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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/21992-8.txt b/21992-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4095c7b --- /dev/null +++ b/21992-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5149 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Christianity and Progress, by Harry Emerson Fosdick + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Christianity and Progress + +Author: Harry Emerson Fosdick + +Release Date: July 19, 2007 [EBook #21992] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHRISTIANITY AND PROGRESS *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + + + The Cole Lectures for 1922 + delivered before Vanderbilt University + + + + +Christianity and Progress + + +By + +HARRY EMERSON FOSDICK + + + _Professor of Practical Theology in the + Union Theological Seminary; + Preacher at the First Presbyterian Church, + New York_ + + + +NEW YORK ------ CHICAGO + +Fleming H. Revell Company + +LONDON AND EDINBURGH + + + + +Copyright, 1922, by + +FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY + + + + + New York: 158 Fifth Avenue + Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave. + London: 21 Paternoster Square + Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street + + + + +THE COLE LECTURES + +The late Colonel E. W. Cole of Nashville, Tennessee, donated to +Vanderbilt University the sum of five thousand dollars, afterwards +increased by Mrs. E. W. Cole to ten thousand, the design and conditions +of which gift are stated as follows: + +"The Object of this fund is to establish a foundation for a perpetual +Lectureship in connection with the School of Religion of the +University, to be restricted in its scope to a defense and advocacy of +the Christian religion. The lectures shall be delivered at such +intervals, from time to time, as shall be deemed best by the Board of +Trust; and the particular theme and lecturer will be determined by the +Theological Faculty. Said lecture shall always be reduced to writing +in full, and the manuscript of the same shall be the property of the +University, to be published or disposed of by the Board of Trust at its +discretion, the net proceeds arising therefrom to be added to the +foundation fund, or otherwise used for the benefit of the School of +Religion." + + + + +Preface + +No one who ever has delivered the Cole Lectures will fail to associate +them, in his grateful memory, with the hospitable fellowship of the +elect at Vanderbilt University. My first expression of thanks is due +to the many professors and students there, lately strangers and now +friends, who, after the burdensome preparation of these lectures, made +their delivery a happy and rewarding experience for the lecturer. I am +hoping now that even though prepared for spoken address the lectures +may be serviceable to others who will read instead of hear them. At +any rate, it seemed best to publish them without change in +form--addresses intended for public delivery and bearing, I doubt not, +many marks of the spoken style. + +I have tried to make a sally into a field of inquiry where, within the +next few years, an increasing company of investigators is sure to go. +The idea of progress was abroad in the world long before men became +conscious of it; and men became conscious of it in its practical +effects long before they stopped to study its transforming consequences +in their philosophy and their religion. No longer, however, can we +avoid the intellectual issue which is involved in our new outlook upon +a dynamic, mobile, progressive world. Hardly a better description +could be given of the intellectual advance which has marked the last +century than that which Renan wrote years ago: "the substitution of the +category of _becoming_ for _being_, of the conception of relativity for +that of the absolute, of movement for immobility." [1] Underneath all +other problems which the Christian Gospel faces is the task of choosing +what her attitude shall be toward this new and powerful force, the idea +of progress, which in every realm is remaking man's thinking. + +I have endeavoured in detail to indicate my indebtedness to the many +books by whose light I have been helped to see my way. In addition I +wish to express especial thanks to my friend and colleague, Professor +Eugene W. Lyman, who read the entire manuscript to my great profit; +and, as well, to my secretary, Miss Margaret Renton, whose efficient +service has been an invaluable help. + +H. E. F. + +New York + + + +[1] Renan: Averroès et L'Averroisme, p. vii. + + + + +Contents + + +LECTURE I + THE IDEA OF PROGRESS + + +LECTURE II + THE NEED FOR RELIGION + + +LECTURE III + THE GOSPEL AND SOCIAL PROGRESS + +LECTURE IV + PROGRESSIVE CHRISTIANITY + +LECTURE V + THE PERILS of PROGRESS + +LECTURE VI + PROGRESS AND GOD + + + + +LECTURE I + +THE IDEA OF PROGRESS + +I + +The supposition that fish do not recognize the existence of water nor +birds the existence of air often has been used to illustrate the +insensitive unawareness of which we all are capable in the presence of +some encompassing medium of our lives. The illustration aptly fits the +minds of multitudes in this generation, who live, as we all do, in the +atmosphere of progressive hopes and yet are not intelligently aware of it +nor conscious of its newness, its strangeness and its penetrating +influence. We read as a matter of course such characteristic lines as +these from Tennyson: + + "Yet I doubt not thro' the ages one increasing purpose runs, + And the thoughts of men are widen'd with the process of the suns." + +Such lines, however, are not to be taken as a matter of course; until +comparatively recent generations such an idea as that never had dawned on +anybody's mind, and the story of the achievement of that progressive +interpretation of history is one of the most fascinating narratives in +the long record of man's mental Odyssey. In particular, the Christian +who desires to understand the influences, both intellectual and +practical, which are playing with transforming power upon Christianity +today, upon its doctrines, its purposes, its institutions, and its social +applications, must first of all understand the idea of progress. For +like a changed climate, which in time alters the fauna and flora of a +continent beyond the power of human conservatism to resist, this +progressive conception of life is affecting every thought and purpose of +man, and no attempted segregation of religion from its influence is +likely to succeed. + +The significance of this judgment becomes the more clear when we note the +fact that the idea of progress in our modern sense is not to be found +before the sixteenth century. Men before that time had lived without +progressive hopes just as before Copernicus they had lived upon a +stationary earth. Man's life was not thought of as a growth; gradual +change for the better was not supposed to be God's method with mankind; +the future was not conceived in terms of possible progress; and man's +estate on earth was not looked upon as capable of indefinite +perfectibility. All these ideas, so familiar to us, were undreamed of in +the ancient and medieval world. The new astronomy is not a more complete +break from the old geocentric system with its stationary earth than is +our modern progressive way of thinking from our fathers' static +conception of human life and history. + + +II + +It will be worth our while at the beginning of our study to review in +outline this development of the idea of progress, that we may better +understand the reasons for its emergence and may more truly estimate its +revolutionary effects. In the ancient world the Greeks, with all their +far-flung speculations, never hit upon the idea of progress. To be sure, +clear intimations, scattered here and there in Greek literature, indicate +faith that man in the past had improved his lot. Aeschylus saw men +lifted from their hazardous lives in sunless caves by the intervention of +Prometheus and his sacrificial teaching of the arts of peace; Euripides +contrasted the primitive barbarism in which man began with the civilized +estate which in Greece he had achieved--but this perceived advance never +was erected into a progressive idea of human life as a whole. Rather, +the original barbarism, from which the arts of civilization had for a +little lifted men, was itself a degeneration from a previous ideal +estate, and human history as a whole was a cyclic and repetitious story +of never-ending rise and fall. Plato's philosophy of history was +typical: the course of cosmic life is divided into cycles, each +seventy-two thousand solar years in length; during the first half of each +cycle, when creation newly comes from the hands of Deity, mankind's +estate is happily ideal, but then decay begins and each cycle's latter +half sinks from bad to worse until Deity once more must take a hand and +make all things new again. Indeed, so far from reaching the idea of +progress, the ancient Greeks at the very center of their thinking were +incapacitated for such an achievement by their suspiciousness of change. +They were artists and to them the perfect was finished, like the +Parthenon, and therefore was incapable of being improved by change. +Change, so far from meaning, as it does with us, the possibility of +betterment, meant with them the certainty of decay; no changes upon earth +in the long run were good; all change was the sure sign that the period +of degeneration had set in from which only divine intervention could +redeem mankind. Paul on Mars Hill quoted the Greek poet Aratus +concerning the sonship of all mankind to God, but Aratus's philosophy of +history is not so pleasantly quotable: + + "How base a progeny sprang from golden sires! + And viler shall they be whom ye beget." [1] + +Such, in general, was the non-progressive outlook of the ancient Greeks. + +Nor did the Romans hit upon the idea of progress in any form remotely +approaching our modern meaning. The casual reader, to be sure, will find +occasional flares of expectancy about the future or of pride in the +advance of the past which at first suggest progressive interpretations of +history. So Seneca, rejoicing because he thought he knew the explanation +of the moon's eclipses, wrote: "The days will come when those things +which now lie hidden time and human diligence will bring to light. . . . +The days will come when our posterity will marvel that we were ignorant +of truths so obvious." [2] So, too, the Epicureans, like the Greek +tragedians before them, believed that human knowledge and effort had +lifted mankind out of primitive barbarism and Lucretius described how man +by the development of agriculture and navigation, the building of cities +and the establishment of laws, the manufacture of physical conveniences +and the creation of artistic beauty, had risen, "gradually progressing," +to his present height.[3] Such hopeful changes in the past, however, were +not the prophecies of continuous advance; they were but incidental +fluctuations in a historic process which knew no progress as a whole. +Even the Stoics saw in history only a recurrent rise and fall in endless +repetition so that all apparent change for good or evil was but the +influx or the ebbing of the tide in an essentially unchanging sea. The +words of Marcus Aurelius are typical: "The periodic movements of the +universe are the same, up and down from age to age"; "He who has seen +present things has seen all, both everything which has taken place from +all eternity and everything which will be for time without end; for all +are of one kin and of one form"; "He who is forty years old, if he has +any understanding at all, has, by virtue of the uniformity that prevails, +seen all things which have been and all that will be." [4] + +When with these Greek and Roman ideas the Hebrew-Christian influences +blended, no conception of progress in the modern sense was added by the +Church's contribution. To be sure, the Christians' uncompromising faith +in personality as the object of divine redemption and their vigorous hope +about the future of God's people in the next world, if not in this, +calcined some elements in the classical tradition. Belief in cycles, +endlessly repeating themselves through cosmic ages, went by the board. +This earth became the theatre of a unique experiment made once for all; +in place of the ebb and flow of tides in a changeless sea, mankind's +story became a drama moving toward a climactic denouement that would +shake heaven and earth together in a divine cataclysm. But this +consummation of all history was not a goal progressively to be achieved; +it was a divine invasion of the world expectantly to be awaited, when the +victorious Christ would return and the Day of Judgment dawn. + +The development of this apocalyptic phrasing of hope has been traced too +often to require long rehearsal here. If the Greeks were essentially +philosophers and welcomed congenially ideas like endless cosmic cycles, +the Hebrews were essentially practical and dramatic in their thinking and +they welcomed a picture of God's victory capable of being visualized by +the imagination. At first their national hopes had been set on the +restoration of the Davidic kingdom; then the Davidic king himself had +grown in their imagination until, as Messiah in a proper sense, he +gathered to himself supernal attributes; then, as a child of their +desperate national circumstances, the hope was born of their Messiah's +sudden coming on the clouds of heaven for their help. Between the +Testaments this expectation expanded and robed itself with pomp and +glory, so that when the Christians came they found awaiting them a +phrasing of hope which they accepted to body forth their certainty of +God's coming sovereignty over all the earth. This expectation of coming +triumph was not progressive; it was cataclysmic. It did not offer the +prospect of great gains to be worked for over long periods of time; it +offered a divine invasion of history immediately at hand. It was +pictured, not in terms of human betterment to be achieved, but of divine +action to be awaited. The victory would suddenly come like the flood in +Noah's day, like the lightning flashing from one end of the heaven to the +other, like a thief in the night. + +To be sure, this eager expectation of a heavenly kingdom immediately to +arrive on earth soon grew dim among the Christians, and the reasons are +obvious. For one thing, the Church herself, moving out from days of +hardship to days of preferment and prosperity, began to allure with her +inviting prospects of growing power the enthusiasms and hopes of the +people, until not the suddenly appearing kingdom from the heavens, but +the expanding Church on earth became the center of Christian interest. +For another thing, Christ meant more to Christians than the inaugurator +of a postponed kingdom which, long awaited with ardent expectation, still +did not arrive; Christ was the giver of eternal life now. More and more +the emphasis shifted from what Christ would do for his people when he +came upon the clouds of heaven to what he was doing for them through his +spiritual presence with them. Even in the Fourth Gospel one finds this +good news that Christ had already come again in the hearts of his people +insisted on in evident contrast with the apocalyptic hope literally +conceived. For another thing, dramatic hopes of a sudden invasion of the +world are always the offspring of desperate conditions. Only when people +are hard put to it do they want history catastrophically stopped in the +midst of its course. The Book of Daniel must be explained by the +tyrannies of Antiochus Epiphanes, the Book of Revelation by the +persecutions of Domitian, the present recrudescence of pre-millennialism +by the tragedy of the Great War. But when the persecution of the Church +by the State gave way to the running of the State by the Church; when to +be a Christian was no longer a road to the lions but the sine qua non of +preferment and power; when the souls under the altar ceased crying, "How +long, O Master, the holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our +blood on them that dwell on the earth?" then the apocalyptic hopes grew +dim and the old desire for a kingdom immediately to come was subdued to +an expectation, no longer imperative and urgent, that sometime the course +of history would stop on Judgment Day. + +In all these Greek and Roman, Hebrew and Christian contributions, which +flowed together and then flowed out into the medieval age, there was no +suggestion of a modern idea of progress, and in the medieval age itself +there was nothing to create a fresh phrasing of expectancy. Men were +aware of the darkness of the days that had fallen on the earth; even when +they began to rouse themselves from their lethargy, their thoughts of +greatness did not reach forward toward a golden age ahead but harked back + + "To the glory that was Greece + And the grandeur that was Rome," + +and their intellectual life, instead of being an adventurous search for +new truth, was a laborious endeavour to stabilize the truth already +formulated in the great days of the early Church. Indeed, the Church's +specific contribution of a vividly imagined faith in a future world, as +the goal of the most absorbing hopes and fears of men, tended rather to +confirm than to dissipate the static conception of earthly life and +history. With an urgency that the ancient world had never known the +Christian world believed in immortality and visualized the circumstances +of the life to come so concretely that in a medieval catechism the lurid +colour of the setting sun was ascribed to the supposition that "he +looketh down upon hell." [5] Nothing in this life had any importance +save as it prepared the souls of men for life to come. Even Roger Bacon, +his mind flashing like a beacon from below the sky-line of the modern +world, was sure that all man's knowledge of nature was useful only in +preparing his soul to await the coming of Antichrist and the Day of +Judgment. There was no idea of progress, then, in the medieval age. +Human life and history were static and the only change to be anticipated +was the climactic event + + "When earth breaks up and heaven expands." + + +III + +The emergence of modern progressive hopes out of this static medievalism +is one of the epic occurrences of history. The causes which furthered +the movement seem now in retrospect to be woven into a fabric so tightly +meshed as to resist unraveling. Nevertheless, it is not difficult to see +at least some of the major factors which furthered this revolutionary +change from a static to a progressive world. + +Among the first, scientific invention is surely to be noted. Even Roger +Bacon, prophecying with clairvoyant insight far in advance of the event, +foresaw one of the determining factors of the modern age: "Machines for +navigating can be made so that without rowers great ships can be guided +by one pilot on river or sea more swiftly than if they were full of +oarsmen. Likewise vehicles are possible which without draught-animals +can be propelled with incredible speed, like the scythed chariots, as we +picture them, in which antiquity fought. Likewise a flying machine is +possible in the middle of which a man may sit, using some ingenious +device by which artificial wings will beat the air like those of a flying +bird. Also machines, small in size, can be constructed to lift and move +unlimited weights, than which in an emergency nothing is more useful." +[6] So dreamed the great friar in the thirteenth century. When, then, +we find the minds of men first throwing off their intellectual vassalage +to antiquity and beginning to believe in themselves, their present powers +and their future prospects, it is this new-found mastery over nature's +latent resources which is the spring and fountain of their confidence. +Cardan, in the sixteenth century, marveling at the then modern inventions +of the compass, the printing press, and gunpowder, cried, "All antiquity +has nothing comparable to these three things." [7] Every year from that +day to this has deepened the impression made upon the minds of men by the +marvelous prospect of harnessing the resources of the universe. The last +one hundred and twenty-five years have seen the invention of the +locomotive, the steamship, the telegraph, the sewing machine, the camera, +the telephone, the gasoline engine, wireless telegraphy and telephony, +and the many other applications of electricity. As one by one new areas +of power have thus come under the control of man, with every conquest +suggesting many more not yet achieved but brought within range of +possibility, old theories of cosmic degeneration and circular futility +have gone to pieces, the glamour of antiquity has lost its allurement, +the great days of humanity upon the earth have been projected into the +future, and the gradual achievement of human progress has become the hope +of man. + +Another element in the emergence of the modern progressive outlook upon +life is immediately consequent upon the first: world-wide discovery, +exploration and intercommunication. Great as the practical results have +been which trace their source to the adventurers who, from Columbus down, +pioneered unknown seas to unknown lands, the psychological effects have +been greater still. Who could longer live cooped up in a static world, +when the old barriers were so being overpassed and new continents were +inviting adventure, settlement, and social experiment hitherto untried? +The theological progressiveness of the Pilgrim Fathers, starting out from +Leyden for a new world, was not primarily a matter of speculation; it was +even more a matter of an adventurous spirit, which, once admitted into +life, could not be kept out of religious thought as well. In Edward +Winslow's account of Pastor Robinson's last sermon before the little +company of pioneers left Leyden, we read that Robinson "took occasion +also miserably to bewaile the state and condition of the Reformed +Churches, who were come to a period in Religion, and would goe no further +than the instruments of their Reformation: As for example, the +_Lutherans_ they could not be drawne to goe beyond what _Luther_ saw, for +whatever part of God's will he had further imparted and revealed to +_Calvin_, they will die rather than embrace it. And so also, saith he, +you see the _Calvinists_, they stick where he left them: a misery much to +bee lamented; For though they were precious shining lights in their +times, yet God hath not revealed his whole will to them: And were they +now living, saith hee, they would bee as ready and willing to embrace +further light, as that they had received." [8] Static methods of +thinking are here evidently going to pieces before the impact of a +distinctly unstatic world. They were looking for "more truth and light +yet to breake forth out of his holy Word" [9] because they lived in a +time when new things had been happening at an exhilarating rate and when +pioneering adventure and general travel in a world of open avenues were +already beginning to have that liberating effect which has increased with +every passing century. + +Closely allied with the two elements already noted is a third: the +increase of knowledge, which, as in the case of astronomy, threw +discredit upon the superior claims of antiquity and made modern men seem +wiser than their sires. For ages the conviction had held the ground that +the ancients were the wisest men who ever lived and that we, their +children, were but infants in comparison. When, therefore, the +Copernican astronomy proved true, when the first terrific shock of it had +passed through resultant anger into wonder and from wonder into stupefied +acceptance, and from that at last into amazed exultation at the vast, new +universe unveiled, the credit of antiquity received a stunning blow. So +far was Aristotle from being "the master of those who know" whom the +medievalists had revered, that he had not even known the shape and motion +of the earth or its relation with the sun. For the first time in history +the idea emerged that humanity accumulates knowledge, that the ancients +were the infants, that the moderns represent the age and wisdom of the +race. Consider the significance of those words of Pascal in the +seventeenth century: "Those whom we call ancient were really new in all +things, and properly constituted the infancy of mankind; and as we have +joined to their knowledge the experience of the centuries which have +followed them, it is in ourselves that we should find this antiquity that +we revere in others." [10] For the first time in history men turned +their faces, in their search for knowledge, not backward but forward, and +began to experience that attitude which with us is habitual--standing on +tip-toe in eager expectancy, sure that tomorrow some new and unheard of +truth will be revealed. + +New inventions, new discoveries, new knowledge--even before the +eighteenth century all these factors were under way. Then a new factor +entered which has played a powerful part in substituting a progressive +for a static world: new social hopes. The medieval age had no +expectation of a better social life on earth. Charity was common but it +was purely individual and remedial; it did not seek to understand or to +cure the causes of social maladjustment; it was sustained by no +expectation of better conditions among men; it was valued because of the +giver's unselfishness rather than because of the recipient's gain, and in +consequence it was for the most part unregulated alms-giving, piously +motived but inefficiently managed. In the eighteenth century a new +outlook and hope emerged. If man could pioneer new lands, learn new +truth and make new inventions, why could he not devise new social systems +where human life would be freed from the miseries of misgovernment and +oppression? With that question at last definitely rising, the long line +of social reformers began which stretched from Abbé de Saint-Pierre to +the latest believer in the possibility of a more decent and salutary +social life for human-kind. The coming of democracy in government +incalculably stimulated the influence of this social hope, for with the +old static forms of absolute autocracy now broken up, with power in the +hands of the people to seek as they would "life, liberty and the pursuit +of happiness," who could put limits to the possibilities? The medieval +age was gone; the modern age had come, and its distinctive note was +progress, with new inventions, new discoveries, new knowledge and new +social hope. + +It would be a fascinating task to watch these interweaving factors at +their work and to trace their commingled influence as slowly their +involved significance became clear, now to this man and now to that. The +best narrative that has been written yet of this epochal movement is +contained in Professor Bury's volume on "The Idea of Progress." There one +sees the stream of this progressive conception of life pushing its way +out as through a delta by way of many minds, often far separated yet +flowing with the same water. Some men attacked the ancients and by +comparison praised the modern time as Perrault did with "The Age of Louis +the Great"; some men foresaw so clearly the possibility of man's control +over nature that they dreamed of terrestrial Utopias as Francis Bacon did +in "New Atlantis"; some men, like Descartes, sought to grasp the +intellectual conditions of human improvement; and others, like Condorcet, +became the fervid prophets of human perfectibility; some, like Turgot, +re-examined history in terms of the new ideas; and some, like Saint Simon +and Comte, sought to discover the law by which all progress moves. This +new idea of life and history came "by divers portions and in divers +manners," but no one can doubt its arrival. The life of man upon this +earth was no longer conceived as static; it was progressive and the +possibilities that lay ahead made all the achievements of the past seem +like the play of childhood. + +At last, in the nineteenth century, the climactic factor was added which +gathered up all the rest and embraced them in a comprehensive philosophy +of life. Evolution became a credible truth. No longer a dim conjecture, +it was established in biology, and then it spread its influence out into +every area of human thought until all history was conceived in genetic +terms and all the sciences were founded upon the evolutionary idea. +Growth became recognized as the fundamental law of life. Nothing in the +universe without, or in man's life within, could longer be conceived as +having sprung full-statured, like Minerva from the head of Jove. All +things achieved maturity by gradual processes. The world itself had thus +come into being, not artificially nailed together like a box, but growing +like a tree, putting forth ever new branches and new leaves. When this +idea had firmly grasped the human mind, the modern age had come indeed, +and progress was its distinctive category of understanding and its +exhilarating phrasing of human hope. Then came the days of mid-Victorian +optimism with songs like this upon men's lips: + + "Every tiger madness muzzled, every serpent passion kill'd, + Every grim ravine a garden, every blazing desert till'd, + + "Robed in universal harvest up to either pole she smiles, + Universal ocean softly washing all her warless isles." [11] + + +IV + +Any one, however, who has lived with discerning thought through the +opening years of the twentieth century, must be aware that something has +happened to chasten and subdue these wildly enthusiastic hopes of the +mid-Victorian age. Others beside the "gloomy dean" of St. Paul's, +whether through well-considered thought or through the psychological +shock of the Great War, have come to look upon this rash, unmitigated +enthusiasm about the earth's future as a fool's paradise. At any rate, +no treatment of the idea of progress would be complete which did not +dwell upon the limitations to that idea, now definitely obvious to +thoughtful men. + +As early as 1879, in Saporta's "Le Monde des Plantes," we run upon one +serious setback to unqualified expectations of progress. Men began to +take into account the fact that this earth is not a permanent affair. +"We recognize from this point of view as from others," wrote Saporta, +"that the world was once young; then adolescent; that it has even passed +the age of maturity; man has come late, when a beginning of physical +decadence had struck the globe, his domain." [12] Here is a fact to give +enthusiasm over earthly progress serious pause. This earth, once +uninhabitable, will be uninhabitable again. If not by wholesale +catastrophe, then by the slow wearing down of the sun's heat, already +passed its climacteric, this planet, the transient theatre of the human +drama, will be no longer the scene of man's activity, but as cold as the +moon, or as hot as colliding stars in heaven, will be able to sustain +human life no more. "The grandest material works of the human race," +wrote Faye in 1884, "will have to be effaced by degrees under the action +of a few physical forces which will survive man for a time. Nothing will +remain, not even the ruins." [13] + +Every suggested clew to a possible escape from the grimness of the +planet's dissolution has been followed up with careful search. The +discovery of radioactivity seemed to promise endlessly extended life to +our sun, but Sir E. Rutherford, before the Royal Astronomical Society, +has roundly denied that the discovery materially lengthens our estimate +of the sun's tenure of life and has said that if the sun were made of +uranium it would not because of that last five years the longer as a +giver of heat.[14] Whether we will or not, we have no choice except to +face the tremendous fact, calmly set down by von Hartmann in 1904: "The +only question is whether . . . the world-process will work itself out +slowly in prodigious lapse of time, according to purely physical laws; or +whether it will find its end by means of some metaphysical resource when +it has reached its culminating point. Only in the last case would its +end coincide with the fulfilment of a purpose or object; in the first +case, a long period of purposeless existence would follow after the +culmination of life." [15] + +In a word, men delighted at the prospect of human progress on this planet +have made an idol of it, only to discover that on a transient earth it +leads nowhere without God and immortality. One disciple of naturalism +recently denied his desire to believe in God because he wanted a risky +universe. But the universe without God is not risky; it is a foregone +conclusion; the dice are all loaded. After the lapse of millions of +years which, however long they be stretched out, will ultimately end, our +solar system will be gone, without even a memory left of anything that +ever was dreamed or done within it. That is the inevitable issue of such +a "risky" universe. When scientifically-minded men, therefore, now take +a long look ahead, the Utopian visions of the mid-Victorian age are not +foremost in their thought. Rather, as one of them recently wrote: + + +"One is tempted to imagine this race of supermen, of some millions of +years hence, grimly confronting the issue of extinction. Probably long +before that time science will have perfectly mastered the problem of the +sun's heat, and will be able to state precisely at what period the +radiation will sink to a level which would normally be fatal to the +living inhabitants of the planets. Then will begin the greatest of +cosmic events: a drama that has doubtless been played numbers of times +already on the stage of the universe: the last stand of the wonderful +microcosm against the brute force of the macrocosm. . . . . + +"One conceives that our supermen will face the end philosophically. +Death is losing its terrors. The race will genially say, as we +individuals do to-day, that it has had a long run. But it will +none-the-less make a grim fight. Life will be worth living, for +everybody, long before that consummation is in sight. The hovering demon +of cold and darkness will be combatted by scientific means of which we +have not the germ of a conception." [16] + + +If ever a river ran out into a desert, the river of progressive hopes, +fed only from springs of materialistic philosophy, has done so here. At +least the Greeks had their immortality and the Hebrews their coming +Kingdom of God, but a modern materialist, with all his talk of progress, +has neither the one nor the other, nor anything to take their place as an +ultimate for hope. Whatever else may be true, progress on a transient +planet has not done away with the need of God and life eternal. + +Moreover, not only have our twentieth century thought and experience +seriously qualified the meaning of progress on this earth by the limiting +of the earth's duration; men have come also to distrust, as a quite +unjustified flourish of sentimentality, the mid-Victorian confidence in +an automatic evolution which willy-nilly lifts humanity to higher levels. +Said Herbert Spencer, "Progress is not an accident, not a thing within +human control, but a beneficent necessity." "This advancement is due to +the working of a universal law; . . . in virtue of that law it must +continue until the state we call perfection is reached. . . . Thus the +ultimate development of the ideal man is logically certain--as certain as +any conclusion in which we place the most implicit faith; . . . so surely +must the things we call evil and immorality disappear; so surely must man +become perfect." [17] There is no scientific basis whatever for such a +judgment. Evolution is not an escalator which, whether or not man run in +addition to its lift, will inevitably raise humanity to a heaven on +earth. Potatoes in the cellar shooting out long white eyes in search of +light are evolving, but they are evolving worse. Upon the basis of a +scientific doctrine of evolution, no idolatrous superstition could be +much more lacking in intellectual support than Spencer's confidence in a +universal, mechanical, irresistible movement toward perfection. The +plain fact is that human history is a strange blend of progress and +regress; it is the story of the rhythmic rise and fall of civilizations +and empires, of gains made only to be lost and lost only to be fought for +once again. Even when advance has come, it has come by mingled progress +and cataclysm as water passes, through gradual increase of warmth, from +ice suddenly to liquid and from liquid suddenly to vapour. Our +nineteenth century ideas of evolution tended to create in us the +impression that humanity had made a smooth and even ascent. We +artificially graded the ascending track of human history, leveled and +macadamized it, and talked of inevitable progress. Such sentimental +optimism has ceased even to be comforting, so utterly untenable has it +become to every well-instructed mind. + +To such unfounded faith in automatic progress a valuable counterweight is +acquaintance with the life of a man like St. Augustine. As one reads +Augustine's sermons one can hear in the background the collapse of a +great civilization. One can tell from his discourses when the barbarians +began to move on Rome. One can hear the crash when Alaric and his hordes +sacked the Eternal City. One can catch the accent of horror at the tidal +waves of anarchy that everywhere swept in to engulf the falling empire. +"Horrible things," said Augustine, "have been told us. There have been +ruins, and fires, and rapine, and murder, and torture. That is true; we +have heard it many times; we have shuddered at all this disaster; we have +often wept, and we have hardly been able to console ourselves." [18] At +last, the empire in ruins, the old civilization tottering to its +collapse, Augustine died in his episcopal city of Hippo, while the +barbarians were hammering at the city gates. Through such scenes this +generation too has lived and has had to learn again, what we never should +have forgotten, that human history is not a smooth and well-rolled lawn +of soft ascents; that it is mountainous, precipitous, terrific--a country +where all progress must be won by dint of intelligence and toil, and +where it is as easy to lose the gains of civilization as it is to fall +over a cliff or to surrender a wheat field to the weeds. An archeologist +in Mesopotamia talked with an Arab lad who neither read, himself, nor +knew any one who did; yet the lad, when he acknowledged this, stood +within a stone's throw of the site where milleniums ago was one of the +greatest universities of the ancient world and where still, amid the +desolation, one could dig and find the old clay tablets on which the +children of that ancient time had learned to write. Progress? Regress! +While history as a whole, from the Cro-Magnon man to the twentieth +century, does certainly suggest a great ascent, it has not been an +automatic levitation. It has been a fight, tragic and ceaseless, against +destructive forces. This world needs something more than a soft gospel +of inevitable progress. It needs salvation from its ignorance, its sin, +its inefficiency, its apathy, its silly optimisms and its appalling +carelessness. + + +V + +Nevertheless, though it is true that our modern ideas of progress on this +earth never in themselves can supply an adequate philosophy of life, and +though it is true that they do not dispense with, but rather emphasize, +our need of God and immortality and the saving powers which Christians +find in Christ, yet those ideas have in them a permanent contribution to +the life of man from whose influence the race cannot escape. When we +have granted the limitations which disillusioned thoughtfulness suggests +concerning progress upon this earth, it still remains true that, in our +new scientific control over the latent resources of the earth without and +over our own mental and moral processes within, we have a machinery for +producing change that opens up exciting prospects before humanity. Never +in our outlook upon man's earthly future can we go back to the endless +cosmic cycles of the Greeks or the apocalyptic expectations of the +Hebrews. We are committed to the hope of making progress, and the +central problem which Christianity faces in adjusting her thought and +practice to the modern age is the problem of coming to intelligent terms +with this dominant idea. + +These lectures are an excursion to spy out this land and to see, if we +may, what the idea of progress through the scientific control of life is +likely to mean and ought to mean to Christianity. If this modern idea is +not intelligently guided in its effect upon our faith and practice, it +will none the less have its effect in haphazard, accidental, unguided, +and probably ruinous ways. If one listens, for example, to the preaching +of liberal ministers, one sees that every accent of their teaching has +been affected by this prevalent and permeating thought. The God they +preach no longer sits afar like Dante's deity in the stationary empyrean +beyond all reach of change; their God is here in the midst of the human +struggle, "their Captain in the well-fought fight." H. G. Wells may be a +poor theologian but he is one of our best interpreters of popular thought +and his idea of God, marching through the world "like fifes and drums," +calling the people to a progressive crusade for righteousness, is one +which modern folk find it most easy to accept. He is a God of progress +who undergirds our endeavours for justice in the earth with his power; +who fights in and for and with us against the hosts of evil; whose +presence is a guarantee of ultimate victory; and whose effect upon us is +to send us out to war against ancient human curses, assured that what +ought to be done can be done. + +As men's thought of God has thus been molded by the idea of progress on +the earth, so, too, the Christ they preach is not primarily, as of old, +the victim by whose substitutionary sacrifice the race of men has found +an open door from the bottomless pit of endless woe to a blessed +immortality in Paradise. The modern emphasis is all another way. Christ +is the divine revealer whose spirit alone can transform individuals and +save society. The sort of character he was, the life he lived, the ideas +he promulgated, are the salt that can preserve human life, the light that +can illumine the way to a kingdom of righteousness on earth. He himself +is the leader in the fight for that kingdom, his sacrifice part of the +price it costs, his spirit the quality of life that is indispensable to +its coming, and when we think of him we sing, + + "The Son of God goes forth to war. . . . + Who follows in his train?" + + +So, too, the Church, as presented by typical modern preachers, is no +longer an ark to which, from the flood of wrath divine, the few may flee +for safety. If men tried to preach in that way, the message would stick +in their throats. The Church is primarily an instrument in God's hands +to bring personal and social righteousness upon the earth. When her +massed influence overcomes a public evil or establishes a public good, +men find the justification of her existence and a first-rate weapon of +apologetic argument in her behalf. When wars come, the Church is blamed +because she did not prevent them; when wars are over, she takes counsel +how she may prove the validity of her message by making their recurrence +impossible; and the pitiful dismemberment of the Church by sects and +schisms is hated and deplored, not so much because of economic waste or +theological folly, as because these insane divisions prevent social +effectiveness in bringing the message of Christ to bear influentially on +modern life. + +Likewise, hope, deeply affected by modern ideas of earthly progress, is +not primarily post-mortem, as it used to be. Men believe in immortality, +but it seems so naturally the continuance of this present life that their +responsible concern is chiefly centered here. The hopes which waken +immediate enthusiasm and stir spontaneous response are hopes of +righteousness victorious upon the earth. Because men believe in God, +they believe that he has great purposes for humankind. The course of +human history is like a river: sometimes it flows so slowly that one +would hardly know it moved at all; sometimes bends come in its channel so +that one can hardly see in what direction it intends to go; sometimes +there are back-eddies so that it seems to be retreating on itself. If a +man has no spiritual interpretation of life, if he does not believe in +God, he may well give up hope and conclude that the human river is +flowing all awry or has altogether ceased to move. A Christian, however, +has a spiritual interpretation of life. He knows that human history is a +river--not a whirlpool, nor a pond, but a river flowing to its end. Just +as, far inland, we can tell that the Hudson is flowing to the sea, +because the waters, when the tide comes in, are tinctured with the +ocean's quality, so now, we believe that we can tell that the river of +human history is flowing out toward the kingdom of our God. Already the +setback of the divine ocean is felt among us in ideals of better life, +personal, social, economic, national. That it is Christianity's function +to believe in these ideals, to have faith in the possibility of their +realization, to supply motives for their achievement, and to work for +them with courage and sacrifice, is the familiar note of modern Christian +hope. + +The modern apologetic also is tinctured with this same quality. Not as +of old is it a laboured working out of metaphysical propositions. +Rather, a modern Christian preacher's defense of the Gospel may be +paraphrased in some such strain as this: You never can achieve a decent +human life upon this planet apart from the Christian Gospel. Neither +outward economic comfort nor international treaties of peace can save the +day for humanity. Not even when our present situation is described as "a +race between education and catastrophe" has the case been adequately +stated. What kind of education is meant? If every man and woman on +earth were a Ph. D., would that solve the human problem? Aaron Burr had +a far keener intellect than George Washington. So far as swiftness and +agility of intelligence were concerned, Burr far out-distanced the +slow-pacing mind of Washington. But, for all that, as you watch Burr's +life, and many another's like him, you understand what Macaulay meant +when he exclaimed: "as if history were not made up of the bad actions of +extraordinary men, as if all the most noted destroyers and deceivers of +our species, all the founders of arbitrary governments and false +religions, had not been extraordinary men, as if nine tenths of the +calamities which have befallen the human race had any other origin than +the union of high intelligence with low desires." Was Nebuchadnezzar of +Babylon unintelligent? Caesar and Napoleon--were they unintelligent? +Has the most monumental and destructive selfishness in human history been +associated with poor minds? No, with great minds, which, if the world +was to be saved their devastation, needed to be reborn into a new spirit. +The transforming gospel which religion brings is indispensable to a +building of the kingdom of righteousness upon the earth. + +Wherever one listens, then, to the typical teaching of modern Christians, +he finds himself in the atmosphere of the idea of progress. Men's +thoughts of God, of Christ, of the Church, of hope, their methods of +apologetic, are shaped to that mold--are often thinned out and flattened +down and made cheap and unconvincing by being shaped to that mold--so +that an endeavour to achieve an intelligent understanding of +Christianity's relationship with the idea of progress is in part a +defensive measure to save the Gospel from being unintelligently mauled +and mishandled by it. Marcus Dods, when he was an old man, said: "I do +not envy those who have to fight the battle of Christianity in the +twentieth century." Then, after a moment, he added, "Yes, perhaps I do, +but it will be a stiff fight." It is a stiff fight, and for this reason +if for no other, that before we can get on much further in a progressive +world we must achieve with wisdom and courage some fundamental +reconstructions in our Christian thinking. + + + +[1] Aratus of Soli: Phaenomena, lines 122-3. + +[2] Lucius Annaeus Seneca: Naturalium Quaestionum, Liber VII, 25. + +[3] T. Lucretius Carus: De Rerum Natura, Lib. V, 1455--"Paullatim docuit +pedetentim progredienteis." + +[4] Marcus Aurelius Antoninus: Meditations, IX, 28; VI, 37; XI, 1. + +[5] Andrew D. White: A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in +Christendom, Vol. I, p. 97. + +[6] Roger Bacon: Epistola de Secretis Operibus Artis et Naturae, et de +Nullitate Magiae, Caput IV, in Opera Quaedam Hactenus Inedita, edited by +J. S. Brewer, p. 533. + +[7] Jerome Cardan: De Subtilitate, Liber Decimusseptimus: De artibus, +artificiosisque rebus. + +[8] Edward Winslow: Hypocrisie Unmasked, p. 97. + +[9] Ibid. + +[10] Blaise Pascal: Opuscules, Preface to the Treatise on Vacuum, in The +Thoughts, Letters and Opuscules of Blaise Pascal, Translated by O. W. +Wight, p. 550. + +[11] Alfred Tennyson: Locksley Hall Sixty Years After. + +[12] Comte de Saporta: Le Monde des Plantes avant L'Apparition de +L'Homme, p. 109. + +[13] H. Faye: Sur L'Origine du Monde, Chapitre XI, p. 256-7. + +[14] Joseph McCabe: The End of the World, p. 112. + +[15] Eduard von Hartmann: Ausgewählte Werke, viii, pp. 572-3 (Leipzig, +1904). + +[16] Joseph McCabe: The End of the World, pp. 116-117. + +[17] Herbert Spencer: Illustrations of Universal Progress, Chapter I, +Progress: Its Law and Cause, p. 58; Social Statics, Part I, Chapter II, +The Evanescence of Evil, Sec. 4, p. 78 ff. + +[18] Louis Bertrand: Saint Augustin, p. 342. + + + + +LECTURE II + +THE NEED FOR RELIGION + +I + +One of the first effects of the idea of progress, whose development our +last lecture traced, has been to increase immeasurably man's self +reliance and to make him confident of humanity's power to take care of +itself. At the heart of the idea of progress is man's new scientific +control over life, and this new mastery, whereby the world seems ready +to serve the purposes of those who will learn the laws, is the dominant +influence in both the intellectual and practical activities of our age. +That religion, in consequence, should seem to many of minor import, if +not quite negligible, and that men, trusting themselves, their +knowledge of law, their use of law-abiding forces, their power to +produce change and to improve conditions, should find less need of +trusting any one except themselves, was inevitable, but for all that it +is fallacious. Already we have seen that a stumbling and uneven +progress, precarious and easily frustrated, taking place upon a +transient planet, goes but a little way to meet those elemental human +needs with which religious faith has dealt. In our present lecture we +propose a more specific consideration of this abiding necessity of +religion in a progressive world. + +How difficult it is to go back in imagination to the days before men +grasped the meaning of natural law! We take gravitation for granted +but, when Newton first proclaimed its law, the artillery of orthodox +pulpits was leveled against him in angry consternation. Said one +preacher, Newton "took from God that direct action on his works so +constantly ascribed to him in Scripture and transferred it to material +mechanism" and he "substituted gravitation for Providence." [1] That +preacher saw truly that the discovery of natural law was going to make +a profound difference to religion. For ages men had been accustomed to +look for the revelation of supernatural power in realms where they did +not know the laws. And as men were tempted to look for the presence of +God in realms where they did not know the laws, so in those realms they +trusted God to do for them what they did not know how to do for +themselves. + +Then men began discovering natural laws, and every time they laid their +hands on a new natural law they laid their hands on a new law-abiding +force and began doing for themselves things of which their fathers had +never dreamed. Stories of old-time miracles are overpassed in our +modern days. Did Aladdin once rub a magic lamp and build a palace? +To-day, knowledge of engineering laws enables us to achieve results +that would put Aladdin quite to shame. He never dreamed a Woolworth +Tower. Did the Israelites once cross the Red Sea dry-shod? One thing, +however, they never would have hoped to do: to cross under and over the +Hudson River day after day in multitudes, dry-shod. Did an axe-head +float once when Elisha threw a stick into the water? But something no +Elisha ever dreamed of seeing we see continually: iron ships navigating +the ocean as though it were their natural element. Did Joshua once +prolong the day for battle by the staying of the sun? Yet Joshua could +never have conceived an habitual lighting of the city's homes and +streets until by night they are more brilliant than by day. Did +Jericho's walls once fall at the united shout of a besieging people? +Those childlike besiegers, however, never dreamed of guns that could +blast Jerichos to pieces from seventy miles away. Huxley was right +when he said that our highly developed sciences have given us a command +over the course of non-human nature greater than that once attributed +to the magicians. + +The consequence has been revolutionary. Old cries of dependence upon +God grow unreal upon the lips of multitudes. Sometimes without knowing +it, often without wanting it, men are drawn by the drift of modern +thought away from all confidence in God and all consciousness of +religious need. Consider two pictures. The first is an epidemic in +New England in the seventeenth century. Everybody is thinking about +God; the churches are full and days are passed in fasting and agonizing +prayer. Only one way of getting rid of such an epidemic is known: men +must gain new favour in the sight of God. The second picture is an +epidemic in New England in the twentieth century. The churches are not +full--they are closed by official order and popular consent to prevent +the spread of germs. Comparatively few people are appealing to God; +almost everybody is appealing to the health commissioner. Not many +people are relying upon religion; everybody is relying upon science. +As one faces the pregnant significance of that contrast, one sees that +in important sections of our modern life science has come to occupy the +place that God used to have in the reliance of our forefathers. For +the dominant fact of our generation is power over the world which has +been put into our hands through the knowledge of laws, and the +consequence is that the scientific mastery of life seems man's +indispensable and sufficient resource. + +The issue is not far to seek. Such has been public confidence in the +efficacy and adequacy of this scientific control of life to meet all +human needs, that in multitudes of minds religion has been crowded to +the wall. Why should we trust God or concern ourselves with the deep +secrets of religious faith, if all our need is met by learning laws, +blowing upon our hands, and going to work? So even Christians come +secretly to look upon their Christianity as a frill, something gracious +but not indispensable, pleasant to live with but not impossible to live +without. Christian preachers lose their ability, looking first upon +their spiritual message and then upon their fellow men, to feel how +desperately the two need each other. Religion has become an "elective +in the university of life." But religion cannot persist as a frill; it +either is central in its importance or else it is not true at all. Its +great days come only when it is seen to be indispensable. We may use +what artificial respiration we will upon the Church, the days of the +Church's full power will not come until the conviction lays hold upon +her that the endeavour to found civilization upon a materialistic +science is leading us to perdition; that man needs desperately the +ministry of religion, its insight into life's meanings, its control +over life's use, its inward power for life's moral purposes; that man +never needed this more than now, when the scientific control of life is +arming him with so great ability to achieve his aims. + + +II + +As we try to discern wherein man's need of religion lies with reference +to the scientific control of life, let us start with the proposition +that, when we have all the facts which science can discover, we still +need a spiritual interpretation of the facts. All our experiences are +made up of two elements: first, the outward circumstance, and second, +the inward interpretation. On the one side is our environment, the +world we live in, the things that befall us, the kaleidoscopic changes +of fortune in the scenery of which our lives are set. On the other +side are the inward interpretations that we give to this outward +circumstance. Experience is compounded of these two elements. + +This clearly is true in ordinary living. Two men, let us say, go to +their physicians and are told that they have only a few months to live. +This is the fact which faces both of them. As we watch them, however, +we are at once aware that this fact is not the whole of their +experience. One of the men crumples up; he "collapses into a yielding +mass of plaintiveness and fear." Thinking of the event which he is +facing, he sees nothing there but horror. That is his interpretation +of it. The other man so looks upon the event which is coming that his +family, far from having to support his spirit, are supported by him. +He buoys them up; he carries them along; his faith and courage are +contagious; and when he thinks of his death it appears in his eyes a +great adventure concerning which the old hymn told the truth: + + "It were a well-spent journey + Though seven deaths lay between." + +That is his interpretation. As we regard the finished experiences of +these two men, we see clearly that, while the same fact lay at the +basis of both, it was the inward interpretation that determined the +quality of the experience. + +This power to transform facts so that they will be no longer merely +facts, but facts plus an interpretation, is one of the most distinctive +and significant elements in human life. The animals do not possess it. +An event befalls a dog and, when the dog is through with it, the event +is what it was before. The dog has done nothing to it. But the same +event befalls a man and at once something begins to happen to it. It +is clothed in the man's thought about it; it is dressed in his +appreciation and understanding; it is transformed by his +interpretations. The event comes out of that man's life something +altogether different from what it was when it went in. The man can do +almost anything with that event. For our experiences do not fall into +our lives in single lumps, like meteors from a distant sky of fate; our +experiences always are made up of the fortunes that befall us and the +interpretations that we give to them. + +So far as the relative importance of these two factors is concerned, we +may see the truth in the application of our thought to happiness. If +there is any area in human experience where the outward circumstance +might be supposed to control the results, it is the realm of happiness; +yet probably nine-tenths of the problem of happiness lies, not in the +outward event, but in the inward interpretation. If we could describe +those conditions in which the happiest people whom we have known have +lived, can any one imagine the diversity of environment that would be +represented in our accounts? Let them move in procession before the +eyes of our imagination, those happy folk whose friendship has been the +benediction of our lives! What a motley company they are! For some +are blind, and some are crippled, and some are invalid; not many are +rich and fortunate; many are poor--a company of handicapped but radiant +spirits whose victorious lives, like the burning bush which Moses saw, +have made in a desert a spot of holy ground. If, now, we ask why it is +that happiness can be so amazingly independent of outward circumstance, +this is the answer: every experience has two factors, the fortune that +befalls and the inward interpretation of it; and, while we often cannot +control the fortune, we always can help with the interpretation. That +is in our power. That is the throne of our sovereignty over our lives. + + +III + +The deep need of a worthy interpretation of life is just as urgent in a +world where the idea of progress reigns as in any other, and to supply +that need is one of the major functions of religion. For religion is +something more than all the creeds that have endeavoured to express its +thought. Religion is something more than all the organizations that +have tried to incarnate its purposes. Religion is the human spirit, by +the grace of God, seeking and finding an interpretation of experience +that puts sense and worth, dignity, elevation, joy, and hope into life. + +A body of students recently requested an address upon the subject: +"What is the use of religion anyway?" The group of ideas behind the +question is not hard to guess: that science gives us all the facts, +that facts and their laws are all we need, that the scientific control +of life guarantees progress, and that religion therefore is +superfluous. But in such a statement one towering interrogation has +been neglected: what about the interpretation of the very facts which +science does present? Could not one address himself to the question of +those students in some such way as this? You say that science has +disclosed to us the leisureliness of the evolving universe. Come back, +then, on the long road to the rear on which Bishop Usher's old date of +creation is a way station an infinitesimal distance behind us; come +back until together we stand at the universe's postern gate and look +out into the mystery whence all things came, where no scientific +investigation can ever go, where no one knows the facts. What do you +make of it? Two voices rise in answer. One calls the world "a +mechanical process, in which we may discover no aim or purpose +whatever." [2] And another voice says: + + "The heavens declare the glory of God; + And the firmament showeth his handiwork." [3] + +That is not a difference in facts, upon which we can get our hands. +That is a difference in the interpretation of the facts. + +Or come forward together to look into that mystery ahead, toward which +this universe and we within it are so prodigiously plunging on. Do we +not often feel, upon this earth whirling through space, like men and +women who by some weird chance have found themselves upon a ship, +ignorant of their point of departure and of their destination? For all +the busyness with which we engage in many tasks, we cannot keep +ourselves from slipping back at times to the ship's stern to look out +along its wake and wonder whence we came, or from going at times also +to its prow to wonder whither we are headed. What do you make of it? +Toward what sort of haven is this good ship earth sailing--a port +fortunate or ill? Or may it be there is no haven, only endless sailing +on an endless sea by a ship that never will arrive? So questioning, we +listen to conflicting voices. One says there is no future except +ultimate annihilation, and another voice sings: + + "All we have willed or hoped or dreamed + of good, shall exist." + +That is not a difference in the facts, that eyes can see and hands +handle; that is a difference in the interpretation of the facts. + +Or from such large considerations come down into some familiar +experience of daily life. Here is a man having a hard battle between +right and wrong. There is no more impressive sight on earth to one who +looks at it with understanding eyes. What do you make of this +mysterious sense of duty which lays its magisterial hand upon us and +will not be denied? At once various voices rise. Haeckel says the +sense of duty is a "long series of phyletic modifications of the +phronema of the cortex." [4] That is his interpretation. And +Wordsworth: + + "Stern Daughter of the Voice of God! + O Duty!" + +This sharp contrast is not a difference between facts, which can be +pinned down as the Lilliputians pinned down Gulliver; it is a +difference in the interpretation of the facts. + +Or let us go together up some high hill from which we can look out upon +the strange history of humankind. We see its agonies and wars, its +rising empires followed by their ruinous collapse, and yet a mysterious +advance, too, as though mankind, swinging up a spiral, met old +questions upon a higher level, so that looking back to the Stone Age, +for all the misery of this present time, we would be rather here than +there. What can we make of it? Hauptmann's Michael Kramer says "All +this life is the shuddering of a fever." And Paul says, "the eternal +purpose which he purposed in Christ." That is not a difference in the +facts. It is a difference in the interpretation of the facts. + +Yet once more, come into the presence of death. The facts that human +eyes can see are plain enough, but what can we make of it--this +standing on the shore, waving farewell to a friendly ship that loses +itself over the rim of the world? Says Thomson of the world's +treatment of man, + + "It grinds him some slow years of bitter breath, + Then grinds him back into eternal death." + +And Paul says: "This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this +mortal must put on immortality. But when this corruptible shall have +put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, +then shall come to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed +up in victory." That is not a contrast between facts; that is a +contrast between interpretations of facts. + +Is it not plain why religion has such an unbreakable hold upon the +human mind? The funeral of Christianity has been predicted many times +but each time the deceased has proved too lively for the obsequies. In +the middle of the eighteenth century they said that Christianity had +one foot in the grave, but then came the amazing revival of religious +life under the Wesleys. In the middle of the last century one wiseacre +said, "In fifty years your Christianity will have died out"; yet, for +all our failures, probably Christianity in all its history has never +made more progress than in the last half century. If you ask why, one +reason is clear: man cannot live in a universe of uninterpreted facts. +The scientific approach to life is not enough. It does not cover all +the ground. Men want to know what life spiritually means and they want +to know that it "means intensely, and means good." Facts alone are +like pieces of irritating grit that get into the oyster shell; the +pearl of life is created by the interpretations which the facts educe. + +In this difference between the facts of experience and their +interpretations lies the secret of the contrast between our two words +_existence_ and _life_. Even before we define the difference, we feel +it. To exist is one thing; to live is another. Existence is comprised +of the bare facts of life alone--the universe in which we live, our +heritage and birth, our desires and their satisfactions, growth, age +and death. All the facts that science can display before us comprise +existence. But life is something more. Life is existence clothed in +spiritual meanings; existence seen with a worthy purpose at the heart +of it and hope ahead, existence informed by the spirit's insights and +understandings, transfigured and glorified by the spirit's faiths and +hopes. It follows, therefore, that while existence is given us to +start with, life is a spiritual achievement. A man must take the facts +of his existence whether he wants to or not, but he makes his life by +the activity of his soul. The facts of existence are like so much +loose type, which can be set up to many meanings. One man leaves those +facts in chaotic disarrangement or sets them up into cynical +affirmations, and he exists. But another man takes the same facts and +by spiritual insight makes them mean gloriously, and he lives indeed. +To suppose that mankind ever can be satisfied with existence only and +can be called off from the endeavour to achieve this more abundant +life, is utterly to misconceive the basic facts of human nature. And +this profound need for a spiritual interpretation of life is not +satisfied by an idea of temporal progress, stimulated by a few +circumstances which predispose our minds to immediate expectancy. + + +IV + +When, therefore, any one asserts the adequacy of the scientific +approach to life, one answer stands ready to our hand: science deals +primarily with facts and their laws, not with their spiritual +interpretations. To put the same truth in another way, science deals +with one specially abstracted aspect of the facts; it drains them of +their qualitative elements and, reducing them to their quantitative +elements, it proceeds to weigh and measure them and state their laws. +It moves in the realm of actualities and not in the realm of values. +One science, for example, takes a gorgeous sunset and reduces it to the +constituent ether waves that cause the colour. What it says about the +sunset is true, but it is not the whole truth. Ask anybody who has +ever seen the sun riding like a golden galleon down the western sea! +Another science takes a boy and reduces him to his Bertillon +measurements and at the top of the statistics writes his name, "John +Smith." That is the truth about John Smith, but it is not the whole +truth. Ask his mother and see! Another science takes our varied and +vibrant mental life and reduces it to its physical basis and states its +laws. That is the truth about our mental life, but it is not the whole +truth. What is more, it is not that part of the truth by which men +really live. For men live by love and joy and hope and faith and +spiritual insight. When these things vanish life is + + "a tale + Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, + Signifying nothing." + + +When a man takes that quantitative aspect of reality, which is the +special province of natural science, as though it were the whole of +reality, he finds himself in a world where the physical forces are in +control. We, ourselves, according to this aspect of life, are the +product of physical forces--marionettes, dancing awhile because +physical forces are pulling on the strings. In a word, when a man +takes that quantitative aspect of reality, which natural science +presents, as though it were the whole of reality, he becomes a +materialistic fatalist, and on that basis we cannot permanently build +either personal character or a stable civilization. It is not +difficult, then, to see one vital significance of Jesus Christ: he has +given us the most glorious interpretation of life's meaning that the +sons of men have ever had. The fatherhood of God, the friendship of +the Spirit, the sovereignty of righteousness, the law of love, the +glory of service, the coming of the Kingdom, the eternal hope--there +never was an interpretation of life to compare with that. If life +often looks as though his interpretation were too good to be true, we +need not be surprised. Few things in the universe _are_ as +superficially they _look_. The earth looks flat and, as long as we +gaze on it, it never will look any other way, but it is spherical for +all that. The earth looks stationary and if we live to be as old as +Methuselah we never will see it move, but it is moving--seventy-five +times faster than a cannon ball! The sun looks as though it rose in +the east and set in the west, and we never can make it look any other +way, but it does not rise nor set at all. So far as this earth is +concerned, the sun is standing still enough. We look as though we +walked with our heads up and our feet down, and we never can make +ourselves look otherwise, but someone finding a safe stance outside +this whirling sphere would see us half the time walking with our heads +down and our feet up. Few things are ever the way they look, and the +end of all scientific research, as of all spiritual insight, is to get +behind the way things look to the way things are. Walter Pater has a +rememberable phrase, "the hiddenness of perfect things." One meaning, +therefore, which Christ has for Christians lies in the realm of +spiritual interpretation. He has done for us there what Copernicus and +Galileo did in astronomy: he has moved us out from our flat earth into +his meaningful universe, full of moral worth and hope. He has become +to us in this, our inner need, what the luminous phrase of the Book of +Job describes, "An interpreter, one among a thousand." And in spite of +all our immediate expectancy, born out of our scientific control of +life, mankind never needed that service more than now. + + +V + +There is a second proposition to which we should attend as we endeavour +to define the need for religion with reference to the scientific +mastery of life. Consider why so often men are tempted to suppose that +science is adequate for human purposes. Is it not because science +supplies men with power? Steam, electricity, petroleum, radium--with +what progressive mastery over the latent resources of the universe does +science move from one area of energy to another, until in the +imagination of recent generations she has seemed to stand saying: all +power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. With such power to +bestow, is she not our rightful mistress? But who that has walked with +discerning eyes through these last few years can any longer be beguiled +by that fallacious vision? Look at what we are doing with this new +power that science has given us! The business to which steel and steam +and electricity, explosives and poisons have recently been put does not +indicate that humanity's problem is solved when new power is put into +our hands. Even the power of wide-spread communication can so be used +that a war which began in Serajevo will end with lads from Kamchatka +and Bombay blasted to pieces by the same shell on a French battlefield. +Even the power of modern finance can be so used that nations will +exhaust the credit of generations yet unborn in waging war. How some +folk keep their cheap and easy optimism about humanity's use of its new +energies is a mystery. We have come pretty near to ruining ourselves +with them already. If we do not achieve more spiritual control over +them than we have yet exhibited we will ruin ourselves with them +altogether. Once more in history a whole civilization will commit +suicide like Saul falling on his own sword. + +The scientific control of life, by itself, creates more problems than +it solves. The problem of international disarmament, for example, has +been forced on us by the fear of that perdition to the suburbs of which +our race has manifestly come through the misuse of scientific +knowledge. Humanity is disturbed about itself because it has +discovered that it is in possession of power enough to wreck the world. +Never before did mankind have so much energy to handle. Multitudes of +people, dubious as to whether disarmament is practical, are driven like +shuttles back and forth between that doubt, upon the one side, and the +certainty, upon the other, that armament is even less practical. The +statisticians have been at work upon this last war and their figures, +like the measurements of the astronomers, grow to a size so colossal +that the tentacles of our imaginations slip off them when we try to +grasp their size. The direct costs of this last war, which left us +with more and harder difficulties than we had at the beginning, were +about $186,000,000,000. Is that practical? At the beginning of 1922 +almost all the nations in Europe, although by taxation they were +breaking their people's financial backs, were spending far more than +their income, and in the United States, far and away the richest nation +on the planet, we faced an enormous deficit. Is that practical? In +this situation, with millions of people unemployed, with starvation +rampant, with social revolution stirring in every country--not because +people are bad, not because they impatiently love violence, but because +they cannot stand forever the social strain and economic consequence of +war--what were we doing? We were launching battleships which cost +$42,000,000 to build, which cost $2,000,000 a year to maintain and +which, in a few years, would be towed out to sea to be used as an +experimental target to try out some new armour-piercing shell. I +wonder if our children's children will look back on that spectacle and +call it practical. In 1912 the naval expenses of this country were +about $136,000,000. In 1921 our naval expenses were about +$641,000,000--approximately five times greater in nine years. So over +all the earth war preparations were pyramiding with an ever +accelerating momentum. And because any man can see that we must stop +sometime, we have been trying desperately to stop now; to turn our +backs upon this mad endeavour to build civilization upon a +materialistic basis, bulwarked by physical force; to turn our faces +toward spiritual forces, fair play, reasonable conference, good-will, +service and co-operation. + +Yet how hard it is to make the change effective! Long ages ago in the +primeval jungle, the dogs' ancestors used to turn around three times in +the thicket before they lay down, that they might make a comfortable +spot to nestle in, and now your highbred Pekingese will turn around +three times upon his silken cushion although there is no earthly reason +why he should. So difficult is it to breed beasts and men out of their +inveterate habits. So hard is it going to be to make men give up the +idea that force is a secure foundation for international relationships. +Yet somehow that change must be made. They are having trouble with the +housing problem in Tokyo and the reason is simple. Tokyo is built on +earthquake ground and it is insecure. You cannot put great houses on +unstable foundations. One story, two stories, three stories--that is +about as high as they dare go. But in New York City one sees the +skyscrapers reaching up their sixty stories into the air. The +explanation is not difficult: Manhattan Island is solid rock. If you +are going to build great structures you must have great foundations. +And civilization is a vast and complicated structure. We cannot build +it on physical force. That is too shaky. We must build it upon +spiritual foundations. + +There are those who suppose that this can be done by progress through +the scientific control of life, and who treat religion as a negligible +element. Such folk forget that while a cat will lap her milk +contentedly from a saucer made of Wedgwood or china, porcelain or +earthenware, and will feel no curiosity about the nature of the +receptacle from which she drinks, human beings are not animals who thus +can take their food and ask no questions about the universe in which it +is served to them. We want to know about life's origin and meaning and +destiny. We cannot keep our questions at home. We cannot stop +thinking. If this universe is fundamentally physical, if the only +spark of spiritual life which it ever knew is the fitful flame of our +own unsteady souls, if it came from dust and to dust will return, +leaving behind no recollection of the human labour, sacrifice and +aspiration which for a little time it unconsciously enshrined, that +outlook makes an incalculable difference to our present lives. For +then our very minds themselves, which have developed here by accident +upon this wandering island in the skies, represent the only kind of +mind there is, and what we do not know never was thought about or cared +for or purposed by anyone, and we, alone in knowing, are ourselves +unknown. + +The consequence of this sort of thinking, which is the essence of +irreligion, is to be seen on every side of us in folk who, having thus +lost all confidence in God and the reality of the spiritual world, +still try to labour for the good of men. They have kept one part of +Christianity, its ideals of character and service; they have lost the +other part, which assures them about God. In a word, they are trying +to build an idealistic and serviceable life upon a godless basis. Now, +the difficulty with this attitude toward life lies here: it demands a +quality of spirit for which it cannot supply the motive. It demands +social hope, confidence, enthusiasm and sacrifice, and all the while it +cuts their nerves. It tells men that the universe is fundamentally a +moral desert, that it never was intended even to have an oasis of +civilization in it, that if we make one grow it will be by dint of our +own effort against the deadset of the universe's apathy, that if, by +our toil, an oasis is achieved, it will have precarious tenure in such +alien and inhospitable soil, and that in the end it will disappear +before the onslaught of the cosmic forces; yet in the same breath it +tells men to work for that oasis with hope, confidence, joy and +enthusiastic sacrifice. This is a world view which asks of men a +valorous and expensive service for which it cannot supply the driving +power. Yet many of our universities are presenting just that outlook +upon life to our young men and women. The youth are being urged to +fight courageously and sacrificially for righteousness upon the earth, +and at the same time they are presented with a view of the background +and destiny of human life similar to that which Schopenhauer expressed: +"Truly optimism cuts so sorry a figure in this theatre of sin, +suffering, and death that we should have to regard it as a piece of +sarcasm, if Hume had not explained its origin--insincere flattery of +God in the arrogant expectation of gain." [5] + +What this generation, which so disparages religion and like the ancient +Sadducee calls its good right arm its god, will ultimately discover is +that the fight for righteousness in character and in society is a long +and arduous campaign. The Bible says that a thousand years in God's +sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the +night. It certainly seems that way. It is a long and roundabout +journey to the Promised Land. Generations die and fall by the way. +The road is white with the bones of pilgrims who attained not the +promises but saw them and greeted them from afar. Some Giordano Bruno, +who gives himself to the achievement of mankind's high aims, is burned +at the stake; centuries pass and on the very spot where he was martyred +a monument is built with this inscription on it: "Raised to Giordano +Bruno by the generation which he foresaw." This is exhilarating when +the story is finished, but in the meantime it is hard work being +Giordano Bruno and sacrificially labouring for a cause which you care +enough for and believe enough in and are sure enough about so that you +will die for it. When such faith and hope and sacrifice are demanded +one cannot get them by exhortation, by waving a wand of words to +conjure his enthusiasm up. Nothing will do but a world-view adequate +to supply motives for the service it demands. Nothing will do but +religion. + +One wonders why the preachers do not feel this more and so recover +their consciousness of an indispensable mission. One wonders that the +churches can be so timid and dull and negative, that our sermons can be +so pallid and inconsequential. One wonders why in the pulpit we have +so many flutes and so few trumpets. For here is a world with the +accumulating energies of the new science in its hands, living in the +purlieus of hell because it cannot gain spiritual mastery over the very +power in which it glories. Here is a world which must build its +civilization on spiritual bases or else collapse into abysmal ruin and +which cannot achieve the task though all the motives of +self-preservation cry out to have it done, because men lack the very +elements of faith and character which it is the business of religion to +supply. + + +VI + +We have said that when science has given us all its facts we still need +a spiritual interpretation of the facts; that when science has put all +its energies into our hands we still need spiritual mastery over their +use. Let us say in conclusion that, when science has given us all its +power, we still need another kind of power which it is not the business +of science to supply. Long ago somebody who knew the inner meaning of +religion wrote: + + "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. + He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; + He leadeth me beside still waters. + He restoreth my soul." + +That last phrase sums up one of the deepest needs of human life. We +are in constant want of spiritual repair; we are lost without a fresh +influx of inward power; we desperately need to have our souls restored. +A young British soldier once came in from the trenches where his +aggressive powers had been in full employ and, having heard one of the +finest concert companies that London could send out, he wrote in a +letter to his family: "I have just come down from the trenches, and +have been listening to one of the best concerts I ever attended. It +makes one feel that perhaps there is a good God after all." The two +aspects of life which that soldier discovered in himself all men +possess. One takes us to life's trenches; the other throws us back on +some revelation of grace and beauty that we may be sure of God. With +one we seek aggressively to master life; with the other we seek +receptively to be inspired. Every normal man needs these two kinds of +influence: one to send him informed and alert to his tasks, the other +to float his soul off its sandbars on the rising tide of spiritual +reassurance and power. Every normal man needs two attitudes: one when +he goes into action determined to do his work and to do it well, and +the other when he subdues his spirit to receptivity and with the +Psalmist cries, + + "My soul, wait thou in silence for God only; + For my expectation is from him." + +When science has given us all the power it can, we still need another +kind of power which science cannot give. + +Whatever else the scientific control of life may have accomplished, it +has not saved mankind from the old and devastating problems of trouble +and sin. So far as individual experience of these is concerned, there +is little discernable difference between two thousand years before +Christ and two thousand years afterward. Still disasters fall upon our +lives, sometimes as swift in their assault as wild beasts leaping from +an unsuspected ambush. Still troubles come, long drawn out and +wearying, like the monotonous dripping of water with which old +torturers used to drive their victims mad. Still sins bring shame to +the conscience and tragic consequence to the life, and tiresome work, +losing the buoyancy of its first inspiration, drags itself out into +purposeless effort and bores us with its futility. Folk now, as much +as ever in all history, need to have their souls restored. The +scientific control of life, however, is not adequate for that. +Electricity and subways and motor cars do not restore the soul; and to +know that there are millions upon millions of solar systems, like our +own, scattered through space does not restore the soul; and to delve in +the sea or to fly in the air or to fling our words through the ether +does not restore the soul. The need of religion is perennial and would +be though our scientific control over life were extended infinitely +beyond our present hope, for the innermost ministry of religion to +human life is the restoration of the soul. + +In this fact lies the failure of that type of naturalism which +endeavours to keep religion as a subjective experience and denies the +reality of an objective God. If we are not already familiar with this +attempted substitution we soon shall be, for our young people are being +taught it in many a classroom now. One of the basic principles of this +new teaching is belief in the spiritual life but, when one inquires +where the spiritual life is, he discovers that it is altogether within +ourselves--there is no original, creative and abiding Spiritual Life +from whom we come, by whom we are sustained, in whom we live. Rather, +as flowers reveal in their fragrance a beauty which is not in the earth +where they grow nor in the roots on which they depend, so our spiritual +life is the mysterious refinement of the material out of which we are +constructed, and it has nothing to correspond with it in the source +from which we sprang. Nevertheless, the new naturalism exalts this +spiritual life within us, calls it our crown and glory, bids us +cultivate and diffuse it, says about it nearly everything a Christian +says except that it is a revelation of eternal reality. Moreover, it +is difficult to differentiate from this outspoken group of professed +naturalists another group of humanists who do retain the idea of God, +but merely as the sum total of man's idealistic life. "God," says one +exponent, "is the farthest outreach of our human ideals." That is to +say, our spiritual lives created God, not God our spiritual lives. +God, as one enthusiastic devotee of this new cult has put it, is a sort +of Uncle Sam, the pooling of the idealistic imaginations of multitudes. +Of course he does not exist, yet in a sense he is real; he is the +projection of our loyalties, affections, hopes. + +It should go without saying that this idea of God has about as much +intellectual validity as belief in Santa Claus and is even more +sentimental, in that it is a deliberate attempt to disguise in pleasant +and familiar terms a fundamentally materialistic interpretation of +reality. The vital failure of this spiritualized naturalism, however, +lies in the inability of its Uncle Sam to meet the deepest needs on +account of which men at their best have been religious. This deified +projection of our ideals we made up ourselves and so we cannot really +pray to him; he does not objectively exist and so has no unifying +meaning which puts purposefulness into creation and hope ahead of it; +he does not care for any one or anything and so we may not trust him; +and neither in sin can he forgive, cleanse, restore, empower, nor in +sorrow comfort and sustain. A god who functions so poorly is not much +of a god. Once more, therefore, one wonders why in a generation when, +not less, but more, because of all our scientific mastery the souls of +men are starved and tired, the Church is not captured by a new sense of +mission. It is precisely in a day when the active and pugnacious +energies of men are most involved in the conquest of the world that the +spirit becomes most worn for lack of sustenance. To be assured of the +nearness and reality and availability of the spiritual world is a +matter of life and death to multitudes of folk to-day. There could +hardly be a more alluring time in which to make the Holy Spirit real to +the world. For the supreme moral asset in any man's life is not his +aggressiveness nor his pugnacity, but his capacity to be inspired--to +be inspired by great books, great music, by love and friendship; to be +inspired by great faiths, great hopes, great ideals; to be inspired +supremely by the Spirit of God. For so we are lifted until the things +we tried to see and could not we now can see because of the altitude at +which we stand, and the things we tried to do and could not we now can +do because of the fellowship in which we live. To one asserting the +adequacy of the scientific control of life, therefore, the Christian's +third answer is clear: man's deepest need is spiritual power, and +spiritual power comes out of the soul's deep fellowships with the +living God. + +Such, then, is the abiding need of religion in a scientific age. To be +scientifically minded is one of the supreme achievements of mankind. +To love truth, as science loves it, to seek truth tirelessly, as +science seeks it, to reveal the latent resources of the universe in +hope that men will use them for good and not for evil, as science does, +is one of the chief glories of our race. When, however, we have taken +everything that science gives, it is not enough for life. When we have +facts, we still need a spiritual interpretation of facts; when we have +all the scientific forces that we can get our hands upon, we still need +spiritual mastery over their use; and, beyond all the power that +science gives, we need that inward power which comes from spiritual +fellowships alone. Religion is indispensable. To build human life +upon another basis is to erect civilization upon sand, where the rain +descends and the floods come and the winds blow and beat upon the house +and it falls and great is the fall thereof. + + + +[1] Andrew D. White: A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology +in Christendom, Vol. II, p. 16. + +[2] Quoted in the Hibbert Journal, Vol. III, January 1905, p. 296. + +[3] Psalm 19:1. + +[4] Ernst Haeckel: The Wonders of Life, p. 413. + +[5] Arthur Schopenhauer: Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, Zweiter +Band, Kapital 46, Von der Nichtigkeit und dem Leiden des Lebens, p. 669. + + + + +LECTURE III + +THE GOSPEL AND SOCIAL PROGRESS + +I + +Our last lecture started with the proposition that the dominant +influence in the intellectual and practical activity of the modern age +is man's scientific mastery over life. This present lecture considers +one of the consequences of this primary fact: namely, the humanitarian +desire to take advantage of this scientific control of life so to +change social conditions that mankind may be relieved from crushing +handicaps which now oppress it. For the growth of scientific knowledge +and control has been coincident with a growth of humanitarian +sentiment. This movement for human relief and social reform, in the +midst of which we live, is one of the chief influences of our time. It +has claimed the allegiance of many of the noblest folk among us. Its +idealism, its call to sacrifice, the concreteness of the tasks which it +undertakes and of the gains which it achieves, have attracted alike the +fine spirits and the practical abilities of our generation. What +attitude shall the Christian Church take toward this challenging +endeavour to save society? How shall she regard this passionate belief +in the possibility of social betterment and this enthusiastic +determination to achieve it? The question is one of crucial importance +and the Church is far from united on its answer. Some Christians claim +the whole movement as the child of the Church, born of her spirit and +expressing her central purpose; others disclaim the whole movement as +evil and teach that the world must grow increasingly worse until some +divine cataclysm shall bring its hopeless corruption to an end; others +treat the movement as useful but of minor import, while they try to +save men by belief in dogmatic creeds or by carefully engineered +emotional experiences. Meanwhile, no words can exaggerate the +fidelity, the vigour, the hopefulness, and the elevated spirit with +which many of our best young men and women throw themselves into this +campaign for better conditions of living. Surely, the intelligent +portion of the Church would better think as clearly as possible about a +matter of such crucial import. + +At first sight, the devotee of social Christianity is inclined +impatiently to brush aside as mere ignorant bigotry on the Church's +part all cautious suspicion of the social movement. But there is one +real difficulty which the thoughtful Christian must perceive when he +compares the characteristic approach to the human problem made by the +social campaign, on the one side, and by religion, on the other. Much +of the modern social movement seems to proceed upon the supposition +that we can save mankind by the manipulation of outward circumstance. +There are societies to change everything that can be changed and, +because the most obvious and easy subjects of transformation are the +external arrangements of human life, men set themselves first and +chiefly to change those. We are always trying to improve the play by +shifting the scenery. But no person of insight ever believed that the +manipulation of circumstance alone can solve man's problems. Said +Emerson, "No change of circumstances can repair a defect of character." +Said Herbert Spencer, "No philosopher's stone of a constitution can +produce golden conduct from leaden instincts." Said James Anthony +Froude, "Human improvement is from within outwards." Said Carlyle, +"Fool! the Ideal is in thyself, the impediment too is in thyself: thy +Condition is but the stuff thou art to shape that same Ideal out of." +Said Mrs. Browning: + + "It takes a soul, + To move a body: it takes a high-souled man + To move the masses even to a cleaner stye: + ..... Ah, your Fouriers failed, + Because not poets enough to understand + That life develops from within." + + +Now, religion's characteristic approach to the human problem is +represented by this conviction that "life develops from within." So +far from expecting to save mankind by the manipulation of outward +circumstance, it habitually has treated outward circumstance as of +inferior moment in comparison with the inner attitudes and resources of +the spirit. Economic affluence, for example, has not seemed to +Christianity in any of its historic forms indispensable to man's +well-being; rather, economic affluence has been regarded as a danger to +be escaped or else to be resolutely handled as one would handle +fire--useful if well managed but desperately perilous if uncontrolled. +Nor can it be said that Christianity has consistently maintained this +attitude without having in actual experience much ground for holding +it. The possession of economic comfort has never yet guaranteed a +decent life, much less a spiritually satisfactory one. The morals of +Fifth Avenue are not such that it can look down on Third Avenue, nor is +it possible anywhere to discern gradation of character on the basis of +relative economic standing. It is undoubtedly true that folks and +families often have their moral stamina weakened and their +personalities debauched by sinking into discouraging poverty, but it is +an open question whether more folks and families have not lost their +souls by rising into wealth. Still, after all these centuries, the +"rich fool," with his overflowing barns and his soul that sought to +feed itself on corn, is a familiar figure; still it is as easy for a +camel to go through a needle's eye as for a rich man to enter the +Kingdom of Heaven. When, therefore, the Christian, approaching the +human problem, not from without in, but from within out, runs upon this +modern social movement endeavouring to save mankind by the manipulation +of outward circumstance, his cautious and qualified consent may be +neither so ignorant nor so unreasonable as it at first appears. + +As an example of manipulated circumstance in which we are asked to +trust, consider the new international arrangements upon which the world +leans so heavily for its hopes of peace. Surely, he would be a poor +Christian who did not rejoice in every reasonable expectation which new +forms of co-operative organization can fulfil. But he would be a +thoughtless Christian, too, if he did not see that all good forms of +international organization are trellises to give the vines of human +relationship a fairer chance to grow; but if the vines themselves +maintain their old acid quality, bringing out of their own inward +nature from roots of bitterness grapes that set the people's teeth on +edge, then no external trellises will solve the problem. It is this +Christian approach to life, from within out, which causes the common +misunderstanding between the social movement and the Church. The first +thinks mainly of the importance of the trellis; the second thinks +chiefly about the quality of the vine. + +The more deep and transforming a man's own religious experience has +been, the more he will insist upon the importance of this inward +approach. Here is a man who has had a profound evangelical experience. +He has gone down into the valley of the shadow with a deep sense of +spiritual need; he has found in Christ a Saviour who has lifted him up +into spiritual freedom and victory; he has gone out to live with a +sense of unpayable indebtedness to him. He has had, in a word, a +typical religious experience at its best with three elements at the +heart of it: a great need, a great salvation, a great gratitude. When +such a man considers the modern social movement, however beautiful its +spirit or admirable its concrete gains, it seems to him superficial if +it presents itself as a panacea. It does not go deep enough to reach +the soul's real problems. The continual misunderstanding between the +Church and the social movement has, then, this explanation: the +characteristic approach of the Christian Gospel to the human problem is +from within out; the characteristic approach of much of the modern +social movement is from without in. + + +II + +If, therefore, the Christian Gospel is going to be true to itself, it +must carefully preserve amid the pressure of our modern social +enthusiasms certain fundamental emphases which are characteristic of +its genius. It must stress the possibility and the necessity of the +inward transformation of the lives of men. We know now that a thorny +cactus does not have to stay a thorny cactus; Burbank can change it. +We know that a crab-apple tree does not have to stay a crab-apple tree; +it can be grafted and become an astrakhan. We know that a malarial +swamp does not have to stay a malarial swamp; it can be drained and +become a health resort. We know that a desert does not have to stay a +desert; it can be irrigated and become a garden. But while all these +possibilities of transformation are opening up in the world outside of +us, the most important in the series concerns the world within us. The +primary question is whether human nature is thus transformable, so that +men can be turned about, hating what formerly they loved and loving +what once they hated. Said Tolstoy, whose early life had been +confessedly vile: "Five years ago faith came to me; I believed in the +doctrine of Jesus, and my whole life underwent a sudden transformation. +What I had once wished for I wished for no longer, and I began to +desire what I had never desired before. What had once appeared to me +right now became wrong, and the wrong of the past I beheld as right." +[1] + +So indispensable to the welfare of the world is this experience, that +we Christians need to break loose from our too narrow conceptions of it +and to set it in a large horizon. We have been too often tempted to +make of conversion a routine emotional experience. Even Jonathan +Edwards was worried about himself in this regard. He wrote once in his +diary: "The chief thing that now makes me in any measure question my +good estate is my not having experienced conversion in those particular +steps wherein the people of New England, and anciently the dissenters +of old England, used to experience it." Poor Jonathan! How many have +been so distraught! But the supreme folly of any man's spiritual life +is to try thus to run himself into the mold of any other man's +experience. There is no regular routine in spiritual transformation. +Some men come in on a high tide of feeling, like Billy Bray, the +drunken miner, who, released from his debasing slavery and reborn into +a vigorous life, cried, "If they were to put me into a barrel I would +shout glory out through the bunghole! Praise the Lord!" Some men come +in like Bushnell, the New England scholar and preacher, who, when he +was an unbelieving tutor at Yale, fell on his knees in the quiet of his +study and said, "O God, I believe there is an eternal difference +between right and wrong and I hereby give myself up to do the right and +to refrain from the wrong." Some men break up into the new life +suddenly like the Oxford graduate who, having lived a dissolute life +until six years after his graduation from the university in 1880, +picked up in his room one day Drummond's "Natural Law in the Spiritual +World," and, lo! the light broke suddenly--"I rejoiced there and then +in a conversion so astounding that the whole village heard of it in +less than twenty-four hours." Some come slowly, like old John +Livingstone, who said, "I do not remember any particular time of +conversion, or that I was much cast down or lift up." Spiritual +transformation is infinitely various because it is so infinitely vital; +but behind all the special forms of experience stands the colossal fact +that men can be transformed by the Spirit of God. + +That this experience of inward enlightenment and transformation should +ever be neglected or minimized or forgotten or crowded out is the more +strange because one keeps running on it outside religion as well as +within. John Keats, when eighteen years old, was handed one day a copy +of Spenser's poems. He never had known before what his life was meant +to be. He found out that day. Like a voice from heaven his call came +in the stately measures of Spenser's glorious verse. He knew that he +was meant to be a poet. Upon this master fact that men can be inwardly +transformed Christ laid his hand and put it at the very center of his +gospel. All through the New Testament there is a throb of joy which, +traced back, brings one to the assurance that no man need stay the way +he is. Among the gladdest, solemnest words in the records of our race +are such passages in the New Testament as this: Fornicators, +adulterers, thieves, covetous, drunkards, revelers, extortioners, such +were some of you; but ye were washed, but ye were sanctified, but ye +were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit +of our God. One cannot find in the New Testament anything stiff and +stilted about this experience. Paul's change came suddenly; Peter's +came slowly. They did not even have, as we have come to have, a +settled word to describe the experience. Ask James what it is and, +practical-minded man that he is, he calls it _conversion_--being turned +around. Ask Peter what it is and, as he looks back upon his old +benighted condition, he cries that it is like _coming out of the +darkness into a marvelous light_. Ask Paul what it is and, with his +love of superlative figures, he cries that it is like _being dead and +being raised again with a great resurrection_. Ask John what it is +and, with his mystical spirit, he says that it is _being born again_. +See the variety that comes from vitality--no stiff methods, no stiff +routine of experience, but throbbing through the whole book the good +news of an illuminating, liberating, transforming experience that can +make men new! + +It is the more strange that this central element in the Christian +Gospel should be neglected in the interests of social reformation +because it is so indispensable to social reformation. Wherever a new +social hope allures the efforts of forward-looking men, there is one +argument against the hope which always rises. You cannot do that--men +say--human nature is against it; human nature has always acted another +way; you cannot change human nature; your hope is folly. As one +listens to such skepticism he sees that men mean by human nature a +static, unalterable thing, huge, inert, changeless, a dull mass that +resists all transformation. The very man who says that may be an +engineer. He may be speaking in the next breath with high enthusiasm +about a desert in Arizona where they are bringing down the water from +the hills and where in a few years there will be no desert, but orange +groves stretching as far as the eye can reach, and eucalyptus trees +making long avenues of shade, and roses running wild, as plenteous as +goldenrod in a New England field. But while about physical nature he +is as hopeful of possible change as a prophet, for human nature he +thinks nothing can be done. + +From the Christian point of view this idea of human nature is utterly +false. So far from being stiff and set, human nature is the most +plastic, the most changeable thing with which we deal. It can be +brutalized beneath the brutes; it can rise into companionship with +angels. Our primitive forefathers, as our fairy tales still reveal, +believed that men and women could be changed into anything--into trees, +rocks, wolves, bears, kings and fairy sprites. One of the most +prominent professors of sociology in America recently said that these +stories are a poetic portraiture of something which eternally is true. +Men can be transformed. That is a basic fact, and it is one of the +central emphases of the Christian Gospel. Of all days in which that +emphasis should be remembered, the chiefest is the day when men are +thinking about social reformation. + + +III + +It is only a clear recognition of the crucial importance of man's +inward transformation which can prepare us for a proper appreciation of +the social movement's meaning. For one point of contact between +religion's approach to the human problem from within out and +reformation's approach from without in lies here: to change social +environments which oppress and dwarf and defile the lives of men is one +way of giving the transforming Spirit a fair chance to reach and redeem +them. All too slowly does the truth lay hold upon the Church that our +very personalities themselves are social products, that we are born out +of society and live in it and are molded by it, that without society we +should not be human at all, and that the influences which play upon our +lives, whether redeeming or degrading, are socially mediated. A man +who says that he believes in the ineffable value of human personalities +and who professes to desire their transformation and yet who has no +desire to give them better homes, better cities, better family +relationships, better health, better economic resources, better +recreations, better books and better schools, is either an ignoramus +who does not see what these things mean in the growth of souls, or else +an unconscious hypocrite who does not really care so much about the +souls of men as he says he does. + +An illuminating illustration of this fact is to be seen in the +expanding ideals of missionary work. When the missionaries first went +to the ends of the earth they went to save souls one by one. They went +out generally with a distinctly, often narrowly, individualistic +motive. They were trying to gather into the ark a few redeemed spirits +out of the wreck of a perishing world; they were not thinking primarily +of building a kingdom of social righteousness in the earth. Consider, +then, the fascinating story of the way the missionaries, whatever may +have been the motives with which they started, have become social +reformers. If the missionaries were to take the Gospel to the people, +they had to get to the people. So they became the explorers of the +world. It was the missionaries who opened up Asia and Africa. Was +there ever a more stirring story of adventure than is given us in the +life of David Livingstone? Then when the missionaries had reached the +people to give them the Gospel, they had to give them the Bible. So +they became the philologists and translators of the world. They built +the lexicons and grammars. They translated the Bible into more than a +hundred languages on the continent of Africa alone. Carey and his +followers did the same for over a score of languages in India. The +Bible to-day is available in over six hundred living languages. +Everywhere this prodigious literary labour has been breaking down the +barriers of speech and thought between the peoples. If ever we do get +a decent internationalism, how much of it will rest back upon this +pioneer spade work of the missionaries, digging through the barricades +of language that separate the minds of men! When, then, the +missionaries had books to give the people, the people had to learn to +read. So the missionaries became educators, and wherever you find the +church you find the school. But what is the use of educating people +who do not understand how to be sanitary, who live in filth and disease +and die needlessly, and how can you take away old superstitions and not +put new science in their places, or deprive the people of witch doctors +without offering them substitutes? So the missionaries became +physicians, and one of the most beneficent enterprises that history +records is medical missions. What is the use, however, of helping +people to get well when their economic condition is such, their +standards of life so low, that they continue to fall sick again in +spite of you? So the missionaries are becoming industrial reformers, +agriculturalists, chemists, physicists, engineers, rebuilding wherever +they can the economic life and comfort of their people. The missionary +cause itself has been compelled, whether it would or not, to grow +socially-minded. As Dan Crawford says about the work in Africa: "Here, +then, is Africa's challenge to its Missionaries. Will they allow a +whole continent to live like beasts in such hovels, millions of negroes +cribbed, cabined, and confined in dens of disease? No doubt it is our +diurnal duty to preach that the soul of all improvement is the +improvement of the soul. But God's equilateral triangle of body, soul, +and spirit must never be ignored. Is not the body wholly _ensouled_, +and is not the soul wholly _embodied_? . . . In other words, in Africa +the only true fulfilling of your heavenly calling is the doing of +earthly things in a heavenly manner." [2] + +Indeed, if any one is tempted to espouse a narrowly individualistic +gospel of regeneration, let him go to the Far East and take note of +Buddhism. Buddhism in wide areas of its life is doing precisely what +the individualists recommend. It is a religion of personal comfort and +redemption. It is not mastered by a vigorous hope of social +reformation. In many ways it is extraordinarily like medieval +Christianity. Consider this definition of his religion that was given +by one Buddhist teacher: "Religion," he said, "is a device to bring +peace of mind in the midst of conditions as they are." Conditions as +they are--settle down in them; be comfortable about them; do not try to +change them; let no prayer for the Kingdom of God on earth disturb +them; and there seek for yourselves "peace of mind in the midst of +conditions as they are." And the Buddhist teacher added, "My religion +is pure religion." But is there any such thing as really caring about +the souls of men and not caring about social habits, moral conditions, +popular recreations, economic handicaps that in every way affect them? +Of all deplorable and degenerate conceptions of religion can anything +be worse than to think of it as a "device to bring peace of mind in the +midst of conditions as they are?" Yet one finds plenty of Church +members in America whose idea of the "simple Gospel" comes perilously +near that Buddhist's idea of "pure religion." + +The utter futility of endeavouring to care about the inward +transformation of men's lives while not caring about their social +environment is evident when one thinks of our international +relationships and their recurrent issue in war. War surely cannot be +thought of any longer as a school for virtue. We used to think it was. +We half believed the German war party when they told us about the +disciplinary value of their gigantic establishment, and when Lord +Roberts assured us that war was tonic for the souls of peoples we were +inclined to think that he was right. When, in answer to our nation's +call, our men went out to fight and all our people were bound up in a +fellowship of devotion to a common cause, so stimulated were we that we +almost were convinced that out of such an experience there might come a +renaissance of spiritual quality and life. Is there anybody who can +blind his eyes to the facts now? Every competent witness in Europe and +America has had to say that we are on a far lower moral level than we +were before the war. Crimes of sex, crimes of violence, have been +unprecedented. Large areas of Europe are to-day in a chaos so complete +that not one man in a thousand in America even dimly imagines it, with +a break-down of all the normal, sustaining relationships and privileges +of civilized life, and with an accompanying collapse of character +unprecedented in Christendom since the days of the Black Plague. If we +are wise we will never again go down into hell expecting to come up +with spirits redeemed. + +To be sure, there are many individuals of such moral stamina that they +have come out of this experience personally the better, not the worse. +There are people who would build into the fiber of their character any +experience that earth could offer them. But if we are thinking of the +moral stability and progress of mankind, surely there is nothing in the +processes of war, as we have seen them, or the results of war, as they +now lie about us, that would lead us to trust to them for help. War +takes a splendid youth willing to serve the will of God in his +generation before he falls on sleep and teaches him the skilful trick +of twisting a bayonet into the abdomen of an enemy. War takes a +loyal-spirited man who is not afraid of anything under heaven and +teaches him to drop bombs on undefended towns, to kill perchance the +baby suckled at her mother's breast. The father of one of our young +men, back from France, finding that his son, like many others, would +not talk, rebuked him for his silence. "Just one thing I will tell +you," the son answered. "One night I was on patrol in No Man's Land, +and suddenly I came face to face with a German about my own age. It +was a question of his life or mine. We fought like wild beasts. When +I came back that night I was covered from head to foot with the blood +and brains of that German. We had nothing personally against each +other. He did not want to kill me any more than I wanted to kill him. +That is war. I did my duty in it, but for God's sake do not ask me to +talk about it! I want to forget it." That _is_ war, and no more +damning influence can be thrown around the characters of people in +general or around the victims of military discipline and experience in +particular than that supplied by war. How then could inconsistency be +made more extreme than by saying that Christianity is concerned about +the souls of men but is not concerned about international good-will and +co-operation? After all, the approaches to the human problem from +without in and from within out are not antithetical, but supplementary. +This tunnel must be dug from both ends and until the Church thoroughly +grasps that fact she will lead an incomplete and ineffectual life. + + +IV + +The purposes of Christianity involve social reform, not only, as we +have said, because we must accomplish environmental change if we are to +achieve widespread individual transformation, but also because we must +reorganize social life and the ideas that underlie it if we are to +maintain and get adequately expressed the individual's Christian spirit +when once he has been transformed. Granted a man with an inwardly +remotived life, sincerely desirous of living Christianly, see what a +situation faces him in the present organization of our economic world! +Selfishness consists in facing any human relationship with the main +intent of getting from it for oneself all the pleasure and profit that +one can. There are folk who use their families so. They live like +parasites on the beautiful institution of family life, getting as much +as possible for as little as possible. There are folk who use the +nation so. To them their country is a gigantic grab-bag from which +their greedy hands may snatch civic security and commercial gain. For +such we have hard and bitter names. There is, however, one +relationship--business--where we take for granted this very attitude +which everywhere else we heartily condemn. Multitudes of folk go up to +that central human relationship with the frank and unabashed confession +that their primary motive is to make out of it all that they can for +themselves. They never have organized their motives around the idea +that the major meaning of business is public service. + +The fact is, however, that all around us forms of business already have +developed where we count it shame for a man to be chiefly motived by a +desire for private gain. If you thought that the preacher were in love +with his purse more than with his Gospel, you would not come again to +hear him, and you would be right; if you thought that the teacher of +your children cared for payday first and for teaching second, you would +find another teacher for them tomorrow, and you ought to; if you +thought that your physician cared more for his fees than he did for his +patients, you would discharge him to-night and seek for a man more +worthy of his high profession; if you had reason to suppose that the +judges of the Supreme Court in Washington cared more for their salary +than they did for justice, you could not easily measure your +indignation and your shame. In the development of human life few +things are nobler than the growth of the professional spirit, where in +wide areas of enterprise, not private gain, but fine workmanship and +public service have become the major motives. If one says that a sharp +line of distinction is to be drawn between what we call professions and +what we call business, he does not know history. Nursing, as a gainful +calling, a hundred years ago was a mercenary affair into which +undesirable people went for what they could get out of it. If nursing +to-day is a great profession, where pride of workmanship and love of +service increasingly are in control, it is because Florence +Nightingale, and a noble company after her, have insisted that nursing +essentially is service and that all nurses ought to organize their +motives around that idea. + +What is the essential difference between professions and business? Why +should the building of a schoolhouse be a carnival of private profit +for labourers and contractors alike, when the teaching in it is +expected to be full of the love of fine workmanship and the joy of +usefulness? Why, when a war is on, must the making of munitions here +be a wild debauch of private profits, but the firing of them "over +there" be a matter of self-forgetful sacrifice? Why, in selling a food +which is essential to health, should the head of a sugar corporation +say with impunity, "I think it is fair to get out of the consumers all +you can, consistent with the business proposition," when the physician +is expected to care for the undernourished with a devoted professional +spirit utterly different from the sugar magnate's words? There is no +real answer to that "why." The fact is that for multitudes of people +business is still in the unredeemed state in which nursing and teaching +and doctoring were at the beginning, and nothing can save us from the +personal and social consequence of this unhappy situation except the +clear vision of the basic meaning of business in terms of service, and +the courageous reorganization of personal motive and economic +institutions around that idea. + +If, then, Christianity is sincerely interested in the quality of human +spirits, in the motives and ideals which dominate personality, she must +be interested in the economic and industrial problems of our day. To +be sure, many ministers make fools of themselves when they pass +judgment on questions which they do not understand. It is true that a +church is much more peaceable and undisturbing when it tries +experiments upon religious emotions with colored lights than when it +makes reports upon the steel trust. Many are tempted, therefore, to +give in to irritation over misdirected ministerial energy or to a +desire for emotional comfort rather than an aroused conscience. One +has only to listen where respectable folk most congregate to hear the +cry: let the Church keep her hands off! + +Let me talk for a moment directly to that group. If you mean, by your +distaste for the Church's interest in a fairer economic life, that most +ministers are unfitted by temperament and training to talk wisely on +economic policies and programs, you are right. Do you suppose that we +ministers do not know how we must appear to you when we try to discuss +the details of business? While, however, you are free to say anything +you wish about the ineptitude of ministers in economic affairs (and we, +from our inside information, will probably agree with you), yet as we +thus put ourselves in your places and try to see the situation through +your eyes, do you also put yourselves in our places and try to see it +through our eyes! + +I speak, I am sure, in the name of thousands of Christian ministers in +this country endeavouring to do their duty in this trying time. We did +not go into the ministry of Jesus Christ either for money or for fun. +If we had wanted either one primarily, we would have done something +else than preach. We went in because we believed in Jesus Christ and +were assured that only he and his truth could medicine the sorry ills +of this sick world. And now, ministers of Christ, with such a motive, +we see continually some of the dearest things we work for, some of the +fairest results that we achieve, going to pieces on the rocks of the +business world. + +You wish us to preach against sin, but you forget that, as one of our +leading sociologists has said, the master iniquities of our time are +connected with money-making. You wish us to imbue your boys and girls +with ideal standards of life, but all too often we see them, having +left our schools and colleges, full of the knightly chivalry of youth, +torn in the world of business between the ideal of Christlikeness and +the selfish rivalry of commercial conflict. We watch them growing +sordid, disillusioned, mercenary, spoiled at last and bereft of their +youth's fine promise. You wish us to preach human brotherhood in +Christ, and then we see that the one chief enemy of brotherhood between +men and nations is economic strife, the root of class consciousness and +war. You send some of us as your representatives to the ends of the +earth to proclaim the Saviour, and then these missionaries send back +word that the non-Christian world knows all too well how far from +dominant in our business life our Christian ideals are and that the +non-Christian world delays accepting our Christ until we have better +proved that his principles will work. Everywhere that the Christian +minister turns, he finds his dearest ideals and hopes entangled in the +economic life. Do you ask us then under these conditions to keep our +hands off? In God's name, you ask too much! + +In the sixteenth century the great conflict in the world's life +centered in the Church. The Reformation was on. All the vital +questions of the day had there their spring. In the eighteenth century +the great conflict of the world's life lay in politics. The American +and French revolutions were afoot. Democracy had struck its tents and +was on the march. All the vital questions of that day had their origin +there. In the twentieth century the great conflict in the world's life +is centered in economics. The most vital questions with which we deal +are entangled with economic motives and institutions. As in the +sixteenth and eighteenth centuries great changes were inevitable, so +now the economic world cannot possibly remain static. The question is +not whether changes will occur, but how they will occur, under whose +aegis and superintendence, by whose guidance and direction, and how +much better the world will be when they are here. Among all the +interests that are vitally concerned with the nature of these changes +none has more at stake than the Christian Church with her +responsibility for the cure of souls. + + +V + +Still another point of contact exists between the Christian purpose and +social reform: the inevitable demand of religious ideals for social +application. The ideal of human equality, for example, came into our +civilization from two main sources--the Stoic philosophy and the +Christian religion--and in both cases it was first of all a spiritual +insight, not a social program. The Stoics and the early Christians +both believed it as a sentiment, but they had no idea of changing the +world to conform with it. Paul repeatedly insisted upon the equality +of all men before God. In his early ministry he wrote it to the +Galatians: "There can be neither Jew nor Greek, there can be neither +bond nor free, there can be no male and female; for ye all are one man +in Christ Jesus." Later he wrote it to the Corinthians: "For in one +Spirit were we all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, +whether bond or free; and were all made to drink of one Spirit." In +his last imprisonment he wrote it to the Colossians: "There cannot be +Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, +bondman, freeman; but Christ is all, and in all." Yet it never would +have occurred to Paul to disturb the social custom of slavery or to +question the divine institution of imperial government. + +Nevertheless, while this idea of human equality did not at first +involve a social program, it meant something real. If we are to +understand what the New Testament means by the equality of men before +God, we must look at men from the New Testament point of view. Those +of us who have been up in an aeroplane know that the higher we fly the +less difference we see in the elevation of things upon the earth. This +man's house is plainly higher than that man's when we are on the ground +but, two thousand feet up, small difference can we observe. Now, the +New Testament flies high. It frankly looks from a great altitude at +the distinctions that seem so important on the earth. We say that +racial differences are very important--a great gulf between Jew and +Gentile. We insist that cultural traditions make an immense +distinction--that to be a Scythian or to be barbarian is widely +separated from being Greek. We are sure that the economic distinction +between bondman and freeman is enormous. But all the while these +superiorities and inferiorities, which we magnify, seem from Paul's +vantage point not nearly so important or so real as we think they are. +He is sure about this central truth, that God asks no questions about +caste or colour or race or wealth or social station. All men stand +alike in his presence and in the Christian fellowship must be regarded +from his point of view. + +It was utterly impossible, however, to keep this spiritual insight from +getting ultimately into a social program. It appealed to motives too +deep and powerful to make possible its segregation as a religious +sentiment. For however impractical an ideal this thought of human +equality may seem in general, and however hard it may be to grant to +others in particular, it is never hard for us to claim for ourselves. +If ever we are condescended to, does any assertion rise more quickly in +our thought than the old cry of our boyhood, "I am as good as you are"? +The lad in school in ragged clothes, who sees himself outclassed by +richer boys, feels it hotly rising in his boyish heart: "I am as good +as you are." The poor man who, with an anxiety he cannot subdue and +yet dares not disclose, is desperately trying to make both ends meet, +feels it as he sees more fortunate men in luxury: "I am as good as you +are." The negro who has tried himself out with his white brethren, who +wears, it may be, an honour key from a great university, who is a +scholar and a gentleman, and yet who is continually denied the most +common courtesies of human intercourse--he says in his heart, although +the words may not pass his lips, "I am as good as you are." Now, the +New Testament took that old cry of the human heart for equality and +turned it upside down. It became no longer for the Christian a bitter +demand for one's rights, but a glad acknowledgment of one's duty. It +did not clamour, "I am as good as you are"; it said, "You are as good +as I am." The early Christians at their best went out into the world +with that cry upon their lips. The Jewish Christians said it to the +Gentiles and the Gentiles to the Jews; the Scythians and barbarians +said it to the Greeks and the Greeks said it in return; the bond said +it to the free and the free said it to the bond. The New Testament +Church in this regard was one of the most extraordinary upheavals in +history, and to-day the best hopes of the world depend upon that spirit +which still says to all men over all the differences of race and colour +and station, "You are as good as I am." + +To be sure, before this equalitarian ideal could be embodied in a +social program it had to await the coming of the modern age with its +open doors, its freer movements of thought and life, its belief in +progress, its machinery of change. But even in the stagnation of the +intervening centuries the old Stoic-Christian ideal never was utterly +forgotten. Lactantius, a Christian writer of the fourth century, said +that God, who creates and inspires men, "willed that all should be +equal." [3] Gregory the Great, at the end of the sixth century, said +that "By nature we are all equal." [4] For ages this spiritual insight +remained dissociated from any social program, but now the inevitable +connection has been made. Old caste systems and chattel slavery have +gone down before this ideal. Aristotle argued that slavery ethically +was right because men were essentially and unchangeably masters or +slaves by nature. Somehow that would not sound plausible to us, even +though the greatest mind of all antiquity did say it. Whatever may be +the differences between men and races, they are not sufficient to +justify the ownership of one man by another. The ideal of equality has +wrecked old aristocracies that seemed to have firm hold on permanence. +If one would feel again the thrill which men felt when first the old +distinctions lost their power, one should read once more the songs of +Robert Burns. They often seem commonplaces to us now, but they were +not commonplaces then: + + "For a' that and a' that, + Their dignities, and a' that; + The pith o' sense and pride o' worth + Are higher rank than a' that!" + +This ideal has made equality before the law one of the maxims of our +civilized governments, failure in which wakens our apprehension and our +fear; it has made equal suffrage a fact, although practical people only +yesterday laughed at it as a dream; it has made equality in opportunity +for an education the underlying postulate of our public school systems, +although in New York State seventy-five years ago the debate was still +acute as to whether such a dream ever could come true; it is to-day +lifting races, long accounted inferior, to an eminence where +increasingly their equality is acknowledged. One with difficulty +restrains his scorn for the intellectual impotence of so-called wise +men who think all idealists mere dreamers. Who is the dreamer--the +despiser or the upholder of an ideal whose upheavals already have burst +through old caste systems, upset old slave systems, wrecked old +aristocracies, pushed obscure and forgotten masses of mankind up to +rough equality in court and election booth and school, and now are +rocking the foundations of old racial and international and economic +ideas? The practical applications of this ideal, as, for example, to +the coloured problem in America, are so full of difficulty that no one +need be ashamed to confess that he does not see in detail how the +principle can be made to work. Nevertheless, so deep in the essential +nature of things is the fact of mankind's fundamental unity, that only +God can foresee to what end the application of it yet may come. At any +rate, it is clear that the Christian ideal of human equality before God +can no longer be kept out of a social program. + + +VI + +There is, then, no standing-ground left for a narrowly individualistic +Christianity. To talk of redeeming personality while one is careless +of the social environments which ruin personality; to talk of building +Christlike character while one is complacent about an economic system +that is definitely organized about the idea of selfish profit; to +praise Christian ideals while one is blind to the inevitable urgency +with which they insist on getting themselves expressed in social +programs--all this is vanity. It is deplorable, therefore, that the +Christian forces are tempted to draw apart, some running up the banner +of personal regeneration and some rallying around the flag of social +reformation. The division is utterly needless. Doubtless our own +individual ways of coming into the Christian life influence us deeply +here. Some of us came into the Christian experience from a sense of +individual need alone. We needed for ourselves sins forgiven, peace +restored, hope bestowed. God meant to us first of all satisfaction for +our deepest personal wants. + + "Rock of Ages, cleft for me, + Let me hide myself in Thee"-- + +such was our cry and such was our salvation. If now we are socially +minded, if we are concerned for economic and international +righteousness, that is an enlargement of our Christian outlook which +has grown out of and still is rooted back in our individual need and +experience of God. + +Some of us, however, did not come into fellowship with God by that +route at all. We came in from the opposite direction. The character +in the Old Testament who seems to me the worthiest exhibition of +personal religion before Jesus is the prophet Jeremiah, but Jeremiah +started his religious experience, not with a sense of individual need, +but with a burning, patriotic, social passion. He was concerned for +Judah. Her iniquities, long accumulating, were bringing upon her an +irretrievable disaster. He laid his soul upon her soul and sought to +breathe into her the breath of life. Then, when he saw the country he +adored, the civilization he cherished, crashing into ruin, he was +thrown back personally on God. He started with social passion; he +ended with social passion plus personal religion. Some of God's +greatest servants have come to know him so. + +Henry Ward Beecher once said that a text is a small gate into a large +field where one can wander about as he pleases, and that the trouble +with most ministers is that they spend all their time swinging on the +gate. That same figure applies to the entrance which many of us made +into the Christian experience. Some of us came in by the gate of +personal religion, and we have been swinging on it ever since; and some +of us came in by the gate of social passion for the regeneration of the +world, and we have been swinging on that gate ever since. We both are +wrong. These are two gates into the same city, and it is the city of +our God. It would be one of the greatest blessings to the Christian +church both at home and on the foreign field if we could come together +on this question where separation is so needless and so foolish. If +some of us started with emphasis upon personal religion, we have no +business to stop until we understand the meaning of social +Christianity. If some of us started with emphasis upon the social +campaign, we have no business to rest until we learn the deep secrets +of personal religion. The redemption of personality is the great aim +of the Christian Gospel, and, therefore, to inspire the inner lives of +men and to lift outward burdens which impede their spiritual growth are +both alike Christian service to bring in the Kingdom. + + + +[1] Leo M. Tolstoi: My Religion, Introduction, p. ix. + +[2] D. Crawford: Thinking Black, pp. 444-445. + +[3] L. C. F. Lactantius: The Divine Institutes, Book V, Chap. xv, xvi. + +[4] Gregory the Great: Moralium Libri, Pars quarta, Lib. XXI, Caput +XV--"Omnes namque homines natura aequales sumus." + + + + +LECTURE IV + +PROGRESSIVE CHRISTIANITY + +I + +Hitherto in the development of our thought, we have been considering the +Christian Gospel as an entity set in the midst of a progressive world, +and we have been studying the new Christian attitudes which this +influential environment has been eliciting. The Gospel has been in our +thought like an individual who, finding himself in novel circumstances, +reacts toward them in ways appropriate alike to them and to his own +character. The influence of the idea of progress upon Christianity, +however, is more penetrating than such a figure can adequately portray. +For no one can long ponder the significance of our generation's +progressive ways of thinking without running straight upon this question: +is not Christianity itself progressive? In the midst of a changing world +does not it also change, so that, reacting upon the new ideas of +progress, it not only assimilates and uses them, but is itself an +illustration of them? Where everything else in man's life in its origin +and growth is conceived, not in terms of static and final creation or +revelation, but in terms of development, can religion be left out? +Instead of being a pond around which once for all a man can walk and take +its measure, a final and completed whole, is not Christianity a river +which, maintaining still reliance upon the historic springs from which it +flows, gathers in new tributaries on its course and is itself a changing, +growing and progressive movement? The question is inevitable in any +study of the relationship between the Gospel and progress, and its +implications are so far-reaching that it deserves our careful thought. + +Certainly it is clear that already modern ideas of progress have had so +penetrating an influence upon Christianity as to affect, not its external +reactions and methods only, nor yet its intellectual formulations alone, +but deeper still its very mood and inward temper. Whether or not +Christianity ought to be a changing movement in a changing world, it +certainly has been that and is so still, and the change can be seen going +on now in the very atmosphere in which it lives and moves and has its +being. For example, consider the attitude of resignation to the will of +God, which was characteristic of medieval Christianity. As we saw in our +first lecture, the medieval age did not think of human life upon this +earth in terms of progress. The hopes of men did not revolve about any +Utopia to be expected here. History was not even a glacier, moving +slowly toward the sunny meadows. It did not move at all; it was not +intended to move; it was standing still. To be sure, the thirteenth +century was one of the greatest in the annals of the race. In it the +foremost European universities were founded, the sublimest Gothic +cathedrals were built, some of the world's finest works of handicraft +were made; in it Cimabue and Giotto painted, Dante wrote, St. Thomas +Aquinas philosophized, and St. Francis of Assisi lived. The motives, +however, which originated and sustained this magnificent outburst of +creative energy were otherworldly--they were not concerned with +anticipations of a happier lot for humankind upon this earth. The +medieval age did not believe that man's estate upon the earth ever would +be fundamentally improved, and in consequence took the only reasonable +attitude, resignation. When famines came, God sent them; they were +punishment for sin; his will be done! When wars came, they were the +flails of God to thresh his people; his will be done! Men were resigned +to slavery on the ground that God had made men to be masters and slaves. +They were resigned to feudalism and absolute monarchy on the ground that +God had made men to be rulers and ruled. Whatever was had been ordained +by the Divine or had been allowed by him in punishment for man's +iniquity. To rebel was sin; to doubt was heresy; to submit was piety. +The Hebrew prophets had not been resigned, nor Jesus Christ, nor Paul. +The whole New Testament blazes with the hope of the kingdom of +righteousness coming upon earth. But the medieval age was resigned. Its +real expectations were post-mortem hopes. So far as this earth was +concerned, men must submit. + +To be sure, in those inner experiences where we must endure what we +cannot help, resignation will always characterize a deeply religious +life. All life is not under our control, to be freely mastered by our +thought and toil. There are areas where scientific knowledge gives us +power to do amazing things, but all around them are other areas which our +hands cannot regulate. Orion and the Pleiades were not made for our +fingers to swing, and our engineering does not change sunrise or sunset +nor make the planets one whit less or more. So, in the experiences of +our inward life, around the realm which we can control is that other +realm where move the mysterious providences of God, beyond our power to +understand and as uncontrollable by us as the tides are by the fish that +live in them. Captain Scott found the South Pole, only to discover that +another man had been there first. When, on his return from the +disappointing quest, the pitiless cold, the endless blizzards, the +failing food, had worn down the strength of the little company and in +their tent amid the boundless desolation they waited for the end while +the life flames burned low, Captain Scott wrote: "I do not regret this +journey. . . . We took risks, we knew we took them; things have come out +against us, and therefore we have no cause for complaint, but bow to the +will of Providence, determined still to do our best to the last." [1] +That is resignation at its noblest. + +When, however, a modern Christian tries to do what the medieval +Christians did--make this attitude of resignation cover the whole field +of life, make it the dominant element in their religion, the proof of +their trust and the test of their piety--he finds himself separated from +the most characteristic and stirring elements in his generation. We are +not resigned anywhere else. Everywhere else we count it our pride and +glory to be unresigned. We are not resigned even to a thorny cactus, +whose spiky exterior seems a convincing argument against its use for +food. When we see a barren plain we do not say as our fathers did: God +made plains so in his inscrutable wisdom; his will be done! We call for +irrigation and, when the fructifying waters flow, we say, Thy will be +done! in the way we think God wishes to have it said. We do not +passively submit to God's will; we actively assert it. The scientific +control of life at this point has deeply changed our religious mood. We +are not resigned to pestilences and already have plans drawn up to make +the yellow fever germ "as extinct as the woolly rhinoceros." We are not +even resigned to the absence of wireless telephony when once we have +imagined its presence, or to the inconvenience of slow methods of travel +when once we have invented swift ones. Not to illiteracy nor to child +labour nor to the white plague nor to commercialized vice nor to +recurrent unemployment are we, at our best, resigned. + +This change of mood did not come easily. So strongly did the medieval +spirit of resignation, submissive in a static world, keep its grip upon +the Church that the Church often defiantly withstood the growth of this +unresigned attitude of which we have been speaking and in which we glory. +Lightning rods were vehemently denounced by many ministers as an +unwarranted interference with God's use of lightning. When God hit a +house he meant to hit it; his will be done! This attitude, thus absurdly +applied, had in more important realms a lamentable consequence. The +campaign of Christian missions to foreign lands was bitterly fought in +wide areas of the Christian Church because if God intended to damn the +heathen he should be allowed to do so without interference from us; his +will be done! As for slavery, the last defense which it had in this +country was on religious grounds: that God had ordained it and that it +was blasphemous to oppose his ordination. In a word, this spirit of +passive resignation has been so deeply ingrained in religious thinking +that it has become oftentimes a serious reproach to Christian people. + +Now, however, the mood of modern Christianity is decisively in contrast +with that medieval spirit. Moreover, we think that we are close to the +Master in this attitude, for whatever difference in outward form of +expectation there may be between his day and ours, when he said: "Thy +kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so on earth," that was not +passive submission to God's will but an aggressive prayer for the victory +of God and righteousness; it was not lying down under the will of God as +something to be endured, but active loyalty to the will of God as +something to be achieved. To be resigned to evil conditions on this +earth is in our eyes close to essential sin. If any one who calls +himself a conservative Christian doubts his share in this anti-medieval +spirit, let him test himself and see. In 1836 the Rev. Leonard Wood, D. +D., wrote down this interesting statement: "I remember when I could +reckon up among my acquaintances forty ministers, and none of them at a +great distance, who were either drunkards or far addicted to drinking. I +could mention an ordination which took place about twenty years ago at +which I myself was ashamed and grieved to see two aged ministers +literally drunk, and a third indecently excited." [2] Our forefathers +were resigned to that, but we are not. The most conservative of us so +hates the colossal abomination of the liquor traffic, that we do not +propose to cease our fight until victory has been won. We are +belligerently unresigned. Or when militarism proves itself an +intolerable curse, we do not count it a divine punishment and prepare +ourselves to make the best of its continuance. We propose to end it. +Militarism, which in days of peace cries, Build me vast armaments, spend +enough upon a single dreadnaught to remake the educational system of a +whole state; militarism, which in the days of war cries, Give me your +best youth to slay, leave the crippled and defective to propagate the +race, give me your best to slay; militarism, which lays its avaricious +hand on every new invention to make gregarious death more swift and +terrible, and when war is over makes the starved bodies of innumerable +children walk in its train for pageantry,--we are not resigned to that. +We count it our Christian duty to be tirelessly unresigned. + +Here is a new mood in Christianity, born out of the scientific control of +life and the modern ideas of progress, and, however consonant it may be +with the spirit of the New Testament, it exhibits in the nature of its +regulative conceptions and in its earthly hopes a transformation within +Christianity which penetrates deep. Progressive change is not simply an +environment to which Christianity conforms; it is a fact which +Christianity exhibits. + + +II + +This idea that Christianity is itself a progressive movement instead of a +static finality involves some serious alterations in the historic +conceptions of the faith, as soon as it is applied to theology. Very +early in Christian history the presence of conflicting heresies led the +church to define its faith in creeds and then to regard these as final +formulations of Christian doctrine, incapable of amendment or addition. +Tertullian, about 204 A. D., spoke of the creedal standard of his day as +"a rule of faith changeless and incapable of reformation." [3] From that +day until our own, when a Roman Catholic Council has decreed that "the +definitions of the Roman Pontiff are unchangeable," [4] an unalterable +character has been ascribed to the dogmas of the Church of Rome. Indeed, +Pius IX, in his Syllabus of Errors, specifically condemned the modern +idea that "Divine revelation is imperfect, and, therefore, subject to +continual and indefinite progress, which corresponds with the progress of +human reason." [5] Nor did Protestantism, with all the reformation which +it wrought, attack this central Catholic conception of a changeless +content and formulation of faith. Not what the Pope said, but what the +Bible said, was by Protestants unalterably to be received. Change there +might be in the sense that unrealized potentialities involved in the +original deposit might be brought to light--a kind of development which +not only Protestants but Catholics like Cardinal Newman have willingly +allowed--but whatever had once been stated as the content of faith by the +received authorities was by both Catholics and Protestants regarded as +unalterably so. In the one case, if the Pope had once defined a dogma, +it was changeless; in the other, if the Bible had once formulated a +pre-scientific cosmology, or used demoniacal possession as an explanation +of disease, or personified evil in a devil, all such mental categories +were changelessly to be received. In its popular forms this conception +of Christianity assumes extreme rigidity--Christianity is a static system +finally formulated, a deposit to be accepted in toto if at all, not to be +added to, not to be subtracted from, not to be changed, its i's all +dotted and its t's all crossed. + +The most crucial problem which we face in our religious thinking is +created by the fact that Christianity thus statically conceived now goes +out into a generation where no other aspect of life is conceived in +static terms at all. The earth itself on which we live, not by fiat +suddenly enacted, but by long and gradual processes, became habitable, +and man upon it through uncounted ages grew out of an unknown past into +his present estate. Everything within man's life has grown, is growing, +and apparently will grow. Music developed from crude forms of rhythmic +noise until now, by way of Bach, Beethoven and Wagner, our modern music, +still developing, has grown to forms of harmony at first undreamed. +Painting developed from the rough outlines of the cavemen until now +possibilities of expression in line and colour have been achieved whose +full expansion we cannot guess. Architecture evolved from the crude huts +of primitive man until now our cathedrals and our new business buildings +alike mark an incalculable advance and prophesy an unimaginable future. +One may refuse to call all development real progress, may insist upon +degeneration as well as betterment through change, but, even so, the +basic fact remains that all the elements which go to make man's life come +into being, are what they are, and pass out of what they are into +something different, through processes of continual growth. Our business +methods change until the commercial wisdom of a few years ago may be the +folly of to-day; our moral ideals change until actions once respectable +become reprobate, and the heroes of one generation would be the convicts +of another; our science changes until ideas that men once were burned at +the stake for entertaining are now the commonplace axioms of every school +boy's thought; our economics change until schools of thought shaped to +old industrial conditions are as outmoded as a one-horse shay beside an +automobile; our philosophy changes like our science when Kant, for +example, starts a revolution in man's thinking, worthy, as he claimed, to +be called Copernican; our cultural habits change until marooned +communities in the Kentucky mountains, "our contemporary ancestors," +having let the stream of human life flow around and past them, seem as +strange to us as a belated what-not in a modern parlour. The perception +of this fact of progressive change is one of the regnant influences in +our modern life and, strangely enough, so far from disliking it, we glory +in it; in our expectancy we count on change; with our control of life we +seek to direct it. + +Indeed no more remarkable difference distinguishes the modern world from +all that went before than its attitude toward change itself. The +medieval world idealized changelessness. Its very astronomy was the +apotheosis of the unalterable. The earth, a globe full of mutation and +decay; around it eight transparent spheres carrying the heavenly bodies, +each outer sphere moving more slowly than its inner neighbour, while the +ninth, moving most slowly of all, moved all the rest; last of all, the +empyrean, blessed with changeless, motionless perfection, the abode of +God--such was the Ptolemaic astronomy as Dante knew it. This +idealization of changelessness was the common property of all that by +gone world. The Holy Roman Empire was the endeavour to perpetuate a +changeless idea of political theory and organization; the Holy Catholic +Church was the endeavour to perpetuate a changeless formulation of +religious dogma and hierarchy; the Summa of St. Thomas Aquinas was the +endeavour to settle forever changeless paths for the human mind to walk +in. To that ancient world as a whole the perfect was the finished, and +therefore it was immutable. + +How different our modern attitude toward change has come to be! We +believe in change, rely on it, hope for it, rejoice in it, are determined +to achieve it and control it. Nowhere is this more evident than in our +thought of the meaning of knowledge. In the medieval age knowledge was +spun as a spider spins his web. Thinking simply made evident what +already was involved in an accepted proposition. A premise was drawn out +into its filaments and then woven into a fabric of new form but of the +same old material. Knowledge did not start from actual things; it did +not intend to change actual things; and the shelves of the libraries +groan with the burden of that endless and largely futile cogitation. +Then the new knowledge began from the observation of things as they +really are and from the use of that observation for the purposes of human +life. Once a lad, seventeen years old, went into the cathedral at Pisa +to worship. Soon he forgot the service and watched a chandelier, +swinging from the lofty roof. He wondered whether, no matter how +changeable the length of its arc, its oscillations always consumed the +same time and, because he had no other means, he timed its motion by the +beating of his pulse. That was one time when a boy went to church and +did well to forget the service. He soon began to wonder whether he could +not make a pendulum which, swinging like the chandeliers, would do useful +business for men. He soon began to discover, in what he had seen that +day, new light on the laws of planetary motion. That was one of the +turning points in human history--the boy was Galileo. The consequences +of this new method are all around us now. The test of knowledge in +modern life is capacity to cause change. If a man really knows +electricity he can cause change; he can illumine cities and drive cars. +If a man really knows engineering, he can cause change; he can tunnel +rivers and bridge gulfs. It is for that purpose we wish knowledge. +Instead of being dreaded, controlled change has become the chief desire +of modern life. + +When, therefore, in this generation with its perception of growth as the +universal law and with its dependence upon controlled change as the hope +of man, Christianity endeavours to glorify changelessness and to maintain +itself in unalterable formulations, it has outlawed itself from its own +age. An Indian punkah-puller, urged by his mistress to better his +condition, replied: "Mem Sahib, my father pulled a punkah, my grandfather +pulled a punkah, all my ancestors for four million ages pulled punkahs, +and, before that, the god who founded our caste pulled a punkah over +Vishnu." How utterly lost such a man would be in the dynamic movements +of our modern Western life!--yet not more lost than is a Christianity +which tries to remain static in a progressive world. + + +III + +Among the influences which have forced well-instructed minds first to +accept and then to glory in the progressive nature of Christianity, the +first place must be given to the history of religion itself. The study +of religion's ancient records in ritual, monument and book, and of +primitive faiths still existing among us in all stages of development, +has made clear the general course which man's religious life has traveled +from very childish beginnings until now. From early animism in its +manifold expressions, through polytheism, kathenotheism, henotheism, to +monotheism, and so out into loftier possibilities of conceiving the +divine nature and purpose--the main road which man has traveled in his +religious development now is traceable. Nor is there any place where it +is more easily traceable than in our own Hebrew-Christian tradition. One +of the fine results of the historical study of the Scriptures is the +possibility which now exists of arranging the manuscripts of the Bible in +approximately chronological order and then tracing through them the +unfolding growth of the faiths and hopes which come to their flower in +the Gospel of Christ. Consider, for example, the exhilarating story of +the developing conception of Jehovah's character from the time he was +worshiped as a mountain-god in the desert until he became known as the +"God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." + +We are explicitly told that the history of Jehovah's relationship with +Israel began at Sinai and that before that time the Hebrew fathers had +never even heard his name.[6] There on a mountain-top in the Sinaitic +wilderness dwelt this new-found god, so anthropomorphically conceived +that he could hide Moses in a rock's cleft from which the prophet could +not see Jehovah's face but could see his back.[7] He was a god of battle +and the name of an old book about him still remains to us, "The book of +the Wars of Jehovah." [8] + + "Jehovah is a man of war: + Jehovah is his name"--[9] + +so his people at first rejoiced in him and gloried in his power when he +thundered and lightened on Sinai. Few stories in man's spiritual history +are so interesting as the record of the way in which this mountain-god, +for the first time, so far as we know, in Semitic history, left his +settled shrine, traveled with his people in the holy Ark, became +acclimated in Canaan, and, gradually absorbing the functions of the old +baals of the land, extended his sovereignty over the whole of Palestine. + +To be sure, even then he still was thought of, as all ancient gods were +thought of, as geographically limited to the country whose god he was. +Milcolm and Chemosh were real gods too, ruling in Philistia and Moab as +Jehovah did in Canaan. This is the meaning of Jephthah's protest to a +hostile chieftain: "Wilt not thou possess that which Chemosh thy god +giveth thee to possess?" [10] This is the meaning of David's protest +when he is driven out to the Philistine cities: "They have driven me out +this day that I should not cleave unto the inheritance of Jehovah, +saying, Go, serve other gods." [11] This is the meaning of Naaman's +desire to have two mules' burden of Jehovah's land on which to worship +Jehovah in Damascus.[12] Jehovah could be worshiped only on Jehovah's +land. But ever as the day of fuller understanding dawned, the +sovereignty of Jehovah widened and his power usurped the place and +function of all other gods. Amos saw him using the nations as his pawns; +Isaiah heard him whistling to the nations as a shepherd to his dogs; +Jeremiah heard him cry, "Can any hide himself in secret places so that I +shall not see him? . . . Do not I fill heaven and earth?" [13]; until at +last we sweep out, through the exile and all the heightening of faith and +clarifying of thought that came with it, into the Great Isaiah's 40th +chapter on the universal and absolute sovereignty of God, into the +Priestly narrative of creation, where God makes all things with a word, +into psalms which cry, + + "For all the gods of the people are idols; + But Jehovah made the heavens." [14] + +Moreover, as Jehovah's sovereignty thus is enlarged until he is the God +of all creation, his character too is deepened and exalted in the +understanding of his people. That noblest succession of moral teachers +in ancient history, the Hebrew prophets, developed a conception of the +nature of God in terms of righteousness, so broad in its outreach, so +high in its quality, that as one mounts through Amos' fifth chapter and +Isaiah's first chapter and Jeremiah's seventh chapter, he finds himself, +like Moses on Nebo's top, looking over into the Promised Land of the New +Testament. There this development flowers out under the influence of +Jesus. God's righteousness is interpreted, not in terms of justice only, +but of compassionate, sacrificial love; his Fatherhood embraces not only +all mankind but each individual, lifting him out of obscurity in the mass +into infinite worthfulness and hope. And more than this development of +idea, the New Testament gives us a new picture of God in the personality +of Jesus, and we see the light of the knowledge of God's glory in his +face. + +Moreover, this development, so plainly recorded in Scripture, was not +unconsciously achieved by the drift of circumstance; it represents the +ardent desire of forward-looking men, inspired by the Spirit. The +Master, himself, was consciously pleading for a progressive movement in +the religious life and thinking of his day. A static religion was the +last thing he ever dreamed of or wanted. No one was more reverent than +he toward his people's past; his thought and his speech were saturated +with the beauty of his race's heritage; yet consider his words as again +and again they fell from his lips: "It was said to them of old time . . . +but I say unto you." His life was rooted in the past but it was not +imprisoned there; it grew up out of the past, not destroying but +fulfilling it. He had in him the spirit of the prophets, who once had +spoken to his people in words of fire; but old forms that he thought had +been outgrown he brushed aside. He would not have his Gospel a patch on +an old garment, he said, nor would he put it like new wine into old +wineskins. He appealed from the oral traditions of the elders to the +written law; within the written law he distinguished between ceremonial +and ethical elements, making the former of small or no account, the +latter all-important; and then within the written ethical law he waived +provisions that seemed to him outmoded by time. Even when he bade +farewell to his disciples, he did not talk to them as if what he himself +had said were a finished system: "I have yet many things to say unto you, +but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is +come, he shall guide you into all the truth." + +In Paul's hands the work which Jesus began went on. He dared an +adventurous move that makes much of our modern progressiveness look like +child's play: he lifted the Christian churches out of the narrow, +religious exclusiveness of the Hebrew synagogue. He dared to wage battle +for the new idea that Christianity was not a Jewish sect but a universal +religion. He withstood to his face Peter, still trammeled in the +narrowness of his Jewish thinking, and he founded churches across the +Roman Empire where was neither Jew nor Greek, barbarian, Scythian, male +nor female, bond nor free, but all were one man in Christ Jesus. + +Even more thrilling were those later days when in Ephesus the writer of +the Fourth Gospel faced a Hellenistic audience, to whom the forms of +thought in which Jesus hitherto had been interpreted were utterly unreal. +The first creed about Jesus proclaimed that he was the Messiah, but +Messiah was a Jewish term and to the folk of Ephesus it had no vital +meaning. John could not go on calling the Master that and that alone, +when he had hungry souls before him who needed the Master but to whom +Jewish terms had no significance. One thing those folk of Ephesus did +understand, the idea of the Logos. They had heard of that from the many +faiths whose pure or syncretized forms made the religious background of +their time. They knew about the Logos from Zoroastrianism, where beside +Ahura Mazdah stood Vohu Manah, the Mind of God; from Stoicism, at the +basis of whose philosophy lay the idea of the Logos; from Alexandrian +Hellenism, by means of which a Jew like Philo had endeavoured to marry +Greek philosophy and Hebrew orthodoxy. And the writer of the Fourth +Gospel used that new form of thought in which to present to his people +the personality of our Lord. "In the beginning was the Logos, and the +Logos was with God, and the Logos was God"--so begins the Fourth Gospel's +prologue, in words that every intelligent person in Ephesus could +understand and was familiar with, and that initial sermon in the book, +for it is a sermon, not philosophy, moves on in forms of thought which +the people knew about and habitually used, until the hidden purpose comes +to light: "The Logos became flesh and dwelt among us (and we beheld his +glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father), full of grace and +truth." John was presenting his Lord to the people of his time in terms +that the people could understand. + +Even within the New Testament, therefore, there is no static creed. For, +like a flowing river, the Church's thought of her Lord shaped itself to +the intellectual banks of the generation through which it moved, even +while, by its construction and erosion, it transfigured them. Nor did +this movement cease with New Testament days. From the Johannine idea of +the Logos to the Nicene Creed, where our Lord is set in the framework of +Greek metaphysics, the development is just as clear as from the category +of Jewish Messiah to the categories of the Fourth Gospel. And if, in our +generation, a conservative scholar like the late Dr. Sanday pleaded for +the necessity of a new Christology, it was not because he was primarily +zealous for a novel philosophy, but because like John of old in Ephesus +he was zealous to present Christ to his own generation in terms that his +own generation could comprehend.[15] + + +IV + +Undoubtedly such an outlook upon the fluid nature of the Christian +movement will demand readjustment in the religious thinking of many +people. They miss the old ideas about revelation. This new +progressiveness seems to them to be merely the story of man's discovery, +finding God, here a little and there a little, as he has found the truths +of astronomy. But God's revelation of himself is just as real when it is +conceived in progressive as when it is conceived in static terms. Men +once thought of God's creation of the world in terms of fiat--it was done +on the instant; and when evolution was propounded men cried that the +progressive method shut God out. We see now how false that fear was. +The creative activity of God never was so nobly conceived as it has been +since we have known the story of his slow unfolding of the universe. We +have a grander picture in our minds than even the psalmist had, when we +say after him, "The heavens declare the glory of God." So men who have +been accustomed to think of revelation in static terms, now that the long +leisureliness of man's developing spiritual insight is apparent, fear +that this does away with revelation. But in God's unfolding education of +his people recorded in the Scriptures revelation is at its noblest. No +man ever found God except when God was seeking to be found. Discovery is +the under side of the process; the upper side is revelation. + +Indeed, this conception of progressive revelation does not shut out +finality. In scientific thought, which continually moves and grows, +expands and changes, truths are discovered once for all. The work of +Copernicus is in a real sense final. This earth does move; it is not +stationary; and the universe is not geocentric. That discovery is final. +Many developments start from that, but the truth itself is settled once +for all. So, in the spiritual history of man, final revelations come. +They will not have to be made over again and they will not have to be +given up. Progress does not shut out finality; it only makes each new +finality a point of departure for a new adventure, not a terminus ad quem +for a conclusive stop. That God was in Christ reconciling the world unto +himself is for the Christian a finality, but, from the day the first +disciples saw its truth until now, the intellectual formulations in which +it has been set and the mental categories by which it has been +interpreted have changed with the changes of each age's thought. + +While at first, then, a progressive Christianity may seem to plunge us +into unsettlement, the more one studies it the less he would wish it +otherwise. Who would accept a snapshot taken at any point on the road of +Christian development as the final and perfect form of Christianity? +Robert Louis Stevenson has drawn for us a picture of a man trying with +cords and pegs to stake out the shadow of an oak tree, expecting that +when he had marked its boundaries the shadow would stay within the limits +of the pegs. Yet all the while the mighty globe was turning around in +space. He could not keep a tree's shadow static on a moving earth. +Nevertheless, multitudes of people in their endeavour to build up an +infallibly settled creed have tried just such a hopeless task. They +forget that while a revelation _from_ God might conceivably be final and +complete, religion deals with a revelation _of_ God. God, the infinite +and eternal, from everlasting to everlasting, the source and crown and +destiny of all the universe--shall a man whose days are as grass rise up +to say that he has made a statement about him which will not need to be +revised? Rather, our prayer should be that the thought of God, the +meaning of God, the glory of God, the plans and purpose of God may expand +in our comprehension until we, who now see in a mirror, darkly, may see +face to face. "Le Dieu défini est le Dieu fini." + +This mistaken endeavour, in the interest of stability, to make a vital +movement static is not confined to religion. Those of us who love Wagner +remember the lesson of Die Meistersinger. Down in Nuremberg they had +standardized and conventionalized music. They had set it down in rules +and men like Beckmesser could not imagine that there was any music +permissible outside the regulations. Then came Walter von Stolzing. +Music to him was not a conventionality but a passion--not a rule, but a +life--and, when he sang, his melodies reached heights of beauty that +Beckmesser's rules did not provide for. It was Walter von Stolzing who +sang the Prize Song, and as the hearts of the people were stirred in +answer to its spontaneous melody, until all the population of Nuremberg +were singing its accumulating harmonies, poor Beckmesser on his +blackboard jotted down the rules which were being broken. Beckmesser +represents a static conception of life which endeavours to freeze +progress at a given point and call it infallible. But Beckmesser is +wrong. You cannot take things like music and religion and set them down +in final rules and regulations. They are life, and you have to let them +grow and flower and expand and reveal evermore the latent splendour at +their heart. + + +V + +Obviously, the point where this progressive conception of Christianity +comes into conflict with many widely accepted ideas is the abandonment +which it involves of an external and inerrant authority in matters of +religion. The marvel is that that idea of authority, which is one of the +historic curses of religion, should be regarded by so many as one of the +vital necessities of the faith. The fact is that religion by its very +nature is one of the realms to which external authority is least +applicable. In science people commonly suppose that they do not take +truth on any one's authority; they prove it. In business they do not +accept methods on authority; they work them out. In statesmanship they +no longer believe in the divine right of kings nor do they accept +infallible dicta handed down from above. But they think that religion is +delivered to them by authority and that they believe what they do believe +because a divine Church or a divine Book or a divine Man told them. + +In this common mode of thinking, popular ideas have the truth turned +upside down. The fact is that science, not religion, is the realm where +most of all we use external authority. They tell us that there are +millions of solar systems scattered through the fields of space. Is that +true? How do we know? We never counted them. We know only what the +authorities say. They tell us that the next great problem in science is +breaking up the atom to discover the incalculable resources of power +there waiting to be harnessed by our skill. Is that true? Most of us do +not understand what an atom is, and what it means to break one up passes +the farthest reach of our imaginations; all we know is what the +authorities say. They tell us that electricity is a mode of motion in +ether. Is that true? Most of us have no first hand knowledge about +electricity. The motorman calls it "juice" and that means as much to us +as to call it a mode of motion in ether; we must rely on the authorities. +They tell us that sometime we are going to talk through wireless +telephones across thousands of miles, so that no man need ever be out of +vocal communication with his family and friends. Is that true? It seems +to us an incredible miracle, but we suppose that it is so, as the +authorities say. In a word, the idea that we do not use authority in +science is absurd. Science is precisely the place where nine hundred and +ninety-nine men out of a thousand use authority the most. The chemistry, +biology, geology, astronomy which the authorities teach is the only +science which most of us possess. + +There is another realm, however, where we never think of taking such an +attitude. They tell us that friendship is beautiful. Is that true? +Would we ever think of saying that we do not know, ourselves, but that we +rely on the authorities? Far better to say that our experience with +friendship has been unhappy and that we personally question its utility! +That, at least, would have an accent of personal, original experience in +it. For here we are facing a realm where we never can enter at all until +we enter, each man for himself. + +Two realms exist, therefore, in each of which first-hand experience is +desirable, but in only one of which it is absolutely indispensable. We +can live on what the authorities in physics say, but there are no proxies +for the soul. Love, friendship, delight in music and in nature, parental +affection--these things are like eating and breathing; no one can do them +for us; we must enter the experience for ourselves. Religion, too, +belongs in this last realm. The one vital thing in religion is +first-hand, personal experience. Religion is the most intimate, inward, +incommunicable fellowship of the human soul. In the words of Plotinus, +religion is "the flight of the alone to the Alone." You never know God +at all until you know him for yourself. The only God you ever will know +is the God you do know for yourself. + +This does not mean, of course, that there are no authorities in religion. +There are authorities in everything, but the function of an authority in +religion, as in every other vital realm, is not to take the place of our +eyes, seeing in our stead and inerrantly declaring to us what it sees; +the function of an authority is to bring to us the insight of the world's +accumulated wisdom and the revelations of God's seers, and so to open our +eyes that we may see, each man for himself. So an authority in +literature does not say to his students: The Merchant of Venice is a +great drama; you may accept my judgment on that--I know. Upon the +contrary, he opens their eyes; he makes them see; he makes their hearts +sensitive so that the genius which made Shylock and Portia live +captivates and subdues them, until like the Samaritans they say, "Now we +believe, not because of thy speaking: for we have heard for ourselves, +and know." That is the only use of authority in a vital, realm. It can +lead us up to the threshold of a great experience where we must enter, +each man for himself, and that service to the spiritual life is the +Bible's inestimable gift. + +At the beginning, Christianity was just such a first-hand experience as +we have described. The Christian fellowship consisted of a group of men +keeping company with Jesus and learning how to live. They had no creeds +to recite when they met together; what they believed was still an +unstereotyped passion in their hearts. They had no sacraments to +distinguish their faith--baptism had been a Jewish rite and even the +Lord's Supper was an informal use of bread and wine, the common elements +of their daily meal. They had no organizations to join; they never +dreamed that the Christian Gospel would build a church outside the +synagogue. Christianity in the beginning was an intensely personal +experience. + +Then the Master went away and the tremendous forces of human life and +history laid hold on the movement which so vitally he had begun. His +followers began building churches. Just as the Wesleyans had to leave +the Church of England, not because they wanted to, but because the +Anglicans would not keep them, so the Christians, not because they +planned to, but because the synagogue was not large enough to hold them, +had to leave the synagogue. They began building creeds; they had to. +Every one of the first Christian creeds was written in sheer +self-defense. If we had been Christians in those first centuries, when a +powerful movement was under way called Gnosticism, which denied that God, +the Father Almighty, had made both the heaven and the earth, which said +that God had made heaven indeed but that a demigod had made the world, +and which denied that Jesus had been born in the flesh and in the flesh +had died, we would have done what the first Christians did: we would have +defined in a creed what it was the Christians did believe as against that +wild conglomeration of Oriental mythology that Gnosticism was, and we +would have shouted the creed as a war cry against the Gnostics. That is +what the so-called Apostles' Creed was--the first Christian battle chant, +a militant proclamation of the historic faith against the heretics; and +every one of its declarations met with a head-on collision some claim of +Gnosticism. Then, too, the early Christians drew up rituals; they had +to. We cannot keep any spiritual thing in human life, even the spirit of +courtesy, as a disembodied wraith. We ritualize it--we bow, we take off +our hats, we shake hands, we rise when a lady enters. We have +innumerable ways of expressing politeness in a ritual. Neither could +they have kept so deep and beautiful a thing as the Christian life +without such expression. + +So historic Christianity grew, organized, creedalized, ritualized. And +ever as it grew, a peril grew with it, for there were multitudes of +people who joined these organizations, recited these creeds, observed +these rituals, took all the secondary and derived elements of +Christianity, but often forgot that vital thing which all this was meant +in the first place to express: a first-hand, personal experience of God +in Christ. That alone is vital in Christianity; all the rest is once or +twice or thrice removed from life. For Christianity is not a creed, nor +an organization, nor a ritual. These are important but they are +secondary. They are the leaves, not the roots; they are the wires, not +the message. Christianity itself is a life. + +If, however, Christianity is thus a life, we cannot stereotype its +expressions in set and final forms. If it is a life in fellowship with +the living God, it will think new thoughts, build new organizations, +expand into new symbolic expressions. We cannot at any given time write +"finis" after its development. We can no more "keep the faith" by +stopping its growth than we can keep a son by insisting on his being +forever a child. The progressiveness of Christianity is not simply its +response to a progressive age; the progressiveness of Christianity +springs from its own inherent vitality. So far is this from being +regrettable, that a modern Christian rejoices in it and gladly recognizes +not only that he is thinking thoughts and undertaking enterprises which +his fathers would not have understood, but also that his children after +him will differ quite as much in teaching and practice from the modernity +of to-day. It has been the fashion to regard this changeableness with +wistful regret. So Wordsworth sings in his sonnet on Mutability: + + "Truth fails not; but her outward forms that bear + The longest date do melt like frosty rime, + That in the morning whitened hill and plain + And is no more; drop like the tower sublime + Of yesterday, which royally did wear + Its crown of weeds, but could not even sustain + Some casual shout that broke the silent air, + Or the unimaginable touch of Time." + +Such wistfulness, however, while a natural sentiment, is not true to the +best Christian thought of our day. He who believes in the living God, +while he will be far from calling all change progress, and while he will, +according to his judgment, withstand perverse changes with all his might, +will also regard the cessation of change as the greatest calamity that +could befall religion. Stagnation in thought or enterprise means death +for Christianity as certainly as it does for any other vital movement. +Stagnation, not change, is Christianity's most deadly enemy, for this is +a progressive world, and in a progressive world no doom is more certain +than that which awaits whatever is belated, obscurantist and reactionary. + + + +[1] Leonard Huxley: Scott's Last Expedition, Vol. I, The Journals of +Captain R. F. Scott, Rn., C. V. O., p. 417. + +[2] Kirby Page; The Sword or the Cross, p. 41. + +[3] Tertullian: De Virginibus Velandis, Cap. I--"Regula quidem fidei una +omnino est, sola immobilis et irreformabilis." + +[4] Vatican Council, July 18, 1870, First Dogmatic Constitution on the +Church of Christ, Chapter IV, Concerning the Infallible Teaching of the +Roman Pontiff. + +[5] The Papal Syllabus of Errors, A. D. 1864, Sec. 1, 5. + +[6] Exodus 6:3; Chap. 19. + +[7] Exodus 33:22-23. + +[8] Numbers 21:14. + +[9] Exodus 15:3. + +[10] Judges 11:24. + +[11] I Samuel 26:19. + +[12] II Kings 5:17. + +[13] Jeremiah 23:24. + +[14] Psalm 96:5. + +[15] William Sanday: Christologies Ancient and Modern. + + + + +LECTURE V + +THE PERILS OF PROGRESS + +I + +In the history of human thought and social organization there is an +interesting pendular swing between conflicting ideas so that, about the +time we wake up to recognize that thought is swinging one way, we may +be fairly sure that soon it will be swinging the other. Man's social +organization, for example, has moved back and forth between the two +poles of individual liberty and social solidarity. To pick up the +swing of that pendulum only in recent times, we note that out of the +social solidarity of the feudal system man swung over to the individual +liberty of the free cities; then from the individual liberty of the +free cities to the social solidarity of the absolute monarchies; then +back again into the individual liberty of the democratic states. We +see that now we are clearly swinging over to some new form of social +solidarity, of which tendency federalism and socialism are expressions, +and doubtless from that we shall recoil toward individual liberty once +more. It is a safe generalization that whenever human thought shows +some decided trend, a corrective movement is not far away. However +enthusiastic we may be, therefore, about the idea of progress and the +positive contributions which it can make to our understanding and +mastery of life, we may be certain that there are in it the faults of +its qualities. If we take it without salt, our children will rise up, +not to applaud our far-seeing wisdom, but to blame our easy-going +credulity. We have already seen that the very idea of progress sprang +up in recent times in consequence of a few factors which predisposed +men's minds to social hopefulness. Fortunately, some of these factors, +such as the scientific control of life through the knowledge of law, +seem permanent, and we are confident that the idea of progress will +have abiding meaning for human thought and life. But no study of the +matter could be complete without an endeavour to discern the perils in +this modern mode of thought and to guard ourselves against accepting as +an unmixed blessing what is certainly, like all things human, a blend +of good and evil. + +One peril involved in the popular acceptance of the idea of progress +has been the creation of a superficial, ill-considered optimism which +has largely lost sight of the terrific obstacles in human nature +against which any real moral advance on earth must win its way. Too +often we have taken for granted what a recent book calls "a goal of +racial perfection and nobility the splendour of which it is beyond our +powers to conceive," and we have dreamed about this earthly paradise +like a saint having visions of heaven and counting it as won already +because he is predestined to obtain it. Belief in inevitable progress +has thus acted as an opiate on many minds, lulling them into an elysium +where all things come by wishing and where human ignorance and folly, +cruelty and selfishness do not impede the peaceful flowing of their +dreams. In a word, the idea of progress has blanketed the sense of +sin. Lord Morley spoke once of "that horrid burden and impediment upon +the soul which the Churches call Sin, and which, by whatever name you +call it, is a real catastrophe in the moral nature of man." The modern +age, busy with slick, swift schemes for progress, has too largely lost +sight of that. + +Indeed, at no point do modern Christians differ more sharply from their +predecessors than in the serious facing of the problem of sin. +Christians of former times were burdened with a heavy sense of their +transgressions, and their primary interest in the Gospel was its +promised reestablishment of their guilty souls in the fellowship of a +holy God. Modern Christianity, however, is distinguished from all that +by a jaunty sense of moral well-being; when we admit our sins we do it +with complacency and cheerfulness; our religion is generally +characterized by an easy-going self-righteousness. Bunyan's Pilgrim +with his lamentable load upon his back, crying, "What shall I do! . . . +I am . . . undone by reason of a burden that lieth hard upon me," is no +fit symbol of a typically modern Christian. + +Doubtless we have cause to be thankful for this swing away from the +morbid extremes to which our fathers often went in their sense of sin. +It is hard to forgive Jonathan Edwards when one reads in his famous +Enfield sermon: "The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as +one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect, over the fire, abhors +you, and is dreadfully provoked; . . . you are ten thousand times so +abominable in his eyes, as the most hateful and venomous serpent is in +ours." Any one who understands human nature could have told him that, +after such a black exaggeration of human depravity as he and his +generation were guilty of, the Christian movement was foredoomed to +swing away over to the opposite extreme of complacent +self-righteousness. Unquestionably we have made the swing. In spite +of the debacle of the Great War, this is one of the most unrepentant +generations that ever walked the earth, dreaming still of automatic +progress toward an earthly paradise. + +Many factors have gone into the making of this modern mood of +self-complacency. _New knowledge_ has helped, by which disasters, such +as once awakened our fathers' poignant sense of sin, are now attributed +to scientific causes rather than to human guilt. When famines or +pestilences came, our fathers thought them God's punishment for sin. +When earthquakes shook the earth or comets hung threateningly in the +sky, our fathers saw in them a divine demand for human penitence. Such +events, referred now to their scientific causes, do not quicken in us a +sense of sin. _New democracy_ also has helped in this development of +self-complacency. Under autocratic kings the common people were common +people and they knew it well. Their dependent commonality was enforced +on them by the constant pressure of their social life. Accustomed to +call themselves miserable worms before an earthly king, they had no +qualms about so estimating themselves before the King of Heaven. +Democracy, however, elevates us into self-esteem. The genius of +democracy is to believe in men, their worth, their possibilities, their +capacities for self-direction. Once the dominant political ideas +depressed men into self-contempt; now they lift men into +self-exaltation. _New excuses for sin_ have aided in creating our mood +of self-content. We know more than our fathers did about the effect of +heredity and environment on character, and we see more clearly that +some souls are not born but damned into the world. Criminals, in +consequence, have come not to be so much condemned as pitied, their +perversion of character is regarded not so much in terms of iniquity as +of disease, and as we thus condone transgression in others, so in +ourselves we palliate our wrong. We regard it as the unfortunate but +hardly blamable consequence of temperament or training. Our fathers, +who thought that the trouble was the devil in them, used to deal +sternly with themselves. Like Chinese Gordon, fighting a besetting sin +in private prayer, they used to come out from their inward struggles +saying, "I hewed Agag in pieces before the Lord." But we are softer +with ourselves; we find in lack of eugenics or in cruel circumstance a +good excuse. + +Undoubtedly, the _new theology_ has helped to encourage this modern +mood of self-complacency. Jonathan Edwards' Enfield sermon pictured +sinners held over the blazing abyss of hell in the hands of a wrathful +deity who at any moment was likely to let go, and so terrific was that +discourse in its delivery that women fainted and strong men clung in +agony to the pillars of the church. Obviously, we do not believe in +that kind of God any more, and as always in reaction we swing to the +opposite extreme, so in the theology of these recent years we have +taught a very mild, benignant sort of deity. One of our popular +drinking songs sums up this aspect of our new theology: + + "God is not censorious + When His children have their fling." + +Indeed, the god of the new theology has not seemed to care acutely +about sin; certainly he has not been warranted to punish heavily; he +has been an indulgent parent and when we have sinned, a polite "Excuse +me" has seemed more than adequate to make amends. John Muir, the +naturalist, was accustomed during earthquake shocks in California to +assuage the anxieties of perturbed Eastern visitors by saying that it +was only Mother Earth trotting her children on her knee. Such +poetizing is quite in the style of the new theology. Nevertheless, the +description, however pretty, is not an adequate account of a real +earthquake, and in this moral universe there are real earthquakes, as +this generation above all others ought to know, when man's sin, his +greed, his selfishness, his rapacity roll up across the years an +accumulating mass of consequence until at last in a mad collapse the +whole earth crashes into ruin. The moral order of the world has not +been trotting us on her knees these recent years; the moral order of +the world has been dipping us in hell; and because the new theology had +not been taking account of such possibilities, had never learned to +preach on that text in the New Testament, "It is a fearful thing to +fall into the hands of the living God," we were ill prepared for the +experience. + +Many factors like those which we have named have contributed to create +our modern negligence of the problem of sin, but under all of them and +permeating them has been the idea that automatic progress is inherent +in the universe. This evolving cosmos has been pictured as a +fool-proof world where men could make and love their lies, with their +souls dead and their stomachs well alive, with selfish profit the +motive of their economic order and narrow nationalism the slogan of +their patriotism, and where still, escaping the consequences, they +could live in a progressive society. A recent writer considers it +possible that "over the crest of the hill the Promised Land stretches +away to the far horizons smiling in eternal sunshine." The picture is +nonsense. All the progress this world ever will know waits upon the +conquest of sin. Strange as it may sound to the ears of this modern +age, long tickled by the amiable idiocies of evolution popularly +misinterpreted, this generation's deepest need is not these dithyrambic +songs about inevitable progress, but a fresh sense of personal and +social sin. + +What the scientific doctrine of evolution really implies is something +much more weighty and sinister than frothy optimism. When a preacher +now quotes Paul, "as in Adam all die," not many of the younger +generation understand him, but when we are told that we came out of +low, sub-human beginnings, that we carry with us yet the bestial +leftovers of an animal heritage to be fought against and overcome and +left behind, well-instructed members of this generation ought to +comprehend. Yet in saying that, we are dealing with the same +fundamental fact which Paul was facing when he said, "as in Adam all +die"; we are handling the same unescapable experience out of which the +old doctrine of original sin first came; we are facing a truth which it +will not pay us to forget: that humanity's sinful nature is not +something which you and I alone make up by individual deeds of wrong, +but that it is an inherited mortgage and handicap on the whole human +family. Why is it that if we let a field run wild it goes to weeds, +while if we wish wheat we must fight for every grain of it? Why is it +that if we let human nature run loose it goes to evil, while he who +would be virtuous must struggle to achieve character? It is because, +in spite of our optimisms and evasions, that fact still is here, which +our fathers often appraised more truly than we, that human nature, with +all its magnificent possibilities, is like the earth's soil filled with +age-long seeds and roots of evil growth, and that progress in goodness, +whether personal or social, must be achieved by grace of some power +which can give us the victory over our evil nature. + +In past generations it was the preachers who talked most about sin and +thundered against it from their pulpits, but now for years they have +been very reticent about it. Others, however, have not been still. +Scientists have made us feel the ancient heritage that must be fought +against; novelists have written no great novel that does not swirl +around some central sin; the work of the dramatists from Shakespeare +until Ibsen is centrally concerned with the problem of human evil; and +now the psycho-analysts are digging down into the unremembered thoughts +of men to bring up into the light of day the origins of our spiritual +miseries in frustrated and suppressed desire. We do not need +artificially to conjure up a sense of sin. All we need to do is to +open our eyes to facts. Take one swift glance at the social state of +the world to-day. Consider our desperate endeavours to save this +rocking civilization from the consequences of the blow just delivered +it by men's iniquities. That should be sufficient to indicate that +this is no fool-proof universe automatically progressive, but that +moral evil is still the central problem of mankind. + +One would almost say that the first rule for all who believe in a +progressive world is not to believe in it too much. Long ago Plato +said that he drove two horses, one white and tractable, the other black +and fractious; Jesus said that two masters sought man's allegiance, one +God, the other mammon; Paul said that his soul was the battle-ground of +two forces, one of which he called spirit and the other flesh; and only +the other day one of our own number told of the same struggle between +two men in each of us, one Dr. Jekyll, the other Mr. Hyde. That +conflict still is pivotal in human history. The idea of progress can +defeat itself no more surely than by getting itself so believed that +men expect automatic social advance apart from the conquest of personal +and social sin. + + +II + +Another result of our superficial confidence in the idea of progress is +reliance upon social palliatives instead of radical cures for our +public maladies. We are so predisposed to think that the world +inherently wants to be better, is inwardly straining to be better, that +we are easily fooled into supposing that some slight easement of +external circumstance will at once release the progressive forces of +mankind and save the race. When, for example, one compares the immense +amount of optimistic expectancy about a warless world with the small +amount of radical thinking as to what really is the matter with us, he +may well be amazed at the unfounded regnancy of the idea of progress. +We rejoice over some slight disarmament as though that were the cure of +our international shame, whereas always one can better trust a real +Quaker with a gun than a thug without one. So the needs of our +international situation, involving external disarmament, to be sure, +involve also regenerations of thought and spirit much more radical than +any rearrangement of outward circumstance. To forget that is to lose +the possibility of real progress; and insight into these deep-seated +needs is often dimmed by our too amiable and innocent belief in +automatic social advance waiting to take place on the slightest excuse. + +To take but a single illustration of a radical change in men's +thinking, difficult to achieve and yet indispensable to a decent world, +consider the group of prejudices and passions which center about +nationalism and which impede the real progress of international +fraternity. What if all Christians took Jesus in earnest in his +attitude that only one object on earth is worthy of the absolute +devotion of a man--the will of God for all mankind--and that therefore +no nationality nor patriotism whatsoever should be the highest object +of man's loyalty? That ought to be an axiom to us, who stood with the +Allies against Germany. Certainly, we condemned Germany roundly enough +because so many of her teachers exalted the state as an object of +absolute loyalty. When in Japan one sees certain classes of people +regarding the Mikado as divine and rating loyalty to him as their +highest duty, it is easy to condemn that. When, however, a man says in +plain English: I am an American but I am a Christian first and I am an +American only in the sense in which I can be an American, being first +of all a Christian, and my loyalty to America does not begin to compare +with my superior loyalty to God's will for all mankind and, if ever +national action makes these two things conflict, I must choose God and +not America--to the ears of many that plain statement has a tang of +newness and danger. In the background of even Christian minds, Jesus +to the contrary notwithstanding, one finds the tacit assumption, +counted almost too sacred to be examined, that of course a man's first +loyalty is to his nation. + +Indeed, we Protestants ought to feel a special responsibility for this +nationalism that so takes the place of God. In medieval and Catholic +Europe folk did not so think of nationalism. Folk in medieval Europe +were taught that their highest obligation was to God or, as they would +have phrased it, to the Church; that the Church could at any time +dispense them from any obligation to king or nation; that the Church +could even make the king, the symbol of the nation, stand three days in +the snow outside the Pope's door at Canossa. Every boy and girl in +medieval Europe was taught that his first duty was spiritual and that +no nationality nor patriotism could compare with that. Then we +Protestants began our battle for spiritual liberty against the tyranny +of Rome, and as one of the most potent agencies in the winning of our +battle we helped to develop the spirit of nationality. In place of the +Holy Roman Church we put state churches. In place of devotion to the +Vatican we were tempted to put devotion to the nation. Luther did more +than write spiritual treatises; he sent out ringing, patriotic appeals +to the German nobility against Rome. It is not an accident that +absolute nationalism came to its climacteric in Germany where +Protestantism began. For Protestantism, without ever intending it, as +an unexpected by-product of its fight for spiritual liberty, helped to +break up western Europe into nations, where nationalism absorbed the +loyalty of the people. And now that little tiger cub we helped to rear +has become a great beast and its roaring shakes the earth. + +A superficial confidence in automatic progress, therefore, which +neglects an elemental fact like this at the root of our whole +international problem is futile; it leads nowhere; it is rose water +prescribed for leprosy. The trouble with nationalism is profound and +this is the gist of it: we may be unselfish personally, but we group +ourselves into social units called nations, where we, being +individually unselfish with reference to the group, are satisfied with +ourselves, but where all the time the group itself is not unselfish, +but, it may be, is aggressively and violently avaricious. Yet to most +people our sacrificial loyalty to the nation would pass for virtue, +even though the nation as a whole were exploiting its neighbours or +waging a useless, unjust war. The loyalty of Germans to Germany may be +rated as the loftiest goodness no matter what Germany as a whole is +doing, and the loyalty of Americans to America may be praised as the +very passport to heaven while America as a whole may be engaged in a +nationally unworthy enterprise. The fine spirit of men's devotion +within the limits of the group disguises the ultimate selfishness of +the whole procedure and cloaks a huge sin under a comparatively small +unselfishness. + +We can see that same principle at work in our industrial situation. We +break up into two groups; we are trades unionists or associated +employers. We are unselfish so far as our group is concerned; we make +it a point of honour to support our economic class; it is part of our +code of duty to be loyal there. But while we are thus unselfish with +reference to the group, the group itself is not unselfish; the group +itself is fighting a bitter and selfish conflict, avaricious and often +cruel. There is no ultimate way out of this situation which does not +include the activity of people who have a loyalty that is greater than +their groups. Henry George was once introduced at Cooper Institute, +New York City, by a chairman who, wishing to curry favour with the +crowd, called out with a loud voice, "Henry George, the friend of the +workingman." George stood up and sternly began, "I am not the friend +of the workingman"; then after a strained silence, "and I am not the +friend of the capitalist"; then after another silence, "I am for men; +men simply as men, regardless of any accidental or superficial +distinctions of race, creed, colour, class, or yet function or +employment." Until we can get that larger loyalty into the hearts of +men, all the committees on earth cannot solve our industrial problems. + +Nor can anything else make it possible to solve our international +problem. The curse of nationalism is that, having pooled the +unselfishness of persons in one group under one national name and of +persons in another group under another national name, it uses this +beautiful unselfishness of patriotism to carry out national enterprises +that are fundamentally selfish. One element, therefore, is +indispensable in any solution: enough Christians, whether they call +themselves by that name or not, who have caught Jesus' point of view +that only one loyalty on earth is absolute--the will of God for all +mankind. This last summer I spent one Sunday night in the home of Mr. +Ozaki, perhaps the leading liberal of Japan, a man who stands in danger +of assassination any day for his international attitude. Suddenly he +turned on me and said, "If the United States should go into a war which +you regarded as unjust and wrong, what would you do?" I had to answer +him swiftly and I had to give him the only answer that a Christian +minister could give and keep his self-respect. I said, "If the United +States goes into a war which I think is unjust and wrong, I will go +into my pulpit the next Sunday morning and in the name of God denounce +that war and take the consequence." Surely, a man does not have to be +a theoretical pacifist, which I am not, to see how indispensable that +attitude is to a Christian. There is hardly anything more needed now +in the international situation than a multitude of people who will sit +in radical judgment on the actions of their governments, so that when +the governments of the world begin to talk war they will know that +surely they must face a mass of people rising up to say: War? Why war? +We are no longer dumb beasts to be led to the slaughter; we no longer +think that any state on earth is God Almighty. If, however, we are to +have that attitude strong enough so that it will stand the strain of +mob psychology and the fear of consequences, it must be founded deep, +as was Jesus' attitude: one absolute loyalty to the will of God for all +mankind. So far from hurting true patriotism, this attitude would be +the making of patriotism. It would purge patriotism from all its +peril, would exalt it, purify it, make of it a blessing, not a curse. +But whatever be the effect upon patriotism, the Christian is committed +by the Master to a prior loyalty; he is a citizen of the Kingdom of God +in all the earth. + +An easy-going belief in inherent and inevitable progress, therefore, is +positively perilous in the manifoldly complex social situation, from +which only the most careful thinking and the most courageous living +will ever rescue us. The Christian Church is indeed entrusted, in the +message of Jesus, with the basic principles of life which the world +needs, but the clarity of vision which sees their meaning and the +courage of heart which will apply them are not easy to achieve. Some +of us have felt that acutely these last few years; all of us should +have learned that whatever progress is wrought out upon this planet +will be sternly fought for and hardly won. Belief in the idea of +progress does not mean that this earth is predestined to drift into +Paradise like thistledown before an inevitable wind. + + +III + +A third peril associated with the idea of progress is quite as +widespread as the other two and in some ways more insidious. The idea +is prevalent that progress involves the constant supersession of the +old by the new so that we, who have appeared thus late in human history +and are therefore the heirs "of all the ages, in the foremost files of +time," may at once assume our superiority to the ancients. The modern +man, living in a world supposedly progressing from early crude +conditions toward perfection, has shifted the golden age from the past +to the future, and in so doing has placed himself in much closer +proximity to it than his ancestors were. The world is getting +better--such is the common assumption which is naturally associated +with the idea of progress. As one enthusiastic sponsor of this +proposition puts it: + + +"Go back ten years, and there was no airship; fifteen years, and there +was no wireless telegraphy; twenty-five years, and there was no +automobile; forty years, and there was no telephone, and no electric +light; sixty years, and there was no photograph, and no sewing machine; +seventy-five years, no telegraph; one hundred years, no railway and no +steamship; one hundred and twenty-five years, no steam engine; two +hundred years, no post-office; three hundred years, no newspaper; five +hundred years, no printing press; one thousand years, no compass, and +ships could not go out of sight of land; two thousand years, no writing +paper, but parchments of skin and tablets of wax and clay. Go back far +enough and there were no plows, no tools, no iron, no cloth; people ate +acorns and roots and lived in caves and went naked or clothed +themselves in the skins of wild beasts." [1] + + +Such is the picture of human history upon this planet which occupies +the modern mind, and one implication often drawn is that we have +outgrown the ancients and that they might well learn from us and not we +from them. + +Christians, however, center their allegiance around ideas and +personalities which are, from the modern standpoint, very old indeed. +The truths that were wrought out in the developing life and faith of +the Hebrew-Christian people are still the regulative Christian truths, +and the personality who crowned the whole development is still the +Christians' Lord. They are challenged, however, to maintain this in a +progressive world. Men do not think of harking back to ancient +Palestine nineteen centuries ago for their business methods, their +educational systems, their scientific opinions, or anything else in +ordinary life whatever. Then why go back to ancient Palestine for the +chief exemplar of the spiritual life? This is a familiar modern +question which springs directly from popular interpretations of +progress. + + "Dim tracts of time divide + Those golden days from me; + Thy voice comes strange o'er years of change; + How can I follow Thee? + + "Comes faint and far Thy voice + From vales of Galilee; + Thy vision fades in ancient shades; + How should we follow Thee?" [2] + + +Behind this familiar mood lies one of the most significant changes that +has ever passed over the human mind. The medieval age was tempted to +look backward for its knowledge of everything. Philosophy was to be +found in Aristotle, science in Pliny and his like. It was the ancients +who were wise; it was the ancients who had understood nature and had +known God. The farther back you went the nearer you came to the +venerable and the authoritative. As, therefore, in every other realm +folk looked back for knowledge, so it was most natural that they should +look back for their religion, too. To find philosophy in Aristotle and +to find spiritual life in Christ required not even the turning of the +head. In all realms the age in its search for knowledge was facing +backwards. It was a significant hour in the history of human thought +when that attitude began to give way. The scandal caused by Alessandro +Tassoni's attacks on Homer and Aristotle in the early seventeenth +century resounded through Europe. He advanced the new and astonishing +idea that, so far from having degenerated since ancient times, the race +had advanced and that the moderns were better than their sires. This +new idea prevailed as belief in progress grew. It met, however, with +violent opposition, and the remnants of that old controversy are still +to be found in volumes like George Hakewill's five hundred page folio +published in 1627 on "the common errour touching Nature's perpetuall +and universall decay." [3] But from the seventeenth century on the +idea gained swift ascendency that the human race, like an individual, +is growing up, that humanity is becoming wiser with the years, that we +can know more than Aristotle and Pliny, that we should look, not back +to the ancients, but rather to ourselves and to our offspring, for the +real wisdom which maturity achieves. Once what was old seemed wise and +established; what was new seemed extempore and insecure: now what is +old seems outgrown; what is new seems probable and convincing. Such is +the natural and prevalent attitude in a world where the idea of +progress is in control. Nor can the applications of this idea to the +realm of religion be evaded. If we would not turn back to Palestine +nineteen centuries ago for anything else, why should we turn back to +find there the Master of our spiritual life? In a word, our modern +belief in progress, popularly interpreted, leads multitudes of people +to listen with itching ears for every new thing, while they condescend +to all that is old in religion, and in particular conclude that, while +Jesus lived a wonderful life for his own day, that was a long time ago +and surely we must be outgrowing him. + +That this attitude is critically perilous to the integrity of the +Christian movement will at once be obvious to any one whose own +spiritual experience is centered in Christ. From the beginning until +now the faith of Christian people has been primarily directed, not to a +set of abstract principles, nor to a set of creedal definitions, but to +a Person. Christians have been people believing in Jesus Christ. This +abiding element has put unity into Christian history. The stream of +Christian thought and progress has never been twice the same, yet for +all that it has been a continuous stream and not an aimless, sprawling +flood, and this unity and consistency have existed for one reason +chiefly: the influence of the personality of Jesus. Folk may have been +Romanists or Protestants, ritualists or Quakers, reactionaries or +progressives, but still they have believed in Jesus. His personality +has been the sun around which even in their differences they have swung +like planets in varying orbits. Take the personality of Jesus out of +Christian history and what you have left is chaos. + +Moreover, it is the personality of Jesus that has been the source of +Christianity's transforming influence on character. Ask whence has +come that power over the spirits of men which we recognize as +Christianity at its mightiest and best, and the origin must be sought, +not primarily in our theologies or rubrics or churches, but in the +character and spirit of Jesus. He himself is the central productive +source of power in Christianity. We have come so to take this for +granted that we do not half appreciate the wonder of it. This +personality, who so has mastered men, was born sixty generations ago in +a small village in an outlying Roman province, and until he was thirty +years of age he lived and worked as a carpenter among his fellow +townsfolk, attracting no wide consideration. Then for three years or +less he poured out his life in courageous teaching and sacrificial +service, amid the growing hatred and hostility of his countrymen, until +he was put to death by crucifixion "because he stirred up the people." +Anatole France, in one of his stories, represents Pilate in his later +years as trying to remember the trial and death of Jesus and being +barely able to recall it. That incident had been so much a part of the +day's work in governing a province like Judea that it had all but +escaped his recollection. Such a representation of the case is not +improbable. It is easy so to tell the story of Jesus' life as to make +his continued influence seem incredible. None would have supposed that +nineteen centuries after his death, Lecky, the historian of European +morals, would say, "The simple record of three short years of active +life has done more to regenerate and to soften mankind than all the +disquisitions of philosophers, and all the exhortations of moralists." +[4] None would have thought that sixty generations after he was gone, +Montefiori, a Jew, putting his finger on the source of Christianity's +power, would light upon the phrase "For the sake of Jesus," and would +cry: "Of what fine lives and deaths has not this motive been the spring +and the sustainment!" [5] None would have thought that so long after +Calvary seemed to end forever the power of Jesus, one of the race's +greatest men, David Livingstone, engaged in one of the race's most +courageous enterprises, breaking his way into the untraveled jungles of +Africa, would sing as he went, for so his journal says he did, + + "Jesus, the very thought of Thee + With sweetness fills my breast"? + +Take the personality of the Master out of Christian history and we have +robbed it of its central moral power. + +Moreover, the personality of Jesus has always been the standard of +reformation when Christianity has become recreant or laggard or +corrupt. A man named John Wilkes started a political movement in +England in the eighteenth century, and around him sprang up a party who +called themselves Wilkites. These followers of Wilkes, however, went +to extremes so wild and perilous that poor John Wilkes himself had to +explain to everybody that, as for him, he was not a Wilkite. This +lapse of a movement from the original intention of its founder is +familiar in history and nowhere is it more clearly illustrated than in +Christianity. The Master, watching Western Christendom today, with all +our hatred, bitterness, war, would have to say, If this is +Christianity, then I am not a Christian. The Master, wandering through +our cathedrals with their masses, waxen images and votive gifts, or +through our Protestant churches with their fine-spun speculations +insisted on as necessary to belief if one is to be a child of grace, +would have to say, If this is Christianity, then I am not a Christian. +Indeed, just this sort of service the Master always has been rendering +his movement; he is the perennial rebuke of all that is degenerate and +false in Christianity. Whenever reform has come, whenever real +Christianity has sprung up again through the false and superficial, the +movement has been associated with somebody's rediscovery of Jesus +Christ. Saint Francis of Assisi rediscovered him, and made a spot of +spiritual beauty at the heart of the medieval age. John Wesley +rediscovered him and his compassion for the outcast, and led the Church +into a new day of evangelism and philanthropy. William Carey +rediscovered him and his unbounded care for men, and blazed the trail +for a new era of expansive Christianity. And if today many of us are +deeply in earnest about the application of Christian principles to the +social life of men, it is because we have rediscovered him and the +spirit of his Good Samaritan. In an old myth, Antaeus, the child of +Earth, could be overcome when he was lifted from contact with the +ground but, whenever he touched again the earth from which he sprang, +his old power came back once more. Such is Christianity's relation +with Jesus Christ. If, therefore, the idea of progress involves the +modern man's condescension to the Master as the outgrown seer of an +ancient day, the idea of progress has given Christianity an incurable +wound. + +Before we surrender to such a popular interpretation of the meaning of +progress, we may well discriminate between two aspects of human life in +one of which we plainly have progressed, but in the other of which +progress is not so evident. In the Coliseum in ancient Rome centuries +ago, a group of Christians waited in the arena to be devoured by the +lions, and eighty thousand spectators watched their vigil. Those +Christians were plain folk--"not many mighty, not many noble"--and +every one of them could have escaped that brutal fate if he had been +willing to burn a little incense to the Emperor. Turn now to +ourselves, eighteen hundred years afterwards. We have had a long time +to outgrow the character and fidelity of those first Christians; do we +think that we have done so? As we imagine ourselves in their places, +are we ready with any glibness to talk about progress in character? +Those first Christians never had ridden in a trolley car; they never +had seen a subway; they never had been to a moving picture show; they +never had talked over a telephone. There are innumerable ways in which +we have progressed far beyond them. But character, fidelity, loyalty +to conscience and to God--are we sure of progress there? + +To hear some people talk, one would suppose that progress is simply a +matter of chronology. That one man or generation comes in time after +another is taken as sufficient evidence that the latter has of course +superseded the earlier. Do we mean that because Tennyson came after +Shelly he is therefore the greater poet? What has chronology to do +with spiritual quality and creativeness, which always must rise from +within, out of the abysmal depths of personality? Professor Gilbert +Murray, thinking primarily in a realm outside religion altogether, +chastises this cheap and superficial claim of advance in spiritual life: + + +"As to Progress, it is no doubt a real fact. To many of us it is a +truth that lies somewhere near the roots of our religion. But it is +never a straight march forward; it is never a result that happens of +its own accord. It is only a name for the mass of accumulated human +effort, successful here, baffled there, misdirected and driven astray +in a third region, but on the whole and in the main producing some +cumulative result. I believe this difficulty about Progress, this fear +that in studying the great teachers of the past we are in some sense +wantonly sitting at the feet of savages, causes real trouble of mind to +many keen students. The full answer to it would take us beyond the +limits of this paper and beyond my own range of knowledge. But the +main lines of the answer seem to me clear. There are in life two +elements, one transitory and progressive, the other comparatively if +not absolutely non-progressive and eternal, and the soul of man is +chiefly concerned with the second. Try to compare our inventions, our +material civilization, our stores of accumulated knowledge, with those +of the age of Aeschylus or Aristotle or St. Francis, and the comparison +is absurd. Our superiority is beyond question and beyond measure. But +compare any chosen poet of our age with Aeschylus, any philosopher with +Aristotle, any saintly preacher with St. Francis, and the result is +totally different. I do not wish to argue that we have fallen below +the standard of those past ages; but it is clear that we are not +definitely above them. The things of the spirit depend on will, on +effort, on aspiration, on the quality of the individual soul, and not +on discoveries and material advances which can be accumulated and added +up." [6] + + +Let any Christian preacher test out this matter and discover for +himself its truth. We are preachers of the Gospel in the twentieth +century. St. Francis of Assisi was a preacher of the Gospel in the +thirteenth century. We know many things which St. Francis and his +generation never could have known but, when we step back through that +outward change into the spirit of St. Francis himself, we must take the +shoes from off our feet, for the place whereon we stand is holy ground. +We may not talk in such an hour about progress in Christian character +in terms of chronology, for a modern minister might well pray to touch +the garment's hem of such a spirit as St. Francis had! When, then, one +speaks of outgrowing Jesus, one would do well to get a better reason +than simply the fact that he was born nineteen centuries ago. The +truth is that humanity has been upon this planet hundreds of thousands +of years, while our known history reaches back, and that very dimly, +through only some four or five thousand. In that known time there has +certainly been no biological development in man that any scientist has +yet discerned. Even the brain of man in the ice age was apparently as +large as ours. Moreover, within that period of history well known to +us, we can see many ups and downs of spiritual life, mountain peaks of +achievement in literature and art and religion, with deep valleys +intervening, but we cannot be sure that the mountain peaks now are +higher than they used to be. The art of the two centuries culminating +about 1530 represents a glorious flowering of creative genius, but it +was succeeded by over three centuries of descent to the abominations of +ugliness which the late eighteenth century produced. We have climbed +up a little since then, but not within distant reach of those lovers +and makers of beauty from whose hearts and hands the Gothic cathedrals +came. Progress in history has lain in the power of man to remember and +so to accumulate for general use the discoveries, both material and +ethical, of many individuals; it has lain in man's increasing +information about the universe, in his increasing mastery over external +nature, and in the growing integration of his social life; it has not +lain in the production of creative personalities appearing in the +course of history with ever greater sublimity of spirit and grasp of +intellect. Where is there a mind on earth today like Plato's? Where +is there a spirit today like Paul's? + +The past invites us still to look back for revelations in the realm of +creative personality. Some things have been done in history, like the +sculptures of Phidias, that never have been done so well since and that +perhaps never will be done so well again. As for the Bible, we may +well look back to that. There is no book to compare with it in the +realm of religion. Most of the books we read are like the rainwater +that fell last night, a superficial matter, soon running off. But the +Bible is a whole sea--the accumulated spiritual gains of ages--and to +know it and to love it, to go down beside it and dip into it, to feel +its vast expanse, the currents that run through it, and the tides that +lift it, is one of the choicest and most rewarding spiritual privileges +that we enjoy. As for Jesus, it is difficult to see what this +twentieth century can mean by supposing that it has outgrown him. It +has outgrown countless elements in his generation and many forms of +thought which he shared with his generation, but it never will outgrow +his spirit, his faith in God, his principles of life: "Our Father who +art in heaven, Hallowed by thy name;" "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God +with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, +and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself;" "It is not the +will of your Father who is in heaven, that one of these little ones +should perish;" "By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, +if ye have love one to another;" "If any man would be first, he shall +be last of all, and servant of all;" "All things therefore whatsoever +ye would that men should do unto you, even so do ye also unto them;" +"Love your enemies, and pray for them that persecute you;" "Thy will be +done, as in heaven, so on earth." Take principles like these, set them +afire in a flaming life the like of which has never come to earth, and +we have in Jesus a revelation of the spiritual world which is not going +to be outgrown. Still for the Christian he is Saviour and Lord, and +across the centuries in his face shines the light of the knowledge of +the glory of God. + + +IV + +Progress, therefore, intelligently apprehended, does not involve that +flippant irreverence for the past that so often is associated with it. +It offers no encouragement to the chase after vagaries in which so many +moderns indulge, as though all that is old were belated and all that is +novel were true. The idea of progress has led more than one eager mind +to think that the old religions were outgrown; that they were the +belated leftovers of a bygone age and were not for modern minds; that a +new religion fitted to our new needs alone would do. Suppose, however, +that one should say: The English language is an archaic affair; it has +grown like Topsy, by chance; it has carried along with it the forms of +thinking of outgrown generations; it is not scientific; what we need is +a new language built to order to meet our wants. In answer one must +acknowledge that the English language is open to very serious +criticism, that one can never tell from the way a word is spelled how +it is going to be pronounced, nor from the way it is pronounced how it +is going to be spelled. One must agree that the English language makes +one phrase do duty for many different meanings. When two people +quarrel, they make up; before the actor goes upon the stage, he makes +up; the preacher goes into his study to make up his sermon; when we do +wrong we try to make up for it; and the saucy lad in school behind his +teacher's back makes up a face. The English language is fearfully and +wonderfully made. But merely because the English language has such +ungainly developments, we are not likely to surrender it and adopt +instead a modern language made to order, like Esperanto. Say what one +will about English, it is the speech in which our poets have sung and +our prophets have prophesied and our seers have dreamed dreams. If any +do not like it they may get a new one, but most of us will stay where +we still can catch the accents of the master spirits who have spoken in +our tongue. There are words in the English language that no Esperanto +words ever can take the place of: home and honour and love and God, +words that have been sung about and prayed over and fought for by our +sires for centuries, and that come to us across the ages with +accumulated meanings, like caskets full of jewels. Surely we are not +going to give up the English language. Progress does not mean +surrendering it, but developing it. + +We shall not give up Christianity. It has had ungainly developments; +it does need reformation; many elements in it are pitiably belated; +but, for all that, the profoundest need of the world is real +Christianity, the kind of life the Master came to put into the hearts +of men. Progress does not mean breaking away from it, but going deeper +into it. + +Here, then, are the three perils which tempt the believer in progress: +a silly underestimate of the tremendous force of human sin, which +withstands all real advance; superficial reliance upon social +palliatives to speed the convalescence of the world, when only radical +cures will do; flippant irreverence toward the past, when, as a matter +of fact, the light we have for the future shines upon us from behind. +He who most believes in progress needs most to resist its temptations. + + + +[1] James H. Snowden: Is the World Growing Better? pp. 41-42. + +[2] Francis Turner Palgrave: Faith and Light in the Latter Days. + +[3] George Hakewill: An Apologie of the Power and Providence of God in +the Government of the World, or An Examination and Censure of the +Common Errour Touching Natures Perpetuall and Universall Decay. + +[4] W. E. H. Lecky: History of European Morals from Augustus to +Charlemagne, Vol. II, p. 9. + +[5] C. G. Montefiore: Some Elements of the Religious Teaching of Jesus +According to the Synoptic Gospels, p. 133. + +[6] Gilbert Murray: Tradition and Progress, Chapter I, Religio +Grammatici, IV, pp. 19-20. + + + + +LECTURE VI + +PROGRESS AND GOD + +I + +We may well begin our final lecture, on the interplay between the idea +of progress and the idea of God, by noting that only faith in God can +satisfy man's craving for spiritual stability amid change. The central +element in the conception of a progressive world is that men's thoughts +and lives have changed, are changing and will change, that nothing +therefore is settled in the sense of being finally formulated, that +creation has never said its last word on any subject or landed its last +hammer blow on any task. Such an outlook on life, instead of being +exhilarating, is to many disquieting in the extreme. In particular it +is disquieting in religion, one of whose functions has always been to +provide stability, to teach men amid the transient to see the eternal. +If in a changing world religious thought changes too, if in that realm +also new answers are given to old questions and new questions rise that +never have been answered before, if forms of faith in which men once +trusted are outgrown, man's unsettlement seems to be complete. The +whole world then is like a huge kaleidoscope turning round and round +and, as it turns, the manifold elements in human experience, even its +religious doctrines and practices, arrange and rearrange themselves in +endless permutations. How then in such a world can religion mean to us +what it has meant to the saints who of old, amid a shaken world, have +sung: + + "Change and decay in all around I see; + O Thou, Who changest not, abide with me!" + + +This fear of the unsettling effects of the idea of progress accounts +for most of the resentment against it in the realm of theology, and for +the desperate endeavours which perennially are made to congeal the +Christian movement at some one stage and to call that stage final. +Stability, however, can never be achieved by resort to such reactionary +dogmatism. What one obtains by that method is not stability but +stagnation, and the two, though often confused, are utterly different. +Stagnation is like a pool, stationary, finished, and without +progressive prospects. A river, however, has another kind of +steadfastness altogether. It is not stationary; it flows; it is never +twice the same and its enlarging prospects as it widens and deepens in +its course are its glory. Nevertheless, the Hudson and the Mississippi +and the Amazon are among the most stable and abiding features which +nature knows. They will probably outlast many mountains. They will +certainly outlast any pool. + +The spiritual stability which we may have in a progressive world is of +this latter sort, if we believe in the living God. It is so much more +inspiring than the stagnation of the dogmatist that one wonders how any +one, seeing both, could choose the inferior article in which to repose +his trust. Consider, for example, the development of the idea of God +himself, the course of which through the Bible we briefly traced in a +previous lecture. From Sinai to Calvary--was ever a record of +progressive revelation more plain or more convincing? The development +begins with Jehovah disclosed in a thunder-storm on a desert mountain, +and it ends with Christ saying: "God is a Spirit: and they that worship +him must worship in spirit and truth;" it begins with a war-god leading +his partisans to victory and it ends with men saying, "God is love; and +he that abideth in love abideth in God, and God abideth in him;" it +begins with a provincial deity loving his tribe and hating its enemies +and it ends with the God of the whole earth worshiped by "a great +multitude, which no man could number, out of every nation and of all +tribes and peoples and tongues;" it begins with a God who commands the +slaying of the Amalekites, "both man and woman, infant and suckling," +and it ends with a Father whose will it is that not "one of these +little ones should perish;" it begins with God's people standing afar +off from his lightnings and praying that he might not speak to them +lest they die and it ends with men going into their inner chambers and, +having shut the door, praying to their Father who is in secret. Here +is no pool; here is a river, the streams whereof make glad the city of +God. + +Consider as well the course of the idea of God after the close of the +New Testament canon. The Biblical conception of God in terms of +righteous and compassionate personal will went out into a world of +thought where Greek metaphysics was largely in control. There God was +conceived in terms of substance, as the ontological basis and ground of +all existence--immutable, inscrutable, unqualified pure being. These +two ideas, God as personal will, and God as metaphysical substance, +never perfectly coalescing, flowed together. In minds like St. +Augustine's one finds them both. God as pure being and God as gracious +and righteous personal will--St. Augustine accepted both ideas but +never harmonized them. Down through Christian history one can see +these two conceptions complementing each other, each balancing the +other's eccentricities. The Greek idea runs out toward pantheism in +Spinoza and Hegel. The Biblical idea runs out toward deism in Duns +Scotus and Calvin. In the eighteenth century an extreme form of deism +held the field and God, as personal will, was conceived as the Creator, +who in a dim and distant past had made all things. In the nineteenth +century the thought of God swung back to terms of immanence, and God, +who had been crowded out of his world, came flooding in as the abiding +life of all of it. + +As one contemplates a line of development like this, he must be aware +that, while change is there, it is not aimless, discontinuous, chaotic +change. The riverbed in which this stream of thought flows is stable +and secure; the whole development is controlled by man's abiding +spiritual need of God and God's unceasing search for man. One feels +about it as he might about man's varying, developing methods of telling +the time of day. Men began by noting roughly the position of the sun +or the length of shadows; they went on to make sun-dials, then +water-clocks, then sand-glasses; then weight-driven clocks were +blunderingly tried and, later, watches, used first as toys, so little +were they to be relied upon. The story of man's telling of the time of +day is a story of progressive change, but it does not lack stability. +The sun and stars and the revolution of the earth abide. The changes +in man's telling of the time have been simply the unfolding of an +abiding relationship between man and his world. + +So the development of man's religious ideas from early, crude +beginnings until now is not a process which one would wish to stop at +any point in order to achieve infallible security. The movement is not +haphazard and discontinuous change, like disparate particles in a +kaleidoscope falling together in new but vitally unrelated ways. Upon +the contrary, its course is a continuous path which can be traced, +recovered in thought, conceived as a whole. We can see where our ideas +came from, what now they are, and in what direction they probably will +move. The stability is in the process itself, arising out of the +abiding relationships of man with the eternal. + +Indeed, the endeavour to achieve stability by methods which alone can +bring stagnation, the endeavor, that is, to hit upon dogmatic finality +in opinion, is of all things in religion probably the most disastrous +in its consequence. Until recent times when reform movements invaded +Mohammedanism and higher criticism tackled the problem of the Koran, +one could see this achievement of stagnation in Islam in all its +inglorious success. The Koran was regarded as having been infallibly +written, word for word, in heaven before ever it came to earth. The +Koran therefore was a book of inerrant and changeless opinion. But the +Koran enshrines the best theological and ethical ideas of Arabia at the +time when it was written: God was an oriental monarch, ruling in +heaven; utter submission to the fate which he decreed was the one law +of human relationship with him; and on earth slavery and polygamy and +conversion of unbelievers by force were recognized as right. The Koran +was ahead of its day, but having been by a theory of inspiration +petrified into artificial finality it became the enemy of all opinions +which would pass beyond its own. + +When, now, one contrasts Mohammedanism with Christianity, one finds an +important difference. For all our temptation, succumbed to by +multitudes, to make the Bible a Koran, Christianity has had a +progressive revelation. In the Bible one can find all the ideas and +customs which Mohammedanism has approved and for which it now is hated: +its oriental deity decreeing fates, its use of force to destroy +unbelievers, its patriarchal polygamy, and its slave systems. All +these things, from which we now send missionaries to convert +Mohammedans, are in our Bible, but in the Bible they are not final. +They are ever being superseded. The revelation is progressive. The +idea of God grows from oriental kingship to compassionate fatherhood; +the use of force gives way to the appeals of love; polygamy is +displaced by monogamy; slavery never openly condemned, even when the +New Testament closes, is being underminded [Transcriber's note: +undermined?] by ideas which, like dynamite, in the end will blast to +pieces its foundations. We are continually running upon passages like +this: "It was said to them of old time, . . . but I say unto you;" +"God, having of old time spoken unto the fathers in the prophets by +divers portions and in divers manners, hath at the end of these days +spoken unto us in his Son;" "The times of ignorance therefore God +overlooked; but now he commandeth men that they should all everywhere +repent;" and over the doorway out of the New Testament into the +Christian centuries that followed is written this inscription: "The +spirit of truth . . . shall guide you into all the truth." In a word, +finality in the Koran is behind--it lies in the treasured concepts of +600 A. D.--but finality in the Bible is ahead. We are moving toward +it. It is too great for us yet to apprehend. Our best thoughts are +thrown out in its direction but they do not exhaust its meaning. + + "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." + + +Such is the exultant outlook of a Christian believer on a progressive +world. If, however, one is to have this exultant outlook, he must +deeply believe in the living God and in the guidance of his Spirit. +What irreligion means at this point is not fully understood by most +unbelieving folk because most unbelievers do not think through to a +conclusion the implications of their own skepticism. We may well be +thankful even in the name of religion for a few people like Bertrand +Russell. He is not only irreligious but he is intelligently +irreligious, and, what is more, he possesses the courage to say frankly +and fully what irreligion really means: + + +"That Man is the product of causes which have no prevision of the end +they were achieving; that his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, +his loves and his beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental +collocations of atoms; that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of +thought and feeling, can preserve an individual life beyond the grave; +that all the labours of the ages, all the devotion, all the +inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined +to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole +temple of Man's achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the +debris of a universe in ruins--all these things, if not quite beyond +dispute, are yet so nearly certain, that no philosophy which rejects +them can hope to stand. Only within the scaffolding of these truths, +only on the firm foundation of unyielding despair, can the soul's +habitation henceforth be safely built." [1] Such is the outlook on +human life of a frank and thoroughgoing irreligion, and there is +nothing exhilarating about it. All progress possible in such a setting +is a good deal like a horse-race staged in a theatre, where the horses +do indeed run furiously, but where we all know well that they are not +getting anywhere. There is a moving floor beneath them, and it is only +the shifting of the scenery that makes them seem to go. Is human +history like that? Is progress an illusion? Is it all going to end as +Bertrand Russell says? Those who believe in the living God are certain +of the contrary, for stability amid change is the gift of a +progressive, religious faith. + + +II + +It must be evident, however, to any one acquainted with popular ideas +of God that if in a progressive world we thus are to maintain a vital +confidence in the spiritual nature of creative reality and so rejoice +in the guidance of the Spirit amid change, we must win through in our +thinking to a very much greater conception of God than that to which +popular Christianity has been accustomed. Few passages in Scripture +better deserve a preacher's attention than God's accusation against his +people in the 50th Psalm: "Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such a +one as thyself." The universal applicability of this charge is evident +to any one who knows the history of man's religious thought. If in the +beginning God did make man in his own image, man has been busy ever +since making God in his image, and the deplorable consequences are +everywhere to be seen. From idolaters, who bow down before wooden +images of the divine in human form, to ourselves, praying to a +magnified man throned somewhere in the skies, man has persistently run +God into his own mold. To be sure, this tendency of man to think of +God as altogether such a one as ourselves is nothing to be surprised +at. Even when we deal with our human fellows, we read ourselves into +our understandings of them. A contemporary observer tells us that +whenever a portrait of Gladstone appeared in French papers he was made +to look like a Frenchman, and that when he was represented in Japanese +papers his countenance had an unmistakably Japanese cast. + +If this habitual tendency to read ourselves into other people is +evident even when we deal with human personalities, whom we can know +well, how can it be absent from man's thought of the eternal? A man +needs only to go out on a starry night with the revelations of modern +astronomy in his mind and to consider the one who made all this and +whose power sustains it, to see how utterly beyond our adequate +comprehension he must be. As men in old tales used to take diffused +superhumans, the genii, and by magic word bring them down into a +stoppered bottle where they could be held in manageable form, so man +has taken the vastness of God and run it into a human symbol. + +This persistent anthropomorphism is revealed in our religious +ceremonies. Within Christianity itself are systems of priestcraft +where the individual believer has no glad, free access to his Father's +presence, but where his approach must be mediated by a priestly ritual, +his forgiveness assured by a priestly declaration, his salvation sealed +by a priestly sacrament. This idea that God must be approached by +stated ceremonies came directly from thinking of God in terms of a +human monarch. No common man could walk carelessly into the presence +of an old-time king. There were proprieties to be observed. There +were courtiers who knew the proper approach to royalty, through whom +the common folk would better send petitions up and from whom they would +better look for favour. So God was pictured as a human monarch with +his throne, his scepter, his ministering attendants. Here on earth the +priests were those courtiers who knew the effectual way of reaching +him, by whom we would best send up our prayers, through whom we would +best look for our salvation. Nordau is not exaggerating when he says: +"When we have studied the sacrificial rites, the incantations, prayers, +hymns, and ceremonies of religion, we have as complete a picture of the +relations between our ancestors and their chiefs as if we had seen them +with our own eyes." [2] + +Our anthropomorphism, however, reaches its most dangerous form in our +inward imaginations of God's character. How the pot has called the +kettle black! Man has read his vanities into God, until he has +supposed that singing anthems to God's praise might flatter him as it +would flatter us. Man has read his cruelties into God, and what in +moments of vindictiveness and wrath we would like to do our enemies we +have supposed Eternal God would do to his. Man has read his religious +partisanship into God; he who holds Orion and the Pleiades in his +leash, the Almighty and Everlasting God, before whom in the beginning +the morning stars sang together, has been conceived as though he were a +Baptist or a Methodist, a Presbyterian or an Anglican. Man has read +his racial pride into God; nations have thought themselves his chosen +people above all his other children because they seemed so to +themselves. The centuries are sick with a god made in man's image, and +all the time the real God has been saying, "Thou thoughtest that I was +altogether such a one as thyself." + +The unhappy prevalence of this mental idolatry is one of the chief +causes for the loss of religious faith among the younger generation. +They have grown up in our homes and churches with their imaginations +dwelling on a God made in man's image, and now through education they +have moved out into a universe so much too big for that little god of +theirs either to have made in the first place or to handle now that +they find it hard to believe in him. Astronomers tell us that there +are a hundred million luminous stars in our sky, and dark stars in +unknown multitudes; that these stars range from a million to ten +million miles in diameter; that some of them are so vast that were they +brought as close to us as our sun is they would fill the entire +horizon; and that these systems are scattered through the stellar +spaces at distances so incredible that, were some hardy discoverer to +seek our planet in the midst of them, it would be like looking for a +needle lost somewhere on the western prairies. The consequence is +inevitable: a vast progressive universe plus an inadequate God means +that in many minds faith in God goes to pieces. + + +III + +One of the profoundest needs of the Church, therefore, in this new and +growing world, is the achievement of such worthy ways of thinking about +God and presenting him as will make the very idea of him a help to +faith and not a stumbling-block to the faithful. In the attainment of +that purpose we need for one thing to approach the thought of God from +an angle which to popular Christianity is largely unfamiliar, although +it is not unfamiliar in the historic tradition of the Church. Too +exclusively have we clung to the mental categories and the resultant +phraseology which have grown up around the idea of God as an individual +like ourselves. The reasons for the prevalence of this individualized +conception of deity are obvious. First, as we have seen, the growth of +the idea of God in Hebrew-Christian thought moved out from a very +clearly visualized figure on a mountain-top to those expanded and +spiritualized forms which glorified the later stages of the Biblical +development; and, second, every one of us in his personal religious +experience and thought recapitulates the same process, starting as a +child with God conceived in very human terms and moving out to expanded +and sublimated forms of that childish conception. Whether, then, we +consider the source of our idea of God in the Biblical tradition or in +our own private experience, we see that it is rooted in and springs up +out of a very human conception of him, and that our characteristic +words about him, attitudes toward him, and imaginations of him, are +associated with these childlike origins. Popular Christianity, +therefore, approaches God with the regulative idea of a human +individual in its mind, and, while popular Christianity would insist +that God is much more than that, it still starts with that, and the +enterprise of stretching the conception is only relatively successful. +Even when it is successful the result must be a God who is achieved by +stretching out a man. + +In this situation the only help for many is, for the time being, to +leave this endeavour to approach God by way of an expanded and +sublimated human individual and to approach God, instead, by way of the +Creative Power from which this amazing universe and all that is within +it have arisen. Man's deepest question concerns the nature of the +Creative Power from which all things and persons have come. In +creation are we dealing with the kind of power which in ordinary life +we recognize as physical, or with the kind which we recognize as +spiritual? With these two sorts of power we actually deal and, so far +as we can see, the ultimate reality which has expressed itself in them +must be akin to the one or to the other or to both. _He who is +convinced that the Creative Power from which all things have come is +spiritual believes in God_. I have seen that simple statement lift the +burden of doubt from minds utterly perplexed and usher befogged spirits +out into the liberty of the glory of the children of God. For they did +not believe that the Creative Power was dynamic dirt, going it blind; +they did believe that the Creative Power was akin to what we know as +spirit, but so accustomed were they to the Church's narrower +anthropomorphism that they did not suppose that this approach was a +legitimate avenue for the soul's faith in God. + +Nevertheless, it is a legitimate avenue and in the history of the +Church many are the souls that have traveled it. The basis for all +mature conceptions of God lies here: that the Power from whom all life +proceeds wells up in two forms. One is physical; we can see it, touch +it, weigh it, analyze and measure it. The other is spiritual; it is +character, conscience, intelligence, purpose, love; we cannot see it, +nor touch it, nor weigh it, nor analyze it. We ourselves did not make +either of these two expressions of life. They came up together out of +the Creative Reality from which we came. When a man thinks of the +Power from which all life proceeds, he must say at least this: that +when it wells up in us it wells up in two forms and one of them is +spirit. How, then, when we think of that Power, can we leave spirit +out? At the heart of the eternal is the fountain of that spiritual +life which in myself I know. + +This thought of God does not start, then, with a magnified man in the +heavens; this thought of God starts with the universe itself vibrant +with life, tingling with energy, where, when scientists try to analyze +matter, they have to trace it back from molecules to atoms, from atoms +to electrons, and from electrons to that vague spirituelle thing which +they call a "strain in the ether," a universe where there is manifestly +no such thing as dead matter, but where everything is alive. When one +thinks of the Power that made this, that sustains this, that flows like +blood through the veins of this, one cannot easily think that +physicalness is enough to predicate concerning him. If the physical +adequately could have revealed that Power, there never would have been +anything but the physical to reveal him. The fact that spiritual life +is here is evidence that it takes spiritual life fully to display the +truth about creation's reality. As an old mystic put it: "God sleeps +in the stone, he dreams in the animal, he wakes in man!" + +It was this approach to God which saved the best spiritual life of the +nineteenth century. For in the eighteenth century Christianity came +nearer to being driven out of business than ever in her history before. +She had believed in a carpenter god who had made the world and +occasionally tinkered with it in events which men called miracles. But +new knowledge made that carpenter god impossible. Area after area +where he had been supposed to operate was closed to him by the +discovery of natural law until at last even comets were seen to be +law-abiding and he was escorted clean to the edge of the universe and +bowed out altogether. Nobody who has not read the contemporary +literature of the eighteenth century can know what dryness of soul +resulted. + +Man, however, cannot live without God. Our fathers had to have God +back again. But if God were to come back again he could not return as +an occasional tinkerer; he had to come as the life in all that lives, +the indwelling presence throughout his creation, whose ways of working +are the laws, so that he penetrates and informs them all. No absentee +landlord could be welcomed back, but if God came as the resident soul +of all creation, men could comprehend that. And he did come back that +way. His return is the glory of the nineteenth century. In the best +visions of the century's prophets that glory shines. + + +MRS. BROWNING: + + "Earth's crammed with heaven, + And every common bush afire with God: + But only he who sees, takes off his shoes." + + +TENNYSON: + + "Speak to Him, thou, for He hears, and + Spirit with Spirit can meet-- + Closer is He than breathing, and nearer + than hands and feet." + + +COLERIDGE: + + "Glory to Thee, Father of Earth and Heaven! + All conscious presence of the Universe! + Nature's vast ever-acting Energy!" + + +WORDSWORTH: + + "a sense sublime + Of something far more deeply interfused, + Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, + And the round ocean and the living air + And the blue sky, and in the mind of man; + A motion and a spirit, that impels + All thinking things, all objects of all thoughts, + And rolls through all things." + + +CARLYLE: + +"Then sawest thou that this fair Universe, were it in the meanest +province thereof, is in very deed the star-domed City of God; that +through every star, through every grass-blade, and most through every +Living Soul, the glory of a present God still beams. But Nature, which +is the Time-vesture of God, and reveals Him to the wise, hides Him from +the foolish." + + +Moreover, this idea of God as the Creative Power conceived in spiritual +terms need not lose any of the intimate meanings which have inhered in +more personal thoughts of him and which are expressed in the Bible's +names for him: Father, Mother, Bridegroom, Husband, Friend. There is +indeed this danger in the approach which we have been describing, that +we may conceive God as so dispersed everywhere that we cannot find him +anywhere and that at last, so diffused, he will lose the practical +value on account of which we want him. For we do desire a God who is +like ourselves--enough like ourselves so that he can understand us and +care for us and enter into our human problems. We do want a human side +to God. A man who had seen in Henry Drummond the most beautiful +exhibition of God's Spirit that he had ever experienced said that after +Henry Drummond died he always prayed up to God by way of Drummond. We +make our most vital approaches to God in that way and we always have, +from the time we prayed to God through our fathers and mothers until +now, when we find God in Christ. We want in God a personality that can +answer ours, and we can have it without belittling in the least his +greatness. + +I know a man who says that one of the turning points of his spiritual +experience came on a day when for the first time it dawned on him that +he never had seen his mother. Now, his mother was the major molding +influence in his life. He could have said about her what Longfellow +said in a letter to his mother, written when he was twenty-one. "For +me," wrote Longfellow, "a line from my mother is more efficacious than +all the homilies preached in Lent; and I find more incitement to virtue +in merely looking at your handwriting than in a whole volume of ethics +and moral discourses." So this man would have felt about the pervasive +influence of his mother. Then it dawned on him one day that he never +had seen her. To be sure, he had seen the bodily instrument by which +she had been able somehow to express herself through look and word and +gesture, but his mother herself, her thoughts, her consciousness, her +love, her spirit, he never had seen and he never would see. She was +the realest force in his life, but she was invisible. When they talked +together they signalled to each other out of the unseen where they +dwelt. They both were as invisible as God. Moreover, while his mother +was only a human, personal spirit, there was a kind of omnipresence in +her so far as he was concerned, and he loved her and she loved him +everywhere, though he never had seen her and never could. If spiritual +life even in its human form can take on such meanings, we need not +think of God as an expanded individual in order to love him, be loved +by him, and company with him as an unseen friend. Let a man once begin +with God as the universal spiritual Presence and then go on to see the +divine quality of that Presence revealed in Christ, and there is no +limit to the deepening and heightening of his estimation of God's +character, except the limits of his own moral imagination. + + +IV + +With many minds the difficulty of achieving an idea of God adequate for +our new universe will not be met by any such intellectual shift of +emphasis as we have suggested. Not anthropomorphic theology so much as +ecclesiasticism is the major burden on their thinking about deity. Two +conceptions of the Church are in conflict to-day in modern +Protestantism, and one of the most crucial problems of America's +religious life in this next generation is the decision as to which of +these two ideas of the Church shall triumph. We may call one the +exclusive and the other the inclusive conception of the Church. The +exclusive conception of the Church lies along lines like these: that we +are the true Church; that we have the true doctrines and the true +practices as no other Church possesses them; that we are constituted as +a Church just because we have these uniquely true opinions and +practices; that all we in the Church agree about these opinions and +that when we joined the Church we gave allegiance to them; that nobody +has any business to belong to our Church unless he agrees with us; that +if there are people outside the Church who disagree, they ought to be +kept outside and if there are people in the Church who come to +disagree, they ought to be put outside. That is the exclusive idea of +the Church, and there are many who need no further description of it +for they were brought up in it and all their youthful religious life +was surrounded by its rigid sectarianism. + +Over against this conception is the inclusive idea of the Church, which +runs along lines like these: that the Christian Church ought to be the +organizing center for all the Christian life of a community; that a +Church is not based upon theological uniformity but upon devotion to +the Lord Jesus, to the life with God and man for which he stood, and to +the work which he gave us to do; that wherever there are people who +have that spiritual devotion, who possess that love, who want more of +it, who desire to work and worship with those of kindred Christian +aspirations, they belong inside the family of the Christian Church. +The inclusive idea of the Church looks out upon our American +communities and sees there, with all their sin, spiritual life +unexpressed and unorganized, good-will and aspiration and moral power +unharnessed and going to waste, and it longs to cry so that the whole +community can hear it. Come, all men of Christian good-will, let us +work together for the Lord of all good life! That is the inclusive +idea of the Church. It desires to be the point of incandescence where, +regardless of denominationalism or theology, the Christian life of the +community bursts into flame. + +As between these two conceptions there hardly can be any question that +the first idea so far has prevailed. Our endlessly split and shivered +Protestantism bears sufficient witness to the influence of the +exclusive idea of the Church. The disastrous consequences of this in +many realms are evident, and one result lies directly in our argument's +path. An exclusive Church narrows the idea of God. Almost inevitably +God comes to be conceived as the head of the exclusive Church, the +origin of its uniquely true doctrine, the director of its uniquely +correct practices, so that the activities of God outside the Church +grow dim, and more and more he is conceived as operating through his +favourite organization as nowhere else in all the universe. In +particular the idea grows easily in the soil of an exclusive Church +that God is not operative except in people who recognize him and that +the world outside such conscious recognition is largely empty of his +activity and barren of his grace. God tends, in such thinking, to +become cooped up in the Church, among the people who consciously have +acknowledged him. What wonder that multitudes of our youth, waking up +to the facts about our vast and growing universe, conclude that it is +too big to be managed by the tribal god of a Protestant sect! + +The achievement of a worthy idea of God involves, therefore, the +ability to discover God in all life, outside the Church as well as +within, and in people who do not believe in him nor recognize him as +well as in those who do. Let us consider for a moment the principle +which is here involved. Many forces and persons serve us when we do +not recognize them and do not know the truth about them. This +experience of being ministered to by persons whom we do not know goes +back even to the maternal care that nourished us before we were born. +No mother waits to be recognized before she serves her child. We are +tempted to think of persons as ministering to us only when the service +is consciously received and acknowledged but, as a matter of fact, +service continually comes to us from sources we are unaware of and do +not think about. + + "Unnumbered comforts to my soul + Thy tender care bestowed, + Before my infant heart conceived + From whom those comforts flowed." + + +This principle applies to mankind's relationship with the physical +universe. Through many generations mankind utterly misconceived it. +They thought the earth was flat, the heavens a little way above; yet, +for all that, the sun warmed them and the rain refreshed them and the +stars guided their wandering boats. The physical universe did not wait +until men knew all the truth about it before being useful to men and at +last, when the truth came and the glory of this vast and mobile cosmos +dawned on mankind, men discovered the facts about forces which, though +unknown and unacknowledged, long had served them. + +This same principle applies also to man's relationship with social +institutions and social securities that have sustained us from our +infancy. If a boy knows that there is a Constitution of the United +States, he does not think about it. Then maturity comes and he begins +vividly to understand the sacrifices which our forefathers underwent in +building up the institutions that have nourished us. He recognizes +forces and factors of which he had been unconscious but whose value, +long unacknowledged, he now gratefully can estimate. + +This same principle also applies to our unconscious indebtedness to +people who have helped us but whom we have not known. This is a far +finer world because of souls who have been here through whom God has +shined like the sun through eastern windows, but we can go on year +after year absorbing unconsciously the influence of these spirits +without ever knowing them. I lived for twelve years in a community to +which in its early days a young minister had come, and where for forty +years he stood as the central influence in the town's life. He brought +it up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. As was said of Joseph +in Potiphar's prison, "Whatsoever they did there, he was the doer of +it." The height of his mind, the unselfishness of his spirit, the +liberality of his thought, made all the people gladly acclaim him as +the foremost citizen of the town. There is a quality in the town's +life yet which never would have been there had it not been for him. +Sometimes yet his spirit must brood above that community which for +forty years he cherished and must say to people whom he never knew, but +who are being blessed by the benedictory influence of his life, what +Jehovah said to Cyrus the Persian, "I girded thee, though thou hast not +known me." + +So, from multitudinous sources services flow in upon us that we do not +recognize. It should be impossible then to think that God never +touches men until men welcome him. Some people seem to suppose that +God ministers to men, saves them, transforms them, raises them up and +liberates them only when they confessedly receive him. That cannot be +true of the God of the New Testament. He is too magnanimous for that. +Jesus says a man is unworthy of his discipleship when he serves only +the friends who are responsive, that we must serve the hostile and +ungrateful, too. Can it be that God is less good than Jesus said we +ought to be? We in the churches have drawn our little lines too tight. +We have been tempted to divide mankind into two classes, the white and +the black: in the Church the white, the saved, who recognize God; +outside, the black, the unsaved, the ungodly who do not recognize him. +By that division we sometimes seem to imply that those outside the +Church are outside the reach of God's transforming grace and power. We +are tempted to look for God's activity chiefly, if not altogether, +inside the organization that avows him. But that cannot be true. He +comes in like the sun through every chink and crevice where he can find +a way of entrance. He does not wait to be welcomed. He does not +insist on being consciously recognized before he enters a man's life. +Rather, through any door or window left unwittingly ajar where he may +steal in, even though unobserved, to lift and liberate a life, there +the God of the New Testament will come--"the light which lighteth every +man coming into the world." + +Consider, for illustration, the many people in this generation who have +given up active relationship with the Church and assured faith in God. +They may even call themselves agnostics. Would it not be true to speak +to them like this: You have not succeeded in getting rid of God. There +is a flame in your heart that will not go out. You try to say there is +no God and then you go out under the stars at night and you begin to +wonder how such a vast, law-abiding universe could come by accident, as +if a man were to throw a font of type on the floor and by chance it +should arrange itself into a play of Shakespeare. Strange universe, +without God! You try to say there is no God and you pick up a book: a +life of Phillips Brooks or David Livingstone or Francis Xavier, and you +begin to wonder that, amid these whirling stars and solar systems, a +race of men should have emerged with spiritual life like that which we +possess, with ideals that beckon us, conscience that warns us and +remorse that punishes us! You cannot easily think that this long +spiritual struggle and achievement of the race is an accident struck +off unwittingly like sparks from falling stones in a material world +without abiding meaning. Or you try to say there is no God, and then +you are married and your first baby is born and there wells up in your +heart that purest love that man can know, the feeling of a parent for a +little child. And you cannot help wondering how a man can walk about +the world with love like that in the center of his life, thinking that +there is nothing to correspond with it in the reality from which his +heart and his baby came. You try to say there is no God, and then you +begin to grow old and the friends you love best on earth pass away, as +Carlyle said his mother did, like "the last pale rim or sickle of the +moon which had once been full, sinking in the dark seas." You cannot +help wondering whether great souls can be so at the mercy of a few +particles of matter that when these are disturbed the spirit is plunged +into oblivion! You never really have gotten rid of God. There is a +flame in the center of your heart which you cannot put out. If there +were no God it would be easier to disbelieve in him than it is. You +cannot get rid of him because the best in you is God in you. The flame +is he and there in the center of your life, recognized or unrecognized, +he is burning up as best he can. + +This principle of God's unrecognized presence applies to a special +group of people that has been growing rapidly in the last few years: +the men and women who give themselves with high spirit to human service +in science or philanthropy but who never think of attributing their +service or love of truth to religious motives. To this group belong +many of our scientists. They give themselves no rest, seeking for +truth which will help human need. In obscure and forgotten +laboratories to-day they search for remedies for ancient, lamentable +ills. They make it a point of professional honour not to take profit +for themselves when they have succeeded, but to give freely to the +world the knowledge they have achieved. The pulpit has often quarreled +with the scientists. Let the pulpit honour them for their amazing +outpouring of service to the world. To this group also belong many of +our philanthropists, to whom sacrifice for the common weal has become +the moral equivalent of war. Yet often these men and women, useful +public servants of the generation as they are, do not know God. They +are great spirits. Let us not pretend that they are not. They are +making a deep and beneficent impress upon their own times, and our sons +and our sons' sons will rise up to call them blessed; yet they do not +know God. What are we to say of such men and women? You know what +some people do say about them. They use them as arguments against +religion. They say, See these fine men living without God. That is an +utter fallacy. They are not living without God. They only think they +are. They are the supreme examples of the work of the unrecognized +God. One wishes that those men and women would recognize God. God can +do much more through responsive than through unresponsive lives. But +we may not say that they are living without God. There, in the center +of their life, in the ideals they work for, in the service they render, +in the love they lavish, in the mission that has mastered them, there +_is_ God. + +Some time ago I wandered down Broadway, in the small hours of the +morning, with one of the prominent citizens of the community. At the +heart of his life is the passion to be of use. Because his character +is stalwart and his ability great, the scope of his service is far +wider than the capacity of most of us. Amid the hurrying crowds and +the flashing lights of Broadway we talked together hour after hour +about God and immortality. He said that he could not believe in God. +He wistfully wished that he could. He was sure that it must add +something beautiful to human life, but for himself he thought that +there was no possibility except to live a high, clean, serviceable life +until he should fall on sleep. All the way home that night I thought +of other people whom I know. Here is a man who believes in God. He +always has believed in God. He was brought up to believe in God and he +has never felt with poignant sympathy enough the abysmal, immedicable +woes of human-kind to have his faith disturbed. He never has had any +doubts. The war passed over him and left him as it found him. The +fiercest storm that ever raged over mankind did not touch the surface +of his pool of sheltered faith. How could one help comparing him with +my friend who could not believe? For he, in high emotion, had spoken +of the miseries of men, of multitudes starving, of the horrors of war, +of the poor whose lives are a long animal struggle to keep the body +alive, of the woes that fall with such terrific incidence upon the +vast, obscure, forgotten masses of our human-kind, and out of the very +ardour of his sympathy had cried: "How can you believe that a good +Father made a world like this?" + +Now, I believe in God with all my heart. But the God whom I believe in +likes that man. Jesus, were he here on earth as once he was, would +love him. I think Jesus would love him more than the other man who +never had faced human misery with sympathy enough to feel his faith +disturbed. This does not mean that we ought contentedly to see men +ministered to by a God whom they do not recognize. It is a pity to be +served by the Eternal Spirit of all grace and yet not know him. In +Jean Webster's "Daddy Long Legs," Jerusha Abbott in the orphanage is +helped by an unknown friend. Year after year the favours flow in from +this friend whom she does not know. She blossoms out into girlhood and +young womanhood and still she does not know him. One day she sees him +and she does not recognize him. She has always thought of him as +looking other than he does, and so even when she sees him she does not +know him. Suppose that the story stopped there! It would be +intolerable to have a story end so. To be served all one's life by a +friend and then not to know him when he seeks recognition is tragedy. +So it is tragedy when God is unrecognized, but behind that is a deeper +tragedy still--people who believe in God but who have thoughts of him +so narrowly ecclesiastical that they themselves do not perceive his +presence, acknowledged or unacknowledged, in all the goodness and truth +and beauty of the universe. + +Such an enlargement of the idea of God to meet the needs of this new +world is one of the innermost demands of religion to-day. When a man +believes in the living God as the Creative Power in this universe, +whose character was revealed in Christ and who, recognized or +unrecognized, reveals himself in every form of goodness, truth and +beauty which life anywhere contains, he has achieved a God adequate for +life. To such a man the modern progressive outlook upon the world +becomes exhilarating; all real advance is a revelation of the purpose +of this living God; and, far from being hostile to religion, our modern +categories furnish the noblest mental formulae in which the religious +spirit ever had opportunity to find expression. We who believe this +have no business to be modest and apologetic about it, as though upon +the defensive we shyly presented it to the suffrages of men. It is a +gospel to proclaim. It does involve a new theology but, with +multitudes of eager minds in our generation, the decision no longer +lies between an old and a new theology, but between new theology and no +theology. No longer can they phrase the deepest experiences of their +souls with God in the outgrown categories of a static world. In all +their other thinking they live in a world deeply permeated by ideas of +progress, and to keep their religion in a separate compartment, +uninfluenced by the best knowledge and hope of their day, is an +enterprise which, whether it succeed or fail, means the death of vital +faith. To take this modern, progressive world into one's mind and then +to achieve an idea of God great enough to encompass it, until with the +little gods gone and the great God come, life is full of the knowledge +of him, as the waters cover the sea, that is alike the duty and the +privilege of Christian leadership to-day. + +In a world which out of lowly beginnings has climbed so far and seems +intended to go on to heights unimagined, God is our hope and in his +name we will set up our banners. + + + +[1] Bertrand Russell: Philosophical Essays, II, The Free Man's Worship, +pp. 60-61. + +[2] Max Nordau: The Interpretation of History, p. 217. + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Christianity and Progress, by Harry Emerson Fosdick + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHRISTIANITY AND PROGRESS *** + +***** This file should be named 21992-8.txt or 21992-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/1/9/9/21992/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/21992-8.zip b/21992-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..7c6b415 --- /dev/null +++ b/21992-8.zip diff --git a/21992.txt b/21992.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b6913b4 --- /dev/null +++ b/21992.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5149 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Christianity and Progress, by Harry Emerson Fosdick + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Christianity and Progress + +Author: Harry Emerson Fosdick + +Release Date: July 19, 2007 [EBook #21992] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHRISTIANITY AND PROGRESS *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + + + The Cole Lectures for 1922 + delivered before Vanderbilt University + + + + +Christianity and Progress + + +By + +HARRY EMERSON FOSDICK + + + _Professor of Practical Theology in the + Union Theological Seminary; + Preacher at the First Presbyterian Church, + New York_ + + + +NEW YORK ------ CHICAGO + +Fleming H. Revell Company + +LONDON AND EDINBURGH + + + + +Copyright, 1922, by + +FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY + + + + + New York: 158 Fifth Avenue + Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave. + London: 21 Paternoster Square + Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street + + + + +THE COLE LECTURES + +The late Colonel E. W. Cole of Nashville, Tennessee, donated to +Vanderbilt University the sum of five thousand dollars, afterwards +increased by Mrs. E. W. Cole to ten thousand, the design and conditions +of which gift are stated as follows: + +"The Object of this fund is to establish a foundation for a perpetual +Lectureship in connection with the School of Religion of the +University, to be restricted in its scope to a defense and advocacy of +the Christian religion. The lectures shall be delivered at such +intervals, from time to time, as shall be deemed best by the Board of +Trust; and the particular theme and lecturer will be determined by the +Theological Faculty. Said lecture shall always be reduced to writing +in full, and the manuscript of the same shall be the property of the +University, to be published or disposed of by the Board of Trust at its +discretion, the net proceeds arising therefrom to be added to the +foundation fund, or otherwise used for the benefit of the School of +Religion." + + + + +Preface + +No one who ever has delivered the Cole Lectures will fail to associate +them, in his grateful memory, with the hospitable fellowship of the +elect at Vanderbilt University. My first expression of thanks is due +to the many professors and students there, lately strangers and now +friends, who, after the burdensome preparation of these lectures, made +their delivery a happy and rewarding experience for the lecturer. I am +hoping now that even though prepared for spoken address the lectures +may be serviceable to others who will read instead of hear them. At +any rate, it seemed best to publish them without change in +form--addresses intended for public delivery and bearing, I doubt not, +many marks of the spoken style. + +I have tried to make a sally into a field of inquiry where, within the +next few years, an increasing company of investigators is sure to go. +The idea of progress was abroad in the world long before men became +conscious of it; and men became conscious of it in its practical +effects long before they stopped to study its transforming consequences +in their philosophy and their religion. No longer, however, can we +avoid the intellectual issue which is involved in our new outlook upon +a dynamic, mobile, progressive world. Hardly a better description +could be given of the intellectual advance which has marked the last +century than that which Renan wrote years ago: "the substitution of the +category of _becoming_ for _being_, of the conception of relativity for +that of the absolute, of movement for immobility." [1] Underneath all +other problems which the Christian Gospel faces is the task of choosing +what her attitude shall be toward this new and powerful force, the idea +of progress, which in every realm is remaking man's thinking. + +I have endeavoured in detail to indicate my indebtedness to the many +books by whose light I have been helped to see my way. In addition I +wish to express especial thanks to my friend and colleague, Professor +Eugene W. Lyman, who read the entire manuscript to my great profit; +and, as well, to my secretary, Miss Margaret Renton, whose efficient +service has been an invaluable help. + +H. E. F. + +New York + + + +[1] Renan: Averroes et L'Averroisme, p. vii. + + + + +Contents + + +LECTURE I + THE IDEA OF PROGRESS + + +LECTURE II + THE NEED FOR RELIGION + + +LECTURE III + THE GOSPEL AND SOCIAL PROGRESS + +LECTURE IV + PROGRESSIVE CHRISTIANITY + +LECTURE V + THE PERILS of PROGRESS + +LECTURE VI + PROGRESS AND GOD + + + + +LECTURE I + +THE IDEA OF PROGRESS + +I + +The supposition that fish do not recognize the existence of water nor +birds the existence of air often has been used to illustrate the +insensitive unawareness of which we all are capable in the presence of +some encompassing medium of our lives. The illustration aptly fits the +minds of multitudes in this generation, who live, as we all do, in the +atmosphere of progressive hopes and yet are not intelligently aware of it +nor conscious of its newness, its strangeness and its penetrating +influence. We read as a matter of course such characteristic lines as +these from Tennyson: + + "Yet I doubt not thro' the ages one increasing purpose runs, + And the thoughts of men are widen'd with the process of the suns." + +Such lines, however, are not to be taken as a matter of course; until +comparatively recent generations such an idea as that never had dawned on +anybody's mind, and the story of the achievement of that progressive +interpretation of history is one of the most fascinating narratives in +the long record of man's mental Odyssey. In particular, the Christian +who desires to understand the influences, both intellectual and +practical, which are playing with transforming power upon Christianity +today, upon its doctrines, its purposes, its institutions, and its social +applications, must first of all understand the idea of progress. For +like a changed climate, which in time alters the fauna and flora of a +continent beyond the power of human conservatism to resist, this +progressive conception of life is affecting every thought and purpose of +man, and no attempted segregation of religion from its influence is +likely to succeed. + +The significance of this judgment becomes the more clear when we note the +fact that the idea of progress in our modern sense is not to be found +before the sixteenth century. Men before that time had lived without +progressive hopes just as before Copernicus they had lived upon a +stationary earth. Man's life was not thought of as a growth; gradual +change for the better was not supposed to be God's method with mankind; +the future was not conceived in terms of possible progress; and man's +estate on earth was not looked upon as capable of indefinite +perfectibility. All these ideas, so familiar to us, were undreamed of in +the ancient and medieval world. The new astronomy is not a more complete +break from the old geocentric system with its stationary earth than is +our modern progressive way of thinking from our fathers' static +conception of human life and history. + + +II + +It will be worth our while at the beginning of our study to review in +outline this development of the idea of progress, that we may better +understand the reasons for its emergence and may more truly estimate its +revolutionary effects. In the ancient world the Greeks, with all their +far-flung speculations, never hit upon the idea of progress. To be sure, +clear intimations, scattered here and there in Greek literature, indicate +faith that man in the past had improved his lot. Aeschylus saw men +lifted from their hazardous lives in sunless caves by the intervention of +Prometheus and his sacrificial teaching of the arts of peace; Euripides +contrasted the primitive barbarism in which man began with the civilized +estate which in Greece he had achieved--but this perceived advance never +was erected into a progressive idea of human life as a whole. Rather, +the original barbarism, from which the arts of civilization had for a +little lifted men, was itself a degeneration from a previous ideal +estate, and human history as a whole was a cyclic and repetitious story +of never-ending rise and fall. Plato's philosophy of history was +typical: the course of cosmic life is divided into cycles, each +seventy-two thousand solar years in length; during the first half of each +cycle, when creation newly comes from the hands of Deity, mankind's +estate is happily ideal, but then decay begins and each cycle's latter +half sinks from bad to worse until Deity once more must take a hand and +make all things new again. Indeed, so far from reaching the idea of +progress, the ancient Greeks at the very center of their thinking were +incapacitated for such an achievement by their suspiciousness of change. +They were artists and to them the perfect was finished, like the +Parthenon, and therefore was incapable of being improved by change. +Change, so far from meaning, as it does with us, the possibility of +betterment, meant with them the certainty of decay; no changes upon earth +in the long run were good; all change was the sure sign that the period +of degeneration had set in from which only divine intervention could +redeem mankind. Paul on Mars Hill quoted the Greek poet Aratus +concerning the sonship of all mankind to God, but Aratus's philosophy of +history is not so pleasantly quotable: + + "How base a progeny sprang from golden sires! + And viler shall they be whom ye beget." [1] + +Such, in general, was the non-progressive outlook of the ancient Greeks. + +Nor did the Romans hit upon the idea of progress in any form remotely +approaching our modern meaning. The casual reader, to be sure, will find +occasional flares of expectancy about the future or of pride in the +advance of the past which at first suggest progressive interpretations of +history. So Seneca, rejoicing because he thought he knew the explanation +of the moon's eclipses, wrote: "The days will come when those things +which now lie hidden time and human diligence will bring to light. . . . +The days will come when our posterity will marvel that we were ignorant +of truths so obvious." [2] So, too, the Epicureans, like the Greek +tragedians before them, believed that human knowledge and effort had +lifted mankind out of primitive barbarism and Lucretius described how man +by the development of agriculture and navigation, the building of cities +and the establishment of laws, the manufacture of physical conveniences +and the creation of artistic beauty, had risen, "gradually progressing," +to his present height.[3] Such hopeful changes in the past, however, were +not the prophecies of continuous advance; they were but incidental +fluctuations in a historic process which knew no progress as a whole. +Even the Stoics saw in history only a recurrent rise and fall in endless +repetition so that all apparent change for good or evil was but the +influx or the ebbing of the tide in an essentially unchanging sea. The +words of Marcus Aurelius are typical: "The periodic movements of the +universe are the same, up and down from age to age"; "He who has seen +present things has seen all, both everything which has taken place from +all eternity and everything which will be for time without end; for all +are of one kin and of one form"; "He who is forty years old, if he has +any understanding at all, has, by virtue of the uniformity that prevails, +seen all things which have been and all that will be." [4] + +When with these Greek and Roman ideas the Hebrew-Christian influences +blended, no conception of progress in the modern sense was added by the +Church's contribution. To be sure, the Christians' uncompromising faith +in personality as the object of divine redemption and their vigorous hope +about the future of God's people in the next world, if not in this, +calcined some elements in the classical tradition. Belief in cycles, +endlessly repeating themselves through cosmic ages, went by the board. +This earth became the theatre of a unique experiment made once for all; +in place of the ebb and flow of tides in a changeless sea, mankind's +story became a drama moving toward a climactic denouement that would +shake heaven and earth together in a divine cataclysm. But this +consummation of all history was not a goal progressively to be achieved; +it was a divine invasion of the world expectantly to be awaited, when the +victorious Christ would return and the Day of Judgment dawn. + +The development of this apocalyptic phrasing of hope has been traced too +often to require long rehearsal here. If the Greeks were essentially +philosophers and welcomed congenially ideas like endless cosmic cycles, +the Hebrews were essentially practical and dramatic in their thinking and +they welcomed a picture of God's victory capable of being visualized by +the imagination. At first their national hopes had been set on the +restoration of the Davidic kingdom; then the Davidic king himself had +grown in their imagination until, as Messiah in a proper sense, he +gathered to himself supernal attributes; then, as a child of their +desperate national circumstances, the hope was born of their Messiah's +sudden coming on the clouds of heaven for their help. Between the +Testaments this expectation expanded and robed itself with pomp and +glory, so that when the Christians came they found awaiting them a +phrasing of hope which they accepted to body forth their certainty of +God's coming sovereignty over all the earth. This expectation of coming +triumph was not progressive; it was cataclysmic. It did not offer the +prospect of great gains to be worked for over long periods of time; it +offered a divine invasion of history immediately at hand. It was +pictured, not in terms of human betterment to be achieved, but of divine +action to be awaited. The victory would suddenly come like the flood in +Noah's day, like the lightning flashing from one end of the heaven to the +other, like a thief in the night. + +To be sure, this eager expectation of a heavenly kingdom immediately to +arrive on earth soon grew dim among the Christians, and the reasons are +obvious. For one thing, the Church herself, moving out from days of +hardship to days of preferment and prosperity, began to allure with her +inviting prospects of growing power the enthusiasms and hopes of the +people, until not the suddenly appearing kingdom from the heavens, but +the expanding Church on earth became the center of Christian interest. +For another thing, Christ meant more to Christians than the inaugurator +of a postponed kingdom which, long awaited with ardent expectation, still +did not arrive; Christ was the giver of eternal life now. More and more +the emphasis shifted from what Christ would do for his people when he +came upon the clouds of heaven to what he was doing for them through his +spiritual presence with them. Even in the Fourth Gospel one finds this +good news that Christ had already come again in the hearts of his people +insisted on in evident contrast with the apocalyptic hope literally +conceived. For another thing, dramatic hopes of a sudden invasion of the +world are always the offspring of desperate conditions. Only when people +are hard put to it do they want history catastrophically stopped in the +midst of its course. The Book of Daniel must be explained by the +tyrannies of Antiochus Epiphanes, the Book of Revelation by the +persecutions of Domitian, the present recrudescence of pre-millennialism +by the tragedy of the Great War. But when the persecution of the Church +by the State gave way to the running of the State by the Church; when to +be a Christian was no longer a road to the lions but the sine qua non of +preferment and power; when the souls under the altar ceased crying, "How +long, O Master, the holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our +blood on them that dwell on the earth?" then the apocalyptic hopes grew +dim and the old desire for a kingdom immediately to come was subdued to +an expectation, no longer imperative and urgent, that sometime the course +of history would stop on Judgment Day. + +In all these Greek and Roman, Hebrew and Christian contributions, which +flowed together and then flowed out into the medieval age, there was no +suggestion of a modern idea of progress, and in the medieval age itself +there was nothing to create a fresh phrasing of expectancy. Men were +aware of the darkness of the days that had fallen on the earth; even when +they began to rouse themselves from their lethargy, their thoughts of +greatness did not reach forward toward a golden age ahead but harked back + + "To the glory that was Greece + And the grandeur that was Rome," + +and their intellectual life, instead of being an adventurous search for +new truth, was a laborious endeavour to stabilize the truth already +formulated in the great days of the early Church. Indeed, the Church's +specific contribution of a vividly imagined faith in a future world, as +the goal of the most absorbing hopes and fears of men, tended rather to +confirm than to dissipate the static conception of earthly life and +history. With an urgency that the ancient world had never known the +Christian world believed in immortality and visualized the circumstances +of the life to come so concretely that in a medieval catechism the lurid +colour of the setting sun was ascribed to the supposition that "he +looketh down upon hell." [5] Nothing in this life had any importance +save as it prepared the souls of men for life to come. Even Roger Bacon, +his mind flashing like a beacon from below the sky-line of the modern +world, was sure that all man's knowledge of nature was useful only in +preparing his soul to await the coming of Antichrist and the Day of +Judgment. There was no idea of progress, then, in the medieval age. +Human life and history were static and the only change to be anticipated +was the climactic event + + "When earth breaks up and heaven expands." + + +III + +The emergence of modern progressive hopes out of this static medievalism +is one of the epic occurrences of history. The causes which furthered +the movement seem now in retrospect to be woven into a fabric so tightly +meshed as to resist unraveling. Nevertheless, it is not difficult to see +at least some of the major factors which furthered this revolutionary +change from a static to a progressive world. + +Among the first, scientific invention is surely to be noted. Even Roger +Bacon, prophecying with clairvoyant insight far in advance of the event, +foresaw one of the determining factors of the modern age: "Machines for +navigating can be made so that without rowers great ships can be guided +by one pilot on river or sea more swiftly than if they were full of +oarsmen. Likewise vehicles are possible which without draught-animals +can be propelled with incredible speed, like the scythed chariots, as we +picture them, in which antiquity fought. Likewise a flying machine is +possible in the middle of which a man may sit, using some ingenious +device by which artificial wings will beat the air like those of a flying +bird. Also machines, small in size, can be constructed to lift and move +unlimited weights, than which in an emergency nothing is more useful." +[6] So dreamed the great friar in the thirteenth century. When, then, +we find the minds of men first throwing off their intellectual vassalage +to antiquity and beginning to believe in themselves, their present powers +and their future prospects, it is this new-found mastery over nature's +latent resources which is the spring and fountain of their confidence. +Cardan, in the sixteenth century, marveling at the then modern inventions +of the compass, the printing press, and gunpowder, cried, "All antiquity +has nothing comparable to these three things." [7] Every year from that +day to this has deepened the impression made upon the minds of men by the +marvelous prospect of harnessing the resources of the universe. The last +one hundred and twenty-five years have seen the invention of the +locomotive, the steamship, the telegraph, the sewing machine, the camera, +the telephone, the gasoline engine, wireless telegraphy and telephony, +and the many other applications of electricity. As one by one new areas +of power have thus come under the control of man, with every conquest +suggesting many more not yet achieved but brought within range of +possibility, old theories of cosmic degeneration and circular futility +have gone to pieces, the glamour of antiquity has lost its allurement, +the great days of humanity upon the earth have been projected into the +future, and the gradual achievement of human progress has become the hope +of man. + +Another element in the emergence of the modern progressive outlook upon +life is immediately consequent upon the first: world-wide discovery, +exploration and intercommunication. Great as the practical results have +been which trace their source to the adventurers who, from Columbus down, +pioneered unknown seas to unknown lands, the psychological effects have +been greater still. Who could longer live cooped up in a static world, +when the old barriers were so being overpassed and new continents were +inviting adventure, settlement, and social experiment hitherto untried? +The theological progressiveness of the Pilgrim Fathers, starting out from +Leyden for a new world, was not primarily a matter of speculation; it was +even more a matter of an adventurous spirit, which, once admitted into +life, could not be kept out of religious thought as well. In Edward +Winslow's account of Pastor Robinson's last sermon before the little +company of pioneers left Leyden, we read that Robinson "took occasion +also miserably to bewaile the state and condition of the Reformed +Churches, who were come to a period in Religion, and would goe no further +than the instruments of their Reformation: As for example, the +_Lutherans_ they could not be drawne to goe beyond what _Luther_ saw, for +whatever part of God's will he had further imparted and revealed to +_Calvin_, they will die rather than embrace it. And so also, saith he, +you see the _Calvinists_, they stick where he left them: a misery much to +bee lamented; For though they were precious shining lights in their +times, yet God hath not revealed his whole will to them: And were they +now living, saith hee, they would bee as ready and willing to embrace +further light, as that they had received." [8] Static methods of +thinking are here evidently going to pieces before the impact of a +distinctly unstatic world. They were looking for "more truth and light +yet to breake forth out of his holy Word" [9] because they lived in a +time when new things had been happening at an exhilarating rate and when +pioneering adventure and general travel in a world of open avenues were +already beginning to have that liberating effect which has increased with +every passing century. + +Closely allied with the two elements already noted is a third: the +increase of knowledge, which, as in the case of astronomy, threw +discredit upon the superior claims of antiquity and made modern men seem +wiser than their sires. For ages the conviction had held the ground that +the ancients were the wisest men who ever lived and that we, their +children, were but infants in comparison. When, therefore, the +Copernican astronomy proved true, when the first terrific shock of it had +passed through resultant anger into wonder and from wonder into stupefied +acceptance, and from that at last into amazed exultation at the vast, new +universe unveiled, the credit of antiquity received a stunning blow. So +far was Aristotle from being "the master of those who know" whom the +medievalists had revered, that he had not even known the shape and motion +of the earth or its relation with the sun. For the first time in history +the idea emerged that humanity accumulates knowledge, that the ancients +were the infants, that the moderns represent the age and wisdom of the +race. Consider the significance of those words of Pascal in the +seventeenth century: "Those whom we call ancient were really new in all +things, and properly constituted the infancy of mankind; and as we have +joined to their knowledge the experience of the centuries which have +followed them, it is in ourselves that we should find this antiquity that +we revere in others." [10] For the first time in history men turned +their faces, in their search for knowledge, not backward but forward, and +began to experience that attitude which with us is habitual--standing on +tip-toe in eager expectancy, sure that tomorrow some new and unheard of +truth will be revealed. + +New inventions, new discoveries, new knowledge--even before the +eighteenth century all these factors were under way. Then a new factor +entered which has played a powerful part in substituting a progressive +for a static world: new social hopes. The medieval age had no +expectation of a better social life on earth. Charity was common but it +was purely individual and remedial; it did not seek to understand or to +cure the causes of social maladjustment; it was sustained by no +expectation of better conditions among men; it was valued because of the +giver's unselfishness rather than because of the recipient's gain, and in +consequence it was for the most part unregulated alms-giving, piously +motived but inefficiently managed. In the eighteenth century a new +outlook and hope emerged. If man could pioneer new lands, learn new +truth and make new inventions, why could he not devise new social systems +where human life would be freed from the miseries of misgovernment and +oppression? With that question at last definitely rising, the long line +of social reformers began which stretched from Abbe de Saint-Pierre to +the latest believer in the possibility of a more decent and salutary +social life for human-kind. The coming of democracy in government +incalculably stimulated the influence of this social hope, for with the +old static forms of absolute autocracy now broken up, with power in the +hands of the people to seek as they would "life, liberty and the pursuit +of happiness," who could put limits to the possibilities? The medieval +age was gone; the modern age had come, and its distinctive note was +progress, with new inventions, new discoveries, new knowledge and new +social hope. + +It would be a fascinating task to watch these interweaving factors at +their work and to trace their commingled influence as slowly their +involved significance became clear, now to this man and now to that. The +best narrative that has been written yet of this epochal movement is +contained in Professor Bury's volume on "The Idea of Progress." There one +sees the stream of this progressive conception of life pushing its way +out as through a delta by way of many minds, often far separated yet +flowing with the same water. Some men attacked the ancients and by +comparison praised the modern time as Perrault did with "The Age of Louis +the Great"; some men foresaw so clearly the possibility of man's control +over nature that they dreamed of terrestrial Utopias as Francis Bacon did +in "New Atlantis"; some men, like Descartes, sought to grasp the +intellectual conditions of human improvement; and others, like Condorcet, +became the fervid prophets of human perfectibility; some, like Turgot, +re-examined history in terms of the new ideas; and some, like Saint Simon +and Comte, sought to discover the law by which all progress moves. This +new idea of life and history came "by divers portions and in divers +manners," but no one can doubt its arrival. The life of man upon this +earth was no longer conceived as static; it was progressive and the +possibilities that lay ahead made all the achievements of the past seem +like the play of childhood. + +At last, in the nineteenth century, the climactic factor was added which +gathered up all the rest and embraced them in a comprehensive philosophy +of life. Evolution became a credible truth. No longer a dim conjecture, +it was established in biology, and then it spread its influence out into +every area of human thought until all history was conceived in genetic +terms and all the sciences were founded upon the evolutionary idea. +Growth became recognized as the fundamental law of life. Nothing in the +universe without, or in man's life within, could longer be conceived as +having sprung full-statured, like Minerva from the head of Jove. All +things achieved maturity by gradual processes. The world itself had thus +come into being, not artificially nailed together like a box, but growing +like a tree, putting forth ever new branches and new leaves. When this +idea had firmly grasped the human mind, the modern age had come indeed, +and progress was its distinctive category of understanding and its +exhilarating phrasing of human hope. Then came the days of mid-Victorian +optimism with songs like this upon men's lips: + + "Every tiger madness muzzled, every serpent passion kill'd, + Every grim ravine a garden, every blazing desert till'd, + + "Robed in universal harvest up to either pole she smiles, + Universal ocean softly washing all her warless isles." [11] + + +IV + +Any one, however, who has lived with discerning thought through the +opening years of the twentieth century, must be aware that something has +happened to chasten and subdue these wildly enthusiastic hopes of the +mid-Victorian age. Others beside the "gloomy dean" of St. Paul's, +whether through well-considered thought or through the psychological +shock of the Great War, have come to look upon this rash, unmitigated +enthusiasm about the earth's future as a fool's paradise. At any rate, +no treatment of the idea of progress would be complete which did not +dwell upon the limitations to that idea, now definitely obvious to +thoughtful men. + +As early as 1879, in Saporta's "Le Monde des Plantes," we run upon one +serious setback to unqualified expectations of progress. Men began to +take into account the fact that this earth is not a permanent affair. +"We recognize from this point of view as from others," wrote Saporta, +"that the world was once young; then adolescent; that it has even passed +the age of maturity; man has come late, when a beginning of physical +decadence had struck the globe, his domain." [12] Here is a fact to give +enthusiasm over earthly progress serious pause. This earth, once +uninhabitable, will be uninhabitable again. If not by wholesale +catastrophe, then by the slow wearing down of the sun's heat, already +passed its climacteric, this planet, the transient theatre of the human +drama, will be no longer the scene of man's activity, but as cold as the +moon, or as hot as colliding stars in heaven, will be able to sustain +human life no more. "The grandest material works of the human race," +wrote Faye in 1884, "will have to be effaced by degrees under the action +of a few physical forces which will survive man for a time. Nothing will +remain, not even the ruins." [13] + +Every suggested clew to a possible escape from the grimness of the +planet's dissolution has been followed up with careful search. The +discovery of radioactivity seemed to promise endlessly extended life to +our sun, but Sir E. Rutherford, before the Royal Astronomical Society, +has roundly denied that the discovery materially lengthens our estimate +of the sun's tenure of life and has said that if the sun were made of +uranium it would not because of that last five years the longer as a +giver of heat.[14] Whether we will or not, we have no choice except to +face the tremendous fact, calmly set down by von Hartmann in 1904: "The +only question is whether . . . the world-process will work itself out +slowly in prodigious lapse of time, according to purely physical laws; or +whether it will find its end by means of some metaphysical resource when +it has reached its culminating point. Only in the last case would its +end coincide with the fulfilment of a purpose or object; in the first +case, a long period of purposeless existence would follow after the +culmination of life." [15] + +In a word, men delighted at the prospect of human progress on this planet +have made an idol of it, only to discover that on a transient earth it +leads nowhere without God and immortality. One disciple of naturalism +recently denied his desire to believe in God because he wanted a risky +universe. But the universe without God is not risky; it is a foregone +conclusion; the dice are all loaded. After the lapse of millions of +years which, however long they be stretched out, will ultimately end, our +solar system will be gone, without even a memory left of anything that +ever was dreamed or done within it. That is the inevitable issue of such +a "risky" universe. When scientifically-minded men, therefore, now take +a long look ahead, the Utopian visions of the mid-Victorian age are not +foremost in their thought. Rather, as one of them recently wrote: + + +"One is tempted to imagine this race of supermen, of some millions of +years hence, grimly confronting the issue of extinction. Probably long +before that time science will have perfectly mastered the problem of the +sun's heat, and will be able to state precisely at what period the +radiation will sink to a level which would normally be fatal to the +living inhabitants of the planets. Then will begin the greatest of +cosmic events: a drama that has doubtless been played numbers of times +already on the stage of the universe: the last stand of the wonderful +microcosm against the brute force of the macrocosm. . . . . + +"One conceives that our supermen will face the end philosophically. +Death is losing its terrors. The race will genially say, as we +individuals do to-day, that it has had a long run. But it will +none-the-less make a grim fight. Life will be worth living, for +everybody, long before that consummation is in sight. The hovering demon +of cold and darkness will be combatted by scientific means of which we +have not the germ of a conception." [16] + + +If ever a river ran out into a desert, the river of progressive hopes, +fed only from springs of materialistic philosophy, has done so here. At +least the Greeks had their immortality and the Hebrews their coming +Kingdom of God, but a modern materialist, with all his talk of progress, +has neither the one nor the other, nor anything to take their place as an +ultimate for hope. Whatever else may be true, progress on a transient +planet has not done away with the need of God and life eternal. + +Moreover, not only have our twentieth century thought and experience +seriously qualified the meaning of progress on this earth by the limiting +of the earth's duration; men have come also to distrust, as a quite +unjustified flourish of sentimentality, the mid-Victorian confidence in +an automatic evolution which willy-nilly lifts humanity to higher levels. +Said Herbert Spencer, "Progress is not an accident, not a thing within +human control, but a beneficent necessity." "This advancement is due to +the working of a universal law; . . . in virtue of that law it must +continue until the state we call perfection is reached. . . . Thus the +ultimate development of the ideal man is logically certain--as certain as +any conclusion in which we place the most implicit faith; . . . so surely +must the things we call evil and immorality disappear; so surely must man +become perfect." [17] There is no scientific basis whatever for such a +judgment. Evolution is not an escalator which, whether or not man run in +addition to its lift, will inevitably raise humanity to a heaven on +earth. Potatoes in the cellar shooting out long white eyes in search of +light are evolving, but they are evolving worse. Upon the basis of a +scientific doctrine of evolution, no idolatrous superstition could be +much more lacking in intellectual support than Spencer's confidence in a +universal, mechanical, irresistible movement toward perfection. The +plain fact is that human history is a strange blend of progress and +regress; it is the story of the rhythmic rise and fall of civilizations +and empires, of gains made only to be lost and lost only to be fought for +once again. Even when advance has come, it has come by mingled progress +and cataclysm as water passes, through gradual increase of warmth, from +ice suddenly to liquid and from liquid suddenly to vapour. Our +nineteenth century ideas of evolution tended to create in us the +impression that humanity had made a smooth and even ascent. We +artificially graded the ascending track of human history, leveled and +macadamized it, and talked of inevitable progress. Such sentimental +optimism has ceased even to be comforting, so utterly untenable has it +become to every well-instructed mind. + +To such unfounded faith in automatic progress a valuable counterweight is +acquaintance with the life of a man like St. Augustine. As one reads +Augustine's sermons one can hear in the background the collapse of a +great civilization. One can tell from his discourses when the barbarians +began to move on Rome. One can hear the crash when Alaric and his hordes +sacked the Eternal City. One can catch the accent of horror at the tidal +waves of anarchy that everywhere swept in to engulf the falling empire. +"Horrible things," said Augustine, "have been told us. There have been +ruins, and fires, and rapine, and murder, and torture. That is true; we +have heard it many times; we have shuddered at all this disaster; we have +often wept, and we have hardly been able to console ourselves." [18] At +last, the empire in ruins, the old civilization tottering to its +collapse, Augustine died in his episcopal city of Hippo, while the +barbarians were hammering at the city gates. Through such scenes this +generation too has lived and has had to learn again, what we never should +have forgotten, that human history is not a smooth and well-rolled lawn +of soft ascents; that it is mountainous, precipitous, terrific--a country +where all progress must be won by dint of intelligence and toil, and +where it is as easy to lose the gains of civilization as it is to fall +over a cliff or to surrender a wheat field to the weeds. An archeologist +in Mesopotamia talked with an Arab lad who neither read, himself, nor +knew any one who did; yet the lad, when he acknowledged this, stood +within a stone's throw of the site where milleniums ago was one of the +greatest universities of the ancient world and where still, amid the +desolation, one could dig and find the old clay tablets on which the +children of that ancient time had learned to write. Progress? Regress! +While history as a whole, from the Cro-Magnon man to the twentieth +century, does certainly suggest a great ascent, it has not been an +automatic levitation. It has been a fight, tragic and ceaseless, against +destructive forces. This world needs something more than a soft gospel +of inevitable progress. It needs salvation from its ignorance, its sin, +its inefficiency, its apathy, its silly optimisms and its appalling +carelessness. + + +V + +Nevertheless, though it is true that our modern ideas of progress on this +earth never in themselves can supply an adequate philosophy of life, and +though it is true that they do not dispense with, but rather emphasize, +our need of God and immortality and the saving powers which Christians +find in Christ, yet those ideas have in them a permanent contribution to +the life of man from whose influence the race cannot escape. When we +have granted the limitations which disillusioned thoughtfulness suggests +concerning progress upon this earth, it still remains true that, in our +new scientific control over the latent resources of the earth without and +over our own mental and moral processes within, we have a machinery for +producing change that opens up exciting prospects before humanity. Never +in our outlook upon man's earthly future can we go back to the endless +cosmic cycles of the Greeks or the apocalyptic expectations of the +Hebrews. We are committed to the hope of making progress, and the +central problem which Christianity faces in adjusting her thought and +practice to the modern age is the problem of coming to intelligent terms +with this dominant idea. + +These lectures are an excursion to spy out this land and to see, if we +may, what the idea of progress through the scientific control of life is +likely to mean and ought to mean to Christianity. If this modern idea is +not intelligently guided in its effect upon our faith and practice, it +will none the less have its effect in haphazard, accidental, unguided, +and probably ruinous ways. If one listens, for example, to the preaching +of liberal ministers, one sees that every accent of their teaching has +been affected by this prevalent and permeating thought. The God they +preach no longer sits afar like Dante's deity in the stationary empyrean +beyond all reach of change; their God is here in the midst of the human +struggle, "their Captain in the well-fought fight." H. G. Wells may be a +poor theologian but he is one of our best interpreters of popular thought +and his idea of God, marching through the world "like fifes and drums," +calling the people to a progressive crusade for righteousness, is one +which modern folk find it most easy to accept. He is a God of progress +who undergirds our endeavours for justice in the earth with his power; +who fights in and for and with us against the hosts of evil; whose +presence is a guarantee of ultimate victory; and whose effect upon us is +to send us out to war against ancient human curses, assured that what +ought to be done can be done. + +As men's thought of God has thus been molded by the idea of progress on +the earth, so, too, the Christ they preach is not primarily, as of old, +the victim by whose substitutionary sacrifice the race of men has found +an open door from the bottomless pit of endless woe to a blessed +immortality in Paradise. The modern emphasis is all another way. Christ +is the divine revealer whose spirit alone can transform individuals and +save society. The sort of character he was, the life he lived, the ideas +he promulgated, are the salt that can preserve human life, the light that +can illumine the way to a kingdom of righteousness on earth. He himself +is the leader in the fight for that kingdom, his sacrifice part of the +price it costs, his spirit the quality of life that is indispensable to +its coming, and when we think of him we sing, + + "The Son of God goes forth to war. . . . + Who follows in his train?" + + +So, too, the Church, as presented by typical modern preachers, is no +longer an ark to which, from the flood of wrath divine, the few may flee +for safety. If men tried to preach in that way, the message would stick +in their throats. The Church is primarily an instrument in God's hands +to bring personal and social righteousness upon the earth. When her +massed influence overcomes a public evil or establishes a public good, +men find the justification of her existence and a first-rate weapon of +apologetic argument in her behalf. When wars come, the Church is blamed +because she did not prevent them; when wars are over, she takes counsel +how she may prove the validity of her message by making their recurrence +impossible; and the pitiful dismemberment of the Church by sects and +schisms is hated and deplored, not so much because of economic waste or +theological folly, as because these insane divisions prevent social +effectiveness in bringing the message of Christ to bear influentially on +modern life. + +Likewise, hope, deeply affected by modern ideas of earthly progress, is +not primarily post-mortem, as it used to be. Men believe in immortality, +but it seems so naturally the continuance of this present life that their +responsible concern is chiefly centered here. The hopes which waken +immediate enthusiasm and stir spontaneous response are hopes of +righteousness victorious upon the earth. Because men believe in God, +they believe that he has great purposes for humankind. The course of +human history is like a river: sometimes it flows so slowly that one +would hardly know it moved at all; sometimes bends come in its channel so +that one can hardly see in what direction it intends to go; sometimes +there are back-eddies so that it seems to be retreating on itself. If a +man has no spiritual interpretation of life, if he does not believe in +God, he may well give up hope and conclude that the human river is +flowing all awry or has altogether ceased to move. A Christian, however, +has a spiritual interpretation of life. He knows that human history is a +river--not a whirlpool, nor a pond, but a river flowing to its end. Just +as, far inland, we can tell that the Hudson is flowing to the sea, +because the waters, when the tide comes in, are tinctured with the +ocean's quality, so now, we believe that we can tell that the river of +human history is flowing out toward the kingdom of our God. Already the +setback of the divine ocean is felt among us in ideals of better life, +personal, social, economic, national. That it is Christianity's function +to believe in these ideals, to have faith in the possibility of their +realization, to supply motives for their achievement, and to work for +them with courage and sacrifice, is the familiar note of modern Christian +hope. + +The modern apologetic also is tinctured with this same quality. Not as +of old is it a laboured working out of metaphysical propositions. +Rather, a modern Christian preacher's defense of the Gospel may be +paraphrased in some such strain as this: You never can achieve a decent +human life upon this planet apart from the Christian Gospel. Neither +outward economic comfort nor international treaties of peace can save the +day for humanity. Not even when our present situation is described as "a +race between education and catastrophe" has the case been adequately +stated. What kind of education is meant? If every man and woman on +earth were a Ph. D., would that solve the human problem? Aaron Burr had +a far keener intellect than George Washington. So far as swiftness and +agility of intelligence were concerned, Burr far out-distanced the +slow-pacing mind of Washington. But, for all that, as you watch Burr's +life, and many another's like him, you understand what Macaulay meant +when he exclaimed: "as if history were not made up of the bad actions of +extraordinary men, as if all the most noted destroyers and deceivers of +our species, all the founders of arbitrary governments and false +religions, had not been extraordinary men, as if nine tenths of the +calamities which have befallen the human race had any other origin than +the union of high intelligence with low desires." Was Nebuchadnezzar of +Babylon unintelligent? Caesar and Napoleon--were they unintelligent? +Has the most monumental and destructive selfishness in human history been +associated with poor minds? No, with great minds, which, if the world +was to be saved their devastation, needed to be reborn into a new spirit. +The transforming gospel which religion brings is indispensable to a +building of the kingdom of righteousness upon the earth. + +Wherever one listens, then, to the typical teaching of modern Christians, +he finds himself in the atmosphere of the idea of progress. Men's +thoughts of God, of Christ, of the Church, of hope, their methods of +apologetic, are shaped to that mold--are often thinned out and flattened +down and made cheap and unconvincing by being shaped to that mold--so +that an endeavour to achieve an intelligent understanding of +Christianity's relationship with the idea of progress is in part a +defensive measure to save the Gospel from being unintelligently mauled +and mishandled by it. Marcus Dods, when he was an old man, said: "I do +not envy those who have to fight the battle of Christianity in the +twentieth century." Then, after a moment, he added, "Yes, perhaps I do, +but it will be a stiff fight." It is a stiff fight, and for this reason +if for no other, that before we can get on much further in a progressive +world we must achieve with wisdom and courage some fundamental +reconstructions in our Christian thinking. + + + +[1] Aratus of Soli: Phaenomena, lines 122-3. + +[2] Lucius Annaeus Seneca: Naturalium Quaestionum, Liber VII, 25. + +[3] T. Lucretius Carus: De Rerum Natura, Lib. V, 1455--"Paullatim docuit +pedetentim progredienteis." + +[4] Marcus Aurelius Antoninus: Meditations, IX, 28; VI, 37; XI, 1. + +[5] Andrew D. White: A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in +Christendom, Vol. I, p. 97. + +[6] Roger Bacon: Epistola de Secretis Operibus Artis et Naturae, et de +Nullitate Magiae, Caput IV, in Opera Quaedam Hactenus Inedita, edited by +J. S. Brewer, p. 533. + +[7] Jerome Cardan: De Subtilitate, Liber Decimusseptimus: De artibus, +artificiosisque rebus. + +[8] Edward Winslow: Hypocrisie Unmasked, p. 97. + +[9] Ibid. + +[10] Blaise Pascal: Opuscules, Preface to the Treatise on Vacuum, in The +Thoughts, Letters and Opuscules of Blaise Pascal, Translated by O. W. +Wight, p. 550. + +[11] Alfred Tennyson: Locksley Hall Sixty Years After. + +[12] Comte de Saporta: Le Monde des Plantes avant L'Apparition de +L'Homme, p. 109. + +[13] H. Faye: Sur L'Origine du Monde, Chapitre XI, p. 256-7. + +[14] Joseph McCabe: The End of the World, p. 112. + +[15] Eduard von Hartmann: Ausgewaehlte Werke, viii, pp. 572-3 (Leipzig, +1904). + +[16] Joseph McCabe: The End of the World, pp. 116-117. + +[17] Herbert Spencer: Illustrations of Universal Progress, Chapter I, +Progress: Its Law and Cause, p. 58; Social Statics, Part I, Chapter II, +The Evanescence of Evil, Sec. 4, p. 78 ff. + +[18] Louis Bertrand: Saint Augustin, p. 342. + + + + +LECTURE II + +THE NEED FOR RELIGION + +I + +One of the first effects of the idea of progress, whose development our +last lecture traced, has been to increase immeasurably man's self +reliance and to make him confident of humanity's power to take care of +itself. At the heart of the idea of progress is man's new scientific +control over life, and this new mastery, whereby the world seems ready +to serve the purposes of those who will learn the laws, is the dominant +influence in both the intellectual and practical activities of our age. +That religion, in consequence, should seem to many of minor import, if +not quite negligible, and that men, trusting themselves, their +knowledge of law, their use of law-abiding forces, their power to +produce change and to improve conditions, should find less need of +trusting any one except themselves, was inevitable, but for all that it +is fallacious. Already we have seen that a stumbling and uneven +progress, precarious and easily frustrated, taking place upon a +transient planet, goes but a little way to meet those elemental human +needs with which religious faith has dealt. In our present lecture we +propose a more specific consideration of this abiding necessity of +religion in a progressive world. + +How difficult it is to go back in imagination to the days before men +grasped the meaning of natural law! We take gravitation for granted +but, when Newton first proclaimed its law, the artillery of orthodox +pulpits was leveled against him in angry consternation. Said one +preacher, Newton "took from God that direct action on his works so +constantly ascribed to him in Scripture and transferred it to material +mechanism" and he "substituted gravitation for Providence." [1] That +preacher saw truly that the discovery of natural law was going to make +a profound difference to religion. For ages men had been accustomed to +look for the revelation of supernatural power in realms where they did +not know the laws. And as men were tempted to look for the presence of +God in realms where they did not know the laws, so in those realms they +trusted God to do for them what they did not know how to do for +themselves. + +Then men began discovering natural laws, and every time they laid their +hands on a new natural law they laid their hands on a new law-abiding +force and began doing for themselves things of which their fathers had +never dreamed. Stories of old-time miracles are overpassed in our +modern days. Did Aladdin once rub a magic lamp and build a palace? +To-day, knowledge of engineering laws enables us to achieve results +that would put Aladdin quite to shame. He never dreamed a Woolworth +Tower. Did the Israelites once cross the Red Sea dry-shod? One thing, +however, they never would have hoped to do: to cross under and over the +Hudson River day after day in multitudes, dry-shod. Did an axe-head +float once when Elisha threw a stick into the water? But something no +Elisha ever dreamed of seeing we see continually: iron ships navigating +the ocean as though it were their natural element. Did Joshua once +prolong the day for battle by the staying of the sun? Yet Joshua could +never have conceived an habitual lighting of the city's homes and +streets until by night they are more brilliant than by day. Did +Jericho's walls once fall at the united shout of a besieging people? +Those childlike besiegers, however, never dreamed of guns that could +blast Jerichos to pieces from seventy miles away. Huxley was right +when he said that our highly developed sciences have given us a command +over the course of non-human nature greater than that once attributed +to the magicians. + +The consequence has been revolutionary. Old cries of dependence upon +God grow unreal upon the lips of multitudes. Sometimes without knowing +it, often without wanting it, men are drawn by the drift of modern +thought away from all confidence in God and all consciousness of +religious need. Consider two pictures. The first is an epidemic in +New England in the seventeenth century. Everybody is thinking about +God; the churches are full and days are passed in fasting and agonizing +prayer. Only one way of getting rid of such an epidemic is known: men +must gain new favour in the sight of God. The second picture is an +epidemic in New England in the twentieth century. The churches are not +full--they are closed by official order and popular consent to prevent +the spread of germs. Comparatively few people are appealing to God; +almost everybody is appealing to the health commissioner. Not many +people are relying upon religion; everybody is relying upon science. +As one faces the pregnant significance of that contrast, one sees that +in important sections of our modern life science has come to occupy the +place that God used to have in the reliance of our forefathers. For +the dominant fact of our generation is power over the world which has +been put into our hands through the knowledge of laws, and the +consequence is that the scientific mastery of life seems man's +indispensable and sufficient resource. + +The issue is not far to seek. Such has been public confidence in the +efficacy and adequacy of this scientific control of life to meet all +human needs, that in multitudes of minds religion has been crowded to +the wall. Why should we trust God or concern ourselves with the deep +secrets of religious faith, if all our need is met by learning laws, +blowing upon our hands, and going to work? So even Christians come +secretly to look upon their Christianity as a frill, something gracious +but not indispensable, pleasant to live with but not impossible to live +without. Christian preachers lose their ability, looking first upon +their spiritual message and then upon their fellow men, to feel how +desperately the two need each other. Religion has become an "elective +in the university of life." But religion cannot persist as a frill; it +either is central in its importance or else it is not true at all. Its +great days come only when it is seen to be indispensable. We may use +what artificial respiration we will upon the Church, the days of the +Church's full power will not come until the conviction lays hold upon +her that the endeavour to found civilization upon a materialistic +science is leading us to perdition; that man needs desperately the +ministry of religion, its insight into life's meanings, its control +over life's use, its inward power for life's moral purposes; that man +never needed this more than now, when the scientific control of life is +arming him with so great ability to achieve his aims. + + +II + +As we try to discern wherein man's need of religion lies with reference +to the scientific control of life, let us start with the proposition +that, when we have all the facts which science can discover, we still +need a spiritual interpretation of the facts. All our experiences are +made up of two elements: first, the outward circumstance, and second, +the inward interpretation. On the one side is our environment, the +world we live in, the things that befall us, the kaleidoscopic changes +of fortune in the scenery of which our lives are set. On the other +side are the inward interpretations that we give to this outward +circumstance. Experience is compounded of these two elements. + +This clearly is true in ordinary living. Two men, let us say, go to +their physicians and are told that they have only a few months to live. +This is the fact which faces both of them. As we watch them, however, +we are at once aware that this fact is not the whole of their +experience. One of the men crumples up; he "collapses into a yielding +mass of plaintiveness and fear." Thinking of the event which he is +facing, he sees nothing there but horror. That is his interpretation +of it. The other man so looks upon the event which is coming that his +family, far from having to support his spirit, are supported by him. +He buoys them up; he carries them along; his faith and courage are +contagious; and when he thinks of his death it appears in his eyes a +great adventure concerning which the old hymn told the truth: + + "It were a well-spent journey + Though seven deaths lay between." + +That is his interpretation. As we regard the finished experiences of +these two men, we see clearly that, while the same fact lay at the +basis of both, it was the inward interpretation that determined the +quality of the experience. + +This power to transform facts so that they will be no longer merely +facts, but facts plus an interpretation, is one of the most distinctive +and significant elements in human life. The animals do not possess it. +An event befalls a dog and, when the dog is through with it, the event +is what it was before. The dog has done nothing to it. But the same +event befalls a man and at once something begins to happen to it. It +is clothed in the man's thought about it; it is dressed in his +appreciation and understanding; it is transformed by his +interpretations. The event comes out of that man's life something +altogether different from what it was when it went in. The man can do +almost anything with that event. For our experiences do not fall into +our lives in single lumps, like meteors from a distant sky of fate; our +experiences always are made up of the fortunes that befall us and the +interpretations that we give to them. + +So far as the relative importance of these two factors is concerned, we +may see the truth in the application of our thought to happiness. If +there is any area in human experience where the outward circumstance +might be supposed to control the results, it is the realm of happiness; +yet probably nine-tenths of the problem of happiness lies, not in the +outward event, but in the inward interpretation. If we could describe +those conditions in which the happiest people whom we have known have +lived, can any one imagine the diversity of environment that would be +represented in our accounts? Let them move in procession before the +eyes of our imagination, those happy folk whose friendship has been the +benediction of our lives! What a motley company they are! For some +are blind, and some are crippled, and some are invalid; not many are +rich and fortunate; many are poor--a company of handicapped but radiant +spirits whose victorious lives, like the burning bush which Moses saw, +have made in a desert a spot of holy ground. If, now, we ask why it is +that happiness can be so amazingly independent of outward circumstance, +this is the answer: every experience has two factors, the fortune that +befalls and the inward interpretation of it; and, while we often cannot +control the fortune, we always can help with the interpretation. That +is in our power. That is the throne of our sovereignty over our lives. + + +III + +The deep need of a worthy interpretation of life is just as urgent in a +world where the idea of progress reigns as in any other, and to supply +that need is one of the major functions of religion. For religion is +something more than all the creeds that have endeavoured to express its +thought. Religion is something more than all the organizations that +have tried to incarnate its purposes. Religion is the human spirit, by +the grace of God, seeking and finding an interpretation of experience +that puts sense and worth, dignity, elevation, joy, and hope into life. + +A body of students recently requested an address upon the subject: +"What is the use of religion anyway?" The group of ideas behind the +question is not hard to guess: that science gives us all the facts, +that facts and their laws are all we need, that the scientific control +of life guarantees progress, and that religion therefore is +superfluous. But in such a statement one towering interrogation has +been neglected: what about the interpretation of the very facts which +science does present? Could not one address himself to the question of +those students in some such way as this? You say that science has +disclosed to us the leisureliness of the evolving universe. Come back, +then, on the long road to the rear on which Bishop Usher's old date of +creation is a way station an infinitesimal distance behind us; come +back until together we stand at the universe's postern gate and look +out into the mystery whence all things came, where no scientific +investigation can ever go, where no one knows the facts. What do you +make of it? Two voices rise in answer. One calls the world "a +mechanical process, in which we may discover no aim or purpose +whatever." [2] And another voice says: + + "The heavens declare the glory of God; + And the firmament showeth his handiwork." [3] + +That is not a difference in facts, upon which we can get our hands. +That is a difference in the interpretation of the facts. + +Or come forward together to look into that mystery ahead, toward which +this universe and we within it are so prodigiously plunging on. Do we +not often feel, upon this earth whirling through space, like men and +women who by some weird chance have found themselves upon a ship, +ignorant of their point of departure and of their destination? For all +the busyness with which we engage in many tasks, we cannot keep +ourselves from slipping back at times to the ship's stern to look out +along its wake and wonder whence we came, or from going at times also +to its prow to wonder whither we are headed. What do you make of it? +Toward what sort of haven is this good ship earth sailing--a port +fortunate or ill? Or may it be there is no haven, only endless sailing +on an endless sea by a ship that never will arrive? So questioning, we +listen to conflicting voices. One says there is no future except +ultimate annihilation, and another voice sings: + + "All we have willed or hoped or dreamed + of good, shall exist." + +That is not a difference in the facts, that eyes can see and hands +handle; that is a difference in the interpretation of the facts. + +Or from such large considerations come down into some familiar +experience of daily life. Here is a man having a hard battle between +right and wrong. There is no more impressive sight on earth to one who +looks at it with understanding eyes. What do you make of this +mysterious sense of duty which lays its magisterial hand upon us and +will not be denied? At once various voices rise. Haeckel says the +sense of duty is a "long series of phyletic modifications of the +phronema of the cortex." [4] That is his interpretation. And +Wordsworth: + + "Stern Daughter of the Voice of God! + O Duty!" + +This sharp contrast is not a difference between facts, which can be +pinned down as the Lilliputians pinned down Gulliver; it is a +difference in the interpretation of the facts. + +Or let us go together up some high hill from which we can look out upon +the strange history of humankind. We see its agonies and wars, its +rising empires followed by their ruinous collapse, and yet a mysterious +advance, too, as though mankind, swinging up a spiral, met old +questions upon a higher level, so that looking back to the Stone Age, +for all the misery of this present time, we would be rather here than +there. What can we make of it? Hauptmann's Michael Kramer says "All +this life is the shuddering of a fever." And Paul says, "the eternal +purpose which he purposed in Christ." That is not a difference in the +facts. It is a difference in the interpretation of the facts. + +Yet once more, come into the presence of death. The facts that human +eyes can see are plain enough, but what can we make of it--this +standing on the shore, waving farewell to a friendly ship that loses +itself over the rim of the world? Says Thomson of the world's +treatment of man, + + "It grinds him some slow years of bitter breath, + Then grinds him back into eternal death." + +And Paul says: "This corruptible must put on incorruption, and this +mortal must put on immortality. But when this corruptible shall have +put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, +then shall come to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed +up in victory." That is not a contrast between facts; that is a +contrast between interpretations of facts. + +Is it not plain why religion has such an unbreakable hold upon the +human mind? The funeral of Christianity has been predicted many times +but each time the deceased has proved too lively for the obsequies. In +the middle of the eighteenth century they said that Christianity had +one foot in the grave, but then came the amazing revival of religious +life under the Wesleys. In the middle of the last century one wiseacre +said, "In fifty years your Christianity will have died out"; yet, for +all our failures, probably Christianity in all its history has never +made more progress than in the last half century. If you ask why, one +reason is clear: man cannot live in a universe of uninterpreted facts. +The scientific approach to life is not enough. It does not cover all +the ground. Men want to know what life spiritually means and they want +to know that it "means intensely, and means good." Facts alone are +like pieces of irritating grit that get into the oyster shell; the +pearl of life is created by the interpretations which the facts educe. + +In this difference between the facts of experience and their +interpretations lies the secret of the contrast between our two words +_existence_ and _life_. Even before we define the difference, we feel +it. To exist is one thing; to live is another. Existence is comprised +of the bare facts of life alone--the universe in which we live, our +heritage and birth, our desires and their satisfactions, growth, age +and death. All the facts that science can display before us comprise +existence. But life is something more. Life is existence clothed in +spiritual meanings; existence seen with a worthy purpose at the heart +of it and hope ahead, existence informed by the spirit's insights and +understandings, transfigured and glorified by the spirit's faiths and +hopes. It follows, therefore, that while existence is given us to +start with, life is a spiritual achievement. A man must take the facts +of his existence whether he wants to or not, but he makes his life by +the activity of his soul. The facts of existence are like so much +loose type, which can be set up to many meanings. One man leaves those +facts in chaotic disarrangement or sets them up into cynical +affirmations, and he exists. But another man takes the same facts and +by spiritual insight makes them mean gloriously, and he lives indeed. +To suppose that mankind ever can be satisfied with existence only and +can be called off from the endeavour to achieve this more abundant +life, is utterly to misconceive the basic facts of human nature. And +this profound need for a spiritual interpretation of life is not +satisfied by an idea of temporal progress, stimulated by a few +circumstances which predispose our minds to immediate expectancy. + + +IV + +When, therefore, any one asserts the adequacy of the scientific +approach to life, one answer stands ready to our hand: science deals +primarily with facts and their laws, not with their spiritual +interpretations. To put the same truth in another way, science deals +with one specially abstracted aspect of the facts; it drains them of +their qualitative elements and, reducing them to their quantitative +elements, it proceeds to weigh and measure them and state their laws. +It moves in the realm of actualities and not in the realm of values. +One science, for example, takes a gorgeous sunset and reduces it to the +constituent ether waves that cause the colour. What it says about the +sunset is true, but it is not the whole truth. Ask anybody who has +ever seen the sun riding like a golden galleon down the western sea! +Another science takes a boy and reduces him to his Bertillon +measurements and at the top of the statistics writes his name, "John +Smith." That is the truth about John Smith, but it is not the whole +truth. Ask his mother and see! Another science takes our varied and +vibrant mental life and reduces it to its physical basis and states its +laws. That is the truth about our mental life, but it is not the whole +truth. What is more, it is not that part of the truth by which men +really live. For men live by love and joy and hope and faith and +spiritual insight. When these things vanish life is + + "a tale + Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, + Signifying nothing." + + +When a man takes that quantitative aspect of reality, which is the +special province of natural science, as though it were the whole of +reality, he finds himself in a world where the physical forces are in +control. We, ourselves, according to this aspect of life, are the +product of physical forces--marionettes, dancing awhile because +physical forces are pulling on the strings. In a word, when a man +takes that quantitative aspect of reality, which natural science +presents, as though it were the whole of reality, he becomes a +materialistic fatalist, and on that basis we cannot permanently build +either personal character or a stable civilization. It is not +difficult, then, to see one vital significance of Jesus Christ: he has +given us the most glorious interpretation of life's meaning that the +sons of men have ever had. The fatherhood of God, the friendship of +the Spirit, the sovereignty of righteousness, the law of love, the +glory of service, the coming of the Kingdom, the eternal hope--there +never was an interpretation of life to compare with that. If life +often looks as though his interpretation were too good to be true, we +need not be surprised. Few things in the universe _are_ as +superficially they _look_. The earth looks flat and, as long as we +gaze on it, it never will look any other way, but it is spherical for +all that. The earth looks stationary and if we live to be as old as +Methuselah we never will see it move, but it is moving--seventy-five +times faster than a cannon ball! The sun looks as though it rose in +the east and set in the west, and we never can make it look any other +way, but it does not rise nor set at all. So far as this earth is +concerned, the sun is standing still enough. We look as though we +walked with our heads up and our feet down, and we never can make +ourselves look otherwise, but someone finding a safe stance outside +this whirling sphere would see us half the time walking with our heads +down and our feet up. Few things are ever the way they look, and the +end of all scientific research, as of all spiritual insight, is to get +behind the way things look to the way things are. Walter Pater has a +rememberable phrase, "the hiddenness of perfect things." One meaning, +therefore, which Christ has for Christians lies in the realm of +spiritual interpretation. He has done for us there what Copernicus and +Galileo did in astronomy: he has moved us out from our flat earth into +his meaningful universe, full of moral worth and hope. He has become +to us in this, our inner need, what the luminous phrase of the Book of +Job describes, "An interpreter, one among a thousand." And in spite of +all our immediate expectancy, born out of our scientific control of +life, mankind never needed that service more than now. + + +V + +There is a second proposition to which we should attend as we endeavour +to define the need for religion with reference to the scientific +mastery of life. Consider why so often men are tempted to suppose that +science is adequate for human purposes. Is it not because science +supplies men with power? Steam, electricity, petroleum, radium--with +what progressive mastery over the latent resources of the universe does +science move from one area of energy to another, until in the +imagination of recent generations she has seemed to stand saying: all +power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. With such power to +bestow, is she not our rightful mistress? But who that has walked with +discerning eyes through these last few years can any longer be beguiled +by that fallacious vision? Look at what we are doing with this new +power that science has given us! The business to which steel and steam +and electricity, explosives and poisons have recently been put does not +indicate that humanity's problem is solved when new power is put into +our hands. Even the power of wide-spread communication can so be used +that a war which began in Serajevo will end with lads from Kamchatka +and Bombay blasted to pieces by the same shell on a French battlefield. +Even the power of modern finance can be so used that nations will +exhaust the credit of generations yet unborn in waging war. How some +folk keep their cheap and easy optimism about humanity's use of its new +energies is a mystery. We have come pretty near to ruining ourselves +with them already. If we do not achieve more spiritual control over +them than we have yet exhibited we will ruin ourselves with them +altogether. Once more in history a whole civilization will commit +suicide like Saul falling on his own sword. + +The scientific control of life, by itself, creates more problems than +it solves. The problem of international disarmament, for example, has +been forced on us by the fear of that perdition to the suburbs of which +our race has manifestly come through the misuse of scientific +knowledge. Humanity is disturbed about itself because it has +discovered that it is in possession of power enough to wreck the world. +Never before did mankind have so much energy to handle. Multitudes of +people, dubious as to whether disarmament is practical, are driven like +shuttles back and forth between that doubt, upon the one side, and the +certainty, upon the other, that armament is even less practical. The +statisticians have been at work upon this last war and their figures, +like the measurements of the astronomers, grow to a size so colossal +that the tentacles of our imaginations slip off them when we try to +grasp their size. The direct costs of this last war, which left us +with more and harder difficulties than we had at the beginning, were +about $186,000,000,000. Is that practical? At the beginning of 1922 +almost all the nations in Europe, although by taxation they were +breaking their people's financial backs, were spending far more than +their income, and in the United States, far and away the richest nation +on the planet, we faced an enormous deficit. Is that practical? In +this situation, with millions of people unemployed, with starvation +rampant, with social revolution stirring in every country--not because +people are bad, not because they impatiently love violence, but because +they cannot stand forever the social strain and economic consequence of +war--what were we doing? We were launching battleships which cost +$42,000,000 to build, which cost $2,000,000 a year to maintain and +which, in a few years, would be towed out to sea to be used as an +experimental target to try out some new armour-piercing shell. I +wonder if our children's children will look back on that spectacle and +call it practical. In 1912 the naval expenses of this country were +about $136,000,000. In 1921 our naval expenses were about +$641,000,000--approximately five times greater in nine years. So over +all the earth war preparations were pyramiding with an ever +accelerating momentum. And because any man can see that we must stop +sometime, we have been trying desperately to stop now; to turn our +backs upon this mad endeavour to build civilization upon a +materialistic basis, bulwarked by physical force; to turn our faces +toward spiritual forces, fair play, reasonable conference, good-will, +service and co-operation. + +Yet how hard it is to make the change effective! Long ages ago in the +primeval jungle, the dogs' ancestors used to turn around three times in +the thicket before they lay down, that they might make a comfortable +spot to nestle in, and now your highbred Pekingese will turn around +three times upon his silken cushion although there is no earthly reason +why he should. So difficult is it to breed beasts and men out of their +inveterate habits. So hard is it going to be to make men give up the +idea that force is a secure foundation for international relationships. +Yet somehow that change must be made. They are having trouble with the +housing problem in Tokyo and the reason is simple. Tokyo is built on +earthquake ground and it is insecure. You cannot put great houses on +unstable foundations. One story, two stories, three stories--that is +about as high as they dare go. But in New York City one sees the +skyscrapers reaching up their sixty stories into the air. The +explanation is not difficult: Manhattan Island is solid rock. If you +are going to build great structures you must have great foundations. +And civilization is a vast and complicated structure. We cannot build +it on physical force. That is too shaky. We must build it upon +spiritual foundations. + +There are those who suppose that this can be done by progress through +the scientific control of life, and who treat religion as a negligible +element. Such folk forget that while a cat will lap her milk +contentedly from a saucer made of Wedgwood or china, porcelain or +earthenware, and will feel no curiosity about the nature of the +receptacle from which she drinks, human beings are not animals who thus +can take their food and ask no questions about the universe in which it +is served to them. We want to know about life's origin and meaning and +destiny. We cannot keep our questions at home. We cannot stop +thinking. If this universe is fundamentally physical, if the only +spark of spiritual life which it ever knew is the fitful flame of our +own unsteady souls, if it came from dust and to dust will return, +leaving behind no recollection of the human labour, sacrifice and +aspiration which for a little time it unconsciously enshrined, that +outlook makes an incalculable difference to our present lives. For +then our very minds themselves, which have developed here by accident +upon this wandering island in the skies, represent the only kind of +mind there is, and what we do not know never was thought about or cared +for or purposed by anyone, and we, alone in knowing, are ourselves +unknown. + +The consequence of this sort of thinking, which is the essence of +irreligion, is to be seen on every side of us in folk who, having thus +lost all confidence in God and the reality of the spiritual world, +still try to labour for the good of men. They have kept one part of +Christianity, its ideals of character and service; they have lost the +other part, which assures them about God. In a word, they are trying +to build an idealistic and serviceable life upon a godless basis. Now, +the difficulty with this attitude toward life lies here: it demands a +quality of spirit for which it cannot supply the motive. It demands +social hope, confidence, enthusiasm and sacrifice, and all the while it +cuts their nerves. It tells men that the universe is fundamentally a +moral desert, that it never was intended even to have an oasis of +civilization in it, that if we make one grow it will be by dint of our +own effort against the deadset of the universe's apathy, that if, by +our toil, an oasis is achieved, it will have precarious tenure in such +alien and inhospitable soil, and that in the end it will disappear +before the onslaught of the cosmic forces; yet in the same breath it +tells men to work for that oasis with hope, confidence, joy and +enthusiastic sacrifice. This is a world view which asks of men a +valorous and expensive service for which it cannot supply the driving +power. Yet many of our universities are presenting just that outlook +upon life to our young men and women. The youth are being urged to +fight courageously and sacrificially for righteousness upon the earth, +and at the same time they are presented with a view of the background +and destiny of human life similar to that which Schopenhauer expressed: +"Truly optimism cuts so sorry a figure in this theatre of sin, +suffering, and death that we should have to regard it as a piece of +sarcasm, if Hume had not explained its origin--insincere flattery of +God in the arrogant expectation of gain." [5] + +What this generation, which so disparages religion and like the ancient +Sadducee calls its good right arm its god, will ultimately discover is +that the fight for righteousness in character and in society is a long +and arduous campaign. The Bible says that a thousand years in God's +sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the +night. It certainly seems that way. It is a long and roundabout +journey to the Promised Land. Generations die and fall by the way. +The road is white with the bones of pilgrims who attained not the +promises but saw them and greeted them from afar. Some Giordano Bruno, +who gives himself to the achievement of mankind's high aims, is burned +at the stake; centuries pass and on the very spot where he was martyred +a monument is built with this inscription on it: "Raised to Giordano +Bruno by the generation which he foresaw." This is exhilarating when +the story is finished, but in the meantime it is hard work being +Giordano Bruno and sacrificially labouring for a cause which you care +enough for and believe enough in and are sure enough about so that you +will die for it. When such faith and hope and sacrifice are demanded +one cannot get them by exhortation, by waving a wand of words to +conjure his enthusiasm up. Nothing will do but a world-view adequate +to supply motives for the service it demands. Nothing will do but +religion. + +One wonders why the preachers do not feel this more and so recover +their consciousness of an indispensable mission. One wonders that the +churches can be so timid and dull and negative, that our sermons can be +so pallid and inconsequential. One wonders why in the pulpit we have +so many flutes and so few trumpets. For here is a world with the +accumulating energies of the new science in its hands, living in the +purlieus of hell because it cannot gain spiritual mastery over the very +power in which it glories. Here is a world which must build its +civilization on spiritual bases or else collapse into abysmal ruin and +which cannot achieve the task though all the motives of +self-preservation cry out to have it done, because men lack the very +elements of faith and character which it is the business of religion to +supply. + + +VI + +We have said that when science has given us all its facts we still need +a spiritual interpretation of the facts; that when science has put all +its energies into our hands we still need spiritual mastery over their +use. Let us say in conclusion that, when science has given us all its +power, we still need another kind of power which it is not the business +of science to supply. Long ago somebody who knew the inner meaning of +religion wrote: + + "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. + He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; + He leadeth me beside still waters. + He restoreth my soul." + +That last phrase sums up one of the deepest needs of human life. We +are in constant want of spiritual repair; we are lost without a fresh +influx of inward power; we desperately need to have our souls restored. +A young British soldier once came in from the trenches where his +aggressive powers had been in full employ and, having heard one of the +finest concert companies that London could send out, he wrote in a +letter to his family: "I have just come down from the trenches, and +have been listening to one of the best concerts I ever attended. It +makes one feel that perhaps there is a good God after all." The two +aspects of life which that soldier discovered in himself all men +possess. One takes us to life's trenches; the other throws us back on +some revelation of grace and beauty that we may be sure of God. With +one we seek aggressively to master life; with the other we seek +receptively to be inspired. Every normal man needs these two kinds of +influence: one to send him informed and alert to his tasks, the other +to float his soul off its sandbars on the rising tide of spiritual +reassurance and power. Every normal man needs two attitudes: one when +he goes into action determined to do his work and to do it well, and +the other when he subdues his spirit to receptivity and with the +Psalmist cries, + + "My soul, wait thou in silence for God only; + For my expectation is from him." + +When science has given us all the power it can, we still need another +kind of power which science cannot give. + +Whatever else the scientific control of life may have accomplished, it +has not saved mankind from the old and devastating problems of trouble +and sin. So far as individual experience of these is concerned, there +is little discernable difference between two thousand years before +Christ and two thousand years afterward. Still disasters fall upon our +lives, sometimes as swift in their assault as wild beasts leaping from +an unsuspected ambush. Still troubles come, long drawn out and +wearying, like the monotonous dripping of water with which old +torturers used to drive their victims mad. Still sins bring shame to +the conscience and tragic consequence to the life, and tiresome work, +losing the buoyancy of its first inspiration, drags itself out into +purposeless effort and bores us with its futility. Folk now, as much +as ever in all history, need to have their souls restored. The +scientific control of life, however, is not adequate for that. +Electricity and subways and motor cars do not restore the soul; and to +know that there are millions upon millions of solar systems, like our +own, scattered through space does not restore the soul; and to delve in +the sea or to fly in the air or to fling our words through the ether +does not restore the soul. The need of religion is perennial and would +be though our scientific control over life were extended infinitely +beyond our present hope, for the innermost ministry of religion to +human life is the restoration of the soul. + +In this fact lies the failure of that type of naturalism which +endeavours to keep religion as a subjective experience and denies the +reality of an objective God. If we are not already familiar with this +attempted substitution we soon shall be, for our young people are being +taught it in many a classroom now. One of the basic principles of this +new teaching is belief in the spiritual life but, when one inquires +where the spiritual life is, he discovers that it is altogether within +ourselves--there is no original, creative and abiding Spiritual Life +from whom we come, by whom we are sustained, in whom we live. Rather, +as flowers reveal in their fragrance a beauty which is not in the earth +where they grow nor in the roots on which they depend, so our spiritual +life is the mysterious refinement of the material out of which we are +constructed, and it has nothing to correspond with it in the source +from which we sprang. Nevertheless, the new naturalism exalts this +spiritual life within us, calls it our crown and glory, bids us +cultivate and diffuse it, says about it nearly everything a Christian +says except that it is a revelation of eternal reality. Moreover, it +is difficult to differentiate from this outspoken group of professed +naturalists another group of humanists who do retain the idea of God, +but merely as the sum total of man's idealistic life. "God," says one +exponent, "is the farthest outreach of our human ideals." That is to +say, our spiritual lives created God, not God our spiritual lives. +God, as one enthusiastic devotee of this new cult has put it, is a sort +of Uncle Sam, the pooling of the idealistic imaginations of multitudes. +Of course he does not exist, yet in a sense he is real; he is the +projection of our loyalties, affections, hopes. + +It should go without saying that this idea of God has about as much +intellectual validity as belief in Santa Claus and is even more +sentimental, in that it is a deliberate attempt to disguise in pleasant +and familiar terms a fundamentally materialistic interpretation of +reality. The vital failure of this spiritualized naturalism, however, +lies in the inability of its Uncle Sam to meet the deepest needs on +account of which men at their best have been religious. This deified +projection of our ideals we made up ourselves and so we cannot really +pray to him; he does not objectively exist and so has no unifying +meaning which puts purposefulness into creation and hope ahead of it; +he does not care for any one or anything and so we may not trust him; +and neither in sin can he forgive, cleanse, restore, empower, nor in +sorrow comfort and sustain. A god who functions so poorly is not much +of a god. Once more, therefore, one wonders why in a generation when, +not less, but more, because of all our scientific mastery the souls of +men are starved and tired, the Church is not captured by a new sense of +mission. It is precisely in a day when the active and pugnacious +energies of men are most involved in the conquest of the world that the +spirit becomes most worn for lack of sustenance. To be assured of the +nearness and reality and availability of the spiritual world is a +matter of life and death to multitudes of folk to-day. There could +hardly be a more alluring time in which to make the Holy Spirit real to +the world. For the supreme moral asset in any man's life is not his +aggressiveness nor his pugnacity, but his capacity to be inspired--to +be inspired by great books, great music, by love and friendship; to be +inspired by great faiths, great hopes, great ideals; to be inspired +supremely by the Spirit of God. For so we are lifted until the things +we tried to see and could not we now can see because of the altitude at +which we stand, and the things we tried to do and could not we now can +do because of the fellowship in which we live. To one asserting the +adequacy of the scientific control of life, therefore, the Christian's +third answer is clear: man's deepest need is spiritual power, and +spiritual power comes out of the soul's deep fellowships with the +living God. + +Such, then, is the abiding need of religion in a scientific age. To be +scientifically minded is one of the supreme achievements of mankind. +To love truth, as science loves it, to seek truth tirelessly, as +science seeks it, to reveal the latent resources of the universe in +hope that men will use them for good and not for evil, as science does, +is one of the chief glories of our race. When, however, we have taken +everything that science gives, it is not enough for life. When we have +facts, we still need a spiritual interpretation of facts; when we have +all the scientific forces that we can get our hands upon, we still need +spiritual mastery over their use; and, beyond all the power that +science gives, we need that inward power which comes from spiritual +fellowships alone. Religion is indispensable. To build human life +upon another basis is to erect civilization upon sand, where the rain +descends and the floods come and the winds blow and beat upon the house +and it falls and great is the fall thereof. + + + +[1] Andrew D. White: A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology +in Christendom, Vol. II, p. 16. + +[2] Quoted in the Hibbert Journal, Vol. III, January 1905, p. 296. + +[3] Psalm 19:1. + +[4] Ernst Haeckel: The Wonders of Life, p. 413. + +[5] Arthur Schopenhauer: Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, Zweiter +Band, Kapital 46, Von der Nichtigkeit und dem Leiden des Lebens, p. 669. + + + + +LECTURE III + +THE GOSPEL AND SOCIAL PROGRESS + +I + +Our last lecture started with the proposition that the dominant +influence in the intellectual and practical activity of the modern age +is man's scientific mastery over life. This present lecture considers +one of the consequences of this primary fact: namely, the humanitarian +desire to take advantage of this scientific control of life so to +change social conditions that mankind may be relieved from crushing +handicaps which now oppress it. For the growth of scientific knowledge +and control has been coincident with a growth of humanitarian +sentiment. This movement for human relief and social reform, in the +midst of which we live, is one of the chief influences of our time. It +has claimed the allegiance of many of the noblest folk among us. Its +idealism, its call to sacrifice, the concreteness of the tasks which it +undertakes and of the gains which it achieves, have attracted alike the +fine spirits and the practical abilities of our generation. What +attitude shall the Christian Church take toward this challenging +endeavour to save society? How shall she regard this passionate belief +in the possibility of social betterment and this enthusiastic +determination to achieve it? The question is one of crucial importance +and the Church is far from united on its answer. Some Christians claim +the whole movement as the child of the Church, born of her spirit and +expressing her central purpose; others disclaim the whole movement as +evil and teach that the world must grow increasingly worse until some +divine cataclysm shall bring its hopeless corruption to an end; others +treat the movement as useful but of minor import, while they try to +save men by belief in dogmatic creeds or by carefully engineered +emotional experiences. Meanwhile, no words can exaggerate the +fidelity, the vigour, the hopefulness, and the elevated spirit with +which many of our best young men and women throw themselves into this +campaign for better conditions of living. Surely, the intelligent +portion of the Church would better think as clearly as possible about a +matter of such crucial import. + +At first sight, the devotee of social Christianity is inclined +impatiently to brush aside as mere ignorant bigotry on the Church's +part all cautious suspicion of the social movement. But there is one +real difficulty which the thoughtful Christian must perceive when he +compares the characteristic approach to the human problem made by the +social campaign, on the one side, and by religion, on the other. Much +of the modern social movement seems to proceed upon the supposition +that we can save mankind by the manipulation of outward circumstance. +There are societies to change everything that can be changed and, +because the most obvious and easy subjects of transformation are the +external arrangements of human life, men set themselves first and +chiefly to change those. We are always trying to improve the play by +shifting the scenery. But no person of insight ever believed that the +manipulation of circumstance alone can solve man's problems. Said +Emerson, "No change of circumstances can repair a defect of character." +Said Herbert Spencer, "No philosopher's stone of a constitution can +produce golden conduct from leaden instincts." Said James Anthony +Froude, "Human improvement is from within outwards." Said Carlyle, +"Fool! the Ideal is in thyself, the impediment too is in thyself: thy +Condition is but the stuff thou art to shape that same Ideal out of." +Said Mrs. Browning: + + "It takes a soul, + To move a body: it takes a high-souled man + To move the masses even to a cleaner stye: + ..... Ah, your Fouriers failed, + Because not poets enough to understand + That life develops from within." + + +Now, religion's characteristic approach to the human problem is +represented by this conviction that "life develops from within." So +far from expecting to save mankind by the manipulation of outward +circumstance, it habitually has treated outward circumstance as of +inferior moment in comparison with the inner attitudes and resources of +the spirit. Economic affluence, for example, has not seemed to +Christianity in any of its historic forms indispensable to man's +well-being; rather, economic affluence has been regarded as a danger to +be escaped or else to be resolutely handled as one would handle +fire--useful if well managed but desperately perilous if uncontrolled. +Nor can it be said that Christianity has consistently maintained this +attitude without having in actual experience much ground for holding +it. The possession of economic comfort has never yet guaranteed a +decent life, much less a spiritually satisfactory one. The morals of +Fifth Avenue are not such that it can look down on Third Avenue, nor is +it possible anywhere to discern gradation of character on the basis of +relative economic standing. It is undoubtedly true that folks and +families often have their moral stamina weakened and their +personalities debauched by sinking into discouraging poverty, but it is +an open question whether more folks and families have not lost their +souls by rising into wealth. Still, after all these centuries, the +"rich fool," with his overflowing barns and his soul that sought to +feed itself on corn, is a familiar figure; still it is as easy for a +camel to go through a needle's eye as for a rich man to enter the +Kingdom of Heaven. When, therefore, the Christian, approaching the +human problem, not from without in, but from within out, runs upon this +modern social movement endeavouring to save mankind by the manipulation +of outward circumstance, his cautious and qualified consent may be +neither so ignorant nor so unreasonable as it at first appears. + +As an example of manipulated circumstance in which we are asked to +trust, consider the new international arrangements upon which the world +leans so heavily for its hopes of peace. Surely, he would be a poor +Christian who did not rejoice in every reasonable expectation which new +forms of co-operative organization can fulfil. But he would be a +thoughtless Christian, too, if he did not see that all good forms of +international organization are trellises to give the vines of human +relationship a fairer chance to grow; but if the vines themselves +maintain their old acid quality, bringing out of their own inward +nature from roots of bitterness grapes that set the people's teeth on +edge, then no external trellises will solve the problem. It is this +Christian approach to life, from within out, which causes the common +misunderstanding between the social movement and the Church. The first +thinks mainly of the importance of the trellis; the second thinks +chiefly about the quality of the vine. + +The more deep and transforming a man's own religious experience has +been, the more he will insist upon the importance of this inward +approach. Here is a man who has had a profound evangelical experience. +He has gone down into the valley of the shadow with a deep sense of +spiritual need; he has found in Christ a Saviour who has lifted him up +into spiritual freedom and victory; he has gone out to live with a +sense of unpayable indebtedness to him. He has had, in a word, a +typical religious experience at its best with three elements at the +heart of it: a great need, a great salvation, a great gratitude. When +such a man considers the modern social movement, however beautiful its +spirit or admirable its concrete gains, it seems to him superficial if +it presents itself as a panacea. It does not go deep enough to reach +the soul's real problems. The continual misunderstanding between the +Church and the social movement has, then, this explanation: the +characteristic approach of the Christian Gospel to the human problem is +from within out; the characteristic approach of much of the modern +social movement is from without in. + + +II + +If, therefore, the Christian Gospel is going to be true to itself, it +must carefully preserve amid the pressure of our modern social +enthusiasms certain fundamental emphases which are characteristic of +its genius. It must stress the possibility and the necessity of the +inward transformation of the lives of men. We know now that a thorny +cactus does not have to stay a thorny cactus; Burbank can change it. +We know that a crab-apple tree does not have to stay a crab-apple tree; +it can be grafted and become an astrakhan. We know that a malarial +swamp does not have to stay a malarial swamp; it can be drained and +become a health resort. We know that a desert does not have to stay a +desert; it can be irrigated and become a garden. But while all these +possibilities of transformation are opening up in the world outside of +us, the most important in the series concerns the world within us. The +primary question is whether human nature is thus transformable, so that +men can be turned about, hating what formerly they loved and loving +what once they hated. Said Tolstoy, whose early life had been +confessedly vile: "Five years ago faith came to me; I believed in the +doctrine of Jesus, and my whole life underwent a sudden transformation. +What I had once wished for I wished for no longer, and I began to +desire what I had never desired before. What had once appeared to me +right now became wrong, and the wrong of the past I beheld as right." +[1] + +So indispensable to the welfare of the world is this experience, that +we Christians need to break loose from our too narrow conceptions of it +and to set it in a large horizon. We have been too often tempted to +make of conversion a routine emotional experience. Even Jonathan +Edwards was worried about himself in this regard. He wrote once in his +diary: "The chief thing that now makes me in any measure question my +good estate is my not having experienced conversion in those particular +steps wherein the people of New England, and anciently the dissenters +of old England, used to experience it." Poor Jonathan! How many have +been so distraught! But the supreme folly of any man's spiritual life +is to try thus to run himself into the mold of any other man's +experience. There is no regular routine in spiritual transformation. +Some men come in on a high tide of feeling, like Billy Bray, the +drunken miner, who, released from his debasing slavery and reborn into +a vigorous life, cried, "If they were to put me into a barrel I would +shout glory out through the bunghole! Praise the Lord!" Some men come +in like Bushnell, the New England scholar and preacher, who, when he +was an unbelieving tutor at Yale, fell on his knees in the quiet of his +study and said, "O God, I believe there is an eternal difference +between right and wrong and I hereby give myself up to do the right and +to refrain from the wrong." Some men break up into the new life +suddenly like the Oxford graduate who, having lived a dissolute life +until six years after his graduation from the university in 1880, +picked up in his room one day Drummond's "Natural Law in the Spiritual +World," and, lo! the light broke suddenly--"I rejoiced there and then +in a conversion so astounding that the whole village heard of it in +less than twenty-four hours." Some come slowly, like old John +Livingstone, who said, "I do not remember any particular time of +conversion, or that I was much cast down or lift up." Spiritual +transformation is infinitely various because it is so infinitely vital; +but behind all the special forms of experience stands the colossal fact +that men can be transformed by the Spirit of God. + +That this experience of inward enlightenment and transformation should +ever be neglected or minimized or forgotten or crowded out is the more +strange because one keeps running on it outside religion as well as +within. John Keats, when eighteen years old, was handed one day a copy +of Spenser's poems. He never had known before what his life was meant +to be. He found out that day. Like a voice from heaven his call came +in the stately measures of Spenser's glorious verse. He knew that he +was meant to be a poet. Upon this master fact that men can be inwardly +transformed Christ laid his hand and put it at the very center of his +gospel. All through the New Testament there is a throb of joy which, +traced back, brings one to the assurance that no man need stay the way +he is. Among the gladdest, solemnest words in the records of our race +are such passages in the New Testament as this: Fornicators, +adulterers, thieves, covetous, drunkards, revelers, extortioners, such +were some of you; but ye were washed, but ye were sanctified, but ye +were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit +of our God. One cannot find in the New Testament anything stiff and +stilted about this experience. Paul's change came suddenly; Peter's +came slowly. They did not even have, as we have come to have, a +settled word to describe the experience. Ask James what it is and, +practical-minded man that he is, he calls it _conversion_--being turned +around. Ask Peter what it is and, as he looks back upon his old +benighted condition, he cries that it is like _coming out of the +darkness into a marvelous light_. Ask Paul what it is and, with his +love of superlative figures, he cries that it is like _being dead and +being raised again with a great resurrection_. Ask John what it is +and, with his mystical spirit, he says that it is _being born again_. +See the variety that comes from vitality--no stiff methods, no stiff +routine of experience, but throbbing through the whole book the good +news of an illuminating, liberating, transforming experience that can +make men new! + +It is the more strange that this central element in the Christian +Gospel should be neglected in the interests of social reformation +because it is so indispensable to social reformation. Wherever a new +social hope allures the efforts of forward-looking men, there is one +argument against the hope which always rises. You cannot do that--men +say--human nature is against it; human nature has always acted another +way; you cannot change human nature; your hope is folly. As one +listens to such skepticism he sees that men mean by human nature a +static, unalterable thing, huge, inert, changeless, a dull mass that +resists all transformation. The very man who says that may be an +engineer. He may be speaking in the next breath with high enthusiasm +about a desert in Arizona where they are bringing down the water from +the hills and where in a few years there will be no desert, but orange +groves stretching as far as the eye can reach, and eucalyptus trees +making long avenues of shade, and roses running wild, as plenteous as +goldenrod in a New England field. But while about physical nature he +is as hopeful of possible change as a prophet, for human nature he +thinks nothing can be done. + +From the Christian point of view this idea of human nature is utterly +false. So far from being stiff and set, human nature is the most +plastic, the most changeable thing with which we deal. It can be +brutalized beneath the brutes; it can rise into companionship with +angels. Our primitive forefathers, as our fairy tales still reveal, +believed that men and women could be changed into anything--into trees, +rocks, wolves, bears, kings and fairy sprites. One of the most +prominent professors of sociology in America recently said that these +stories are a poetic portraiture of something which eternally is true. +Men can be transformed. That is a basic fact, and it is one of the +central emphases of the Christian Gospel. Of all days in which that +emphasis should be remembered, the chiefest is the day when men are +thinking about social reformation. + + +III + +It is only a clear recognition of the crucial importance of man's +inward transformation which can prepare us for a proper appreciation of +the social movement's meaning. For one point of contact between +religion's approach to the human problem from within out and +reformation's approach from without in lies here: to change social +environments which oppress and dwarf and defile the lives of men is one +way of giving the transforming Spirit a fair chance to reach and redeem +them. All too slowly does the truth lay hold upon the Church that our +very personalities themselves are social products, that we are born out +of society and live in it and are molded by it, that without society we +should not be human at all, and that the influences which play upon our +lives, whether redeeming or degrading, are socially mediated. A man +who says that he believes in the ineffable value of human personalities +and who professes to desire their transformation and yet who has no +desire to give them better homes, better cities, better family +relationships, better health, better economic resources, better +recreations, better books and better schools, is either an ignoramus +who does not see what these things mean in the growth of souls, or else +an unconscious hypocrite who does not really care so much about the +souls of men as he says he does. + +An illuminating illustration of this fact is to be seen in the +expanding ideals of missionary work. When the missionaries first went +to the ends of the earth they went to save souls one by one. They went +out generally with a distinctly, often narrowly, individualistic +motive. They were trying to gather into the ark a few redeemed spirits +out of the wreck of a perishing world; they were not thinking primarily +of building a kingdom of social righteousness in the earth. Consider, +then, the fascinating story of the way the missionaries, whatever may +have been the motives with which they started, have become social +reformers. If the missionaries were to take the Gospel to the people, +they had to get to the people. So they became the explorers of the +world. It was the missionaries who opened up Asia and Africa. Was +there ever a more stirring story of adventure than is given us in the +life of David Livingstone? Then when the missionaries had reached the +people to give them the Gospel, they had to give them the Bible. So +they became the philologists and translators of the world. They built +the lexicons and grammars. They translated the Bible into more than a +hundred languages on the continent of Africa alone. Carey and his +followers did the same for over a score of languages in India. The +Bible to-day is available in over six hundred living languages. +Everywhere this prodigious literary labour has been breaking down the +barriers of speech and thought between the peoples. If ever we do get +a decent internationalism, how much of it will rest back upon this +pioneer spade work of the missionaries, digging through the barricades +of language that separate the minds of men! When, then, the +missionaries had books to give the people, the people had to learn to +read. So the missionaries became educators, and wherever you find the +church you find the school. But what is the use of educating people +who do not understand how to be sanitary, who live in filth and disease +and die needlessly, and how can you take away old superstitions and not +put new science in their places, or deprive the people of witch doctors +without offering them substitutes? So the missionaries became +physicians, and one of the most beneficent enterprises that history +records is medical missions. What is the use, however, of helping +people to get well when their economic condition is such, their +standards of life so low, that they continue to fall sick again in +spite of you? So the missionaries are becoming industrial reformers, +agriculturalists, chemists, physicists, engineers, rebuilding wherever +they can the economic life and comfort of their people. The missionary +cause itself has been compelled, whether it would or not, to grow +socially-minded. As Dan Crawford says about the work in Africa: "Here, +then, is Africa's challenge to its Missionaries. Will they allow a +whole continent to live like beasts in such hovels, millions of negroes +cribbed, cabined, and confined in dens of disease? No doubt it is our +diurnal duty to preach that the soul of all improvement is the +improvement of the soul. But God's equilateral triangle of body, soul, +and spirit must never be ignored. Is not the body wholly _ensouled_, +and is not the soul wholly _embodied_? . . . In other words, in Africa +the only true fulfilling of your heavenly calling is the doing of +earthly things in a heavenly manner." [2] + +Indeed, if any one is tempted to espouse a narrowly individualistic +gospel of regeneration, let him go to the Far East and take note of +Buddhism. Buddhism in wide areas of its life is doing precisely what +the individualists recommend. It is a religion of personal comfort and +redemption. It is not mastered by a vigorous hope of social +reformation. In many ways it is extraordinarily like medieval +Christianity. Consider this definition of his religion that was given +by one Buddhist teacher: "Religion," he said, "is a device to bring +peace of mind in the midst of conditions as they are." Conditions as +they are--settle down in them; be comfortable about them; do not try to +change them; let no prayer for the Kingdom of God on earth disturb +them; and there seek for yourselves "peace of mind in the midst of +conditions as they are." And the Buddhist teacher added, "My religion +is pure religion." But is there any such thing as really caring about +the souls of men and not caring about social habits, moral conditions, +popular recreations, economic handicaps that in every way affect them? +Of all deplorable and degenerate conceptions of religion can anything +be worse than to think of it as a "device to bring peace of mind in the +midst of conditions as they are?" Yet one finds plenty of Church +members in America whose idea of the "simple Gospel" comes perilously +near that Buddhist's idea of "pure religion." + +The utter futility of endeavouring to care about the inward +transformation of men's lives while not caring about their social +environment is evident when one thinks of our international +relationships and their recurrent issue in war. War surely cannot be +thought of any longer as a school for virtue. We used to think it was. +We half believed the German war party when they told us about the +disciplinary value of their gigantic establishment, and when Lord +Roberts assured us that war was tonic for the souls of peoples we were +inclined to think that he was right. When, in answer to our nation's +call, our men went out to fight and all our people were bound up in a +fellowship of devotion to a common cause, so stimulated were we that we +almost were convinced that out of such an experience there might come a +renaissance of spiritual quality and life. Is there anybody who can +blind his eyes to the facts now? Every competent witness in Europe and +America has had to say that we are on a far lower moral level than we +were before the war. Crimes of sex, crimes of violence, have been +unprecedented. Large areas of Europe are to-day in a chaos so complete +that not one man in a thousand in America even dimly imagines it, with +a break-down of all the normal, sustaining relationships and privileges +of civilized life, and with an accompanying collapse of character +unprecedented in Christendom since the days of the Black Plague. If we +are wise we will never again go down into hell expecting to come up +with spirits redeemed. + +To be sure, there are many individuals of such moral stamina that they +have come out of this experience personally the better, not the worse. +There are people who would build into the fiber of their character any +experience that earth could offer them. But if we are thinking of the +moral stability and progress of mankind, surely there is nothing in the +processes of war, as we have seen them, or the results of war, as they +now lie about us, that would lead us to trust to them for help. War +takes a splendid youth willing to serve the will of God in his +generation before he falls on sleep and teaches him the skilful trick +of twisting a bayonet into the abdomen of an enemy. War takes a +loyal-spirited man who is not afraid of anything under heaven and +teaches him to drop bombs on undefended towns, to kill perchance the +baby suckled at her mother's breast. The father of one of our young +men, back from France, finding that his son, like many others, would +not talk, rebuked him for his silence. "Just one thing I will tell +you," the son answered. "One night I was on patrol in No Man's Land, +and suddenly I came face to face with a German about my own age. It +was a question of his life or mine. We fought like wild beasts. When +I came back that night I was covered from head to foot with the blood +and brains of that German. We had nothing personally against each +other. He did not want to kill me any more than I wanted to kill him. +That is war. I did my duty in it, but for God's sake do not ask me to +talk about it! I want to forget it." That _is_ war, and no more +damning influence can be thrown around the characters of people in +general or around the victims of military discipline and experience in +particular than that supplied by war. How then could inconsistency be +made more extreme than by saying that Christianity is concerned about +the souls of men but is not concerned about international good-will and +co-operation? After all, the approaches to the human problem from +without in and from within out are not antithetical, but supplementary. +This tunnel must be dug from both ends and until the Church thoroughly +grasps that fact she will lead an incomplete and ineffectual life. + + +IV + +The purposes of Christianity involve social reform, not only, as we +have said, because we must accomplish environmental change if we are to +achieve widespread individual transformation, but also because we must +reorganize social life and the ideas that underlie it if we are to +maintain and get adequately expressed the individual's Christian spirit +when once he has been transformed. Granted a man with an inwardly +remotived life, sincerely desirous of living Christianly, see what a +situation faces him in the present organization of our economic world! +Selfishness consists in facing any human relationship with the main +intent of getting from it for oneself all the pleasure and profit that +one can. There are folk who use their families so. They live like +parasites on the beautiful institution of family life, getting as much +as possible for as little as possible. There are folk who use the +nation so. To them their country is a gigantic grab-bag from which +their greedy hands may snatch civic security and commercial gain. For +such we have hard and bitter names. There is, however, one +relationship--business--where we take for granted this very attitude +which everywhere else we heartily condemn. Multitudes of folk go up to +that central human relationship with the frank and unabashed confession +that their primary motive is to make out of it all that they can for +themselves. They never have organized their motives around the idea +that the major meaning of business is public service. + +The fact is, however, that all around us forms of business already have +developed where we count it shame for a man to be chiefly motived by a +desire for private gain. If you thought that the preacher were in love +with his purse more than with his Gospel, you would not come again to +hear him, and you would be right; if you thought that the teacher of +your children cared for payday first and for teaching second, you would +find another teacher for them tomorrow, and you ought to; if you +thought that your physician cared more for his fees than he did for his +patients, you would discharge him to-night and seek for a man more +worthy of his high profession; if you had reason to suppose that the +judges of the Supreme Court in Washington cared more for their salary +than they did for justice, you could not easily measure your +indignation and your shame. In the development of human life few +things are nobler than the growth of the professional spirit, where in +wide areas of enterprise, not private gain, but fine workmanship and +public service have become the major motives. If one says that a sharp +line of distinction is to be drawn between what we call professions and +what we call business, he does not know history. Nursing, as a gainful +calling, a hundred years ago was a mercenary affair into which +undesirable people went for what they could get out of it. If nursing +to-day is a great profession, where pride of workmanship and love of +service increasingly are in control, it is because Florence +Nightingale, and a noble company after her, have insisted that nursing +essentially is service and that all nurses ought to organize their +motives around that idea. + +What is the essential difference between professions and business? Why +should the building of a schoolhouse be a carnival of private profit +for labourers and contractors alike, when the teaching in it is +expected to be full of the love of fine workmanship and the joy of +usefulness? Why, when a war is on, must the making of munitions here +be a wild debauch of private profits, but the firing of them "over +there" be a matter of self-forgetful sacrifice? Why, in selling a food +which is essential to health, should the head of a sugar corporation +say with impunity, "I think it is fair to get out of the consumers all +you can, consistent with the business proposition," when the physician +is expected to care for the undernourished with a devoted professional +spirit utterly different from the sugar magnate's words? There is no +real answer to that "why." The fact is that for multitudes of people +business is still in the unredeemed state in which nursing and teaching +and doctoring were at the beginning, and nothing can save us from the +personal and social consequence of this unhappy situation except the +clear vision of the basic meaning of business in terms of service, and +the courageous reorganization of personal motive and economic +institutions around that idea. + +If, then, Christianity is sincerely interested in the quality of human +spirits, in the motives and ideals which dominate personality, she must +be interested in the economic and industrial problems of our day. To +be sure, many ministers make fools of themselves when they pass +judgment on questions which they do not understand. It is true that a +church is much more peaceable and undisturbing when it tries +experiments upon religious emotions with colored lights than when it +makes reports upon the steel trust. Many are tempted, therefore, to +give in to irritation over misdirected ministerial energy or to a +desire for emotional comfort rather than an aroused conscience. One +has only to listen where respectable folk most congregate to hear the +cry: let the Church keep her hands off! + +Let me talk for a moment directly to that group. If you mean, by your +distaste for the Church's interest in a fairer economic life, that most +ministers are unfitted by temperament and training to talk wisely on +economic policies and programs, you are right. Do you suppose that we +ministers do not know how we must appear to you when we try to discuss +the details of business? While, however, you are free to say anything +you wish about the ineptitude of ministers in economic affairs (and we, +from our inside information, will probably agree with you), yet as we +thus put ourselves in your places and try to see the situation through +your eyes, do you also put yourselves in our places and try to see it +through our eyes! + +I speak, I am sure, in the name of thousands of Christian ministers in +this country endeavouring to do their duty in this trying time. We did +not go into the ministry of Jesus Christ either for money or for fun. +If we had wanted either one primarily, we would have done something +else than preach. We went in because we believed in Jesus Christ and +were assured that only he and his truth could medicine the sorry ills +of this sick world. And now, ministers of Christ, with such a motive, +we see continually some of the dearest things we work for, some of the +fairest results that we achieve, going to pieces on the rocks of the +business world. + +You wish us to preach against sin, but you forget that, as one of our +leading sociologists has said, the master iniquities of our time are +connected with money-making. You wish us to imbue your boys and girls +with ideal standards of life, but all too often we see them, having +left our schools and colleges, full of the knightly chivalry of youth, +torn in the world of business between the ideal of Christlikeness and +the selfish rivalry of commercial conflict. We watch them growing +sordid, disillusioned, mercenary, spoiled at last and bereft of their +youth's fine promise. You wish us to preach human brotherhood in +Christ, and then we see that the one chief enemy of brotherhood between +men and nations is economic strife, the root of class consciousness and +war. You send some of us as your representatives to the ends of the +earth to proclaim the Saviour, and then these missionaries send back +word that the non-Christian world knows all too well how far from +dominant in our business life our Christian ideals are and that the +non-Christian world delays accepting our Christ until we have better +proved that his principles will work. Everywhere that the Christian +minister turns, he finds his dearest ideals and hopes entangled in the +economic life. Do you ask us then under these conditions to keep our +hands off? In God's name, you ask too much! + +In the sixteenth century the great conflict in the world's life +centered in the Church. The Reformation was on. All the vital +questions of the day had there their spring. In the eighteenth century +the great conflict of the world's life lay in politics. The American +and French revolutions were afoot. Democracy had struck its tents and +was on the march. All the vital questions of that day had their origin +there. In the twentieth century the great conflict in the world's life +is centered in economics. The most vital questions with which we deal +are entangled with economic motives and institutions. As in the +sixteenth and eighteenth centuries great changes were inevitable, so +now the economic world cannot possibly remain static. The question is +not whether changes will occur, but how they will occur, under whose +aegis and superintendence, by whose guidance and direction, and how +much better the world will be when they are here. Among all the +interests that are vitally concerned with the nature of these changes +none has more at stake than the Christian Church with her +responsibility for the cure of souls. + + +V + +Still another point of contact exists between the Christian purpose and +social reform: the inevitable demand of religious ideals for social +application. The ideal of human equality, for example, came into our +civilization from two main sources--the Stoic philosophy and the +Christian religion--and in both cases it was first of all a spiritual +insight, not a social program. The Stoics and the early Christians +both believed it as a sentiment, but they had no idea of changing the +world to conform with it. Paul repeatedly insisted upon the equality +of all men before God. In his early ministry he wrote it to the +Galatians: "There can be neither Jew nor Greek, there can be neither +bond nor free, there can be no male and female; for ye all are one man +in Christ Jesus." Later he wrote it to the Corinthians: "For in one +Spirit were we all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, +whether bond or free; and were all made to drink of one Spirit." In +his last imprisonment he wrote it to the Colossians: "There cannot be +Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, +bondman, freeman; but Christ is all, and in all." Yet it never would +have occurred to Paul to disturb the social custom of slavery or to +question the divine institution of imperial government. + +Nevertheless, while this idea of human equality did not at first +involve a social program, it meant something real. If we are to +understand what the New Testament means by the equality of men before +God, we must look at men from the New Testament point of view. Those +of us who have been up in an aeroplane know that the higher we fly the +less difference we see in the elevation of things upon the earth. This +man's house is plainly higher than that man's when we are on the ground +but, two thousand feet up, small difference can we observe. Now, the +New Testament flies high. It frankly looks from a great altitude at +the distinctions that seem so important on the earth. We say that +racial differences are very important--a great gulf between Jew and +Gentile. We insist that cultural traditions make an immense +distinction--that to be a Scythian or to be barbarian is widely +separated from being Greek. We are sure that the economic distinction +between bondman and freeman is enormous. But all the while these +superiorities and inferiorities, which we magnify, seem from Paul's +vantage point not nearly so important or so real as we think they are. +He is sure about this central truth, that God asks no questions about +caste or colour or race or wealth or social station. All men stand +alike in his presence and in the Christian fellowship must be regarded +from his point of view. + +It was utterly impossible, however, to keep this spiritual insight from +getting ultimately into a social program. It appealed to motives too +deep and powerful to make possible its segregation as a religious +sentiment. For however impractical an ideal this thought of human +equality may seem in general, and however hard it may be to grant to +others in particular, it is never hard for us to claim for ourselves. +If ever we are condescended to, does any assertion rise more quickly in +our thought than the old cry of our boyhood, "I am as good as you are"? +The lad in school in ragged clothes, who sees himself outclassed by +richer boys, feels it hotly rising in his boyish heart: "I am as good +as you are." The poor man who, with an anxiety he cannot subdue and +yet dares not disclose, is desperately trying to make both ends meet, +feels it as he sees more fortunate men in luxury: "I am as good as you +are." The negro who has tried himself out with his white brethren, who +wears, it may be, an honour key from a great university, who is a +scholar and a gentleman, and yet who is continually denied the most +common courtesies of human intercourse--he says in his heart, although +the words may not pass his lips, "I am as good as you are." Now, the +New Testament took that old cry of the human heart for equality and +turned it upside down. It became no longer for the Christian a bitter +demand for one's rights, but a glad acknowledgment of one's duty. It +did not clamour, "I am as good as you are"; it said, "You are as good +as I am." The early Christians at their best went out into the world +with that cry upon their lips. The Jewish Christians said it to the +Gentiles and the Gentiles to the Jews; the Scythians and barbarians +said it to the Greeks and the Greeks said it in return; the bond said +it to the free and the free said it to the bond. The New Testament +Church in this regard was one of the most extraordinary upheavals in +history, and to-day the best hopes of the world depend upon that spirit +which still says to all men over all the differences of race and colour +and station, "You are as good as I am." + +To be sure, before this equalitarian ideal could be embodied in a +social program it had to await the coming of the modern age with its +open doors, its freer movements of thought and life, its belief in +progress, its machinery of change. But even in the stagnation of the +intervening centuries the old Stoic-Christian ideal never was utterly +forgotten. Lactantius, a Christian writer of the fourth century, said +that God, who creates and inspires men, "willed that all should be +equal." [3] Gregory the Great, at the end of the sixth century, said +that "By nature we are all equal." [4] For ages this spiritual insight +remained dissociated from any social program, but now the inevitable +connection has been made. Old caste systems and chattel slavery have +gone down before this ideal. Aristotle argued that slavery ethically +was right because men were essentially and unchangeably masters or +slaves by nature. Somehow that would not sound plausible to us, even +though the greatest mind of all antiquity did say it. Whatever may be +the differences between men and races, they are not sufficient to +justify the ownership of one man by another. The ideal of equality has +wrecked old aristocracies that seemed to have firm hold on permanence. +If one would feel again the thrill which men felt when first the old +distinctions lost their power, one should read once more the songs of +Robert Burns. They often seem commonplaces to us now, but they were +not commonplaces then: + + "For a' that and a' that, + Their dignities, and a' that; + The pith o' sense and pride o' worth + Are higher rank than a' that!" + +This ideal has made equality before the law one of the maxims of our +civilized governments, failure in which wakens our apprehension and our +fear; it has made equal suffrage a fact, although practical people only +yesterday laughed at it as a dream; it has made equality in opportunity +for an education the underlying postulate of our public school systems, +although in New York State seventy-five years ago the debate was still +acute as to whether such a dream ever could come true; it is to-day +lifting races, long accounted inferior, to an eminence where +increasingly their equality is acknowledged. One with difficulty +restrains his scorn for the intellectual impotence of so-called wise +men who think all idealists mere dreamers. Who is the dreamer--the +despiser or the upholder of an ideal whose upheavals already have burst +through old caste systems, upset old slave systems, wrecked old +aristocracies, pushed obscure and forgotten masses of mankind up to +rough equality in court and election booth and school, and now are +rocking the foundations of old racial and international and economic +ideas? The practical applications of this ideal, as, for example, to +the coloured problem in America, are so full of difficulty that no one +need be ashamed to confess that he does not see in detail how the +principle can be made to work. Nevertheless, so deep in the essential +nature of things is the fact of mankind's fundamental unity, that only +God can foresee to what end the application of it yet may come. At any +rate, it is clear that the Christian ideal of human equality before God +can no longer be kept out of a social program. + + +VI + +There is, then, no standing-ground left for a narrowly individualistic +Christianity. To talk of redeeming personality while one is careless +of the social environments which ruin personality; to talk of building +Christlike character while one is complacent about an economic system +that is definitely organized about the idea of selfish profit; to +praise Christian ideals while one is blind to the inevitable urgency +with which they insist on getting themselves expressed in social +programs--all this is vanity. It is deplorable, therefore, that the +Christian forces are tempted to draw apart, some running up the banner +of personal regeneration and some rallying around the flag of social +reformation. The division is utterly needless. Doubtless our own +individual ways of coming into the Christian life influence us deeply +here. Some of us came into the Christian experience from a sense of +individual need alone. We needed for ourselves sins forgiven, peace +restored, hope bestowed. God meant to us first of all satisfaction for +our deepest personal wants. + + "Rock of Ages, cleft for me, + Let me hide myself in Thee"-- + +such was our cry and such was our salvation. If now we are socially +minded, if we are concerned for economic and international +righteousness, that is an enlargement of our Christian outlook which +has grown out of and still is rooted back in our individual need and +experience of God. + +Some of us, however, did not come into fellowship with God by that +route at all. We came in from the opposite direction. The character +in the Old Testament who seems to me the worthiest exhibition of +personal religion before Jesus is the prophet Jeremiah, but Jeremiah +started his religious experience, not with a sense of individual need, +but with a burning, patriotic, social passion. He was concerned for +Judah. Her iniquities, long accumulating, were bringing upon her an +irretrievable disaster. He laid his soul upon her soul and sought to +breathe into her the breath of life. Then, when he saw the country he +adored, the civilization he cherished, crashing into ruin, he was +thrown back personally on God. He started with social passion; he +ended with social passion plus personal religion. Some of God's +greatest servants have come to know him so. + +Henry Ward Beecher once said that a text is a small gate into a large +field where one can wander about as he pleases, and that the trouble +with most ministers is that they spend all their time swinging on the +gate. That same figure applies to the entrance which many of us made +into the Christian experience. Some of us came in by the gate of +personal religion, and we have been swinging on it ever since; and some +of us came in by the gate of social passion for the regeneration of the +world, and we have been swinging on that gate ever since. We both are +wrong. These are two gates into the same city, and it is the city of +our God. It would be one of the greatest blessings to the Christian +church both at home and on the foreign field if we could come together +on this question where separation is so needless and so foolish. If +some of us started with emphasis upon personal religion, we have no +business to stop until we understand the meaning of social +Christianity. If some of us started with emphasis upon the social +campaign, we have no business to rest until we learn the deep secrets +of personal religion. The redemption of personality is the great aim +of the Christian Gospel, and, therefore, to inspire the inner lives of +men and to lift outward burdens which impede their spiritual growth are +both alike Christian service to bring in the Kingdom. + + + +[1] Leo M. Tolstoi: My Religion, Introduction, p. ix. + +[2] D. Crawford: Thinking Black, pp. 444-445. + +[3] L. C. F. Lactantius: The Divine Institutes, Book V, Chap. xv, xvi. + +[4] Gregory the Great: Moralium Libri, Pars quarta, Lib. XXI, Caput +XV--"Omnes namque homines natura aequales sumus." + + + + +LECTURE IV + +PROGRESSIVE CHRISTIANITY + +I + +Hitherto in the development of our thought, we have been considering the +Christian Gospel as an entity set in the midst of a progressive world, +and we have been studying the new Christian attitudes which this +influential environment has been eliciting. The Gospel has been in our +thought like an individual who, finding himself in novel circumstances, +reacts toward them in ways appropriate alike to them and to his own +character. The influence of the idea of progress upon Christianity, +however, is more penetrating than such a figure can adequately portray. +For no one can long ponder the significance of our generation's +progressive ways of thinking without running straight upon this question: +is not Christianity itself progressive? In the midst of a changing world +does not it also change, so that, reacting upon the new ideas of +progress, it not only assimilates and uses them, but is itself an +illustration of them? Where everything else in man's life in its origin +and growth is conceived, not in terms of static and final creation or +revelation, but in terms of development, can religion be left out? +Instead of being a pond around which once for all a man can walk and take +its measure, a final and completed whole, is not Christianity a river +which, maintaining still reliance upon the historic springs from which it +flows, gathers in new tributaries on its course and is itself a changing, +growing and progressive movement? The question is inevitable in any +study of the relationship between the Gospel and progress, and its +implications are so far-reaching that it deserves our careful thought. + +Certainly it is clear that already modern ideas of progress have had so +penetrating an influence upon Christianity as to affect, not its external +reactions and methods only, nor yet its intellectual formulations alone, +but deeper still its very mood and inward temper. Whether or not +Christianity ought to be a changing movement in a changing world, it +certainly has been that and is so still, and the change can be seen going +on now in the very atmosphere in which it lives and moves and has its +being. For example, consider the attitude of resignation to the will of +God, which was characteristic of medieval Christianity. As we saw in our +first lecture, the medieval age did not think of human life upon this +earth in terms of progress. The hopes of men did not revolve about any +Utopia to be expected here. History was not even a glacier, moving +slowly toward the sunny meadows. It did not move at all; it was not +intended to move; it was standing still. To be sure, the thirteenth +century was one of the greatest in the annals of the race. In it the +foremost European universities were founded, the sublimest Gothic +cathedrals were built, some of the world's finest works of handicraft +were made; in it Cimabue and Giotto painted, Dante wrote, St. Thomas +Aquinas philosophized, and St. Francis of Assisi lived. The motives, +however, which originated and sustained this magnificent outburst of +creative energy were otherworldly--they were not concerned with +anticipations of a happier lot for humankind upon this earth. The +medieval age did not believe that man's estate upon the earth ever would +be fundamentally improved, and in consequence took the only reasonable +attitude, resignation. When famines came, God sent them; they were +punishment for sin; his will be done! When wars came, they were the +flails of God to thresh his people; his will be done! Men were resigned +to slavery on the ground that God had made men to be masters and slaves. +They were resigned to feudalism and absolute monarchy on the ground that +God had made men to be rulers and ruled. Whatever was had been ordained +by the Divine or had been allowed by him in punishment for man's +iniquity. To rebel was sin; to doubt was heresy; to submit was piety. +The Hebrew prophets had not been resigned, nor Jesus Christ, nor Paul. +The whole New Testament blazes with the hope of the kingdom of +righteousness coming upon earth. But the medieval age was resigned. Its +real expectations were post-mortem hopes. So far as this earth was +concerned, men must submit. + +To be sure, in those inner experiences where we must endure what we +cannot help, resignation will always characterize a deeply religious +life. All life is not under our control, to be freely mastered by our +thought and toil. There are areas where scientific knowledge gives us +power to do amazing things, but all around them are other areas which our +hands cannot regulate. Orion and the Pleiades were not made for our +fingers to swing, and our engineering does not change sunrise or sunset +nor make the planets one whit less or more. So, in the experiences of +our inward life, around the realm which we can control is that other +realm where move the mysterious providences of God, beyond our power to +understand and as uncontrollable by us as the tides are by the fish that +live in them. Captain Scott found the South Pole, only to discover that +another man had been there first. When, on his return from the +disappointing quest, the pitiless cold, the endless blizzards, the +failing food, had worn down the strength of the little company and in +their tent amid the boundless desolation they waited for the end while +the life flames burned low, Captain Scott wrote: "I do not regret this +journey. . . . We took risks, we knew we took them; things have come out +against us, and therefore we have no cause for complaint, but bow to the +will of Providence, determined still to do our best to the last." [1] +That is resignation at its noblest. + +When, however, a modern Christian tries to do what the medieval +Christians did--make this attitude of resignation cover the whole field +of life, make it the dominant element in their religion, the proof of +their trust and the test of their piety--he finds himself separated from +the most characteristic and stirring elements in his generation. We are +not resigned anywhere else. Everywhere else we count it our pride and +glory to be unresigned. We are not resigned even to a thorny cactus, +whose spiky exterior seems a convincing argument against its use for +food. When we see a barren plain we do not say as our fathers did: God +made plains so in his inscrutable wisdom; his will be done! We call for +irrigation and, when the fructifying waters flow, we say, Thy will be +done! in the way we think God wishes to have it said. We do not +passively submit to God's will; we actively assert it. The scientific +control of life at this point has deeply changed our religious mood. We +are not resigned to pestilences and already have plans drawn up to make +the yellow fever germ "as extinct as the woolly rhinoceros." We are not +even resigned to the absence of wireless telephony when once we have +imagined its presence, or to the inconvenience of slow methods of travel +when once we have invented swift ones. Not to illiteracy nor to child +labour nor to the white plague nor to commercialized vice nor to +recurrent unemployment are we, at our best, resigned. + +This change of mood did not come easily. So strongly did the medieval +spirit of resignation, submissive in a static world, keep its grip upon +the Church that the Church often defiantly withstood the growth of this +unresigned attitude of which we have been speaking and in which we glory. +Lightning rods were vehemently denounced by many ministers as an +unwarranted interference with God's use of lightning. When God hit a +house he meant to hit it; his will be done! This attitude, thus absurdly +applied, had in more important realms a lamentable consequence. The +campaign of Christian missions to foreign lands was bitterly fought in +wide areas of the Christian Church because if God intended to damn the +heathen he should be allowed to do so without interference from us; his +will be done! As for slavery, the last defense which it had in this +country was on religious grounds: that God had ordained it and that it +was blasphemous to oppose his ordination. In a word, this spirit of +passive resignation has been so deeply ingrained in religious thinking +that it has become oftentimes a serious reproach to Christian people. + +Now, however, the mood of modern Christianity is decisively in contrast +with that medieval spirit. Moreover, we think that we are close to the +Master in this attitude, for whatever difference in outward form of +expectation there may be between his day and ours, when he said: "Thy +kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so on earth," that was not +passive submission to God's will but an aggressive prayer for the victory +of God and righteousness; it was not lying down under the will of God as +something to be endured, but active loyalty to the will of God as +something to be achieved. To be resigned to evil conditions on this +earth is in our eyes close to essential sin. If any one who calls +himself a conservative Christian doubts his share in this anti-medieval +spirit, let him test himself and see. In 1836 the Rev. Leonard Wood, D. +D., wrote down this interesting statement: "I remember when I could +reckon up among my acquaintances forty ministers, and none of them at a +great distance, who were either drunkards or far addicted to drinking. I +could mention an ordination which took place about twenty years ago at +which I myself was ashamed and grieved to see two aged ministers +literally drunk, and a third indecently excited." [2] Our forefathers +were resigned to that, but we are not. The most conservative of us so +hates the colossal abomination of the liquor traffic, that we do not +propose to cease our fight until victory has been won. We are +belligerently unresigned. Or when militarism proves itself an +intolerable curse, we do not count it a divine punishment and prepare +ourselves to make the best of its continuance. We propose to end it. +Militarism, which in days of peace cries, Build me vast armaments, spend +enough upon a single dreadnaught to remake the educational system of a +whole state; militarism, which in the days of war cries, Give me your +best youth to slay, leave the crippled and defective to propagate the +race, give me your best to slay; militarism, which lays its avaricious +hand on every new invention to make gregarious death more swift and +terrible, and when war is over makes the starved bodies of innumerable +children walk in its train for pageantry,--we are not resigned to that. +We count it our Christian duty to be tirelessly unresigned. + +Here is a new mood in Christianity, born out of the scientific control of +life and the modern ideas of progress, and, however consonant it may be +with the spirit of the New Testament, it exhibits in the nature of its +regulative conceptions and in its earthly hopes a transformation within +Christianity which penetrates deep. Progressive change is not simply an +environment to which Christianity conforms; it is a fact which +Christianity exhibits. + + +II + +This idea that Christianity is itself a progressive movement instead of a +static finality involves some serious alterations in the historic +conceptions of the faith, as soon as it is applied to theology. Very +early in Christian history the presence of conflicting heresies led the +church to define its faith in creeds and then to regard these as final +formulations of Christian doctrine, incapable of amendment or addition. +Tertullian, about 204 A. D., spoke of the creedal standard of his day as +"a rule of faith changeless and incapable of reformation." [3] From that +day until our own, when a Roman Catholic Council has decreed that "the +definitions of the Roman Pontiff are unchangeable," [4] an unalterable +character has been ascribed to the dogmas of the Church of Rome. Indeed, +Pius IX, in his Syllabus of Errors, specifically condemned the modern +idea that "Divine revelation is imperfect, and, therefore, subject to +continual and indefinite progress, which corresponds with the progress of +human reason." [5] Nor did Protestantism, with all the reformation which +it wrought, attack this central Catholic conception of a changeless +content and formulation of faith. Not what the Pope said, but what the +Bible said, was by Protestants unalterably to be received. Change there +might be in the sense that unrealized potentialities involved in the +original deposit might be brought to light--a kind of development which +not only Protestants but Catholics like Cardinal Newman have willingly +allowed--but whatever had once been stated as the content of faith by the +received authorities was by both Catholics and Protestants regarded as +unalterably so. In the one case, if the Pope had once defined a dogma, +it was changeless; in the other, if the Bible had once formulated a +pre-scientific cosmology, or used demoniacal possession as an explanation +of disease, or personified evil in a devil, all such mental categories +were changelessly to be received. In its popular forms this conception +of Christianity assumes extreme rigidity--Christianity is a static system +finally formulated, a deposit to be accepted in toto if at all, not to be +added to, not to be subtracted from, not to be changed, its i's all +dotted and its t's all crossed. + +The most crucial problem which we face in our religious thinking is +created by the fact that Christianity thus statically conceived now goes +out into a generation where no other aspect of life is conceived in +static terms at all. The earth itself on which we live, not by fiat +suddenly enacted, but by long and gradual processes, became habitable, +and man upon it through uncounted ages grew out of an unknown past into +his present estate. Everything within man's life has grown, is growing, +and apparently will grow. Music developed from crude forms of rhythmic +noise until now, by way of Bach, Beethoven and Wagner, our modern music, +still developing, has grown to forms of harmony at first undreamed. +Painting developed from the rough outlines of the cavemen until now +possibilities of expression in line and colour have been achieved whose +full expansion we cannot guess. Architecture evolved from the crude huts +of primitive man until now our cathedrals and our new business buildings +alike mark an incalculable advance and prophesy an unimaginable future. +One may refuse to call all development real progress, may insist upon +degeneration as well as betterment through change, but, even so, the +basic fact remains that all the elements which go to make man's life come +into being, are what they are, and pass out of what they are into +something different, through processes of continual growth. Our business +methods change until the commercial wisdom of a few years ago may be the +folly of to-day; our moral ideals change until actions once respectable +become reprobate, and the heroes of one generation would be the convicts +of another; our science changes until ideas that men once were burned at +the stake for entertaining are now the commonplace axioms of every school +boy's thought; our economics change until schools of thought shaped to +old industrial conditions are as outmoded as a one-horse shay beside an +automobile; our philosophy changes like our science when Kant, for +example, starts a revolution in man's thinking, worthy, as he claimed, to +be called Copernican; our cultural habits change until marooned +communities in the Kentucky mountains, "our contemporary ancestors," +having let the stream of human life flow around and past them, seem as +strange to us as a belated what-not in a modern parlour. The perception +of this fact of progressive change is one of the regnant influences in +our modern life and, strangely enough, so far from disliking it, we glory +in it; in our expectancy we count on change; with our control of life we +seek to direct it. + +Indeed no more remarkable difference distinguishes the modern world from +all that went before than its attitude toward change itself. The +medieval world idealized changelessness. Its very astronomy was the +apotheosis of the unalterable. The earth, a globe full of mutation and +decay; around it eight transparent spheres carrying the heavenly bodies, +each outer sphere moving more slowly than its inner neighbour, while the +ninth, moving most slowly of all, moved all the rest; last of all, the +empyrean, blessed with changeless, motionless perfection, the abode of +God--such was the Ptolemaic astronomy as Dante knew it. This +idealization of changelessness was the common property of all that by +gone world. The Holy Roman Empire was the endeavour to perpetuate a +changeless idea of political theory and organization; the Holy Catholic +Church was the endeavour to perpetuate a changeless formulation of +religious dogma and hierarchy; the Summa of St. Thomas Aquinas was the +endeavour to settle forever changeless paths for the human mind to walk +in. To that ancient world as a whole the perfect was the finished, and +therefore it was immutable. + +How different our modern attitude toward change has come to be! We +believe in change, rely on it, hope for it, rejoice in it, are determined +to achieve it and control it. Nowhere is this more evident than in our +thought of the meaning of knowledge. In the medieval age knowledge was +spun as a spider spins his web. Thinking simply made evident what +already was involved in an accepted proposition. A premise was drawn out +into its filaments and then woven into a fabric of new form but of the +same old material. Knowledge did not start from actual things; it did +not intend to change actual things; and the shelves of the libraries +groan with the burden of that endless and largely futile cogitation. +Then the new knowledge began from the observation of things as they +really are and from the use of that observation for the purposes of human +life. Once a lad, seventeen years old, went into the cathedral at Pisa +to worship. Soon he forgot the service and watched a chandelier, +swinging from the lofty roof. He wondered whether, no matter how +changeable the length of its arc, its oscillations always consumed the +same time and, because he had no other means, he timed its motion by the +beating of his pulse. That was one time when a boy went to church and +did well to forget the service. He soon began to wonder whether he could +not make a pendulum which, swinging like the chandeliers, would do useful +business for men. He soon began to discover, in what he had seen that +day, new light on the laws of planetary motion. That was one of the +turning points in human history--the boy was Galileo. The consequences +of this new method are all around us now. The test of knowledge in +modern life is capacity to cause change. If a man really knows +electricity he can cause change; he can illumine cities and drive cars. +If a man really knows engineering, he can cause change; he can tunnel +rivers and bridge gulfs. It is for that purpose we wish knowledge. +Instead of being dreaded, controlled change has become the chief desire +of modern life. + +When, therefore, in this generation with its perception of growth as the +universal law and with its dependence upon controlled change as the hope +of man, Christianity endeavours to glorify changelessness and to maintain +itself in unalterable formulations, it has outlawed itself from its own +age. An Indian punkah-puller, urged by his mistress to better his +condition, replied: "Mem Sahib, my father pulled a punkah, my grandfather +pulled a punkah, all my ancestors for four million ages pulled punkahs, +and, before that, the god who founded our caste pulled a punkah over +Vishnu." How utterly lost such a man would be in the dynamic movements +of our modern Western life!--yet not more lost than is a Christianity +which tries to remain static in a progressive world. + + +III + +Among the influences which have forced well-instructed minds first to +accept and then to glory in the progressive nature of Christianity, the +first place must be given to the history of religion itself. The study +of religion's ancient records in ritual, monument and book, and of +primitive faiths still existing among us in all stages of development, +has made clear the general course which man's religious life has traveled +from very childish beginnings until now. From early animism in its +manifold expressions, through polytheism, kathenotheism, henotheism, to +monotheism, and so out into loftier possibilities of conceiving the +divine nature and purpose--the main road which man has traveled in his +religious development now is traceable. Nor is there any place where it +is more easily traceable than in our own Hebrew-Christian tradition. One +of the fine results of the historical study of the Scriptures is the +possibility which now exists of arranging the manuscripts of the Bible in +approximately chronological order and then tracing through them the +unfolding growth of the faiths and hopes which come to their flower in +the Gospel of Christ. Consider, for example, the exhilarating story of +the developing conception of Jehovah's character from the time he was +worshiped as a mountain-god in the desert until he became known as the +"God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." + +We are explicitly told that the history of Jehovah's relationship with +Israel began at Sinai and that before that time the Hebrew fathers had +never even heard his name.[6] There on a mountain-top in the Sinaitic +wilderness dwelt this new-found god, so anthropomorphically conceived +that he could hide Moses in a rock's cleft from which the prophet could +not see Jehovah's face but could see his back.[7] He was a god of battle +and the name of an old book about him still remains to us, "The book of +the Wars of Jehovah." [8] + + "Jehovah is a man of war: + Jehovah is his name"--[9] + +so his people at first rejoiced in him and gloried in his power when he +thundered and lightened on Sinai. Few stories in man's spiritual history +are so interesting as the record of the way in which this mountain-god, +for the first time, so far as we know, in Semitic history, left his +settled shrine, traveled with his people in the holy Ark, became +acclimated in Canaan, and, gradually absorbing the functions of the old +baals of the land, extended his sovereignty over the whole of Palestine. + +To be sure, even then he still was thought of, as all ancient gods were +thought of, as geographically limited to the country whose god he was. +Milcolm and Chemosh were real gods too, ruling in Philistia and Moab as +Jehovah did in Canaan. This is the meaning of Jephthah's protest to a +hostile chieftain: "Wilt not thou possess that which Chemosh thy god +giveth thee to possess?" [10] This is the meaning of David's protest +when he is driven out to the Philistine cities: "They have driven me out +this day that I should not cleave unto the inheritance of Jehovah, +saying, Go, serve other gods." [11] This is the meaning of Naaman's +desire to have two mules' burden of Jehovah's land on which to worship +Jehovah in Damascus.[12] Jehovah could be worshiped only on Jehovah's +land. But ever as the day of fuller understanding dawned, the +sovereignty of Jehovah widened and his power usurped the place and +function of all other gods. Amos saw him using the nations as his pawns; +Isaiah heard him whistling to the nations as a shepherd to his dogs; +Jeremiah heard him cry, "Can any hide himself in secret places so that I +shall not see him? . . . Do not I fill heaven and earth?" [13]; until at +last we sweep out, through the exile and all the heightening of faith and +clarifying of thought that came with it, into the Great Isaiah's 40th +chapter on the universal and absolute sovereignty of God, into the +Priestly narrative of creation, where God makes all things with a word, +into psalms which cry, + + "For all the gods of the people are idols; + But Jehovah made the heavens." [14] + +Moreover, as Jehovah's sovereignty thus is enlarged until he is the God +of all creation, his character too is deepened and exalted in the +understanding of his people. That noblest succession of moral teachers +in ancient history, the Hebrew prophets, developed a conception of the +nature of God in terms of righteousness, so broad in its outreach, so +high in its quality, that as one mounts through Amos' fifth chapter and +Isaiah's first chapter and Jeremiah's seventh chapter, he finds himself, +like Moses on Nebo's top, looking over into the Promised Land of the New +Testament. There this development flowers out under the influence of +Jesus. God's righteousness is interpreted, not in terms of justice only, +but of compassionate, sacrificial love; his Fatherhood embraces not only +all mankind but each individual, lifting him out of obscurity in the mass +into infinite worthfulness and hope. And more than this development of +idea, the New Testament gives us a new picture of God in the personality +of Jesus, and we see the light of the knowledge of God's glory in his +face. + +Moreover, this development, so plainly recorded in Scripture, was not +unconsciously achieved by the drift of circumstance; it represents the +ardent desire of forward-looking men, inspired by the Spirit. The +Master, himself, was consciously pleading for a progressive movement in +the religious life and thinking of his day. A static religion was the +last thing he ever dreamed of or wanted. No one was more reverent than +he toward his people's past; his thought and his speech were saturated +with the beauty of his race's heritage; yet consider his words as again +and again they fell from his lips: "It was said to them of old time . . . +but I say unto you." His life was rooted in the past but it was not +imprisoned there; it grew up out of the past, not destroying but +fulfilling it. He had in him the spirit of the prophets, who once had +spoken to his people in words of fire; but old forms that he thought had +been outgrown he brushed aside. He would not have his Gospel a patch on +an old garment, he said, nor would he put it like new wine into old +wineskins. He appealed from the oral traditions of the elders to the +written law; within the written law he distinguished between ceremonial +and ethical elements, making the former of small or no account, the +latter all-important; and then within the written ethical law he waived +provisions that seemed to him outmoded by time. Even when he bade +farewell to his disciples, he did not talk to them as if what he himself +had said were a finished system: "I have yet many things to say unto you, +but ye cannot bear them now. Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is +come, he shall guide you into all the truth." + +In Paul's hands the work which Jesus began went on. He dared an +adventurous move that makes much of our modern progressiveness look like +child's play: he lifted the Christian churches out of the narrow, +religious exclusiveness of the Hebrew synagogue. He dared to wage battle +for the new idea that Christianity was not a Jewish sect but a universal +religion. He withstood to his face Peter, still trammeled in the +narrowness of his Jewish thinking, and he founded churches across the +Roman Empire where was neither Jew nor Greek, barbarian, Scythian, male +nor female, bond nor free, but all were one man in Christ Jesus. + +Even more thrilling were those later days when in Ephesus the writer of +the Fourth Gospel faced a Hellenistic audience, to whom the forms of +thought in which Jesus hitherto had been interpreted were utterly unreal. +The first creed about Jesus proclaimed that he was the Messiah, but +Messiah was a Jewish term and to the folk of Ephesus it had no vital +meaning. John could not go on calling the Master that and that alone, +when he had hungry souls before him who needed the Master but to whom +Jewish terms had no significance. One thing those folk of Ephesus did +understand, the idea of the Logos. They had heard of that from the many +faiths whose pure or syncretized forms made the religious background of +their time. They knew about the Logos from Zoroastrianism, where beside +Ahura Mazdah stood Vohu Manah, the Mind of God; from Stoicism, at the +basis of whose philosophy lay the idea of the Logos; from Alexandrian +Hellenism, by means of which a Jew like Philo had endeavoured to marry +Greek philosophy and Hebrew orthodoxy. And the writer of the Fourth +Gospel used that new form of thought in which to present to his people +the personality of our Lord. "In the beginning was the Logos, and the +Logos was with God, and the Logos was God"--so begins the Fourth Gospel's +prologue, in words that every intelligent person in Ephesus could +understand and was familiar with, and that initial sermon in the book, +for it is a sermon, not philosophy, moves on in forms of thought which +the people knew about and habitually used, until the hidden purpose comes +to light: "The Logos became flesh and dwelt among us (and we beheld his +glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father), full of grace and +truth." John was presenting his Lord to the people of his time in terms +that the people could understand. + +Even within the New Testament, therefore, there is no static creed. For, +like a flowing river, the Church's thought of her Lord shaped itself to +the intellectual banks of the generation through which it moved, even +while, by its construction and erosion, it transfigured them. Nor did +this movement cease with New Testament days. From the Johannine idea of +the Logos to the Nicene Creed, where our Lord is set in the framework of +Greek metaphysics, the development is just as clear as from the category +of Jewish Messiah to the categories of the Fourth Gospel. And if, in our +generation, a conservative scholar like the late Dr. Sanday pleaded for +the necessity of a new Christology, it was not because he was primarily +zealous for a novel philosophy, but because like John of old in Ephesus +he was zealous to present Christ to his own generation in terms that his +own generation could comprehend.[15] + + +IV + +Undoubtedly such an outlook upon the fluid nature of the Christian +movement will demand readjustment in the religious thinking of many +people. They miss the old ideas about revelation. This new +progressiveness seems to them to be merely the story of man's discovery, +finding God, here a little and there a little, as he has found the truths +of astronomy. But God's revelation of himself is just as real when it is +conceived in progressive as when it is conceived in static terms. Men +once thought of God's creation of the world in terms of fiat--it was done +on the instant; and when evolution was propounded men cried that the +progressive method shut God out. We see now how false that fear was. +The creative activity of God never was so nobly conceived as it has been +since we have known the story of his slow unfolding of the universe. We +have a grander picture in our minds than even the psalmist had, when we +say after him, "The heavens declare the glory of God." So men who have +been accustomed to think of revelation in static terms, now that the long +leisureliness of man's developing spiritual insight is apparent, fear +that this does away with revelation. But in God's unfolding education of +his people recorded in the Scriptures revelation is at its noblest. No +man ever found God except when God was seeking to be found. Discovery is +the under side of the process; the upper side is revelation. + +Indeed, this conception of progressive revelation does not shut out +finality. In scientific thought, which continually moves and grows, +expands and changes, truths are discovered once for all. The work of +Copernicus is in a real sense final. This earth does move; it is not +stationary; and the universe is not geocentric. That discovery is final. +Many developments start from that, but the truth itself is settled once +for all. So, in the spiritual history of man, final revelations come. +They will not have to be made over again and they will not have to be +given up. Progress does not shut out finality; it only makes each new +finality a point of departure for a new adventure, not a terminus ad quem +for a conclusive stop. That God was in Christ reconciling the world unto +himself is for the Christian a finality, but, from the day the first +disciples saw its truth until now, the intellectual formulations in which +it has been set and the mental categories by which it has been +interpreted have changed with the changes of each age's thought. + +While at first, then, a progressive Christianity may seem to plunge us +into unsettlement, the more one studies it the less he would wish it +otherwise. Who would accept a snapshot taken at any point on the road of +Christian development as the final and perfect form of Christianity? +Robert Louis Stevenson has drawn for us a picture of a man trying with +cords and pegs to stake out the shadow of an oak tree, expecting that +when he had marked its boundaries the shadow would stay within the limits +of the pegs. Yet all the while the mighty globe was turning around in +space. He could not keep a tree's shadow static on a moving earth. +Nevertheless, multitudes of people in their endeavour to build up an +infallibly settled creed have tried just such a hopeless task. They +forget that while a revelation _from_ God might conceivably be final and +complete, religion deals with a revelation _of_ God. God, the infinite +and eternal, from everlasting to everlasting, the source and crown and +destiny of all the universe--shall a man whose days are as grass rise up +to say that he has made a statement about him which will not need to be +revised? Rather, our prayer should be that the thought of God, the +meaning of God, the glory of God, the plans and purpose of God may expand +in our comprehension until we, who now see in a mirror, darkly, may see +face to face. "Le Dieu defini est le Dieu fini." + +This mistaken endeavour, in the interest of stability, to make a vital +movement static is not confined to religion. Those of us who love Wagner +remember the lesson of Die Meistersinger. Down in Nuremberg they had +standardized and conventionalized music. They had set it down in rules +and men like Beckmesser could not imagine that there was any music +permissible outside the regulations. Then came Walter von Stolzing. +Music to him was not a conventionality but a passion--not a rule, but a +life--and, when he sang, his melodies reached heights of beauty that +Beckmesser's rules did not provide for. It was Walter von Stolzing who +sang the Prize Song, and as the hearts of the people were stirred in +answer to its spontaneous melody, until all the population of Nuremberg +were singing its accumulating harmonies, poor Beckmesser on his +blackboard jotted down the rules which were being broken. Beckmesser +represents a static conception of life which endeavours to freeze +progress at a given point and call it infallible. But Beckmesser is +wrong. You cannot take things like music and religion and set them down +in final rules and regulations. They are life, and you have to let them +grow and flower and expand and reveal evermore the latent splendour at +their heart. + + +V + +Obviously, the point where this progressive conception of Christianity +comes into conflict with many widely accepted ideas is the abandonment +which it involves of an external and inerrant authority in matters of +religion. The marvel is that that idea of authority, which is one of the +historic curses of religion, should be regarded by so many as one of the +vital necessities of the faith. The fact is that religion by its very +nature is one of the realms to which external authority is least +applicable. In science people commonly suppose that they do not take +truth on any one's authority; they prove it. In business they do not +accept methods on authority; they work them out. In statesmanship they +no longer believe in the divine right of kings nor do they accept +infallible dicta handed down from above. But they think that religion is +delivered to them by authority and that they believe what they do believe +because a divine Church or a divine Book or a divine Man told them. + +In this common mode of thinking, popular ideas have the truth turned +upside down. The fact is that science, not religion, is the realm where +most of all we use external authority. They tell us that there are +millions of solar systems scattered through the fields of space. Is that +true? How do we know? We never counted them. We know only what the +authorities say. They tell us that the next great problem in science is +breaking up the atom to discover the incalculable resources of power +there waiting to be harnessed by our skill. Is that true? Most of us do +not understand what an atom is, and what it means to break one up passes +the farthest reach of our imaginations; all we know is what the +authorities say. They tell us that electricity is a mode of motion in +ether. Is that true? Most of us have no first hand knowledge about +electricity. The motorman calls it "juice" and that means as much to us +as to call it a mode of motion in ether; we must rely on the authorities. +They tell us that sometime we are going to talk through wireless +telephones across thousands of miles, so that no man need ever be out of +vocal communication with his family and friends. Is that true? It seems +to us an incredible miracle, but we suppose that it is so, as the +authorities say. In a word, the idea that we do not use authority in +science is absurd. Science is precisely the place where nine hundred and +ninety-nine men out of a thousand use authority the most. The chemistry, +biology, geology, astronomy which the authorities teach is the only +science which most of us possess. + +There is another realm, however, where we never think of taking such an +attitude. They tell us that friendship is beautiful. Is that true? +Would we ever think of saying that we do not know, ourselves, but that we +rely on the authorities? Far better to say that our experience with +friendship has been unhappy and that we personally question its utility! +That, at least, would have an accent of personal, original experience in +it. For here we are facing a realm where we never can enter at all until +we enter, each man for himself. + +Two realms exist, therefore, in each of which first-hand experience is +desirable, but in only one of which it is absolutely indispensable. We +can live on what the authorities in physics say, but there are no proxies +for the soul. Love, friendship, delight in music and in nature, parental +affection--these things are like eating and breathing; no one can do them +for us; we must enter the experience for ourselves. Religion, too, +belongs in this last realm. The one vital thing in religion is +first-hand, personal experience. Religion is the most intimate, inward, +incommunicable fellowship of the human soul. In the words of Plotinus, +religion is "the flight of the alone to the Alone." You never know God +at all until you know him for yourself. The only God you ever will know +is the God you do know for yourself. + +This does not mean, of course, that there are no authorities in religion. +There are authorities in everything, but the function of an authority in +religion, as in every other vital realm, is not to take the place of our +eyes, seeing in our stead and inerrantly declaring to us what it sees; +the function of an authority is to bring to us the insight of the world's +accumulated wisdom and the revelations of God's seers, and so to open our +eyes that we may see, each man for himself. So an authority in +literature does not say to his students: The Merchant of Venice is a +great drama; you may accept my judgment on that--I know. Upon the +contrary, he opens their eyes; he makes them see; he makes their hearts +sensitive so that the genius which made Shylock and Portia live +captivates and subdues them, until like the Samaritans they say, "Now we +believe, not because of thy speaking: for we have heard for ourselves, +and know." That is the only use of authority in a vital, realm. It can +lead us up to the threshold of a great experience where we must enter, +each man for himself, and that service to the spiritual life is the +Bible's inestimable gift. + +At the beginning, Christianity was just such a first-hand experience as +we have described. The Christian fellowship consisted of a group of men +keeping company with Jesus and learning how to live. They had no creeds +to recite when they met together; what they believed was still an +unstereotyped passion in their hearts. They had no sacraments to +distinguish their faith--baptism had been a Jewish rite and even the +Lord's Supper was an informal use of bread and wine, the common elements +of their daily meal. They had no organizations to join; they never +dreamed that the Christian Gospel would build a church outside the +synagogue. Christianity in the beginning was an intensely personal +experience. + +Then the Master went away and the tremendous forces of human life and +history laid hold on the movement which so vitally he had begun. His +followers began building churches. Just as the Wesleyans had to leave +the Church of England, not because they wanted to, but because the +Anglicans would not keep them, so the Christians, not because they +planned to, but because the synagogue was not large enough to hold them, +had to leave the synagogue. They began building creeds; they had to. +Every one of the first Christian creeds was written in sheer +self-defense. If we had been Christians in those first centuries, when a +powerful movement was under way called Gnosticism, which denied that God, +the Father Almighty, had made both the heaven and the earth, which said +that God had made heaven indeed but that a demigod had made the world, +and which denied that Jesus had been born in the flesh and in the flesh +had died, we would have done what the first Christians did: we would have +defined in a creed what it was the Christians did believe as against that +wild conglomeration of Oriental mythology that Gnosticism was, and we +would have shouted the creed as a war cry against the Gnostics. That is +what the so-called Apostles' Creed was--the first Christian battle chant, +a militant proclamation of the historic faith against the heretics; and +every one of its declarations met with a head-on collision some claim of +Gnosticism. Then, too, the early Christians drew up rituals; they had +to. We cannot keep any spiritual thing in human life, even the spirit of +courtesy, as a disembodied wraith. We ritualize it--we bow, we take off +our hats, we shake hands, we rise when a lady enters. We have +innumerable ways of expressing politeness in a ritual. Neither could +they have kept so deep and beautiful a thing as the Christian life +without such expression. + +So historic Christianity grew, organized, creedalized, ritualized. And +ever as it grew, a peril grew with it, for there were multitudes of +people who joined these organizations, recited these creeds, observed +these rituals, took all the secondary and derived elements of +Christianity, but often forgot that vital thing which all this was meant +in the first place to express: a first-hand, personal experience of God +in Christ. That alone is vital in Christianity; all the rest is once or +twice or thrice removed from life. For Christianity is not a creed, nor +an organization, nor a ritual. These are important but they are +secondary. They are the leaves, not the roots; they are the wires, not +the message. Christianity itself is a life. + +If, however, Christianity is thus a life, we cannot stereotype its +expressions in set and final forms. If it is a life in fellowship with +the living God, it will think new thoughts, build new organizations, +expand into new symbolic expressions. We cannot at any given time write +"finis" after its development. We can no more "keep the faith" by +stopping its growth than we can keep a son by insisting on his being +forever a child. The progressiveness of Christianity is not simply its +response to a progressive age; the progressiveness of Christianity +springs from its own inherent vitality. So far is this from being +regrettable, that a modern Christian rejoices in it and gladly recognizes +not only that he is thinking thoughts and undertaking enterprises which +his fathers would not have understood, but also that his children after +him will differ quite as much in teaching and practice from the modernity +of to-day. It has been the fashion to regard this changeableness with +wistful regret. So Wordsworth sings in his sonnet on Mutability: + + "Truth fails not; but her outward forms that bear + The longest date do melt like frosty rime, + That in the morning whitened hill and plain + And is no more; drop like the tower sublime + Of yesterday, which royally did wear + Its crown of weeds, but could not even sustain + Some casual shout that broke the silent air, + Or the unimaginable touch of Time." + +Such wistfulness, however, while a natural sentiment, is not true to the +best Christian thought of our day. He who believes in the living God, +while he will be far from calling all change progress, and while he will, +according to his judgment, withstand perverse changes with all his might, +will also regard the cessation of change as the greatest calamity that +could befall religion. Stagnation in thought or enterprise means death +for Christianity as certainly as it does for any other vital movement. +Stagnation, not change, is Christianity's most deadly enemy, for this is +a progressive world, and in a progressive world no doom is more certain +than that which awaits whatever is belated, obscurantist and reactionary. + + + +[1] Leonard Huxley: Scott's Last Expedition, Vol. I, The Journals of +Captain R. F. Scott, Rn., C. V. O., p. 417. + +[2] Kirby Page; The Sword or the Cross, p. 41. + +[3] Tertullian: De Virginibus Velandis, Cap. I--"Regula quidem fidei una +omnino est, sola immobilis et irreformabilis." + +[4] Vatican Council, July 18, 1870, First Dogmatic Constitution on the +Church of Christ, Chapter IV, Concerning the Infallible Teaching of the +Roman Pontiff. + +[5] The Papal Syllabus of Errors, A. D. 1864, Sec. 1, 5. + +[6] Exodus 6:3; Chap. 19. + +[7] Exodus 33:22-23. + +[8] Numbers 21:14. + +[9] Exodus 15:3. + +[10] Judges 11:24. + +[11] I Samuel 26:19. + +[12] II Kings 5:17. + +[13] Jeremiah 23:24. + +[14] Psalm 96:5. + +[15] William Sanday: Christologies Ancient and Modern. + + + + +LECTURE V + +THE PERILS OF PROGRESS + +I + +In the history of human thought and social organization there is an +interesting pendular swing between conflicting ideas so that, about the +time we wake up to recognize that thought is swinging one way, we may +be fairly sure that soon it will be swinging the other. Man's social +organization, for example, has moved back and forth between the two +poles of individual liberty and social solidarity. To pick up the +swing of that pendulum only in recent times, we note that out of the +social solidarity of the feudal system man swung over to the individual +liberty of the free cities; then from the individual liberty of the +free cities to the social solidarity of the absolute monarchies; then +back again into the individual liberty of the democratic states. We +see that now we are clearly swinging over to some new form of social +solidarity, of which tendency federalism and socialism are expressions, +and doubtless from that we shall recoil toward individual liberty once +more. It is a safe generalization that whenever human thought shows +some decided trend, a corrective movement is not far away. However +enthusiastic we may be, therefore, about the idea of progress and the +positive contributions which it can make to our understanding and +mastery of life, we may be certain that there are in it the faults of +its qualities. If we take it without salt, our children will rise up, +not to applaud our far-seeing wisdom, but to blame our easy-going +credulity. We have already seen that the very idea of progress sprang +up in recent times in consequence of a few factors which predisposed +men's minds to social hopefulness. Fortunately, some of these factors, +such as the scientific control of life through the knowledge of law, +seem permanent, and we are confident that the idea of progress will +have abiding meaning for human thought and life. But no study of the +matter could be complete without an endeavour to discern the perils in +this modern mode of thought and to guard ourselves against accepting as +an unmixed blessing what is certainly, like all things human, a blend +of good and evil. + +One peril involved in the popular acceptance of the idea of progress +has been the creation of a superficial, ill-considered optimism which +has largely lost sight of the terrific obstacles in human nature +against which any real moral advance on earth must win its way. Too +often we have taken for granted what a recent book calls "a goal of +racial perfection and nobility the splendour of which it is beyond our +powers to conceive," and we have dreamed about this earthly paradise +like a saint having visions of heaven and counting it as won already +because he is predestined to obtain it. Belief in inevitable progress +has thus acted as an opiate on many minds, lulling them into an elysium +where all things come by wishing and where human ignorance and folly, +cruelty and selfishness do not impede the peaceful flowing of their +dreams. In a word, the idea of progress has blanketed the sense of +sin. Lord Morley spoke once of "that horrid burden and impediment upon +the soul which the Churches call Sin, and which, by whatever name you +call it, is a real catastrophe in the moral nature of man." The modern +age, busy with slick, swift schemes for progress, has too largely lost +sight of that. + +Indeed, at no point do modern Christians differ more sharply from their +predecessors than in the serious facing of the problem of sin. +Christians of former times were burdened with a heavy sense of their +transgressions, and their primary interest in the Gospel was its +promised reestablishment of their guilty souls in the fellowship of a +holy God. Modern Christianity, however, is distinguished from all that +by a jaunty sense of moral well-being; when we admit our sins we do it +with complacency and cheerfulness; our religion is generally +characterized by an easy-going self-righteousness. Bunyan's Pilgrim +with his lamentable load upon his back, crying, "What shall I do! . . . +I am . . . undone by reason of a burden that lieth hard upon me," is no +fit symbol of a typically modern Christian. + +Doubtless we have cause to be thankful for this swing away from the +morbid extremes to which our fathers often went in their sense of sin. +It is hard to forgive Jonathan Edwards when one reads in his famous +Enfield sermon: "The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as +one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect, over the fire, abhors +you, and is dreadfully provoked; . . . you are ten thousand times so +abominable in his eyes, as the most hateful and venomous serpent is in +ours." Any one who understands human nature could have told him that, +after such a black exaggeration of human depravity as he and his +generation were guilty of, the Christian movement was foredoomed to +swing away over to the opposite extreme of complacent +self-righteousness. Unquestionably we have made the swing. In spite +of the debacle of the Great War, this is one of the most unrepentant +generations that ever walked the earth, dreaming still of automatic +progress toward an earthly paradise. + +Many factors have gone into the making of this modern mood of +self-complacency. _New knowledge_ has helped, by which disasters, such +as once awakened our fathers' poignant sense of sin, are now attributed +to scientific causes rather than to human guilt. When famines or +pestilences came, our fathers thought them God's punishment for sin. +When earthquakes shook the earth or comets hung threateningly in the +sky, our fathers saw in them a divine demand for human penitence. Such +events, referred now to their scientific causes, do not quicken in us a +sense of sin. _New democracy_ also has helped in this development of +self-complacency. Under autocratic kings the common people were common +people and they knew it well. Their dependent commonality was enforced +on them by the constant pressure of their social life. Accustomed to +call themselves miserable worms before an earthly king, they had no +qualms about so estimating themselves before the King of Heaven. +Democracy, however, elevates us into self-esteem. The genius of +democracy is to believe in men, their worth, their possibilities, their +capacities for self-direction. Once the dominant political ideas +depressed men into self-contempt; now they lift men into +self-exaltation. _New excuses for sin_ have aided in creating our mood +of self-content. We know more than our fathers did about the effect of +heredity and environment on character, and we see more clearly that +some souls are not born but damned into the world. Criminals, in +consequence, have come not to be so much condemned as pitied, their +perversion of character is regarded not so much in terms of iniquity as +of disease, and as we thus condone transgression in others, so in +ourselves we palliate our wrong. We regard it as the unfortunate but +hardly blamable consequence of temperament or training. Our fathers, +who thought that the trouble was the devil in them, used to deal +sternly with themselves. Like Chinese Gordon, fighting a besetting sin +in private prayer, they used to come out from their inward struggles +saying, "I hewed Agag in pieces before the Lord." But we are softer +with ourselves; we find in lack of eugenics or in cruel circumstance a +good excuse. + +Undoubtedly, the _new theology_ has helped to encourage this modern +mood of self-complacency. Jonathan Edwards' Enfield sermon pictured +sinners held over the blazing abyss of hell in the hands of a wrathful +deity who at any moment was likely to let go, and so terrific was that +discourse in its delivery that women fainted and strong men clung in +agony to the pillars of the church. Obviously, we do not believe in +that kind of God any more, and as always in reaction we swing to the +opposite extreme, so in the theology of these recent years we have +taught a very mild, benignant sort of deity. One of our popular +drinking songs sums up this aspect of our new theology: + + "God is not censorious + When His children have their fling." + +Indeed, the god of the new theology has not seemed to care acutely +about sin; certainly he has not been warranted to punish heavily; he +has been an indulgent parent and when we have sinned, a polite "Excuse +me" has seemed more than adequate to make amends. John Muir, the +naturalist, was accustomed during earthquake shocks in California to +assuage the anxieties of perturbed Eastern visitors by saying that it +was only Mother Earth trotting her children on her knee. Such +poetizing is quite in the style of the new theology. Nevertheless, the +description, however pretty, is not an adequate account of a real +earthquake, and in this moral universe there are real earthquakes, as +this generation above all others ought to know, when man's sin, his +greed, his selfishness, his rapacity roll up across the years an +accumulating mass of consequence until at last in a mad collapse the +whole earth crashes into ruin. The moral order of the world has not +been trotting us on her knees these recent years; the moral order of +the world has been dipping us in hell; and because the new theology had +not been taking account of such possibilities, had never learned to +preach on that text in the New Testament, "It is a fearful thing to +fall into the hands of the living God," we were ill prepared for the +experience. + +Many factors like those which we have named have contributed to create +our modern negligence of the problem of sin, but under all of them and +permeating them has been the idea that automatic progress is inherent +in the universe. This evolving cosmos has been pictured as a +fool-proof world where men could make and love their lies, with their +souls dead and their stomachs well alive, with selfish profit the +motive of their economic order and narrow nationalism the slogan of +their patriotism, and where still, escaping the consequences, they +could live in a progressive society. A recent writer considers it +possible that "over the crest of the hill the Promised Land stretches +away to the far horizons smiling in eternal sunshine." The picture is +nonsense. All the progress this world ever will know waits upon the +conquest of sin. Strange as it may sound to the ears of this modern +age, long tickled by the amiable idiocies of evolution popularly +misinterpreted, this generation's deepest need is not these dithyrambic +songs about inevitable progress, but a fresh sense of personal and +social sin. + +What the scientific doctrine of evolution really implies is something +much more weighty and sinister than frothy optimism. When a preacher +now quotes Paul, "as in Adam all die," not many of the younger +generation understand him, but when we are told that we came out of +low, sub-human beginnings, that we carry with us yet the bestial +leftovers of an animal heritage to be fought against and overcome and +left behind, well-instructed members of this generation ought to +comprehend. Yet in saying that, we are dealing with the same +fundamental fact which Paul was facing when he said, "as in Adam all +die"; we are handling the same unescapable experience out of which the +old doctrine of original sin first came; we are facing a truth which it +will not pay us to forget: that humanity's sinful nature is not +something which you and I alone make up by individual deeds of wrong, +but that it is an inherited mortgage and handicap on the whole human +family. Why is it that if we let a field run wild it goes to weeds, +while if we wish wheat we must fight for every grain of it? Why is it +that if we let human nature run loose it goes to evil, while he who +would be virtuous must struggle to achieve character? It is because, +in spite of our optimisms and evasions, that fact still is here, which +our fathers often appraised more truly than we, that human nature, with +all its magnificent possibilities, is like the earth's soil filled with +age-long seeds and roots of evil growth, and that progress in goodness, +whether personal or social, must be achieved by grace of some power +which can give us the victory over our evil nature. + +In past generations it was the preachers who talked most about sin and +thundered against it from their pulpits, but now for years they have +been very reticent about it. Others, however, have not been still. +Scientists have made us feel the ancient heritage that must be fought +against; novelists have written no great novel that does not swirl +around some central sin; the work of the dramatists from Shakespeare +until Ibsen is centrally concerned with the problem of human evil; and +now the psycho-analysts are digging down into the unremembered thoughts +of men to bring up into the light of day the origins of our spiritual +miseries in frustrated and suppressed desire. We do not need +artificially to conjure up a sense of sin. All we need to do is to +open our eyes to facts. Take one swift glance at the social state of +the world to-day. Consider our desperate endeavours to save this +rocking civilization from the consequences of the blow just delivered +it by men's iniquities. That should be sufficient to indicate that +this is no fool-proof universe automatically progressive, but that +moral evil is still the central problem of mankind. + +One would almost say that the first rule for all who believe in a +progressive world is not to believe in it too much. Long ago Plato +said that he drove two horses, one white and tractable, the other black +and fractious; Jesus said that two masters sought man's allegiance, one +God, the other mammon; Paul said that his soul was the battle-ground of +two forces, one of which he called spirit and the other flesh; and only +the other day one of our own number told of the same struggle between +two men in each of us, one Dr. Jekyll, the other Mr. Hyde. That +conflict still is pivotal in human history. The idea of progress can +defeat itself no more surely than by getting itself so believed that +men expect automatic social advance apart from the conquest of personal +and social sin. + + +II + +Another result of our superficial confidence in the idea of progress is +reliance upon social palliatives instead of radical cures for our +public maladies. We are so predisposed to think that the world +inherently wants to be better, is inwardly straining to be better, that +we are easily fooled into supposing that some slight easement of +external circumstance will at once release the progressive forces of +mankind and save the race. When, for example, one compares the immense +amount of optimistic expectancy about a warless world with the small +amount of radical thinking as to what really is the matter with us, he +may well be amazed at the unfounded regnancy of the idea of progress. +We rejoice over some slight disarmament as though that were the cure of +our international shame, whereas always one can better trust a real +Quaker with a gun than a thug without one. So the needs of our +international situation, involving external disarmament, to be sure, +involve also regenerations of thought and spirit much more radical than +any rearrangement of outward circumstance. To forget that is to lose +the possibility of real progress; and insight into these deep-seated +needs is often dimmed by our too amiable and innocent belief in +automatic social advance waiting to take place on the slightest excuse. + +To take but a single illustration of a radical change in men's +thinking, difficult to achieve and yet indispensable to a decent world, +consider the group of prejudices and passions which center about +nationalism and which impede the real progress of international +fraternity. What if all Christians took Jesus in earnest in his +attitude that only one object on earth is worthy of the absolute +devotion of a man--the will of God for all mankind--and that therefore +no nationality nor patriotism whatsoever should be the highest object +of man's loyalty? That ought to be an axiom to us, who stood with the +Allies against Germany. Certainly, we condemned Germany roundly enough +because so many of her teachers exalted the state as an object of +absolute loyalty. When in Japan one sees certain classes of people +regarding the Mikado as divine and rating loyalty to him as their +highest duty, it is easy to condemn that. When, however, a man says in +plain English: I am an American but I am a Christian first and I am an +American only in the sense in which I can be an American, being first +of all a Christian, and my loyalty to America does not begin to compare +with my superior loyalty to God's will for all mankind and, if ever +national action makes these two things conflict, I must choose God and +not America--to the ears of many that plain statement has a tang of +newness and danger. In the background of even Christian minds, Jesus +to the contrary notwithstanding, one finds the tacit assumption, +counted almost too sacred to be examined, that of course a man's first +loyalty is to his nation. + +Indeed, we Protestants ought to feel a special responsibility for this +nationalism that so takes the place of God. In medieval and Catholic +Europe folk did not so think of nationalism. Folk in medieval Europe +were taught that their highest obligation was to God or, as they would +have phrased it, to the Church; that the Church could at any time +dispense them from any obligation to king or nation; that the Church +could even make the king, the symbol of the nation, stand three days in +the snow outside the Pope's door at Canossa. Every boy and girl in +medieval Europe was taught that his first duty was spiritual and that +no nationality nor patriotism could compare with that. Then we +Protestants began our battle for spiritual liberty against the tyranny +of Rome, and as one of the most potent agencies in the winning of our +battle we helped to develop the spirit of nationality. In place of the +Holy Roman Church we put state churches. In place of devotion to the +Vatican we were tempted to put devotion to the nation. Luther did more +than write spiritual treatises; he sent out ringing, patriotic appeals +to the German nobility against Rome. It is not an accident that +absolute nationalism came to its climacteric in Germany where +Protestantism began. For Protestantism, without ever intending it, as +an unexpected by-product of its fight for spiritual liberty, helped to +break up western Europe into nations, where nationalism absorbed the +loyalty of the people. And now that little tiger cub we helped to rear +has become a great beast and its roaring shakes the earth. + +A superficial confidence in automatic progress, therefore, which +neglects an elemental fact like this at the root of our whole +international problem is futile; it leads nowhere; it is rose water +prescribed for leprosy. The trouble with nationalism is profound and +this is the gist of it: we may be unselfish personally, but we group +ourselves into social units called nations, where we, being +individually unselfish with reference to the group, are satisfied with +ourselves, but where all the time the group itself is not unselfish, +but, it may be, is aggressively and violently avaricious. Yet to most +people our sacrificial loyalty to the nation would pass for virtue, +even though the nation as a whole were exploiting its neighbours or +waging a useless, unjust war. The loyalty of Germans to Germany may be +rated as the loftiest goodness no matter what Germany as a whole is +doing, and the loyalty of Americans to America may be praised as the +very passport to heaven while America as a whole may be engaged in a +nationally unworthy enterprise. The fine spirit of men's devotion +within the limits of the group disguises the ultimate selfishness of +the whole procedure and cloaks a huge sin under a comparatively small +unselfishness. + +We can see that same principle at work in our industrial situation. We +break up into two groups; we are trades unionists or associated +employers. We are unselfish so far as our group is concerned; we make +it a point of honour to support our economic class; it is part of our +code of duty to be loyal there. But while we are thus unselfish with +reference to the group, the group itself is not unselfish; the group +itself is fighting a bitter and selfish conflict, avaricious and often +cruel. There is no ultimate way out of this situation which does not +include the activity of people who have a loyalty that is greater than +their groups. Henry George was once introduced at Cooper Institute, +New York City, by a chairman who, wishing to curry favour with the +crowd, called out with a loud voice, "Henry George, the friend of the +workingman." George stood up and sternly began, "I am not the friend +of the workingman"; then after a strained silence, "and I am not the +friend of the capitalist"; then after another silence, "I am for men; +men simply as men, regardless of any accidental or superficial +distinctions of race, creed, colour, class, or yet function or +employment." Until we can get that larger loyalty into the hearts of +men, all the committees on earth cannot solve our industrial problems. + +Nor can anything else make it possible to solve our international +problem. The curse of nationalism is that, having pooled the +unselfishness of persons in one group under one national name and of +persons in another group under another national name, it uses this +beautiful unselfishness of patriotism to carry out national enterprises +that are fundamentally selfish. One element, therefore, is +indispensable in any solution: enough Christians, whether they call +themselves by that name or not, who have caught Jesus' point of view +that only one loyalty on earth is absolute--the will of God for all +mankind. This last summer I spent one Sunday night in the home of Mr. +Ozaki, perhaps the leading liberal of Japan, a man who stands in danger +of assassination any day for his international attitude. Suddenly he +turned on me and said, "If the United States should go into a war which +you regarded as unjust and wrong, what would you do?" I had to answer +him swiftly and I had to give him the only answer that a Christian +minister could give and keep his self-respect. I said, "If the United +States goes into a war which I think is unjust and wrong, I will go +into my pulpit the next Sunday morning and in the name of God denounce +that war and take the consequence." Surely, a man does not have to be +a theoretical pacifist, which I am not, to see how indispensable that +attitude is to a Christian. There is hardly anything more needed now +in the international situation than a multitude of people who will sit +in radical judgment on the actions of their governments, so that when +the governments of the world begin to talk war they will know that +surely they must face a mass of people rising up to say: War? Why war? +We are no longer dumb beasts to be led to the slaughter; we no longer +think that any state on earth is God Almighty. If, however, we are to +have that attitude strong enough so that it will stand the strain of +mob psychology and the fear of consequences, it must be founded deep, +as was Jesus' attitude: one absolute loyalty to the will of God for all +mankind. So far from hurting true patriotism, this attitude would be +the making of patriotism. It would purge patriotism from all its +peril, would exalt it, purify it, make of it a blessing, not a curse. +But whatever be the effect upon patriotism, the Christian is committed +by the Master to a prior loyalty; he is a citizen of the Kingdom of God +in all the earth. + +An easy-going belief in inherent and inevitable progress, therefore, is +positively perilous in the manifoldly complex social situation, from +which only the most careful thinking and the most courageous living +will ever rescue us. The Christian Church is indeed entrusted, in the +message of Jesus, with the basic principles of life which the world +needs, but the clarity of vision which sees their meaning and the +courage of heart which will apply them are not easy to achieve. Some +of us have felt that acutely these last few years; all of us should +have learned that whatever progress is wrought out upon this planet +will be sternly fought for and hardly won. Belief in the idea of +progress does not mean that this earth is predestined to drift into +Paradise like thistledown before an inevitable wind. + + +III + +A third peril associated with the idea of progress is quite as +widespread as the other two and in some ways more insidious. The idea +is prevalent that progress involves the constant supersession of the +old by the new so that we, who have appeared thus late in human history +and are therefore the heirs "of all the ages, in the foremost files of +time," may at once assume our superiority to the ancients. The modern +man, living in a world supposedly progressing from early crude +conditions toward perfection, has shifted the golden age from the past +to the future, and in so doing has placed himself in much closer +proximity to it than his ancestors were. The world is getting +better--such is the common assumption which is naturally associated +with the idea of progress. As one enthusiastic sponsor of this +proposition puts it: + + +"Go back ten years, and there was no airship; fifteen years, and there +was no wireless telegraphy; twenty-five years, and there was no +automobile; forty years, and there was no telephone, and no electric +light; sixty years, and there was no photograph, and no sewing machine; +seventy-five years, no telegraph; one hundred years, no railway and no +steamship; one hundred and twenty-five years, no steam engine; two +hundred years, no post-office; three hundred years, no newspaper; five +hundred years, no printing press; one thousand years, no compass, and +ships could not go out of sight of land; two thousand years, no writing +paper, but parchments of skin and tablets of wax and clay. Go back far +enough and there were no plows, no tools, no iron, no cloth; people ate +acorns and roots and lived in caves and went naked or clothed +themselves in the skins of wild beasts." [1] + + +Such is the picture of human history upon this planet which occupies +the modern mind, and one implication often drawn is that we have +outgrown the ancients and that they might well learn from us and not we +from them. + +Christians, however, center their allegiance around ideas and +personalities which are, from the modern standpoint, very old indeed. +The truths that were wrought out in the developing life and faith of +the Hebrew-Christian people are still the regulative Christian truths, +and the personality who crowned the whole development is still the +Christians' Lord. They are challenged, however, to maintain this in a +progressive world. Men do not think of harking back to ancient +Palestine nineteen centuries ago for their business methods, their +educational systems, their scientific opinions, or anything else in +ordinary life whatever. Then why go back to ancient Palestine for the +chief exemplar of the spiritual life? This is a familiar modern +question which springs directly from popular interpretations of +progress. + + "Dim tracts of time divide + Those golden days from me; + Thy voice comes strange o'er years of change; + How can I follow Thee? + + "Comes faint and far Thy voice + From vales of Galilee; + Thy vision fades in ancient shades; + How should we follow Thee?" [2] + + +Behind this familiar mood lies one of the most significant changes that +has ever passed over the human mind. The medieval age was tempted to +look backward for its knowledge of everything. Philosophy was to be +found in Aristotle, science in Pliny and his like. It was the ancients +who were wise; it was the ancients who had understood nature and had +known God. The farther back you went the nearer you came to the +venerable and the authoritative. As, therefore, in every other realm +folk looked back for knowledge, so it was most natural that they should +look back for their religion, too. To find philosophy in Aristotle and +to find spiritual life in Christ required not even the turning of the +head. In all realms the age in its search for knowledge was facing +backwards. It was a significant hour in the history of human thought +when that attitude began to give way. The scandal caused by Alessandro +Tassoni's attacks on Homer and Aristotle in the early seventeenth +century resounded through Europe. He advanced the new and astonishing +idea that, so far from having degenerated since ancient times, the race +had advanced and that the moderns were better than their sires. This +new idea prevailed as belief in progress grew. It met, however, with +violent opposition, and the remnants of that old controversy are still +to be found in volumes like George Hakewill's five hundred page folio +published in 1627 on "the common errour touching Nature's perpetuall +and universall decay." [3] But from the seventeenth century on the +idea gained swift ascendency that the human race, like an individual, +is growing up, that humanity is becoming wiser with the years, that we +can know more than Aristotle and Pliny, that we should look, not back +to the ancients, but rather to ourselves and to our offspring, for the +real wisdom which maturity achieves. Once what was old seemed wise and +established; what was new seemed extempore and insecure: now what is +old seems outgrown; what is new seems probable and convincing. Such is +the natural and prevalent attitude in a world where the idea of +progress is in control. Nor can the applications of this idea to the +realm of religion be evaded. If we would not turn back to Palestine +nineteen centuries ago for anything else, why should we turn back to +find there the Master of our spiritual life? In a word, our modern +belief in progress, popularly interpreted, leads multitudes of people +to listen with itching ears for every new thing, while they condescend +to all that is old in religion, and in particular conclude that, while +Jesus lived a wonderful life for his own day, that was a long time ago +and surely we must be outgrowing him. + +That this attitude is critically perilous to the integrity of the +Christian movement will at once be obvious to any one whose own +spiritual experience is centered in Christ. From the beginning until +now the faith of Christian people has been primarily directed, not to a +set of abstract principles, nor to a set of creedal definitions, but to +a Person. Christians have been people believing in Jesus Christ. This +abiding element has put unity into Christian history. The stream of +Christian thought and progress has never been twice the same, yet for +all that it has been a continuous stream and not an aimless, sprawling +flood, and this unity and consistency have existed for one reason +chiefly: the influence of the personality of Jesus. Folk may have been +Romanists or Protestants, ritualists or Quakers, reactionaries or +progressives, but still they have believed in Jesus. His personality +has been the sun around which even in their differences they have swung +like planets in varying orbits. Take the personality of Jesus out of +Christian history and what you have left is chaos. + +Moreover, it is the personality of Jesus that has been the source of +Christianity's transforming influence on character. Ask whence has +come that power over the spirits of men which we recognize as +Christianity at its mightiest and best, and the origin must be sought, +not primarily in our theologies or rubrics or churches, but in the +character and spirit of Jesus. He himself is the central productive +source of power in Christianity. We have come so to take this for +granted that we do not half appreciate the wonder of it. This +personality, who so has mastered men, was born sixty generations ago in +a small village in an outlying Roman province, and until he was thirty +years of age he lived and worked as a carpenter among his fellow +townsfolk, attracting no wide consideration. Then for three years or +less he poured out his life in courageous teaching and sacrificial +service, amid the growing hatred and hostility of his countrymen, until +he was put to death by crucifixion "because he stirred up the people." +Anatole France, in one of his stories, represents Pilate in his later +years as trying to remember the trial and death of Jesus and being +barely able to recall it. That incident had been so much a part of the +day's work in governing a province like Judea that it had all but +escaped his recollection. Such a representation of the case is not +improbable. It is easy so to tell the story of Jesus' life as to make +his continued influence seem incredible. None would have supposed that +nineteen centuries after his death, Lecky, the historian of European +morals, would say, "The simple record of three short years of active +life has done more to regenerate and to soften mankind than all the +disquisitions of philosophers, and all the exhortations of moralists." +[4] None would have thought that sixty generations after he was gone, +Montefiori, a Jew, putting his finger on the source of Christianity's +power, would light upon the phrase "For the sake of Jesus," and would +cry: "Of what fine lives and deaths has not this motive been the spring +and the sustainment!" [5] None would have thought that so long after +Calvary seemed to end forever the power of Jesus, one of the race's +greatest men, David Livingstone, engaged in one of the race's most +courageous enterprises, breaking his way into the untraveled jungles of +Africa, would sing as he went, for so his journal says he did, + + "Jesus, the very thought of Thee + With sweetness fills my breast"? + +Take the personality of the Master out of Christian history and we have +robbed it of its central moral power. + +Moreover, the personality of Jesus has always been the standard of +reformation when Christianity has become recreant or laggard or +corrupt. A man named John Wilkes started a political movement in +England in the eighteenth century, and around him sprang up a party who +called themselves Wilkites. These followers of Wilkes, however, went +to extremes so wild and perilous that poor John Wilkes himself had to +explain to everybody that, as for him, he was not a Wilkite. This +lapse of a movement from the original intention of its founder is +familiar in history and nowhere is it more clearly illustrated than in +Christianity. The Master, watching Western Christendom today, with all +our hatred, bitterness, war, would have to say, If this is +Christianity, then I am not a Christian. The Master, wandering through +our cathedrals with their masses, waxen images and votive gifts, or +through our Protestant churches with their fine-spun speculations +insisted on as necessary to belief if one is to be a child of grace, +would have to say, If this is Christianity, then I am not a Christian. +Indeed, just this sort of service the Master always has been rendering +his movement; he is the perennial rebuke of all that is degenerate and +false in Christianity. Whenever reform has come, whenever real +Christianity has sprung up again through the false and superficial, the +movement has been associated with somebody's rediscovery of Jesus +Christ. Saint Francis of Assisi rediscovered him, and made a spot of +spiritual beauty at the heart of the medieval age. John Wesley +rediscovered him and his compassion for the outcast, and led the Church +into a new day of evangelism and philanthropy. William Carey +rediscovered him and his unbounded care for men, and blazed the trail +for a new era of expansive Christianity. And if today many of us are +deeply in earnest about the application of Christian principles to the +social life of men, it is because we have rediscovered him and the +spirit of his Good Samaritan. In an old myth, Antaeus, the child of +Earth, could be overcome when he was lifted from contact with the +ground but, whenever he touched again the earth from which he sprang, +his old power came back once more. Such is Christianity's relation +with Jesus Christ. If, therefore, the idea of progress involves the +modern man's condescension to the Master as the outgrown seer of an +ancient day, the idea of progress has given Christianity an incurable +wound. + +Before we surrender to such a popular interpretation of the meaning of +progress, we may well discriminate between two aspects of human life in +one of which we plainly have progressed, but in the other of which +progress is not so evident. In the Coliseum in ancient Rome centuries +ago, a group of Christians waited in the arena to be devoured by the +lions, and eighty thousand spectators watched their vigil. Those +Christians were plain folk--"not many mighty, not many noble"--and +every one of them could have escaped that brutal fate if he had been +willing to burn a little incense to the Emperor. Turn now to +ourselves, eighteen hundred years afterwards. We have had a long time +to outgrow the character and fidelity of those first Christians; do we +think that we have done so? As we imagine ourselves in their places, +are we ready with any glibness to talk about progress in character? +Those first Christians never had ridden in a trolley car; they never +had seen a subway; they never had been to a moving picture show; they +never had talked over a telephone. There are innumerable ways in which +we have progressed far beyond them. But character, fidelity, loyalty +to conscience and to God--are we sure of progress there? + +To hear some people talk, one would suppose that progress is simply a +matter of chronology. That one man or generation comes in time after +another is taken as sufficient evidence that the latter has of course +superseded the earlier. Do we mean that because Tennyson came after +Shelly he is therefore the greater poet? What has chronology to do +with spiritual quality and creativeness, which always must rise from +within, out of the abysmal depths of personality? Professor Gilbert +Murray, thinking primarily in a realm outside religion altogether, +chastises this cheap and superficial claim of advance in spiritual life: + + +"As to Progress, it is no doubt a real fact. To many of us it is a +truth that lies somewhere near the roots of our religion. But it is +never a straight march forward; it is never a result that happens of +its own accord. It is only a name for the mass of accumulated human +effort, successful here, baffled there, misdirected and driven astray +in a third region, but on the whole and in the main producing some +cumulative result. I believe this difficulty about Progress, this fear +that in studying the great teachers of the past we are in some sense +wantonly sitting at the feet of savages, causes real trouble of mind to +many keen students. The full answer to it would take us beyond the +limits of this paper and beyond my own range of knowledge. But the +main lines of the answer seem to me clear. There are in life two +elements, one transitory and progressive, the other comparatively if +not absolutely non-progressive and eternal, and the soul of man is +chiefly concerned with the second. Try to compare our inventions, our +material civilization, our stores of accumulated knowledge, with those +of the age of Aeschylus or Aristotle or St. Francis, and the comparison +is absurd. Our superiority is beyond question and beyond measure. But +compare any chosen poet of our age with Aeschylus, any philosopher with +Aristotle, any saintly preacher with St. Francis, and the result is +totally different. I do not wish to argue that we have fallen below +the standard of those past ages; but it is clear that we are not +definitely above them. The things of the spirit depend on will, on +effort, on aspiration, on the quality of the individual soul, and not +on discoveries and material advances which can be accumulated and added +up." [6] + + +Let any Christian preacher test out this matter and discover for +himself its truth. We are preachers of the Gospel in the twentieth +century. St. Francis of Assisi was a preacher of the Gospel in the +thirteenth century. We know many things which St. Francis and his +generation never could have known but, when we step back through that +outward change into the spirit of St. Francis himself, we must take the +shoes from off our feet, for the place whereon we stand is holy ground. +We may not talk in such an hour about progress in Christian character +in terms of chronology, for a modern minister might well pray to touch +the garment's hem of such a spirit as St. Francis had! When, then, one +speaks of outgrowing Jesus, one would do well to get a better reason +than simply the fact that he was born nineteen centuries ago. The +truth is that humanity has been upon this planet hundreds of thousands +of years, while our known history reaches back, and that very dimly, +through only some four or five thousand. In that known time there has +certainly been no biological development in man that any scientist has +yet discerned. Even the brain of man in the ice age was apparently as +large as ours. Moreover, within that period of history well known to +us, we can see many ups and downs of spiritual life, mountain peaks of +achievement in literature and art and religion, with deep valleys +intervening, but we cannot be sure that the mountain peaks now are +higher than they used to be. The art of the two centuries culminating +about 1530 represents a glorious flowering of creative genius, but it +was succeeded by over three centuries of descent to the abominations of +ugliness which the late eighteenth century produced. We have climbed +up a little since then, but not within distant reach of those lovers +and makers of beauty from whose hearts and hands the Gothic cathedrals +came. Progress in history has lain in the power of man to remember and +so to accumulate for general use the discoveries, both material and +ethical, of many individuals; it has lain in man's increasing +information about the universe, in his increasing mastery over external +nature, and in the growing integration of his social life; it has not +lain in the production of creative personalities appearing in the +course of history with ever greater sublimity of spirit and grasp of +intellect. Where is there a mind on earth today like Plato's? Where +is there a spirit today like Paul's? + +The past invites us still to look back for revelations in the realm of +creative personality. Some things have been done in history, like the +sculptures of Phidias, that never have been done so well since and that +perhaps never will be done so well again. As for the Bible, we may +well look back to that. There is no book to compare with it in the +realm of religion. Most of the books we read are like the rainwater +that fell last night, a superficial matter, soon running off. But the +Bible is a whole sea--the accumulated spiritual gains of ages--and to +know it and to love it, to go down beside it and dip into it, to feel +its vast expanse, the currents that run through it, and the tides that +lift it, is one of the choicest and most rewarding spiritual privileges +that we enjoy. As for Jesus, it is difficult to see what this +twentieth century can mean by supposing that it has outgrown him. It +has outgrown countless elements in his generation and many forms of +thought which he shared with his generation, but it never will outgrow +his spirit, his faith in God, his principles of life: "Our Father who +art in heaven, Hallowed by thy name;" "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God +with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, +and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself;" "It is not the +will of your Father who is in heaven, that one of these little ones +should perish;" "By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, +if ye have love one to another;" "If any man would be first, he shall +be last of all, and servant of all;" "All things therefore whatsoever +ye would that men should do unto you, even so do ye also unto them;" +"Love your enemies, and pray for them that persecute you;" "Thy will be +done, as in heaven, so on earth." Take principles like these, set them +afire in a flaming life the like of which has never come to earth, and +we have in Jesus a revelation of the spiritual world which is not going +to be outgrown. Still for the Christian he is Saviour and Lord, and +across the centuries in his face shines the light of the knowledge of +the glory of God. + + +IV + +Progress, therefore, intelligently apprehended, does not involve that +flippant irreverence for the past that so often is associated with it. +It offers no encouragement to the chase after vagaries in which so many +moderns indulge, as though all that is old were belated and all that is +novel were true. The idea of progress has led more than one eager mind +to think that the old religions were outgrown; that they were the +belated leftovers of a bygone age and were not for modern minds; that a +new religion fitted to our new needs alone would do. Suppose, however, +that one should say: The English language is an archaic affair; it has +grown like Topsy, by chance; it has carried along with it the forms of +thinking of outgrown generations; it is not scientific; what we need is +a new language built to order to meet our wants. In answer one must +acknowledge that the English language is open to very serious +criticism, that one can never tell from the way a word is spelled how +it is going to be pronounced, nor from the way it is pronounced how it +is going to be spelled. One must agree that the English language makes +one phrase do duty for many different meanings. When two people +quarrel, they make up; before the actor goes upon the stage, he makes +up; the preacher goes into his study to make up his sermon; when we do +wrong we try to make up for it; and the saucy lad in school behind his +teacher's back makes up a face. The English language is fearfully and +wonderfully made. But merely because the English language has such +ungainly developments, we are not likely to surrender it and adopt +instead a modern language made to order, like Esperanto. Say what one +will about English, it is the speech in which our poets have sung and +our prophets have prophesied and our seers have dreamed dreams. If any +do not like it they may get a new one, but most of us will stay where +we still can catch the accents of the master spirits who have spoken in +our tongue. There are words in the English language that no Esperanto +words ever can take the place of: home and honour and love and God, +words that have been sung about and prayed over and fought for by our +sires for centuries, and that come to us across the ages with +accumulated meanings, like caskets full of jewels. Surely we are not +going to give up the English language. Progress does not mean +surrendering it, but developing it. + +We shall not give up Christianity. It has had ungainly developments; +it does need reformation; many elements in it are pitiably belated; +but, for all that, the profoundest need of the world is real +Christianity, the kind of life the Master came to put into the hearts +of men. Progress does not mean breaking away from it, but going deeper +into it. + +Here, then, are the three perils which tempt the believer in progress: +a silly underestimate of the tremendous force of human sin, which +withstands all real advance; superficial reliance upon social +palliatives to speed the convalescence of the world, when only radical +cures will do; flippant irreverence toward the past, when, as a matter +of fact, the light we have for the future shines upon us from behind. +He who most believes in progress needs most to resist its temptations. + + + +[1] James H. Snowden: Is the World Growing Better? pp. 41-42. + +[2] Francis Turner Palgrave: Faith and Light in the Latter Days. + +[3] George Hakewill: An Apologie of the Power and Providence of God in +the Government of the World, or An Examination and Censure of the +Common Errour Touching Natures Perpetuall and Universall Decay. + +[4] W. E. H. Lecky: History of European Morals from Augustus to +Charlemagne, Vol. II, p. 9. + +[5] C. G. Montefiore: Some Elements of the Religious Teaching of Jesus +According to the Synoptic Gospels, p. 133. + +[6] Gilbert Murray: Tradition and Progress, Chapter I, Religio +Grammatici, IV, pp. 19-20. + + + + +LECTURE VI + +PROGRESS AND GOD + +I + +We may well begin our final lecture, on the interplay between the idea +of progress and the idea of God, by noting that only faith in God can +satisfy man's craving for spiritual stability amid change. The central +element in the conception of a progressive world is that men's thoughts +and lives have changed, are changing and will change, that nothing +therefore is settled in the sense of being finally formulated, that +creation has never said its last word on any subject or landed its last +hammer blow on any task. Such an outlook on life, instead of being +exhilarating, is to many disquieting in the extreme. In particular it +is disquieting in religion, one of whose functions has always been to +provide stability, to teach men amid the transient to see the eternal. +If in a changing world religious thought changes too, if in that realm +also new answers are given to old questions and new questions rise that +never have been answered before, if forms of faith in which men once +trusted are outgrown, man's unsettlement seems to be complete. The +whole world then is like a huge kaleidoscope turning round and round +and, as it turns, the manifold elements in human experience, even its +religious doctrines and practices, arrange and rearrange themselves in +endless permutations. How then in such a world can religion mean to us +what it has meant to the saints who of old, amid a shaken world, have +sung: + + "Change and decay in all around I see; + O Thou, Who changest not, abide with me!" + + +This fear of the unsettling effects of the idea of progress accounts +for most of the resentment against it in the realm of theology, and for +the desperate endeavours which perennially are made to congeal the +Christian movement at some one stage and to call that stage final. +Stability, however, can never be achieved by resort to such reactionary +dogmatism. What one obtains by that method is not stability but +stagnation, and the two, though often confused, are utterly different. +Stagnation is like a pool, stationary, finished, and without +progressive prospects. A river, however, has another kind of +steadfastness altogether. It is not stationary; it flows; it is never +twice the same and its enlarging prospects as it widens and deepens in +its course are its glory. Nevertheless, the Hudson and the Mississippi +and the Amazon are among the most stable and abiding features which +nature knows. They will probably outlast many mountains. They will +certainly outlast any pool. + +The spiritual stability which we may have in a progressive world is of +this latter sort, if we believe in the living God. It is so much more +inspiring than the stagnation of the dogmatist that one wonders how any +one, seeing both, could choose the inferior article in which to repose +his trust. Consider, for example, the development of the idea of God +himself, the course of which through the Bible we briefly traced in a +previous lecture. From Sinai to Calvary--was ever a record of +progressive revelation more plain or more convincing? The development +begins with Jehovah disclosed in a thunder-storm on a desert mountain, +and it ends with Christ saying: "God is a Spirit: and they that worship +him must worship in spirit and truth;" it begins with a war-god leading +his partisans to victory and it ends with men saying, "God is love; and +he that abideth in love abideth in God, and God abideth in him;" it +begins with a provincial deity loving his tribe and hating its enemies +and it ends with the God of the whole earth worshiped by "a great +multitude, which no man could number, out of every nation and of all +tribes and peoples and tongues;" it begins with a God who commands the +slaying of the Amalekites, "both man and woman, infant and suckling," +and it ends with a Father whose will it is that not "one of these +little ones should perish;" it begins with God's people standing afar +off from his lightnings and praying that he might not speak to them +lest they die and it ends with men going into their inner chambers and, +having shut the door, praying to their Father who is in secret. Here +is no pool; here is a river, the streams whereof make glad the city of +God. + +Consider as well the course of the idea of God after the close of the +New Testament canon. The Biblical conception of God in terms of +righteous and compassionate personal will went out into a world of +thought where Greek metaphysics was largely in control. There God was +conceived in terms of substance, as the ontological basis and ground of +all existence--immutable, inscrutable, unqualified pure being. These +two ideas, God as personal will, and God as metaphysical substance, +never perfectly coalescing, flowed together. In minds like St. +Augustine's one finds them both. God as pure being and God as gracious +and righteous personal will--St. Augustine accepted both ideas but +never harmonized them. Down through Christian history one can see +these two conceptions complementing each other, each balancing the +other's eccentricities. The Greek idea runs out toward pantheism in +Spinoza and Hegel. The Biblical idea runs out toward deism in Duns +Scotus and Calvin. In the eighteenth century an extreme form of deism +held the field and God, as personal will, was conceived as the Creator, +who in a dim and distant past had made all things. In the nineteenth +century the thought of God swung back to terms of immanence, and God, +who had been crowded out of his world, came flooding in as the abiding +life of all of it. + +As one contemplates a line of development like this, he must be aware +that, while change is there, it is not aimless, discontinuous, chaotic +change. The riverbed in which this stream of thought flows is stable +and secure; the whole development is controlled by man's abiding +spiritual need of God and God's unceasing search for man. One feels +about it as he might about man's varying, developing methods of telling +the time of day. Men began by noting roughly the position of the sun +or the length of shadows; they went on to make sun-dials, then +water-clocks, then sand-glasses; then weight-driven clocks were +blunderingly tried and, later, watches, used first as toys, so little +were they to be relied upon. The story of man's telling of the time of +day is a story of progressive change, but it does not lack stability. +The sun and stars and the revolution of the earth abide. The changes +in man's telling of the time have been simply the unfolding of an +abiding relationship between man and his world. + +So the development of man's religious ideas from early, crude +beginnings until now is not a process which one would wish to stop at +any point in order to achieve infallible security. The movement is not +haphazard and discontinuous change, like disparate particles in a +kaleidoscope falling together in new but vitally unrelated ways. Upon +the contrary, its course is a continuous path which can be traced, +recovered in thought, conceived as a whole. We can see where our ideas +came from, what now they are, and in what direction they probably will +move. The stability is in the process itself, arising out of the +abiding relationships of man with the eternal. + +Indeed, the endeavour to achieve stability by methods which alone can +bring stagnation, the endeavor, that is, to hit upon dogmatic finality +in opinion, is of all things in religion probably the most disastrous +in its consequence. Until recent times when reform movements invaded +Mohammedanism and higher criticism tackled the problem of the Koran, +one could see this achievement of stagnation in Islam in all its +inglorious success. The Koran was regarded as having been infallibly +written, word for word, in heaven before ever it came to earth. The +Koran therefore was a book of inerrant and changeless opinion. But the +Koran enshrines the best theological and ethical ideas of Arabia at the +time when it was written: God was an oriental monarch, ruling in +heaven; utter submission to the fate which he decreed was the one law +of human relationship with him; and on earth slavery and polygamy and +conversion of unbelievers by force were recognized as right. The Koran +was ahead of its day, but having been by a theory of inspiration +petrified into artificial finality it became the enemy of all opinions +which would pass beyond its own. + +When, now, one contrasts Mohammedanism with Christianity, one finds an +important difference. For all our temptation, succumbed to by +multitudes, to make the Bible a Koran, Christianity has had a +progressive revelation. In the Bible one can find all the ideas and +customs which Mohammedanism has approved and for which it now is hated: +its oriental deity decreeing fates, its use of force to destroy +unbelievers, its patriarchal polygamy, and its slave systems. All +these things, from which we now send missionaries to convert +Mohammedans, are in our Bible, but in the Bible they are not final. +They are ever being superseded. The revelation is progressive. The +idea of God grows from oriental kingship to compassionate fatherhood; +the use of force gives way to the appeals of love; polygamy is +displaced by monogamy; slavery never openly condemned, even when the +New Testament closes, is being underminded [Transcriber's note: +undermined?] by ideas which, like dynamite, in the end will blast to +pieces its foundations. We are continually running upon passages like +this: "It was said to them of old time, . . . but I say unto you;" +"God, having of old time spoken unto the fathers in the prophets by +divers portions and in divers manners, hath at the end of these days +spoken unto us in his Son;" "The times of ignorance therefore God +overlooked; but now he commandeth men that they should all everywhere +repent;" and over the doorway out of the New Testament into the +Christian centuries that followed is written this inscription: "The +spirit of truth . . . shall guide you into all the truth." In a word, +finality in the Koran is behind--it lies in the treasured concepts of +600 A. D.--but finality in the Bible is ahead. We are moving toward +it. It is too great for us yet to apprehend. Our best thoughts are +thrown out in its direction but they do not exhaust its meaning. + + "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." + + +Such is the exultant outlook of a Christian believer on a progressive +world. If, however, one is to have this exultant outlook, he must +deeply believe in the living God and in the guidance of his Spirit. +What irreligion means at this point is not fully understood by most +unbelieving folk because most unbelievers do not think through to a +conclusion the implications of their own skepticism. We may well be +thankful even in the name of religion for a few people like Bertrand +Russell. He is not only irreligious but he is intelligently +irreligious, and, what is more, he possesses the courage to say frankly +and fully what irreligion really means: + + +"That Man is the product of causes which have no prevision of the end +they were achieving; that his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, +his loves and his beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental +collocations of atoms; that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of +thought and feeling, can preserve an individual life beyond the grave; +that all the labours of the ages, all the devotion, all the +inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined +to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole +temple of Man's achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the +debris of a universe in ruins--all these things, if not quite beyond +dispute, are yet so nearly certain, that no philosophy which rejects +them can hope to stand. Only within the scaffolding of these truths, +only on the firm foundation of unyielding despair, can the soul's +habitation henceforth be safely built." [1] Such is the outlook on +human life of a frank and thoroughgoing irreligion, and there is +nothing exhilarating about it. All progress possible in such a setting +is a good deal like a horse-race staged in a theatre, where the horses +do indeed run furiously, but where we all know well that they are not +getting anywhere. There is a moving floor beneath them, and it is only +the shifting of the scenery that makes them seem to go. Is human +history like that? Is progress an illusion? Is it all going to end as +Bertrand Russell says? Those who believe in the living God are certain +of the contrary, for stability amid change is the gift of a +progressive, religious faith. + + +II + +It must be evident, however, to any one acquainted with popular ideas +of God that if in a progressive world we thus are to maintain a vital +confidence in the spiritual nature of creative reality and so rejoice +in the guidance of the Spirit amid change, we must win through in our +thinking to a very much greater conception of God than that to which +popular Christianity has been accustomed. Few passages in Scripture +better deserve a preacher's attention than God's accusation against his +people in the 50th Psalm: "Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such a +one as thyself." The universal applicability of this charge is evident +to any one who knows the history of man's religious thought. If in the +beginning God did make man in his own image, man has been busy ever +since making God in his image, and the deplorable consequences are +everywhere to be seen. From idolaters, who bow down before wooden +images of the divine in human form, to ourselves, praying to a +magnified man throned somewhere in the skies, man has persistently run +God into his own mold. To be sure, this tendency of man to think of +God as altogether such a one as ourselves is nothing to be surprised +at. Even when we deal with our human fellows, we read ourselves into +our understandings of them. A contemporary observer tells us that +whenever a portrait of Gladstone appeared in French papers he was made +to look like a Frenchman, and that when he was represented in Japanese +papers his countenance had an unmistakably Japanese cast. + +If this habitual tendency to read ourselves into other people is +evident even when we deal with human personalities, whom we can know +well, how can it be absent from man's thought of the eternal? A man +needs only to go out on a starry night with the revelations of modern +astronomy in his mind and to consider the one who made all this and +whose power sustains it, to see how utterly beyond our adequate +comprehension he must be. As men in old tales used to take diffused +superhumans, the genii, and by magic word bring them down into a +stoppered bottle where they could be held in manageable form, so man +has taken the vastness of God and run it into a human symbol. + +This persistent anthropomorphism is revealed in our religious +ceremonies. Within Christianity itself are systems of priestcraft +where the individual believer has no glad, free access to his Father's +presence, but where his approach must be mediated by a priestly ritual, +his forgiveness assured by a priestly declaration, his salvation sealed +by a priestly sacrament. This idea that God must be approached by +stated ceremonies came directly from thinking of God in terms of a +human monarch. No common man could walk carelessly into the presence +of an old-time king. There were proprieties to be observed. There +were courtiers who knew the proper approach to royalty, through whom +the common folk would better send petitions up and from whom they would +better look for favour. So God was pictured as a human monarch with +his throne, his scepter, his ministering attendants. Here on earth the +priests were those courtiers who knew the effectual way of reaching +him, by whom we would best send up our prayers, through whom we would +best look for our salvation. Nordau is not exaggerating when he says: +"When we have studied the sacrificial rites, the incantations, prayers, +hymns, and ceremonies of religion, we have as complete a picture of the +relations between our ancestors and their chiefs as if we had seen them +with our own eyes." [2] + +Our anthropomorphism, however, reaches its most dangerous form in our +inward imaginations of God's character. How the pot has called the +kettle black! Man has read his vanities into God, until he has +supposed that singing anthems to God's praise might flatter him as it +would flatter us. Man has read his cruelties into God, and what in +moments of vindictiveness and wrath we would like to do our enemies we +have supposed Eternal God would do to his. Man has read his religious +partisanship into God; he who holds Orion and the Pleiades in his +leash, the Almighty and Everlasting God, before whom in the beginning +the morning stars sang together, has been conceived as though he were a +Baptist or a Methodist, a Presbyterian or an Anglican. Man has read +his racial pride into God; nations have thought themselves his chosen +people above all his other children because they seemed so to +themselves. The centuries are sick with a god made in man's image, and +all the time the real God has been saying, "Thou thoughtest that I was +altogether such a one as thyself." + +The unhappy prevalence of this mental idolatry is one of the chief +causes for the loss of religious faith among the younger generation. +They have grown up in our homes and churches with their imaginations +dwelling on a God made in man's image, and now through education they +have moved out into a universe so much too big for that little god of +theirs either to have made in the first place or to handle now that +they find it hard to believe in him. Astronomers tell us that there +are a hundred million luminous stars in our sky, and dark stars in +unknown multitudes; that these stars range from a million to ten +million miles in diameter; that some of them are so vast that were they +brought as close to us as our sun is they would fill the entire +horizon; and that these systems are scattered through the stellar +spaces at distances so incredible that, were some hardy discoverer to +seek our planet in the midst of them, it would be like looking for a +needle lost somewhere on the western prairies. The consequence is +inevitable: a vast progressive universe plus an inadequate God means +that in many minds faith in God goes to pieces. + + +III + +One of the profoundest needs of the Church, therefore, in this new and +growing world, is the achievement of such worthy ways of thinking about +God and presenting him as will make the very idea of him a help to +faith and not a stumbling-block to the faithful. In the attainment of +that purpose we need for one thing to approach the thought of God from +an angle which to popular Christianity is largely unfamiliar, although +it is not unfamiliar in the historic tradition of the Church. Too +exclusively have we clung to the mental categories and the resultant +phraseology which have grown up around the idea of God as an individual +like ourselves. The reasons for the prevalence of this individualized +conception of deity are obvious. First, as we have seen, the growth of +the idea of God in Hebrew-Christian thought moved out from a very +clearly visualized figure on a mountain-top to those expanded and +spiritualized forms which glorified the later stages of the Biblical +development; and, second, every one of us in his personal religious +experience and thought recapitulates the same process, starting as a +child with God conceived in very human terms and moving out to expanded +and sublimated forms of that childish conception. Whether, then, we +consider the source of our idea of God in the Biblical tradition or in +our own private experience, we see that it is rooted in and springs up +out of a very human conception of him, and that our characteristic +words about him, attitudes toward him, and imaginations of him, are +associated with these childlike origins. Popular Christianity, +therefore, approaches God with the regulative idea of a human +individual in its mind, and, while popular Christianity would insist +that God is much more than that, it still starts with that, and the +enterprise of stretching the conception is only relatively successful. +Even when it is successful the result must be a God who is achieved by +stretching out a man. + +In this situation the only help for many is, for the time being, to +leave this endeavour to approach God by way of an expanded and +sublimated human individual and to approach God, instead, by way of the +Creative Power from which this amazing universe and all that is within +it have arisen. Man's deepest question concerns the nature of the +Creative Power from which all things and persons have come. In +creation are we dealing with the kind of power which in ordinary life +we recognize as physical, or with the kind which we recognize as +spiritual? With these two sorts of power we actually deal and, so far +as we can see, the ultimate reality which has expressed itself in them +must be akin to the one or to the other or to both. _He who is +convinced that the Creative Power from which all things have come is +spiritual believes in God_. I have seen that simple statement lift the +burden of doubt from minds utterly perplexed and usher befogged spirits +out into the liberty of the glory of the children of God. For they did +not believe that the Creative Power was dynamic dirt, going it blind; +they did believe that the Creative Power was akin to what we know as +spirit, but so accustomed were they to the Church's narrower +anthropomorphism that they did not suppose that this approach was a +legitimate avenue for the soul's faith in God. + +Nevertheless, it is a legitimate avenue and in the history of the +Church many are the souls that have traveled it. The basis for all +mature conceptions of God lies here: that the Power from whom all life +proceeds wells up in two forms. One is physical; we can see it, touch +it, weigh it, analyze and measure it. The other is spiritual; it is +character, conscience, intelligence, purpose, love; we cannot see it, +nor touch it, nor weigh it, nor analyze it. We ourselves did not make +either of these two expressions of life. They came up together out of +the Creative Reality from which we came. When a man thinks of the +Power from which all life proceeds, he must say at least this: that +when it wells up in us it wells up in two forms and one of them is +spirit. How, then, when we think of that Power, can we leave spirit +out? At the heart of the eternal is the fountain of that spiritual +life which in myself I know. + +This thought of God does not start, then, with a magnified man in the +heavens; this thought of God starts with the universe itself vibrant +with life, tingling with energy, where, when scientists try to analyze +matter, they have to trace it back from molecules to atoms, from atoms +to electrons, and from electrons to that vague spirituelle thing which +they call a "strain in the ether," a universe where there is manifestly +no such thing as dead matter, but where everything is alive. When one +thinks of the Power that made this, that sustains this, that flows like +blood through the veins of this, one cannot easily think that +physicalness is enough to predicate concerning him. If the physical +adequately could have revealed that Power, there never would have been +anything but the physical to reveal him. The fact that spiritual life +is here is evidence that it takes spiritual life fully to display the +truth about creation's reality. As an old mystic put it: "God sleeps +in the stone, he dreams in the animal, he wakes in man!" + +It was this approach to God which saved the best spiritual life of the +nineteenth century. For in the eighteenth century Christianity came +nearer to being driven out of business than ever in her history before. +She had believed in a carpenter god who had made the world and +occasionally tinkered with it in events which men called miracles. But +new knowledge made that carpenter god impossible. Area after area +where he had been supposed to operate was closed to him by the +discovery of natural law until at last even comets were seen to be +law-abiding and he was escorted clean to the edge of the universe and +bowed out altogether. Nobody who has not read the contemporary +literature of the eighteenth century can know what dryness of soul +resulted. + +Man, however, cannot live without God. Our fathers had to have God +back again. But if God were to come back again he could not return as +an occasional tinkerer; he had to come as the life in all that lives, +the indwelling presence throughout his creation, whose ways of working +are the laws, so that he penetrates and informs them all. No absentee +landlord could be welcomed back, but if God came as the resident soul +of all creation, men could comprehend that. And he did come back that +way. His return is the glory of the nineteenth century. In the best +visions of the century's prophets that glory shines. + + +MRS. BROWNING: + + "Earth's crammed with heaven, + And every common bush afire with God: + But only he who sees, takes off his shoes." + + +TENNYSON: + + "Speak to Him, thou, for He hears, and + Spirit with Spirit can meet-- + Closer is He than breathing, and nearer + than hands and feet." + + +COLERIDGE: + + "Glory to Thee, Father of Earth and Heaven! + All conscious presence of the Universe! + Nature's vast ever-acting Energy!" + + +WORDSWORTH: + + "a sense sublime + Of something far more deeply interfused, + Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, + And the round ocean and the living air + And the blue sky, and in the mind of man; + A motion and a spirit, that impels + All thinking things, all objects of all thoughts, + And rolls through all things." + + +CARLYLE: + +"Then sawest thou that this fair Universe, were it in the meanest +province thereof, is in very deed the star-domed City of God; that +through every star, through every grass-blade, and most through every +Living Soul, the glory of a present God still beams. But Nature, which +is the Time-vesture of God, and reveals Him to the wise, hides Him from +the foolish." + + +Moreover, this idea of God as the Creative Power conceived in spiritual +terms need not lose any of the intimate meanings which have inhered in +more personal thoughts of him and which are expressed in the Bible's +names for him: Father, Mother, Bridegroom, Husband, Friend. There is +indeed this danger in the approach which we have been describing, that +we may conceive God as so dispersed everywhere that we cannot find him +anywhere and that at last, so diffused, he will lose the practical +value on account of which we want him. For we do desire a God who is +like ourselves--enough like ourselves so that he can understand us and +care for us and enter into our human problems. We do want a human side +to God. A man who had seen in Henry Drummond the most beautiful +exhibition of God's Spirit that he had ever experienced said that after +Henry Drummond died he always prayed up to God by way of Drummond. We +make our most vital approaches to God in that way and we always have, +from the time we prayed to God through our fathers and mothers until +now, when we find God in Christ. We want in God a personality that can +answer ours, and we can have it without belittling in the least his +greatness. + +I know a man who says that one of the turning points of his spiritual +experience came on a day when for the first time it dawned on him that +he never had seen his mother. Now, his mother was the major molding +influence in his life. He could have said about her what Longfellow +said in a letter to his mother, written when he was twenty-one. "For +me," wrote Longfellow, "a line from my mother is more efficacious than +all the homilies preached in Lent; and I find more incitement to virtue +in merely looking at your handwriting than in a whole volume of ethics +and moral discourses." So this man would have felt about the pervasive +influence of his mother. Then it dawned on him one day that he never +had seen her. To be sure, he had seen the bodily instrument by which +she had been able somehow to express herself through look and word and +gesture, but his mother herself, her thoughts, her consciousness, her +love, her spirit, he never had seen and he never would see. She was +the realest force in his life, but she was invisible. When they talked +together they signalled to each other out of the unseen where they +dwelt. They both were as invisible as God. Moreover, while his mother +was only a human, personal spirit, there was a kind of omnipresence in +her so far as he was concerned, and he loved her and she loved him +everywhere, though he never had seen her and never could. If spiritual +life even in its human form can take on such meanings, we need not +think of God as an expanded individual in order to love him, be loved +by him, and company with him as an unseen friend. Let a man once begin +with God as the universal spiritual Presence and then go on to see the +divine quality of that Presence revealed in Christ, and there is no +limit to the deepening and heightening of his estimation of God's +character, except the limits of his own moral imagination. + + +IV + +With many minds the difficulty of achieving an idea of God adequate for +our new universe will not be met by any such intellectual shift of +emphasis as we have suggested. Not anthropomorphic theology so much as +ecclesiasticism is the major burden on their thinking about deity. Two +conceptions of the Church are in conflict to-day in modern +Protestantism, and one of the most crucial problems of America's +religious life in this next generation is the decision as to which of +these two ideas of the Church shall triumph. We may call one the +exclusive and the other the inclusive conception of the Church. The +exclusive conception of the Church lies along lines like these: that we +are the true Church; that we have the true doctrines and the true +practices as no other Church possesses them; that we are constituted as +a Church just because we have these uniquely true opinions and +practices; that all we in the Church agree about these opinions and +that when we joined the Church we gave allegiance to them; that nobody +has any business to belong to our Church unless he agrees with us; that +if there are people outside the Church who disagree, they ought to be +kept outside and if there are people in the Church who come to +disagree, they ought to be put outside. That is the exclusive idea of +the Church, and there are many who need no further description of it +for they were brought up in it and all their youthful religious life +was surrounded by its rigid sectarianism. + +Over against this conception is the inclusive idea of the Church, which +runs along lines like these: that the Christian Church ought to be the +organizing center for all the Christian life of a community; that a +Church is not based upon theological uniformity but upon devotion to +the Lord Jesus, to the life with God and man for which he stood, and to +the work which he gave us to do; that wherever there are people who +have that spiritual devotion, who possess that love, who want more of +it, who desire to work and worship with those of kindred Christian +aspirations, they belong inside the family of the Christian Church. +The inclusive idea of the Church looks out upon our American +communities and sees there, with all their sin, spiritual life +unexpressed and unorganized, good-will and aspiration and moral power +unharnessed and going to waste, and it longs to cry so that the whole +community can hear it. Come, all men of Christian good-will, let us +work together for the Lord of all good life! That is the inclusive +idea of the Church. It desires to be the point of incandescence where, +regardless of denominationalism or theology, the Christian life of the +community bursts into flame. + +As between these two conceptions there hardly can be any question that +the first idea so far has prevailed. Our endlessly split and shivered +Protestantism bears sufficient witness to the influence of the +exclusive idea of the Church. The disastrous consequences of this in +many realms are evident, and one result lies directly in our argument's +path. An exclusive Church narrows the idea of God. Almost inevitably +God comes to be conceived as the head of the exclusive Church, the +origin of its uniquely true doctrine, the director of its uniquely +correct practices, so that the activities of God outside the Church +grow dim, and more and more he is conceived as operating through his +favourite organization as nowhere else in all the universe. In +particular the idea grows easily in the soil of an exclusive Church +that God is not operative except in people who recognize him and that +the world outside such conscious recognition is largely empty of his +activity and barren of his grace. God tends, in such thinking, to +become cooped up in the Church, among the people who consciously have +acknowledged him. What wonder that multitudes of our youth, waking up +to the facts about our vast and growing universe, conclude that it is +too big to be managed by the tribal god of a Protestant sect! + +The achievement of a worthy idea of God involves, therefore, the +ability to discover God in all life, outside the Church as well as +within, and in people who do not believe in him nor recognize him as +well as in those who do. Let us consider for a moment the principle +which is here involved. Many forces and persons serve us when we do +not recognize them and do not know the truth about them. This +experience of being ministered to by persons whom we do not know goes +back even to the maternal care that nourished us before we were born. +No mother waits to be recognized before she serves her child. We are +tempted to think of persons as ministering to us only when the service +is consciously received and acknowledged but, as a matter of fact, +service continually comes to us from sources we are unaware of and do +not think about. + + "Unnumbered comforts to my soul + Thy tender care bestowed, + Before my infant heart conceived + From whom those comforts flowed." + + +This principle applies to mankind's relationship with the physical +universe. Through many generations mankind utterly misconceived it. +They thought the earth was flat, the heavens a little way above; yet, +for all that, the sun warmed them and the rain refreshed them and the +stars guided their wandering boats. The physical universe did not wait +until men knew all the truth about it before being useful to men and at +last, when the truth came and the glory of this vast and mobile cosmos +dawned on mankind, men discovered the facts about forces which, though +unknown and unacknowledged, long had served them. + +This same principle applies also to man's relationship with social +institutions and social securities that have sustained us from our +infancy. If a boy knows that there is a Constitution of the United +States, he does not think about it. Then maturity comes and he begins +vividly to understand the sacrifices which our forefathers underwent in +building up the institutions that have nourished us. He recognizes +forces and factors of which he had been unconscious but whose value, +long unacknowledged, he now gratefully can estimate. + +This same principle also applies to our unconscious indebtedness to +people who have helped us but whom we have not known. This is a far +finer world because of souls who have been here through whom God has +shined like the sun through eastern windows, but we can go on year +after year absorbing unconsciously the influence of these spirits +without ever knowing them. I lived for twelve years in a community to +which in its early days a young minister had come, and where for forty +years he stood as the central influence in the town's life. He brought +it up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. As was said of Joseph +in Potiphar's prison, "Whatsoever they did there, he was the doer of +it." The height of his mind, the unselfishness of his spirit, the +liberality of his thought, made all the people gladly acclaim him as +the foremost citizen of the town. There is a quality in the town's +life yet which never would have been there had it not been for him. +Sometimes yet his spirit must brood above that community which for +forty years he cherished and must say to people whom he never knew, but +who are being blessed by the benedictory influence of his life, what +Jehovah said to Cyrus the Persian, "I girded thee, though thou hast not +known me." + +So, from multitudinous sources services flow in upon us that we do not +recognize. It should be impossible then to think that God never +touches men until men welcome him. Some people seem to suppose that +God ministers to men, saves them, transforms them, raises them up and +liberates them only when they confessedly receive him. That cannot be +true of the God of the New Testament. He is too magnanimous for that. +Jesus says a man is unworthy of his discipleship when he serves only +the friends who are responsive, that we must serve the hostile and +ungrateful, too. Can it be that God is less good than Jesus said we +ought to be? We in the churches have drawn our little lines too tight. +We have been tempted to divide mankind into two classes, the white and +the black: in the Church the white, the saved, who recognize God; +outside, the black, the unsaved, the ungodly who do not recognize him. +By that division we sometimes seem to imply that those outside the +Church are outside the reach of God's transforming grace and power. We +are tempted to look for God's activity chiefly, if not altogether, +inside the organization that avows him. But that cannot be true. He +comes in like the sun through every chink and crevice where he can find +a way of entrance. He does not wait to be welcomed. He does not +insist on being consciously recognized before he enters a man's life. +Rather, through any door or window left unwittingly ajar where he may +steal in, even though unobserved, to lift and liberate a life, there +the God of the New Testament will come--"the light which lighteth every +man coming into the world." + +Consider, for illustration, the many people in this generation who have +given up active relationship with the Church and assured faith in God. +They may even call themselves agnostics. Would it not be true to speak +to them like this: You have not succeeded in getting rid of God. There +is a flame in your heart that will not go out. You try to say there is +no God and then you go out under the stars at night and you begin to +wonder how such a vast, law-abiding universe could come by accident, as +if a man were to throw a font of type on the floor and by chance it +should arrange itself into a play of Shakespeare. Strange universe, +without God! You try to say there is no God and you pick up a book: a +life of Phillips Brooks or David Livingstone or Francis Xavier, and you +begin to wonder that, amid these whirling stars and solar systems, a +race of men should have emerged with spiritual life like that which we +possess, with ideals that beckon us, conscience that warns us and +remorse that punishes us! You cannot easily think that this long +spiritual struggle and achievement of the race is an accident struck +off unwittingly like sparks from falling stones in a material world +without abiding meaning. Or you try to say there is no God, and then +you are married and your first baby is born and there wells up in your +heart that purest love that man can know, the feeling of a parent for a +little child. And you cannot help wondering how a man can walk about +the world with love like that in the center of his life, thinking that +there is nothing to correspond with it in the reality from which his +heart and his baby came. You try to say there is no God, and then you +begin to grow old and the friends you love best on earth pass away, as +Carlyle said his mother did, like "the last pale rim or sickle of the +moon which had once been full, sinking in the dark seas." You cannot +help wondering whether great souls can be so at the mercy of a few +particles of matter that when these are disturbed the spirit is plunged +into oblivion! You never really have gotten rid of God. There is a +flame in the center of your heart which you cannot put out. If there +were no God it would be easier to disbelieve in him than it is. You +cannot get rid of him because the best in you is God in you. The flame +is he and there in the center of your life, recognized or unrecognized, +he is burning up as best he can. + +This principle of God's unrecognized presence applies to a special +group of people that has been growing rapidly in the last few years: +the men and women who give themselves with high spirit to human service +in science or philanthropy but who never think of attributing their +service or love of truth to religious motives. To this group belong +many of our scientists. They give themselves no rest, seeking for +truth which will help human need. In obscure and forgotten +laboratories to-day they search for remedies for ancient, lamentable +ills. They make it a point of professional honour not to take profit +for themselves when they have succeeded, but to give freely to the +world the knowledge they have achieved. The pulpit has often quarreled +with the scientists. Let the pulpit honour them for their amazing +outpouring of service to the world. To this group also belong many of +our philanthropists, to whom sacrifice for the common weal has become +the moral equivalent of war. Yet often these men and women, useful +public servants of the generation as they are, do not know God. They +are great spirits. Let us not pretend that they are not. They are +making a deep and beneficent impress upon their own times, and our sons +and our sons' sons will rise up to call them blessed; yet they do not +know God. What are we to say of such men and women? You know what +some people do say about them. They use them as arguments against +religion. They say, See these fine men living without God. That is an +utter fallacy. They are not living without God. They only think they +are. They are the supreme examples of the work of the unrecognized +God. One wishes that those men and women would recognize God. God can +do much more through responsive than through unresponsive lives. But +we may not say that they are living without God. There, in the center +of their life, in the ideals they work for, in the service they render, +in the love they lavish, in the mission that has mastered them, there +_is_ God. + +Some time ago I wandered down Broadway, in the small hours of the +morning, with one of the prominent citizens of the community. At the +heart of his life is the passion to be of use. Because his character +is stalwart and his ability great, the scope of his service is far +wider than the capacity of most of us. Amid the hurrying crowds and +the flashing lights of Broadway we talked together hour after hour +about God and immortality. He said that he could not believe in God. +He wistfully wished that he could. He was sure that it must add +something beautiful to human life, but for himself he thought that +there was no possibility except to live a high, clean, serviceable life +until he should fall on sleep. All the way home that night I thought +of other people whom I know. Here is a man who believes in God. He +always has believed in God. He was brought up to believe in God and he +has never felt with poignant sympathy enough the abysmal, immedicable +woes of human-kind to have his faith disturbed. He never has had any +doubts. The war passed over him and left him as it found him. The +fiercest storm that ever raged over mankind did not touch the surface +of his pool of sheltered faith. How could one help comparing him with +my friend who could not believe? For he, in high emotion, had spoken +of the miseries of men, of multitudes starving, of the horrors of war, +of the poor whose lives are a long animal struggle to keep the body +alive, of the woes that fall with such terrific incidence upon the +vast, obscure, forgotten masses of our human-kind, and out of the very +ardour of his sympathy had cried: "How can you believe that a good +Father made a world like this?" + +Now, I believe in God with all my heart. But the God whom I believe in +likes that man. Jesus, were he here on earth as once he was, would +love him. I think Jesus would love him more than the other man who +never had faced human misery with sympathy enough to feel his faith +disturbed. This does not mean that we ought contentedly to see men +ministered to by a God whom they do not recognize. It is a pity to be +served by the Eternal Spirit of all grace and yet not know him. In +Jean Webster's "Daddy Long Legs," Jerusha Abbott in the orphanage is +helped by an unknown friend. Year after year the favours flow in from +this friend whom she does not know. She blossoms out into girlhood and +young womanhood and still she does not know him. One day she sees him +and she does not recognize him. She has always thought of him as +looking other than he does, and so even when she sees him she does not +know him. Suppose that the story stopped there! It would be +intolerable to have a story end so. To be served all one's life by a +friend and then not to know him when he seeks recognition is tragedy. +So it is tragedy when God is unrecognized, but behind that is a deeper +tragedy still--people who believe in God but who have thoughts of him +so narrowly ecclesiastical that they themselves do not perceive his +presence, acknowledged or unacknowledged, in all the goodness and truth +and beauty of the universe. + +Such an enlargement of the idea of God to meet the needs of this new +world is one of the innermost demands of religion to-day. When a man +believes in the living God as the Creative Power in this universe, +whose character was revealed in Christ and who, recognized or +unrecognized, reveals himself in every form of goodness, truth and +beauty which life anywhere contains, he has achieved a God adequate for +life. To such a man the modern progressive outlook upon the world +becomes exhilarating; all real advance is a revelation of the purpose +of this living God; and, far from being hostile to religion, our modern +categories furnish the noblest mental formulae in which the religious +spirit ever had opportunity to find expression. We who believe this +have no business to be modest and apologetic about it, as though upon +the defensive we shyly presented it to the suffrages of men. It is a +gospel to proclaim. It does involve a new theology but, with +multitudes of eager minds in our generation, the decision no longer +lies between an old and a new theology, but between new theology and no +theology. No longer can they phrase the deepest experiences of their +souls with God in the outgrown categories of a static world. In all +their other thinking they live in a world deeply permeated by ideas of +progress, and to keep their religion in a separate compartment, +uninfluenced by the best knowledge and hope of their day, is an +enterprise which, whether it succeed or fail, means the death of vital +faith. To take this modern, progressive world into one's mind and then +to achieve an idea of God great enough to encompass it, until with the +little gods gone and the great God come, life is full of the knowledge +of him, as the waters cover the sea, that is alike the duty and the +privilege of Christian leadership to-day. + +In a world which out of lowly beginnings has climbed so far and seems +intended to go on to heights unimagined, God is our hope and in his +name we will set up our banners. + + + +[1] Bertrand Russell: Philosophical Essays, II, The Free Man's Worship, +pp. 60-61. + +[2] Max Nordau: The Interpretation of History, p. 217. + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Christianity and Progress, by Harry Emerson Fosdick + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHRISTIANITY AND PROGRESS *** + +***** This file should be named 21992.txt or 21992.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/1/9/9/21992/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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