COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM 
 THE BROWNINGS 
 
 BY 
 
 AMORY H. BRADFORD, D.D. 
 
 Author of 
 
 *' Spirit and Life," "Heredity and Christian Problems," "The 
 
 Growing Revelation," etc. 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO. 
 
 PUBLISHERS 
 
2.^"^ 
 
 
 15671 
 
 Library of CorKiress 
 
 Two Copies Received 
 JUL 7 1900 
 
 Copyright enitiy 
 
 SECOND COPY. 
 
 Of-liveirtl \(\ 
 
 ORDLR DIVISION, 
 
 AUG 3 1900 
 
 
 Copyright, 1900, 
 Bv TuoMAfe Y. Ckoweli. <<t Company, 
 
i SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE 
 BROWNINGS 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE 
 BROWNINGS. 
 
 I. REVELATION BY LIFE. 
 
 A lesson from Robert Broivning. 
 
 The noblest and most inspiring religious teachers in 
 all ages and lands have conveyed their messages through 
 the medium of poetry. Theology always runs in a pro- 
 saic mould ; ethics is very likely to take the form of 
 apothegm ; but the truth which inspires, which is the 
 result of vision rather than of reasoning, usually finds 
 poetic expression. The greatest of the prophets and the 
 most persuasive of the preachers have all been poets ; 
 but all poets have not been preachers and prophets. 
 The earliest manifestations of religious feeling are poems, 
 like the hymns of the Vedas. The Hebrew prophets 
 were all sublime poets. Sometimes their visions were 
 voiced in the Hebrew parallelisms, and sometimes in 
 prose-poems, but both vision and diction were always of 
 the nature of poetry. It is possible to go a step farther and 
 to say that most great poets have been profoundly relig- 
 ious. Dante, Milton, Wordsworth, Tennyson, the Brown- 
 ings, and Whittier were all in the truest sense prophets. 
 If any in these modern centuries have uttered the truth 
 of God in enduring words, they have been such authors 
 as these, no " idle singers of an empty day,'' but " min- 
 strels who walked the earth with their singing robes 
 
 5 
 
6 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 around them." They have been voices for the Spirit. 
 The message of no prophet ever rang more truly to the 
 music of love to God and man than do the songs of 
 Whittier; no teacher has spoken more clearly of the 
 immortal life and " the eternal hope " than Tennyson ; 
 the apostle John was not more intensely and nobly 
 mystical than was Eobert Browning ; and no prophetess 
 or Sibyl was ever more evidently filled with a divine 
 passion than was Mrs. Browning. 
 
 In this little book I shall endeavor to emphasize two 
 or three of the many spiritual lessons which the Brown- 
 ings have taught the world. My object is not a study 
 of these poets as religious teachers. That would require 
 a volume of more imposing proportions, for one of them 
 was a profoundly mystical theologian, and the other was 
 an intensely practical preacher. My purpose is exposi- 
 tion rather than investigation. 
 
 Among the poems of Bobert Browning is one which 
 may be called an echo of the sermon on Mars Hill. 
 " Cleon " is a supposed letter from a Greek poet, artist, 
 and philosopher to his patron king. It begins with a 
 recognition of the munificence and nobility of Protus, 
 who had sent rich gifts to Cleon. Evidently in response 
 to some inquiry of his king, Cleon recites his own 
 achievements as a poet, painter, and architect ; and this 
 leads to the thought that he could not claim all the credit 
 for his skill as an artist, but that it was the fruit of long 
 ages of discipline and growth in others. Very quickly 
 he comes to what the blind poet-preacher of Scotland, Dr. 
 George Mathewson, has called the distinctive character- 
 istic of all religions, viz., their teaching concerning in- 
 carnation. To this well-nigh universal faith Browning 
 represents Cleon as giving expression in the following 
 lines : 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 7 
 
 " Long since I imaged, wrote the fiction out, 
 That he [Zeus] or other God descended here, 
 And, once for all, showed simultaneously 
 What, in its nature, never can be shown 
 Piecemeal, or in succession ; showed, I say, 
 The worth, both absolute and relative. 
 Of all his children from the birth of time, 
 His instruments for all appointed Avork." 
 
 This passage, in which Browning represents a pagan 
 as dimly anticipating the incarnation in Jesus Christ, 
 has scriptural expression in the Gospel of John — " And 
 the word became flesh and dwelt among us." Cleon 
 imagined that God had descended to the earth. Men 
 have always and everywhere desired a manifested God. 
 That desire, in almost all lands, has sooner or later as- 
 sumed the proportions of faith. The two great mystics, 
 the apostle John and Robert Browning, are in entire har- 
 mony at this point. " Only the good discerns the good," 
 says Mrs. Browning; and we paraphrase it and say, 
 " Only God discerns God." 
 
 If God is to be known by us He must reveal Himself 
 to us; when He does this there is that in all men 
 which recognizes Him. There is never any difficulty 
 in determining what things belong to God and what to 
 man. The stars are God's work ; the frescoes in a cathe- 
 dral are man's work. Flowers are from the hands of God ; 
 imitations in wax and glass are made by man. Forests 
 every autumn burn with the glory of God ; houses are 
 erected by man. In other words, we easily distinguish 
 some things as human products and others as from 
 a divine author. You find this idea of a Deity reveal- 
 ing himself in the poems of Homer and in the hymns 
 of the Vedas. Browning's pagan was not the only 
 one who has dreamed that God descended. To this ex- 
 
8 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 pectancy in humaiiity He comes, aud is recognized 
 as God. However much some may insist that Jesus 
 Christ was only human, they never deny that His es- 
 sential spiritual characteristics were those of the Deity. 
 ^^ No one by searching has found out God.'' We cannot 
 find Him, but we may recognize Him. Is it reasonable 
 to suppose that all men would be created with facul- 
 ties for discerning the Divine, and never be given an 
 opportunity for using them ? Eobert Browning teaches 
 that the ^' desire of all nations " became reality in the 
 Christian revelation in Jesus Christ — the supreme 
 and only adequate disclosure of Deity in terms of human 
 life. 
 
 But we are hardly more ignorant concerning Deity 
 than concerning ourselves ; and yet we can never know 
 ourselves by studying ourselves. We may learn some- 
 thing of what we are at one period of time, but we can- 
 not learn what we were intended to be. If you find a 
 thousand pieces of china scattered by the roadside you 
 have no conception of the beauty of a K-oyal Worcester 
 vase. If you study those pieces separately you may 
 discover that they are fragments of something artistic, but 
 you must see the whole vase before you will have a vision 
 of " the thing of beauty." Likewise if we would know 
 what we are ideally, we must have before our eyes some- 
 thing besides our own poor experience, with our failures, 
 mistakes, weaknesses, and often wilful wrong-doing. 
 If we study ourselves we see fragments of manhood, or, 
 at best, manhood unfinished ; we do not see ourselves in 
 our possibilities and ideal relations. 
 
 If a man ever knows himself he must be permitted to 
 see — if we may so speak — the plan according to which 
 he was made. And if we ever know God He must 
 condescend to our limitations and within them reveal 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FBOM THE BROWNINGS. 9 
 
 Himself. If we ever know ourselves, our ideal selves must 
 come to our actual selves in a form the reality of which 
 cannot be doubted. Cleon seems to have grasped this fact. 
 The God who, to his imagination, " descended " showed 
 " simultaneously," that is, all at once, what could never 
 have been understood if the truth had been given " piece- 
 meal." The illustration of the vase will help us once 
 more. If one piece of china and then another are ex- 
 amined the beauty of the whole design will never be 
 appreciated. For that the -peviect vase must be seen. 
 And so one noble desire, another holy aspiration, another 
 heroic act, will never make plain what we were really 
 intended to be ; the whole plan must needs be disclosed. 
 And then we are related to beings above us and to other 
 beings around us. The lines which connect us with 
 persons and things above and around run away into 
 darkness. Who shall tell whither they lead ? We 
 have never yet been able to reach far into the mysteries j 
 they elude discovery ; they are objects for revelation. 
 Jesus Christ was a man, and yet a true Son of God. 
 He was the typical man, what we were intended to be, 
 and what we will be when time and discipline have done 
 their work. He was also brother to all men : He entered 
 fully and sympathetically into the human condition, and 
 this shows that our true relation to our fellow-men is 
 that of brothers. These simple truths could not be 
 made plain in words : they required to be expressed in 
 terms of life. Brotherhood even now is regarded, by 
 many, as an iridescent dream ; but no one fails to ap- 
 preciate a warm-hearted, generous, self-denying brother. 
 We speak of God ; but our eyes have never seen Him, 
 our ears have never heard Him, we cannot find Him, 
 but He may come to us and make himself known. The 
 "heathen" hoped that He would do this; the Chris- 
 
10 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 tian says: "He has done it." Jesus Christ is the ideal 
 man, and therefore all the revelation of God and of the 
 perfected race that it is possible for our poor faculties to 
 compass. This Robert Browning teaches. 
 
 Cleon dreamed of a God who would use men as instru- 
 ments for all appointed work. That, also, is a thought 
 which is of the substance of the Christian revelation. 
 Jesus taught that all men were intended to be what He 
 was. Behind this teaching there is a profound philoso- 
 phy, since all that the world will know about Deity must 
 come through man, or at least through something human. 
 If God has a special speech of His own, in His inter- 
 course with men He must lay it aside and use our lan- 
 guage, because we cannot understand anything which is 
 not human. Therefore men are the vehicles of all reve- 
 lations to men. The Bible is the word of God in so far 
 as that word could be written in a book, but only a 
 small part of it could be thus written. Divine revelation 
 has to submit to human limitations. Whatever is re- 
 vealed of God, of the spiritual spheres, of the divine will, 
 must be through the media of thought, words, deeds, or 
 character, and these have no existence apart from human 
 beings. Man is the organ ; the wind is from above, and 
 inspiration and revelation are the music which results 
 when the divine breath fills the human faculties ; but the 
 human faculties are as essential as the divine breath. 
 
 Men are God's agents in all inspiration. By inspira- 
 tion I mean not only the passion and vision of Isaiah, 
 Paul, and John, but all that leads others to think great 
 thoughts and undertake noble enterprises. General Gor- 
 don was inspired in his wonderful achievements in 
 China ; and when almost single-handed he withstood his 
 murderers in the desert until his death at Khartoum. 
 Abraham Lincoln and Alexander of Russia were divinely 
 
SPIBITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 11 
 
 guided to emancipate millions of slaves. rCaphael, when 
 he painted the " Madonna '' and the " Transfiguration," 
 was as truly inspired by the Almighty as John when 
 he wrote the Apocalypse. All heroic endeavor shows 
 traces of divine inspiration. Milton wrote '^ Paradise 
 Lost," Coleridge his " Hymn before Sunrise in the Vale 
 of Chamouni," Browning his " Cleon," Beethoven his 
 sonatas, and Angelo and Murillo painted their angels 
 and their saints, as they were moved by the spirit of 
 God. When our Father would multiply pictures of the 
 glory of nature and man He brings artists into being ; 
 when He would fill the world with music He pours into 
 elect souls the echoes of heavenly harmonies ; when He 
 would thrill men with song He gives to poets the vision 
 and the utterance divine. Cleon truly says, " Men are 
 His instruments for all appointed work." 
 
 All divine purposes for men are achieved through 
 men. When hoary evils are to be overthrown reformers 
 are raised up like Luther and Knox. Whirlwinds never 
 sweep away corrupt institutions, neither do they often 
 fall of themselves, but a few men have clear sight and 
 heroic courage, and these, seeing the evils which imperil 
 the common weal, attack and destroy them. The prisons 
 of Europe were made to approach decency through the 
 etforts of John Howard — a man so full of holy love 
 that it ran over in sacrificing service. Florence Night- 
 ingale revolutionized the war-hospitals of Europe and 
 thus immensely diminished the horrors of war ; and she 
 was only God's servant. 
 
 Sometimes, probably, the Divine Spirit moves directly 
 on human spirits, but, usually, if men are to be saved 
 some man must take to them the Word of Life. Blood- 
 less and impalpable propositions never helped the race 
 one step upward. Salvation is by man. Instead of 
 
12 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 silent influences from the invisible, missionaries have 
 taken the Gospel to their fellow-men, and not infre- 
 quently the truth would have been meaningless without 
 the messenger. 
 
 Municipal abuses are corrected by no Pentecostal 
 miracles. The wind may drive away the clouds and the 
 sun burn up vapors, but it required Octavia Hill and 
 John Kuskin to start the movement to secure better 
 dwellings for the poor of London; and Arnold Toynbee 
 and those who have come after him were needed to take 
 the life of the universities to the slums of Whitechapel 
 and the East Side of New York. The holy city may 
 descend out of heaven from God, but its walls will be 
 garnished by those who have learned their craft in the 
 school of earthly experience. 
 
 As evils are to be reformed ; as the Holy Gospel is to 
 be preached ; as better social conditions are to be created 
 by men, so also comfort and peace are to reach the deepest 
 individual needs through human agencies. The Apoca- 
 lypse contains hints of a time when God will wipe away 
 all tears, and bind up broken hearts. Did it ever occur 
 to you that God's way of wiping away tears and binding 
 up hearts that are broken is by human hands ? or that 
 the process has already begun ? It is going on even 
 now, not by the direct touch of the Almighty, but by 
 means of the soft palms and loving influences of those 
 whom we call brother and sister, father and mother, lover 
 and friend. This also is worthy of emphasis. There will 
 never be peace among the nations until there is peace 
 among individuals ; and there will be peace among men 
 only as those who have vision and strength minister to 
 those who have not. The better days are surely com- 
 ing ; evil will be overthrown ; the Word of Life will 
 reach into all lands; Hope in morning robes will drive 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 13 
 
 despair into the outer darkness ; civilization and brother- 
 hood will take the places of barbarism and selfishness ; 
 tears and sorrow will disappear, and all this will be 
 achieved by the love in human hearts, the music in 
 human voices, and the strength of human arms. But 
 now the question, at once practical and personal, arises 
 and presses for an answer : If God does His Avork 
 through human beings, are we worthy to be used by Him ? 
 If He should desire our help in destroying evil, are our 
 hearts pure enough, and our lives holy enough, for a ser- 
 vice so transcendent ? If He would have us speak of 
 Christ to others, will they see Him in us ? If words of 
 comfort and peace are needed by those whose eyes are 
 filled with tears, and whose hearts are breaking with 
 sorrow, are we sympathetic and genuine enough for so 
 holy a ministry ? 
 
 These are some of the thoughts suggested as we study 
 one brief passage from Robert Browning's " Cleon," and 
 go back of the poem to the Scripture on which it is 
 founded, and read of the Word made flesh, who dwelt on 
 the earth, full of grace and truth. The "desire of all 
 nations " is realized in God revealed not " piecemeal " or 
 "in succession," but "simultaneously," in the perfect 
 Man who is the type of all men and who has shown that 
 all are God's " instruments for all appointed work." 
 
 II. THE SECRET OF SERVICE. 
 A Lesson from Mrs. Browning. 
 
 The truths which I have traced in Eobert Brown- 
 ing's "Cleon" find equally vivid though far different 
 expression in the works of Mrs. Browning. The hus- 
 band was speculative and philosophical; the wife was 
 intense and practical. The husband wrote as one who 
 
14 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 had a mystery to be solved; the wife as one who had 
 discerned the only way in which a difficulty might be 
 overcome ; and both alike as those who had learned that 
 the revelation of God in terms of humanity throws the 
 only light on the human problem which is really 
 luminous. 
 
 Leigh Hunt called Elizabeth Barrett Browning " Ten- 
 nyson's sister." Some one else has called her " Shake- 
 speare's daughter." She was, I think, the greatest 
 poetess who has ever lived. It has been said that she 
 had ^' a soul of fire in a body of pearl." No one was ever 
 more sensitive to sorrow and pain. She was like a harp, 
 and responded to the slightest breath of aspiration or of 
 suffering. Her song was strong, clear, and sometimes 
 terribly intense; again, it was soft and sweet as love 
 itself. It was pervaded with trust in God and confi- 
 dence in the triumph of His kingdom. Concerning her 
 religious faith, Mrs. Browning wrote to Leigh Hunt, " I 
 believe in the divinity of Christ in the intensest sense, 
 that He was God absolutely. But for the rest, I am 
 very unorthodox about the spirit, the flesh, and the 
 devil."' Among her poems the longest is "Aurora 
 Leigh," which is at once a novel, a social study, a poem, 
 and a glorious hymn to pure love. It has been called by 
 Taine the greatest long poem in the language — greater 
 even than " Paradise Lost." Others have regarded it as 
 crude, unfinished, extravagant. I think it is one of the 
 few really great poems of our English literature, and 
 that means of the world's literature. Aurora was the 
 daughter of a Florentine mother and an English father. 
 In her childhood she was brought, an orphan, to England, 
 to live with an aunt who was critically formal and pre- 
 cise, and who little understood the impulsive girl who 
 
 1 Memoirs, p. xxxv. 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 15 
 
 loved beauty, and into whose soul had already gone the 
 tenderness of Italian skies and the sweetness of Italian 
 flowers. In that home was a cousin who in due time 
 loved Aurora, or dreamed that he did ; but he was absorbed 
 with social schemes and wanted a wife to help him in his 
 work. The proud and splendid woman loved in return, 
 but would have no such love as was offered to her. They 
 separated — Romney Leigh oppressed by the weight of 
 the world's misery, and thinking that Providence was 
 dependent for its alleviation on him ; Aurora to dream 
 her dreams and sing her songs, and to wait for her vindi- 
 cation in the future. After ten years, chastened by 
 many failures and deep sorrows, they once more told 
 their love, and found that neither had ceased to long for 
 the other. On this slender thread is strung wisdom, 
 wondrous poetry, and truth profounder than philosophies 
 often teach. Eomney, speaking of his work for the out- 
 cast, says : 
 
 '' But I, I sympathize with man, not God; 
 I think I was a man for chiefly this : 
 And when I stand beside a dying bed, 
 It's death to me. . . 
 And I, a man, as men are now, and not 
 As men may be hereafter, feel with men 
 In the agonizing present." 
 
 Such identification with the sufferings of others is essen- 
 tial to good work for humanity. He who does not feel 
 another's sorrows as if they were his own can never do 
 much in the way of-relief . But what motive is strong 
 enough to inspire such identification with troubles not 
 our own ? This is the answer : 
 
 *•' The hungry beggar boy . . . 
 Contains, himself, both flowers and firmaments, 
 And surging seas and aspeetable stars, 
 
16 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 And all that we Avould push jjim out of sight 
 
 In order to see nearer. Let us pray 
 
 God's grace to keep God's image in repute." 
 
 To see God's image in every man is to find inspiration 
 for service that can never weary. Much effort at social 
 amelioration is mere philanthropic dilettantism because 
 persons are confused with things. Aurora held that the 
 worst and weakest are children of God. 
 
 The necessity of the incarnation in order that men may 
 be reached and inspired with heavenly aspirations con- 
 denses Mrs. Browning's philosophy and theology. 
 
 "• 'T is impossible 
 To get at men excepting through their souls, 
 However open their carnivorous jaAvs ; 
 The soul 's the way. Not even Christ himself 
 Can save man else than as He holds man's soul ; 
 And therefore did He come into our flesh, 
 As some wise hunter creeping on his knees 
 With a torch, into the blackness of some cave. 
 To face and quell the beast there, — take the soul, 
 And 80 possess the whole man, body and soul." 
 
 I now quote the very heart of the poem as a social 
 study : 
 
 '■'• * The man most man, with tendereet human hands, 
 Works best for men, — as God in Nazareth.' . . . 
 ■He paused upon the word, and then resumed : 
 ' Fewer programmes : we who have no prescience. 
 Fewer systems : we who are held and do not hold. 
 Less mapping out of masses, to be saved 
 By nations, or by sexes. Fourier 's void. 
 And Comte is dwarfed, — and Cabet puerile. 
 Subsists no law of life outside of life ; 
 No perfect manners without Christian souls : 
 The Christ himself had been no Lawgiver, 
 Unless He had given the life, too, with the law.'" 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 17 
 
 These noble teachings concerning the methods by 
 which the outcast and depraved are to be reached and 
 uplifted are but an elaboration of the second chapter of 
 Hebrews. " The man most man, with tenderest human 
 hands, works best for men, — as God in Nazareth," — is 
 an echo of earlier words. Mrs. Browning's social phil- 
 osophy is identical with the theology of the New Tes- 
 tament. It was necessary that the Saviour should be 
 made like His brethren in order that He might show 
 what humanity is destined to be. "God was in Christ;" 
 and God in varying degrees is in all men. If we were 
 what we might be, and may be in the long, long future, 
 God would be in us, as He was in Jesus. 
 
 Jesus said : " He that hath seen me hath seen the 
 Father ; " the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews 
 wrote : " It behooved Him in all things to be made like 
 unto His brethren." In other words, it was God's 
 duty to Himself to become man, for in no other way 
 could He realize Himself. Man, not only one man, is 
 designed to be the highest revelation of God. That 
 means that Jesus Christ was the pattern of every 
 "hungry beggar boy," every roue, and every tyrant 
 with his foot on the divine image. Few of us have yet 
 dreamed how far Christ's teaching goes; and, perhaps, 
 still fewer are ready to receive doctrines so radical and 
 revolutionary. 
 
 What were we designed to be ? At this point Mrs. 
 Browning is in agreement with her husband, only she 
 expresses her views with more of intensity and passion. 
 Jesus shows us in a human form what man must be when 
 God possesses Him. God is love, and love manifests 
 itself in service. He sees one blind, and can no more 
 be prevented from opening those eyes than the sun 
 from shining. He sees one burdened with guilt, and 
 
18 SPIBITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 can no more be kept from saying " Thy sins be forgiven 
 thee" than the sun can be kept from burning up the 
 mists. God is love, and when He has a large place in 
 a man that man has a hand for ragged children, as Guth- 
 rie had ; a head full of devices for the outcast poor, as 
 Shaftesbury had ; a consuming desire for the emancipa- 
 tion of the slaves, as Wilberf orce had ; a heart breaking 
 for those in sin, as John Wesley had. In the most un- 
 selfish and loving spirits we see hints of what humanity 
 will sometime be. Jesus differs from other men in that 
 He is as full a revelation of the divine as is possible in 
 humanity. Every human being, according to ability and 
 opportunity, may be a medium for the manifestation of 
 God. And more than this — God has always been in 
 humanity. Precisely as this truth is recognized are in- 
 dividuals inspired to heroic and holy service. Who is 
 that wretch wallowing in vice and drunkenness ? Who 
 is that child in an environment which makes virtue im- 
 possible ? Who is that woman shivering, alone, swal- 
 lowing her tears, asking : " Which is more to be dreaded, 
 the cold waters, or the colder hearts of those who will 
 not see what is crushing me ? " Just as he is, that 
 drunkard has something divine in him. In that dirty, 
 boisterous boy is something which takes hold of Beth- 
 lehem, Calvary, and the throne of God, and which is 
 capable of endless growth. That woman stained and 
 soiled has been w^ronged, crushed by the ones who ought 
 to have protected her; she is an outcast from the social 
 order, but she is the sister of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, 
 the Son of God. The Psalmist cried: "Whither shall I 
 flee from Thy presence ? If I ascend up into heaven, 
 Thou art there : If I make my bed in hell, behold Thou 
 art there. If I take the Avings of the morning and 
 dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 19 
 
 shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold 
 me/' 
 
 Jesus goes a step farther. He teaches that the God who 
 is on the horizon of the sea, and in the abysses of the 
 under world, is also in the depths of humanity ; that He 
 is in all, white and black, good and bad, educated and 
 ignorant, and that the cross is the only adequate hint of 
 the worth of a man. This I hold to be a vital truth, and 
 one greatly needing emphasis. There is a diamond " in 
 every hungry beggar boy " and in every polluted wreck 
 of manhood. Jesus in Himself is the revelation of what 
 in some far-off time all may become ; He is the altitude 
 which the race will reach in the fulness of the ages. 
 "Alas, long-sufeering and most patient God, 
 Thou need'st be surelier God to bear with us 
 Than even to have made us ! Thou aspire, aspire 
 From henceforth for me ! Thou who hast thyself 
 Endured this fleshhood, knowing how, as a soaked 
 And sucking vesture, it would drag us down 
 And choke us in the melancholy Deep, 
 Sustain me, that, with thee, I walk these waves 
 Resisting ! breathe me upward, thou for me 
 Aspiring, who art the way, the truth, the life — 
 That no truth henceforth seem indifferent. 
 No way to truth laborious, and no life, 
 Not even this I live, intolerable." 
 
 No one who is great in power alone can get near 
 enough to suffering human hearts to inspire them with 
 aspirations for holiness. Why is a mother sympathetic ? 
 Because her child is part of her very self. She car- 
 ries its griefs as her own, and has travelled the way 
 along which her loved one is walking. Who are the 
 most helpful in sorrow ? Always those who have suf- 
 fered. " My heart is breaking — who are you that you 
 presume to advise me ? " ^^ But, my friend, I have been 
 
20 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 where you are myself ; last year I lost my fortune ; six 
 months ago I buried my wife ; three months ago I laid 
 my little one by her mother's side. I am all alone and 
 poor, and I want to tell you that T have found these words 
 divinely true : ' He hath borne our griefs and carried our 
 sorrows.' " Community in sorrow opens the door at 
 once. " Come in, my brother. Show me the secret of 
 your peace." Precisely because our elder Brother has 
 been where we are, and knows all the way in which we 
 move, He has attraction and inspiration for us. 
 
 Doubts, like clouds from the nether abyss, sweep into 
 our horizon, and we cry, " If God is, I cannot find Him ; 
 if forgiveness is possible, I cannot realize it ; if life is 
 anything but mockery, I cannot understand it." In the 
 midst of our perplexity two liien come to us. One says : 
 " You ought to put away those doubts. You are deny- 
 ing the Saviour who died for you." The other says : 
 "Be patient, my brother, I have had experiences like 
 yours. Do not do anything rash ; wait to be led. I 
 know there is no gloom more terrible than yours, for I 
 have been in the same cloud ; but by and by the light will 
 dawn. Be sure of one thing — if there is a God, and you 
 are really seeking Him, He will not allow you to fail 
 of finding Him." Which of these will be the more likely 
 to help us ? If God is to command our wills, dispel our 
 griefs, and save us from our sins He must show that He 
 appreciates our difficulties. This the Christian revela- 
 tion teaches that He has done : " He was made perfect 
 through suffering." He was so hungry that He was 
 tempted to turn stones into bread ; so poor that He had 
 no house in which to sleep ; He lost friends by death ; 
 He was whipped until His back ran blood ; He hung all 
 day with nails driven through His quivering flesh ; He 
 was misunderstood, abused, lied about, and thus, having 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 21 
 
 been made " like unto His brethren," He was fitted to be 
 not only their sympathizing friend, but their Saviour. 
 '^ Son of God, was ever grief like thine ? " When the 
 dark days come, as come they sometime will, you will 
 realize how divine is the music which eclioes among the 
 ruins of your life, as you catch the accents of these sacred 
 words, "He hath borne our griefs. ... In all their afflic- 
 tions He was afflicted." '^ But when I seek to be faithful 
 to truth, as I see it, I am met by abuse and shame ; it is 
 enough to discourage any one." Yes, but death did not 
 shake His loyalty to truth. " I try to help others, and 
 for love hate is returned." Yes, and so it was with Him 
 who prayed for those who drove the nails. " I am 
 utterly crushed by disappointment and anxiety, and no 
 one cares." Yes, some one cares. He who is a man of 
 sorrows and acquainted with grief. He cares. I have 
 been interested to observe that this truth of the sympa- 
 thizing God appeals to men quite as much as to women. 
 Perhaps it is because they have quite as much need of 
 sympathy. A man's solitude sometimes seems more 
 desolate than a woman's, possibly because he is less sen- 
 sitive to the reality of the Unseen. 
 
 There is a God of all comfort because there has first 
 been a long-suffering and compassionate God. The real- 
 ization of this fact is the coronation of the human expe- 
 rience. Because she appreciated this so intensely Mrs. 
 Browning was able to write, in " De Prof undis," 
 
 ' '• And having in thy life-depth thrown 
 Being and suffering (which are one). 
 As a child drops his pebble small 
 Down some deep well, and hears it fall 
 Smiling, so I. Thy days go on." 
 
 This world is to be saved by life. "The man mosi; 
 man, with tenderest human hands, works best for men, 
 
22 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS, 
 
 — as God in Nazareth." And how did God work in Naza- 
 reth ? By getting for Himself a lodgement in one per- 
 fect human heart and then living divinely within human 
 limitations. " Fewer programmes/' " fewer systems." 
 
 " Subsists no law of hfe outside of life ; 
 No perfect manners without Christian souls : 
 The Christ Himself had been no Lawgiver, 
 Unless He had given the life, too, with the law." 
 
 For weary ages philosophers had tried to solve the 
 problems of misery, sin, and death ; many plans for in- 
 dividual and social improvement had been devised, and 
 as the result of the long process of speculation most 
 thinkers had come to believe that the mysteries were in- 
 soluble ; that the best that any could do was to get 
 through the world with as little trouble to themselves 
 and as little annoyance to others as possible. Then 
 Jesus Christ came with his new method of salvation by 
 life. His plan was to impart His life to others. He se- 
 lected a dozen workingmen, kept them with Him until 
 they had something of His spirit and vision ; told them 
 to do to others as He had done to them, and then closed 
 His career by being put to death for loyalty to His great 
 love. When compared with our ways of attempting 
 large enterprises His plan seems stupendous absurdity ; 
 but how magnificently it has worked ! One life touched 
 other lives with its vitality and power; brooded over 
 them until they were ready to do the same to others ; 
 they reached still others and imparted to them what they 
 had received, and the process has gone on ever since. 
 The history of Christianity is the history of the growth 
 of the divine life into human lives and human society. 
 An unknown Jew landed in Europe and began a move- 
 ment which, quickly, was too big for Him to compass. He 
 
SPIBITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BUOWNINGS. 23 
 
 preached to a few, but His words had wings. Many heard 
 them and read them, and they in turn repeated the mes- 
 sage, and sped it along until the map of the civilized world 
 was changed. This is the miracle of miracles. An appar- 
 ently unknown, uneducated Jewish peasant, who, after 
 a short, ignominious career was executed as a criminal, 
 has become the centre and inspiration of a movement 
 which is filling the earth with light and love. The sun 
 rose on the world when Jesus was born. Where He is 
 followed mercy and justice walk hand in hand ; where He 
 is worshipped pure homes and gentle service make do- 
 mestic life beautiful ; where His words are heeded death 
 loses its depressing and bewildering power. The Incar- 
 nation teaches that God's method of salvation is by life. 
 We may try to trace the movements of life, but it is as 
 independent of our theories as tropical vines are of trel- 
 lises. We may think to shut it within some holy sym- 
 bol, but it will break in pieces the symbol as a growing 
 seed will split a rock. It is life that men need, the 
 touch of living sympathy, the thrill of heavenly hope, 
 inspiration to noble service, the vision of eternal possi- 
 bilities, and this life always comes from above. We need 
 not more sermons, but more men so genuine that lies 
 will not stick to them. Not arguments for Christianity, 
 but men in business and women in society pure as light, 
 sympathetic as love, honest as truth, human as Christ, 
 are the means by which this world is to be saved. 
 
 " It behooved Him in all things to be made like unto 
 His brethren." 
 
 '' The man most man, with tenderest human hands, 
 Works best for men, — as God in Nazareth." 
 
 Humanity has in it something divine; therefore no 
 service for man is lost. 
 
24 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 All who have sinned and all who have suffered may 
 see in Jesus Christ what they were intended to be, and 
 in Him they may see also the sympathy and sacrifice of 
 God. 
 
 The divine method of saving the world is by the im- 
 partation of life, and the growth of the kingdom of God 
 is the growth of that life into the hearts and lives of 
 men. 
 
 Mrs. Browning's faith in the reality of the incarnation 
 was the result of her intense sensitiveness to the sor- 
 rows of humanity. Her sympathy was the prophecy of 
 the victory of the love and compassion which she dis- 
 cerned at the heart of the universe. To her practical 
 mind the ideas of God and of the better time for the race 
 were inseparably bound together. She could not even 
 imagine a Deity who would not reveal Himself to His 
 children crying in the darkness to know " wherefore they 
 were born." 
 
 If this subject were always approached from the side 
 of human need, rather than from that of speculation^ 
 there would be few who would not reach Mrs. Browning's 
 conclusions. 
 
 III. HALF TRUTHS AXD THE TRUTH. 
 
 A Lesson from Robert Browning. 
 
 I PROPOSE in this chapter to consider a subject which 
 is suggested with about equal emphasis in Eobert Brown- 
 ing's " Cleon " and in Paul's sermon on Mars Hill. Paul 
 was in Athens. About him were the remnants of the 
 most wonderful civilization the world had seen. He 
 was surrounded by descendants of philosophers, poets, 
 artists. In full view were the Acropolis and Parthenon. 
 Socrates had walked those streets, and under whispering 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 25 
 
 trees near by Plato had led his disciples. In sight of 
 the place where he stood may have been some of the 
 creations of Phidias ; and certainly those very walls had 
 echoed with the impassioned appeals of Demosthenes and 
 the polished periods of Pericles. Among such scenes 
 Paul found an altar with the inscription : " To an un- 
 known god," and by a reference to it began his address 
 on Mars Hill. 
 
 There were several such altars in that city. Their 
 origin is not known. " It is related that Epimenides put 
 an end to a plague, and therefore one may find at Athens 
 altars without the designation of a god by name. From 
 this particular instance the general view may be derived 
 that, on important occasions, when reference to a god 
 known by name was wanting, as in public calamities of 
 which no definite god could be assigned as the author, in 
 order to honor or propitiate the god concerned by sacri- 
 fice, without lighting on a wrong one, altars were erected 
 which were destined and designated ' To an unknown 
 god.' " ' 
 
 The beginning of the sermon on Mars Hill was a 
 recognition that there was an element of truth in pagan- 
 ism. Paul went directly to the reality beneath the in- 
 scription. The first part of the sermon is a proclamation 
 of the God who was not discerned by the Athenians. 
 The second part is a deduction from the first. If there 
 is one God who made heaven and earth and all the races 
 of men then all are related to Him, and should repent 
 and seek His favor. This declaration he clinched by 
 reference to one of the Greek poets, Aratos of Soli in 
 Cilicia, in the third century before Christ, who said, 
 "For we are His offspring." The same sentence is 
 found in the hymn of Cleanthes to Jupiter. The Athen- 
 
 1 Meyer's Commentar}'. 
 
26 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 ians had glimpses of the truth concerning God and of the 
 consequent unity and brotherhood of the race, but those 
 glimpses were so dim as to exercise little influence on 
 character. They were half truths, not the truth. 
 
 Robert Browning's "Cleon," a part of which has 
 already furnished us an important lesson, also illustrates 
 the subject at the head of this chapter. We have pre- 
 viously observed the emphasis which Browning placed 
 upon the truth that if men ever realize their possible 
 destiny it must be revealed to them in terms of life. In 
 other words, God Himself must manifest His purpose in 
 ways intelligible to human understanding. After the 
 brief but vital passage which touches on incarnation as 
 essential to revelation, we come to the heart of the poem. 
 Cleon writes : 
 
 '■'■ Thou askest . . . 
 Whether I fear death less than dost thyself, 
 The fortunate of men? ' For ' (writest thou) 
 ' Thou leavest much behind, while I leave naught. 
 Thy life stays in the poems men shall sing. 
 The pictures men shall study ; while my life, 
 Complete and whole now in its power and joy, 
 Dies altogether with my brain and arm, 
 Is lost indeed; since what survives myself ? 
 The brazen statue to o'erlook my grave. 
 Set on the promontory whicli I named. 
 And that — some supple courtier of my heir 
 Shall use its robed and sceptred arm, perhaps, 
 To fix the rope to, which best drags it down. 
 I go then ; triumph thou, who dost not go ! ' " 
 
 Thus we are introduced to the question of the ages, 
 " If a man die, shall he live again? " That pagan king 
 feared death. He thought when he died nothing of him 
 would remain because he possessed nothing but temporal 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 27 
 
 power. He even envied the poet whose songs would be 
 sung and pictures studied when his body should be dust. 
 
 '■^ In man there 's failure, only since he left 
 The lower and inconscious forms of life. 
 . . . We struggle, fain to enlarge 
 Our bounded physical recipiency. 
 Increase our power, supply fresh oil to life. 
 Repair the waste of age and sickness : no. 
 It skills not! life's inadequate to joy, 
 ..... agree, 
 
 king ! with thy profound discouragement, 
 
 Most progress is most failure ; thou sayest well." 
 
 This terrible sadness continues through a score or 
 more of lines, and then nature begins to assert itself : 
 
 '^ I, I the feeling, thinking, acting man, 
 The man who loved his life so overmuch, 
 Sleep in my urn. It is so horrible, 
 
 1 dare at times imagine to my need 
 Some future state revealed to us by Zeus, 
 Unlimited in capability 
 
 For joy, as this is in desire for joy. 
 
 To seek which, the joy hunger forces us : 
 
 . . . . But no ! 
 
 Zeus has not revealed it; and alas, 
 
 He must have done so were it possible ! " 
 
 Little did Cleon dream that at that very time the life 
 beyond death was being preached, and that there was 
 even then in G-reece one who had seen Him over whom 
 death had no power. 
 
 " , . . Farewell. And for the rest, 
 I cannot tell thy messenger aright 
 Where to deliver what he bears of thine 
 To one called Faulus : we have heard his fame ; 
 
28 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 Indeed if Christus be not one with him — 
 
 I know not, nor am troubled much to know, 
 
 Thou canst not think a mere barbarian Jew 
 
 As Paulus proves to be, one circumcised, 
 
 Hath access to a secret shut from us ? 
 
 Thou wrongest our philosophy, O king. 
 
 In stooping to inquire of such an one, 
 
 As if his answer could impose at all ! 
 
 He writeth, doth he? Well, and he may write. 
 
 Oh, the Jew findeth scholars ! certain slaves 
 
 Who touched on this same isle, preached him and Christ 
 
 And (as I gathered from a bystander) 
 
 Their doctrine could be held by no sane man." 
 
 Thus the poem ends. In it Robert Browning has 
 given expression to the longing for religious certainty 
 which was evident in the whole heathen world ; to the 
 desire for knowledge about God ; to the feeling that, if 
 He exists, He must in some way manifest Himself ; to 
 the deep and constant hunger of the soul to know 
 whether death ends all, and to the self-confidence which 
 so often shuts the eyes to the light when the day really 
 dawns. 
 
 The poem and the sermon on Mars Hill agree in recog- 
 nizing that the Athenians had some truth. They were 
 not in total darkness. They were in night, but the stars 
 were shining. Those altars to an unknown god indi- 
 cated a conviction of the reality of the invisible powers, 
 and were symbols of the longing of the race for God. 
 
 Other altars have borne witness to the same fact. On 
 Salisbury plains is Stonehenge, more marvellous than the 
 Gothic splendor of the cathedral near by. In the centre 
 of that solemn relic of ancient days is an altar. What 
 does it signify ? That in some ruder time men believed 
 in God and feared Him. Unknown He was, or to Him 
 human beings would never have been sacrificed ; but the 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 29 
 
 hearts of men reached beyond their ignorance and said, 
 " He must exist." Wherever men have begun to think 
 they have cried : " Oh, that I knew where T might find 
 Him ! " That cry indicates possession of a fraction of 
 the truth about the Deity. 
 
 The sermon of Paul revolves around the hunger of the 
 soul for God. The dominant thought of Eobert Brown- 
 ing's poem is the equally persistent craving for knowl- 
 edge concerning what follows death. Can life be " in- 
 adequate to joy," and there be no sphere in which joy is 
 possible ? Is it true that " most progress is most 
 failure " ? What terrible pathos lurks in the question, 
 " If a man die, shall he live again ? " When has it not 
 been asked ? Is there nothing for us but struggle, heart- 
 ache, disappointment, a little gladness, and then a narrow 
 space in the cold earth forever ? Protus asked Cleon 
 whether a poet feared death as much as a king ; and the 
 poet answered that he had reason to fear it more. The 
 heart says, " I dare imagine some future state revealed 
 to us ; " but cold, hard fact simply says, " Zeus has not 
 revealed it." 
 
 The subjects central in the sermon and the poem are 
 the poles around which the history of the world has re- 
 volved. 
 
 The Athenians whom Paul addressed had a half 
 truth ; the poet who speaks through Browning's words 
 had also part of a truth : his whole nature declared 
 that life did not end at the grave, and yet, because he had 
 no surer evidence, he heeded not the inner voice. 
 
 Half truths prove the truth. The crescent, as well as 
 the moon at its full, shows that the moon exists. After 
 a voyage of storm and fog the clouds lift and the hills of 
 Ireland appear. Only a small part is seen, but the voy- 
 ager could not be more confident that land has been 
 
30 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 sighted if he saw the whole " green isle." When Colum- 
 bus sought the new world his companions became dis- 
 couraged and clamored for home. He kept them from 
 turning back until drift-wood was seen on the waters : 
 they Avere then as sure of the new continent as if they 
 had seen it. Twenty miles at sea is a lighthouse. The 
 line of rocks is out of sight, but the lighthouse sends its 
 gleams far into the night ; and in fog the sound of its bell 
 never ceases. The mariner knows where he is and what 
 to do because of the light and the bell. 
 
 The crescent is only a part of the moon ; Ireland's 
 coast-line is but a hint of Ireland ; drift-wood is not 
 much like the new world; and a lighthouse does not 
 resemble a long line of concealed rocks : these are only 
 parts of truths, but they prove that reality lies behind 
 them. 
 
 The same principle holds in the moral and spiritual 
 spheres. 
 
 As soon as men begin to think, they face the idea of 
 God. It is imperfect — only a vast shadow 5 but where 
 there is shadow there must be substance. Where did the 
 thought of God first come from ? When did it appear ? 
 There are indications that men have always had glimpses 
 of a supreme power or person. The savage sees a spirit 
 in the storm ; in lightning, the flashing of an eye ; and 
 he hears a voice in reverberating thunder. Cicero said 
 that what has been believed always and everywhere is 
 the voice of the gods. A traveller catching sight of the 
 spires of Cologne Cathedral knows that there is something 
 great there, although he little dreams of the forests of 
 pillars and statues which rise in sculj^tured splendor 
 beneath. And we who everywhere see suggestions of love 
 lifted above the wretchedness and ignorance of human 
 life are sure that within the darkness is a Person. 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 31 
 
 The same reasoning applies to the idea of duty. The 
 people never existed who did not believe that they ought 
 to do right and ought not to do wrong ; but the questions 
 "What is right?" and "What is wrong?" have had 
 widely different answers. The Hindoo mother thought 
 it was right to throw her babe to the river-god ; the 
 Spartans thought it right to steal and wrong to be found 
 out; the Druids offered human sacrifices. Is there, 
 then, no right ? Because ideals of duty differ, is truth 
 a dream ? The Hindoo mother had only half the truth : 
 she was right in thinking she ought to obey the unseen 
 powers, but wrong in what she believed was required by 
 them. The Chinese are right in honoring their ancestors, 
 but they have not yet caught sight of the truth that God 
 is the Father of all. Men know that they ought to do right, 
 therefore there is such a thing as right. A dozen soldiers 
 hear an order to charge ; they go ahead, each one doing 
 what he is trained to do. Because they act differently, 
 it does not follow that no order has been given. Men 
 hear the voice of conscience saying, " Do right," and go 
 in a thousand different directions ; which only means 
 that each is loyal to his own moral sense — as he ought 
 to be. Different ideals of duty but emphasize the fact 
 that beneath all of them is a unity in which they 
 cohere. 
 
 And now we approach the subject of life beyond the 
 grave. The doctrine in some form has always and every- 
 where been held. The Egyptians believed it ; so did the 
 Greeks, the Romans, the ancient dwellers in Mexico, and 
 the American Indians. 
 
 Cleon said : 
 
 " I dare at times imagine to my need 
 Some future state revealed to us." 
 
32 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 An inner voice declares that we were made for some- 
 thing better than death. That voice will not be silenced. 
 We make our philosophies and talk about returning to 
 the All, as do flowers, leaves, forests ; but the voice within 
 says, " It cannot be." We hear the matchless music of 
 Beethoven's symphonies and ask, " Will that music live 
 and thrill for a thousand years, even though Beethoven 
 has long since returned to dust ? " Is the man less than 
 his art ? We look into the face of the Sistine Madonna 
 and inquire, " Can Ave believe that that painting has won 
 admiration for three centuries, while he who painted it 
 has long since ceased to exist ? " Was Raphael more 
 ephemeral than the colors he mixed ? This question 
 contains one-half the truth concerning immortality. It 
 is man crying, " I cannot die ; " there is lacking only the 
 response of the Divine voice, " Thou shalt never die." 
 
 It is impossible to think of an object unlike anything 
 which ever existed. The mind never actually creates. 
 Imaginations are but reflections of realities. 
 
 There have been in all ages and among all nations ideas 
 of God, of duty, of life unhindered by death : where did 
 they come from ? These thoughts, however faint, prove 
 that behind each half truth is a corresponding truth. 
 
 " Our little systems have their day, 
 They have their day, and cease to be ; 
 They are but broken lights of Thee, 
 And thou, O Lord, art more than they." 
 
 Half truths and no more leave us in darkness. The 
 Athenian idea of an unknown God left room for the 
 doctrine of many gods. In all the streams were 
 nymphs, in all the trees were dryads ; there was a god 
 for the sea, another for war, another for love ; highest 
 of all was Zeus, and all the deities were at last subject 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 33 
 
 to the fateS; so that it is difficult to say what the Greek 
 theology really was. The faith was full of poetry; it 
 glorified nature ; it did not lack reverence, but it lacked 
 conscience. Its votaries lived among glorious hills, 
 beside swift rivers, near the " far-resounding sea," 
 beneath tender skies, and in a climate that wooed to 
 constant dreams. There was in their religion no clear 
 idea of an Almighty who ruled in justice, and would 
 surely cause holiness to prevail. They thought of 
 themselves as possible friends, or enemies, of a thou- 
 sand divinities. They had a hint of the fact that they 
 were the offspring of G-od, but there they halted and 
 the result was sensualism. 
 
 Turn now to Browning's poem. Cleon felt within him- 
 self the thrills of immortal life. When his soul had a 
 chance to assert itself, it cried, " I must live, aud con- 
 tinue to sing, and paint, and build, and make glad the 
 hearts of men ; " but then the darkness closed, and, from 
 the dream-tower that he had climbed, he cried : 
 
 '< . . . But alas! 
 The soul now climbs it just to perish there. 
 . . . I . . . agree, 
 O king, with thy profound discouragement, 
 Who seest the wider but to sigh the more, 
 Most progress is most failure ; thou sayest well." 
 
 We are made to live, yet are condemned to die : this 
 was the conclusion of those who had no clear revelation 
 of God, and no light on the future, except the longing of 
 their own hearts. 
 
 In a sense it is true that those who have only half 
 truth are no better than those who have none. And yet 
 we must discriminate, for no one has more than a partial 
 view of anything. It is not the fractional view which 
 
does the harm, but mistaking that half for the whole. 
 The spirit of man is always more than what he pos- 
 sesses. Many of the most heroic souls have had limited 
 knowledge. Men of action require intensity rather than 
 largeness of vision. The question of how we use what 
 light we have is more important than the amount which 
 has dawned upon us. 
 
 Those who hold a part of a truth firmly, except in rare 
 cases, make up for lack of vision by positiveness of con- 
 viction. The bigots of all ages have been those who were 
 true to what they saw, and yet who saw but little. 
 They have had glimpses of justice and none of love, or 
 of love and not of justice. They are usually good, but 
 seldom do good. Enthusiasts have wide visions, and are 
 filled with great inspirations, but fanatics and bigots 
 usually compensate for lack of knowledge by dogmatic 
 assertion. The larger the view of God and the universe 
 the finer and sweeter the life, and the nobler and more 
 inspiring the influence. 
 
 Most men hold to half truths instead of the truth be- 
 cause they are not willing to learn. Protus had heard of 
 Paul and Christ, and had asked his learned friend con- 
 cerning them. The king, realizing that he had nothing but 
 power, was willing to turn to any one who could give him 
 knowledge. The poet and philosopher disdained to receive 
 light from the only source from which it could come : 
 
 "• Thou canst not think ti mere bai'barian Jew, 
 As Paulus proves to be, one circumcised, 
 Hath access to a secret shut from us ? " 
 
 New truth comes only to the open mind. I would 
 rather be a heathen with mind and heart open than a 
 Christian with the windows of my soul closed. Paul 
 preached in Athens the doctrine of the eternal Father- 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 60 
 
 hood, of resurrection and life, and some mocked, and 
 others said, " We will hear you again." Cleon heard a 
 divine voice in his soul declaring that he ought not to 
 die, but he Avould not heed the message because it came 
 from a " barbarian Jew.*' 
 
 There is a light which lighteth every man which 
 cometh into the world. Plato, Epictetus, Marcus Aure- 
 lius, and thousands of others have Avalked by that light. 
 Those who have truly sought have found what they 
 most needed to know. Something in every soul speaks 
 of God, duty, and immortality. In all lands and times 
 many have been true to the primal revelation. The 
 condition of knowledge is willingness to learn. The 
 last word has not been spoken concerning any great sub- 
 ject. Truth does not change, but human apprehension and 
 expression of it ought daily to be adjusted to the new con- 
 ditions. We should say to all men, to all books, to all 
 nature, " If you can tell me anything of God, of myself, of 
 duty, or of the hereafter, bring me your message ! " If 
 the Athenians had done this they would not have scorned 
 Paul. If Cleon had done this he might have found peace 
 at the hands even of a "barbarian Jew." If the church 
 of E-ome had done this she would never have put her 
 hand on Galileo, or sent Giordano Bruno to the stake. 
 If we, in our time, would do this we should say to all 
 heroic and consecrated investigators in all fields of in- 
 quiry : " We have no theories to exploit ; we desire only 
 truth, let it come whence it will." 
 
 I am persuaded that we are on the eve of a day of 
 great spiritual disclosures. The unknown is constantly 
 opening its depths. The miraculous is becoming natural. 
 No one would be surprised if the elixir of life were to be 
 found and death forever banished. What next ? We 
 stand before the tremulous curtain which separates from 
 
36 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 
 
 the unseen universe, and would not greatly wonder if it 
 should rise and reveal visions of which, as yet, we have 
 not dreamed. Never was there more need of the open 
 heart and submissive will than now. 
 
 If Paul were to return to the earth he would see that 
 his doctrine of God has turned the kingdoms of the 
 world upside down. It is not France of which Germany 
 is afraid, but the doctrine of Paul on Mars Hill. It was 
 not the mob that overthrew the Empire in France, 
 but the doctrine of Paul on Mars Hill. If Cleon were 
 to return, would he call Paul " a barbarian Jew " ? 
 and say of Jesus, " His doctrine could be held by no 
 sane man " ? He who is willing to learn finds truth. 
 He who shuts his mind, whether he be orthodox Chris- 
 tian or heathen philosopher, is sure to shut the light 
 out, and with it the freedom and peace which come with 
 truth. 
 
 What is truth ? Pilate's sneer has long been the 
 world's inquiry. The answer of the Christian's Master 
 is, " I am the truth." So far as He is yet understood, 
 have the life, teaching, and influence of the Christ justi- 
 fied His claims ? Is He the truth ? There is only one 
 test. Does He satisfy the needs of the human soul ? 
 Does the deep within respond to the deep without ? 
 
 Is Jesus Christ the truth concerning God? Can there 
 be a more satisfying conception of Deity than this ? — In 
 infinity and eternity He is revealed in Jesus Christ, who 
 was full of love, tender as a mother, sympathizing with 
 the needy and outcast, a being whose essential nature 
 impels Him to bind up the broken-hearted, heal diseases, 
 forgive sins, and cause all things to work toward bless- 
 ing. The transcendent and immanent Deity of the 
 theologians, the absolute and unconditioned of the phi- 
 losophers, in all that concerns His relations to His crea- 
 
SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. 37 
 
 tiires is manifested in Jesus Christ-. This is tlie first 
 principle of the Christian revelation. 
 
 Is Jesns Christ the truth concerning duty? He said: 
 Love God with all thy heart, and love one another as I 
 have loved you. He said, " Whatsoever 3^e would that 
 men should do to you, do ye even so to them." Is there 
 one sin or vice, one social or moral disorder which would 
 not be banished from the earth if His rule of love were 
 to be obeyed ? Has any philosophy of ethics ever gone 
 deeper than this sentence of the Apostle, " Love is the 
 fulfilling of the law " ? 
 
 Is Jesus Christ the truth concerning what lies beyond 
 the ^^rave ? He was buried ; death did not hold Him ; 
 He arose in a form which human eyes recognized, and 
 held communion with his old companions. In all things 
 He was the type of humanity, He was the perfect Man ; 
 and therefore, as in His life and death He reveals God 
 descending to man, so also in His resurrection He shows 
 man rising to communion with other spirits in the land 
 where there is no death. 
 
 Did Jesus Christ reveal all that will ever be known of 
 God ? This we cannot believe. With the advance of 
 science and the enlargement of experience, new ideals 
 of right and wrong will be uplifted. The standards will 
 rise as life expands. "And He has not told us very 
 much about the future ! " No, but He has furnished the 
 light we need to live by, and our true course is to keep 
 close to Him, waiting for further revelations. 
 
 Do you say, " You have painted a beautiful picture, 
 one that would satisfy if it were only true " ? That is 
 the very point of my argument. Because the Christian 
 revelation does satisf}^, because it answers the eager and 
 irrepressible voices of the soul, because it meets the uni- 
 versal human longing with all that any need to know 
 
/I- 
 
 88 SPIRITUAL LESSONS FROM THE BROWNINGS. '^ 
 
 of God, duty, destiny, I insist that it is worthy to be 
 trusted. There is no other court of apjjeal ; if this 
 does not certify truth then the race must remain forever 
 in darkness. 
 
 The address of Paul and the poem of Browning em- 
 phasize great thoughts : Half truths prove the truth, as 
 the shadow the substance. Those who are content with 
 half truths might almost as well be in total darkness. 
 He who would know much of spiritual things must keep 
 his mind open. In our search for reality we are not left 
 to ourselves, we have the truth embodied in a Person, 
 and the race will always have the Spirit of Truth, who 
 forever and forever will lead into all truth. We move 
 on toward the future with music in our hearts and a 
 song on our lips, because we believe in our Father, God, 
 our Saviour, Christ, and in an immortality of constant 
 growth and ceaseless joy. 
 
 0^