creatures to fairly people the earth, and then let them live on indefinitely, none of them dying ? " That is a perfectly fair question. But, to my mind, this would not have resulted in a tithe, a thousandth part, even, of the pleasures on the part of the lower world that are produced by the present system. Which would confer most pleasure, having a thousand men sit at a good dinner, for an hour apiece, or having one man sit at the same dinner for a thou- sand hours ? Which results in the larger amount of creature comfort, to have countless millions on millions on millions of tiny creatures live their little lives — lives relatively long as ours — in the air of a summer day, and then suddenly go out like a snuffed candle, and as painlessly, probably, as the can- dle does, or have just a few alive and continue on indefinitely, year after year ? The present process seems to me perfectly parallel to the illustration I have used. It gives millions of creatures an opportunity to sit at the feast of life, to taste its sweets, instead of only a few continuing it for an indefinite period of time. I believe, then, that the present system, in spite of all that anybody can say against it, is productive of infinitely more pleasure than the opposite. And if we look at things, not through the eyes of an inflamed and irritated sentimentality, but through the eyes of a clear, calm reason that seeks for 64 Life facts, I believe we are justified in looking out over the animal world and thinking of its countless noises only as songs of joy, — one glad, bright, sunny scene from North to South, from East to West, and round the globe ; and all this diseased picturing of it as monsters tearing each other, and as every- thing being red with ravin, seems to me no more sane than the imaginations of a man who is suffering from delirium tremens. It is not true. And so, when people ask me how I am going to get rid of this great problem of world-wide suffering beneath man, I do not believe that, as compared with the amount of joy involved in their living, there is any problem there to be done away with. The pain, the suffering, is as nothing, — no more than are the shadows compared with the flood of sunlight that illumines space. I believe, then, that we may talk about nature as sending up one age-long and world-wide hymn of gladness and of praise. II. I come now to my second point, the other half of the problem, — as it pertains to man. I shall need to repeat one or two points here and so get over them more briefly. (i) As between existence and non-existence, as in the case of the animal, it is the question whether we shall have life coupled with the possibility of pain, or no life at all. I have not been free from pain ; I have had my share of pov- erty, of struggle, of disappointment, of broken ideals, of heartache ; and yet I have seen some sacred, blessed minutes that have paid me for a year of pain. And I, for one, can look God in the face and bless him for his gift of life in spite of all its disabilities and sorrows. (2) I believe, then, in life. In the next place, let us ask about man the same question as we asked before about the animal. Do you know, I think that any quantity of our suiferings are useless, and the counts in our indictment are purely imaginary ? Answer yourself in the quiet of your own The Problem of Pain 65 room ; sit down and be fair with yourself and with God ; ask as to whether you have not received in this life as much, at any rate, as you were entitled to. How much were you en- titled to ? Because God gave you life here, did he promise to make you millionaires ? Have you any right to claim to be millionaires ? Have you any right to charge God as being unjust because some other man is a millionaire and you are not? He has given you a certain amount of intelligence, a certain quantity and power of brain. Have you any right to sit down and whine because he did not make a Shakspere of you ? He has given you a passable quantity of good looks. Have you any right to find fault with him because he did not make you Venuses or Apollo Belvideres ? Had you any claim on the universe, at the hour of your birth, for any par- ticular amount of happiness ? If you had, where did you get it ? A little more modesty on our part, a little more justice, a little more carefulness of thought, will take away a large part of the difficulty that we try, and, as we think, vainly try to explain. If you look upon the things you have that are worth having as gifts, and then remember that, of the thou- sand things you wish you had, perhaps you have not a just claim to a single one of them, that you have no right to charge God with injustice because he has not given them, perhaps it will abate a little of your fault-finding. (3) And then, in the third place, as in the case of the ani- mal, I believe that we enormously exaggerate the amount of human suffering as compared with the amount of human comfort. This is an age of super-sensitiveness on all these subjects. The grand and vigorous joy of life that you find ringing in the literature of the Greeks, in Chaucer, — who, by the way, did not live in nearly so good an age as we do and was not specially blessed in the ordinary affairs of life, — all these notes of joy have turned in the modern 66 Life world into pessimistic whines and wails, and, nine times out of ten, for no rational cause whatsoever that I can discover. The world is infinitely better off than it was before \ men live longer, live more healthfully, their general wants are better supplied, than ever before since the world began. And yet the general majority of people, like a baby crying for the moon, are forgetting all the wealth of comforts that are about them, and complaining against the ordering of the universe because they have not everything of which they can dream. We look down, for example, to use an illustration, — I have to use terms, and they mean a good deal that I do not believe in, — look down upon the wage-workers of the world, — if it is down : from what I hear a good many mill- ionaires talking about, I think from their point of view it may very frequently be up, — but consider those people who are less well off than we are, those who work for two dollars or two dollars and a half a day, perhaps, while you are inde- pendent, making your own fortunes or having a salary that lifts you very much above that position. Now, I believe it is a very great mistake for us to suppose that all the happi- ness is up on the higher grade, and to look down, as some platform orator often does, upon the toiling millions, as he calls them, as if they were in the most distressful condition in all the world. Now, friends, I can speak from personal experience, — you will pardon my referring to it in that way. There are very few poor boys in Boston whose boyhood is poorer than mine was ; and I should think to-day that it was a calamity if I were obliged to take my boy and put him down there into the condition in which I was. And yet I was not conscious of being abused. My boyhood in Maine was a glad one, a happy one, in spite of the fact that I had almost none of the The Problem of Pain 67 thousand things that children have to-day to contribute to their happiness, in spite of the fact that I suffered cold, in spite of the fact that my dinner was frequently a little more scanty than I would have desired. My boyhood was a happy boyhood. This whole thing is relative. Take a man who is living on five thousand dollars a year and give him four thousand dollars, and he is poor. Take a man who is living on five hundred dollars a year and give him six hun- dred dollars, and he is rich. And these people who are living thus on their wages are not such pitiable objects as enthusiastic philanthropists would have us imagine. Do not misunderstand me here, friends, as out of sympathy with these. I think I have proved my right to speak in this way by the fact that I have done, all my life long, everything I could to help the world on in every direction, to help men on and up. But it is a question now as to relative happiness ; and I do not believe that these men up here, who have made the money and at- tained to the high social and political positions, are relatively the ones that are getting the most in the way of comfort out of this world. It was not a great while ago that a railroad president told me, as a matter of confidence out of his own heart, that he looked with envy on the baggage-man at some station on his road, who had nothing to do but look after the affairs of every day and go home and do what he could not, — sleep quietly at night. And yet we have diseased our thoughts about this matter of what constitutes happiness until I sup- pose the baggage-master would have been eaten up with envy of the railroad president, who at the same moment was envy- ing him. The world is a great deal happier, friends, than we are ac- customed to think it. In the first place, if you will watch 68 Life yourselves, you will notice your minds playing this kind of trick on you. You have a peaceful, happy life for days and weeks, and there is no event to mark it off, and you do not remember it any more than you remember a square yard of sunshine as you pass by or when looking at it out of doors. But something happens to make you suffer, and you remem- ber that a long time; and the shadow of that suffering spreads itself like a cloud, until it seems to blot out all the sunshine. It is said that happy nations have no history. The happy parts of our lives are not the ones that we record. We write down our sorrows : we do not stop to write out in detail the pleasant, comfortable hours that we enjoy. (4) Then I wish to note another point, which I touched on very briefly in treating of the animal world. From the point of view of God, or the universe, I believe that there is no causeless, no useless pain. Pain is always preventive, guardian, in its nature. It is like those signs that you see standing at the entrance of ways that are not passable, " Pri- vate way, dangerous passing." Pain always means a condi- tion of happy life broken, one of God's laws disregarded, whether it is a personal or a social law. It is simply a warning, " Do not pass that way again." When the time comes that there is no hope of life left in the body, so that there is no use in fighting for continued existence, then, almost always, the pain ceases. From the point of view of men, there is plenty of causeless, useless, wicked pain, grow- ing out of selfishness, growing out of thoughtlessness, grow- ing out of possibly intentional cruelty. But, from the point of view of God, of the universe, all pain simply marks dis- eased, imperfect conditions of things, and presses us on and up to escape them. I do not believe there is a thinker in the world who can point out a case of pain that does not fall under this definition. TJie Problem of Pain 69 (5) I must hasten over this, however, though I might argue it much more at length to advantage, to touch my next point. Let us consider now, within the sphere of human life, this great struggle, this world-wide competition between nations, social groups, business houses, individual men and women, — one universal, age-long scene of effort to get ahead. I showed you last Sunday, I think quite plainly, that what- ever harm, whatever suffering, might come to individuals, on the whole and in the long run, the grandest results had been produced under the dominance of that method. I wish now to consider it a little more closely as to its moral bearing on the rights of individuals. As I said a moment ago, so far as I can understand it, no individual living has any just claim on the universe for any more beauty or any more brain power or any more muscular power or any more general intelligence than he possesses. When he talks about its being unjust because Mr. Vanderbilt is worth a hundred millions, and he can only earn his living, — unjust how? It may be that we have not attained the ideal order of society, that we have not attained as equal a distribution of these things as we might desire. It may be that Mr. Vanderbilt is not kind in the use of his money. But how have I any claim against God for a definite quantity of money? — that is what I never can understand, — or how is God unjust because he has not given me some more ? Consider now this struggle, this conflict, that is going on. Who is the happiest ? Who gets the most benefit out of the winning on the part of those who do win ? Are those men who succeed, as we say, in the struggle, the happiest ones ? Take Elias Howe, who conferred such a world-wide benefit in the invention of the sewing-machine, — did he get the greatest amount of happiness out of it ? Millions of people all over the earth to-day are getting more happiness out of it 70 Life than he did. Take the case of Shakspere. Shakspere led a fairly comfortable life ; but, so far as we can find out, he was better satisfied with his business success than he was with his poems. Did Shakspere get more happiness out of his plays than the rest of people ? Again, millions of men have reaped more pleasure as the result of his successful competition with the playwrights of his time than ever he succeeded in attaining. Suppose there is a struggle between two inventors in any department of life, — only one can succeed : would it be better for the world to have a second-rate or third-rate or tenth-rate machine succeed ? Manifestly, it is better for the world to have the best succeed. It is better, too, for the unsuccessful competitors ; for they are a part of the world, and they and their children enter in and reap their share of the result of the attainment of the best. (6) And, then, there is another thing. Something comes out of this that people who talk about the injustice of com- petition seem to me to very little comprehend. Take the struggle of two inventors : one of them succeeds, and the other fails. It is better, I said, always that the best one should succeed. There would be just as much suffering between the two themselves if the poor one succeeded, and it would be a great deal worse for the world. It is better, as I say, that the best should succeed. But they who strive to attain certain definite objects, but do not quite succeed, — do they fail ? Is the struggle of no use ? A man enters a gym- nasium, and determines, if he can, to reach a certain standard of excellence as an athlete. He may not quite attain it ; but have his effort, his struggle, his training, been all thrown away? Let me read you here, as bearing on this point, — summing it up, — some simple lines of my own which I have read you before, entitled " Pursuit " : — The Problem of Pain yi My boyhood chased the butterfly, Or, when the shower was gone, Sought treasures at the rainbow's end That lured me, wandering, on. I caught nor bow nor butterfly, Though eagerly I ran, But in the chase I found myself, And grew to be a man. In later years I chased the good, The beautiful, the true ; Mirage-like forms which take not shape, They flit while I pursue. But, while the endless chase I run, I grow in life divine ; I miss th' ideal that I seek, But God himself is mine. People forget that out of just this struggle, whether it suc- ceeds in attaining this particular point or that, there comes soul-growth, culture, — the building up of manhood into the divine. And when we remember, friends, — and, mark you, I shall not attempt to substantiate it this morning ; for it lies upon those who doubt the age-long trust to prove its falsity, so far as this argument is concerned, — when we remember the age-long hope of an eternal career, out under the shadows there and beyond, and remember that in infinite time there is scope and range for the growth of every individual soul into all of which it is capable, then the problem has no longer any more meaning as an indictment against the good- ness or the wisdom of God. And it is better even for happiness that there should be infinite variety and diversity. Even over yonder shall we find fault because we are not all Saint Pauls, not all Saint Johns, not all Dantes, Goethes, Shaksperes, Homers ? Sup- pose you had a heaven crowded full of Shaksperes, just alike: it would not be a very interesting place. But have •} 7 2 Life it crowded full of human souls as diversified as the count- less forms of life, and out of the multiplicity there comes a wondrous harmony that means an eternal anthem of praise. Now, friends, just one word of suggested contrast. As compared with the old system of the universe, the old theory, this is a law of goodness and beauty and love. For, how- ever many failures there may be, however long delayed may be the success, we do not believe in any eternal failures. The old system gave us the hope that a few would come out ahead, and the rest, not pursuing and following, but cast as rubbish to the void, — no, no, no, not rubbish ; for rubbish feels not and suffers not, — cast as wrecked, distorted, tortured souls to the void. As compared with the old system, then, the difficulties of justifying the ways of God to man are as nothing in the light of the modern theory of evolution. It answers almost all the old objections, — provisionally, at any rate, — and gives us rational ground on which to stand. For, again, — let it come in like the same tone of music towards the close that it was at the beginning, — though there may be ever so much of ruin in the scheme of the old theory, — " Oh, yet we trust that somehow good Will be the final goal of ill, To pangs of nature, sins of will, Defects of doubt, and taints of blood ; " That nothing walks with aimless feet ; That not one life shall be destroyed, Or cast as rubbish to the void, When God hath made the pile complete." THE INDIVIDUAL SOUL UNDER LAW. At first sight there is an apparent serious loss in coming out of the old universe, leaving behind us our old thought about God, and coming to be mentally and sympathetically an inhabitant of the new one. If you stop to think a mo- ment, you will see how very reasonable, how necessary, per- haps, is this apparent loss. Only go back for a little while, — for the change, as I have told you, is very modern, — only go back for a little while, and how were we related, the individual soul as towards its God ? The old world was very small. The whole universe, instead of being boundless, as we think of it to-day, a limit- less waste of blue sprinkled with stars and stretchfng on until thought is weary in attempting to find a limit, — instead of this, it was a little cosey universe, so to speak, that we could easily grasp with our thought, in which we could easily find ourselves at home. Here was this little world, carpeted with green, with mountain pillars to support a sky not very far away, stars, sun, and moon only lights for the conven- ience of man ; just overhead a real celestial court, with God sitting there on a throne surrounded by his angels, hearing every call of any one of his children in distress, and, as represented in the old Scriptures, ready to send his angel down, who might come like a flash of light, standing by our elbow before we were through speaking, ready to take our 74 Life prayers and carry them up to the throne of God, and to execute God's will concerning us. There seemed then to be this intimate personal relationship between the soul and God, and prayer meant asking for help, for comfort, for relief of a personal, visibly outlined God who would send help to us, if it was best; if not, perhaps would send an invisible angel down to whisper comfort and make us strong to bear. God seemed very near to us then, help seemed very accessible, prayer seemed very reasonable, so that to change from that to our present thought of things seems to the hearts of many to be like a desolation. Every change of this sort must wear such an aspect at the outset. You remember that naive story of Rachel, that I have had occasion sometimes to refer to, how, when she was leaving her father's house to go with her husband, she stole her father's gods — the teraphim, as they were called, tiny, port- able images — and hid them in her camel's furniture, and sat upon them, thinking that in this way she was carrying these divine presences and powers and helps with her, so that they might be at her side always. Now, if you could have sat down by her, and convinced her that these were only senseless images, and that God was even what the Jews afterwards came to think him, a great being, ordinarily invisi- ble, sitting on a throne in the heavens, you would have made her heart desolate, you would have seemed to be taking away her gods ; for now they were close by, she could see them, handle them, appeal to them for help. But that would mean that he was far away, invisible, and perhaps too far away to hear or to care. I believe it is something like this sense of desolation that comes over the heart of a firm believer in the Catholic Church when he is asked to surrender his faith in the saints, in the Virgin Mary; when he is asked to give up those The Individual Soul wider Law 75 images, those statues, that, while they are not real persons, do at any rate seem to make them nearer. It is a perfectly human feeling. You know that the photograph is not your friend- and yet, somehow, the friend seems a little nearer when you are gazing upon this visible image of that friend's face. When you carry round in your pocket with you the photograph of the one you love, it seems to keep you some- what nearer to that friend. So this is perfectly natural and human. And yet where are we to-day? Not only the portable deities of Rachel, not only the images of the Catholic, — of the " mother of God " and the saints, — are put away by the hand of rational and intelligent men and women, but we are in an entirely different kind of a world from that in which our thought and heart have been so long domesticated. We are in an infinite universe, so great that we seem lost, — as though we were suddenly taken out of the midst of a garden and placed in a limitless desert, where there seems no spot for the eye or the heart or the weary foot to rest on any hand. And not only has the universe become thus infinite to us, but we are told by modern science that the universe is under the reign of inexorable, changeless, eternal law. So, while we are ready to admire such a universe, to look upon such infinite mechanism with admiration, and talk about how grand it is, how marvellous the power and the wisdom displayed in it throughout its limitless domain, yet it does seem at first sight to take away our God, and leave us orphans, as though now we were under a despotism of un- feeling forces. Not only do I hear whispers and echoes of this from my own friends in this congregation, but it is in all the air. I received a letter from a gentleman, the editor of a publica- 7 6 Life tion in New York, the last week, asking me to write some- thing, though he knew that he was not going to believe what he expected me to write, but asking me, however, in fairness, to present that side, saying, " I tell my readers that they must choose between the old God of Calvin and the great impersonal forces of the universe." This is the way people feel. We are now, they say, under the reign of law, in the midst of great impersonal forces that do not feel, that do not think, that do not love, that do not care, and we are victims of these forces. We must make our way in the midst of these as well as we can, safely, if possible, crushed by them, if necessary ; but, in any case, it is of no use to cry out, and there is nothing that we can do to change things. This is the feeling. I propose, then, this morning to discuss this general ques- tion a little with you, and see if we can find any daylight, any help, or any hope, in the midst of it all. In the first place, let us note that, whether we like it or not, whether we lose God by it or find him, whether we feel desolate-hearted or comforted by the fact, it is a fact that this universe is governed according to changeless, universal, inexorable, eternal law. Turn whichever way we will, we are confronted by this fact. It is the great achievement of modern science that it is bringing the universe more and more under this reign of law, — that is, to our thought ; for science does not create the law : it only discovers the actual conditions of things, and reveals them to us. I know, for instance, that it is in accordance with perfect, changeless law that these flowers here this morning have been unfolded. We know that, if a particle of dust is flying in the street, it is under the control of forces that act in accordance with law as much as is the sun in his rising or his setting. We know that The Individual Soul under Law yy every new advance that science makes only adds a new province, so to speak, to this empire of law. We know that the conditions of the atmosphere over our heads this morning are determined in accordance with changeless and eternal law ; and any competent scientific man would tell you that to change this atmospheric condition even to the extent of taking away from or adding to it one minutest particle of moisture would be as great and astounding a miracle as it would be to uproot the eternal stability of Mount Washing- ton and hurl it into Boston Harbor. It is in accordance with law that all these things are determined. This moisture, this water, — what is it? We know that its composition, as the chemist talks about it, is in accordance with eternal law. It is two parts by weight of hydrogen to sixteen parts of oxygen, or two volumes of hydrogen to one of oxygen. We know that it is in accordance with these definite, fixed, eternal proportions that water is constituted ; and, if the chemist should find that there was the slightest or most infinitesimal variation here, it would appall him as much as it would the astronomer to find out that the sun was ten seconds late in rising some morning. It would mean that the omnipotent grasp that was holding things in the stability of eternal order was being loosened, giving way j that chaos was coming again. Everywhere, then, from star dust over our heads, of which worlds and systems are being made, to the dust of the streets beneath our feet, — everywhere one scene of universal, eternal, inexorable law. Whether we like it or not, that is the fact. It is beginning to be discovered that law rules just as thoroughly in human life, in the development of governments, in the growth of social order, of the industrial civilization of the world, in ethics, in religion, in the highest spiritual realms, and that we are as truly under the reign of law here as we are in the lower realms of life. This, too, is a fact. 78 Life Now, perhaps it will clear the matter a little if we ask ourselves what we mean by the universe being under the reign of law. People are frequently fooled by words, com- forted by words with nothing behind them, frightened by words with nothing behind them. What do we mean by law ? The word " law " is popularly used in three senses. Not that there are not more than three senses, but that these three are of importance for us to note for a moment. We hear in the churches and in religion, and, as we read the Bible, about the law of Moses. That means a certain set of institutions, of rites and ceremonies, supposed to have been established by Moses. The Jews thought that only by recog- nition of and obedience to this Mosaic law could they get into favor with God. But we now recognize a large part of that institution as only man-made, temporary, and as passed away. That, then, is one sense in which the word "law" is used, as referring to the law of Moses. Then, it is used in the sense in which we apply it when we speak of statutes or enactments of a king or Parliament or Congress. The people make laws, we say ; that is, they declare that the people are the subjects of these laws, that they shall follow certain prescribed methods of conduct, they shall do this, they shall refrain from that. You will notice here that the law is not necessarily a part of the nature of things. It may be merely a whim of the ruler, whether of the king or the people. It may be some arbitrary thing that has been determined upon, not necessarily inherent in human nature or the nature of things. This is statute law. Now, we do not mean either of these things when we speak of law as the scientific world uses the word. What do we mean? People talk about law as though it were a some- thing, — a thing, an entity, a power. Even scientific men The Individual Soul wider Law yg speak frequently in a way entirely unwarranted. They talk about our being governed by law. We are not governed by law, unless the word " by " be used in the sense of in accord with. Law, in the scientific sense of the word, is simply an expression of the sanity of the universe. It means nothing more nor less than that events occur in an orderly way, not in an illogical, arbitrary, absurd, disorderly way. It means that, when you observe a certain event, that event is always preceded by something which can rationally be looked upon as the cause of it. For instance, if you see a flower, you know perfectly well that that flower was unfolded from a seed. You speak of the seed having been cultivated in fitting soil, and as having developed into the flower. A thousand things conspire to develop it, and all the things that go to the production of a rose are spoken of as the cause of that rose \ and if these causes were changed, if any one of them were taken away, if the conditions had been modified, the result would have been modified. Why do we know so ? Because we know that the universe is one of law and order, and that all events are preceded by fitting con- ditions, which may be looked upon and spoken about as the causes of events. All we mean, then, when we talk about the universe as being the scene of the reign of law, is that God is a sane, a logical, an orderly being, and that he gov- erns things in such a way that the universe is a scene of order, not a scene of disorder : that is all. Would you have it otherwise ? Would it be encouraging or discouraging to find any sign of its being otherwise ? It means simply this, — that God acts always in the best possi- ble way. We know that water freezes at a certain tempera- ture, that it will always freeze at that temperature, other things being the same. We know that it will boil at a cer- tain temperature, and always at the same temperature, other 80 Life things being the same ; that at a still higher temperature it will evaporate and disappear in the air, and always at that temperature. We know that iron possesses certain qualities that are spoken of as the laws of its constitution, that under precisely the same circumstances these qualities will be pre- cisely the same, that iron will always act in a certain definite way. The chemist knows that all his gases will act in this precise and definite way, as the astronomer knows that every star will obey the laws of its nature and constitution. All this means only that God is an orderly being. One element of confusion that I need to notice befcce going farther, that comes in here and that troubles us very much in considering this question, is the inherited idea of a dualism in things. The most of us still, even if we say with our lips that we believe that we are parts of the universe, do not really believe it. We have mentally established a dualism, instead of a unity. We talk about nature and God, — two of them, — nature something outside of and separate from God. It used to be universally believed that nature was a sort of mechanism which at a certain time God invented, created, or whatever word you choose to use ; that he imposed upon it certain laws, choosing what those laws should be, making them arbitrary, and that he set this great machine going and made it the scene of human life ; that he is able, if he will, to come in and touch a spring here and modify the working of the machine there, seeming to an onlooker to be outside the natural order of things, as a man who has invented a steam-engine might modify or change it or make it work differently at one time from the way it works at another. But, if there is any one thing certainly established by modern knowledge, it is that there is no dualism in things. There is a oneness of things, i.e. a universe, not a duality ; and what we speak of as the forces of nature are not at all something The Individual Soul under Law 81 outside of and separate from God. They are God's methods, God's habits, if you choose so to speak. God lifts the rose from the sod as really as though you could see him perform- ing the work. God swings the stars in their spheres as really as, to the old-time imagination, Apollo in the chariot drove the sun across the blue. It is God present, working, acting, tireless, creating, moulding, lifting, everywhere and forever. Now, then, we are ready to take the next step, and to see that the wisdom of God determines this fact of the change- less and eternal reign of law. Consider for a moment. If you could think of a beginning, — I use this simply by way of illustration, — and think of God as doing a certain thing the first time, of course, if he is perfectly wise, he did it in a perfect way. Suppose he has to do it again, — a thousand, a million times, to keep on doing it forever, — he must up to the millionth time do it in a per- fect or an imperfect way. If he does it in a perfect way, he will do it precisely as he did it first. If he does it in an im- perfect way, then he is something less than all-wise. The very wisdom of God, if we choose to look at it in that way, would determine this perfect and universal order. But let me suggest to you another way to look at it. I do not believe in any beginning of things. Though we cannot mentally comprehend it, God is eternal, and the universe is undoubtedly eternal also, as the natural and eternal expres- sion of himself. In the nature of things, then, the constitu- tion of the universe is eternal. It is determined by the nature of God ; and he is all-wise and eternal. Therefore, by necessity, the universe is eternal, and is governed in accordance with perfect wisdom, which means what we call perfect and changeless law. And now turn about and look at it, not from the point of 82 Life view of God, but from our own point of view. It is not only in accordance with the perfect wisdom of God that we should be under this reign of law, but it is an absolute necessity for the welfare of man. There are only two ways by which the universe could be governed. One is in accordance with perfect and change- less law; the other, in accordance with capricious inter- ferences, changing things, making things work in unexpected ways, producing results unprepared for by the natural order. One would mean an orderly world, the other an illogical world ; one a world you could count on, the other would practically be a mad-house. Think of the condition of things, if we were not able to tell a day ahead whether water would freeze at a certain temperature, whether wood was going to retain its qualities, or whether to-morrow it would be something else; whether iron was to remain iron, steel steel, gold gold ; whether the stars were to follow their courses in unvarying order, or whether they would change from day to day and month to month ! On that theory, — a theory which people are foolishly longing for as a comfort and refuge, — the universe would be only one vast insane asylum, or insane and no asylum ; for an asylum is a place where some one not insane has charge of things. But this would mean that the universe itself was insane. Consider for a moment one or two points. Unless the universe is to be one unchanging scene of order, it would be impossible for us to know anything. What do we mean by knowing? We experiment, we investigate, we find out the qualities of things ; but, if they did not retain those qualities, how could we know anything? How could we study electricity unless we felt perfectly sure that it would behave in precisely the same way under the same circum- stances forever? To know what these qualities are under The Individual Soul under Law 83 given circumstances is what we mean by knowing electricity. Knowledge has no other meaning. We know a rose when we have studied its mode of unfolding, when we have learned its qualities ; but, if to-morrow it might be something else, we should not know a rose. So, in any direction, look as you will, it is only because things never can change that knowl- edge is possible. And then, again, it is only because things are eternally the same that we can build up anything like what we call civilization. How could we lay out plans for the future, build bridges, construct ships to sail over the sea, invent railways and steam-engines, electric telegraphs, all those things that constitute the warp and woof of our civilized life, — how could we count on these, how could we con- struct them at all, if we were not perfectly certain that things were to go on after this perfect order of change- less law? And, then, not only knowledge and civilization, but the individual development, depends on this changeless condi- tion of things. As an illustration of what I mean, take those people whom we call uncivilized. If you study their condition, you will find that that which constitutes them savage and barbarous more than anything else is the fact that they have no knowl- edge of the law and order of things, and so have not devel- oped themselves in the study and control of these great natural forces. A little while ago, an epidemic broke out in the city of Naples. What did the people do? Study sanitary laws, try to find out the laws of health and control them? No. They organized processions and marched round with images of saints, and prayed to God to help them out of their difficulty. That is what the barbarous man does. But do you not see that, if we could obviate 84 Life and overcome all difficulties by a prayer or ritual or an ejaculation, instead of being better developed in knowledge, in self-control, and control of the forces of the universe, we should be infants forever in an eternal nursery? Suppose I need not take any care of my health, suppose I break all the laws of life, and then pray to God to help me out of my trouble ; suppose I need not build a bridge safe, strong, according to the laws of the materials of which it is constructed, but ask God to hold it up while I am driving over in my carriage ; suppose I need not construct my rail- way properly, but ask God to keep me out of difficulty; suppose I need not study the laws of navigation or build my ship safely, but pray to God to save me from the storm, — do you not see that in a universe like this there would be no self-culture, no soul development, no growing up to be men and women, understanding the forces of things, dealing with them, shaping and controlling them? There would be the same danger in such a universe as I sometimes notice in the case of the son or daughter of a very rich man. What is this danger ? Why, they say, " My father is rich : it does not make any difference whether I know anything or not, whether I learn to do anything, whether I train my brain, whether I cultivate my hand, whether I learn a trade or not." Perhaps it does not, if all a man has to do is to go through life a baby, or a comfortable animal, with something to eat and something to drink and something to keep him from freezing to death. But, if he is to be a man, then some- thing very different must be done. Do you not see that in such a universe all motive would be taken away for training ourselves, for growing, for becoming something, for thinking, feeling, aspiring, for understanding how to master conditions and to shape the forces of the universe ? It would then be the doom of the soul if we were to be taken out of this The Individual Soul tinder Law 85 orderly universe and put where we could have all that we wanted for the asking. We come now to another point which is of perhaps quite as much importance as any of the rest. Does this fact of the universal reign of law take away our personal relation to God ? Does it make prayer an absurdity ? Does it take away our Father, and leave us merely in the hands of im- personal forces? Why, it seems to me, friends, that it is only a thoughtless philosophy that says so. Under the old theory, when God was away off there in the heavens some- where and man was here in the midst of the natural forces, that was the time when we were really far from God. Per- haps men could then go to him and get help in their trouble, and perhaps they could not. Certainly, they did not always succeed. But men were farther from him in a sense than they are to-day. Let us wake up to the great truth, the grandest truth of modern revelation, — that God is nearer to us to-day than the breath we breathe, nearer to us than our pulse-beat, nearer to us than the thought most secret in the brain. In him we live and move and have our being. We cannot take a step, we cannot lift a hand, we cannot breathe a breath, we cannot open our eyes, we cannot listen, but we are dealing first hand with God, face to face, forever. And suppose he does not save us always by interference with his own methods of work. How can he ? This method is God right here. It is not asking God to save us from some hostile power : it is asking God to undo with one hand what he has done with the other. It is asking him to save us from himself. It is asking him to change his eternal order for our petty convenience, when he is all the time saying to us, Learn my order and obey, and perfect shall be the life that shall result from it. Then another thing. Suppose we are suffering as the 86 Life result of a broken law which God cannot change for our whim without upsetting the order of things, — even then we need not feel that we are away from God's love. I have had an experience that teaches me this, and you have had similar experiences. Suppose my little boy meets with an accident and must undergo a surgical operation. I force him, if need be, to go through with it, not because I do not care, but because I care so much that I would take ten times the pain gladly if I might. But just because I love him I grasp him in my arms, so that he cannot escape, and force him to bear what to him is torture. Is prayer to me under those circumstances absurd ? It is, if he asks me to leave him so. But if he cries out in his pain, " Papa," if he looks up into my face to be sure that I am there, sure that I am going to see him clear through his trouble, there is no absurdity. Is there not wisdom as well as infinite tender- ness in that kind of prayer ? God holds us in his arms and will not let us escape when we have broken his laws, not because he does not love us, but because he does love us so much that he will make us suffer for the sake of the culture and development that come by suffering. Then look at prayer in another way, for I believe that prayer is a power; and it is a power, not in spite of the laws of the universe, but just because the universe is law- ful. How shallow people's thoughts are about these things ! Every one of you is praying all the time. You cannot escape it if you try. God is the source of all things. You reach out your hand to take something: that is a prayer. You make a combination, an invention, you bring to pass something that would not have happened but for you and the universe working together, and that is the result of deal- ing with the forces of this universe, that is dealing with God; and you gain this from God by study and under- The Individual Soul under Law 87 standing and obeying. And this is a kind of prayer. You bring to pass things that never would have happened but for your intervention. You do not do it by breaking law, but by learning and obeying law. Every steam-engine, every great invention, means simply that man has studied God, has learned the conditions by which his powers will work, has complied with those conditions, and so has prayed to God and received an answer. And in the spiritual realm how is it ? Shall we believe that everything down here is different from what it is in the spiritual realm ? Are there not spiritual laws with which we must comply, spiritual conditions ? I believe that this up- looking, this prayer, may just as really be a compliance with spiritual conditions, in accordance with which my soul may grow, as is my establishing a manufactory by complying with the conditions that God has established. Let me try to hint what I mean by one or two illustrations. Suppose a flower to be endowed with personality and intel- ligence, and suppose it should say, " I have been taught all my life that my beauty and growth have been dependent upon the sun ; but now I have learned at last that the sun in its activity is under changeless law." Suppose this flower was situated somewhere in the shade, and it was a question whether it should go into the sun or not. It might say: "The sun is apparently helpless. What is the use of my doing anything about it ? I cannot change anything : I might as well remain where I am." But the flower, if it would go out into the sunshine, if it would come into right relations with this changeless force, that force would produce results that would not otherwise come to pass. Suppose an artist, who wishes to improve himself, sits down in front of some great work of art, and worships it, we will say; that is, admires it, for worship is only another 88 Life name for admiration. He feels himself lifted, thrilled, ex- alted, in the presence of that picture. He looks up to it as a source of help and strength. He does not expect the picture to change or do anything. If he thought it might, it would defeat the very purpose of his mind. Suppose he prays for light, for strength, for inspiration, for comfort, for help. If he studies it, if he worships it enough, it will inspire, it will lift, it will thrill his heart, it will touch and kindle his brain, it will lead to cultivation of his muscular power of execution, so that he becomes a grander painter than he otherwise would be. So let me think of God. If God did not care, even though he were as insensible as the sun or the painting, yet to lift up the heart and the soul in the presence of this divine ideal would even then have power to lift, change, transform, remould us. How much more, when we know that, as we come into this presence", it is the eternal love of the eternal Father that is shining down upon us, the eternal beauty and the eternal good, and that we may study the conditions, comply with the laws ; and all the omnipotence of God is at our service to transform, reshape, and lift ! This is the heart of prayer. I would not dare to pray to God if I thought I could change him. It is because I know I cannot, but that I know I myself am capable of infinite remoulding and uplifting, that I come to learn the eternal changeless conditions, and so come nearer to him forever. In this theory of things, then, we may go on into the next life, not into a scene of idleness, rest, and perfect attainment but to a scene worthy of a growing, immortal soul, a place for study, a place where we may still find out conditions for higher and grander advance, a place where we may be thrilled by the joy of achievement, and go on from victory to victory forever and ever. GOODNESS AND MORAL EVIL. The existence of what is called moral evil has been, perhaps, the most serious stumbling-block of the ages in the pathway of human trust in the goodness that governs the world. In early days, when people believed in the multi- plicity of gods, though they could not think of everything as being by any possibility good, they had no difficulty in ex- plaining the existence of both goodness and evil ; for they did it by the simple method of supposing that the kindly gods were the source of all the good, and the malignant ones the cause of all the evil. There was a time in the history of Jewish thought, after it had developed its magnificent monotheism, as represented by its greater prophets, when they frankly faced the facts, and said that God was equally the source of the good and of the evil. Isaiah, for example, represents Jehovah as saying, " I form light and create dark- ness ; I make peace and create evil ; I, the Lord, do all these things." But in their later life, after they came in contact with Persian dualism, a system of thought that repre- sented the good and the evil of the world as the result of the age-long conflict between two rival deities, the Jews them- selves changed their philosophy of things. There grew up a belief in the existence of a great adversary, an evil power, only less mighty than the Omnipotent himself ; and to him, to his agency, they attributed the fact that sin and sorrow and death had come into the world. 90 Life I wish to call your attention afresh to the mystery of this existence of moral evil as it has been held and taught in the creeds of Christendom. I am well aware that you are familiar with the main outlines as I shall present them to you; but I need to present them afresh, because I wish them as a background against which to draw another theory of things which seems to me more consistent with modern knowledge, more consistent with human hope, more con- sistent with our great, loving trust in our Father in heaven. What, then, is the main outline of human history as touch- ing this matter of moral evil, as it has been held in the thought of Christendom for fifteen hundred years ? It started, they tell us, before the creation of the world. There was at some distant period in the past a revolt even in heaven itself. Lucifer, the light-bringer, the leader of all the angels, is supposed to have rebelled against the om- nipotent power ; of course a hopeless revolt, and, of course, he was cast out into the place prepared for him, where, with varying alternations of imprisonment and release, he has made his home from that time to this. And from that time to this his power has been pitted against the Almighty, who, for some mysterious, inexplicable reason, permitted him to lay waste and devastate God's fair world, and interfere with the progress of the universe as God had originally planned it. He then, in pursuance of his evil purpose, tempts man to his fall, and the earth is ruined. Then, for four thousand years, — I speak, of course, according to the popular chro- nology of the creeds, — God does nothing to save the world except to reveal himself to one of the smallest nations of the earth, training them, with varying success and failure, through all these years, but, mark you, not even telling them that the world had fallen, not even telling them clearly that they were to live again after death and that the fruit of Goodness and Moral Evil 91 their disobedience was to be eternal pain. Then, at the end of these four thousand years, the Omnipotent himself comes to the earth for the purpose of redeeming it. He lives as a man for thirty years unknown. Then there is one year of public life in which he preaches and teaches the few who are gathered about him. He is then put to death, and disappears from the earth, having planted this seed of new life in the hearts of mankind, which issues in the organiza- tion of the Christian Church, the purpose of which is to re- generate and save mankind. With what result ? Nearly two thousand years have passed since God himself specially visited the earth to save it ; and, presumably, during all that time he has been doing his utmost. With what result ? I ask. That to-day perhaps one-third of the people of the world have heard that he has been here ; and the majority of those who have heard the story do not believe it, do not pay any practical attention to it. And the out- come of it is to be that the world is to go on in this fashion for nobody knows how many ages ; and, meanwhile, all those who die without having been especially prepared are to go to eternal sorrow, a sorrow that is to send up its hopeless wail forever. No wonder that the existence and the devastating effects of moral evil have been a mystery to oppress and weigh down the heart of the race. The only wonder is that more sensitive souls who have sympathetically appreciated what it all means have not gone wild in the midst of the un- bearable perplexity. How it has touched, how it has impressed those who think, how it has troubled the brains and the hearts of some of the noblest even of those who have accepted it, thinking they must, I wish to give you an illustration. You must pardon me if I read you a whole page, for I cannot spare a sentence of it; and you must pardon me, even though 92 Life on a former occasion I read you at least a part of it. I need it here. I want it for the sake of impressing this lesson and as leading to that which is to follow. When I was a boy in the Sunday-school down in Maine there was no religious name in America so familiar to me as that of Rev. Albert Barnes. He was a Presbyterian, a preacher in Philadelphia, perhaps the best known orthodox preacher in the country ; and that not simply because he was a great preacher, which he was, but because he was the author of a series of notes on the Gospels and different parts of the Bible, which were at that day the great popular com- mentary of the country, and which were used in almost all the Sunday-schools as explaining most parts of the New Testament and many parts of the Old. Dr. Barnes never wavered, so far as I know, in his acceptance of this general outline of the " mystery of iniquity " which I have just given to you ; and yet here is what he says about it, showing how it troubled him, showing what a difficulty it was to both his mind and his heart : — That the immortal mind should be allowed to jeopard its infinite wel- fare, and that trifles should be allowed to draw it away from God and virtue and Heaven; that any should suffer forever, — lingering on in hopeless despair and rolling amidst infinite torments, without the possi- bility of alleviation and without end ; that since God can save men, and will save a part, he has not purposed to save all ; that, on the supposi- tion that the atonement is ample, and that the blood of Christ can cleanse from all and every sin, it is not in fact applied to all; that, in a word, a God who claims to be worthy of the confidence of the universe, and to be a being of infinite benevolence, should make such a world as this, full of sinners and sufferers ; and that, when an atonement had been made, He did not save all the race, and put an end to sin and woe for- ever, — these, and kindred difficulties, meet the mind when we think on this great subject; and they meet us when we endeavor to urge our fellow-sinners to be reconciled to God, and to put confidence in Him. On this ground they hesitate. These are real, not imaginary difficulties. Goodness and Moral Evil 93 They are probably felt by every mind that has ever reflected on the sub- ject ; and they are unexplained, unmitigated, unremoved. I confess, for one, that I feel them, and feel them more sensibly and powerfully the more I look at them, and the longer I live. I do not understand these facts; and I make no advances towards understanding them. I do not know that I have a ray of light on this subject, which I had not when the subject first flashed across my soul. I have read, to some extent, what wise and good men hrve written; I have looked at their theories and explanations ; I have endeavored to weigh their arguments ; for my whole soul pants for light and relief on these questions. But I get neither ; and, in the distress and anguish of my own spirit, I confess that I see no light whatever. I see not one ray to disclose to me the reason why sin came into the world, why the earth is strewed with the dying and the dead, and why man must suffer to all eternity. I have never yet seen a particle of light thrown on these subjects, that has given a moment's ease to my tortured mind ; nor have I an explana- tion to offer, or a thought to suggest, that would be of relief to you. I trust other men — as they profess to do — understand this better than I do, and that they have not the anguish of spirit which I have ; but I con- fess, when I look on a world of sinners and sufferers, upon death-beds and graveyards, upon the world of woe, filled with hosts to suffer for- ever; when I see my friends, my parents, my family, my people, my fellow-citizens, — when I look upon a whole race, all involved in this sin and danger ; and when I see the great mass of them wholly unconcerned, and when I feel that God only can save them, and yet he does not do it, — I am struck dumb. It is all dark, dark, dark to my soul, and I cannot disguise it. So much for the feeling of one who accepts, who believes, because he feels himself compelled to believe, in this theory of the origin, the nature, and the consequences of moral evil. If I had time, or if it were necessary, as it is germane to my subject, I could take up the theory point by point, and show you how a more careful examination only intensifies the difficulty. As an illustration of what I mean, think of the absolute impossibility of an archangel's rebelling in heaven. 94 Life He knew that God was all-righteous, and that only in know- ing and obeying him were happiness and peace for himself. Utterly causeless, utterly hopeless, utterly inexplicable, that such a thing ever could be ! Who will offer any clearer ex- planation as to why God should permit such a power (grant- ing its existence) to wander at large through his universe, devastating the fairest part of it, producing results of suffer- ing that were to be eternal? So I might take up point after point of this theory, and show the utter impossibility of reconciling it either with the mind, the conscience, or the heart; but I pass all that by with just this brief hint, and come to what seems to me a more rational theory as to the nature, the origin, and the out- tome of moral evil. What is the attitude that we are compelled to take as the result of the growth of modern knowledge concerning the nature and origin of man and the course of human history ? The old scene shifts and utterly fades away. Put it entirely one side, and let us go down the ages towards the beginning, with all these confusions out of our brain, and see what we actually find. We find, first, a world with no humanity in it : of course, a world where there is suffering, where there is death among the lower forms of life, and where, of course, all talk of good and evil in a moral sense is out of place. Out of this world of the lower forms of life we see humanity gradually emerge. As humanity develops, what is the necessary, the natural result ? Why, man, developed in intelligence, developed in sympathy, developed in consciousness of himself and a con- science of others, recognizes the natural, necessary, eter- nal distinctions between good and evil. Evil is not an entity that comes into the world, a thing that we need to account for. If we are going to account for either, we need to con- Goodness and Moral Evil 95 sider the development out of an unmoral world of morality. It is the origin of good that we are to deal with. But good and evil in the nature of things are twin-born. You can no more conceive of one without the other than you can of light without shadow, or heat without cold, or music without dis- cord, or pleasure without pain. They necessarily go to- gether, mutually limiting and explaining and helping to the comprehension of each other, so that, if man is to be a moral being at all, then both good and evil must exist. But there must be developed a conscience concerning them. And what is this conscience ? The most natural thing in the world. As man develops in brain and sympathy and heart, he recognizes of course other people as other selves. He says: Here is another man who wants to possess the same things that I possess, and naturally has the same right to them. He wants happiness as much as I do. He is ca- pable of suffering as much as I am. In short, he has the faculties and powers that I have, all the desires, all the aspirations, all the hopes, all the fears. And there neces- sarily comes along with a consciousness of this the feeling — I have no more right to injure him, to make him suffer, than he has to make me suffer. So there develops the con- science as naturally as a flower unfolds. The good and the evil go together. We fool ourselves so with words ! We assume that God might have helped it, — that he let evil and suffering come into the world on purpose, in order to afflict and trouble humanity ; but these things have no relation to power. There are some things that Omnipotence cannot do, because they are absurd. He cannot put into the brain of man the thought of light without its complementary thought of shadow; for light as light has no meaning else. He cannot put into the mind of man the thought of pleasure apart from the possi- g6 Life bility of pain, because, otherwise, pleasure would have no meaning. It is impossible that good, the thought, the con- sciousness of good should exist without the opposite con- sciousness of evil. The two are naturally related and necessary to each other. Again, it is simply absurd in the very nature of things for us to suppose that God could create a moral being in any other way than that through which he is creating us moral beings all the time. He might, indeed, conceivably create a set of automatons to be wound up and go through a set of mechanical motions for a period of time until they run down again ; but the only way by which men as they develop can learn things is by experience. That is the only way they can learn the distinction between good and evil, learn to avoid the evil and to choose the good, learn to recognize that on the good depend happiness and peace and welfare for themselves and all mankind. And to suppose that the Omnipotent him- self could create a race of moral beings in any other way is to suppose an absurdity. Now, then, let us look over the world, and see what we shall think of this fact of moral evil. They have been telling us for ages that man is a being totally depraved, naturally, inherently, essentially wrong ; and they talk about the world as being an evil world. On the other hand, I dare make this assertion and challenge contradiction from any and every quarter: there is not one faculty, not one characteristic or quality inherent in, essential, necessary to, human nature, that is not in itself altogether and always good. There is no essential, natural, necessary evil in humanity whatsoever, and never has been, and never can be. And outside of humanity in the world there exists absolutely nothing that is in itself essentially, necessarily evil. Consider for a moment : there are only two possible ways Goodness and Moral Evil 97 by which any man ever did wrong or ever could do wrong. It is by perverted or wrong use of a faculty or quality or power which in itself and in its right action is right. Take my hand, for example. The hand is all right. There is nothing essentially evil in it. I can use it properly for a good purpose, — to help, to add to the happiness, the well-being of my fellows and myself, — or I can use it to harm. But because it can be perverted, because it can be used for a wrong purpose, it does not make the hand itself evil. And as of the hand, so equally of every single member, faculty, quality, characteristic, power, of human nature. From head to foot, physically, mentally, morally, spiritually, there is noth- ing necessarily, inherently evil : all is good. The other way by which a man can do wrong is by the excessive or overmuch use or indulgence of some power, some quality, characteristic, which in itself is perfectly right. There is no possible action, then, of which you can conceive that in itself is necessarily wrong. Let us take two or three illustrations from the Ten Com- mandments. Take the question of killing a man. "Thou shalt not kill." Is that wrong or right ? You are perfectly well aware that in one case killing may be murder and in another case it may be heroism. The killing, the act itself, has no inherent, essential, necessary moral quality at all. It may be good or bad according to circumstances. " Thou shalt not steal." Taking away something which is supposed to belong to another ; — the act of stealing, is simply a taking away. Taking it wrongfully, taking that which really belongs to another, and to which you have no right, this is theft. But are there not a hundred circum- stances in which it is conceivable that it might not only be right, but an act of justice, to take away something which is in the possession of another ? It is not the act of taking away itself that is wrong. 98 Life " Thou shalt not covet." What does that mean ? We naturally and necessarily desire to possess things ; and this desire is nothing more or less than an extension up through the higher ranges of our nature of the physical quality of hunger. And what does hunger mean ? Simply the reaching out after the necessary materials on which to feed and grow. Hunger is right. Desire for anything in the heavens above or the earth beneath is right, — as right as it is for a flower to long for sunshine and droop for it. It is only desiring excessively or wrongly, or desiring that leads to my taking away things that do not belong to me, or taking them in violent and injurious ways, that is wrong. The desire it- self, the wish for all good things, is not only right, but neces- sary to existence itself. What is ambition that is so much decried ? I would not give much for the man or woman who had not ambition, — a desire to excel, a desire to grow, to be great, a desire to be well i thought of by one's fellows. These are the very root and essence of self-respect and all that is noblest and best in men and women. Of course, it can be perverted; of course, it can be excessive ; of course, I can be willing to gratify my ambition at the expense of the welfare and happi- ness of -other people. And when it so trespasses, when it goes beyond the limits of that which is allowable, of that which is consistent with the rights and welfare of other people, it becomes wrong ; but it is not wrong in itself. So of pride, so of all characteristics. You cannot find in the whole catalogue of the world's possible activities anything that in itself is essentially, necessarily evil. Evil is only the perversion or the excessive use of that which is naturally right. What are the springs, the sources, then, of moral evil? How is it that men do transgress so frequently ? How is it Goodness and Moral Evil 99 that there is so much of what we call sin, and consequently so much of sorrow in the world ? It has its root in the fact which is the hope of the universe and not its despair. We couple sin and sorrow together. Why? Because this is a righteous universe, and you cannot knowingly or unknow- ingly transgress one of its laws and escape the penalty. It means that these laws are the necessary and constituent laws of things, so that this very fact that we do couple sin and sorrow together is in itself an utter refutation of any charge that can be brought against the essential goodness of the world. What, then, are the sources of moral evil practically? They are three, and I believe only three. In the first place, having been developed as we have from the animal world, so far as our physical and many of our mental and even our moral characteristics are concerned, it is perfectly natural that men should be overweighted with passion, with impulses, with feelings that the animals possess. The quality of the tiger and the fox and the bear still clings to us. But there cannot be too much passion, provided there be rational control adequate to the passion ; for pas- sion, impulse, feeling, are the motive force of the universe. The world would come to a stand-still, and nothing grand would ever be done, were it not for the existence of passion, which is ever power. There cannot, then, be too much, pro- vided it be under proper control. The source of a large part of the world's evil is that men and women are unbal- anced, that passion is mightier than reason, than conscience; and this way and that, like ships in storms at sea, they are swept out of their course, and sometimes are overwhelmed by the waters. The next source of moral evil as it appears practically in the history of the world is ignorance. People are perpetually ioo Life deceiving themselves, perpetually fooling themselves. They desire something which in itself is good ; but they are not willing to wait for the right way of getting it. They cheat themselves into believing that they can get it by some round- about or indirect method, and still have it as good to them after they get it. They cheat themselves, because they do not know as yet what kind of a universe this is. Do you suppose that there is a man in all this world that would de- liberately, weighing the consequences, seeing everything in- volved, choose the evil, knowing that evil necessarily means unhappiness, injury to himself and to everybody involved? That would be insanity. No man ever chose evil that way. He cheats himself into thinking that somehow or other he will be able to escape the consequences ; that somehow or other the universe is going to make an exception in his case. He has not thoroughly learned the lesson yet that clear- headed wisdom teaches, that it never pays to do wrong. The third source of evil is lack of faith, — and this I be- lieve to be perhaps the most important of all, — the lack of trust. In other words, it is despair. I believe that, if you go over the face of this poor old earth to-day, and visit all its dens, its slums, its prisons, and come in contact with all its criminal classes, you will find that the chief secret of the criminality may be summed up in the one word " despair." These are not strong people. They are the people who have fought awhile with the forces that have environed them, and have become discouraged. They have given it up. They have lost faith in the reality of justice and goodness in the world. They do not believe that in the long run the out- come shall be good. They have lost confidence in God, in themselves, in their fellows, in the world. They think that it is not worth while to wait. So they strike out and clutch at this thing and that, trying to seize it violently instead of Goodness and Moral Evil 101 trusting that all things come to those who can wait, and that at any rate, whatever comes or whatever goes, he who is true to himself, to his fellows, and to his God, actually does gain the best. If a man only believed that, — which is true, — if he only trusted that, — which is certain, — you could not con- ceive of him as breaking a law, as doing wrong. I believe this : that all the moral evil that comes into actuality in human life is developed from these three sources, — the unbalanced passion, the ignorance, the lack of trust. How, then, is this evil to be outgrown ? I believe that in the long run it will prove at last not to have been either lack of love or wisdom or power on God's part ; that it is the necessary process of experience through which the race must be passed in coming to its higher education* How is it to be outgrown ? It is being outgrown. The sources that I have pointed out are hints as to how. As the world becomes more civilized, men climb gradually up from the animal ranges into the higher, the human part of us. Passion becomes controlled, refined, elevated, turned to higher uses. The man becomes humane ; the brain, heart, conscience, become supreme, and so the lower life is ruled and relegated to its proper sphere. Then, as the world grows wiser and men learn to know more and more that righteous- ness does mean happiness, that this is not a world, as we used to be taught, in which all the pleasure and the good time belong to those who are breaking God's laws, only they will have to suffer the penalty for it in the future world, we learn that the goodness, the happiness, and the pleasure of this world go together, and that now it pays to do right ; that now the way of the transgressor is hard, not merely that the end of the way is hard. And then, as the world grows older, it is learning more and more the lesson of trust. It is more and more believing 102 Life in the essential goodness of things, the integrity of the world, the integrity of humanity, and so learning the lesson of patience and of waiting ; that, in spite of the charges that are brought against this poor human nature of ours, there is infinitely more of good than there is of evil, infinitely more of love than there is of hate, infinitely more of helpfulness and kindliness than there is of conscious and purposive injury. The good is in an immense majority. The quiet, the order, the peace, the progress of society, on the whole and in the long run, testify to this, day after day. And the outcome ? Why, the outcome is like the gradua- tion of the scholar from the school. When we have learned the lesson, by and by, as the ages pass, " The low, sad music of humanity " shall sink down the past to be heard no more, and in its place shall be the song of happiness and peace and good will that shall make the earth seem indeed a veritable king- dom of our Father. MY LIFE'S MEANING. I remember a story told of a conversation between the Duke of Wellington and a young man who had been stationed as a missionary at some far-off point, and, having become somewhat discouraged, had returned. The duke asked why he had come home. " Do you not believe," asked the duke, " that it is a part of the purpose of God to bring all the world to the knowledge of the truth ? " The young man replied that of course he did. " Do you not believe," said the duke, " that you could do something to further that plan by remaining where you have been stationed ? " He replied that of course he did. " Then," said the duke, " go back to your post, and stay there until you receive authoritative orders to occupy some other position." It would be very easy, I suppose, for all of us to do that, if we could really believe that somebody, with the adequate wisdom, the adequate power, the adequate love, had put us somewhere and had told us to stay. That which makes it hard is the doubt that insinuates itself into so many minds in the modern world as to whether there is any special meaning in my life or in yours, as to whether there is any particular object to be gained, anything to make it worth while for us to endure hardness like good soldiers. And it is, — there is no use in disguising it, — it is more difficult to-day for us to believe this than it "was for people to believe 104 Life it a hundred or two hundred or five hundred years ago. I have had occasion to refresh your memory with what you all know, — as to how diminutive a thing the universe was then as compared with our present conception of it. In a small world, with God close by, — a world over which God's angels were habitually passing and returning, like ministers of the king, keeping oversight of this and of that ; in a little world where we could believe that we were really under the eye of a great Being, who had made us and had placed us where we were, and who had appointed us a per- fectly definite thing to do, — in a world like that, I say, so small, so comprehensible, it was a comparatively easy thing for people to believe that their little selves were really part of a divine plan, and that it was important for them to stick to the post to which they had been assigned until they received authoritative orders to occupy some other position. It is harder to believe it now, because the universe seems so vast, and because the old heaven, just beyond the blue, has faded away, and there is found no place for it, because we cannot think of God as present in the old sense, — as an outlined being, sitting somewhere, issuing orders, telling us what we are to do, offering us rewards for doing, or threaten- ing us with penalties if we are faithless. All this definite picture has dissolved like morning mist ; and we look this way and that, and wonder where God is, if he is anywhere. We wonder if he really finds time, in the midst of his infi- nite occupations, even to remember that we exist, much more to care whether we are doing this thing or doing that. Whether he does care, whether he knows, whether he thinks of you and me, we must find out in the first place, or come to the holding of a general theory, at any rate, by consider- ing for a little a larger problem. Have we any right to think there is a purpose, a meaning, My Life's Meaning 105 in the universe at all ? That is the first question to be set- tled. Is it one wild scene of confusion ? Are we in the hands merely of impersonal forces ? Is there anybody who knows that I exist, who takes note of what I think, of what I do, who cares anything about it, who has any interest in either the steps I take or the ends I reach ? If there is a purpose in the universe, then, whether we can comprehend it or not, we may find it a rational thing for us to conclude that there may also be a purpose, and a definite, especial purpose, in our little personal lives. Now, friends, I do not care to trouble you any with argu- ments concerning the old questions of design and plan, after the style of Paley and the writers on " evidence " of a hun- dred or two hundred years ago ; but, as I survey this scene of things, as I fix my eyes so far as is possible on the far- away beginnings, as I trace the steps by which things have come to be where they are, and as I run my eye along these lines, and as I forecast, as I must, the probable, or at least the possible, outcome, I cannot avoid the rational conviction that there is purpose, that there is plan, in this "mighty maze " of things. As a hint of what I mean, we know that this solar system of ours has grown from star-dust to a system with the sun at the centre, surrounded by its planets, and they by their sat- ellites, moon or moons. We know that this has grown by orderly process, by logical steps, following an intelligible line of progress observable by us. Are we not, then, author- ized to think that, from the standpoint of that Power which is controlling and shaping things, this intelligible line of progress is intelligent purpose and plan ? How comes it to be intellectually intelligible to us, if there be no intelligent purpose working through it all ? And precisely this same order that we observe in the growth of our own solar system 106 Life we know is in progress in all parts of space. So far as our instruments of investigation are able to reach, we see every- where this same method of creation being followed. And we see it now not only, but ever following the same intelli- gible lines. And, when our special solar system has been evolved, then what ? Is there no intelligible order, no sign of purpose or plan, running through it since that day ? It took ages for this earth to become capable of being inhab- ited by forms of life such as we are familiar with ; but, the moment the first tiny form appeared, there appeared also this same orderly movement and lift, following lines of intel- ligent order and growth from the beginning, climbing up through various structures of the lower orders until man was reached. Then the same order again, lifting and pushing and leading, until from the first physical development there came the mental, then the moral, then the spiritual, — a wavelike advance, the topmost crest of which is made up of the mighty souls of the world ; and the force that has led, that has lifted, is undiminished still, leading on with promise of grander things to be. And, then, if we choose to subdivide this human life of ours, if we trace the growth of the individual or of the family or of society or the industrial organization of the world or the ethical or the religious, it makes no matter which way we turn our eyes, in all these different departments of life we see parallel lines of orderly advance ; and I for one, as a rational being, looking over this scene which is rationally comprehensible, cannot escape the conviction that reason, plan, purpose, order, are through it all. If so, what ? If there are purpose and plan and order in the whole, then that purpose includes and must include the minutest part that is essential to the completeness of that whole. My Life's Meaning 107 Take as an illustration the work of an architect. When he has laid out his plans for a magnificent building, that plan includes the proper laying of every brick, the proper application of every trowelful of mortar. It includes per- fection in the minutest parts, and they are all essential to the completeness of the total result. Or, when a general lays out the plan of a vast campaign, that plan includes not only the intelligence and faithfulness of his generals, but it includes the intelligence and the faithfulness of the offi- cers all the way down, and not only of the officers, but the intelligence and faithfulness of the poorest private and of the most insignificant, least important fragment of the whole army. All these are essential to the carrying out of his great plan. But you say — and you will say it justly, for no finite illus- tration can adequately set forth an infinite truth — that these illustrations do not teach quite enough for comfort. The architect does not think of every individual brick, of every individual trowelful of mortar. He does not think of the laying of each stone plumb and true and square. He cannot follow out all these details, keep an eye on it all, be person- ally interested in it all ; and so, as far as he is concerned, you may think of him as indifferent to all these minute particulars. And in the case of the general : no general is able to be personally acquainted with, to come into personal contact with, more than a few of his lieutenants and sub- ordinates. He cannot know every private soldier in the ranks. He cannot know their joys and sorrows, hopes and fears. The question as to whether any one private is prop- erly clothed and fed, as to whether he is overworked on the march, or whether he receives the proper amount of rest, does not come to him. So these illustrations do not go far enough. What you and I want, if we may have it, is to 108 Life believe that there is a grand plan governing the universe, and that he who is at the head of it is acquainted with his lieutenants and subordinates, and that they are acquainted with him, and so all the way down, rank by rank, to the smallest private. We want to feel, if we may, no less than this. It is the heart hunger that he who is supreme has a thought of us, tells us to do our duty, to occupy this position or that. We want to feel that there is this personal rela- tionship between the individual soul, however small or poor or insignificant, and the one Infinite Soul which is the life of all. Have we any right to believe in so stupendous, so over- whelming a truth — if it be a truth — as this ? I believe that the illustrations which I used, though good for their purpose as far as they go, fall infinitely short of what we may trust is the grand reality of our individual lives. An infinite wisdom includes directly and without effort not only the wide scheme, but the very minutest particle of it ; and when I see under the microscope a little dust particle float- ing, or when I see some particle of matter so minute that I cannot discern it by the naked eye or one that I can see merely by the use of a scientific imagination, or when I think of the ultimate particles that make up a gas as in eternal motion sweeping round their tiny orbits, — as I think of these things, I am compelled to postulate the immediate presence, the immediate activity of God, to account for them, as much as I am to make me feel that Sirius is sweeping safely through his magnificent orbit, as much as I am to think that it is the divine power that sweeps to-day some- where through space the comet that flashed across our hori- zon one hundred, two hundred, five hundred years ago, that I know is not lost, but is following the divine path, and is again to delight the eyes of those who prophesied that path My Life's Meaning 109 and the moment of its return. When we are dealing with an infinite intelligence, we are compelled to believe that that intelligence includes the minutest as well as the most mag- nificent, — includes it all from lieutenants down to privates. And why should we not believe it ? The only obstacle with which I am acquainted is merely the fact that it so over- whelms our imagination that we cannot think it. But there is no great cosmic truth with which I am familiar that we can think, that we can grasp ; and we must remember that the measure of our capacity to grasp and comprehend a thing is not at all the measure of its truth or reality. We may dem- onstrate that a certain thing is true beyond all question, and yet utterly fail to comprehend it. I believe, then, that your life and mine is a definite part of God's definite plan, and that he looks to you and to me to be faithful and true in the accomplishment of that part of the task which is assigned to us, and that it is important to the outcome as related to the whole. I had occasion, a few days ago, to purchase a piece of goods ; and, after I had decided on the pattern and the quality that suited me, I found that there was a defect in it, which ruined it for my purpose. Only one thread was wrong, but that spoiled the whole piece. And so even God cannot make things just right, — free from all defect, — except as we who are his co- workers see to it that the minutest part of the plan which has been confided to us is faithfully wrought out. Now, just what does this imply ? It means, I believe, a purpose, a plan, and in your being and in my being just where we are to-day. If we have done wrong, if we are in a false position out of which we ought to take ourselves immediately, even that does not touch the general truth ; for it means and includes this fact, that we should at once put ourselves right. There is a purpose and a plan, I believe, no Life in our being just where we are this moment, facing just the task, the duty, that lies next our hand immediately be- fore us. Does this plan include the idea that we are, as the Prayer- Book has it, to be " content in that station in life in which Providence has placed us " ? Not at all, or not necessarily. I believe, rather, that there should be in the souls of all of us a divine discontent, a desire to be more, to possess more, to accomplish more than we have yet been able to reach. But there are several limitations to this. We are not at liberty to gain something we desire, to change our position for a more favorable one, to become wiser, stronger, richer, to attain a more exalted station, at a cost either of utter faithfulness to ourselves or at the cost of that which is essen- tial to the life, the well-being, the happiness, of any other soul on earth. We are to stay where we are ; we are to fill the position in which we find ourselves, fill it truly, fill it completely, fill it with uttermost faithfulness ; and we are at the same time to be ready to know more, to do more, to become more, to occupy a better, finer, higher, more desira- ble position, just as soon as we can do it without being false to ourselves or false to our fellow-men. But I believe it is God's plan — it is our highest, grandest duty — to stand just where we are, and fill the place where we find ourselves, until there is a path open, — a path along which, with just and loving feet, we may tread, that shall lead us into a more desirable way. I know that this is a hard doctrine ; and it is not less hard for me than for any of you. Never think when I am preach- ing to you some difficult thing, something hard of accom- plishment, that I do it because I have found it easy. I am in the midst of the same struggle, subject to the same temp- tations, ready to stumble over the same obstacles, to soil my My Life's Meaning in robes in the same dust j and yet, seeing that which I believe to be the highest and best for myself, I see also that which is highest and best for you. Let us look at one or two concrete examples. Take the case of the young man who feels himself getting on only indifferently well in business, — not meeting with the kind or degree of success that he hoped for in his earlier days. And here is one on his right hand and one on his left, by ways which he is not quite ready to stoop to, stepping up and onward into higher mercantile position, places of larger pay and more responsibility. Shall I say to him, Stay where you are until, with uttermost honor, with clear-eyed truth, you can go into a higher place ? A thousand times yes. For you cannot afford to sacrifice yourself, to be less of a man, to injure and degrade the life of one of your fellow- men, for the sake of apparent haste towards business success. That man makes poor speed who outruns and leaves behind his own soul. Or take the case of the woman whose life is narrow, poor, hindered, hampered at every turn. I know thousands of such, capable of thought, capable of study, capable of social enjoyments, capable of all sorts of high and fine things which are yet forbidden. Why? They are tied to the present duty, no matter what it be. I need not go into de- tails ; but, in order to be utterly true to the place in which they find themselves, they must forego this inviting path- way and that, and feel sometimes, perhaps, that their own lives are shrinking, dwarfed, poorer than they might have been, for lack of dew and sunshine and air. They have failed to unfold the finer, higher faculties of their souls. What shall we tell them ? Until the time comes when, with- out injury to any other soul, without unfaithfulness to that duty which seems to be placed by a higher power directly 112 Life before them, they must stand, being true, at any rate, to the present duty, and trusting for what is to come. Do you not see, can you not gain a glimpse of, the great truth that, by being thus faithful to their own finer, higher selves, they are culturing and developing that which is most God-like in them, no matter at what loss ? I know such peo- ple, in whose presence I feel not only like taking off my hat with reverence, but I feel sometimes like bending my knee, knowing that by being at their feet I am on holy ground. No matter what the obstacle may be, we cannot gain any- thing by being false to the task that to-day is ours ; and, if we ever wish to reach any finer, higher position, is there any other way except that of culturing the finest, highest, truest, sweetest things in us, so that, when the path does open, we may step up into this higher place that we have mastered, with all that is best in us, with power with which to deal with the new circumstances, to accomplish the higher and finer results for which we have prepared ourselves ? What is the finest thing in a man or woman ? Is it not what they are ■? Is it not the soul, the spirit of love, of help- fulness ? and is it not true that all we can acquire of posi- tion, of surroundings, will at last be adjudged of importance only as we have been able to make them minister to the cul- tivation of what we are and become ? Overwhelm the archi- tect with materials, bury him under them, and he proves his ability as an architect only by his power to use them in the construction of some fine structure that is worthy of his genius. And so all our money, all our place, all our power of every kind, is only so much material intrusted to us ; and we succeed only as we convert these into soul-culture. And, then, the finest thing we can do, after we have become, is to help somebody else to the attainment of the same grand end ; and the meaning of our lives is to be found just My Life's Meaning 113 here, and that meaning can be attained only by utter faith- fulness in the place where we are and to the next duty that lies at our hand. I do not mean that we should not reach out our hands, as we are engaged in this great struggle for soul attainment, to take what comfort, what cheer, what fellowship, what inspi- ration, what love we can attain, if so be that these things really help lift and do not hurt and degrade the soul. This is to be the criterion by which we are to measure the matter of indulgence. In this struggle I sometimes do not know which most to pity, the over-rich or the over-poor. There are peculiar temptations and almost equal dangers, perhaps, surrounding them both. The rich is so apt to feel the sense of responsibility loosening, to feel that he has attained, to say, I am rich and increased with goods, and have need of nothing, and to forget that possibly, in this higher sense of which I have spoken, he is all the while " poor and miserable and blind and naked." And the poor ? He is so apt to suffer from the opposite temptation, feeling that it is not worth while to try, so little can be accomplished. So little ! Friends, there is no com- parison of little or great here ; for what is it you are engaged in ? You are engaged in the building of a soul ; and there are no little souls or great souls, so far as this work or this possibility is concerned. And they who are faithful in ob- scurity, faithful when no one is overlooking, may find that they are working into the quality of their lives a finer grain than otherwise would be possible. The overseer of a great factory finds it easy to be faithful. He knows that promo- tion depends on that, that the stockholders and managers have their eye on him day by day, measuring him, and that according to that measure he will succeed. But how is it with the man at the bench, who is engaged on some mere 1 14 Life fragment of the work, and who does not expect any promo- tion, but who is only trying to go from one weary day to an- other ? It is a great deal harder for a man like that to be faithful. But, if a man remembers that, no matter what his outward and ostensible occupation may be, what he is really doing is working on the soul, then there is no question of position, of high or low, but only a question as to whether you shall help discover the meaning of your own life and attain it. And, if we do not clearly see the way, still we need not doubt that there is a way. I wish to close this morning by calling your attention to an illustration with which, perhaps, you are familiar, but so beautiful, so fitting, that I know of no better way with which to round out my theme. It is said that the tapestry-weavers abroad work always upon what is called the wrong side of their task, looking at the pattern that is above them, but not seeing just what it is, or just how much they are accomplishing, working on thus blindly day by day, being merely faithful to the next tiny stitch to be taken in their work, having confidence in their overseer, and knowing that a failure in the least shall appear as a defect in the completed result. I believe that, in this matter of working out our own life's meaning, whatever the pattern may be, there is nothing finer or better that any soul can do than merely to take the next stitch as acccurately as may be in the light of what we believe to be the grand design. " Let us take to our hearts a lesson — no lesson can braver be — From the ways of the tapestry-weavers on the other side of the sea. Above their heads the pattern hangs ; they study it with care ; The while their ringers deftly weave, their eyes are fastened there. They tell this curious thing, besides, of the patient, plodding weaver, — He works on the wrong side evermore, but works for the right side ever. My Life's Meaning 115 It is only when the weaver stops, and the web is loosed and turned, That he sees his real handiwork, — that his marvellous skill is learned. Ah ! the sight of its delicate beauty ! how it pays him for all it cost ! No rarer, daintier work than his was ever done by the frost. The years of man are Nature's looms, let down from the place of the sun, Wherein we are weaving alway, till the mystic web is done. Sometimes blindly ; but weaving surely, each for himself his fate ; We may not see how the right side looks : we must often weave and wait." A HUMAN LIFE. While attempting to outline for you this morning my idea of that which constitutes, in the highest and noblest sense of the word, a human life, I hope that you will not think of me as supposing for an instant that I myself have at- tained. I do not stand on some height above you, calling to you to come up where I am. I think that I see far off summits shining in God's eternal sunlight ; but I stand with you in the valley, and only ask you to climb with me, offer- ing to help you if I can, and asking you to help me if you will. It is a task which we ought to undertake together. My feet are as likely to become weary as are yours. My heart is as likely to be heavy and discouraged as yours; and sometimes, when the clouds settle and these summits disappear from view, I may be as likely as you to have hours of wondering as to whether, after all, they are real, whether they are not cloud forms that dissolve and fade, or, if they be real, whether it be worth all the pains to climb up to them, or whether they be really attainable with our ordinary human strength. I only attempt, then, to outline for you what I think is true in the higher realms of our com- mon human life ; what I think may be, and therefore what we ought to strive after. It is a common task set before us all. A human life, a life distinctively, peculiarly human, — how A Human Life 117 shall we get at a conception of such a life ? Is it not true that we judge, and rightly, anything and everything in the light of that which is peculiar to itself, not in the light of what it shares with something else ? We judge it for what it is or what it may be ; and we value it as good or evil according as it realizes this ideal of what is peculiarly and distinctively its own. Let us lead up to our conception of what is peculiarly hu- man through some illustrations drawn from lower existences. Take this old planet of ours, — what is it that makes it just the earth it is ? Not the qualities and characteristics which this world shares with the other planets that make up the family circle about the sun. It is the differences, the peculiarities, which fit it to be the home of a race of beings that have climbed from some low region in the past to where they are to-day, and are reaching up to the attainment of something still beyond. It is these peculiar qualities and character- istics that make the earth the fit home of man. And, when we consider some of the individual features and facts of this earth, we are faced by the same simple and yet important truth. We judge the stones that we quarry by the peculiar qualities which make them what they are, as to whether they are fitted for the peculiar uses to which we design them. One stone, we say, is good for building purposes ; another is fit to carve into a statue ; another has some peculiar qual- ity of brilliancy that makes of it a gem. We judge each in the light of these peculiar qualities. We do not find fault with granite because it is not marble, nor with the marble because it is not granite, nor with either of them that it is not a diamond or an emerald or a ruby. We decide as to whether each one of them is good in the light of the peculiar characteristics which make it what it is, which adapt it to its special and peculiar use. n8 Life And so, when we come up to the animal world, or the forms of life beneath us, is it not the same ? A singing-bird we do not judge by its feathers. We do not raise the ques- tion as to its beauty, but as to the quality of its song. If we belonged to the old knightly days when with hawk on wrist we went out to engage in field sports, we should not have asked of the hawk that it should sing, only that it should be swift of wing and capable of overtaking its prey. So when we come up to the animal world. We judge the dog by its own peculiar qualities and character- istics. Is he a good watch-dog ? Then we do not raise the question of beauty. He is fitted for this peculiar office, and we judge him in the light of that. If, however, we wish a dog merely as a plaything, a pet, then we seek for other qualities, and decide whether he is good or bad in the light of these. We do not ask the horse to be as strong as the elephant or shaped like him. We ask only that he be fitted for the peculiar work that we require of him. And so, all the way up, you notice that the same things are true every- where. We judge all things, from the lowest to the highest, in the light of those qualities which constitute them what they are, and which fit them to be the highest and best of which they are capable. Let us come, with this principle as our measuring-rod, to estimate the qualities and peculiarities of man, and find what it is that makes a human being. I propose, in the first place and as leading up to the heights of my thought, to deal with some of the lower qualities and characteristics of man, — some of those that in more or less degree he shares with the world beneath him, — and see in what relation these stand to those higher qualities that make us what we are and what we are capable of becoming. In the first place, then, man, whatever else he may be, A Human Life 119 whatever more, as I have had occasion to point out to you more than once, — man is an animal. He shares with the world beneath him so much of its life. And I believe we are not to cast contempt upon this lower life of ours ; for, if we do, it will certainly have revenge upon us, even in the highest realms of our being. We are animals ; and we ought, then, to be as perfect animals as possible. We ought to develop our physical characteristics to their highest, to keep ourselves in perfect physical condition, if we may. I do not share the ascetic idea, that has been so common in the relig- ions of the past, that these bodies are a sort of prison-house of the soul ; that they are to be treated with contempt, trod- den under foot ; that the end and object of life is to beat down the body or to break through its walls and escape. I do not believe that, because we are pent in these bodies, therefore intellectual and spiritual truth, the highest truth attainable by man, is made more difficult of attainment. I believe, rather, that in this stage of our development, at least, the body is as essential to us as is the soul, — the phys- ical part as the mental, the affectional, the moral, or the spiritual, — and that by as much as the physical is trained, cultured, kept at its best, by so much do we get clearer visions of the divine, and by so much is the divine which is in us made capable of culture, development, and expres- sion. Both religion and morals have been degraded in the past, because men have misconceived the relation of the physical to them. They have thought by contemning the body, by breaking down the physical life, by starving its natural aptitudes, tendencies, and tastes, they could exalt those things which they rightly recognized as being higher than the physical. They are higher than the physical, yet the physical is the pedestal on which they must rest ; and, unless the pedestal be sound, solid, and secure, that which 120 Life rests upon it must fall into the dust and perhaps be broken in its fall. I believe, then, that every faculty of the physical ought to be developed to its highest efficiency. How about the indulgence of physical tastes, appetites, passions ? How about the exercise of all these physical peculiarities that belong to us as animals ? So far as they are healthful, so far as they are fight, so far as they do not injure our higher selves or the welfare of anybody else, I believe that we have a perfect right to all the pleasure that we can get out of this life here on earth as we are passing through it. Only we should remember that there is some- thing higher in us, that it is not the physical which consti- tutes us men, and see to it that through indulgence of the physical faculties, powers, and tastes, we do not injure or degrade that which makes us something more than physical. We need that these lower faculties of ours should be kept in perfect tune, in order that the higher may reach their grand- est manifestation. And we need also to curb and control and keep under the domination of reason and right all this lower side of us, lest the higher in us be injured and de- graded below that of which it is capable. The man who lives only in the body or for the body, who makes that the one great end of life, who seeks chiefly phys- ical comfort, physical enjoyments, no matter how refined, no matter how gentlemanly he may be in the pursuit of these things, no matter how carefully he may guard the question as to whether he injures the welfare of any other in the process, though he do no wrong positively, is not leading a human life. He who lives in the physical chiefly, however beautiful the life may be, is leading only an animal life, he has not yet climbed up into his manhood at all. Let us take a step higher, and come up into the range of the intellectual. What of the man who seeks to know, who A Human Life 121 searches the world for truth, the man who disports himself in the fields of literature, the man who builds for himself palaces of art, halls of music, the man who lives in the higher ranges of the intellectual life, — has he attained to the human ? It depends entirely upon the spirit that animates him, the end that he has in view. I care not how many grand truths a man may discover and bestow upon the world, — he may in the bestowal of these truths be conferring benefit upon the earth, — but, if the conferring of the benefit be no part of his purpose, if his soul be not turned that way, making it one of the great aims and ends of his life, if he be seeking truth merely for the sake of selfish intellectual indulgence, if he be living in this intellectual realm ever so innocently, so far as any positive harm be wrought upon the world, still he is not leading what I mean by a human life. A man may be as selfish, as self-centred, as self-contained, in the world of intellect, as is the man who is buried in the world of mere sense, caring only for the gratification of his animal desires. There must be something more than merely the search for truth. A man may indeed discover truths which are impor- tant for the welfare of the world, like one who collects the waters of a thirsty region in a reservoir for his own amuse- ment, because he is interested in it, studying how it may be done, and yet keeping these waters in the reservoir, not making them minister to human welfare. A man may do all this, and yet be purely, intensely selfish in his occupation ; and so, however much benefit he may ultimately confer upon the world, after his control of these things has ceased, still the world would owe him no thanks, — for he who helps an- other without meaning to must not find fault if he receive no meed of gratitude even for his services. Come up higher still, — for it is higher, — to the afTectional nature. Is a man necessarily leading a human life because 122 Life he is tender and true here ? Let a man build for himself a home which shall be an ideal home, a home concerning which no one can make just criticism. The outer structure, the inner decoration, the spirit, the atmosphere, shall be all that any one could dream of or demand, — one air of perfect love blowing like a breath of heaven through it all. And such a man may have his circle of friends outside his home, with whom he stands in intimate personal relations of love and tenderness and service. He may build himself a world like this, and live in it his life long, wholly untainted by any touch or breath of impurity, and yet lead a life of utter self- ishness, a life that rightly might be charged with being un- human, because he cares only for those who are closely linked with him by these personal and affectional associa- tions. The bear loves and will die for her cub. There are herds of wild animals that will fight even to the death for mutual self-defence. Until there is something in us higher and grander than that which we share with any of the lower forms of life, we cannot claim that we have climbed up into that which is human. I will go further yet. Let us go up into the realm of the spiritual. A man may devote himself with his whole soul, as he thinks, to his God, and yet do it in a way that, if not /whuman, is at least wzhuman ; for he falls beneath the meas- ure of that which is demanded of a human life. Is it not true that, in many of the religions of the past, men in what they have regarded as devotion to their souls have ruined their bodies, have blighted or perverted their intellectual natures, so as not to be capable of coming to the truth ? have warped their affectional natures, starving themselves here, starving those that look to them for comfort and help, leading unhuman lives, for the sake, as they supposed, of that which was highest in them, entertaining dishonoring and A Huma?i Life 123 selfish views of God, and all, as they believed, for the sake of honoring the Divine ? If a man pursues the culture and development of his own soul merely for his own soul's sake, if he pursues it in such a way as to dwarf and blight the other characteristics of his own nature, if he pursues it in such a way as to lead him to neglect the services which as a man he owes to his fellows, then, however religious he may be in his own esteem, he falls short of attaining to that which can be called a human life. In the second sermon of this series, I went into some particulars in pointing out those qualities and characteristics which man has as man above and beyond any of those which he shares with the world beneath him. I need this morning to recur to some of these, although with a wholly different purpose from that which I then had in view. Let us consider, then, those things that are peculiar to man, so that we may get a clear idea as to what it means to lead a human life. I shall note only three of those which I touched on before, and treat them in a wholly different way. In the first place, man is a being who cannot, if he would, live alone. He cannot, if he would, attain the highest and best by means of his own hand, his own brain, his own heart, his own spirit. If to-day any one of us should go off by himself and try to lead a hermit existence, tired of or dis- gusted with his fellow-men, he would carry with him his body, his brain, his heart, his soul, all full and running over with gifts which he had received from his fellow-men. And, if you should take him after he has built his hermitage, and strip him of those things that he owes to his fellows, what would there be left ? The finest and highest qualities of his soul would be gone ; all the refinements, delicacies, and beauties of his affectional nature would be gone ; his power 124 Life to think and all the accumulated knowledge of the world would be gone ; even the very complex and marvellous struct- ure of his brain, by means of which he does think, would be reduced to such small proportions as would place him on a level with the very lowest of the animal world. All his finest and highest physical characteristics would be gone. He would be only a skeleton, — of a man, — shall I say ? Hardly the skeleton of one of the higher animals. So much does he owe to his fellows. For all that is best in us we have wrought out not alone : we have wrought it out together. Man, then, is a being who finds his highest and best life in association with his fellow-men, in receiving from them and in giving to them. And, then, this fact has been born, — that the conscience, the moral nature, the sense of justice, all demand that what is good for us shall also be meted out so far as possible to every man who lives. Here, then, is the first quality, the first peculiarity to which I would call your attention as constituting man in the very highest sense. By as much, then, as you attempt to lead a selfish, sequestered life, by as much as you try to throw off your obligations to others, by as much as you at- tempt to ignore or deny the debt which you owe to the world, by as much as you try to lead a selfish life in any direction, — by so much do you throw away your birthright as a sharer in the grand common life, the grand common destiny of man. Here, then, is the first thing. You may lead your physical life, you may lead your intellectual life, your affectional life, your religious life, as fully, as grandly, as you will, but always subordinated to and made to minister to the welfare of this associated humanity of which you are a part. If you fail in this, by just so much you fail to grasp that which is human. Another point. I have often had occasion to tell you that A Human Life 125 man, so far as we know, is the only being on earth who is gifted with the power of the ideal, — not only with the capac- ity of remembering, of looking back over what he was, of tracing the pathway of his development, but of being restless, of being dissatisfied, discontented, haunted by dreams, see- ing ever something in the intellectual world, in the moral, the spiritual, the physical, no matter where, which is as yet beyond his grasp. This is a quality which is peculiarly human. It means a desire to attain something better, to reach on to something ever luring, ever eluding. And I do not expect to sit down even in heaven satisfied. Unless we cease to be the children of an infinite God, there will always be a thirst for the infinite in our finite lives ; and we shall ever find ourselves striving towards the attainment of some- thing still beyond. Another quality, and the last one on which I shall dwell this morning, akin to this and springing out of it, yet some- thing entirely different, something even higher and finer, is that of which many a man and many a woman in this nine- teenth century is ashamed, — that quality which makes us worshippers. People sometimes speak lightly, slightingly, of worship, as though it were a stoop of the soul, as though it were humiliating to bend the knee, as though there were something not quite manly in the attitude. The old Greeks named man anthropos, the upward looker. It is only by virtue of the fact that we do look up in admira- tion, in worship, of something recognized as higher than we that we are distinctively and peculiarly human. By as much as a man worships, by so much is he great. You can tell the quality of a man by his admirations, if you can discover what they are. What does he love ? What does he admire ? What does he worship ? For no man can worship a thing except in so far as there is something in himself which 126 Life answers to this quality. If, then, a man worships something higher than himself, it means the power, the potency, the promise, in himself of becoming that. As the old poet Daniel has said, — " Unless above himself he can Erect himself, how poor a thing is man ! " Or as Tennyson has said, this time in regard to prayer, but that kind of prayer the heart of which is essentially worship : — " For what are men better than sheep or goats That nourish a blind life within the brain, If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer Both for themselves and those who call them friend ? For so the whole round earth is every way Bound by gold chains about the feet of God." It is this quality in us that makes us worship something higher, and, while we look up, reach out our hands and try to embrace all we love and lift them with us to the same adoration. It is this that makes us capable of ever growing into something that is higher, finer, better. Here, then, it seems to me, we find the key of that which is the distinctive, peculiar, human life, — the life that conse- crates itself to the general good, that cannot be happy in the midst of the general unhappiness, that can say, as the old Hindu prayer has it, Even if the opportunity offer, we can- not enter into peace alone. Then comes the ideal, personal and general, of something better than has yet been attained, that looks up and on. Then, worship, admiration, the im- pulse and motive force for climbing. Here is that which is grandly human. And, now, I care not how complete your life may be on the lower levels. They need, indeed, to be complete there ; and you need the higher culture and development ; you need A Human Life 127 • the cultivated mind for the discovery of truth ; you need the warm, tender, affectionate life in the midst of family and friends ; you need this devotion to that which is spiritual, — all these, but all these subordinated to general ends, and lifted into this higher realm and made a part of this grander universal life. Now, is a life like this possible ? " To some," you are ready to say, "yes." Is it possible to you? Is it possible to me ? If it were not, there would be no duty attached to it. I believe that we make a great mistake in supposing that we must get free from all hampering associations, free from all burdens, or have a world that would just suit us in every way, before we can ever gain or lead the ideal human life. It is not needful that this should be. The carpenter at his bench may do his work while always in his brain and his heart cherishing the wider outlook and trying to make that which is commonplace to him a part at last of the large, good, healthful human life which is the promise of the world. It does not make any difference what position we occupy, what place we are in, what gifts we are endowed with : it is the loving spirit, the purpose of the heart, the soul, which is the chief thing. We can halo the com- monest task by this light of the ideal, — the light that " never was on sea or land." Indeed, we should fail of our grand purpose if we neglected the common duty of the hour. This common task must be fulfilled, but fulfilled in the spirit of a son or daughter of God, as a part of the great life-task of the world. Suppose our circumstances are such that we feel it practically impossible to link ourselves in any way with some of these grand universal measures, — the great movements that promise to lift and help the world. Suppose we think it impossible for us to enter into this larger life, that we are tied down day after day to petty, common tasks, 128 Life that we have neither the heart nor the strength nor the time for them. Remember, friends, one little tiny word of Brown- ing's,— " What I aspired to be, But was not, comforts me." The wish, the purpose, the aspiration, — these, though seem- ingly light as air, do yet become a part of that great common impulse which is the very heave and lift of the Almighty in lifting the world into a clearer light and a higher air. So that in spirit, in purpose, and, as far as possible, in action, we may become a part of this great common life, and so share at last the great common triumph. WORK AND PLAY. A commonplace theme is this, and in some respects I shall treat it in a commonplace way. I need, however, to consider some of the principles involved as a preparation for the themes which are to follow. Perhaps because the sub- ject is a commonplace one people are not apt to note care- fully enough the underlying principles, the meaning of these things to which they are accustomed. The difference between work and play is not a difference that consists in the activities engaged in, or the faculties that are used, or the stress, the power, with which these faculties are used. The difference is almost entirely one of aim, one of motive. Work is that which is done for the sake of some ulterior object, either as touching the question of develop- ment or the production of some object desired; while play, although it may exercise substantially the same faculties, and exercise them quite as strongly, is such an activity as is engaged in for its own sake, as we say, or for the sake of the mere pleasure involved. A man will start out on a walk of five or six miles for the pleasure of the walk or because he is tired of his office. He will expand his lungs and take in the fresh air, rejoicing in every sight and sound of nature, and feel himself refreshed from it all, counting it play, when perhaps another time, if you should ask him to take pre- cisely the same walk, with no more effort involved, he would 130 Life look upon it as a wearisome burden, as a piece of work from which he would shrink if he could. Children are constantly doing things "for the fun of it," as they say, that involve much more effort than those things that they dread and shrink from as tasks. The story is told — I think I referred to it some years ago, but it illustrates my point admirably — that a school-teacher on a Saturday afternoon took a whole band of boys out into the fields for study and observation. They were so inter- ested that they lost all sense of time and distance ; and, when they turned to go home, he found that the children were so weary that they were ready to break down and cry at the thought of the task before them. It occurred to him to turn the trip home into play; and he set the boys to cutting sticks and switches which they were to mount and ride as hobby-horses, and they went laughing and happy all the way home, because they had turned their task into play. This illustrates the point that work is not essentially the putting forth of effort ; that play is not the absence of effort. I have known a man to play chess for sixteen long hours on a stretch, so absorbed, so interested in the game that he had forgotten that it was work. If, however, you had put him to a precisely similar task sixteen hours long, in which there was no interest on its own account, in which he could take no personal pleasure, he would have considered that he was being tyrannized over in the most uncomfortable way. Work and play, then, do not differ so far as the processes are con- cerned, but according as the end in view is one of self-cult- ure and development, or the creation of something that does not already exist, or whether it is simply for its own sake, for the pleasure of the exercise of the faculties that are involved. Men have always shrunk from work. That is not contra- Work and Play 131 dieted by the well-known fact that a man can become so habituated to his task, after long years, as to find home and peace nowhere else. There are stories on record of men who have been kept in prison for thirty or forty years, until they had become so habituated to it that, after they were set free, they have come back and begged to be admitted to their old quarters again. They had lost the ability to feel at home in any other conditions. So men, after working at a particular task, or profession, for twenty, thirty, forty years, become so habituated to that, they have run their lives so completely into this one mould, that there is no peace, no rest, for them anywhere else ; and so they come, as they say, to love their work, their task. But, in spite of this, men do not love work. Men do not naturally take to it. And men have ever been driven on to their tasks as if they were slaves by some sort of necessity, or else by the spur of the motive, or the desire to attain some end that could not be reached in any other way. So it is not strange that the first dream of the world as to a perfect condition was a garden where there should be no work involved, where practically everything that a man might want should spring up at his hand. It is not strange that poets like Tennyson should sing of the lotus-eaters' vision, a paradise where all things should be like a summer afternoon, where all effort and toil should be outgrown and complete rest attained. It is not strange that men, weary with tasks, should look forward to heaven as a place of eternal rest. And yet, as we stop to look at it a moment, we are perfectly well aware that eternal rest would be un- bearable. The dream, however, I say, is quite natural, be- cause we do not take easily to the performance of tasks that involve effort and that leave us weary when the effort is over. 132 Life And yet, though men dream these dreams of everlasting peace, where all wants are supplied without toil, where there is no dreary drudgery and all may do as they please, — yet, as we stop to contemplate the picture a moment, we find that this, after all, is a condition of barbarism. There are para- dises to-day, plenty of them, on this poor old planet. There are lands, there are islands in the sea, where the inhabi- tants need not work; where the climate is such that they need very little protection against the cold, where they need neither houses nor clothing, except of the most primitive and simple kind ; where the soil naturally and bounteously pro- duces whatsoever is absolutely necessary to supply their physical wants ; so that they are gardens of Eden. Only the inhabitants have always been and always must be barbaric. Adam himself, if you picture the man that the old legend tells us about, was a barbarian pure and simple, an animal, utterly ignorant, utterly inexperienced, knowing not even the distinction between good and evil, unclothed, with no men- tal, moral, spiritual wants whatever ; and, though he had had them to an unlimited extent, with nothing whatever in his entire surroundings in any way fitted to feed the higher mental, moral, or spiritual faculties of his being. All these dreams, then, of gardens of Eden, of lotus-eaters' lands, are dreams of animalism, dreams of barbarism. I remember, when a boy, that I read a book which fasci- nated me very much. I have wished many a time, for these many years past, that I could find that book again ; and yet I do not know even how to search for it, for I have entirely forgotten title, publisher, and all the particulars that would enable me to succeed in such a quest. It was a fairy story, but with a modern lesson. It related how a man desired to develop himself into mastery over his fellow-men and to acquire power to create more beautiful and grander con* Work and Play 133 ditions in the world. He was told that he might learn this secret on condition that he would rise every day early in the morning, dress himself in coarse and stout clothing, and go out doors ; and it was told him that he should meet a fairy who would teach him the secret of developing himself into the mastery of men and the power to re-create the world, and the story tells of his success. It was a thin and transparent allegory of the power of labor. Work is the great fairy that cultivates and develops the individual and gives him con- trol of all his conditions. " Paradise Lost " closes with one of the most pathetic little pictures that I know of in all the world, — Adam and Eve doomed to turn their back on Eden, going " hand in hand, with wandering step and slow," out into the wild, waste world. If there ever was such a journey as this taken by our human ancestors, it was the most fortunate, the most blessed journey ever undertaken in all the history of man ; for labor is not a curse, — it is the one prime blessing. Think what depends on it. In the first place, work is absolutely essential to self- culture, development, growth. It is work, and only work, that has transformed the animal into man. It has taken the primeval savage of the woods and given us Shakspere, Michel Angelo, Jesus, all the noble and great of the world. It is only work that has transformed the barbarian into civil- ized man. Physical culture is dependent upon it. Mental culture, moral culture, spiritual culture, are dependent on it. It is only through work that the eye can be trained to the discernment of hundreds of colors and shades that we do not naturally see. It is only by work that the ear is made capa- ble of hearing finer distinctions of sound ; and it is only when I can hear all these finer distinctions that sound is transformed into music. What is it that enables a man 134 Life not merely to listen to a noise, but to hear a symphony? It means years, ages, of training on the part of the race in the first place ; and then it means years of special cultivation on the part of the individual before he becomes capable of grasping the meaning of the master. You could not give a man one of Beethoven's symphonies on any other condition than a long preparation of toil on his part. All the angels in heaven could not introduce to a soul the meaning of music like this except by leading that soul's feet up the toil- worn pathway of effort and labor. God himself would find the task a contradiction and an absurdity. God cannot give us his highest and finest things except as we become pre- pared for them ; and that preparation means work. Toil on our part gives this ability; toil on our part develops the open faculty and gives the soul hands with which it can reach out and take the mighty gifts of Heaven. And then, on the other hand, of course it is apparent, it requires no argument, it is only as the result of toil that the world has been changed from a wilderness to a civilized land. Not one single item of that long list of inventions, improvements, advances, which have lifted man above the level of the brute and made him powerful over the forces of nature, — not one item of all this list that has not been attained as the result of human labor. Work, then, a curse? It is the whitest, most shining angel that God ever sent with a message of peace and hope and happiness for man. And yet work* is not all good. Too much work, instead of lifting a man out of barbarism, crushes him down into it deeper still, and makes it impossible for him to rise. Con- sider what I mean. Work, in the broad sense in which I have been speaking of it, includes the training and the exercise of all the higher human faculties and capabilities of the race. The great Work and Play 135 majority of the world, the mass of men, except those that I have referred to as living in a climate that calls for no effort, — the great mass of men, I say, is held down under a necessity of a certain kind, a quantity of labor that makes it practi- cally impossible for them to rise in the scale of human life. If a man is obliged to work all his working hours, every day, every week, every month the year round, simply for the sake of getting bread, clothes, shelter for himself and those de- pendent on him, do you not see that anything like the highest kinds of work, on which the development of his higher nature depends, becomes practically impossible to him ? There must be some time, some leisure, and oppor- tunity. A man who must work all the time for the satisfac- tion of his animal wants is only an animal. He has no opportunity to be anything else. There must, then, be some way found for gradual release of these bonds, now in this case, now in that, before the stragglers on the world's great march of civilization can come up with the main body of those who have lifted themselves at least a little way out of this kind of necessity for continual physical toil. It is sometimes said, by way of argument in favor of the present condition of things, when one sees an attempt made to have shorter hours of labor, — I am not discussing that question now, mark you, either for or against it, — whether wisely or unwisely, that, if it were possible for these work- men to get shorter hours, one might question the wisdom of it for them, because they would throw away their money every week when they were released ; that, if they have certain hours free, they are sure to waste their money in dis- sipation, sure to injure themselves instead of bettering them- selves by this enlargement of liberty. Granted. Why not ? How can you expect anything else ? You say, if you let a little boy have an edge tool, he is in danger of cutting him- 136 Life self. Of course he is. But, if you do not let him have an edge tool, he is in more serious danger, — the danger of never knowing how to use edge tools or to use his hands. I grant you that these laborers when suddenly released are apt to make a poor use of their time and pay ; but, if they are not released, they will never learn how to make a human use either of time or money. They must be trusted with that same liberty with which we trust ourselves, because there is no possibility of the development of humanity except through the use of our faculties unconstrained. Give men the liberty to learn the natural, essential laws of life, of culture, of devel- opment, and they will become men after a while. But shut them up, and they never may become men. They may not do so much positive evil at first ; but they will never become capable of positive good. There must, then, be the liberty to acquire somehow if the world is to become civilized. I have one other point I wish to refer to in regard to this matter of work. I think in a sermon that I preached several years ago I touched on a similar idea, but with another pur- pose in view. Mr. Emerson once said that, if it had not been for the accident of the Pilgrims having drifted to the shores of Massachusetts, New England would probably never have been settled, so frowning is her sky, so inhospitable her soil. Our forefathers came from a country where there had been a revolt against vicious amusements on the part of the people ; and they came to a land where they were com- pelled to work severely to overcome the obstacles which opposed their success. As the result, there is a strain in the New England blood that leads us to exalt work as a sort of deity, to make it a little god to be worshipped, regarding it as a good thing for its own sake. This matter is carried so far that you can find men boasting of the fact that they have done a wonderful quantity of work, although they may have Work and Play 137 injured themselves in the process. You find men boasting that they have not taken a vacation for years. Now, if a man has been so situated that he could not take a vacation for years, and he wants my sympathy, he can have it. But, if he asks me to admire him for a voluntary self-immolation of that sort, I must respectfully decline. I have no admira- tion for anything of the sort. Work looked at simply for its own sake is not worth a whit more than play. Work is worth the outcome of work ; and work is good only when one needs to toil for his own sake or for the sake of hu- manity. I ask you to turn with me for a moment to consider the question of play. When may a man play ? How much may he play ? The answer seems very simple. A man may play when he has earned the right to play ; and he may play as much as is needed to bring him into and keep him in good condition, provided he can get the time and opportunity for it rightly. There are two kinds of play. One is dissipation. It dis- sipates, it scatters energy, faculty, power j leaves a man less capable than he was before. I saw the humorous side of this touched on in a paper within a year. A man had been off on his vacation for a week, and came back looking heartily worn out and ill, when a friend asked him what he had been doing that should make him look so badly. He replied that he had been on his vacation, and was all tired out, but that he should be rested after he had been at work a few days. A great many take their vacation in that fashion, and it leaves them worn and dissipated. The other kind of play — divide the word a little differ- ently, and you will see its meaning — is re-creation, — play which re-creates, which adds to faculty, which makes one more capable of work. It leaves one with a fresh zest for 138 Life his task and in better shape for its performance than he was before. This is the true kind of play. I said that all work tended to brutalize, to degrade humanity. Precisely the same thing is true, only in another way, of all play. I heard a young man say within a year, asking the question concern- ing another young man whose father was rich : If he doesn't need to work, why should he ? His father is rich, and he does not need to work. He has money enough, or is going to inherit enough, to live on the rest of his life. If, then, he does not need to work, why should he ? For two reasons. In the first place, as I have already pointed out to you, and argued at some length, he should work to make himself a man ; for work is absolutely essential to the culture of any high, fine faculties in us. And you, fathers and mothers, are going to make a mistake who think that you are doing your children a favor by setting them free from the necessity of doing anything, if you are bringing them up with the idea that they need not toil because their father has toiled before them. Think of the absurdity of it. Could you learn by hours and days and weeks of practice to play the piano for your son or your daughter ? You might, indeed, by the cultivation of your own musical faculty, by creating an atmosphere favorable to the development of musical genius, make it easier for your child ; but this is a sort of thing that never can be done for another. If you teach your boy that he need not do anything because he can fall back on this source of supply, you are doing him the worst possible kind of harm, because you are taking away the spur that would goad him on to manhood. There is another reason. I have touched on this before ; but I cannot touch on it too often. Perhaps you are aware of the fact that the world lives from hand to mouth. It is on the verge of starvation all the time. If no work should be Work and Play 139 done in the world, all the people would be dead inside of two or three years ; for there would be nothing more left to live on. We are creating constantly as we go on the means of our subsistence. What do you think, then, of the question ? You will recall the lesson that I read this morning, and that I said the word " steal " would come to have a larger significance than it has now. What do you think of the man who simply goes on year after year using up the small store of the world's accumulated means for living, and never add- ing to it by one single grain ? I believe that, when the standard of moral living shall be higher than it is to-day, this sort of thing will be looked upon as theft. No matter how you have come into the possession of your means, you owe the ability to have come into such possession to human- ity. You have no exclusive right, then, to this which has been produced, in the sense that you can go on ad libitum taking away from the little pile, and leaving the world nearer to the starvation point and adding not one thing to the ac- cumulated good. This is the great indictment that I would bring against the man who simply lives by his wits and the man who lives only for his own self-indulgence on the money that his ancestors have accumulated. I would bring this charge, as did Matthew Arnold, against the men of the no- bility of England and in Europe. A year and a half ago, when I was in Vienna, I was talk- ing with an old gentleman about the brother of the Emperor of Austria. I said, What sort of man is he ? He shrugged his shoulders and lifted his eyebrows, I said, What does he do ? He named over almost all the conceivable vices that you can think of, and said that he spent his time exclusively in those and in wasting the people's money. The time will come when the man who steals a loaf of bread at the street 140 Life corner to save himself or his family from starvation will be regarded as saintly, when held up against the background of that kind of prince. Any man who is willing to walk through this world, taking out of it all the time and put- ting nothing into the common stock, comes short of the ideal of what it means to lead a noble human life, to use the very mildest of terms concerning him. All play, then, barbarizes as much as all work brutalizes. What, then, is the ideal ? Were I not to follow this dis- course by others, it would be natural for me here to raise questions as to what work is profitable, what kind of work people ought to engage in, what products are really valuable, what is the standard of value, and also as to whether there is any power outside the individual initiative that has the wisdom or the right to decide who shall work, or in what de- partment, or how many hours, and all these kindred subjects. I pass them by, however, this morning. They will naturally come up for discussion in one of the two following sermons. I need only say this morning that the ideal to which the world is looking, and towards which we ought to be working all the time, is such a condition of affairs, if it can be at- tained, as shall give all men enough to do, not too much, not place upon them a crushing burden, but giving with toil enough time for self-culture, for self-development ; that shall create such a condition of things as shall leave the individ- ual free, so far as possible, to choose those things that he loves and so again to do the best he can, for we never do good work unless we love it; that shall enable people to choose such tasks as those into which they can put a little of brain, a little of heart, a little of imagination, as well as mus- cle ; that shall leave people free enough so that they can get such recreation as they need in order to fit them for the proper accomplishment of their tasks. This manifestly is Work and Play 141 the ideal towards which the world is looking, wisely or un- wisely, and which it is trying ever and ever to attain. And what does this mean ? It means that neither work nor play is to be regarded as the end of life. What is the end of life ? Simply living ; life first as continued existence, and then, philosophically speaking, as content; life as holding — what? Satisfaction, joys, pleasures, the things that we desire. Life, then, is the end and aim, the ideal, — long life, full life. And both work and play are to be judged only as they contribute to this. WEALTH AND POVERTY. What is wealth? The accumulated product of labor, a great many people would reply ; and this is a part of the truth ; or they would say the accumulated joint product of labor and capital ; and, again, this is a part of the truth, but not all. A man, for example, in California might stumble on to a gold mine, not as yet worked or owned by anybody, and suddenly find himself worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. In his case, that may be neither the result of labor nor of applied capital ; but purely by the result of accident he has come into possession of something that is looked upon as very valuable, and which he can exchange for what- soever he may desire. The application of labor does not always produce wealth, nor does the application of capital. It might take as much labor and as much capital to raise worthless rock to the surface of the earth as it would to lift out the most valuable quartz from a gold mine. Or a certain quantity of capital is used, a certain quantity of labor is expended, and the production is wealth. Or sometimes, as I have already intimated, the wealth comes into the possession of the man or the community without the expenditure of either labor or capital in any commensurate degree to the amount of wealth. A man might come into possession of a lot of land, he might take it, as in a case that I happened to Wealth and Poverty 143 know of, because he had lent money to a friend and had received a mortgage as the only thing the friend had in the way of security, while neither he nor his friend regarded the mortgage as of any adequate value. And yet the rise of property in the town after a few years made the person who was obliged to take the land on this mortgage exceed- ingly wealthy. One might hold a piece of land where a new city is springing up ; he might have taken it up while it was still wild land, and have expended no labor on it, have applied no capital, or very little, at any rate, after its coming into his possession, and yet after a course of years find himself immensely wealthy. Labor and capital must indeed indirectly enter into this result, the labor and capital of other people, but not necessarily very much of either labor or capital on his part. Wealth, then, what is it ? Here is a simpler definition : it is an accumulation of objects of human desire. For the measure of value is nothing else than the fact that the thing possessed is looked on as having the quality of being what a great many people desire. No matter whether the desire is wise or unwise : the simple fact that a great number of people desire to possess a certain thing determines the fact that it shall be regarded as wealth. It is wealth, because it can be exchanged for anything that a man may wish in return for it. If, for example, all men should suddenly lose all desire to possess gold, if nobody wanted gold any more, it would be worth no more than pebble stones. Again, you will see, as resulting from this definition, that the most valuable things are those which the largest numbers of people desire, and which are the least in quantity. Take as an extreme illustration Raphael's Sistine Madonna, which is probably as valuable a painting as there is in the world, 144 Life perhaps the most valuable painting. So valuable is it that it becomes a question of national contest, not personal, as to who shall possess it. Probably to-day there is not money enough that any nation would be induced to offer for it that could procure its removal from its present position. Great paintings have possessed such value that they have become matters of diplomatic intercourse between nations. The first Napoleon, for example, seized by force certain works of art from the great nations ; and after his fall, by the gen- eral consent of the nations involved, they were returned to their owners, as indicating that they were so valuable that no man had a right, even by conquest, to take them away. If nobody wanted the Sistine Madonna, if nobody appre- ciated its beauty or the genius expended on its production, it would suddenly lose all value, and any one could have it who chose to carry it away. The underlying principle, then, that determines the worth of anything is this fact of human desire. If you analyze this, it is only a modification of the great fundamental fact of hunger. A man desires food for the life of his body. He desires, or hungers, for clothing, either to protect him- self from the cold or as a matter of taste and beauty. He desires shelter, to satisfy this hunger for protection, from the weather in the first instance, and then to satisfy the higher aesthetic hunger, taste for beauty of form and of decoration. And so you may run the analysis from the lowest physical hunger up to the highest spiritual aspira- tion \ and that which people hunger for, for the supply of any want of any range or degree of intensity, becomes a matter of value as worth, as wealth. We do not call those things wealth which are consumed as we go along. We use the term rather of those objects of human desire which are accumulated beyond the immediate necessity of the owner. Wealth and Poverty 145 We are now ready to raise the next questions. Is wealth desirable ? Is poverty a blessed condition ? Would it be better if the world were neither rich nor poor, if there were no poor people, if there were no rich people, if everybody possessed, as Tolstoi seems to desire, just enough to sup- ply the ordinary wants of the human animal ? Would that be a desirable condition for human society ? It seems to me most certainly not. For wealth, some accumulated value beyond that which is needed for the immediate necessities of the community, is the very condi- tion of all higher growth. Picture to yourselves, if you please, a world in which there is neither poverty nor riches ; in which every man, woman and child has shelter from the cold, clothing enough for decency, food enough to supply the ordinary calls of hunger, and so is comfortable ; a world in which no one is harassed by any anxiety as to what he is going to eat or drink or wear to-morrow or next year. Would this be a desirable condition of the world ? So far, yes. But if there were not more than that, if there were only enough wealth in the world to give all people physical shelter, physical clothing, physical food, then we might be for the next dozen centuries comfortable, well-fed animals ; but we could be nothing more than that. I said a few minutes ago that this analogy with hunger might be run all the way from the lowest physical desire for food clear up to the highest spiritual aspiration. Now, if these higher hungers are, in the first place, going to exist, and if they are going to be fed, so that men can grow above the level of comfortable animals, then there must be in the hands of somebody sufficient accumulation of wealth to pro- vide food for these higher hungers. If men are to think, if they are to read books, if they are to study, if they are to travel, so as to learn something about other parts of the world, 146 Life if they are to have social intercourse with each other, they must, some of them, at any rate, be free from this grinding fact of toil to the end of simply supplying their animal wants. There must be somebody to write books if people are to read them ; and a man who is writing a book must have wealth enough so that he is set free for at least a part of the time from the necessity of working merely to supply his animal wants. He must have time, he must have something to eat, something to wear, some shelter while he is writing his book. If a man is to paint a picture, — if you want pictures, — he must be released from the necessity of merely earning his bread, so that he may have time to paint the picture. So with every work of art. If a man is to cultivate the spiritual, the moral side of human nature, either his own or some- body's else, if he is to minister to these higher, loftier ranges of human being, he must have time, he must be able to think, he must be able to cultivate these higher faculties for his own sake. He must be released from that toil which merely gives him bread and clothes and shelter. He must at least be sufficiently released so that he can do his higher work. And one thing we need to remember is that this work is anything but a selfish work. These higher labors, in the main, are engaged in for the benefit of all the world. And we must remember, also, that it is the poorest possible social economy to keep a man who is capable of doing these higher, grander things engaged all the hours of the day, every day of his life, merely in keeping himself alive. If you want these things, you must set somebody free. Now, the condition of all these higher things is, as you will readily see, that there shall be accumulated wealth, wealth more than is necessary simply to supply the wants of every day. Now, then, how shall these higher ends be attained ? That Wealth and Poverty 147 is, when wealth is accumulated, who shall own it ? Who shall dispense it ? Who shall use it ? Here comes in the great contest with which I shall deal next Sunday between public ownership and private ownership. Before we can answer the question as to who really owns the wealth that is accumulated in the world to-day, another question must be asked : Who has produced it ? And, though we grant at present the fact of private ownership, we must not lightly assume that the man who to-day happens to be in possession of wealth is the man who has produced it. I do not now refer to any dishonest ways of coming into pos- session of it. Of course, everybody grants that the man who has stolen it or by any kind of knavery or indirection has come into the possession of wealth that he did not create is not the rightful owner of it. Every one grants that he is not the wealth-producer at all. He may be only a wealth- waster. But let us now turn from this, and consider the case of the man who has really created wealth, more than he needs, more than he cares to use, so that we speak of him as a rich man. Consider him as a man who is thoroughly honest in every fibre of his being, who has consciously wronged no man. How large a part of his wealth does he really, per- sonally own, in the sense that he has a right to do with it precisely as he pleases ? And here we need to note, — and, if we are not socialists, we shall fight socialism all the better for being just to it, — we need to recognize that wealth is never a personal, isolated, individual fact. It is always a social fact. Suppose Robinson Crusoe had discovered a gold mine or even a diamond mine on his island, would he have been rich ? Some cast-off clothing left there by a pass- ing ship would have been worth more to him. A few broken planks, timbers, or boards cast on shore by the waves would 148 Life have been wealth to him in a sense that would not have ap- plied to the gold or the diamonds. A man standing alone can never be rich. And this, in the true sense of the word, is so, even if he live in a civilized community. I remember a man in my old town when I was a boy, — a hermit, a de- formed man, a curiosity to all of us children. I used to see him on the street once in a while. He was a wool-grower, and his house was piled high with wool. Every spare space was full with wool that he was accumulating and holding merely because he could not get the price for it that he de- sired. Was he rich ? If he was not going to exchange this for something else, use it for some public purpose or public end, he might as well have filled his house with sand. A man like that is not rich. A man, then, who stands alone never is rich and never can be ; for wealth is a social thing, the social factor in which is the matter of exchange, the public use of these accumulations. No man ever yet made money alone. He needs the assistance of society. You may trace this matter clear to the beginning, and the prin- ciple holds all the way through. As I have had occasion to tell you before, my hands, my brain, whatever I am in the way of faculty or capacity, is a gift. It has come to me from this toiling, struggling humanity. And, then, who created your commercial conditions ? The men who, beginning with a tree dug out for a boat, ended at last in the magnificent steamers that cross the ocean in six days ; the men that have explored the world ; the men that have lifted up civilization, that have created the thousands and millions of wants in the farthest ends of the planet, so that the things you now create can be exchanged for other things that you desire. It is humanity through its entire his- tory, from the beginning until to-day, that has conferred upon every rich man not only the faculty and power by which We alt J i and Poverty 149 to accumulate wealth, but the conditions that make those ac- cumulations possible. So wealth is a social thing. It is not something that you did. You did it with the help of all the world, and you could not have done it without that help. Who owns wealth, then ? The rich man and humanity own it, not the rich man alone. But that does not settle the question as to who shall hold the title-deeds, as to who shall dispense wealth and use it. This is entirely another question. We all of us grant the principle of socialism some time in our lives. You pay a tax ; you submit to the process of law, of government, of organ- ized society, that puts its hand in your pocket to take out a certain fraction of your wealth for public uses. Every time you submit to this, you admit the right of society to do this in exchange for what society is doing for you and for every- body else. You submit to a draft in time of war, and thereby acknowledge the principle that the welfare of the whole is more important than the welfare of any single person. We admit, then, the fundamental principle of socialism ; but the question as to whether the property that has been accumulated by these men whom we call rich shall inhere in their hands, whether they shall hold the title-deeds, whether they shall be free to use it as they please during their life- time and to bequeath it to public institutions or to their chil- dren, — these are matters of public expediency, pure and simple. And I believe, and it seems to me that human ex- perience shows this point so far, — what may happen in the future I do not know, — that the interests of society are best subserved by the individual ownership and the individual use of property. At any rate there have as yet been no social experiments in the world that are encouraging enough to make any wise man care to venture the prospects of the world in that direction. 150 Life Then let us look at it another way. Suppose I wish to go to Chicago. What is my interest in the matter ? It is to be taken up here in Boston and set down in Chicago speedily, safely, economically. That is all the interest I have in the matter. Now, if I attain that end, what differ- ence does it make to me personally whether the ownership of the road is vested in the government at Washington or in the hands of one man or of forty men ? I wish to go speedily, safely, and economically to Chicago ; and I wish the management of the road to be such that I can attain that end. And I believe, as I study the experience of the world up to the present time, that it is in favor of the suppo- sition that we shall attain these ends best by means of pri- vate ownership and private competition. Consider another matter which helps a good deal, it seems to me, in a just estimate of the problems involved. I said that wealth is not a personal, private matter, and that it cannot be. No man who is rich can help serving the com- munity, even if he tries. He may waste a good deal of money. He may build himself more expensive houses, keep a more expensive establishment, than he needs. He may waste in selfish ways a large amount of money ; but the amount, after all, is comparatively small. We speak of it sometimes as an enormous waste. Take, simply as an illus- tration, a man like Mr. Vanderbilt. I do not know the amount of his wealth ; but let us suppose it is two hundred millions of dollars. He cannot possibly eat a very large amount of that, nor wear it, nor put it into a house. What he can use in these personal ways is comparatively a small fraction of the two hundred millions. Now, what must he do with the rest ? He must serve you and me with it, in spite of himself. Even if he withdrew the whole two hundred millions from public service, if he had it melted down Wealth and Poverty 151 into bars of gold, and buried in his cellar, he could not dam- age the public much. The business of the United States would not stop if two hundred millions of dollars were with- drawn from circulation. He would hurt himself a thousand times more than he would hurt others ; for, if he should put all of his money into bars of gold and bury it, he would become a pauper, and, the moment he uses a fraction of it to buy something to eat or wear or a house to live in, he begins to serve the community by its use. He cannot avoid it. And then, as to the other larger part of the fortune which he cannot possibly use for his own personal aggran- dizement or pleasure, the only way he can get his percentage of profit is by putting it into public circulation, by using it for the public good. It is, then, as I said, a matter of expe- diency whether a man shall be permitted to hold and use according to his own judgment the wealth that has come into his possession or whether he shall surrender it to the public to use at its discretion. I believe the total experience of the world is in favor of private ownership and private com- petition. Let us turn now to the matter of poverty. I only wish to touch on a few principles underlying the matter. What does poverty mean ? The only poverty that is an injury to a man is that which makes him incapable of growth, which takes away from the means of growth, which hinders his becoming what he is capable of being. A man who has enough to live on with comfort, who has attained what Mr. Emerson means when he speaks of " plain living and high thinking," is not a man to be pitied, even though he attain this at the cost of effort. As I told you last Sunday, the man who is released from the necessity of effort, unless there is a spring in him which leads him to put forth this effort voluntarily, has by that very fact been injured, and is 152 Life in danger of being degraded. For only by effort comes growth. The one evil of poverty, then, is this, — that it puts it beyond the reach of a person to be able to attain the possibilities of unfolding and growth which are in his nature. Now, what are the causes of poverty ? I shall speak of two or three necessary causes and of one or two that are not necessary. The first cause of poverty is the niggardliness of the earth. The earth is not very bountiful. We are compelled to work all the time, and to use all the resources at our disposal to produce as much wealth as to-day exists. The next cause of poverty that I will speak of is a social one, — the unwise meddling and interference of law-makers. I believe that any amount of poverty is produced by this. I think we have altogether too much legislation on social and economical matters. People who know very little about it attempt to doctor the patient, and leave him worse off than he was before. More individual initiative, greater effort to find out how people can do things best, and less legislative meddling are things greatly to be desired. Then there are two necessary causes which can only excite pity and sympathy. There are thousands of people who, from one cause or another, are incapable. This does not mean that a man shall be idiotic or insane. There are different grades of incapacity. There are noble men and noble women who simply as a matter of inheritance are incapable of combating with the world. Take two men and drop them suddenly in California, in the streets of San Francisco ; and inside of six months one will have a flour- ishing business, and the other will have accomplished noth- ing at all, the circumstances being the same. For one reason or another, one man does not seem to be able to Wealth and Poverty 153 grasp and manage his conditions so as to get anything out of them. We pity a deformed man, a lame man, for the reason that he is not able to keep up. Let us extend our tender sympathy to those who are mentally crippled or lame. It is as inevitably a misfortune as the other, and is even a greater one. The next necessary cause is illness. Thousands of people are ill and cannot take care of themselves, and must of necessity be helped, or they suffer and starve. Beyond these causes there are several that are not neces- sary, such as vice, idleness, unthrift, the attempt of men to live by their wits, not trying to create wealth, but merely to get by indirection a fraction of that which some one else has created. These causes all lead down to poverty inevitably. But it is not of poverty as a comfortable condition of strug- gle — the mere opposite of wealth — that I wish to speak. It is not that which calls for pity : it is rather that which we mean when we use the word " pauperism." I believe that it is possible for society as it goes on and gets wiser to elimi- nate pauperism from the world. If the community is to sup- port the incompetent and the sick, — those who for one rea- son or another are incapable of taking care of themselves, — then it undoubtedly has the right to see to it that its re- sources shall not be lessened by the unthrift, the theft, the dishonesty, of those who could support themselves if they would. I believe that society has a right — and it ought to exercise it — to take tender, loving care of those who cannot take care of themselves, whatever be the" cost, and then to compel those who are well and strong and capable to do one of two things,- 1 — earn their own living or starve. These men have no right to prey on the community, to lessen the amount of the world's wealth, that is needed for some higher purpose than merely to support drones. 154 Life There are some of the problems of poverty that are so complicated as to be immensely difficult. Take as a hint, of what I think comes home with special emphasis to those of us who are actively engaged in this work, the case of the man who is a drunkard, bound by law, and perhaps — and the wonder of it, too — by love, to a woman noble, faithful, true, — cases which we are facing perpetually, where, to help the woman and family, starving, cold, in trouble of every kind, you must also feed the drunken appetite, the most utterly worthless man. These are the problems that make the question of poverty a difficult one to deal with practi- cally. I believe that there ought to be quick and sharp work made of those men who are chronic and habitual drunkards. I believe the State should take them, as it would criminals or any others who habitually prey on the community, and put them where they would be obliged to earn at least the satis- faction of their common animal needs. Now, at the close, one word as to the great question, What shall the rich man do with his money ? I refer now not to the matter of supporting himself, not to his house, his carriage, his clothing, the works of art, of literature and music, with which he chooses to fill his home. But what shall he do with the great surplus that he does not really need ? I would have no laws touching this matter. We know that they have a legal right to do with it as they please. Let me make a suggestion. I would have a man perfectly free to leave his property to wife and daughters, — yes, and to sons, so far as they can be assisted to get on their feet ; though I believe, and I know, whatever you think of your own children, that you will agree with me in regard to other homes and children, that nine times out of ten the sons are injured more than they are helped by having too much money left to *hem. They are rare boys, indeed, who are so Wealth and Poverty 155 high keyed with honor and the impulse to serve their kind that they do not let down a little when too much money is put into their hands. Thousands of fathers have injured those they loved by leaving too much property to them. Recur for a moment to the fundamental principle that I dealt with at some length awhile ago. I said that the owner of this wealth is not you alone. It is you and man. Now, where comes in man's share, humanity's share ? You could never have accumulated this wealth but for the assist- ance of humanity. I would have no laws on the subject; but I would educate the thought and the conscience of the world up to a grand use of these accumulated thousands. Mr. Andrew Carnegie, in a remarkable article in the North America?! Review not a great while ago, declared that he thinks the time will come when it will be considered a dis- grace for a man to die very rich, a disgrace for him simply to leave his thousands or his millions to his own family and friends. He recognizes, on the theory that I have just elab- orated, that no man has been able to accumulate, and there- fore no man owns, this alone ; and he advises — and he is taking his own advice — the use of this great surplus wealth while the man is living, so that he can see after its judicious and wise expenditure, so that he can rejoice in the good that he has accomplished by it. I never expect to have an opportunity of trying this experi- ment. I do not know how I should do if I had it ; but it seems to me that, if I were worth hundreds of thousands or millions, there would be no higher joy than for me to try to help the world with it while I was here, while I could see what was being done with it, and not leave it to be fought over in the courts, diverted from purposes I had in mind. It seems to me that I should take perfect delight in helping the public. There are a hundred ways : public parks, public 156 Life libraries, public schools, higher institutions of learning, and many others suggest themselves. Then there is one other that I will take the opportunity to refer to just now, because I have found many instances of it. Men who are capable of doing the highest and best work should be set free from the necessity of earning bread and butter, and thus have an opportunity to do the higher work. The average community is never anxious to have that which is very much above it, because it does not under- stand or appreciate it ; but you and I and a few here and there, who can foresee which way the world is moving, can appreciate these things. I can see a man here and a woman there capable of doing work that is of public importance, and yet hampered, hindered, tied down to the necessity of simply keeping their stomachs from complaining, kept from this work which would be of universal worth, because not free. It seems to me I should love, — I have now in mind two or three such cases, — I should love to say to these men : I know what your ideals are, what you are reaching out after, what you are capable of doing : go and do it, — not because I give you the liberty, the opportunity personally, I act simply as the agent of the community. Do the higher, nobler work of which you are capable, not for me, but for humanity. I know men who would do grander work than they are doing if they were not harassed, were not troubled, by what would come to them if they were suddenly taken ill, of what would come to their families and those dependent on them, who would do higher work if they were set free. It seems to me that, if I were rich, I should love to pick out this man and that one, and thus set them to their best work. These only as hints of what men of wealth might do. It seems to me so much more noble, so much grander, than Wealth and Poverty 157 merely holding wealth tight until the white fingers of death tear open the grasp and take it away. What comfort in that? What comfort in leaving it for the possible injury, the possible ruin of those we love, leaving it to be fought over in the courts, leaving it to be diverted from the pur- poses you had most deeply at heart? Why not take the joy of doing it while you can see it done and know the results ? And at the last, if the poor, the discontented, the laboring men of the world, could only see the rich recognizing these opportunities and animated by these motives, all enmity would disappear, the world would flow together in love, and the kingdom of God would be very nigh. MR. BELLAMY'S NATIONALISM. I had intended, and so announced on the printed slips that set forth the series of sermons in which I am now en- gaged, to have covered the whole question of social agita- tion under the one heading " Social Dreams," making Na- tionalism only a part, giving it a place along with others. But the importance of the subject at the present time, as estimated by the popular interest in it, is such as to make it seem best to devote one entire discourse to that topic. I shall therefore, under some such title as Social Dreams, as I have been requested, consider other phases of the present social agitation, and perhaps announce more clearly my own personal views next Sunday morning. This morning, then, as I have said, my subject is " Mr. Bellamy's Nationalism." It is a very hopeful sign that the people are so widely and so intensely interested in questions of social reform. It is well that they are not contented, that, whatever progress may have been made in the past, whatever progress we may be making to-day, it does not satisfy us. It is well that peo- ple are haunted by dreams, and that in all directions they desire something better than has yet been attained. When you find the ground restless in the gardens and fields in the spring, you know it means that there is life there. And in a field where there is life you expect to see not only flowers Mr. Bellamy's Nationalism 159 and grain, but also weeds ; and you are not willing to give up the flowers and grain for the sake of getting rid of the weeds. You are willing that they should grow together for the sake of attaining the finest results. This wide-spread interest, this general agitation, is a most hopeful condition of things ; and though for the time being people are astray, though they are chasing some will-of-the-wisp, thinking it a star, though they are on a road that can lead to no practical result, still, in spite of these things, it is well ; for there is always hope where there is life, where there is movement, where there is earnest search for the attainment of some ideal end. The only discouraging condition of things is utter quiescence, stagnation ; for the force that leads people wrong will lead them right, when they find the way. But there is an offset to this. So long as people are on a false track, so long as they are seeking impractically, just so long, of course, they are wasting time, wasting power, wast- ing enthusiasm, that might be expended in bringing about practicable results. So, then, it seems to me very important for us earnestly, carefully, patiently, to look into these pro- posed theories of social reform, and to find out what they promise to the world ; to see, if we can, whether these prom- ises are capable of realization, and whether, indeed, we wish them realized. Now, I have two or three counts in the indictment which I wish to bring against Mr. Bellamy's Nationalism, on this ground : that it seems to me it is based on a misconception as to actual facts and conditions, and that it promises things that, if we could realize, we should hesitate about, but that seem to me are in their nature not capable of realization. At the outset, I wish to note two or three underlying assumptions. It is one of the common devices of the re- former to try to persuade people that things are in a very 160 Life bad way, so bad that there is need of desperate remedies, that something immediate must be done. If he can persuade people of this, then he naturally gets them to turn with a great deal of interest and enthusiasm to his proposed pan- acea. There are three underlying assumptions of Nationalism that seem to me not only false, but mischievous. They are not exclusively confined to this system. They are assumed by Mr. Henry George and by a good many other social agi- tators as well ; but this morning I am speaking of National- ism, and so shall refer to them only as connected with that. In the first place, Mr. Bellamy assumes that the present condition of the industrial world is about as bad as it can be, and that it is getting worse all the time. This is the funda- mental idea back of it all. In his very last manifesto, in an address in Tremont Temple only a little while ago,* on the occasion of the first anniversary of the formation of the Nationalist Club, he sets forth what he claims to be his con- viction in regard to the matter as strongly as language is capable of doing it. He tells us that the tendency is to con- centrate all the wealth of the country in a very few hands, and that this tendency is going on with a sort of geometric ratio. He says that within one hundred years " one three- hundredth of the people have succeeded in freezing out their 65,000,000 partners as to more than half the assets of the concern, and within thirty years they will have secured the remainder." He says that the method by which riches are being acquired at the present time has eaten out the founda- tions of the country's honesty. He says that this "new order of nobility" — meaning the rich — "is laying its foun- dations deep by obtaining absolute mastery of the means of support of the people." He says that the time is coming very rapidly when there " will be no class between the very *Dec. 20, i88q. Mr. Bellamy's Nationalism 161 rich, living on their capital, and the mass of wage-workers and salaried men absolutely dependent on the former." * This is his description of the social and industrial condi- tion, contained in these hints as to what actually exists now and what is rapidly coming to pass. Now, as a matter of fact, nothing could be very much more nearly false than these statements. It is not true that the rich are rapidly growing richer, and the poor rapidly growing poorer, and that the poor are becoming more and more dependent on the rich. What are the plain, hard, cold facts ? During the period covered by the years between 1850 and 1880, the average income of the wage-worker in England almost doubled. The same was substantially true for the same period in this country. What is true in regard to the increase of wealth ? It is true that a very large number of people are rich to-day who were not rich fifty years ago, — that is, the number of comparatively rich people is rapidly increasing ; but it is also true that the percentage of profit that accrues to capital is growing less and less every year, and the percentage of profit that is turned over to labor is growing more and more every year. This is the result of careful statistical inquiry, both in England and in this coun- try ; and it is simply an unspeakable absurdity for a man to talk about the condition of the average man or woman as getting worse, in the light of the facts as to their comparative conditions now and two or three hundred years ago. The average day laborer in America in this year of our Lord 1890 has more of all the ordinary every-day comforts of life, he has more food for the brain, more food for heart-culture, more to lift up and stimulate him to spiritual aspiration, more of all those things that contribute to the ordinary well-being and the comfort of a man, than could possibly have been * See Our Day for January, 1890. 162 Life possessed by Queen Elizabeth or any of her court. There is no comparison between the conditions of the two. The common laborer to-day is better off than even the nobility were five hundred years ago in England. There is hardly a tramp between the Atlantic and the Pacific that to-day is not better off than was the average day laborer of England at that time. What is true of the mass of our farmers throughout this country, the mass of our mechanics, the mass of our day laborers ? Nearly all of them have a com- fortable house, most of them have a carpet on at least one room. Thousands of them have a piano. They have music, they have books. If they have not good schools for their children where they are, you will find that in many cases they are able to send the son or the daughter to some good school at a distance. You will find this to be the general condition of the working people through the country ; and I dare to say that there is not a man in America of ordinary ability, of good health and good habits, who cannot easily earn his support, and a little something besides. I do not say, by any means, that we are in an ideal condition. I only say that the fundamental assumption of many of these social reformers is false from beginning to end. There is another false assumption ; and that is that the day laborer, the poor people, as the word goes, are the ones that create all the wealth, and that rich people, by some under- hand, indirect way, take it away from them. One of the most famous things in Mr. Bellamy's book is that picture with which you are all familiar, in which he compares society to a stage-coach. I do not believe it is possible for human ingenuity to put more falsehood into a comparison than is contained in that. What is the representation ? It is that the poor people, the drudges, the day laborers, are the ones who are pulling the coach along. They are tired, they are Mr. Bellamy's Nationalism 163 in the mud, they are disheartened. But they are pulling the coach, which is society, along. And the rich, the cultured, the favorites of fortune, are inside, or sitting on the top, en- joying the scenery and having a pleasant time. This is the way he pictures the world as going on. Now and then a man falls off from the top, and has at once to pull on the ropes, or one who is pulling may drop the ropes and climb to the top ; but the point is that the drudges, the workers, are pulling the world along, and all the brain, the culture, the wealth, are riding and having a good time. Nothing could be falser than the whole idea. Who is it that gets the world on ? It is almost never the drudges, the mere hand-workers who get the world forward. It is the brain and culture of the world that have been the cause of every step of advance, up and on, since the world began; and it is this same brain and culture of the world that have created ninety-nine one-hundredths of all the wealth of the world as well. Did Mr. McCormick do noth- ing towards the advancement of the world ? Did the in- ventor of the cotton-gin do nothing? Did the inventor of the steam-engine do nothing ? How is it about those who have thought out the ways by which the world has gone forward ? Who was it that freed four million slaves, and created the beginning, at least, of a new civilization in this country ? Was it the slaves ? Did they pull American society up and out of the old condition ? No : it was the educated and tender-hearted Garrison, the aristocratic Phillips ; it was the men of thought and culture and heart and brain power who thought out the way and did it for them. So far as we can see, the slaves would have been in a condition^ of slavery now if the initiative had waited to be taken by them. I use this only as an illustra- tion. Turn it whichever way you will, substantially the same 1 64 Life thing is true. It is not the hand-workers that create the world's wealth, that the rich and the favored take away from them. Then it is utterly false to speak of the hand- workers as being the only laborers, as doing the whole of the work. The brain is physical as much as the muscles ; and, when a man thinks hard, he wears his brain out as much as a day laborer wears his hand out. Take one more illustration : I must refer to these only in a fragmentary way. A few years ago, Pasteur was studying quietly in Paris, engaged in what must have seemed to the ordinary workman a sort of pretentious idleness. He was studying the diseases of in- sects, about as unpractical a business, you would suppose, as any man could be engaged in. But it happened that the silk industry of some of the provinces of France was com- pletely prostrated, and thousands of people thrown out of employment and whole regions prostrated by want. To whom did they look for relief ? To the hand laborer ? No : they sent to Pasteur, who went down and studied the prob- lem ; and in a little while, by the toil of brain and thought, and as the result of what they must have called doing noth- ing for several years, he saved more wealth and did more for the industries of France than all the laborers could have done in a hundred years. So much, then, for this second fallacy. Another fallacy seems to me even more mischievous. Mr. Bellamy is doing what he can to create a separation of class sympathy that shall make it very difficult for the rich and the poor, the thinkers and the hand-workers, to co-operate in bringing about a better condition of things. For what does he do ? He pictures in glowing words an ideal condi- tion of things, a millennium ; and he teaches the laborer, and all those who follow him and accept his doctrine, that there Mr. Bellamy's Nationalism 165 is no reason in the world why this perfect condition of things should not be realized in a very few years, except for the soullessness of corporations and the sordid greed of the rich. Here, then, is a heaven waiting ready for everybody j but a few rich people and a few corporations are standing at the gate and keeping the rest of the world out. That is the picture ; and, again, from beginning to end it is utterly false. There is no crasser ignorance, no cruder analysis, dis- played by anybody on earth than by the man who assumes that all institutions, all social conditions, are created and kept up by a certain few people for their own advantage. There are crass and ignorant religious critics who are all the time talking as though religions had been invented by a few priests for the sake of getting power to rob the people. Stupidly foolish and ignorant the whole idea, as though any few people ever had power over a nation to create its insti- tutions for them ! Institutions are always growths, and always the incarnation of popular thought, popular feeling, and popular will. There is not a national institution on the face of the earth to-day that could last a week if the people did not want it. Talk about the Catholic Church domi- nating, shaping, ruling Europe ! It is because the people of Europe want the Catholic Church that it exists. Now and then, of course, when an institution gets too old, when people have learned that the fundamental ideas out of which it sprang were false, there may be here and there a man who will try to keep up the delusion for the sake of holding the advantageous position that he has ; but no in- stitution ever came into existence in any such fashion. And so our social and industrial institutions were not created by individuals for their own advantage ; and they cannot be preserved by individuals for their own advantage. They are 1 66 Life the natural growth of all the past nistory of humanity, the next step upward and onward ; and no person, no class, is responsible for them. These three fundamental assumptions, then, on which Nationalism rests, which are supposed to be the reason for the urgent necessity of adopting it, are false from be- ginning to end. Of course, I do not mean that Mr. Bellamy would consciously misrepresent : I only say that he is griev- ously mistaken as to his facts. This leads me now, very naturally, to consider the fitness of Mr. Bellamy for the great work of the social reorganiza- tion of the modern world. We are not left here to guess- work. He tells us himself how it happened that he has become the most conspicuous representative of social reform in this country ; and he says that it was purely by accident. It is noteworthy that he has never studied the social condi- tions of the world in the past. Social reform is not a specialty of his; he does not claim to be learned on the subject. He has not traced the origins and the method of growth of modern society, so as to see in the light of them what the next step ought to be. How did he happen to become a social reformer, then ? He tells us in an article written for the Nationalist since the publication of his book.* He says : " I had, at the outset, no idea of attempting a serious contribution to the movement of social reform. The idea was of a mere literary fantasy, a fairy tale of social felicity. There was no thought of contriving a house which practical men might live in, but merely of hanging in mid- air, far out of reach of the sordid and material world of the present, a cloud-palace for an ideal humanity." And then, in another part of the same article, he says, " Something in this way it was that, no thanks to myself, I stumbled over the destined corner-stone of the new social order." * The Nationalist for May, 1889. Mr. Bellamy's Nationalism \6y This is the way "Looking Backward" came to be written. When I heard Mr. Bellamy give the first address that he ever made in public, last May, in Tremont Temple, at the anniver- sary of the Free Religious Association, I was ready to believe what he says of himself; for in that he showed ignorance worthy of a school-boy concerning the very fundamental prin- ciples of the science and philosophy of the modern world. I smiled some years ago, when looking over a lecture of Mr. Talmage on Evolution, to find that the great Brooklyn preacher did not know what he was talking about. He went on to speak of some of the principal phrases, catchwords, of Darwinism and evolution in a way quite worthy of a school-boy, and a small one at that. He simply did not know what these phrases meant; and I said at once, and naturally, I have no use for Mr. Talmage as a social or scientific leader. And so, when I heard Mr. Bellamy make precisely the same blunder,* when I heard him speak of the law of "the survival of the fittest," and knew by the way in which he spoke that he had not the slightest idea what it meant, I said, Here, at any rate, is not a hopeful man for the discussion of these great themes. A man who under- takes to discuss the movement of the modern world on prin- ciples of scientific development ought at least to know what the phrase " the survival of the fittest " means. This, then, being the way, and this being a hint as to the equipment with which he started out, let us now glance at the essence, the fundamental idea, of the new reform. How does Mr. Bellamy propose to bring in the new and perfect social order? A writer in the Transcript of last night t says that the Socialists do not propose to go the whole length of " Looking Backward " now ; that they were only going to try in this direction and that, and see how things work. And I heard some one say, who is giving a * See The New Ideal, July, 1889, p. 112. t Feb. 15, 1890. 1 68 Life great deal of thought to this subject, that we are in danger of misrepresenting Socialists, if we take " Looking Back- ward " to be anything more than a dream, a fairy tale. But yet Mr. Bellamy himself declares, in the words that I have read, that this is to be the foundation-stone of the coming order of things ; and in his very last manifesto, given in Tremont Temple, he says, "Our plan of recon- struction is the simple and obvious one of placing the in- dustrial duty of citizens on the ground on which their mili- tary duty already rests." The last word that he has spoken on the subject is the reannouncement of the essential prin- ciple of his book " Looking Backward." We have a right, then, in dealing with his type of Nationalism, to take that as the freshest and clearest view on the subject. What, then, does Mr. Bellamy propose to do ? I cannot go into details. I give you only the central thought. He proposes to organize all society — that is, all men and women between the ages of twenty-one and forty -five — into a great army, precisely after the plan of the great standing armies of the nations of the world to-day. He proposes to organize all workers into one vast military order. Each man is to have his place assigned to him, and is to do the work that is given him to do. He is to have his individual liberty of initiative, of choice, practically taken away from him be- tween the ages of twenty-one and forty-five. He believes that in this way there can be produced enough wealth to supply the wants of everybody and make everybody comfort- able and happy. This is his central idea. I wish now to examine this idea, and see what its practical outcome would be likely to be. To begin with, I wish to note what people very easily overlook, that he proposes to establish here in America a hard, fixed, fast, universal, absolute despotism. There is no Mr. Bellamy's Nationalism 169 despotism that is quite equal to the despotism of a great standing army, like that of Germany, for example. This is an illustration of what he proposes to do with modern so- ciety. Note that this is just where the world began. Go back five, ten, fifteen, twenty, forty thousand years, and you find the tribes and nations of that time with no individual initia- tive, with no individual ownership, under absolute despot- ism, the individual counting for nothing, society counting for everything. Instead, then, of this being a new discovery of the modern world, having in it the promise and potency of a higher type of civilization, it is only a case of the most re- markable atavism with which I am familiar. It is only the rediscovery of the despotic barbarism in which the world began. Not one single step has the world taken from those old days to this except along the lines of and towards the development of individual liberty, individual initiative. And this country — and this is the one thing we are proudest of — is distinguished by being the country where the individual is most free ; and Mr. Bellamy asks us to surrender all this, to give up our personal liberty, and submit to the worst type of despotism of which it is possible for anybody to conceive. How does Mr. Bellamy propose to make people work under this despotism ? What is he going to do with people who do not choose to work ? It is very significant to note with what ease he slips over the hard places. He says : " As for actual neglect of work, positively bad work, or other overt remissness on the part of men incapable of generous motives, the discipline of the industrial arm is far too strict to allow much of that. A man able to do his duty, and persistently refusing, is cut off from all human society." Again he says.: "Our entire social order is so wholly based upon and deduced from it that, if it were conceivable 170 Life that a man should escape it, he would be left with no pos- sible way to provide for his existence. He would have ex- cluded himself from the world, cut himself off from his kind." And again he says that under Nationalism every man will be entirely free to act according to his natural aptitude, "subject only to necessary regulation." Necessary regula- tion ! Necessary regulation is all that the Czar of Russia asks for. Necessary regulation is all that the King of Dahomey wants. The Catholic Church, in the days of the Inquisition, the stake, the boot, the thumb-screw, was only exercising the " necessary regulation " ; and when a man became too great a heretic, and he was to be cut off from human society, the ecclesiastical court recommended him to God's mercy and the secular arm, asking that he be quietly put out of the way without the shedding of blood, — which meant that he should be burned. Cover it with any soft disguise which you please, a system under which every man is to be put to a task and compelled to carry it out by a power that is over him spying him, watch- ing him at every turn, is simply the grossest and meanest form of despotism of which you can conceive. One other point. Mr. Bellamy quietly assumes, what is as false as it can be, that somehow or other there is plenty of wealth lying round for everybody ; that all that is necessary is some new method of distributing it. He needs to prove, if he asks us to give up our individual liberty and submit to a despotism like this, that there is going to be good enough in the way of result to make that pay. He does not prove that the world will be any richer under this method. Under this compulsory system is any more wealth to be produced ? We know by facts and figures that there is not wealth enough in existence now to make everybody well off, if it were Mr. Bellamys Nationalism 171 ever so evenly divided. He must prove that such a system would be sure to create more wealth. Would a system in which no one is going to work except those from twenty-one to forty-five, and those under compulsion, produce a great deal more wealth than people produce to-day? To-day a man away out West on a little farm, all alone, out of sight of everybody, will work hard. Why ? Because he owns his little farm, which he has taken up, or he is trying to pay for it. He expects to build a house, and hopes a railroad will come along and increase the value of the land. He is work- ing under the only impulse and motive under which any man yet ever voluntarily did work since the world began; and you may trust him to do it, because that motive holds good. Mr. Bellamy proposes to take away that motive. How is he going to keep that lonely man away on that farm at work ? He would need a policeman to watch him all the time. Under this pro'posed system, every man becomes an em- ployee of the State, and the only motive for him to work is the fact that somebody is to compel him to work. It seems to me that we should need about half the people turned into officials or police to watch and superintend the other half. At any rate, there is not one single illustration brought for- ward as yet, to my knowledge, that even suggests the hope that more product would result from this new system than from the one under which we are living to-day; and any system is vitally defective that does not promise to give us more wealth ; for, as I have said, we have not enough to go round now, and make everybody well off. Then there is another aspect of it which seems to me at times ridiculous, as I contemplate it. Instead of this being a brand-new theory to apply to our new country and our modern civilization, Nationalism is nothing but the last 172 Life frayed out, ragged remnant of the old paternal theory of European governments. If you want to picture the whole theory, ask the question as to who is this government which is going to do everything ? Where is it ? What is it ? This theory assumes some power not the people that are at work, some power that is all-wise and able to superintend a scheme like this, some power that is almighty and able to keep every- body at work, with a vast storehouse of wealth that it is ready to dispense to everybody. On this theory, as soon as the new system is started, there are to be shorter hours and higher pay ; but we are not told where the money is to come from to pay the workers. It assumes the existence of this thing called a government that is going to do everything. Where is it ? Who is it ? In this country, who is the government ? Why, it is made up of you and me. That is all the government there is ; and, if you and I are not already wise enough to do everything, and good enough to do everything, and rich enough to do every- thing, and strong enough to do everything, how do we sud- denly become rich and wise and good and strong by saying the word " government " over instead of " you and me " ? It seems to me, if we analyze the thing to its lowest terms, that the reason, or the unreason, lies just here. Suppose I say, I am not able to support myself quite as well as I should like to be supported. I cannot do it alone. You are not able to support yourself quite as well as you would like to be supported. Now let us do this : you agree to sup- port me, and I will agree to support you, and we will both be rich. I think that is not a misrepresentation. It seems to me a perfectly fair analysis. It bears a striking resem- blance to an amusing story I have heard of a man who thought he should get married. He said, " I can about half support myself; and I think it will be a pity if my wife Mr. Bellamy's Nationalism 173 cannot do the other half." As to who was going to support his wife meantime he did not give a hint. While I am sup- porting you, and you are supporting me, while everybody is engaged in supporting somebody else, how is it to come to pass that you or I, or the third or fourth person, is going to produce one single cent's worth more of property than we produce now ? I do not see how it is going to add to the social income. Then there is another thing. If Mr. Bellamy could carry out the scheme, and the casting of the final vote should be left with me, I would vote against it heart and brain and soul; for the scheme is low in its ideals and aims. It opens an unlimited field for political corruption. It is practically in its outcome even immoral, when you carefully analyze it. What is his kingdom of heaven ? He does not even hint that it is going to make any man or woman wiser or better than now. He says there is no need of change in human nature to bring about his kingdom of heaven. He will leave people as they are. The system which he proposes is not to make the world nobler or better, but only to redistribute the world's wealth, so that everybody will have enough to eat and drink and wear. That is the height of the ambition of Nationalism as set forth in Mr. Bellamy's book, — a universal pasture with grass enough in it for all. That is all there is to it. And then, as I said, it opens an unlimited field for political corruption; for all these people between twenty-one and forty-five are to be ruled by the men over forty-five. The latter are to have the entire power over the former in their hands. And, when you consider that it takes the President of the United States and his cabinet and a large part of Con- gress — if the newspaper reports are correct — a great part of their time to apDoint the custom-house officials and the post- 174 Life masters o^ the country under the present system, with no end of fighting and quarrelling as to who these appointees shall be, what will be the condition when all the men over forty- five have nothing to do but to attend to politics, and instead of thousands there are millions to be appointed to places ? Then this puts a premium on laziness and inefficiency and incapacity. It is a practical denial of the method by which God has governed and led the world from the beginning until now. Charity is fine, if it is voluntary ; but involuntary charity is injustice. One point more, and one which alone, were none of the others true, would to my mind be absolutely fatal to the whole scheme. Where, under Mr. Bellamy's scheme, is that growth to come in out of which the future higher and finer things are to be born ? The people, mind you, are to be all under orders ; they are to do the work they are set to do, and no other. They are to have a little choice under " nec- essary regulation," that is all. Now, mark you this. The world at any particular time, if it is governed as a democ- racy, is governed as is the government in which we rejoice, under the rule of the average, is it not ? not under the rule of the wisest, not under the rule of the best. And did you ever stop to think that the best things of the world in every direction are always ahead of the average, so far above the average that they are not even appreciated by it ? In art, the average taste accepts very poor work, little above the "chromo." In literature, what books does the average buy and read ? And so in every department of thought the aver- age is not the leader. It does not lead in religion nor in education. Yet the average is to have the power to govern absolutely in this new kingdom of men, — just the common- place common sense of the majority. Now, if we were going to have a despotism at all, I for one would very much Mr. Bellamy s Nationalism 175 prefer the despotism of one man, for it might happen now and then that he would be great and wise and good ; but this despotism of what Matthew Arnold calls " Philistinism," the hard, fast prejudices and stupidity of the average of human beings, — this would be intolerable. Take Isaiah and Micah and Jesus and Paul and Savona- rola and Kuss and Luther and Servetus and John Wesley and Channing and Parker, men so far above and beyond their age that, instead of being praised and appreciated, they were tortured and persecuted for what they did for men, — how would they have done their work ? Under Nationalism, who would have taken Jesus of Nazareth from his work- bench and set him to preaching throughout Galilee and in Jerusalem ? They murdered him for doing it, as it was. Would they have appointed him to that task, and paid him for doing it ? He would have been kept at his carpenter's bench, or dressing vines on the hillsides, until he was forty- five at least. So you may take any of the founders, the great leaders of the world in any department, the men who have seen something away ahead and beyond the vision of the majority, the ones to whom the world owes every fresh new step of progress that it has made, — these men would have been ruthlessly repressed, cut off. They would have been treated as wise men were treated in Spain. Do you remem- ber the story of the king who visited another king and asked him how he could get rid of the troublesome thinkers, the disturbers of the popular peace in his empire, and how the other king took him out for a walk in his garden, and with his stick struck off the heads of the flowers and the grasses that were a little higher than the average, and said, That is the way I do it ? That is the way the world has been kept back, by repression of individual initiative. There would be no place in the new scheme for thinkers, for leaders. All 176 Life the best in religion, the best in ethics, the best in art, the best in literature, the best in music, would be lost. Of course, no one would ever appoint a man to those tasks and pay him for them. Under the present system, the men who have these gifts must work and fight their way and starve, perhaps, until the victory comes, — the victory not for them- selves, but for the world. Whether there be any way, then, by which society can be lifted up and led forward more rapidly than it is moving to-day, most certainly this is not the way. The way, as I be- lieve, lies precisely in the opposite direction, — not in the repression of the individual, not in the government of the masses, but in the fuller, freer development and play of in- dividual taste, individual power, individual life. OTHER SOCIAL DREAMS. In the olden time, the messenger who brought what was regarded as bad news to the king was in danger of his life ; at any rate, he was pretty sure to lose the king's favor and to be precluded from any high position of service in the future. The bringing of what is looked upon as bad news is never a gracious task ; and, whether the ruling power be king or a social majority, the principle is unchanged. A man who dares to oppose any prevalent social craze must expect to pay the necessary penalty for his temerity. Al- ready I have been accused, on account of the last sermon in this course, of taking sides against the welfare of the people and of preaching to please my wealthy parishioners. I am glad there is even a little wealth in the congregation ; but, if I desired to go with the majority so far as that is con- cerned, I should take the other side. It teaches me how little, after all, we really know ourselves. I had supposed up to this hour that, if there was anything in the direction of public reputation which I had earned, it was that of say- ing what I frankly and simply believed, without any regard to my own parishioners or the parishioners of anybody else. I speak of this simply to bring out the point that the man who dares to oppose the popular sentiment of the hour is apt to be looked at as opposing the real welfare of men, al- though he may be ever so earnestly trying to help it on. 178 Life During the Middle Ages, a great army of children started out on a crusade for the Holy Land. Ignorant, inexperi- enced, knowing little of the geography of Europe or Asia, and supposing that the holy city of their search was only a little way off, they started, with high heart and strong cour- age, only day by day to meet with bitter disappointment. And as they marched, whenever they saw the spires of a town rising above the distant horizon, they cried out, " Is this Jerusalem ? " And then, disappointed, they either fell in their tracks or started out on the long and weary march once more. Humanity is on the march toward the holy city of its vision ; and the one difficulty is that we lack patience, lack persistence of effort. We are anxious to believe that every town we see is the Jerusalem of our search ; and he who is obliged to bring the bad news that the end of the journey is not yet, though his purpose be to guide and stimulate towards what is the true end, is in danger of incurring dis- pleasure because of the disappointment that he brings. And yet, certainly, next to the service of telling people what road they ought to follow is the service that a man renders his fellows when he tells them the road they ought not to follow. At least so much is gained, — that useless effort may be pre- vented. I propose this morning, in the first place, to note briefly — it must be that for lack of time — some of the chief social dreams that men have cherished, then to show the radical defects in them, and then, at the last, to point out what seem to me a few practical steps forward that we are capable of taking. First, then, for some of these social dreams. I am well aware that there are very few outright communists in the world at the present time, and that many may think I am Other Social Dreams 179 speaking of something which is not a practical thing when I discuss communism ; and yet I need to note it for a mo- ment, because all these other dreams, whatever form they may take, are communistic in principle, and so similar ob- jections lie against them that lie against outright commun- ism. The grave defect of communism at the outset is, what I have had occasion to tell you before in other connections, that there is not wealth enough in existence in all the world to make all the people well off, as we say, contented, — not even enough to satisfy all the world's legitimate aims and needs. So, if there were an equal division to-day, we should be little benefited, as I think. For, until some power shall make men and women over so that they shall be equal in capacity, in brain power, in heart power, in goodness, what is the use of an equal division of substance ? An artificially established equality like that would not continue a week. And, then, certain grave objections lie against it, even if there were wealth enough to make ail prosperous. What is it to take by force wealth from the man who has created it and give it to one who has not ? Ought we not to label it with that ugly word " theft " ? For that it is. But you not only injure the man who has created the wealth by tak- ing away that which is his, you injure equally, perhaps even more, the man whom you unwisely make your beneficiary. For giving to a man outright that which he has not earned in such a fashion as this is only to put a premium upon lazi- ness or upon incapacity. It is to take away the one ade- quate motive force for human effort. And when you remem- ber that the only stimulus under which men have ever grown, have ever developed themselves as yet, is this desire for things and the reaching out after them for their attainment, and that, if you could take away this motive force, you would 180 Life condemn the world to perpetual ignorance, perpetual stupid- ity, perpetual incapacity, you will realize that you would stunt and stop the very life-progress of mankind. Enough for that. Turn, next, to what has been the outgrowth of the noblest love of man, what a great many people thoroughly believe in to-day, industrial co-operation : what can we say of that ? One of the most distinguished essayists of the world,* in a recent number of the Forum^ closed his article by announc- ing his belief that the hope of the world lies in this principle of co-operation, — and, in order to set forth its merits, it is spoken of in contrast with competition, which is denounced as selfish and as calling out all the evil passions of men, — as an illustration of mutual help, of social love, and desire for the welfare of all. The trouble with this theory, it seems to me, at least one of the troubles, lies here. Organize your industrial co-operative society, or as many of them as you please, but by that you do not and you cannot escape the universal principle of competition. Whether we like it or not, as I have told you before, competition is the method of the universe, and has been from the first ; and I do not be- lieve that men can escape it any more than they can escape the air they breathe. If you have two co-operative manu- facturing societies, they must of necessity compete with each other for the general market. The only way you could es- cape it would be by having not only a national co-operative society, but a cosmopolitan co-operative society. Until you reach that point, competition is not escaped. But there is a more serious defect than that even ; and that is that it requires at the present time a large amount of capi- tal to organize and carry on any business successfully ; and the wage-workers of the world, in general, do not possess a sufficient amount of capital. They must look to the capital- *W. S. Lilly. t February, 1890. Other Social Dreams 181 ist for aid. And then, when they have asked the capitalist for aid, what follows ? The capitalist must take all the risk of failure ; for the others have nothing to lose. Is it not fair, if you ask a man to do that, that he should have a larger share of the product ? If six men engage in a co-operative society, and three of them agree to take all the risk provided they fail, would you not think it fair and just that they should have a little more than half the product if they succeed ? But the gravest defect of all lies right here. Any man looking over the world can see that the number of business geniuses is very small. I am told — I have never verified the figures, and do not know whether they are accurate or not — that ninety-five per cent, of the men who go into busi- ness fail first or last during their careers. The number of men, then, who are capable of organizing and carrying on successfully great industrial enterprises is about as few as are the great military geniuses of the world. And how are these men chosen ? Never by popular vote. They are de- veloped as the result of the keenest competition. They are one of the most signal illustrations of the survival of the fit- test in their line. Here and there is a man who is capable of managing these great concerns. What would be the chances of any ordinary co-operative society of workmen electing a man who is fit, who is competent, who has de- veloped power, and keeping him in his place? You must change human nature, you must get rid of little petty jeal- ousies, you must get more of patience and power of waiting, more of trust in each other, before you can make business succeed on this basis. At any rate, there have been no experiments as yet that have been successful enough to give the world much hope in this direction. I should be glad if society could take a step ahead by that means ; but I confess, when I look at human nature and at the principles involved 1 82 Life and the results of experience so far, I have very little hope that that is the road along which society is to advance. Another of the famous dreamers of the modern world is Count Tolstoi, who claims that he is the principal interpreter of Christianity at present living. So many are the defini- tions of Christianity that I do not wonder a man hesitates when you ask him if he is a Christian ; and sometimes I do not wonder if he hesitates to say that he really desires to be one. What is Christianity? According to Tolstoi, the cen- tral principle of Christianity is non-resistance. And, in ac- cordance with this principle, he would abolish all force. That is, Tolstoi' is an anarchist, in the philosophical sense of that word. He would abolish all government, all legal enforce- ment of contracts of any kind, all distinctions of nationali- ties, so far as it is possible ; and he thinks that literature and art and science, all that we are accustomed to regard as the higher and finer developments of civilization, are vanity. His ideal seems to be that every one should engage in com- mon physical labor for the supply of his own common phys- ical wants, and so reduce the world to this kind of dead level of animal comfort. I should not be in favor of it, even were it possible. As I look over Count Tolstoi's ideal country, it seems to me at least singularly uninteresting. I should die of ennui, if of nothing else. This animal comfort would be poor pay in exchange for the abdication on the part of humanity of these higher things that the world has developed as the result of its age-long struggle. One more social dream I must touch on. The most inter- esting book on political economy which I ever read was undoubtedly Mr. Henry George's " Progress and Poverty." They say that political economy is a dismal science. I did not find his book dismal at all ; and, when I laid it down, I found myself for a little while wondering that the human Other Social Dreams 183 race had plodded on in its trouble and sorrow so long, won- dering that it had not actually stumbled on to the millennium, it seemed so easy, so simple, so practical. What is the cen- tral idea of Mr. Henry George ? He starts with the asser- tion, which can perhaps be philosophically defended with a good deal of success, that the earth belongs to man, that all the natural resources belong to the race ; that is, that that which man did not create he cannot call his own in an individualistic sense. The land was here before any man appeared. So Mr. Henry George says that all the land be- longs not to the individual, but to the people. And in carry- ing out his theory, or such part of it as he proposes, — for he does not even attempt to urge the carrying out of it all, — in carrying out such part as he thinks necessary, he practically urges the abolition of private ownership of land and an ap- propriation by the government of all land rents. A man would be able to hold property and buy and sell as to-day, only what they really buy and sell would not be the land, but the right to use it ; and the rent which the man now pays to the owner of the corner lot or building would be put into the national treasury. The great trouble, or one of the great troubles, with this theory is that he either carries it too far or else does not carry it far enough. If all the things that were here before the race began its career upon earth be- longed to the race, then not only the land, but all the waters, rivers, springs, all the mines, whether of gold or lead or whatever they may be, all the coal, all the natural gas, — and I do not see why not all electricity and steam, — would be- long to the race. But I cannot go into this to any extent or show you this morning why it is so. But only a little dis- cussion is required to show that it is utterly impracticable to carry out a theory like this. If we mean that all the land belongs to the race, then the people that live within the 1 84 Life limits of the United States have no exclusive right to their own territory. They would be obliged in equity to divide the income with all the race of mankind, for anything I can see. The Fijis, the inhabitants of the South Sea Islands, have as much right to it as has Mr. George or any other man in America. And, then, it is simply impossible to divide, to draw the line, between that which nature furnishes and that which man has furnished. The coat which I wear this morn- ing a year or two ago was perhaps under the surface of the earth, the most of it. It grew up first as grass, was eaten by the sheep, and the sheep transformed it into wool ; and then by a good many other processes it has come to be what it is this morning. How much of it was produced by nature, and how much of it was the result of the application of human effort? How much of it do I own? How much of it belongs to the rest of the world ? The moment you begin to carry out a theory like this, you are met with a thousand impracticalities and impossibilities. But the one thing that to my mind settles the question so that we need not seri- ously try to discuss it lies in its utter inadequacy. Mr. George teaches that in this way the whole country could be made well off. The societies organized to carry out his ideas have been called " Anti-poverty Societies " ; and the claim has been that, if people would only accede to this method, poverty might be abolished. But, evidently, Mr. George did not cipher out his problem very carefully. I am going to use the figures that have been furnished by a man who is well known as a political economist, and who has made a study of the matter. He tells me that, according to the census of 1880, if all the ground rent of America were divided up, it would amount to only two cents apiece per day all round. That is, my share for a year would be a little over seven dollars. I do not quite see how that is going to Other Social Dreams 185 abolish my poverty. In other words, if you carried out Mr. George's theory, it would simply amount to about half the taxes that are now paid to the government. Mr. George assumed in his book that we might by adopting his theory abolish custom-houses and all methods of revenue for gov- ernment expenses, and have a large surplus for public libraries and public works of different kinds and to add to the general wealth. As a matter of fact, it would only pay one-half the taxes of the country, which is so slight a thing that, if there were no other objection to his theory, this would leave it where it is not worth while to waste one's breath over it. These are all the social theories that are prominent enough to demand mention this morning. What is the radical difficulty with all of them ? The diffi- culty, it seems to me, is that they are what I have called them, " dreams." They are in the air : they are out of all practical, vital relation with the forces under the impulse of which the world has come to its present stage. They are not theories deduced from the working principles of human experience. Now, the one way by which any light can be thrown on the future is as the result of a careful study of the past. If we can find out how the world has taken its steps of progress in the past, we shall have a little light at least, if not all we want, on the next step to be taken. These theories overlook another great fact. This uni- verse is not a dead one. It is not a stagnant one : it does not keep still. If you look back to the beginning, and then down the centuries until the present time, you can see that there has been a drift, a tendency, a flood, as mighty, as resistless as a river. The universe is moving, — moving in certain definite directions, and with tremendous force ; and 1 86 Life it is simply childish for any man to imagine that he can change this great, mighty, onward sweep of things. It is absurd for any man to suppose that he can devise what he regards as a desirable condition of things, and get the universe outright and straightway to accept it. I can pict- ure a millennium that at the present time would seem satis- factory to me; but how am I going to overcome the tre- mendous drift of things ? How am I going to suddenly change human nature, human impulse, the force of tradition ? How am I going to make the universe over all at once into the shape of my dream ? The only wise, because the only practical, thing is for us to study the drift, or force, the move- ments of things, and find out which way they are going, and then co-operate with them. If I believed the universe was going all wrong, I should straightway give it up, try to be as comfortable as I might, and let it go. It is simply foolish for any one man to suppose that he can change the nature of the universe. That is the difficulty with most of these theories. They assume that somebody, somehow, in some way, is going to change everything. But society as it exists to-day, whether you look at it politically, morally, religiously, or industrially, is a growth, the result of ages of growth. You cannot in this off-hand fashion reverse or change things. I wish to say just a word in regard to these ordinary human forces that are at work. One of the most popular things that the public speaker can do is to denounce what he calls the selfishness of humanity, and call on everybody straightway to be something else than what he is. But let us look for a moment at this matter of selfishness. What does it mean ? It means simply that every man de- sires something. He desires food for his body, he desires knowledge for the brain, he desires love for the heart. If Other Social Dreams 187 he have a spiritual nature developed, he has that desire which we name aspiration for the higher and finer things of life. Would you change all this ? Do you call this selfish ? If he wants money, you call that selfish. If he wants knowledge, is he selfish ? If he wants the object of his love, is he selfish ? If he wants spiritual develop- ment, wants God, is he selfish ? You appeal to men to seek their own welfare, and offer them the bribe of heaven if they do, and the threat of hell if they do not. Is that appealing to unselfish motives ? We are all astray in the misuse of these words " selfish " and " unselfish." If you could abolish this fact of human desire, you would abolish the universe. The flower desires light and water and fitting soil ; and it will struggle pathetically to seek them if you do not furnish them. Why does it desire them? That it may grow, blossom, and be fragrant and beautiful. A man de- sires ; and this desire is the root of all the development, all the unfolding, all the beauty and glory of human nature and human life. It is only the misuse of this desire which you have a right to stigmatize as selfishness and evil. This thing, then, that the reformers would abolish, if they could, under the name of " selfishness," is the God-given root of all that is best, of all that it is possible for anybody to hope for or attain. A man takes a high range and grade. How ? Why ? By as much as he desires many things and high things. You may measure a man by the quantity and qual- ity of his desires. Desire, then, is a divine thing, not a devilish thing. It is a good thing, not a bad thing. I am selfish and wicked only when I wish to interfere with your getting the things that you need as the condition of growth. I am not selfish in desiring the most and the best that I can have myself, provided I do not interfere with your desiring and getting, so far as you rightly may, the same. 1 88 Life Now, what is it that the world wants ? What is it that we need ? We all dream of, we all want, a better condition of things. We are all ready to do what we can to bring it about. What really is it that we desire ? We do not desire absolute equality. If we desired that, we should desire the impossible. It seems to me that, even if I could, I would not turn the world into one Illinois prairie, even though the level were as high as the tops of the highest mountains. It would be dreadfully monotonous. It is the high mountain peaks, snow-covered, lightning-smitten many and many a time, that are the sources of all the life, beauty, and fertility of the valleys. What we really desire is the lifting of human- ity above the necessity of everlasting drudgery that keeps people from the possibility of being men. A little less work, a little more leisure, more time to cultivate the social side of us, to develop heart and brain and spirit, — this is really what we need. This is the only thing that we need. Now are there any practical steps that we can take towards this ideal that is so devoutly to be wished ? I cannot go into such detail as I would like. I should need an hour to adequately deal with what I must put into fifteen minutes. The first practical step is one that is in the power of the rich. They can do much by following out the line which I indicated a Sunday or two ago. The spirit, the temper, which they manifest, may have power to change the social climate, the atmosphere of human life. The first thing that the rich need to do is to let all the world see that they do not claim that they have a right to do with their money that which they please, but that all they claim is the right to do what is right. That is the only right that any man has. Let the rich man, then, show the world, the poor, the wage- worker, that he recognizes the truth that his money is not an individual, but a social fact, and that in some broad, generous sense it be- Other Social Dreams 189 longs to the community, and let him use it for the public good, and not for personal and selfish aims, and he may change the entire spirit and attitude of the world, so that the different classes of society shall recognize each other as friends coworking towards some good, high end. This is the first thing. The next thing I believe to be very important, though it is quite impossible to go into detail in treating it : I believe that government can do very much to equalize the social burdens and lift off the crushing loads of the world and open equal opportunities for its citizens. For example, every man who studies the matter knows that the burden of taxation is most unequal, unfair, and that it frequently presses most heavily on those least able to bear it. I do not know how many of you agree with me ; but I believe that that form of taxation which we call the tariff bears most unequally, most unjustly, on the different classes of the community, and that much in the way of lightening the burden of society can be done by new regulations here. Then I believe that much can be done by limiting the power of monopolies. Let me be clearly understood. I do not think that all monopolies are evil. For example, we say high license in the liquor trade creates a monopoly. A mo- nopoly of that trade is put into the hands of a few, if we carry out the law strictly ; but that is entirely in the interest of the public welfare. Monopoly, then, may be a good thing, and not a bad thing. In the strictest sense of the word, there is no monopoly, and can be no monopoly, except that which is established by government. To talk about men as engaged in monopolies or railway managers as monopolists is not treating the dictionary quite fairly. When the French king, an absolute despot, in the olden times selected some favorite and gave him the exclusive right to manufacture and sell at 190 Life any price he chose all the gloves, or all the spectacles, or whatever it might be, he created a perfect monopoly by so doing. But there is nothing that I know of except the fact that people do not believe it will pay that prevents their going into any business carried on at present in America ; and, so long as that is true, no business is a monopoly. But I believe that there are immense prerogatives exercised by these men who have accumulated great wealth, and who have more power thereby, who many a time use that power in unjust and oppressive ways, and that government can do much in the way of regulating these powers in the interest of all. This must be in the way of giving all an equal opportunity. I only hint this, because I cannot go into details this morning. The third thing is a very important one. It is in the line of education. I believe that our public school system in America needs radical reform in the interest of the great masses of the people. At present, two-thirds at least of the children who enter our primary schools are obliged to leave school by the time they are ten, twelve, thirteen, or fourteen years of age. Our school system is organized ideally to begin with the kindergarten and end at Harvard College. Yet most of the children are obliged to go a little way, and break off without complete training in anything. What is the public interested in ? It is in securing the ability on the part of all its boys and girls for honest self-support. Indus- trial education ought to be put on an equality with the ordi- nary education of the brain, as it is called. It ought to be the first aim of our public education to make all the children capable of self-support. The next aim ought to be to give so much of intelligence to all the children that they shall be able to cast a wise ballot, to know what they are doing. Third, all the children ought to be educated in the funda- mental principles of right and wrong, so that they need not Other Social Dreams 191 ignorantly go astray. These three things ought to be the great aims of the public schools. For lack of intelligence, people are perpetually trying over and over again exploded theories, ways of helping on the world, just because they do not know any better. They follow a road that has proved over and over again to lead to the land of Nowhere. They are attempting methods as absurd as a man's attempt- ing to lift himself from the earth, because they do not know that a thousand years ago all of these were tried and found to be impossible. These common experiences of the race ought to be made common property, so that effort and money and enthusiasm need no longer be wasted on im- practical schemes. Then one more thing, one of the most important. Every wise student of the recent history of the world knows that the greatest additions to the world's wealth have come along the lines of invention and discovery. There has been more wealth added to England and America during the last fifty years — I think I am not wrong in making the statement — than in the previous five hundred ; and that is almost en- tirely due to the immense expansion of the inventive genius of man and our additional knowledge of and our control of the forces of nature. Now, whatever will stimulate this inventive faculty ought to be encouraged. He who makes a discovery or an invention ought to be paid so liberally for it that all the world will be eager to attain a like reward. Suppose Mr. Edison or Mr. McCormick or the inventor of the sewing-machine have become millionnaires, the millions which are paid to them for their inventions are as a drop in the bucket compared to the world of wealth which they conferred upon mankind. There ought, then, to be the highest rewards offered to those who thus add magnificently to the world's wealth. For never forget that any social 192 Life theory that comes to you, offering anything else as a panacea except an immense increase of the world's wealth, is sure to fail. There is not wealth enough now, and before the world can be released from its drudgery there must be ways found of creating more ; for this wealth is the only angel of God that ever did or ever can release man from drudgery or set him free to cultivate the higher sides of his being. Since, then, so large an amount of the world's wealth has come in this direction, let us do all we can to stimulate this inventive activity of the world; for I believe we have only tapped the surface as yet. We have gained a little control over steam, a very much less amount of control over elec- tricity. We have only begun to find out what they can do for us. There are boys now living who will leave New York or Boston in the morning and be in San Francisco the next night, carried there with perfect safety. There are boys now living who will cross the Atlantic in four, perhaps three, days ; and I should not be surprised if there were boys now living who will navigate the air. We are only on the shore of these discoveries that are going to put the great forces of nature easily in our control, and make us not slaves of a plot of ground for a pittance of bread, but kings of the earth and of the air as well. One other point I must touch. I believe that the next step industrially will be that which has been called "the capi- talization of labor." Industry began in slavery. It took the next step through feudalism, serfdom. We are now in the third stage, that of freedom of contract and the payment of wages. Those indiscreet people who talk about wage- workers as being as badly off as slaves are impatient. They do not stop to think what they are talking about. We have made a great advance on any condition that the industrial world was ever in in the past ; but I believe that the wage- Other Social Dreams 193 worker does not as yet receive his proportionate amount of product. I do not say fair amount \ for, if the capitalist is going to take all the risk and assure the wage-worker of his wage whether the capitalist makes money or not, the wage- worker must not wonder if he takes a little more than his proportion of the product as payment, not only for the use of his money, but for the risk of his capital. What is capital ? Anything which now exists, which may be made the instru- ment of further production, can fairly be looked upon as capital. My hand, if skilled, my brain, my physical strength, whatever I know or can do, — these are rightly named "capital," as much so as my neighbor's thousand dollars. Suppose, then, I agree with the man who has the money, and say I put into the business my skill of hand, my brain, my knowledge, my experience, not as a wage-worker, but as capital, and I agree to take out of the product my propor- tionate share of what is produced, and I agree to take my share of the risk, also, as payment for this additional share of the product that I am going to receive. When men have risen to this point, — and I believe they will rise to it, — the wage-system will be a thing of the past, as feudalism is ; and all men, according to their degree of skill and ability, will become capitalists, and there will be no more talk about labor and capital, because all men will be laborers and capitalists alike. I believe this is going to be the next step — I do not say it dogmatically — in the industrial progress of the world. And now at the close I believe that this world is capable of not only supporting all its inhabitants, but of lifting them up into the heart and brain and the soul that constitute all that is worthy of manhood. I believe that the grandest dream is capable of realization ; but it must come along these lines of the conquest of the world and of patient labor. 194 Life And, when each individual is developed to the highest and best, then, and then only, shall we realize the only socialism that is attainable or even desirable. For, when you have a world of developed individuals, they will learn, as they are gradually learning to-day, that they cannot and do not live alone, that there is one grand, mutual interdependence spring- ing out of the fact that we are men ; and we shall learn, as we are learning gradually, that no man can be happy, no man can be rich, no man can be prosperous, all by himself, that he receives and gives, and that it is only in the exercise of this union of, faculties that help each other that we become the most of which we are capable. So there is no contradiction, and cannot be, between your welfare and mine ; for, when I am helping you to attain the most and the best, I am exer- cising just those faculties of my nature which make me most human and most like God. MORALITIES AND MORALITY. I received a letter, about a week ago, which is the type of large numbers that come to me. It indicates, along with its fellows, the wide-spread confusion that there has been in the popular mind as to the standard and the sanctions of ethics, — that is, as to what is right and what is wrong, — as to how we know what is right and what is wrong, — as to what will happen to us if we do right or do wrong. There is no generally admitted or widely accepted standard in regard to this ; hence, naturally, confusion. The gentleman who wrote this letter put his question somewhat in this form. He says, If you do not believe in the infallibility of the Bible, if you do not accept the doc- trine of hell, then what reason have you left for deciding as to what is right or what is wrong, and as to what are the sanctions of right and wrong ? And where do rewards and penalties come in ? In other words, he is in the state of mind occupied, I suppose, still by thousands and thousands of persons who believe that if suddenly the Bible should be lost, and the world should come to lose its belief in everlast- ing punishment, we should be all afloat as to what we ought to do and as to why we ought to do it ; that there is no reason for right or wrong except the command of a book, the arbitrary external law of an external and arbitrary power. I wish to call your attention to several phases of this con- 196 Life fusion before I attempt to make plain to you what seems to me the one pathway out of it. This man, I say, is the type of thousands who believe that the only reason for conduct is faith in the infallibility of book revelation. And yet let me ask you to note whether those who believe in the book reve- lation are agreed as to what is right and what is wrong. In other words, does the book furnish even to those who claim to accept it an unquestioned and clear standard of right and wrong ? One of the most noteworthy things, I think, is that the persons who most strenuously insist upon the infallibility of the Bible, and who look upon it and it alone as furnishing the standard of right and wrong, continually claim, week by week and year by year, that we ought to do no end of things that the Bible does not say anything about. And they over- look persistently, and persistently neglect to pay any sort of attention to, any number of things that the Bible insists upon with the utmost plainness and earnestness. That is, those who claim to take the New Testament as their standard of right and wrong do not abide by it themselves. Why, then, should they insist upon others accepting it ? or why should they claim that, when it is taken away, nothing of any conse- quence is left ? Let me illustrate by one or two things. You will note care- fully, because I do not wish to be misunderstood, that I am not raising the question whether certain things are right or wrong just now, but only whether they are commanded by the New Testament. Most of the persons who claim to take this as their one infallible guide and standard insist upon our observance of the first day of the week as a sacred and holy day. And in many cases you will find that they will forgive a breach of the moral law, an unkindness toward a neighbor, a slander, a falsehood, a bit of dishonesty in Moralities and Moi'ality 197 business, — they will forgive that which is really a wrong, an injury to somebody, — much more readily than they will forgive one who dares to differ from their idea as to how Sunday ought to be observed. But yet — note, I am not saying whether it is right or wrong, good or bad, to keep Sunday — the New Testament has no command whatever on the subject. So, if any one chooses to keep Sunday, he can- not offer any New Testament authority for so doing. Take another illustration. The New Testament commands in the most express terms possible that people shall love not only their neighbors and their friends, but that they shall love their enemies, pray for those who persecute them, be tender and kindly towards those who despitefully and evilly entreat them ; and yet I venture to say that the great majority of those who hold the New Testament as a final authority and arbiter in matters of right and wrong are oftener seen dis- liking or trying positively to injure such, or looking on at least with complacency and a little secret gladness when they find them stumbling and falling. On the other hand, what an outcry there was only a little while ago, how the papers rang with it, and how popular indignation was roused by the fact that an Orthodox clergyman in one of the towns of this State, refused to call a physician when his little child was sick, trusting to prayer for the healing of the child ! Nearly all those who claim the New Testament as the stand- ard of right and wrong were as indignant as they could be over what seemed to them cruelty and barbarism. Yet the New Testament explicitly commands those who accept it as authority and guide that they shall do precisely what this clergyman did. The New Testament forbids going to law with a brother Christian. How many people who take the New Testament as authority ever think of obeying a command like that ? It 198 Life forbids absolutely and in express terms the taking of an oath ; but there is hardly a Christian in America who can be permitted to testify on the witness-stand without the taking of an oath, and no man can hold office without the most formal acceptance of an oath as a part of his installation to the office. I speak of these things simply to illustrate the point that those who claim the New Testament as the standard of right and wrong commit real wrongs without thinking, with- out being troubled in their consciences one whit, apparently, while they insist upon our doing as necessary and right all sorts of things that the New Testament does not command at all. Turn to another branch of the Christian Church as a further illustration. Take the Roman Catholic Church. The Catholic Church does not look to the Bible as its standard, but to church teaching and church tradition. It claims that the spirit of God resides in the organization, and so the Church itself is the standard and guide. But any one who reads the history of the Catholic Church even superficially will note this fact : that it has been and is now in many cases very lenient towards injuries, towards real wrongs, towards sins which men commit against each other. One can get over this very easily in dealing with the authorities of the Church ; and yet it is very strict in regard to its own sacra- ments, in regard to keeping its own ritual and laws, in re- gard to such matters as the eating of meat on a Friday, in regard to the keeping of its fasts. In other words, it has established a standard apart from any consideration of the real rights and wrongs of men and women as they are living here in this world ; and it insists upon the doing of those things that are not in any vital relation to the real welfare of men even more vigorously than those things which, as Moralities and Morality 199 the result of experience, are proved to be the conditions of human welfare. Take one brief illustration in another department. I have used it before ; but it is a capital illustration on a point which I wish to make clear to you. I have an acquaintance in this city, — a lady. I have noth- ing whatever to say against her. I wish simply to point out the mental peculiarity which is the result of her ecclesias- tical training, as to her idea of what God requires of her, as to what is right and what is wrong. I think I could find defects in her character, in her relations to her friends, in the matter of duty between her and her neighbors, the same kind of defects that I could find in any of us ; and yet these do not trouble her conscience particularly, any more than they trouble the consciences of the rest of us. But she was so troubled in regard to the matter of her attending relig- ious services during Lent that, when her sister suddenly died, she gravely told me that she believed the death of that sister was God's judgment upon her for not attending these religious services. Let me give one personal illustration from my own boy- hood experience. I became a member of the Congregational church when I was thirteen years old. We had among others what was called a monthly meeting, a preparatory lecture, or a monthly conference meeting, preparatory to the celebration of the Lord's Supper, which was to come on the following Sunday. It was the very hardest thing I had to do as a church member during those days to attend that meeting, because I knew that I should be called upon to speak, to say something in regard to my religious feelings and experiences \ and I was timid to the point of making this actual torture. I remember that, when I did not do it, however, my conscience troubled me more seriously for that 200 Life than for anything else that I can recall during my entire boy- hood. Anger, unkindness, injury, neglect of the wishes or welfare of father and mother, — none of these things touched my conscience half as much as failure to attend that partic- ular meeting. I speak of this simply to illustrate how we erect these artificial standards, and how many a time the things that trouble us, that press upon our consciences most, are the things that, when you clearly weigh the welfare, the happiness, the prosperity of the world, are light as dust in the balance, perhaps of no importance whatsoever. If you go outside of Christianity on all these questions, you will find even more confusion. The different religions of the world have their own standards as to what is right and what is wrong. And, strangely enough, — so strangely that at first sight it makes one raise the question whether man is a moral being at all, — there is hardly a conceivable crime on earth that at some time or somewhere in the history of some religion has not been consecrated as a part of the demanded service that must be paid to a goddess or a god. Murder, in the form of human sacrifice, has been one of the commonest of these duties. And so I might go through the whole catalogue, and there is hardly a crime that has not somewhere and at some time been a religious and moral duty, according to the standard then prevailing. What does this all mean ? Does it mean that conscience is of no account ? that conscience is only a paid attorney, ready to take a fee from any one who will pay the highest, and be in favor of this or that master according to what seems its interest? Does it mean that there is no perma- nent right or wrong in the world, that there is no eternal ethical standard in the light of which we are bound ? I have had friends sometimes go so far as to seriously raise that question with me, since I have been in Boston, — not bad peo- Moralities and Morality 201 pie at all, some of them the best people I have ever known. They have been confused, so confused that they have said to me, Isn't it true, after all, that right and wrong are mere matters of climate and of stages of culture ? That which is wrong in Boston is right enough in Turkey. The American mother takes the most tender and loving care of her little child. The Hindu mother as conscientiously takes her little child and casts it to the crocodile in the Ganges. The son or the daughter in Boston considers it not only the most sacred of all obligations, but generally, I am glad to say, the deepest and highest of all joys, to take tender and loving care of father and mother, as they get old and can no longer take care of themselves. But every student of anthropology knows that there have been peoples on the earth, and that there are even yet, who as soon as father and mother get a little decrepit and old consider it the highest obligation to put them remorselessly to death. Is there, then, no standard for us? What does conscience mean ? In reply to this, let me make perfectly clear to you what is true concerning this much abused matter of conscience. You know people, no matter what theory they may hold upon this subject, who are conscientiously just as wrong as they can be ; that is, they are according to your deepest con- victions. How, then, can you talk about conscience being a divine faculty that resides in the soul as the guide for man in matters of right and wrong? If one man goes conscien- tiously west and another conscientiously east, and still other people are going just as conscientiously to every other point of the compass, each claiming that he is going in the only possible right direction, how can you claim that conscience is a guide ? A little clear thinking will show you tfeat in regard to the matter as to what is right and what is wrong conscience is 202 Life not a guide at all, and never was intended to be. What is the divine thing, the permanent thing, in any conscience ? It is simply the everlasting witness of the divine in us as to our obligation to do right. Conscience forever rings in our hearts the one command of moral obligation : Do right, do right, do right ! But no man's conscience ever told him, since the world began, what was right or what was wrong. What is right and what is wrong, these have been learned as the results of human experience, precisely as any other truth has been learned since the world was. And the man is in great peril, peril of injuring himself, peril of being unkind and injurious to his neighbor, who makes his present con- science the judgment-seat before which he dares call any other soul for sentence. You think that a certain course of conduct is the right, and the only right, one : then you are bound by it. But, unless you can bring some better reason than merely that you think so, you have no business to judge any other soul that lives. Conscience gives you no authority. You have a right to say to any man, You are under obligation to do right ; but, before you have a right to bring him up to your standard, you are under the highest possible obligation to prove to him that your standard is cor- rect ; but your thinking so at the moment is no proof what- ever that it is correct. Here have come in half of the cruel- ties, half of the falsities, half of the injustices of the world, — the lack of charity, the bitterness, the injury to the social and the moral world. I think I am right; and I presume to erect that into a throne and order the rest of my family, my neighbors, my friends, to come before me for sentence. Insolent egotism ! I have no right to do anything of the sort. What is the standard of right and wrong ? Is there one ? Right here I wish to do what I know some of you do not like Moralities and Morality 203 to have me do ; that is, read a passage instead of speak. But I must read this because it is so important in its bearing on this question, and because of the person who wrote it. It is in the January number of the Forum, and is from an article on " The Ethics of Marriage," by W. S. Lilly, one of the most brilliant essayists living, a devout and earnest Roman Catholic. See what he says as to the standard of ethics : — " The ethics taught by Christianity are not, as Mr. John Morley somewhere calls them, ' a mere appendage to a set of theological mysteries.' They are independent of those mys- teries, and would subsist to all eternity, though Christianity and all religions were swept into oblivion." (Think of a Catholic saying that !) " The moral law is ascertained, not from the announcements of prophets, apostles, evangelists, but from a natural and permanent revelation of the reason. ' Natural reason,' says Suarez, in his great treatise, De Legi- bus, ' indicates what is in itself good or bad for men ' ; or, as elsewhere in the same work he expresses it, ■ Natural reason indicates what is good or bad for a rational creature.' The great fundamental truths of ethics are necessary, like the great fundamental truths of mathematics. They do not proceed from the arbitrary will of God. They are unchange- able, even by the fiat of the Omnipotent. The moral pre- cepts of Christianity do not derive their validity from the Christian religion. They are not a corollary from its theo- logical creed. It is mere matter of fact, patent to every one who will look into his Bible, that Jesus Christ and his apos- tles left no code of ethics. The Gospels and Epistles do not yield even the elements of such a code. Certain it is that when, in the expanding Christian society, the need arose for an ethical synthesis, recourse was had to the inexhaustible fountains of wisdom opened by the Hellenic mind ; to those 204 Life 'Mellifluous streams that watered all the schools Of Academics, old and new, with those Surnamed Peripatetics, and the sect Epicurean and the Stoic severe.' "The clearness, the precision of psychological analysis, which distinguish the ethics of the Catholic schools, are due more to Aristotle and Plato than to Hebrew prophets or Christian apostles." This is the opinion of a singularly devout, earnest Catho- lic. I am glad to say that I could not have put my own belief into more precise and forcible words. The standard of ethics, of right and wrong, is eternal, is unchangeable; but it is not derived from any priest, from any prophet, from any apostle, from any bible, from any church, from any outside source whatsoever. It is simply the constituent law of things. In other words, the law of life is the one eternal, unchanging standard of ethics, of right and of wrong. I must try to make this clear to you if I can. Let me call your attention to the fact that we are living in the pivotal age of all the centuries. We are at the turn- ing-point of the ages. The world, in the future generations, will look back to this time as the great crisis of the most profound and tremendous revolution of thought that has ever taken place. We do not see it, because we are in the midst of it, as a man in a regiment, in the smoke of the battle, does not see which way the army is moving half as well as the general who is on the hill-top overlooking the scene. Let me indicate to you the central point of this great change. In every religion that the world has ever known in the past, the will of God, the standard of right and wrong, both religious and moral obligations, have been supposed to emanate from an external source. In other words, God has Moralities and Morality 205 been a legislator, a tsar, an emperor, a king, outside of things, issuing his decrees, enforcing his laws over all people by arbitrary penalties of reward and punishment. What change are we passing through? We have reached this point, that the great, profound thinkers of the world are agreed that there is no God and never has been outside of things at all ; that God is the life, the force, the power in and through things, no more outside of things than my soul is outside of my body. Note what follows. If any religion, any priest, any oracle, any prophet, any book, any church, has ever truly translated into human speech one of God's laws, it has been by as much as it has been able to apprehend this interior constitu- ent law of things. There is not a single binding law in this universe, except the pervasive, universal law of life ; and, if any book speaks truly in regard to this, it is by as much as it has correctly apprehended and announced one of these eternal, unchanging laws of life. Ethics, then, is as all-per- vasive and as necessary as the law of gravity. Talk about a man escaping an ethical law ! He might as well escape his horizon ; for ethical laws are the laws of his life. Let me illustrate, if I can, to make clear what I mean. Suppose I could draw a circle in your presence. What is a circle ? It is a line every point of which is equidistant from another point that is called the centre. That statement we call the law of the circle. How can you injure, harm, or by figure of speech sin against a circle ? There is no con- ceivable way except by breaking this law which constitutes it a circle. If you do that, you destroy it. It ceases to be ! You have sinned against its life. Take a river. What is a river ? A body of water in a definite current flowing be- tween two banks. If you take away the watei or one of the banks, or both, if you destroy the conditions, it ceases to be 206 Life a river. You can sin against its life by destroying the condi- tions of its existence. Take a tree. There are certain con- ditions on which its life, health, and growth depend. How can you harm the tree in any possible way except by injuring its health, its life, by taking away from its power of growth or bearing ? Now come to man. What is my body ? It has definite outlines : it is constituted what it is by these outlines. Then it is made up of certain organs, or parts, in certain definite relations to each other ; and the constancy of these relations that I speak of is the law of my body. How can you harm my body ? There is no possible way of sinning against it or injuring it except by lowering the tone of its health, by tak- ing away something from its life. And, if you break one of the laws that constitute me what I am, you do take away from health, you do take away from life. Consider the larger organism called the State, or the nation, where individuals count, so to speak, as cells, as con- stituent parts of this larger organism. How can you injure the State ? By such a course of conduct as takes away from the life, the prosperity, the power of the State. There is no other way of injuring it. Of course, what will injure it will depend upon the organization of the State. That which will injure an empire might not injure a republic. A course of conduct that everybody admits is right here in America is condemned in Russia, and rightly so, — that is, provided Russia has a right to be. For, of course, you will see that here the one supreme sin, politically speaking, is and must be treason. You can do anything else, and be forgiven ; but, if you sin against the conditions of the existence or life of the State, how can you be forgiven ? The State cannot for- give that. It is a matter of self-defence, a matter of life to the State. Moralities and Morality 207 So, in the Catholic Church, to recur to the illustration which I used at the opening, its attitude is perfectly natural and right, from the point of view of the pope. You cannot expect him to do otherwise. If a church is organized so that it puts as the one supreme object its own existence, its continuing to be and its retaining its power, why, of course, any other sin is venial except that which threatens the power and the life of the church itself. Of course, the pope can forgive anything else quicker than that. A Catholic may murder, and the Church be safe ; and heresy in thought, yes, because you can think as you please, and still the Church be safe. But heresy spoken threatens the very life of the Church ; and of course it cannot be permitted, — anything else. The only safe church, then, you will see, in accordance with this principle, is the church that does not place first its own existence, the continuance of it as a denomination, its own power, but that church which places the truth first, and which links its life with the discovery and acceptance of the truth. That is the only safe church on earth, because a church organized in any other way must perforce place its own rights, its own power, its continued existence, above and before all moral laws. Do you not see how it must be so? So you take the religions of the world that I have spoken of as placing rituals before morals, character, justice, — why not ? Suppose I believe in a God outside the nature of things, who, looking over this scene, is indifferent to it per- haps, and commands me to do certain things on pain of pun- ishment in another life. If I really believe that, must I not break any and every social law, every political law, if need be, for the sake of obeying this God who holds my very life and destiny forever in his hands ? Eternity is of infinitely more importance than any question that touches this little 208 Life world. Of course, then, this supposed command of a God, outside of the nature of things, will supersede any and every obligation of which you can conceive for a moment. Here, then, you will see is the reason fqr all this confu- sion that we have noticed as so general over the world. It is because people have gone to some supposed external authority — priest, church, book — or some particular social order as their standard, instead of going to the heart of life, the source of things, and finding the real God and the real laws of righteousness where they are, where they always have been, and where they must be forever. But you will note that all these men in the confusion of the past have been blindly seeking after the truth, in spite of their mis- takes and failures. They have been always trying to find that which they believed right in the largest and highest and truest sense. Here, then, is the simple fact that life, life as duration, life as contents, — that is, as well-being and happiness, — is the one standard of right ; and the only wrong you can by any possibility commit is a wrong against the well-being, the life of a man, a social order, a church, a State, or what- ever the life that is being considered may be. The only harm you can possibly do is that which is against the life, the welfare, of somebody. What this is in any particular case must be a matter of study and discovery. We find out what is right, what is wrong, or what is bad in an individual or the world by experience. I was talking of this subject with a friend the other day ; and he raised a question of so much importance that I must give you the benefit of the discussion between us. He said, If life is the one eternal standard, then how does it ever come to be that life can be rightly and grandly sacrificed ? Where does self-sacrifice come in ? Where does martyrdom Moralities and Morality 209 come in ? I will tell you. The worst sin that I can pos- sibly commit against my body is some action which lowers the tone of its health, and which, carried far enough, would lead to death. I cannot possibly harm my body in any other way. Yes ; but I am not body alone. I am mind. Now, it is conceivable that there may come such a juncture of affairs in my life as that there shall be conflict between the physical well-being and the mental, that the mental part may be better developed. In sacrificing and injuring, and in a sense sinning against, my body, then, I may be only sacrificing the lower life to the higher mental life. And that may not only be desirable, but grand as well. Or there may come a juncture in my life where I need to sacrifice the physical and mental both to the affectional life. There have been cases where sons have nobly and grandly sacri- ficed their physical well-being and a career of study which they would love to have had — their mental development — for the sake of the higher obligation, as they conceived it, and as I conceive it, of being true to the love of father and mother or friends dependent on them. Here, again, it is life which is the standard, only the higher life supersedes the lower. So a man may sacrifice all that he is for the sake of a grand conviction, for a mighty truth, in the spirit which Jesus had in mind, when he said, " He that loseth his life for my sake shall find it," or, as the apostle says, referring to Jesus hanging on the cross, "Who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame." A man may then, for what he believes to be the eternal life of the soul, grandly and gladly sacrifice every- thing lower, and still not change the standard. He gives up the lower life for a fuller, grander life that can be attained in no other way. Or an individual may sacrifice himself for society, for 210 Life a " cause," as we say, considering himself only a little unit, just as I may sacrifice my finger or my arm to save my life. If my finger or my arm might be conceived of as intelli- gent, as capable of choice, they might be grand enough to demand that they be sacrificed to save my life. So a man can choose a social life, a politicial life, or the religious life of the time, the grander life of the world, instead of his own individual life, and may give himself up to the larger life of mankind. The lower life, then, the narrower life, may be sacrificed without any infringement of the principle that I have announced, that the one eternal standard of right is life; and that which conduces to the individual life, bodily, mental, moral, affectional, spiritual, that which con- duces to the larger life of the world, that which leads and looks onward and has in it the promise of the coming time, is right. That which is against that is wrong ; and nothing else can be wrong. Right and wrong, then, are to be understood by studying the progress, the development, of the race, just as we find out any other truth ; and, when you have discovered it, do it. And all external authority, Church, Bible, priest, or what not, is right, is of authority, only in so far as it rightly reads and tran lates this inner eternal law of life. RELIGIONS AND RELIGION. Because the thought of the early world was ignorant and crude, because the religious ideas which were held are now regarded as very childish and superstitious, there are a great many people who do not think deeply enough to get over the impression that religion may be all crudeness, all igno- rance, all superstition. It had so lowly a birth, its begin- nings were so poor, there was so much of cruelty and bar- barity connected with it, that some people wonder whether, when the world gets wise and tender-hearted and true, relig- ion will not be among the memories of things that have passed away. But, by parity of reasoning, why are not the heavens blotted out? Why do suns still swing in their orbits and stars still shine ? The thought of the early world concerning these bright bodies over our heads was very crude, very ignorant, very superstitious. They had no more correct theory concerning these than they had concerning the religious nature and life of man. But we know that this does not touch the central facts, the eternal realities, of astronomy. Though it be only within two or three hundred years that we have begun in any adequate fashion to grasp the great truths that these heavenly bodies illustrate and convey, still we know that they are the same stars that shone upon the early world. No change of theory puts out a single sun or dims one single star ray. The great essential truths 212 Life were in the beginning, were at every step of human progress, and are to-day undimmed and unchanged. The change, perfectly natural, perfectly rational, is only in the growing intelligence, and so the broadening thought, of mankind. Religion had its birth in the most natural way in the world. It was a necessity to early man, as much as it is to-day; and the shape which religion took was a perfectly natural and necessary shape, considering the nature of man and his surroundings. I have very little sympathy with the man who can study this past history of the world even in its most barbaric, most ignorant, most cruel manifestations, without uncovering his head in reverence. I have no sym- pathy with the man who can refer to this with a sneer upon his lip. It shows a very shallow thought, a very partial comprehension of the meaning of this great fact of the relig- ious outreaching of the human soul. Primitive man reasoned as well as we reason, and precisely in the same way, when you take into account the small mental development that he had attained, and the small amount of knowledge concerning the facts of the universe which he had acquired. Early man, then, was just as rational a creature as we are to-day, con- sidering his brain development and his circumstances. Let us note for a moment how naturally, how necessarily, religion sprang up when man first began to think and feel as a man. He knew only himself, and himself very incom- pletely. The only knowledge he had of any kind of life or power was derived from a contemplation of his own nature; and he knew of himself only as a conscious individual, pos- sessing will and able to exert force. And, whenever he saw any movement in the world about him, how else, being what he was, could he interpret it except in terms derived from contemplation of his own nature ? When man opened his eyes and looked out over the world and the heavens above Religions and Religion 213 him, he saw clouds moving, he saw the lightnings, he heard the tremendous voice of thunder, he noticed the growth of grasses and plants and flowers and trees, he saw the brooks rushing down the hillsides, he saw all the mighty movements, the mysterious forces of the world around him ; and he was obliged to translate these into terms of will and personality. And he was not so far wrong as some shallow wise men of the world even yet imagine, in my opinion. He thought that all these were living things, and he was right ; for we to-day believe that the universe is living all through, only his error — a natural one — was in attributing individual personality to these separate manifestations of the one force and life that is the soul of things. And when, through what- ever course of reasoning, — I cannot go into it this morning, — he came to think of some one of these mysterious powers as his god, as he came to think of himself in personal rela- tion to this power, — perhaps thinking of this power as the ancestor of his tribe and of himself as one of the tribe, — as he came to think of this mighty force able to hurt him, able to help him, a force on whose will he depended for life, for breath, for all things, do you not see how naturally the relig- ion which he adopted would blossom out into the forms that it actually did assume ? Not only was religion a natural and a necessary growth of the early world, but the multiplicity of religions was just as natural and necessary a result of the condition in which prime- val man found himself. He had no conception of the unity of the world, the unity of the human race, the unity of these man- ifold forces that impressed themselves upon him on every hand. How could he have ? And, when he looked round him at the members of his own tribe, he had come, in ways which I need not stop to enumerate, to think of this tribe as all akin, having descended from one common ancestor, with 214 Life one blood flowing through the veins of all the members ; and within the limits of this kinship, this family, this tribe, he lived his life. He did not think of himself as standing in any sort of relation of right or wrong or of love towards the members of any other tribe. His own tribe was the scene of his life and the field of his activity. His conscience would not trouble him if he killed the member of some other tribe or took away his property by force or violence, or ren- dered any injury whatever. But within the limits of his own tribe, within the limits of this supposed kinship, he felt him- self bound by obligations of right and wrong as strong, for the time, as those which we feel to-day. Each one of these tribes had its own god, a god that had nothing whatever to do with the gods of any other tribe. Moab might worship his god, the Philistine might worship his god, the Assyrian might worship his god, the Egyptian might worship his god ; but Israel felt under no obligation to pay any worship to these deities, even although believing them real, as real as his own. I speak of this simply as illustrating what was true of all families and tribes of men in the early periods of human history. Each man felt under obligation to wor- ship his own god ; and so far in those days were religions from having or manifesting anything like a missionary or proselyting spirit that it was not supposed to be right even for the member of one tribe to have anything whatever to do with the religion of another tribe. The only way by which an alien or a foreigner could come to share the wor- ship of another tribe was by the process of being adopted into that tribe ; that is, by feigning, or making, the fact of kinship which was the one only tie that bound them to each other, and which bound them to their god. This condition of things you will see was perfectly natural, entirely necessary at that stage of human development. Religions and Religion 215 And here let me say a word — for these old superstitions and misconceptions do so persist — concerning the question as to whether there is one true religion while all the rest are false. I was brought up to suppose that there was only one real and true religion, and that all the rest were delusions, forg- eries of devils or of designing priests and founders. I was brought up to suppose that Mahomet, for example, was a conscious impostor, instead of being, as now I hold, in his degree and according to his light, as much a prophet and reformer as any of the great religious founders of mankind. Milton, you will perhaps remember, represents all the false religions as being the inventions of fallen angels, they try- ing in this way to interfere with the worship of the one true God, thus to lead men astray to their destruction. This has been the common idea. I think, when we become more in- telligent, less prejudiced, we shall come to the conclusion that all the religions of the world, including even our own Christianity, are equally natural outgrowths of the religious yearning and need of the human heart ; that they are all members of one family, all divine so far as they have at- tained the truth, all lacking in divinity so far as they still cherish errors and misconceptions. Let me turn from this point and raise another question. What were these men trying to gain by their religions ? In other words, what has been the aim since the world was of this religious life of man ? What has man sought in trying to worship his gods ? Why has he sought them after this method or that? one way in Asia, another way in Africa, another way in Europe, perhaps yet another way in America ? What has man been trying to do ? He has been trying from the very beginning, — and this ought to give us an added respect and sympathy for him, — 216 Life he has been trying to do precisely what we are trying to do here this morning. No matter how crude, no matter how bloody, how barbaric, how superstitious the religious mani- festation has been, it has been, at the first at any rate, an earnest effort after God, a trying to find this power that presses on man on every side and still eludes him at every turn, a trying to find out the nature of this power that was here before he was born, on which he depends, that will remain forever while the generations of men come and go. Man has always been trying to find out the nature of this power, to find out the relation in which he stood to this power, to find out what this power wanted of him. In other words, man has always been searching after the secret of life, more life, fuller life, life filled up with good, life ever growing more and better. Study any religion you please, and you will find that the people of that time have formed the best thought they could concerning this mysterious power outside of them ; they have had the best thought they were capable of having, and they have tried to find out the way by which they might ward off his supposed anger, by which they might win his favor, by which they might get into such relations to him that life, peace, prosperity, growth, should be theirs. That is what men have always been trying to do, whatever name they have used in addressing the un- seen power, by whatever rites or ceremonies they have sought to approach him. They have ever been seeking this one aim as wisely as they knew. I wish to emphasize and to clarify this thought a little by referring to two or three specific types of religion, that you may see how necessary these types have been, and how they illustrate the point that I have just made. Men have felt the presence of this invisible power, and as I just told you have ever had the best thought about it which Religions and Religion 217 their stage of development was capable of. But you will note that religions have taken these different shapes in accord with the different theories of things which men have held. It is no accident that the first word of Genesis is a scientific word. The first word of every religion on earth is a scientific word. That is, men have begun of necessity with some sort of thinking about the nature of things, and the theory which they have come to adopt has been their theology, the framework of their religious life. Let me give you now one of the crudest and lowest with which we are acquainted. I do not know but all men have passed through this stage. I am inclined to think they have, though I do not speak dogmatically on this point. If you will go back far enough, you will find that the men of that period believed that the animal forms around them were just as divine as they themselves were, or as this mysterious power which they thought of as their god. You will find that these tribes believed that it was one common life shared by the god and the animal which they took as their totem. That is, they believed there was a real vital kinship between their deity and this particular animal and their tribe, and this animal stood as the sacred representative of their divin- ity. They believed that the one life coursed through them all. And to keep this life vital, full, there was only one way ; and here is the origin of sacrifices. I can only hint this truth, which requires volumes to explain and make clear. The origin of animal sacrifices is undoubtedly here. When any calamity occurred to the tribe, or when for one reason or another they thought that their god was losing interest in them or was a little further away from them, and they wished to tighten the bonds that bound them in this one kinship with the divine power, on which their prosperity depended, then they would put to death one of these sacred 21 8 Life animals that contained the life of the god ; and they and the god together in the sacrificial feast would drink the blood of this animal and eat its flesh, and so renew the bonds of this common life which was shared by them all. A remnant of this we find in the old Arab idea of the inviolable sacred- ness of the bond that binds you to the man with whom you have eaten. I have no time to explain it ; but the Lord's Supper is only the last and most refined development of this same primi- tive thought of man. Man believed that he partook of the life of that of which he ate, that he became like it. By eating, as he believed, with god, he renewed afresh the bond which together they shared in this common life. Now, do you not see that, if men have reached the stage of culture where they have no higher idea of God than this, this method of approaching him, of getting into right rela- tions with him, is as natural and necessary as are our methods to us ? Let me ask you to look for a moment at Buddhism as an illustration of another type of religion. What did the Buddh- ist think ? At first, he did not think much about the god or the gods ; but he believed that in some way the individual soul had become entangled in this mesh of personal existence which was an evil. The Buddhist teaches that to escape personal desire, personal ambition, personality in all its forms, is the only deliverance for man. In some way, per- haps, he does not know how to explain it, each soul is hin- dered in its career by being born over and over again, a series of reincarnations, — perpetually bound, as he expresses it, to this wheel of life, now up in the sunshine, now down in the dark, unable to extricate himself and escape, or to find repose and calm. This is the Buddhist theory of the universe and of the relation of the individual to it ; and what Religions and Religion 219 Euddha claimed was to teach the way by which a man might lessen the number of these incarnations, and some way escape them altogether and reach Nirvana, a period or place of annihilation possibly, at any rate of the absorption of the individual consciousness, and so escape from all this turmoil and trouble, this up and down of human life. What is the Christian theory, the theory of the last five hundred years ? You know perfectly well, I need not re- count it to you, what this theory is, — the fall of man, the anger of God, the necessity of placating him and of deliver- ing the individual soul from his wrath, the whole to issue in hell or in heaven as an eternal condition of affairs. Do you not see that here is first, no matter how it sprung up, this theory, this conception of things ? And that religion, which is this outreaching after God, must of necessity take these various shapes according to the thought of the world as to the universe, as to God, as to man, as to the relation in which we stand to God, as to the desirable outcome of life ? But, as the world goes on, there is a constant tendency towards unity. One of the next movements of the human brain and human heart is towards the discovery of some central principle in which shall be unified all the appar- ent diversity of things. So, through a perfectly natural process, the world has gone on from the belief in many relig- ions and many gods to one religion and one god. First, the Hebrews believed that their god was only their tribal deity, and that other gods insisted rightly on the worship of their own people. Then they came to believe that their god was the only God, and that all the others were vain imaginings of ignorant people ; and, as the result of the scientific de- velopment of the world, unity is, as we know, put beyond all question. The universe, infinite in its range and sweep, has become simplicity itself so far as the materials of which 220 Life it is made are concerned. We know that the same sub- stance we tread under our feet, the dust of this earth, is the same as that which shines in the stars, which makes up the composition of every separate planet. We know that the universe is one in substance. When Newton discovered the law of gravity, he proved that it is one power, one hand, that holds the galaxies and systems in one grasp, reducing the whole complexity to marvellous simplicity. Modern science has gone on to demonstrate that all the multiplicity of forces that we call light, heat, electricity, and what not, are only varieties of one force, only differences in the mode of motion that moves forever and is never weary. So we have one universe at last, and one God. Another subject which I hinted to you last Sunday, and which I wish to recur to this morning, is this. The God of the universe is no longer outside of it, but in it, — its life, its thought, its conscious will, its purpose, its soul. And here let me point out the fact that the crudest and most ignorant savage was not so very far astray. He thought all these things were alive. The error that he committed was in think- ing there were so many different kinds of lives. He was right in saying that they were all alive ; for the latest word of phi- losophy and science is that this power which is manifested through the universe on every hand is the same power that lives in the individual, in the form of conscious will. So the barbaric man, in thinking that the world was all alive, and in thinking that his God was of kin to him, was not wrong ; for it is this power, this divineness all through the universe, that is in us and makes us alive. We have reached a point now where we are ready to take the next great step, which in one sense is to be the final step, in the growth of the world's religion. We must drop the u s" and no longer talk about "religions," but say "re- Religious and Religion 221 ligion " ; for, just as there has always been one theory con- cerning the universe, the stars over our heads, that was true from the beginning, while none of the others were true, so there has always been only one truth about God, one truth about man. So there never has been but one religion, in the true sense of that word, and never could have been, and never can be, — only one religion from the beginning ; and men feeling about in the twilight of the world were simply in their crude and ignorant way seeking after it, feeling after God, as Paul said, if haply they might find him, though he be not far from each one of us. There has, then, been but one true religion from the beginning, and all the attempts of men in groping after this have only been glimpses of broken lights that have preceded the dawn. But, though a belief in the unity of the universe and the oneness of God has been attained, the multiplicity of relig- ious theories still remains. Even in Christianity, is it not true — I beg you not to misunderstand me — that there are a good many different religions ? God is not the same God to the Romanist that he is to the Protestant, though the same word be used. God is not the same being to the Orthodox that he is to the Unitarian, though we spell the same name with the three same letters. Religion, after all, is constituted by this theory of things that we hold. The Orthodox hold that man is a fallen being. Until within a few years they have held that man has been on this earth only a little while ; that God hates man ; that it is only through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ that God is made mer- ciful and ready to forgive ; that some of us are going to be saved and the rest of us are going to be lost. On the other hand, liberal Unitarians believe that man has been in this world uncounted ages; that he has never fallen; that God has never hated him ; that he loves and always has loved 222 Life him, and given him all the light which he was capable of re- ceiving ; that he has led him all the way and is leading, no matter by what name he is called by man ; that man does not need to be saved from a fall or from the wrath of God, he only needs to be saved from ignorance, from passion, from hate and selfishness, from the evil of animal qualities still in him ; that he needs to be educated, lifted, developed, and to be brought into accord with the real truth of God and the nature of things. Now, how can you rationally speak of these two as the same religion ? No matter if they both be called " Chris- tian," or if they both speak of God and use the same word for his name. The two religions are utterly unlike and utterly inconsistent with each other. This new religion we know, not to be perfect truth, but, to be approximately truer than any other ; for there can be but one true religion, and what must that be ? It can be only one thing. It must start, in the first place, with as correct a theory as we can get of the universe, with the best theory that science has given us. Then it must have as correct a thought as possible concerning God, as to what kind of being he is, and what he desires of us, what he wants us to do. Then the practical part of it on our side must be to get into the right relation with God, to comply with his laws, to grow into harmony with him, to be reconciled to him. This is the one civilized, reasonable religion on the face of the earth, and along these lines it must go : it can no other. For, note, God is in the universe now, not outside of it ; he is issuing no laws from without : the only laws of God are the vital, constituent laws of the universe. There are no arbitrary, externally imposed laws. If any priest, any prophet, any church, any book, has ever uttered one syllable of divine revelation, to this must it come for judgment; and it is divine only as it agrees with Religions and Religion 223 the eternal truth and nature of things. There is, indeed, a revelation, and there is coming an infallible revelation ; for the infallible revelation is just the progressively discovering and demonstrating of truth in the heavens above and the earth beneath, in the past and the present, to the human brain and for the unfolding of human society, and there is no revelation except this. If then, as I said, any church, book, or priest, has ever uttered a syllable of claimed revela- tion, it is revelation only if it is true, and if it agrees with this eternal truth of the nature of things. Here, then, is to come at last infallibility, — not the infallibility of an external, imposed law, but the infallibility of discovered truth. Now, as regards this truth in its external manifestation in worship, what shall I say ? The Church may organize itself as it pleases so as to make itself most efficient for its work : it may use any rites, services, forms of worship, cere- monies, it pleases, only provided that they express and help the religious life, and are not dead forms and made substi- tutes for life. Another thing. In the light of this grand truth of the one- ness of religion and of its natural revelation in the unfolding truth of things, there is the grand hope that in the future there need be no more cataclysms, no more revolutions, no more persecutions, no more overturnings ; but, with the heart open for a larger love, with the life open for a grander character, with the brain open for the newer truth, mankind may march on step by step through the years, ever seeing more and more of the divinity of things, ever growing to a comprehension and a practice of these higher truths, and so reaching on towards the perfect light of a perfect day. And, when this is attained, it will mean perfect truth of thought, perfection of conduct, and all-inclusive love, the very kingdom of God realized among men. WHAT IS IT ALL FOR? At the outset, I ask you to go with me while we take a rapid survey of the course of human progress on this planet. You will readily see that what I propose is only a very general and rough outline, in order that I may bring this general course of life vividly to your attention, that you may be ready with me to consider the question, What is it all for ? You are familiar with the nebular theory, in accordance with which many thousands, perhaps millions, of years ago this old earth of ours cooled down until it became a fit place for the abode of life ; and this life came, first, in the very lowest forms. For a series of ages, life slowly climbed from one form to another, up through fishes, reptiles, birds, and mammals, — uncounted ages before man himself appeared. And aU this while, as though there were a providence at work guiding the course of this development, the world was being stored with the rough materials out of which the com- ing civilization was to be wrought. Coal beds were laid down, veins of ore deposited, and the whole planet was made the apparently inexhaustible storehouse of forces that only waited the discovery and application of intelligence to trans- form them into the readily trained, tireless servants of humanity. At last man appeared. Then — who shall tell for how many years, how many thousands of years? — his What is it all for? 225 progress was so slow that we can hardly speak of him as human, cannot speak of him at all as civilized. Long dreary ages of savagery follow. At last he discovers the use of fire. He discovers these veins of metal in the earth, learns to smelt them and turn them into tools and weapons, and then — ages of barbarism still. I wish to call your attention to some general features, such features as the pessimist commonly uses out of which to construct the indictment against the wisdom and goodness of things. How nany thousands of years, then, during which the separate and hostile tribes were engaged in almost incessant warfare ! And then, as one step higher, — higher because it was substituted for the wholesale, indiscriminate slaughter of captives, — there came human slavery for thou- sands of years, during which men and women were held by force on the part of others, compelled to unremitting and unpaid toil ; the rights of neither husband nor wife nor child respected, treated like cattle in the open market. Then from the beginning all the way up until to-day how much of physical pain, every nerve athrill with anguish, the head weary, the heart sick and faint ! Make the problem as difficult as you will, paint the picture in as dark colors as you choose, remember it is true that this side of the picture, if you fix your attention on it, cannot be overdrawn. Then take one case, the case of death, of separation of friends. Let it be the death of a child, of a husband or wife or a life- long friend, it matters not whose. I wish to call your atten- tion to this problem of death, the heart-ache, the despair, the feeling that life is no longer worth keeping because the ob- ject of the heart's love has been rent away, this difficulty of taking up the burden of life, of walking alone, where one has had such dear companionship. This is one case : multiply it by hundreds, by thousands, by millions. Make it the age- 226 Life long, the universal experience, and then see how great a problem it is when we face this fact of death. Turn to another illustrative fact. How many men and women there have been in all ages who have walked the earth alone, who have had an experience bitterer, if possible, than that which I have just described ! for I think all of you will agree with Tennyson when he says, — " 'Tis better to have loved and lost Than never to have loved at all." What, then, will you say of those who have walked through life in a dream that has never been realized, who have thought that they had found the mate, the companion, of their soul, and have waked up to find it an illusion, who have hoped for satisfactory companionship and have never found it, who have been haunted by an ideal of love that might satisfy brain and heart and every taste and faculty, — a happy dream that has never been turned to fact ? Then think of the numbers of men who in all ages have pursued what they believed to be some grand object of life that has forever eluded them, the number of those who have tried to invent something w r hich might help to lift up and lead on the world. Visit the Patent Office in Washington, and see the hundreds and thousands of models there that have never come to any practical result, and then consider for a moment how much of thought, how much of dream, how much of high hope, how much of bitter disappointment, those tongueless models are able to tell ; and that is only a fraction of the world-wide, year-long sorrow. Think of the men who in the line of their profession or business have dreamed that some time they would be in a position to accomplish some great thing for the world, to help at least their friends or this or that cause, who have lain down at last What is it all fort 227 to fall into their final sleep, seeing the vision ever still in the air, something that they have never been able to grasp, some- thing that has haunted them, made them restless, and at last made them feel that they had struggled in vain, that they had been hardly wiser than is the little child who starts out on the search for the end of the rainbow, where certain good things are promised him if he can only reach it. And then survey the scene of human life and pick out the great, the noble, the prophets, the witnesses, the teachers, the great world-leaders, and see what has been their fate. Almost every one of them bitterly thought of, fought by those they desired to help ; almost every one of them mis- conceived by their own friends, by those who were nearest to them, by those from whom, if from any, they might expect to have a hand-clasp of sympathy and encourage- ment ; struck, beaten in heart as well as in body, by those whom they longed to cover with blessing and good. The long roll of the world's saints and martyrs, the men that have been in prison, the men to whose lips the cup of death has been offered, the men about whose limbs the flame has curled, the men every joint of whose bodies has been racked with torture, the men whom now we praise, we love, we call divine, — see what price they have had to pay for the unselfishness of making the world a little lighter, a little easier place to live in, of breaking the bonds of minds and souls ! Then look out over the face of civilization to-day. In spite of all the progress that has been made, in spite of the fact that the world was never so well off as it is now in any department, yet never, perhaps, was there such wide-spread discontent, so that many are sadly inclined to utter the words of the old Hebrew pessimist, who even then told the world that "he that increaseth knowledge increaseth 228 Life sorrow." So much discontent is there that many look back with weary and aching hearts to the time when, although the world was poorer, although there was not such wide- spread knowledge as to-day, although there were none of the mighty discoveries, none of the means of controlling the physical forces of the world, still there was at least, some- how, more of animal content than there is to-day. Men, I say, look back and wonder if those times were not really better than these. But I would not have you merely occupy the point of view of the pessimist. It has not been all savagery, all barbarism, all slavery, all war, all death, all heart-hunger, all separation from those that we love, all persecution and pain to noble souls. It is not all evil and all discontent even at this hour. I only wish, for the purpose that I have in mind, to hint to you this darker side, the material out of which the common charge against the universe is made, and to confess the uttermost truth in it all. But you are to remember, in justice to the course of human history, how natural and how easy it is for men to fix their attention, as they look back over the past, only on the dramatic incidents of life, and so to tell themselves a story which is largely false. I think there is hardly anything falser than ordinary history. It gives you the impression that the world is made up of the rise and fall of dynasties, of what are called noble fam- ilies, made up of the conflicts, the battles, between kings and peoples, made up of diplomatic quarrels ; while all the time the facts of general content, of prosperity, of increasing good, of quiet human happiness, human love, human peace, human hope, are all left one side and forgotten. I believe, — I cannot run over the history of men with this point in mind, to give you the reasons for my faith, — but I believe that, in spite of all that has been said, there has been, from What is it all for? 229 that far-off morning when the first man looked up to heaven until to-day, unspeakably more of happiness than there has been of unhappiness, unspeakably more of good than there has been of evil, unspeakably more of hope than there has been of despair, unspeakably more of the divine than there has been of the bestial. The simple fact that we are here to-day, with this discontent in our hearts, with this hope that looks up to the future, with this consciousness of power, with this growing control of the planet that we live upon, and with this belief that we can master and make the future serve us, — all this is demonstration of what I have said, that there has been a preponderance of good over evil in all the past. I wish now, however, while keeping this pessimistic side of things in mind, or rather while you survey the whole field of human life and human history with which I have been dealing in this course of sermons, to ask you to raise with me the question whether there is any conceivable outcome that can justify all the process that the world is going through. If there is such an outcome, what is it ? May we have something of hope in our hearts and of strength in our arms as we face the further problems of human life ? There are those who tell us that there is no outcome, who tell us what Macbeth said of human life, that " It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing " ; and there are theories that can be held that, to my mind, would justify this charge of Macbeth. You will recall, perhaps, the opening lines of Milton in " Paradise Lost." This problem that I present to you is the same that the world has always presented to itself. A little while ago, 230 Life Mr. Mallock roused the public by asking the question, "Is life worth living?" It is perpetually coming up. Milton, in his opening lines, invokes the divine spirit instead of the ancient pagan muse, and asks that power may be given him that, as he ascends "to the highth of this great argument," he " May assert eternal Providence, And justify the ways of God to men." It is my purpose to present to you three possible theories All the theories that you can frame as to the outcome of things are only variations of these three. I wish, therefore, to present you, in rough, brief outline, these three, to ask you which one of them seems the most rational, which you will adopt as a working theory of life. i. First, the one which still surrounds us on every hand, the one which Milton specially outlines as his solution of the problem, the theory of " Paradise Lost." This, as you know, is none other than the theory of the popular churches, and has been for the last millennium and a half. It starts with the idea that man is an abortive piece of work, not what God intended him ; that he is fallen, ruined. You know the outcome. I need not spend time in detailing it, It means that, after this brief scene of life here, in which each individual soul is supposed to be on probation for an eternal and changeless future, a few elected, chosen of God from all eternity, are to be gathered like grains of wheat from the wheat-field, and taken into God's garner; that these few souls are to come into his bright presence and share his glory, his joy unutterable, forevermore. But the * great majority are to pass from life in their sins, are for their punishment to go their way down the abysses of eter- nal darkness and eternal punishment. This is the solution of Milton. This is the outcome which the orthodox churches i What is it all for? 231 offer to us. Ask them what life is for, and this is the reply, A little brief life here on earth, heaven for a few, eternal pain for the many. The two conditions are fixed, separated by a gulf impassable, and to continue forever ; and what for ? The old creeds, of which they are now considering the revi- sion, tell us that on the one hand a few are saved to illustrate God's glory and mercy, and the rest are punished forever to illustrate the great glory of his justice. Is this a satisfactory theory? Does it make life seem worth while to us ? I need not argue this at length. I only need to say that there are three elements that make up all that is grand and manly in us, and that those three, when acting unrestrained, condemn it utterly. It is not satisfac- tory to the intellect of man ; for it does not seem a worthy scheme of the universe. It does not seem an outcome that we love to contemplate as satisfying the mind. And, then, the human heart cries out against it, — this heart that demands love as the only thing that will satisfy it, love not for itself, but for all mankind, for all sentient creatures that live. This cannot be accepted unless the heart can become so calloused, so hard, as to be happy in heaven with the perpetual thought of this other place intrud- ing like a shadow on the brightness, like a discord in the music. Why, we are becoming so civilized to-day that the whole world is roused to indignation at the tales of suffering and torture that come to us from Siberian prisons ; and what are these ? A few men, a few women, and suffering only for a year or two \ and then it is over, and peace, if no more, is the outcome of it all. How could thousands of loving, tender hearts be happy in heaven while something so much worse than Siberian torture was being carried on in the prison-house of the universe, — not for a week or a year, but forever and ever and ever ? Were such a thing conceivable, 232 Life I think that all loving men and women would kneel before the throne of Him that they would no longer dare to call Father, and beg at least to share, if they could not alleviate, the torment. The heart will not bear it then. Then the conscience refuses to accept it, from first to last, every fibre, every thread in its warp and woof. The whole scheme from inception to close is utterly, hideously unjust. There has been no injustice on the face of the earth up to that of the worst of those that we call inhuman monsters that for one instant can compare with it. If life is for this, then the less of it the better ; and any father or mother, it seems to me, would commit a crime to add one soul to the already too large number of candidates for such a destiny. 2. There is another theory in answer to the question, What is it all for ? the theory of many of the largest-hearted humanitarians of the world. It is the theory of Comte, the theory so ably represented in England by Mr. Harrison, who calls this pre-eminently the religion of humanity. It is the theory of many materialistic scientists, the theory that man is the only intelligence in the universe, that we have no right to speak the word " God " or believe that he exists ; that we have no right to speak the word " soul " or believe that we are souls \ that we have no right to expect to over- leap the gulf of death ; that the only thing for us to do is — what we can to make the pathway of humanity easier here. This theory holds that humanity is the only conscious power in the universe, that it is the product of blind force working under the guidance of necessary law. By and by the world and all that inhabit it are to pass away like a dream, — like a morning mist I was going to say; but no: the figure is not strong enough, for the morning mist, though it disappears from sight, still endures, — but this is to pass away into utter nothingness. When you ask one of these What is it all for f 233 men, then, or any of those who hold any variety of this theory, what it is all for, he must answer that in the last resort it is for — nothing. Picture it, if you can. Recur to the past as I have out- lined it, this solar system of ours as growing, the earth be- coming a fit habitation for life ; life climbing up from the lower forms until man appears, the long barbaric ages, the preparation of the planet, the dawning of civilization, the discovery of fire, of metals, the partial control of the forces of the world, then a great civilization climbing up into the light, achieving such results as are still the wonder of their descendants, — Greece, Rome, Palestine, the mighty men of the past, Confucius, Buddha, Jesus, those who have reigned in the field of intellect, the great poets, the great scholars, the great discoverers, the great inventors, those by whose mastery modern civilization has at last come to begin to con- trol these mighty forces of steam, electricity, of which we see but the beginning, — the end is not yet, — the world led up, going on, every land discovered, every wilderness turned into a garden, every waterway a highway for commerce, the song of the happy sailors on every sea, the hum of factories by every waterfall, or doing their work under the power of electricity or steam, the world redeemed, civilized, crime at last outgrown, poverty at last put under foot, superstition at last superseded, the world one scene of light and laughter and joy and peace, men having won perfect control over the planet, over themselves, until the grandest dream of the world is realized. All this — and then what? Snuffed out like a candle, to fall back into utter nothingness again ! Does it seem worth while ? Does it commend itself to your intellect as worthy of thought ? Does it commend itself to your heart as satisfying its infinite longings ? Does it com- mend itself to your conscience as just to those who have 234 Life sacrificed and suffered that coming ages might be happy and at peace ? It seems to me, friends, that the statement of a theory like this is stronger by way of refutation than any- thing that can be said concerning it. As Mr. John Fiske has said, considered intellectually, such a theory puts the world to permanent intellectual confusion. It satisfies no element of a high and noble man. And not all the songs of such a singer as George Eliot, representing how the individual soul becomes one note in the increasing music of humanity, can seem to justify it; for, after all, it is nothing at all at the end. 3. One more theory remains, — which I need not tell you is my own, — that starts with the thought that matter was not first, but spirit. I do not know but matter may be eternal. When I say " first," therefore, I refer to the order of impor- tance, not necessarily to the order of time. Matter may, for aught I know, be the eternal garment, the eternal ex- pression, of the infinite life, — I incline to this view, — but spirit, life, at the heart of things, not death, not unconscious- ness, a purpose reaching through the ages ; and, in the case of every soul that has ever lived, death not the end, only a re- birth, — death, whenever and however it comes, only the next step in the stairway of eternal ascent. There is time enough, time for immortality without our exhausting the possibilities of growth that we feel dumbly in us seeking for expression. This modern theory of the universe is practical. For the first time, it makes immortality a wholly rational thought; for it is possible for us to think of infinite advance without ever exhausting the universe, ever getting weary, ever get- ting through. If we may hold this theory that death is not the end, — and I believe that, if it is not yet demon- strated, we are on the eve of its demonstration, — then life becomes for the first time grandly worth while ; for by this theory we are under the law of cause and effect in this What is it all for f 235 world, in regard to the development of each individual soul, and, when we step out into the next sphere, still the same God, still the same universal rule of cause and effect, still the same infinite opportunity, still the same broad field for personal culture, personal achievement, personal growth; each soul left free under the guidance of God to learn the meaning, the sublimity, and win the victory of life for itself ; all under the guidance of God, enfolded in his clasping wis- dom and love, so that no man in any world can go beyond his care, no man can escape his compulsion, that compul- sion that does not interfere with freedom, but presses upon us with invitation to good, and will teach us the meaning, the dignity, the grandeur, the sweetness of life, so that we shall choose the right and turn away with loathing from that which we have learned to be wrong. Is there any fact in all the past that is not easily explica- ble in the light of this theory ? For, as I have had occasion to tell you in the course of these sermons that I have been giving to you, it is inconceivable to us that the body should be developed except as the result of effort, the attempt to overcome obstacles. It is inconceivable that the mind should be developed, that knowledge should be acquired, except as the result of experience with ignorance, mistakes, failures, the overcoming of obstacles. So it is equally incon- ceivable that the moral nature in us should be developed except by experience with evil, except as the result of strug- gle, as the result of effort, as the result of the overcoming of obstacles. In the light of this theory, look back ; take the ages of the world when they were in the period of savagery and barbarism, when life meant so little. They were still under the guidance of the same God. Man was ever learning the meaning of life. All the struggle, all the battle, and slavery 236 Life and evil of every kind were only helping the culture and development of the soul. The soul that was separated from the object of its love is conscious that that object of love is not lost, but waits somewhere for reunion. That soul that walked alone and found no mate is conscious that somewhere, somehow, that yearning of the soul shall be satisfied. Why, we have learned enough to know that to-day heart can answer to heart half-way round the globe ! I be- lieve that love is that gravity of souls that will sweep into one orbit, sometime and somewhere, all those that belong to- gether. And so the martyrs, all those who have died for the betterment of the race, are somewhere overlooking the scene, rejoicing in the results of their pain and their sacrifice, over- looking the scene, perhaps, side by side with him of whom the New Testament writer says that "for the joy that was set before him he endured the cross, despising the shame." An outcome like this seems to me grandly worth while ; and if we may hold it, as I think we most reasonably may, then I for one believe that, looking over the history of the world and blinking none of its ugly facts, we may be able to discover that in the light of it we may find adequate and satisfactory solution to this question, What is it all for ? Let me suggest to you one thought more. I have been telling you something about the want of the heart, the want of the conscience, the want of the brain, their demand for sat- isfaction. Now note this one thought ; for it seems to me that it is a very profound one, reaching down even to the very roots of things, and yet high enough to measure heaven itself. On any theory of the universe you please to hold, I am here, a thinking being, a being with a conscience that demands justice, with a heart that demands love. (I speak of myself only as representing the race.) Where did this What is it all for? 237 thought, this conscience, this heart, come from ? It is the child and creation of the universe on any theory, whether there is a God or is not. There must be something in the universe that corresponds to and is capable of producing the brain, the conscience, the heart of man. How did they come here ? They are here, and are living, eternal witnesses to the thought, the conscience, the heart of things, as I be- lieve. And they are prophecies, since they are the expression of the nature of things, and since they demand the perfect thought and love and right. I hold that they are proph- ecies of that which the world has been seeking from the first, is seeking to-day, and in the nature of things must seek forever. «3k 3PS 4 ;Jr! *v *fi".K- ! .**- ^ ■#v, £jf ^w^