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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Humanity in the City, by E. H. Chapin
+
+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: Humanity in the City
+
+Author: E. H. Chapin
+
+Release Date: August 27, 2008 [EBook #26441]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HUMANITY IN THE CITY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Julia Miller and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Internet Archive/American Libraries.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+HUMANITY IN THE CITY.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: Every effort has been made to replicate this text as
+faithfully as possible; please see list of printing issues at the end
+of the text.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+[Illustration: E. H. Chapin]
+
+
+
+
+HUMANITY IN THE CITY.
+
+BY THE
+
+REV. E. H. CHAPIN.
+
+
+ NEW YORK:
+   DE WITT & DAVENPORT, PUBLISHERS,
+   160 & 162 NASSAU STREET.
+
+ BOSTON:
+   ABEL TOMPKINS, 38 & 40 CORNHILL.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1854, by
+DE WITT & DAVENPORT,
+
+In the Clerk's Office of the U. S. District Court
+for the Southern District of New York
+
+
+ G. W. ALEXANDER,
+   BINDER,
+ 9 Spruce Street.
+
+ W. H. TINSON.
+   STEREOTYPER,
+ 24 Beekman Street.
+
+ TAWS, RUSSELL & CO.
+   PRINTERS,
+ No. 26 Beekman Street.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+                                                         PAGE
+
+  I. THE LESSONS OF THE STREET                             13
+
+  II. MAN AND MACHINERY                                    39
+
+  III. THE STRIFE FOR PRECEDENCE                           65
+
+  IV. THE SYMBOLS OF THE REPUBLIC                          93
+
+  V. THE SPRINGS OF SOCIAL LIFE                           123
+
+  VI. THE ALLIES OF THE TEMPTER                           157
+
+  VII. THE CHILDREN OF THE POOR                           187
+
+  VIII. THE HELP OF RELIGION                              223
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+A volume like the present hardly requires the formality of a preface. It
+is the continuation of a series already published, and, like that, aims
+at applying the highest standard of Morality and Religion to the phases
+of every-day life. In order, however, that the view with which these
+discourses have been prepared may not be misconceived, I wish merely to
+say that I am far from supposing that these are the only themes to be
+preached, or that they constitute the highest class of practical
+subjects, and shall be sorry if in any way they seem to imply a neglect
+of that interior and holy life which is the spring not only of right
+affections, but of clear perception and sturdy, every-day duty. I hope,
+on the contrary, that the very aspects of this busy city life--the very
+problems which start out of it--will tend to convince men of the
+necessity of this inward and regenerating principle. Nevertheless, I
+maintain that these topics have a place in the circle of the preacher's
+work, and he need entertain no fear of desecrating his pulpit by secular
+themes, who seeks to consecrate all things in any way involving the
+action and the welfare of men, by the spirit and aims of His Religion
+who, while he preached the Gospel, likewise fed the hungry, healed the
+sick, and touched the issues of every temporal want. I may have failed
+in the method, I trust I have not in the purpose.
+
+    E. H. C.
+
+_New York, May, 1854._
+
+
+
+
+THE LESSONS OF THE STREET.
+
+HUMANITY IN THE CITY.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE I.
+
+THE LESSONS OF THE STREET.
+
+      Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the
+      streets.--PROVERBS, i. 20.
+
+
+The great truths of religion may be communicated to the mind and the
+heart in two ways--by abstract treatment, and by illustration. It must
+be taken up in its absolute connection with God, and with our own souls.
+In solitary meditation, in self-examination, and in prayer, we shall
+learn the intrinsic claims which Faith and Duty have upon reason and
+conscience. But we cannot proceed far before we discover the necessity
+of some _symbol_, by which these abstract principles may be made
+distinct to us. And, looking around for this purpose, we find that all
+the phases of existence are full of spiritual illustration--full of
+religious suggestion and argument. Thus our Saviour pronounced his great
+doctrines of Eternal Life, and of Personal Religion, and then turned to
+the world for a commentary. Under his teaching nature became an
+illuminated missal, lettered by the lilies of the field, and pencilled
+with hues that played through the leaves of Olivet. The wild birds, in
+their flight, bore upward the beautiful lesson of Providence, and the
+significance of the Kingdom of Heaven was contained in a mustard-seed.
+By no abstruse reasoning did he make his instructions so vivid to his
+disciples, and so fresh to ourselves. But he awoke the conviction of
+moral need, and repentance, and Divine Love, by drawing from instances
+with which they had been familiar all their lives--the procedures of
+government, the transactions of business, the labors of the husbandman,
+and the incidents of home. And the result is essentially the same,
+whether we start with the religious truth to find some illustration in
+the world around us, or from some aspect of human life, or nature,
+extract a religious truth. Nor need this always be sharply obvious. It
+is only necessary that our point of view be sufficiently elevated to
+throw a spiritual light upon things, and to reveal their moral
+relations; for, often, our understandings are cleared, and our hearts
+made better, by the mere scope and tendency of such observations.
+
+With this conviction, I called your attention, last winter, to some of
+the "Aspects of City Life," and with the same view, I wish now to
+address you, for a few Sunday evenings, on the Conditions of Humanity in
+the City, in which series I shall endeavor not only to present new
+topics of interest, but to urge more explicitly some points, which, in
+the afore-mentioned discourses, I merely touched upon.
+
+The essential meaning of the personification in the text is in
+accordance, I think, with the general tenor of remark which I have just
+been making. For I understand it to mean, that everything is
+instructive, that even in the common ways of life the most important
+truths, and the profoundest moral and religious significance, are
+contained. And the words before us, also, specifically indicate the
+subject upon which I wish to speak this evening, for they declare that
+"Wisdom... uttereth her voice in the streets."
+
+The street through which you walk every day; with whose sights and
+sounds you have been familiar, perhaps, all your lives; is it all so
+common-place that it yields you no deep lessons,--deep and fresh, it may
+be, if you would only look around with discerning eyes? Engaged with
+your own special interests, and busy with monotonous details, you may
+not heed it; and yet there is something finer than the grandest poetry,
+even in the mere spectacle of these multitudinous billows of life,
+rolling down the long, broad, avenue. It is an inspiring lyric, this
+inexhaustible procession, in the misty perspective ever lost, ever
+renewed, sweeping onward between its architectural banks to the music of
+innumerable wheels; the rainbow colors, the silks, the velvets, the
+jewels, the tatters, the plumes, the faces--no two alike--shooting out
+from unknown depths, and passing away for ever--perpetually sweeping
+onward in the fresh air of morning, under the glare of noon, under the
+fading, flickering light, until the shadow climbs the tallest spire, and
+night comes with revelations and mysteries of its own.
+
+And yet this changeful tide of activity is no mere lyric. It is an epic,
+rather, unfolding in its progress the contrasts, the conflicts, the
+heroisms, the failures,--in one word, the great and solemn issues of
+human life. And a few comprehensive lessons from that "Wisdom which
+uttereth her voice in the streets," may prove a fitting introduction,
+from which we can pass to consider more specific conditions of humanity
+in the city.
+
+Taking up the subject in this light, I observe that the first lesson of
+the street is in the illustration which it affords us of the
+_diversities of human conditions_. The most superficial eye recognizes
+this. A city is, in one respect, like a high mountain; the latter is an
+epitome of the physical globe; for its sides are belted by products of
+every zone, from the tropical luxuriance that clusters around its base,
+to its arctic summit far up in the sky. So is the city an epitome of
+the social world. All the belts of civilization intersect along its
+avenues. It contains the products of every moral zone. It is
+cosmopolitan, not only in a national, but in a spiritual, sense. Here
+you may find not only the finest Saxon culture, but the grossest
+barbaric degradation. There you pass a form of Caucasian development,
+the fine-cut features, the imperial forehead, the intelligent eye, the
+confident tread, the true port and stature of a man. But who is this
+that follows in his track; under the same national sky, surrounded by
+the same institutions, and yet with those pinched features, that stunted
+form, that villainous look; is it Papuan, Bushman, or Carib? Fitly
+representing either of these, though born in a Christian city, and
+bearing about not only the stamp of violated physical law, but of moral
+neglect and baseness. And no one needs to be told that there are savages
+in New York, as well as in the islands of the sea. Savages, not in
+gloomy forests, but under the strength of gas-light, and the eyes of
+policemen; with war-whoops and clubs very much the same, and garments as
+fantastic, and souls as brutal, as any of their kindred at the
+antipodes. China, India, Africa, will you not find their features in
+some circles of the social world right around you? Idolatry! you cannot
+find any more gross, any more cruel, on the broad earth, than within the
+area of a mile around this pulpit. Dark minds from which God is
+obscured; deluded souls, whose fetish is the dice-box or the bottle;
+apathetic spirits, steeped in sensual abomination, unmoved by a moral
+ripple, soaking in the slump of animal vitality. False gods, more
+hideous, more awful, than Moloch or Baal; worshipped with shrieks,
+worshipped with curses, with the hearth-stone for the bloody altar, and
+the drunken husband for the immolating priest, and women and children
+for the victims. I have no terms of respect too high for the brave and
+conscientious men who carry the gospel, and their own lives, in their
+hands to distant shores. But, surely, they need not go thus far to
+_seek_ for the benighted and the debased. They may find there a wider
+extent of heathenism, but none more intense than that which prevails
+close by the school and the church. The richest products of modern
+progress and Christian culture grow on the verge of barren wastes, and
+jungles of violence, and "the region of the shadow of death."
+
+In the street, however, not only do we behold these different degrees of
+civilization, but those problems of diversity, which the highest form of
+existing civilization developes--the diversities of extreme poverty, and
+extreme wealth, for instance. Here sits the beggar, sick and pinched
+with cold; and there goes a man of no better flesh and blood, and no
+more authentic charter of soul, wrapped in comfort, and actually bloated
+with luxury. There issues the whine of distress, beside the glittering
+carriage-wheels. There, amidst the rush of gaiety; the busy, selfish
+whirl; half naked, shivering, with her bare feet on the icy pavement,
+stands the little girl, with the shadow of an experience upon her that
+has made her preternaturally old, and it may be, driven the angel from
+her face. Still, we cannot believe that above that wintry heaven which
+stretches over her, there is less regard for the poor, neglected child,
+than for that rosy belt of infant happiness which girdles and gladdens
+ten thousand hearths.
+
+And here, too, through the brilliant street, and the broad light of day,
+walks Purity, enshrined in the loveliest form of womanhood. And along
+that same street by night, attended by fitting shadows, strolls
+womanhood discrowned, clothed with painted shame, yet, even in the
+springs of that guilty heart not utterly quenched. We render just homage
+to the one, we pour scorn upon the other; but, could we trace back the
+lines of circumstance, and inquire why the one stands guarded with such
+sweet respect, and why the other has fallen, we might raise problems
+with which we cannot tax Providence, which we may not lay altogether to
+the charge of the condemned, but for which we might challenge an answer
+from society.
+
+And, if we would ascertain the practical purport of this lesson of human
+diversity which is so conspicuous in the street--the meaning of these
+sharp contrasts of refinement and grossness, intelligence and ignorance,
+respectability and guilt--we only ask a question that thousands have
+asked before us. And yet, it is possible to surmise the purpose of these
+diversities. We know, for one thing, that out of them come some of the
+noblest instances of character and of achievement. Ignorance and crime
+and poverty and vice, stand in fearful contrast to knowledge and
+integrity and wealth and purity; but they likewise constitute the dark
+background against which the virtues of human life stand out in radiant
+relief; virtues developed by the struggle which they create; virtues
+which seem impossible without their co-existence. For, whence issues any
+such thing as _virtue_, except out of the temptation and antagonism of
+vice? How could _Charity_ ever have appeared in the world, were there no
+dark ways to be trodden by its bright feet, and no suffering and sadness
+to require its aid? I look at these asylums, these hospitals, these
+ragged schools--a zodiac of beautiful charities, girdling all this
+selfishness and sin--I look at these monuments which humanity will honor
+when war shall be but a legend, and laurels have withered to dust; and
+when I think what they have grown out of, and why they stand here, I
+regard them as so many sublime way-marks by which Providence unfolds its
+purposes among men, and by which men trace out the plan of God.
+
+And then, again, perhaps this problem of human diversity presses
+heaviest where civilization is the most advanced, in order that men may
+be more sharply aroused to seek some practical solution. It is an
+encouraging sign when an evil begins to be intensely felt, and the
+demand for relief becomes desperate. The civilization of our time is
+imperfect; involves many incongruities; perhaps creates some evils; but
+that it is an improved civilization, is evinced by the fact that it is
+_self-conscious_; for perception is the necessary antecedent of endeavor
+and success. The contrasts of human condition, then, that unfold
+themselves in the crowded street, may teach us our duty and our
+responsibility in lessening social inequality and need.
+
+But a solution of this problem, clearer perhaps than any other, appears
+when we consider another lesson of the street; a lesson which requires
+us to look a little deeper, but which, when we do look, is no less
+evident than these diversities. That lesson unfolds the essential
+_unity_ of humanity. For, we find that the differences between men are
+_formal_ rather than _real_; that, with various outward conditions, they
+pass through the same great trials; and that the scales which seem to
+hang uneven at the surface, and to be tipped this way and that by the
+currents of worldly fortune, are very nearly balanced in the depths of
+the inner life. We are shallow judges of the happiness or the misery of
+others, if we estimate it by any marks that distinguish them from
+ourselves; if, for instance, we say that because they have more money
+they are happier, or because they live more meagrely they are more
+wretched. For, men are allied by much more than they differ. The rich
+man, rolling by in his chariot, and the beggar, shivering in his rags,
+are allied by much more than they differ. It is safer, therefore, to
+estimate our neighbor's real condition by what we find in our own lot,
+than by what we do not find there. And now, see into what an essential
+unity this criterion draws the jostling, divergent masses in yonder
+street! Each man there, like all the rest, finds life to be a
+discipline. Each has his separate form of discipline; but it bears upon
+the kindred spirit that is in every one of us, and strikes upon motives,
+sympathies, faculties, that run through the common humanity. Surely, you
+will not calculate any _essential_ difference from mere appearances; for
+the light laughter that bubbles on the lip often mantles over brackish
+depths of sadness, and the serious look may be the sober veil that
+covers a divine peace. You know that the bosom _can_ ache beneath
+diamond brooches, and how many blithe hearts dance under coarse wool.
+But I do not allude merely to these accidental contrasts. I mean that
+about equal measures of trial, equal measures of what men call good and
+evil, are allotted to all; enough, at least, to prove the identity of
+our humanity, and to show that we are all subjects of the same great
+plan. You say that the poor man who passes yonder, carrying his burden,
+has a hard lot of it, and it may be he has; but the rich man who brushes
+by him has a hard lot of it too--just as hard for _him_, just as well
+fitted to discipline him for the great ends of life. He has his money
+to take care of; a pleasant occupation, you may think; but, after all,
+an _occupation_, with all the strain and anxiety of labor, making more
+hard work for him, day and night, perhaps, than his neighbor has who
+digs ditches or thumps a lapstone. And it is quite likely that he feels
+poorer than the poor man, and, if he ever becomes self-conscious, has
+great reason to feel meaner. And then, he has his rivalries, his
+competitions, his troubles of caste and etiquette, so that the merchant,
+in his sumptuous apartments, comes to the same essential point, "sweats,
+and bears fardels," as well as his brother in the garret; tosses on his
+bed with surfeit, or perplexity, while the other is wrapped in peaceful
+slumber; and, if he is one who recognizes the moral ends of life, finds
+himself called upon to contend with his own heart, and to fight with
+peculiar temptations. And thus the rich man and the poor man, who seem
+so unequal in the street, would find but a thin partition between them,
+could they, as they might, detect one another kneeling on the same
+platform of spiritual endeavor, and sending up the same prayers to the
+same eternal throne.
+
+But, say you, "here is one who is returning to a home of destitution, of
+misery; where the light of the natural day is almost shut out, but in
+which brood the deeper shadows of despair." And yet, in many a splendid
+mansion you will find a more fearful destitution, a dearth of
+affections, killed by envy, jealousy, distrust; stifled by glittering
+formalities; a brood of evil passions that mock the splendor, and darken
+the magnificent walls. The measure of joy, too, is distributed with the
+same impartiality as the measure of woe. The child's grief throbs
+against the round of its little heart as heavily as the man's sorrow;
+and the one finds as much delight in his kite or drum, as the other in
+striking the springs of enterprise or soaring on the wings of fame.
+After all, happiness is the rule, not the exception, even in the hearts
+that beat in the crowded city; and its great elements are as common as
+the air, and the sunshine, and free movement, and good health. And what
+the fortunate may seem to gain in variety of methods, may only be
+unconscious devices to simulate or recover that natural relish which
+others have never lost. And no one doubts that the great dispensations
+of life, the events that make epochs in our fleeting years, cleave
+through all the strata of outward difference, and lay bare the core of
+our one humanity. Sickness! does it not make Dives look very much like
+Lazarus, and show our common weakness, and reveal the common marvel of
+this "harp of thousand strings?" And sorrow! it veils all faces, and
+bows all forms alike, and sends the same shudder through the frame, and
+casts the same darkness upon the walls, and peals forth in the same
+dirge of maternal agony by the dead boy's cradle in the sumptuous
+chamber, and the baby's last sleep on its bed of straw. And Death! how
+wonderfully it makes them all alike who in the street wore such various
+garments, and had such distinct aims, and were whirled apart in such
+different orbits! Ah! our essential humanity comes out in those composed
+forms and still features. Those divergent currents have carried them out
+upon the same placid sea at last; and the same solemn light streams
+upon the clasped hands and the uplifted faces. We don't mind the drapery
+so much then. It seems a very superficial matter beside the silent and
+starless mystery that enfolds them all.
+
+In what I have thus said I do not mean to maintain that outward
+conditions are nothing. I think they are a great deal; and we do right
+in striving to improve them; in escaping the evil, and seeking to secure
+the good that pertains to them. But, I repeat, when we come to the
+essential humanity, to the real discipline and substance of life, we
+find the same great features; and so this lesson of the street may help
+explain the problem suggested by the other; may reconcile each of us to
+our condition in the crowd, and direct our attention to substantial
+results.
+
+But, again, the street, with its processions and activities, teaches us
+that much in human life is merely _phenomenal_, merely _appears_. We
+enter into this truth by a very common train of observation. We know how
+much is put on purposely for the public gaze, and has no other intention
+than to be seen; how hollow are many of the smiles, and gay looks, and
+smooth decencies. And even the complexion of some, with its red and
+white, is more unsubstantial than all the rest; for it is in danger of
+being washed away by the first shower. It is strange to meet people
+whose personal significance in life is that of a shop window exhibiting
+lace and jewelry; strange to encounter men in whose place we might
+substitute a well-dressed effigy, and they would hardly be missed. Of
+course appearances should be attended to, and are good in their place.
+It is right that we should honor society by our best looks and ways. But
+it is not merely ridiculous, it is sad, to think how much in the street,
+where humanity exhibits all its phases, is appearance and but little
+else.
+
+But dress and manners are not all that is phenomenal in human life.
+These men and women themselves, this streaming crowd, these brick walls
+and stately pinnacles, those that pursue and the things that are
+pursued, are only appearances. It may be profitable for us to stand
+apart from this multitude, this river of living forms, and think in how
+short a time it all will have passed away; how short a time since, and
+it was not! A little while ago, and this rich and populous city was a
+green island, and our beautiful bay clasped it in its silver arms like
+an emerald. The wilderness stood here, and the child of the forest
+thought of it as a prepared abiding place for himself and for his people
+for ever. The red man has gone; the wild woods have vanished; and these
+structures, and vehicles, and busy crowds, have come into their places
+magically, like the new picture in a dissolving view. But are these
+forms of life, is your presence here or mine, any more substantial than
+those that have sunk away? Nay, all this splendid civilization, what is
+it but a sparkling ripple in the calm eternity of God? Dwellings,
+stores, banks, churches, streets, and the restless multitudes, are but
+forms of life,--as it were a rack of cloud drifting across the mirror of
+absolute being. That which seems to you substantial is only spectral.
+And as the dress of the fop, and the smile of the coquette, is merely an
+appearance; so the wealth for which men strain in eager chase, and the
+fabrics which pride builds up, the anvils on which labor strikes its
+mighty blows, and the body to which so much is devoted, and which
+absorbs so much care, are but appearances also. While that which may
+seem to you as a shadow--the spiritual substratum of life, the basis of
+those spiritual laws which run through all our conditions--is the only
+abiding substance.
+
+If we only look in this light, my friends, upon the continuous spectacle
+of human movement and human change, we shall find that "Wisdom...
+uttereth her voice in the streets." Old as the thought may be, in the
+rush of the great crowd it will come to us fresh and impressively, that
+all this is but a form of spiritual and eternal being. A day in the city
+is like life itself. Out of unconscious slumber into the brilliant
+morning and the thick activity we come. But, by-and-by, the heaving mass
+breaks into units, and one by one dissolves into the shadow of the
+night. Two cities grow up side by side--the city in which men appear,
+the city into which they vanish; the city whose houses and goods they
+possess for a little while and then leave behind them, and the city
+whose white monuments just show us the pinnacles of their estates in the
+eternal world. The busy, diversified crowd that rolls through the
+streets--it is only an appearance! It is a ceaseless march of
+emigration. In a little while, the names in this year's Directory may be
+read in Greenwood.
+
+But we must not rest with this as the final lesson of the street. It is
+only the form of Life that is transient and phenomenal; but the _Life_
+itself is here, also--here, in these flashing eyes, and heaving breasts,
+and active limbs. These conditions, however transient, involve the great
+interest of Humanity; and that lends the deepest significance to these
+conditions. The interest of Humanity! which gives importance to all it
+touches, and transforms nature into history; which imparts dignity to
+the rudest workshop, and the most barren shore, and the humblest
+grave--this permits us to draw no mean or discouraging conclusions from
+the achievements and the changes of the multitudes around us. It may do
+for the skeptic, who sees nothing in existence but these forms of
+things; who sees nothing but the limited phenomena of our present state,
+and thinks that includes all; it may do for him to croak over the
+transitoriness of life, and call it a trivial game. But it is _not_
+trivial; and there is no spot where man acts, there is nothing that he
+does, that is insignificant. Perhaps you have a quick eye for the
+foibles of people, and can detect their vanities, and meannesses, and
+laughable conceits. If you employ this gift to correct a bad habit, or
+expose a falsehood, it is well enough. But if it induces you to look
+upon things merely with the skill of a satirist, then let me say, there
+is no "ludicrous side" to life; there is nothing in human conduct that
+is simply absurd. The least transaction has a moral cast, and every word
+and act reveals spiritual relations. The interest of man can never be
+thrown into insignificance by his conditions; these draw interest from
+him. And, whatever his post in the world, however limited or broad his
+sphere of observation, for _him_ life is real, and has intense
+relations. We must not stand so far apart from the crowd as to occupy
+the position of mere spectators, and regard these men and women as so
+many mechanical figures in a panorama. We must look through the depths
+of their experience into their own souls, and through the depths of that
+experience again upon the world, beholding it as it appears to the
+beggar, and the lonely woman, and the child of vice and crime, and the
+hero, and the saint, and as it falls with intense yet diverse
+refractions upon all these multiform angles of personality. So shall we
+learn to cherish a solemn and tender interest in the dear humanity
+around us, and feel the arteries of sympathy which connect it, in all
+its conditions, with our own hearts. And, as we return homeward from our
+study of the street, it may be with our irritation, and prejudice, and
+selfishness softened down; with a larger love flowing out towards the
+least, and even the worst; realizing the spiritual ties that make us
+one, and the Infinite Fatherhood that encircles us all; perhaps
+suggestions will come to us that have been best expressed in the words
+of the poet--
+
+    "Let us move slowly through the street,
+      Filled with an ever-shifting train,
+    Amid the sound of steps that beat
+      The murmuring walks like autumn rain.
+
+    "How fast the flitting figures come!
+      The mild, the fierce, the stony face;
+    Some bright with thoughtless smiles, and some
+      Where secret tears have left their trace.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Each, where his tasks or pleasures call
+      They pass, and heed each other not.
+    There is, Who heeds, Who holds them all,
+      In His large love and boundless thought.
+
+    "These struggling tides of life that seem,
+      In wayward, aimless course to tend,
+    Are eddies of the mighty stream
+      That rolls to its appointed end."
+
+
+
+
+MAN AND MACHINERY.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE II.
+
+MAN AND MACHINERY.
+
+      For the spirit of the living creature was in the
+      wheels.--EZEKIEL, i. 20.
+
+
+Whatever may have been the significance of the sublime vision from which
+I have extracted those words, I do not think that their essential
+meaning is perverted when I apply them to the subject which comes before
+us this evening. I am not aware of any sentence that expresses more
+concisely the relation which I would indicate between _Man_ and
+_Machinery_; between those great agents of human achievement and the
+living intelligence which works in them and by them. And though a Divine
+Spirit moved in those flashing splendors which burned before the eyes of
+the prophet, is it not also a divine spirit that mingles in every great
+manifestation of humanity, and that moves even in the action of man,
+the worker, toiling among innumerable wheels?
+
+Perhaps if we were called upon to name some one feature of the present
+age which distinguishes it from all other ages, and endows it with a
+special wonder and glory, we should call it the Age of Machinery. We
+trust our age is unfolding something better than material triumphs. The
+results of past thought and past endeavor are pouring through it in
+expanding currents of knowledge, liberty, and brotherhood. But the great
+_agents_ in this diffusion of ideas and principles are those vehicles of
+iron, and those messengers of lightning, which compress the huge globe
+into a neighborhood, and bring all its interests within the system of a
+daily newspaper. Like the generations which have preceded us, we enter
+into the labors of others, and inherit the fruits of their effort. But
+these powerful instruments, condensing time and space, endow a single
+half-century with the possibilities of a cycle. If we take the period
+comprehending the American and the French revolutions as a dividing
+line, and look both sides the chasm, we shall discover the difference
+of a thousand years. Remarkable for brilliant achievements in every
+department of physics, ours well deserves to be called the Age of
+_Science_, also. But it is still more remarkable, for the application of
+the most majestic and subtle constituents of the universe to the most
+familiar uses; the wild forces of matter have been caught and harnessed.
+Go into any factory, and see what fine workmen we have made of the great
+elements around us. See how magnificent nature has humbled itself, and
+works in shirt-sleeves. Without food, without sweat, without weariness,
+it toils all day at the loom, and shouts lustily in the sounding wheels.
+How diligently the iron fingers pick and sort, and the muscles of steel
+retain their faithful gripe, and enormous energies run to and fro with
+an obedient click; while forces that tear the arteries of the earth and
+heave volcanoes, spin the fabric of an infant's robe, and weave the
+flowers in a lady's brocade.
+
+I think, then, we may appropriately call it--The Age of Machinery. It is
+not a peculiarity of the city, but, rather, seeks room to stretch
+itself out; and so you may perceive its smoky signals hovering over a
+thousand vallies, and the echo of its mighty pulses throbbing among the
+loneliest hills. Nevertheless, it is sufficiently developed here to
+illustrate the Conditions of Humanity in the City, and this fact,
+together with the general interest of the subject, is my warrant for
+taking it up in the present discourse. And my remarks must necessarily
+be of a general cast, as I have no room for the statistics, and details,
+and various discussions which grow out of the theme.
+
+And the key-note of all that I shall say, at the present time, is really
+in the text itself--"For the spirit of the living creature was in the
+wheels."
+
+In the first place, these words suggest the relations of _Use_ and
+_Help_ between Man and Machinery. Upon surveying these numerous and
+complicated instruments, the thought that most readily occurs, perhaps,
+is that of the _necessity_ of machinery. The very first step that man
+takes, out of the condition of infant weakness and animal rudeness, must
+be accomplished by the aid of some implement. He alone, of all beings
+upon the face of the earth, is obliged to _invent_, and is capable of
+endless invention. The necessity for this springs out, and is a prophecy
+of, his destiny. The moment he was seen fashioning the first tool,
+however imperfect, that moment was indicated the difference between
+himself and the brute, and the control he was destined to gain over the
+world about him. To fulfil this destiny, he confronts nature with naked
+hands; and yet, there is the earth to plough, the harvest to reap, the
+torrent to bridge, the ocean to cross; there are all the results to
+achieve which constitute the difference between the primitive man, and
+the civilization of the nineteenth century. The Machine, then--the agent
+which links the gratification to the want--is born of necessity. But we
+must make a distinction between those instruments which are positively
+essential, and those, for instance, which merely answer the demands of
+luxury or indolence.
+
+And this brings up the question of the _comparative_ uses of
+Machinery--the foremost place being assigned to those implements which
+are absolutely indispensable to man's existence upon the earth. But
+between this absolute degree, and that of frivolous invention, there are
+countless grades of utility. And the question of usefulness must be
+decided according to the _standard_ of utility which we apply. If bare
+subsistence is assumed to be the end of man upon the earth, most of our
+modern inventions are useless. We can travel without a locomotive, and
+procure a meal without a cooking-range. The moment we rise above the
+grossest conception of human existence, the test of usefulness becomes
+enlarged, and we can make a safe decision upon whatever increases man's
+comfort, adds to his ability, or inspires his culture. In this way, new
+things _become_ indispensable. That which was not necessary _à priori_,
+_is_ necessary now, in a fresh stage of development, and in connection
+with circumstances that have sprung up and formed around it. That which
+was not necessary to man the savage, living on roots and raw fish, is
+necessary to man the civilized, with new possibilities opening before
+him, and new faculties unfolded within him. The printing-press was not
+absolutely necessary to Nimrod, or to Julius Cæsar, but is it not
+absolutely necessary now? Strike it out of existence to-day, and what
+would be the condition of the world to-morrow? You would have to tear
+away with it all that has grown up around it, and become assimilated to
+it--the textures of the world's growth for three hundred years. Paul
+moved the old world without a telegraph, and Columbus found a new one
+without a steamship. But see how essential these agents are to the
+present condition of civilization. How many derangements among the
+wheels of business, and the plans of affection, if merely a snow-drift
+blocks the cars, or a thunder-storm snaps the wires! Our estimate of
+necessity, and, therefore, of utility, must be formed according to
+present conditions, and the legitimate demand that rises out of them;
+these conditions themselves being the necessary developments of society
+and of the individual.
+
+But some of these, you may say, are the demands of luxury, of indolent
+ease, of man setting nature to work and lapsing in self-indulgence. To
+some degree this result may grow out of the present state of things; as
+some portion of evil will follow in the sweep of an immense good. But
+what is the precise sentence to be passed upon this prevalent luxury? Of
+course, admitting the evil--which is apparent--I maintain that there is
+a great deal of good in it; that it is inextricably associated with much
+real refinement and progress. Men are accustomed to speak of the
+simplicity and purity of past times, and to compare, with a sigh, the
+good old era of the stage-coach and the spinning-wheel with these days
+of whizzing machinery, Aladdin palaces, and California gold. But the
+core of logic that lies within this rind of sentiment forces a
+conclusion that I can by no means admit, the conclusion that the world
+is going backward. I never knew of an epoch that was not thought by some
+then living to be the worst that ever was, and which did not seem to
+stand in humiliating contrast with some blessed period gone by. But the
+golden age of Christianity is in the future, not in the past. Those old
+ages are like the landscape that shows best in purple distance, all
+verdant and smooth and bathed in mellow light. But could we go back and
+touch the reality, we should find many a swamp of disease, and rough
+and grimy paths of rock and mire. Those were good old times, it may be
+thought, when baron and peasant feasted together. But the one could not
+read, and made his mark with a sword-pommel; and the other was not held
+so dear as a favorite dog. Pure and simple times were those of our
+grandfathers,--it may be. Possibly not so pure as we may think, however,
+and with a simplicity ingrained with some bigotry and a good deal of
+conceit. The fact is, we are bad enough, imperfect, not because we are
+growing worse, but because we are yet far from the best. I think,
+however, with Lord Bacon, that _these_ are "the old times." The world is
+older now than it ever was, and it contains the best life and fruition
+of the past. And this special condition of luxury is a growth out of the
+past, and is the necessary concomitant of much that is good. Opening new
+channels for industry, it furnishes occupation for thousands; while, in
+many of its phases, it indicates a refined culture, and a sphere
+elevated above the imperative wants of existence. It is no proof of the
+disadvantages of machinery, therefore, to say that it ministers to
+something beside absolute bodily need, and delivers man from a slow and
+exhausting drudgery. So far as it helps us to control nature, and
+increases the facilities of human intercourse, and diffuses general
+comfort and elegance, and affords a respite from incessant physical
+toil, so far it is an agent and a sign of progress.
+
+But, it may be said again, that it is the agent of a selfish and
+exclusive power, enriching a few and injuring many. And it cannot be
+denied that grave problems grow out of the relations between Machinery
+and the laboring classes. Every little while, some new invention is
+thrust forward, which takes a portion of labor out of the hands of flesh
+and transfers it to hands of iron. It is not enough to say that mankind
+in general is benefited by these inanimate agents, which do the work of
+the world so much more rapidly and powerfully. This may answer as an
+argument against a monopoly of any one kind of mechanical force. It may
+be a reason for using cars instead of steamboats, and balloons rather
+than railroads. The general good must be advanced, whatever the damage
+to private interests. But the present case brings up the question
+whether machinery is a general good at all; whether the effect of its
+introduction into almost every department of labor, will not be felt in
+the destitution of millions. And, upon this point, I observe, that, like
+all other great revolutions, the immediate effect may be such as has
+been suggested. But the final result will be beneficial, and such a
+result may be traced out even now. For instance, this clogging of old
+departments of labor will precipitate men upon fresh ones, and upon
+those that have been too much neglected. It will tend to introduce woman
+to branches of industry perfectly suited to her, but which have been too
+exclusively occupied by the other sex, and to turn the attention of
+robust men to those great fields of productive toil which are as yet but
+little improved. It may drive them from the dependence, the crowded
+competition, the unwholesome life of the city, into the broad fields and
+open air and the sovereignty of the soil. And if this immense intrusion
+of machinery has only this result, of equalizing the balance against
+production, we shall have one solution of the problem. And there will be
+another solution, if this phalanx of mechanism shall lift the mass of
+men above the occasions of coarse material drudgery into other
+activities, which doubtless will be thrown open, and shall allow more
+leisure for spiritual culture. But in this, and all other great
+questions affecting human welfare, I throw myself back, finally, upon
+the tokens of Providential Design. The world moves forward, not
+backward; and the great developments of time are for good, not evil. By
+machinery, man proceeds with his dominion over nature. He assimilates it
+to himself; it becomes, so to speak, a part of himself. Every great
+invention is the enlargement of his own personality. Iron and fire
+become blood and muscle, and gravitation flows in the current of his
+will. His pulses beat in the steamship, throbbing through the deep,
+while the fibres of his heart and brain inclose the earth in an electric
+network of thought and sympathy. That which was given to help man, will
+not hinder nor hurt him. "For the spirit of the living creature is in
+the wheels."
+
+I observe, in the second place, that the words of the text accord with
+the testimony which machinery bears to the _dignity of man_. All these
+great inventions--these implements of marvellous skill and power--prove
+that the inventor, or the worker, himself is _not_ a machine. I know of
+nothing which gives me so forcible an impression of the worth and
+superiority of mind, of its alliance with the Creative Intelligence, as
+the exhibition of an ingenious piece of mechanism. I have stood with
+wonder before such a specimen, and seen it work with all the precision
+of a reflecting creature. Lifting the most tremendous weights, cleaving
+the most solid masses, performing the nicest tasks, as though a living
+intellect were in it, informing it and directing its power. I hardly
+know of any achievement that stands as a higher witness for the human
+mind. The great poem that bursts in a flood of inspiration upon the soul
+of genius, and opens the realms of immortal beauty, may lift us to a
+nobler plane of endeavor. The heroic act of toil or martyrdom for
+principle, certainly has a loftier, because it is a moral, grandeur. But
+as an illustration of the _creativeness_ of man's intellect--of its
+wondrous capability--of its alliance with that attribute of the Divine
+Nature which is evident in the fibres of the grass-blade and the march
+of the galaxy--I know of nothing more striking than this piece of
+mechanism, which is the product of the most profound and patient
+thought, the harmonizing of antagonistic forces, the combination of the
+most abstruse details, fitted to the remotest exigencies, and working
+just as the inventive mind meant it should, and just as it was set
+a-going, as if that mind were presiding over it, were in it, though it
+is now far distant, or has vanished from the earth. That mind is
+immortal! that nature, which is common to all men, transcends any shape
+of matter and is superior to mechanism. And it may be necessary to say
+this, necessary to say that man, who is helped by machinery, is
+_separate_ from it. It is mind that is thus involved with matter. The
+spirit of a living creature that is in the wheels.
+
+It may be necessary to say this, my friends, and to say it frequently,
+lest the vast mechanical achievements of our time seduce us into a mere
+mechanical life. I do not think that the deepest question is, whether
+machinery will multiply to such an extent as to snatch the bread from
+the mouths of living men; but whether men, with all the possibilities of
+their nature, will not become absorbed in that which supplies them with
+bread alone? I have just expressed my admiration for the genius of the
+great inventor. Nor can I honor too highly the faithful and industrious
+mechanic--the man who fills up his chink in the great economy by
+patiently using his hammer or his wheel. For, he _does_ something. If he
+only sews a welt, or planes a knot, he helps build up the solid pyramid
+of this world's welfare. While there are those who, exhibiting but
+little use while living, might, if embalmed, serve the same purpose as
+those forms of ape and ibis _inside_ the Egyptian caverns--serve to
+illustrate the shapes and idolatries of human conceit. At any rate,
+there is no doubt of the essential nobility of that man who pours into
+life the honest vigor of his toil, over those who compose this feathery
+foam of fashion that sweeps along Broadway; who consider the insignia of
+honor to consist in wealth and indolence; and who, ignoring the family
+history, paint coats of arms to cover up the leather aprons of their
+grandfathers.
+
+I shall not be misunderstood then, when, making a distinction in behalf
+of the mechanic by profession, I say that no man should be a mere
+mechanic in _soul_. In other words, no man should be bound up in a
+routine of material ends and uses. He should not be a mechanic, working
+exclusively in a dead system, but always the architect of a living
+ideal. And surrounded, astonished, served and enriched as we are by
+these splendid legions of mechanism, the danger is that material
+achievement will seem to us the _supreme_ achievement; that all life
+will become machinery; and the higher interests of being, and the great
+firmament of immortality, be eclipsed by these flashing wheels. We are
+in danger of being drawn away from the sanctities of the inner life and
+the still work of the soul, by this maelstrom of excitement and power.
+No religious man can help asking, and asking anxiously, whether the
+spirit of devotion is as deep and fresh, whether spiritual communion
+with God is as direct and constant, in this whirl and roar, and
+marvellous achievement, as they were in times bearing less evidently the
+signs of material progress. For, that which merely gives us a stronger
+grasp of the world around us, and sends us along the level of nature, is
+not the most genuine element of progress; but that which elevates our
+moral plane and enriches the great deep of our spiritual being. The
+steamship and telegraph are not absolute tokens of this progress, but
+the moral earnestness and the Christian charity that work through them
+are; and these must spring up in hearts that are not merely adjusted to
+the world, but lifted above it--that are not so occupied by mere
+machinery as to neglect the living streams of an inward and devout
+culture.
+
+But, for another reason,--or as an extension of the same reason,--we
+need to realize the truth that man is separate from and superior to
+machinery. It is because, upon a practical recognition of this truth
+depends the just action of all who control the interests of labor, and,
+so to speak, the lives and souls of the laborers. If we should beware of
+an influence that would render us _mere_ mechanics in our own higher
+nature, we should likewise remove anything that makes others mere
+machines, presenting for us no other consideration than the amount of
+work they can perform for us, and with how little care and cost. I
+cannot now enter into the great questions that spring up here concerning
+the relations of capital and labor, and of the employer and the
+employed. I only observe that these are among the deepest questions of
+the time: questions which will be heard, which must be discussed, and
+practically answered. And they who by plans and experiments, however
+visionary they may seem, however abortive they may prove, are trying to
+solve this problem, are much wiser in their generation than those who
+content themselves with cutaneous palliatives and a stolid conservatism.
+But I maintain now, that back of all these considerations stands this
+truism,--that man is not a machine; that the being who toils in the
+factory, the furnace, the dark mine underground, is one who needs and
+hopes and suffers and dies, as sinews of iron and fabrics of brass
+cannot. "The spirit of a living creature is in the wheels." A cry for
+justice, for free action, for spiritual opportunity, comes not from the
+roaring engine or the dizzy loom, but out from the midst of those who
+are endowed with the sensitiveness and the moral possibilities that
+belong to humanity, and humanity alone. Set in motion the grandest piece
+of mechanism ever conceived by human genius, and still there is infinite
+difference between it and the poorest drudge that bears God's
+image,--between it and any human claim.
+
+It must have been a noble spectacle, a few weeks since, to have seen
+that great ship[A] sail out of port, stretching its proud beak over the
+sea, and with thundering exultation trampling its sapphire floor. One
+might have followed its wake with a glistening eye, and said to
+himself--"There is the great symbol of human progress, there is the
+consummation of man's triumph over nature! The long results of ages are
+condensed in that fabric of strength and beauty. Man has compelled the
+forest, and ravished the mine, and converted the stream, and chained the
+fire; and now, with the eye of science and the hand of skill, he rides
+in this triumphal chariot, making a swift, obedient pathway of the
+deep!" But when that dark day burst upon them, and nature with one angry
+sweep transformed that splendid palace into a floating death-chamber;
+when ocean lifted up this triumph of man's skill, and shook it like a
+toy; the interest which hung over that awful desolation--the interest to
+which your hearts flow out with painful sympathy to-night--was in
+nothing that man had achieved, but in humanity itself. All the
+workmanship, all the material splendor, all the skill, were nothing
+compared with one heart beating amidst that tempest; compared with one
+groan that rose from that sea of agony, and then was silent for ever.
+
+    [Footnote A: This discourse was delivered just after the tidings
+    of the loss of the San Francisco, in December, 1853.]
+
+And, again, when I consider the conduct of that gallant captain who, day
+by day, rode by the side of the shuddering wreck, and in slippery peril
+maintained the royalty of his manhood, and sent a brother's cheer and a
+brother's help through the storm; when I think of that noble achievement
+where the Stars and Stripes and the Cross of St. George were lost and
+blended in the light of universal humanity; I say to myself--how does an
+act like this shed light upon a thousand instances of human depravity!
+What is any material triumph compared to this moral beauty! And what is
+the great distinction between rags and coronets, between senates and
+workshops, when in the breast of every man, and everywhere, there is the
+possibility of such heroism, such charity, and such splendid
+performance!
+
+And so, my friends, turning from this specific illustration, and looking
+through the wards of cities, the busy factories, the dim attics and
+cellars, they all become glorious by the reflected light of the humanity
+that toils and suffers within them. Man is greater than any achievement
+of mechanism, any interest of capital, and all the questions which these
+involve must be brought to the test of his moral capabilities, and his
+spiritual as well as earthly wants.
+
+But I observe, finally, that the words of the text suggest the
+_Providential design_ and the _Divine agency_ that are involved in the
+great mechanical achievements of our age. As the Divine Spirit flowed
+through those living creatures and moved those wheels, so God's
+influence is in the movement of humanity, and in the instruments of that
+movement. We get only a narrow, and often an inexplicable conception of
+things, until we behold them encircled by this horizon of a Providential
+design. And if humanity, with all its claims and possibilities, is
+involved in this network of mechanism, so doubtless are the processes of
+Infinite Wisdom. Something more than material greatness, or ends limited
+merely to this earth, is to be wrought out by it. Indications of this
+appear already. The telegraph and steamship, for instance, serve not
+only the interests of trade and commerce, but of liberty, and
+brotherhood, and of Christian influence.
+
+It is beautiful to see how the most selfish agents presently become
+converted to the broadest uses, and matter is transformed into the
+vehicle of spirit. For God is in history. It is a Divine dispensation,
+and has miracles of its own. And, because they come by natural
+development let us not fail to recognize the benevolence and the
+significance involved with them. Is not the effect of miracle in the
+electric wire? The printing-press, is it not the gift of tongues? It is
+atheistic to suppose that all these wondrous agents have only a narrow
+and material purpose, and play no part in the highest scheme of the
+world. Like the prophet by the river Chebar, we may behold them as the
+symbols in a sublime vision. These wheels within wheels, full of eyes,
+full of intelligence, and full of human destiny and vast purpose, we
+know not all their meaning yet. But they have a great meaning.
+Beneficent intention runs through their swift motions--voices of promise
+rise in their multitudinous sounds. A living spirit is in these
+wheels--the influence of God; the spirit of man. And, in due time, out
+of them will evolve the incalculable issues of human welfare and the
+Divine glory.
+
+
+
+
+THE STRIFE FOR PRECEDENCE.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE III.
+
+THE STRIFE FOR PRECEDENCE.
+
+      And if a man strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned
+      except he strive lawfully.--II. TIMOTHY, ii. 5.
+
+
+In walking the streets of the city, there rises the interesting
+question--What are the various motives which animate these restless
+people, and send them to and fro? As a French author has well
+observed,--"The necessaries of life do not occasion, at most, a third
+part of the hurry." They are comparatively few who struggle among these
+busy waves for a bare subsistence. There are others who are impelled by
+some of the deepest affections of the human heart, and who toil day
+after day with noble self-sacrifice for the comfort of dependent
+parents, and helpless children. While others still run on errands of
+mercy, and work in the harness of unrelaxing duty. But when we have
+taken all these influences into the account, and made the most of them,
+there remains a large quantity of activity which, as we trace it to its
+spring, we shall find issuing from a desire for influence, for
+notoriety, for some kind of personal distinction. The city,--in this
+instance, as in many others, representing the world at large,--is
+essentially a race-course, or battle-field, in which, through forms of
+ambitious effort, and cunning method, and plodding labor, and
+ostentation, the aspirations of thousands appear and carry on a _Strife
+for Precedence_.
+
+And, in selecting this phase of human life as the theme of the present
+discourse, I observe in the first place--that the desire for precedence
+is one of the _deepest_ and most _subtle_ motives in the soul of man. It
+is prolific of disguises. It is not merely under the mask which we may
+put on before other people, but it glides through various
+transformations of self-deceit; like the evil genius in the fairy tale,
+now dwindling to a mere seed, now bursting into a devouring fire. When,
+with an honest purpose, we probe it and pluck at it, still we may
+detect it in the lowest socket of the heart. Often it is most vital when
+we feel most sure that it is vanquished. It delights in the garb of
+humility, and finds its food in the profession of self-renunciation. See
+its grossest expression in the desire for physical superiority--the
+glory of the victor in the Grecian games, or the modern pugilist with
+the champion's belt. This is the reason why men, priding themselves upon
+qualities in which they are equalled by any mastiff and excelled by any
+horse, will stand up and batter one another into a mass of blood and
+bruises. And if we analyze the merit of some conqueror upon a hundred
+battle-fields, we shall find ingredients almost as coarse. Only there
+was a larger impulse, and more genius to light the way; so that _his_
+combat in the ring became _achievement_, and his success _fame_. The
+outside difference was in the value of the stakes; but the huzzas did
+not rise much nearer to heaven in the one instance than in the other.
+And when we get at the real centre of all those plaudits, we find only a
+little throbbing atom, a little human heart, all on fire with the lust
+for supremacy.
+
+But these are the more palpable shapes of this desire for Precedence. It
+works more covertly, but with no less energy. I need not--for I
+cannot--specify all the instances in which it acts. It would constitute
+a more concise statement to affirm where it does _not_ act. It is
+sufficiently apparent in the scramble of the market and the parade of
+the street; at the toilette of beauty; in the etiquette of the
+drawing-room, where people sit as if in a cavern of icicles; in the
+spurious patriotism of politics; and too often, it is to be feared, in
+the highest seats of the synagogue, and where men lift holy hands of
+prayer. It is the scholar's inspiration. When he comes to the steep and
+rugged way, it helps him to make a foot-hold, and the thorns blossom
+into roses as he climbs. Sometimes, even, it saturates the plan of the
+philanthropist, and peppers the milk of his charity with an inconsistent
+wrath.
+
+It seems an unhappy, as it must often be an unjust method, to attribute
+any appearance of good conduct to the meanest possible motive. It is a
+policy that makes a man afraid of his best friends. He feels that every
+draft he makes upon human honor, or affection, is liable to be cashed
+with counterfeit bills. If there were no alternative between the
+cleverness that suspects everybody, and the credulity that trusts
+everybody, I think I had rather be one of the dupes than one of the
+oracles. For, really, there is less misery in being cheated than in that
+kind of wisdom which perceives, or thinks it perceives, that all mankind
+are cheats. But, while simple fact forbids our assuming either of these
+extremes, we must, nevertheless, in reasoning upon the phenomena of
+human conduct, allow large scope for the influence of which I am now
+treating. For, as I have already intimated, we shall find it lurking
+under numerous forms. In discussing the question of Slavery, for
+instance, it is often said--that it is for the interest of the master to
+take good care of his human as he does of his brute stock--to see that
+they are well-fed, clothed, &c. And so it is for his _interest_ to do
+this. But how often does the lust for supremacy over-ride interest
+itself! How often does an imperious personality thrust itself forward
+in the most absurd ways, damaging its own property and welfare, just as
+a boy breaks his top, or a balked rider shoots his horse, or an
+independent congregationalist locks his pew-door, as much as to
+say--"There, the world knows one thing about me, at least. It knows that
+I am _master_ and _owner_ here!"
+
+But I observe, further, that, while this desire for Precedence is common
+among men of all conditions, there are some modes of its expression
+which are peculiarly excited in a democratic form of society. That which
+is the open glory of a community like ours, is with many a secret
+vexation and shame. People boast here of the equality of our
+institutions, and then try their best to break up the social level. In a
+genuine Aristocracy, where they have endeavored to preserve a
+gulf-stream of noble blood in the midst of the plebeian Atlantic, and a
+man holds his distinction by the color of the bark on his family tree,
+and the kind of sap that circulates through it, there is no danger of
+any unpleasant mistakes. The hard palm of Labor may cross the gloved
+hand of Leisure, and nobody will suspect that the select is too
+familiar with the vulgar. Consequently, there is a good deal of
+affability and prime manliness, besides those associations of sentiment
+and imagination which, if there must be an aristocracy, lend it an
+artistic consistency. But here, where everybody says that all men are
+equal, and everybody is afraid they _will_ be; where there are no
+adamantine barriers of birth and caste; people are anxiously exclusive.
+And though the forms of aristocracy flourish more gorgeously in their
+native soil, the genuine _virus_ can be found in New York almost as
+readily as in London, or Vienna. And the virus breaks out in the most
+absurd shapes of liveries and titles. And these forms of aspiration are
+not only absurd because they are inconsistent, but because they
+illustrate no real ground of precedence. They are superficial and
+uncertain. They do not pertain to the man but to his accidents. He gains
+by them no intrinsic glory, no permanent good. To employ the language of
+the text, by these he strives for masteries; but he does not strive
+lawfully, and so he is not crowned. And this leads me to say something
+respecting what is false, and what is legitimate, in that strife for
+Precedence which is so amply illustrated in the life of the City.
+
+Let us, then, consider some of the forms which this struggle assumes in
+the streets and the dwellings around us. I remark, in the first place,
+that it inspires much of the effort for _wealth_. I believe there are
+but few, comparatively, who are anxious to make money merely for the
+sake of piling it up, and counting it out. There may be a mania of this
+kind, in which men become enamored of Mammon for his own sake, and hug
+him to their breasts, and kiss his golden lips, with all the ardor of
+lovers. Still, I suspect that the genuine miser--that is, one who loves
+money for itself alone--is an exceptional man. But every man who is not
+absolutely inactive and useless in the world, is moved by some kind of
+passion. For, it is not correct to speak of _outliving_ our passions. We
+may outlive the passion of young, fresh love, that makes the world a
+May-time of blossoms and of roses. We may outlive the passion for
+selfish fame, because some transcendent claim of duty snatches us up to
+a sublimer level. We may change these earlier forms for the passion of
+philanthropy, the passion for truth, the passion of holy conviction. But
+so long as we live at all, we do not outlive passion. And with many the
+most persistent desire is for that precedence which attends the
+possession of wealth. That miser, as you call him, with a face like
+parchment, and in whose nature all the springs of emotion seem to have
+grown rusty with long disuse, is animated by a secret flame that keeps
+him all a-glow. It is the consciousness of power--the mightiest power of
+the present age--the power of money. Those figures which he scrawls at
+his writing-desk involve a more potent magic than the cabalistic cyphers
+of Doctor Dee, or Cornelius Agrippa. His hand presses the spring of an
+influence that casts midnight or sunshine over the World of Traffic, and
+shakes entire blocks of real estate with a speculative earthquake. It is
+not the Czar or the Sultan, but the Capitalist, that makes war or
+preserves peace. The destinies of the time are enacted not in Congress
+or Parliament, but in the Bank of England and in Wall street. It is a
+mighty power that sits on 'Change, and inspires the great movements of
+the world; sending its messengers panting through the deep and feeling
+around the globe with telegraphic nerves. And one may well be more
+ambitious to wield a portion of this power than to speak in senates, or
+to sit upon a throne. Here is something that will raise him above the
+common level; will pay him for long years of sacrifice and contumely;
+will hide meanness of birth, and scantiness of education, and paint over
+the stains of damaged character. Here is the most feasible way of
+distinction in a democracy. The doors of respectability and honor turn
+on silver hinges. Gravity relaxes, fashion gives way, beauty smiles, and
+talent defers, before the man of money. He may be an ignoramus, but he
+possesses the golden alphabet. He may be a boor, but Plutus lends a
+charm which eclipses the grace of Apollo. He may have accumulated his
+wealth in a way which would make an intelligent hyena ashamed of
+himself, but he _has_ accumulated it, and the past is forgotten. I do
+not mean to say that, as the general rule, wealth is thus associated,
+but I believe that one great motive for money-getting, is the
+consciousness of the power and the distinction that accompany its
+possession; and so, many a man in the thick dust of the mart--though it
+may not always be clear to himself--is really engaged in a strife for
+Precedence.
+
+Again, consider the illustrations of this strife in the _Style_ of
+_Living_. It is really a battle of chairs and mirrors, of plate and
+equipage, and is the spring of the monstrous extravagance that
+characterizes our city life. For I suppose there is no place on the
+earth where people have run into such gorgeous nonsense as here--turning
+home into a Parisian toy-shop, absorbing the price of a good farm in the
+ornaments of a parlor, and hanging up a judge's salary in a single
+chandelier. Not that I accept the standard of absolute necessity, or
+agree with those who cry out--"Have nothing but what is absolutely
+_useful_!" For, if the universe had been cast after their type, there
+would have been no embroidery on the wings of the butterfly, and the
+awful summit of Mont Blanc would have yielded fire-wood. There is an
+instinct of beauty and grace implanted in our nature, which demands
+elegance and even luxury, and the bare necessaries of life do _not_
+answer every purpose. And, to say nothing of the employment which these
+accessories of refinement afford for thousands--for I have spoken of
+this in the previous series--the most sturdy utilitarian is not
+consistent with his theory. He defers to the social condition around him
+to such an extent that he sleeps on a bed instead of a bench, and wears
+broadcloth instead of untanned sheepskin. And, therefore, others might
+say, and say truly, that a good deal that is actually superfluous is the
+fruit of certain social proprieties which cannot, with any consistency,
+be violated. Our style of living may lawfully run from the bare
+necessaries of existence, through the stages of comfort and convenience,
+even into luxury, according to our condition and means. But in some of
+the style of living in this very city, there is neither good taste,
+social propriety, nor common sense. It is an apoplectic splendor; a
+melo-dramatic glitter; in one word, a vulgar spirit of social rivalry
+blossoming in lace, brocade, gilding, and fresco. It is one way of
+getting a head taller than another upon this democratic level. It is a
+carpet contest for the mastery in what is called "society." And if one
+mourns over the exuberant selfishness that lifts its pinnacles out of
+this dreary sea of hunger and despair, and wonders that so many live
+wrapped in the idea that they were created merely to be gratified; he
+can hardly help being amused, on the other hand, at this fashionable
+strife for precedence, and the methods which it developes.
+
+But enough has been said to illustrate the false element in the great
+struggle for Human Precedence. This vicious principle is most
+comprehensively stated in the proposition, that there is no substantial
+ground of supremacy in anything that is merely accidental or external to
+a man. These things may sometimes stand as symbols of true merit and
+greatness, but they are not themselves proofs of precedence. A man's
+wealth may be the fruit of noble energy and honest toil, and he may
+exert a wide influence by virtue of that intrinsic ability of which his
+good fortune is the sign. Indeed, the more I study the world the more I
+acquire a respect for these kings of enterprise--these heroes of
+practical effort--who, feeling that they have been sent into the world
+to do something, do not fold their hands and shut their eyes in ideal
+dreams, or stumble at discrepancies, but lay hold of what lies about
+them--rough stone, timber, iron, brass,--and become what it is really a
+noble compliment to say of any man--"the architects of their own
+fortune." I have great respect for these men who drive the wheels, and
+kindle the furnaces, and launch the ships, and build the edifices, and
+keep this sea of every-day action perpetually agitated by the keels of
+their endeavor. Their claims to precedence, however, consist not in
+their wealth, but in that which accumulates the wealth. But the man who
+rests merely upon what he _has_, occupies no substantial ground of
+supremacy. And if this is the case with those whose claim hangs merely
+upon what they are worth in the world of money, it is at least equally
+so with those who set their title to precedence upon their style of
+dress or living. For how uncertain are all these things! depending upon
+the fickle currents of fortune; throwing the honors into our hands
+to-day, and transferring them to our neighbor to-morrow! How tantalizing
+this conflict, in which victory changes with the fashion, and we feel
+weak or strong according to the verdict of a clique! And all these
+rivalries and envies and aspirations, what a confession of personal
+feebleness they really are! How slightly a true man feels them, who
+knows that he is not mere silk or furniture, and never frets about his
+place in the world; but just slides into it by the gravitation of his
+nature, and swings there as easily as a star! But the mere leader of
+fashion has no genuine claim to supremacy; at least, no abiding
+assurance of it. He has embroidered his title upon his waistcoat, and
+carries his worth in his watch-chain; and if he is allowed any real
+precedence for this it is almost a moral swindle,--a way of obtaining
+goods under false pretences. But without running into more minute
+discussion, I say again--that there is no substantial ground of
+supremacy in aught that is merely accidental or external; and he who
+rests upon such claims stands upon a pedestal as uncertain as it is
+spurious.
+
+"If a man strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned, except he strive
+lawfully." This was the old rule of the Grecian games, which would not
+permit the prize to be gained by any unfair or incomplete methods. It
+was applied by the apostle to a specific work--the great work of the
+Christian ministry. But it is a law which prevails in all human action.
+And, while it suggests that spurious precedence for which there is so
+much striving, it also indicates the fact that there _is_ a real
+difference of degree among men, and that there are proper methods of
+obtaining supremacy.
+
+And, as I look around in the populous city, in order to illustrate the
+grounds of this lawful precedence, I observe, in the first place, that
+there are men who occupy the higher places by ordinance of nature so to
+speak; or, more properly, by the purpose of God. It is a fact in nature
+that all men are created equal, and it is also a fact in nature that
+all men are not equal. All men are created equal as to the essential
+rights and privileges of humanity. They have a claim to live; they have
+an impartial share in the Divine Love; they have a right to liberty, to
+freedom of thought and of limb, by a constitution older than any
+historical document, drawn up in the court of God's decrees and
+authenticated by His handwriting in the soul. Thus far all men are
+_created_ equal, and, if it turns out otherwise with them, it ensues
+from what is _made_ by man, not what is commanded by Heaven. But so far
+as quantity of nature is concerned--original capacity and spiritual
+gifts--men are not equal. And if it is asked--"Why are they not equal?"
+I answer, it is by appointment of the same Sovereign Mind which has
+ordained that "one star shall differ from another star in glory." But
+each form of being has its own capacities, and if these are filled the
+moral harmony is secured. Through all prevails the law of compensation,
+balancing the vicissitudes of experience. And, among these diversities
+of human capacity, some must of necessity occupy the highest place--men
+whose native genius carries them up in a splendid orbit, and endows them
+with control. And the world at large always acknowledges the rectitude
+of this appointment. It cherishes no envy toward men of this kind, but
+renders them spontaneous homage.
+
+But, although this genius, this original power, rises to a natural
+supremacy, it does not involve the most legitimate element of
+precedence. There is no real ground of merit in the natural talents of a
+man, any more than there is a ground of merit in personal beauty, or
+family descent. He has nothing but what has been given him--the five
+talents instead of his neighbor's one talent--and, so long as he does
+not use them to their best purpose, there is only an admirable
+possibility, no merit of achievement.
+
+And all genuine merit--that which entitles one to some ground of human
+precedence--comes from personal achievement in life; substantially, from
+the stock of actual benefit which one has contributed to the world, and
+which has become assimilated to his own spiritual nature. The ground of
+precedence--so far as it is lawful for man to think of anything like
+precedence at all--is not in outward possessions, not in gifts, but in
+_uses_. And here is thrown open a broad and noble field, depending not
+upon genius or station, but upon _will_, and therefore accessible to
+every man. Here is an arena where one may strive lawfully, emulous to
+build up his own inner nature, emulous to let such power as he possesses
+go out in blessings for the world. A field for all of us, my friends,
+right here in the dense city, amidst the hurrying feet, the clang of
+machinery, and the roar of wheels. And the condition of the game is, not
+large capacity but good purpose and loyal endeavor; not to strive
+greatly but to strive lawfully.
+
+And, I observe once more, that the real claim to precedence is not
+eagerly snatched by us, but _comes_ to us. It is not in _seeming_ but in
+_being_, and it makes no essential difference whether the world
+confesses it or not, so long as we actually have it, working in our
+consciousness of duty and drawing our consolation from inward resources.
+Here, my friend, is your work--here is the field of opportunity, which,
+however broad and rich absolutely, is for you great and pregnant with
+incalculable possibilities. And though men may not see its best results,
+they are nevertheless real, and develop in your own soul a light and
+power, a ground and fabric of precedence that cannot be shaken, and will
+never vanish away.
+
+And yet, to a large extent, the world does confess this true supremacy.
+For, let me ask, who among these crowds of citizens are really honored?
+Not those who are so eagerly and vainly striving in their narrow,
+conventional circle, heedful merely of the rules of their own little
+game. But those who actually fill an honorable place in life. How much
+acknowledged dignity is there in that man who just accepts his station
+and makes the most of it, filling it with patience and self-sacrifice
+and achieving the victory of principle and affection! How much genuine
+nobleness in the quiet, unconscious discharge of duty! The field for
+precedence is it not a broad one, and close at hand? And is there no
+alternative between a frivolous and outside distinction, and some great
+theatre of action large enough to fill and dazzle the world's eye?
+Daily, right around us, there are occasions that summon up all the
+energies of manhood as with a trumpet-peal. See yonder! where the
+conflagration, bursting through marble walls, casts a terrible splendor
+down the street and reddens the midnight sky. What an enemy has broken
+loose among us, devouring the achievements of human skill and the hopes
+of enterprise! What shall stay it? With a triumphant shout it snaps the
+fetters of stone; it roars with victory; it bends its flaming crest
+towards peaceful homes where men and mothers and babes lie in
+unconscious slumber. The bell beats; and what old bugle-strain, what
+pibroch, what rattling drum, ever sounded a more perilous call? And on
+what battle-field that you have read of was there ever displayed a
+loftier heroism, a more dauntless energy, than that man displays who,
+with the unconscious courage of duty, plunges into the furnace, mounts
+the quivering walls, and, making his own body a barrier between his
+fellow-men and the flame, stands there scorched, bruised, bleeding, and
+beats the red terror back and beats it down, with that irresistible
+energy which always springs from the human will bent upon a noble
+purpose?
+
+And so, in other forms, more quiet and more sacred, where the
+anticipation of public applause does not furnish its motive, men are
+exercising a heroism, and working achievements, that make dim and pale
+the trophies that are plucked from fields of war and in lists of
+glittering renown. And when these things are known the hearts of men
+render a spontaneous honor, and admit the genuine titles of supremacy.
+Yet, if this true achievement in life is not known or confessed by the
+world, its results really exist, and impart their inalienable strength
+and blessing to the soul, while as the grounds of false supremacy
+dissolve all gives way.
+
+And, my friends, the tendency of things is to bring out more and more
+these real claims to human precedence, and to throw all spurious titles
+into the shade. This is the radical purport of true democracy, which I
+take to be the social synonym of _Christianity_. I have shown what
+inconsistencies and false distinctions swarm here in our midst, under
+the profession of republican equality. This, however, is because names
+are _not_ things. I don't call that "democracy" which is simply the
+domineering spirit of self-exaltation in a new shape. For there is no
+_essential_ difference whether we call the social order a monarchy or a
+commonwealth; whether its leading men are Charles and Louis, or
+Robespierre and Cromwell. If we must have the old social fallacies, they
+appear more attractive with the old symbols. In that case, I would
+rather not have them changed. For, when I look merely at the
+_sentimental_ side of things, I feel sorry when the so-called "Royal
+Martyr," with a dignity which contrasts with his past conduct, stretches
+his head upon the block; or when the pitiless insults of a Parisian mob
+are hurled upon the head of the beautiful Marie Antoinette. A poetic
+regret and enthusiasm is awakened by the associations that cluster about
+the Golden Lion and the Bourbon Lilies. And, when I turn to those grim
+Ironsides, or those frantic Jacobins, the work they are doing looks
+savage enough. But, with a more discriminating vision, I perceive that
+that rude popular storm, which desolates palaces and shatters crowns,
+embosoms a rectifying process which, tumbling all false distinctions
+from their pedestals, shall by-and-by heave up the platform of social
+justice, and reveal the true dignity of man. The essential work of
+democracy is not the destruction of forms; is not the giant arm of
+revolution, striking the hours of human progress by the crash of falling
+thrones. But its great work is _construction_--is in changing the very
+_spirit_ of institutions--and it asserts its legitimacy and bases its
+claims upon the Christian doctrine of the human soul.
+
+Therefore, I regard these spurious claims to precedence--these endeavors
+after social distinction by virtue of riches, and equipage, and
+wardrobes--as only evidences of a transition-state. Men, letting go the
+feudal forms, and still assuming that there is some ground of human
+precedence, as there really is, have adopted these false expressions of
+it. They will in turn pass away, and give place to more genuine
+methods.
+
+But let it be remembered, that these false forms of precedence are not
+only inconsistent with our social professions and institutions, but they
+are futile because they are contrary to the Divine Law. Our endeavors in
+life have a twofold operation, and we must count not only their effect
+upon others but their reaction upon the fabric of our own inner being.
+For, whatever honor _men_ may attribute to us, we know that there is no
+real, substantial ground of supremacy except in the excellence and power
+of our own spiritual nature. And this is acquired not in ostentatious
+and selfish striving, but when self is least thought of; in the calm
+work of duty, and when all conception of human merit fades into the
+Glory of God. And this is the great end to be desired--this strength and
+exaltation of the soul. This imparts the profoundest significance to
+that great life-struggle which goes on in these crowded streets. The
+city! what is it but a vast amphitheatre, filled with racers, with
+charioteers, with eager competitors; surrounded by an unseen and awful
+array of witnesses? And here, daily, the lists are opened, and men
+contend for success, for station, for power. But these are meretricious
+and perishable awards. The real prize is a spiritual gain, a crown that
+"fadeth not away." And, if we comprehend the great purpose of existence
+at all--if we look with any eagerness to its intrinsic issues and its
+final result; we shall heed that decree of Divine Wisdom and Justice
+that comes down to us through all the vicissitude of life--through all
+the hurry and turmoil and contention. "If a man strive for masteries,
+yet is he not crowned, except he strive lawfully."
+
+
+
+
+THE SYMBOLS OF THE REPUBLIC.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE IV.
+
+THE SYMBOLS OF THE REPUBLIC.
+
+      Thou art a great people, and hast great power.--JOSHUA, xvii. 17.
+
+
+These words, originally addressed by the Hebrew Leader to the children
+of Joseph--the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh--have been applicable to
+many nations which, since that time, have risen, and flourished, and
+fallen. But when we consider the circumstances of its origin, its
+marvellous growth in all the attributes of civilization, and especially
+the immense _possibilities_ which it involves; without even being
+chargeable with a natural vanity, we may say, that to no country on the
+face of the earth have they ever been more fitted than to this. For, my
+friends, we know that it _is_ a dictate of our nature to magnify that
+which is our own. However insignificant it really is, man spreads an
+ideal glory over the land of his birth. Perhaps its historical
+importance compensates for its geographical narrowness, or its material
+poverty is hidden by its intellectual wealth. From its stock of mighty
+men--its heroes, and bards, and sages--who have brightened the roll of
+fame; or from its memorable battle-fields, on rude heath and in mountain
+defile; or from its achievements which have swelled the tides of human
+enterprise, and made the world its debtor; he draws the inspiration, he
+carries away the conviction of greatness--so that wherever its emblems
+come before his eyes, they touch the deep springs of reverence and
+pride. Nor let us condemn this feeling as merely a selfish and
+exaggerating one. This spirit of nationality exists for wise purposes,
+embosoms the richest elements of loyalty and faith, and is one of those
+profound _sentiments_ of our nature that cannot be driven out by any
+process of logic.
+
+But, if a nation really inherits the description in the text, it must
+possess something more than an illustrious history and an ideal glory.
+We must determine its greatness by its symbols; yet these must be not
+merely signs of things, but instruments of achievement; not merely the
+illustrations of dead works or patriotic enthusiasm, but the agents of
+actual power and of living performance. Now, in looking over the world
+at the present time, there are other nations to which the words of
+Joshua might be applied as well as to our own, and with as little
+assumption of national vanity. Other people are great and have great
+power, by virtue of political importance, vast possessions, and strong
+institutions. To say nothing of the rest, consider that huge domain
+which at this hour confronts the troubled principalities of Europe. It
+stretches itself out over three continents. The waves of three oceans
+chafe against its shaggy sides. The energies of innumerable tribes are
+throbbing in its breast. It clasps regions yet raw in history as well as
+those that are grey with tradition, and incloses in one empire the bones
+of the Siberian mammoth and the valleys of Circassian flowers. And it is
+great not only by geographical extent, but by political purpose--great
+by the idea which is involved with its destiny--an idea austere as the
+climate, tremendous as the forces, indomitable as the will of the
+gigantic north. It would set the inheritance of the Byzantine Emperors
+in the diadem of Peter the Great. It would make the Sea of Marmara and
+the ridges of the Caucasus, paths to illimitable empire and
+uncompromising despotism. It moves down the map of the world, as a
+glacier moves down the Alps, patient and relentless, startling the
+jealous rivals that watch its course, and granting contemptuous peace to
+the allies that shiver in its shadow.
+
+In considering, therefore, the symbols which prove that we also are a
+great people, having great power, we should select those which indicate
+the possession of a _peculiar_ power. This peculiarity is not in our
+geographical extent or material greatness. But it _is_, I think, in our
+institutions, in the tendency of our national ideas, and in the
+legitimate result of these. It is in conceptions and elements the direct
+opposite of those that work in the destiny of the mighty empire just
+referred to--and for this reason I _have_ referred to it.
+
+In taking up a subject, then, which is especially connected with the
+conditions of humanity in the city, because in the city the conception
+of a people--of a public--is especially illustrated, let us
+inquire--What _are_ the symbols of our republic; the signs and agents of
+our greatness as a nation? And, for the sake of avoiding too many
+specifications, I propose to consider these under two or three general
+classes.
+
+In the first place, then, I would select as a symbol of the Republic,
+_Whatever represents the privilege of Free Thought_. As to whatever
+gives full play to the intellect, whatever diffuses the intelligence,
+whatever wakes up and assists the entire spiritual nature of individuals
+and communities, I think there is really more opportunity here than
+anywhere else on the face of the earth. And, as a sign and instrument of
+this, I would point to some _District School-house_; rough,
+weather-worn, standing in some bleak corner of New York or New
+Hampshire; through whose closed windows the passer-by catches the
+confused hum of recitation, or at whose door he sees children of all
+conditions mingling in motley play. Of all conditions, so far as
+external peculiarities go; for the laws of nature and the ordinances of
+Providence cannot be dispensed with even here; but of one condition as
+the recognized possessors of immortal _mind_. Those who have helped
+mould the Republic have clearly seen that, although intelligence is not
+the foundation of national greatness--for there is something deeper than
+that--still it is the discerning and directing power upon which depends
+the right use even of moral elements. They have scouted the notion that
+there is any ultimate evil in diffused knowledge; any such thing as "a
+dangerous truth;" and have affirmed that the best way to winnow the
+false from the true, is to equip and set a-going the intellectual
+machine by which God has ordained that the work shall be done. It has
+been felt, that, if the State can properly extend its influence anywhere
+beyond the restrictive limits of evil, or the punishment of overt wrong;
+if anywhere it may exercise a positive ministration for good; it is
+here, where it does not interfere on the one hand with those outward
+pursuits which should be left to individual choice and aptitude, nor on
+the other, with those inward sanctities which pertain to conscience and
+to God; it is here, in that region of our personality from which we can
+best discern our duty and fill our place. For the intellect is the most
+neutral of all our qualities. Man is swayed by the animal propensities
+of his nature; he is swayed by the moral and religious elements of his
+nature; but the intellect, by itself, is not a motive power. It is a
+_light_; and no one will object to its being kindled except those who,
+by that objection, virtually confess that they fear the light. And this
+work of kindling is just what the state purposes to do for a child;
+leaving his religious convictions to such helps as conscience has
+chosen, and his position in life to the decision of circumstances. And
+there is no way in which it can show so much impartiality, and exercise
+practically the most essential conception of freedom. For thus, as I
+have already said, it recognizes a common inheritance--something which
+all have--the possession of _mind_--something which is of more
+importance than any external condition, for it influences external
+condition; (whoever saw an educated community of which anything like a
+large fraction were paupers and criminals?) something on which rests the
+claim of human freedom; for the charter of man's liberty is in his soul,
+not his estate. It says to the poorest child--"You are rich in this one
+endowment, before which all external possessions grow dim. No piled-up
+wealth, no social station, no throne, reaches as high as that spiritual
+plane upon which every human being stands by virtue of his humanity; and
+from that plane, mingling now in the Common School with the lowliest and
+the lordliest, we give you the opportunity to ascend as high as you may.
+We put into your hands the key of knowledge; leaving your religious
+convictions, with which we dare not interfere, to your chosen guides. So
+far as the intellectual path may lead, it is open to you.--Go free!" And
+when we consider the great principles which are thus practically
+confessed; when we consider the vast consequences which grow out of
+this; I think that little District School-house dilates, grows
+splendid, makes our hearts beat with admiration and gratitude, makes us
+resolve that at all events, _that_ must stand; for, indeed, it is one of
+the noblest symbols of the Republic--a sign and an instrument of a great
+people, having great power.
+
+Or, if you would behold another of these symbols, go through this city,
+and pause wherever you hear the rumbling of the _Printing-Press_. As I
+have dwelt upon the characteristics of this great power in another
+place, I only allude to it here as a vehicle of that _expression_ which
+is so essential to all genuine freedom of thought. Mere education is no
+evidence of this freedom. It may be made, it has been made in one of the
+most intelligent but despotic countries in Europe, an instrument for
+drilling the human mind into an absolute routine of state policy. Mere
+liberty of speculation is nothing, though it has the boundless firmament
+of abstraction for its own, so long as it is not allowed to strike the
+solid ground of fact or touch one organized abuse. Let us be thankful
+for a free-press--the electric tongue of thought, which at every stroke
+is felt throughout a continent, which no dictator dares to chain, and
+over whose issues no censor sits in judgment--or only that great censor,
+public opinion. Everybody is aware of its evil as well as its good--the
+errors, the crudities, the abominations it sends out. But we must
+remember that it is only the representative, the voice, of elements that
+actually exist in human minds and bosoms; and, surely, it is better that
+they should come out into the free air, and be sprinkled by the chloride
+of truth, than to work darkly and infectiously out of sight. It is the
+hidden, not the open evil that is dangerous.
+
+Or, still again, you might have seen a true symbol of the Republic in
+the spectacle which has been presented this very day--the spectacle of a
+_Free Worship_. The great stream of religious impulse has poured through
+these streets, and separated into its rills of distinctive opinion,
+without trepidation and without challenge. Every man has had the
+opportunity to commune with his God, and approach the Cross of his
+Redeemer, with no established barriers between. Neither the cathedral
+nor the chapel rest upon the patronage of the state, but in the deep
+foundations of individual conviction. To be sure, here and there, there
+is a little assumption; but it is dramatic rather than substantial, and
+does not amount to much. Here and there breaks out an unjust prejudice
+or a spiteful calumny, but it shames the source more than the object,
+and soon dies away in the atmosphere of tolerance and investigation. It
+looks doubtful sometimes, but I verily believe that the real spirit, as
+well as the mere form of Religious equality, is beginning to prevail.
+Every day, it is more and more practically acknowledged that
+Christianity is profounder than any name, and exists under strange and
+despised names; that there really is decent observance in every church,
+and holy living in every communion; and a man finds that his neighbor
+has the same essence of righteousness as himself, though he has not half
+so many links in his creed. And something more than tolerance grows out
+of this practical liberty. It is not easy to measure the moral
+sincerity, the moral principle, which results from it; which is far more
+precious than mere intelligence; which is the perennial spring and
+assurance of national welfare.
+
+But I proceed to observe, in the second place, that we may select as a
+symbol of the Republic--a sign and an instrument of a great people,
+having great power--whatever illustrates the principle of _Political
+Equality_. I am speaking, at present, not of our deficiencies, but of
+our possessions; not of the instances in which this doctrine of equality
+is practically contradicted, but of those in which it is practically
+acknowledged. The sovereignty of every man is a fundamental principle in
+our institutions; it is essential to the conception of a Republic; and
+so far as it _is_ legitimately a Republic, we shall find this principle
+in operation. And, looking around for some extant symbol of this, let me
+select that which is the object of so much strife and agitation--the
+_Presidential Chair_. I do not, by any means, consider this the most
+comfortable seat in the nation, or that the most deserving man is sure
+to get there; but, as an emblem, I believe it illustrates the noblest
+privileges, and the proudest supremacy, on the face of the globe. And I
+refer to it as a _possibility_ for the poorest and humblest child in the
+land. No hereditary gallery leads to it--only the broad road of the
+people. And, as the highest seat in the nation, it illustrates all the
+honors of the nation. They are possible to anybody. And I trust the time
+has not yet arrived when this can be said only by way of satire; can be
+true only because the waves of political corruption carry the meanest
+and unworthiest into office; but as a grand fact, a fact with which are
+involved the springs of our national greatness and power, it may be said
+that here there are no barriers of caste, no terms of descent, no depths
+so low that enterprise cannot rise out of them, no heights so exalted
+that genius cannot attain them; for, on a platform as level to the
+peasant's threshold as to the nabob's door, stand the judge's bench, the
+senator's seat, and the President's chair.
+
+As another symbol of this political equality, I would name the
+_Ballot-Box_. I am aware that this is not everywhere a consistent
+symbol; but to a large degree it is so. I know what miserable
+associations cluster around this instrument of popular power. I know
+that the arena in which it stands is trodden into mire by the feet of
+reckless ambition and selfish greed. The wire-pulling and the bribing,
+the pitiful truckling and the grotesque compromises, the exaggeration
+and the detraction, the melo-dramatic issues and the sham patriotism,
+the party watch-words and the party nick-names, the schemes of the few
+paraded as the will of the many, the elevation of men whose only worth
+is in the votes they command--vile men, whose hands you would not grasp
+in friendship, whose presence you would not tolerate by your
+fireside--incompetent men, whose fitness is not in their capacity as
+functionaries, or legislators, but as organ pipes; the snatching at the
+slices and offal of office, the intemperance and the violence, the
+finesse and the falsehood, the gin and the glory; these are indeed but
+too closely identified with that political agitation which circles
+around the Ballot-Box. But, after all, they are not essential to it.
+They are only the masks of a genuine grandeur and importance. For it
+_is_ a grand thing--something which involves profound doctrines of
+Right--something which has cost ages of effort and sacrifice--it _is_ a
+grand thing that here, at last, each voter has just the weight of one
+man; no more, no less; and the weakest, by virtue of his recognized
+manhood, is as strong as the mightiest. And consider, for a moment, what
+it is to cast a vote. It is the token of inestimable privileges, and
+involves the responsibilities of an hereditary trust. It has passed into
+your hands as a right, reaped from fields of suffering and blood. The
+grandeur of History is represented in your act. Men have wrought with
+pen and tongue, and pined in dungeons, and died on scaffolds, that you
+might obtain this symbol of freedom, and enjoy this consciousness of a
+sacred individuality. To the ballot have been transmitted, as it were,
+the dignity of the sceptre and the potency of the sword. And that which
+is so potent as a right, is also pregnant as a duty; a duty for the
+present and for the future. If you will, that folded leaf becomes a
+tongue of justice, a voice of order, a force of imperial law; securing
+rights, abolishing abuses, erecting new institutions of truth and love.
+And, _however_ you will, it is the expression of a solemn
+responsibility, the exercise of an immeasurable power for good or for
+evil, now and hereafter. It is the medium through which you act upon
+your country--the organic nerve which incorporates you with its life and
+welfare. There is no agent with which the possibilities of the Republic
+are more intimately involved, none upon which we can fall back with more
+confidence, than the Ballot-Box.
+
+But there is a symbol which represents the power and greatness of a
+Republic more significantly than all the rest, and is comprehensive of
+all the rest. It is the fruit of unfettered thought and political
+equality, of intelligence and virtue, of private sovereignty and public
+duty--it is a free, true, harmonious _Man_. As the crown or the sceptre
+is the symbol of a Monarchy; as heraldic honors are the symbols of an
+Oligarchy; so, I repeat, the most expressive symbol of a Republic is a
+man--a man free in limb and soul, a man intelligent and self-governed, a
+man whose spiritual vision is clear, and in whose breast the voice of
+conscience is peremptory, with whom the conception of duties is deeper
+even than the conception of rights; in short, a man who embodies all the
+elements, and represents to the world the best results of Liberty. Laws
+are nothing, institutions are nothing, national power and greatness are
+nothing, save as they assist the Moral purpose of God in the development
+of humanity. To this test we must bring the symbols of the Republic, and
+judge whether they are fitting and consistent. No matter what else they
+accomplish, no matter what else they signify, if they do not serve this
+end they are either incomplete instruments, or vain forms. For, Man is
+of more worth than Institutions; Religion is greater than politics; and
+the designs of Providence are wider than the cycles of National destiny.
+
+I turn, then, to the signs of our own national greatness; I turn to
+these symbols of spiritual freedom and political equality; and I
+ask--how completely do they develop this most significant symbol of
+all--how completely do they serve the purposes of God in History--by
+securing the welfare, the culture, the moral elevation of humanity? And
+the reply is--that, by our institutions and our endeavors, these ends
+have been served in various ways. There is here, to-day, a more
+enlightened, free, self-governed humanity--and we say it without
+arrogance--than anywhere else on the globe. Our benefits are of the kind
+that are not realized, because they are so great and familiar--like the
+light and the air; but take them away, or transfer us to some other
+atmosphere, and how we should miss them, and pine and dwindle! Let no
+man, in his zeal for bold rebuke or needed reform, overlook what has
+been done, and what is enjoyed here, as to the noblest results of
+national greatness and power.
+
+But every sincere man must say likewise that, with us, the
+_possibilities_ are far greater than the _performance_; that these
+symbols are the splendid tokens of what _may be_, rather than what _is_.
+And, that I may bring this discourse to a practical conclusion, let me
+say that two things, at least, are necessary to convert these
+possibilities into the noblest achievement.
+
+In the first place, it is essential that every citizen of the republic
+should recognize his own manhood; the sacredness of his own personality;
+and should recognize this especially in relation to his duties, which
+are inextricably involved with his rights. For here it is true in a
+special sense, that the mass is but an aggregate of personalities--that
+public sin is but the projection of your sin and mine. A man will often
+say that he is responsible to his country, and responsible to his
+constituents; but upon no claim, by no sophistry, should he suffer
+himself to forget that he is also responsible to his God. He does forget
+this, when he acts for political interests, and as one of a party, as he
+never would act in his private affairs. And does he suppose that there
+is a corporate vice, or virtue, differing from his private vice or
+virtue, as a gentleman's purse differs from the public fund? There is no
+such distinction in moral qualities. It is your own coin that helps
+swell the amount; it bears your stamp, and you are responsible for the
+product. If the party lies, then _you_ are guilty of falsehood. If the
+party--as is very likely--does a mean thing, then _you_ do it. It is
+surely so, so far as you are one of the party, and go with it in its
+action. God does not take account of parties; party names are not known
+in that court of Divine Judgment; but your name and mine are on the
+books there. There is no such thing--and this is true, perhaps, in more
+senses than one--there is no such thing as a party conscience. It is
+individual conscience that is implicated. Party! Party! Ah! my friends,
+here is the influence which, it is to be feared, balks and falsifies
+many of these glorious symbols. Men rally round musty epithets. They
+take up issues which have no more relation to the deep, vital, throbbing
+interest of the time, than they have to the fashions of our
+grandfathers. They parade high-sounding principles to cover selfish
+ends; interpret the Constitution by a doctrine of loaves and fishes;
+while individual independence and private conviction are whirled away in
+the political maelstrom, and the party-badge is reverenced and hugged as
+the African reverences and hugs his fetish. And surely it is a case for
+congratulation, when some great, exciting question breaks out and jars
+these conventional idols, and so sweeps and shatters these party
+organizations and turns them topsy-turvy, that a man is shaken out of
+his harness, does not know exactly what party he _does_ belong to, and
+begins to feel that he has a soul of his own. I am not denying the use
+and the necessity of parties as instruments, but protest against them as
+ends, especially when principle is smothered under their platforms, and
+they absorb the moral personality of a man.
+
+It may not seem so strange that the political field should so often be
+the field of a lax and depressed morality, when we consider that here is
+the great theatre where human ambition struggles for its aims; here are
+enlisted the strongest passions of the soul; here throng some of its
+fiercest temptations; here the stakes played for are the kingdoms of
+this world, and the glory of them. And this, I suppose, is the reason
+why the most authentic type of human depravity is a thoroughly
+unprincipled politician. Such an instance, at least, may strike us more
+forcibly, because we see the perversion of great faculties, and
+capabilities are contrasted with performance; while, on the other hand
+he may be confirmed in his moral bankruptcy by the fact that, in playing
+upon the passions of men he sees the worst side of humanity. But,
+surely, there have been those who passed this ordeal, and came out with
+brighter lustre; who have kept the eye of conscience elevated above the
+ecliptic of political routine; who have made politics identical with
+lofty duties and great principles; whose patriotism was not a clamorous
+catch-word, but a breathing inspiration, a silent heart-fire. In private
+life they have felt the great privilege of their citizenship; the
+magnitude of the obligation which bound them to virtue and to
+consistency; while, in public life, they have kept their trust firm as
+steel, bright as gold; have felt, with due balance on either side, the
+beatings of the popular heart and the dictates of the everlasting Right;
+and in themselves have represented the union of liberty and law, the
+real greatness of a nation. Without such men, the nation has no
+greatness; for its significance and its power are in the moral worth of
+its citizens.
+
+The second condition necessary to the fulfilment of the great results
+indicated by these symbols, is consistent action upon the ideas that
+constitute the basis of our own institutions. If many of the privileges
+and peculiarities which I have specified in this discourse are possessed
+by other nations, in one respect we differ from them all. These
+privileges and peculiarities are _legitimately_ ours. They have not been
+grafted on hereditary antagonisms. They have not grown up in _spite_ of
+our institutions, but as the _fruit_ of our institutions. These ideas,
+entwined with the very roots of our Republic, shooting through every
+fibre, running into every limb, bind us to a recognition of human
+brotherhood; to sympathy with Liberty wherever it struggles; and to
+stedfast opposition to whatever crushes the rights, hinders the
+development, or denies the humanity of man. If these symbols of the
+Republic mean anything, they mean just this; and whatever is
+inconsistent with this, is inconsistent with the terms of our national
+birthright. Depend upon it, not the assertion of Liberty, but whatever
+is opposed to Liberty, is the innovating and agitating element in this
+country. It interrupts the legitimate current of our destiny. It shocks
+the popular heart with inconsistency. It becomes mixed with the ashes of
+the old heroes, and the land keeps heaving with the fermentation. One
+assumption is too impudent, too nakedly in contradiction with the
+fundamental ideas of our Republic ever to be admitted--the assumption
+that the man who speaks for freedom, who sympathizes with the broadest
+doctrine of human rights, and sets around these the eternal barriers of
+justice, is an innovator and an agitator. I ask--what made our
+Revolution legitimate? What were the central ideas that throbbed in the
+breasts of its heroes and martyrs? Take down the old muskets bent in the
+hot encounter, and printed with many a death-gripe; take down the old
+uniforms, clipped by Hessian sabres and torn by British bullets; take
+down the dusty muster-rolls, scrawled with those venerable names--names
+that now "are graven on the stone," names that are buried in the sod,
+names that have gone up to immortality--and ask, for what was this great
+struggle? Was it not for freedom, based upon the conception of the right
+and supremacy of freedom? And is _this_ the legitimate conclusion of
+that sublime postulate--this other Fact which, never retreating, always
+advancing, follows the steps of Freedom over the continent like a
+shadow, looms up like a phantom against the Rocky Mountains, and darkens
+the fairest waters? On the contrary, is not Freedom that old truth, that
+conceded premise that does _not_ agitate? Liberty, Human Rights,
+Universal Brotherhood, was it not for these ideas ye fought--was it not
+these ye planted in the soil, and laid with the corner-stone of our
+institutions? My friends, I know, and you know, could those men give
+palpable sign and representation, the answer that would come, as in one
+quick flash from bayonet to bayonet, in one long roll of drums, from
+Lexington to Yorktown.
+
+These peculiar privileges, then, to which I have referred, differ from
+those of other nations inasmuch as they are not grafted expedients, but
+legitimate fruits. Unless we change the premises of our Republic, and
+shift the foils in our historical argument, these are necessary
+conclusions. They are necessary conclusions, if our symbols represent
+realities. Russia is consistent with its national idea. It pours forth
+its legions and moves to its work with a terrible consistency. And if
+we--also a great people, having great power--are equally consistent, we
+shall fall back upon no selfish conservatism, but aid whatever tends to
+fulfil the Providential purpose of our existence, and whatever helps and
+advances man.
+
+One thing is certain. So long as any nation truly lives, it unfolds its
+specific idea and lives according to its original type. When it fails to
+do this, the sentence of decay is already written upon it. If it fails
+to illustrate God's purpose in its obedience, it illustrates His control
+in retribution. For there is nothing supreme, nothing finally
+triumphant, nothing of the last importance, but His Law. It penetrates,
+and oversweeps, and survives all charters and institutions and
+nationalities, like the infinite space that encompasses Alps and Andes,
+and planets and systems. It is this that successive generations
+illustrate. It is this that all history vindicates. If a nation runs
+parallel to this Divine Law, it is well; if false to its purpose and its
+control, down it goes. The prophet Isaiah, in one of the most terrific
+and sublime passages of the Bible, represents the king of Babylon, while
+passing into the under-world, saluted by departed rulers, by dead kings,
+rising from their shadowy thrones, and exclaiming, "Art thou become weak
+as we? Art thou become like unto us?" Thus has many a nation gone down
+to its doom. Shall it be so with this Republic, because false to its
+ideal? Shall it descend to the shades of perished pomp and greatness,
+and see Nineveh with dusty, hieroglyphic robes rising up to meet it; and
+Persia, with the empty wine-cup of its luxury; and Rome, with the shadow
+of universal empire on its discrowned head; and hear them say--"Art thou
+become weak as we? Art thou become like unto us?"
+
+My friends, I look at the eager enterprise, the young, hopeful vigor,
+the tides of possibility that flow through this great city; I look at
+the symbols of this Republic; and I cannot believe that such is to be
+the result. I look back upon our history, and cannot argue such a future
+from such a past. A great light lay upon the wake of those frail ships
+that bore our fathers hither; the wake of past ages, the following of
+good men's prayers and brave men's deeds, the mingling currents of
+martyr-blood and prophet-fire. And methinks, as they struck the shore,
+and met the savage wilderness, a Voice saluted them; a voice not of
+profane ambition and of selfish hope, but of Divine promise, intending
+Divine results--proclaiming, "Thou art a great people, and hast great
+power." And He will fulfil this prophecy, Who leads the course of
+history over the broad deep and through mysterious ways, and Who unfolds
+His own glory in the destinies of men.
+
+
+
+
+THE SPRINGS OF SOCIAL LIFE.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE V.
+
+THE SPRINGS OF SOCIAL LIFE.
+
+      Let them learn first to show piety at home.--I. TIMOTHY, v. 4.
+
+
+The text--which I purpose to employ not as a specific precept, but as
+the illustration of a general principle--indicates those Springs of
+Social Life which constitute the subject of the present discourse.
+
+The crowd in a city affords comparatively little interest, when we
+contemplate it merely as a crowd. But, when we resolve it into its
+individual particles, and consider each of these as endued with the
+attributes and involved with the conditions of humanity, our deepest
+sympathies are touched. Every drop of that great stream is a conscious
+personality. In some shape, the universe is reflected in it. In some
+way, it takes hold of the reality of life: and the living organism of
+which it is composed both acts and suffers, receives from the world
+around it and contributes to it. That entire mass of people involves
+nothing more than the interest of humanity, and the same interest
+pertains to the least unit of that mass.
+
+And, doubtless, you have sometimes busied yourself with the
+speculation--"Where do all these people come from? And whither do they
+retire at night?" Now, this is really a very suggestive question, and to
+follow it out to a practical answer would yield results of the
+profoundest importance. For out of hidden channels, here and there, _do_
+spring all these struggling activities, these human diversities, these
+various influences good and evil, that make up the crowd and spectacle
+of city life. And night after night, with the rarest exceptions, into
+some retreat they all disappear. Some spot--whether it seem the veriest
+mockery to style it so, or whether it be a synonym for the sweetest
+sanctities--some spot each of this living multitude calls by the name of
+"Home."
+
+For some that name is associated with a more than oriental
+magnificence. Man and nature wait upon them there in every conceivable
+form of service. There is no method of convenience or luxury which
+ingenuity can devise; no bounty that earth can yield from her many-zoned
+bosom; no shape which art can summon from the regions of the beautiful,
+that is not possible there. Lifting its palatial walls, and kindling
+with brilliant lights, it stands there as the completest symbol of
+material refinement and civilization. It is arctic winter without. The
+snow chokes up the dreary street, and the whistling wind cuts the
+beggar's rags. But it is Italy, it is Ceylon, it is tropic gorgeousness
+within. And these are the abodes of the children of fortune, whose
+wishes require no talisman but expression, who, all their lives long,
+have been used to such indulgence, or who accept it now as the fruit of
+their own effort. This is the hospitality which some men find in life,
+and out of which they constitute a home.
+
+But none the less enviable, and perhaps much more so, are those retreats
+where comfort waits on moderate means, while contentment imparts to
+these an unpurchasable efficacy; where, blended with those infirmities
+and liabilities which are common to palace and cottage, the domestic
+affections flourish, and the dearest treasures of life are kept.
+Thousands of homes like this there are, all around us. It describes the
+largest class of homes, we may believe. And who can estimate their
+influence over these busy tides of action, all day long? That world of
+traffic, that world of toil, that looks so hard and gross and
+sordid,--is it not transformed somewhat, does it not grow beautiful
+even, when you think how many of its energies have their spring by the
+infant's cradle and the mother's chair? And what lights, what shadows,
+unseen by you, fall upon the speculative eyes, fall upon the hearts, of
+thousands in that homeward-streaming crowd! Light of welcoming
+hearth-fires, shadows of children's play upon the walls; light of
+affections in which there are no decay and no deceit; shadows of sacred
+retirement where God alone is; light of joys which this world's storms
+cannot utterly quench; shadows of sorrow around sick-beds, and in vacant
+places, that still make home the dearer as the arena of earth's purest
+discipline and of its most triumphant faith!
+
+And why delineate the features of that other class of homes, whose most
+significant word is "_Privation_?" Where cheerlessness, and hunger, and
+desponding toil, or hopeless apathy, brood continually. Let your own
+sympathies, let your own imaginations that cannot exaggerate the
+reality, call up the vision of such. Think how many such abodes there
+are this very night, which winter besieges with all his terrors, and
+into which he sends his invading frost! Think what Home is to hundreds,
+and, therefore, how life looks to them, seen through this atmosphere of
+disease and want, with starvation by the hearth, and death at the door,
+and misery everywhere! Think, when the cold pierces even through all
+your wrappages of comfort, and scarcity almost pinches, what forms of
+humanity, with lungs, and nerves, and hearts, and every capacity for
+suffering, are scraping the moss of subsistence from the barest rocks of
+life, and struggling every day through an avalanche! Think what this
+Sabbath has been in the dwellings of the poor, you who have had time to
+listen to the Gospel, and have heard it comfortably--so comfortably,
+perhaps, that you have fallen asleep under it--think what this Sabbath
+has been in the dwellings of the poor! And yet, when I consider what,
+doubtless, the Sabbath has been in some of those places, I am thankful
+that the highest ideal, the richest sanctities of Home, are not
+dependent upon outward conditions; for even there, unfaltering duty and
+true love have made the bare walls beautiful, and prayer has set the
+desolate chamber on the steps of the Divine throne; and before the eye
+of faith the cold arch of the winter night, that looks in through hole
+and cranny, has burst into a revelation of heaven, and a path for those
+ministering angels that come to help the sufferer and to comfort God's
+poor.
+
+With more unqualified sadness, therefore, our thoughts must rest upon
+still another group of dwellings, where deprivation and ignorance are
+mingled with vice and crime--where want and guilt strip away the masks
+of civilization, and bring out the essential savage in man's nature.
+These also we must call "_homes_!" These breathing-holes of abomination,
+these moral tombs, where huddle the demons of violence, and cunning, and
+debauchery, and from which they issue. That vast Hades of social evil
+opening downward from our streets, where the best ideals have no type,
+and the purest sentiments scarce a name; where God is but a dark cloud
+of muttering thunder in the soul; where all that is fair in womanhood is
+dishevelled and transformed; and where childhood is baptized in infamy,
+trained to sin, canopied with curses, and rocked to sleep by the
+convulsive hell of passions all around it.
+
+The Homes of the Metropolis! Thus diversified are they in their general
+types, and more numerous in their individual conditions than can be
+specified. And, surely, it is no vain speculation that inquires--"What
+are they? Into what retreats do the elements of this busy crowd
+dissolve, night after night?" Whatever they may be, a common interest
+envelopes them and links them all together--the interest of humanity.
+They have vanished from the streets. One great shadow covers them, and
+hides their distinctions. For a time they are all equal. They have
+fallen asleep--poor, tired humanity at the best!--they have fallen
+asleep on the bosom of a common Providence, that bears them all up, as
+it bears the planet on which they now repose, through the orbit of its
+great purpose and the immensities of its love. But in the morning all
+these diversities will break forth again, each pouring its influence
+into the general stream. And who does not perceive how much the
+character of that influence must depend upon the condition of those
+homes? Who does not see that not only the interest of the common
+humanity in its most intimate experiences attaches to them, but the
+interest of community? Not only are they the reservoirs of individual
+power and peculiarity, but they are the Springs of Social Life. And this
+the apostle indicated, when he directed that certain, who bore intimate
+relations to the early church, should "first learn to show piety at
+home."
+
+Keeping this conclusion in mind, let me ask you to consider, for a
+little while, what Home _must_ be.
+
+In the first place--it is the _earliest and the most influential
+school_. Nowhere else is the character so moulded; nowhere else is so
+much infused into our entire being. For, whatever it may be, it is the
+nursery of childhood; and "the child is father to the man." Here dawns
+upon the human mind the conception of life. Here, when the nature is
+uninscribed and plastic, it takes its first impressions. I suppose it to
+be true, that more is learnt, more that is elementary and a key to all
+the rest, in the first few years of childhood than in all after time. I
+do not deny, of course, that much is corrected and overcome under
+another class of influences. But the deepest impressions, the seeds of
+the most stubborn habits, are planted at home. Hence the peculiar
+anxiety of good men to rescue _children_ from the influences of a bad
+home. And, even then, with what obstacles do they have to contend! How
+radical are the prejudices already formed in that young mind! How
+obstinate the customs, how opaque the ignorance, how rank the growth of
+error! Nay, into what complete fruition have all these grown, simply in
+the neglect of home-culture, to say nothing of influences positively
+evil! Really, the color and current of a man's destiny are indicated
+here, unless a shock of wonderful transformation comes over him. I do
+not mean to say that anybody is wholly the creature of circumstances;
+but he is the _subject_ of circumstances. If they do not entirely make
+_him_, they furnish the occasion out of which he makes something; and,
+viewed either from the platform of the inward or the outward, they
+furnish an important key to his life. And, although the path of
+reformation is more difficult than the descent into evil, and demands an
+effort which too few are inclined to put forth; though by the conditions
+of our nature the good is more easily swept away than the bad; still, it
+is encouraging to estimate the permanence and the power of those _good_
+influences which are received at home. Everybody knows, when he is
+pitched into this whirlpool of evil that rolls around him in the world,
+how those old home-restraints lie upon him like a magic chain, hard to
+be forced away--perhaps never utterly forced away. And, seeking for
+those who should stand up in this boisterous sweep of sin, you would
+look and I would look to those who had received the best impressions
+under the domestic roof. If I were alone, poor, compelled to ask charity
+somewhere in this selfish world, I would go, not to the man who has
+learnt most of what he calls his "wisdom" from the experience of mature
+life, but to him in whose heart there evidently remains something of
+childhood's tenderness, kept warm by the remembered pressures of his
+mother's breast. If I were seeking to restore some wild prodigal,
+brazen-fronted by his own wicked will and by the scorn with which men
+have battered him--if I were looking for some gleam of promise in his
+turbulent nature, and sounding its depths to find some spring of
+repentance--I should never despair if I could discover one gentle pulse
+that beat with the memories of a good and happy home. Why, who needs to
+be told of the potency of this our earliest school, to say nothing of
+other influences, if only a faithful _mother_ presides there? O! mother,
+mother, name for the earliest relationship, symbol of the divine
+tenderness; kindling a love that we never blush to confess, and a
+veneration that we cannot help rendering; how does your mystic
+influence, imparted from the soft pressure and the undying smile, weave
+itself through all the brightness through all the darkness of our after
+life. The mould of character set on the front of the world's great men,
+and gladly confessed by them, bears your stamp. Your inspiration burns
+along the poet's line. It is your true courage, more than man's rude
+daring, that makes the force of heroes. The statesman, when treason to
+humanity wears the garb of power, and duty calls him like a trumpet,
+hears your voice. The philanthropist, when he feels that the most
+efficient service is to be patient and to wait, imbibes the strength of
+your fortitude. The sailor, "on the high and giddy mast," mingles your
+name close to God's. And thousands in life's great claims, in life's
+great perils, trace back the influences of the hour to some early time,
+some calm moment, when,--little, timid children,--they knelt by your
+side, and from tones of reverence and looks of love and simple words of
+prayer, they first learnt piety at home.
+
+But I observe again, that Home is the sphere where are most clearly
+displayed _the real elements of character_. The world furnishes
+occasions of trial, but it also furnishes prudential considerations.
+Without any absolute hypocrisy, one measures his speech and restrains
+his action in the street and the market. And it is easy to conceive how
+small men may perform great deeds, and mean men seem philanthropic, and
+cowards flourish as heroes, with the tremendous motive of publicity to
+urge them. But at home all masks are thrown aside, and the true
+proportions of the man appear. Here he can find his actual moral
+standard, and measure himself accordingly. If he is irritable, here
+breaks forth his repressed fretfulness. If he is selfish, here are the
+sordid tokens. If he passes in any way for more than he is worth, here
+you may detect the counterfeit in the ring of his natural voice and the
+superscription of his undisguised life. No, the world is not the place
+to prove the moral stature and quality of a man. There are too many
+props and stimulants. Nor, on the other hand, can he himself determine
+his actual character merely by looking into his own solitary heart.
+Therein he may discover _possibilities_, but it needs actuality to make
+up the estimate of a complete life. He must _do_ something as well as be
+something; he must do something in order that he may be something. For,
+what he thinks is in his heart may be exaggerated by self-flattery, or
+darkened by morbid self-distrust. It needs some occasion to prove what
+is really there. And Home is precisely that sphere which is sufficiently
+removed from the factitious motives of publicity on the one extreme, and
+the unexercised possibilities of the human heart on the other, to afford
+a genuine test. What a man really is, therefore, will appear in the
+truest light under his own roof and by his own fireside. I can believe
+that he is a Christian, when I know that he faithfully takes up the
+daily duties, and bears the crosses, that cluster within his own doors.
+I shall think that the world rightly calls him a philanthropist, when,
+notwithstanding common faults and infirmities, he receives the
+spontaneous award of the good husband and father, and the kindness of
+his nature is reflected in the very air and light of his dwelling.
+And,--talk of noble deeds!--where will you find occasions for, where
+will you behold manifestations of, a more beautiful self-sacrifice, a
+more generous heroism, than in the labors and in the endurance of
+thousands of men and women, shut out from the world's observation in
+silent nooks and corners of this very city, amidst the relationships and
+cares and struggles of home? But whether it be in forms of good or evil,
+we know that the real elements of character, the genuine moral qualities
+of people, must be expressed there.
+
+And, I remark once more, that at Home we must find _the most essential
+happiness or misery of life_. The same conditions apply here as those
+which relate to character. The world is a theatre of _seeming_, and we
+can hardly tell by what we notice there who is, or who is not, happy. We
+know that gaiety is often the reckless ripple over depths of despair;
+and that men will bear up with a smile while untold agony is gnawing at
+their heart-strings, and will die laughing, in an agony of defiance,
+under the sword-strokes of fortune. On the other hand we may count some
+as unfortunate, in whose bosoms, all the while, there are flowing
+inexhaustible springs of peace, and who derive real joy from what we
+suppose to be a hard and pitiable lot. But amidst the undisguised
+realities of home we can form the most correct estimate of a man's
+condition. In the first place because, as has been remarked, he is there
+most truly himself. He gains opportunity for reflection, and gives vent
+to the secret burden of his heart. There he empties the load of his
+envies, his rivalries, his disappointments; which he has carried before
+the world muffled in courtesy or pride. These, it may be, meet and are
+re-acted upon by kindred elements; engendered, perhaps, by the very
+atmosphere which he himself, in the first place, created. Oh! how many
+rich dwellings there are, crowded with every appointment of luxury, that
+are only glittering ice-caverns of selfishness and discontent;
+pavilions of misery, where jangling discord mars the show, and a chill
+of mutual distrust breathes through the sumptuous apartments, and
+heartless ostentation presides like a robed skeleton at the feast. You
+feel that nothing is genial or spontaneous there. The courtesy is dreary
+etiquette, and the laughter forced music. You would dine as happily with
+the forms on the canvas, with the cold marbles in the hall. For all this
+magnificence is nothing more than a gorgeous pall over dead
+affections--nothing more than the coronation of a living woe.
+
+"Better is a dinner of herbs," says the wise man, "where love is, than a
+stalled ox and hatred therewith." And many a home exists where there
+_is_ but little more than a dinner of herbs, which affection and mutual
+loyalty, and sweet dispositions, convert into a palace. And there are
+fixed boundaries of peace, that society cannot encroach upon, while the
+processions of ambition and pleasure and ceaseless pursuit, pass by its
+windows and disturb it not. Here the good man and the brave man--the
+man who has nobly discharged his duty at whatever cost--is respected and
+understood. Hither he can retreat beyond the shots of calumny which have
+torn the ensign of his good name; beyond the deceit of men, which halts
+at the threshold. Here he can look calmly out upon the changes of
+fortune and the frowns of the world. Here his perplexed spirit finds
+inspirations of strength, and space for rest. There is no happiness in
+life, there is no misery, like that growing out of the dispositions
+which consecrate or desecrate a Home.
+
+Moreover, the elements of profoundest joy or suffering are there,
+because there are unfolded the deepest experiences of our mortal lot.
+There transpire those events which constitute the _eras_ of our
+existence. There, day by day, grows the sentiment of filial veneration
+and love. There is the joy of wedded felicity. There wells up in the
+heart the first strange gush of parental affection. There comes the
+intimation of awful change staring upon us with the face of death.
+There falls the shadow of the funeral train, passing across the
+threshold. There breaks in upon us the sense of bereavement, in the
+vacant chambers; where the familiar foot-step patters, where the
+familiar voice is heard no more. From the very nature of things, the
+profoundest happiness and misery of human life must be experienced among
+the conditions of Home.
+
+Having thus in some respects considered what Home _must_ be, I have
+virtually anticipated whatever may be said in the second division of
+this discourse respecting what Home _ought_ to be.
+
+Thus, as it is the earliest and most influential school, it behoves
+every one who is bound by its responsibilities to make it an agent of
+the _best culture_. The great subject of Home Education, is of itself
+enough for a series of discourses; and I have not room to lay down even
+the general propositions which belong to it, much less for
+specifications. But I would remind you--and I think the suggestion is
+especially needed amidst the whirl of city life--that there _is_ such a
+thing as Home Education, and it presses its claims upon everybody who
+inhabits a Home. There is such a thing as Home Education, differing from
+school education, whether of the week day or the Sabbath, and therefore
+it is a matter we ought to attend to, and not suppose we have done
+enough when we patronize an academy, or help fill a class on Sunday. To
+every parent--to every influential member of a household--there is
+committed a charge which can be shifted to no one else; there is an
+opportunity which no outside teacher possesses. There are some duties in
+life that we have to look for and to go after; there are others which
+are passed right into our hands, whether we will or not. And this duty
+of Home Education is of the latter kind. Now, I have just said that I
+cannot specify here, and even if there were room I am not sure that it
+would be advisable. For I doubt whether we can give any manual of
+methods and instruments in this respect, any more than there can be a
+manual of religious exercises suited to every spiritual peculiarity.
+Dispositions, capacities, circumstances, must create their own methods.
+And perhaps the poorest method of all would be some system of domestic
+education, which the experimenter thinks will do the work exactly. I am
+somewhat suspicious of systems. I am more than suspicious of any
+constrained formal method, bringing up children in a mere manual drill,
+crimping them into a mould of mincing proprieties, and making them speak
+with an automaton click. Perhaps the most headlong young men that can be
+found, are those who spent their early days in a sort of strait jacket
+with a clock-work movement. They were wound up so tight when they were
+boys, that now they take great pleasure in going fast, and running down.
+In other words, having felt their early training to be mere _training_,
+the moment they strip off the constraint, they plunge into the opposite
+extreme of _no_ constraint. Nay, I believe that even children who are
+left to their own instincts, and shoved out into the world to take care
+of themselves, are generally better balanced, and go with steadier
+motion than these. Of course, however, neither extreme is right. There
+is such a thing, I say once more, as Home Education, involving all
+necessary training and true constraint; and yet not oppressively felt as
+such, because it is free, informal, and respects the spontaneity of the
+childish nature. But, whether our Home Education be formal or informal,
+direct or indirect, there is one kind of education which we are sure to
+impart. It is the education of example, silent, effective, stronger and
+more easily apprehended than any set of maxims. I would we were all duly
+impressed with the responsibilities of Home as they appear in this
+light; might feel, however we may be absorbed in business or in
+pleasure, that the young mind and heart are receiving influences, and
+growing into expressions that in some way will surprise us.
+
+In the next place I observe, that if we display our real dispositions
+and characters at home, we should recognize it practically as _a sphere
+of moral discipline_. The family is a divine ordinance--the Home is an
+institution of God, forecast in the peculiarities of our very nature.
+History shows no period when it did not exist, and we discover no tribe
+so barbarous as to be without it. It is the foundation of all society.
+It embosoms the germ and ideal of the State. According to the purity of
+its relations, the intensity of its sympathies, the inviolability of its
+rights, a nation's life is high or low, feeble or strong, fickle or
+enduring. And if it is thus rooted in the nature and the history of man,
+we may well believe that it affords some of the profoundest occasions
+for that moral discipline which is the great purpose of our existence
+upon the earth.
+
+It is certainly the great sphere in which our affections are to be
+cultivated. Of course I do not mean that this is the limit of their
+cultivation. But here they are nurtured, and out of this they grow. As
+love is the Infinite Nature itself, so is it the prevalent sentiment of
+all life. It has been ordained that this great element should flow
+through every form of being, linking them together by a common feeling,
+and lending some interest to the most insignificant. And man has been
+set in the family relation that this sentiment might be developed.
+There is no one in whose heart it does not exist. You cannot find me a
+being so defaced, so alienated from the common stock of humanity, as to
+cherish in his bosom no secret fount of love, no fibril of affection
+linking him to something else. But of this love there are numerous
+degrees; and the highest forms of it, that go forth in expressions of
+self-sacrifice and worldwide sympathy, are only developed by culture.
+And for this culture there are rich opportunities amidst the relations
+and sanctities of Home.
+
+And there is opportunity among these relations also, for active duty,
+and in its daily tasks and responsibilities, is often illustrated that
+practical lesson which society so much needs--the lesson of mutual help.
+It is a school where we may learn endurance and charity. Out of its
+trials is developed the sense of religious need; and under the shadow of
+its bereavements we appreciate the glorious vision of Faith. There are
+other issues in life, where we need these divine helps; none where we
+feel the need of them more. Those who have stood by the sick-bed and
+taken the last look of the dearest earthly objects, and yet have lifted
+hearts of trust, and eyes of transcendent hope, are able to meet the
+intensest sorrows of the world, and to come out like refined gold. Home,
+then, should be regarded especially in this light, as a sphere where the
+richest elements of our moral culture are supplied.
+
+Finally, if at home we find the most essential happiness or misery of
+life, of course each should do his best to make it the most _attractive_
+of all places. He should bring not his worst, but his best temper there.
+How many are there who bottle up their wrath all the day long, and
+uncork it when they get home! They had better reverse the process. If
+you must chafe under disappointment, and indulge angry passion, let it
+out in the excitement of the world, where the rough friction of business
+will help you to get rid of it, or where nobody has time to care whether
+you get rid of it or not.
+
+And let _business_ stay where it belongs. Do not interrupt social claims
+with its speculations; nor drag the counting-room into the parlor.
+There are some men with whom business is a disease; they are never easy
+with it and never rid of it. Thus, perhaps, they acquire a reputation
+for smartness and enterprise; but they do it, it is to be feared, by
+putting aside other and more sacred claims.
+
+Nor let him who is the genial companion abroad, be the morose boarder in
+his own house, reserving his vivacity for society and the lees for the
+fireside. It is a great deal better to be like the stream that is good
+and welcome wherever it flows, but is sure to be fresh at its source.
+Indeed, there are men who are made up of foam, and sparkle, and who
+circulate in society, but contribute nothing to the necessaries of life,
+and are returned empty. It is an unfortunate gift that cheers the world
+outdoors, but casts only a dreary shadow inside.
+
+Of course, in speaking of the influence of dispositions in making home
+attractive, I would include the duty of those who stay at home as well
+as of those who go abroad, and that self-sacrifice and kind hearts
+should be found as well as brought there. Indeed, if time would allow me
+to make a theme of what now can be only a hint, I should dwell largely
+upon _woman's_ influence in this matter.
+
+But home is to be rendered attractive not only by the disposition, but
+by the customs of its inmates. It must be a place to live, not merely to
+eat and sleep in; a place where we can find entertainment, and not
+always leave in search of it. It is really a monstrous folly, this
+fashionable treatment of home, which leads people to abandon it almost
+every night in pursuit of pleasure, or else to sweep it with a rout,
+which considers a household evening very dull, and makes Sunday a day
+for sleeping and yawning. The central idea of home is _stability_, and
+this has much less chance to be realized in the city than in the
+country. In the latter, old forms and landmarks are not so liable to
+interruption, and the slow process of time works instead of the hand of
+innovation. But in a city, where a man emigrates before he has fairly
+settled, and where many move with every May-day, the idea of a homestead
+is almost obsolete. Elegance, solidity, venerable associations, none of
+these can resist the march of improvement, and the rapid tide of
+business enterprise. The main streets of a great city in this country,
+may almost be termed so many dissolving views of perpetual change and
+renewal. But, perhaps, there is hardly one of us who does not feel that
+by his or her own exertions the essential element of Home can be made
+far more abiding than it now is; and where we hear of frivolous
+daughters and dissipated sons, many a parent may ask the question, "What
+have I done to cheer and consecrate the household world, and make it
+more abiding?"
+
+My friends, when I consider the magnitude and importance of the subject
+now before us, and how many topics of discussion grow out of it--when I
+think how much must be left entirely unsaid--I entreat you not to
+suppose that I offer this discourse as anything more than a
+_suggestion_--a suggestion meant to turn your attention to this subject
+of Home in the City, and leaving it to the elaboration of your own
+thoughts. Remember, here abide the deepest springs of social life. The
+noblest privileges, the greatest duties, find their basis here; and we
+are taught first "to show piety at Home." And the influence of this
+institution upon all other fields of human action, private or public, is
+too obvious to mention. All life flows from the centre, outwards; and
+the citizen who desires the order and purity of the community in which
+he lives; the philanthropist, who, under all conditions, regards the
+highest welfare of his race; the Christian, who urges the secret culture
+of the soul, must look with peculiar solicitude to this institution. It
+is one whose impotence is demonstrated by the strength of the instinct
+which creates it and clings to it--an instinct which associates the most
+genuine happiness with its sacred enclosure of affection, however rude
+or poor that spot may be--which, while a man has such a place to call
+his own, makes him feel that he is somebody, and has some tie and claim
+in the world; and which, on the other hand, associated the most bitter
+destitution, the dreariest isolation, with that one word--"Homeless."
+
+How this instinct abides, how long and how far it goes with us, is
+beautifully illustrated in the lines of Goldsmith.
+
+    "In all my wand'rings round this world of care,
+    In all my griefs--and God has giv'n my share,
+    I still had hopes my latest hours to crown,
+    Amidst these humble bow'rs to lay me down;
+    To husband out life's taper at the close,
+    And keep the flame from wasting by repose.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Around my fire an ev'ning group to draw,
+    And tell of all I felt, and all I saw;
+    And, as a hare whom hounds and horns pursue,
+    Pants to the place from whence at first he flew,
+    I still had hopes, my long vexations past,
+    Here to return--and die at Home at last."
+
+Hopes, my friends, which I think glow in the breasts of most of us, and
+burst spontaneously from our lips. "Let us," we say, "if our lot may be
+so ordered--if the lines of duty run not otherwise--let us live at
+Home." Here, amidst those darkened and brightened associations which are
+woven in the warp and woof of our deepest experience. Here, where gentle
+memories steal upon us with the shadows of the twilight, and for ever
+tapestry the walls. Here, where we have held delightful intercourse with
+man, and secret communion with God. Here, where we have tried to do our
+duty, and exercise our love, and to drink with patience the sweet and
+bitter which our Father mingles in life's mysterious cup. Here, where
+old friends are always cherished and new ones gladly come. Here, where
+the dearest ties of earth have bound us in a family circle; and though
+here and there we find broken links, we still keep hold of them, and
+they draw us up.
+
+And when on this familiar hearth our own vital lamp burns low, and the
+golden bowl begins to shudder and the silver cord to untwine, let our
+last look be upon faces that we best love; let the gates that open into
+the celestial City be these well-known doors--and thus may we also
+_die_ at Home!
+
+And this instinct of Home is not attached merely to earthly conditions,
+but mingles with those aspirations which flow into the illimitable
+future. As in the vast city we seek some enclosure of our own--some
+place of shelter for our heads, of sympathy for our hearts; so,
+respecting the destiny of the soul. In spite of all our philosophy, we
+cannot be satisfied with the conception of a mere immaterial essence
+floating hither and thither in immensity. The intellect looks eagerly
+forward to a boundless and excursive state; but the affections, the
+sentiments, yearn for some locality--some spot of residence and repose.
+We cannot help cherishing the conception of a place where our friends
+are grouped together, and whither we shall go, though to be united in
+wider and more glorious relations. And, knowing no better name for it,
+with eyes of hope and tearful rapture, we look up and call it "Home."
+
+
+
+
+THE ALLIES OF THE TEMPTER.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE VI.
+
+THE ALLIES OF THE TEMPTER.
+
+      He that is not with me is against me.--MATTHEW xii. 30.
+
+
+One of the discourses of the preceding series was devoted to a
+consideration of the vices--especially the three prominent vices--of
+great cities. I propose at the present time to speak of the
+_Influences_, more or less direct, by which these and kindred evils are
+encouraged. Vice, and moral corruption of any kind, no doubt has its
+roots in the gross hearts and in the perverted appetites of men. But the
+most superficial observer must see that these are nourished not merely
+by their native soil, but by the social atmosphere which spreads around.
+Of course character constitutes the man, and, however this may be
+affected by circumstances, it enfolds the consciousness of an original
+personality acting upon and through and in spite of its conditions.
+Nevertheless, the ingredients of this very personality are assimilated
+out of these conditions, and it is difficult to limit or define the
+subtile elements that blend in the deepest currents of a man's nature.
+It is, at least, a simple truism that he differs in one state of society
+from what he is in another. And, therefore, among the forces which help
+make up his moral condition, we must calculate the social forces. His
+virtues are not all self-sustained, and his vices draw nutriment from
+fine and remote channels. It would be an interesting process to analyze
+our own habits and temper and cast of thought, and find how much of this
+is involved with our physical relations. The air we breathe, the house
+in which we dwell, the very way in which it fronts the sun, the degrees
+of light and of shade that fall upon us with the flying hours, all weave
+their delicate influences into the tissues of our being. And how much
+that we do not suspect comes to us, day by day, in social intercourse,
+in the bearing of friends, in the tone and air of conversation, in the
+mere magnetism of the parlor or the street! How much to strengthen or
+to weaken us; to clear or to cloud our moral atmosphere; to make us
+fresh and decisive, or to slowly sap our virtue! But it is a more solemn
+task to compute the influences that proceed _from_ us, and to discover
+how, unknown to ourselves, we are swaying the circles of other lives.
+Why, the mightiest forces go silently. You do not see the gases that
+compose the vital air. You do not feel the aroma that steals along
+loaded with poison, or wafts a blessing through the sick man's window.
+You do not hear the electric pulse that beats in the summer light and in
+the drop of dew. Neither can you estimate the mysterious attraction that
+plays all through this network of social relations, nor the energy of
+good or of evil with which it is charged not merely from your words and
+deeds, but from the still reservoir of your example.
+
+When I look around at the prevalent vices of the city, then, and at its
+various forms of corruption, I am not willing to rest with the mere
+assertion, that all this is the fruit of personal sin and folly on the
+part of those who have yielded to temptation. It _is_ the fruit of
+personal sin and folly. And we, perhaps, in our serene respectabilities,
+shrink back and wonder at it. It _is_ strange--is it not?--that the
+young, the fair, the gifted, should yield themselves to that arch-deceit
+which has allured and ruined men for six thousand years? Is it not the
+same old guilt, the same sophistry and foolishness, here in New York,
+that it always has been? Did it not bear the same Circean cup through
+the halls of Nineveh and Babylon, and fling Cæsars and Alexanders to the
+ground? Did it not wear the same seductive smile and harlot tinsel when
+it walked the streets of Tyre, and reclined in the decorated chambers of
+Egypt? And will not its votaries find now, as then, that it entices with
+the embrace of death and the fascination of hell? Why should they thus
+float upon the very rim of this great whirlpool, and not notice the
+groans that come up from its depths; and see that its phosphoric
+illusion is mixed with fiery flakes of torment and the foam of despair?
+It is indeed wonderful that so many should be thus deluded over and
+over again; so many noble energies thrown away, so many sanctions
+trampled upon, so many bright hopes quenched for ever. It is wonderful
+that any being made in the form of man, should cast down his
+prerogatives and wallow like the beast. Sufficient evidence of sin and
+folly in those who do this, to be sure; but in what way do these
+allurements present themselves? What are the resources and entrenchments
+of these vices, by which they act upon human appetite and passion? You
+point me to brilliant windows and gay apartments; to sparkling glasses,
+and shining heaps, and shapes of painted shame. "These," you say, "are
+the forms which the Tempter assumes. Under smiling features and fair
+garlands, he hides at first that hideousness which in due time is
+revealed to his victims. From the lighted vestibules which open so
+easily to the touch, and where all seems only a coronation of youthful
+pleasure and natural joy, the feet of men slide downward into those
+abysses which are hidden from the public gaze, and over whose depths the
+blackness of darkness broods." And all this, again, is true. These are
+the ways in which the Tempter works. But is there nothing but this to
+explain the power which evil has upon men, in the midst of the great
+city? These manifold allurements, these haunts of infamy and shambles of
+destruction--I see them standing upon strange foundations. I see them
+propped by these very influences to which I have alluded; influences of
+social condition and individual example. They would not be so
+formidable, they would not stand so long, were it not that
+respectability in its daily walk and conversation; and social culture in
+thousands of homes; and even justice in its lofty seat; lend them
+support. "He that is not with me is against me," said Jesus; and, taking
+this proverb as a rule, a good many people may be surprised to find
+that, in one way and another, they are _Allies_ of the Tempter.
+
+The allies of the Tempter, I propose to speak of now--not the forms of
+Temptation, which I have already illustrated. Nor do I intend to dwell
+upon those _direct_ conditions of moral evil, out of which vice and
+crime grow as spontaneously as weeds out of a damp and neglected
+soil--those wide seed fields of _ignorance_ and abject _poverty_ which
+lie around us. But the more remote and indirect causes it may be
+profitable for us to consider; and to these I now proceed.
+
+I observe, then, in the first place, that the Tempter has one Ally in
+_Public Sanction_. There are sources of vice and crime that are
+permitted and encouraged by _Law_. I hardly need specify the prominent
+instance to which I allude. But I am not aware of a more enormous public
+inconsistency than what is termed "the License System"--the system of
+permitting the sale of intoxicating drinks in a degree, and of
+restricting them in a degree. For, by this method, either a moral wrong
+is committed, or else a civil one. If these drinks are an individual and
+public injury; if they distribute the seeds of disease, crime, death,
+and every form of social misery; then what right have we in any respect
+to set upon them the solemn sanction of a Law? If, on the other hand,
+they are a benefit to mankind; a good gift of Providence, as some seem
+to think; why should we hamper their circulation? Why should we allow
+one man the privilege of distributing such a blessing, and forbid
+another who, no doubt, is equally zealous for the public good?
+
+But this very system is a confession by public opinion, in its most
+authentic form of expression, that the sale of intoxicating drinks is an
+evil. "Only," we are told, "as it is a prevalent and deep-seated evil,
+it must be _regulated_." But how can we regulate an irregularity? How
+can you regulate an obstruction that is involved with the springs of a
+machine, or the works of a clock? The only possible method obvious to
+common sense, would be to remove the obstruction; and it would be
+thought the most foolish speculation conceivable for one to spend his
+ingenuity in contriving some way to keep the obstruction where it is,
+and yet to keep the clock going as it ought. If it moved regularly, the
+matter referred to would not be an obstruction; and if it did not, the
+contrivance to keep it there would be a help to the obstruction. Now, I
+consider this great vice of Intemperance a decided obstruction in the
+clock-work of an individual man, or the more general mechanism of
+society. It transforms a great many faces into bad dial-plates, disturbs
+the pendulum of public order, makes people go much too fast, and renders
+them liable to strike at all times. Now, if a man, or a community, can
+be made to go just as well with it as without it, we certainly need no
+legislation, for there _is_ no obstruction. On the other hand, if it is
+essentially an irregularity, the only rational method is to get rid of
+its accessories altogether. To enact some way in which the irregularity
+shall work, is to confirm and sanction the irregularity. And the
+license-system--for I wish to be plain and specific here--confirms and
+sanctions the agents of intemperance. It indicates a way in which the
+irregularity may work.
+
+And not only is vice thus aided by the Law. The existence of such a
+sanction engenders either an error or a moral wrong. For it indicates
+that the sale of intoxicating drinks is a public benefit, which is
+false; or, on the other hand, that it is lawful to uphold an evil. The
+same principle carried out by individuals, would excuse almost any
+fault. The man who steals a loaf of bread may contend that it is a
+necessary expedient; and he who fills an empty purse at his neighbor's
+expense, only endeavors to regulate an irregularity.
+
+But suppose we make the system a strict one, what process should be
+employed? Probably you would say--"break up all these filthy and low
+haunts; all these places where the habitually intemperate, the degraded,
+the wretchedly poor congregate; and let these beverages be sold only in
+respectable places and to respectable people." But is this really the
+best plan? On the contrary, it seems quite reasonable to maintain that
+it is better to sell to the intemperate than to the sober--to the
+degraded than to the respectable--for the same reason that it is better
+to burn up an old hulk than to set fire to a new and splendid ship. I
+think it worse to put the first glass to a young man's lips, than to
+crown with madness an old drunkard's life-long alienation--worse to wake
+the fierce appetite in the depths of a generous and promising nature,
+than to take the carrion of a man, a mere shell of imbecility, and soak
+it in a fresh debauch. Therefore, if I were going to say where the
+License should be granted in order to show its efficacy, I would
+say--take the worst sinks of intemperance in the city, give them the
+sanction of the Law, and let them run to overflowing. But shut up the
+gilded apartments where youth takes its first draught, and
+respectability just begins to falter from its level. Close the ample
+doors through which enters the long train of those who stumble to
+destruction and reel into quick graves, and let the flood overwhelm only
+the maimed and battered conscripts that remain. Besides, it is better to
+see vice as it really is, than as it sometimes appears. The danger of
+intemperance is when it assumes this very garb of respectability, and
+sits in the radiant circle of fashion attended by wit and beauty and
+social delight. Let us see the Tempter, not as he seems when he throws
+out his earliest lures, in festal garments and with roses around his
+brow; but as he looks when fairly engaged in his work, showing his
+genuine expression. Let us see this vice of intemperance in its
+_results_, as they teem and darken here in the midst of our city life.
+Lay bare its channel--let us see to its very depths--where it flows over
+the wrecks of human happiness, and over dead men's bones. Lay bare its
+festering heaps of disease, its madness, its despair, its domestic
+desolation, its reckless sweep over all order and sanctity; and thus,
+tracing it from its sources under glittering chandeliers and in fonts of
+crystal, we shall be able to say--"this is the real element which exists
+and does its work, by public connivance and with the sanction of Law!"
+
+If you ask me then, whether I think that a statute of absolute
+prohibition would stop this flowing curse, I reply that at least it
+would put the influence of authority on the right side. It would lend it
+the force of consistent endeavor. As it is, it would be far better if
+the public sanction had no expression; for now it only confirms and
+guarantees the evil. Its power is exerted not in the right, but in the
+wrong direction. It is an ally of the tempter. For the spirit of
+everlasting Justice and Benevolence, speaking as it were by the mouth of
+Jesus, says--"He that is not with me is against me."
+
+But I observe, in the second place, that the forces of temptation in the
+city are nourished by _public neglect_. In individual experience it will
+be found, I think, that sins of _omission_ are more numerous and are
+worse than sins of _commission_. If we examine our lives closely, we
+shall discover that our moral indebtedness comes even less from what we
+have done, than from what we ought to have done. And this individual
+experience has a counterpart in social conditions. How many evils among
+us grow up under the shadow of inoperative laws--laws which have a voice
+and nothing else--nay, hardly a voice, so seldom are they heard even to
+speak. They appear to have been enacted merely as a compliment to
+decency, and they remain in the statute-book as "idle as painted ships
+upon a painted ocean." The dens of debauch keep open doors night and
+day; the saloons of profligacy send out their cards of invitation; the
+gambler rattles his triumphant dice; but excursive policemen never see,
+and vigilant magistrates never hear! Some provision of nature has
+imparted a very singular quality to the optic powers of the one, and the
+auditory nerves of the other. The laws against this vice, or that
+custom, stand fixed and silent; and as for putting them in operation,
+one would as soon think of pulling up so many grave-stones. They _are_
+the grave-stones of a dead public sentiment--the stumbling-blocks of a
+blind justice, that too often shakes hands with the very guilt which it
+professes to condemn. I do not, by any means, believe that everything is
+to be accomplished by law. I do not believe that the profoundest results
+are to be accomplished by it. But, if it possesses any efficacy at all,
+it consists in its power to repress open and shameless wrong; and where
+any such wrong _is_ open and shameless, public neglect is the cause, and
+such public neglect, therefore, is an Ally of the Tempter. And let us
+consider the enormity of such evils. In every great city there are some
+omissions of executive duty, which, though grievous to be borne, are
+noticed with good humor. But there are moral swamps, sending up their
+foul steam to pollute the common light; there are kennels of
+uncleanness, running with the waste of human lives, sweeping along with
+the death-gurgle of human souls; there is a dry-rot of impurity
+infecting the town-air, withering the dearest sanctities of society and
+of home--and over this kind of evil we cannot be facetious. Think how
+much is risked here, and how much is lost! Domestic happiness,
+reputation, honor, health, order, the prospects of the young, the peace
+of the old--Fathers, the hopes of your sons! Mothers, the interests of
+your daughters! and, though speaking may have little effect, say whether
+we ought not to speak, and to speak indignantly, of the neglect which
+lets these evils spread with deadly luxuriance, and winks at them as
+though they were harmless?
+
+But, my friends, what do we mean by "public sanction," or "public
+neglect?" There are some convenient synonyms which help us to cover up
+our personal responsibility--help us to transfer our own sense of duty
+to a vague secondary agent, and keep peace with our own consciences.
+And yet they are only _synonyms_, after all. Now this term "public" is
+but another word for the aggregate of our personal obligations, and does
+not for a single moment rid us of our share in the general influence.
+The real point of my present topic is this--you and I and every other
+individual involved in this network of social relations, are helping or
+weakening the force of these prevalent evils. And it may arouse us to
+some decision of conduct to consider how the most respectable--those who
+would shrink with horror from these foul customs--are, nevertheless,
+Allies of the Tempter. And I might state, as a comprehensive
+proposition, that every man _is_ an Ally of the Tempter, who does not
+put forth a conscious and positive moral energy; who does not habitually
+throw his example and his influence in the right direction. It is not
+enough that he abstains from wrong himself--that he is chaste, and
+temperate, and upright, and unimpeached. For perhaps the most hopeless
+people, morally speaking, are those people who, according to their own
+confession, "have never done any harm." There is a good prospect for
+those who are trying to grow better, however they may slip and flounder.
+There is hope, on the other hand, for the desperately wicked--for the
+very violence of one extreme precipitates the other; and sometimes the
+best and purest souls have been swept by a thunder-shower of sin. But
+those who rest upon the fact that they "have never done any harm," by
+being so easily contented show but little moral vitality. There is no
+aspiration in their natures. They seem to have no particular mission in
+the universe; for, if they have never done any harm, they have done
+little else. They are poorly fitted for this earth, which demands the
+effort of all our faculties; poorly fitted for heaven, whose inhabitants
+would not make harmlessness their chief characteristic. Their residence
+and their paradise might be a great exhausted receiver, where there is
+no gravitation to draw them down, and no air to send them up. But, in
+truth, these people deceive themselves. Every man exerts a _positive_
+influence, and cannot, if he would, be a mere negation in the world. In
+the great conflict of good and evil there is no middle ground. There
+are no compromises in God's government, and neutral men are the devil's
+allies. "He that is not with me, is against me."
+
+Let us see, then, how possible it is that _we_ may contribute to the
+force of evil in the City. In other words, let us inquire--in what way
+do respectable and harmless people, as they deem themselves, become
+Allies of the Tempter?
+
+In the first place, by their _customs_. And, chief of all, by the custom
+of an intense and inconsiderate selfishness. How many there are who
+require no other sanction for what they do than "that pleases me," or
+"this gratifies me!" It is wonderful what a mighty agent _self_ is,
+estimated by its own standards. It is the hero of every exploit, the
+centre of every event, and the oracle of all opinions. It interprets the
+purpose of the universe; it finds out exactly what the world was made
+for. At least, a good many, apparently, have ascertained that the world
+was made for them, and that they were sent into it to get what
+gratification they can. And it appears sadly out of tune to them, if it
+does not serve this end. In anything they do, therefore, they consider
+only selfish consequences. They do not apprehend the universe in its
+great harmony. They do not trace out its web of mutual relations--a
+braid of light held in the hand of Infinite Love. They do not know the
+sympathy that shoots in the crystal, and shimmers in the aurora, and
+beats in the heart of the ocean, and makes the silent music that rolls
+from sphere to sphere along the glittering scale of heaven. If they did,
+they would discover, perhaps, that the social world is constructed upon
+the same plan; and man cannot be an alien from the common humanity
+however hard he may try. Yes: concerning any custom, you have not only
+yourself to consider, but the bearings of its influence throughout this
+tissue of hearts and minds with which you are involved. You cannot
+isolate yourself from your responsibilities. You cannot shut yourself
+within comfortable walls, and say--"Here is the limit of my obligations,
+and here I will do as I please!" You may _say_ this, but you do not rid
+yourself of these claims. Through imperceptible aqueducts your influence
+runs abroad; and what you do, and what you are, contributes particles of
+disease or health to the social atmosphere that envelopes all. I look
+around, then, upon the vices and even the crimes of the City, and I say
+that some of them find root in the customs of the respectable and the
+fashionable. Profligacy, which we shrink from in its open profession,
+and which appears abominable in its avowed haunts, finds encouragement
+wherever the libertine receives the smile of beauty, and the guilt of
+the meanest sort of a man is excused on account of an agreeable manner.
+Thus the poison of the snake, and the blight of his venom on many a
+reputation and many a womanly heart, is all forgotten in the
+drawing-room, because of the fascination of his hiss and the glitter of
+his skin. Again, the Tempter has an Ally in the world of Traffic,
+wherever bad things are stamped with respectable names--when, for
+instance, swindling is called "smartness," and robbery "per-centage."
+Among people of less note in the world these matters are named
+"cheating" and "stealing," and some of them may take punishment the more
+reluctantly because they cannot perceive the difference. And, still
+again, I think that a little use of intoxicating drinks is like the
+little matter that kindles a great fire, and that there would not be so
+much intemperance if there were not so many "temperate" drinkers. The
+sluices of the grog-shop are fed from the wine-glasses in the parlor;
+and there is a lineal descent from the gentleman who hiccups at his
+elegant dinner-table to the sot who makes a bed of the gutter.
+
+"Am I my brother's keeper?" asked the first man who reddened his hands
+with the violated life of a man; and the answer came crying upward in a
+voice of blood from the ground. "Am I my brother's keeper?" _you_ ask,
+perhaps, with a tone of surprise or scorn. _You_ ask O! respectable
+gentleman or lady; O! man in the thick of business; O! self-indulgent
+Epicurean;--and the answer comes to you not from the ground merely, but
+from the universal air--the answer of kindred pulses, of confluent
+sympathies, of an inseparable humanity--though it swarms in rags, and
+riots in shame, and seems far off from you in its hell of debasement and
+despair. Nay, perhaps the answer comes very _near_ to you. It may come
+from some one of your own household. You may ask--"Who has tempted even
+my very child?" Ask _Yourself_--"Need he have gone outside this very
+door to find temptation?" Ah! perhaps you are not merely an Ally of the
+Tempter, but have furnished conscripts for his vast army. Your children
+perhaps will rise up and call you--_not_ "blessed." And see, too, what
+kind of conscripts the Tempter draws from the ranks of respectable and
+especially of fashionable life. Mere striplings, so dwarfed and dwindled
+by precocious dissipation that they look like feeble specimens of
+wax-work; whose faculties--the evident product of a thin soil--have been
+developed by bottles of wine and fast horses; whose memories are too
+short to remember their parents; whose ideas are too artificial to touch
+any genuine spring of nature; who are ashamed of true manliness, and
+make a miserable farce of what they _call_ "manliness;" and who, as
+they parade the streets, make up a sort of bombastic interlude in the
+drama of "Young America."
+
+But, whatever view we may take of this general subject, it is evident
+that we cannot easily exaggerate the influence of "respectable and
+fashionable" customs upon the forces of temptation. And, surely, it
+becomes each of us to consider the tendencies of his own example, and
+ask--"Is it toward the right or the wrong? Is it for, or against the
+good?"
+
+Again, the Tempter finds help from our _indifference_. This, indeed, may
+be the qualification which should be applied to the remarks I have just
+made. It is not to be supposed that the evil influences which go out
+from the customs alluded to, are the results of _intention_. They spring
+up in a lack of interest and of the consciousness of duty. They grow
+rank and luxuriant in neglect. If we were only in earnest as to these
+vices and crimes and guilty customs; if we would only wake from our
+apathy, to reflection and conviction; how soon would they diminish, and
+how many of them would pass away!
+
+But, as comprehensive of this, and in fact all the rest that may be
+said, I observe, finally, that the temptations of a great city are
+strong because of a lack of the spirit of _Christian love_. In one
+respect, especially, is it true that men in general are not _with_
+Jesus, and therefore are against him. They have not his sympathies, his
+spirit of self-sacrifice, his broad, deep, universal charity. Baneful
+customs, and cold indifferentism grow up in a soil that is watered by no
+living and unselfish love. They show the dryness and the baseness of our
+social state. And it is not merely in the lack of active and practical
+love that the Tempter grows strong; but in the exercise of a prevalent
+_uncharitableness_. Too many of us have no disposition but scorn for the
+fallen; see no blessed possibilities in them; do not detect any divine
+ray glimmering in the thick darkness--do not discern the precious soul,
+like a crown-jewel, in its filthy and battered casket. And if this
+paralyzes and kills the springs of our own activity, need I say how the
+hearts of the offending are repelled and hardened in such a hostile
+atmosphere? Need I say how desperate is the Ishmaelitish conviction;
+the sense of isolation and antagonism; and, on the other hand, how
+powerful and healing, even for the most distant and hopeless, is the
+sweet attraction of sympathy? And what are we, that we dare to cherish
+this exclusive horror, this pitiless, unrelenting scorn? When we
+consider our own slips, compared with our temptations; the account to
+which God may hold us, not the smooth standards of human respectability;
+how much higher is our own moral level, that we feel no chords of a
+common humanity reaching down even to those fallen ones, and cannot
+stoop to touch them? My friends, it may be, after all, that the Tempter
+has no surer ally than the averted face of contempt and the word of
+unsoftened rebuke, driving the barb of conscious guilt deeper and
+despairingly into a brother's soul.
+
+And, as I look upon this mass of social evil, these steaming wells of
+passion, these solid fortifications of habit where the Tempter is
+entrenched, I ask how is all this to pass away? And the answer is--only
+by the spirit of Christian Love, sweeping these impediments of
+selfishness from the heart, and animating us to effort. _With_ Christ
+the work certainly can be done. In this Gospel-beating amidst the guilt
+and sorrow of the world like the pulsations of a Divine heart--in the
+few leaves of this Testament--there is an illimitable power, before
+whose inspiration in the purposes and deeds of men no evil thing shall
+stand. And the spirit and exercise of this Love _is_ Religion. It is the
+up-shot of all that is preached--it is the open and tangible test of
+every mystic experience that drifts through the soul--it is so deep, so
+broad, and runs so far, that it comprehends all requirements; and they
+who cherish it, and practice it in the low and dark and desolate places
+of the world, are the true saints. Nothing else will do in its place.
+Not Churches, nor creeds, nor rituals, nor respectabilities. Without it
+we are not friends of Christ, nor co-workers with God. Without it we
+deepen the channels of human woe, and prop the strong-holds of
+wickedness. Without it, whatever we may not be, we are Allies of the
+Tempter. The Saviour says to each of us to-day, placed amidst these
+antagonistic forces of Life--"He that is not with me is against me."
+
+
+
+
+THE CHILDREN OF THE POOR.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE VII.
+
+THE CHILDREN OF THE POOR.
+
+      The young children ask bread, and no man breaketh it unto
+      them.--LAMENTATIONS iv., 4.
+
+
+The writer of these words bewailed a state of War and Captivity--a state
+of things in which the great relations of human life are broken up and
+desecrated. But it is strange to find that the most flourishing forms of
+civilization involve conditions very similar to this. For, if any man
+will push beyond the circle of his daily associations, and enter the
+regions of the abject poor, he will see how the hostile forces of
+privation, and hunger, and unguided impulse, have laid waste the
+sanctities of existence in the abodes and in the breasts of thousands as
+with sword and with fire. There is no essential difference in
+starvation, whether it ensues from the ravages of an invading host or
+from the lack of means. Temptation is a fierce legion; and death looks
+no more terrible under a Babylonian helmet, than it does upon the gaunt
+faces of men who die upon the bare floor or wallow in rags. The worst
+calamity _in_ a calamity--if I may use such an expression--the most
+deplorable thing in any of the great evils of life, occurs when the
+selfish instinct within us is aroused, by want or terror, to such a
+degree that it overwhelms all social limitations, absorbs every
+sympathy, and leaves nothing but an intense individualism. This is the
+result in a sudden shock of danger, when the alarmed instinct is the
+first that starts to the summons. Sometimes, in protracted peril, it
+grows into an actual delirium of selfishness, and drowns even the sense
+of fear--as men amidst the horrors of a shipwreck will commit the most
+brutal excesses, and even rob the dying. And thus, in the desolation of
+Jerusalem as described by Jeremiah, the very yearnings of maternity were
+swallowed up by this fierce instinct.
+
+    "The hands of tender-hearted women cooked their own children;
+    They were their food, in the destruction of the daughter of my people."
+
+And results as bad as this appear in the conditions of poverty,
+suffering, and social degradation. Every fine chord of human nature is
+seared, sodden, torn from its sockets, in the darkness of the moral
+faculties and by the pressure of animal wants. The poor man is conscious
+of nothing but privation and suffering. He gazes at the power and
+discipline and pomp of society all about him, not as an ally but as a
+captive, or as a savage foe. The whole wears the aspect of a besieging
+army, and the Ishmaelitish feeling predominates. In the midst of the
+City he becomes an Arab of the desert, a robber of the rock. Now, it
+makes little difference whether the circle is wider or narrower, whether
+the siege is a moral or a literal one, whether the agent is the sword or
+the condition of society. The essential results will be the same. The
+civilization of New York may and does hem in a desolation as fearful in
+kind as that of Jerusalem, and involves sufferings as keen, and wakes
+up instincts as fiercely selfish. And one whose sympathies with the wide
+humanity are as fresh and clear as the Prophet's were with the woes of
+his people, might draw closer within these various circles of prosperity
+and refinement and activity, that lend such attractiveness to the great
+city--this magnificent girdle of commerce, embossed with the symbols of
+all nations--these arteries of traffic, filled with circulating wealth
+and power--these groups of fashion and of beauty, whose cheapest jewels
+would open the kingdom of heaven to ten thousand souls; he might pass
+within all these bands of "civilization," and in some alley, or "Five
+Points," sit down and weep for the calamity of his brethren. He would
+behold there War and Captivity enough to fill an entire volume of
+Lamentations. Captivity! were men ever bound by a darker chain, or
+trampled by a harder heel, than those victims of destitution and of
+their own passions? War! did the Jew behold any hosts more terrible
+pressing into Jerusalem, than you and I might see if we looked about us?
+The entrenched filth that all day long sends its steaming rot through
+lane and dwelling, through bone and marrow, and saps away the life. Cold
+that encamps itself in the empty fire-place, and blows through the
+broken door, and paralyzes the naked limbs. Hunger that takes the strong
+man by the throat, and kills the infant in its mother's arms. And still
+another traitorous legion that, equipped with the fascinations of the
+bottle and the shamelessness of harlotry, appeals to the passions of the
+brutal and proffers comfort to the hearts of the sad. War and Captivity
+in the midst of peace and refinement--is it not, my friends? And, with
+all this, may we not expect that fierce instinct of selfishness which
+overwhelms every other impulse, and breaks out in crime? Ah! and do we
+not discover a counterpart to that saddest feature of all in such
+circumstances--a desecration even of the parental instinct? Fathers,
+beating their sons into the career of guilt; and mothers--worse than
+those who made horrid food of their own children--offering their
+daughters to the Moloch of lust in the shape of some "gentlemanly"
+devil with a portable hell in his own breast!
+
+And it seems to me that if one with a prophet vision and a prophet
+heart, widened to the compass of humanity, should thus go into these
+waste places, nothing would affect him more; nothing would strike a
+deeper and tenderer chord in his bosom; than the condition of these
+little ones amidst the siege and terror. And, comprehending all their
+need--their moral as well as their physical destitution--he might
+exclaim, as describing the most pitiable spectacle of all--"The young
+children ask bread, and no man breaketh it unto them."
+
+And I think that every one of you who has reflected at all upon this
+subject, must feel that, of all the conditions of Humanity in the darker
+regions of the City, there is none more sorrowful, more momentous, and
+at the same time more hopeful, than the condition of the Children of the
+Poor. And I do not call your attention to this subject to-night with the
+expectation of proclaiming any fresh doctrine, or offering any novel
+suggestion, but because in a series of discourses like the present I
+cannot consistently pass by such a prominent phase; and more especially
+because I wish to push the old truth from your heads into your hearts,
+so that you may be excited to immediate and practical action.
+
+I purpose then, in regard to the Children of the Poor, to maintain one
+or two _principles_, to state a few _facts_, and to consider some
+_remedies_; and these will constitute the divisions of my discourse.
+
+In the first place then, I lay down a general principle which divides
+itself into two specific principles. I maintain that we are under
+peculiar obligations in regard to children. Of all our duties, except
+those which we owe directly to God--of all the ways in which we are
+required to _show_ our duty to God--I know of none more peremptory than
+this. It is the obligation of an instinct that appears everywhere; that
+swells in the breasts of the rudest people; that mingles with the most
+tender and beautiful and sacred associations of human life.
+
+Childhood and Children! is there any heart so sheathed in worldliness,
+or benumbed by sorrow, or hardened in its very nature, as to feel no
+gentle thrill responding to these terms? Surely, in some way these
+little ones have "touched the finer issues" of our being, and given us
+an unconscious benediction. Some of you are Mothers, and have acquired
+the holiest laws of duty, the sweetest solicitudes, the noblest
+inspirations, in the orbit of a child's life. And, however wide the
+circle of its wandering, you have held it still, by some tether of the
+heart, bound to the centre of a fathomless and unforgetting love. Some
+of you are Fathers, and in the opening promise of your sons have built
+fresh plans and enjoyed young hopes, and even in the decline of life
+have walked its morning paths anew. Many of us have felt our first great
+sorrow, and the breaking up of the spiritual deep within us, by the
+couch of a dead child. Clasping the little lifeless hand, we have
+comprehended, as never before, the _reality_ of death, and through the
+gloom, covering all the world about us, have caught sudden glimpses of
+the immortal fields. And, all of us, I trust, are thankful that God has
+not created merely men and women, crimped into artificial patterns, with
+selfish speculation in their eyes, with sadness and weariness and
+trouble about many things carving the wrinkles and stealing away the
+bloom; but pours in upon us a fresh stream of being that overflows our
+rigid conventionalisms with the buoyancy of nature, plays into this
+dusty and angular life like the jets of a fountain, like floods of
+sunshine, upsets our miserable dignity, meets us with a love that
+contains no deceit, a frankness that rebukes our quibbling compliments,
+nourishes the poetry of the soul, and, perpetually descending from the
+threshold of the Infinite, keeps open an arch-way of mystery and heaven.
+
+And now, just consider what a child _is_--this being thus fresh from the
+unknown realm, tender, plastic, dependent; a bud enfolding the boundless
+possibilities of humanity, and growing rank, running to waste, or
+opening in beauty, as you turn, neglect, or support it--just consider
+what a child is; and he must be far gone in indifference or depravity,
+who does not recognize the specific duty growing out of a general
+obligation which is forced upon us by the intrinsic claims of that
+child's nature. If we were appealed to by nothing else but its drooping
+reliance and natural wants, there would be enough to draw our attention
+to every phase of childhood that comes within our sphere.
+
+But our purpose this evening calls us away from these brighter images of
+childhood, to consider those who are surrounded with the most savage
+aspects and the worst influences of the world. And, beside the absolute
+duty which is imposed upon us by their natural position, I observe that
+the Children of the Poor create an appeal to _prudential_
+considerations. They form a large proportion of those groups known in
+every city as "The _Dangerous_ Classes." For they will be developed
+somehow. If they receive not that attention which is demanded by their
+position; if they are left to darkness and neglect; still, it is no mere
+mass of negative existence that they constitute. There is vitality there
+and positive strength, in those lanes and cellars, put forth for evil if
+not drawn towards the good. We must not confound ignorance with torpor
+of spirit or bluntness of understanding. One of the most remarkable
+characteristics of vagrant children is a keen, precocious intellect. A
+boy of seven in the streets of a city is more developed in this respect
+than one of fourteen in the country--a development, of course, which is
+easily accounted for by the antagonisms with which the child has had to
+contend, and the devices which have been inspired by the sheer pressure
+of want. He has been pitched into the sea of events to sink or swim, and
+those sharpened faculties are the tentacles put forth by an effort of
+nature in order to secure a hold of life. And there is something very
+sad and very fearful in this precocity. The vagrant boy has known
+nothing of the stages of childhood, conducting with beautiful simplicity
+from one timid step to another, and gradually forming it for the
+realities of the world. But the neglected infant has wilted into the
+premature man, with his old cunning look, blending so fantastically, so
+mournfully, with the unformed features of youth. Knowing the world on
+its worst side--knowing its hostility, its knavery, its foulness, its
+heartless materialism--knowing it as the man does not know it who has
+only breathed the country air, and looked upon the open face of nature.
+Is it not very sad, my friends, that the vagrant boy _should_ know so
+much; and, without one hour of romance, one step of childish innocence
+and imagination, should have gone clear through "the world" which so
+many boast that they understand--the knave's world, the libertine's
+world, the world of the skeptical, scoffing, Ishmaelitish spirit? And
+yet he has so little _real_ knowledge--there is such a cloud of
+ignorance and moral stupor resting upon his brain and heart! So much of
+him is merely animal, foxy, wolfish, and this sharpened intellect only a
+faculty, an instinct, a preternatural organ pushed out to gain
+subsistence with. It is a terrible anomaly, and yet, I say, it is none
+the less an active power, and shows us that, however neglected, the
+child of the abject poor is not dormant or undeveloped. In the first
+place, very likely, it has developed itself into a dogged atheism--a
+sulky unbelief. The brain of the vagrant boy is active with speculation
+as well as with practice--he has some theory of this life in which he
+lives, and, as might be expected, a theory woven with the tissues of
+his own experience; woven with the shadows and the lurid lights of his
+lot. A gentleman passing one day through the streets of Edinboro', saw a
+boy, who lived by selling fire-wood, standing with a heavy load upon his
+back, looking at a number of boys amusing themselves in a play-ground.
+"Sometimes," says the writer, "he laughed aloud, at other times he
+looked sad and sorrowful. Stepping up to him I said--'Well, my boy, you
+seem to enjoy the fun very much; but why don't you lay down your load of
+sticks?'... 'I wan't thinking about the burden--I wan't thinking about
+the sticks, sir.' 'And may I ask what you were thinking about?' 'Oh, I
+was just thinking about what the good missionary said the other day. You
+know, sir, I don't go to church, for I have no clothes; but one of the
+missionaries comes every week to our stair, and holds a meeting. He was
+preaching to us last week, and among other things he said--"Although
+there are rich folks and poor folks in this world, yet we are all
+brothers." Now, sir, just look at these lads--every one of them has
+fine jackets, fine caps, with warm shoes and stockings, but I have
+none;--So I was just thinking if those were my brothers, it doesn't look
+like it, sir--it doesn't look like it. See, sir, they are all flying
+kites, while I am flying in rags--they are running about at kick-ball
+and cricket; but I must climb the long, long stairs, with a heavy load,
+and an empty stomach, whilst my back is like to break. It doesn't look
+like it, sir--it doesn't look like it.'" Or, take the following
+instance, which I extract from the Records of one of the Benevolent
+Societies of our own city: "Can you read or write? said the visitor to a
+poor boy. Marty hung his head. I repeated the question two or three
+times before he answered, and the tears dropped on his hands, as he
+said, despairingly, and I thought defiantly--'No, sir, I can't read nor
+write neither. God don't want me to read, sir. Indeed, so it looks
+likely. Didn't He take away my father since before I can remember him?
+And haven't I been working all the time to fetch in something to eat,
+and for the fire, and for clothes? I went out to pick coal when I could
+take a basket in my arms--and I have had no chance for school since.'"
+Now this is fallacious and dangerous reasoning, my friends;
+nevertheless, it _is_ reasoning, and shows that the mind of the poor boy
+is not inactive as to the problems of life. And the intellect which is
+so acute in theory will soon drive to practice. Stimulated by that
+selfish instinct which, as I have shown, will under pressure absorb
+every other consideration, he speedily commences the career of _crime_.
+And have you ever looked into this matter of crime? Or do you know it
+only as a monstrous fact in the social mechanism, and in the records of
+human nature? If so, it would be well for us to consider the way in
+which it appears to the violator of right--the way in which things look
+to him who works _inside_ the web of guilt. And we may be sure that it
+does not look to him as it does to us from the midst of respectabilities
+and comforts, or from a high intellectual and moral stand-point. Now I
+am not going to justify crime, or to indulge any sentiment upon the
+subject. But, really, one of the most practical questions that can be
+asked is--"_Why_ is this one, or that one, a criminal?" Do I say that
+the guilt should be imputed to the condition--that it is all owing to
+circumstances? No: but I _do_ say that, in nine cases out of ten, crime
+is no proof of _special_ depravity apart from _general_ depravity, and
+that the circumstances have just so much weight as this--that put you or
+me in those same circumstances, in nine cases out of ten, we should be
+criminals too. In the same circumstances, my friends; and this involves
+a great deal. It involves an hereditary taint stamped in the very mould
+of birth; it involves physical misery; it involves intellectual and
+moral destitution; it involves the worst kind of social influence; it
+involves the pressure of all the natural appetites, rioting in this need
+of the body and this darkness of the soul. And it implies no suspicion
+of a man's moral standard--it is no insult to his self-respect--to tell
+him that, under similar conditions, it is extremely probable he would
+have been a criminal too. Reasoning in an arm-chair is very proper, and
+often very accurate, but the logic of starvation is too peremptory for
+syllogisms. There is a sort of compound made up of frost, damp, dirt and
+rags, which works double magic: it sometimes converts a thief into a
+philosopher, and sometimes a philosopher into a thief. I am not
+speaking, however, of the mere impulse of animal want, but of this
+condition where the counter-acting forces are dormant. And for this
+reason you and I can draw no immoral conclusion from the doctrine of
+circumstances. We could not be like the moral leper who infests the dark
+regions of the city--we could not be like the child of sin and shame who
+broods there--without losing our identity. In contemplating this matter,
+the feeling for ourselves should be simply one of humility and
+thankfulness. We have grown up in pure light and air, appeased with the
+comforts, and braced by at least the current morality of society. But,
+concerning those degraded ones, what some call "charity" is no more than
+"justice." It is no more than justice to say--all the conditions being
+considered--that as to a vast majority of them, crime is no proof of
+_special_ depravity. It is the genuine humanity that is there--not base
+metal. It came from the common mint--somewhere you will find upon it a
+faint scar of the Divine Image--but the coin was pitched into this
+bonfire of appetite and blasphemy, and it has come out a cinder. Thus,
+proud and happy Mother, might _your_ boy have been a defaced and
+distorted being, kicked, cuffed, knotted with frost, blackened with
+bruises; a pick-pocket, a wharf-rat, a panel-thief; with his intellect
+sharpened to an intense and impish cunning--only knowing that it is a
+hard world, and he must get out of it what he can. Thus, fond Father,
+might _your_ daughter, whom the very winds must salute with courtesy,
+have gone through the streets at night--a painted desolation, a reeling
+shame. Do you think these were made of better texture than those who
+blacken and fester yonder? Do you think that when these last came into
+the world there was no milk in mothers' breasts for them, no Divine
+solicitude about them, no tenderness in the heart of Christ; but that
+they were the refuse, whirled into existence as the great wheel of Life
+shaped the finer mould of the respectable and the happy? I tell you
+that God made them complete souls, and stamped His Image upon them--but
+they have fallen into the dark and dreary ways; the fierce flames have
+hardened them; the foul air has tainted them; and their special
+depravity, over and above the common depravity, is the infection of
+circumstances. The young boy, the young girl, driven by necessity and
+sharpened with cunning, run into crime. They are all _educated_; for
+circumstances--not merely books--are education; but this is their
+seminary, and the alphabet is spontaneous, and the science of quick
+growth. And with the consequences of all this exposure and temptation we
+are all mixed up; and, if the claim of the child in its intrinsic
+position does not move us, _prudential_ considerations should--the
+consideration of what society does suffer, and must suffer, if these
+conditions are not changed.
+
+Such, then, are some of the _principles_ involved with my theme. Let us
+in the second place pass to consider, very briefly, a few of the
+_facts_. Briefly, because I have no time for details, and because the
+general state of the case is but too well known to you.
+
+It is a fact, then, that there are among us a vast number of children in
+the most miserable and perilous condition. In the year 1849, the Chief
+of Police reported the destitution and vice among this class of vagrants
+as almost "incredible." In that report he says--"The offspring of always
+careless, generally intemperate, and oftentimes dishonest parents, they
+never see the inside of a school-room, and so far as our excellent
+system of public education is concerned, it is to them a nullity." It
+appears that, at that time, in 12 wards of the city, there were 2,955 of
+these children, of whom two-thirds were females between the ages of 8
+and 16. I am informed, also, by the Chief of Police, that 100 per cent.
+should now be added to this estimate; not all attributable, of course,
+to growth in depravity, but to the increase of population, especially by
+immigration. I understand, moreover, that within the past year there
+have been ten thousand arrests, and five thousand commitments of boys
+alone between the ages of 5 and 15.
+
+These are naked statistics, affording you an outline of the actual state
+of things. Need I paint the costume and the scenery, and describe the
+sad and awful drama in which these children play their parts? I could
+not if I would. But think of that vast amount of young life running to
+waste, sweeping through the sewers of the social fabric, an
+under-current of taint and desolation! Think of them, starved, beaten,
+driven into crime not merely by necessity, but by the very hands of
+their parents! and think of them this night, cuddling in rags, shivering
+on straw, cradled in reeking filth, drinking in blasphemy and obscenity
+and cunning policies of sin, under that dark canopy that shuts out
+social sympathy, and hides the very Face of God. And if you have, I will
+not say parental hearts, but human souls, you will ask if there ought
+not to be some remedy, and will say that all who can should help in
+administering that remedy.
+
+And _remedies_ there appear to be, my friends. For, while I said that
+there is no condition in the city more sad and momentous than that of
+these children of the poor, I said, likewise, that there is none more
+_hopeful_. The essential and comprehensive remedy of all I indicated in
+the close of the last discourse, and shall have occasion to dwell upon
+in the next. That remedy is the practical operation of
+Christianity--first of all in our own hearts, and then flowing out in
+action. I mean especially the _method_ of Jesus, which consisted not of
+mere teaching but of _help_--which touched not only the issues of the
+sin-sick soul, but the weakness and want of the body. To the demoniac,
+to the leper, to the impotent man by the pool, he brought not abstract
+truths, but words of healing and works of practical deliverance. How
+striking is the fact that the freshest and noblest charities of this
+nineteenth century are only developments of the manner in which the
+Redeemer soothed the sorrows and vanquished the evils of the world! For
+those institutions which especially excite the public interest at the
+present day, are those whose plan it is first to remove the children of
+the poor from those wretched and foul _conditions_ upon which I have
+laid so much stress, and to lead them to a higher culture by extending,
+first, the hand of temporal relief. They aim to break up the sockets of
+custom, and to introduce the degraded child to fresh motives of action
+and fields of endeavor; to throw around him the atmosphere of a true
+home, and to blend intellectual, and moral, and religious training with
+that true charity which teaches one how to assert his own manliness, and
+support himself by the honest labor of his own hands. Now I do not wish
+to be invidious, I am glad that such a constellation of philanthropic
+promise has risen upon the dark places of the abject poor. I point with
+pleasure to what has been accomplished in the Sahara of the Five Points,
+and in what still remains to be done I discern a field broad enough to
+prevent collision and dispute--broad enough to employ the means and the
+generous energies of thousands. With equal pleasure I refer to that
+"Juvenile Asylum," with its noble interposition ere the feet of the
+erring boy shall take the _second_ step in crime, and which has recently
+rendered still more efficient its system of labor and relief by
+extending the benefit to girls. But as I wish this evening to
+concentrate your sympathies, I call your attention especially to the
+institution known as "The Children's Aid Society," the general character
+and the practical results of which I will briefly state. Its main object
+is sufficiently indicated by its name. Its machinery is simple, and acts
+upon the principle just laid down. It seeks first to remove the poor
+child from the coil of evil influences which have been thrown around
+him, and which have been daily strengthened by the sharpest pressure of
+animal necessities. It comprehends the two-fold benefit of _education_
+and _labor_ in its system of "Industrial Schools." Of these, at the
+present time, in this city, there are eight, in which a multitude of
+children are educated, taught to work, supplied with a warm dinner
+daily, and with such clothing as they can learn to make. In connection
+with these there is one shoe-shop, in which thirty or forty boys earn a
+livelihood. Another object of this society is to find employment for its
+beneficiaries out of the city, and during the past year places in the
+country have been found for one hundred and twenty-five, where their
+employers treat them as their own children.
+
+In institutions like these, then, you perceive the indications of a
+remedy for the condition of these children of the poor--a system of help
+which gives something more than spiritual instruction on the one hand,
+something more than mere food and clothing on the other; which combines
+measures of relief and nourishment for the demands of our whole nature
+in the form of the ignorant and suffering child; and which, better than
+all, lifts him out of the humiliating condition of a mere pauper or
+dependent, and sets him in a channel of manly exertion,
+self-development, and self-support; which not only does the negative
+work of removing a mass of evil from society, but makes for it the
+positive contribution of an improved and educated humanity. I do not say
+that all the relief lies here, that it will do all that is needed, or
+that nothing better will be devised. But I think the _tendency_ of these
+institutions is the right one, and that they indicate the _way_ in which
+this great social problem is to be solved. But it is not necessary to
+say that the faith which we cherish in such a system is dead without
+works; and that something more is needed than a few model institutions
+working here and there. This matter makes a practical claim upon us all,
+in the fact that, in one way or another, we may all help forward this
+method of relief--we may help it forward as active laborers in the very
+midst of the field, as teachers and missionaries, or contributors of our
+goods and money. Each knows what he can best do--what is his special,
+Providential _call_ in the matter; but let him be assured that he _has_
+a call; and that this spectacle of exposed, needy, suffering childhood
+is not a mere spectacle for his sympathies, but a field white with a
+harvest that waits for his effort. Have we nothing but sympathies
+wherewith to answer the poor woman's prayer--a prayer that echoes
+through so many hearts in this great city--"May the Lord spare my Archy
+from the bad boys, and from taking to the ways of his father!"
+
+There is one thing which strikes me as very affecting in the condition
+of any child. It is when that condition is necessarily a melancholy
+one--when the circumstances which hem it around cast over the surface of
+that young life an abiding gloom. A melancholy child! What an anomaly
+among the harmonies of the universe; something as incongruous as a bird
+drooping in a cage, or a flower in a sepulchre. The musical laughter
+muffled and broken; the spontaneous smile transformed to a sad
+suspicion; and the austerities of mature life, the fearful speculation,
+and forecast of evil, fixed and frozen on a boy's face! And then the
+sorrow of a child is so _absorbing_--for he lives only in the present.
+In the afflictions which fall upon him, man has the aid of reason and
+faith--he looks beyond the present issue, he detects the significance of
+his calamity, and strengthened thus a brave heart can vanquish any
+sorrow. But, as Richter beautifully says--"the little cradle, or
+bed-canopy of the child, is easier darkened than the starry heaven of
+man." Surely, then, it is a blessed thing to contribute aught that will
+lighten this gloom, and place the child in natural conditions.
+
+But there is one phase of this subject which, in its appeal to us, is
+more eloquent than all the rest. It is where there are children who
+stand not merely in the intrinsic claim of their childhood; or in their
+touching sadness; or pushing their energies into vice and crime; but
+nobly struggling _against_ the tide of evil--struggling to bear up in
+their lot--enduring and achieving for the sake of those who, young as
+these children are, are dependent on them. If I had time, I think I
+could write a "Martyrology;" not following the track of famous men,
+whose faces look out upon us from the brutal amphitheatre and from the
+fire with a halo of glory around them, and whom we behold, by the vision
+of faith, with their gory robes transfigured to celestial whiteness,
+waving palms in their hands; but tracing out incidents in the lives of
+some of the children here in our city--not dead, but _living_ martyrs!
+O! I think I _could_ write such a Martyrology, with blood and tears,
+over many a gloomy threshold, on the walls of many a desolate room; and
+let future generations come and read it--a fearful record of human
+suffering--a sweet memorial of human virtue--when many of these old
+woes, we trust, shall have passed away for ever.
+
+Permit me, in closing, to present two or three incidents illustrative of
+this heroism and sacrifice among the Children of the Poor.
+
+Take, for instance, the account of a writer who tells us that in the
+street he "met a little girl, very poor, but with such a sweet sad
+expression," adds he, "that I involuntarily stopped and spoke to her.
+She answered my questions very clearly, but the heavy, sad look never
+left her eyes a moment. She had no father or mother. She took care of
+the children herself; she was only _thirteen_; she sewed on check
+shirts, and made a living for them." He went to see her. "It is a low,
+damp basement her home. She lives there with the three little children,
+whom she supports, and the elder sick brother, who sometimes picks up a
+trifle. She had been washing for herself and little ones. 'She almost
+thought that she could take in washing now,' and the little ones with
+their knees to their mouths crouched up before the stove, looked as if
+there could not be a doubt of sister's doing anything she tried. 'Well,
+Annie, how do you make a living now?' 'I sew on the check shirts, sir,
+and the flannel shirts; I get five cents for the checks, and nine cents
+for the others; but just now they wont let me have the flannel, because
+I can't deposit two dollars.' 'It must be very hard work?' 'O! I don't
+mind, sir; but to-day the visitors came, and said we'd better go to the
+poor-house, and I said I couldn't like to leave these little ones yet;
+and I thought if I only had candles, I could sit up till ten or eleven,
+and make the shirts.' ... She had learned everything she knew at the
+Industrial School.... She never went to church, for she had no clothes,
+but she could read and write.... 'It was very damp there,' she said,
+'and then it was so cold nights.'"
+
+I will, in the next place, introduce you to a garret-room, six feet by
+ten. The occupants are a poor mother and her son. The mother works at
+making shirts with collars and stitched bosoms, at six shillings and
+sixpence per dozen, for a man who pays half in merchandise, and who,
+when she is starving for bread, puts her off with calico at a _shilling_
+a yard that is not worth more than fourpence! But _he_ is not the martyr
+in the case. When the visitor entered, her son George, about twelve
+years old, "was just coming in for dinner, pale and apparently exhausted
+by the effort of climbing the stairs, and sank down upon a rough plank
+bench near the door." He worked in a glass-factory, earning a bare
+subsistence. "He is a little old man at twelve," says the narrator, "the
+paleness of his sunken cheeks was relieved by the hectic flush; his
+hollow dry eye was moistened by an occasional tear; and his thin white
+lip quivered as he told me his simple story; how he was braving hunger
+and death--for he cannot live long--to help his mother pay the rent and
+buy her bread. 'Half-past ten at night is early for him to return,' said
+the mother; 'sometimes it is half-past eleven and I am sitting up for
+him.' Sometimes, in the morning, she finds him awake, 'but he don't want
+to get up, and he puts his hands on his sides and says, 'Mother, it
+hurts me here when I breathe.' I can work, and I do work,' adds she,
+'all the time--but I can't make as much as my little boy.'"
+
+One more account. It is of a beggar-girl who "lives," as the narrative
+goes on to say, "in a rear building where full daylight never shines--in
+a cellar-room where pure dry air is never breathed. A quick gentle girl
+of twelve years, she speaks to the visitor as he enters--'Mother does
+not see you, sir, because she's blind.' The mother was an old woman of
+sixty-five or seventy years, with six or seven others seated around.
+'But you told me you and your mother and little sister lived by
+yourselves.' 'Yes, sir--here it is;'" and at the end of the passage the
+visitor discovers a narrow place, about five feet by three. The bed was
+rolled up in one corner, and nearly filled the room. "'But where is your
+stove?' 'We have none, sir. The people in the next room are very kind to
+mother, and let her come in there to warm--because, you know, I get half
+the coal.' 'But where do you cook your food?' 'We never cook any, sir;
+it is already cooked. I go early in the morning to get coal and chips
+for the fire, and I must have two baskets of coal and wood to kindle
+with by noon. That's mother's half. Then when the people have eaten
+dinner, I go round to get the bits they leave. I can get two baskets of
+coal every day now; but when it gets cold, and we must have a great
+deal, it is hard for me to find any--there's so many poor chaps to pick
+it. Sometimes the _ladies_ speak cross to me, and shut the door hard at
+me, and sometimes the _gentlemen_ slap me in the face, and kick my
+basket, and then I come home, and mother says not to cry, for may be
+I'll do better to-morrow. Sometimes I get my basket almost full, and
+then put it by for to-morrow; and then, if next day we have enough, I
+take this to a poor woman next door. Sometimes I get only a few bits in
+my basket for all day, and may be the next day. And then I _fast_,
+because, you know, mother is sick and weakly, and can't be able to fast
+like me.'"
+
+These my friends, are some of the "short and simple annals of the poor."
+But those of whom Gray spoke rest peacefully in the "country
+churchyard;" their spirits are in heaven, and their history is embalmed
+in his own immortal Elegy. But _these_ records are of those who yet live
+and suffer--"Martyrs _without_ the palm."
+
+And could I summon them here to-night, and would the Master but enter as
+when upon earth, surely he would look upon them in tender pity; would
+bless them; would take in his arms those whom the world has cast aside
+and overlooked. Nay, perhaps he would transfigure their actuality into
+their possibility, and we might see "the angels in their faces,"
+pleading with us before the Father's throne!
+
+
+
+
+THE HELP OF RELIGION.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE VIII.
+
+THE HELP OF RELIGION.
+
+      For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to
+      come.--HEBREWS xiii, 14.
+
+
+There are a good many people who, apparently, are never troubled by any
+speculations arising out of a comprehensive view of things. They are
+keenly alive to all objects within their sphere; but their eyes are
+close to the surface, and their experience comes in shocks of sensation,
+and shreds of perception. They know the superficial features of the
+world and its conventional expressions; are conversant with its business
+and its pleasures; with the market, the fashions, the town-talk, the
+worldly fortunes of their neighbors. Sometimes, a powerful affliction
+startles them in this smooth routine, and for a moment they are
+surprised to find how wide the universe is, and among what great
+realities we dwell. But, usually, their existence is a narrow revolving
+disc, bringing around the same group of incidents and the same
+associations, morning, noon, and night. They comprehend Life as they
+comprehend the expanse of yonder harbor, dotted with shifting but
+familiar forms, ruffled by a passing wind or bright under a summer sun,
+and whose tides duly rise and fall. But they little think of the oceanic
+vastness which it represents; and how its oscillations come from great
+currents that leap out of the Antarctic, and swell around tropical
+islands, and sweep the lines of continents, and roll in the Polar Sea.
+
+These, therefore, are not perplexed by questions such as occur to him
+who, looking beyond his own worldly interests and the area of daily
+routine, takes into view the scope of being and the profounder phenomena
+of human life. For such a view will inevitably engender speculation, nor
+can he rest until he obtains some _theory_ of existence. These very
+conditions of Humanity in the City, for instance--these conditions of
+poverty, and responsibility, and relationship, and privilege, and
+strife, and toil--yea, the lessons which come to us from the crowd as it
+flows through these streets; constitute a great problem, of which every
+thinking man will seek some solution.
+
+Now, throughout this entire series of discourses--although I have not
+deemed it necessary in every instance to make a specific application--I
+have assumed that you and I were looking upon these various phases of
+Humanity from the Christian stand-point, and therefore I could not fitly
+conclude this work without indicating the Help which RELIGION affords
+concerning these problems of existence.
+
+I observe, then, that while it may seem very simple to affirm that a
+_theory_ does not, in any case, alter _facts_; yet there is often an
+advantage in laying down this proposition. For this leads us to
+understand precisely what a theory _may_ do. It does not alter facts,
+but it throws them into new relations, and presents them in an entirely
+different light. Materialism, for instance, is a theory of Life; and
+Christianity--in which term I include not only a system of Doctrines,
+but of practical forces--is also a theory of Life. Now, neither of these
+gets rid of the great facts of existence. Men sin and suffer and die,
+whether we adopt the one system or the other. But, surely, when we
+approach these facts from the side of Religion, they appear in very
+different lights, and are taken up with very different results, from
+their appearance and effect when interpreted by the creed of Unbelief.
+It would be very absurd then, because Christianity does not instantly
+abolish, or fully explain, all these strange and darker realities, to
+fall back upon the opposite ground of skepticism. This is only receding
+from the best solution to the worst--or, rather, to no solution at all.
+For I maintain that Christianity gives us not merely the best, but the
+_only_ solution of these problems. It will be my purpose in this
+discourse, at least, to show what kind of help Religion _does_ afford
+for Humanity in all these diverse conditions; and, having done this, I
+shall leave it to your own convictions to decide whether it is not a
+great and practical Help; and whether there _is_ any other help. I
+propose to illustrate the influence of Religion to this effect,
+first--as a _Conviction_; second, as a _Working Power_; and third, as an
+_Interpretation_.
+
+I say, then, in the first place, that religion furnishes great help for
+man in the various issues of life, when he becomes actually convinced
+that its truths and sanctions are _genuine_. In other words, the
+conception of a moral government, of a directing Providence, and of
+eternal realities, vividly apprehended by the intellect, kept fresh in
+the heart, and assimilated to the entire spiritual nature, is a personal
+inspiration. It elevates the platform of a man's being, so that all
+things appear in true proportion. It clears his vision to detect
+principles, and endows him with moral courage. I do not know that I can
+better suggest its influence as a help here, in the conditions of the
+city, than by asking you to imagine what _would_ be the state of things
+in the spheres of toil and traffic--in all the multiform relations of
+our humanity--if men really apprehended and believed it? _It_, I
+say--not some special dogma or institution, but the absolute spirit and
+truth of Christianity. For I do not think that, generally, this _is_
+actually credited. I think that, with many professions of religion, and
+much outward respect for it, and an extensive circulation of vague
+conceptions about it, it is _not_ commonly felt and vitalized--it is not
+apprehended in its blessedness and power, and absolute excellence. To
+the habits of the soul it does not represent and mean realities as a
+written contract does, or a bank-bill--something that men precipitate
+themselves upon, and that sways the under-currents of their action. New
+York, with its Broadway and its Wall Street; with its proud buildings
+and its bristling masts; is a reality--but that city of which the text
+makes mention; that city which good men seek, and which in the
+Apocalypse of Faith they see; whose splendors glitter through the solemn
+twilight; nay, which hems them around for ever, and shines down upon
+them brighter than the noonday sun; to thousands, toiling, sinning, and
+suffering here, is _not_ a reality. For, I ask you, my friends, if it
+_were_ realized, could there be so much abject need among us; so much
+stony-hearted selfishness; so much shuffling in trade, and corruption
+in politics, and meanness in intercourse, and foolish superficial
+living? I know, and you know, that one of the greatest evils is--not
+merely that men are worldly, irreligious, bound up in sad conditions and
+narrow conceits; but that they are so, because they do not apprehend the
+nature and do not feel the reality of religion. For I say once more,
+that a conviction of its reality must be a great help in adjusting the
+problems of life. And this, because it acts upon the centre of all the
+sin, and much of the suffering of the world. This personal application
+of religion stands before all other remedies for the removal of these
+evils. Others are attempted--others are, in a degree, successful; but
+none go so deep and produce results so sure. It seems to me that the
+position of humanity in this respect, is illustrated in the narrative of
+the Demoniac of Gadara. We are told that he had been bound with chains,
+but in his fierce madness had burst them asunder. And then, again, men
+had tried various expedients, but they could not tame him. But when the
+influence of Jesus fell upon his soul, it took hold of it with sweet
+authority; the legion left him, and the poor, wounded, houseless man sat
+clothed and in his right mind. So is it with man in society; so is it
+with some of these social evils. The power of _law_ has been invoked;
+and it has its legitimate sphere of operation. It checks the purposed
+violence. It arrests the overt act. It may consistently be summoned to
+purify all those channels of social action which it assumes to regulate;
+and, instead of patronizing the wrong, to set its face and hand against
+it. Thus it may prevent public harm, though it cannot stop self-injury,
+and remove occasions of temptation, though it cannot impart moral
+strength. It has no efficacy to change the assassin's heart, yet we call
+upon it to guard us against murder. We bid it close the den of infamy,
+though it does not quench guilty passion. And we may use it to stop the
+sale of intoxicating drinks, though it does not destroy the drunkard's
+appetite. And this indicates both the function and the limitation of the
+law. Thrown over the wild forces that rage in the human heart, and that
+afflict community, it is like the fetters on the limbs of the demoniac.
+It may restrain for a time; but in some sweep of temptation it is
+spurned and snapped asunder. On the other hand, we have the expedients
+of the _reformer_. He comes with props and palliatives; soothing some
+cutaneous irritation, or removing some foul condition. And let us
+recognize the legitimacy of _his_ endeavor. We must approach the human
+heart through the web of its external circumstances, as well as
+directly. Nay, often this is the only way by which we can get at it at
+all. And well may we rejoice over the rescue from specific vices, and
+commend the zeal and patience which fasten upon some colossal evil to
+batter and drive it from the world. But notwithstanding such noble
+achievement, how many have remained among the tombs, or gone back to the
+wilderness--demoniacs still! It is an old truth, but I say it as though
+it were in the conviction of a fresh fact forced upon me by these great
+problems that heave up in the currents of City Life; it is an
+unavoidable conclusion that there is only one influence that can make
+safe, and pure, and strong in goodness, those recesses out of which
+issue so much social evil, and so much personal suffering. And that is
+the influence not of the law-giver, nor of the reformer; but of the
+Redeemer. It is that power which flows through the soul in a practical
+conviction of the reality of religion. It is the help which comes from
+its inspiration of divine truth and goodness in the breasts of
+individual men, turning them from evil, rendering them strong against
+temptation, and sending out from their lives fresh forces of
+righteousness and love.
+
+Indeed, I believe that any man who really thinks and feels, and who has
+much experience of Life, will become convinced of the _necessity_ of
+Religion. I would leave its claims not to the argument of the Moralist,
+or the advocacy of the Pulpit, but as they urge themselves upon us here
+out of the whirl, and weariness, and vicissitudes of the City. Surely,
+as its calm voice appeals to the sons of men, striving in this heated
+atmosphere; chasing phantoms that rise out of the dust; absorbed in the
+fickle game of fortune; borne along for a little while on the top-waves
+of excitement, and then dying unmarked as a rain-drop that falls into
+the sea; surely as its voice appeals to these, saying--"Come unto me,
+all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest!" it
+strikes the deepest chords in thousands of hearts. I will not adopt now
+any professional argument to prove the great necessity of Religion as a
+Help in Life. But I would take my stand, in imagination, at some corner
+of yonder tumultuous street. How multiform the crowds that sweep by me;
+how diverse the faces; what a kaleidoscope of human conditions! And yet,
+when you attempt to classify them, how few are the actual _types_ of
+men--how many fall into a common group; and when you try them by the
+profoundest standard--that of a common experience and common wants--how
+marvellously alike they all are! How similar in inward expression, the
+rich man who walks yonder, to that poor drudging son of toil, who bows
+his back and strains his sinews until they ache! How similar in effect
+the burdens which they both bear--the burden of wealth, and the burden
+of poverty, in the fact that they _are_ burdens upon the heart and the
+soul! And are they not both struggling with the realities of life, and
+moved by quenchless desires, and looking up into the same infinite
+mystery? Ah! my friends, I hardly think it would be the most effectual
+way to preach Religion in this church on Sunday, as a matter of
+course--but to stand out there on week-days, and strike the deepest
+chords throbbing unconsciously in the bosoms of those who pass me by. I
+would appeal to you, O disappointed, almost heart-broken man, who for
+years have endeavored to earn a competency to lift your head above the
+sheer necessities of life, but have failed in the chase, and been beaten
+back, and seen others who have exerted themselves not near as much, not
+so honorably, perhaps, rise to the very top of the stream and sail clear
+ahead;--or to you, O "favorite of fortune," as the world calls you, who
+find your palace to be only a stately sepulchre, in which all genuine
+feeling and simple enjoyment lies dead and wrapped in cerements of
+chilling etiquette--whose daughter, perhaps, has mocked your fondest
+plans; or whose son has turned out a miserable weed of dissipation--a
+degenerate fopling, a rake, a fool;--or to you, O butterfly of fashion,
+sailing with embroidered wings in search of admiration and of pleasure;
+or still again, to you who have just gathered together the means of
+enjoyment, and ease, and everything, to make life pleasant, and lo!
+death has entered, and your hopes are darkened and in the dust; I appeal
+to you, O types of this streaming humanity, that wears so many masks,
+yet, carries under all a common heart; and ask you, if there is not some
+void that no earthly good can fill--that no finite thing can sustain and
+satisfy? Can you go on with the common business of the world, discharge
+all its obligations, control yourself in its excitements, resist its
+evil solicitations, bear up under its trials, and, finally, reach that
+period in life when you must ask--"What is all this worth?--these years
+of toil, these eager enterprises, this golden accumulation or
+unfortunate failure--what are they all worth, and what do they
+mean?"--can anybody well get along with all this, without Religion? My
+friends, I say to you that, not consciously, perhaps, like the old
+saints who wrought and prayed and walked with upward-looking faces--but
+really, in the deep yearning and the secret gravitation of the soul--you
+_do_ confess that here we have no continuing city, and you are seeking
+one to come. At least, it seems to me that without the Help of Religion,
+there is only the alternative of moral indifference--a cold, hard
+worldliness, or of recklessness and spiritual despair. And is not this
+the alternative which is exhibited in the midst of all our
+civilization--in the midst of this gorgeous materialism of the
+nineteenth century? Thousands, it is to be apprehended, do exhibit one
+or the other of those extremes which the poet has so well described:
+
+    "For most men in a brazen prison live,
+      Where, in the sun's hot eye,
+      With heads bent o'er their toil, they languidly
+    Their minds to some unmeaning task-work give,
+      Dreaming of naught beyond their prison wall;
+        And so, year after year,
+      Fresh products of their barren labor fall
+        From their tired hands, and rest
+      Never yet comes more near.
+      Gloom settles slowly down over their breast,
+    And while they try to stem
+      The waves of mournful thought by which they are prest,
+    Death in their prison reaches them
+      Unfreed, having seen nothing, still unblest.
+
+    "And the rest, a few,
+      Escape their prison, and depart
+    On the wide ocean of life anew.
+      There the freed prisoner, where'er his heart
+    Listeth, will sail;
+    Nor does he know how there prevail
+    Despotic on life's sea,
+    Trade-winds that cross it from eternity.
+    Awhile he holds some false way, undebarred
+    By thwarting signs, and braves
+    The freshening wind, and blackening waves,
+    And then the tempest strikes him, and between
+    The lightning bursts is seen
+    Only a driving wreck,
+    And the pale master on his spar-strewn deck
+    With anguished face and flying hair,
+      Grasping the rudder hard,
+    Still bent to make some port he knows not where,
+    Still standing for some false impossible shore,
+    And sterner comes the roar
+    Of sea and wind, and through the deepening gloom,
+    Fainter and fainter wreck and helmsman loom."
+
+But, before I quit this head of my discourse, let me say that in order
+to be accepted as the great Help of Life, Religion must in some way be
+_presented_ as a reality. It must not be held forth as a mere
+abstraction--it must be precipitated into its concrete relations.
+Parting with none of its sanctity, it must be stripped of its vagueness
+and technicality, and be spoken in the fresh language of the time. I
+feel sure that amidst prevalent irreligion, nothing is so much needed as
+a definite statement of _what_ religion is; and that men should learn to
+recognize its vascular connection with every department of action. It
+must be understood that "being religious" is not a work apart by itself,
+but a spirit of faith and righteousness, flowing out from the centre of
+a regenerated heart into all the employments and intercourse of the
+world. Not merely the preacher in the pulpit, and the saint on his
+knees, may do the work of religion, but the mechanic who smites with the
+hammer and drives the wheel; the artist seeking to realize his pure
+ideal of the beautiful; the mother in the gentle offices of home; the
+statesman in the forlorn hope of liberty and justice; and the
+philosopher whose thought treads reverently among the splendid mysteries
+of the universe. I know that some will deem this a secularization of
+religion--a desecration of its holy essence by worldly alliances. But
+they are mistaken. It is a _consecration_ of pursuits and spheres that
+have been cut off from all sacredness, and devoted to secondary ends.
+Are not the just, the useful, the beautiful, from God, as well as the
+good and the holy? And, therefore, is not any practice which serves
+these, a service of God? It is needed that men should feel that every
+lawful pursuit _is_ sacred and not profane; that every position in life
+is close to the steps of the divine throne; and that the most beaten and
+familiar paths lie under the awful shadow of the Infinite; then they
+will go about their daily pursuits, and fill their common relationships,
+with hearts of worship and pulses of unselfish love; instead of
+regarding religion as an isolated peculiarity for a corner of the closet
+and a fraction of the week, and leaving all the rest of time and space
+an unconsecrated waste, where lawless passions travel, and selfishness
+pitches its tents. O! if religion _were_ thus a diffusive, practical,
+every-day reality, there would be a marvellous change in the aspects of
+life and the conditions of humanity around us. The great city, now so
+gross and profane, would become as a vast cathedral, through whose stony
+aisles would flow perpetual service; where labor would discharge its
+daily offices, and faith and patience keep their heavenward look, and
+love present its offerings. Yea, the very roll of wheels through its
+busy streets would be as a litany, and the sound of homeward feet the
+chant of its evening psalm.
+
+But religion is not only a help in and for ourselves; it has a
+ministration for others--for this great mass of destitution and
+suffering that broods in the midst of the city. Christianity is not
+merely a theory of existence--it is a _working-power_. Its precepts are
+practical, and enjoin not merely states of mind and heart, but
+conditions of activity. There is an entire magazine of working-forces in
+that one great law--"Love thy neighbor as thyself." Hear the words of
+an apostolical commentator upon it. "If a brother or sister be naked,
+and destitute of daily food," says he, "and one of you say unto them,
+Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them
+not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?
+Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone." And wherever
+Christianity has existed and been apprehended, it has produced
+beneficent results for humanity. It has gone over the earth like its
+Divine Author, with healing and with help for the woes of the race.
+Anybody who takes his stand at the head-waters of modern history, will
+see that a mighty energy was then poured into the world, whose influence
+is evident in the truest civilization, in the best results, of ages. In
+estimating the practical power of Christianity, we must look at the
+_positive_ phase of things--we must consider what has actually been
+done; not merely what remains to be done. We must adopt proportionate
+standards, not the little measures of to-day and yesterday, in which the
+tides of human melioration may oscillate, and even seem to flow
+backward and at the best to make slight headway. But take up the cycle
+of history that preceded the advent of Christianity, and compare it with
+the present period; and is there not an entirely different expression on
+the face of things, so far as conceptions of humanity and influences of
+philanthropy are concerned? Contrast "a Roman holiday," its butchery and
+its blood, with a modern anniversary that clasps the round world in its
+jubilee, and see if humanity has not been helped by religion. Or look
+back upon Grecian art and refinement, and tell me what oration or poem,
+or pantheon of marble beauty, is half as glorious as the plain brick
+free-school; the asylum of industry; the home for the penitent, the
+disabled and the poor? Ah! my friends, these are such familiar things
+that we may not think them the great things they really are; and in
+gazing upon the colossal evils that yet tower up before us, they may
+seem slight achievements. But they _are_ great: and when I see the poor
+drunkard return to a renovated home--the demoniac sitting clothed and in
+his right mind once more; when I see the dumb write, and hear the blind
+read, and little rescued children sing their thankful hymns; I think
+humanity _has_ been helped a great deal since that Divine Teacher walked
+the earth, and took the lambs to his bosom, and made the foul leper
+clean, and partook with publicans and sinners, and bade the guilty go
+and sin no more. I think that currents of love and self-sacrifice, from
+that heart that was pierced for us upon the cross, have found their way
+through the channels of ages, through all the impediments of worldliness
+and selfishness, and inspired and blessed men far more than they know.
+
+But if, turning from the positive achievement, you point to the evils
+that still exist--if you lift the coverings of respectability and custom
+from the ghastly facts that are embedded here in our so-called
+civilization; if you bid me mark the vice, the poverty, the crime, the
+oppression, the grinding monopoly, the prejudice, the gigantic
+materialism and practical atheism that are mixed up with it, and seem to
+be inseparable parts of it; then I ask you--how would it be _without_
+the Help of Religion? What interpretation should we obtain from the
+dark creed of the skeptic, what inspiration from the philosophy of
+annihilation, and of fate? To say nothing of those forces of Love and
+self-sacrifice which it sheds abroad in the world, and to which I have
+just alluded,--Religion, in one single proposition, sends pregnant
+elements of direction and relief into the midst of these giant evils.
+That one proposition is the immortality of man--the priceless
+spirituality of every man--the ascription of a nature more glorious and
+imperishable than a star. Here is the spring of its perpetual antagonism
+to the world, and to the evil of the world. The latter bases its
+estimate of man upon outward conditions; estimates his name and his
+title, his equipage and his parentage, the bulk of his gold, the color
+of his skin, his _apparent_ success or defeat. Christianity points to
+that vivid centre of a soul, in whose light all these external
+distinctions fade, are fused into dross, become comparatively naught.
+All the evil of the world stands upon the assumption of the former
+rule--upon the ground of external and material valuation--which, as has
+been well observed by another, is a "method of studying the problems of
+the universe by fetching rules from the _wider_ sphere (therefore the
+_lower_) to import into the _higher_.... So long as this logical
+strategy is allowed, the Titans will always conquer the gods; the
+ground-forces of the lowest nature will propagate themselves, pulse
+after pulse, from the abysses to the skies, and _right_ will exist only
+on sufferance from _might_." On the other hand, I say, Religion,
+Christianity, starts from the centre outward--starts with the dignity
+and sanctity of the human soul--and in this is the great element of all
+progress and reform. Out of this have sprung the achievements of modern
+freedom. Assuming this inward birthright of every man, men have snapped
+feudal fetters, and broken the seals of ancient proscription, and torn
+up branching genealogies, and trodden diadems in the dust. It was this
+fact that inspired Sidney's speech, and Hampden's effort, and
+Washington's calm determination. It is this that erects itself against
+majorities, policies, institutions, charters, and will not be beaten
+down, and will agitate, and will triumph. It is this that sends
+philanthropy upon its mission; and bids it stoop to the most fallen, and
+search under the darkest depravity. "Go abroad," it says, "amidst the
+guilt and misery of the great city. In the rags, the filth, the
+abomination, there are jewels fallen from heaven. There are souls upon
+which angels look with solicitude. There are interests for which Christ
+died. Search patiently, and deeply, and never give up the endeavor to
+find, to lift up, to restore." Is not all the spring of benevolent
+effort, then, in this single proposition of Religion? This one great
+Truth it utters amidst the suffering and injustice of the world--that
+men are heirs of one inheritance; possessors of a birthright by virtue
+of which all outward inequalities fade away. It bases a demand for
+mutual help and love, upon the fact that we are all on a
+pilgrimage--high, low, honored, degraded, master, slave, we go forth
+together, and these earthly distinctions all drop away. Rich man with
+rows of real-estate, with money safe in bank, with solid securities
+walled around you--you will carry no more away than Lazarus yonder--in
+God's eyes you are no richer than he. Because here we have no continuing
+city. The destinies of our common humanity flow forward into another and
+more enduring one.
+
+And, if still this problem of human degradation and suffering presses
+upon us, I say further, that where the constituents of this problem are
+most prominent, there religion is the most active. The heaviest poverty
+is belted about by the brightest charities; the hot-beds of crime
+generate the most radical efforts for its prevention and its cure; and
+while oppression is at work, setting its dark types upon virgin soil to
+print off its own shame and condemnation, indignant voices expose it and
+indignant hearts react against it. And more and more, every day, it is
+felt and proclaimed that religion is a working-principle--a practical
+power. Never was it more profoundly felt than in this very age that men
+must be confessors of Christianity as well as professors. And in the
+light of this conception, proffering fresh and willing help, Religion
+walks abroad; and lo! waste places grow verdant, and the strongholds of
+guilt and misery sink down, and blessed institutions rise up, and
+industry takes the place of crime, and cursings are exchanged for songs,
+and the poorest sees the immortal light, and is lifted up by the grand
+thought--that "here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to
+come."
+
+We have thus seen that Religion is a Help as to the fact of sin, when
+men are convinced of it as a great reality; and a help as to the fact of
+human suffering, because it is a working-power. But, over and above all
+this, there are problems that perplex us, and demand some answer;
+problems as to the How, and the Wherefore, and the End. There are times
+when our thoughts rise above all specific instances, and we take up
+humanity and existence as a whole, and ask--"What means it all?"
+Sometimes this question starts out of an individual experience. The
+shock of affliction has jarred our hearts; our expectations have come to
+naught; bereavement has broken up the routine of our life; or our own
+souls have surprised us with sudden revelations. At any rate, we find
+our being here involved with mystery. There is something that our
+understanding cannot entirely grasp; something that our unassisted eyes
+cannot see. And the only help for us in such a case is the Help of
+Religion, presenting us, through faith, with an _interpretation_ of
+human life--an interpretation which tells us that what we now experience
+and behold is only transitional, preliminary, and that we see through a
+glass darkly, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be.
+
+And is it necessary for me to dwell upon the strength which has thus
+been imparted to sad and wounded spirits, when with perfect trust in
+Infinite Goodness they have thus realized that they stand only on one
+round of an upward course--only in a little segment of the immense plan?
+I will merely say now, that if, through faith, religion is a help to
+these by interpreting life in harmony with individual experience, so
+through this faith does it help the meditative man troubled by the
+general problem of existence and humanity. The meaning of these various
+conditions in the city--the meaning of these sins, and sorrows, and
+inequalities--the meaning of this tide of life itself that rolls in
+endless succession through these stony arteries--does it perplex you?
+Accept, then, the help which religion gives by interpreting it as only
+preliminary and transitional; only a portion of a wider scheme.
+
+We commenced this series of discourses by standing, as it were, in the
+street, on a level with all these phases of humanity. Ascend now some
+lofty post of observation; some high watch-tower. The mottled tide flows
+and dashes far below you. The sounds of strife and endeavor rise faintly
+to your ears, and are drowned in the upper air. So in the altitude and
+comprehensiveness of faith, all this that seemed so huge and startling
+dwindles to a little stream in the great ocean of existence, and all
+these tumults are swallowed up in the currents of silent but beneficent
+design. But, in the meantime, the daylight has gone, the night-shadow
+has fallen, this stream of human life has ebbed away, and all these
+sounds are still. See, now, how much of your perplexity came from a
+deceit of eye-sight--see how the light of this world blinded you to the
+immensity and the meaning of existence! See! over your head spreads the
+great firmament. There are Sirius, and Orion, and the glittering
+Pleiades. How harmoniously they are related; how calmly they roll! And
+now, O man! fresh from the reeking dust, and the cry of pained hearts,
+and the shadows of the grave, do not the scales of unbelief drop from
+your eyes, when you see the width of God's universe, and feel that His
+purpose girdles this little planet and steers its freight of souls? You
+were deceived by your standards of greatness and duration. You thought
+that this material city, with what it contains, was everything. But
+_they_ have cherished the true view, who in the spirit of the text have
+interpreted these Conditions of Humanity--the conditions of those who
+seek and sin and suffer in the busy crowd; of those who rest beneath
+yonder gleaming tomb-stones. And, as we read what all wise and good men
+have virtually said, our mortal term contracts, our immortal career
+opens, our years seem as ticks of a clock, and the entire sum of our
+life but a minute-mark on the dial of eternity; and this huge metropolis
+becomes a dim veil, a perishable symbol of real and enduring things.
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:
+
+Every effort has been made to replicate this text as faithfully as
+possible, including obsolete and variant spellings. Obvious
+typographical errors in punctuation (misplaced quotes and the like) have
+been fixed. Corrections [in brackets] in the text are noted below:
+
+page 27: quote typo corrected
+
+    But, say you, '["]here is one who is returning to a home of
+    destitution, of misery; where the
+
+page 39: typo corrected
+
+    between those great agents of human achievment[achievement]
+    and the living intelligence
+
+page 41: typo corrected
+
+    years. Remarkable for brilliant achievments[achievements] in
+    every department of physics, ours well deserves
+
+page 45: hyphen removed
+
+    the old world without a telegraph, and Columbus found a new
+    one without a steam[-]ship.
+
+page 49: typo corrected
+
+    open air and the sovreignty[sovereignty] of the soil. And if
+    this immense intrusion of machinery has
+
+page 58: duplicate word removed
+
+    stream, and chained the fire; and now, [with] with the eye of
+    science and the hand of skill,
+
+page 84: typo corrected
+
+    dignity is there in that man who justs[just] accepts his
+    station and makes the most of
+
+page 154: removed quote
+
+      celestial City be these well-known doors--and thus may we
+      also _die_ at Home!["]
+
+page 173: typo corrected
+
+    heaven, whose inhabitants would not make
+    harmlesness[harmlessness] their chief characteristic. Their
+
+page 195: typo corrected
+
+    and, perpetually descending from the threshold of the
+    Infinite, keeps open an arch-way of mysstery[mystery] and
+    heaven.
+
+page 201: typo corrected
+
+    dangerous reasoning, my friends; neverthless[nevertheless],
+    it _is_ reasoning, and shows that the mind of the
+
+page 240: typo corrected
+
+    of life and the conditions of humanity arouud[around] us. The
+    great city, now so gross and profane,
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Humanity in the City, by E. H. Chapin
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Humanity in the City, by E. H. Chapin
+
+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: Humanity in the City
+
+Author: E. H. Chapin
+
+Release Date: August 27, 2008 [EBook #26441]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HUMANITY IN THE CITY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Julia Miller and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
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+</pre>
+
+
+<h1>HUMANITY IN THE CITY.</h1>
+
+<div class="trans_note"><a name="top" id="top"></a>
+<p class="center"><big>TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:</big></p>
+<p class="noindent">
+Every effort has been made to replicate this text as
+faithfully as possible; please see <a href="#TN">list of printing issues</a> at the
+end of the text.</p>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;">
+<img src="images/chapin.jpg" width="400" height="569" alt="E. H. Chapin" title="E. H. Chapin" />
+<span class="caption">E. H. Chapin<br />
+<small>Engraved by J. C. Buttre</small></span>
+</div>
+
+<h2>HUMANITY IN THE CITY.<br /><br /></h2>
+
+<h3><small>BY THE</small><br />
+
+REV. E. H. CHAPIN.<br /><br /><br /><br /></h3>
+
+<p class="center">NEW YORK:<br />
+DE WITT &amp; DAVENPORT, PUBLISHERS,<br />
+160 &amp; 162 NASSAU STREET.<br /><br />
+BOSTON:<br />
+ABEL TOMPKINS, 38 &amp; 40 CORNHILL.<br /><br />
+</p>
+
+<p class="center"><small>Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1854, by
+DE WITT &amp; DAVENPORT,<br />
+In the Clerk's Office of the U. S. District Court
+for the Southern District of New York</small></p>
+
+<p class="center"><small>G. W. ALEXANDER,<br />
+BINDER,<br />
+9 Spruce Street.</small></p>
+
+<p class="center"><small>W. H. TINSON.<br />
+STEREOTYPER,<br />
+24 Beekman Street.</small></p>
+
+<p class="center"><small>TAWS, RUSSELL &amp; CO.<br />
+PRINTERS,<br />
+<i>No. 26 Beekman Street.</i></small>
+</p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="contents" id="contents"></a>CONTENTS</h2>
+
+<table summary="Table of Contents">
+<tr>
+
+
+<th class="tda"></th>
+<th class="tdc" colspan="2">PAGE</th>
+</tr>
+<tr><td class="tda">
+I.</td>
+<td class="tdb"><span class="smcap">The Lessons of the Street</span></td><td class="tdc"> <a href="#Page_13">13</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="tda">
+II.</td>
+<td class="tdb"><span class="smcap">Man and Machinery</span></td><td class="tdc"> <a href="#Page_39">39</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="tda">
+III.</td>
+<td class="tdb"><span class="smcap">The Strife for Precedence</span></td><td class="tdc"> <a href="#Page_65">65</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="tda">
+IV.</td>
+<td class="tdb"><span class="smcap">The Symbols of the Republic</span></td><td class="tdc"> <a href="#Page_93">93</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="tda">
+V.</td>
+<td class="tdb"><span class="smcap">The Springs of Social Life</span></td><td class="tdc"> <a href="#Page_123">123</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="tda">
+VI.</td>
+<td class="tdb"><span class="smcap">The Allies of the Tempter</span></td><td class="tdc"> <a href="#Page_157">157</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="tda">
+VII.</td>
+<td class="tdb"><span class="smcap">The Children of the Poor</span></td><td class="tdc"> <a href="#Page_187">187</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td class="tda">
+VIII.</td>
+<td class="tdb"><span class="smcap">The Help of Religion</span></td><td class="tdc"> <a href="#Page_223">223</a></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[ix]</a></span></p>
+<h2>PREFACE.</h2>
+
+
+<p>A volume like the present hardly requires the formality of a preface. It
+is the continuation of a series already published, and, like that, aims
+at applying the highest standard of Morality and Religion to the phases
+of every-day life. In order, however, that the view with which these
+discourses have been prepared may not be misconceived, I wish merely to
+say that I am far from supposing that these are the only themes to be
+preached, or that they constitute the highest class of practical
+subjects, and shall be sorry <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[x]</a></span>if in any way they seem to imply a neglect
+of that interior and holy life which is the spring not only of right
+affections, but of clear perception and sturdy, every-day duty. I hope,
+on the contrary, that the very aspects of this busy city life&mdash;the very
+problems which start out of it&mdash;will tend to convince men of the
+necessity of this inward and regenerating principle. Nevertheless, I
+maintain that these topics have a place in the circle of the preacher's
+work, and he need entertain no fear of desecrating his pulpit by secular
+themes, who seeks to consecrate all things in any way involving the
+action and the welfare of men, by the spirit and aims of His Religion
+who, while he preached the Gospel, likewise fed the hungry, healed the
+sick, and touched the issues of every temporal want. I may have failed
+in the method, I trust I have not in the purpose.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">E. H. C.</span><br />
+<br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;"><i>New York, May, 1854.</i></span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>THE LESSONS OF THE STREET.</h2>
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="HUMANITY_IN_THE_CITY" id="HUMANITY_IN_THE_CITY"></a>HUMANITY IN THE CITY.</h2><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 45%;" />
+<h2><a name="DISCOURSE_I" id="DISCOURSE_I"></a><a name="THE_LESSONS_OF_THE_STREET" id="THE_LESSONS_OF_THE_STREET"></a>DISCOURSE I.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE LESSONS OF THE STREET.</h3>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center">Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the
+streets.&mdash;<span class="smcap">Proverbs</span>, i. 20.</p></div>
+
+
+<p>The great truths of religion may be communicated to the mind and the
+heart in two ways&mdash;by abstract treatment, and by illustration. It must
+be taken up in its absolute connection with God, and with our own souls.
+In solitary meditation, in self-examination, and in prayer, we shall
+learn the intrinsic claims which Faith and Duty have upon reason and
+conscience. But we cannot proceed far before we discover the necessity
+of some <i>symbol</i>, by which these abstract principles may be made
+distinct to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span>us. And, looking around for this purpose, we find that all
+the phases of existence are full of spiritual illustration&mdash;full of
+religious suggestion and argument. Thus our Saviour pronounced his great
+doctrines of Eternal Life, and of Personal Religion, and then turned to
+the world for a commentary. Under his teaching nature became an
+illuminated missal, lettered by the lilies of the field, and pencilled
+with hues that played through the leaves of Olivet. The wild birds, in
+their flight, bore upward the beautiful lesson of Providence, and the
+significance of the Kingdom of Heaven was contained in a mustard-seed.
+By no abstruse reasoning did he make his instructions so vivid to his
+disciples, and so fresh to ourselves. But he awoke the conviction of
+moral need, and repentance, and Divine Love, by drawing from instances
+with which they had been familiar all their lives&mdash;the procedures of
+government, the transactions of business, the labors of the husbandman,
+and the incidents of home. And the result is essentially the same,
+whether we start with the religious truth to find some illustration in
+the world <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span>around us, or from some aspect of human life, or nature,
+extract a religious truth. Nor need this always be sharply obvious. It
+is only necessary that our point of view be sufficiently elevated to
+throw a spiritual light upon things, and to reveal their moral
+relations; for, often, our understandings are cleared, and our hearts
+made better, by the mere scope and tendency of such observations.</p>
+
+<p>With this conviction, I called your attention, last winter, to some of
+the "Aspects of City Life," and with the same view, I wish now to
+address you, for a few Sunday evenings, on the Conditions of Humanity in
+the City, in which series I shall endeavor not only to present new
+topics of interest, but to urge more explicitly some points, which, in
+the afore-mentioned discourses, I merely touched upon.</p>
+
+<p>The essential meaning of the personification in the text is in
+accordance, I think, with the general tenor of remark which I have just
+been making. For I understand it to mean, that everything is
+instructive, that even in the common ways of life the most important
+truths, and the profoundest moral and reli<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>gious significance, are
+contained. And the words before us, also, specifically indicate the
+subject upon which I wish to speak this evening, for they declare that
+"Wisdom... uttereth her voice in the streets."</p>
+
+<p>The street through which you walk every day; with whose sights and
+sounds you have been familiar, perhaps, all your lives; is it all so
+common-place that it yields you no deep lessons,&mdash;deep and fresh, it may
+be, if you would only look around with discerning eyes? Engaged with
+your own special interests, and busy with monotonous details, you may
+not heed it; and yet there is something finer than the grandest poetry,
+even in the mere spectacle of these multitudinous billows of life,
+rolling down the long, broad, avenue. It is an inspiring lyric, this
+inexhaustible procession, in the misty perspective ever lost, ever
+renewed, sweeping onward between its architectural banks to the music of
+innumerable wheels; the rainbow colors, the silks, the velvets, the
+jewels, the tatters, the plumes, the faces&mdash;no two alike&mdash;shooting out
+from unknown depths, and passing away for ever&mdash;perpetually sweep<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>ing
+onward in the fresh air of morning, under the glare of noon, under the
+fading, flickering light, until the shadow climbs the tallest spire, and
+night comes with revelations and mysteries of its own.</p>
+
+<p>And yet this changeful tide of activity is no mere lyric. It is an epic,
+rather, unfolding in its progress the contrasts, the conflicts, the
+heroisms, the failures,&mdash;in one word, the great and solemn issues of
+human life. And a few comprehensive lessons from that "Wisdom which
+uttereth her voice in the streets," may prove a fitting introduction,
+from which we can pass to consider more specific conditions of humanity
+in the city.</p>
+
+<p>Taking up the subject in this light, I observe that the first lesson of
+the street is in the illustration which it affords us of the
+<i>diversities of human conditions</i>. The most superficial eye recognizes
+this. A city is, in one respect, like a high mountain; the latter is an
+epitome of the physical globe; for its sides are belted by products of
+every zone, from the tropical luxuriance that clusters around its base,
+to its arctic summit far up in the sky. So is the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span>city an epitome of
+the social world. All the belts of civilization intersect along its
+avenues. It contains the products of every moral zone. It is
+cosmopolitan, not only in a national, but in a spiritual, sense. Here
+you may find not only the finest Saxon culture, but the grossest
+barbaric degradation. There you pass a form of Caucasian development,
+the fine-cut features, the imperial forehead, the intelligent eye, the
+confident tread, the true port and stature of a man. But who is this
+that follows in his track; under the same national sky, surrounded by
+the same institutions, and yet with those pinched features, that stunted
+form, that villainous look; is it Papuan, Bushman, or Carib? Fitly
+representing either of these, though born in a Christian city, and
+bearing about not only the stamp of violated physical law, but of moral
+neglect and baseness. And no one needs to be told that there are savages
+in New York, as well as in the islands of the sea. Savages, not in
+gloomy forests, but under the strength of gas-light, and the eyes of
+policemen; with war-whoops and clubs very much the same, and garments as
+fantastic, and souls <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span>as brutal, as any of their kindred at the
+antipodes. China, India, Africa, will you not find their features in
+some circles of the social world right around you? Idolatry! you cannot
+find any more gross, any more cruel, on the broad earth, than within the
+area of a mile around this pulpit. Dark minds from which God is
+obscured; deluded souls, whose fetish is the dice-box or the bottle;
+apathetic spirits, steeped in sensual abomination, unmoved by a moral
+ripple, soaking in the slump of animal vitality. False gods, more
+hideous, more awful, than Moloch or Baal; worshipped with shrieks,
+worshipped with curses, with the hearth-stone for the bloody altar, and
+the drunken husband for the immolating priest, and women and children
+for the victims. I have no terms of respect too high for the brave and
+conscientious men who carry the gospel, and their own lives, in their
+hands to distant shores. But, surely, they need not go thus far to
+<i>seek</i> for the benighted and the debased. They may find there a wider
+extent of heathenism, but none more intense than that which prevails
+close by the school and the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span>church. The richest products of modern
+progress and Christian culture grow on the verge of barren wastes, and
+jungles of violence, and "the region of the shadow of death."</p>
+
+<p>In the street, however, not only do we behold these different degrees of
+civilization, but those problems of diversity, which the highest form of
+existing civilization developes&mdash;the diversities of extreme poverty, and
+extreme wealth, for instance. Here sits the beggar, sick and pinched
+with cold; and there goes a man of no better flesh and blood, and no
+more authentic charter of soul, wrapped in comfort, and actually bloated
+with luxury. There issues the whine of distress, beside the glittering
+carriage-wheels. There, amidst the rush of gaiety; the busy, selfish
+whirl; half naked, shivering, with her bare feet on the icy pavement,
+stands the little girl, with the shadow of an experience upon her that
+has made her preternaturally old, and it may be, driven the angel from
+her face. Still, we cannot believe that above that wintry heaven which
+stretches over her, there is less regard for the poor, neglected child,
+than for that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span>rosy belt of infant happiness which girdles and gladdens
+ten thousand hearths.</p>
+
+<p>And here, too, through the brilliant street, and the broad light of day,
+walks Purity, enshrined in the loveliest form of womanhood. And along
+that same street by night, attended by fitting shadows, strolls
+womanhood discrowned, clothed with painted shame, yet, even in the
+springs of that guilty heart not utterly quenched. We render just homage
+to the one, we pour scorn upon the other; but, could we trace back the
+lines of circumstance, and inquire why the one stands guarded with such
+sweet respect, and why the other has fallen, we might raise problems
+with which we cannot tax Providence, which we may not lay altogether to
+the charge of the condemned, but for which we might challenge an answer
+from society.</p>
+
+<p>And, if we would ascertain the practical purport of this lesson of human
+diversity which is so conspicuous in the street&mdash;the meaning of these
+sharp contrasts of refinement and grossness, intelligence and ignorance,
+respectability and guilt&mdash;we only ask a question <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>that thousands have
+asked before us. And yet, it is possible to surmise the purpose of these
+diversities. We know, for one thing, that out of them come some of the
+noblest instances of character and of achievement. Ignorance and crime
+and poverty and vice, stand in fearful contrast to knowledge and
+integrity and wealth and purity; but they likewise constitute the dark
+background against which the virtues of human life stand out in radiant
+relief; virtues developed by the struggle which they create; virtues
+which seem impossible without their co-existence. For, whence issues any
+such thing as <i>virtue</i>, except out of the temptation and antagonism of
+vice? How could <i>Charity</i> ever have appeared in the world, were there no
+dark ways to be trodden by its bright feet, and no suffering and sadness
+to require its aid? I look at these asylums, these hospitals, these
+ragged schools&mdash;a zodiac of beautiful charities, girdling all this
+selfishness and sin&mdash;I look at these monuments which humanity will honor
+when war shall be but a legend, and laurels have withered to dust; and
+when I think what they have grown out of, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span>and why they stand here, I
+regard them as so many sublime way-marks by which Providence unfolds its
+purposes among men, and by which men trace out the plan of God.</p>
+
+<p>And then, again, perhaps this problem of human diversity presses
+heaviest where civilization is the most advanced, in order that men may
+be more sharply aroused to seek some practical solution. It is an
+encouraging sign when an evil begins to be intensely felt, and the
+demand for relief becomes desperate. The civilization of our time is
+imperfect; involves many incongruities; perhaps creates some evils; but
+that it is an improved civilization, is evinced by the fact that it is
+<i>self-conscious</i>; for perception is the necessary antecedent of endeavor
+and success. The contrasts of human condition, then, that unfold
+themselves in the crowded street, may teach us our duty and our
+responsibility in lessening social inequality and need.</p>
+
+<p>But a solution of this problem, clearer perhaps than any other, appears
+when we consider another lesson of the street; a lesson which requires
+us to look a little deeper, but which, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>when we do look, is no less
+evident than these diversities. That lesson unfolds the essential
+<i>unity</i> of humanity. For, we find that the differences between men are
+<i>formal</i> rather than <i>real</i>; that, with various outward conditions, they
+pass through the same great trials; and that the scales which seem to
+hang uneven at the surface, and to be tipped this way and that by the
+currents of worldly fortune, are very nearly balanced in the depths of
+the inner life. We are shallow judges of the happiness or the misery of
+others, if we estimate it by any marks that distinguish them from
+ourselves; if, for instance, we say that because they have more money
+they are happier, or because they live more meagrely they are more
+wretched. For, men are allied by much more than they differ. The rich
+man, rolling by in his chariot, and the beggar, shivering in his rags,
+are allied by much more than they differ. It is safer, therefore, to
+estimate our neighbor's real condition by what we find in our own lot,
+than by what we do not find there. And now, see into what an essential
+unity this criterion draws the jostling, divergent masses <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>in yonder
+street! Each man there, like all the rest, finds life to be a
+discipline. Each has his separate form of discipline; but it bears upon
+the kindred spirit that is in every one of us, and strikes upon motives,
+sympathies, faculties, that run through the common humanity. Surely, you
+will not calculate any <i>essential</i> difference from mere appearances; for
+the light laughter that bubbles on the lip often mantles over brackish
+depths of sadness, and the serious look may be the sober veil that
+covers a divine peace. You know that the bosom <i>can</i> ache beneath
+diamond brooches, and how many blithe hearts dance under coarse wool.
+But I do not allude merely to these accidental contrasts. I mean that
+about equal measures of trial, equal measures of what men call good and
+evil, are allotted to all; enough, at least, to prove the identity of
+our humanity, and to show that we are all subjects of the same great
+plan. You say that the poor man who passes yonder, carrying his burden,
+has a hard lot of it, and it may be he has; but the rich man who brushes
+by him has a hard lot of it too&mdash;just as hard for <i>him</i>, just as well
+fitted to dis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>cipline him for the great ends of life. He has his money
+to take care of; a pleasant occupation, you may think; but, after all,
+an <i>occupation</i>, with all the strain and anxiety of labor, making more
+hard work for him, day and night, perhaps, than his neighbor has who
+digs ditches or thumps a lapstone. And it is quite likely that he feels
+poorer than the poor man, and, if he ever becomes self-conscious, has
+great reason to feel meaner. And then, he has his rivalries, his
+competitions, his troubles of caste and etiquette, so that the merchant,
+in his sumptuous apartments, comes to the same essential point, "sweats,
+and bears fardels," as well as his brother in the garret; tosses on his
+bed with surfeit, or perplexity, while the other is wrapped in peaceful
+slumber; and, if he is one who recognizes the moral ends of life, finds
+himself called upon to contend with his own heart, and to fight with
+peculiar temptations. And thus the rich man and the poor man, who seem
+so unequal in the street, would find but a thin partition between them,
+could they, as they might, detect one another kneeling on the same
+platform of spiritual endeavor, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span>sending up the same prayers to the
+same eternal throne.</p>
+
+<p>But, say you, <a name="Page_27t" id="Page_27t"></a><a href="#Page_27tn">"here</a> is one who is returning to a home of destitution, of
+misery; where the light of the natural day is almost shut out, but in
+which brood the deeper shadows of despair." And yet, in many a splendid
+mansion you will find a more fearful destitution, a dearth of
+affections, killed by envy, jealousy, distrust; stifled by glittering
+formalities; a brood of evil passions that mock the splendor, and darken
+the magnificent walls. The measure of joy, too, is distributed with the
+same impartiality as the measure of woe. The child's grief throbs
+against the round of its little heart as heavily as the man's sorrow;
+and the one finds as much delight in his kite or drum, as the other in
+striking the springs of enterprise or soaring on the wings of fame.
+After all, happiness is the rule, not the exception, even in the hearts
+that beat in the crowded city; and its great elements are as common as
+the air, and the sunshine, and free movement, and good health. And what
+the fortunate may seem to gain in variety of methods, may only <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span>be
+unconscious devices to simulate or recover that natural relish which
+others have never lost. And no one doubts that the great dispensations
+of life, the events that make epochs in our fleeting years, cleave
+through all the strata of outward difference, and lay bare the core of
+our one humanity. Sickness! does it not make Dives look very much like
+Lazarus, and show our common weakness, and reveal the common marvel of
+this "harp of thousand strings?" And sorrow! it veils all faces, and
+bows all forms alike, and sends the same shudder through the frame, and
+casts the same darkness upon the walls, and peals forth in the same
+dirge of maternal agony by the dead boy's cradle in the sumptuous
+chamber, and the baby's last sleep on its bed of straw. And Death! how
+wonderfully it makes them all alike who in the street wore such various
+garments, and had such distinct aims, and were whirled apart in such
+different orbits! Ah! our essential humanity comes out in those composed
+forms and still features. Those divergent currents have carried them out
+upon the same placid sea at last; and the same <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span>solemn light streams
+upon the clasped hands and the uplifted faces. We don't mind the drapery
+so much then. It seems a very superficial matter beside the silent and
+starless mystery that enfolds them all.</p>
+
+<p>In what I have thus said I do not mean to maintain that outward
+conditions are nothing. I think they are a great deal; and we do right
+in striving to improve them; in escaping the evil, and seeking to secure
+the good that pertains to them. But, I repeat, when we come to the
+essential humanity, to the real discipline and substance of life, we
+find the same great features; and so this lesson of the street may help
+explain the problem suggested by the other; may reconcile each of us to
+our condition in the crowd, and direct our attention to substantial
+results.</p>
+
+<p>But, again, the street, with its processions and activities, teaches us
+that much in human life is merely <i>phenomenal</i>, merely <i>appears</i>. We
+enter into this truth by a very common train of observation. We know how
+much is put on purposely for the public gaze, and has no other intention
+than to be seen; how hollow <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>are many of the smiles, and gay looks, and
+smooth decencies. And even the complexion of some, with its red and
+white, is more unsubstantial than all the rest; for it is in danger of
+being washed away by the first shower. It is strange to meet people
+whose personal significance in life is that of a shop window exhibiting
+lace and jewelry; strange to encounter men in whose place we might
+substitute a well-dressed effigy, and they would hardly be missed. Of
+course appearances should be attended to, and are good in their place.
+It is right that we should honor society by our best looks and ways. But
+it is not merely ridiculous, it is sad, to think how much in the street,
+where humanity exhibits all its phases, is appearance and but little
+else.</p>
+
+<p>But dress and manners are not all that is phenomenal in human life.
+These men and women themselves, this streaming crowd, these brick walls
+and stately pinnacles, those that pursue and the things that are
+pursued, are only appearances. It may be profitable for us to stand
+apart from this multitude, this river of living forms, and think in how
+short a time it all <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span>will have passed away; how short a time since, and
+it was not! A little while ago, and this rich and populous city was a
+green island, and our beautiful bay clasped it in its silver arms like
+an emerald. The wilderness stood here, and the child of the forest
+thought of it as a prepared abiding place for himself and for his people
+for ever. The red man has gone; the wild woods have vanished; and these
+structures, and vehicles, and busy crowds, have come into their places
+magically, like the new picture in a dissolving view. But are these
+forms of life, is your presence here or mine, any more substantial than
+those that have sunk away? Nay, all this splendid civilization, what is
+it but a sparkling ripple in the calm eternity of God? Dwellings,
+stores, banks, churches, streets, and the restless multitudes, are but
+forms of life,&mdash;as it were a rack of cloud drifting across the mirror of
+absolute being. That which seems to you substantial is only spectral.
+And as the dress of the fop, and the smile of the coquette, is merely an
+appearance; so the wealth for which men strain in eager chase, and the
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>fabrics which pride builds up, the anvils on which labor strikes its
+mighty blows, and the body to which so much is devoted, and which
+absorbs so much care, are but appearances also. While that which may
+seem to you as a shadow&mdash;the spiritual substratum of life, the basis of
+those spiritual laws which run through all our conditions&mdash;is the only
+abiding substance.</p>
+
+<p>If we only look in this light, my friends, upon the continuous spectacle
+of human movement and human change, we shall find that "Wisdom...
+uttereth her voice in the streets." Old as the thought may be, in the
+rush of the great crowd it will come to us fresh and impressively, that
+all this is but a form of spiritual and eternal being. A day in the city
+is like life itself. Out of unconscious slumber into the brilliant
+morning and the thick activity we come. But, by-and-by, the heaving mass
+breaks into units, and one by one dissolves into the shadow of the
+night. Two cities grow up side by side&mdash;the city in which men appear,
+the city into which they vanish; the city whose houses and goods they
+possess for a little while <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>and then leave behind them, and the city
+whose white monuments just show us the pinnacles of their estates in the
+eternal world. The busy, diversified crowd that rolls through the
+streets&mdash;it is only an appearance! It is a ceaseless march of
+emigration. In a little while, the names in this year's Directory may be
+read in Greenwood.</p>
+
+<p>But we must not rest with this as the final lesson of the street. It is
+only the form of Life that is transient and phenomenal; but the <i>Life</i>
+itself is here, also&mdash;here, in these flashing eyes, and heaving breasts,
+and active limbs. These conditions, however transient, involve the great
+interest of Humanity; and that lends the deepest significance to these
+conditions. The interest of Humanity! which gives importance to all it
+touches, and transforms nature into history; which imparts dignity to
+the rudest workshop, and the most barren shore, and the humblest
+grave&mdash;this permits us to draw no mean or discouraging conclusions from
+the achievements and the changes of the multitudes around us. It may do
+for the skeptic, who sees nothing in existence but these <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span>forms of
+things; who sees nothing but the limited phenomena of our present state,
+and thinks that includes all; it may do for him to croak over the
+transitoriness of life, and call it a trivial game. But it is <i>not</i>
+trivial; and there is no spot where man acts, there is nothing that he
+does, that is insignificant. Perhaps you have a quick eye for the
+foibles of people, and can detect their vanities, and meannesses, and
+laughable conceits. If you employ this gift to correct a bad habit, or
+expose a falsehood, it is well enough. But if it induces you to look
+upon things merely with the skill of a satirist, then let me say, there
+is no "ludicrous side" to life; there is nothing in human conduct that
+is simply absurd. The least transaction has a moral cast, and every word
+and act reveals spiritual relations. The interest of man can never be
+thrown into insignificance by his conditions; these draw interest from
+him. And, whatever his post in the world, however limited or broad his
+sphere of observation, for <i>him</i> life is real, and has intense
+relations. We must not stand so far apart from the crowd as to occupy
+the position of mere spectators, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span>and regard these men and women as so
+many mechanical figures in a panorama. We must look through the depths
+of their experience into their own souls, and through the depths of that
+experience again upon the world, beholding it as it appears to the
+beggar, and the lonely woman, and the child of vice and crime, and the
+hero, and the saint, and as it falls with intense yet diverse
+refractions upon all these multiform angles of personality. So shall we
+learn to cherish a solemn and tender interest in the dear humanity
+around us, and feel the arteries of sympathy which connect it, in all
+its conditions, with our own hearts. And, as we return homeward from our
+study of the street, it may be with our irritation, and prejudice, and
+selfishness softened down; with a larger love flowing out towards the
+least, and even the worst; realizing the spiritual ties that make us
+one, and the Infinite Fatherhood that encircles us all; perhaps
+suggestions will come to us that have been best expressed in the words
+of the poet&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Let us move slowly through the street,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Filled with an ever-shifting train,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span>Amid the sound of steps that beat<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">The murmuring walks like autumn rain.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"How fast the flitting figures come!<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">The mild, the fierce, the stony face;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Some bright with thoughtless smiles, and some<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Where secret tears have left their trace.<br /></span></div>
+<div class="stanza"><span class="i2">*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*<br /></span></div>
+<div class="stanza"><span class="i0">"Each, where his tasks or pleasures call<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">They pass, and heed each other not.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">There is, Who heeds, Who holds them all,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">In His large love and boundless thought.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"These struggling tides of life that seem,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">In wayward, aimless course to tend,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Are eddies of the mighty stream<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">That rolls to its appointed end."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span></p>
+<h2>MAN AND MACHINERY.</h2>
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span></p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="MAN_AND_MACHINERY" id="MAN_AND_MACHINERY"></a><a name="DISCOURSE_II" id="DISCOURSE_II"></a>DISCOURSE II.</h2>
+
+<h3>MAN AND MACHINERY.</h3>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center">For the spirit of the living creature was in the
+wheels.&mdash;<span class="smcap">Ezekiel</span>, i. 20.</p></div>
+
+
+<p>Whatever may have been the significance of the sublime vision from which
+I have extracted those words, I do not think that their essential
+meaning is perverted when I apply them to the subject which comes before
+us this evening. I am not aware of any sentence that expresses more
+concisely the relation which I would indicate between <i>Man</i> and
+<i>Machinery</i>; between those great agents of human <a name="Page_39t" id="Page_39t"></a><a href="#Page_39tn">achievement</a> and the
+living intelligence which works in them and by them. And though a Divine
+Spirit moved in those flashing splendors which burned before the eyes of
+the prophet, is it not also a divine spirit that mingles in every great
+manifestation of human<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>ity, and that moves even in the action of man,
+the worker, toiling among innumerable wheels?</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps if we were called upon to name some one feature of the present
+age which distinguishes it from all other ages, and endows it with a
+special wonder and glory, we should call it the Age of Machinery. We
+trust our age is unfolding something better than material triumphs. The
+results of past thought and past endeavor are pouring through it in
+expanding currents of knowledge, liberty, and brotherhood. But the great
+<i>agents</i> in this diffusion of ideas and principles are those vehicles of
+iron, and those messengers of lightning, which compress the huge globe
+into a neighborhood, and bring all its interests within the system of a
+daily newspaper. Like the generations which have preceded us, we enter
+into the labors of others, and inherit the fruits of their effort. But
+these powerful instruments, condensing time and space, endow a single
+half-century with the possibilities of a cycle. If we take the period
+comprehending the American and the French revolutions as a dividing
+line, and look both sides the chasm, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>we shall discover the difference
+of a thousand years. Remarkable for brilliant <a name="Page_41t" id="Page_41t"></a><a href="#Page_41tn">achievements</a> in every
+department of physics, ours well deserves to be called the Age of
+<i>Science</i>, also. But it is still more remarkable, for the application of
+the most majestic and subtle constituents of the universe to the most
+familiar uses; the wild forces of matter have been caught and harnessed.
+Go into any factory, and see what fine workmen we have made of the great
+elements around us. See how magnificent nature has humbled itself, and
+works in shirt-sleeves. Without food, without sweat, without weariness,
+it toils all day at the loom, and shouts lustily in the sounding wheels.
+How diligently the iron fingers pick and sort, and the muscles of steel
+retain their faithful gripe, and enormous energies run to and fro with
+an obedient click; while forces that tear the arteries of the earth and
+heave volcanoes, spin the fabric of an infant's robe, and weave the
+flowers in a lady's brocade.</p>
+
+<p>I think, then, we may appropriately call it&mdash;The Age of Machinery. It is
+not a peculiarity of the city, but, rather, seeks room to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span>stretch
+itself out; and so you may perceive its smoky signals hovering over a
+thousand vallies, and the echo of its mighty pulses throbbing among the
+loneliest hills. Nevertheless, it is sufficiently developed here to
+illustrate the Conditions of Humanity in the City, and this fact,
+together with the general interest of the subject, is my warrant for
+taking it up in the present discourse. And my remarks must necessarily
+be of a general cast, as I have no room for the statistics, and details,
+and various discussions which grow out of the theme.</p>
+
+<p>And the key-note of all that I shall say, at the present time, is really
+in the text itself&mdash;"For the spirit of the living creature was in the
+wheels."</p>
+
+<p>In the first place, these words suggest the relations of <i>Use</i> and
+<i>Help</i> between Man and Machinery. Upon surveying these numerous and
+complicated instruments, the thought that most readily occurs, perhaps,
+is that of the <i>necessity</i> of machinery. The very first step that man
+takes, out of the condition of infant weakness and animal rudeness, must
+be accomplished by the aid of some implement. He <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span>alone, of all beings
+upon the face of the earth, is obliged to <i>invent</i>, and is capable of
+endless invention. The necessity for this springs out, and is a prophecy
+of, his destiny. The moment he was seen fashioning the first tool,
+however imperfect, that moment was indicated the difference between
+himself and the brute, and the control he was destined to gain over the
+world about him. To fulfil this destiny, he confronts nature with naked
+hands; and yet, there is the earth to plough, the harvest to reap, the
+torrent to bridge, the ocean to cross; there are all the results to
+achieve which constitute the difference between the primitive man, and
+the civilization of the nineteenth century. The Machine, then&mdash;the agent
+which links the gratification to the want&mdash;is born of necessity. But we
+must make a distinction between those instruments which are positively
+essential, and those, for instance, which merely answer the demands of
+luxury or indolence.</p>
+
+<p>And this brings up the question of the <i>comparative</i> uses of
+Machinery&mdash;the foremost place being assigned to those implements which
+are absolutely indispensable to man's existence <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span>upon the earth. But
+between this absolute degree, and that of frivolous invention, there are
+countless grades of utility. And the question of usefulness must be
+decided according to the <i>standard</i> of utility which we apply. If bare
+subsistence is assumed to be the end of man upon the earth, most of our
+modern inventions are useless. We can travel without a locomotive, and
+procure a meal without a cooking-range. The moment we rise above the
+grossest conception of human existence, the test of usefulness becomes
+enlarged, and we can make a safe decision upon whatever increases man's
+comfort, adds to his ability, or inspires his culture. In this way, new
+things <i>become</i> indispensable. That which was not necessary <i>&agrave; priori</i>,
+<i>is</i> necessary now, in a fresh stage of development, and in connection
+with circumstances that have sprung up and formed around it. That which
+was not necessary to man the savage, living on roots and raw fish, is
+necessary to man the civilized, with new possibilities opening before
+him, and new faculties unfolded within him. The printing-press was not
+absolutely necessary to Nimrod, or to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span> Julius C&aelig;sar, but is it not
+absolutely necessary now? Strike it out of existence to-day, and what
+would be the condition of the world to-morrow? You would have to tear
+away with it all that has grown up around it, and become assimilated to
+it&mdash;the textures of the world's growth for three hundred years. Paul
+moved the old world without a telegraph, and Columbus found a new one
+without a <a name="Page_45t" id="Page_45t"></a><a href="#Page_45tn">steamship</a>. But see how essential these agents are to the
+present condition of civilization. How many derangements among the
+wheels of business, and the plans of affection, if merely a snow-drift
+blocks the cars, or a thunder-storm snaps the wires! Our estimate of
+necessity, and, therefore, of utility, must be formed according to
+present conditions, and the legitimate demand that rises out of them;
+these conditions themselves being the necessary developments of society
+and of the individual.</p>
+
+<p>But some of these, you may say, are the demands of luxury, of indolent
+ease, of man setting nature to work and lapsing in self-indulgence. To
+some degree this result may grow out of the present state of things; as
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>some portion of evil will follow in the sweep of an immense good. But
+what is the precise sentence to be passed upon this prevalent luxury? Of
+course, admitting the evil&mdash;which is apparent&mdash;I maintain that there is
+a great deal of good in it; that it is inextricably associated with much
+real refinement and progress. Men are accustomed to speak of the
+simplicity and purity of past times, and to compare, with a sigh, the
+good old era of the stage-coach and the spinning-wheel with these days
+of whizzing machinery, Aladdin palaces, and California gold. But the
+core of logic that lies within this rind of sentiment forces a
+conclusion that I can by no means admit, the conclusion that the world
+is going backward. I never knew of an epoch that was not thought by some
+then living to be the worst that ever was, and which did not seem to
+stand in humiliating contrast with some blessed period gone by. But the
+golden age of Christianity is in the future, not in the past. Those old
+ages are like the landscape that shows best in purple distance, all
+verdant and smooth and bathed in mellow light. But could we go back and
+touch the reality, we <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span>should find many a swamp of disease, and rough
+and grimy paths of rock and mire. Those were good old times, it may be
+thought, when baron and peasant feasted together. But the one could not
+read, and made his mark with a sword-pommel; and the other was not held
+so dear as a favorite dog. Pure and simple times were those of our
+grandfathers,&mdash;it may be. Possibly not so pure as we may think, however,
+and with a simplicity ingrained with some bigotry and a good deal of
+conceit. The fact is, we are bad enough, imperfect, not because we are
+growing worse, but because we are yet far from the best. I think,
+however, with Lord Bacon, that <i>these</i> are "the old times." The world is
+older now than it ever was, and it contains the best life and fruition
+of the past. And this special condition of luxury is a growth out of the
+past, and is the necessary concomitant of much that is good. Opening new
+channels for industry, it furnishes occupation for thousands; while, in
+many of its phases, it indicates a refined culture, and a sphere
+elevated above the imperative wants of existence. It is no proof of the
+disadvantages <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span>of machinery, therefore, to say that it ministers to
+something beside absolute bodily need, and delivers man from a slow and
+exhausting drudgery. So far as it helps us to control nature, and
+increases the facilities of human intercourse, and diffuses general
+comfort and elegance, and affords a respite from incessant physical
+toil, so far it is an agent and a sign of progress.</p>
+
+<p>But, it may be said again, that it is the agent of a selfish and
+exclusive power, enriching a few and injuring many. And it cannot be
+denied that grave problems grow out of the relations between Machinery
+and the laboring classes. Every little while, some new invention is
+thrust forward, which takes a portion of labor out of the hands of flesh
+and transfers it to hands of iron. It is not enough to say that mankind
+in general is benefited by these inanimate agents, which do the work of
+the world so much more rapidly and powerfully. This may answer as an
+argument against a monopoly of any one kind of mechanical force. It may
+be a reason for using cars instead of steamboats, and balloons rather
+than railroads.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span> The general good must be advanced, whatever the damage
+to private interests. But the present case brings up the question
+whether machinery is a general good at all; whether the effect of its
+introduction into almost every department of labor, will not be felt in
+the destitution of millions. And, upon this point, I observe, that, like
+all other great revolutions, the immediate effect may be such as has
+been suggested. But the final result will be beneficial, and such a
+result may be traced out even now. For instance, this clogging of old
+departments of labor will precipitate men upon fresh ones, and upon
+those that have been too much neglected. It will tend to introduce woman
+to branches of industry perfectly suited to her, but which have been too
+exclusively occupied by the other sex, and to turn the attention of
+robust men to those great fields of productive toil which are as yet but
+little improved. It may drive them from the dependence, the crowded
+competition, the unwholesome life of the city, into the broad fields and
+open air and the <a name="Page_49t" id="Page_49t"></a><a href="#Page_49tn">sovereignty</a> of the soil. And if this immense intrusion
+of machinery has <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>only this result, of equalizing the balance against
+production, we shall have one solution of the problem. And there will be
+another solution, if this phalanx of mechanism shall lift the mass of
+men above the occasions of coarse material drudgery into other
+activities, which doubtless will be thrown open, and shall allow more
+leisure for spiritual culture. But in this, and all other great
+questions affecting human welfare, I throw myself back, finally, upon
+the tokens of Providential Design. The world moves forward, not
+backward; and the great developments of time are for good, not evil. By
+machinery, man proceeds with his dominion over nature. He assimilates it
+to himself; it becomes, so to speak, a part of himself. Every great
+invention is the enlargement of his own personality. Iron and fire
+become blood and muscle, and gravitation flows in the current of his
+will. His pulses beat in the steamship, throbbing through the deep,
+while the fibres of his heart and brain inclose the earth in an electric
+network of thought and sympathy. That which was given to help man, will
+not hinder nor hurt <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span>him. "For the spirit of the living creature is in
+the wheels."</p>
+
+<p>I observe, in the second place, that the words of the text accord with
+the testimony which machinery bears to the <i>dignity of man</i>. All these
+great inventions&mdash;these implements of marvellous skill and power&mdash;prove
+that the inventor, or the worker, himself is <i>not</i> a machine. I know of
+nothing which gives me so forcible an impression of the worth and
+superiority of mind, of its alliance with the Creative Intelligence, as
+the exhibition of an ingenious piece of mechanism. I have stood with
+wonder before such a specimen, and seen it work with all the precision
+of a reflecting creature. Lifting the most tremendous weights, cleaving
+the most solid masses, performing the nicest tasks, as though a living
+intellect were in it, informing it and directing its power. I hardly
+know of any achievement that stands as a higher witness for the human
+mind. The great poem that bursts in a flood of inspiration upon the soul
+of genius, and opens the realms of immortal beauty, may lift us to a
+nobler plane of endeavor. The heroic act of toil or <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span>martyrdom for
+principle, certainly has a loftier, because it is a moral, grandeur. But
+as an illustration of the <i>creativeness</i> of man's intellect&mdash;of its
+wondrous capability&mdash;of its alliance with that attribute of the Divine
+Nature which is evident in the fibres of the grass-blade and the march
+of the galaxy&mdash;I know of nothing more striking than this piece of
+mechanism, which is the product of the most profound and patient
+thought, the harmonizing of antagonistic forces, the combination of the
+most abstruse details, fitted to the remotest exigencies, and working
+just as the inventive mind meant it should, and just as it was set
+a-going, as if that mind were presiding over it, were in it, though it
+is now far distant, or has vanished from the earth. That mind is
+immortal! that nature, which is common to all men, transcends any shape
+of matter and is superior to mechanism. And it may be necessary to say
+this, necessary to say that man, who is helped by machinery, is
+<i>separate</i> from it. It is mind that is thus involved with matter. The
+spirit of a living creature that is in the wheels.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>It may be necessary to say this, my friends, and to say it frequently,
+lest the vast mechanical achievements of our time seduce us into a mere
+mechanical life. I do not think that the deepest question is, whether
+machinery will multiply to such an extent as to snatch the bread from
+the mouths of living men; but whether men, with all the possibilities of
+their nature, will not become absorbed in that which supplies them with
+bread alone? I have just expressed my admiration for the genius of the
+great inventor. Nor can I honor too highly the faithful and industrious
+mechanic&mdash;the man who fills up his chink in the great economy by
+patiently using his hammer or his wheel. For, he <i>does</i> something. If he
+only sews a welt, or planes a knot, he helps build up the solid pyramid
+of this world's welfare. While there are those who, exhibiting but
+little use while living, might, if embalmed, serve the same purpose as
+those forms of ape and ibis <i>inside</i> the Egyptian caverns&mdash;serve to
+illustrate the shapes and idolatries of human conceit. At any rate,
+there is no doubt of the essential nobility of that man who pours into
+life the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span>honest vigor of his toil, over those who compose this feathery
+foam of fashion that sweeps along Broadway; who consider the insignia of
+honor to consist in wealth and indolence; and who, ignoring the family
+history, paint coats of arms to cover up the leather aprons of their
+grandfathers.</p>
+
+<p>I shall not be misunderstood then, when, making a distinction in behalf
+of the mechanic by profession, I say that no man should be a mere
+mechanic in <i>soul</i>. In other words, no man should be bound up in a
+routine of material ends and uses. He should not be a mechanic, working
+exclusively in a dead system, but always the architect of a living
+ideal. And surrounded, astonished, served and enriched as we are by
+these splendid legions of mechanism, the danger is that material
+achievement will seem to us the <i>supreme</i> achievement; that all life
+will become machinery; and the higher interests of being, and the great
+firmament of immortality, be eclipsed by these flashing wheels. We are
+in danger of being drawn away from the sanctities of the inner life and
+the still work of the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span>soul, by this maelstrom of excitement and power.
+No religious man can help asking, and asking anxiously, whether the
+spirit of devotion is as deep and fresh, whether spiritual communion
+with God is as direct and constant, in this whirl and roar, and
+marvellous achievement, as they were in times bearing less evidently the
+signs of material progress. For, that which merely gives us a stronger
+grasp of the world around us, and sends us along the level of nature, is
+not the most genuine element of progress; but that which elevates our
+moral plane and enriches the great deep of our spiritual being. The
+steamship and telegraph are not absolute tokens of this progress, but
+the moral earnestness and the Christian charity that work through them
+are; and these must spring up in hearts that are not merely adjusted to
+the world, but lifted above it&mdash;that are not so occupied by mere
+machinery as to neglect the living streams of an inward and devout
+culture.</p>
+
+<p>But, for another reason,&mdash;or as an extension of the same reason,&mdash;we
+need to realize the truth that man is separate from and superior <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span>to
+machinery. It is because, upon a practical recognition of this truth
+depends the just action of all who control the interests of labor, and,
+so to speak, the lives and souls of the laborers. If we should beware of
+an influence that would render us <i>mere</i> mechanics in our own higher
+nature, we should likewise remove anything that makes others mere
+machines, presenting for us no other consideration than the amount of
+work they can perform for us, and with how little care and cost. I
+cannot now enter into the great questions that spring up here concerning
+the relations of capital and labor, and of the employer and the
+employed. I only observe that these are among the deepest questions of
+the time: questions which will be heard, which must be discussed, and
+practically answered. And they who by plans and experiments, however
+visionary they may seem, however abortive they may prove, are trying to
+solve this problem, are much wiser in their generation than those who
+content themselves with cutaneous palliatives and a stolid conservatism.
+But I maintain now, that back of all these considerations <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span>stands this
+truism,&mdash;that man is not a machine; that the being who toils in the
+factory, the furnace, the dark mine underground, is one who needs and
+hopes and suffers and dies, as sinews of iron and fabrics of brass
+cannot. "The spirit of a living creature is in the wheels." A cry for
+justice, for free action, for spiritual opportunity, comes not from the
+roaring engine or the dizzy loom, but out from the midst of those who
+are endowed with the sensitiveness and the moral possibilities that
+belong to humanity, and humanity alone. Set in motion the grandest piece
+of mechanism ever conceived by human genius, and still there is infinite
+difference between it and the poorest drudge that bears God's
+image,&mdash;between it and any human claim.</p>
+
+<p>It must have been a noble spectacle, a few weeks since, to have seen
+that great ship<a name="FNanchor_A_1" id="FNanchor_A_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a> sail out of port, stretching its proud beak over the
+sea, and with thundering exultation trampling its sapphire floor. One
+might have followed its wake with a glistening eye, and said <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span>to
+himself&mdash;"There is the great symbol of human progress, there is the
+consummation of man's triumph over nature! The long results of ages are
+condensed in that fabric of strength and beauty. Man has compelled the
+forest, and ravished the mine, and converted the stream, and chained the
+fire; and now, <a name="Page_58t" id="Page_58t"></a><a href="#Page_58tn">with</a> the eye of science and the hand of skill, he rides
+in this triumphal chariot, making a swift, obedient pathway of the
+deep!" But when that dark day burst upon them, and nature with one angry
+sweep transformed that splendid palace into a floating death-chamber;
+when ocean lifted up this triumph of man's skill, and shook it like a
+toy; the interest which hung over that awful desolation&mdash;the interest to
+which your hearts flow out with painful sympathy to-night&mdash;was in
+nothing that man had achieved, but in humanity itself. All the
+workmanship, all the material splendor, all the skill, were nothing
+compared with one heart beating amidst that tempest; compared with one
+groan that rose from that sea of agony, and then was silent for ever.</p>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p class="noindent"><a name="Footnote_A_1" id="Footnote_A_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_A_1"><span class="label">[Note A:</span></a> This discourse was delivered just after the tidings of the
+loss of the San Francisco, in December, 1853.]</p></div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>And, again, when I consider the conduct of that gallant captain who, day
+by day, rode by the side of the shuddering wreck, and in slippery peril
+maintained the royalty of his manhood, and sent a brother's cheer and a
+brother's help through the storm; when I think of that noble achievement
+where the Stars and Stripes and the Cross of St. George were lost and
+blended in the light of universal humanity; I say to myself&mdash;how does an
+act like this shed light upon a thousand instances of human depravity!
+What is any material triumph compared to this moral beauty! And what is
+the great distinction between rags and coronets, between senates and
+workshops, when in the breast of every man, and everywhere, there is the
+possibility of such heroism, such charity, and such splendid
+performance!</p>
+
+<p>And so, my friends, turning from this specific illustration, and looking
+through the wards of cities, the busy factories, the dim attics and
+cellars, they all become glorious by the reflected light of the humanity
+that toils and suffers within them. Man is greater than any <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span>achievement
+of mechanism, any interest of capital, and all the questions which these
+involve must be brought to the test of his moral capabilities, and his
+spiritual as well as earthly wants.</p>
+
+<p>But I observe, finally, that the words of the text suggest the
+<i>Providential design</i> and the <i>Divine agency</i> that are involved in the
+great mechanical achievements of our age. As the Divine Spirit flowed
+through those living creatures and moved those wheels, so God's
+influence is in the movement of humanity, and in the instruments of that
+movement. We get only a narrow, and often an inexplicable conception of
+things, until we behold them encircled by this horizon of a Providential
+design. And if humanity, with all its claims and possibilities, is
+involved in this network of mechanism, so doubtless are the processes of
+Infinite Wisdom. Something more than material greatness, or ends limited
+merely to this earth, is to be wrought out by it. Indications of this
+appear already. The telegraph and steamship, for instance, serve not
+only the interests of trade and commerce, but of lib<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>erty, and
+brotherhood, and of Christian influence.</p>
+
+<p>It is beautiful to see how the most selfish agents presently become
+converted to the broadest uses, and matter is transformed into the
+vehicle of spirit. For God is in history. It is a Divine dispensation,
+and has miracles of its own. And, because they come by natural
+development let us not fail to recognize the benevolence and the
+significance involved with them. Is not the effect of miracle in the
+electric wire? The printing-press, is it not the gift of tongues? It is
+atheistic to suppose that all these wondrous agents have only a narrow
+and material purpose, and play no part in the highest scheme of the
+world. Like the prophet by the river Chebar, we may behold them as the
+symbols in a sublime vision. These wheels within wheels, full of eyes,
+full of intelligence, and full of human destiny and vast purpose, we
+know not all their meaning yet. But they have a great meaning.
+Beneficent intention runs through their swift motions&mdash;voices of promise
+rise in their multitudinous sounds. A living spirit is in these
+wheels&mdash;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>the influence of God; the spirit of man. And, in due time, out
+of them will evolve the incalculable issues of human welfare and the
+Divine glory.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span></p>
+<h2>THE STRIFE FOR PRECEDENCE.</h2>
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span></p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="THE_STRIFE_FOR_PRECEDENCE" id="THE_STRIFE_FOR_PRECEDENCE"></a><a name="DISCOURSE_III" id="DISCOURSE_III"></a>DISCOURSE III.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE STRIFE FOR PRECEDENCE.</h3>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center">And if a man strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned
+except he strive lawfully.&mdash;II. <span class="smcap">Timothy</span>, ii. 5.</p></div>
+
+
+<p>In walking the streets of the city, there rises the interesting
+question&mdash;What are the various motives which animate these restless
+people, and send them to and fro? As a French author has well
+observed,&mdash;"The necessaries of life do not occasion, at most, a third
+part of the hurry." They are comparatively few who struggle among these
+busy waves for a bare subsistence. There are others who are impelled by
+some of the deepest affections of the human heart, and who toil day
+after day with noble self-sacrifice for the comfort of dependent
+parents, and helpless children. While others still run on errands of
+mercy, and work in the harness of unrelaxing duty. But when we have
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span>taken all these influences into the account, and made the most of them,
+there remains a large quantity of activity which, as we trace it to its
+spring, we shall find issuing from a desire for influence, for
+notoriety, for some kind of personal distinction. The city,&mdash;in this
+instance, as in many others, representing the world at large,&mdash;is
+essentially a race-course, or battle-field, in which, through forms of
+ambitious effort, and cunning method, and plodding labor, and
+ostentation, the aspirations of thousands appear and carry on a <i>Strife
+for Precedence</i>.</p>
+
+<p>And, in selecting this phase of human life as the theme of the present
+discourse, I observe in the first place&mdash;that the desire for precedence
+is one of the <i>deepest</i> and most <i>subtle</i> motives in the soul of man. It
+is prolific of disguises. It is not merely under the mask which we may
+put on before other people, but it glides through various
+transformations of self-deceit; like the evil genius in the fairy tale,
+now dwindling to a mere seed, now bursting into a devouring fire. When,
+with an honest purpose, we probe it and pluck at it, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>still we may
+detect it in the lowest socket of the heart. Often it is most vital when
+we feel most sure that it is vanquished. It delights in the garb of
+humility, and finds its food in the profession of self-renunciation. See
+its grossest expression in the desire for physical superiority&mdash;the
+glory of the victor in the Grecian games, or the modern pugilist with
+the champion's belt. This is the reason why men, priding themselves upon
+qualities in which they are equalled by any mastiff and excelled by any
+horse, will stand up and batter one another into a mass of blood and
+bruises. And if we analyze the merit of some conqueror upon a hundred
+battle-fields, we shall find ingredients almost as coarse. Only there
+was a larger impulse, and more genius to light the way; so that <i>his</i>
+combat in the ring became <i>achievement</i>, and his success <i>fame</i>. The
+outside difference was in the value of the stakes; but the huzzas did
+not rise much nearer to heaven in the one instance than in the other.
+And when we get at the real centre of all those plaudits, we find only a
+little throbbing atom, a little human <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span>heart, all on fire with the lust
+for supremacy.</p>
+
+<p>But these are the more palpable shapes of this desire for Precedence. It
+works more covertly, but with no less energy. I need not&mdash;for I
+cannot&mdash;specify all the instances in which it acts. It would constitute
+a more concise statement to affirm where it does <i>not</i> act. It is
+sufficiently apparent in the scramble of the market and the parade of
+the street; at the toilette of beauty; in the etiquette of the
+drawing-room, where people sit as if in a cavern of icicles; in the
+spurious patriotism of politics; and too often, it is to be feared, in
+the highest seats of the synagogue, and where men lift holy hands of
+prayer. It is the scholar's inspiration. When he comes to the steep and
+rugged way, it helps him to make a foot-hold, and the thorns blossom
+into roses as he climbs. Sometimes, even, it saturates the plan of the
+philanthropist, and peppers the milk of his charity with an inconsistent
+wrath.</p>
+
+<p>It seems an unhappy, as it must often be an unjust method, to attribute
+any appearance of good conduct to the meanest possible motive.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span> It is a
+policy that makes a man afraid of his best friends. He feels that every
+draft he makes upon human honor, or affection, is liable to be cashed
+with counterfeit bills. If there were no alternative between the
+cleverness that suspects everybody, and the credulity that trusts
+everybody, I think I had rather be one of the dupes than one of the
+oracles. For, really, there is less misery in being cheated than in that
+kind of wisdom which perceives, or thinks it perceives, that all mankind
+are cheats. But, while simple fact forbids our assuming either of these
+extremes, we must, nevertheless, in reasoning upon the phenomena of
+human conduct, allow large scope for the influence of which I am now
+treating. For, as I have already intimated, we shall find it lurking
+under numerous forms. In discussing the question of Slavery, for
+instance, it is often said&mdash;that it is for the interest of the master to
+take good care of his human as he does of his brute stock&mdash;to see that
+they are well-fed, clothed, &amp;c. And so it is for his <i>interest</i> to do
+this. But how often does the lust for supremacy over-ride interest
+itself!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span> How often does an imperious personality thrust itself forward
+in the most absurd ways, damaging its own property and welfare, just as
+a boy breaks his top, or a balked rider shoots his horse, or an
+independent congregationalist locks his pew-door, as much as to
+say&mdash;"There, the world knows one thing about me, at least. It knows that
+I am <i>master</i> and <i>owner</i> here!"</p>
+
+<p>But I observe, further, that, while this desire for Precedence is common
+among men of all conditions, there are some modes of its expression
+which are peculiarly excited in a democratic form of society. That which
+is the open glory of a community like ours, is with many a secret
+vexation and shame. People boast here of the equality of our
+institutions, and then try their best to break up the social level. In a
+genuine Aristocracy, where they have endeavored to preserve a
+gulf-stream of noble blood in the midst of the plebeian Atlantic, and a
+man holds his distinction by the color of the bark on his family tree,
+and the kind of sap that circulates through it, there is no danger of
+any unpleasant mistakes. The hard palm of Labor may cross the gloved
+hand <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span>of Leisure, and nobody will suspect that the select is too
+familiar with the vulgar. Consequently, there is a good deal of
+affability and prime manliness, besides those associations of sentiment
+and imagination which, if there must be an aristocracy, lend it an
+artistic consistency. But here, where everybody says that all men are
+equal, and everybody is afraid they <i>will</i> be; where there are no
+adamantine barriers of birth and caste; people are anxiously exclusive.
+And though the forms of aristocracy flourish more gorgeously in their
+native soil, the genuine <i>virus</i> can be found in New York almost as
+readily as in London, or Vienna. And the virus breaks out in the most
+absurd shapes of liveries and titles. And these forms of aspiration are
+not only absurd because they are inconsistent, but because they
+illustrate no real ground of precedence. They are superficial and
+uncertain. They do not pertain to the man but to his accidents. He gains
+by them no intrinsic glory, no permanent good. To employ the language of
+the text, by these he strives for masteries; but he does not strive
+lawfully, and so he is not crowned. And this <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span>leads me to say something
+respecting what is false, and what is legitimate, in that strife for
+Precedence which is so amply illustrated in the life of the City.</p>
+
+<p>Let us, then, consider some of the forms which this struggle assumes in
+the streets and the dwellings around us. I remark, in the first place,
+that it inspires much of the effort for <i>wealth</i>. I believe there are
+but few, comparatively, who are anxious to make money merely for the
+sake of piling it up, and counting it out. There may be a mania of this
+kind, in which men become enamored of Mammon for his own sake, and hug
+him to their breasts, and kiss his golden lips, with all the ardor of
+lovers. Still, I suspect that the genuine miser&mdash;that is, one who loves
+money for itself alone&mdash;is an exceptional man. But every man who is not
+absolutely inactive and useless in the world, is moved by some kind of
+passion. For, it is not correct to speak of <i>outliving</i> our passions. We
+may outlive the passion of young, fresh love, that makes the world a
+May-time of blossoms and of roses. We may outlive the passion for
+selfish fame, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span>because some transcendent claim of duty snatches us up to
+a sublimer level. We may change these earlier forms for the passion of
+philanthropy, the passion for truth, the passion of holy conviction. But
+so long as we live at all, we do not outlive passion. And with many the
+most persistent desire is for that precedence which attends the
+possession of wealth. That miser, as you call him, with a face like
+parchment, and in whose nature all the springs of emotion seem to have
+grown rusty with long disuse, is animated by a secret flame that keeps
+him all a-glow. It is the consciousness of power&mdash;the mightiest power of
+the present age&mdash;the power of money. Those figures which he scrawls at
+his writing-desk involve a more potent magic than the cabalistic cyphers
+of Doctor Dee, or Cornelius Agrippa. His hand presses the spring of an
+influence that casts midnight or sunshine over the World of Traffic, and
+shakes entire blocks of real estate with a speculative earthquake. It is
+not the Czar or the Sultan, but the Capitalist, that makes war or
+preserves peace. The destinies of the time are enacted not in Congress
+or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span> Parliament, but in the Bank of England and in Wall street. It is a
+mighty power that sits on 'Change, and inspires the great movements of
+the world; sending its messengers panting through the deep and feeling
+around the globe with telegraphic nerves. And one may well be more
+ambitious to wield a portion of this power than to speak in senates, or
+to sit upon a throne. Here is something that will raise him above the
+common level; will pay him for long years of sacrifice and contumely;
+will hide meanness of birth, and scantiness of education, and paint over
+the stains of damaged character. Here is the most feasible way of
+distinction in a democracy. The doors of respectability and honor turn
+on silver hinges. Gravity relaxes, fashion gives way, beauty smiles, and
+talent defers, before the man of money. He may be an ignoramus, but he
+possesses the golden alphabet. He may be a boor, but Plutus lends a
+charm which eclipses the grace of Apollo. He may have accumulated his
+wealth in a way which would make an intelligent hyena ashamed of
+himself, but he <i>has</i> accumulated it, and the past is forgotten. I <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span>do
+not mean to say that, as the general rule, wealth is thus associated,
+but I believe that one great motive for money-getting, is the
+consciousness of the power and the distinction that accompany its
+possession; and so, many a man in the thick dust of the mart&mdash;though it
+may not always be clear to himself&mdash;is really engaged in a strife for
+Precedence.</p>
+
+<p>Again, consider the illustrations of this strife in the <i>Style</i> of
+<i>Living</i>. It is really a battle of chairs and mirrors, of plate and
+equipage, and is the spring of the monstrous extravagance that
+characterizes our city life. For I suppose there is no place on the
+earth where people have run into such gorgeous nonsense as here&mdash;turning
+home into a Parisian toy-shop, absorbing the price of a good farm in the
+ornaments of a parlor, and hanging up a judge's salary in a single
+chandelier. Not that I accept the standard of absolute necessity, or
+agree with those who cry out&mdash;"Have nothing but what is absolutely
+<i>useful</i>!" For, if the universe had been cast after their type, there
+would have been no embroidery on the wings of the butterfly, and the
+awful summit of Mont Blanc <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>would have yielded fire-wood. There is an
+instinct of beauty and grace implanted in our nature, which demands
+elegance and even luxury, and the bare necessaries of life do <i>not</i>
+answer every purpose. And, to say nothing of the employment which these
+accessories of refinement afford for thousands&mdash;for I have spoken of
+this in the previous series&mdash;the most sturdy utilitarian is not
+consistent with his theory. He defers to the social condition around him
+to such an extent that he sleeps on a bed instead of a bench, and wears
+broadcloth instead of untanned sheepskin. And, therefore, others might
+say, and say truly, that a good deal that is actually superfluous is the
+fruit of certain social proprieties which cannot, with any consistency,
+be violated. Our style of living may lawfully run from the bare
+necessaries of existence, through the stages of comfort and convenience,
+even into luxury, according to our condition and means. But in some of
+the style of living in this very city, there is neither good taste,
+social propriety, nor common sense. It is an apoplectic splendor; a
+melo-dramatic glitter; in one word, a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span>vulgar spirit of social rivalry
+blossoming in lace, brocade, gilding, and fresco. It is one way of
+getting a head taller than another upon this democratic level. It is a
+carpet contest for the mastery in what is called "society." And if one
+mourns over the exuberant selfishness that lifts its pinnacles out of
+this dreary sea of hunger and despair, and wonders that so many live
+wrapped in the idea that they were created merely to be gratified; he
+can hardly help being amused, on the other hand, at this fashionable
+strife for precedence, and the methods which it developes.</p>
+
+<p>But enough has been said to illustrate the false element in the great
+struggle for Human Precedence. This vicious principle is most
+comprehensively stated in the proposition, that there is no substantial
+ground of supremacy in anything that is merely accidental or external to
+a man. These things may sometimes stand as symbols of true merit and
+greatness, but they are not themselves proofs of precedence. A man's
+wealth may be the fruit of noble energy and honest toil, and he may
+exert a wide influence by virtue of that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span>intrinsic ability of which his
+good fortune is the sign. Indeed, the more I study the world the more I
+acquire a respect for these kings of enterprise&mdash;these heroes of
+practical effort&mdash;who, feeling that they have been sent into the world
+to do something, do not fold their hands and shut their eyes in ideal
+dreams, or stumble at discrepancies, but lay hold of what lies about
+them&mdash;rough stone, timber, iron, brass,&mdash;and become what it is really a
+noble compliment to say of any man&mdash;"the architects of their own
+fortune." I have great respect for these men who drive the wheels, and
+kindle the furnaces, and launch the ships, and build the edifices, and
+keep this sea of every-day action perpetually agitated by the keels of
+their endeavor. Their claims to precedence, however, consist not in
+their wealth, but in that which accumulates the wealth. But the man who
+rests merely upon what he <i>has</i>, occupies no substantial ground of
+supremacy. And if this is the case with those whose claim hangs merely
+upon what they are worth in the world of money, it is at least equally
+so with those who set their title to precedence <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span>upon their style of
+dress or living. For how uncertain are all these things! depending upon
+the fickle currents of fortune; throwing the honors into our hands
+to-day, and transferring them to our neighbor to-morrow! How tantalizing
+this conflict, in which victory changes with the fashion, and we feel
+weak or strong according to the verdict of a clique! And all these
+rivalries and envies and aspirations, what a confession of personal
+feebleness they really are! How slightly a true man feels them, who
+knows that he is not mere silk or furniture, and never frets about his
+place in the world; but just slides into it by the gravitation of his
+nature, and swings there as easily as a star! But the mere leader of
+fashion has no genuine claim to supremacy; at least, no abiding
+assurance of it. He has embroidered his title upon his waistcoat, and
+carries his worth in his watch-chain; and if he is allowed any real
+precedence for this it is almost a moral swindle,&mdash;a way of obtaining
+goods under false pretences. But without running into more minute
+discussion, I say again&mdash;that there is no substantial ground of
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span>supremacy in aught that is merely accidental or external; and he who
+rests upon such claims stands upon a pedestal as uncertain as it is
+spurious.</p>
+
+<p>"If a man strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned, except he strive
+lawfully." This was the old rule of the Grecian games, which would not
+permit the prize to be gained by any unfair or incomplete methods. It
+was applied by the apostle to a specific work&mdash;the great work of the
+Christian ministry. But it is a law which prevails in all human action.
+And, while it suggests that spurious precedence for which there is so
+much striving, it also indicates the fact that there <i>is</i> a real
+difference of degree among men, and that there are proper methods of
+obtaining supremacy.</p>
+
+<p>And, as I look around in the populous city, in order to illustrate the
+grounds of this lawful precedence, I observe, in the first place, that
+there are men who occupy the higher places by ordinance of nature so to
+speak; or, more properly, by the purpose of God. It is a fact in nature
+that all men are created equal, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span>it is also a fact in nature that
+all men are not equal. All men are created equal as to the essential
+rights and privileges of humanity. They have a claim to live; they have
+an impartial share in the Divine Love; they have a right to liberty, to
+freedom of thought and of limb, by a constitution older than any
+historical document, drawn up in the court of God's decrees and
+authenticated by His handwriting in the soul. Thus far all men are
+<i>created</i> equal, and, if it turns out otherwise with them, it ensues
+from what is <i>made</i> by man, not what is commanded by Heaven. But so far
+as quantity of nature is concerned&mdash;original capacity and spiritual
+gifts&mdash;men are not equal. And if it is asked&mdash;"Why are they not equal?"
+I answer, it is by appointment of the same Sovereign Mind which has
+ordained that "one star shall differ from another star in glory." But
+each form of being has its own capacities, and if these are filled the
+moral harmony is secured. Through all prevails the law of compensation,
+balancing the vicissitudes of experience. And, among these diversities
+of human capacity, some must <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span>of necessity occupy the highest place&mdash;men
+whose native genius carries them up in a splendid orbit, and endows them
+with control. And the world at large always acknowledges the rectitude
+of this appointment. It cherishes no envy toward men of this kind, but
+renders them spontaneous homage.</p>
+
+<p>But, although this genius, this original power, rises to a natural
+supremacy, it does not involve the most legitimate element of
+precedence. There is no real ground of merit in the natural talents of a
+man, any more than there is a ground of merit in personal beauty, or
+family descent. He has nothing but what has been given him&mdash;the five
+talents instead of his neighbor's one talent&mdash;and, so long as he does
+not use them to their best purpose, there is only an admirable
+possibility, no merit of achievement.</p>
+
+<p>And all genuine merit&mdash;that which entitles one to some ground of human
+precedence&mdash;comes from personal achievement in life; substantially, from
+the stock of actual benefit which one has contributed to the world, and
+which has become assimilated to his own spiri<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span>tual nature. The ground of
+precedence&mdash;so far as it is lawful for man to think of anything like
+precedence at all&mdash;is not in outward possessions, not in gifts, but in
+<i>uses</i>. And here is thrown open a broad and noble field, depending not
+upon genius or station, but upon <i>will</i>, and therefore accessible to
+every man. Here is an arena where one may strive lawfully, emulous to
+build up his own inner nature, emulous to let such power as he possesses
+go out in blessings for the world. A field for all of us, my friends,
+right here in the dense city, amidst the hurrying feet, the clang of
+machinery, and the roar of wheels. And the condition of the game is, not
+large capacity but good purpose and loyal endeavor; not to strive
+greatly but to strive lawfully.</p>
+
+<p>And, I observe once more, that the real claim to precedence is not
+eagerly snatched by us, but <i>comes</i> to us. It is not in <i>seeming</i> but in
+<i>being</i>, and it makes no essential difference whether the world
+confesses it or not, so long as we actually have it, working in our
+consciousness of duty and drawing our consolation from inward resources.
+Here, my friend, is <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span>your work&mdash;here is the field of opportunity, which,
+however broad and rich absolutely, is for you great and pregnant with
+incalculable possibilities. And though men may not see its best results,
+they are nevertheless real, and develop in your own soul a light and
+power, a ground and fabric of precedence that cannot be shaken, and will
+never vanish away.</p>
+
+<p>And yet, to a large extent, the world does confess this true supremacy.
+For, let me ask, who among these crowds of citizens are really honored?
+Not those who are so eagerly and vainly striving in their narrow,
+conventional circle, heedful merely of the rules of their own little
+game. But those who actually fill an honorable place in life. How much
+acknowledged dignity is there in that man who <a name="Page_84t" id="Page_84t"></a><a href="#Page_84tn">just</a> accepts his station
+and makes the most of it, filling it with patience and self-sacrifice
+and achieving the victory of principle and affection! How much genuine
+nobleness in the quiet, unconscious discharge of duty! The field for
+precedence is it not a broad one, and close at hand? And is there no
+alternative between a frivolous and outside distinction, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span>some great
+theatre of action large enough to fill and dazzle the world's eye?
+Daily, right around us, there are occasions that summon up all the
+energies of manhood as with a trumpet-peal. See yonder! where the
+conflagration, bursting through marble walls, casts a terrible splendor
+down the street and reddens the midnight sky. What an enemy has broken
+loose among us, devouring the achievements of human skill and the hopes
+of enterprise! What shall stay it? With a triumphant shout it snaps the
+fetters of stone; it roars with victory; it bends its flaming crest
+towards peaceful homes where men and mothers and babes lie in
+unconscious slumber. The bell beats; and what old bugle-strain, what
+pibroch, what rattling drum, ever sounded a more perilous call? And on
+what battle-field that you have read of was there ever displayed a
+loftier heroism, a more dauntless energy, than that man displays who,
+with the unconscious courage of duty, plunges into the furnace, mounts
+the quivering walls, and, making his own body a barrier between his
+fellow-men and the flame, stands there <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>scorched, bruised, bleeding, and
+beats the red terror back and beats it down, with that irresistible
+energy which always springs from the human will bent upon a noble
+purpose?</p>
+
+<p>And so, in other forms, more quiet and more sacred, where the
+anticipation of public applause does not furnish its motive, men are
+exercising a heroism, and working achievements, that make dim and pale
+the trophies that are plucked from fields of war and in lists of
+glittering renown. And when these things are known the hearts of men
+render a spontaneous honor, and admit the genuine titles of supremacy.
+Yet, if this true achievement in life is not known or confessed by the
+world, its results really exist, and impart their inalienable strength
+and blessing to the soul, while as the grounds of false supremacy
+dissolve all gives way.</p>
+
+<p>And, my friends, the tendency of things is to bring out more and more
+these real claims to human precedence, and to throw all spurious titles
+into the shade. This is the radical purport of true democracy, which I
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span>take to be the social synonym of <i>Christianity</i>. I have shown what
+inconsistencies and false distinctions swarm here in our midst, under
+the profession of republican equality. This, however, is because names
+are <i>not</i> things. I don't call that "democracy" which is simply the
+domineering spirit of self-exaltation in a new shape. For there is no
+<i>essential</i> difference whether we call the social order a monarchy or a
+commonwealth; whether its leading men are Charles and Louis, or
+Robespierre and Cromwell. If we must have the old social fallacies, they
+appear more attractive with the old symbols. In that case, I would
+rather not have them changed. For, when I look merely at the
+<i>sentimental</i> side of things, I feel sorry when the so-called "Royal
+Martyr," with a dignity which contrasts with his past conduct, stretches
+his head upon the block; or when the pitiless insults of a Parisian mob
+are hurled upon the head of the beautiful Marie Antoinette. A poetic
+regret and enthusiasm is awakened by the associations that cluster about
+the Golden Lion and the Bourbon Lilies. And, when I turn to those grim
+Ironsides, or those <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span>frantic Jacobins, the work they are doing looks
+savage enough. But, with a more discriminating vision, I perceive that
+that rude popular storm, which desolates palaces and shatters crowns,
+embosoms a rectifying process which, tumbling all false distinctions
+from their pedestals, shall by-and-by heave up the platform of social
+justice, and reveal the true dignity of man. The essential work of
+democracy is not the destruction of forms; is not the giant arm of
+revolution, striking the hours of human progress by the crash of falling
+thrones. But its great work is <i>construction</i>&mdash;is in changing the very
+<i>spirit</i> of institutions&mdash;and it asserts its legitimacy and bases its
+claims upon the Christian doctrine of the human soul.</p>
+
+<p>Therefore, I regard these spurious claims to precedence&mdash;these endeavors
+after social distinction by virtue of riches, and equipage, and
+wardrobes&mdash;as only evidences of a transition-state. Men, letting go the
+feudal forms, and still assuming that there is some ground of human
+precedence, as there really is, have adopted these false expressions of
+it. They <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span>will in turn pass away, and give place to more genuine
+methods.</p>
+
+<p>But let it be remembered, that these false forms of precedence are not
+only inconsistent with our social professions and institutions, but they
+are futile because they are contrary to the Divine Law. Our endeavors in
+life have a twofold operation, and we must count not only their effect
+upon others but their reaction upon the fabric of our own inner being.
+For, whatever honor <i>men</i> may attribute to us, we know that there is no
+real, substantial ground of supremacy except in the excellence and power
+of our own spiritual nature. And this is acquired not in ostentatious
+and selfish striving, but when self is least thought of; in the calm
+work of duty, and when all conception of human merit fades into the
+Glory of God. And this is the great end to be desired&mdash;this strength and
+exaltation of the soul. This imparts the profoundest significance to
+that great life-struggle which goes on in these crowded streets. The
+city! what is it but a vast amphitheatre, filled with racers, with
+charioteers, with eager competitors; surround<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span>ed by an unseen and awful
+array of witnesses? And here, daily, the lists are opened, and men
+contend for success, for station, for power. But these are meretricious
+and perishable awards. The real prize is a spiritual gain, a crown that
+"fadeth not away." And, if we comprehend the great purpose of existence
+at all&mdash;if we look with any eagerness to its intrinsic issues and its
+final result; we shall heed that decree of Divine Wisdom and Justice
+that comes down to us through all the vicissitude of life&mdash;through all
+the hurry and turmoil and contention. "If a man strive for masteries,
+yet is he not crowned, except he strive lawfully."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span></p>
+<h2>THE SYMBOLS OF THE REPUBLIC.</h2>
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span></p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="THE_SYMBOLS_OF_THE_REPUBLIC" id="THE_SYMBOLS_OF_THE_REPUBLIC"></a><a name="DISCOURSE_IV" id="DISCOURSE_IV"></a>DISCOURSE IV.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE SYMBOLS OF THE REPUBLIC.</h3>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center">Thou art a great people, and hast great power.&mdash;<span class="smcap">Joshua</span>, xvii. 17.</p></div>
+
+
+<p>These words, originally addressed by the Hebrew Leader to the children
+of Joseph&mdash;the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh&mdash;have been applicable to
+many nations which, since that time, have risen, and flourished, and
+fallen. But when we consider the circumstances of its origin, its
+marvellous growth in all the attributes of civilization, and especially
+the immense <i>possibilities</i> which it involves; without even being
+chargeable with a natural vanity, we may say, that to no country on the
+face of the earth have they ever been more fitted than to this. For, my
+friends, we know that it <i>is</i> a dictate of our nature to magnify that
+which is our own. However insignificant it really is, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>man spreads an
+ideal glory over the land of his birth. Perhaps its historical
+importance compensates for its geographical narrowness, or its material
+poverty is hidden by its intellectual wealth. From its stock of mighty
+men&mdash;its heroes, and bards, and sages&mdash;who have brightened the roll of
+fame; or from its memorable battle-fields, on rude heath and in mountain
+defile; or from its achievements which have swelled the tides of human
+enterprise, and made the world its debtor; he draws the inspiration, he
+carries away the conviction of greatness&mdash;so that wherever its emblems
+come before his eyes, they touch the deep springs of reverence and
+pride. Nor let us condemn this feeling as merely a selfish and
+exaggerating one. This spirit of nationality exists for wise purposes,
+embosoms the richest elements of loyalty and faith, and is one of those
+profound <i>sentiments</i> of our nature that cannot be driven out by any
+process of logic.</p>
+
+<p>But, if a nation really inherits the description in the text, it must
+possess something more than an illustrious history and an ideal glory.
+We must determine its greatness by <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span>its symbols; yet these must be not
+merely signs of things, but instruments of achievement; not merely the
+illustrations of dead works or patriotic enthusiasm, but the agents of
+actual power and of living performance. Now, in looking over the world
+at the present time, there are other nations to which the words of
+Joshua might be applied as well as to our own, and with as little
+assumption of national vanity. Other people are great and have great
+power, by virtue of political importance, vast possessions, and strong
+institutions. To say nothing of the rest, consider that huge domain
+which at this hour confronts the troubled principalities of Europe. It
+stretches itself out over three continents. The waves of three oceans
+chafe against its shaggy sides. The energies of innumerable tribes are
+throbbing in its breast. It clasps regions yet raw in history as well as
+those that are grey with tradition, and incloses in one empire the bones
+of the Siberian mammoth and the valleys of Circassian flowers. And it is
+great not only by geographical extent, but by political purpose&mdash;great
+by the idea which is involved <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span>with its destiny&mdash;an idea austere as the
+climate, tremendous as the forces, indomitable as the will of the
+gigantic north. It would set the inheritance of the Byzantine Emperors
+in the diadem of Peter the Great. It would make the Sea of Marmara and
+the ridges of the Caucasus, paths to illimitable empire and
+uncompromising despotism. It moves down the map of the world, as a
+glacier moves down the Alps, patient and relentless, startling the
+jealous rivals that watch its course, and granting contemptuous peace to
+the allies that shiver in its shadow.</p>
+
+<p>In considering, therefore, the symbols which prove that we also are a
+great people, having great power, we should select those which indicate
+the possession of a <i>peculiar</i> power. This peculiarity is not in our
+geographical extent or material greatness. But it <i>is</i>, I think, in our
+institutions, in the tendency of our national ideas, and in the
+legitimate result of these. It is in conceptions and elements the direct
+opposite of those that work in the destiny of the mighty empire just
+referred to&mdash;and for this reason I <i>have</i> referred to it.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>In taking up a subject, then, which is especially connected with the
+conditions of humanity in the city, because in the city the conception
+of a people&mdash;of a public&mdash;is especially illustrated, let us
+inquire&mdash;What <i>are</i> the symbols of our republic; the signs and agents of
+our greatness as a nation? And, for the sake of avoiding too many
+specifications, I propose to consider these under two or three general
+classes.</p>
+
+<p>In the first place, then, I would select as a symbol of the Republic,
+<i>Whatever represents the privilege of Free Thought</i>. As to whatever
+gives full play to the intellect, whatever diffuses the intelligence,
+whatever wakes up and assists the entire spiritual nature of individuals
+and communities, I think there is really more opportunity here than
+anywhere else on the face of the earth. And, as a sign and instrument of
+this, I would point to some <i>District School-house</i>; rough,
+weather-worn, standing in some bleak corner of New York or New
+Hampshire; through whose closed windows the passer-by catches the
+confused hum of recitation, or at whose door he sees <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span>children of all
+conditions mingling in motley play. Of all conditions, so far as
+external peculiarities go; for the laws of nature and the ordinances of
+Providence cannot be dispensed with even here; but of one condition as
+the recognized possessors of immortal <i>mind</i>. Those who have helped
+mould the Republic have clearly seen that, although intelligence is not
+the foundation of national greatness&mdash;for there is something deeper than
+that&mdash;still it is the discerning and directing power upon which depends
+the right use even of moral elements. They have scouted the notion that
+there is any ultimate evil in diffused knowledge; any such thing as "a
+dangerous truth;" and have affirmed that the best way to winnow the
+false from the true, is to equip and set a-going the intellectual
+machine by which God has ordained that the work shall be done. It has
+been felt, that, if the State can properly extend its influence anywhere
+beyond the restrictive limits of evil, or the punishment of overt wrong;
+if anywhere it may exercise a positive ministration for good; it is
+here, where it does not interfere on the one hand <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span>with those outward
+pursuits which should be left to individual choice and aptitude, nor on
+the other, with those inward sanctities which pertain to conscience and
+to God; it is here, in that region of our personality from which we can
+best discern our duty and fill our place. For the intellect is the most
+neutral of all our qualities. Man is swayed by the animal propensities
+of his nature; he is swayed by the moral and religious elements of his
+nature; but the intellect, by itself, is not a motive power. It is a
+<i>light</i>; and no one will object to its being kindled except those who,
+by that objection, virtually confess that they fear the light. And this
+work of kindling is just what the state purposes to do for a child;
+leaving his religious convictions to such helps as conscience has
+chosen, and his position in life to the decision of circumstances. And
+there is no way in which it can show so much impartiality, and exercise
+practically the most essential conception of freedom. For thus, as I
+have already said, it recognizes a common inheritance&mdash;something which
+all have&mdash;the possession of <i>mind</i>&mdash;something which is of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span>more
+importance than any external condition, for it influences external
+condition; (whoever saw an educated community of which anything like a
+large fraction were paupers and criminals?) something on which rests the
+claim of human freedom; for the charter of man's liberty is in his soul,
+not his estate. It says to the poorest child&mdash;"You are rich in this one
+endowment, before which all external possessions grow dim. No piled-up
+wealth, no social station, no throne, reaches as high as that spiritual
+plane upon which every human being stands by virtue of his humanity; and
+from that plane, mingling now in the Common School with the lowliest and
+the lordliest, we give you the opportunity to ascend as high as you may.
+We put into your hands the key of knowledge; leaving your religious
+convictions, with which we dare not interfere, to your chosen guides. So
+far as the intellectual path may lead, it is open to you.&mdash;Go free!" And
+when we consider the great principles which are thus practically
+confessed; when we consider the vast consequences which grow out of
+this; I think that little District School-house <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span>dilates, grows
+splendid, makes our hearts beat with admiration and gratitude, makes us
+resolve that at all events, <i>that</i> must stand; for, indeed, it is one of
+the noblest symbols of the Republic&mdash;a sign and an instrument of a great
+people, having great power.</p>
+
+<p>Or, if you would behold another of these symbols, go through this city,
+and pause wherever you hear the rumbling of the <i>Printing-Press</i>. As I
+have dwelt upon the characteristics of this great power in another
+place, I only allude to it here as a vehicle of that <i>expression</i> which
+is so essential to all genuine freedom of thought. Mere education is no
+evidence of this freedom. It may be made, it has been made in one of the
+most intelligent but despotic countries in Europe, an instrument for
+drilling the human mind into an absolute routine of state policy. Mere
+liberty of speculation is nothing, though it has the boundless firmament
+of abstraction for its own, so long as it is not allowed to strike the
+solid ground of fact or touch one organized abuse. Let us be thankful
+for a free-press&mdash;the electric tongue of thought, which at every stroke
+is felt <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span>throughout a continent, which no dictator dares to chain, and
+over whose issues no censor sits in judgment&mdash;or only that great censor,
+public opinion. Everybody is aware of its evil as well as its good&mdash;the
+errors, the crudities, the abominations it sends out. But we must
+remember that it is only the representative, the voice, of elements that
+actually exist in human minds and bosoms; and, surely, it is better that
+they should come out into the free air, and be sprinkled by the chloride
+of truth, than to work darkly and infectiously out of sight. It is the
+hidden, not the open evil that is dangerous.</p>
+
+<p>Or, still again, you might have seen a true symbol of the Republic in
+the spectacle which has been presented this very day&mdash;the spectacle of a
+<i>Free Worship</i>. The great stream of religious impulse has poured through
+these streets, and separated into its rills of distinctive opinion,
+without trepidation and without challenge. Every man has had the
+opportunity to commune with his God, and approach the Cross of his
+Redeemer, with no established barriers between. Neither the cathedral
+nor <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span>the chapel rest upon the patronage of the state, but in the deep
+foundations of individual conviction. To be sure, here and there, there
+is a little assumption; but it is dramatic rather than substantial, and
+does not amount to much. Here and there breaks out an unjust prejudice
+or a spiteful calumny, but it shames the source more than the object,
+and soon dies away in the atmosphere of tolerance and investigation. It
+looks doubtful sometimes, but I verily believe that the real spirit, as
+well as the mere form of Religious equality, is beginning to prevail.
+Every day, it is more and more practically acknowledged that
+Christianity is profounder than any name, and exists under strange and
+despised names; that there really is decent observance in every church,
+and holy living in every communion; and a man finds that his neighbor
+has the same essence of righteousness as himself, though he has not half
+so many links in his creed. And something more than tolerance grows out
+of this practical liberty. It is not easy to measure the moral
+sincerity, the moral principle, which results from it; which is far more
+precious than mere <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span>intelligence; which is the perennial spring and
+assurance of national welfare.</p>
+
+<p>But I proceed to observe, in the second place, that we may select as a
+symbol of the Republic&mdash;a sign and an instrument of a great people,
+having great power&mdash;whatever illustrates the principle of <i>Political
+Equality</i>. I am speaking, at present, not of our deficiencies, but of
+our possessions; not of the instances in which this doctrine of equality
+is practically contradicted, but of those in which it is practically
+acknowledged. The sovereignty of every man is a fundamental principle in
+our institutions; it is essential to the conception of a Republic; and
+so far as it <i>is</i> legitimately a Republic, we shall find this principle
+in operation. And, looking around for some extant symbol of this, let me
+select that which is the object of so much strife and agitation&mdash;the
+<i>Presidential Chair</i>. I do not, by any means, consider this the most
+comfortable seat in the nation, or that the most deserving man is sure
+to get there; but, as an emblem, I believe it illustrates the noblest
+privileges, and the proudest supremacy, on the face of the globe.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span> And I
+refer to it as a <i>possibility</i> for the poorest and humblest child in the
+land. No hereditary gallery leads to it&mdash;only the broad road of the
+people. And, as the highest seat in the nation, it illustrates all the
+honors of the nation. They are possible to anybody. And I trust the time
+has not yet arrived when this can be said only by way of satire; can be
+true only because the waves of political corruption carry the meanest
+and unworthiest into office; but as a grand fact, a fact with which are
+involved the springs of our national greatness and power, it may be said
+that here there are no barriers of caste, no terms of descent, no depths
+so low that enterprise cannot rise out of them, no heights so exalted
+that genius cannot attain them; for, on a platform as level to the
+peasant's threshold as to the nabob's door, stand the judge's bench, the
+senator's seat, and the President's chair.</p>
+
+<p>As another symbol of this political equality, I would name the
+<i>Ballot-Box</i>. I am aware that this is not everywhere a consistent
+symbol; but to a large degree it is so. I know what miserable
+associations cluster <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span>around this instrument of popular power. I know
+that the arena in which it stands is trodden into mire by the feet of
+reckless ambition and selfish greed. The wire-pulling and the bribing,
+the pitiful truckling and the grotesque compromises, the exaggeration
+and the detraction, the melo-dramatic issues and the sham patriotism,
+the party watch-words and the party nick-names, the schemes of the few
+paraded as the will of the many, the elevation of men whose only worth
+is in the votes they command&mdash;vile men, whose hands you would not grasp
+in friendship, whose presence you would not tolerate by your
+fireside&mdash;incompetent men, whose fitness is not in their capacity as
+functionaries, or legislators, but as organ pipes; the snatching at the
+slices and offal of office, the intemperance and the violence, the
+finesse and the falsehood, the gin and the glory; these are indeed but
+too closely identified with that political agitation which circles
+around the Ballot-Box. But, after all, they are not essential to it.
+They are only the masks of a genuine grandeur and importance. For it
+<i>is</i> a grand thing&mdash;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span>something which involves profound doctrines of
+Right&mdash;something which has cost ages of effort and sacrifice&mdash;it <i>is</i> a
+grand thing that here, at last, each voter has just the weight of one
+man; no more, no less; and the weakest, by virtue of his recognized
+manhood, is as strong as the mightiest. And consider, for a moment, what
+it is to cast a vote. It is the token of inestimable privileges, and
+involves the responsibilities of an hereditary trust. It has passed into
+your hands as a right, reaped from fields of suffering and blood. The
+grandeur of History is represented in your act. Men have wrought with
+pen and tongue, and pined in dungeons, and died on scaffolds, that you
+might obtain this symbol of freedom, and enjoy this consciousness of a
+sacred individuality. To the ballot have been transmitted, as it were,
+the dignity of the sceptre and the potency of the sword. And that which
+is so potent as a right, is also pregnant as a duty; a duty for the
+present and for the future. If you will, that folded leaf becomes a
+tongue of justice, a voice of order, a force of imperial law; securing
+rights, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span>abolishing abuses, erecting new institutions of truth and love.
+And, <i>however</i> you will, it is the expression of a solemn
+responsibility, the exercise of an immeasurable power for good or for
+evil, now and hereafter. It is the medium through which you act upon
+your country&mdash;the organic nerve which incorporates you with its life and
+welfare. There is no agent with which the possibilities of the Republic
+are more intimately involved, none upon which we can fall back with more
+confidence, than the Ballot-Box.</p>
+
+<p>But there is a symbol which represents the power and greatness of a
+Republic more significantly than all the rest, and is comprehensive of
+all the rest. It is the fruit of unfettered thought and political
+equality, of intelligence and virtue, of private sovereignty and public
+duty&mdash;it is a free, true, harmonious <i>Man</i>. As the crown or the sceptre
+is the symbol of a Monarchy; as heraldic honors are the symbols of an
+Oligarchy; so, I repeat, the most expressive symbol of a Republic is a
+man&mdash;a man free in limb and soul, a man intelligent and self-governed, a
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span>man whose spiritual vision is clear, and in whose breast the voice of
+conscience is peremptory, with whom the conception of duties is deeper
+even than the conception of rights; in short, a man who embodies all the
+elements, and represents to the world the best results of Liberty. Laws
+are nothing, institutions are nothing, national power and greatness are
+nothing, save as they assist the Moral purpose of God in the development
+of humanity. To this test we must bring the symbols of the Republic, and
+judge whether they are fitting and consistent. No matter what else they
+accomplish, no matter what else they signify, if they do not serve this
+end they are either incomplete instruments, or vain forms. For, Man is
+of more worth than Institutions; Religion is greater than politics; and
+the designs of Providence are wider than the cycles of National destiny.</p>
+
+<p>I turn, then, to the signs of our own national greatness; I turn to
+these symbols of spiritual freedom and political equality; and I
+ask&mdash;how completely do they develop this most significant symbol of
+all&mdash;how completely do <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span>they serve the purposes of God in History&mdash;by
+securing the welfare, the culture, the moral elevation of humanity? And
+the reply is&mdash;that, by our institutions and our endeavors, these ends
+have been served in various ways. There is here, to-day, a more
+enlightened, free, self-governed humanity&mdash;and we say it without
+arrogance&mdash;than anywhere else on the globe. Our benefits are of the kind
+that are not realized, because they are so great and familiar&mdash;like the
+light and the air; but take them away, or transfer us to some other
+atmosphere, and how we should miss them, and pine and dwindle! Let no
+man, in his zeal for bold rebuke or needed reform, overlook what has
+been done, and what is enjoyed here, as to the noblest results of
+national greatness and power.</p>
+
+<p>But every sincere man must say likewise that, with us, the
+<i>possibilities</i> are far greater than the <i>performance</i>; that these
+symbols are the splendid tokens of what <i>may be</i>, rather than what <i>is</i>.
+And, that I may bring this discourse to a practical conclusion, let me
+say that two things, at least, are necessary to con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span>vert these
+possibilities into the noblest achievement.</p>
+
+<p>In the first place, it is essential that every citizen of the republic
+should recognize his own manhood; the sacredness of his own personality;
+and should recognize this especially in relation to his duties, which
+are inextricably involved with his rights. For here it is true in a
+special sense, that the mass is but an aggregate of personalities&mdash;that
+public sin is but the projection of your sin and mine. A man will often
+say that he is responsible to his country, and responsible to his
+constituents; but upon no claim, by no sophistry, should he suffer
+himself to forget that he is also responsible to his God. He does forget
+this, when he acts for political interests, and as one of a party, as he
+never would act in his private affairs. And does he suppose that there
+is a corporate vice, or virtue, differing from his private vice or
+virtue, as a gentleman's purse differs from the public fund? There is no
+such distinction in moral qualities. It is your own coin that helps
+swell the amount; it bears your stamp, and you are responsible for the
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span>product. If the party lies, then <i>you</i> are guilty of falsehood. If the
+party&mdash;as is very likely&mdash;does a mean thing, then <i>you</i> do it. It is
+surely so, so far as you are one of the party, and go with it in its
+action. God does not take account of parties; party names are not known
+in that court of Divine Judgment; but your name and mine are on the
+books there. There is no such thing&mdash;and this is true, perhaps, in more
+senses than one&mdash;there is no such thing as a party conscience. It is
+individual conscience that is implicated. Party! Party! Ah! my friends,
+here is the influence which, it is to be feared, balks and falsifies
+many of these glorious symbols. Men rally round musty epithets. They
+take up issues which have no more relation to the deep, vital, throbbing
+interest of the time, than they have to the fashions of our
+grandfathers. They parade high-sounding principles to cover selfish
+ends; interpret the Constitution by a doctrine of loaves and fishes;
+while individual independence and private conviction are whirled away in
+the political maelstrom, and the party-badge is reverenced and hugged as
+the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span> African reverences and hugs his fetish. And surely it is a case for
+congratulation, when some great, exciting question breaks out and jars
+these conventional idols, and so sweeps and shatters these party
+organizations and turns them topsy-turvy, that a man is shaken out of
+his harness, does not know exactly what party he <i>does</i> belong to, and
+begins to feel that he has a soul of his own. I am not denying the use
+and the necessity of parties as instruments, but protest against them as
+ends, especially when principle is smothered under their platforms, and
+they absorb the moral personality of a man.</p>
+
+<p>It may not seem so strange that the political field should so often be
+the field of a lax and depressed morality, when we consider that here is
+the great theatre where human ambition struggles for its aims; here are
+enlisted the strongest passions of the soul; here throng some of its
+fiercest temptations; here the stakes played for are the kingdoms of
+this world, and the glory of them. And this, I suppose, is the reason
+why the most authentic type of human depravity is a thoroughly
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span>unprincipled politician. Such an instance, at least, may strike us more
+forcibly, because we see the perversion of great faculties, and
+capabilities are contrasted with performance; while, on the other hand
+he may be confirmed in his moral bankruptcy by the fact that, in playing
+upon the passions of men he sees the worst side of humanity. But,
+surely, there have been those who passed this ordeal, and came out with
+brighter lustre; who have kept the eye of conscience elevated above the
+ecliptic of political routine; who have made politics identical with
+lofty duties and great principles; whose patriotism was not a clamorous
+catch-word, but a breathing inspiration, a silent heart-fire. In private
+life they have felt the great privilege of their citizenship; the
+magnitude of the obligation which bound them to virtue and to
+consistency; while, in public life, they have kept their trust firm as
+steel, bright as gold; have felt, with due balance on either side, the
+beatings of the popular heart and the dictates of the everlasting Right;
+and in themselves have represented the union of liberty and law, the
+real greatness of a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span>nation. Without such men, the nation has no
+greatness; for its significance and its power are in the moral worth of
+its citizens.</p>
+
+<p>The second condition necessary to the fulfilment of the great results
+indicated by these symbols, is consistent action upon the ideas that
+constitute the basis of our own institutions. If many of the privileges
+and peculiarities which I have specified in this discourse are possessed
+by other nations, in one respect we differ from them all. These
+privileges and peculiarities are <i>legitimately</i> ours. They have not been
+grafted on hereditary antagonisms. They have not grown up in <i>spite</i> of
+our institutions, but as the <i>fruit</i> of our institutions. These ideas,
+entwined with the very roots of our Republic, shooting through every
+fibre, running into every limb, bind us to a recognition of human
+brotherhood; to sympathy with Liberty wherever it struggles; and to
+stedfast opposition to whatever crushes the rights, hinders the
+development, or denies the humanity of man. If these symbols of the
+Republic mean anything, they mean just this; and whatever is
+inconsistent with this, is <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span>inconsistent with the terms of our national
+birthright. Depend upon it, not the assertion of Liberty, but whatever
+is opposed to Liberty, is the innovating and agitating element in this
+country. It interrupts the legitimate current of our destiny. It shocks
+the popular heart with inconsistency. It becomes mixed with the ashes of
+the old heroes, and the land keeps heaving with the fermentation. One
+assumption is too impudent, too nakedly in contradiction with the
+fundamental ideas of our Republic ever to be admitted&mdash;the assumption
+that the man who speaks for freedom, who sympathizes with the broadest
+doctrine of human rights, and sets around these the eternal barriers of
+justice, is an innovator and an agitator. I ask&mdash;what made our
+Revolution legitimate? What were the central ideas that throbbed in the
+breasts of its heroes and martyrs? Take down the old muskets bent in the
+hot encounter, and printed with many a death-gripe; take down the old
+uniforms, clipped by Hessian sabres and torn by British bullets; take
+down the dusty muster-rolls, scrawled with those venerable names&mdash;names
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span>that now "are graven on the stone," names that are buried in the sod,
+names that have gone up to immortality&mdash;and ask, for what was this great
+struggle? Was it not for freedom, based upon the conception of the right
+and supremacy of freedom? And is <i>this</i> the legitimate conclusion of
+that sublime postulate&mdash;this other Fact which, never retreating, always
+advancing, follows the steps of Freedom over the continent like a
+shadow, looms up like a phantom against the Rocky Mountains, and darkens
+the fairest waters? On the contrary, is not Freedom that old truth, that
+conceded premise that does <i>not</i> agitate? Liberty, Human Rights,
+Universal Brotherhood, was it not for these ideas ye fought&mdash;was it not
+these ye planted in the soil, and laid with the corner-stone of our
+institutions? My friends, I know, and you know, could those men give
+palpable sign and representation, the answer that would come, as in one
+quick flash from bayonet to bayonet, in one long roll of drums, from
+Lexington to Yorktown.</p>
+
+<p>These peculiar privileges, then, to which I have referred, differ from
+those of other <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span>nations inasmuch as they are not grafted expedients, but
+legitimate fruits. Unless we change the premises of our Republic, and
+shift the foils in our historical argument, these are necessary
+conclusions. They are necessary conclusions, if our symbols represent
+realities. Russia is consistent with its national idea. It pours forth
+its legions and moves to its work with a terrible consistency. And if
+we&mdash;also a great people, having great power&mdash;are equally consistent, we
+shall fall back upon no selfish conservatism, but aid whatever tends to
+fulfil the Providential purpose of our existence, and whatever helps and
+advances man.</p>
+
+<p>One thing is certain. So long as any nation truly lives, it unfolds its
+specific idea and lives according to its original type. When it fails to
+do this, the sentence of decay is already written upon it. If it fails
+to illustrate God's purpose in its obedience, it illustrates His control
+in retribution. For there is nothing supreme, nothing finally
+triumphant, nothing of the last importance, but His Law. It penetrates,
+and oversweeps, and survives all charters and institutions and
+nationalities, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span>like the infinite space that encompasses Alps and Andes,
+and planets and systems. It is this that successive generations
+illustrate. It is this that all history vindicates. If a nation runs
+parallel to this Divine Law, it is well; if false to its purpose and its
+control, down it goes. The prophet Isaiah, in one of the most terrific
+and sublime passages of the Bible, represents the king of Babylon, while
+passing into the under-world, saluted by departed rulers, by dead kings,
+rising from their shadowy thrones, and exclaiming, "Art thou become weak
+as we? Art thou become like unto us?" Thus has many a nation gone down
+to its doom. Shall it be so with this Republic, because false to its
+ideal? Shall it descend to the shades of perished pomp and greatness,
+and see Nineveh with dusty, hieroglyphic robes rising up to meet it; and
+Persia, with the empty wine-cup of its luxury; and Rome, with the shadow
+of universal empire on its discrowned head; and hear them say&mdash;"Art thou
+become weak as we? Art thou become like unto us?"</p>
+
+<p>My friends, I look at the eager enterprise, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span>the young, hopeful vigor,
+the tides of possibility that flow through this great city; I look at
+the symbols of this Republic; and I cannot believe that such is to be
+the result. I look back upon our history, and cannot argue such a future
+from such a past. A great light lay upon the wake of those frail ships
+that bore our fathers hither; the wake of past ages, the following of
+good men's prayers and brave men's deeds, the mingling currents of
+martyr-blood and prophet-fire. And methinks, as they struck the shore,
+and met the savage wilderness, a Voice saluted them; a voice not of
+profane ambition and of selfish hope, but of Divine promise, intending
+Divine results&mdash;proclaiming, "Thou art a great people, and hast great
+power." And He will fulfil this prophecy, Who leads the course of
+history over the broad deep and through mysterious ways, and Who unfolds
+His own glory in the destinies of men.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>THE SPRINGS OF SOCIAL LIFE.</h2>
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span></p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="THE_SPRINGS_OF_SOCIAL_LIFE" id="THE_SPRINGS_OF_SOCIAL_LIFE"></a><a name="DISCOURSE_V" id="DISCOURSE_V"></a>DISCOURSE V.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE SPRINGS OF SOCIAL LIFE.</h3>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center">Let them learn first to show piety at home.&mdash;<span class="smcap">I. Timothy</span>, v. 4.</p></div>
+
+
+<p>The text&mdash;which I purpose to employ not as a specific precept, but as
+the illustration of a general principle&mdash;indicates those Springs of
+Social Life which constitute the subject of the present discourse.</p>
+
+<p>The crowd in a city affords comparatively little interest, when we
+contemplate it merely as a crowd. But, when we resolve it into its
+individual particles, and consider each of these as endued with the
+attributes and involved with the conditions of humanity, our deepest
+sympathies are touched. Every drop of that great stream is a conscious
+personality. In some shape, the universe is reflected in it. In some
+way, it takes hold of the reality of life:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span> and the living organism of
+which it is composed both acts and suffers, receives from the world
+around it and contributes to it. That entire mass of people involves
+nothing more than the interest of humanity, and the same interest
+pertains to the least unit of that mass.</p>
+
+<p>And, doubtless, you have sometimes busied yourself with the
+speculation&mdash;"Where do all these people come from? And whither do they
+retire at night?" Now, this is really a very suggestive question, and to
+follow it out to a practical answer would yield results of the
+profoundest importance. For out of hidden channels, here and there, <i>do</i>
+spring all these struggling activities, these human diversities, these
+various influences good and evil, that make up the crowd and spectacle
+of city life. And night after night, with the rarest exceptions, into
+some retreat they all disappear. Some spot&mdash;whether it seem the veriest
+mockery to style it so, or whether it be a synonym for the sweetest
+sanctities&mdash;some spot each of this living multitude calls by the name of
+"Home."</p>
+
+<p>For some that name is associated with a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span>more than oriental
+magnificence. Man and nature wait upon them there in every conceivable
+form of service. There is no method of convenience or luxury which
+ingenuity can devise; no bounty that earth can yield from her many-zoned
+bosom; no shape which art can summon from the regions of the beautiful,
+that is not possible there. Lifting its palatial walls, and kindling
+with brilliant lights, it stands there as the completest symbol of
+material refinement and civilization. It is arctic winter without. The
+snow chokes up the dreary street, and the whistling wind cuts the
+beggar's rags. But it is Italy, it is Ceylon, it is tropic gorgeousness
+within. And these are the abodes of the children of fortune, whose
+wishes require no talisman but expression, who, all their lives long,
+have been used to such indulgence, or who accept it now as the fruit of
+their own effort. This is the hospitality which some men find in life,
+and out of which they constitute a home.</p>
+
+<p>But none the less enviable, and perhaps much more so, are those retreats
+where comfort waits on moderate means, while contentment <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span>imparts to
+these an unpurchasable efficacy; where, blended with those infirmities
+and liabilities which are common to palace and cottage, the domestic
+affections flourish, and the dearest treasures of life are kept.
+Thousands of homes like this there are, all around us. It describes the
+largest class of homes, we may believe. And who can estimate their
+influence over these busy tides of action, all day long? That world of
+traffic, that world of toil, that looks so hard and gross and
+sordid,&mdash;is it not transformed somewhat, does it not grow beautiful
+even, when you think how many of its energies have their spring by the
+infant's cradle and the mother's chair? And what lights, what shadows,
+unseen by you, fall upon the speculative eyes, fall upon the hearts, of
+thousands in that homeward-streaming crowd! Light of welcoming
+hearth-fires, shadows of children's play upon the walls; light of
+affections in which there are no decay and no deceit; shadows of sacred
+retirement where God alone is; light of joys which this world's storms
+cannot utterly quench; shadows of sorrow around sick-beds, and in vacant
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span>places, that still make home the dearer as the arena of earth's purest
+discipline and of its most triumphant faith!</p>
+
+<p>And why delineate the features of that other class of homes, whose most
+significant word is "<i>Privation</i>?" Where cheerlessness, and hunger, and
+desponding toil, or hopeless apathy, brood continually. Let your own
+sympathies, let your own imaginations that cannot exaggerate the
+reality, call up the vision of such. Think how many such abodes there
+are this very night, which winter besieges with all his terrors, and
+into which he sends his invading frost! Think what Home is to hundreds,
+and, therefore, how life looks to them, seen through this atmosphere of
+disease and want, with starvation by the hearth, and death at the door,
+and misery everywhere! Think, when the cold pierces even through all
+your wrappages of comfort, and scarcity almost pinches, what forms of
+humanity, with lungs, and nerves, and hearts, and every capacity for
+suffering, are scraping the moss of subsistence from the barest rocks of
+life, and struggling every day through an <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span>avalanche! Think what this
+Sabbath has been in the dwellings of the poor, you who have had time to
+listen to the Gospel, and have heard it comfortably&mdash;so comfortably,
+perhaps, that you have fallen asleep under it&mdash;think what this Sabbath
+has been in the dwellings of the poor! And yet, when I consider what,
+doubtless, the Sabbath has been in some of those places, I am thankful
+that the highest ideal, the richest sanctities of Home, are not
+dependent upon outward conditions; for even there, unfaltering duty and
+true love have made the bare walls beautiful, and prayer has set the
+desolate chamber on the steps of the Divine throne; and before the eye
+of faith the cold arch of the winter night, that looks in through hole
+and cranny, has burst into a revelation of heaven, and a path for those
+ministering angels that come to help the sufferer and to comfort God's
+poor.</p>
+
+<p>With more unqualified sadness, therefore, our thoughts must rest upon
+still another group of dwellings, where deprivation and ignorance are
+mingled with vice and crime&mdash;where want and guilt strip away the masks
+of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span>civilization, and bring out the essential savage in man's nature.
+These also we must call "<i>homes</i>!" These breathing-holes of abomination,
+these moral tombs, where huddle the demons of violence, and cunning, and
+debauchery, and from which they issue. That vast Hades of social evil
+opening downward from our streets, where the best ideals have no type,
+and the purest sentiments scarce a name; where God is but a dark cloud
+of muttering thunder in the soul; where all that is fair in womanhood is
+dishevelled and transformed; and where childhood is baptized in infamy,
+trained to sin, canopied with curses, and rocked to sleep by the
+convulsive hell of passions all around it.</p>
+
+<p>The Homes of the Metropolis! Thus diversified are they in their general
+types, and more numerous in their individual conditions than can be
+specified. And, surely, it is no vain speculation that inquires&mdash;"What
+are they? Into what retreats do the elements of this busy crowd
+dissolve, night after night?" Whatever they may be, a common interest
+envelopes them and links them all together&mdash;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span>the interest of humanity.
+They have vanished from the streets. One great shadow covers them, and
+hides their distinctions. For a time they are all equal. They have
+fallen asleep&mdash;poor, tired humanity at the best!&mdash;they have fallen
+asleep on the bosom of a common Providence, that bears them all up, as
+it bears the planet on which they now repose, through the orbit of its
+great purpose and the immensities of its love. But in the morning all
+these diversities will break forth again, each pouring its influence
+into the general stream. And who does not perceive how much the
+character of that influence must depend upon the condition of those
+homes? Who does not see that not only the interest of the common
+humanity in its most intimate experiences attaches to them, but the
+interest of community? Not only are they the reservoirs of individual
+power and peculiarity, but they are the Springs of Social Life. And this
+the apostle indicated, when he directed that certain, who bore intimate
+relations to the early church, should "first learn to show piety at
+home."</p>
+
+<p>Keeping this conclusion in mind, let me ask <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span>you to consider, for a
+little while, what Home <i>must</i> be.</p>
+
+<p>In the first place&mdash;it is the <i>earliest and the most influential
+school</i>. Nowhere else is the character so moulded; nowhere else is so
+much infused into our entire being. For, whatever it may be, it is the
+nursery of childhood; and "the child is father to the man." Here dawns
+upon the human mind the conception of life. Here, when the nature is
+uninscribed and plastic, it takes its first impressions. I suppose it to
+be true, that more is learnt, more that is elementary and a key to all
+the rest, in the first few years of childhood than in all after time. I
+do not deny, of course, that much is corrected and overcome under
+another class of influences. But the deepest impressions, the seeds of
+the most stubborn habits, are planted at home. Hence the peculiar
+anxiety of good men to rescue <i>children</i> from the influences of a bad
+home. And, even then, with what obstacles do they have to contend! How
+radical are the prejudices already formed in that young mind! How
+obstinate the customs, how opaque the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span>ignorance, how rank the growth of
+error! Nay, into what complete fruition have all these grown, simply in
+the neglect of home-culture, to say nothing of influences positively
+evil! Really, the color and current of a man's destiny are indicated
+here, unless a shock of wonderful transformation comes over him. I do
+not mean to say that anybody is wholly the creature of circumstances;
+but he is the <i>subject</i> of circumstances. If they do not entirely make
+<i>him</i>, they furnish the occasion out of which he makes something; and,
+viewed either from the platform of the inward or the outward, they
+furnish an important key to his life. And, although the path of
+reformation is more difficult than the descent into evil, and demands an
+effort which too few are inclined to put forth; though by the conditions
+of our nature the good is more easily swept away than the bad; still, it
+is encouraging to estimate the permanence and the power of those <i>good</i>
+influences which are received at home. Everybody knows, when he is
+pitched into this whirlpool of evil that rolls around him in the world,
+how those old <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span>home-restraints lie upon him like a magic chain, hard to
+be forced away&mdash;perhaps never utterly forced away. And, seeking for
+those who should stand up in this boisterous sweep of sin, you would
+look and I would look to those who had received the best impressions
+under the domestic roof. If I were alone, poor, compelled to ask charity
+somewhere in this selfish world, I would go, not to the man who has
+learnt most of what he calls his "wisdom" from the experience of mature
+life, but to him in whose heart there evidently remains something of
+childhood's tenderness, kept warm by the remembered pressures of his
+mother's breast. If I were seeking to restore some wild prodigal,
+brazen-fronted by his own wicked will and by the scorn with which men
+have battered him&mdash;if I were looking for some gleam of promise in his
+turbulent nature, and sounding its depths to find some spring of
+repentance&mdash;I should never despair if I could discover one gentle pulse
+that beat with the memories of a good and happy home. Why, who needs to
+be told of the potency of this our earliest school, to say <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span>nothing of
+other influences, if only a faithful <i>mother</i> presides there? O! mother,
+mother, name for the earliest relationship, symbol of the divine
+tenderness; kindling a love that we never blush to confess, and a
+veneration that we cannot help rendering; how does your mystic
+influence, imparted from the soft pressure and the undying smile, weave
+itself through all the brightness through all the darkness of our after
+life. The mould of character set on the front of the world's great men,
+and gladly confessed by them, bears your stamp. Your inspiration burns
+along the poet's line. It is your true courage, more than man's rude
+daring, that makes the force of heroes. The statesman, when treason to
+humanity wears the garb of power, and duty calls him like a trumpet,
+hears your voice. The philanthropist, when he feels that the most
+efficient service is to be patient and to wait, imbibes the strength of
+your fortitude. The sailor, "on the high and giddy mast," mingles your
+name close to God's. And thousands in life's great claims, in life's
+great perils, trace back the influences of the hour to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span>some early time,
+some calm moment, when,&mdash;little, timid children,&mdash;they knelt by your
+side, and from tones of reverence and looks of love and simple words of
+prayer, they first learnt piety at home.</p>
+
+<p>But I observe again, that Home is the sphere where are most clearly
+displayed <i>the real elements of character</i>. The world furnishes
+occasions of trial, but it also furnishes prudential considerations.
+Without any absolute hypocrisy, one measures his speech and restrains
+his action in the street and the market. And it is easy to conceive how
+small men may perform great deeds, and mean men seem philanthropic, and
+cowards flourish as heroes, with the tremendous motive of publicity to
+urge them. But at home all masks are thrown aside, and the true
+proportions of the man appear. Here he can find his actual moral
+standard, and measure himself accordingly. If he is irritable, here
+breaks forth his repressed fretfulness. If he is selfish, here are the
+sordid tokens. If he passes in any way for more than he is worth, here
+you may detect the counterfeit in the ring of his natural voice and the
+superscription <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span>of his undisguised life. No, the world is not the place
+to prove the moral stature and quality of a man. There are too many
+props and stimulants. Nor, on the other hand, can he himself determine
+his actual character merely by looking into his own solitary heart.
+Therein he may discover <i>possibilities</i>, but it needs actuality to make
+up the estimate of a complete life. He must <i>do</i> something as well as be
+something; he must do something in order that he may be something. For,
+what he thinks is in his heart may be exaggerated by self-flattery, or
+darkened by morbid self-distrust. It needs some occasion to prove what
+is really there. And Home is precisely that sphere which is sufficiently
+removed from the factitious motives of publicity on the one extreme, and
+the unexercised possibilities of the human heart on the other, to afford
+a genuine test. What a man really is, therefore, will appear in the
+truest light under his own roof and by his own fireside. I can believe
+that he is a Christian, when I know that he faithfully takes up the
+daily duties, and bears the crosses, that cluster within his own doors.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span>
+I shall think that the world rightly calls him a philanthropist, when,
+notwithstanding common faults and infirmities, he receives the
+spontaneous award of the good husband and father, and the kindness of
+his nature is reflected in the very air and light of his dwelling.
+And,&mdash;talk of noble deeds!&mdash;where will you find occasions for, where
+will you behold manifestations of, a more beautiful self-sacrifice, a
+more generous heroism, than in the labors and in the endurance of
+thousands of men and women, shut out from the world's observation in
+silent nooks and corners of this very city, amidst the relationships and
+cares and struggles of home? But whether it be in forms of good or evil,
+we know that the real elements of character, the genuine moral qualities
+of people, must be expressed there.</p>
+
+<p>And, I remark once more, that at Home we must find <i>the most essential
+happiness or misery of life</i>. The same conditions apply here as those
+which relate to character. The world is a theatre of <i>seeming</i>, and we
+can hardly tell by what we notice there who is, or who is not, happy. We
+know that gaiety is <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span>often the reckless ripple over depths of despair;
+and that men will bear up with a smile while untold agony is gnawing at
+their heart-strings, and will die laughing, in an agony of defiance,
+under the sword-strokes of fortune. On the other hand we may count some
+as unfortunate, in whose bosoms, all the while, there are flowing
+inexhaustible springs of peace, and who derive real joy from what we
+suppose to be a hard and pitiable lot. But amidst the undisguised
+realities of home we can form the most correct estimate of a man's
+condition. In the first place because, as has been remarked, he is there
+most truly himself. He gains opportunity for reflection, and gives vent
+to the secret burden of his heart. There he empties the load of his
+envies, his rivalries, his disappointments; which he has carried before
+the world muffled in courtesy or pride. These, it may be, meet and are
+re-acted upon by kindred elements; engendered, perhaps, by the very
+atmosphere which he himself, in the first place, created. Oh! how many
+rich dwellings there are, crowded with every appointment of luxury, that
+are only glittering <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span>ice-caverns of selfishness and discontent;
+pavilions of misery, where jangling discord mars the show, and a chill
+of mutual distrust breathes through the sumptuous apartments, and
+heartless ostentation presides like a robed skeleton at the feast. You
+feel that nothing is genial or spontaneous there. The courtesy is dreary
+etiquette, and the laughter forced music. You would dine as happily with
+the forms on the canvas, with the cold marbles in the hall. For all this
+magnificence is nothing more than a gorgeous pall over dead
+affections&mdash;nothing more than the coronation of a living woe.</p>
+
+<p>"Better is a dinner of herbs," says the wise man, "where love is, than a
+stalled ox and hatred therewith." And many a home exists where there
+<i>is</i> but little more than a dinner of herbs, which affection and mutual
+loyalty, and sweet dispositions, convert into a palace. And there are
+fixed boundaries of peace, that society cannot encroach upon, while the
+processions of ambition and pleasure and ceaseless pursuit, pass by its
+windows and disturb it not. Here the good man and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span>the brave man&mdash;the
+man who has nobly discharged his duty at whatever cost&mdash;is respected and
+understood. Hither he can retreat beyond the shots of calumny which have
+torn the ensign of his good name; beyond the deceit of men, which halts
+at the threshold. Here he can look calmly out upon the changes of
+fortune and the frowns of the world. Here his perplexed spirit finds
+inspirations of strength, and space for rest. There is no happiness in
+life, there is no misery, like that growing out of the dispositions
+which consecrate or desecrate a Home.</p>
+
+<p>Moreover, the elements of profoundest joy or suffering are there,
+because there are unfolded the deepest experiences of our mortal lot.
+There transpire those events which constitute the <i>eras</i> of our
+existence. There, day by day, grows the sentiment of filial veneration
+and love. There is the joy of wedded felicity. There wells up in the
+heart the first strange gush of parental affection. There comes the
+intimation of awful change staring upon us with the face of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span>death.
+There falls the shadow of the funeral train, passing across the
+threshold. There breaks in upon us the sense of bereavement, in the
+vacant chambers; where the familiar foot-step patters, where the
+familiar voice is heard no more. From the very nature of things, the
+profoundest happiness and misery of human life must be experienced among
+the conditions of Home.</p>
+
+<p>Having thus in some respects considered what Home <i>must</i> be, I have
+virtually anticipated whatever may be said in the second division of
+this discourse respecting what Home <i>ought</i> to be.</p>
+
+<p>Thus, as it is the earliest and most influential school, it behoves
+every one who is bound by its responsibilities to make it an agent of
+the <i>best culture</i>. The great subject of Home Education, is of itself
+enough for a series of discourses; and I have not room to lay down even
+the general propositions which belong to it, much less for
+specifications. But I would remind you&mdash;and I think the suggestion is
+especially needed amidst the whirl of city life&mdash;that there <i>is</i> such a
+thing as Home<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span> Education, and it presses its claims upon everybody who
+inhabits a Home. There is such a thing as Home Education, differing from
+school education, whether of the week day or the Sabbath, and therefore
+it is a matter we ought to attend to, and not suppose we have done
+enough when we patronize an academy, or help fill a class on Sunday. To
+every parent&mdash;to every influential member of a household&mdash;there is
+committed a charge which can be shifted to no one else; there is an
+opportunity which no outside teacher possesses. There are some duties in
+life that we have to look for and to go after; there are others which
+are passed right into our hands, whether we will or not. And this duty
+of Home Education is of the latter kind. Now, I have just said that I
+cannot specify here, and even if there were room I am not sure that it
+would be advisable. For I doubt whether we can give any manual of
+methods and instruments in this respect, any more than there can be a
+manual of religious exercises suited to every spiritual peculiarity.
+Dispositions, capacities, circumstances, must <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span>create their own methods.
+And perhaps the poorest method of all would be some system of domestic
+education, which the experimenter thinks will do the work exactly. I am
+somewhat suspicious of systems. I am more than suspicious of any
+constrained formal method, bringing up children in a mere manual drill,
+crimping them into a mould of mincing proprieties, and making them speak
+with an automaton click. Perhaps the most headlong young men that can be
+found, are those who spent their early days in a sort of strait jacket
+with a clock-work movement. They were wound up so tight when they were
+boys, that now they take great pleasure in going fast, and running down.
+In other words, having felt their early training to be mere <i>training</i>,
+the moment they strip off the constraint, they plunge into the opposite
+extreme of <i>no</i> constraint. Nay, I believe that even children who are
+left to their own instincts, and shoved out into the world to take care
+of themselves, are generally better balanced, and go with steadier
+motion than these. Of course, however, neither extreme is right.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span> There
+is such a thing, I say once more, as Home Education, involving all
+necessary training and true constraint; and yet not oppressively felt as
+such, because it is free, informal, and respects the spontaneity of the
+childish nature. But, whether our Home Education be formal or informal,
+direct or indirect, there is one kind of education which we are sure to
+impart. It is the education of example, silent, effective, stronger and
+more easily apprehended than any set of maxims. I would we were all duly
+impressed with the responsibilities of Home as they appear in this
+light; might feel, however we may be absorbed in business or in
+pleasure, that the young mind and heart are receiving influences, and
+growing into expressions that in some way will surprise us.</p>
+
+<p>In the next place I observe, that if we display our real dispositions
+and characters at home, we should recognize it practically as <i>a sphere
+of moral discipline</i>. The family is a divine ordinance&mdash;the Home is an
+institution of God, forecast in the peculiarities of our very nature.
+History shows no period <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span>when it did not exist, and we discover no tribe
+so barbarous as to be without it. It is the foundation of all society.
+It embosoms the germ and ideal of the State. According to the purity of
+its relations, the intensity of its sympathies, the inviolability of its
+rights, a nation's life is high or low, feeble or strong, fickle or
+enduring. And if it is thus rooted in the nature and the history of man,
+we may well believe that it affords some of the profoundest occasions
+for that moral discipline which is the great purpose of our existence
+upon the earth.</p>
+
+<p>It is certainly the great sphere in which our affections are to be
+cultivated. Of course I do not mean that this is the limit of their
+cultivation. But here they are nurtured, and out of this they grow. As
+love is the Infinite Nature itself, so is it the prevalent sentiment of
+all life. It has been ordained that this great element should flow
+through every form of being, linking them together by a common feeling,
+and lending some interest to the most insignificant. And man has been
+set in the family relation that this <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span>sentiment might be developed.
+There is no one in whose heart it does not exist. You cannot find me a
+being so defaced, so alienated from the common stock of humanity, as to
+cherish in his bosom no secret fount of love, no fibril of affection
+linking him to something else. But of this love there are numerous
+degrees; and the highest forms of it, that go forth in expressions of
+self-sacrifice and worldwide sympathy, are only developed by culture.
+And for this culture there are rich opportunities amidst the relations
+and sanctities of Home.</p>
+
+<p>And there is opportunity among these relations also, for active duty,
+and in its daily tasks and responsibilities, is often illustrated that
+practical lesson which society so much needs&mdash;the lesson of mutual help.
+It is a school where we may learn endurance and charity. Out of its
+trials is developed the sense of religious need; and under the shadow of
+its bereavements we appreciate the glorious vision of Faith. There are
+other issues in life, where we need these divine helps; none where we
+feel the need <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span>of them more. Those who have stood by the sick-bed and
+taken the last look of the dearest earthly objects, and yet have lifted
+hearts of trust, and eyes of transcendent hope, are able to meet the
+intensest sorrows of the world, and to come out like refined gold. Home,
+then, should be regarded especially in this light, as a sphere where the
+richest elements of our moral culture are supplied.</p>
+
+<p>Finally, if at home we find the most essential happiness or misery of
+life, of course each should do his best to make it the most <i>attractive</i>
+of all places. He should bring not his worst, but his best temper there.
+How many are there who bottle up their wrath all the day long, and
+uncork it when they get home! They had better reverse the process. If
+you must chafe under disappointment, and indulge angry passion, let it
+out in the excitement of the world, where the rough friction of business
+will help you to get rid of it, or where nobody has time to care whether
+you get rid of it or not.</p>
+
+<p>And let <i>business</i> stay where it belongs. Do not interrupt social claims
+with its spe<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span>culations; nor drag the counting-room into the parlor.
+There are some men with whom business is a disease; they are never easy
+with it and never rid of it. Thus, perhaps, they acquire a reputation
+for smartness and enterprise; but they do it, it is to be feared, by
+putting aside other and more sacred claims.</p>
+
+<p>Nor let him who is the genial companion abroad, be the morose boarder in
+his own house, reserving his vivacity for society and the lees for the
+fireside. It is a great deal better to be like the stream that is good
+and welcome wherever it flows, but is sure to be fresh at its source.
+Indeed, there are men who are made up of foam, and sparkle, and who
+circulate in society, but contribute nothing to the necessaries of life,
+and are returned empty. It is an unfortunate gift that cheers the world
+outdoors, but casts only a dreary shadow inside.</p>
+
+<p>Of course, in speaking of the influence of dispositions in making home
+attractive, I would include the duty of those who <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span>stay at home as well
+as of those who go abroad, and that self-sacrifice and kind hearts
+should be found as well as brought there. Indeed, if time would allow me
+to make a theme of what now can be only a hint, I should dwell largely
+upon <i>woman's</i> influence in this matter.</p>
+
+<p>But home is to be rendered attractive not only by the disposition, but
+by the customs of its inmates. It must be a place to live, not merely to
+eat and sleep in; a place where we can find entertainment, and not
+always leave in search of it. It is really a monstrous folly, this
+fashionable treatment of home, which leads people to abandon it almost
+every night in pursuit of pleasure, or else to sweep it with a rout,
+which considers a household evening very dull, and makes Sunday a day
+for sleeping and yawning. The central idea of home is <i>stability</i>, and
+this has much less chance to be realized in the city than in the
+country. In the latter, old forms and landmarks are not so liable to
+interruption, and the slow process of time works instead of the hand <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span>of
+innovation. But in a city, where a man emigrates before he has fairly
+settled, and where many move with every May-day, the idea of a homestead
+is almost obsolete. Elegance, solidity, venerable associations, none of
+these can resist the march of improvement, and the rapid tide of
+business enterprise. The main streets of a great city in this country,
+may almost be termed so many dissolving views of perpetual change and
+renewal. But, perhaps, there is hardly one of us who does not feel that
+by his or her own exertions the essential element of Home can be made
+far more abiding than it now is; and where we hear of frivolous
+daughters and dissipated sons, many a parent may ask the question, "What
+have I done to cheer and consecrate the household world, and make it
+more abiding?"</p>
+
+<p>My friends, when I consider the magnitude and importance of the subject
+now before us, and how many topics of discussion grow out of it&mdash;when I
+think how much must be left entirely unsaid&mdash;I entreat you not to
+suppose that I offer this discourse as <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>anything more than a
+<i>suggestion</i>&mdash;a suggestion meant to turn your attention to this subject
+of Home in the City, and leaving it to the elaboration of your own
+thoughts. Remember, here abide the deepest springs of social life. The
+noblest privileges, the greatest duties, find their basis here; and we
+are taught first "to show piety at Home." And the influence of this
+institution upon all other fields of human action, private or public, is
+too obvious to mention. All life flows from the centre, outwards; and
+the citizen who desires the order and purity of the community in which
+he lives; the philanthropist, who, under all conditions, regards the
+highest welfare of his race; the Christian, who urges the secret culture
+of the soul, must look with peculiar solicitude to this institution. It
+is one whose impotence is demonstrated by the strength of the instinct
+which creates it and clings to it&mdash;an instinct which associates the most
+genuine happiness with its sacred enclosure of affection, however rude
+or poor that spot may be&mdash;which, while a man has such a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span>place to call
+his own, makes him feel that he is somebody, and has some tie and claim
+in the world; and which, on the other hand, associated the most bitter
+destitution, the dreariest isolation, with that one word&mdash;"Homeless."</p>
+
+<p>How this instinct abides, how long and how far it goes with us, is
+beautifully illustrated in the lines of Goldsmith.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"In all my wand'rings round this world of care,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In all my griefs&mdash;and God has giv'n my share,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I still had hopes my latest hours to crown,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Amidst these humble bow'rs to lay me down;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To husband out life's taper at the close,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And keep the flame from wasting by repose.<br /></span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="stanza"><span class="i2">*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;*<br /></span></div>
+
+<div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Around my fire an ev'ning group to draw,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And tell of all I felt, and all I saw;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And, as a hare whom hounds and horns pursue,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Pants to the place from whence at first he flew,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I still had hopes, my long vexations past,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Here to return&mdash;and die at Home at last."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Hopes, my friends, which I think glow in the breasts of most of us, and
+burst spontaneously from our lips. "Let us," we <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span>say, "if our lot may be
+so ordered&mdash;if the lines of duty run not otherwise&mdash;let us live at
+Home." Here, amidst those darkened and brightened associations which are
+woven in the warp and woof of our deepest experience. Here, where gentle
+memories steal upon us with the shadows of the twilight, and for ever
+tapestry the walls. Here, where we have held delightful intercourse with
+man, and secret communion with God. Here, where we have tried to do our
+duty, and exercise our love, and to drink with patience the sweet and
+bitter which our Father mingles in life's mysterious cup. Here, where
+old friends are always cherished and new ones gladly come. Here, where
+the dearest ties of earth have bound us in a family circle; and though
+here and there we find broken links, we still keep hold of them, and
+they draw us up.</p>
+
+<p>And when on this familiar hearth our own vital lamp burns low, and the
+golden bowl begins to shudder and the silver cord to untwine, let our
+last look be upon faces that we best love; let the gates that open into
+the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span>celestial City be these well-known doors&mdash;and thus may we also
+<i>die</i> at <a name="Page_154t" id="Page_154t"></a><a href="#Page_154tn">Home!</a></p>
+
+<p>And this instinct of Home is not attached merely to earthly conditions,
+but mingles with those aspirations which flow into the illimitable
+future. As in the vast city we seek some enclosure of our own&mdash;some
+place of shelter for our heads, of sympathy for our hearts; so,
+respecting the destiny of the soul. In spite of all our philosophy, we
+cannot be satisfied with the conception of a mere immaterial essence
+floating hither and thither in immensity. The intellect looks eagerly
+forward to a boundless and excursive state; but the affections, the
+sentiments, yearn for some locality&mdash;some spot of residence and repose.
+We cannot help cherishing the conception of a place where our friends
+are grouped together, and whither we shall go, though to be united in
+wider and more glorious relations. And, knowing no better name for it,
+with eyes of hope and tearful rapture, we look up and call it "Home."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span></p>
+<h2>THE ALLIES OF THE TEMPTER.</h2>
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span></p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="THE_ALLIES_OF_THE_TEMPTER" id="THE_ALLIES_OF_THE_TEMPTER"></a><a name="DISCOURSE_VI" id="DISCOURSE_VI"></a>DISCOURSE VI.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE ALLIES OF THE TEMPTER.</h3>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center">He that is not with me is against me.&mdash;<span class="smcap">Matthew</span> xii. 30.</p></div>
+
+
+<p>One of the discourses of the preceding series was devoted to a
+consideration of the vices&mdash;especially the three prominent vices&mdash;of
+great cities. I propose at the present time to speak of the
+<i>Influences</i>, more or less direct, by which these and kindred evils are
+encouraged. Vice, and moral corruption of any kind, no doubt has its
+roots in the gross hearts and in the perverted appetites of men. But the
+most superficial observer must see that these are nourished not merely
+by their native soil, but by the social atmosphere which spreads around.
+Of course character constitutes the man, and, however this may be
+affected by circumstances, it enfolds the consciousness of an original
+per<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>sonality acting upon and through and in spite of its conditions.
+Nevertheless, the ingredients of this very personality are assimilated
+out of these conditions, and it is difficult to limit or define the
+subtile elements that blend in the deepest currents of a man's nature.
+It is, at least, a simple truism that he differs in one state of society
+from what he is in another. And, therefore, among the forces which help
+make up his moral condition, we must calculate the social forces. His
+virtues are not all self-sustained, and his vices draw nutriment from
+fine and remote channels. It would be an interesting process to analyze
+our own habits and temper and cast of thought, and find how much of this
+is involved with our physical relations. The air we breathe, the house
+in which we dwell, the very way in which it fronts the sun, the degrees
+of light and of shade that fall upon us with the flying hours, all weave
+their delicate influences into the tissues of our being. And how much
+that we do not suspect comes to us, day by day, in social intercourse,
+in the bearing of friends, in the tone and air of conversation, in the
+mere <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span>magnetism of the parlor or the street! How much to strengthen or
+to weaken us; to clear or to cloud our moral atmosphere; to make us
+fresh and decisive, or to slowly sap our virtue! But it is a more solemn
+task to compute the influences that proceed <i>from</i> us, and to discover
+how, unknown to ourselves, we are swaying the circles of other lives.
+Why, the mightiest forces go silently. You do not see the gases that
+compose the vital air. You do not feel the aroma that steals along
+loaded with poison, or wafts a blessing through the sick man's window.
+You do not hear the electric pulse that beats in the summer light and in
+the drop of dew. Neither can you estimate the mysterious attraction that
+plays all through this network of social relations, nor the energy of
+good or of evil with which it is charged not merely from your words and
+deeds, but from the still reservoir of your example.</p>
+
+<p>When I look around at the prevalent vices of the city, then, and at its
+various forms of corruption, I am not willing to rest with the mere
+assertion, that all this is the fruit of per<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span>sonal sin and folly on the
+part of those who have yielded to temptation. It <i>is</i> the fruit of
+personal sin and folly. And we, perhaps, in our serene respectabilities,
+shrink back and wonder at it. It <i>is</i> strange&mdash;is it not?&mdash;that the
+young, the fair, the gifted, should yield themselves to that arch-deceit
+which has allured and ruined men for six thousand years? Is it not the
+same old guilt, the same sophistry and foolishness, here in New York,
+that it always has been? Did it not bear the same Circean cup through
+the halls of Nineveh and Babylon, and fling C&aelig;sars and Alexanders to the
+ground? Did it not wear the same seductive smile and harlot tinsel when
+it walked the streets of Tyre, and reclined in the decorated chambers of
+Egypt? And will not its votaries find now, as then, that it entices with
+the embrace of death and the fascination of hell? Why should they thus
+float upon the very rim of this great whirlpool, and not notice the
+groans that come up from its depths; and see that its phosphoric
+illusion is mixed with fiery flakes of torment and the foam of despair?
+It is indeed wonderful that so many <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span>should be thus deluded over and
+over again; so many noble energies thrown away, so many sanctions
+trampled upon, so many bright hopes quenched for ever. It is wonderful
+that any being made in the form of man, should cast down his
+prerogatives and wallow like the beast. Sufficient evidence of sin and
+folly in those who do this, to be sure; but in what way do these
+allurements present themselves? What are the resources and entrenchments
+of these vices, by which they act upon human appetite and passion? You
+point me to brilliant windows and gay apartments; to sparkling glasses,
+and shining heaps, and shapes of painted shame. "These," you say, "are
+the forms which the Tempter assumes. Under smiling features and fair
+garlands, he hides at first that hideousness which in due time is
+revealed to his victims. From the lighted vestibules which open so
+easily to the touch, and where all seems only a coronation of youthful
+pleasure and natural joy, the feet of men slide downward into those
+abysses which are hidden from the public gaze, and over whose depths the
+blackness of darkness broods." And <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span>all this, again, is true. These are
+the ways in which the Tempter works. But is there nothing but this to
+explain the power which evil has upon men, in the midst of the great
+city? These manifold allurements, these haunts of infamy and shambles of
+destruction&mdash;I see them standing upon strange foundations. I see them
+propped by these very influences to which I have alluded; influences of
+social condition and individual example. They would not be so
+formidable, they would not stand so long, were it not that
+respectability in its daily walk and conversation; and social culture in
+thousands of homes; and even justice in its lofty seat; lend them
+support. "He that is not with me is against me," said Jesus; and, taking
+this proverb as a rule, a good many people may be surprised to find
+that, in one way and another, they are <i>Allies</i> of the Tempter.</p>
+
+<p>The allies of the Tempter, I propose to speak of now&mdash;not the forms of
+Temptation, which I have already illustrated. Nor do I intend to dwell
+upon those <i>direct</i> conditions of moral evil, out of which vice and
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span>crime grow as spontaneously as weeds out of a damp and neglected
+soil&mdash;those wide seed fields of <i>ignorance</i> and abject <i>poverty</i> which
+lie around us. But the more remote and indirect causes it may be
+profitable for us to consider; and to these I now proceed.</p>
+
+<p>I observe, then, in the first place, that the Tempter has one Ally in
+<i>Public Sanction</i>. There are sources of vice and crime that are
+permitted and encouraged by <i>Law</i>. I hardly need specify the prominent
+instance to which I allude. But I am not aware of a more enormous public
+inconsistency than what is termed "the License System"&mdash;the system of
+permitting the sale of intoxicating drinks in a degree, and of
+restricting them in a degree. For, by this method, either a moral wrong
+is committed, or else a civil one. If these drinks are an individual and
+public injury; if they distribute the seeds of disease, crime, death,
+and every form of social misery; then what right have we in any respect
+to set upon them the solemn sanction of a Law? If, on the other hand,
+they are a benefit to mankind; a good gift of Provi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span>dence, as some seem
+to think; why should we hamper their circulation? Why should we allow
+one man the privilege of distributing such a blessing, and forbid
+another who, no doubt, is equally zealous for the public good?</p>
+
+<p>But this very system is a confession by public opinion, in its most
+authentic form of expression, that the sale of intoxicating drinks is an
+evil. "Only," we are told, "as it is a prevalent and deep-seated evil,
+it must be <i>regulated</i>." But how can we regulate an irregularity? How
+can you regulate an obstruction that is involved with the springs of a
+machine, or the works of a clock? The only possible method obvious to
+common sense, would be to remove the obstruction; and it would be
+thought the most foolish speculation conceivable for one to spend his
+ingenuity in contriving some way to keep the obstruction where it is,
+and yet to keep the clock going as it ought. If it moved regularly, the
+matter referred to would not be an obstruction; and if it did not, the
+contrivance to keep it there would <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span>be a help to the obstruction. Now, I
+consider this great vice of Intemperance a decided obstruction in the
+clock-work of an individual man, or the more general mechanism of
+society. It transforms a great many faces into bad dial-plates, disturbs
+the pendulum of public order, makes people go much too fast, and renders
+them liable to strike at all times. Now, if a man, or a community, can
+be made to go just as well with it as without it, we certainly need no
+legislation, for there <i>is</i> no obstruction. On the other hand, if it is
+essentially an irregularity, the only rational method is to get rid of
+its accessories altogether. To enact some way in which the irregularity
+shall work, is to confirm and sanction the irregularity. And the
+license-system&mdash;for I wish to be plain and specific here&mdash;confirms and
+sanctions the agents of intemperance. It indicates a way in which the
+irregularity may work.</p>
+
+<p>And not only is vice thus aided by the Law. The existence of such a
+sanction engenders either an error or a moral wrong. For it indicates
+that the sale of intoxicating drinks is <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span>a public benefit, which is
+false; or, on the other hand, that it is lawful to uphold an evil. The
+same principle carried out by individuals, would excuse almost any
+fault. The man who steals a loaf of bread may contend that it is a
+necessary expedient; and he who fills an empty purse at his neighbor's
+expense, only endeavors to regulate an irregularity.</p>
+
+<p>But suppose we make the system a strict one, what process should be
+employed? Probably you would say&mdash;"break up all these filthy and low
+haunts; all these places where the habitually intemperate, the degraded,
+the wretchedly poor congregate; and let these beverages be sold only in
+respectable places and to respectable people." But is this really the
+best plan? On the contrary, it seems quite reasonable to maintain that
+it is better to sell to the intemperate than to the sober&mdash;to the
+degraded than to the respectable&mdash;for the same reason that it is better
+to burn up an old hulk than to set fire to a new and splendid ship. I
+think it worse to put the first glass to a young man's lips, than to
+crown with madness an old drunkard's life-long alienation&mdash;worse to wake
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span>the fierce appetite in the depths of a generous and promising nature,
+than to take the carrion of a man, a mere shell of imbecility, and soak
+it in a fresh debauch. Therefore, if I were going to say where the
+License should be granted in order to show its efficacy, I would
+say&mdash;take the worst sinks of intemperance in the city, give them the
+sanction of the Law, and let them run to overflowing. But shut up the
+gilded apartments where youth takes its first draught, and
+respectability just begins to falter from its level. Close the ample
+doors through which enters the long train of those who stumble to
+destruction and reel into quick graves, and let the flood overwhelm only
+the maimed and battered conscripts that remain. Besides, it is better to
+see vice as it really is, than as it sometimes appears. The danger of
+intemperance is when it assumes this very garb of respectability, and
+sits in the radiant circle of fashion attended by wit and beauty and
+social delight. Let us see the Tempter, not as he seems when he throws
+out his earliest lures, in festal garments and with roses around his
+brow; but as he looks when fairly engaged <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span>in his work, showing his
+genuine expression. Let us see this vice of intemperance in its
+<i>results</i>, as they teem and darken here in the midst of our city life.
+Lay bare its channel&mdash;let us see to its very depths&mdash;where it flows over
+the wrecks of human happiness, and over dead men's bones. Lay bare its
+festering heaps of disease, its madness, its despair, its domestic
+desolation, its reckless sweep over all order and sanctity; and thus,
+tracing it from its sources under glittering chandeliers and in fonts of
+crystal, we shall be able to say&mdash;"this is the real element which exists
+and does its work, by public connivance and with the sanction of Law!"</p>
+
+<p>If you ask me then, whether I think that a statute of absolute
+prohibition would stop this flowing curse, I reply that at least it
+would put the influence of authority on the right side. It would lend it
+the force of consistent endeavor. As it is, it would be far better if
+the public sanction had no expression; for now it only confirms and
+guarantees the evil. Its power is exerted not in the right, but in the
+wrong direction. It is an ally of the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span>tempter. For the spirit of
+everlasting Justice and Benevolence, speaking as it were by the mouth of
+Jesus, says&mdash;"He that is not with me is against me."</p>
+
+<p>But I observe, in the second place, that the forces of temptation in the
+city are nourished by <i>public neglect</i>. In individual experience it will
+be found, I think, that sins of <i>omission</i> are more numerous and are
+worse than sins of <i>commission</i>. If we examine our lives closely, we
+shall discover that our moral indebtedness comes even less from what we
+have done, than from what we ought to have done. And this individual
+experience has a counterpart in social conditions. How many evils among
+us grow up under the shadow of inoperative laws&mdash;laws which have a voice
+and nothing else&mdash;nay, hardly a voice, so seldom are they heard even to
+speak. They appear to have been enacted merely as a compliment to
+decency, and they remain in the statute-book as "idle as painted ships
+upon a painted ocean." The dens of debauch keep open doors night and
+day; the saloons of profligacy send out their cards of invitation; the
+gambler rattles his <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span>triumphant dice; but excursive policemen never see,
+and vigilant magistrates never hear! Some provision of nature has
+imparted a very singular quality to the optic powers of the one, and the
+auditory nerves of the other. The laws against this vice, or that
+custom, stand fixed and silent; and as for putting them in operation,
+one would as soon think of pulling up so many grave-stones. They <i>are</i>
+the grave-stones of a dead public sentiment&mdash;the stumbling-blocks of a
+blind justice, that too often shakes hands with the very guilt which it
+professes to condemn. I do not, by any means, believe that everything is
+to be accomplished by law. I do not believe that the profoundest results
+are to be accomplished by it. But, if it possesses any efficacy at all,
+it consists in its power to repress open and shameless wrong; and where
+any such wrong <i>is</i> open and shameless, public neglect is the cause, and
+such public neglect, therefore, is an Ally of the Tempter. And let us
+consider the enormity of such evils. In every great city there are some
+omissions of executive duty, which, though grievous to be borne, are
+noticed with good humor. But <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span>there are moral swamps, sending up their
+foul steam to pollute the common light; there are kennels of
+uncleanness, running with the waste of human lives, sweeping along with
+the death-gurgle of human souls; there is a dry-rot of impurity
+infecting the town-air, withering the dearest sanctities of society and
+of home&mdash;and over this kind of evil we cannot be facetious. Think how
+much is risked here, and how much is lost! Domestic happiness,
+reputation, honor, health, order, the prospects of the young, the peace
+of the old&mdash;Fathers, the hopes of your sons! Mothers, the interests of
+your daughters! and, though speaking may have little effect, say whether
+we ought not to speak, and to speak indignantly, of the neglect which
+lets these evils spread with deadly luxuriance, and winks at them as
+though they were harmless?</p>
+
+<p>But, my friends, what do we mean by "public sanction," or "public
+neglect?" There are some convenient synonyms which help us to cover up
+our personal responsibility&mdash;help us to transfer our own sense of duty
+to a vague secondary agent, and keep peace with <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span>our own consciences.
+And yet they are only <i>synonyms</i>, after all. Now this term "public" is
+but another word for the aggregate of our personal obligations, and does
+not for a single moment rid us of our share in the general influence.
+The real point of my present topic is this&mdash;you and I and every other
+individual involved in this network of social relations, are helping or
+weakening the force of these prevalent evils. And it may arouse us to
+some decision of conduct to consider how the most respectable&mdash;those who
+would shrink with horror from these foul customs&mdash;are, nevertheless,
+Allies of the Tempter. And I might state, as a comprehensive
+proposition, that every man <i>is</i> an Ally of the Tempter, who does not
+put forth a conscious and positive moral energy; who does not habitually
+throw his example and his influence in the right direction. It is not
+enough that he abstains from wrong himself&mdash;that he is chaste, and
+temperate, and upright, and unimpeached. For perhaps the most hopeless
+people, morally speaking, are those people who, according to their own
+confession, "have never done any <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span>harm." There is a good prospect for
+those who are trying to grow better, however they may slip and flounder.
+There is hope, on the other hand, for the desperately wicked&mdash;for the
+very violence of one extreme precipitates the other; and sometimes the
+best and purest souls have been swept by a thunder-shower of sin. But
+those who rest upon the fact that they "have never done any harm," by
+being so easily contented show but little moral vitality. There is no
+aspiration in their natures. They seem to have no particular mission in
+the universe; for, if they have never done any harm, they have done
+little else. They are poorly fitted for this earth, which demands the
+effort of all our faculties; poorly fitted for heaven, whose inhabitants
+would not make <a name="Page_173t" id="Page_173t"></a><a href="#Page_173tn">harmlessness</a> their chief characteristic. Their residence
+and their paradise might be a great exhausted receiver, where there is
+no gravitation to draw them down, and no air to send them up. But, in
+truth, these people deceive themselves. Every man exerts a <i>positive</i>
+influence, and cannot, if he would, be a mere negation in the world. In
+the great con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span>flict of good and evil there is no middle ground. There
+are no compromises in God's government, and neutral men are the devil's
+allies. "He that is not with me, is against me."</p>
+
+<p>Let us see, then, how possible it is that <i>we</i> may contribute to the
+force of evil in the City. In other words, let us inquire&mdash;in what way
+do respectable and harmless people, as they deem themselves, become
+Allies of the Tempter?</p>
+
+<p>In the first place, by their <i>customs</i>. And, chief of all, by the custom
+of an intense and inconsiderate selfishness. How many there are who
+require no other sanction for what they do than "that pleases me," or
+"this gratifies me!" It is wonderful what a mighty agent <i>self</i> is,
+estimated by its own standards. It is the hero of every exploit, the
+centre of every event, and the oracle of all opinions. It interprets the
+purpose of the universe; it finds out exactly what the world was made
+for. At least, a good many, apparently, have ascertained that the world
+was made for them, and that they were sent into it to get what
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span>gratification they can. And it appears sadly out of tune to them, if it
+does not serve this end. In anything they do, therefore, they consider
+only selfish consequences. They do not apprehend the universe in its
+great harmony. They do not trace out its web of mutual relations&mdash;a
+braid of light held in the hand of Infinite Love. They do not know the
+sympathy that shoots in the crystal, and shimmers in the aurora, and
+beats in the heart of the ocean, and makes the silent music that rolls
+from sphere to sphere along the glittering scale of heaven. If they did,
+they would discover, perhaps, that the social world is constructed upon
+the same plan; and man cannot be an alien from the common humanity
+however hard he may try. Yes: concerning any custom, you have not only
+yourself to consider, but the bearings of its influence throughout this
+tissue of hearts and minds with which you are involved. You cannot
+isolate yourself from your responsibilities. You cannot shut yourself
+within comfortable walls, and say&mdash;"Here is the limit of my obligations,
+and here I will do as I please!" You may <i>say</i> this, but <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span>you do not rid
+yourself of these claims. Through imperceptible aqueducts your influence
+runs abroad; and what you do, and what you are, contributes particles of
+disease or health to the social atmosphere that envelopes all. I look
+around, then, upon the vices and even the crimes of the City, and I say
+that some of them find root in the customs of the respectable and the
+fashionable. Profligacy, which we shrink from in its open profession,
+and which appears abominable in its avowed haunts, finds encouragement
+wherever the libertine receives the smile of beauty, and the guilt of
+the meanest sort of a man is excused on account of an agreeable manner.
+Thus the poison of the snake, and the blight of his venom on many a
+reputation and many a womanly heart, is all forgotten in the
+drawing-room, because of the fascination of his hiss and the glitter of
+his skin. Again, the Tempter has an Ally in the world of Traffic,
+wherever bad things are stamped with respectable names&mdash;when, for
+instance, swindling is called "smartness," and robbery "per-centage."
+Among people of less note in the world these <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span>matters are named
+"cheating" and "stealing," and some of them may take punishment the more
+reluctantly because they cannot perceive the difference. And, still
+again, I think that a little use of intoxicating drinks is like the
+little matter that kindles a great fire, and that there would not be so
+much intemperance if there were not so many "temperate" drinkers. The
+sluices of the grog-shop are fed from the wine-glasses in the parlor;
+and there is a lineal descent from the gentleman who hiccups at his
+elegant dinner-table to the sot who makes a bed of the gutter.</p>
+
+<p>"Am I my brother's keeper?" asked the first man who reddened his hands
+with the violated life of a man; and the answer came crying upward in a
+voice of blood from the ground. "Am I my brother's keeper?" <i>you</i> ask,
+perhaps, with a tone of surprise or scorn. <i>You</i> ask O! respectable
+gentleman or lady; O! man in the thick of business; O! self-indulgent
+Epicurean;&mdash;and the answer comes to you not from the ground merely, but
+from the universal air&mdash;the answer of kindred pulses, of confluent
+sympathies, of an insepara<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span>ble humanity&mdash;though it swarms in rags, and
+riots in shame, and seems far off from you in its hell of debasement and
+despair. Nay, perhaps the answer comes very <i>near</i> to you. It may come
+from some one of your own household. You may ask&mdash;"Who has tempted even
+my very child?" Ask <i>Yourself</i>&mdash;"Need he have gone outside this very
+door to find temptation?" Ah! perhaps you are not merely an Ally of the
+Tempter, but have furnished conscripts for his vast army. Your children
+perhaps will rise up and call you&mdash;<i>not</i> "blessed." And see, too, what
+kind of conscripts the Tempter draws from the ranks of respectable and
+especially of fashionable life. Mere striplings, so dwarfed and dwindled
+by precocious dissipation that they look like feeble specimens of
+wax-work; whose faculties&mdash;the evident product of a thin soil&mdash;have been
+developed by bottles of wine and fast horses; whose memories are too
+short to remember their parents; whose ideas are too artificial to touch
+any genuine spring of nature; who are ashamed of true manliness, and
+make a miserable farce of what they <i>call</i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span> "manliness;" and who, as
+they parade the streets, make up a sort of bombastic interlude in the
+drama of "Young America."</p>
+
+<p>But, whatever view we may take of this general subject, it is evident
+that we cannot easily exaggerate the influence of "respectable and
+fashionable" customs upon the forces of temptation. And, surely, it
+becomes each of us to consider the tendencies of his own example, and
+ask&mdash;"Is it toward the right or the wrong? Is it for, or against the
+good?"</p>
+
+<p>Again, the Tempter finds help from our <i>indifference</i>. This, indeed, may
+be the qualification which should be applied to the remarks I have just
+made. It is not to be supposed that the evil influences which go out
+from the customs alluded to, are the results of <i>intention</i>. They spring
+up in a lack of interest and of the consciousness of duty. They grow
+rank and luxuriant in neglect. If we were only in earnest as to these
+vices and crimes and guilty customs; if we would only wake from our
+apathy, to reflection and conviction; how soon would they diminish, and
+how many of them would pass away!</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>But, as comprehensive of this, and in fact all the rest that may be
+said, I observe, finally, that the temptations of a great city are
+strong because of a lack of the spirit of <i>Christian love</i>. In one
+respect, especially, is it true that men in general are not <i>with</i>
+Jesus, and therefore are against him. They have not his sympathies, his
+spirit of self-sacrifice, his broad, deep, universal charity. Baneful
+customs, and cold indifferentism grow up in a soil that is watered by no
+living and unselfish love. They show the dryness and the baseness of our
+social state. And it is not merely in the lack of active and practical
+love that the Tempter grows strong; but in the exercise of a prevalent
+<i>uncharitableness</i>. Too many of us have no disposition but scorn for the
+fallen; see no blessed possibilities in them; do not detect any divine
+ray glimmering in the thick darkness&mdash;do not discern the precious soul,
+like a crown-jewel, in its filthy and battered casket. And if this
+paralyzes and kills the springs of our own activity, need I say how the
+hearts of the offending are repelled and hardened in such a hostile
+atmosphere? Need I say how <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span>desperate is the Ishmaelitish conviction;
+the sense of isolation and antagonism; and, on the other hand, how
+powerful and healing, even for the most distant and hopeless, is the
+sweet attraction of sympathy? And what are we, that we dare to cherish
+this exclusive horror, this pitiless, unrelenting scorn? When we
+consider our own slips, compared with our temptations; the account to
+which God may hold us, not the smooth standards of human respectability;
+how much higher is our own moral level, that we feel no chords of a
+common humanity reaching down even to those fallen ones, and cannot
+stoop to touch them? My friends, it may be, after all, that the Tempter
+has no surer ally than the averted face of contempt and the word of
+unsoftened rebuke, driving the barb of conscious guilt deeper and
+despairingly into a brother's soul.</p>
+
+<p>And, as I look upon this mass of social evil, these steaming wells of
+passion, these solid fortifications of habit where the Tempter is
+entrenched, I ask how is all this to pass away? And the answer is&mdash;only
+by the spirit of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span> Christian Love, sweeping these impediments of
+selfishness from the heart, and animating us to effort. <i>With</i> Christ
+the work certainly can be done. In this Gospel-beating amidst the guilt
+and sorrow of the world like the pulsations of a Divine heart&mdash;in the
+few leaves of this Testament&mdash;there is an illimitable power, before
+whose inspiration in the purposes and deeds of men no evil thing shall
+stand. And the spirit and exercise of this Love <i>is</i> Religion. It is the
+up-shot of all that is preached&mdash;it is the open and tangible test of
+every mystic experience that drifts through the soul&mdash;it is so deep, so
+broad, and runs so far, that it comprehends all requirements; and they
+who cherish it, and practice it in the low and dark and desolate places
+of the world, are the true saints. Nothing else will do in its place.
+Not Churches, nor creeds, nor rituals, nor respectabilities. Without it
+we are not friends of Christ, nor co-workers with God. Without it we
+deepen the channels of human woe, and prop the strong-holds of
+wickedness. Without it, whatever we may not be, we are Allies of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>the
+Tempter. The Saviour says to each of us to-day, placed amidst these
+antagonistic forces of Life&mdash;"He that is not with me is against me."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span></p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span></p>
+<h2>THE CHILDREN OF THE POOR.</h2>
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span></p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="THE_CHILDREN_OF_THE_POOR" id="THE_CHILDREN_OF_THE_POOR"></a><a name="DISCOURSE_VII" id="DISCOURSE_VII"></a>DISCOURSE VII.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE CHILDREN OF THE POOR.</h3>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center">The young children ask bread, and no man breaketh it unto
+them.&mdash;<span class="smcap">Lamentations</span> iv., 4.</p></div>
+
+
+<p>The writer of these words bewailed a state of War and Captivity&mdash;a state
+of things in which the great relations of human life are broken up and
+desecrated. But it is strange to find that the most flourishing forms of
+civilization involve conditions very similar to this. For, if any man
+will push beyond the circle of his daily associations, and enter the
+regions of the abject poor, he will see how the hostile forces of
+privation, and hunger, and unguided impulse, have laid waste the
+sanctities of existence in the abodes and in the breasts of thousands as
+with sword and with fire. There <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span>is no essential difference in
+starvation, whether it ensues from the ravages of an invading host or
+from the lack of means. Temptation is a fierce legion; and death looks
+no more terrible under a Babylonian helmet, than it does upon the gaunt
+faces of men who die upon the bare floor or wallow in rags. The worst
+calamity <i>in</i> a calamity&mdash;if I may use such an expression&mdash;the most
+deplorable thing in any of the great evils of life, occurs when the
+selfish instinct within us is aroused, by want or terror, to such a
+degree that it overwhelms all social limitations, absorbs every
+sympathy, and leaves nothing but an intense individualism. This is the
+result in a sudden shock of danger, when the alarmed instinct is the
+first that starts to the summons. Sometimes, in protracted peril, it
+grows into an actual delirium of selfishness, and drowns even the sense
+of fear&mdash;as men amidst the horrors of a shipwreck will commit the most
+brutal excesses, and even rob the dying. And thus, in the desolation of
+Jerusalem as described by Jeremiah, the very yearnings of maternity were
+swallowed up by this fierce instinct.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"The hands of tender-hearted women cooked their own children;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">They were their food, in the destruction of the daughter of my people."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>And results as bad as this appear in the conditions of poverty,
+suffering, and social degradation. Every fine chord of human nature is
+seared, sodden, torn from its sockets, in the darkness of the moral
+faculties and by the pressure of animal wants. The poor man is conscious
+of nothing but privation and suffering. He gazes at the power and
+discipline and pomp of society all about him, not as an ally but as a
+captive, or as a savage foe. The whole wears the aspect of a besieging
+army, and the Ishmaelitish feeling predominates. In the midst of the
+City he becomes an Arab of the desert, a robber of the rock. Now, it
+makes little difference whether the circle is wider or narrower, whether
+the siege is a moral or a literal one, whether the agent is the sword or
+the condition of society. The essential results will be the same. The
+civilization of New York may and does hem in a desolation as fearful in
+kind as that of Jeru<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span>salem, and involves sufferings as keen, and wakes
+up instincts as fiercely selfish. And one whose sympathies with the wide
+humanity are as fresh and clear as the Prophet's were with the woes of
+his people, might draw closer within these various circles of prosperity
+and refinement and activity, that lend such attractiveness to the great
+city&mdash;this magnificent girdle of commerce, embossed with the symbols of
+all nations&mdash;these arteries of traffic, filled with circulating wealth
+and power&mdash;these groups of fashion and of beauty, whose cheapest jewels
+would open the kingdom of heaven to ten thousand souls; he might pass
+within all these bands of "civilization," and in some alley, or "Five
+Points," sit down and weep for the calamity of his brethren. He would
+behold there War and Captivity enough to fill an entire volume of
+Lamentations. Captivity! were men ever bound by a darker chain, or
+trampled by a harder heel, than those victims of destitution and of
+their own passions? War! did the Jew behold any hosts more terrible
+pressing into Jerusalem, than you and I might see if we looked about us?
+The <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span>entrenched filth that all day long sends its steaming rot through
+lane and dwelling, through bone and marrow, and saps away the life. Cold
+that encamps itself in the empty fire-place, and blows through the
+broken door, and paralyzes the naked limbs. Hunger that takes the strong
+man by the throat, and kills the infant in its mother's arms. And still
+another traitorous legion that, equipped with the fascinations of the
+bottle and the shamelessness of harlotry, appeals to the passions of the
+brutal and proffers comfort to the hearts of the sad. War and Captivity
+in the midst of peace and refinement&mdash;is it not, my friends? And, with
+all this, may we not expect that fierce instinct of selfishness which
+overwhelms every other impulse, and breaks out in crime? Ah! and do we
+not discover a counterpart to that saddest feature of all in such
+circumstances&mdash;a desecration even of the parental instinct? Fathers,
+beating their sons into the career of guilt; and mothers&mdash;worse than
+those who made horrid food of their own children&mdash;offering their
+daughters to the Moloch of lust in the shape of some "gentlemanly"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span>
+devil with a portable hell in his own breast!</p>
+
+<p>And it seems to me that if one with a prophet vision and a prophet
+heart, widened to the compass of humanity, should thus go into these
+waste places, nothing would affect him more; nothing would strike a
+deeper and tenderer chord in his bosom; than the condition of these
+little ones amidst the siege and terror. And, comprehending all their
+need&mdash;their moral as well as their physical destitution&mdash;he might
+exclaim, as describing the most pitiable spectacle of all&mdash;"The young
+children ask bread, and no man breaketh it unto them."</p>
+
+<p>And I think that every one of you who has reflected at all upon this
+subject, must feel that, of all the conditions of Humanity in the darker
+regions of the City, there is none more sorrowful, more momentous, and
+at the same time more hopeful, than the condition of the Children of the
+Poor. And I do not call your attention to this subject to-night with the
+expectation of proclaiming any fresh doctrine, or offering any novel
+suggestion, but because in a series of discourses like the present I
+can<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span>not consistently pass by such a prominent phase; and more especially
+because I wish to push the old truth from your heads into your hearts,
+so that you may be excited to immediate and practical action.</p>
+
+<p>I purpose then, in regard to the Children of the Poor, to maintain one
+or two <i>principles</i>, to state a few <i>facts</i>, and to consider some
+<i>remedies</i>; and these will constitute the divisions of my discourse.</p>
+
+<p>In the first place then, I lay down a general principle which divides
+itself into two specific principles. I maintain that we are under
+peculiar obligations in regard to children. Of all our duties, except
+those which we owe directly to God&mdash;of all the ways in which we are
+required to <i>show</i> our duty to God&mdash;I know of none more peremptory than
+this. It is the obligation of an instinct that appears everywhere; that
+swells in the breasts of the rudest people; that mingles with the most
+tender and beautiful and sacred associations of human life.</p>
+
+<p>Childhood and Children! is there any heart so sheathed in worldliness,
+or benumbed by sorrow, or hardened in its very nature, as to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span>feel no
+gentle thrill responding to these terms? Surely, in some way these
+little ones have "touched the finer issues" of our being, and given us
+an unconscious benediction. Some of you are Mothers, and have acquired
+the holiest laws of duty, the sweetest solicitudes, the noblest
+inspirations, in the orbit of a child's life. And, however wide the
+circle of its wandering, you have held it still, by some tether of the
+heart, bound to the centre of a fathomless and unforgetting love. Some
+of you are Fathers, and in the opening promise of your sons have built
+fresh plans and enjoyed young hopes, and even in the decline of life
+have walked its morning paths anew. Many of us have felt our first great
+sorrow, and the breaking up of the spiritual deep within us, by the
+couch of a dead child. Clasping the little lifeless hand, we have
+comprehended, as never before, the <i>reality</i> of death, and through the
+gloom, covering all the world about us, have caught sudden glimpses of
+the immortal fields. And, all of us, I trust, are thankful that God has
+not created merely men and women, crimped into artificial patterns, with
+selfish <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span>speculation in their eyes, with sadness and weariness and
+trouble about many things carving the wrinkles and stealing away the
+bloom; but pours in upon us a fresh stream of being that overflows our
+rigid conventionalisms with the buoyancy of nature, plays into this
+dusty and angular life like the jets of a fountain, like floods of
+sunshine, upsets our miserable dignity, meets us with a love that
+contains no deceit, a frankness that rebukes our quibbling compliments,
+nourishes the poetry of the soul, and, perpetually descending from the
+threshold of the Infinite, keeps open an arch-way of <a name="Page_195t" id="Page_195t"></a><a href="#Page_195tn">mystery</a> and heaven.</p>
+
+<p>And now, just consider what a child <i>is</i>&mdash;this being thus fresh from the
+unknown realm, tender, plastic, dependent; a bud enfolding the boundless
+possibilities of humanity, and growing rank, running to waste, or
+opening in beauty, as you turn, neglect, or support it&mdash;just consider
+what a child is; and he must be far gone in indifference or depravity,
+who does not recognize the specific duty growing out of a general
+obligation which is forced upon us by the intrinsic claims of that
+child's nature.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span> If we were appealed to by nothing else but its drooping
+reliance and natural wants, there would be enough to draw our attention
+to every phase of childhood that comes within our sphere.</p>
+
+<p>But our purpose this evening calls us away from these brighter images of
+childhood, to consider those who are surrounded with the most savage
+aspects and the worst influences of the world. And, beside the absolute
+duty which is imposed upon us by their natural position, I observe that
+the Children of the Poor create an appeal to <i>prudential</i>
+considerations. They form a large proportion of those groups known in
+every city as "The <i>Dangerous</i> Classes." For they will be developed
+somehow. If they receive not that attention which is demanded by their
+position; if they are left to darkness and neglect; still, it is no mere
+mass of negative existence that they constitute. There is vitality there
+and positive strength, in those lanes and cellars, put forth for evil if
+not drawn towards the good. We must not confound ignorance with torpor
+of spirit or bluntness of understanding. One of <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span>the most remarkable
+characteristics of vagrant children is a keen, precocious intellect. A
+boy of seven in the streets of a city is more developed in this respect
+than one of fourteen in the country&mdash;a development, of course, which is
+easily accounted for by the antagonisms with which the child has had to
+contend, and the devices which have been inspired by the sheer pressure
+of want. He has been pitched into the sea of events to sink or swim, and
+those sharpened faculties are the tentacles put forth by an effort of
+nature in order to secure a hold of life. And there is something very
+sad and very fearful in this precocity. The vagrant boy has known
+nothing of the stages of childhood, conducting with beautiful simplicity
+from one timid step to another, and gradually forming it for the
+realities of the world. But the neglected infant has wilted into the
+premature man, with his old cunning look, blending so fantastically, so
+mournfully, with the unformed features of youth. Knowing the world on
+its worst side&mdash;knowing its hostility, its knavery, its foulness, its
+heartless materialism&mdash;knowing it as the man does not <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span>know it who has
+only breathed the country air, and looked upon the open face of nature.
+Is it not very sad, my friends, that the vagrant boy <i>should</i> know so
+much; and, without one hour of romance, one step of childish innocence
+and imagination, should have gone clear through "the world" which so
+many boast that they understand&mdash;the knave's world, the libertine's
+world, the world of the skeptical, scoffing, Ishmaelitish spirit? And
+yet he has so little <i>real</i> knowledge&mdash;there is such a cloud of
+ignorance and moral stupor resting upon his brain and heart! So much of
+him is merely animal, foxy, wolfish, and this sharpened intellect only a
+faculty, an instinct, a preternatural organ pushed out to gain
+subsistence with. It is a terrible anomaly, and yet, I say, it is none
+the less an active power, and shows us that, however neglected, the
+child of the abject poor is not dormant or undeveloped. In the first
+place, very likely, it has developed itself into a dogged atheism&mdash;a
+sulky unbelief. The brain of the vagrant boy is active with speculation
+as well as with practice&mdash;he has some theory of this life in which he
+lives, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span>and, as might be expected, a theory woven with the tissues of
+his own experience; woven with the shadows and the lurid lights of his
+lot. A gentleman passing one day through the streets of Edinboro', saw a
+boy, who lived by selling fire-wood, standing with a heavy load upon his
+back, looking at a number of boys amusing themselves in a play-ground.
+"Sometimes," says the writer, "he laughed aloud, at other times he
+looked sad and sorrowful. Stepping up to him I said&mdash;'Well, my boy, you
+seem to enjoy the fun very much; but why don't you lay down your load of
+sticks?'... 'I wan't thinking about the burden&mdash;I wan't thinking about
+the sticks, sir.' 'And may I ask what you were thinking about?' 'Oh, I
+was just thinking about what the good missionary said the other day. You
+know, sir, I don't go to church, for I have no clothes; but one of the
+missionaries comes every week to our stair, and holds a meeting. He was
+preaching to us last week, and among other things he said&mdash;"Although
+there are rich folks and poor folks in this world, yet we are all
+brothers." Now, sir, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span>just look at these lads&mdash;every one of them has
+fine jackets, fine caps, with warm shoes and stockings, but I have
+none;&mdash;So I was just thinking if those were my brothers, it doesn't look
+like it, sir&mdash;it doesn't look like it. See, sir, they are all flying
+kites, while I am flying in rags&mdash;they are running about at kick-ball
+and cricket; but I must climb the long, long stairs, with a heavy load,
+and an empty stomach, whilst my back is like to break. It doesn't look
+like it, sir&mdash;it doesn't look like it.'" Or, take the following
+instance, which I extract from the Records of one of the Benevolent
+Societies of our own city: "Can you read or write? said the visitor to a
+poor boy. Marty hung his head. I repeated the question two or three
+times before he answered, and the tears dropped on his hands, as he
+said, despairingly, and I thought defiantly&mdash;'No, sir, I can't read nor
+write neither. God don't want me to read, sir. Indeed, so it looks
+likely. Didn't He take away my father since before I can remember him?
+And haven't I been working all the time to fetch in something to eat,
+and for the fire, and for clothes?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span> I went out to pick coal when I could
+take a basket in my arms&mdash;and I have had no chance for school since.'"
+Now this is fallacious and dangerous reasoning, my friends;
+<a name="Page_201t" id="Page_201t"></a><a href="#Page_201tn">nevertheless</a>, it <i>is</i> reasoning, and shows that the mind of the poor boy
+is not inactive as to the problems of life. And the intellect which is
+so acute in theory will soon drive to practice. Stimulated by that
+selfish instinct which, as I have shown, will under pressure absorb
+every other consideration, he speedily commences the career of <i>crime</i>.
+And have you ever looked into this matter of crime? Or do you know it
+only as a monstrous fact in the social mechanism, and in the records of
+human nature? If so, it would be well for us to consider the way in
+which it appears to the violator of right&mdash;the way in which things look
+to him who works <i>inside</i> the web of guilt. And we may be sure that it
+does not look to him as it does to us from the midst of respectabilities
+and comforts, or from a high intellectual and moral stand-point. Now I
+am not going to justify crime, or to indulge any sentiment upon the
+subject. But, really, one of the most practi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span>cal questions that can be
+asked is&mdash;"<i>Why</i> is this one, or that one, a criminal?" Do I say that
+the guilt should be imputed to the condition&mdash;that it is all owing to
+circumstances? No: but I <i>do</i> say that, in nine cases out of ten, crime
+is no proof of <i>special</i> depravity apart from <i>general</i> depravity, and
+that the circumstances have just so much weight as this&mdash;that put you or
+me in those same circumstances, in nine cases out of ten, we should be
+criminals too. In the same circumstances, my friends; and this involves
+a great deal. It involves an hereditary taint stamped in the very mould
+of birth; it involves physical misery; it involves intellectual and
+moral destitution; it involves the worst kind of social influence; it
+involves the pressure of all the natural appetites, rioting in this need
+of the body and this darkness of the soul. And it implies no suspicion
+of a man's moral standard&mdash;it is no insult to his self-respect&mdash;to tell
+him that, under similar conditions, it is extremely probable he would
+have been a criminal too. Reasoning in an arm-chair is very proper, and
+often very accurate, but the logic of starva<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span>tion is too peremptory for
+syllogisms. There is a sort of compound made up of frost, damp, dirt and
+rags, which works double magic: it sometimes converts a thief into a
+philosopher, and sometimes a philosopher into a thief. I am not
+speaking, however, of the mere impulse of animal want, but of this
+condition where the counter-acting forces are dormant. And for this
+reason you and I can draw no immoral conclusion from the doctrine of
+circumstances. We could not be like the moral leper who infests the dark
+regions of the city&mdash;we could not be like the child of sin and shame who
+broods there&mdash;without losing our identity. In contemplating this matter,
+the feeling for ourselves should be simply one of humility and
+thankfulness. We have grown up in pure light and air, appeased with the
+comforts, and braced by at least the current morality of society. But,
+concerning those degraded ones, what some call "charity" is no more than
+"justice." It is no more than justice to say&mdash;all the conditions being
+considered&mdash;that as to a vast majority of them, crime is no proof of
+<i>special</i> depravity. It is the genuine <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span>humanity that is there&mdash;not base
+metal. It came from the common mint&mdash;somewhere you will find upon it a
+faint scar of the Divine Image&mdash;but the coin was pitched into this
+bonfire of appetite and blasphemy, and it has come out a cinder. Thus,
+proud and happy Mother, might <i>your</i> boy have been a defaced and
+distorted being, kicked, cuffed, knotted with frost, blackened with
+bruises; a pick-pocket, a wharf-rat, a panel-thief; with his intellect
+sharpened to an intense and impish cunning&mdash;only knowing that it is a
+hard world, and he must get out of it what he can. Thus, fond Father,
+might <i>your</i> daughter, whom the very winds must salute with courtesy,
+have gone through the streets at night&mdash;a painted desolation, a reeling
+shame. Do you think these were made of better texture than those who
+blacken and fester yonder? Do you think that when these last came into
+the world there was no milk in mothers' breasts for them, no Divine
+solicitude about them, no tenderness in the heart of Christ; but that
+they were the refuse, whirled into existence as the great wheel of Life
+shaped the finer mould <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span>of the respectable and the happy? I tell you
+that God made them complete souls, and stamped His Image upon them&mdash;but
+they have fallen into the dark and dreary ways; the fierce flames have
+hardened them; the foul air has tainted them; and their special
+depravity, over and above the common depravity, is the infection of
+circumstances. The young boy, the young girl, driven by necessity and
+sharpened with cunning, run into crime. They are all <i>educated</i>; for
+circumstances&mdash;not merely books&mdash;are education; but this is their
+seminary, and the alphabet is spontaneous, and the science of quick
+growth. And with the consequences of all this exposure and temptation we
+are all mixed up; and, if the claim of the child in its intrinsic
+position does not move us, <i>prudential</i> considerations should&mdash;the
+consideration of what society does suffer, and must suffer, if these
+conditions are not changed.</p>
+
+<p>Such, then, are some of the <i>principles</i> involved with my theme. Let us
+in the second place pass to consider, very briefly, a few of the
+<i>facts</i>. Briefly, because I have no <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span>time for details, and because the
+general state of the case is but too well known to you.</p>
+
+<p>It is a fact, then, that there are among us a vast number of children in
+the most miserable and perilous condition. In the year 1849, the Chief
+of Police reported the destitution and vice among this class of vagrants
+as almost "incredible." In that report he says&mdash;"The offspring of always
+careless, generally intemperate, and oftentimes dishonest parents, they
+never see the inside of a school-room, and so far as our excellent
+system of public education is concerned, it is to them a nullity." It
+appears that, at that time, in 12 wards of the city, there were 2,955 of
+these children, of whom two-thirds were females between the ages of 8
+and 16. I am informed, also, by the Chief of Police, that 100 per cent.
+should now be added to this estimate; not all attributable, of course,
+to growth in depravity, but to the increase of population, especially by
+immigration. I understand, moreover, that within the past year there
+have been ten thousand arrests, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span>and five thousand commitments of boys
+alone between the ages of 5 and 15.</p>
+
+<p>These are naked statistics, affording you an outline of the actual state
+of things. Need I paint the costume and the scenery, and describe the
+sad and awful drama in which these children play their parts? I could
+not if I would. But think of that vast amount of young life running to
+waste, sweeping through the sewers of the social fabric, an
+under-current of taint and desolation! Think of them, starved, beaten,
+driven into crime not merely by necessity, but by the very hands of
+their parents! and think of them this night, cuddling in rags, shivering
+on straw, cradled in reeking filth, drinking in blasphemy and obscenity
+and cunning policies of sin, under that dark canopy that shuts out
+social sympathy, and hides the very Face of God. And if you have, I will
+not say parental hearts, but human souls, you will ask if there ought
+not to be some remedy, and will say that all who can should help in
+administering that remedy.</p>
+
+<p>And <i>remedies</i> there appear to be, my <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span>friends. For, while I said that
+there is no condition in the city more sad and momentous than that of
+these children of the poor, I said, likewise, that there is none more
+<i>hopeful</i>. The essential and comprehensive remedy of all I indicated in
+the close of the last discourse, and shall have occasion to dwell upon
+in the next. That remedy is the practical operation of
+Christianity&mdash;first of all in our own hearts, and then flowing out in
+action. I mean especially the <i>method</i> of Jesus, which consisted not of
+mere teaching but of <i>help</i>&mdash;which touched not only the issues of the
+sin-sick soul, but the weakness and want of the body. To the demoniac,
+to the leper, to the impotent man by the pool, he brought not abstract
+truths, but words of healing and works of practical deliverance. How
+striking is the fact that the freshest and noblest charities of this
+nineteenth century are only developments of the manner in which the
+Redeemer soothed the sorrows and vanquished the evils of the world! For
+those institutions which especially excite the public interest at the
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span>present day, are those whose plan it is first to remove the children of
+the poor from those wretched and foul <i>conditions</i> upon which I have
+laid so much stress, and to lead them to a higher culture by extending,
+first, the hand of temporal relief. They aim to break up the sockets of
+custom, and to introduce the degraded child to fresh motives of action
+and fields of endeavor; to throw around him the atmosphere of a true
+home, and to blend intellectual, and moral, and religious training with
+that true charity which teaches one how to assert his own manliness, and
+support himself by the honest labor of his own hands. Now I do not wish
+to be invidious, I am glad that such a constellation of philanthropic
+promise has risen upon the dark places of the abject poor. I point with
+pleasure to what has been accomplished in the Sahara of the Five Points,
+and in what still remains to be done I discern a field broad enough to
+prevent collision and dispute&mdash;broad enough to employ the means and the
+generous energies of thousands. With equal pleasure I refer to that
+"Juvenile Asylum,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span> with its noble interposition ere the feet of the
+erring boy shall take the <i>second</i> step in crime, and which has recently
+rendered still more efficient its system of labor and relief by
+extending the benefit to girls. But as I wish this evening to
+concentrate your sympathies, I call your attention especially to the
+institution known as "The Children's Aid Society," the general character
+and the practical results of which I will briefly state. Its main object
+is sufficiently indicated by its name. Its machinery is simple, and acts
+upon the principle just laid down. It seeks first to remove the poor
+child from the coil of evil influences which have been thrown around
+him, and which have been daily strengthened by the sharpest pressure of
+animal necessities. It comprehends the two-fold benefit of <i>education</i>
+and <i>labor</i> in its system of "Industrial Schools." Of these, at the
+present time, in this city, there are eight, in which a multitude of
+children are educated, taught to work, supplied with a warm dinner
+daily, and with such clothing as they can learn to make. In connection
+with these there is one <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span>shoe-shop, in which thirty or forty boys earn a
+livelihood. Another object of this society is to find employment for its
+beneficiaries out of the city, and during the past year places in the
+country have been found for one hundred and twenty-five, where their
+employers treat them as their own children.</p>
+
+<p>In institutions like these, then, you perceive the indications of a
+remedy for the condition of these children of the poor&mdash;a system of help
+which gives something more than spiritual instruction on the one hand,
+something more than mere food and clothing on the other; which combines
+measures of relief and nourishment for the demands of our whole nature
+in the form of the ignorant and suffering child; and which, better than
+all, lifts him out of the humiliating condition of a mere pauper or
+dependent, and sets him in a channel of manly exertion,
+self-development, and self-support; which not only does the negative
+work of removing a mass of evil from society, but makes for it the
+positive contribution of an improved and educated humanity. I do not say
+that all the relief lies <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span>here, that it will do all that is needed, or
+that nothing better will be devised. But I think the <i>tendency</i> of these
+institutions is the right one, and that they indicate the <i>way</i> in which
+this great social problem is to be solved. But it is not necessary to
+say that the faith which we cherish in such a system is dead without
+works; and that something more is needed than a few model institutions
+working here and there. This matter makes a practical claim upon us all,
+in the fact that, in one way or another, we may all help forward this
+method of relief&mdash;we may help it forward as active laborers in the very
+midst of the field, as teachers and missionaries, or contributors of our
+goods and money. Each knows what he can best do&mdash;what is his special,
+Providential <i>call</i> in the matter; but let him be assured that he <i>has</i>
+a call; and that this spectacle of exposed, needy, suffering childhood
+is not a mere spectacle for his sympathies, but a field white with a
+harvest that waits for his effort. Have we nothing but sympathies
+wherewith to answer the poor woman's prayer&mdash;a prayer that <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span>echoes
+through so many hearts in this great city&mdash;"May the Lord spare my Archy
+from the bad boys, and from taking to the ways of his father!"</p>
+
+<p>There is one thing which strikes me as very affecting in the condition
+of any child. It is when that condition is necessarily a melancholy
+one&mdash;when the circumstances which hem it around cast over the surface of
+that young life an abiding gloom. A melancholy child! What an anomaly
+among the harmonies of the universe; something as incongruous as a bird
+drooping in a cage, or a flower in a sepulchre. The musical laughter
+muffled and broken; the spontaneous smile transformed to a sad
+suspicion; and the austerities of mature life, the fearful speculation,
+and forecast of evil, fixed and frozen on a boy's face! And then the
+sorrow of a child is so <i>absorbing</i>&mdash;for he lives only in the present.
+In the afflictions which fall upon him, man has the aid of reason and
+faith&mdash;he looks beyond the present issue, he detects the significance of
+his calamity, and strengthened thus a brave heart can vanquish any
+sorrow. But, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span>as Richter beautifully says&mdash;"the little cradle, or
+bed-canopy of the child, is easier darkened than the starry heaven of
+man." Surely, then, it is a blessed thing to contribute aught that will
+lighten this gloom, and place the child in natural conditions.</p>
+
+<p>But there is one phase of this subject which, in its appeal to us, is
+more eloquent than all the rest. It is where there are children who
+stand not merely in the intrinsic claim of their childhood; or in their
+touching sadness; or pushing their energies into vice and crime; but
+nobly struggling <i>against</i> the tide of evil&mdash;struggling to bear up in
+their lot&mdash;enduring and achieving for the sake of those who, young as
+these children are, are dependent on them. If I had time, I think I
+could write a "Martyrology;" not following the track of famous men,
+whose faces look out upon us from the brutal amphitheatre and from the
+fire with a halo of glory around them, and whom we behold, by the vision
+of faith, with their gory robes transfigured to celestial whiteness,
+waving palms in their hands; but tracing out incidents in the lives of
+some of the children here in our <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span>city&mdash;not dead, but <i>living</i> martyrs!
+O! I think I <i>could</i> write such a Martyrology, with blood and tears,
+over many a gloomy threshold, on the walls of many a desolate room; and
+let future generations come and read it&mdash;a fearful record of human
+suffering&mdash;a sweet memorial of human virtue&mdash;when many of these old
+woes, we trust, shall have passed away for ever.</p>
+
+<p>Permit me, in closing, to present two or three incidents illustrative of
+this heroism and sacrifice among the Children of the Poor.</p>
+
+<p>Take, for instance, the account of a writer who tells us that in the
+street he "met a little girl, very poor, but with such a sweet sad
+expression," adds he, "that I involuntarily stopped and spoke to her.
+She answered my questions very clearly, but the heavy, sad look never
+left her eyes a moment. She had no father or mother. She took care of
+the children herself; she was only <i>thirteen</i>; she sewed on check
+shirts, and made a living for them." He went to see her. "It is a low,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span>damp basement her home. She lives there with the three little children,
+whom she supports, and the elder sick brother, who sometimes picks up a
+trifle. She had been washing for herself and little ones. 'She almost
+thought that she could take in washing now,' and the little ones with
+their knees to their mouths crouched up before the stove, looked as if
+there could not be a doubt of sister's doing anything she tried. 'Well,
+Annie, how do you make a living now?' 'I sew on the check shirts, sir,
+and the flannel shirts; I get five cents for the checks, and nine cents
+for the others; but just now they wont let me have the flannel, because
+I can't deposit two dollars.' 'It must be very hard work?' 'O! I don't
+mind, sir; but to-day the visitors came, and said we'd better go to the
+poor-house, and I said I couldn't like to leave these little ones yet;
+and I thought if I only had candles, I could sit up till ten or eleven,
+and make the shirts.' ... She had learned everything she knew at the
+Industrial School.... She never went to church, for she had no clothes,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span>but she could read and write.... 'It was very damp there,' she said,
+'and then it was so cold nights.'"</p>
+
+<p>I will, in the next place, introduce you to a garret-room, six feet by
+ten. The occupants are a poor mother and her son. The mother works at
+making shirts with collars and stitched bosoms, at six shillings and
+sixpence per dozen, for a man who pays half in merchandise, and who,
+when she is starving for bread, puts her off with calico at a <i>shilling</i>
+a yard that is not worth more than fourpence! But <i>he</i> is not the martyr
+in the case. When the visitor entered, her son George, about twelve
+years old, "was just coming in for dinner, pale and apparently exhausted
+by the effort of climbing the stairs, and sank down upon a rough plank
+bench near the door." He worked in a glass-factory, earning a bare
+subsistence. "He is a little old man at twelve," says the narrator, "the
+paleness of his sunken cheeks was relieved by the hectic flush; his
+hollow dry eye was moistened by an occasional tear; and his thin white
+lip quivered as he told me his simple story; how he was braving hunger
+and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span>death&mdash;for he cannot live long&mdash;to help his mother pay the rent and
+buy her bread. 'Half-past ten at night is early for him to return,' said
+the mother; 'sometimes it is half-past eleven and I am sitting up for
+him.' Sometimes, in the morning, she finds him awake, 'but he don't want
+to get up, and he puts his hands on his sides and says, 'Mother, it
+hurts me here when I breathe.' I can work, and I do work,' adds she,
+'all the time&mdash;but I can't make as much as my little boy.'"</p>
+
+<p>One more account. It is of a beggar-girl who "lives," as the narrative
+goes on to say, "in a rear building where full daylight never shines&mdash;in
+a cellar-room where pure dry air is never breathed. A quick gentle girl
+of twelve years, she speaks to the visitor as he enters&mdash;'Mother does
+not see you, sir, because she's blind.' The mother was an old woman of
+sixty-five or seventy years, with six or seven others seated around.
+'But you told me you and your mother and little sister lived by
+yourselves.' 'Yes, sir&mdash;here it is;'" and at the end of the passage the
+visitor discovers a nar<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span>row place, about five feet by three. The bed was
+rolled up in one corner, and nearly filled the room. "'But where is your
+stove?' 'We have none, sir. The people in the next room are very kind to
+mother, and let her come in there to warm&mdash;because, you know, I get half
+the coal.' 'But where do you cook your food?' 'We never cook any, sir;
+it is already cooked. I go early in the morning to get coal and chips
+for the fire, and I must have two baskets of coal and wood to kindle
+with by noon. That's mother's half. Then when the people have eaten
+dinner, I go round to get the bits they leave. I can get two baskets of
+coal every day now; but when it gets cold, and we must have a great
+deal, it is hard for me to find any&mdash;there's so many poor chaps to pick
+it. Sometimes the <i>ladies</i> speak cross to me, and shut the door hard at
+me, and sometimes the <i>gentlemen</i> slap me in the face, and kick my
+basket, and then I come home, and mother says not to cry, for may be
+I'll do better to-morrow. Sometimes I get my basket almost full, and
+then put it by for to-morrow; and then, if next day we have enough, I
+take this <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span>to a poor woman next door. Sometimes I get only a few bits in
+my basket for all day, and may be the next day. And then I <i>fast</i>,
+because, you know, mother is sick and weakly, and can't be able to fast
+like me.'"</p>
+
+<p>These my friends, are some of the "short and simple annals of the poor."
+But those of whom Gray spoke rest peacefully in the "country
+churchyard;" their spirits are in heaven, and their history is embalmed
+in his own immortal Elegy. But <i>these</i> records are of those who yet live
+and suffer&mdash;"Martyrs <i>without</i> the palm."</p>
+
+<p>And could I summon them here to-night, and would the Master but enter as
+when upon earth, surely he would look upon them in tender pity; would
+bless them; would take in his arms those whom the world has cast aside
+and overlooked. Nay, perhaps he would transfigure their actuality into
+their possibility, and we might see "the angels in their faces,"
+pleading with us before the Father's throne!</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span></p>
+<h2>THE HELP OF RELIGION.</h2>
+
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span></p>
+<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span></p>
+<h2><a name="THE_HELP_OF_RELIGION" id="THE_HELP_OF_RELIGION"></a><a name="DISCOURSE_VIII" id="DISCOURSE_VIII"></a>DISCOURSE VIII.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE HELP OF RELIGION.</h3>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p class="center">For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to
+come.&mdash;<span class="smcap">Hebrews</span> xiii, 14.</p></div>
+
+
+<p>There are a good many people who, apparently, are never troubled by any
+speculations arising out of a comprehensive view of things. They are
+keenly alive to all objects within their sphere; but their eyes are
+close to the surface, and their experience comes in shocks of sensation,
+and shreds of perception. They know the superficial features of the
+world and its conventional expressions; are conversant with its business
+and its pleasures; with the market, the fashions, the town-talk, the
+worldly fortunes of their neighbors. Sometimes, a powerful affliction
+startles them in this smooth routine, and for a moment they are
+surprised <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span>to find how wide the universe is, and among what great
+realities we dwell. But, usually, their existence is a narrow revolving
+disc, bringing around the same group of incidents and the same
+associations, morning, noon, and night. They comprehend Life as they
+comprehend the expanse of yonder harbor, dotted with shifting but
+familiar forms, ruffled by a passing wind or bright under a summer sun,
+and whose tides duly rise and fall. But they little think of the oceanic
+vastness which it represents; and how its oscillations come from great
+currents that leap out of the Antarctic, and swell around tropical
+islands, and sweep the lines of continents, and roll in the Polar Sea.</p>
+
+<p>These, therefore, are not perplexed by questions such as occur to him
+who, looking beyond his own worldly interests and the area of daily
+routine, takes into view the scope of being and the profounder phenomena
+of human life. For such a view will inevitably engender speculation, nor
+can he rest until he obtains some <i>theory</i> of existence. These very
+conditions of Humanity in the City, for in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span>stance&mdash;these conditions of
+poverty, and responsibility, and relationship, and privilege, and
+strife, and toil&mdash;yea, the lessons which come to us from the crowd as it
+flows through these streets; constitute a great problem, of which every
+thinking man will seek some solution.</p>
+
+<p>Now, throughout this entire series of discourses&mdash;although I have not
+deemed it necessary in every instance to make a specific application&mdash;I
+have assumed that you and I were looking upon these various phases of
+Humanity from the Christian stand-point, and therefore I could not fitly
+conclude this work without indicating the Help which <span class="smcap">Religion</span> affords
+concerning these problems of existence.</p>
+
+<p>I observe, then, that while it may seem very simple to affirm that a
+<i>theory</i> does not, in any case, alter <i>facts</i>; yet there is often an
+advantage in laying down this proposition. For this leads us to
+understand precisely what a theory <i>may</i> do. It does not alter facts,
+but it throws them into new relations, and presents them in an entirely
+different light. Materialism, for instance, is a theory of Life; and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span>
+Christianity&mdash;in which term I include not only a system of Doctrines,
+but of practical forces&mdash;is also a theory of Life. Now, neither of these
+gets rid of the great facts of existence. Men sin and suffer and die,
+whether we adopt the one system or the other. But, surely, when we
+approach these facts from the side of Religion, they appear in very
+different lights, and are taken up with very different results, from
+their appearance and effect when interpreted by the creed of Unbelief.
+It would be very absurd then, because Christianity does not instantly
+abolish, or fully explain, all these strange and darker realities, to
+fall back upon the opposite ground of skepticism. This is only receding
+from the best solution to the worst&mdash;or, rather, to no solution at all.
+For I maintain that Christianity gives us not merely the best, but the
+<i>only</i> solution of these problems. It will be my purpose in this
+discourse, at least, to show what kind of help Religion <i>does</i> afford
+for Humanity in all these diverse conditions; and, having done this, I
+shall leave it to your own convictions to decide whether it is not a
+great and practical Help; and whether <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span>there <i>is</i> any other help. I
+propose to illustrate the influence of Religion to this effect,
+first&mdash;as a <i>Conviction</i>; second, as a <i>Working Power</i>; and third, as an
+<i>Interpretation</i>.</p>
+
+<p>I say, then, in the first place, that religion furnishes great help for
+man in the various issues of life, when he becomes actually convinced
+that its truths and sanctions are <i>genuine</i>. In other words, the
+conception of a moral government, of a directing Providence, and of
+eternal realities, vividly apprehended by the intellect, kept fresh in
+the heart, and assimilated to the entire spiritual nature, is a personal
+inspiration. It elevates the platform of a man's being, so that all
+things appear in true proportion. It clears his vision to detect
+principles, and endows him with moral courage. I do not know that I can
+better suggest its influence as a help here, in the conditions of the
+city, than by asking you to imagine what <i>would</i> be the state of things
+in the spheres of toil and traffic&mdash;in all the multiform relations of
+our humanity&mdash;if men really apprehended and believed it? <i>It</i>, I
+say&mdash;not some special dogma or institution, but the absolute spirit and
+truth <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span>of Christianity. For I do not think that, generally, this <i>is</i>
+actually credited. I think that, with many professions of religion, and
+much outward respect for it, and an extensive circulation of vague
+conceptions about it, it is <i>not</i> commonly felt and vitalized&mdash;it is not
+apprehended in its blessedness and power, and absolute excellence. To
+the habits of the soul it does not represent and mean realities as a
+written contract does, or a bank-bill&mdash;something that men precipitate
+themselves upon, and that sways the under-currents of their action. New
+York, with its Broadway and its Wall Street; with its proud buildings
+and its bristling masts; is a reality&mdash;but that city of which the text
+makes mention; that city which good men seek, and which in the
+Apocalypse of Faith they see; whose splendors glitter through the solemn
+twilight; nay, which hems them around for ever, and shines down upon
+them brighter than the noonday sun; to thousands, toiling, sinning, and
+suffering here, is <i>not</i> a reality. For, I ask you, my friends, if it
+<i>were</i> realized, could there be so much abject need among us; so much
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span>stony-hearted selfishness; so much shuffling in trade, and corruption
+in politics, and meanness in intercourse, and foolish superficial
+living? I know, and you know, that one of the greatest evils is&mdash;not
+merely that men are worldly, irreligious, bound up in sad conditions and
+narrow conceits; but that they are so, because they do not apprehend the
+nature and do not feel the reality of religion. For I say once more,
+that a conviction of its reality must be a great help in adjusting the
+problems of life. And this, because it acts upon the centre of all the
+sin, and much of the suffering of the world. This personal application
+of religion stands before all other remedies for the removal of these
+evils. Others are attempted&mdash;others are, in a degree, successful; but
+none go so deep and produce results so sure. It seems to me that the
+position of humanity in this respect, is illustrated in the narrative of
+the Demoniac of Gadara. We are told that he had been bound with chains,
+but in his fierce madness had burst them asunder. And then, again, men
+had tried various expedients, but they could not tame him. But when the
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span>influence of Jesus fell upon his soul, it took hold of it with sweet
+authority; the legion left him, and the poor, wounded, houseless man sat
+clothed and in his right mind. So is it with man in society; so is it
+with some of these social evils. The power of <i>law</i> has been invoked;
+and it has its legitimate sphere of operation. It checks the purposed
+violence. It arrests the overt act. It may consistently be summoned to
+purify all those channels of social action which it assumes to regulate;
+and, instead of patronizing the wrong, to set its face and hand against
+it. Thus it may prevent public harm, though it cannot stop self-injury,
+and remove occasions of temptation, though it cannot impart moral
+strength. It has no efficacy to change the assassin's heart, yet we call
+upon it to guard us against murder. We bid it close the den of infamy,
+though it does not quench guilty passion. And we may use it to stop the
+sale of intoxicating drinks, though it does not destroy the drunkard's
+appetite. And this indicates both the function and the limitation of the
+law. Thrown over the wild forces that rage in the human heart, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span>and that
+afflict community, it is like the fetters on the limbs of the demoniac.
+It may restrain for a time; but in some sweep of temptation it is
+spurned and snapped asunder. On the other hand, we have the expedients
+of the <i>reformer</i>. He comes with props and palliatives; soothing some
+cutaneous irritation, or removing some foul condition. And let us
+recognize the legitimacy of <i>his</i> endeavor. We must approach the human
+heart through the web of its external circumstances, as well as
+directly. Nay, often this is the only way by which we can get at it at
+all. And well may we rejoice over the rescue from specific vices, and
+commend the zeal and patience which fasten upon some colossal evil to
+batter and drive it from the world. But notwithstanding such noble
+achievement, how many have remained among the tombs, or gone back to the
+wilderness&mdash;demoniacs still! It is an old truth, but I say it as though
+it were in the conviction of a fresh fact forced upon me by these great
+problems that heave up in the currents of City Life; it is an
+unavoidable conclusion that there is only one influence that can make
+safe, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span>pure, and strong in goodness, those recesses out of which
+issue so much social evil, and so much personal suffering. And that is
+the influence not of the law-giver, nor of the reformer; but of the
+Redeemer. It is that power which flows through the soul in a practical
+conviction of the reality of religion. It is the help which comes from
+its inspiration of divine truth and goodness in the breasts of
+individual men, turning them from evil, rendering them strong against
+temptation, and sending out from their lives fresh forces of
+righteousness and love.</p>
+
+<p>Indeed, I believe that any man who really thinks and feels, and who has
+much experience of Life, will become convinced of the <i>necessity</i> of
+Religion. I would leave its claims not to the argument of the Moralist,
+or the advocacy of the Pulpit, but as they urge themselves upon us here
+out of the whirl, and weariness, and vicissitudes of the City. Surely,
+as its calm voice appeals to the sons of men, striving in this heated
+atmosphere; chasing phantoms that rise out of the dust; absorbed in the
+fickle game of fortune; borne along for a little <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span>while on the top-waves
+of excitement, and then dying unmarked as a rain-drop that falls into
+the sea; surely as its voice appeals to these, saying&mdash;"Come unto me,
+all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest!" it
+strikes the deepest chords in thousands of hearts. I will not adopt now
+any professional argument to prove the great necessity of Religion as a
+Help in Life. But I would take my stand, in imagination, at some corner
+of yonder tumultuous street. How multiform the crowds that sweep by me;
+how diverse the faces; what a kaleidoscope of human conditions! And yet,
+when you attempt to classify them, how few are the actual <i>types</i> of
+men&mdash;how many fall into a common group; and when you try them by the
+profoundest standard&mdash;that of a common experience and common wants&mdash;how
+marvellously alike they all are! How similar in inward expression, the
+rich man who walks yonder, to that poor drudging son of toil, who bows
+his back and strains his sinews until they ache! How similar in effect
+the burdens which they both bear&mdash;the burden of wealth, and the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span>burden
+of poverty, in the fact that they <i>are</i> burdens upon the heart and the
+soul! And are they not both struggling with the realities of life, and
+moved by quenchless desires, and looking up into the same infinite
+mystery? Ah! my friends, I hardly think it would be the most effectual
+way to preach Religion in this church on Sunday, as a matter of
+course&mdash;but to stand out there on week-days, and strike the deepest
+chords throbbing unconsciously in the bosoms of those who pass me by. I
+would appeal to you, O disappointed, almost heart-broken man, who for
+years have endeavored to earn a competency to lift your head above the
+sheer necessities of life, but have failed in the chase, and been beaten
+back, and seen others who have exerted themselves not near as much, not
+so honorably, perhaps, rise to the very top of the stream and sail clear
+ahead;&mdash;or to you, O "favorite of fortune," as the world calls you, who
+find your palace to be only a stately sepulchre, in which all genuine
+feeling and simple enjoyment lies dead and wrapped in cerements of
+chilling etiquette&mdash;whose daughter, perhaps, has <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span>mocked your fondest
+plans; or whose son has turned out a miserable weed of dissipation&mdash;a
+degenerate fopling, a rake, a fool;&mdash;or to you, O butterfly of fashion,
+sailing with embroidered wings in search of admiration and of pleasure;
+or still again, to you who have just gathered together the means of
+enjoyment, and ease, and everything, to make life pleasant, and lo!
+death has entered, and your hopes are darkened and in the dust; I appeal
+to you, O types of this streaming humanity, that wears so many masks,
+yet, carries under all a common heart; and ask you, if there is not some
+void that no earthly good can fill&mdash;that no finite thing can sustain and
+satisfy? Can you go on with the common business of the world, discharge
+all its obligations, control yourself in its excitements, resist its
+evil solicitations, bear up under its trials, and, finally, reach that
+period in life when you must ask&mdash;"What is all this worth?&mdash;these years
+of toil, these eager enterprises, this golden accumulation or
+unfortunate failure&mdash;what are they all worth, and what do they
+mean?"&mdash;can anybody well get along with all this, without Religion?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span> My
+friends, I say to you that, not consciously, perhaps, like the old
+saints who wrought and prayed and walked with upward-looking faces&mdash;but
+really, in the deep yearning and the secret gravitation of the soul&mdash;you
+<i>do</i> confess that here we have no continuing city, and you are seeking
+one to come. At least, it seems to me that without the Help of Religion,
+there is only the alternative of moral indifference&mdash;a cold, hard
+worldliness, or of recklessness and spiritual despair. And is not this
+the alternative which is exhibited in the midst of all our
+civilization&mdash;in the midst of this gorgeous materialism of the
+nineteenth century? Thousands, it is to be apprehended, do exhibit one
+or the other of those extremes which the poet has so well described:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"For most men in a brazen prison live,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Where, in the sun's hot eye,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">With heads bent o'er their toil, they languidly<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Their minds to some unmeaning task-work give,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Dreaming of naught beyond their prison wall;<br /></span>
+<span class="i4">And so, year after year,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Fresh products of their barren labor fall<br /></span>
+<span class="i4">From their tired hands, and rest<br /></span>
+<span class="i2"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span>Never yet comes more near.<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Gloom settles slowly down over their breast,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And while they try to stem<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">The waves of mournful thought by which they are prest,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Death in their prison reaches them<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Unfreed, having seen nothing, still unblest.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"And the rest, a few,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Escape their prison, and depart<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">On the wide ocean of life anew.<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">There the freed prisoner, where'er his heart<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Listeth, will sail;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Nor does he know how there prevail<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Despotic on life's sea,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Trade-winds that cross it from eternity.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Awhile he holds some false way, undebarred<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">By thwarting signs, and braves<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The freshening wind, and blackening waves,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And then the tempest strikes him, and between<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The lightning bursts is seen<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Only a driving wreck,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And the pale master on his spar-strewn deck<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">With anguished face and flying hair,<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Grasping the rudder hard,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Still bent to make some port he knows not where,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Still standing for some false impossible shore,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And sterner comes the roar<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of sea and wind, and through the deepening gloom,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Fainter and fainter wreck and helmsman loom."<br /></span>
+</div></div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>But, before I quit this head of my discourse, let me say that in order
+to be accepted as the great Help of Life, Religion must in some way be
+<i>presented</i> as a reality. It must not be held forth as a mere
+abstraction&mdash;it must be precipitated into its concrete relations.
+Parting with none of its sanctity, it must be stripped of its vagueness
+and technicality, and be spoken in the fresh language of the time. I
+feel sure that amidst prevalent irreligion, nothing is so much needed as
+a definite statement of <i>what</i> religion is; and that men should learn to
+recognize its vascular connection with every department of action. It
+must be understood that "being religious" is not a work apart by itself,
+but a spirit of faith and righteousness, flowing out from the centre of
+a regenerated heart into all the employments and intercourse of the
+world. Not merely the preacher in the pulpit, and the saint on his
+knees, may do the work of religion, but the mechanic who smites with the
+hammer and drives the wheel; the artist seeking to realize his pure
+ideal of the beautiful; the mother in the gentle offices of home; the
+statesman in <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span>the forlorn hope of liberty and justice; and the
+philosopher whose thought treads reverently among the splendid mysteries
+of the universe. I know that some will deem this a secularization of
+religion&mdash;a desecration of its holy essence by worldly alliances. But
+they are mistaken. It is a <i>consecration</i> of pursuits and spheres that
+have been cut off from all sacredness, and devoted to secondary ends.
+Are not the just, the useful, the beautiful, from God, as well as the
+good and the holy? And, therefore, is not any practice which serves
+these, a service of God? It is needed that men should feel that every
+lawful pursuit <i>is</i> sacred and not profane; that every position in life
+is close to the steps of the divine throne; and that the most beaten and
+familiar paths lie under the awful shadow of the Infinite; then they
+will go about their daily pursuits, and fill their common relationships,
+with hearts of worship and pulses of unselfish love; instead of
+regarding religion as an isolated peculiarity for a corner of the closet
+and a fraction of the week, and leaving all the rest of time and space
+an unconsecrated waste, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span>where lawless passions travel, and selfishness
+pitches its tents. O! if religion <i>were</i> thus a diffusive, practical,
+every-day reality, there would be a marvellous change in the aspects of
+life and the conditions of humanity <a name="Page_240t" id="Page_240t"></a><a href="#Page_240tn">around</a> us. The great city, now so
+gross and profane, would become as a vast cathedral, through whose stony
+aisles would flow perpetual service; where labor would discharge its
+daily offices, and faith and patience keep their heavenward look, and
+love present its offerings. Yea, the very roll of wheels through its
+busy streets would be as a litany, and the sound of homeward feet the
+chant of its evening psalm.</p>
+
+<p>But religion is not only a help in and for ourselves; it has a
+ministration for others&mdash;for this great mass of destitution and
+suffering that broods in the midst of the city. Christianity is not
+merely a theory of existence&mdash;it is a <i>working-power</i>. Its precepts are
+practical, and enjoin not merely states of mind and heart, but
+conditions of activity. There is an entire magazine of working-forces in
+that one great law&mdash;"Love thy neighbor as thyself."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span> Hear the words of
+an apostolical commentator upon it. "If a brother or sister be naked,
+and destitute of daily food," says he, "and one of you say unto them,
+Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them
+not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?
+Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone." And wherever
+Christianity has existed and been apprehended, it has produced
+beneficent results for humanity. It has gone over the earth like its
+Divine Author, with healing and with help for the woes of the race.
+Anybody who takes his stand at the head-waters of modern history, will
+see that a mighty energy was then poured into the world, whose influence
+is evident in the truest civilization, in the best results, of ages. In
+estimating the practical power of Christianity, we must look at the
+<i>positive</i> phase of things&mdash;we must consider what has actually been
+done; not merely what remains to be done. We must adopt proportionate
+standards, not the little measures of to-day and yesterday, in which the
+tides of human melioration may oscillate, and even <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span>seem to flow
+backward and at the best to make slight headway. But take up the cycle
+of history that preceded the advent of Christianity, and compare it with
+the present period; and is there not an entirely different expression on
+the face of things, so far as conceptions of humanity and influences of
+philanthropy are concerned? Contrast "a Roman holiday," its butchery and
+its blood, with a modern anniversary that clasps the round world in its
+jubilee, and see if humanity has not been helped by religion. Or look
+back upon Grecian art and refinement, and tell me what oration or poem,
+or pantheon of marble beauty, is half as glorious as the plain brick
+free-school; the asylum of industry; the home for the penitent, the
+disabled and the poor? Ah! my friends, these are such familiar things
+that we may not think them the great things they really are; and in
+gazing upon the colossal evils that yet tower up before us, they may
+seem slight achievements. But they <i>are</i> great: and when I see the poor
+drunkard return to a renovated home&mdash;the demoniac sitting clothed and in
+his right mind once <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span>more; when I see the dumb write, and hear the blind
+read, and little rescued children sing their thankful hymns; I think
+humanity <i>has</i> been helped a great deal since that Divine Teacher walked
+the earth, and took the lambs to his bosom, and made the foul leper
+clean, and partook with publicans and sinners, and bade the guilty go
+and sin no more. I think that currents of love and self-sacrifice, from
+that heart that was pierced for us upon the cross, have found their way
+through the channels of ages, through all the impediments of worldliness
+and selfishness, and inspired and blessed men far more than they know.</p>
+
+<p>But if, turning from the positive achievement, you point to the evils
+that still exist&mdash;if you lift the coverings of respectability and custom
+from the ghastly facts that are embedded here in our so-called
+civilization; if you bid me mark the vice, the poverty, the crime, the
+oppression, the grinding monopoly, the prejudice, the gigantic
+materialism and practical atheism that are mixed up with it, and seem to
+be inseparable parts of it; then I ask you&mdash;how would it be <i>without</i>
+the Help <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span>of Religion? What interpretation should we obtain from the
+dark creed of the skeptic, what inspiration from the philosophy of
+annihilation, and of fate? To say nothing of those forces of Love and
+self-sacrifice which it sheds abroad in the world, and to which I have
+just alluded,&mdash;Religion, in one single proposition, sends pregnant
+elements of direction and relief into the midst of these giant evils.
+That one proposition is the immortality of man&mdash;the priceless
+spirituality of every man&mdash;the ascription of a nature more glorious and
+imperishable than a star. Here is the spring of its perpetual antagonism
+to the world, and to the evil of the world. The latter bases its
+estimate of man upon outward conditions; estimates his name and his
+title, his equipage and his parentage, the bulk of his gold, the color
+of his skin, his <i>apparent</i> success or defeat. Christianity points to
+that vivid centre of a soul, in whose light all these external
+distinctions fade, are fused into dross, become comparatively naught.
+All the evil of the world stands upon the assumption of the former
+rule&mdash;upon the ground of external <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span>and material valuation&mdash;which, as has
+been well observed by another, is a "method of studying the problems of
+the universe by fetching rules from the <i>wider</i> sphere (therefore the
+<i>lower</i>) to import into the <i>higher</i>.... So long as this logical
+strategy is allowed, the Titans will always conquer the gods; the
+ground-forces of the lowest nature will propagate themselves, pulse
+after pulse, from the abysses to the skies, and <i>right</i> will exist only
+on sufferance from <i>might</i>." On the other hand, I say, Religion,
+Christianity, starts from the centre outward&mdash;starts with the dignity
+and sanctity of the human soul&mdash;and in this is the great element of all
+progress and reform. Out of this have sprung the achievements of modern
+freedom. Assuming this inward birthright of every man, men have snapped
+feudal fetters, and broken the seals of ancient proscription, and torn
+up branching genealogies, and trodden diadems in the dust. It was this
+fact that inspired Sidney's speech, and Hampden's effort, and
+Washington's calm determination. It is this that erects itself against
+majorities, policies, institutions, chart<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span>ers, and will not be beaten
+down, and will agitate, and will triumph. It is this that sends
+philanthropy upon its mission; and bids it stoop to the most fallen, and
+search under the darkest depravity. "Go abroad," it says, "amidst the
+guilt and misery of the great city. In the rags, the filth, the
+abomination, there are jewels fallen from heaven. There are souls upon
+which angels look with solicitude. There are interests for which Christ
+died. Search patiently, and deeply, and never give up the endeavor to
+find, to lift up, to restore." Is not all the spring of benevolent
+effort, then, in this single proposition of Religion? This one great
+Truth it utters amidst the suffering and injustice of the world&mdash;that
+men are heirs of one inheritance; possessors of a birthright by virtue
+of which all outward inequalities fade away. It bases a demand for
+mutual help and love, upon the fact that we are all on a
+pilgrimage&mdash;high, low, honored, degraded, master, slave, we go forth
+together, and these earthly distinctions all drop away. Rich man with
+rows of real-estate, with money safe in bank, with solid securities
+walled <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span>around you&mdash;you will carry no more away than Lazarus yonder&mdash;in
+God's eyes you are no richer than he. Because here we have no continuing
+city. The destinies of our common humanity flow forward into another and
+more enduring one.</p>
+
+<p>And, if still this problem of human degradation and suffering presses
+upon us, I say further, that where the constituents of this problem are
+most prominent, there religion is the most active. The heaviest poverty
+is belted about by the brightest charities; the hot-beds of crime
+generate the most radical efforts for its prevention and its cure; and
+while oppression is at work, setting its dark types upon virgin soil to
+print off its own shame and condemnation, indignant voices expose it and
+indignant hearts react against it. And more and more, every day, it is
+felt and proclaimed that religion is a working-principle&mdash;a practical
+power. Never was it more profoundly felt than in this very age that men
+must be confessors of Christianity as well as professors. And in the
+light of this conception, proffering fresh and willing help, Reli<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span>gion
+walks abroad; and lo! waste places grow verdant, and the strongholds of
+guilt and misery sink down, and blessed institutions rise up, and
+industry takes the place of crime, and cursings are exchanged for songs,
+and the poorest sees the immortal light, and is lifted up by the grand
+thought&mdash;that "here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to
+come."</p>
+
+<p>We have thus seen that Religion is a Help as to the fact of sin, when
+men are convinced of it as a great reality; and a help as to the fact of
+human suffering, because it is a working-power. But, over and above all
+this, there are problems that perplex us, and demand some answer;
+problems as to the How, and the Wherefore, and the End. There are times
+when our thoughts rise above all specific instances, and we take up
+humanity and existence as a whole, and ask&mdash;"What means it all?"
+Sometimes this question starts out of an individual experience. The
+shock of affliction has jarred our hearts; our expectations have come to
+naught; bereavement has broken up the routine of our life; or our own
+souls have <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span>surprised us with sudden revelations. At any rate, we find
+our being here involved with mystery. There is something that our
+understanding cannot entirely grasp; something that our unassisted eyes
+cannot see. And the only help for us in such a case is the Help of
+Religion, presenting us, through faith, with an <i>interpretation</i> of
+human life&mdash;an interpretation which tells us that what we now experience
+and behold is only transitional, preliminary, and that we see through a
+glass darkly, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be.</p>
+
+<p>And is it necessary for me to dwell upon the strength which has thus
+been imparted to sad and wounded spirits, when with perfect trust in
+Infinite Goodness they have thus realized that they stand only on one
+round of an upward course&mdash;only in a little segment of the immense plan?
+I will merely say now, that if, through faith, religion is a help to
+these by interpreting life in harmony with individual experience, so
+through this faith does it help the meditative man troubled by the
+general problem of existence and humanity. The meaning of these various
+conditions in the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span>city&mdash;the meaning of these sins, and sorrows, and
+inequalities&mdash;the meaning of this tide of life itself that rolls in
+endless succession through these stony arteries&mdash;does it perplex you?
+Accept, then, the help which religion gives by interpreting it as only
+preliminary and transitional; only a portion of a wider scheme.</p>
+
+<p>We commenced this series of discourses by standing, as it were, in the
+street, on a level with all these phases of humanity. Ascend now some
+lofty post of observation; some high watch-tower. The mottled tide flows
+and dashes far below you. The sounds of strife and endeavor rise faintly
+to your ears, and are drowned in the upper air. So in the altitude and
+comprehensiveness of faith, all this that seemed so huge and startling
+dwindles to a little stream in the great ocean of existence, and all
+these tumults are swallowed up in the currents of silent but beneficent
+design. But, in the meantime, the daylight has gone, the night-shadow
+has fallen, this stream of human life has ebbed away, and all these
+sounds are still. See, now, how much of your <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span>perplexity came from a
+deceit of eye-sight&mdash;see how the light of this world blinded you to the
+immensity and the meaning of existence! See! over your head spreads the
+great firmament. There are Sirius, and Orion, and the glittering
+Pleiades. How harmoniously they are related; how calmly they roll! And
+now, O man! fresh from the reeking dust, and the cry of pained hearts,
+and the shadows of the grave, do not the scales of unbelief drop from
+your eyes, when you see the width of God's universe, and feel that His
+purpose girdles this little planet and steers its freight of souls? You
+were deceived by your standards of greatness and duration. You thought
+that this material city, with what it contains, was everything. But
+<i>they</i> have cherished the true view, who in the spirit of the text have
+interpreted these Conditions of Humanity&mdash;the conditions of those who
+seek and sin and suffer in the busy crowd; of those who rest beneath
+yonder gleaming tomb-stones. And, as we read what all wise and good men
+have virtually said, our mortal term contracts, our immortal career
+opens, our years seem as ticks <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span>of a clock, and the entire sum of our
+life but a minute-mark on the dial of eternity; and this huge metropolis
+becomes a dim veil, a perishable symbol of real and enduring things.</p>
+
+
+<h4>THE END.<br /></h4>
+
+<div class="trans_note">
+<p class="center"><a name="TN" id="TN"></a><big>TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:</big></p>
+
+<p class="noindent">Every effort has been made to replicate this text as faithfully as
+possible, including obsolete and variant spellings. Obvious
+typographical errors in punctuation (misplaced quotes and the like) have
+been fixed. Corrections [in brackets] in the text are noted below:</p>
+
+<p class="noindent">
+<a name="Page_27tn" id="Page_27tn"></a>page 27: quote typo corrected<br />
+
+But, say you, <a href="#Page_27t">'["]</a>here is one who is returning
+to a home of destitution, of misery; where the
+<br /><br />
+
+<a name="Page_39tn" id="Page_39tn"></a>page 39: typo corrected<br />
+
+between those great agents of
+human <a href="#Page_39t">achievment[achievement]</a> and the living intelligence
+<br /><br />
+
+<a name="Page_41tn" id="Page_41tn"></a>page 41: typo corrected<br />
+
+years. Remarkable for brilliant <a href="#Page_41t">achievments[achievements]</a>
+in every department of physics, ours well deserves
+<br /><br />
+
+<a name="Page_45tn" id="Page_45tn"></a>page 45: hyphen removed<br />
+
+the old world without a telegraph, and Columbus
+found a new one without a <a href="#Page_45t">steam[-]ship</a>.
+<br /><br />
+
+<a name="Page_49tn" id="Page_49tn"></a>page 49: typo corrected<br />
+
+open air and the <a href="#Page_49t">sovreignty[sovereignty]</a> of the soil. And
+if this immense intrusion of machinery has
+<br /><br />
+
+<a name="Page_58tn" id="Page_58tn"></a>page 58: duplicate word removed<br />
+
+stream, and chained the fire; and now, <a href="#Page_58t">[with]</a>
+with the eye of science and the hand of skill,
+<br /><br />
+
+<a name="Page_84tn" id="Page_84tn"></a>page 84: typo corrected<br />
+
+dignity is there in that man who
+<a href="#Page_84t">justs[just]</a> accepts his station and makes the most of
+<br /><br />
+
+<a name="Page_154tn" id="Page_154tn"></a>page 154: removed quote<br />
+celestial City be these well-known doors--and
+thus may we also <i>die</i> at Home!<a href="#Page_154t">["]</a>
+<br /><br />
+
+<a name="Page_173tn" id="Page_173tn"></a>page 173: typo corrected<br />
+
+heaven, whose inhabitants would not make
+<a href="#Page_173t">harmlesness[harmlessness]</a> their chief characteristic. Their
+<br /><br />
+
+<a name="Page_195tn" id="Page_195tn"></a>page 195: typo corrected<br />
+
+and, perpetually descending from the threshold
+of the Infinite, keeps open an arch-way of <a href="#Page_195t">mysstery[mystery]</a>
+and heaven.
+<br /><br />
+
+<a name="Page_201tn" id="Page_201tn"></a>page 201: typo corrected<br />
+
+dangerous reasoning, my friends; <a href="#Page_201t">neverthless[nevertheless]</a>,
+it <i>is</i> reasoning, and shows that the mind of the
+<br /><br />
+
+<a name="Page_240tn" id="Page_240tn"></a>page 240: typo corrected<br />
+
+of life and the conditions of humanity <a href="#Page_240t">arouud[around]</a>
+us. The great city, now so gross and profane,</p></div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Humanity in the City, by E. H. Chapin
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+</body>
+</html>
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Humanity in the City, by E. H. Chapin
+
+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: Humanity in the City
+
+Author: E. H. Chapin
+
+Release Date: August 27, 2008 [EBook #26441]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HUMANITY IN THE CITY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Julia Miller and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
+produced from images generously made available by The
+Internet Archive/American Libraries.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+HUMANITY IN THE CITY.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: Every effort has been made to replicate this text as
+faithfully as possible; please see list of printing issues at the end
+of the text.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+[Illustration: E. H. Chapin]
+
+
+
+
+HUMANITY IN THE CITY.
+
+BY THE
+
+REV. E. H. CHAPIN.
+
+
+ NEW YORK:
+   DE WITT & DAVENPORT, PUBLISHERS,
+   160 & 162 NASSAU STREET.
+
+ BOSTON:
+   ABEL TOMPKINS, 38 & 40 CORNHILL.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1854, by
+DE WITT & DAVENPORT,
+
+In the Clerk's Office of the U. S. District Court
+for the Southern District of New York
+
+
+ G. W. ALEXANDER,
+   BINDER,
+ 9 Spruce Street.
+
+ W. H. TINSON.
+   STEREOTYPER,
+ 24 Beekman Street.
+
+ TAWS, RUSSELL & CO.
+   PRINTERS,
+ No. 26 Beekman Street.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+                                                         PAGE
+
+  I. THE LESSONS OF THE STREET                             13
+
+  II. MAN AND MACHINERY                                    39
+
+  III. THE STRIFE FOR PRECEDENCE                           65
+
+  IV. THE SYMBOLS OF THE REPUBLIC                          93
+
+  V. THE SPRINGS OF SOCIAL LIFE                           123
+
+  VI. THE ALLIES OF THE TEMPTER                           157
+
+  VII. THE CHILDREN OF THE POOR                           187
+
+  VIII. THE HELP OF RELIGION                              223
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+A volume like the present hardly requires the formality of a preface. It
+is the continuation of a series already published, and, like that, aims
+at applying the highest standard of Morality and Religion to the phases
+of every-day life. In order, however, that the view with which these
+discourses have been prepared may not be misconceived, I wish merely to
+say that I am far from supposing that these are the only themes to be
+preached, or that they constitute the highest class of practical
+subjects, and shall be sorry if in any way they seem to imply a neglect
+of that interior and holy life which is the spring not only of right
+affections, but of clear perception and sturdy, every-day duty. I hope,
+on the contrary, that the very aspects of this busy city life--the very
+problems which start out of it--will tend to convince men of the
+necessity of this inward and regenerating principle. Nevertheless, I
+maintain that these topics have a place in the circle of the preacher's
+work, and he need entertain no fear of desecrating his pulpit by secular
+themes, who seeks to consecrate all things in any way involving the
+action and the welfare of men, by the spirit and aims of His Religion
+who, while he preached the Gospel, likewise fed the hungry, healed the
+sick, and touched the issues of every temporal want. I may have failed
+in the method, I trust I have not in the purpose.
+
+    E. H. C.
+
+_New York, May, 1854._
+
+
+
+
+THE LESSONS OF THE STREET.
+
+HUMANITY IN THE CITY.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE I.
+
+THE LESSONS OF THE STREET.
+
+      Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the
+      streets.--PROVERBS, i. 20.
+
+
+The great truths of religion may be communicated to the mind and the
+heart in two ways--by abstract treatment, and by illustration. It must
+be taken up in its absolute connection with God, and with our own souls.
+In solitary meditation, in self-examination, and in prayer, we shall
+learn the intrinsic claims which Faith and Duty have upon reason and
+conscience. But we cannot proceed far before we discover the necessity
+of some _symbol_, by which these abstract principles may be made
+distinct to us. And, looking around for this purpose, we find that all
+the phases of existence are full of spiritual illustration--full of
+religious suggestion and argument. Thus our Saviour pronounced his great
+doctrines of Eternal Life, and of Personal Religion, and then turned to
+the world for a commentary. Under his teaching nature became an
+illuminated missal, lettered by the lilies of the field, and pencilled
+with hues that played through the leaves of Olivet. The wild birds, in
+their flight, bore upward the beautiful lesson of Providence, and the
+significance of the Kingdom of Heaven was contained in a mustard-seed.
+By no abstruse reasoning did he make his instructions so vivid to his
+disciples, and so fresh to ourselves. But he awoke the conviction of
+moral need, and repentance, and Divine Love, by drawing from instances
+with which they had been familiar all their lives--the procedures of
+government, the transactions of business, the labors of the husbandman,
+and the incidents of home. And the result is essentially the same,
+whether we start with the religious truth to find some illustration in
+the world around us, or from some aspect of human life, or nature,
+extract a religious truth. Nor need this always be sharply obvious. It
+is only necessary that our point of view be sufficiently elevated to
+throw a spiritual light upon things, and to reveal their moral
+relations; for, often, our understandings are cleared, and our hearts
+made better, by the mere scope and tendency of such observations.
+
+With this conviction, I called your attention, last winter, to some of
+the "Aspects of City Life," and with the same view, I wish now to
+address you, for a few Sunday evenings, on the Conditions of Humanity in
+the City, in which series I shall endeavor not only to present new
+topics of interest, but to urge more explicitly some points, which, in
+the afore-mentioned discourses, I merely touched upon.
+
+The essential meaning of the personification in the text is in
+accordance, I think, with the general tenor of remark which I have just
+been making. For I understand it to mean, that everything is
+instructive, that even in the common ways of life the most important
+truths, and the profoundest moral and religious significance, are
+contained. And the words before us, also, specifically indicate the
+subject upon which I wish to speak this evening, for they declare that
+"Wisdom... uttereth her voice in the streets."
+
+The street through which you walk every day; with whose sights and
+sounds you have been familiar, perhaps, all your lives; is it all so
+common-place that it yields you no deep lessons,--deep and fresh, it may
+be, if you would only look around with discerning eyes? Engaged with
+your own special interests, and busy with monotonous details, you may
+not heed it; and yet there is something finer than the grandest poetry,
+even in the mere spectacle of these multitudinous billows of life,
+rolling down the long, broad, avenue. It is an inspiring lyric, this
+inexhaustible procession, in the misty perspective ever lost, ever
+renewed, sweeping onward between its architectural banks to the music of
+innumerable wheels; the rainbow colors, the silks, the velvets, the
+jewels, the tatters, the plumes, the faces--no two alike--shooting out
+from unknown depths, and passing away for ever--perpetually sweeping
+onward in the fresh air of morning, under the glare of noon, under the
+fading, flickering light, until the shadow climbs the tallest spire, and
+night comes with revelations and mysteries of its own.
+
+And yet this changeful tide of activity is no mere lyric. It is an epic,
+rather, unfolding in its progress the contrasts, the conflicts, the
+heroisms, the failures,--in one word, the great and solemn issues of
+human life. And a few comprehensive lessons from that "Wisdom which
+uttereth her voice in the streets," may prove a fitting introduction,
+from which we can pass to consider more specific conditions of humanity
+in the city.
+
+Taking up the subject in this light, I observe that the first lesson of
+the street is in the illustration which it affords us of the
+_diversities of human conditions_. The most superficial eye recognizes
+this. A city is, in one respect, like a high mountain; the latter is an
+epitome of the physical globe; for its sides are belted by products of
+every zone, from the tropical luxuriance that clusters around its base,
+to its arctic summit far up in the sky. So is the city an epitome of
+the social world. All the belts of civilization intersect along its
+avenues. It contains the products of every moral zone. It is
+cosmopolitan, not only in a national, but in a spiritual, sense. Here
+you may find not only the finest Saxon culture, but the grossest
+barbaric degradation. There you pass a form of Caucasian development,
+the fine-cut features, the imperial forehead, the intelligent eye, the
+confident tread, the true port and stature of a man. But who is this
+that follows in his track; under the same national sky, surrounded by
+the same institutions, and yet with those pinched features, that stunted
+form, that villainous look; is it Papuan, Bushman, or Carib? Fitly
+representing either of these, though born in a Christian city, and
+bearing about not only the stamp of violated physical law, but of moral
+neglect and baseness. And no one needs to be told that there are savages
+in New York, as well as in the islands of the sea. Savages, not in
+gloomy forests, but under the strength of gas-light, and the eyes of
+policemen; with war-whoops and clubs very much the same, and garments as
+fantastic, and souls as brutal, as any of their kindred at the
+antipodes. China, India, Africa, will you not find their features in
+some circles of the social world right around you? Idolatry! you cannot
+find any more gross, any more cruel, on the broad earth, than within the
+area of a mile around this pulpit. Dark minds from which God is
+obscured; deluded souls, whose fetish is the dice-box or the bottle;
+apathetic spirits, steeped in sensual abomination, unmoved by a moral
+ripple, soaking in the slump of animal vitality. False gods, more
+hideous, more awful, than Moloch or Baal; worshipped with shrieks,
+worshipped with curses, with the hearth-stone for the bloody altar, and
+the drunken husband for the immolating priest, and women and children
+for the victims. I have no terms of respect too high for the brave and
+conscientious men who carry the gospel, and their own lives, in their
+hands to distant shores. But, surely, they need not go thus far to
+_seek_ for the benighted and the debased. They may find there a wider
+extent of heathenism, but none more intense than that which prevails
+close by the school and the church. The richest products of modern
+progress and Christian culture grow on the verge of barren wastes, and
+jungles of violence, and "the region of the shadow of death."
+
+In the street, however, not only do we behold these different degrees of
+civilization, but those problems of diversity, which the highest form of
+existing civilization developes--the diversities of extreme poverty, and
+extreme wealth, for instance. Here sits the beggar, sick and pinched
+with cold; and there goes a man of no better flesh and blood, and no
+more authentic charter of soul, wrapped in comfort, and actually bloated
+with luxury. There issues the whine of distress, beside the glittering
+carriage-wheels. There, amidst the rush of gaiety; the busy, selfish
+whirl; half naked, shivering, with her bare feet on the icy pavement,
+stands the little girl, with the shadow of an experience upon her that
+has made her preternaturally old, and it may be, driven the angel from
+her face. Still, we cannot believe that above that wintry heaven which
+stretches over her, there is less regard for the poor, neglected child,
+than for that rosy belt of infant happiness which girdles and gladdens
+ten thousand hearths.
+
+And here, too, through the brilliant street, and the broad light of day,
+walks Purity, enshrined in the loveliest form of womanhood. And along
+that same street by night, attended by fitting shadows, strolls
+womanhood discrowned, clothed with painted shame, yet, even in the
+springs of that guilty heart not utterly quenched. We render just homage
+to the one, we pour scorn upon the other; but, could we trace back the
+lines of circumstance, and inquire why the one stands guarded with such
+sweet respect, and why the other has fallen, we might raise problems
+with which we cannot tax Providence, which we may not lay altogether to
+the charge of the condemned, but for which we might challenge an answer
+from society.
+
+And, if we would ascertain the practical purport of this lesson of human
+diversity which is so conspicuous in the street--the meaning of these
+sharp contrasts of refinement and grossness, intelligence and ignorance,
+respectability and guilt--we only ask a question that thousands have
+asked before us. And yet, it is possible to surmise the purpose of these
+diversities. We know, for one thing, that out of them come some of the
+noblest instances of character and of achievement. Ignorance and crime
+and poverty and vice, stand in fearful contrast to knowledge and
+integrity and wealth and purity; but they likewise constitute the dark
+background against which the virtues of human life stand out in radiant
+relief; virtues developed by the struggle which they create; virtues
+which seem impossible without their co-existence. For, whence issues any
+such thing as _virtue_, except out of the temptation and antagonism of
+vice? How could _Charity_ ever have appeared in the world, were there no
+dark ways to be trodden by its bright feet, and no suffering and sadness
+to require its aid? I look at these asylums, these hospitals, these
+ragged schools--a zodiac of beautiful charities, girdling all this
+selfishness and sin--I look at these monuments which humanity will honor
+when war shall be but a legend, and laurels have withered to dust; and
+when I think what they have grown out of, and why they stand here, I
+regard them as so many sublime way-marks by which Providence unfolds its
+purposes among men, and by which men trace out the plan of God.
+
+And then, again, perhaps this problem of human diversity presses
+heaviest where civilization is the most advanced, in order that men may
+be more sharply aroused to seek some practical solution. It is an
+encouraging sign when an evil begins to be intensely felt, and the
+demand for relief becomes desperate. The civilization of our time is
+imperfect; involves many incongruities; perhaps creates some evils; but
+that it is an improved civilization, is evinced by the fact that it is
+_self-conscious_; for perception is the necessary antecedent of endeavor
+and success. The contrasts of human condition, then, that unfold
+themselves in the crowded street, may teach us our duty and our
+responsibility in lessening social inequality and need.
+
+But a solution of this problem, clearer perhaps than any other, appears
+when we consider another lesson of the street; a lesson which requires
+us to look a little deeper, but which, when we do look, is no less
+evident than these diversities. That lesson unfolds the essential
+_unity_ of humanity. For, we find that the differences between men are
+_formal_ rather than _real_; that, with various outward conditions, they
+pass through the same great trials; and that the scales which seem to
+hang uneven at the surface, and to be tipped this way and that by the
+currents of worldly fortune, are very nearly balanced in the depths of
+the inner life. We are shallow judges of the happiness or the misery of
+others, if we estimate it by any marks that distinguish them from
+ourselves; if, for instance, we say that because they have more money
+they are happier, or because they live more meagrely they are more
+wretched. For, men are allied by much more than they differ. The rich
+man, rolling by in his chariot, and the beggar, shivering in his rags,
+are allied by much more than they differ. It is safer, therefore, to
+estimate our neighbor's real condition by what we find in our own lot,
+than by what we do not find there. And now, see into what an essential
+unity this criterion draws the jostling, divergent masses in yonder
+street! Each man there, like all the rest, finds life to be a
+discipline. Each has his separate form of discipline; but it bears upon
+the kindred spirit that is in every one of us, and strikes upon motives,
+sympathies, faculties, that run through the common humanity. Surely, you
+will not calculate any _essential_ difference from mere appearances; for
+the light laughter that bubbles on the lip often mantles over brackish
+depths of sadness, and the serious look may be the sober veil that
+covers a divine peace. You know that the bosom _can_ ache beneath
+diamond brooches, and how many blithe hearts dance under coarse wool.
+But I do not allude merely to these accidental contrasts. I mean that
+about equal measures of trial, equal measures of what men call good and
+evil, are allotted to all; enough, at least, to prove the identity of
+our humanity, and to show that we are all subjects of the same great
+plan. You say that the poor man who passes yonder, carrying his burden,
+has a hard lot of it, and it may be he has; but the rich man who brushes
+by him has a hard lot of it too--just as hard for _him_, just as well
+fitted to discipline him for the great ends of life. He has his money
+to take care of; a pleasant occupation, you may think; but, after all,
+an _occupation_, with all the strain and anxiety of labor, making more
+hard work for him, day and night, perhaps, than his neighbor has who
+digs ditches or thumps a lapstone. And it is quite likely that he feels
+poorer than the poor man, and, if he ever becomes self-conscious, has
+great reason to feel meaner. And then, he has his rivalries, his
+competitions, his troubles of caste and etiquette, so that the merchant,
+in his sumptuous apartments, comes to the same essential point, "sweats,
+and bears fardels," as well as his brother in the garret; tosses on his
+bed with surfeit, or perplexity, while the other is wrapped in peaceful
+slumber; and, if he is one who recognizes the moral ends of life, finds
+himself called upon to contend with his own heart, and to fight with
+peculiar temptations. And thus the rich man and the poor man, who seem
+so unequal in the street, would find but a thin partition between them,
+could they, as they might, detect one another kneeling on the same
+platform of spiritual endeavor, and sending up the same prayers to the
+same eternal throne.
+
+But, say you, "here is one who is returning to a home of destitution, of
+misery; where the light of the natural day is almost shut out, but in
+which brood the deeper shadows of despair." And yet, in many a splendid
+mansion you will find a more fearful destitution, a dearth of
+affections, killed by envy, jealousy, distrust; stifled by glittering
+formalities; a brood of evil passions that mock the splendor, and darken
+the magnificent walls. The measure of joy, too, is distributed with the
+same impartiality as the measure of woe. The child's grief throbs
+against the round of its little heart as heavily as the man's sorrow;
+and the one finds as much delight in his kite or drum, as the other in
+striking the springs of enterprise or soaring on the wings of fame.
+After all, happiness is the rule, not the exception, even in the hearts
+that beat in the crowded city; and its great elements are as common as
+the air, and the sunshine, and free movement, and good health. And what
+the fortunate may seem to gain in variety of methods, may only be
+unconscious devices to simulate or recover that natural relish which
+others have never lost. And no one doubts that the great dispensations
+of life, the events that make epochs in our fleeting years, cleave
+through all the strata of outward difference, and lay bare the core of
+our one humanity. Sickness! does it not make Dives look very much like
+Lazarus, and show our common weakness, and reveal the common marvel of
+this "harp of thousand strings?" And sorrow! it veils all faces, and
+bows all forms alike, and sends the same shudder through the frame, and
+casts the same darkness upon the walls, and peals forth in the same
+dirge of maternal agony by the dead boy's cradle in the sumptuous
+chamber, and the baby's last sleep on its bed of straw. And Death! how
+wonderfully it makes them all alike who in the street wore such various
+garments, and had such distinct aims, and were whirled apart in such
+different orbits! Ah! our essential humanity comes out in those composed
+forms and still features. Those divergent currents have carried them out
+upon the same placid sea at last; and the same solemn light streams
+upon the clasped hands and the uplifted faces. We don't mind the drapery
+so much then. It seems a very superficial matter beside the silent and
+starless mystery that enfolds them all.
+
+In what I have thus said I do not mean to maintain that outward
+conditions are nothing. I think they are a great deal; and we do right
+in striving to improve them; in escaping the evil, and seeking to secure
+the good that pertains to them. But, I repeat, when we come to the
+essential humanity, to the real discipline and substance of life, we
+find the same great features; and so this lesson of the street may help
+explain the problem suggested by the other; may reconcile each of us to
+our condition in the crowd, and direct our attention to substantial
+results.
+
+But, again, the street, with its processions and activities, teaches us
+that much in human life is merely _phenomenal_, merely _appears_. We
+enter into this truth by a very common train of observation. We know how
+much is put on purposely for the public gaze, and has no other intention
+than to be seen; how hollow are many of the smiles, and gay looks, and
+smooth decencies. And even the complexion of some, with its red and
+white, is more unsubstantial than all the rest; for it is in danger of
+being washed away by the first shower. It is strange to meet people
+whose personal significance in life is that of a shop window exhibiting
+lace and jewelry; strange to encounter men in whose place we might
+substitute a well-dressed effigy, and they would hardly be missed. Of
+course appearances should be attended to, and are good in their place.
+It is right that we should honor society by our best looks and ways. But
+it is not merely ridiculous, it is sad, to think how much in the street,
+where humanity exhibits all its phases, is appearance and but little
+else.
+
+But dress and manners are not all that is phenomenal in human life.
+These men and women themselves, this streaming crowd, these brick walls
+and stately pinnacles, those that pursue and the things that are
+pursued, are only appearances. It may be profitable for us to stand
+apart from this multitude, this river of living forms, and think in how
+short a time it all will have passed away; how short a time since, and
+it was not! A little while ago, and this rich and populous city was a
+green island, and our beautiful bay clasped it in its silver arms like
+an emerald. The wilderness stood here, and the child of the forest
+thought of it as a prepared abiding place for himself and for his people
+for ever. The red man has gone; the wild woods have vanished; and these
+structures, and vehicles, and busy crowds, have come into their places
+magically, like the new picture in a dissolving view. But are these
+forms of life, is your presence here or mine, any more substantial than
+those that have sunk away? Nay, all this splendid civilization, what is
+it but a sparkling ripple in the calm eternity of God? Dwellings,
+stores, banks, churches, streets, and the restless multitudes, are but
+forms of life,--as it were a rack of cloud drifting across the mirror of
+absolute being. That which seems to you substantial is only spectral.
+And as the dress of the fop, and the smile of the coquette, is merely an
+appearance; so the wealth for which men strain in eager chase, and the
+fabrics which pride builds up, the anvils on which labor strikes its
+mighty blows, and the body to which so much is devoted, and which
+absorbs so much care, are but appearances also. While that which may
+seem to you as a shadow--the spiritual substratum of life, the basis of
+those spiritual laws which run through all our conditions--is the only
+abiding substance.
+
+If we only look in this light, my friends, upon the continuous spectacle
+of human movement and human change, we shall find that "Wisdom...
+uttereth her voice in the streets." Old as the thought may be, in the
+rush of the great crowd it will come to us fresh and impressively, that
+all this is but a form of spiritual and eternal being. A day in the city
+is like life itself. Out of unconscious slumber into the brilliant
+morning and the thick activity we come. But, by-and-by, the heaving mass
+breaks into units, and one by one dissolves into the shadow of the
+night. Two cities grow up side by side--the city in which men appear,
+the city into which they vanish; the city whose houses and goods they
+possess for a little while and then leave behind them, and the city
+whose white monuments just show us the pinnacles of their estates in the
+eternal world. The busy, diversified crowd that rolls through the
+streets--it is only an appearance! It is a ceaseless march of
+emigration. In a little while, the names in this year's Directory may be
+read in Greenwood.
+
+But we must not rest with this as the final lesson of the street. It is
+only the form of Life that is transient and phenomenal; but the _Life_
+itself is here, also--here, in these flashing eyes, and heaving breasts,
+and active limbs. These conditions, however transient, involve the great
+interest of Humanity; and that lends the deepest significance to these
+conditions. The interest of Humanity! which gives importance to all it
+touches, and transforms nature into history; which imparts dignity to
+the rudest workshop, and the most barren shore, and the humblest
+grave--this permits us to draw no mean or discouraging conclusions from
+the achievements and the changes of the multitudes around us. It may do
+for the skeptic, who sees nothing in existence but these forms of
+things; who sees nothing but the limited phenomena of our present state,
+and thinks that includes all; it may do for him to croak over the
+transitoriness of life, and call it a trivial game. But it is _not_
+trivial; and there is no spot where man acts, there is nothing that he
+does, that is insignificant. Perhaps you have a quick eye for the
+foibles of people, and can detect their vanities, and meannesses, and
+laughable conceits. If you employ this gift to correct a bad habit, or
+expose a falsehood, it is well enough. But if it induces you to look
+upon things merely with the skill of a satirist, then let me say, there
+is no "ludicrous side" to life; there is nothing in human conduct that
+is simply absurd. The least transaction has a moral cast, and every word
+and act reveals spiritual relations. The interest of man can never be
+thrown into insignificance by his conditions; these draw interest from
+him. And, whatever his post in the world, however limited or broad his
+sphere of observation, for _him_ life is real, and has intense
+relations. We must not stand so far apart from the crowd as to occupy
+the position of mere spectators, and regard these men and women as so
+many mechanical figures in a panorama. We must look through the depths
+of their experience into their own souls, and through the depths of that
+experience again upon the world, beholding it as it appears to the
+beggar, and the lonely woman, and the child of vice and crime, and the
+hero, and the saint, and as it falls with intense yet diverse
+refractions upon all these multiform angles of personality. So shall we
+learn to cherish a solemn and tender interest in the dear humanity
+around us, and feel the arteries of sympathy which connect it, in all
+its conditions, with our own hearts. And, as we return homeward from our
+study of the street, it may be with our irritation, and prejudice, and
+selfishness softened down; with a larger love flowing out towards the
+least, and even the worst; realizing the spiritual ties that make us
+one, and the Infinite Fatherhood that encircles us all; perhaps
+suggestions will come to us that have been best expressed in the words
+of the poet--
+
+    "Let us move slowly through the street,
+      Filled with an ever-shifting train,
+    Amid the sound of steps that beat
+      The murmuring walks like autumn rain.
+
+    "How fast the flitting figures come!
+      The mild, the fierce, the stony face;
+    Some bright with thoughtless smiles, and some
+      Where secret tears have left their trace.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    "Each, where his tasks or pleasures call
+      They pass, and heed each other not.
+    There is, Who heeds, Who holds them all,
+      In His large love and boundless thought.
+
+    "These struggling tides of life that seem,
+      In wayward, aimless course to tend,
+    Are eddies of the mighty stream
+      That rolls to its appointed end."
+
+
+
+
+MAN AND MACHINERY.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE II.
+
+MAN AND MACHINERY.
+
+      For the spirit of the living creature was in the
+      wheels.--EZEKIEL, i. 20.
+
+
+Whatever may have been the significance of the sublime vision from which
+I have extracted those words, I do not think that their essential
+meaning is perverted when I apply them to the subject which comes before
+us this evening. I am not aware of any sentence that expresses more
+concisely the relation which I would indicate between _Man_ and
+_Machinery_; between those great agents of human achievement and the
+living intelligence which works in them and by them. And though a Divine
+Spirit moved in those flashing splendors which burned before the eyes of
+the prophet, is it not also a divine spirit that mingles in every great
+manifestation of humanity, and that moves even in the action of man,
+the worker, toiling among innumerable wheels?
+
+Perhaps if we were called upon to name some one feature of the present
+age which distinguishes it from all other ages, and endows it with a
+special wonder and glory, we should call it the Age of Machinery. We
+trust our age is unfolding something better than material triumphs. The
+results of past thought and past endeavor are pouring through it in
+expanding currents of knowledge, liberty, and brotherhood. But the great
+_agents_ in this diffusion of ideas and principles are those vehicles of
+iron, and those messengers of lightning, which compress the huge globe
+into a neighborhood, and bring all its interests within the system of a
+daily newspaper. Like the generations which have preceded us, we enter
+into the labors of others, and inherit the fruits of their effort. But
+these powerful instruments, condensing time and space, endow a single
+half-century with the possibilities of a cycle. If we take the period
+comprehending the American and the French revolutions as a dividing
+line, and look both sides the chasm, we shall discover the difference
+of a thousand years. Remarkable for brilliant achievements in every
+department of physics, ours well deserves to be called the Age of
+_Science_, also. But it is still more remarkable, for the application of
+the most majestic and subtle constituents of the universe to the most
+familiar uses; the wild forces of matter have been caught and harnessed.
+Go into any factory, and see what fine workmen we have made of the great
+elements around us. See how magnificent nature has humbled itself, and
+works in shirt-sleeves. Without food, without sweat, without weariness,
+it toils all day at the loom, and shouts lustily in the sounding wheels.
+How diligently the iron fingers pick and sort, and the muscles of steel
+retain their faithful gripe, and enormous energies run to and fro with
+an obedient click; while forces that tear the arteries of the earth and
+heave volcanoes, spin the fabric of an infant's robe, and weave the
+flowers in a lady's brocade.
+
+I think, then, we may appropriately call it--The Age of Machinery. It is
+not a peculiarity of the city, but, rather, seeks room to stretch
+itself out; and so you may perceive its smoky signals hovering over a
+thousand vallies, and the echo of its mighty pulses throbbing among the
+loneliest hills. Nevertheless, it is sufficiently developed here to
+illustrate the Conditions of Humanity in the City, and this fact,
+together with the general interest of the subject, is my warrant for
+taking it up in the present discourse. And my remarks must necessarily
+be of a general cast, as I have no room for the statistics, and details,
+and various discussions which grow out of the theme.
+
+And the key-note of all that I shall say, at the present time, is really
+in the text itself--"For the spirit of the living creature was in the
+wheels."
+
+In the first place, these words suggest the relations of _Use_ and
+_Help_ between Man and Machinery. Upon surveying these numerous and
+complicated instruments, the thought that most readily occurs, perhaps,
+is that of the _necessity_ of machinery. The very first step that man
+takes, out of the condition of infant weakness and animal rudeness, must
+be accomplished by the aid of some implement. He alone, of all beings
+upon the face of the earth, is obliged to _invent_, and is capable of
+endless invention. The necessity for this springs out, and is a prophecy
+of, his destiny. The moment he was seen fashioning the first tool,
+however imperfect, that moment was indicated the difference between
+himself and the brute, and the control he was destined to gain over the
+world about him. To fulfil this destiny, he confronts nature with naked
+hands; and yet, there is the earth to plough, the harvest to reap, the
+torrent to bridge, the ocean to cross; there are all the results to
+achieve which constitute the difference between the primitive man, and
+the civilization of the nineteenth century. The Machine, then--the agent
+which links the gratification to the want--is born of necessity. But we
+must make a distinction between those instruments which are positively
+essential, and those, for instance, which merely answer the demands of
+luxury or indolence.
+
+And this brings up the question of the _comparative_ uses of
+Machinery--the foremost place being assigned to those implements which
+are absolutely indispensable to man's existence upon the earth. But
+between this absolute degree, and that of frivolous invention, there are
+countless grades of utility. And the question of usefulness must be
+decided according to the _standard_ of utility which we apply. If bare
+subsistence is assumed to be the end of man upon the earth, most of our
+modern inventions are useless. We can travel without a locomotive, and
+procure a meal without a cooking-range. The moment we rise above the
+grossest conception of human existence, the test of usefulness becomes
+enlarged, and we can make a safe decision upon whatever increases man's
+comfort, adds to his ability, or inspires his culture. In this way, new
+things _become_ indispensable. That which was not necessary _a priori_,
+_is_ necessary now, in a fresh stage of development, and in connection
+with circumstances that have sprung up and formed around it. That which
+was not necessary to man the savage, living on roots and raw fish, is
+necessary to man the civilized, with new possibilities opening before
+him, and new faculties unfolded within him. The printing-press was not
+absolutely necessary to Nimrod, or to Julius Caesar, but is it not
+absolutely necessary now? Strike it out of existence to-day, and what
+would be the condition of the world to-morrow? You would have to tear
+away with it all that has grown up around it, and become assimilated to
+it--the textures of the world's growth for three hundred years. Paul
+moved the old world without a telegraph, and Columbus found a new one
+without a steamship. But see how essential these agents are to the
+present condition of civilization. How many derangements among the
+wheels of business, and the plans of affection, if merely a snow-drift
+blocks the cars, or a thunder-storm snaps the wires! Our estimate of
+necessity, and, therefore, of utility, must be formed according to
+present conditions, and the legitimate demand that rises out of them;
+these conditions themselves being the necessary developments of society
+and of the individual.
+
+But some of these, you may say, are the demands of luxury, of indolent
+ease, of man setting nature to work and lapsing in self-indulgence. To
+some degree this result may grow out of the present state of things; as
+some portion of evil will follow in the sweep of an immense good. But
+what is the precise sentence to be passed upon this prevalent luxury? Of
+course, admitting the evil--which is apparent--I maintain that there is
+a great deal of good in it; that it is inextricably associated with much
+real refinement and progress. Men are accustomed to speak of the
+simplicity and purity of past times, and to compare, with a sigh, the
+good old era of the stage-coach and the spinning-wheel with these days
+of whizzing machinery, Aladdin palaces, and California gold. But the
+core of logic that lies within this rind of sentiment forces a
+conclusion that I can by no means admit, the conclusion that the world
+is going backward. I never knew of an epoch that was not thought by some
+then living to be the worst that ever was, and which did not seem to
+stand in humiliating contrast with some blessed period gone by. But the
+golden age of Christianity is in the future, not in the past. Those old
+ages are like the landscape that shows best in purple distance, all
+verdant and smooth and bathed in mellow light. But could we go back and
+touch the reality, we should find many a swamp of disease, and rough
+and grimy paths of rock and mire. Those were good old times, it may be
+thought, when baron and peasant feasted together. But the one could not
+read, and made his mark with a sword-pommel; and the other was not held
+so dear as a favorite dog. Pure and simple times were those of our
+grandfathers,--it may be. Possibly not so pure as we may think, however,
+and with a simplicity ingrained with some bigotry and a good deal of
+conceit. The fact is, we are bad enough, imperfect, not because we are
+growing worse, but because we are yet far from the best. I think,
+however, with Lord Bacon, that _these_ are "the old times." The world is
+older now than it ever was, and it contains the best life and fruition
+of the past. And this special condition of luxury is a growth out of the
+past, and is the necessary concomitant of much that is good. Opening new
+channels for industry, it furnishes occupation for thousands; while, in
+many of its phases, it indicates a refined culture, and a sphere
+elevated above the imperative wants of existence. It is no proof of the
+disadvantages of machinery, therefore, to say that it ministers to
+something beside absolute bodily need, and delivers man from a slow and
+exhausting drudgery. So far as it helps us to control nature, and
+increases the facilities of human intercourse, and diffuses general
+comfort and elegance, and affords a respite from incessant physical
+toil, so far it is an agent and a sign of progress.
+
+But, it may be said again, that it is the agent of a selfish and
+exclusive power, enriching a few and injuring many. And it cannot be
+denied that grave problems grow out of the relations between Machinery
+and the laboring classes. Every little while, some new invention is
+thrust forward, which takes a portion of labor out of the hands of flesh
+and transfers it to hands of iron. It is not enough to say that mankind
+in general is benefited by these inanimate agents, which do the work of
+the world so much more rapidly and powerfully. This may answer as an
+argument against a monopoly of any one kind of mechanical force. It may
+be a reason for using cars instead of steamboats, and balloons rather
+than railroads. The general good must be advanced, whatever the damage
+to private interests. But the present case brings up the question
+whether machinery is a general good at all; whether the effect of its
+introduction into almost every department of labor, will not be felt in
+the destitution of millions. And, upon this point, I observe, that, like
+all other great revolutions, the immediate effect may be such as has
+been suggested. But the final result will be beneficial, and such a
+result may be traced out even now. For instance, this clogging of old
+departments of labor will precipitate men upon fresh ones, and upon
+those that have been too much neglected. It will tend to introduce woman
+to branches of industry perfectly suited to her, but which have been too
+exclusively occupied by the other sex, and to turn the attention of
+robust men to those great fields of productive toil which are as yet but
+little improved. It may drive them from the dependence, the crowded
+competition, the unwholesome life of the city, into the broad fields and
+open air and the sovereignty of the soil. And if this immense intrusion
+of machinery has only this result, of equalizing the balance against
+production, we shall have one solution of the problem. And there will be
+another solution, if this phalanx of mechanism shall lift the mass of
+men above the occasions of coarse material drudgery into other
+activities, which doubtless will be thrown open, and shall allow more
+leisure for spiritual culture. But in this, and all other great
+questions affecting human welfare, I throw myself back, finally, upon
+the tokens of Providential Design. The world moves forward, not
+backward; and the great developments of time are for good, not evil. By
+machinery, man proceeds with his dominion over nature. He assimilates it
+to himself; it becomes, so to speak, a part of himself. Every great
+invention is the enlargement of his own personality. Iron and fire
+become blood and muscle, and gravitation flows in the current of his
+will. His pulses beat in the steamship, throbbing through the deep,
+while the fibres of his heart and brain inclose the earth in an electric
+network of thought and sympathy. That which was given to help man, will
+not hinder nor hurt him. "For the spirit of the living creature is in
+the wheels."
+
+I observe, in the second place, that the words of the text accord with
+the testimony which machinery bears to the _dignity of man_. All these
+great inventions--these implements of marvellous skill and power--prove
+that the inventor, or the worker, himself is _not_ a machine. I know of
+nothing which gives me so forcible an impression of the worth and
+superiority of mind, of its alliance with the Creative Intelligence, as
+the exhibition of an ingenious piece of mechanism. I have stood with
+wonder before such a specimen, and seen it work with all the precision
+of a reflecting creature. Lifting the most tremendous weights, cleaving
+the most solid masses, performing the nicest tasks, as though a living
+intellect were in it, informing it and directing its power. I hardly
+know of any achievement that stands as a higher witness for the human
+mind. The great poem that bursts in a flood of inspiration upon the soul
+of genius, and opens the realms of immortal beauty, may lift us to a
+nobler plane of endeavor. The heroic act of toil or martyrdom for
+principle, certainly has a loftier, because it is a moral, grandeur. But
+as an illustration of the _creativeness_ of man's intellect--of its
+wondrous capability--of its alliance with that attribute of the Divine
+Nature which is evident in the fibres of the grass-blade and the march
+of the galaxy--I know of nothing more striking than this piece of
+mechanism, which is the product of the most profound and patient
+thought, the harmonizing of antagonistic forces, the combination of the
+most abstruse details, fitted to the remotest exigencies, and working
+just as the inventive mind meant it should, and just as it was set
+a-going, as if that mind were presiding over it, were in it, though it
+is now far distant, or has vanished from the earth. That mind is
+immortal! that nature, which is common to all men, transcends any shape
+of matter and is superior to mechanism. And it may be necessary to say
+this, necessary to say that man, who is helped by machinery, is
+_separate_ from it. It is mind that is thus involved with matter. The
+spirit of a living creature that is in the wheels.
+
+It may be necessary to say this, my friends, and to say it frequently,
+lest the vast mechanical achievements of our time seduce us into a mere
+mechanical life. I do not think that the deepest question is, whether
+machinery will multiply to such an extent as to snatch the bread from
+the mouths of living men; but whether men, with all the possibilities of
+their nature, will not become absorbed in that which supplies them with
+bread alone? I have just expressed my admiration for the genius of the
+great inventor. Nor can I honor too highly the faithful and industrious
+mechanic--the man who fills up his chink in the great economy by
+patiently using his hammer or his wheel. For, he _does_ something. If he
+only sews a welt, or planes a knot, he helps build up the solid pyramid
+of this world's welfare. While there are those who, exhibiting but
+little use while living, might, if embalmed, serve the same purpose as
+those forms of ape and ibis _inside_ the Egyptian caverns--serve to
+illustrate the shapes and idolatries of human conceit. At any rate,
+there is no doubt of the essential nobility of that man who pours into
+life the honest vigor of his toil, over those who compose this feathery
+foam of fashion that sweeps along Broadway; who consider the insignia of
+honor to consist in wealth and indolence; and who, ignoring the family
+history, paint coats of arms to cover up the leather aprons of their
+grandfathers.
+
+I shall not be misunderstood then, when, making a distinction in behalf
+of the mechanic by profession, I say that no man should be a mere
+mechanic in _soul_. In other words, no man should be bound up in a
+routine of material ends and uses. He should not be a mechanic, working
+exclusively in a dead system, but always the architect of a living
+ideal. And surrounded, astonished, served and enriched as we are by
+these splendid legions of mechanism, the danger is that material
+achievement will seem to us the _supreme_ achievement; that all life
+will become machinery; and the higher interests of being, and the great
+firmament of immortality, be eclipsed by these flashing wheels. We are
+in danger of being drawn away from the sanctities of the inner life and
+the still work of the soul, by this maelstrom of excitement and power.
+No religious man can help asking, and asking anxiously, whether the
+spirit of devotion is as deep and fresh, whether spiritual communion
+with God is as direct and constant, in this whirl and roar, and
+marvellous achievement, as they were in times bearing less evidently the
+signs of material progress. For, that which merely gives us a stronger
+grasp of the world around us, and sends us along the level of nature, is
+not the most genuine element of progress; but that which elevates our
+moral plane and enriches the great deep of our spiritual being. The
+steamship and telegraph are not absolute tokens of this progress, but
+the moral earnestness and the Christian charity that work through them
+are; and these must spring up in hearts that are not merely adjusted to
+the world, but lifted above it--that are not so occupied by mere
+machinery as to neglect the living streams of an inward and devout
+culture.
+
+But, for another reason,--or as an extension of the same reason,--we
+need to realize the truth that man is separate from and superior to
+machinery. It is because, upon a practical recognition of this truth
+depends the just action of all who control the interests of labor, and,
+so to speak, the lives and souls of the laborers. If we should beware of
+an influence that would render us _mere_ mechanics in our own higher
+nature, we should likewise remove anything that makes others mere
+machines, presenting for us no other consideration than the amount of
+work they can perform for us, and with how little care and cost. I
+cannot now enter into the great questions that spring up here concerning
+the relations of capital and labor, and of the employer and the
+employed. I only observe that these are among the deepest questions of
+the time: questions which will be heard, which must be discussed, and
+practically answered. And they who by plans and experiments, however
+visionary they may seem, however abortive they may prove, are trying to
+solve this problem, are much wiser in their generation than those who
+content themselves with cutaneous palliatives and a stolid conservatism.
+But I maintain now, that back of all these considerations stands this
+truism,--that man is not a machine; that the being who toils in the
+factory, the furnace, the dark mine underground, is one who needs and
+hopes and suffers and dies, as sinews of iron and fabrics of brass
+cannot. "The spirit of a living creature is in the wheels." A cry for
+justice, for free action, for spiritual opportunity, comes not from the
+roaring engine or the dizzy loom, but out from the midst of those who
+are endowed with the sensitiveness and the moral possibilities that
+belong to humanity, and humanity alone. Set in motion the grandest piece
+of mechanism ever conceived by human genius, and still there is infinite
+difference between it and the poorest drudge that bears God's
+image,--between it and any human claim.
+
+It must have been a noble spectacle, a few weeks since, to have seen
+that great ship[A] sail out of port, stretching its proud beak over the
+sea, and with thundering exultation trampling its sapphire floor. One
+might have followed its wake with a glistening eye, and said to
+himself--"There is the great symbol of human progress, there is the
+consummation of man's triumph over nature! The long results of ages are
+condensed in that fabric of strength and beauty. Man has compelled the
+forest, and ravished the mine, and converted the stream, and chained the
+fire; and now, with the eye of science and the hand of skill, he rides
+in this triumphal chariot, making a swift, obedient pathway of the
+deep!" But when that dark day burst upon them, and nature with one angry
+sweep transformed that splendid palace into a floating death-chamber;
+when ocean lifted up this triumph of man's skill, and shook it like a
+toy; the interest which hung over that awful desolation--the interest to
+which your hearts flow out with painful sympathy to-night--was in
+nothing that man had achieved, but in humanity itself. All the
+workmanship, all the material splendor, all the skill, were nothing
+compared with one heart beating amidst that tempest; compared with one
+groan that rose from that sea of agony, and then was silent for ever.
+
+    [Footnote A: This discourse was delivered just after the tidings
+    of the loss of the San Francisco, in December, 1853.]
+
+And, again, when I consider the conduct of that gallant captain who, day
+by day, rode by the side of the shuddering wreck, and in slippery peril
+maintained the royalty of his manhood, and sent a brother's cheer and a
+brother's help through the storm; when I think of that noble achievement
+where the Stars and Stripes and the Cross of St. George were lost and
+blended in the light of universal humanity; I say to myself--how does an
+act like this shed light upon a thousand instances of human depravity!
+What is any material triumph compared to this moral beauty! And what is
+the great distinction between rags and coronets, between senates and
+workshops, when in the breast of every man, and everywhere, there is the
+possibility of such heroism, such charity, and such splendid
+performance!
+
+And so, my friends, turning from this specific illustration, and looking
+through the wards of cities, the busy factories, the dim attics and
+cellars, they all become glorious by the reflected light of the humanity
+that toils and suffers within them. Man is greater than any achievement
+of mechanism, any interest of capital, and all the questions which these
+involve must be brought to the test of his moral capabilities, and his
+spiritual as well as earthly wants.
+
+But I observe, finally, that the words of the text suggest the
+_Providential design_ and the _Divine agency_ that are involved in the
+great mechanical achievements of our age. As the Divine Spirit flowed
+through those living creatures and moved those wheels, so God's
+influence is in the movement of humanity, and in the instruments of that
+movement. We get only a narrow, and often an inexplicable conception of
+things, until we behold them encircled by this horizon of a Providential
+design. And if humanity, with all its claims and possibilities, is
+involved in this network of mechanism, so doubtless are the processes of
+Infinite Wisdom. Something more than material greatness, or ends limited
+merely to this earth, is to be wrought out by it. Indications of this
+appear already. The telegraph and steamship, for instance, serve not
+only the interests of trade and commerce, but of liberty, and
+brotherhood, and of Christian influence.
+
+It is beautiful to see how the most selfish agents presently become
+converted to the broadest uses, and matter is transformed into the
+vehicle of spirit. For God is in history. It is a Divine dispensation,
+and has miracles of its own. And, because they come by natural
+development let us not fail to recognize the benevolence and the
+significance involved with them. Is not the effect of miracle in the
+electric wire? The printing-press, is it not the gift of tongues? It is
+atheistic to suppose that all these wondrous agents have only a narrow
+and material purpose, and play no part in the highest scheme of the
+world. Like the prophet by the river Chebar, we may behold them as the
+symbols in a sublime vision. These wheels within wheels, full of eyes,
+full of intelligence, and full of human destiny and vast purpose, we
+know not all their meaning yet. But they have a great meaning.
+Beneficent intention runs through their swift motions--voices of promise
+rise in their multitudinous sounds. A living spirit is in these
+wheels--the influence of God; the spirit of man. And, in due time, out
+of them will evolve the incalculable issues of human welfare and the
+Divine glory.
+
+
+
+
+THE STRIFE FOR PRECEDENCE.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE III.
+
+THE STRIFE FOR PRECEDENCE.
+
+      And if a man strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned
+      except he strive lawfully.--II. TIMOTHY, ii. 5.
+
+
+In walking the streets of the city, there rises the interesting
+question--What are the various motives which animate these restless
+people, and send them to and fro? As a French author has well
+observed,--"The necessaries of life do not occasion, at most, a third
+part of the hurry." They are comparatively few who struggle among these
+busy waves for a bare subsistence. There are others who are impelled by
+some of the deepest affections of the human heart, and who toil day
+after day with noble self-sacrifice for the comfort of dependent
+parents, and helpless children. While others still run on errands of
+mercy, and work in the harness of unrelaxing duty. But when we have
+taken all these influences into the account, and made the most of them,
+there remains a large quantity of activity which, as we trace it to its
+spring, we shall find issuing from a desire for influence, for
+notoriety, for some kind of personal distinction. The city,--in this
+instance, as in many others, representing the world at large,--is
+essentially a race-course, or battle-field, in which, through forms of
+ambitious effort, and cunning method, and plodding labor, and
+ostentation, the aspirations of thousands appear and carry on a _Strife
+for Precedence_.
+
+And, in selecting this phase of human life as the theme of the present
+discourse, I observe in the first place--that the desire for precedence
+is one of the _deepest_ and most _subtle_ motives in the soul of man. It
+is prolific of disguises. It is not merely under the mask which we may
+put on before other people, but it glides through various
+transformations of self-deceit; like the evil genius in the fairy tale,
+now dwindling to a mere seed, now bursting into a devouring fire. When,
+with an honest purpose, we probe it and pluck at it, still we may
+detect it in the lowest socket of the heart. Often it is most vital when
+we feel most sure that it is vanquished. It delights in the garb of
+humility, and finds its food in the profession of self-renunciation. See
+its grossest expression in the desire for physical superiority--the
+glory of the victor in the Grecian games, or the modern pugilist with
+the champion's belt. This is the reason why men, priding themselves upon
+qualities in which they are equalled by any mastiff and excelled by any
+horse, will stand up and batter one another into a mass of blood and
+bruises. And if we analyze the merit of some conqueror upon a hundred
+battle-fields, we shall find ingredients almost as coarse. Only there
+was a larger impulse, and more genius to light the way; so that _his_
+combat in the ring became _achievement_, and his success _fame_. The
+outside difference was in the value of the stakes; but the huzzas did
+not rise much nearer to heaven in the one instance than in the other.
+And when we get at the real centre of all those plaudits, we find only a
+little throbbing atom, a little human heart, all on fire with the lust
+for supremacy.
+
+But these are the more palpable shapes of this desire for Precedence. It
+works more covertly, but with no less energy. I need not--for I
+cannot--specify all the instances in which it acts. It would constitute
+a more concise statement to affirm where it does _not_ act. It is
+sufficiently apparent in the scramble of the market and the parade of
+the street; at the toilette of beauty; in the etiquette of the
+drawing-room, where people sit as if in a cavern of icicles; in the
+spurious patriotism of politics; and too often, it is to be feared, in
+the highest seats of the synagogue, and where men lift holy hands of
+prayer. It is the scholar's inspiration. When he comes to the steep and
+rugged way, it helps him to make a foot-hold, and the thorns blossom
+into roses as he climbs. Sometimes, even, it saturates the plan of the
+philanthropist, and peppers the milk of his charity with an inconsistent
+wrath.
+
+It seems an unhappy, as it must often be an unjust method, to attribute
+any appearance of good conduct to the meanest possible motive. It is a
+policy that makes a man afraid of his best friends. He feels that every
+draft he makes upon human honor, or affection, is liable to be cashed
+with counterfeit bills. If there were no alternative between the
+cleverness that suspects everybody, and the credulity that trusts
+everybody, I think I had rather be one of the dupes than one of the
+oracles. For, really, there is less misery in being cheated than in that
+kind of wisdom which perceives, or thinks it perceives, that all mankind
+are cheats. But, while simple fact forbids our assuming either of these
+extremes, we must, nevertheless, in reasoning upon the phenomena of
+human conduct, allow large scope for the influence of which I am now
+treating. For, as I have already intimated, we shall find it lurking
+under numerous forms. In discussing the question of Slavery, for
+instance, it is often said--that it is for the interest of the master to
+take good care of his human as he does of his brute stock--to see that
+they are well-fed, clothed, &c. And so it is for his _interest_ to do
+this. But how often does the lust for supremacy over-ride interest
+itself! How often does an imperious personality thrust itself forward
+in the most absurd ways, damaging its own property and welfare, just as
+a boy breaks his top, or a balked rider shoots his horse, or an
+independent congregationalist locks his pew-door, as much as to
+say--"There, the world knows one thing about me, at least. It knows that
+I am _master_ and _owner_ here!"
+
+But I observe, further, that, while this desire for Precedence is common
+among men of all conditions, there are some modes of its expression
+which are peculiarly excited in a democratic form of society. That which
+is the open glory of a community like ours, is with many a secret
+vexation and shame. People boast here of the equality of our
+institutions, and then try their best to break up the social level. In a
+genuine Aristocracy, where they have endeavored to preserve a
+gulf-stream of noble blood in the midst of the plebeian Atlantic, and a
+man holds his distinction by the color of the bark on his family tree,
+and the kind of sap that circulates through it, there is no danger of
+any unpleasant mistakes. The hard palm of Labor may cross the gloved
+hand of Leisure, and nobody will suspect that the select is too
+familiar with the vulgar. Consequently, there is a good deal of
+affability and prime manliness, besides those associations of sentiment
+and imagination which, if there must be an aristocracy, lend it an
+artistic consistency. But here, where everybody says that all men are
+equal, and everybody is afraid they _will_ be; where there are no
+adamantine barriers of birth and caste; people are anxiously exclusive.
+And though the forms of aristocracy flourish more gorgeously in their
+native soil, the genuine _virus_ can be found in New York almost as
+readily as in London, or Vienna. And the virus breaks out in the most
+absurd shapes of liveries and titles. And these forms of aspiration are
+not only absurd because they are inconsistent, but because they
+illustrate no real ground of precedence. They are superficial and
+uncertain. They do not pertain to the man but to his accidents. He gains
+by them no intrinsic glory, no permanent good. To employ the language of
+the text, by these he strives for masteries; but he does not strive
+lawfully, and so he is not crowned. And this leads me to say something
+respecting what is false, and what is legitimate, in that strife for
+Precedence which is so amply illustrated in the life of the City.
+
+Let us, then, consider some of the forms which this struggle assumes in
+the streets and the dwellings around us. I remark, in the first place,
+that it inspires much of the effort for _wealth_. I believe there are
+but few, comparatively, who are anxious to make money merely for the
+sake of piling it up, and counting it out. There may be a mania of this
+kind, in which men become enamored of Mammon for his own sake, and hug
+him to their breasts, and kiss his golden lips, with all the ardor of
+lovers. Still, I suspect that the genuine miser--that is, one who loves
+money for itself alone--is an exceptional man. But every man who is not
+absolutely inactive and useless in the world, is moved by some kind of
+passion. For, it is not correct to speak of _outliving_ our passions. We
+may outlive the passion of young, fresh love, that makes the world a
+May-time of blossoms and of roses. We may outlive the passion for
+selfish fame, because some transcendent claim of duty snatches us up to
+a sublimer level. We may change these earlier forms for the passion of
+philanthropy, the passion for truth, the passion of holy conviction. But
+so long as we live at all, we do not outlive passion. And with many the
+most persistent desire is for that precedence which attends the
+possession of wealth. That miser, as you call him, with a face like
+parchment, and in whose nature all the springs of emotion seem to have
+grown rusty with long disuse, is animated by a secret flame that keeps
+him all a-glow. It is the consciousness of power--the mightiest power of
+the present age--the power of money. Those figures which he scrawls at
+his writing-desk involve a more potent magic than the cabalistic cyphers
+of Doctor Dee, or Cornelius Agrippa. His hand presses the spring of an
+influence that casts midnight or sunshine over the World of Traffic, and
+shakes entire blocks of real estate with a speculative earthquake. It is
+not the Czar or the Sultan, but the Capitalist, that makes war or
+preserves peace. The destinies of the time are enacted not in Congress
+or Parliament, but in the Bank of England and in Wall street. It is a
+mighty power that sits on 'Change, and inspires the great movements of
+the world; sending its messengers panting through the deep and feeling
+around the globe with telegraphic nerves. And one may well be more
+ambitious to wield a portion of this power than to speak in senates, or
+to sit upon a throne. Here is something that will raise him above the
+common level; will pay him for long years of sacrifice and contumely;
+will hide meanness of birth, and scantiness of education, and paint over
+the stains of damaged character. Here is the most feasible way of
+distinction in a democracy. The doors of respectability and honor turn
+on silver hinges. Gravity relaxes, fashion gives way, beauty smiles, and
+talent defers, before the man of money. He may be an ignoramus, but he
+possesses the golden alphabet. He may be a boor, but Plutus lends a
+charm which eclipses the grace of Apollo. He may have accumulated his
+wealth in a way which would make an intelligent hyena ashamed of
+himself, but he _has_ accumulated it, and the past is forgotten. I do
+not mean to say that, as the general rule, wealth is thus associated,
+but I believe that one great motive for money-getting, is the
+consciousness of the power and the distinction that accompany its
+possession; and so, many a man in the thick dust of the mart--though it
+may not always be clear to himself--is really engaged in a strife for
+Precedence.
+
+Again, consider the illustrations of this strife in the _Style_ of
+_Living_. It is really a battle of chairs and mirrors, of plate and
+equipage, and is the spring of the monstrous extravagance that
+characterizes our city life. For I suppose there is no place on the
+earth where people have run into such gorgeous nonsense as here--turning
+home into a Parisian toy-shop, absorbing the price of a good farm in the
+ornaments of a parlor, and hanging up a judge's salary in a single
+chandelier. Not that I accept the standard of absolute necessity, or
+agree with those who cry out--"Have nothing but what is absolutely
+_useful_!" For, if the universe had been cast after their type, there
+would have been no embroidery on the wings of the butterfly, and the
+awful summit of Mont Blanc would have yielded fire-wood. There is an
+instinct of beauty and grace implanted in our nature, which demands
+elegance and even luxury, and the bare necessaries of life do _not_
+answer every purpose. And, to say nothing of the employment which these
+accessories of refinement afford for thousands--for I have spoken of
+this in the previous series--the most sturdy utilitarian is not
+consistent with his theory. He defers to the social condition around him
+to such an extent that he sleeps on a bed instead of a bench, and wears
+broadcloth instead of untanned sheepskin. And, therefore, others might
+say, and say truly, that a good deal that is actually superfluous is the
+fruit of certain social proprieties which cannot, with any consistency,
+be violated. Our style of living may lawfully run from the bare
+necessaries of existence, through the stages of comfort and convenience,
+even into luxury, according to our condition and means. But in some of
+the style of living in this very city, there is neither good taste,
+social propriety, nor common sense. It is an apoplectic splendor; a
+melo-dramatic glitter; in one word, a vulgar spirit of social rivalry
+blossoming in lace, brocade, gilding, and fresco. It is one way of
+getting a head taller than another upon this democratic level. It is a
+carpet contest for the mastery in what is called "society." And if one
+mourns over the exuberant selfishness that lifts its pinnacles out of
+this dreary sea of hunger and despair, and wonders that so many live
+wrapped in the idea that they were created merely to be gratified; he
+can hardly help being amused, on the other hand, at this fashionable
+strife for precedence, and the methods which it developes.
+
+But enough has been said to illustrate the false element in the great
+struggle for Human Precedence. This vicious principle is most
+comprehensively stated in the proposition, that there is no substantial
+ground of supremacy in anything that is merely accidental or external to
+a man. These things may sometimes stand as symbols of true merit and
+greatness, but they are not themselves proofs of precedence. A man's
+wealth may be the fruit of noble energy and honest toil, and he may
+exert a wide influence by virtue of that intrinsic ability of which his
+good fortune is the sign. Indeed, the more I study the world the more I
+acquire a respect for these kings of enterprise--these heroes of
+practical effort--who, feeling that they have been sent into the world
+to do something, do not fold their hands and shut their eyes in ideal
+dreams, or stumble at discrepancies, but lay hold of what lies about
+them--rough stone, timber, iron, brass,--and become what it is really a
+noble compliment to say of any man--"the architects of their own
+fortune." I have great respect for these men who drive the wheels, and
+kindle the furnaces, and launch the ships, and build the edifices, and
+keep this sea of every-day action perpetually agitated by the keels of
+their endeavor. Their claims to precedence, however, consist not in
+their wealth, but in that which accumulates the wealth. But the man who
+rests merely upon what he _has_, occupies no substantial ground of
+supremacy. And if this is the case with those whose claim hangs merely
+upon what they are worth in the world of money, it is at least equally
+so with those who set their title to precedence upon their style of
+dress or living. For how uncertain are all these things! depending upon
+the fickle currents of fortune; throwing the honors into our hands
+to-day, and transferring them to our neighbor to-morrow! How tantalizing
+this conflict, in which victory changes with the fashion, and we feel
+weak or strong according to the verdict of a clique! And all these
+rivalries and envies and aspirations, what a confession of personal
+feebleness they really are! How slightly a true man feels them, who
+knows that he is not mere silk or furniture, and never frets about his
+place in the world; but just slides into it by the gravitation of his
+nature, and swings there as easily as a star! But the mere leader of
+fashion has no genuine claim to supremacy; at least, no abiding
+assurance of it. He has embroidered his title upon his waistcoat, and
+carries his worth in his watch-chain; and if he is allowed any real
+precedence for this it is almost a moral swindle,--a way of obtaining
+goods under false pretences. But without running into more minute
+discussion, I say again--that there is no substantial ground of
+supremacy in aught that is merely accidental or external; and he who
+rests upon such claims stands upon a pedestal as uncertain as it is
+spurious.
+
+"If a man strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned, except he strive
+lawfully." This was the old rule of the Grecian games, which would not
+permit the prize to be gained by any unfair or incomplete methods. It
+was applied by the apostle to a specific work--the great work of the
+Christian ministry. But it is a law which prevails in all human action.
+And, while it suggests that spurious precedence for which there is so
+much striving, it also indicates the fact that there _is_ a real
+difference of degree among men, and that there are proper methods of
+obtaining supremacy.
+
+And, as I look around in the populous city, in order to illustrate the
+grounds of this lawful precedence, I observe, in the first place, that
+there are men who occupy the higher places by ordinance of nature so to
+speak; or, more properly, by the purpose of God. It is a fact in nature
+that all men are created equal, and it is also a fact in nature that
+all men are not equal. All men are created equal as to the essential
+rights and privileges of humanity. They have a claim to live; they have
+an impartial share in the Divine Love; they have a right to liberty, to
+freedom of thought and of limb, by a constitution older than any
+historical document, drawn up in the court of God's decrees and
+authenticated by His handwriting in the soul. Thus far all men are
+_created_ equal, and, if it turns out otherwise with them, it ensues
+from what is _made_ by man, not what is commanded by Heaven. But so far
+as quantity of nature is concerned--original capacity and spiritual
+gifts--men are not equal. And if it is asked--"Why are they not equal?"
+I answer, it is by appointment of the same Sovereign Mind which has
+ordained that "one star shall differ from another star in glory." But
+each form of being has its own capacities, and if these are filled the
+moral harmony is secured. Through all prevails the law of compensation,
+balancing the vicissitudes of experience. And, among these diversities
+of human capacity, some must of necessity occupy the highest place--men
+whose native genius carries them up in a splendid orbit, and endows them
+with control. And the world at large always acknowledges the rectitude
+of this appointment. It cherishes no envy toward men of this kind, but
+renders them spontaneous homage.
+
+But, although this genius, this original power, rises to a natural
+supremacy, it does not involve the most legitimate element of
+precedence. There is no real ground of merit in the natural talents of a
+man, any more than there is a ground of merit in personal beauty, or
+family descent. He has nothing but what has been given him--the five
+talents instead of his neighbor's one talent--and, so long as he does
+not use them to their best purpose, there is only an admirable
+possibility, no merit of achievement.
+
+And all genuine merit--that which entitles one to some ground of human
+precedence--comes from personal achievement in life; substantially, from
+the stock of actual benefit which one has contributed to the world, and
+which has become assimilated to his own spiritual nature. The ground of
+precedence--so far as it is lawful for man to think of anything like
+precedence at all--is not in outward possessions, not in gifts, but in
+_uses_. And here is thrown open a broad and noble field, depending not
+upon genius or station, but upon _will_, and therefore accessible to
+every man. Here is an arena where one may strive lawfully, emulous to
+build up his own inner nature, emulous to let such power as he possesses
+go out in blessings for the world. A field for all of us, my friends,
+right here in the dense city, amidst the hurrying feet, the clang of
+machinery, and the roar of wheels. And the condition of the game is, not
+large capacity but good purpose and loyal endeavor; not to strive
+greatly but to strive lawfully.
+
+And, I observe once more, that the real claim to precedence is not
+eagerly snatched by us, but _comes_ to us. It is not in _seeming_ but in
+_being_, and it makes no essential difference whether the world
+confesses it or not, so long as we actually have it, working in our
+consciousness of duty and drawing our consolation from inward resources.
+Here, my friend, is your work--here is the field of opportunity, which,
+however broad and rich absolutely, is for you great and pregnant with
+incalculable possibilities. And though men may not see its best results,
+they are nevertheless real, and develop in your own soul a light and
+power, a ground and fabric of precedence that cannot be shaken, and will
+never vanish away.
+
+And yet, to a large extent, the world does confess this true supremacy.
+For, let me ask, who among these crowds of citizens are really honored?
+Not those who are so eagerly and vainly striving in their narrow,
+conventional circle, heedful merely of the rules of their own little
+game. But those who actually fill an honorable place in life. How much
+acknowledged dignity is there in that man who just accepts his station
+and makes the most of it, filling it with patience and self-sacrifice
+and achieving the victory of principle and affection! How much genuine
+nobleness in the quiet, unconscious discharge of duty! The field for
+precedence is it not a broad one, and close at hand? And is there no
+alternative between a frivolous and outside distinction, and some great
+theatre of action large enough to fill and dazzle the world's eye?
+Daily, right around us, there are occasions that summon up all the
+energies of manhood as with a trumpet-peal. See yonder! where the
+conflagration, bursting through marble walls, casts a terrible splendor
+down the street and reddens the midnight sky. What an enemy has broken
+loose among us, devouring the achievements of human skill and the hopes
+of enterprise! What shall stay it? With a triumphant shout it snaps the
+fetters of stone; it roars with victory; it bends its flaming crest
+towards peaceful homes where men and mothers and babes lie in
+unconscious slumber. The bell beats; and what old bugle-strain, what
+pibroch, what rattling drum, ever sounded a more perilous call? And on
+what battle-field that you have read of was there ever displayed a
+loftier heroism, a more dauntless energy, than that man displays who,
+with the unconscious courage of duty, plunges into the furnace, mounts
+the quivering walls, and, making his own body a barrier between his
+fellow-men and the flame, stands there scorched, bruised, bleeding, and
+beats the red terror back and beats it down, with that irresistible
+energy which always springs from the human will bent upon a noble
+purpose?
+
+And so, in other forms, more quiet and more sacred, where the
+anticipation of public applause does not furnish its motive, men are
+exercising a heroism, and working achievements, that make dim and pale
+the trophies that are plucked from fields of war and in lists of
+glittering renown. And when these things are known the hearts of men
+render a spontaneous honor, and admit the genuine titles of supremacy.
+Yet, if this true achievement in life is not known or confessed by the
+world, its results really exist, and impart their inalienable strength
+and blessing to the soul, while as the grounds of false supremacy
+dissolve all gives way.
+
+And, my friends, the tendency of things is to bring out more and more
+these real claims to human precedence, and to throw all spurious titles
+into the shade. This is the radical purport of true democracy, which I
+take to be the social synonym of _Christianity_. I have shown what
+inconsistencies and false distinctions swarm here in our midst, under
+the profession of republican equality. This, however, is because names
+are _not_ things. I don't call that "democracy" which is simply the
+domineering spirit of self-exaltation in a new shape. For there is no
+_essential_ difference whether we call the social order a monarchy or a
+commonwealth; whether its leading men are Charles and Louis, or
+Robespierre and Cromwell. If we must have the old social fallacies, they
+appear more attractive with the old symbols. In that case, I would
+rather not have them changed. For, when I look merely at the
+_sentimental_ side of things, I feel sorry when the so-called "Royal
+Martyr," with a dignity which contrasts with his past conduct, stretches
+his head upon the block; or when the pitiless insults of a Parisian mob
+are hurled upon the head of the beautiful Marie Antoinette. A poetic
+regret and enthusiasm is awakened by the associations that cluster about
+the Golden Lion and the Bourbon Lilies. And, when I turn to those grim
+Ironsides, or those frantic Jacobins, the work they are doing looks
+savage enough. But, with a more discriminating vision, I perceive that
+that rude popular storm, which desolates palaces and shatters crowns,
+embosoms a rectifying process which, tumbling all false distinctions
+from their pedestals, shall by-and-by heave up the platform of social
+justice, and reveal the true dignity of man. The essential work of
+democracy is not the destruction of forms; is not the giant arm of
+revolution, striking the hours of human progress by the crash of falling
+thrones. But its great work is _construction_--is in changing the very
+_spirit_ of institutions--and it asserts its legitimacy and bases its
+claims upon the Christian doctrine of the human soul.
+
+Therefore, I regard these spurious claims to precedence--these endeavors
+after social distinction by virtue of riches, and equipage, and
+wardrobes--as only evidences of a transition-state. Men, letting go the
+feudal forms, and still assuming that there is some ground of human
+precedence, as there really is, have adopted these false expressions of
+it. They will in turn pass away, and give place to more genuine
+methods.
+
+But let it be remembered, that these false forms of precedence are not
+only inconsistent with our social professions and institutions, but they
+are futile because they are contrary to the Divine Law. Our endeavors in
+life have a twofold operation, and we must count not only their effect
+upon others but their reaction upon the fabric of our own inner being.
+For, whatever honor _men_ may attribute to us, we know that there is no
+real, substantial ground of supremacy except in the excellence and power
+of our own spiritual nature. And this is acquired not in ostentatious
+and selfish striving, but when self is least thought of; in the calm
+work of duty, and when all conception of human merit fades into the
+Glory of God. And this is the great end to be desired--this strength and
+exaltation of the soul. This imparts the profoundest significance to
+that great life-struggle which goes on in these crowded streets. The
+city! what is it but a vast amphitheatre, filled with racers, with
+charioteers, with eager competitors; surrounded by an unseen and awful
+array of witnesses? And here, daily, the lists are opened, and men
+contend for success, for station, for power. But these are meretricious
+and perishable awards. The real prize is a spiritual gain, a crown that
+"fadeth not away." And, if we comprehend the great purpose of existence
+at all--if we look with any eagerness to its intrinsic issues and its
+final result; we shall heed that decree of Divine Wisdom and Justice
+that comes down to us through all the vicissitude of life--through all
+the hurry and turmoil and contention. "If a man strive for masteries,
+yet is he not crowned, except he strive lawfully."
+
+
+
+
+THE SYMBOLS OF THE REPUBLIC.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE IV.
+
+THE SYMBOLS OF THE REPUBLIC.
+
+      Thou art a great people, and hast great power.--JOSHUA, xvii. 17.
+
+
+These words, originally addressed by the Hebrew Leader to the children
+of Joseph--the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh--have been applicable to
+many nations which, since that time, have risen, and flourished, and
+fallen. But when we consider the circumstances of its origin, its
+marvellous growth in all the attributes of civilization, and especially
+the immense _possibilities_ which it involves; without even being
+chargeable with a natural vanity, we may say, that to no country on the
+face of the earth have they ever been more fitted than to this. For, my
+friends, we know that it _is_ a dictate of our nature to magnify that
+which is our own. However insignificant it really is, man spreads an
+ideal glory over the land of his birth. Perhaps its historical
+importance compensates for its geographical narrowness, or its material
+poverty is hidden by its intellectual wealth. From its stock of mighty
+men--its heroes, and bards, and sages--who have brightened the roll of
+fame; or from its memorable battle-fields, on rude heath and in mountain
+defile; or from its achievements which have swelled the tides of human
+enterprise, and made the world its debtor; he draws the inspiration, he
+carries away the conviction of greatness--so that wherever its emblems
+come before his eyes, they touch the deep springs of reverence and
+pride. Nor let us condemn this feeling as merely a selfish and
+exaggerating one. This spirit of nationality exists for wise purposes,
+embosoms the richest elements of loyalty and faith, and is one of those
+profound _sentiments_ of our nature that cannot be driven out by any
+process of logic.
+
+But, if a nation really inherits the description in the text, it must
+possess something more than an illustrious history and an ideal glory.
+We must determine its greatness by its symbols; yet these must be not
+merely signs of things, but instruments of achievement; not merely the
+illustrations of dead works or patriotic enthusiasm, but the agents of
+actual power and of living performance. Now, in looking over the world
+at the present time, there are other nations to which the words of
+Joshua might be applied as well as to our own, and with as little
+assumption of national vanity. Other people are great and have great
+power, by virtue of political importance, vast possessions, and strong
+institutions. To say nothing of the rest, consider that huge domain
+which at this hour confronts the troubled principalities of Europe. It
+stretches itself out over three continents. The waves of three oceans
+chafe against its shaggy sides. The energies of innumerable tribes are
+throbbing in its breast. It clasps regions yet raw in history as well as
+those that are grey with tradition, and incloses in one empire the bones
+of the Siberian mammoth and the valleys of Circassian flowers. And it is
+great not only by geographical extent, but by political purpose--great
+by the idea which is involved with its destiny--an idea austere as the
+climate, tremendous as the forces, indomitable as the will of the
+gigantic north. It would set the inheritance of the Byzantine Emperors
+in the diadem of Peter the Great. It would make the Sea of Marmara and
+the ridges of the Caucasus, paths to illimitable empire and
+uncompromising despotism. It moves down the map of the world, as a
+glacier moves down the Alps, patient and relentless, startling the
+jealous rivals that watch its course, and granting contemptuous peace to
+the allies that shiver in its shadow.
+
+In considering, therefore, the symbols which prove that we also are a
+great people, having great power, we should select those which indicate
+the possession of a _peculiar_ power. This peculiarity is not in our
+geographical extent or material greatness. But it _is_, I think, in our
+institutions, in the tendency of our national ideas, and in the
+legitimate result of these. It is in conceptions and elements the direct
+opposite of those that work in the destiny of the mighty empire just
+referred to--and for this reason I _have_ referred to it.
+
+In taking up a subject, then, which is especially connected with the
+conditions of humanity in the city, because in the city the conception
+of a people--of a public--is especially illustrated, let us
+inquire--What _are_ the symbols of our republic; the signs and agents of
+our greatness as a nation? And, for the sake of avoiding too many
+specifications, I propose to consider these under two or three general
+classes.
+
+In the first place, then, I would select as a symbol of the Republic,
+_Whatever represents the privilege of Free Thought_. As to whatever
+gives full play to the intellect, whatever diffuses the intelligence,
+whatever wakes up and assists the entire spiritual nature of individuals
+and communities, I think there is really more opportunity here than
+anywhere else on the face of the earth. And, as a sign and instrument of
+this, I would point to some _District School-house_; rough,
+weather-worn, standing in some bleak corner of New York or New
+Hampshire; through whose closed windows the passer-by catches the
+confused hum of recitation, or at whose door he sees children of all
+conditions mingling in motley play. Of all conditions, so far as
+external peculiarities go; for the laws of nature and the ordinances of
+Providence cannot be dispensed with even here; but of one condition as
+the recognized possessors of immortal _mind_. Those who have helped
+mould the Republic have clearly seen that, although intelligence is not
+the foundation of national greatness--for there is something deeper than
+that--still it is the discerning and directing power upon which depends
+the right use even of moral elements. They have scouted the notion that
+there is any ultimate evil in diffused knowledge; any such thing as "a
+dangerous truth;" and have affirmed that the best way to winnow the
+false from the true, is to equip and set a-going the intellectual
+machine by which God has ordained that the work shall be done. It has
+been felt, that, if the State can properly extend its influence anywhere
+beyond the restrictive limits of evil, or the punishment of overt wrong;
+if anywhere it may exercise a positive ministration for good; it is
+here, where it does not interfere on the one hand with those outward
+pursuits which should be left to individual choice and aptitude, nor on
+the other, with those inward sanctities which pertain to conscience and
+to God; it is here, in that region of our personality from which we can
+best discern our duty and fill our place. For the intellect is the most
+neutral of all our qualities. Man is swayed by the animal propensities
+of his nature; he is swayed by the moral and religious elements of his
+nature; but the intellect, by itself, is not a motive power. It is a
+_light_; and no one will object to its being kindled except those who,
+by that objection, virtually confess that they fear the light. And this
+work of kindling is just what the state purposes to do for a child;
+leaving his religious convictions to such helps as conscience has
+chosen, and his position in life to the decision of circumstances. And
+there is no way in which it can show so much impartiality, and exercise
+practically the most essential conception of freedom. For thus, as I
+have already said, it recognizes a common inheritance--something which
+all have--the possession of _mind_--something which is of more
+importance than any external condition, for it influences external
+condition; (whoever saw an educated community of which anything like a
+large fraction were paupers and criminals?) something on which rests the
+claim of human freedom; for the charter of man's liberty is in his soul,
+not his estate. It says to the poorest child--"You are rich in this one
+endowment, before which all external possessions grow dim. No piled-up
+wealth, no social station, no throne, reaches as high as that spiritual
+plane upon which every human being stands by virtue of his humanity; and
+from that plane, mingling now in the Common School with the lowliest and
+the lordliest, we give you the opportunity to ascend as high as you may.
+We put into your hands the key of knowledge; leaving your religious
+convictions, with which we dare not interfere, to your chosen guides. So
+far as the intellectual path may lead, it is open to you.--Go free!" And
+when we consider the great principles which are thus practically
+confessed; when we consider the vast consequences which grow out of
+this; I think that little District School-house dilates, grows
+splendid, makes our hearts beat with admiration and gratitude, makes us
+resolve that at all events, _that_ must stand; for, indeed, it is one of
+the noblest symbols of the Republic--a sign and an instrument of a great
+people, having great power.
+
+Or, if you would behold another of these symbols, go through this city,
+and pause wherever you hear the rumbling of the _Printing-Press_. As I
+have dwelt upon the characteristics of this great power in another
+place, I only allude to it here as a vehicle of that _expression_ which
+is so essential to all genuine freedom of thought. Mere education is no
+evidence of this freedom. It may be made, it has been made in one of the
+most intelligent but despotic countries in Europe, an instrument for
+drilling the human mind into an absolute routine of state policy. Mere
+liberty of speculation is nothing, though it has the boundless firmament
+of abstraction for its own, so long as it is not allowed to strike the
+solid ground of fact or touch one organized abuse. Let us be thankful
+for a free-press--the electric tongue of thought, which at every stroke
+is felt throughout a continent, which no dictator dares to chain, and
+over whose issues no censor sits in judgment--or only that great censor,
+public opinion. Everybody is aware of its evil as well as its good--the
+errors, the crudities, the abominations it sends out. But we must
+remember that it is only the representative, the voice, of elements that
+actually exist in human minds and bosoms; and, surely, it is better that
+they should come out into the free air, and be sprinkled by the chloride
+of truth, than to work darkly and infectiously out of sight. It is the
+hidden, not the open evil that is dangerous.
+
+Or, still again, you might have seen a true symbol of the Republic in
+the spectacle which has been presented this very day--the spectacle of a
+_Free Worship_. The great stream of religious impulse has poured through
+these streets, and separated into its rills of distinctive opinion,
+without trepidation and without challenge. Every man has had the
+opportunity to commune with his God, and approach the Cross of his
+Redeemer, with no established barriers between. Neither the cathedral
+nor the chapel rest upon the patronage of the state, but in the deep
+foundations of individual conviction. To be sure, here and there, there
+is a little assumption; but it is dramatic rather than substantial, and
+does not amount to much. Here and there breaks out an unjust prejudice
+or a spiteful calumny, but it shames the source more than the object,
+and soon dies away in the atmosphere of tolerance and investigation. It
+looks doubtful sometimes, but I verily believe that the real spirit, as
+well as the mere form of Religious equality, is beginning to prevail.
+Every day, it is more and more practically acknowledged that
+Christianity is profounder than any name, and exists under strange and
+despised names; that there really is decent observance in every church,
+and holy living in every communion; and a man finds that his neighbor
+has the same essence of righteousness as himself, though he has not half
+so many links in his creed. And something more than tolerance grows out
+of this practical liberty. It is not easy to measure the moral
+sincerity, the moral principle, which results from it; which is far more
+precious than mere intelligence; which is the perennial spring and
+assurance of national welfare.
+
+But I proceed to observe, in the second place, that we may select as a
+symbol of the Republic--a sign and an instrument of a great people,
+having great power--whatever illustrates the principle of _Political
+Equality_. I am speaking, at present, not of our deficiencies, but of
+our possessions; not of the instances in which this doctrine of equality
+is practically contradicted, but of those in which it is practically
+acknowledged. The sovereignty of every man is a fundamental principle in
+our institutions; it is essential to the conception of a Republic; and
+so far as it _is_ legitimately a Republic, we shall find this principle
+in operation. And, looking around for some extant symbol of this, let me
+select that which is the object of so much strife and agitation--the
+_Presidential Chair_. I do not, by any means, consider this the most
+comfortable seat in the nation, or that the most deserving man is sure
+to get there; but, as an emblem, I believe it illustrates the noblest
+privileges, and the proudest supremacy, on the face of the globe. And I
+refer to it as a _possibility_ for the poorest and humblest child in the
+land. No hereditary gallery leads to it--only the broad road of the
+people. And, as the highest seat in the nation, it illustrates all the
+honors of the nation. They are possible to anybody. And I trust the time
+has not yet arrived when this can be said only by way of satire; can be
+true only because the waves of political corruption carry the meanest
+and unworthiest into office; but as a grand fact, a fact with which are
+involved the springs of our national greatness and power, it may be said
+that here there are no barriers of caste, no terms of descent, no depths
+so low that enterprise cannot rise out of them, no heights so exalted
+that genius cannot attain them; for, on a platform as level to the
+peasant's threshold as to the nabob's door, stand the judge's bench, the
+senator's seat, and the President's chair.
+
+As another symbol of this political equality, I would name the
+_Ballot-Box_. I am aware that this is not everywhere a consistent
+symbol; but to a large degree it is so. I know what miserable
+associations cluster around this instrument of popular power. I know
+that the arena in which it stands is trodden into mire by the feet of
+reckless ambition and selfish greed. The wire-pulling and the bribing,
+the pitiful truckling and the grotesque compromises, the exaggeration
+and the detraction, the melo-dramatic issues and the sham patriotism,
+the party watch-words and the party nick-names, the schemes of the few
+paraded as the will of the many, the elevation of men whose only worth
+is in the votes they command--vile men, whose hands you would not grasp
+in friendship, whose presence you would not tolerate by your
+fireside--incompetent men, whose fitness is not in their capacity as
+functionaries, or legislators, but as organ pipes; the snatching at the
+slices and offal of office, the intemperance and the violence, the
+finesse and the falsehood, the gin and the glory; these are indeed but
+too closely identified with that political agitation which circles
+around the Ballot-Box. But, after all, they are not essential to it.
+They are only the masks of a genuine grandeur and importance. For it
+_is_ a grand thing--something which involves profound doctrines of
+Right--something which has cost ages of effort and sacrifice--it _is_ a
+grand thing that here, at last, each voter has just the weight of one
+man; no more, no less; and the weakest, by virtue of his recognized
+manhood, is as strong as the mightiest. And consider, for a moment, what
+it is to cast a vote. It is the token of inestimable privileges, and
+involves the responsibilities of an hereditary trust. It has passed into
+your hands as a right, reaped from fields of suffering and blood. The
+grandeur of History is represented in your act. Men have wrought with
+pen and tongue, and pined in dungeons, and died on scaffolds, that you
+might obtain this symbol of freedom, and enjoy this consciousness of a
+sacred individuality. To the ballot have been transmitted, as it were,
+the dignity of the sceptre and the potency of the sword. And that which
+is so potent as a right, is also pregnant as a duty; a duty for the
+present and for the future. If you will, that folded leaf becomes a
+tongue of justice, a voice of order, a force of imperial law; securing
+rights, abolishing abuses, erecting new institutions of truth and love.
+And, _however_ you will, it is the expression of a solemn
+responsibility, the exercise of an immeasurable power for good or for
+evil, now and hereafter. It is the medium through which you act upon
+your country--the organic nerve which incorporates you with its life and
+welfare. There is no agent with which the possibilities of the Republic
+are more intimately involved, none upon which we can fall back with more
+confidence, than the Ballot-Box.
+
+But there is a symbol which represents the power and greatness of a
+Republic more significantly than all the rest, and is comprehensive of
+all the rest. It is the fruit of unfettered thought and political
+equality, of intelligence and virtue, of private sovereignty and public
+duty--it is a free, true, harmonious _Man_. As the crown or the sceptre
+is the symbol of a Monarchy; as heraldic honors are the symbols of an
+Oligarchy; so, I repeat, the most expressive symbol of a Republic is a
+man--a man free in limb and soul, a man intelligent and self-governed, a
+man whose spiritual vision is clear, and in whose breast the voice of
+conscience is peremptory, with whom the conception of duties is deeper
+even than the conception of rights; in short, a man who embodies all the
+elements, and represents to the world the best results of Liberty. Laws
+are nothing, institutions are nothing, national power and greatness are
+nothing, save as they assist the Moral purpose of God in the development
+of humanity. To this test we must bring the symbols of the Republic, and
+judge whether they are fitting and consistent. No matter what else they
+accomplish, no matter what else they signify, if they do not serve this
+end they are either incomplete instruments, or vain forms. For, Man is
+of more worth than Institutions; Religion is greater than politics; and
+the designs of Providence are wider than the cycles of National destiny.
+
+I turn, then, to the signs of our own national greatness; I turn to
+these symbols of spiritual freedom and political equality; and I
+ask--how completely do they develop this most significant symbol of
+all--how completely do they serve the purposes of God in History--by
+securing the welfare, the culture, the moral elevation of humanity? And
+the reply is--that, by our institutions and our endeavors, these ends
+have been served in various ways. There is here, to-day, a more
+enlightened, free, self-governed humanity--and we say it without
+arrogance--than anywhere else on the globe. Our benefits are of the kind
+that are not realized, because they are so great and familiar--like the
+light and the air; but take them away, or transfer us to some other
+atmosphere, and how we should miss them, and pine and dwindle! Let no
+man, in his zeal for bold rebuke or needed reform, overlook what has
+been done, and what is enjoyed here, as to the noblest results of
+national greatness and power.
+
+But every sincere man must say likewise that, with us, the
+_possibilities_ are far greater than the _performance_; that these
+symbols are the splendid tokens of what _may be_, rather than what _is_.
+And, that I may bring this discourse to a practical conclusion, let me
+say that two things, at least, are necessary to convert these
+possibilities into the noblest achievement.
+
+In the first place, it is essential that every citizen of the republic
+should recognize his own manhood; the sacredness of his own personality;
+and should recognize this especially in relation to his duties, which
+are inextricably involved with his rights. For here it is true in a
+special sense, that the mass is but an aggregate of personalities--that
+public sin is but the projection of your sin and mine. A man will often
+say that he is responsible to his country, and responsible to his
+constituents; but upon no claim, by no sophistry, should he suffer
+himself to forget that he is also responsible to his God. He does forget
+this, when he acts for political interests, and as one of a party, as he
+never would act in his private affairs. And does he suppose that there
+is a corporate vice, or virtue, differing from his private vice or
+virtue, as a gentleman's purse differs from the public fund? There is no
+such distinction in moral qualities. It is your own coin that helps
+swell the amount; it bears your stamp, and you are responsible for the
+product. If the party lies, then _you_ are guilty of falsehood. If the
+party--as is very likely--does a mean thing, then _you_ do it. It is
+surely so, so far as you are one of the party, and go with it in its
+action. God does not take account of parties; party names are not known
+in that court of Divine Judgment; but your name and mine are on the
+books there. There is no such thing--and this is true, perhaps, in more
+senses than one--there is no such thing as a party conscience. It is
+individual conscience that is implicated. Party! Party! Ah! my friends,
+here is the influence which, it is to be feared, balks and falsifies
+many of these glorious symbols. Men rally round musty epithets. They
+take up issues which have no more relation to the deep, vital, throbbing
+interest of the time, than they have to the fashions of our
+grandfathers. They parade high-sounding principles to cover selfish
+ends; interpret the Constitution by a doctrine of loaves and fishes;
+while individual independence and private conviction are whirled away in
+the political maelstrom, and the party-badge is reverenced and hugged as
+the African reverences and hugs his fetish. And surely it is a case for
+congratulation, when some great, exciting question breaks out and jars
+these conventional idols, and so sweeps and shatters these party
+organizations and turns them topsy-turvy, that a man is shaken out of
+his harness, does not know exactly what party he _does_ belong to, and
+begins to feel that he has a soul of his own. I am not denying the use
+and the necessity of parties as instruments, but protest against them as
+ends, especially when principle is smothered under their platforms, and
+they absorb the moral personality of a man.
+
+It may not seem so strange that the political field should so often be
+the field of a lax and depressed morality, when we consider that here is
+the great theatre where human ambition struggles for its aims; here are
+enlisted the strongest passions of the soul; here throng some of its
+fiercest temptations; here the stakes played for are the kingdoms of
+this world, and the glory of them. And this, I suppose, is the reason
+why the most authentic type of human depravity is a thoroughly
+unprincipled politician. Such an instance, at least, may strike us more
+forcibly, because we see the perversion of great faculties, and
+capabilities are contrasted with performance; while, on the other hand
+he may be confirmed in his moral bankruptcy by the fact that, in playing
+upon the passions of men he sees the worst side of humanity. But,
+surely, there have been those who passed this ordeal, and came out with
+brighter lustre; who have kept the eye of conscience elevated above the
+ecliptic of political routine; who have made politics identical with
+lofty duties and great principles; whose patriotism was not a clamorous
+catch-word, but a breathing inspiration, a silent heart-fire. In private
+life they have felt the great privilege of their citizenship; the
+magnitude of the obligation which bound them to virtue and to
+consistency; while, in public life, they have kept their trust firm as
+steel, bright as gold; have felt, with due balance on either side, the
+beatings of the popular heart and the dictates of the everlasting Right;
+and in themselves have represented the union of liberty and law, the
+real greatness of a nation. Without such men, the nation has no
+greatness; for its significance and its power are in the moral worth of
+its citizens.
+
+The second condition necessary to the fulfilment of the great results
+indicated by these symbols, is consistent action upon the ideas that
+constitute the basis of our own institutions. If many of the privileges
+and peculiarities which I have specified in this discourse are possessed
+by other nations, in one respect we differ from them all. These
+privileges and peculiarities are _legitimately_ ours. They have not been
+grafted on hereditary antagonisms. They have not grown up in _spite_ of
+our institutions, but as the _fruit_ of our institutions. These ideas,
+entwined with the very roots of our Republic, shooting through every
+fibre, running into every limb, bind us to a recognition of human
+brotherhood; to sympathy with Liberty wherever it struggles; and to
+stedfast opposition to whatever crushes the rights, hinders the
+development, or denies the humanity of man. If these symbols of the
+Republic mean anything, they mean just this; and whatever is
+inconsistent with this, is inconsistent with the terms of our national
+birthright. Depend upon it, not the assertion of Liberty, but whatever
+is opposed to Liberty, is the innovating and agitating element in this
+country. It interrupts the legitimate current of our destiny. It shocks
+the popular heart with inconsistency. It becomes mixed with the ashes of
+the old heroes, and the land keeps heaving with the fermentation. One
+assumption is too impudent, too nakedly in contradiction with the
+fundamental ideas of our Republic ever to be admitted--the assumption
+that the man who speaks for freedom, who sympathizes with the broadest
+doctrine of human rights, and sets around these the eternal barriers of
+justice, is an innovator and an agitator. I ask--what made our
+Revolution legitimate? What were the central ideas that throbbed in the
+breasts of its heroes and martyrs? Take down the old muskets bent in the
+hot encounter, and printed with many a death-gripe; take down the old
+uniforms, clipped by Hessian sabres and torn by British bullets; take
+down the dusty muster-rolls, scrawled with those venerable names--names
+that now "are graven on the stone," names that are buried in the sod,
+names that have gone up to immortality--and ask, for what was this great
+struggle? Was it not for freedom, based upon the conception of the right
+and supremacy of freedom? And is _this_ the legitimate conclusion of
+that sublime postulate--this other Fact which, never retreating, always
+advancing, follows the steps of Freedom over the continent like a
+shadow, looms up like a phantom against the Rocky Mountains, and darkens
+the fairest waters? On the contrary, is not Freedom that old truth, that
+conceded premise that does _not_ agitate? Liberty, Human Rights,
+Universal Brotherhood, was it not for these ideas ye fought--was it not
+these ye planted in the soil, and laid with the corner-stone of our
+institutions? My friends, I know, and you know, could those men give
+palpable sign and representation, the answer that would come, as in one
+quick flash from bayonet to bayonet, in one long roll of drums, from
+Lexington to Yorktown.
+
+These peculiar privileges, then, to which I have referred, differ from
+those of other nations inasmuch as they are not grafted expedients, but
+legitimate fruits. Unless we change the premises of our Republic, and
+shift the foils in our historical argument, these are necessary
+conclusions. They are necessary conclusions, if our symbols represent
+realities. Russia is consistent with its national idea. It pours forth
+its legions and moves to its work with a terrible consistency. And if
+we--also a great people, having great power--are equally consistent, we
+shall fall back upon no selfish conservatism, but aid whatever tends to
+fulfil the Providential purpose of our existence, and whatever helps and
+advances man.
+
+One thing is certain. So long as any nation truly lives, it unfolds its
+specific idea and lives according to its original type. When it fails to
+do this, the sentence of decay is already written upon it. If it fails
+to illustrate God's purpose in its obedience, it illustrates His control
+in retribution. For there is nothing supreme, nothing finally
+triumphant, nothing of the last importance, but His Law. It penetrates,
+and oversweeps, and survives all charters and institutions and
+nationalities, like the infinite space that encompasses Alps and Andes,
+and planets and systems. It is this that successive generations
+illustrate. It is this that all history vindicates. If a nation runs
+parallel to this Divine Law, it is well; if false to its purpose and its
+control, down it goes. The prophet Isaiah, in one of the most terrific
+and sublime passages of the Bible, represents the king of Babylon, while
+passing into the under-world, saluted by departed rulers, by dead kings,
+rising from their shadowy thrones, and exclaiming, "Art thou become weak
+as we? Art thou become like unto us?" Thus has many a nation gone down
+to its doom. Shall it be so with this Republic, because false to its
+ideal? Shall it descend to the shades of perished pomp and greatness,
+and see Nineveh with dusty, hieroglyphic robes rising up to meet it; and
+Persia, with the empty wine-cup of its luxury; and Rome, with the shadow
+of universal empire on its discrowned head; and hear them say--"Art thou
+become weak as we? Art thou become like unto us?"
+
+My friends, I look at the eager enterprise, the young, hopeful vigor,
+the tides of possibility that flow through this great city; I look at
+the symbols of this Republic; and I cannot believe that such is to be
+the result. I look back upon our history, and cannot argue such a future
+from such a past. A great light lay upon the wake of those frail ships
+that bore our fathers hither; the wake of past ages, the following of
+good men's prayers and brave men's deeds, the mingling currents of
+martyr-blood and prophet-fire. And methinks, as they struck the shore,
+and met the savage wilderness, a Voice saluted them; a voice not of
+profane ambition and of selfish hope, but of Divine promise, intending
+Divine results--proclaiming, "Thou art a great people, and hast great
+power." And He will fulfil this prophecy, Who leads the course of
+history over the broad deep and through mysterious ways, and Who unfolds
+His own glory in the destinies of men.
+
+
+
+
+THE SPRINGS OF SOCIAL LIFE.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE V.
+
+THE SPRINGS OF SOCIAL LIFE.
+
+      Let them learn first to show piety at home.--I. TIMOTHY, v. 4.
+
+
+The text--which I purpose to employ not as a specific precept, but as
+the illustration of a general principle--indicates those Springs of
+Social Life which constitute the subject of the present discourse.
+
+The crowd in a city affords comparatively little interest, when we
+contemplate it merely as a crowd. But, when we resolve it into its
+individual particles, and consider each of these as endued with the
+attributes and involved with the conditions of humanity, our deepest
+sympathies are touched. Every drop of that great stream is a conscious
+personality. In some shape, the universe is reflected in it. In some
+way, it takes hold of the reality of life: and the living organism of
+which it is composed both acts and suffers, receives from the world
+around it and contributes to it. That entire mass of people involves
+nothing more than the interest of humanity, and the same interest
+pertains to the least unit of that mass.
+
+And, doubtless, you have sometimes busied yourself with the
+speculation--"Where do all these people come from? And whither do they
+retire at night?" Now, this is really a very suggestive question, and to
+follow it out to a practical answer would yield results of the
+profoundest importance. For out of hidden channels, here and there, _do_
+spring all these struggling activities, these human diversities, these
+various influences good and evil, that make up the crowd and spectacle
+of city life. And night after night, with the rarest exceptions, into
+some retreat they all disappear. Some spot--whether it seem the veriest
+mockery to style it so, or whether it be a synonym for the sweetest
+sanctities--some spot each of this living multitude calls by the name of
+"Home."
+
+For some that name is associated with a more than oriental
+magnificence. Man and nature wait upon them there in every conceivable
+form of service. There is no method of convenience or luxury which
+ingenuity can devise; no bounty that earth can yield from her many-zoned
+bosom; no shape which art can summon from the regions of the beautiful,
+that is not possible there. Lifting its palatial walls, and kindling
+with brilliant lights, it stands there as the completest symbol of
+material refinement and civilization. It is arctic winter without. The
+snow chokes up the dreary street, and the whistling wind cuts the
+beggar's rags. But it is Italy, it is Ceylon, it is tropic gorgeousness
+within. And these are the abodes of the children of fortune, whose
+wishes require no talisman but expression, who, all their lives long,
+have been used to such indulgence, or who accept it now as the fruit of
+their own effort. This is the hospitality which some men find in life,
+and out of which they constitute a home.
+
+But none the less enviable, and perhaps much more so, are those retreats
+where comfort waits on moderate means, while contentment imparts to
+these an unpurchasable efficacy; where, blended with those infirmities
+and liabilities which are common to palace and cottage, the domestic
+affections flourish, and the dearest treasures of life are kept.
+Thousands of homes like this there are, all around us. It describes the
+largest class of homes, we may believe. And who can estimate their
+influence over these busy tides of action, all day long? That world of
+traffic, that world of toil, that looks so hard and gross and
+sordid,--is it not transformed somewhat, does it not grow beautiful
+even, when you think how many of its energies have their spring by the
+infant's cradle and the mother's chair? And what lights, what shadows,
+unseen by you, fall upon the speculative eyes, fall upon the hearts, of
+thousands in that homeward-streaming crowd! Light of welcoming
+hearth-fires, shadows of children's play upon the walls; light of
+affections in which there are no decay and no deceit; shadows of sacred
+retirement where God alone is; light of joys which this world's storms
+cannot utterly quench; shadows of sorrow around sick-beds, and in vacant
+places, that still make home the dearer as the arena of earth's purest
+discipline and of its most triumphant faith!
+
+And why delineate the features of that other class of homes, whose most
+significant word is "_Privation_?" Where cheerlessness, and hunger, and
+desponding toil, or hopeless apathy, brood continually. Let your own
+sympathies, let your own imaginations that cannot exaggerate the
+reality, call up the vision of such. Think how many such abodes there
+are this very night, which winter besieges with all his terrors, and
+into which he sends his invading frost! Think what Home is to hundreds,
+and, therefore, how life looks to them, seen through this atmosphere of
+disease and want, with starvation by the hearth, and death at the door,
+and misery everywhere! Think, when the cold pierces even through all
+your wrappages of comfort, and scarcity almost pinches, what forms of
+humanity, with lungs, and nerves, and hearts, and every capacity for
+suffering, are scraping the moss of subsistence from the barest rocks of
+life, and struggling every day through an avalanche! Think what this
+Sabbath has been in the dwellings of the poor, you who have had time to
+listen to the Gospel, and have heard it comfortably--so comfortably,
+perhaps, that you have fallen asleep under it--think what this Sabbath
+has been in the dwellings of the poor! And yet, when I consider what,
+doubtless, the Sabbath has been in some of those places, I am thankful
+that the highest ideal, the richest sanctities of Home, are not
+dependent upon outward conditions; for even there, unfaltering duty and
+true love have made the bare walls beautiful, and prayer has set the
+desolate chamber on the steps of the Divine throne; and before the eye
+of faith the cold arch of the winter night, that looks in through hole
+and cranny, has burst into a revelation of heaven, and a path for those
+ministering angels that come to help the sufferer and to comfort God's
+poor.
+
+With more unqualified sadness, therefore, our thoughts must rest upon
+still another group of dwellings, where deprivation and ignorance are
+mingled with vice and crime--where want and guilt strip away the masks
+of civilization, and bring out the essential savage in man's nature.
+These also we must call "_homes_!" These breathing-holes of abomination,
+these moral tombs, where huddle the demons of violence, and cunning, and
+debauchery, and from which they issue. That vast Hades of social evil
+opening downward from our streets, where the best ideals have no type,
+and the purest sentiments scarce a name; where God is but a dark cloud
+of muttering thunder in the soul; where all that is fair in womanhood is
+dishevelled and transformed; and where childhood is baptized in infamy,
+trained to sin, canopied with curses, and rocked to sleep by the
+convulsive hell of passions all around it.
+
+The Homes of the Metropolis! Thus diversified are they in their general
+types, and more numerous in their individual conditions than can be
+specified. And, surely, it is no vain speculation that inquires--"What
+are they? Into what retreats do the elements of this busy crowd
+dissolve, night after night?" Whatever they may be, a common interest
+envelopes them and links them all together--the interest of humanity.
+They have vanished from the streets. One great shadow covers them, and
+hides their distinctions. For a time they are all equal. They have
+fallen asleep--poor, tired humanity at the best!--they have fallen
+asleep on the bosom of a common Providence, that bears them all up, as
+it bears the planet on which they now repose, through the orbit of its
+great purpose and the immensities of its love. But in the morning all
+these diversities will break forth again, each pouring its influence
+into the general stream. And who does not perceive how much the
+character of that influence must depend upon the condition of those
+homes? Who does not see that not only the interest of the common
+humanity in its most intimate experiences attaches to them, but the
+interest of community? Not only are they the reservoirs of individual
+power and peculiarity, but they are the Springs of Social Life. And this
+the apostle indicated, when he directed that certain, who bore intimate
+relations to the early church, should "first learn to show piety at
+home."
+
+Keeping this conclusion in mind, let me ask you to consider, for a
+little while, what Home _must_ be.
+
+In the first place--it is the _earliest and the most influential
+school_. Nowhere else is the character so moulded; nowhere else is so
+much infused into our entire being. For, whatever it may be, it is the
+nursery of childhood; and "the child is father to the man." Here dawns
+upon the human mind the conception of life. Here, when the nature is
+uninscribed and plastic, it takes its first impressions. I suppose it to
+be true, that more is learnt, more that is elementary and a key to all
+the rest, in the first few years of childhood than in all after time. I
+do not deny, of course, that much is corrected and overcome under
+another class of influences. But the deepest impressions, the seeds of
+the most stubborn habits, are planted at home. Hence the peculiar
+anxiety of good men to rescue _children_ from the influences of a bad
+home. And, even then, with what obstacles do they have to contend! How
+radical are the prejudices already formed in that young mind! How
+obstinate the customs, how opaque the ignorance, how rank the growth of
+error! Nay, into what complete fruition have all these grown, simply in
+the neglect of home-culture, to say nothing of influences positively
+evil! Really, the color and current of a man's destiny are indicated
+here, unless a shock of wonderful transformation comes over him. I do
+not mean to say that anybody is wholly the creature of circumstances;
+but he is the _subject_ of circumstances. If they do not entirely make
+_him_, they furnish the occasion out of which he makes something; and,
+viewed either from the platform of the inward or the outward, they
+furnish an important key to his life. And, although the path of
+reformation is more difficult than the descent into evil, and demands an
+effort which too few are inclined to put forth; though by the conditions
+of our nature the good is more easily swept away than the bad; still, it
+is encouraging to estimate the permanence and the power of those _good_
+influences which are received at home. Everybody knows, when he is
+pitched into this whirlpool of evil that rolls around him in the world,
+how those old home-restraints lie upon him like a magic chain, hard to
+be forced away--perhaps never utterly forced away. And, seeking for
+those who should stand up in this boisterous sweep of sin, you would
+look and I would look to those who had received the best impressions
+under the domestic roof. If I were alone, poor, compelled to ask charity
+somewhere in this selfish world, I would go, not to the man who has
+learnt most of what he calls his "wisdom" from the experience of mature
+life, but to him in whose heart there evidently remains something of
+childhood's tenderness, kept warm by the remembered pressures of his
+mother's breast. If I were seeking to restore some wild prodigal,
+brazen-fronted by his own wicked will and by the scorn with which men
+have battered him--if I were looking for some gleam of promise in his
+turbulent nature, and sounding its depths to find some spring of
+repentance--I should never despair if I could discover one gentle pulse
+that beat with the memories of a good and happy home. Why, who needs to
+be told of the potency of this our earliest school, to say nothing of
+other influences, if only a faithful _mother_ presides there? O! mother,
+mother, name for the earliest relationship, symbol of the divine
+tenderness; kindling a love that we never blush to confess, and a
+veneration that we cannot help rendering; how does your mystic
+influence, imparted from the soft pressure and the undying smile, weave
+itself through all the brightness through all the darkness of our after
+life. The mould of character set on the front of the world's great men,
+and gladly confessed by them, bears your stamp. Your inspiration burns
+along the poet's line. It is your true courage, more than man's rude
+daring, that makes the force of heroes. The statesman, when treason to
+humanity wears the garb of power, and duty calls him like a trumpet,
+hears your voice. The philanthropist, when he feels that the most
+efficient service is to be patient and to wait, imbibes the strength of
+your fortitude. The sailor, "on the high and giddy mast," mingles your
+name close to God's. And thousands in life's great claims, in life's
+great perils, trace back the influences of the hour to some early time,
+some calm moment, when,--little, timid children,--they knelt by your
+side, and from tones of reverence and looks of love and simple words of
+prayer, they first learnt piety at home.
+
+But I observe again, that Home is the sphere where are most clearly
+displayed _the real elements of character_. The world furnishes
+occasions of trial, but it also furnishes prudential considerations.
+Without any absolute hypocrisy, one measures his speech and restrains
+his action in the street and the market. And it is easy to conceive how
+small men may perform great deeds, and mean men seem philanthropic, and
+cowards flourish as heroes, with the tremendous motive of publicity to
+urge them. But at home all masks are thrown aside, and the true
+proportions of the man appear. Here he can find his actual moral
+standard, and measure himself accordingly. If he is irritable, here
+breaks forth his repressed fretfulness. If he is selfish, here are the
+sordid tokens. If he passes in any way for more than he is worth, here
+you may detect the counterfeit in the ring of his natural voice and the
+superscription of his undisguised life. No, the world is not the place
+to prove the moral stature and quality of a man. There are too many
+props and stimulants. Nor, on the other hand, can he himself determine
+his actual character merely by looking into his own solitary heart.
+Therein he may discover _possibilities_, but it needs actuality to make
+up the estimate of a complete life. He must _do_ something as well as be
+something; he must do something in order that he may be something. For,
+what he thinks is in his heart may be exaggerated by self-flattery, or
+darkened by morbid self-distrust. It needs some occasion to prove what
+is really there. And Home is precisely that sphere which is sufficiently
+removed from the factitious motives of publicity on the one extreme, and
+the unexercised possibilities of the human heart on the other, to afford
+a genuine test. What a man really is, therefore, will appear in the
+truest light under his own roof and by his own fireside. I can believe
+that he is a Christian, when I know that he faithfully takes up the
+daily duties, and bears the crosses, that cluster within his own doors.
+I shall think that the world rightly calls him a philanthropist, when,
+notwithstanding common faults and infirmities, he receives the
+spontaneous award of the good husband and father, and the kindness of
+his nature is reflected in the very air and light of his dwelling.
+And,--talk of noble deeds!--where will you find occasions for, where
+will you behold manifestations of, a more beautiful self-sacrifice, a
+more generous heroism, than in the labors and in the endurance of
+thousands of men and women, shut out from the world's observation in
+silent nooks and corners of this very city, amidst the relationships and
+cares and struggles of home? But whether it be in forms of good or evil,
+we know that the real elements of character, the genuine moral qualities
+of people, must be expressed there.
+
+And, I remark once more, that at Home we must find _the most essential
+happiness or misery of life_. The same conditions apply here as those
+which relate to character. The world is a theatre of _seeming_, and we
+can hardly tell by what we notice there who is, or who is not, happy. We
+know that gaiety is often the reckless ripple over depths of despair;
+and that men will bear up with a smile while untold agony is gnawing at
+their heart-strings, and will die laughing, in an agony of defiance,
+under the sword-strokes of fortune. On the other hand we may count some
+as unfortunate, in whose bosoms, all the while, there are flowing
+inexhaustible springs of peace, and who derive real joy from what we
+suppose to be a hard and pitiable lot. But amidst the undisguised
+realities of home we can form the most correct estimate of a man's
+condition. In the first place because, as has been remarked, he is there
+most truly himself. He gains opportunity for reflection, and gives vent
+to the secret burden of his heart. There he empties the load of his
+envies, his rivalries, his disappointments; which he has carried before
+the world muffled in courtesy or pride. These, it may be, meet and are
+re-acted upon by kindred elements; engendered, perhaps, by the very
+atmosphere which he himself, in the first place, created. Oh! how many
+rich dwellings there are, crowded with every appointment of luxury, that
+are only glittering ice-caverns of selfishness and discontent;
+pavilions of misery, where jangling discord mars the show, and a chill
+of mutual distrust breathes through the sumptuous apartments, and
+heartless ostentation presides like a robed skeleton at the feast. You
+feel that nothing is genial or spontaneous there. The courtesy is dreary
+etiquette, and the laughter forced music. You would dine as happily with
+the forms on the canvas, with the cold marbles in the hall. For all this
+magnificence is nothing more than a gorgeous pall over dead
+affections--nothing more than the coronation of a living woe.
+
+"Better is a dinner of herbs," says the wise man, "where love is, than a
+stalled ox and hatred therewith." And many a home exists where there
+_is_ but little more than a dinner of herbs, which affection and mutual
+loyalty, and sweet dispositions, convert into a palace. And there are
+fixed boundaries of peace, that society cannot encroach upon, while the
+processions of ambition and pleasure and ceaseless pursuit, pass by its
+windows and disturb it not. Here the good man and the brave man--the
+man who has nobly discharged his duty at whatever cost--is respected and
+understood. Hither he can retreat beyond the shots of calumny which have
+torn the ensign of his good name; beyond the deceit of men, which halts
+at the threshold. Here he can look calmly out upon the changes of
+fortune and the frowns of the world. Here his perplexed spirit finds
+inspirations of strength, and space for rest. There is no happiness in
+life, there is no misery, like that growing out of the dispositions
+which consecrate or desecrate a Home.
+
+Moreover, the elements of profoundest joy or suffering are there,
+because there are unfolded the deepest experiences of our mortal lot.
+There transpire those events which constitute the _eras_ of our
+existence. There, day by day, grows the sentiment of filial veneration
+and love. There is the joy of wedded felicity. There wells up in the
+heart the first strange gush of parental affection. There comes the
+intimation of awful change staring upon us with the face of death.
+There falls the shadow of the funeral train, passing across the
+threshold. There breaks in upon us the sense of bereavement, in the
+vacant chambers; where the familiar foot-step patters, where the
+familiar voice is heard no more. From the very nature of things, the
+profoundest happiness and misery of human life must be experienced among
+the conditions of Home.
+
+Having thus in some respects considered what Home _must_ be, I have
+virtually anticipated whatever may be said in the second division of
+this discourse respecting what Home _ought_ to be.
+
+Thus, as it is the earliest and most influential school, it behoves
+every one who is bound by its responsibilities to make it an agent of
+the _best culture_. The great subject of Home Education, is of itself
+enough for a series of discourses; and I have not room to lay down even
+the general propositions which belong to it, much less for
+specifications. But I would remind you--and I think the suggestion is
+especially needed amidst the whirl of city life--that there _is_ such a
+thing as Home Education, and it presses its claims upon everybody who
+inhabits a Home. There is such a thing as Home Education, differing from
+school education, whether of the week day or the Sabbath, and therefore
+it is a matter we ought to attend to, and not suppose we have done
+enough when we patronize an academy, or help fill a class on Sunday. To
+every parent--to every influential member of a household--there is
+committed a charge which can be shifted to no one else; there is an
+opportunity which no outside teacher possesses. There are some duties in
+life that we have to look for and to go after; there are others which
+are passed right into our hands, whether we will or not. And this duty
+of Home Education is of the latter kind. Now, I have just said that I
+cannot specify here, and even if there were room I am not sure that it
+would be advisable. For I doubt whether we can give any manual of
+methods and instruments in this respect, any more than there can be a
+manual of religious exercises suited to every spiritual peculiarity.
+Dispositions, capacities, circumstances, must create their own methods.
+And perhaps the poorest method of all would be some system of domestic
+education, which the experimenter thinks will do the work exactly. I am
+somewhat suspicious of systems. I am more than suspicious of any
+constrained formal method, bringing up children in a mere manual drill,
+crimping them into a mould of mincing proprieties, and making them speak
+with an automaton click. Perhaps the most headlong young men that can be
+found, are those who spent their early days in a sort of strait jacket
+with a clock-work movement. They were wound up so tight when they were
+boys, that now they take great pleasure in going fast, and running down.
+In other words, having felt their early training to be mere _training_,
+the moment they strip off the constraint, they plunge into the opposite
+extreme of _no_ constraint. Nay, I believe that even children who are
+left to their own instincts, and shoved out into the world to take care
+of themselves, are generally better balanced, and go with steadier
+motion than these. Of course, however, neither extreme is right. There
+is such a thing, I say once more, as Home Education, involving all
+necessary training and true constraint; and yet not oppressively felt as
+such, because it is free, informal, and respects the spontaneity of the
+childish nature. But, whether our Home Education be formal or informal,
+direct or indirect, there is one kind of education which we are sure to
+impart. It is the education of example, silent, effective, stronger and
+more easily apprehended than any set of maxims. I would we were all duly
+impressed with the responsibilities of Home as they appear in this
+light; might feel, however we may be absorbed in business or in
+pleasure, that the young mind and heart are receiving influences, and
+growing into expressions that in some way will surprise us.
+
+In the next place I observe, that if we display our real dispositions
+and characters at home, we should recognize it practically as _a sphere
+of moral discipline_. The family is a divine ordinance--the Home is an
+institution of God, forecast in the peculiarities of our very nature.
+History shows no period when it did not exist, and we discover no tribe
+so barbarous as to be without it. It is the foundation of all society.
+It embosoms the germ and ideal of the State. According to the purity of
+its relations, the intensity of its sympathies, the inviolability of its
+rights, a nation's life is high or low, feeble or strong, fickle or
+enduring. And if it is thus rooted in the nature and the history of man,
+we may well believe that it affords some of the profoundest occasions
+for that moral discipline which is the great purpose of our existence
+upon the earth.
+
+It is certainly the great sphere in which our affections are to be
+cultivated. Of course I do not mean that this is the limit of their
+cultivation. But here they are nurtured, and out of this they grow. As
+love is the Infinite Nature itself, so is it the prevalent sentiment of
+all life. It has been ordained that this great element should flow
+through every form of being, linking them together by a common feeling,
+and lending some interest to the most insignificant. And man has been
+set in the family relation that this sentiment might be developed.
+There is no one in whose heart it does not exist. You cannot find me a
+being so defaced, so alienated from the common stock of humanity, as to
+cherish in his bosom no secret fount of love, no fibril of affection
+linking him to something else. But of this love there are numerous
+degrees; and the highest forms of it, that go forth in expressions of
+self-sacrifice and worldwide sympathy, are only developed by culture.
+And for this culture there are rich opportunities amidst the relations
+and sanctities of Home.
+
+And there is opportunity among these relations also, for active duty,
+and in its daily tasks and responsibilities, is often illustrated that
+practical lesson which society so much needs--the lesson of mutual help.
+It is a school where we may learn endurance and charity. Out of its
+trials is developed the sense of religious need; and under the shadow of
+its bereavements we appreciate the glorious vision of Faith. There are
+other issues in life, where we need these divine helps; none where we
+feel the need of them more. Those who have stood by the sick-bed and
+taken the last look of the dearest earthly objects, and yet have lifted
+hearts of trust, and eyes of transcendent hope, are able to meet the
+intensest sorrows of the world, and to come out like refined gold. Home,
+then, should be regarded especially in this light, as a sphere where the
+richest elements of our moral culture are supplied.
+
+Finally, if at home we find the most essential happiness or misery of
+life, of course each should do his best to make it the most _attractive_
+of all places. He should bring not his worst, but his best temper there.
+How many are there who bottle up their wrath all the day long, and
+uncork it when they get home! They had better reverse the process. If
+you must chafe under disappointment, and indulge angry passion, let it
+out in the excitement of the world, where the rough friction of business
+will help you to get rid of it, or where nobody has time to care whether
+you get rid of it or not.
+
+And let _business_ stay where it belongs. Do not interrupt social claims
+with its speculations; nor drag the counting-room into the parlor.
+There are some men with whom business is a disease; they are never easy
+with it and never rid of it. Thus, perhaps, they acquire a reputation
+for smartness and enterprise; but they do it, it is to be feared, by
+putting aside other and more sacred claims.
+
+Nor let him who is the genial companion abroad, be the morose boarder in
+his own house, reserving his vivacity for society and the lees for the
+fireside. It is a great deal better to be like the stream that is good
+and welcome wherever it flows, but is sure to be fresh at its source.
+Indeed, there are men who are made up of foam, and sparkle, and who
+circulate in society, but contribute nothing to the necessaries of life,
+and are returned empty. It is an unfortunate gift that cheers the world
+outdoors, but casts only a dreary shadow inside.
+
+Of course, in speaking of the influence of dispositions in making home
+attractive, I would include the duty of those who stay at home as well
+as of those who go abroad, and that self-sacrifice and kind hearts
+should be found as well as brought there. Indeed, if time would allow me
+to make a theme of what now can be only a hint, I should dwell largely
+upon _woman's_ influence in this matter.
+
+But home is to be rendered attractive not only by the disposition, but
+by the customs of its inmates. It must be a place to live, not merely to
+eat and sleep in; a place where we can find entertainment, and not
+always leave in search of it. It is really a monstrous folly, this
+fashionable treatment of home, which leads people to abandon it almost
+every night in pursuit of pleasure, or else to sweep it with a rout,
+which considers a household evening very dull, and makes Sunday a day
+for sleeping and yawning. The central idea of home is _stability_, and
+this has much less chance to be realized in the city than in the
+country. In the latter, old forms and landmarks are not so liable to
+interruption, and the slow process of time works instead of the hand of
+innovation. But in a city, where a man emigrates before he has fairly
+settled, and where many move with every May-day, the idea of a homestead
+is almost obsolete. Elegance, solidity, venerable associations, none of
+these can resist the march of improvement, and the rapid tide of
+business enterprise. The main streets of a great city in this country,
+may almost be termed so many dissolving views of perpetual change and
+renewal. But, perhaps, there is hardly one of us who does not feel that
+by his or her own exertions the essential element of Home can be made
+far more abiding than it now is; and where we hear of frivolous
+daughters and dissipated sons, many a parent may ask the question, "What
+have I done to cheer and consecrate the household world, and make it
+more abiding?"
+
+My friends, when I consider the magnitude and importance of the subject
+now before us, and how many topics of discussion grow out of it--when I
+think how much must be left entirely unsaid--I entreat you not to
+suppose that I offer this discourse as anything more than a
+_suggestion_--a suggestion meant to turn your attention to this subject
+of Home in the City, and leaving it to the elaboration of your own
+thoughts. Remember, here abide the deepest springs of social life. The
+noblest privileges, the greatest duties, find their basis here; and we
+are taught first "to show piety at Home." And the influence of this
+institution upon all other fields of human action, private or public, is
+too obvious to mention. All life flows from the centre, outwards; and
+the citizen who desires the order and purity of the community in which
+he lives; the philanthropist, who, under all conditions, regards the
+highest welfare of his race; the Christian, who urges the secret culture
+of the soul, must look with peculiar solicitude to this institution. It
+is one whose impotence is demonstrated by the strength of the instinct
+which creates it and clings to it--an instinct which associates the most
+genuine happiness with its sacred enclosure of affection, however rude
+or poor that spot may be--which, while a man has such a place to call
+his own, makes him feel that he is somebody, and has some tie and claim
+in the world; and which, on the other hand, associated the most bitter
+destitution, the dreariest isolation, with that one word--"Homeless."
+
+How this instinct abides, how long and how far it goes with us, is
+beautifully illustrated in the lines of Goldsmith.
+
+    "In all my wand'rings round this world of care,
+    In all my griefs--and God has giv'n my share,
+    I still had hopes my latest hours to crown,
+    Amidst these humble bow'rs to lay me down;
+    To husband out life's taper at the close,
+    And keep the flame from wasting by repose.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Around my fire an ev'ning group to draw,
+    And tell of all I felt, and all I saw;
+    And, as a hare whom hounds and horns pursue,
+    Pants to the place from whence at first he flew,
+    I still had hopes, my long vexations past,
+    Here to return--and die at Home at last."
+
+Hopes, my friends, which I think glow in the breasts of most of us, and
+burst spontaneously from our lips. "Let us," we say, "if our lot may be
+so ordered--if the lines of duty run not otherwise--let us live at
+Home." Here, amidst those darkened and brightened associations which are
+woven in the warp and woof of our deepest experience. Here, where gentle
+memories steal upon us with the shadows of the twilight, and for ever
+tapestry the walls. Here, where we have held delightful intercourse with
+man, and secret communion with God. Here, where we have tried to do our
+duty, and exercise our love, and to drink with patience the sweet and
+bitter which our Father mingles in life's mysterious cup. Here, where
+old friends are always cherished and new ones gladly come. Here, where
+the dearest ties of earth have bound us in a family circle; and though
+here and there we find broken links, we still keep hold of them, and
+they draw us up.
+
+And when on this familiar hearth our own vital lamp burns low, and the
+golden bowl begins to shudder and the silver cord to untwine, let our
+last look be upon faces that we best love; let the gates that open into
+the celestial City be these well-known doors--and thus may we also
+_die_ at Home!
+
+And this instinct of Home is not attached merely to earthly conditions,
+but mingles with those aspirations which flow into the illimitable
+future. As in the vast city we seek some enclosure of our own--some
+place of shelter for our heads, of sympathy for our hearts; so,
+respecting the destiny of the soul. In spite of all our philosophy, we
+cannot be satisfied with the conception of a mere immaterial essence
+floating hither and thither in immensity. The intellect looks eagerly
+forward to a boundless and excursive state; but the affections, the
+sentiments, yearn for some locality--some spot of residence and repose.
+We cannot help cherishing the conception of a place where our friends
+are grouped together, and whither we shall go, though to be united in
+wider and more glorious relations. And, knowing no better name for it,
+with eyes of hope and tearful rapture, we look up and call it "Home."
+
+
+
+
+THE ALLIES OF THE TEMPTER.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE VI.
+
+THE ALLIES OF THE TEMPTER.
+
+      He that is not with me is against me.--MATTHEW xii. 30.
+
+
+One of the discourses of the preceding series was devoted to a
+consideration of the vices--especially the three prominent vices--of
+great cities. I propose at the present time to speak of the
+_Influences_, more or less direct, by which these and kindred evils are
+encouraged. Vice, and moral corruption of any kind, no doubt has its
+roots in the gross hearts and in the perverted appetites of men. But the
+most superficial observer must see that these are nourished not merely
+by their native soil, but by the social atmosphere which spreads around.
+Of course character constitutes the man, and, however this may be
+affected by circumstances, it enfolds the consciousness of an original
+personality acting upon and through and in spite of its conditions.
+Nevertheless, the ingredients of this very personality are assimilated
+out of these conditions, and it is difficult to limit or define the
+subtile elements that blend in the deepest currents of a man's nature.
+It is, at least, a simple truism that he differs in one state of society
+from what he is in another. And, therefore, among the forces which help
+make up his moral condition, we must calculate the social forces. His
+virtues are not all self-sustained, and his vices draw nutriment from
+fine and remote channels. It would be an interesting process to analyze
+our own habits and temper and cast of thought, and find how much of this
+is involved with our physical relations. The air we breathe, the house
+in which we dwell, the very way in which it fronts the sun, the degrees
+of light and of shade that fall upon us with the flying hours, all weave
+their delicate influences into the tissues of our being. And how much
+that we do not suspect comes to us, day by day, in social intercourse,
+in the bearing of friends, in the tone and air of conversation, in the
+mere magnetism of the parlor or the street! How much to strengthen or
+to weaken us; to clear or to cloud our moral atmosphere; to make us
+fresh and decisive, or to slowly sap our virtue! But it is a more solemn
+task to compute the influences that proceed _from_ us, and to discover
+how, unknown to ourselves, we are swaying the circles of other lives.
+Why, the mightiest forces go silently. You do not see the gases that
+compose the vital air. You do not feel the aroma that steals along
+loaded with poison, or wafts a blessing through the sick man's window.
+You do not hear the electric pulse that beats in the summer light and in
+the drop of dew. Neither can you estimate the mysterious attraction that
+plays all through this network of social relations, nor the energy of
+good or of evil with which it is charged not merely from your words and
+deeds, but from the still reservoir of your example.
+
+When I look around at the prevalent vices of the city, then, and at its
+various forms of corruption, I am not willing to rest with the mere
+assertion, that all this is the fruit of personal sin and folly on the
+part of those who have yielded to temptation. It _is_ the fruit of
+personal sin and folly. And we, perhaps, in our serene respectabilities,
+shrink back and wonder at it. It _is_ strange--is it not?--that the
+young, the fair, the gifted, should yield themselves to that arch-deceit
+which has allured and ruined men for six thousand years? Is it not the
+same old guilt, the same sophistry and foolishness, here in New York,
+that it always has been? Did it not bear the same Circean cup through
+the halls of Nineveh and Babylon, and fling Caesars and Alexanders to the
+ground? Did it not wear the same seductive smile and harlot tinsel when
+it walked the streets of Tyre, and reclined in the decorated chambers of
+Egypt? And will not its votaries find now, as then, that it entices with
+the embrace of death and the fascination of hell? Why should they thus
+float upon the very rim of this great whirlpool, and not notice the
+groans that come up from its depths; and see that its phosphoric
+illusion is mixed with fiery flakes of torment and the foam of despair?
+It is indeed wonderful that so many should be thus deluded over and
+over again; so many noble energies thrown away, so many sanctions
+trampled upon, so many bright hopes quenched for ever. It is wonderful
+that any being made in the form of man, should cast down his
+prerogatives and wallow like the beast. Sufficient evidence of sin and
+folly in those who do this, to be sure; but in what way do these
+allurements present themselves? What are the resources and entrenchments
+of these vices, by which they act upon human appetite and passion? You
+point me to brilliant windows and gay apartments; to sparkling glasses,
+and shining heaps, and shapes of painted shame. "These," you say, "are
+the forms which the Tempter assumes. Under smiling features and fair
+garlands, he hides at first that hideousness which in due time is
+revealed to his victims. From the lighted vestibules which open so
+easily to the touch, and where all seems only a coronation of youthful
+pleasure and natural joy, the feet of men slide downward into those
+abysses which are hidden from the public gaze, and over whose depths the
+blackness of darkness broods." And all this, again, is true. These are
+the ways in which the Tempter works. But is there nothing but this to
+explain the power which evil has upon men, in the midst of the great
+city? These manifold allurements, these haunts of infamy and shambles of
+destruction--I see them standing upon strange foundations. I see them
+propped by these very influences to which I have alluded; influences of
+social condition and individual example. They would not be so
+formidable, they would not stand so long, were it not that
+respectability in its daily walk and conversation; and social culture in
+thousands of homes; and even justice in its lofty seat; lend them
+support. "He that is not with me is against me," said Jesus; and, taking
+this proverb as a rule, a good many people may be surprised to find
+that, in one way and another, they are _Allies_ of the Tempter.
+
+The allies of the Tempter, I propose to speak of now--not the forms of
+Temptation, which I have already illustrated. Nor do I intend to dwell
+upon those _direct_ conditions of moral evil, out of which vice and
+crime grow as spontaneously as weeds out of a damp and neglected
+soil--those wide seed fields of _ignorance_ and abject _poverty_ which
+lie around us. But the more remote and indirect causes it may be
+profitable for us to consider; and to these I now proceed.
+
+I observe, then, in the first place, that the Tempter has one Ally in
+_Public Sanction_. There are sources of vice and crime that are
+permitted and encouraged by _Law_. I hardly need specify the prominent
+instance to which I allude. But I am not aware of a more enormous public
+inconsistency than what is termed "the License System"--the system of
+permitting the sale of intoxicating drinks in a degree, and of
+restricting them in a degree. For, by this method, either a moral wrong
+is committed, or else a civil one. If these drinks are an individual and
+public injury; if they distribute the seeds of disease, crime, death,
+and every form of social misery; then what right have we in any respect
+to set upon them the solemn sanction of a Law? If, on the other hand,
+they are a benefit to mankind; a good gift of Providence, as some seem
+to think; why should we hamper their circulation? Why should we allow
+one man the privilege of distributing such a blessing, and forbid
+another who, no doubt, is equally zealous for the public good?
+
+But this very system is a confession by public opinion, in its most
+authentic form of expression, that the sale of intoxicating drinks is an
+evil. "Only," we are told, "as it is a prevalent and deep-seated evil,
+it must be _regulated_." But how can we regulate an irregularity? How
+can you regulate an obstruction that is involved with the springs of a
+machine, or the works of a clock? The only possible method obvious to
+common sense, would be to remove the obstruction; and it would be
+thought the most foolish speculation conceivable for one to spend his
+ingenuity in contriving some way to keep the obstruction where it is,
+and yet to keep the clock going as it ought. If it moved regularly, the
+matter referred to would not be an obstruction; and if it did not, the
+contrivance to keep it there would be a help to the obstruction. Now, I
+consider this great vice of Intemperance a decided obstruction in the
+clock-work of an individual man, or the more general mechanism of
+society. It transforms a great many faces into bad dial-plates, disturbs
+the pendulum of public order, makes people go much too fast, and renders
+them liable to strike at all times. Now, if a man, or a community, can
+be made to go just as well with it as without it, we certainly need no
+legislation, for there _is_ no obstruction. On the other hand, if it is
+essentially an irregularity, the only rational method is to get rid of
+its accessories altogether. To enact some way in which the irregularity
+shall work, is to confirm and sanction the irregularity. And the
+license-system--for I wish to be plain and specific here--confirms and
+sanctions the agents of intemperance. It indicates a way in which the
+irregularity may work.
+
+And not only is vice thus aided by the Law. The existence of such a
+sanction engenders either an error or a moral wrong. For it indicates
+that the sale of intoxicating drinks is a public benefit, which is
+false; or, on the other hand, that it is lawful to uphold an evil. The
+same principle carried out by individuals, would excuse almost any
+fault. The man who steals a loaf of bread may contend that it is a
+necessary expedient; and he who fills an empty purse at his neighbor's
+expense, only endeavors to regulate an irregularity.
+
+But suppose we make the system a strict one, what process should be
+employed? Probably you would say--"break up all these filthy and low
+haunts; all these places where the habitually intemperate, the degraded,
+the wretchedly poor congregate; and let these beverages be sold only in
+respectable places and to respectable people." But is this really the
+best plan? On the contrary, it seems quite reasonable to maintain that
+it is better to sell to the intemperate than to the sober--to the
+degraded than to the respectable--for the same reason that it is better
+to burn up an old hulk than to set fire to a new and splendid ship. I
+think it worse to put the first glass to a young man's lips, than to
+crown with madness an old drunkard's life-long alienation--worse to wake
+the fierce appetite in the depths of a generous and promising nature,
+than to take the carrion of a man, a mere shell of imbecility, and soak
+it in a fresh debauch. Therefore, if I were going to say where the
+License should be granted in order to show its efficacy, I would
+say--take the worst sinks of intemperance in the city, give them the
+sanction of the Law, and let them run to overflowing. But shut up the
+gilded apartments where youth takes its first draught, and
+respectability just begins to falter from its level. Close the ample
+doors through which enters the long train of those who stumble to
+destruction and reel into quick graves, and let the flood overwhelm only
+the maimed and battered conscripts that remain. Besides, it is better to
+see vice as it really is, than as it sometimes appears. The danger of
+intemperance is when it assumes this very garb of respectability, and
+sits in the radiant circle of fashion attended by wit and beauty and
+social delight. Let us see the Tempter, not as he seems when he throws
+out his earliest lures, in festal garments and with roses around his
+brow; but as he looks when fairly engaged in his work, showing his
+genuine expression. Let us see this vice of intemperance in its
+_results_, as they teem and darken here in the midst of our city life.
+Lay bare its channel--let us see to its very depths--where it flows over
+the wrecks of human happiness, and over dead men's bones. Lay bare its
+festering heaps of disease, its madness, its despair, its domestic
+desolation, its reckless sweep over all order and sanctity; and thus,
+tracing it from its sources under glittering chandeliers and in fonts of
+crystal, we shall be able to say--"this is the real element which exists
+and does its work, by public connivance and with the sanction of Law!"
+
+If you ask me then, whether I think that a statute of absolute
+prohibition would stop this flowing curse, I reply that at least it
+would put the influence of authority on the right side. It would lend it
+the force of consistent endeavor. As it is, it would be far better if
+the public sanction had no expression; for now it only confirms and
+guarantees the evil. Its power is exerted not in the right, but in the
+wrong direction. It is an ally of the tempter. For the spirit of
+everlasting Justice and Benevolence, speaking as it were by the mouth of
+Jesus, says--"He that is not with me is against me."
+
+But I observe, in the second place, that the forces of temptation in the
+city are nourished by _public neglect_. In individual experience it will
+be found, I think, that sins of _omission_ are more numerous and are
+worse than sins of _commission_. If we examine our lives closely, we
+shall discover that our moral indebtedness comes even less from what we
+have done, than from what we ought to have done. And this individual
+experience has a counterpart in social conditions. How many evils among
+us grow up under the shadow of inoperative laws--laws which have a voice
+and nothing else--nay, hardly a voice, so seldom are they heard even to
+speak. They appear to have been enacted merely as a compliment to
+decency, and they remain in the statute-book as "idle as painted ships
+upon a painted ocean." The dens of debauch keep open doors night and
+day; the saloons of profligacy send out their cards of invitation; the
+gambler rattles his triumphant dice; but excursive policemen never see,
+and vigilant magistrates never hear! Some provision of nature has
+imparted a very singular quality to the optic powers of the one, and the
+auditory nerves of the other. The laws against this vice, or that
+custom, stand fixed and silent; and as for putting them in operation,
+one would as soon think of pulling up so many grave-stones. They _are_
+the grave-stones of a dead public sentiment--the stumbling-blocks of a
+blind justice, that too often shakes hands with the very guilt which it
+professes to condemn. I do not, by any means, believe that everything is
+to be accomplished by law. I do not believe that the profoundest results
+are to be accomplished by it. But, if it possesses any efficacy at all,
+it consists in its power to repress open and shameless wrong; and where
+any such wrong _is_ open and shameless, public neglect is the cause, and
+such public neglect, therefore, is an Ally of the Tempter. And let us
+consider the enormity of such evils. In every great city there are some
+omissions of executive duty, which, though grievous to be borne, are
+noticed with good humor. But there are moral swamps, sending up their
+foul steam to pollute the common light; there are kennels of
+uncleanness, running with the waste of human lives, sweeping along with
+the death-gurgle of human souls; there is a dry-rot of impurity
+infecting the town-air, withering the dearest sanctities of society and
+of home--and over this kind of evil we cannot be facetious. Think how
+much is risked here, and how much is lost! Domestic happiness,
+reputation, honor, health, order, the prospects of the young, the peace
+of the old--Fathers, the hopes of your sons! Mothers, the interests of
+your daughters! and, though speaking may have little effect, say whether
+we ought not to speak, and to speak indignantly, of the neglect which
+lets these evils spread with deadly luxuriance, and winks at them as
+though they were harmless?
+
+But, my friends, what do we mean by "public sanction," or "public
+neglect?" There are some convenient synonyms which help us to cover up
+our personal responsibility--help us to transfer our own sense of duty
+to a vague secondary agent, and keep peace with our own consciences.
+And yet they are only _synonyms_, after all. Now this term "public" is
+but another word for the aggregate of our personal obligations, and does
+not for a single moment rid us of our share in the general influence.
+The real point of my present topic is this--you and I and every other
+individual involved in this network of social relations, are helping or
+weakening the force of these prevalent evils. And it may arouse us to
+some decision of conduct to consider how the most respectable--those who
+would shrink with horror from these foul customs--are, nevertheless,
+Allies of the Tempter. And I might state, as a comprehensive
+proposition, that every man _is_ an Ally of the Tempter, who does not
+put forth a conscious and positive moral energy; who does not habitually
+throw his example and his influence in the right direction. It is not
+enough that he abstains from wrong himself--that he is chaste, and
+temperate, and upright, and unimpeached. For perhaps the most hopeless
+people, morally speaking, are those people who, according to their own
+confession, "have never done any harm." There is a good prospect for
+those who are trying to grow better, however they may slip and flounder.
+There is hope, on the other hand, for the desperately wicked--for the
+very violence of one extreme precipitates the other; and sometimes the
+best and purest souls have been swept by a thunder-shower of sin. But
+those who rest upon the fact that they "have never done any harm," by
+being so easily contented show but little moral vitality. There is no
+aspiration in their natures. They seem to have no particular mission in
+the universe; for, if they have never done any harm, they have done
+little else. They are poorly fitted for this earth, which demands the
+effort of all our faculties; poorly fitted for heaven, whose inhabitants
+would not make harmlessness their chief characteristic. Their residence
+and their paradise might be a great exhausted receiver, where there is
+no gravitation to draw them down, and no air to send them up. But, in
+truth, these people deceive themselves. Every man exerts a _positive_
+influence, and cannot, if he would, be a mere negation in the world. In
+the great conflict of good and evil there is no middle ground. There
+are no compromises in God's government, and neutral men are the devil's
+allies. "He that is not with me, is against me."
+
+Let us see, then, how possible it is that _we_ may contribute to the
+force of evil in the City. In other words, let us inquire--in what way
+do respectable and harmless people, as they deem themselves, become
+Allies of the Tempter?
+
+In the first place, by their _customs_. And, chief of all, by the custom
+of an intense and inconsiderate selfishness. How many there are who
+require no other sanction for what they do than "that pleases me," or
+"this gratifies me!" It is wonderful what a mighty agent _self_ is,
+estimated by its own standards. It is the hero of every exploit, the
+centre of every event, and the oracle of all opinions. It interprets the
+purpose of the universe; it finds out exactly what the world was made
+for. At least, a good many, apparently, have ascertained that the world
+was made for them, and that they were sent into it to get what
+gratification they can. And it appears sadly out of tune to them, if it
+does not serve this end. In anything they do, therefore, they consider
+only selfish consequences. They do not apprehend the universe in its
+great harmony. They do not trace out its web of mutual relations--a
+braid of light held in the hand of Infinite Love. They do not know the
+sympathy that shoots in the crystal, and shimmers in the aurora, and
+beats in the heart of the ocean, and makes the silent music that rolls
+from sphere to sphere along the glittering scale of heaven. If they did,
+they would discover, perhaps, that the social world is constructed upon
+the same plan; and man cannot be an alien from the common humanity
+however hard he may try. Yes: concerning any custom, you have not only
+yourself to consider, but the bearings of its influence throughout this
+tissue of hearts and minds with which you are involved. You cannot
+isolate yourself from your responsibilities. You cannot shut yourself
+within comfortable walls, and say--"Here is the limit of my obligations,
+and here I will do as I please!" You may _say_ this, but you do not rid
+yourself of these claims. Through imperceptible aqueducts your influence
+runs abroad; and what you do, and what you are, contributes particles of
+disease or health to the social atmosphere that envelopes all. I look
+around, then, upon the vices and even the crimes of the City, and I say
+that some of them find root in the customs of the respectable and the
+fashionable. Profligacy, which we shrink from in its open profession,
+and which appears abominable in its avowed haunts, finds encouragement
+wherever the libertine receives the smile of beauty, and the guilt of
+the meanest sort of a man is excused on account of an agreeable manner.
+Thus the poison of the snake, and the blight of his venom on many a
+reputation and many a womanly heart, is all forgotten in the
+drawing-room, because of the fascination of his hiss and the glitter of
+his skin. Again, the Tempter has an Ally in the world of Traffic,
+wherever bad things are stamped with respectable names--when, for
+instance, swindling is called "smartness," and robbery "per-centage."
+Among people of less note in the world these matters are named
+"cheating" and "stealing," and some of them may take punishment the more
+reluctantly because they cannot perceive the difference. And, still
+again, I think that a little use of intoxicating drinks is like the
+little matter that kindles a great fire, and that there would not be so
+much intemperance if there were not so many "temperate" drinkers. The
+sluices of the grog-shop are fed from the wine-glasses in the parlor;
+and there is a lineal descent from the gentleman who hiccups at his
+elegant dinner-table to the sot who makes a bed of the gutter.
+
+"Am I my brother's keeper?" asked the first man who reddened his hands
+with the violated life of a man; and the answer came crying upward in a
+voice of blood from the ground. "Am I my brother's keeper?" _you_ ask,
+perhaps, with a tone of surprise or scorn. _You_ ask O! respectable
+gentleman or lady; O! man in the thick of business; O! self-indulgent
+Epicurean;--and the answer comes to you not from the ground merely, but
+from the universal air--the answer of kindred pulses, of confluent
+sympathies, of an inseparable humanity--though it swarms in rags, and
+riots in shame, and seems far off from you in its hell of debasement and
+despair. Nay, perhaps the answer comes very _near_ to you. It may come
+from some one of your own household. You may ask--"Who has tempted even
+my very child?" Ask _Yourself_--"Need he have gone outside this very
+door to find temptation?" Ah! perhaps you are not merely an Ally of the
+Tempter, but have furnished conscripts for his vast army. Your children
+perhaps will rise up and call you--_not_ "blessed." And see, too, what
+kind of conscripts the Tempter draws from the ranks of respectable and
+especially of fashionable life. Mere striplings, so dwarfed and dwindled
+by precocious dissipation that they look like feeble specimens of
+wax-work; whose faculties--the evident product of a thin soil--have been
+developed by bottles of wine and fast horses; whose memories are too
+short to remember their parents; whose ideas are too artificial to touch
+any genuine spring of nature; who are ashamed of true manliness, and
+make a miserable farce of what they _call_ "manliness;" and who, as
+they parade the streets, make up a sort of bombastic interlude in the
+drama of "Young America."
+
+But, whatever view we may take of this general subject, it is evident
+that we cannot easily exaggerate the influence of "respectable and
+fashionable" customs upon the forces of temptation. And, surely, it
+becomes each of us to consider the tendencies of his own example, and
+ask--"Is it toward the right or the wrong? Is it for, or against the
+good?"
+
+Again, the Tempter finds help from our _indifference_. This, indeed, may
+be the qualification which should be applied to the remarks I have just
+made. It is not to be supposed that the evil influences which go out
+from the customs alluded to, are the results of _intention_. They spring
+up in a lack of interest and of the consciousness of duty. They grow
+rank and luxuriant in neglect. If we were only in earnest as to these
+vices and crimes and guilty customs; if we would only wake from our
+apathy, to reflection and conviction; how soon would they diminish, and
+how many of them would pass away!
+
+But, as comprehensive of this, and in fact all the rest that may be
+said, I observe, finally, that the temptations of a great city are
+strong because of a lack of the spirit of _Christian love_. In one
+respect, especially, is it true that men in general are not _with_
+Jesus, and therefore are against him. They have not his sympathies, his
+spirit of self-sacrifice, his broad, deep, universal charity. Baneful
+customs, and cold indifferentism grow up in a soil that is watered by no
+living and unselfish love. They show the dryness and the baseness of our
+social state. And it is not merely in the lack of active and practical
+love that the Tempter grows strong; but in the exercise of a prevalent
+_uncharitableness_. Too many of us have no disposition but scorn for the
+fallen; see no blessed possibilities in them; do not detect any divine
+ray glimmering in the thick darkness--do not discern the precious soul,
+like a crown-jewel, in its filthy and battered casket. And if this
+paralyzes and kills the springs of our own activity, need I say how the
+hearts of the offending are repelled and hardened in such a hostile
+atmosphere? Need I say how desperate is the Ishmaelitish conviction;
+the sense of isolation and antagonism; and, on the other hand, how
+powerful and healing, even for the most distant and hopeless, is the
+sweet attraction of sympathy? And what are we, that we dare to cherish
+this exclusive horror, this pitiless, unrelenting scorn? When we
+consider our own slips, compared with our temptations; the account to
+which God may hold us, not the smooth standards of human respectability;
+how much higher is our own moral level, that we feel no chords of a
+common humanity reaching down even to those fallen ones, and cannot
+stoop to touch them? My friends, it may be, after all, that the Tempter
+has no surer ally than the averted face of contempt and the word of
+unsoftened rebuke, driving the barb of conscious guilt deeper and
+despairingly into a brother's soul.
+
+And, as I look upon this mass of social evil, these steaming wells of
+passion, these solid fortifications of habit where the Tempter is
+entrenched, I ask how is all this to pass away? And the answer is--only
+by the spirit of Christian Love, sweeping these impediments of
+selfishness from the heart, and animating us to effort. _With_ Christ
+the work certainly can be done. In this Gospel-beating amidst the guilt
+and sorrow of the world like the pulsations of a Divine heart--in the
+few leaves of this Testament--there is an illimitable power, before
+whose inspiration in the purposes and deeds of men no evil thing shall
+stand. And the spirit and exercise of this Love _is_ Religion. It is the
+up-shot of all that is preached--it is the open and tangible test of
+every mystic experience that drifts through the soul--it is so deep, so
+broad, and runs so far, that it comprehends all requirements; and they
+who cherish it, and practice it in the low and dark and desolate places
+of the world, are the true saints. Nothing else will do in its place.
+Not Churches, nor creeds, nor rituals, nor respectabilities. Without it
+we are not friends of Christ, nor co-workers with God. Without it we
+deepen the channels of human woe, and prop the strong-holds of
+wickedness. Without it, whatever we may not be, we are Allies of the
+Tempter. The Saviour says to each of us to-day, placed amidst these
+antagonistic forces of Life--"He that is not with me is against me."
+
+
+
+
+THE CHILDREN OF THE POOR.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE VII.
+
+THE CHILDREN OF THE POOR.
+
+      The young children ask bread, and no man breaketh it unto
+      them.--LAMENTATIONS iv., 4.
+
+
+The writer of these words bewailed a state of War and Captivity--a state
+of things in which the great relations of human life are broken up and
+desecrated. But it is strange to find that the most flourishing forms of
+civilization involve conditions very similar to this. For, if any man
+will push beyond the circle of his daily associations, and enter the
+regions of the abject poor, he will see how the hostile forces of
+privation, and hunger, and unguided impulse, have laid waste the
+sanctities of existence in the abodes and in the breasts of thousands as
+with sword and with fire. There is no essential difference in
+starvation, whether it ensues from the ravages of an invading host or
+from the lack of means. Temptation is a fierce legion; and death looks
+no more terrible under a Babylonian helmet, than it does upon the gaunt
+faces of men who die upon the bare floor or wallow in rags. The worst
+calamity _in_ a calamity--if I may use such an expression--the most
+deplorable thing in any of the great evils of life, occurs when the
+selfish instinct within us is aroused, by want or terror, to such a
+degree that it overwhelms all social limitations, absorbs every
+sympathy, and leaves nothing but an intense individualism. This is the
+result in a sudden shock of danger, when the alarmed instinct is the
+first that starts to the summons. Sometimes, in protracted peril, it
+grows into an actual delirium of selfishness, and drowns even the sense
+of fear--as men amidst the horrors of a shipwreck will commit the most
+brutal excesses, and even rob the dying. And thus, in the desolation of
+Jerusalem as described by Jeremiah, the very yearnings of maternity were
+swallowed up by this fierce instinct.
+
+    "The hands of tender-hearted women cooked their own children;
+    They were their food, in the destruction of the daughter of my people."
+
+And results as bad as this appear in the conditions of poverty,
+suffering, and social degradation. Every fine chord of human nature is
+seared, sodden, torn from its sockets, in the darkness of the moral
+faculties and by the pressure of animal wants. The poor man is conscious
+of nothing but privation and suffering. He gazes at the power and
+discipline and pomp of society all about him, not as an ally but as a
+captive, or as a savage foe. The whole wears the aspect of a besieging
+army, and the Ishmaelitish feeling predominates. In the midst of the
+City he becomes an Arab of the desert, a robber of the rock. Now, it
+makes little difference whether the circle is wider or narrower, whether
+the siege is a moral or a literal one, whether the agent is the sword or
+the condition of society. The essential results will be the same. The
+civilization of New York may and does hem in a desolation as fearful in
+kind as that of Jerusalem, and involves sufferings as keen, and wakes
+up instincts as fiercely selfish. And one whose sympathies with the wide
+humanity are as fresh and clear as the Prophet's were with the woes of
+his people, might draw closer within these various circles of prosperity
+and refinement and activity, that lend such attractiveness to the great
+city--this magnificent girdle of commerce, embossed with the symbols of
+all nations--these arteries of traffic, filled with circulating wealth
+and power--these groups of fashion and of beauty, whose cheapest jewels
+would open the kingdom of heaven to ten thousand souls; he might pass
+within all these bands of "civilization," and in some alley, or "Five
+Points," sit down and weep for the calamity of his brethren. He would
+behold there War and Captivity enough to fill an entire volume of
+Lamentations. Captivity! were men ever bound by a darker chain, or
+trampled by a harder heel, than those victims of destitution and of
+their own passions? War! did the Jew behold any hosts more terrible
+pressing into Jerusalem, than you and I might see if we looked about us?
+The entrenched filth that all day long sends its steaming rot through
+lane and dwelling, through bone and marrow, and saps away the life. Cold
+that encamps itself in the empty fire-place, and blows through the
+broken door, and paralyzes the naked limbs. Hunger that takes the strong
+man by the throat, and kills the infant in its mother's arms. And still
+another traitorous legion that, equipped with the fascinations of the
+bottle and the shamelessness of harlotry, appeals to the passions of the
+brutal and proffers comfort to the hearts of the sad. War and Captivity
+in the midst of peace and refinement--is it not, my friends? And, with
+all this, may we not expect that fierce instinct of selfishness which
+overwhelms every other impulse, and breaks out in crime? Ah! and do we
+not discover a counterpart to that saddest feature of all in such
+circumstances--a desecration even of the parental instinct? Fathers,
+beating their sons into the career of guilt; and mothers--worse than
+those who made horrid food of their own children--offering their
+daughters to the Moloch of lust in the shape of some "gentlemanly"
+devil with a portable hell in his own breast!
+
+And it seems to me that if one with a prophet vision and a prophet
+heart, widened to the compass of humanity, should thus go into these
+waste places, nothing would affect him more; nothing would strike a
+deeper and tenderer chord in his bosom; than the condition of these
+little ones amidst the siege and terror. And, comprehending all their
+need--their moral as well as their physical destitution--he might
+exclaim, as describing the most pitiable spectacle of all--"The young
+children ask bread, and no man breaketh it unto them."
+
+And I think that every one of you who has reflected at all upon this
+subject, must feel that, of all the conditions of Humanity in the darker
+regions of the City, there is none more sorrowful, more momentous, and
+at the same time more hopeful, than the condition of the Children of the
+Poor. And I do not call your attention to this subject to-night with the
+expectation of proclaiming any fresh doctrine, or offering any novel
+suggestion, but because in a series of discourses like the present I
+cannot consistently pass by such a prominent phase; and more especially
+because I wish to push the old truth from your heads into your hearts,
+so that you may be excited to immediate and practical action.
+
+I purpose then, in regard to the Children of the Poor, to maintain one
+or two _principles_, to state a few _facts_, and to consider some
+_remedies_; and these will constitute the divisions of my discourse.
+
+In the first place then, I lay down a general principle which divides
+itself into two specific principles. I maintain that we are under
+peculiar obligations in regard to children. Of all our duties, except
+those which we owe directly to God--of all the ways in which we are
+required to _show_ our duty to God--I know of none more peremptory than
+this. It is the obligation of an instinct that appears everywhere; that
+swells in the breasts of the rudest people; that mingles with the most
+tender and beautiful and sacred associations of human life.
+
+Childhood and Children! is there any heart so sheathed in worldliness,
+or benumbed by sorrow, or hardened in its very nature, as to feel no
+gentle thrill responding to these terms? Surely, in some way these
+little ones have "touched the finer issues" of our being, and given us
+an unconscious benediction. Some of you are Mothers, and have acquired
+the holiest laws of duty, the sweetest solicitudes, the noblest
+inspirations, in the orbit of a child's life. And, however wide the
+circle of its wandering, you have held it still, by some tether of the
+heart, bound to the centre of a fathomless and unforgetting love. Some
+of you are Fathers, and in the opening promise of your sons have built
+fresh plans and enjoyed young hopes, and even in the decline of life
+have walked its morning paths anew. Many of us have felt our first great
+sorrow, and the breaking up of the spiritual deep within us, by the
+couch of a dead child. Clasping the little lifeless hand, we have
+comprehended, as never before, the _reality_ of death, and through the
+gloom, covering all the world about us, have caught sudden glimpses of
+the immortal fields. And, all of us, I trust, are thankful that God has
+not created merely men and women, crimped into artificial patterns, with
+selfish speculation in their eyes, with sadness and weariness and
+trouble about many things carving the wrinkles and stealing away the
+bloom; but pours in upon us a fresh stream of being that overflows our
+rigid conventionalisms with the buoyancy of nature, plays into this
+dusty and angular life like the jets of a fountain, like floods of
+sunshine, upsets our miserable dignity, meets us with a love that
+contains no deceit, a frankness that rebukes our quibbling compliments,
+nourishes the poetry of the soul, and, perpetually descending from the
+threshold of the Infinite, keeps open an arch-way of mystery and heaven.
+
+And now, just consider what a child _is_--this being thus fresh from the
+unknown realm, tender, plastic, dependent; a bud enfolding the boundless
+possibilities of humanity, and growing rank, running to waste, or
+opening in beauty, as you turn, neglect, or support it--just consider
+what a child is; and he must be far gone in indifference or depravity,
+who does not recognize the specific duty growing out of a general
+obligation which is forced upon us by the intrinsic claims of that
+child's nature. If we were appealed to by nothing else but its drooping
+reliance and natural wants, there would be enough to draw our attention
+to every phase of childhood that comes within our sphere.
+
+But our purpose this evening calls us away from these brighter images of
+childhood, to consider those who are surrounded with the most savage
+aspects and the worst influences of the world. And, beside the absolute
+duty which is imposed upon us by their natural position, I observe that
+the Children of the Poor create an appeal to _prudential_
+considerations. They form a large proportion of those groups known in
+every city as "The _Dangerous_ Classes." For they will be developed
+somehow. If they receive not that attention which is demanded by their
+position; if they are left to darkness and neglect; still, it is no mere
+mass of negative existence that they constitute. There is vitality there
+and positive strength, in those lanes and cellars, put forth for evil if
+not drawn towards the good. We must not confound ignorance with torpor
+of spirit or bluntness of understanding. One of the most remarkable
+characteristics of vagrant children is a keen, precocious intellect. A
+boy of seven in the streets of a city is more developed in this respect
+than one of fourteen in the country--a development, of course, which is
+easily accounted for by the antagonisms with which the child has had to
+contend, and the devices which have been inspired by the sheer pressure
+of want. He has been pitched into the sea of events to sink or swim, and
+those sharpened faculties are the tentacles put forth by an effort of
+nature in order to secure a hold of life. And there is something very
+sad and very fearful in this precocity. The vagrant boy has known
+nothing of the stages of childhood, conducting with beautiful simplicity
+from one timid step to another, and gradually forming it for the
+realities of the world. But the neglected infant has wilted into the
+premature man, with his old cunning look, blending so fantastically, so
+mournfully, with the unformed features of youth. Knowing the world on
+its worst side--knowing its hostility, its knavery, its foulness, its
+heartless materialism--knowing it as the man does not know it who has
+only breathed the country air, and looked upon the open face of nature.
+Is it not very sad, my friends, that the vagrant boy _should_ know so
+much; and, without one hour of romance, one step of childish innocence
+and imagination, should have gone clear through "the world" which so
+many boast that they understand--the knave's world, the libertine's
+world, the world of the skeptical, scoffing, Ishmaelitish spirit? And
+yet he has so little _real_ knowledge--there is such a cloud of
+ignorance and moral stupor resting upon his brain and heart! So much of
+him is merely animal, foxy, wolfish, and this sharpened intellect only a
+faculty, an instinct, a preternatural organ pushed out to gain
+subsistence with. It is a terrible anomaly, and yet, I say, it is none
+the less an active power, and shows us that, however neglected, the
+child of the abject poor is not dormant or undeveloped. In the first
+place, very likely, it has developed itself into a dogged atheism--a
+sulky unbelief. The brain of the vagrant boy is active with speculation
+as well as with practice--he has some theory of this life in which he
+lives, and, as might be expected, a theory woven with the tissues of
+his own experience; woven with the shadows and the lurid lights of his
+lot. A gentleman passing one day through the streets of Edinboro', saw a
+boy, who lived by selling fire-wood, standing with a heavy load upon his
+back, looking at a number of boys amusing themselves in a play-ground.
+"Sometimes," says the writer, "he laughed aloud, at other times he
+looked sad and sorrowful. Stepping up to him I said--'Well, my boy, you
+seem to enjoy the fun very much; but why don't you lay down your load of
+sticks?'... 'I wan't thinking about the burden--I wan't thinking about
+the sticks, sir.' 'And may I ask what you were thinking about?' 'Oh, I
+was just thinking about what the good missionary said the other day. You
+know, sir, I don't go to church, for I have no clothes; but one of the
+missionaries comes every week to our stair, and holds a meeting. He was
+preaching to us last week, and among other things he said--"Although
+there are rich folks and poor folks in this world, yet we are all
+brothers." Now, sir, just look at these lads--every one of them has
+fine jackets, fine caps, with warm shoes and stockings, but I have
+none;--So I was just thinking if those were my brothers, it doesn't look
+like it, sir--it doesn't look like it. See, sir, they are all flying
+kites, while I am flying in rags--they are running about at kick-ball
+and cricket; but I must climb the long, long stairs, with a heavy load,
+and an empty stomach, whilst my back is like to break. It doesn't look
+like it, sir--it doesn't look like it.'" Or, take the following
+instance, which I extract from the Records of one of the Benevolent
+Societies of our own city: "Can you read or write? said the visitor to a
+poor boy. Marty hung his head. I repeated the question two or three
+times before he answered, and the tears dropped on his hands, as he
+said, despairingly, and I thought defiantly--'No, sir, I can't read nor
+write neither. God don't want me to read, sir. Indeed, so it looks
+likely. Didn't He take away my father since before I can remember him?
+And haven't I been working all the time to fetch in something to eat,
+and for the fire, and for clothes? I went out to pick coal when I could
+take a basket in my arms--and I have had no chance for school since.'"
+Now this is fallacious and dangerous reasoning, my friends;
+nevertheless, it _is_ reasoning, and shows that the mind of the poor boy
+is not inactive as to the problems of life. And the intellect which is
+so acute in theory will soon drive to practice. Stimulated by that
+selfish instinct which, as I have shown, will under pressure absorb
+every other consideration, he speedily commences the career of _crime_.
+And have you ever looked into this matter of crime? Or do you know it
+only as a monstrous fact in the social mechanism, and in the records of
+human nature? If so, it would be well for us to consider the way in
+which it appears to the violator of right--the way in which things look
+to him who works _inside_ the web of guilt. And we may be sure that it
+does not look to him as it does to us from the midst of respectabilities
+and comforts, or from a high intellectual and moral stand-point. Now I
+am not going to justify crime, or to indulge any sentiment upon the
+subject. But, really, one of the most practical questions that can be
+asked is--"_Why_ is this one, or that one, a criminal?" Do I say that
+the guilt should be imputed to the condition--that it is all owing to
+circumstances? No: but I _do_ say that, in nine cases out of ten, crime
+is no proof of _special_ depravity apart from _general_ depravity, and
+that the circumstances have just so much weight as this--that put you or
+me in those same circumstances, in nine cases out of ten, we should be
+criminals too. In the same circumstances, my friends; and this involves
+a great deal. It involves an hereditary taint stamped in the very mould
+of birth; it involves physical misery; it involves intellectual and
+moral destitution; it involves the worst kind of social influence; it
+involves the pressure of all the natural appetites, rioting in this need
+of the body and this darkness of the soul. And it implies no suspicion
+of a man's moral standard--it is no insult to his self-respect--to tell
+him that, under similar conditions, it is extremely probable he would
+have been a criminal too. Reasoning in an arm-chair is very proper, and
+often very accurate, but the logic of starvation is too peremptory for
+syllogisms. There is a sort of compound made up of frost, damp, dirt and
+rags, which works double magic: it sometimes converts a thief into a
+philosopher, and sometimes a philosopher into a thief. I am not
+speaking, however, of the mere impulse of animal want, but of this
+condition where the counter-acting forces are dormant. And for this
+reason you and I can draw no immoral conclusion from the doctrine of
+circumstances. We could not be like the moral leper who infests the dark
+regions of the city--we could not be like the child of sin and shame who
+broods there--without losing our identity. In contemplating this matter,
+the feeling for ourselves should be simply one of humility and
+thankfulness. We have grown up in pure light and air, appeased with the
+comforts, and braced by at least the current morality of society. But,
+concerning those degraded ones, what some call "charity" is no more than
+"justice." It is no more than justice to say--all the conditions being
+considered--that as to a vast majority of them, crime is no proof of
+_special_ depravity. It is the genuine humanity that is there--not base
+metal. It came from the common mint--somewhere you will find upon it a
+faint scar of the Divine Image--but the coin was pitched into this
+bonfire of appetite and blasphemy, and it has come out a cinder. Thus,
+proud and happy Mother, might _your_ boy have been a defaced and
+distorted being, kicked, cuffed, knotted with frost, blackened with
+bruises; a pick-pocket, a wharf-rat, a panel-thief; with his intellect
+sharpened to an intense and impish cunning--only knowing that it is a
+hard world, and he must get out of it what he can. Thus, fond Father,
+might _your_ daughter, whom the very winds must salute with courtesy,
+have gone through the streets at night--a painted desolation, a reeling
+shame. Do you think these were made of better texture than those who
+blacken and fester yonder? Do you think that when these last came into
+the world there was no milk in mothers' breasts for them, no Divine
+solicitude about them, no tenderness in the heart of Christ; but that
+they were the refuse, whirled into existence as the great wheel of Life
+shaped the finer mould of the respectable and the happy? I tell you
+that God made them complete souls, and stamped His Image upon them--but
+they have fallen into the dark and dreary ways; the fierce flames have
+hardened them; the foul air has tainted them; and their special
+depravity, over and above the common depravity, is the infection of
+circumstances. The young boy, the young girl, driven by necessity and
+sharpened with cunning, run into crime. They are all _educated_; for
+circumstances--not merely books--are education; but this is their
+seminary, and the alphabet is spontaneous, and the science of quick
+growth. And with the consequences of all this exposure and temptation we
+are all mixed up; and, if the claim of the child in its intrinsic
+position does not move us, _prudential_ considerations should--the
+consideration of what society does suffer, and must suffer, if these
+conditions are not changed.
+
+Such, then, are some of the _principles_ involved with my theme. Let us
+in the second place pass to consider, very briefly, a few of the
+_facts_. Briefly, because I have no time for details, and because the
+general state of the case is but too well known to you.
+
+It is a fact, then, that there are among us a vast number of children in
+the most miserable and perilous condition. In the year 1849, the Chief
+of Police reported the destitution and vice among this class of vagrants
+as almost "incredible." In that report he says--"The offspring of always
+careless, generally intemperate, and oftentimes dishonest parents, they
+never see the inside of a school-room, and so far as our excellent
+system of public education is concerned, it is to them a nullity." It
+appears that, at that time, in 12 wards of the city, there were 2,955 of
+these children, of whom two-thirds were females between the ages of 8
+and 16. I am informed, also, by the Chief of Police, that 100 per cent.
+should now be added to this estimate; not all attributable, of course,
+to growth in depravity, but to the increase of population, especially by
+immigration. I understand, moreover, that within the past year there
+have been ten thousand arrests, and five thousand commitments of boys
+alone between the ages of 5 and 15.
+
+These are naked statistics, affording you an outline of the actual state
+of things. Need I paint the costume and the scenery, and describe the
+sad and awful drama in which these children play their parts? I could
+not if I would. But think of that vast amount of young life running to
+waste, sweeping through the sewers of the social fabric, an
+under-current of taint and desolation! Think of them, starved, beaten,
+driven into crime not merely by necessity, but by the very hands of
+their parents! and think of them this night, cuddling in rags, shivering
+on straw, cradled in reeking filth, drinking in blasphemy and obscenity
+and cunning policies of sin, under that dark canopy that shuts out
+social sympathy, and hides the very Face of God. And if you have, I will
+not say parental hearts, but human souls, you will ask if there ought
+not to be some remedy, and will say that all who can should help in
+administering that remedy.
+
+And _remedies_ there appear to be, my friends. For, while I said that
+there is no condition in the city more sad and momentous than that of
+these children of the poor, I said, likewise, that there is none more
+_hopeful_. The essential and comprehensive remedy of all I indicated in
+the close of the last discourse, and shall have occasion to dwell upon
+in the next. That remedy is the practical operation of
+Christianity--first of all in our own hearts, and then flowing out in
+action. I mean especially the _method_ of Jesus, which consisted not of
+mere teaching but of _help_--which touched not only the issues of the
+sin-sick soul, but the weakness and want of the body. To the demoniac,
+to the leper, to the impotent man by the pool, he brought not abstract
+truths, but words of healing and works of practical deliverance. How
+striking is the fact that the freshest and noblest charities of this
+nineteenth century are only developments of the manner in which the
+Redeemer soothed the sorrows and vanquished the evils of the world! For
+those institutions which especially excite the public interest at the
+present day, are those whose plan it is first to remove the children of
+the poor from those wretched and foul _conditions_ upon which I have
+laid so much stress, and to lead them to a higher culture by extending,
+first, the hand of temporal relief. They aim to break up the sockets of
+custom, and to introduce the degraded child to fresh motives of action
+and fields of endeavor; to throw around him the atmosphere of a true
+home, and to blend intellectual, and moral, and religious training with
+that true charity which teaches one how to assert his own manliness, and
+support himself by the honest labor of his own hands. Now I do not wish
+to be invidious, I am glad that such a constellation of philanthropic
+promise has risen upon the dark places of the abject poor. I point with
+pleasure to what has been accomplished in the Sahara of the Five Points,
+and in what still remains to be done I discern a field broad enough to
+prevent collision and dispute--broad enough to employ the means and the
+generous energies of thousands. With equal pleasure I refer to that
+"Juvenile Asylum," with its noble interposition ere the feet of the
+erring boy shall take the _second_ step in crime, and which has recently
+rendered still more efficient its system of labor and relief by
+extending the benefit to girls. But as I wish this evening to
+concentrate your sympathies, I call your attention especially to the
+institution known as "The Children's Aid Society," the general character
+and the practical results of which I will briefly state. Its main object
+is sufficiently indicated by its name. Its machinery is simple, and acts
+upon the principle just laid down. It seeks first to remove the poor
+child from the coil of evil influences which have been thrown around
+him, and which have been daily strengthened by the sharpest pressure of
+animal necessities. It comprehends the two-fold benefit of _education_
+and _labor_ in its system of "Industrial Schools." Of these, at the
+present time, in this city, there are eight, in which a multitude of
+children are educated, taught to work, supplied with a warm dinner
+daily, and with such clothing as they can learn to make. In connection
+with these there is one shoe-shop, in which thirty or forty boys earn a
+livelihood. Another object of this society is to find employment for its
+beneficiaries out of the city, and during the past year places in the
+country have been found for one hundred and twenty-five, where their
+employers treat them as their own children.
+
+In institutions like these, then, you perceive the indications of a
+remedy for the condition of these children of the poor--a system of help
+which gives something more than spiritual instruction on the one hand,
+something more than mere food and clothing on the other; which combines
+measures of relief and nourishment for the demands of our whole nature
+in the form of the ignorant and suffering child; and which, better than
+all, lifts him out of the humiliating condition of a mere pauper or
+dependent, and sets him in a channel of manly exertion,
+self-development, and self-support; which not only does the negative
+work of removing a mass of evil from society, but makes for it the
+positive contribution of an improved and educated humanity. I do not say
+that all the relief lies here, that it will do all that is needed, or
+that nothing better will be devised. But I think the _tendency_ of these
+institutions is the right one, and that they indicate the _way_ in which
+this great social problem is to be solved. But it is not necessary to
+say that the faith which we cherish in such a system is dead without
+works; and that something more is needed than a few model institutions
+working here and there. This matter makes a practical claim upon us all,
+in the fact that, in one way or another, we may all help forward this
+method of relief--we may help it forward as active laborers in the very
+midst of the field, as teachers and missionaries, or contributors of our
+goods and money. Each knows what he can best do--what is his special,
+Providential _call_ in the matter; but let him be assured that he _has_
+a call; and that this spectacle of exposed, needy, suffering childhood
+is not a mere spectacle for his sympathies, but a field white with a
+harvest that waits for his effort. Have we nothing but sympathies
+wherewith to answer the poor woman's prayer--a prayer that echoes
+through so many hearts in this great city--"May the Lord spare my Archy
+from the bad boys, and from taking to the ways of his father!"
+
+There is one thing which strikes me as very affecting in the condition
+of any child. It is when that condition is necessarily a melancholy
+one--when the circumstances which hem it around cast over the surface of
+that young life an abiding gloom. A melancholy child! What an anomaly
+among the harmonies of the universe; something as incongruous as a bird
+drooping in a cage, or a flower in a sepulchre. The musical laughter
+muffled and broken; the spontaneous smile transformed to a sad
+suspicion; and the austerities of mature life, the fearful speculation,
+and forecast of evil, fixed and frozen on a boy's face! And then the
+sorrow of a child is so _absorbing_--for he lives only in the present.
+In the afflictions which fall upon him, man has the aid of reason and
+faith--he looks beyond the present issue, he detects the significance of
+his calamity, and strengthened thus a brave heart can vanquish any
+sorrow. But, as Richter beautifully says--"the little cradle, or
+bed-canopy of the child, is easier darkened than the starry heaven of
+man." Surely, then, it is a blessed thing to contribute aught that will
+lighten this gloom, and place the child in natural conditions.
+
+But there is one phase of this subject which, in its appeal to us, is
+more eloquent than all the rest. It is where there are children who
+stand not merely in the intrinsic claim of their childhood; or in their
+touching sadness; or pushing their energies into vice and crime; but
+nobly struggling _against_ the tide of evil--struggling to bear up in
+their lot--enduring and achieving for the sake of those who, young as
+these children are, are dependent on them. If I had time, I think I
+could write a "Martyrology;" not following the track of famous men,
+whose faces look out upon us from the brutal amphitheatre and from the
+fire with a halo of glory around them, and whom we behold, by the vision
+of faith, with their gory robes transfigured to celestial whiteness,
+waving palms in their hands; but tracing out incidents in the lives of
+some of the children here in our city--not dead, but _living_ martyrs!
+O! I think I _could_ write such a Martyrology, with blood and tears,
+over many a gloomy threshold, on the walls of many a desolate room; and
+let future generations come and read it--a fearful record of human
+suffering--a sweet memorial of human virtue--when many of these old
+woes, we trust, shall have passed away for ever.
+
+Permit me, in closing, to present two or three incidents illustrative of
+this heroism and sacrifice among the Children of the Poor.
+
+Take, for instance, the account of a writer who tells us that in the
+street he "met a little girl, very poor, but with such a sweet sad
+expression," adds he, "that I involuntarily stopped and spoke to her.
+She answered my questions very clearly, but the heavy, sad look never
+left her eyes a moment. She had no father or mother. She took care of
+the children herself; she was only _thirteen_; she sewed on check
+shirts, and made a living for them." He went to see her. "It is a low,
+damp basement her home. She lives there with the three little children,
+whom she supports, and the elder sick brother, who sometimes picks up a
+trifle. She had been washing for herself and little ones. 'She almost
+thought that she could take in washing now,' and the little ones with
+their knees to their mouths crouched up before the stove, looked as if
+there could not be a doubt of sister's doing anything she tried. 'Well,
+Annie, how do you make a living now?' 'I sew on the check shirts, sir,
+and the flannel shirts; I get five cents for the checks, and nine cents
+for the others; but just now they wont let me have the flannel, because
+I can't deposit two dollars.' 'It must be very hard work?' 'O! I don't
+mind, sir; but to-day the visitors came, and said we'd better go to the
+poor-house, and I said I couldn't like to leave these little ones yet;
+and I thought if I only had candles, I could sit up till ten or eleven,
+and make the shirts.' ... She had learned everything she knew at the
+Industrial School.... She never went to church, for she had no clothes,
+but she could read and write.... 'It was very damp there,' she said,
+'and then it was so cold nights.'"
+
+I will, in the next place, introduce you to a garret-room, six feet by
+ten. The occupants are a poor mother and her son. The mother works at
+making shirts with collars and stitched bosoms, at six shillings and
+sixpence per dozen, for a man who pays half in merchandise, and who,
+when she is starving for bread, puts her off with calico at a _shilling_
+a yard that is not worth more than fourpence! But _he_ is not the martyr
+in the case. When the visitor entered, her son George, about twelve
+years old, "was just coming in for dinner, pale and apparently exhausted
+by the effort of climbing the stairs, and sank down upon a rough plank
+bench near the door." He worked in a glass-factory, earning a bare
+subsistence. "He is a little old man at twelve," says the narrator, "the
+paleness of his sunken cheeks was relieved by the hectic flush; his
+hollow dry eye was moistened by an occasional tear; and his thin white
+lip quivered as he told me his simple story; how he was braving hunger
+and death--for he cannot live long--to help his mother pay the rent and
+buy her bread. 'Half-past ten at night is early for him to return,' said
+the mother; 'sometimes it is half-past eleven and I am sitting up for
+him.' Sometimes, in the morning, she finds him awake, 'but he don't want
+to get up, and he puts his hands on his sides and says, 'Mother, it
+hurts me here when I breathe.' I can work, and I do work,' adds she,
+'all the time--but I can't make as much as my little boy.'"
+
+One more account. It is of a beggar-girl who "lives," as the narrative
+goes on to say, "in a rear building where full daylight never shines--in
+a cellar-room where pure dry air is never breathed. A quick gentle girl
+of twelve years, she speaks to the visitor as he enters--'Mother does
+not see you, sir, because she's blind.' The mother was an old woman of
+sixty-five or seventy years, with six or seven others seated around.
+'But you told me you and your mother and little sister lived by
+yourselves.' 'Yes, sir--here it is;'" and at the end of the passage the
+visitor discovers a narrow place, about five feet by three. The bed was
+rolled up in one corner, and nearly filled the room. "'But where is your
+stove?' 'We have none, sir. The people in the next room are very kind to
+mother, and let her come in there to warm--because, you know, I get half
+the coal.' 'But where do you cook your food?' 'We never cook any, sir;
+it is already cooked. I go early in the morning to get coal and chips
+for the fire, and I must have two baskets of coal and wood to kindle
+with by noon. That's mother's half. Then when the people have eaten
+dinner, I go round to get the bits they leave. I can get two baskets of
+coal every day now; but when it gets cold, and we must have a great
+deal, it is hard for me to find any--there's so many poor chaps to pick
+it. Sometimes the _ladies_ speak cross to me, and shut the door hard at
+me, and sometimes the _gentlemen_ slap me in the face, and kick my
+basket, and then I come home, and mother says not to cry, for may be
+I'll do better to-morrow. Sometimes I get my basket almost full, and
+then put it by for to-morrow; and then, if next day we have enough, I
+take this to a poor woman next door. Sometimes I get only a few bits in
+my basket for all day, and may be the next day. And then I _fast_,
+because, you know, mother is sick and weakly, and can't be able to fast
+like me.'"
+
+These my friends, are some of the "short and simple annals of the poor."
+But those of whom Gray spoke rest peacefully in the "country
+churchyard;" their spirits are in heaven, and their history is embalmed
+in his own immortal Elegy. But _these_ records are of those who yet live
+and suffer--"Martyrs _without_ the palm."
+
+And could I summon them here to-night, and would the Master but enter as
+when upon earth, surely he would look upon them in tender pity; would
+bless them; would take in his arms those whom the world has cast aside
+and overlooked. Nay, perhaps he would transfigure their actuality into
+their possibility, and we might see "the angels in their faces,"
+pleading with us before the Father's throne!
+
+
+
+
+THE HELP OF RELIGION.
+
+
+
+
+DISCOURSE VIII.
+
+THE HELP OF RELIGION.
+
+      For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to
+      come.--HEBREWS xiii, 14.
+
+
+There are a good many people who, apparently, are never troubled by any
+speculations arising out of a comprehensive view of things. They are
+keenly alive to all objects within their sphere; but their eyes are
+close to the surface, and their experience comes in shocks of sensation,
+and shreds of perception. They know the superficial features of the
+world and its conventional expressions; are conversant with its business
+and its pleasures; with the market, the fashions, the town-talk, the
+worldly fortunes of their neighbors. Sometimes, a powerful affliction
+startles them in this smooth routine, and for a moment they are
+surprised to find how wide the universe is, and among what great
+realities we dwell. But, usually, their existence is a narrow revolving
+disc, bringing around the same group of incidents and the same
+associations, morning, noon, and night. They comprehend Life as they
+comprehend the expanse of yonder harbor, dotted with shifting but
+familiar forms, ruffled by a passing wind or bright under a summer sun,
+and whose tides duly rise and fall. But they little think of the oceanic
+vastness which it represents; and how its oscillations come from great
+currents that leap out of the Antarctic, and swell around tropical
+islands, and sweep the lines of continents, and roll in the Polar Sea.
+
+These, therefore, are not perplexed by questions such as occur to him
+who, looking beyond his own worldly interests and the area of daily
+routine, takes into view the scope of being and the profounder phenomena
+of human life. For such a view will inevitably engender speculation, nor
+can he rest until he obtains some _theory_ of existence. These very
+conditions of Humanity in the City, for instance--these conditions of
+poverty, and responsibility, and relationship, and privilege, and
+strife, and toil--yea, the lessons which come to us from the crowd as it
+flows through these streets; constitute a great problem, of which every
+thinking man will seek some solution.
+
+Now, throughout this entire series of discourses--although I have not
+deemed it necessary in every instance to make a specific application--I
+have assumed that you and I were looking upon these various phases of
+Humanity from the Christian stand-point, and therefore I could not fitly
+conclude this work without indicating the Help which RELIGION affords
+concerning these problems of existence.
+
+I observe, then, that while it may seem very simple to affirm that a
+_theory_ does not, in any case, alter _facts_; yet there is often an
+advantage in laying down this proposition. For this leads us to
+understand precisely what a theory _may_ do. It does not alter facts,
+but it throws them into new relations, and presents them in an entirely
+different light. Materialism, for instance, is a theory of Life; and
+Christianity--in which term I include not only a system of Doctrines,
+but of practical forces--is also a theory of Life. Now, neither of these
+gets rid of the great facts of existence. Men sin and suffer and die,
+whether we adopt the one system or the other. But, surely, when we
+approach these facts from the side of Religion, they appear in very
+different lights, and are taken up with very different results, from
+their appearance and effect when interpreted by the creed of Unbelief.
+It would be very absurd then, because Christianity does not instantly
+abolish, or fully explain, all these strange and darker realities, to
+fall back upon the opposite ground of skepticism. This is only receding
+from the best solution to the worst--or, rather, to no solution at all.
+For I maintain that Christianity gives us not merely the best, but the
+_only_ solution of these problems. It will be my purpose in this
+discourse, at least, to show what kind of help Religion _does_ afford
+for Humanity in all these diverse conditions; and, having done this, I
+shall leave it to your own convictions to decide whether it is not a
+great and practical Help; and whether there _is_ any other help. I
+propose to illustrate the influence of Religion to this effect,
+first--as a _Conviction_; second, as a _Working Power_; and third, as an
+_Interpretation_.
+
+I say, then, in the first place, that religion furnishes great help for
+man in the various issues of life, when he becomes actually convinced
+that its truths and sanctions are _genuine_. In other words, the
+conception of a moral government, of a directing Providence, and of
+eternal realities, vividly apprehended by the intellect, kept fresh in
+the heart, and assimilated to the entire spiritual nature, is a personal
+inspiration. It elevates the platform of a man's being, so that all
+things appear in true proportion. It clears his vision to detect
+principles, and endows him with moral courage. I do not know that I can
+better suggest its influence as a help here, in the conditions of the
+city, than by asking you to imagine what _would_ be the state of things
+in the spheres of toil and traffic--in all the multiform relations of
+our humanity--if men really apprehended and believed it? _It_, I
+say--not some special dogma or institution, but the absolute spirit and
+truth of Christianity. For I do not think that, generally, this _is_
+actually credited. I think that, with many professions of religion, and
+much outward respect for it, and an extensive circulation of vague
+conceptions about it, it is _not_ commonly felt and vitalized--it is not
+apprehended in its blessedness and power, and absolute excellence. To
+the habits of the soul it does not represent and mean realities as a
+written contract does, or a bank-bill--something that men precipitate
+themselves upon, and that sways the under-currents of their action. New
+York, with its Broadway and its Wall Street; with its proud buildings
+and its bristling masts; is a reality--but that city of which the text
+makes mention; that city which good men seek, and which in the
+Apocalypse of Faith they see; whose splendors glitter through the solemn
+twilight; nay, which hems them around for ever, and shines down upon
+them brighter than the noonday sun; to thousands, toiling, sinning, and
+suffering here, is _not_ a reality. For, I ask you, my friends, if it
+_were_ realized, could there be so much abject need among us; so much
+stony-hearted selfishness; so much shuffling in trade, and corruption
+in politics, and meanness in intercourse, and foolish superficial
+living? I know, and you know, that one of the greatest evils is--not
+merely that men are worldly, irreligious, bound up in sad conditions and
+narrow conceits; but that they are so, because they do not apprehend the
+nature and do not feel the reality of religion. For I say once more,
+that a conviction of its reality must be a great help in adjusting the
+problems of life. And this, because it acts upon the centre of all the
+sin, and much of the suffering of the world. This personal application
+of religion stands before all other remedies for the removal of these
+evils. Others are attempted--others are, in a degree, successful; but
+none go so deep and produce results so sure. It seems to me that the
+position of humanity in this respect, is illustrated in the narrative of
+the Demoniac of Gadara. We are told that he had been bound with chains,
+but in his fierce madness had burst them asunder. And then, again, men
+had tried various expedients, but they could not tame him. But when the
+influence of Jesus fell upon his soul, it took hold of it with sweet
+authority; the legion left him, and the poor, wounded, houseless man sat
+clothed and in his right mind. So is it with man in society; so is it
+with some of these social evils. The power of _law_ has been invoked;
+and it has its legitimate sphere of operation. It checks the purposed
+violence. It arrests the overt act. It may consistently be summoned to
+purify all those channels of social action which it assumes to regulate;
+and, instead of patronizing the wrong, to set its face and hand against
+it. Thus it may prevent public harm, though it cannot stop self-injury,
+and remove occasions of temptation, though it cannot impart moral
+strength. It has no efficacy to change the assassin's heart, yet we call
+upon it to guard us against murder. We bid it close the den of infamy,
+though it does not quench guilty passion. And we may use it to stop the
+sale of intoxicating drinks, though it does not destroy the drunkard's
+appetite. And this indicates both the function and the limitation of the
+law. Thrown over the wild forces that rage in the human heart, and that
+afflict community, it is like the fetters on the limbs of the demoniac.
+It may restrain for a time; but in some sweep of temptation it is
+spurned and snapped asunder. On the other hand, we have the expedients
+of the _reformer_. He comes with props and palliatives; soothing some
+cutaneous irritation, or removing some foul condition. And let us
+recognize the legitimacy of _his_ endeavor. We must approach the human
+heart through the web of its external circumstances, as well as
+directly. Nay, often this is the only way by which we can get at it at
+all. And well may we rejoice over the rescue from specific vices, and
+commend the zeal and patience which fasten upon some colossal evil to
+batter and drive it from the world. But notwithstanding such noble
+achievement, how many have remained among the tombs, or gone back to the
+wilderness--demoniacs still! It is an old truth, but I say it as though
+it were in the conviction of a fresh fact forced upon me by these great
+problems that heave up in the currents of City Life; it is an
+unavoidable conclusion that there is only one influence that can make
+safe, and pure, and strong in goodness, those recesses out of which
+issue so much social evil, and so much personal suffering. And that is
+the influence not of the law-giver, nor of the reformer; but of the
+Redeemer. It is that power which flows through the soul in a practical
+conviction of the reality of religion. It is the help which comes from
+its inspiration of divine truth and goodness in the breasts of
+individual men, turning them from evil, rendering them strong against
+temptation, and sending out from their lives fresh forces of
+righteousness and love.
+
+Indeed, I believe that any man who really thinks and feels, and who has
+much experience of Life, will become convinced of the _necessity_ of
+Religion. I would leave its claims not to the argument of the Moralist,
+or the advocacy of the Pulpit, but as they urge themselves upon us here
+out of the whirl, and weariness, and vicissitudes of the City. Surely,
+as its calm voice appeals to the sons of men, striving in this heated
+atmosphere; chasing phantoms that rise out of the dust; absorbed in the
+fickle game of fortune; borne along for a little while on the top-waves
+of excitement, and then dying unmarked as a rain-drop that falls into
+the sea; surely as its voice appeals to these, saying--"Come unto me,
+all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest!" it
+strikes the deepest chords in thousands of hearts. I will not adopt now
+any professional argument to prove the great necessity of Religion as a
+Help in Life. But I would take my stand, in imagination, at some corner
+of yonder tumultuous street. How multiform the crowds that sweep by me;
+how diverse the faces; what a kaleidoscope of human conditions! And yet,
+when you attempt to classify them, how few are the actual _types_ of
+men--how many fall into a common group; and when you try them by the
+profoundest standard--that of a common experience and common wants--how
+marvellously alike they all are! How similar in inward expression, the
+rich man who walks yonder, to that poor drudging son of toil, who bows
+his back and strains his sinews until they ache! How similar in effect
+the burdens which they both bear--the burden of wealth, and the burden
+of poverty, in the fact that they _are_ burdens upon the heart and the
+soul! And are they not both struggling with the realities of life, and
+moved by quenchless desires, and looking up into the same infinite
+mystery? Ah! my friends, I hardly think it would be the most effectual
+way to preach Religion in this church on Sunday, as a matter of
+course--but to stand out there on week-days, and strike the deepest
+chords throbbing unconsciously in the bosoms of those who pass me by. I
+would appeal to you, O disappointed, almost heart-broken man, who for
+years have endeavored to earn a competency to lift your head above the
+sheer necessities of life, but have failed in the chase, and been beaten
+back, and seen others who have exerted themselves not near as much, not
+so honorably, perhaps, rise to the very top of the stream and sail clear
+ahead;--or to you, O "favorite of fortune," as the world calls you, who
+find your palace to be only a stately sepulchre, in which all genuine
+feeling and simple enjoyment lies dead and wrapped in cerements of
+chilling etiquette--whose daughter, perhaps, has mocked your fondest
+plans; or whose son has turned out a miserable weed of dissipation--a
+degenerate fopling, a rake, a fool;--or to you, O butterfly of fashion,
+sailing with embroidered wings in search of admiration and of pleasure;
+or still again, to you who have just gathered together the means of
+enjoyment, and ease, and everything, to make life pleasant, and lo!
+death has entered, and your hopes are darkened and in the dust; I appeal
+to you, O types of this streaming humanity, that wears so many masks,
+yet, carries under all a common heart; and ask you, if there is not some
+void that no earthly good can fill--that no finite thing can sustain and
+satisfy? Can you go on with the common business of the world, discharge
+all its obligations, control yourself in its excitements, resist its
+evil solicitations, bear up under its trials, and, finally, reach that
+period in life when you must ask--"What is all this worth?--these years
+of toil, these eager enterprises, this golden accumulation or
+unfortunate failure--what are they all worth, and what do they
+mean?"--can anybody well get along with all this, without Religion? My
+friends, I say to you that, not consciously, perhaps, like the old
+saints who wrought and prayed and walked with upward-looking faces--but
+really, in the deep yearning and the secret gravitation of the soul--you
+_do_ confess that here we have no continuing city, and you are seeking
+one to come. At least, it seems to me that without the Help of Religion,
+there is only the alternative of moral indifference--a cold, hard
+worldliness, or of recklessness and spiritual despair. And is not this
+the alternative which is exhibited in the midst of all our
+civilization--in the midst of this gorgeous materialism of the
+nineteenth century? Thousands, it is to be apprehended, do exhibit one
+or the other of those extremes which the poet has so well described:
+
+    "For most men in a brazen prison live,
+      Where, in the sun's hot eye,
+      With heads bent o'er their toil, they languidly
+    Their minds to some unmeaning task-work give,
+      Dreaming of naught beyond their prison wall;
+        And so, year after year,
+      Fresh products of their barren labor fall
+        From their tired hands, and rest
+      Never yet comes more near.
+      Gloom settles slowly down over their breast,
+    And while they try to stem
+      The waves of mournful thought by which they are prest,
+    Death in their prison reaches them
+      Unfreed, having seen nothing, still unblest.
+
+    "And the rest, a few,
+      Escape their prison, and depart
+    On the wide ocean of life anew.
+      There the freed prisoner, where'er his heart
+    Listeth, will sail;
+    Nor does he know how there prevail
+    Despotic on life's sea,
+    Trade-winds that cross it from eternity.
+    Awhile he holds some false way, undebarred
+    By thwarting signs, and braves
+    The freshening wind, and blackening waves,
+    And then the tempest strikes him, and between
+    The lightning bursts is seen
+    Only a driving wreck,
+    And the pale master on his spar-strewn deck
+    With anguished face and flying hair,
+      Grasping the rudder hard,
+    Still bent to make some port he knows not where,
+    Still standing for some false impossible shore,
+    And sterner comes the roar
+    Of sea and wind, and through the deepening gloom,
+    Fainter and fainter wreck and helmsman loom."
+
+But, before I quit this head of my discourse, let me say that in order
+to be accepted as the great Help of Life, Religion must in some way be
+_presented_ as a reality. It must not be held forth as a mere
+abstraction--it must be precipitated into its concrete relations.
+Parting with none of its sanctity, it must be stripped of its vagueness
+and technicality, and be spoken in the fresh language of the time. I
+feel sure that amidst prevalent irreligion, nothing is so much needed as
+a definite statement of _what_ religion is; and that men should learn to
+recognize its vascular connection with every department of action. It
+must be understood that "being religious" is not a work apart by itself,
+but a spirit of faith and righteousness, flowing out from the centre of
+a regenerated heart into all the employments and intercourse of the
+world. Not merely the preacher in the pulpit, and the saint on his
+knees, may do the work of religion, but the mechanic who smites with the
+hammer and drives the wheel; the artist seeking to realize his pure
+ideal of the beautiful; the mother in the gentle offices of home; the
+statesman in the forlorn hope of liberty and justice; and the
+philosopher whose thought treads reverently among the splendid mysteries
+of the universe. I know that some will deem this a secularization of
+religion--a desecration of its holy essence by worldly alliances. But
+they are mistaken. It is a _consecration_ of pursuits and spheres that
+have been cut off from all sacredness, and devoted to secondary ends.
+Are not the just, the useful, the beautiful, from God, as well as the
+good and the holy? And, therefore, is not any practice which serves
+these, a service of God? It is needed that men should feel that every
+lawful pursuit _is_ sacred and not profane; that every position in life
+is close to the steps of the divine throne; and that the most beaten and
+familiar paths lie under the awful shadow of the Infinite; then they
+will go about their daily pursuits, and fill their common relationships,
+with hearts of worship and pulses of unselfish love; instead of
+regarding religion as an isolated peculiarity for a corner of the closet
+and a fraction of the week, and leaving all the rest of time and space
+an unconsecrated waste, where lawless passions travel, and selfishness
+pitches its tents. O! if religion _were_ thus a diffusive, practical,
+every-day reality, there would be a marvellous change in the aspects of
+life and the conditions of humanity around us. The great city, now so
+gross and profane, would become as a vast cathedral, through whose stony
+aisles would flow perpetual service; where labor would discharge its
+daily offices, and faith and patience keep their heavenward look, and
+love present its offerings. Yea, the very roll of wheels through its
+busy streets would be as a litany, and the sound of homeward feet the
+chant of its evening psalm.
+
+But religion is not only a help in and for ourselves; it has a
+ministration for others--for this great mass of destitution and
+suffering that broods in the midst of the city. Christianity is not
+merely a theory of existence--it is a _working-power_. Its precepts are
+practical, and enjoin not merely states of mind and heart, but
+conditions of activity. There is an entire magazine of working-forces in
+that one great law--"Love thy neighbor as thyself." Hear the words of
+an apostolical commentator upon it. "If a brother or sister be naked,
+and destitute of daily food," says he, "and one of you say unto them,
+Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them
+not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?
+Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone." And wherever
+Christianity has existed and been apprehended, it has produced
+beneficent results for humanity. It has gone over the earth like its
+Divine Author, with healing and with help for the woes of the race.
+Anybody who takes his stand at the head-waters of modern history, will
+see that a mighty energy was then poured into the world, whose influence
+is evident in the truest civilization, in the best results, of ages. In
+estimating the practical power of Christianity, we must look at the
+_positive_ phase of things--we must consider what has actually been
+done; not merely what remains to be done. We must adopt proportionate
+standards, not the little measures of to-day and yesterday, in which the
+tides of human melioration may oscillate, and even seem to flow
+backward and at the best to make slight headway. But take up the cycle
+of history that preceded the advent of Christianity, and compare it with
+the present period; and is there not an entirely different expression on
+the face of things, so far as conceptions of humanity and influences of
+philanthropy are concerned? Contrast "a Roman holiday," its butchery and
+its blood, with a modern anniversary that clasps the round world in its
+jubilee, and see if humanity has not been helped by religion. Or look
+back upon Grecian art and refinement, and tell me what oration or poem,
+or pantheon of marble beauty, is half as glorious as the plain brick
+free-school; the asylum of industry; the home for the penitent, the
+disabled and the poor? Ah! my friends, these are such familiar things
+that we may not think them the great things they really are; and in
+gazing upon the colossal evils that yet tower up before us, they may
+seem slight achievements. But they _are_ great: and when I see the poor
+drunkard return to a renovated home--the demoniac sitting clothed and in
+his right mind once more; when I see the dumb write, and hear the blind
+read, and little rescued children sing their thankful hymns; I think
+humanity _has_ been helped a great deal since that Divine Teacher walked
+the earth, and took the lambs to his bosom, and made the foul leper
+clean, and partook with publicans and sinners, and bade the guilty go
+and sin no more. I think that currents of love and self-sacrifice, from
+that heart that was pierced for us upon the cross, have found their way
+through the channels of ages, through all the impediments of worldliness
+and selfishness, and inspired and blessed men far more than they know.
+
+But if, turning from the positive achievement, you point to the evils
+that still exist--if you lift the coverings of respectability and custom
+from the ghastly facts that are embedded here in our so-called
+civilization; if you bid me mark the vice, the poverty, the crime, the
+oppression, the grinding monopoly, the prejudice, the gigantic
+materialism and practical atheism that are mixed up with it, and seem to
+be inseparable parts of it; then I ask you--how would it be _without_
+the Help of Religion? What interpretation should we obtain from the
+dark creed of the skeptic, what inspiration from the philosophy of
+annihilation, and of fate? To say nothing of those forces of Love and
+self-sacrifice which it sheds abroad in the world, and to which I have
+just alluded,--Religion, in one single proposition, sends pregnant
+elements of direction and relief into the midst of these giant evils.
+That one proposition is the immortality of man--the priceless
+spirituality of every man--the ascription of a nature more glorious and
+imperishable than a star. Here is the spring of its perpetual antagonism
+to the world, and to the evil of the world. The latter bases its
+estimate of man upon outward conditions; estimates his name and his
+title, his equipage and his parentage, the bulk of his gold, the color
+of his skin, his _apparent_ success or defeat. Christianity points to
+that vivid centre of a soul, in whose light all these external
+distinctions fade, are fused into dross, become comparatively naught.
+All the evil of the world stands upon the assumption of the former
+rule--upon the ground of external and material valuation--which, as has
+been well observed by another, is a "method of studying the problems of
+the universe by fetching rules from the _wider_ sphere (therefore the
+_lower_) to import into the _higher_.... So long as this logical
+strategy is allowed, the Titans will always conquer the gods; the
+ground-forces of the lowest nature will propagate themselves, pulse
+after pulse, from the abysses to the skies, and _right_ will exist only
+on sufferance from _might_." On the other hand, I say, Religion,
+Christianity, starts from the centre outward--starts with the dignity
+and sanctity of the human soul--and in this is the great element of all
+progress and reform. Out of this have sprung the achievements of modern
+freedom. Assuming this inward birthright of every man, men have snapped
+feudal fetters, and broken the seals of ancient proscription, and torn
+up branching genealogies, and trodden diadems in the dust. It was this
+fact that inspired Sidney's speech, and Hampden's effort, and
+Washington's calm determination. It is this that erects itself against
+majorities, policies, institutions, charters, and will not be beaten
+down, and will agitate, and will triumph. It is this that sends
+philanthropy upon its mission; and bids it stoop to the most fallen, and
+search under the darkest depravity. "Go abroad," it says, "amidst the
+guilt and misery of the great city. In the rags, the filth, the
+abomination, there are jewels fallen from heaven. There are souls upon
+which angels look with solicitude. There are interests for which Christ
+died. Search patiently, and deeply, and never give up the endeavor to
+find, to lift up, to restore." Is not all the spring of benevolent
+effort, then, in this single proposition of Religion? This one great
+Truth it utters amidst the suffering and injustice of the world--that
+men are heirs of one inheritance; possessors of a birthright by virtue
+of which all outward inequalities fade away. It bases a demand for
+mutual help and love, upon the fact that we are all on a
+pilgrimage--high, low, honored, degraded, master, slave, we go forth
+together, and these earthly distinctions all drop away. Rich man with
+rows of real-estate, with money safe in bank, with solid securities
+walled around you--you will carry no more away than Lazarus yonder--in
+God's eyes you are no richer than he. Because here we have no continuing
+city. The destinies of our common humanity flow forward into another and
+more enduring one.
+
+And, if still this problem of human degradation and suffering presses
+upon us, I say further, that where the constituents of this problem are
+most prominent, there religion is the most active. The heaviest poverty
+is belted about by the brightest charities; the hot-beds of crime
+generate the most radical efforts for its prevention and its cure; and
+while oppression is at work, setting its dark types upon virgin soil to
+print off its own shame and condemnation, indignant voices expose it and
+indignant hearts react against it. And more and more, every day, it is
+felt and proclaimed that religion is a working-principle--a practical
+power. Never was it more profoundly felt than in this very age that men
+must be confessors of Christianity as well as professors. And in the
+light of this conception, proffering fresh and willing help, Religion
+walks abroad; and lo! waste places grow verdant, and the strongholds of
+guilt and misery sink down, and blessed institutions rise up, and
+industry takes the place of crime, and cursings are exchanged for songs,
+and the poorest sees the immortal light, and is lifted up by the grand
+thought--that "here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to
+come."
+
+We have thus seen that Religion is a Help as to the fact of sin, when
+men are convinced of it as a great reality; and a help as to the fact of
+human suffering, because it is a working-power. But, over and above all
+this, there are problems that perplex us, and demand some answer;
+problems as to the How, and the Wherefore, and the End. There are times
+when our thoughts rise above all specific instances, and we take up
+humanity and existence as a whole, and ask--"What means it all?"
+Sometimes this question starts out of an individual experience. The
+shock of affliction has jarred our hearts; our expectations have come to
+naught; bereavement has broken up the routine of our life; or our own
+souls have surprised us with sudden revelations. At any rate, we find
+our being here involved with mystery. There is something that our
+understanding cannot entirely grasp; something that our unassisted eyes
+cannot see. And the only help for us in such a case is the Help of
+Religion, presenting us, through faith, with an _interpretation_ of
+human life--an interpretation which tells us that what we now experience
+and behold is only transitional, preliminary, and that we see through a
+glass darkly, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be.
+
+And is it necessary for me to dwell upon the strength which has thus
+been imparted to sad and wounded spirits, when with perfect trust in
+Infinite Goodness they have thus realized that they stand only on one
+round of an upward course--only in a little segment of the immense plan?
+I will merely say now, that if, through faith, religion is a help to
+these by interpreting life in harmony with individual experience, so
+through this faith does it help the meditative man troubled by the
+general problem of existence and humanity. The meaning of these various
+conditions in the city--the meaning of these sins, and sorrows, and
+inequalities--the meaning of this tide of life itself that rolls in
+endless succession through these stony arteries--does it perplex you?
+Accept, then, the help which religion gives by interpreting it as only
+preliminary and transitional; only a portion of a wider scheme.
+
+We commenced this series of discourses by standing, as it were, in the
+street, on a level with all these phases of humanity. Ascend now some
+lofty post of observation; some high watch-tower. The mottled tide flows
+and dashes far below you. The sounds of strife and endeavor rise faintly
+to your ears, and are drowned in the upper air. So in the altitude and
+comprehensiveness of faith, all this that seemed so huge and startling
+dwindles to a little stream in the great ocean of existence, and all
+these tumults are swallowed up in the currents of silent but beneficent
+design. But, in the meantime, the daylight has gone, the night-shadow
+has fallen, this stream of human life has ebbed away, and all these
+sounds are still. See, now, how much of your perplexity came from a
+deceit of eye-sight--see how the light of this world blinded you to the
+immensity and the meaning of existence! See! over your head spreads the
+great firmament. There are Sirius, and Orion, and the glittering
+Pleiades. How harmoniously they are related; how calmly they roll! And
+now, O man! fresh from the reeking dust, and the cry of pained hearts,
+and the shadows of the grave, do not the scales of unbelief drop from
+your eyes, when you see the width of God's universe, and feel that His
+purpose girdles this little planet and steers its freight of souls? You
+were deceived by your standards of greatness and duration. You thought
+that this material city, with what it contains, was everything. But
+_they_ have cherished the true view, who in the spirit of the text have
+interpreted these Conditions of Humanity--the conditions of those who
+seek and sin and suffer in the busy crowd; of those who rest beneath
+yonder gleaming tomb-stones. And, as we read what all wise and good men
+have virtually said, our mortal term contracts, our immortal career
+opens, our years seem as ticks of a clock, and the entire sum of our
+life but a minute-mark on the dial of eternity; and this huge metropolis
+becomes a dim veil, a perishable symbol of real and enduring things.
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:
+
+Every effort has been made to replicate this text as faithfully as
+possible, including obsolete and variant spellings. Obvious
+typographical errors in punctuation (misplaced quotes and the like) have
+been fixed. Corrections [in brackets] in the text are noted below:
+
+page 27: quote typo corrected
+
+    But, say you, '["]here is one who is returning to a home of
+    destitution, of misery; where the
+
+page 39: typo corrected
+
+    between those great agents of human achievment[achievement]
+    and the living intelligence
+
+page 41: typo corrected
+
+    years. Remarkable for brilliant achievments[achievements] in
+    every department of physics, ours well deserves
+
+page 45: hyphen removed
+
+    the old world without a telegraph, and Columbus found a new
+    one without a steam[-]ship.
+
+page 49: typo corrected
+
+    open air and the sovreignty[sovereignty] of the soil. And if
+    this immense intrusion of machinery has
+
+page 58: duplicate word removed
+
+    stream, and chained the fire; and now, [with] with the eye of
+    science and the hand of skill,
+
+page 84: typo corrected
+
+    dignity is there in that man who justs[just] accepts his
+    station and makes the most of
+
+page 154: removed quote
+
+      celestial City be these well-known doors--and thus may we
+      also _die_ at Home!["]
+
+page 173: typo corrected
+
+    heaven, whose inhabitants would not make
+    harmlesness[harmlessness] their chief characteristic. Their
+
+page 195: typo corrected
+
+    and, perpetually descending from the threshold of the
+    Infinite, keeps open an arch-way of mysstery[mystery] and
+    heaven.
+
+page 201: typo corrected
+
+    dangerous reasoning, my friends; neverthless[nevertheless],
+    it _is_ reasoning, and shows that the mind of the
+
+page 240: typo corrected
+
+    of life and the conditions of humanity arouud[around] us. The
+    great city, now so gross and profane,
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Humanity in the City, by E. H. Chapin
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