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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/33296-8.txt b/33296-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d72925d --- /dev/null +++ b/33296-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2594 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Five Young Men, by Charles Reynolds Brown + +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: Five Young Men + Messages of Yesterday for the Young Men of To-day + +Author: Charles Reynolds Brown + +Release Date: July 30, 2010 [EBook #33296] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FIVE YOUNG MEN *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + +Five Young Men + + Messages of Yesterday for + the Young Men of To-day + + + +By + +CHARLES REYNOLDS BROWN + +_Dean of the School of Religion, Yale University_ + + + + +NEW YORK CHICAGO TORONTO + +Fleming H. Revell Company + +LONDON AND EDINBURGH + + + + +Copyright, 1917, by + +FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY + + + + New York: 158 Fifth Avenue + Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave. + London: 21 Paternoster Square + Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street + + + + +_To the Young Men_ + +_of Yale_ + + _Whose friendship I have highly + valued and in whose future + I feel the warmest interest_ + + + + +Preface + +These addresses were given in the United Church on the Green, New +Haven, Connecticut, on the Sunday evenings of Lent. The audiences were +made up largely of men, many of them Yale students. I have brought the +addresses together in this little book with the hope that they may have +a certain value in their appeal to a wider audience of young men who in +school and college, in their homes and in business life, are making +those determinations which will decide the issue for them in those +exacting years which are before us. + +It has been given to us to live through one of the great crises of the +world's history. In these days the hearts of men are being tried as by +fire. If it is "wood, hay and stubble" that we are putting into our +personal moral structures, into the purposes and methods which rule our +industrial life and into our national temper and fiber, then we may +expect to see our work destroyed. The only qualities which will stand +the test are those qualities which are symbolized by "gold, silver and +precious stones." + +C. R. B. + +_Yale University._ + + + + +Contents + + I. THE YOUNG MAN WHO WAS A FAVOURITE SON + II. THE YOUNG MAN WHO WAS AN ATHLETE + III. THE YOUNG MAN WHO BECAME KING + IV. THE YOUNG MAN WHO WAS BORN TO THE PURPLE + V. THE YOUNG MAN WHO CHANGED THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD + + + + +I + +The Young Man Who Was a Favourite Son + +Which would you say is the harder to bear, adversity or prosperity? I +am not sure. If I were a betting man I would not know on which horse +to put my money. + +The Bible says, "The destruction of the poor is their poverty." The +narrowness and the meagreness of their lives, the lack of access to the +highest interests seems to drive them oftentimes into the coarser forms +of indulgence which are their undoing. The Bible also says, "It is +easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich +man to enter the Kingdom of God." The millionaire who strives to be +thoroughly Christian in all his attitudes and actions, in the secret +desires which rule his own soul and in the relations he sustains to his +fellow men by reason of his wealth has a hard task. In every great +city you will find the sons of millionaires falling down or flinging +themselves away in thoughtless dissipation where the sons of toil are +standing up and making good. + +Here, for example, was a young man who was born on the sunny side of +the street. He was the son of a rich man, and the favourite son. He +was handsome--"It came to pass that Joseph was a goodly person and well +favoured." He was habitually well dressed--"His father gave him a coat +of many colours," which there in the Orient marked him as a young man +of style. He had a vivid imagination and was a good talker. He was a +young man of parts and his story was so interesting to those early +Hebrews that here in the Book of Genesis thirteen full chapters are +given to his personal history. + +Let me notice three points in his career--first, his early +unpopularity. You do not have to know Hebrew to understand why he was +not as popular as Santa Claus. He was his father's favourite, which is +a heavy load for any child to bear. He lived in a family where there +were four sets of children. His father had married two wives, Rachel +who was handsome because he loved her, and Leah who was "tender-eyed," +the Scripture says, because she was the daughter of his employer at +that time and it was good business. There were also children who had +been born to the two housemaids, according to the easy customs of that +far-off time and place. Joseph was the son of Rachel, the favourite +wife, and her favourite son. He wore the signs of this parental +popularity in the gay coat of many colours. It was almost inevitable +that he should become vain and overbearing. + +He was also a talebearer. He looked down with unconcealed contempt +upon his half-brothers who were the sons of the housemaids. "When +Joseph was with the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah he brought unto his +father their evil report." + +The tattler in the school and the squealer on the street come in, +justly perhaps, for the contempt of their fellows. And whatever +allowance may be made for exceptional situations, the instinct which +brands the talebearer as mean is mainly wholesome. It was One who knew +what was in man who said, "Why beholdest thou the mote in thy brother's +eye and considerest not the beam in thine own eye? Judge not that ye +be not judged." It is well for every man to sweep his own dooryard +first before he begins to peddle stories as to the condition of his +neighbour's dooryard. + +This young man also had his full share of that conceit which thinks +quite as highly of itself as it ought to think. He had his daydreams, +and this was well. I would not give a fig for the young fellow who +does not see ahead of him masses of possible achievement in his +particular line as high as the Sierras, if not quite so solid. But +Joseph was soft and callow enough to tell his day-dreams to his fellows +before he had done anything to indicate that those dreams might come +true. + +He told his brothers that he would be the tallest sheaf in the field +and that they as lesser sheaves would come and make obeisance before +him. He went still further and included his elders and betters in that +general bowing down. He said, "Behold the sun and moon and the eleven +stars made obeisance to me." He saw himself as the centre of the whole +solar system and the rest of his family revolving about him as minor +satellites. This day-dream of the ambitious young man was too much +even for his indulgent father. "And Jacob rebuked him for his dream." + +There you have all the necessary ingredients for a family explosion. +When any young man is a favourite son, and a talebearer, and is filled +to the eyes with self-conceit, he has in him the sulphur, the +saltpeter, and the charcoal which enter into the composition of that +sort of gunpowder which is liable to blow him up. You do not wonder +that his brothers hated him. You are not surprised that when they saw +him coming across the fields at Dothan they said with a sneer, "Behold, +the dreamer cometh!" + +We might naturally expect that they would conspire against him. They +proposed to see whether or not this conceited young tattler would +become the tallest sheaf in the field and the centre of the whole solar +system there in little Canaan. He had himself to thank for getting in +wrong with his associates. He was not showing the qualities which make +for peace and joy and advancement. + +But in the second place he was sent early in life to the school of +adversity. The place where he "prepared" was not much like "The Hill" +or Hotchkiss; it bore no resemblance whatever to Andover or Exeter. He +took all the grades in the commonest of all common schools. He was +under the tuition of struggle and difficulty. He was a Freshman, then +a Sophomore, a Junior and a Senior in the University of Experience, +where the college colours are always "black and blue" because the +lessons are learned by hard knocks. He learned obedience by the things +that he suffered. He had the conceit taken out of him by being knocked +down. He knew the meaning of the word "discipline," so that he could +have spelled it and parsed it forward and backwards and crosswise. + +He was tried in these three ways: first, by being sold as a slave boy +into Egypt. His father sent him out to Dothan to see how his brothers +were faring with their flocks. When they saw him coming across the +plain they said, "Behold the dreamer! Let us cast him into a pit and +see what will become of his dreams." + +His brothers seized him and threw him into a deep well, where there was +no water, intending to let him die in that horrible way. But when a +company of Ishmaelites came along on their way to Egypt, a happier +thought struck those men. Judah, who was always a thrifty soul, said, +"What profit is it if we slay our brother and conceal his blood?" +There is no money in murder. "Let us sell him to the Ishmaelites." + +Here was the proverbial instinct, an eye for the main chance, already +on its feet and doing business in the very childhood of that race, +which has enjoyed such marked success in commercial pursuits. "Let us +sell him and let not our hand be upon him, for"--here emerges Mr. +Pecksniff, who is much older than the time of Dickens--"for he is our +brother and our flesh." His argument was plausible and the men drew +Joseph out of the pit and sold him to the Ishmaelites who carried him +down into Egypt. Now the hands of the ten men were not stained with +innocent blood and they were also twenty pieces of silver to the good. + +How human and how modern were the mental processes of those crafty men! +The man who decides to coin his brother's life into money instead of +killing him with an axe has chosen so much milder a form of wrong-doing +that he feels almost virtuous. "Let us not slay our brother"--that has +an atrocious sound. It smacks of the doings of gunmen. Let not our +hand be upon him for he is our flesh! + +"But let us sell him"--this is so much more humane! Let us burn out +his energy swiftly in the long hard hours of the steel mill to make our +profits large. When he is exhausted before his time we can scrap him, +flinging him aside to make room for a fresh hand. Let us set the pace +in the factory so sharp that the man in middle life cannot hold it--he +will be compelled to drop out and tramp the streets in search of a job, +while some younger man takes up his work. Let us keep the wages of the +working girl so near the danger line that unless she is splendidly +fortified with moral stamina she may be tempted after she has sold her +days to greed to add to her income by selling her nights to shame. + +Let not our hands be stained by the murder of our own flesh and +blood--let us sell them in these more delicate and refined ways to +increase the toll of profits! The voice of Judah is still heard in the +land. There on the plains of Dothan this favourite son fell into the +hands of greed and was sold as a slave boy into the land of Egypt. + +He was also tested by the accusations of an evil-minded woman. When +the Ishmaelites disposed of him in Egypt he was purchased by Potiphar, +an officer in Pharaoh's guard. He was made a house servant. He showed +himself diligent and faithful and was advanced until he was the +overseer of Potiphar's whole establishment. + +He was a handsome young Hebrew, his complexion being much fairer than +that of the dark-skinned Egyptians. He attracted the attention and won +the admiration of Potiphar's wife, who was an evil-minded, faithless +creature. As Joseph went about the house in the discharge of his +duties she approached him repeatedly with her solicitations to evil. + +He did not look her in the eye, as Billy Sunday suggests in his brisk +way, and say, "Nothing doing." He said something infinitely better +than that--"There is none greater in this house than I. My master hath +kept back nothing from me but thee. How then can I do this great +wickedness and sin against God." + +He was not one of those men who do in Rome as the Romans do, who do in +New York as Broadway does, even though that may mean a less wholesome +type of conduct than they are accustomed to put up in their home towns. +He was a man of principle wherever he was placed. How can I sin +against God! + +Heaven be praised for men of principle and for men who are not afraid! +A well-to-do Harvard student in one of the dormitories was shaving one +morning when a wretched woman of the street slipped into his room +through the door which he had left ajar. She shut the door and with +her back against it said to him, "Give me fifty dollars instantly or I +will scream for help." He looked around at her and said, "Yell +away"--and went on with his shaving. He knew that his own life was +clean. He had lived as a man of integrity and he felt that his +statement would be taken anywhere against hers, because it was worth +one hundred cents on the dollar. And she knew it--so she slunk out +like a whipped cur. If he had compromised with her or had given her a +dollar, he might have been in for endless trouble and disgrace. + +But Joseph was not in Cambridge--he was in Egypt. He was not a +well-known Harvard student--he was only a slave boy there in the house +of his master. When this woman whom he had repulsed made her ugly, +lying accusation against him she was believed and he was thrown into +prison. + +What indeed has now become of his dreams! He was a stranger in a +strange land. He was a slave who had been jailed on an ugly charge. +He must have felt that he was a long way from becoming the tallest +sheaf in the field or the brightest star in the sky. + +He was also tested by the ingratitude of those whom he had befriended. +While he was in jail he did not for one hour give up his hope of +advancement. He kept right on, attending the school of those +instructors whose names are printed in the catalogue as Professor +Adversity, Professor Difficulty and Doctor Discipline. He found them +most capable teachers. They did not teach him much of that which is +found in text-books, but they were teaching him to be a man, which +after all is the main object of all education. + +When Joseph was knocked down he did not wait for some Red Cross nurse +to come with "first aid to the injured." He got right up and was there +on the mat ready for the next round. And the young fellow with that +sort of stuff in him learns, I care not how soft, callow and conceited +he may have been in his "prep. school" days. + +He was in prison, but since nothing better offered he would show +himself the best prisoner behind those bars. He bore the false +accusation of that lying woman without a word of recrimination lest he +should injure the honour of his master, who had befriended him when he +was in his employ. He spent his days not in laziness nor in vice, not +in repining and dejection. He bore himself with such a thoughtful, +unselfish spirit that he won the favour of the warden and was made a +kind of overseer among the prisoners of his ward. + +He won the regard and confidence of his fellow prisoners by his +sympathetic interest in their welfare. When they were perplexed they +came to him. The butler and the baker from Pharaoh's household were +imprisoned for some fault, and when they dreamed Joseph interpreted to +them their dreams in skillful fashion. And when the butler was +pardoned out a few days later, according to Joseph's prediction, he +promised to remember his friend when once more he stood in Pharaoh's +presence. + +But after the manner of many he forgot all about his fellow prisoner in +the joy of his own release. Joseph still lingered in jail. How +sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless friend! There +in the jail he drank to the dregs the cup of ingratitude. + +But read on, read on! The Lord has not let His voice fall yet. This +is not a period--it is only a comma or semicolon. The mills of the +gods grind slow, but they grind; and to every man who merits it a good +grist comes at last. Read on! + +There came a night when Pharaoh dreamed. The monarch saw seven fat +cows come up out of the River Nile, which was the source of all +fertility there in the Delta. Then he saw seven lean cows come up out +of the river and they ate up the seven fat cows and yet remained as +lean and hungry as they had been before. In the morning Pharaoh called +for his wise men and his magicians, but they could make nothing of it. + +Then the chief butler remembered his fault. He remembered Joseph who +had interpreted his own dream in yonder prison. He told Pharaoh of +that strange experience, and the monarch promptly sent for this gifted +young Hebrew. "Seest thou a man diligent in his business he shall +stand before kings." Joseph had shown himself diligent in his business +as a servant in the house of Potiphar, and as a prisoner he had made +himself useful to the warden of the jail. Now he is summoned to stand +before the ruler of all the land of Egypt. + +He is the same man in name as when he walked across the fields of +Dothan with his heart full of conceit, but how much he has learned! +His coat of many colours has been replaced by the dull gray of the +prison garb. He has acquired new moods and new methods and a finer +quality of manhood. When Pharaoh called upon him to interpret his +strange dream, Joseph replied modestly, "It is not in me. +Interpretations belong to God. And God shall give Pharaoh an answer of +peace." It was in this mood of reverent, expectant awe that he +undertook the interpretation of the monarch's dream. + +How character ripens in adversity! Wheat ripens best under smiling, +sunny skies, but the rigorous winter of hardship and struggle is +demanded for the maturing of those fine qualities of mind and heart +which make up character at its best. Men have found by experience that +it is impossible to produce apples of the choicest flavour where there +is no frost. I am quite sure that the best type of human excellence +cannot be secured without frost. "He is testing me," Job said, when +all those troubles fell upon him; "He knows the way that I take and +when He has tried me I shall come forth as gold." + +Here was a young man who in early life had been a spoiled child, a +conceited prig, a talebearer among his fellows, but in the hard school +of adversity he had learned to labour and to wait. He could now endure +as seeing One who is invisible. + +The law of gravitation never forgets anything, never overlooks +anything. It matters not whether it is a pound of feathers or a ton of +lead or a planet, the power of gravitation is right there attending to +business. If a man falls out of a fifth story window in New York, in +Constantinople, or in Calcutta, the law of gravitation is there and the +man gets hurt. The moral order never forgets anything, never overlooks +anything. What men sow, they reap, though the harvest be long delayed. +If they sow to the flesh, sometime, somewhere they go out with bruised +hands and bleeding hearts to reap corruption. When they sow to the +spirit they will in the same inevitable way reap life eternal. Here at +last the man of purpose and of faith is reaping the results of +discipline bravely met and nobly borne. + +This young man owed his ultimate success to the fact that he was a man +of vision. There is a certain fascination in the story of any life +which rises from obscurity to eminence. Whether the path lies from the +log cabin of a rail splitter to the White House, from the lowly work of +the lanyard to the head of victorious armies, or from a pit on the +plains of Dothan to a palace on the banks of the Nile, there is +something in the human heart which responds to the unfolding of such a +life-story. + +The Hebrews were happy in relating how men of their race had made their +way up to places of honour at alien courts through the sheer force of +their own personal ability. Here was Joseph coming up out of the +prison house to the right hand of Pharaoh! Here was Daniel preferred +above the other presidents and princes at the court of Darius! Here +was Benjamin Disraeli belonging to a race formerly disfranchised in +England becoming at last Prime Minister of Her Most Christian Majesty +Queen Victoria! Let every man who looks down upon some lowly life +beware lest he despise what God has blessed! + +Here was a young man who had vision! He saw things. He did not merely +"look," as would some dog that bays the moon. When he walked across +the plains of Dothan his mind was not altogether upon wool and +mutton--he was already dreaming of high achievement in his future +years. When he was thrown into the pit and sold into slavery his brain +was busy with the stars. When he faced temptation he saw it all with +the eye of faith--how could he do this great wickedness and sin against +God. And when he was confronted with a problem confessedly too hard +for him he lifted up his eyes to the hills from whence cometh help. +"It is not in me. The interpretation of life belongs to God." + +He was only seventeen years old when he walked across the fields that +day to the place where his brothers kept their flocks. Now he was +thirty. He had increased in stature, in wisdom and in favour with God +and man. It had taken thirteen long years to add those cubits to his +height, but they had been well spent. The Almighty takes His time in +working out His finer effects. The spoiled child, the censorious +talebearer, the callow, conceited youth must be wrought upon by the +beat and play of human life. When any man has vision and faith there +is a divinity which shapes his ends, rough-hewn though they be by +doting fathers and envious brothers, by false accusers, and by +ungrateful companions. When a man is faced right, all things, no +matter what shape they bear, will ultimately work together for his good. + +"A man in whom the spirit of God is"--that was Pharaoh's verdict when +Joseph had skillfully interpreted his dream, indicating that the seven +fat cows coming up out of the Nile meant seven years of plenty in the +land of Egypt, and that the seven lean cows following them and +devouring them meant seven years of famine, which would tax the +resources of Pharaoh's empire in feeding the hungry people. And when +the monarch had listened to the wise words, had sensed the humane +spirit of this young Hebrew, and had seen the look of faith upon his +face, he felt that no other man would be so competent to become High +Commissioner of the Food Supply there in the land of Egypt. Thus +Joseph was set in a place of authority at Pharaoh's right hand. + +His dreams are coming true! He had framed his first anticipations out +of sheaves. Then his mind began to be busy with the stars. He was +destined to have a part in preserving the life of his own Hebrew race +and a part in that moral movement which would outlast the stars +themselves. Through all those long hard years which lay between the +pit of Dothan and the palace of Pharaoh, he was sustained by that +vision of things divine which shone perpetually in his sky. + +"A man in whom the spirit of God is"--here is the ultimate reason for +every splendid advance! Here is the ultimate reason why any man is +able to rise from those lower levels where wool and mutton are the main +considerations to those higher levels where he becomes a trusted +implement in the hand of God for a service that will endure. + +The young man was a man of faith. He had faith in God. He had faith +in his fellows, as he showed when he generously forgave the brothers +who had wronged him, having them as ruler of Egypt utterly in his +power. He had faith in himself because the spirit of God dwelt in his +heart. And it matters not whether it is Egypt or Connecticut, the +eighteenth century before Christ or the twentieth century after Christ, +it is "by faith" that men work righteousness and obtain promises, wax +valiant in fight and beat back the armies of aliens. + +In the long run the world belongs to the idealist. The ultimate +shaping of its life is in the hands of the men who walk the busy +streets and dusty lanes with their feet on the ground but with their +heads and their hearts among the stars. The men of vision and faith +sometimes lose a skirmish; now and then they are defeated in a battle; +but when the war is fought through to a finish they are on the winning +side. + +Here in this company there may be many a favourite son. You are +inexpressibly dear to the hearts of those parents. Their thoughts, +their prayers and their efforts are all reaching out for the best +things for you. They do not know and you do not know what hard tests +may lie ahead. You too may be sent for thirteen long years to the +school of adversity, but if the spirit of God is in your heart, if you +have faith, a vital and personal faith in Jesus Christ, if you have +caught the vision of what life may be made to mean at its best, then it +lies within your power also to achieve. + + + + +II + +The Young Man Who Was an Athlete + +What a roomy place the Bible is! It is not filled up with model men +and women. It is not filled up with nice little boys and girls, all +neat and sweet, good enough to be angels right off with no alterations. +It is peopled with imperfect, blundering folk like ourselves. + +Some of these samples of human life are offered to us for our +imitation, and some by way of warning. The wide variety exhibited +shows how God can use and bless the better elements in many a life +where the wheat and the tares grow together until the harvest. The +divine purpose shows an amazing measure of hospitality. "The love of +God is broader than the measure of man's mind." + +We come for example to the eleventh chapter of Hebrews. It is the roll +call of men of faith. "By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent +sacrifice than Cain." By faith Enoch was translated that he should not +see death because he walked with God. By faith Noah built an ark for +the saving of his house. By faith Abraham went out to found a nation +in which all the nations of the earth should be blessed, not knowing +whither he went. "By faith Moses chose rather to suffer affliction +with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season." + +"And what shall I say more," the author remarks in passing. "Time +would fail me to tell of all the men who by faith subdued kingdoms and +wrought righteousness, obtained promises and put to flight the armies +of evil, Gideon and Barak, Samson and Jephthah." + +Samson! The very presence of his name in this catalogue of moral +heroes all but takes away one's breath. What does this big husky +fellow, this wild, fun-loving chap have to do with the working out of +the divine purpose for the race? We are as much surprised as we would +be if we had found Jack Johnson undertaking to preach the Gospel, or +John L. Sullivan trying to be elected as a professor in Princeton +Theological Seminary. Samson as a hero of the faith! Surely this is +"Saul among the prophets." We will be interested in studying the life +of this young man who had the build and the mood of an athlete. + +He had in his youth the strength and promise of a mighty man. He +caught a young lion and seizing it by its jaws ripped it apart as an +ordinary man would have rent a kid. He caught up the jaw-bone of an +ass and slew heaps and heaps of his enemies in personal combat. He +carried off the gates of a city and hid them on the top of a hill as if +he had been celebrating Hallowe'en. He would have been the making of +any football team. If he had furnished the forward thrust of a flying +wedge it would have gone through any line that might have stood in its +way. + +It would not be easy to draw a hard and fast line here between the +prose and the poetry of these narratives. Something of history and a +great deal of folk-lore undoubtedly are blended in these stirring +tales. There are many passages in the earlier portions of the Bible +which have more value for the history of ideas than for the history of +actual occurrence. They are full of truth though they may not always +conform to sober fact. They are parables rather than records. + +But we may be sure that this interesting young giant had something more +than mere physical prowess. He had in him some of the elements of +genuine leadership else he would not have been regarded as a judge and +a leader in Israel, raised up for a great work. The people would never +have woven these stories about his name nor enrolled him among the +moral heroes of their race had he not possessed some of the elements of +real strength. He had in him the sense of power--it is a quality which +all men covet and all women adore. + +He had a keen sense of the joy of living. We are glad that the element +of humour was not left out of the Bible. It would not have been so +human, so complete, so unmistakably "the Book of Books" had this been +lacking. I am sure that the Almighty has a sense of humour. He must +have or He never would have created pelicans and monkeys. "He that +sitteth in the heavens shall laugh," we read--and He must have laughed +when He made these curious creatures. He was willing to give this +fun-loving Samson a place on the roster of the Army of the Lord. + +Samson stands out on the pages of Scripture as a big, overgrown, +rollicking boy looking upon life as one huge joke. His major study was +to turn the laugh on the dull-witted, slow-going Philistines. He tore +the young lion and when a swarm of bees had made honey in the carcass +Samson made this riddle,--"Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of +the strong came forth sweetness." He propounded his riddle to the +Philistines and made them a bet that they could not guess it. And when +they wheedled the answer to the riddle out of Samson's wife he retorted +upon them in coarse fashion, "If ye had not plowed with my heifer, ye +would not have guessed my riddle." + +He carried off the gates of the city of Gaza and hid them. He caught +foxes and tied firebrands to their tails and then turned them loose in +the ripe wheat fields of the Philistines, roaring aloud over the havoc +they made. He slew his enemies with the jaw-bone of an ass and then +made a clever pun (which the Hebrew reveals) upon the name of his +homely weapon. + +He was the joker of the pack. Time and again in the days of his power +he was able to take the trick. When he came to die that element of +grim humour was still in his heart. He had lost his strength because +he had slept for a night with his head in the lap of his enemy. His +foes had put out his eyes and had made him to grind as a slave in one +of their mills. Now he was brought as a kind of paid jester to one of +their feasts to make fun for the party. + +There in the house of his foes, holding fast to a door-post he prayed +in grim fashion that his former strength might for a moment be renewed, +"that he might be avenged upon his enemies for the loss _of one of his +two eyes_." He would leave the rest of the account to be settled +later. When he had them roaring with laughter at some of his sallies, +he pulled down the house upon their heads and killed them all, +perishing himself in the disaster. He was full of humour and had a +deep sense of the joy of living. + +He was a strange mixture of good and evil. Here was a blend of +weakness and of strength! Here was the baser metal mingled as an +unworthy alloy with much that was fine gold. "Samson got the laugh on +the Philistine men," as William R. Richards said once in Battell +Chapel, "but their sisters avenged themselves on him by making a slave, +a tool, and a fool of him. This old writer tells his story straight on +without stopping to moralize. But where can you find a better sermon +on the need of personal purity? Of the two forms of sin which +especially assail young men, Samson might guard us from one by way of +example, and from the other by way of warning. Touching no wine, for +he was a Nazarite from his birth, he excelled in strength. But placing +his head in the lap of a false woman whose name was Delilah, there came +to him weakness, blindness, the prison house, and the grave." + +He refused the cup which cheers and also inebriates, but he gave his +heart and his strength to that alluring enemy of the divine purpose who +ruined him. Where a young man is a physical weakling, then if his mind +is dull and his heart mean, he is at least all of a piece. He is +consistent in his make-up. Where his body is strong as was the body of +this young giant, revealing in every movement of it that joy and vigour +which come with abundance of life, then if his mental and moral life +are weak and thin, there is something tragic in that walking lie. The +outward man promises so much, but the inward man is a wail of +disappointment. + +"The Philistines took him," is the terse comment of the writer upon +Samson's unhappy career. But his sins had already taken him captive. +He had become the bond servant of his own passions. He was already a +slave through his lack of self-control. + +"The wages of sin is death"--if you doubt it read through to the end +the story of any man who is headed wrong and keeps going in that +direction. You will find the word "Death" written over against his +name in five capital letters. Read the story of this young man who in +his youth was so "strong and sunny," as his name in the original has +it. When you read on you presently find him dead in his eyes, as he +gropes his way about the prison house in the land of the Philistines. +He is dead in his muscles as he weakly turns the wheels of a mill, +which was the work commonly assigned to women in those rude tribes. He +is dead in reputation--the fool and the jester brought in to make sport +at the table of his captors! He is dead in his soul for he is unaware +that the Lord has departed from him. The wages of sin is death. +Whether pay day comes the following Saturday night or at the end of the +year, or in the final outcome, in every case the sorry result will be +the same. + +We are compelled to say that Samson's life was a tragedy because he +failed at these three points. He never learned to take life seriously. +The joker is not the best card in the pack, except by an arbitrary +rule--and in all the better games at cards, the joker is thrown out. +When all is said and done, life is serious business. The humour, the +amusement, the recreation are only the sauce on the table to give an +added zest and relish--they are not the roast beef and potatoes. You +cannot live on them nor by them. The man who laughs and laughs loudly +and laughs at everything will have the laugh turned on him. The very +fact that he has never brought his life under the power of a serious, +definite, compelling purpose will cause him to be left far in the rear +by those men who waken up early to the fact that the world is not to be +taken as a joke. + +There was a certain joy no doubt in carrying off the gates of Gaza. I +can recall certain episodes on the evening of the thirty-first of +October when the carrying off of the gates of some neighbour seemed to +me to fill the cup of life to the brim. There is a certain joy in +getting a cow up into the pulpit of the College Chapel or into the +belfry of some church on a dark night--the young fellow who has never +helped to solve that problem in physics has missed something. There is +a time to read the paper we call "Life," and to see some man on the +stage who can be as funny as William Collier. Where all these are the +diversions of a mind devoted to serious ends, where they are only the +by-product of human interest, they have a rightful place in our regime. + +But their lines are soon spoken, and the stage must be cleared for +those who have something of more moment to tell. "How much do you +really care?" the world is asking. "How ready are you to think +intently upon something which has no more fun in it than a page of +figures or an array of unyielding facts? How far are you ready to bend +all the best energies of body, brain and heart to the gaining of some +worthy end? How completely have you set your heart upon that which is +vital?" Your answer to these questions will in large measure tell the +story of your future achievement. + +This young man failed because he had not acquired the habit of +persistence. His big deeds were all done in a hurry, and they were +soon over. He carried off the gates of the city in ten minutes. He +tore the young lion apart in an instant. He slaughtered the +Philistines with the jaw-bone of an ass in less time than I am taking +in telling it. He tied torches to the tails of the foxes and let them +loose in the wheat fields in a careless half hour of thoughtless sport. +You do not find the man binding up a lifetime of effort into a moral +unit by an all-inclusive and dominant intention. He was never ready to +work and to keep on working until achievement of a worthy sort should +crown his effort. + +You cannot drive a long nail in to the head by hammering around all +over the board. You must hit the nail on the head and keep on hitting +it on the head until you have sent it home. You cannot sink the shaft +of a mine by digging all around over the mountainside. You must dig in +one place and keep on digging in one place persistently until you have +sunk your shaft to the vein of ore. You cannot build a life that is +worthy to be the life of a child of God unless you gird yourself for +that persistent effort which lies between you and the goal upon which +you have set your heart. It cannot be done in an hour, or in a day, or +in a year. The hard task of presenting to Him a life which will bear +His own eye and win His approval will mortgage the best strength of all +your best years. + +You may have the body of an athlete. You may have a mind with splendid +capacity in it for real achievement. You may have a heart which reacts +as promptly as gunpowder when a spark of genuine aspiration is applied +to it. You may have all these--I hope you have--but unless you have +learned the high art of staying by, of holding on, of keeping at it no +matter what comes, you are doomed to defeat. + +How often you see a young man of generous impulse, of kindly +disposition, like Esau, faltering and failing as the years come and go +until at last he is little better than a vagabond upon the face of the +earth. How often you find a man of purpose and persistence, like +Jacob, with many an unfortunate trait in him, with a heavy moral +handicap to overcome, finally winning out by the sheer force of his +spiritual tenacity. "Be thou faithful unto death," the promise has it, +"and I will give thee the crown of life." The crown is held in reserve +for those who persist clear through to the end. + +This young man failed because he lacked the favour of God. In the +early stages of his career we read of a divine element in his life. +"The woman bare a son and called his name Samson, and the Lord blessed +him. And the spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him" for those +deeds of valour. + +However we may interpret these expressions the fact is plain that so +long as he kept his life clean and true he had the sense of divine +reinforcement making him equal to the tasks which fell to his lot. +Then there came a time when by his own actions he forfeited all this. +He became as weak as a rag in the face of temptation, in the presence +of duty, in some great opportunity for valiant effort which opened +before him. And he did not realize how weak he was until he went down +in defeat. "He wist not that the Lord had departed from him." + +The spirit of self-indulgence, I care not whether it goes straight for +the coarse sins of the flesh or moves in more refined ways towards the +life of selfish ease and barren culture, will take the iron out of a +man's blood. It will take the vim out of his muscles, the power to +hold fast out of his will. + +The man who saves his life for his own personal gratification will soon +find that he has no life to save. That which makes life life is gone. +It is the habit of self-control, the spirit of self-surrender to the +will of God, the purpose of self-dedication to the highest ends in +sight, which puts power into the thrust of each man's effort. + +The circular letter which Lord Kitchener, head of the War Office, sent +to every British soldier when the English troops were ordered to the +Continent reads like a classic: + + +"You are ordered abroad as a soldier of the King. The honour of the +British Army depends upon your individual conduct. You have a task to +perform which will need courage, energy, and patience. Be on your +guard against excesses. You will find temptation both in women and in +wine. Resist both and do your duty bravely. Fear God. Honour the +King. + +"(Signed) KITCHENER." + + +Hang those great words up in your mind! Hang the picture of that +strong, stern, brave man in your heart that you too may wear the cross +of honour. + +If it is good for men to be sober and clean in war time, why not at all +times? Have we not sore need of these same qualities in the more +exacting pursuits of peace? Every man who is worthy of the name of man +is set to guard some sacred interest, though he carries neither gun nor +sword. + +Here is the everlasting fight being waged three hundred and sixty-five +days in the year--and it is waged year in and year out for there is no +discharge in that war--against hunger and cold, against disease and +death, against poverty and crime! Why not have men at their best in +the mill and in the mine, on the farm and in the factory, in the +counting-room and in the places of trade? The armies which are sent +forth to save, to feed, and to clothe men's lives, no less than the +armies of bloodshed have need of the same high discipline. They, too, +are crippled and broken, they are driven back and hurled to defeat by +those moral foes which march under the banner of self-indulgence. + +Here is an evil traffic which flaunts its wares in our faces in every +city block where the forces of righteousness have not risen in strength +to cast it out. But we have fallen upon times when the economic forces +are lining up solidly with the verdict of medical science and the power +of religion in a relentless opposition to the use of alcohol as a +beverage. In these days the man who thinks more of his job than he +does of his grog has the floor. + +The wise railroad managers know full well that a tippler in the cab of +an engine or at the flagman's post means sooner or later a frightful +accident with loss of property and life. The owners of intricate and +delicate machinery in the great factories know that placing in control +men whose brains have been clogged and drugged with liquor is as +foolish as throwing sand into the ball bearings. "Safety First" means +"Sober First." The taxpayers are becoming no less insistent--they have +learned that the open saloon means added crime and poverty where they +must foot the bills. Decent people have grown tired of cleaning up the +muss and the dirt occasioned by the rum sellers. The moral forces of +the community recognize the fact that the liquor business allies itself +openly with immoralities of every sort. The people are saying in state +after state, in country after country, "Time's up! You have failed to +show your right to be! You will have to go." The habit of indulgence +in that which robs men of strength, of intelligence, of conscience, +finds every good man's hand against it. + +We read in this strange story that Samson's strength was in his hair. +When his locks were cut away by the fair and false hand of evil he was +as weak as a woman. + +How much of sober history and how much of poetic allegory there may be +in these glowing statements it is not easy to say. But the moral +content of this record is clear. When those slender and delicate lines +of contact which, as he believed according to his vow as a Nazarite, +bound him in loyalty to the source of all strength, were broken, then +his splendid prowess was no more. "It is that little half-inch rim of +the tree where the sap runs up to the sun that makes the tree alive or +dead." However you phrase it in the clearer light of this twentieth +century of ours, guard with all diligence those lines of communication +between your own inner life and the life of God. Maintain within +yourself that faith and hope and love which will bring to you your own +full measure of strength and joy. + +The dull, sad picture of this defeated man is not wholly unrelieved by +any brighter touch. When he was shorn of his strength, robbed of his +honour, stained in the quality of his manhood, we read, "Howbeit the +hair of his head began to grow again after he was shorn." + +It was only a gleam of hope, but it was a gleam. It was a far-off +promise of that divine redemptive process which has become the basis of +our trust. His claim upon the divine favour and his hold upon the +sources of strength were not utterly forfeited by his acts of +evil-doing. His hair began to grow again and a hope of moral recovery +was begotten in his heart. "If we say we have no sin we deceive +ourselves; but if we confess our sins He is faithful and just to +forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." + +Let me close with this plain, straight word of appeal as strong as I +can make it! You need God in your life. You need Him not as a +philosophical belief touching the origin and ground of all finite +existence; not as a mere dogma to be written at the head of your +Confession of Faith; not as a name to be introduced into some liturgy +which you may occasionally employ. You need God as a present, personal +and profound experience. To know Him is to live, and to live well. + +It was Phillips Brooks who said once to an audience of Harvard men, +"Here is the last great certainty, be sure of God! By simple, loving +worship, by continual obedience, by keeping yourself pure even as He is +pure, creep close to Him, keep close to Him, and in the end nothing can +overthrow you." + + + + +III + +The Young Man Who Became King + +In some wise way when the door of opportunity opens upon a trying +situation there comes forth a man of sufficient size to perform the +task. When the time is ripe for the Protestant Reformation Martin +Luther is ready and walks in. When the day arrives for Napoleon +Bonaparte to be sent to St. Helena and the peace of Europe restored, +the Duke of Wellington, representing British tenacity, is ready. When +the hour has struck for American slavery to be destroyed by words and +laws and grape-shot, William Lloyd Garrison and Abraham Lincoln and +Ulysses S. Grant are ready. Back of every emergency God waits. He has +His great right hand full of men and when the fullness of time is come +He brings upon the scene His own appointed man. + +Here in a very old book is the story of the greatest king that Israel +ever had! The House of Tudor in England, the House of Hohenzollern in +Germany or the late House of the Romanoffs in Russia, never had such a +hold upon the popular imagination and affection as did "the house and +lineage of David" upon the hearts of the Hebrews. The One who was to +be born "King of kings and Lord of lords" to reign forever and ever was +to come from "the house and lineage of David." + +But how was this country boy with rough hands and all the marks of toil +upon him to become king? He was no Crown Prince--Jonathan was the +eldest son of the reigning monarch. He was neither the eldest nor the +favourite son of any man. He was the youngest son of a farmer named +Jesse and because he seemed less promising than his older brothers he +had been given the care of the sheep. Anybody with eyes in his head +and feet to walk about can watch sheep. The boy did not seem at first +glance to have his foot on the ladder nor to possess the elements of +royalty. + +He became king because he had these five qualities: First of all he +showed fidelity in the ordinary duties of every-day life. Here is the +summing up of his method--"And David behaved himself wisely in all his +ways and the Lord was with him." If a bunch of sheep became his field +of opportunity he would do his work in such fashion that no one could +do it better. He would lead them in green pastures and by still waters +so that they should not want. His rod and his staff would protect +them. He would learn the use of sling and stone so that "he could +sling," as the record says, "at a hair's breadth and not miss." If a +wolf or a bear should attack his flock, he would be able to drive them +off. + +The simple ordinary duties which belong to keeping sheep or to getting +one's lessons at school, to meeting one's obligations in some modest +position in office or store, or in doing one's best in a factory or on +a farm, become a kind of dress rehearsal for the larger duties which +lie ahead. If a man knows his lines and can take his part effectively +upon the narrower stage of action he is in line for promotion to a more +important rôle. You will find whole regiments of young fellows who +drag along, scamping their work and slighting those opportunities which +are right at hand. They are saving up their energies to do something +splendidly effective week after next. But week after next never comes +to such men. It is always to-day, and to-day in their eyes seems ever +small. + +If those men were already on the quarterdeck as captains of great ocean +liners; if they were already bank presidents sitting in handsome +offices of their own; if they were already journalists of the first +rank writing editorials for metropolitan dailies, they would do what +their hands and their minds found to do with their might. But in this +day of small things they feel that fidelity and skill would be thrown +away. They have mixed up the words of the promise--they think it +reads, "You have been unfaithful over a few things, I will make thee +ruler over everything." When a man is going up-stairs he must put his +foot first on the step which is at the bottom and then take the other +steps in order. The same rule holds in the great business of living a +man's life and doing a man's work in the world. + +The young man who was to become king showed courage and high resolve in +the face of danger. There came a day when the Israelites and the +Philistines were lined up in battle array on the opposite sides of a +valley. The Philistines had their champion fighter in the person of a +huge fellow named Goliath. His armour weighed one hundred and fifty +pounds. His spear was like a weaver's beam. He stood roaring out his +defiance against the armies of Israel, "Choose you a man! Let him come +down to me and fight. If he kills me, we will be your servants. If I +prevail against him then ye shall be our servants." + +After the manner of the Iliad he stood ready to let the issue of the +campaign turn upon the result of a solitary combat between himself and +any Israelite they might put up against him. Saul, the king of Israel, +had offered to enrich with great wealth the man who would fight that +huge Philistine. He had promised to give him the hand of his own +daughter, the fair young princess, in marriage, and to make his +father's house forever free in Israel. But no Israelite had dared to +fight the terrible Goliath. + +Then David appeared upon the scene. He had been sent down by his +father with ten loaves of fresh bread, with ten cheeses and a supply of +parched corn for his brothers who were at the front. He saw this huge +Goliath stalking up and down the picket lines between the armies. He +cried out in his resentment at the apparent cowardice of his own +countrymen, "Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy +the armies of the living God!" David was informed that even the +promise of high reward offered by the king had not induced an Israelite +to face the Philistine. + +Then spoke out the voice of faith from the heart of unstained youth! +"Let no man's heart fail because of him--thy servant will go and fight +this Philistine." The king remonstrated with him. He pointed out the +folly of sending an untrained youth to meet the disciplined man of war. +But David insisted that his rough experiences with the lions and the +bears which attacked his flock had furnished him the necessary +training. The king then offered him his own armour, which would +naturally be the best suit of armour in the camp, that the stripling +might in some measure be protected. But after trying on this suit of +mail David put it aside. "I cannot go with these," he said, "for I +have not proved them." He refused the conventional modes of defense, +relying upon those weapons which had been tested by experience. He +took his sling and five smooth stones from the brook and announced that +he was ready for the combat. + +It seemed a contest most unequal when the principals were put forth +with the Israelites and the Philistines ranged up on either side of the +valley to watch the outcome. Goliath was enraged when he saw the boy +they had sent against him. "Am I a dog?" he said. And then he cursed +David by all his gods and threatened to feed his flesh to the beasts of +the field before an hour had passed. Like many a modern combatant +Goliath was mighty with his mouth. His tongue was like a weaver's beam. + +The young man was not disturbed. His weapons were taken from the +armoury of experience, and his courage came from the same reliable +source. "The Lord who delivered me out of the paws of the lion and the +bear will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine." The moral +triumphs of those early years when a boy keeps his life clean and +strong become the earnest of the larger victories he is set to win in +his mature manhood. The growing boy who disdains to lie or to cheat, +to stain his life with dirt or to show himself a coward, will know how +to bear himself when the harder tests of middle life assail him. + +The young man's religious faith contributed to his courage. It was +moral strength pitted against brute force. It was the scornful +self-confidence which trusted in a coat of brass and a huge spear +measuring itself against the spirit of faith which became the source of +a finer form of valour. "Thou comest to me with sword and spear," +David cried, as he saw his foe advancing. "I come to thee in the name +of the Lord of Hosts whom thou hast defied." His trust in God kept his +nerves steady so that he was still able in the presence of that roaring +giant to sling stones at a hair's breadth and not miss. His moral +passion as he went forth to lift that reproach from the banner of his +nation gave strength to his right arm. + +The huge Philistine came on, brandishing his spear and roaring out his +wrath. David saw the unprotected spot below the visor of the man's +helmet. He took one of his five smooth stones and slung it with such +force and precision as to strike Goliath full in the forehead, knocking +him senseless. He then ran forward and took the huge sword of his +enemy and cut off his head holding it aloft as a trophy of his courage. +When the Philistines saw their champion fall they fled in terror and +the Israelites pursuing them won a notable victory. + +How splendid is the quality of moral courage! How kingly is the man +who can face all manner of danger undaunted because he knows that his +heart is right and his cause is just! He deserves to be crowned. The +battle is the Lord's in the last analysis and He saveth not alone with +sword and spear. + +There are sentiments and principles which become deep-rooted in a +nation's life mightier by far than the heaviest battalions. There are +habits of thought and long-cherished convictions which constitute a +more reliable form of defense than all the ramparts and battlements +devised by strategists. A nation of Davids will in the final outcome +outmatch any nation of Goliaths with all their swords and spears. And +in one's personal life the clear conscience and the heart of faith will +bring any man off from any field where he may be sent more than +conqueror through Him who loves us. + +This young man showed also a fine capacity for friendship with men. +"His soul was knit with the soul of Jonathan and he loved him as he +loved his own soul." The fine friendship of a man for a man, or the +gracious affection which a woman feels for a woman who is indeed her +friend, becomes a noble form of human relationship. Those ties where +the charm and power of the sex-impulse has no place have in them a +world of moral worth. + +It is easy for any man to fall in love with some beautiful woman--it is +as easy as rolling off a log, and ever so much more delightful. It is +easy for any man to inhale the sweet incense which arises from the +devotion of some affectionate woman's heart. But where a man loves a +man in an unsullied, unselfish friendship until his soul is knit with +the soul of that man in an interlacing and interlocking of interest, +then you have that harder, rarer form of human relationship which is +rich with promise. + +The young chap who is never quite happy with his fellows, who must +always have some adoring young woman present in order to be content, is +not quite all there. He is a "softy." He is lath and plaster where +there should be quartered oak. He has sentiment than principle; he has +less muscle and more fat than go to the make-up of a virile manhood. +The very absence of the glamour and mystery which enters into all +attachments between those of opposite sex clears the air for the +manifestation of some of those fine forms of fidelity and devotion +which belong to friendship at its best. + +Here the friendship was the more notable when we recall how the two men +were placed. Jonathan was the eldest son of the king, the heir to the +throne, the natural successor of Saul. But David by his military +prowess had come to be highly esteemed. When he returned victorious +from his wars against the enemies of Israel the proud and happy women +had sung in the streets, "Saul has slain his thousands, but David has +slain his tens of thousands." And David had been privately anointed by +Samuel the prophet as a worthy candidate for the throne of Israel. + +Jonathan, as the Crown Prince, had the least to gain and the most to +lose by protecting the life and ministering to the well-being of this +friend who might one day aspire to the throne. He made his affection a +thing resplendent by its sheer unselfishness. He saw that David might +increase while he would decrease, yet even so the sky of his affection +was unclouded by a single touch of jealousy. How great is that love +which envieth not. + +And David in turn made his own adequate response to this magnanimous +interest. He showed himself in his whole bearing a man worthy of the +friendship of a prince of the blood. Heaven be praised for men who can +find joy and satisfaction in the friendship of their fellows. + +The young man who was destined to become king was generous to his +enemies. Saul stood head and shoulders above his fellows, physically +speaking, but in his mental and moral stature he was less than +knee-high to the man who followed him upon the throne. When he heard +the women singing David's praises, "Saul was very wroth--the saying +displeased him and he eyed David from that day forward." + +When the king saw the fine friendship between his own son Jonathan and +the rising David his heart became as bitter as gall. "Thou son of a +perverse, rebellious woman," he cried to the Crown Prince, "thou hast +chosen this son of Jesse to thine own confusion." And when David +increased year after year in stature, in wisdom, and in favour with God +and men, Saul tried repeatedly to kill him. His soul cried out, "Let +me feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him." + +It is not easy for any man, especially a young man with hot, red blood +in his veins and the sense of injustice rankling in his heart, to stand +up in the face of hatred and malice and keep sweet about it. "Love +your enemies. Bless them who curse you. Do good to them that hate +you. Pray for those who despitefully use you." If you are struck upon +the cheek take a second blow upon the other cheek rather than strike +back in resentment. If a man compels you unjustly to go a mile with +him, go two miles rather than seek to be avenged. Take the rules of +action constantly from within, from the best instincts of your own +heart rather than have them furnished to you by the evil behaviour of +wrong-doers. Allow no man's meanness to master you--allow rather your +own nobility to overcome that evil with good. + +How easy it is to say it, but to do it--aye, there is the rub! It is +so divinely hard to put these fine principles into practice. The soft +answer may turn away wrath, but the hot retort comes more readily to +the lips. The humane return of good for evil points the way of +spiritual advance, but the desire to pay every man back in his own coin +with a tip thrown in for good measure is often more natural. The more +honour then to the man who has learned that greater is he that ruleth +his own spirit than he that taketh a city. + +When David had Saul within his power he refused to strike. There were +months when the young man was hunted through the hills of Judea by the +hirelings of the wicked king, as if he had been a mad dog. There came +a night when Saul was sleeping in his barricade of wagons. He had +around him the three thousand soldiers whom he had led into the +mountains in his mad effort to capture David. The young man had been +pursued until he had felt that there was only a step between him and +death. + +That very night, accompanied only by his armour-bearer, David stole +under cover of the darkness into Saul's camp. He presently stood in +the tent of the sleeping giant. Here was his enemy lying helpless at +his feet! His armour-bearer, knowing the history of that enmity, +whispered, "Let me smite him with one blow to the earth! I will not +smite the second time." One blow in the dark would suffice to end that +murderous career. + +And it ought to be remembered that this was in a day when "an eye for +an eye and a tooth for a tooth" was the law of the land. It was +esteemed the law of God. The atmosphere was not one of +forbearance--the popular heroes were men like Samson and Gideon, women +like Deborah and Jael, who did not hesitate to strike down their foes. +"Let me smite him," came the whisper in the dark. "One blow will +suffice." + +But peace hath her victories no less than war. Mercy has its trophies +no less than force. Here was a man who would not avenge himself--he +would give place unto wrath knowing that vengeance belongs to God. He +was ready to make the bold adventure of undertaking to overcome evil +with good. + +David would not strike his enemy even though that enemy had been in hot +pursuit of him. "Destroy him not," he whispered to his +companion-in-arms as he felt him clutching the sword which hung at his +side. David's greatest victory was not over Goliath, the Philistine +giant--it was over himself, over that spirit of revenge which might so +easily have ruled his heart in that dark, hard hour. + +He had in splendid measure the quality of mercy which the poet sings. + + "The quality of mercy is not strain'd, + It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven + Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest; + It blesseth him that gives and him that takes. + 'Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes + The throned monarch better than his crown; + We do pray for mercy, + And that same prayer doth teach us all to render + The deeds of mercy." + + +We are discovering those qualities which entitled this young man to be +crowned as king. + +Finally, he was a man of genuine piety. We read in one place that he +was "a man after God's own heart." The statement has been a puzzle to +many an honest mind. This man who in his later years dipped his hands +in the blood of his foes and fell on one occasion into the grossest sin +with an attractive woman, this fellow a man after God's own heart! + +He was not an angel. As we go up and down through history we find men +and not angels. We find men with mud on their boots, with blisters on +their hands, and with scars on their souls. George Washington owned +slaves. John Calvin burned Servetus at the stake. Peter the Apostle +denied his Lord three times in a single night--he denied with an oath. +If you are looking for moral perfection you will have to look somewhere +else than on this earth. + +David was a man after God's own heart, not because he never did wrong, +but because when he fell down he got up again. He got up again faced +towards God and not away from Him, faced away from the evil which had +thrown him down and not towards a further advance in wrong-doing. "The +wise make of their moral failures ladders by which they climb towards +Heaven. The foolish make of their moral failures graves wherein they +bury all their highest hopes." + +When Oscar Wilde was imprisoned in Reading gaol for his own wretched +wrongdoing he wrote that strangely human document, "De Profundis." It +was a message "out of the depths." In that book he used this striking +sentence which I have never forgotten since the first time I read it, +"The highest moment in a man's career may be the hour when he kneels in +the dust and beats upon his breast and tells all the sins of his life." + +"God be merciful to me, a sinner." "Have mercy upon me, O God. +Against Thee have I sinned. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity and +cleanse me from my sin." This is all that any honest man can say in +the presence of his Maker, and when he does say it honestly he is on +his way to the divine favour. + +David was a man of faith and of prayer; he was a man of deep, sweet +feeling and of spiritual longing. In all his better moments when he +was truly himself his heart hungered after righteousness and his soul +was athirst for the living God. A man of that moral mood and build is +much more after God's own heart, even though he may upon occasion be +betrayed by the fervour of his nature into wrong-doing, than is the +coldly correct man who has never felt enough of warm-hearted devotion +to anything to raise the spiritual temperature a single degree. + +I do not know how many of these Psalms came from the lips or the pen of +David. No one knows--not many in all probability. But I know that +these words represent experiences which were David's beyond a +peradventure. "The Lord is my rock and my fortress, my deliverer and +my saviour. In my distress I called upon Him and He heard me. He drew +me out of many waters and He brought me forth into a large place. +Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life and I +shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever." + +He came to the throne at the age of thirty, and he reigned over Israel +for forty years. His name was handed down in human history as that of +the greatest king that Israel ever had. He never could have done it +but for the fact that he had in his heart faith and hope and love +towards God and towards his fellow men. He was a man of deep and +genuine piety. + +When William IV of England passed away there was a young girl of +sixteen named Victoria who was spending the night in Kensington Palace. +Word was suddenly brought to her that the King was dead and that she +was Queen of England. She immediately fell upon her knees imploring +divine help and guidance in the discharge of the high duties which had +been thrust upon her. May it not be that this was one secret of her +beneficent reign which lasted for more than sixty years? The rulers +who begin the ascent of their thrones upon their knees rise high +because their eyes are upon that Great White Throne which is the final +seat of all authority and of all blessing. + +Here then were the leading traits in that young man who became king! +In his early life when he was nothing but a shepherd boy he showed +fidelity in the ordinary duties of every-day life. He showed courage +and high resolve in the presence of danger. He had a fine capacity for +joyous and enduring friendship with his brother men. He was +great-hearted and magnanimous to his foes, even when he had them +utterly in his power. He was a man of simple, genuine faith in the +living God. + +Whether you are living in Palestine or in Connecticut, in the tenth +century before Christ or in the twentieth century after, are not these +the qualities which are sure to be crowned? Are not these the traits +which make any man kingly in his bearing and in the whole content of +his inner life? + +Set your hearts upon those traits and make them your own! Fight the +good fight! Keep your faith! Finish your course with honour and you +will find at the end of it laid up for you a crown of righteousness, +which God gives to every man who serves Him aright. + + + + +IV + +The Young Man Who Was Born to the Purple + +"In the year that King Uzziah died"--it was more than a date, it was an +experience! The king had been a wise and good ruler. He had served +his country well for fifty-two long years. He showed an interest in +the welfare of his people--"He loved husbandry and dug wells for them +in the desert." He caused vineyards to be planted on the slopes of +Carmel and he increased the herds of cattle which grazed in the +lowlands. He fortified his capital by building towers at the valley +gate and at the turning of the wall in Jerusalem. + +His reign was beneficent, but now he was dead, and this warm-hearted +young patriot felt that his heart was overwhelmed. He and his fellow +citizens must now plan for the future of their county without the +guidance and inspiration of this great king. + +But "In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord." There came +something more than a personal experience of disappointment. There +came the emergence of a new and higher form of faith. This young man +saw the earthly majesty of this wise and good king go down in utter +defeat. In some strange way the king contracted leprosy. During all +the closing years of his reign he suffered from the crawling inroads of +that loathsome disease. By the stern requirements of the Jewish law he +was banished from his own capital. He was compelled to live outside +the city and to reign by deputy. He finally died a lingering and +horrible death. + +And in that dread hour the young man saw the heavenly majesty of the +King of kings resplendent and enduring. "In the year that King Uzziah +died I saw the Lord, high and lifted up, sitting upon His throne and +His glory filled the temple." The spirit of hero-worship was passing +over into religious faith. + +Let me study with you the effect of this crisis in the life of his +nation upon this young man who was born to the purple. He possessed +all those advantages which go with wealth, social position, and +education. We have here no rough man of the hills like Elijah, the +Tishbite, rudely dressed and rude in speech. We have here no man with +the smell of the fields in his garments like Amos, the herdsman of +Tekoa. + +Isaiah belonged to the fortunate class. He lived on Fifth Avenue. He +had an assured social position which gave him ready access to the court +and to the presence of the king. He was familiar with the customs and +the costumes of fashionable society, as we find in that chapter where +he openly rebukes the showy extravagance of the idle rich. He was well +educated--he had that literary skill which comes only to those who are +well trained. In all the Old Testament you will find nothing finer +than the sweep and finish of some of this young prophet's public +utterances. He was one to whom five talents had been given where other +men were struggling along with one apiece. He therefore owed to +society what might be called the debt of privilege. It is a fixed +charge upon the lives of those who sit above the salt. It has a right +to insist upon full payment. "To whom much is given, of him will much +be required." + +It is for every man to ask himself: "How much do I eat up in my +generous mode of life? How much in food and dress, in housing and +furnishing, in motor cars and yachts, in travel and in recreation? How +much do I consume in those provisions which I make for a wider culture +through books, pictures, music and the like?" What is your average +intake of this world's good things? That measure of consumption will +indicate the measure of your responsibility. If you are born to the +purple and fare sumptuously in all these ways then the world has a +right to demand that you shall render back in corresponding measure +that useful service which is your plain duty. + +In that effective cartoon which Jesus drew of the Rich Man and Lazarus, +it was the unpaid debt of privilege which brought about the loss of a +soul. Jesus showed the two men in this world, one of them living in a +palace, clothed with purple and fine linen, faring sumptuously every +day; the other in rags dying at the Rich Man's gate, hungry and full of +sores. Then Jesus showed the two men in the next world, Lazarus the +beggar now in Abraham's bosom, and the son of good fortune enduring +torment. + +There is no hint that the Rich Man had gained a penny of his wealth +wrongfully; no charge of lying or theft, of murder or adultery is laid +at his door. He was damned not by the wicked things he had done, but +for the lack of that generous and humane service which he had left +undone. His sin was that of selfish indifference. The way to +perdition is paved with moral neglect. The debt of privilege can no +more be escaped than death or taxes. To whom much is given, of him +will much be required. And a full sense of that responsibility was +brought home to this well-endowed young man in the year the great king +died. + +The fortunate young man stood out in the open confessing his sense of +moral need. There in the place of worship in that high and serious +mood which followed upon the death of the king, he caught a fresh +vision of God. "I saw the Lord high and lifted up, sitting upon His +throne. I saw Him surrounded with the winged seraphs. And one of them +cried to another, Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts! The whole +earth is full of His glory." + +The very sight of the unstained purity of Him "unto whom all hearts are +open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid," brought +this young man to his knees. He knelt in the dust and beat upon his +breast and told the sins of his life. "Woe is me, I am undone. I am a +man of unclean lips. I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. +And mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." + +The man who has no sense of sin has little sense of any sort. If we +say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves or else we lie. Where is the +man who can stand up in the presence of those who know him and say, +"Every deed that I have done was done in honour and integrity. Every +word that has fallen from my lips has been spoken in truth and in +kindliness. Every desire which I have harboured in my soul has been +one upon which the eye of my Maker might rest with approval." + +Can you say that? I am frank to confess that I cannot. I have done +wrong. I feel my need of the divine mercy. I want forgiveness, +cleansing and renewal. And every man who is honest enough to look +himself in the face, without flinching, will be moved to make the same +confession. It is up out of those moments of contrition when men are +humbled and broken before God that the spiritual impulses come which +are to beat back the forces of evil and make this earth at last as fair +as the sky. + +I care not what the man's outward station may be--he may live on the +Avenue or he may live in the slums; he may be clothed in purple or he +may be dressed in rags; he wear a Phi Beta Kappa key or he may be so +untaught that he has to make his mark when he signs a mortgage--in any +event here is a prayer which will fit his lips--it fits every pair of +lips: "God be merciful to me, a sinner." + +In that one brief sentence we have the four main terms of religious +experience. "God," the object of religion, the ground of all finite +existence, the basis of all our hope! "Me," the human soul, the +subject of religion, the field where the work of religion is to be +wrought out! "Sin," the obstacle to religion, the source of all our +moral failure, the cause of our alienation from God! And "mercy," the +agent of religion, the form of energy which accomplishes our recovery! +God be merciful to me, a sinner. + +This young man of good fortune stood up in the temple in the presence +of his fellows making his open confession of moral need. "Woe is me +for I am undone. I am a man of unclean lips." + +In that very hour when this honest confession came from his lips his +life was cleansed by the direct action of the divine spirit. He saw +one of the winged seraphs flying towards him through the open spaces of +Heaven. The angel took a live coal from the altar and laid it upon the +lips of this young man. He cried out as he did it, saying, "Thine +iniquity is taken away. Thy sin is purged." Isaiah was no more a man +of unclean lips--he could now speak with that Lord whose name is Holy +as friend speaks with friend. + +We have this profound moral experience dressed up in those grand, +Oriental robes which were dear to the people of that region. But when +you strip away the silk, the lace, and the feathers of Eastern imagery, +and get down to the bare, warm truth, this is what you find--a man +whose sense of moral lack had prompted that open confession, cleansed +in that high hour by the direct action of the divine spirit upon his +soul. + +Here is that which is basic and fundamental in all religious life! I +wonder if we have not been tempted in recent years to obscure this +vital experience. We have held those two big words, "Heredity" and +"Environment," so close to our eyes as to blind us, oftentimes, to the +larger vision of that which is superhuman in earthly experience. + +It is possible for the inner life of a man to be so wrought upon by the +action of the spirit of God that the corrupt nature is cleansed, the +weak nature is made strong, the selfish disposition is transformed into +benign love. + +It matters little how you go about it, if you go with sincere faith. +You may seek for that renewal through the regenerating influence of the +Sacraments dear to the heart of the Romanist and the High Churchman. +If you find it there, it will be because Christ is within the +Sacrament. You may seek for it in those profound emotional reactions +which come at the Methodist mourners' bench. If you find it there, it +will be because the spirit of Christ was operating through those +feelings. You may find it as you make an about face, turning away from +that which is evil and making Christian duty your supreme choice in the +quiet of your own room. If you find it there, it will be because +Christ was present in those movements of your inner life. The woman +was healed in the Gospel story by touching the hem of Christ's garment +because Christ was within that garment. + +If any man will seek for moral renewal at the hands of God he will +find. If he will knock at any one of these doors it will open. Here +is the Gospel as it stands recorded on the pages of the Old +Testament--"The spirit of the Lord shall come upon thee and thou shall +be turned into another man." Here is the same Gospel as it stands +recorded on the pages of the New Testament--"If any man is in Christ he +is a new creature. Old things are passed away and all things are +become new." + +In the joy of moral renewal this well-born, well-reared, well-trained +young man gave himself in eager consecration to the highest he saw. "I +heard the voice of the Lord say, Whom shall I send? Who will go for +us? Then said I, Here am I, send me." + +His nation, now robbed of its great king by the hand of disease, was +facing a crisis. The national church to which he belonged was steeped +in formalism and insincerity. The divine voice was uttering a +heartfelt lament over the unfaithfulness of the chosen people. "Israel +doth not know! My people do not think. The whole head is sick and the +whole heart is faint." + +There was a loud cry for men of large build with wise heads and sound +hearts to furnish moral leadership. And in the face of that demand +this son of good fortune did not allow the divine spirit to go out into +the highways and hedges in order to compel some sort of man, any sort +of man, to come in that the ranks might be filled. He answered to his +name with a clear-cut consecration of himself. "Here am I, send me." + +When war comes to any country, there are rich men who give money, +millions of it, that the war chest may be full. There are great +manufacturers who promptly place their plants at the disposal of the +government for the making of munitions. There are ship owners who turn +over their vessels to the Navy that they may be sent to do business in +the great waters of national defense. There are wise men who think +hard upon the problems of finance and statecraft that they may provide +that counsel which is more precious than rubies. All this is in the +highest degree praiseworthy. + +But the only men who give what Lincoln called at Gettysburg "the last +full measure of devotion" are the men who give themselves. These men +do not go on horseback nor in automobiles. They walk. They eat the +hardtack. They sleep on the ground. They dig the trenches and fight +in them. They march out at the word of command to be shot at. They +keep right on doing those plain things until the war is ended and +victory achieved. These are the men who awaken our warmest feeling of +admiration and gratitude. "Here am I, send me"--nothing can take the +place of that! + +In that sterner war where there is no discharge, in that age-long, +world-wide fight against the evils of earth this same sound principle +holds. Money is needed; counsel is needed; organization and +administrative ability are needed. The bringing in of that kingdom +which is not meat and drink, nor shot and shell, but righteousness and +peace and joy in the divine spirit, requires all these fine forms of +effort. But nothing can ever take the place of that personal +consecration of each man's own soul to the service of the living God. + +In that high hour when Isaiah saw the God of things as they are, high +and lifted up, sitting on His throne, he did not say, "Here are any +number of fine people, send them. Here is a man who could perform the +task better than I--send him." He said what every man must say who +means to stand right in the Day of Judgment, "Here am I, send me." + +He was the son of good fortune, and his life was bright and rich with +many an advantage. But this did not prompt him to claim any sort of +exemption from the call for volunteers. His vision of the awful +difference between the earthly majesty of that king who sank so swiftly +into a leper's grave and the heavenly majesty which rose above it +sovereign and eternal, made him feel that nothing would suffice but the +gift of himself. + +What shall it profit a man, this man, that man, any man, to gain the +largest measure of earthly success you may choose to name, if in the +process he loses himself, his real self, his best self, his enduring +self? What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world, but feels +within himself a capacity for higher things unrealized? In the great +outcome nothing really matters save the devotion of the personal life +to the highest ends. + +In the year 1840 near the city of Louvain a child was born, who came of +good stuff. He was educated for a business career, and there in +prosperous little Belgium the outlook at that time for wealth, for +social position, and for a life of joy was very bright. But at the age +of eighteen this boy offered himself for the priesthood of the Roman +Catholic Church. He joined the Society of the Sacred Heart. He went +out to the Hawaiian Islands as a missionary and was ordained as a +priest in the city of Honolulu. + +He was at once impressed with the sad condition of the leper settlement +on the island of Molokai. He resolved to give his life to those poor, +diseased, horror-stricken people. He knew that to live among them +would mean banishment from his ordinary associations and the loss of +all possible preferment in the church. He knew that he might himself +contract that terrible disease and suffer a lingering, painful, +frightful death. "No matter," he cried, "I am going." And he went. + +He not only preached to those lepers the Gospel of the Son of God and +ministered to them in spiritual things--his own labours and his appeals +to the Hawaiian government secured for them better dwellings, an +improved water supply, and a more generous provisioning of the unhappy +settlement. For five years he worked alone, but for the occasional +assistance of a priest who came to the colony for a single day. He +finally succumbed to the dread disease of leprosy and in his +forty-ninth year died a martyr to humane devotion. His name was Father +Damien, and he shed fresh luster upon the Christian ministry. + +The young man who was born to the purple, called now to be a prophet of +God, seized upon the vital elements of religion and uttered them with +power. "What does it mean to be religious?" men were asking. Some of +the dull, blind priests of that day were saying, "It means sacrifice +and burnt offering. It means the careful and showy observance of the +forms of worship." Israel did not know; the people did not think. + +Then this young prophet gave them the word of God with an edge on it. +He showed them the folly of all those outward signs of devotion apart +from the inward spirit of righteousness. "To what purpose is the +multitude of your sacrifices? Who hath required this at your hands? +When you spread forth your hands I will hide my eyes. When you make +many prayers I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood. Wash you, +make you clean. Put away the evil of your doings. Cease to do evil, +learn to do well. Then though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be +white as snow." + +"Salvation by righteousness--this is the message of the Old Testament," +Matthew Arnold used to say. "Righteousness through Jesus Christ," this +is the message of the New Testament! And this nineteenth century man +of letters was but echoing the words which fell from the lips of those +prophets in the eighth century before Christ. + +"Wherewith shall I come before the Lord?" said Micah. "Will the Lord +be pleased with a thousand rams or with ten thousand rivers of oil? He +hath showed thee, O man, what is good, and what doth the Lord require +of thee but to do justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with thy +God." + +"Seek justice," Isaiah said; "relieve the oppressed, judge the +fatherless, plead for the widow. If ye be willing and obedient ye +shall eat the good of the land. If ye refuse and rebel ye shall be +devoured." This was the heart of his message. It was the call of God +to personal righteousness. + +He represents the Almighty as sitting upon the throne of the universe, +summoning His people into friendly conference with Him. "Come now, let +us reason together, saith the Lord." Religion is not a thing of magic. +There is no sleight-of-hand or hocus-pocus in the benefits it seeks to +confer. Religion is rational and moral. It is a reasoned form of +intercourse between an intelligent and moral being who is finite and +the Intelligent and Moral Being who is Infinite. Its benefits are to +be realized in that direct impress of the spirit of God upon the soul +of the man who has made an intelligent and honest approach to his Maker. + +The young prophet saw his country threatened with disaster from both +sides. He saw upon the south the selfish and cruel designs of Egypt. +He saw the encroachments of mighty Assyria from the north. He saw the +madness of those Israelites who thought they could combine wickedness +and worship, the observance of religious forms with lives of moral +unconcern. And in that hour the truths he lifted before them were "The +majesty and authority of God, the everlasting obligation of personal +righteousness, the certainty of the ultimate triumph of God's Kingdom +over the wrath of man." These were the mighty truths by which he +sought to inspire the hearts of men to do their duty, come what might. + +Have we not great need at this very hour of just such men! It has been +given to you and to me to live through one of the great, searching +crises of human history. The world has never seen a struggle so +gigantic. We have been patient for more than two years with a certain +nation across the sea--patient clear up to the border of what has +seemed to some of our neighbours like a lazy acquiescence in +lawlessness. We have seen that nation referring contemptuously to her +own treaties as mere scraps of paper, and then openly disregarding her +solemn obligations. + +We saw the outrage perpetrated upon Belgium, an outrage which men who +know their histories better than I know mine are saying will go down as +the greatest crime in the annals of the race. We saw the drowning of +hundreds of helpless women and children in the sinking of the +_Lusitania_ without warning and in flat defiance of international law. +We saw the judicial murder of women like Edith Cavell and of men like +Captain Fryatt. We have seen the Zeppelins engaged in the dastardly +business of hurling down bombs upon unfortified towns for the killing +of old women and little children--heretofore when decent nations have +gone to war men have fought with men. We have seen thousands of +helpless Armenians butchered by the Moslem allies of that so-called +Christian power,--it is all but universally believed, with its own +connivance and under its direction. We have witnessed a frightful +record of brutality and outrage, investigated and established by the +competent testimony of such men as James Bryce and Cardinal Mercier. +We have seen the sinking of hospital ships loaded with wounded men and +the sinking of relief ships carrying provisions to the famine-stricken +children of Belgium, no matter what flag they flew, or what cargo they +bore. + +We have had our own rights as a neutral trampled upon by that +government with the arrogant assumption that her necessities knew no +law. And now to crown it all we have detected the official +representatives of that country with protests of friendship upon their +false lips actually plotting with Mexico and seeking to extend that +plot to Japan with the unholy purpose of destroying the peace between +this country and its neighbours. + +The men of our country who have red blood in their veins and the sense +of justice in their hearts are saying, "How long, O Lord, how long!" +War is a terrible thing and no honest man ever speaks lightly of war. +But there are things which are worse than war. The loss of all +capacity for moral indignation is worse. The easy, lazy, cowardly +acquiescence in lawlessness and crime is worse. The loss of the +readiness to sacrifice one's very life, if need be, for those ends +which are just and right, is infinitely worse. + +There are interests which are worth fighting for and, if need be, they +are worth dying for. The sanctity of womanhood and the safety of +little children, the security of those interests which are essential to +human well-being and the protection of our homes, the honour and +integrity of our country, and the maintenance of those majestic +principles of righteousness which underlie all social advance--these +ends are worth dying for. If these high ends can be secured by +persuasion and moral appeal, well and good. But if they cannot, if +their very existence is threatened by lawlessness and hate, then let +men of sound mind and honest heart stand ready to do battle for the +right. + +In these hours of stress which have come upon our country, we have need +of men who possess the necessary moral courage to stand forth and meet +the crisis. There is a loud call everywhere for those who are prepared +to face duty without flinching. It is for every man to say touching +his own measure of ability, "Here am I, send me." + +If the cause of democracy is not to fail in those hard years which will +come at the close of this war, there is need not only of wise and +honest leaders--there is need of ranks upon ranks of plain men who are +ready to give their best strength to the service of that government +which is "of the people, for the people, and by the people." + + + "O beautiful, my country, ours once more, + What were our lives without thee; + What all our lives to save thee. + We reck not what we give thee, + We will not dare to doubt thee, + But ask whatever else and we will dare." + + + + +V + +The Young Man Who Changed the History of the World + +Why do you write it 1917? "April 1, 1917," that was the way you wrote +it this afternoon in your letter to her. + +There was a time when it was not so. The Hebrews were dating their +calendars from what they supposed to have been the period of the +creation. The Romans reckoned their time from the founding of the city +on the seven hills. The Greeks reckoned their time from the first +Olympic games. + +But to-day if you meet a Hebrew, or an Italian, or a Greek in any part +of the world and ask him, "What year is it?" he will reply instantly, +"Nineteen seventeen." It is just that long since a certain Child was +born in Bethlehem of Judea. + +How strange it is, when you come to think of it, that the birth of a +child in an out-of-the-way village in Palestine should change the +calendars of the world! We find in this commonplace fact a prophecy of +His radical transforming power in every department of life. He was +destined to take the moral government of the race upon His shoulder as +none other ever has. He was to alter the flow of the spiritual +currents in human society and ultimately to change the history of the +world. + +He did it all while He was still a young man. He was only thirty-three +years old when they put Him to death upon the Cross. He had used +thirty of those thirty-three years in quiet preparation for the great +tasks which were to come. No wonder the three years of which we know +so much were mighty when we think of the thirty years of preparation +standing behind them! Ten years of training and discipline for one of +public action! Ten days of study and devotion for one day of healing, +redemptive effort! Ten hours of silence and prayer before God for one +hour of speech in the ears of men! + +He did it all in His youth and when He died at the age of thirty-three +He did not look down and say, "I have failed because My life is cut off +all too soon." He looked up and said, "I have finished the work which +Thou gavest Me to do." + +How marvellous was the life of this young man who changed the history +of the world! If we could get away from the idea that He is a +stained-glass window or a marble statue or a lovely story in a book +which most men seldom read--if we could only see Him as He was, the +Word made flesh, real, warm, alive, our hearts would leap. + +He was born in the manger of a stable. He grew up in a carpenter's +home and in a carpenter's shop. He never saw the inside of a college, +yet somehow He learned to think straight and to speak as never man +spake. He lived with the birds and the flowers, the trees, the hills +and the stars. He thought deeply upon the interests and needs of men +until He knew what was in man and needed not that any should tell +Him--He told them. He looked up with pure eyes and a pure heart until +He saw God. Therefore, when He spoke His word was with power; and when +He lived His life was with power; and when He stretched forth His hand, +His touch had healing in it. + +His mind was exceedingly broad. He had never been outside the borders +of His own little country, which is about the size of the State of New +Hampshire. He had never seen the mighty cities in Egypt to the south +of Him, nor Antioch in Syria to the north. He had never looked upon +Athens nor upon Rome. The man who thinks Broadway, New York, is the +center of the solar system would have called Him provincial. His feet +knew nothing save the narrow streets of Jerusalem and the still +narrower lanes of Galilee. + +Yet He moved about with a dream of world-wide empire in His head and +the vision of a Kingdom Everlasting in His heart. "I, if I be lifted +up, will draw all men unto Me." When He sent forth His disciples to do +the work He had taught them to do, this is the way their commission +read: "Go into all the world. Make disciples of all nations. Baptize +everybody into My name and the name of the Father." He had +courage--think of His standing there, a young peasant in little +Palestine, talking about a world-wide empire over which He would rule +by His own unseen spirit! + +He found little in His environment to add strength to His hope. He +lived under a government which was tyrannical and corrupt. The Jewish +Church to which He belonged was formal and lifeless. He faced a +society which was ruled by men like Herod, and by women like the +shameless wife of Herod, who cut off a poor man's head for telling her +the truth about herself. He saw the religious leaders of His day +straining at gnats of difficulty in their formal worship and then +swallowing camels of moral fault in their every-day conduct. The +situation might well have frightened the boldest heart. It never +frightened Him. "The spirit of the Lord is upon Me," He said at the +beginning of His ministry, "because He hath anointed Me to preach good +tidings to the poor; He hath sent Me to bind up the broken-hearted, to +preach deliverance to the captive, and to set at liberty them that are +bruised." And when He came to the close of His ministry, He said, +"Behold, I make all things new, a new heaven and a new earth, wherein +dwelleth righteousness." He was undaunted. + +He was an optimist. By that I do not mean one of those silly, +short-sighted individuals who goes about saying, "Look always on the +bright side." Jesus looked at both sides. He went about with His eyes +open. He saw everything. He saw the struggle and the sorrow of human +life and felt it as if it had been all His own. He looked upon the +tired, sad, sin-stained face of the race. He knew it as He knew His +own face, and He saw the heart of pain which had made it so. He was no +schoolboy shouting himself hoarse in a thoughtless enthusiasm which had +never tested its strength against the graver difficulties of life. He +saw it all, felt it all, understood it all, yet He lived and died in a +great, sweet, serene hope for the race. You cannot find one hateful, +cynical or despairing word falling from His lips. + +He stood once where the shadow of the Cross was already drawing a black +line across His path. He had twelve disciples to whom for the past two +years He had given the best part of His time, His thought and His love. +One of them had already betrayed Him, bargaining away his poor measure +of loyalty for thirty pieces of silver. In the next hour another +disciple would deny Him three times over with an oath. Another would +doubt Him straight in the face of all those pledges of genuineness +which they had received at first hand. And when the hour of trial +struck His disciples would all show themselves cowards and quitters. + +Even so, this young man did not despair. "Be of good cheer," He cried. +"I have overcome the world." He was speaking in anticipation, but He +was so sure of it that He used the past tense as of a thing +accomplished. "I have overcome the world." He had kindled a fire +which would never go out. He had lodged a bit of yeast in the heart of +the race which would finally leaven the whole lump. He had saturated a +few men with His ideas and spirit, and they would set in motion a +process which one day would cause every knee to bow before Him and +every tongue to confess that He is Lord. + +He was to change the history of the world--how did He go about it? In +the first place He changed men's thoughts about God. Men are +influenced by their environment--they are transformed by the renewing +of their minds. They are moulded by the thoughts they think and the +desires they cherish. As a man thinketh in his heart touching the +things that matter, so he becomes. + +This is true as regards all our prevailing habits of mind, but the +potency of right thought is to be found at its best when we come to a +man's thought of God. How shall we think about ultimate reality? What +is behind all these changing, passing phenomena? Who is back of it +all? Is anybody? If so, is he wise or blind? Is he good or evil or +morally indifferent? Does he mean anything by it all, or is he only an +unreasoning, purposeless force? You cannot ask yourself or your +fellows a more important question than this--"How shall we think about +God?" + +Men had been filling their minds with all sorts of wild and foolish +guesses about God. This young man placed upon the lips of the race and +within its heart that great word "Father." "When ye pray say, 'Our +Father.'" Begin with those words on your lips, with that thought in +your mind and with the filial spirit in your heart. When you worship +"Worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father seeketh such +to worship Him." When you would turn away from the evil of your life +say, "I will arise and go to my Father." When you want assurance say, +"No man can pluck me out of my Father's hand." When you come to die +say, "Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit." Death is the act of +a tired child falling back into the arms of his Father. He showed us +the Father and it sufficed us. + +This great truth was the heart of this young man's message to the +race--God is our Father. God combines the strength and the tenderness, +the authority and the devotion, the responsible control and the +capacity for self-sacrifice which belong to fatherhood at its best. +Take the highest you have ever seen in fatherhood and raise it to the +_nth_ power, and then trust that, for that is God. + +How many of you believe that? It is the easiest thing in the world to +say, "I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and earth," +but do you really believe it? Are you striving to live it? If God is +your Father, then you are His children, heirs of God, joint heirs with +Jesus Christ! Your interests are His interests. Your life and His +life, your destiny and His destiny, are not things apart--they are all +one. + +In the light of that great overarching, underlying, interpenetrating +truth, there is no duty more commanding, no privilege more resplendent +than that of living daily and hourly in the filial spirit before Him. +When a man really believes that, he goes about saying by word and by +deed, "I am not alone, the Father is with me. I come not to do my own +will, but the will of Him who sent me. I must be about my Father's +business." When that great sublime truth is set within the heart of +the race, as it was set within the heart of this young man, it changes +the history of the world. + +He also changed men's thoughts about goodness. What does it mean to be +good? When may we call any man good? There were men who felt that +being good meant obeying the law, keeping the rules, ordering one's +life in accordance with the endless specifications outlined in the +Sacred Books. If a man could get through the day without having gotten +off the path for an inch, then he might be esteemed good. And the race +groaned under the burdens which this system had bound upon the +consciences of men. It was all outward, formal, mechanical, impossible. + +Jesus set Himself against that whole conception and method of goodness. +"Except your righteousness exceeds that," He said to the men of His +day, "you will not in any wise enter the Kingdom of Heaven." Goodness +must be inward, vital, spontaneous. A good tree brings forth good +fruit. It cannot otherwise. It does it as naturally as a bird sings. +Therefore, make the tree good and let the fruit come as it will--it +will be all right. A good man out of the good treasure of his heart +brings forth good deeds. He does it spontaneously. Therefore, make +the heart right and let the man do as he pleases. Love God with an +honest heart and love your neighbours as well as yourself, and then do +as you like. Love works no ill, either Godward or manward; therefore, +love is the fulfilling of all law. Here is the great underlying +principle of all righteousness to which all our ethical considerations +must be adjusted. As men rise from the practice of keeping outward +rules into the more exacting but more joyous liberty of the spirit, +they become genuinely good. + +In the third place Jesus put within our reach a power which would +change our hearts. If you are made as I am, and as I have found +hundreds of other men, you feel oftentimes that your life is weak and +thin and mean. You do not love God with an honest heart and strive to +be what He would have you. You do not love your neighbours as you +ought, and give expression to that love in unselfish action. You lag +back when you ought to be forging ahead. You lie down where you ought +to climb. You muddle along in a dull, commonplace way when your +aspirations and your high resolves should be mounting up with wings +like eagles. + +When you are frankly honest with yourself you say, as I have said to +myself, and as Paul said before us, "The good that I would I do not, +and the evil that I would not, that I do. O wretched man that I am, +who shall deliver me!" + +Here was One who knew that men are weak and thin and mean, yet He +believed that every one of them through faith in Him could have a life +strong and rich and fine, He actually believed that men who have bumped +their way clear down to the bottom of the moral stairs could climb up +again. He believed that the woman of the street, whom the bigots of +that day were ready to stone, could "go and sin no more," her sins +forgiven because she loved much. + +The publicans and harlots would go into the Kingdom--they would go in, +Jesus said, ahead of some of those respectable, cold-hearted Pharisees +who were scandalized at such talk. He knew the capacity for moral +renewal which lies in waiting in every heart, and He knew His own power +to call that capacity into effective action. "I am the door," He said, +"to newness of life. By Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved. He +shall go in and out and find pasture." Security, liberty, sustenance, +they would all be his! + +My mind goes back to a man in one of my former parishes. He kept a +little store, but he neglected his business in order to get drunk. The +wolf was often at his door. He had a good wife and two lovely +daughters, but he had broken their hearts by his evil ways. He would +become so intoxicated that he would not know his own name nor the +street he lived on. When he was coming out of such debauches he would +go about dirty, blear-eyed, trembling, asking every man he met to give +him money to get another drink. + +Then there came a day when that man's heredity was not changed, his +environment was not changed, but his heart was changed. He put his +faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and was turned into another man. He +became at once sober, reliable, industrious, affectionate, aspiring. +He put a smile on his wife's face which is there yet. He began to take +care of his store and of his family. He became an honoured and useful +citizen, chosen to positions of trust by his fellow men. He has now +gone to his reward, but if he hears what I am saying he would tell you +that it is all true. He would tell you also that he owed this change +to the transforming power of the Son of God, the Saviour of men. + +How the world changes and for the better! When Jesus Christ was here +they said of Him, "He receiveth sinners and eateth with them." They +said it with a sneer. When William Booth, the head of the Salvation +Army, did the same thing they said of him, "He receiveth sinners," but +they regarded it as the glory of his life. The first century saw the +Son of Man scorned and spat upon for receiving sinners and eating with +them. The twentieth century saw William Booth received at court by +King Edward VII and honoured with a degree from Oxford University for +receiving sinners. The world moves; there is sunrise everywhere and +the promise of a brighter day! And this great change has been wrought +by the One who brought upon the earth a finer form of spiritual energy +to renew the hearts of men. + +And finally this young man set in the sky of human aspiration a fixed +star of hope. You cannot change the world by scolding it. You cannot +change the world by petting it. You must set before its eyes a vision +of God and in its heart a passion for goodness, and in its will a form +of strength that will not accept defeat, and in its sky a star of hope. + + "Strong Son of God, Immortal Love + Whom we that have not seen Thy face + By faith and faith alone embrace + Believing where we cannot prove." + + +Jesus Christ has done that for us all--"Believing where we cannot +prove!" He has taught us how to hope and to trust and in that sign to +conquer. + +He tasted the whole human situation for every man. He was tempted in +all points like as we are, and tried by those ordeals which culminated +on Calvary. "In this world," He said, "ye shall have tribulation." The +word He used means literally "pressure." Life is not all music and +refreshments. Every honest life must be lived under pressure. It is +compelled to do its work under the steady weight of duty, obligation, +responsibility. It is compelled to fight a good fight in order to keep +its faith and finish its course. + +In the end that is the making of any life. Steam does all its work +under pressure. Turn it loose in the air to go where it will and it +becomes useless. In this world we must live under pressure. But Jesus +bade men face it all undaunted and radiant. He planted in their lives +an eternal hope, "Be of good cheer. I have overcome--you can." + +He knew that His own purposes were entirely right--"I do always those +things that please the Father." He knew that He was strongly +entrenched in the love and confidence of those who knew Him best. He +knew that the great moral order was on His side and that He could +afford to wait for results. In that high confidence He moved ahead as +serene as the sun shining in its strength. "Be of good cheer," He +cried, when He stood within a hundred yards of Calvary. + +His victory was not meant to be exceptional, it was meant to be +representative. It was to be shared and repeated by all those who walk +in fellowship with Him. How much it means when a man is making his way +through some dark forest or climbing some stiff mountainside to find +the faintest sort of a trail. "Other men have passed this way," he +cries, "and what men have done, men can do again." + +Here is a trail of spiritual victory, reaching on and up through all +manner of untoward situations! His own patient, bleeding feet marked +it out and thousands of His faithful followers have traversed it in +their turn. "Who can separate us from the love of Christ? Can +tribulation or distress or persecution or famine, or peril or sword? +Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who +loved us. For I am persuaded that neither life nor death nor angels, +nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, +nor height nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate +us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." + +When the long, hard, dark days come it means everything to a man to +know that there is that within him which cannot go down in final +defeat. His real life, his best life, his enduring life, is hid with +Christ in God, and that life will yet have its way. + +The earth is another place when it is seen to have a sky above it. +This earthly life is another thing when it is seen to have a heaven +above it and beyond it. We are saved by hope, by the hope of life +abundant, life enduring, life eternal, which shines on and on, no +matter how earth's clouds may come and go. + +When all else seems to fail we look up and hear this young man say, +"Let not your heart be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in Me. +In My Father's house are many mansions. If it were not so I would have +told you. I go to prepare a place for you that where I am there ye may +be. Be of good cheer, I have overcome and by My grace you will." + +Here then is my case! Here is my own tribute of loyalty and affection +for that young man who changed the history of the world. He did it by +changing men's thoughts about God--"To us there is but one God, the +Father." He did it by changing men's conception of goodness--to be +good is to be like Him, simple, genuine, spontaneous, in our love and +practice of the right life. He did it by changing the hearts of men +from within--"If any man is in Christ he is a new creature." He did it +by setting in our human sky a fixed star of hope to shine on until the +day dawns and the shadows flee away. + +In the face of it all how can any man of sense and conscience do less +than follow Him and act with Him until His will is done on earth as it +is done in Heaven! + + "If Jesus Christ is a man + And only a man, I say + That of all mankind I cleave to Him + And to Him will I cleave alway. + + "If Jesus Christ be God + And the only God, I swear + I will follow Him through Heaven and Hell, + The earth, the sea, the air." + + + + + +_Printed in the United States of America_ + + + + +BIOGRAPHY AND REMINISCENCES + + +JAMES M. LUDLOW, P.P., Litt.D. + +_Author of "The Captain of the Janizaries," "Deborah," etc._ + + +Along the Friendly Way + +Reminiscences and Impressions. Frontispiece, 12mo, cloth, net + +Dr. Ludlow has observed keenly, and thought wisely and deeply; he has +read extensively, traveled widely, and rubbed elbows and wits with men +great and little of many nations and under varying conditions. He is +the "full man" of which the philosopher speaks. And all these +intellectual and spiritual riches garnered from many harvests he +spreads before the reader in a style that is remarkable for its +felicity of phrasing, the color of its varied imagery, and its humor, +warmth, and human sympathy. + + +HERBERT H. GOWEN, F. R. G. S. + +The Napoleon of the Pacific: Kamehameha the Great + +Illustrated, 12mo, cloth, net + +The history of the great chieftain who, in the closing years of the +eighteenth century, effected the union of the eight islands of the +Hawaiian Archipelago and welded them into a kingdom. Both student and +general reader will find THE NAPOLEON OF THE PACIFIC a richly, stored +mine of deeply interesting information, extremely difficult to come at +in any other form. + + +CLARA E. LAUGHLIN + +Foch the Man + +_New Revised and Enlarged Edition with Additional Illustrations. Net_ + +W. B. McCormick in the _N. Y. Sun_ says: "Miss Laughlin has let nothing +escape her that will throw light on the development of his character. +A revelation of the man who at sixty-seven put the crowning touch to +the complete defeat of Germany's military pretensions." + + +FREDERICK LYNCH, P.P. + +The One Great Society + +A Book of Recollections. 12mo, cloth, net + +Records of some personal reminiscences and recollections of the author, +who, as preacher, editor and prominent member of one or two +international organizations, has met many of the world's prominent men +in the fields of divinity, philanthropy, literature and reform. + + + +THE NEW WORLD ORDER + + +PROF. A. T. ROBERTSON, P.P., LL.D. + +The New Citizenship + +The Christian Facing a New World Order. Net + +"Characterized by the thoroughgoing, wide-reaching scholarship for +which Professor Robertson is internationally noted, but also by his +fine common sense, felicity of diction and strength and beauty of +style. It is a book for busy laymen and book-reading women, as well as +for preachers."--_Baptist World_. + + +GEORGE WOOD ANDERSON + +Problem--or Opportunity? + +Which is it the Church is Now Facing. 12mo, cloth, net + +Mr. Anderson, an evangelist, has seen service with the American boys on +the battle-front, and impelled by his vivid experiences oversea, +addresses himself afresh to the problems and opportunities now facing +the Christian church. A plea for a more devoted working and +application of the program Christ laid out for His followers, to the +clamant needs of humanity at large. + + +C. B. WILLIAMS, Ph.D., P.P. + +Citizens of Two Worlds + +12mo, cloth, net + +"A volume of addresses growing out of the spirit of this new age of +democracy and brotherhood, which speaks to the hearts of struggling men +and women who want to solve the age's economic and social problems by +following the teachings of the Nazarene. Sermons which show how to +reach up to heaven for the dynamic and inspiration to reach down to +earth and help its needy millions."--_Christian Work_. + + +WILLIAM C. SCHAEFFER, P.P. + +The Greater Task + +Studies in Social Service. Cloth, net + +"This author believes that the kingdom of God is coming; that it has +come; that it will continue to come in ever greater and greater power +and glory. He writes with force and illumination, and brings home with +great effectiveness, both to the individual and the Church, the sense +of duty and the broad scope of obligation and opportunity in the +present crisis. A book of real leadership and merit."--_Christian +Guardian_. + + + + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Five Young Men, by Charles Reynolds Brown + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FIVE YOUNG MEN *** + +***** This file should be named 33296-8.txt or 33296-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/3/2/9/33296/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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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: Five Young Men + Messages of Yesterday for the Young Men of To-day + +Author: Charles Reynolds Brown + +Release Date: July 30, 2010 [EBook #33296] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FIVE YOUNG MEN *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +Five Young Men +</H1> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +Messages of Yesterday for<BR> +the Young Men of To-day<BR> +</H3> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +By +</H4> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHARLES REYNOLDS BROWN +</H3> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +<I>Dean of the School of Religion, Yale University</I> +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +NEW YORK CHICAGO TORONTO +</H4> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +Fleming H. Revell Company +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +LONDON AND EDINBURGH +</H4> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +Copyright, 1917, by +<BR> +FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY +</H5> + +<BR><BR> + +<H5 STYLE="margin-left: 30%"> +New York: 158 Fifth Avenue<BR> +Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave.<BR> +London: 21 Paternoster Square<BR> +Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street<BR> +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +<I>To the Young Men</I> +<BR> +<I>of Yale</I> +<BR> +<I>Whose friendship I have highly<BR> +valued and in whose future<BR> +I feel the warmest interest</I><BR> +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +Preface +</H3> + +<P> +These addresses were given in the United Church on the Green, New +Haven, Connecticut, on the Sunday evenings of Lent. The audiences were +made up largely of men, many of them Yale students. I have brought the +addresses together in this little book with the hope that they may have +a certain value in their appeal to a wider audience of young men who in +school and college, in their homes and in business life, are making +those determinations which will decide the issue for them in those +exacting years which are before us. +</P> + +<P> +It has been given to us to live through one of the great crises of the +world's history. In these days the hearts of men are being tried as by +fire. If it is "wood, hay and stubble" that we are putting into our +personal moral structures, into the purposes and methods which rule our +industrial life and into our national temper and fiber, then we may +expect to see our work destroyed. The only qualities which will stand +the test are those qualities which are symbolized by "gold, silver and +precious stones." +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +C. R. B. +<BR><BR> +<I>Yale University.</I> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Contents +</H2> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">I. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap01">THE YOUNG MAN WHO WAS A FAVOURITE SON</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap02">THE YOUNG MAN WHO WAS AN ATHLETE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap03">THE YOUNG MAN WHO BECAME KING</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap04">THE YOUNG MAN WHO WAS BORN TO THE PURPLE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap05">THE YOUNG MAN WHO CHANGED THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +I +</H4> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Young Man Who Was a Favourite Son +</H3> + +<P> +Which would you say is the harder to bear, adversity or prosperity? I +am not sure. If I were a betting man I would not know on which horse +to put my money. +</P> + +<P> +The Bible says, "The destruction of the poor is their poverty." The +narrowness and the meagreness of their lives, the lack of access to the +highest interests seems to drive them oftentimes into the coarser forms +of indulgence which are their undoing. The Bible also says, "It is +easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich +man to enter the Kingdom of God." The millionaire who strives to be +thoroughly Christian in all his attitudes and actions, in the secret +desires which rule his own soul and in the relations he sustains to his +fellow men by reason of his wealth has a hard task. In every great +city you will find the sons of millionaires falling down or flinging +themselves away in thoughtless dissipation where the sons of toil are +standing up and making good. +</P> + +<P> +Here, for example, was a young man who was born on the sunny side of +the street. He was the son of a rich man, and the favourite son. He +was handsome—"It came to pass that Joseph was a goodly person and well +favoured." He was habitually well dressed—"His father gave him a coat +of many colours," which there in the Orient marked him as a young man +of style. He had a vivid imagination and was a good talker. He was a +young man of parts and his story was so interesting to those early +Hebrews that here in the Book of Genesis thirteen full chapters are +given to his personal history. +</P> + +<P> +Let me notice three points in his career—first, his early +unpopularity. You do not have to know Hebrew to understand why he was +not as popular as Santa Claus. He was his father's favourite, which is +a heavy load for any child to bear. He lived in a family where there +were four sets of children. His father had married two wives, Rachel +who was handsome because he loved her, and Leah who was "tender-eyed," +the Scripture says, because she was the daughter of his employer at +that time and it was good business. There were also children who had +been born to the two housemaids, according to the easy customs of that +far-off time and place. Joseph was the son of Rachel, the favourite +wife, and her favourite son. He wore the signs of this parental +popularity in the gay coat of many colours. It was almost inevitable +that he should become vain and overbearing. +</P> + +<P> +He was also a talebearer. He looked down with unconcealed contempt +upon his half-brothers who were the sons of the housemaids. "When +Joseph was with the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah he brought unto his +father their evil report." +</P> + +<P> +The tattler in the school and the squealer on the street come in, +justly perhaps, for the contempt of their fellows. And whatever +allowance may be made for exceptional situations, the instinct which +brands the talebearer as mean is mainly wholesome. It was One who knew +what was in man who said, "Why beholdest thou the mote in thy brother's +eye and considerest not the beam in thine own eye? Judge not that ye +be not judged." It is well for every man to sweep his own dooryard +first before he begins to peddle stories as to the condition of his +neighbour's dooryard. +</P> + +<P> +This young man also had his full share of that conceit which thinks +quite as highly of itself as it ought to think. He had his daydreams, +and this was well. I would not give a fig for the young fellow who +does not see ahead of him masses of possible achievement in his +particular line as high as the Sierras, if not quite so solid. But +Joseph was soft and callow enough to tell his day-dreams to his fellows +before he had done anything to indicate that those dreams might come +true. +</P> + +<P> +He told his brothers that he would be the tallest sheaf in the field +and that they as lesser sheaves would come and make obeisance before +him. He went still further and included his elders and betters in that +general bowing down. He said, "Behold the sun and moon and the eleven +stars made obeisance to me." He saw himself as the centre of the whole +solar system and the rest of his family revolving about him as minor +satellites. This day-dream of the ambitious young man was too much +even for his indulgent father. "And Jacob rebuked him for his dream." +</P> + +<P> +There you have all the necessary ingredients for a family explosion. +When any young man is a favourite son, and a talebearer, and is filled +to the eyes with self-conceit, he has in him the sulphur, the +saltpeter, and the charcoal which enter into the composition of that +sort of gunpowder which is liable to blow him up. You do not wonder +that his brothers hated him. You are not surprised that when they saw +him coming across the fields at Dothan they said with a sneer, "Behold, +the dreamer cometh!" +</P> + +<P> +We might naturally expect that they would conspire against him. They +proposed to see whether or not this conceited young tattler would +become the tallest sheaf in the field and the centre of the whole solar +system there in little Canaan. He had himself to thank for getting in +wrong with his associates. He was not showing the qualities which make +for peace and joy and advancement. +</P> + +<P> +But in the second place he was sent early in life to the school of +adversity. The place where he "prepared" was not much like "The Hill" +or Hotchkiss; it bore no resemblance whatever to Andover or Exeter. He +took all the grades in the commonest of all common schools. He was +under the tuition of struggle and difficulty. He was a Freshman, then +a Sophomore, a Junior and a Senior in the University of Experience, +where the college colours are always "black and blue" because the +lessons are learned by hard knocks. He learned obedience by the things +that he suffered. He had the conceit taken out of him by being knocked +down. He knew the meaning of the word "discipline," so that he could +have spelled it and parsed it forward and backwards and crosswise. +</P> + +<P> +He was tried in these three ways: first, by being sold as a slave boy +into Egypt. His father sent him out to Dothan to see how his brothers +were faring with their flocks. When they saw him coming across the +plain they said, "Behold the dreamer! Let us cast him into a pit and +see what will become of his dreams." +</P> + +<P> +His brothers seized him and threw him into a deep well, where there was +no water, intending to let him die in that horrible way. But when a +company of Ishmaelites came along on their way to Egypt, a happier +thought struck those men. Judah, who was always a thrifty soul, said, +"What profit is it if we slay our brother and conceal his blood?" +There is no money in murder. "Let us sell him to the Ishmaelites." +</P> + +<P> +Here was the proverbial instinct, an eye for the main chance, already +on its feet and doing business in the very childhood of that race, +which has enjoyed such marked success in commercial pursuits. "Let us +sell him and let not our hand be upon him, for"—here emerges Mr. +Pecksniff, who is much older than the time of Dickens—"for he is our +brother and our flesh." His argument was plausible and the men drew +Joseph out of the pit and sold him to the Ishmaelites who carried him +down into Egypt. Now the hands of the ten men were not stained with +innocent blood and they were also twenty pieces of silver to the good. +</P> + +<P> +How human and how modern were the mental processes of those crafty men! +The man who decides to coin his brother's life into money instead of +killing him with an axe has chosen so much milder a form of wrong-doing +that he feels almost virtuous. "Let us not slay our brother"—that has +an atrocious sound. It smacks of the doings of gunmen. Let not our +hand be upon him for he is our flesh! +</P> + +<P> +"But let us sell him"—this is so much more humane! Let us burn out +his energy swiftly in the long hard hours of the steel mill to make our +profits large. When he is exhausted before his time we can scrap him, +flinging him aside to make room for a fresh hand. Let us set the pace +in the factory so sharp that the man in middle life cannot hold it—he +will be compelled to drop out and tramp the streets in search of a job, +while some younger man takes up his work. Let us keep the wages of the +working girl so near the danger line that unless she is splendidly +fortified with moral stamina she may be tempted after she has sold her +days to greed to add to her income by selling her nights to shame. +</P> + +<P> +Let not our hands be stained by the murder of our own flesh and +blood—let us sell them in these more delicate and refined ways to +increase the toll of profits! The voice of Judah is still heard in the +land. There on the plains of Dothan this favourite son fell into the +hands of greed and was sold as a slave boy into the land of Egypt. +</P> + +<P> +He was also tested by the accusations of an evil-minded woman. When +the Ishmaelites disposed of him in Egypt he was purchased by Potiphar, +an officer in Pharaoh's guard. He was made a house servant. He showed +himself diligent and faithful and was advanced until he was the +overseer of Potiphar's whole establishment. +</P> + +<P> +He was a handsome young Hebrew, his complexion being much fairer than +that of the dark-skinned Egyptians. He attracted the attention and won +the admiration of Potiphar's wife, who was an evil-minded, faithless +creature. As Joseph went about the house in the discharge of his +duties she approached him repeatedly with her solicitations to evil. +</P> + +<P> +He did not look her in the eye, as Billy Sunday suggests in his brisk +way, and say, "Nothing doing." He said something infinitely better +than that—"There is none greater in this house than I. My master hath +kept back nothing from me but thee. How then can I do this great +wickedness and sin against God." +</P> + +<P> +He was not one of those men who do in Rome as the Romans do, who do in +New York as Broadway does, even though that may mean a less wholesome +type of conduct than they are accustomed to put up in their home towns. +He was a man of principle wherever he was placed. How can I sin +against God! +</P> + +<P> +Heaven be praised for men of principle and for men who are not afraid! +A well-to-do Harvard student in one of the dormitories was shaving one +morning when a wretched woman of the street slipped into his room +through the door which he had left ajar. She shut the door and with +her back against it said to him, "Give me fifty dollars instantly or I +will scream for help." He looked around at her and said, "Yell +away"—and went on with his shaving. He knew that his own life was +clean. He had lived as a man of integrity and he felt that his +statement would be taken anywhere against hers, because it was worth +one hundred cents on the dollar. And she knew it—so she slunk out +like a whipped cur. If he had compromised with her or had given her a +dollar, he might have been in for endless trouble and disgrace. +</P> + +<P> +But Joseph was not in Cambridge—he was in Egypt. He was not a +well-known Harvard student—he was only a slave boy there in the house +of his master. When this woman whom he had repulsed made her ugly, +lying accusation against him she was believed and he was thrown into +prison. +</P> + +<P> +What indeed has now become of his dreams! He was a stranger in a +strange land. He was a slave who had been jailed on an ugly charge. +He must have felt that he was a long way from becoming the tallest +sheaf in the field or the brightest star in the sky. +</P> + +<P> +He was also tested by the ingratitude of those whom he had befriended. +While he was in jail he did not for one hour give up his hope of +advancement. He kept right on, attending the school of those +instructors whose names are printed in the catalogue as Professor +Adversity, Professor Difficulty and Doctor Discipline. He found them +most capable teachers. They did not teach him much of that which is +found in text-books, but they were teaching him to be a man, which +after all is the main object of all education. +</P> + +<P> +When Joseph was knocked down he did not wait for some Red Cross nurse +to come with "first aid to the injured." He got right up and was there +on the mat ready for the next round. And the young fellow with that +sort of stuff in him learns, I care not how soft, callow and conceited +he may have been in his "prep. school" days. +</P> + +<P> +He was in prison, but since nothing better offered he would show +himself the best prisoner behind those bars. He bore the false +accusation of that lying woman without a word of recrimination lest he +should injure the honour of his master, who had befriended him when he +was in his employ. He spent his days not in laziness nor in vice, not +in repining and dejection. He bore himself with such a thoughtful, +unselfish spirit that he won the favour of the warden and was made a +kind of overseer among the prisoners of his ward. +</P> + +<P> +He won the regard and confidence of his fellow prisoners by his +sympathetic interest in their welfare. When they were perplexed they +came to him. The butler and the baker from Pharaoh's household were +imprisoned for some fault, and when they dreamed Joseph interpreted to +them their dreams in skillful fashion. And when the butler was +pardoned out a few days later, according to Joseph's prediction, he +promised to remember his friend when once more he stood in Pharaoh's +presence. +</P> + +<P> +But after the manner of many he forgot all about his fellow prisoner in +the joy of his own release. Joseph still lingered in jail. How +sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless friend! There +in the jail he drank to the dregs the cup of ingratitude. +</P> + +<P> +But read on, read on! The Lord has not let His voice fall yet. This +is not a period—it is only a comma or semicolon. The mills of the +gods grind slow, but they grind; and to every man who merits it a good +grist comes at last. Read on! +</P> + +<P> +There came a night when Pharaoh dreamed. The monarch saw seven fat +cows come up out of the River Nile, which was the source of all +fertility there in the Delta. Then he saw seven lean cows come up out +of the river and they ate up the seven fat cows and yet remained as +lean and hungry as they had been before. In the morning Pharaoh called +for his wise men and his magicians, but they could make nothing of it. +</P> + +<P> +Then the chief butler remembered his fault. He remembered Joseph who +had interpreted his own dream in yonder prison. He told Pharaoh of +that strange experience, and the monarch promptly sent for this gifted +young Hebrew. "Seest thou a man diligent in his business he shall +stand before kings." Joseph had shown himself diligent in his business +as a servant in the house of Potiphar, and as a prisoner he had made +himself useful to the warden of the jail. Now he is summoned to stand +before the ruler of all the land of Egypt. +</P> + +<P> +He is the same man in name as when he walked across the fields of +Dothan with his heart full of conceit, but how much he has learned! +His coat of many colours has been replaced by the dull gray of the +prison garb. He has acquired new moods and new methods and a finer +quality of manhood. When Pharaoh called upon him to interpret his +strange dream, Joseph replied modestly, "It is not in me. +Interpretations belong to God. And God shall give Pharaoh an answer of +peace." It was in this mood of reverent, expectant awe that he +undertook the interpretation of the monarch's dream. +</P> + +<P> +How character ripens in adversity! Wheat ripens best under smiling, +sunny skies, but the rigorous winter of hardship and struggle is +demanded for the maturing of those fine qualities of mind and heart +which make up character at its best. Men have found by experience that +it is impossible to produce apples of the choicest flavour where there +is no frost. I am quite sure that the best type of human excellence +cannot be secured without frost. "He is testing me," Job said, when +all those troubles fell upon him; "He knows the way that I take and +when He has tried me I shall come forth as gold." +</P> + +<P> +Here was a young man who in early life had been a spoiled child, a +conceited prig, a talebearer among his fellows, but in the hard school +of adversity he had learned to labour and to wait. He could now endure +as seeing One who is invisible. +</P> + +<P> +The law of gravitation never forgets anything, never overlooks +anything. It matters not whether it is a pound of feathers or a ton of +lead or a planet, the power of gravitation is right there attending to +business. If a man falls out of a fifth story window in New York, in +Constantinople, or in Calcutta, the law of gravitation is there and the +man gets hurt. The moral order never forgets anything, never overlooks +anything. What men sow, they reap, though the harvest be long delayed. +If they sow to the flesh, sometime, somewhere they go out with bruised +hands and bleeding hearts to reap corruption. When they sow to the +spirit they will in the same inevitable way reap life eternal. Here at +last the man of purpose and of faith is reaping the results of +discipline bravely met and nobly borne. +</P> + +<P> +This young man owed his ultimate success to the fact that he was a man +of vision. There is a certain fascination in the story of any life +which rises from obscurity to eminence. Whether the path lies from the +log cabin of a rail splitter to the White House, from the lowly work of +the lanyard to the head of victorious armies, or from a pit on the +plains of Dothan to a palace on the banks of the Nile, there is +something in the human heart which responds to the unfolding of such a +life-story. +</P> + +<P> +The Hebrews were happy in relating how men of their race had made their +way up to places of honour at alien courts through the sheer force of +their own personal ability. Here was Joseph coming up out of the +prison house to the right hand of Pharaoh! Here was Daniel preferred +above the other presidents and princes at the court of Darius! Here +was Benjamin Disraeli belonging to a race formerly disfranchised in +England becoming at last Prime Minister of Her Most Christian Majesty +Queen Victoria! Let every man who looks down upon some lowly life +beware lest he despise what God has blessed! +</P> + +<P> +Here was a young man who had vision! He saw things. He did not merely +"look," as would some dog that bays the moon. When he walked across +the plains of Dothan his mind was not altogether upon wool and +mutton—he was already dreaming of high achievement in his future +years. When he was thrown into the pit and sold into slavery his brain +was busy with the stars. When he faced temptation he saw it all with +the eye of faith—how could he do this great wickedness and sin against +God. And when he was confronted with a problem confessedly too hard +for him he lifted up his eyes to the hills from whence cometh help. +"It is not in me. The interpretation of life belongs to God." +</P> + +<P> +He was only seventeen years old when he walked across the fields that +day to the place where his brothers kept their flocks. Now he was +thirty. He had increased in stature, in wisdom and in favour with God +and man. It had taken thirteen long years to add those cubits to his +height, but they had been well spent. The Almighty takes His time in +working out His finer effects. The spoiled child, the censorious +talebearer, the callow, conceited youth must be wrought upon by the +beat and play of human life. When any man has vision and faith there +is a divinity which shapes his ends, rough-hewn though they be by +doting fathers and envious brothers, by false accusers, and by +ungrateful companions. When a man is faced right, all things, no +matter what shape they bear, will ultimately work together for his good. +</P> + +<P> +"A man in whom the spirit of God is"—that was Pharaoh's verdict when +Joseph had skillfully interpreted his dream, indicating that the seven +fat cows coming up out of the Nile meant seven years of plenty in the +land of Egypt, and that the seven lean cows following them and +devouring them meant seven years of famine, which would tax the +resources of Pharaoh's empire in feeding the hungry people. And when +the monarch had listened to the wise words, had sensed the humane +spirit of this young Hebrew, and had seen the look of faith upon his +face, he felt that no other man would be so competent to become High +Commissioner of the Food Supply there in the land of Egypt. Thus +Joseph was set in a place of authority at Pharaoh's right hand. +</P> + +<P> +His dreams are coming true! He had framed his first anticipations out +of sheaves. Then his mind began to be busy with the stars. He was +destined to have a part in preserving the life of his own Hebrew race +and a part in that moral movement which would outlast the stars +themselves. Through all those long hard years which lay between the +pit of Dothan and the palace of Pharaoh, he was sustained by that +vision of things divine which shone perpetually in his sky. +</P> + +<P> +"A man in whom the spirit of God is"—here is the ultimate reason for +every splendid advance! Here is the ultimate reason why any man is +able to rise from those lower levels where wool and mutton are the main +considerations to those higher levels where he becomes a trusted +implement in the hand of God for a service that will endure. +</P> + +<P> +The young man was a man of faith. He had faith in God. He had faith +in his fellows, as he showed when he generously forgave the brothers +who had wronged him, having them as ruler of Egypt utterly in his +power. He had faith in himself because the spirit of God dwelt in his +heart. And it matters not whether it is Egypt or Connecticut, the +eighteenth century before Christ or the twentieth century after Christ, +it is "by faith" that men work righteousness and obtain promises, wax +valiant in fight and beat back the armies of aliens. +</P> + +<P> +In the long run the world belongs to the idealist. The ultimate +shaping of its life is in the hands of the men who walk the busy +streets and dusty lanes with their feet on the ground but with their +heads and their hearts among the stars. The men of vision and faith +sometimes lose a skirmish; now and then they are defeated in a battle; +but when the war is fought through to a finish they are on the winning +side. +</P> + +<P> +Here in this company there may be many a favourite son. You are +inexpressibly dear to the hearts of those parents. Their thoughts, +their prayers and their efforts are all reaching out for the best +things for you. They do not know and you do not know what hard tests +may lie ahead. You too may be sent for thirteen long years to the +school of adversity, but if the spirit of God is in your heart, if you +have faith, a vital and personal faith in Jesus Christ, if you have +caught the vision of what life may be made to mean at its best, then it +lies within your power also to achieve. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H4> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Young Man Who Was an Athlete +</H3> + +<P> +What a roomy place the Bible is! It is not filled up with model men +and women. It is not filled up with nice little boys and girls, all +neat and sweet, good enough to be angels right off with no alterations. +It is peopled with imperfect, blundering folk like ourselves. +</P> + +<P> +Some of these samples of human life are offered to us for our +imitation, and some by way of warning. The wide variety exhibited +shows how God can use and bless the better elements in many a life +where the wheat and the tares grow together until the harvest. The +divine purpose shows an amazing measure of hospitality. "The love of +God is broader than the measure of man's mind." +</P> + +<P> +We come for example to the eleventh chapter of Hebrews. It is the roll +call of men of faith. "By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent +sacrifice than Cain." By faith Enoch was translated that he should not +see death because he walked with God. By faith Noah built an ark for +the saving of his house. By faith Abraham went out to found a nation +in which all the nations of the earth should be blessed, not knowing +whither he went. "By faith Moses chose rather to suffer affliction +with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season." +</P> + +<P> +"And what shall I say more," the author remarks in passing. "Time +would fail me to tell of all the men who by faith subdued kingdoms and +wrought righteousness, obtained promises and put to flight the armies +of evil, Gideon and Barak, Samson and Jephthah." +</P> + +<P> +Samson! The very presence of his name in this catalogue of moral +heroes all but takes away one's breath. What does this big husky +fellow, this wild, fun-loving chap have to do with the working out of +the divine purpose for the race? We are as much surprised as we would +be if we had found Jack Johnson undertaking to preach the Gospel, or +John L. Sullivan trying to be elected as a professor in Princeton +Theological Seminary. Samson as a hero of the faith! Surely this is +"Saul among the prophets." We will be interested in studying the life +of this young man who had the build and the mood of an athlete. +</P> + +<P> +He had in his youth the strength and promise of a mighty man. He +caught a young lion and seizing it by its jaws ripped it apart as an +ordinary man would have rent a kid. He caught up the jaw-bone of an +ass and slew heaps and heaps of his enemies in personal combat. He +carried off the gates of a city and hid them on the top of a hill as if +he had been celebrating Hallowe'en. He would have been the making of +any football team. If he had furnished the forward thrust of a flying +wedge it would have gone through any line that might have stood in its +way. +</P> + +<P> +It would not be easy to draw a hard and fast line here between the +prose and the poetry of these narratives. Something of history and a +great deal of folk-lore undoubtedly are blended in these stirring +tales. There are many passages in the earlier portions of the Bible +which have more value for the history of ideas than for the history of +actual occurrence. They are full of truth though they may not always +conform to sober fact. They are parables rather than records. +</P> + +<P> +But we may be sure that this interesting young giant had something more +than mere physical prowess. He had in him some of the elements of +genuine leadership else he would not have been regarded as a judge and +a leader in Israel, raised up for a great work. The people would never +have woven these stories about his name nor enrolled him among the +moral heroes of their race had he not possessed some of the elements of +real strength. He had in him the sense of power—it is a quality which +all men covet and all women adore. +</P> + +<P> +He had a keen sense of the joy of living. We are glad that the element +of humour was not left out of the Bible. It would not have been so +human, so complete, so unmistakably "the Book of Books" had this been +lacking. I am sure that the Almighty has a sense of humour. He must +have or He never would have created pelicans and monkeys. "He that +sitteth in the heavens shall laugh," we read—and He must have laughed +when He made these curious creatures. He was willing to give this +fun-loving Samson a place on the roster of the Army of the Lord. +</P> + +<P> +Samson stands out on the pages of Scripture as a big, overgrown, +rollicking boy looking upon life as one huge joke. His major study was +to turn the laugh on the dull-witted, slow-going Philistines. He tore +the young lion and when a swarm of bees had made honey in the carcass +Samson made this riddle,—"Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of +the strong came forth sweetness." He propounded his riddle to the +Philistines and made them a bet that they could not guess it. And when +they wheedled the answer to the riddle out of Samson's wife he retorted +upon them in coarse fashion, "If ye had not plowed with my heifer, ye +would not have guessed my riddle." +</P> + +<P> +He carried off the gates of the city of Gaza and hid them. He caught +foxes and tied firebrands to their tails and then turned them loose in +the ripe wheat fields of the Philistines, roaring aloud over the havoc +they made. He slew his enemies with the jaw-bone of an ass and then +made a clever pun (which the Hebrew reveals) upon the name of his +homely weapon. +</P> + +<P> +He was the joker of the pack. Time and again in the days of his power +he was able to take the trick. When he came to die that element of +grim humour was still in his heart. He had lost his strength because +he had slept for a night with his head in the lap of his enemy. His +foes had put out his eyes and had made him to grind as a slave in one +of their mills. Now he was brought as a kind of paid jester to one of +their feasts to make fun for the party. +</P> + +<P> +There in the house of his foes, holding fast to a door-post he prayed +in grim fashion that his former strength might for a moment be renewed, +"that he might be avenged upon his enemies for the loss <I>of one of his +two eyes</I>." He would leave the rest of the account to be settled +later. When he had them roaring with laughter at some of his sallies, +he pulled down the house upon their heads and killed them all, +perishing himself in the disaster. He was full of humour and had a +deep sense of the joy of living. +</P> + +<P> +He was a strange mixture of good and evil. Here was a blend of +weakness and of strength! Here was the baser metal mingled as an +unworthy alloy with much that was fine gold. "Samson got the laugh on +the Philistine men," as William R. Richards said once in Battell +Chapel, "but their sisters avenged themselves on him by making a slave, +a tool, and a fool of him. This old writer tells his story straight on +without stopping to moralize. But where can you find a better sermon +on the need of personal purity? Of the two forms of sin which +especially assail young men, Samson might guard us from one by way of +example, and from the other by way of warning. Touching no wine, for +he was a Nazarite from his birth, he excelled in strength. But placing +his head in the lap of a false woman whose name was Delilah, there came +to him weakness, blindness, the prison house, and the grave." +</P> + +<P> +He refused the cup which cheers and also inebriates, but he gave his +heart and his strength to that alluring enemy of the divine purpose who +ruined him. Where a young man is a physical weakling, then if his mind +is dull and his heart mean, he is at least all of a piece. He is +consistent in his make-up. Where his body is strong as was the body of +this young giant, revealing in every movement of it that joy and vigour +which come with abundance of life, then if his mental and moral life +are weak and thin, there is something tragic in that walking lie. The +outward man promises so much, but the inward man is a wail of +disappointment. +</P> + +<P> +"The Philistines took him," is the terse comment of the writer upon +Samson's unhappy career. But his sins had already taken him captive. +He had become the bond servant of his own passions. He was already a +slave through his lack of self-control. +</P> + +<P> +"The wages of sin is death"—if you doubt it read through to the end +the story of any man who is headed wrong and keeps going in that +direction. You will find the word "Death" written over against his +name in five capital letters. Read the story of this young man who in +his youth was so "strong and sunny," as his name in the original has +it. When you read on you presently find him dead in his eyes, as he +gropes his way about the prison house in the land of the Philistines. +He is dead in his muscles as he weakly turns the wheels of a mill, +which was the work commonly assigned to women in those rude tribes. He +is dead in reputation—the fool and the jester brought in to make sport +at the table of his captors! He is dead in his soul for he is unaware +that the Lord has departed from him. The wages of sin is death. +Whether pay day comes the following Saturday night or at the end of the +year, or in the final outcome, in every case the sorry result will be +the same. +</P> + +<P> +We are compelled to say that Samson's life was a tragedy because he +failed at these three points. He never learned to take life seriously. +The joker is not the best card in the pack, except by an arbitrary +rule—and in all the better games at cards, the joker is thrown out. +When all is said and done, life is serious business. The humour, the +amusement, the recreation are only the sauce on the table to give an +added zest and relish—they are not the roast beef and potatoes. You +cannot live on them nor by them. The man who laughs and laughs loudly +and laughs at everything will have the laugh turned on him. The very +fact that he has never brought his life under the power of a serious, +definite, compelling purpose will cause him to be left far in the rear +by those men who waken up early to the fact that the world is not to be +taken as a joke. +</P> + +<P> +There was a certain joy no doubt in carrying off the gates of Gaza. I +can recall certain episodes on the evening of the thirty-first of +October when the carrying off of the gates of some neighbour seemed to +me to fill the cup of life to the brim. There is a certain joy in +getting a cow up into the pulpit of the College Chapel or into the +belfry of some church on a dark night—the young fellow who has never +helped to solve that problem in physics has missed something. There is +a time to read the paper we call "Life," and to see some man on the +stage who can be as funny as William Collier. Where all these are the +diversions of a mind devoted to serious ends, where they are only the +by-product of human interest, they have a rightful place in our regime. +</P> + +<P> +But their lines are soon spoken, and the stage must be cleared for +those who have something of more moment to tell. "How much do you +really care?" the world is asking. "How ready are you to think +intently upon something which has no more fun in it than a page of +figures or an array of unyielding facts? How far are you ready to bend +all the best energies of body, brain and heart to the gaining of some +worthy end? How completely have you set your heart upon that which is +vital?" Your answer to these questions will in large measure tell the +story of your future achievement. +</P> + +<P> +This young man failed because he had not acquired the habit of +persistence. His big deeds were all done in a hurry, and they were +soon over. He carried off the gates of the city in ten minutes. He +tore the young lion apart in an instant. He slaughtered the +Philistines with the jaw-bone of an ass in less time than I am taking +in telling it. He tied torches to the tails of the foxes and let them +loose in the wheat fields in a careless half hour of thoughtless sport. +You do not find the man binding up a lifetime of effort into a moral +unit by an all-inclusive and dominant intention. He was never ready to +work and to keep on working until achievement of a worthy sort should +crown his effort. +</P> + +<P> +You cannot drive a long nail in to the head by hammering around all +over the board. You must hit the nail on the head and keep on hitting +it on the head until you have sent it home. You cannot sink the shaft +of a mine by digging all around over the mountainside. You must dig in +one place and keep on digging in one place persistently until you have +sunk your shaft to the vein of ore. You cannot build a life that is +worthy to be the life of a child of God unless you gird yourself for +that persistent effort which lies between you and the goal upon which +you have set your heart. It cannot be done in an hour, or in a day, or +in a year. The hard task of presenting to Him a life which will bear +His own eye and win His approval will mortgage the best strength of all +your best years. +</P> + +<P> +You may have the body of an athlete. You may have a mind with splendid +capacity in it for real achievement. You may have a heart which reacts +as promptly as gunpowder when a spark of genuine aspiration is applied +to it. You may have all these—I hope you have—but unless you have +learned the high art of staying by, of holding on, of keeping at it no +matter what comes, you are doomed to defeat. +</P> + +<P> +How often you see a young man of generous impulse, of kindly +disposition, like Esau, faltering and failing as the years come and go +until at last he is little better than a vagabond upon the face of the +earth. How often you find a man of purpose and persistence, like +Jacob, with many an unfortunate trait in him, with a heavy moral +handicap to overcome, finally winning out by the sheer force of his +spiritual tenacity. "Be thou faithful unto death," the promise has it, +"and I will give thee the crown of life." The crown is held in reserve +for those who persist clear through to the end. +</P> + +<P> +This young man failed because he lacked the favour of God. In the +early stages of his career we read of a divine element in his life. +"The woman bare a son and called his name Samson, and the Lord blessed +him. And the spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him" for those +deeds of valour. +</P> + +<P> +However we may interpret these expressions the fact is plain that so +long as he kept his life clean and true he had the sense of divine +reinforcement making him equal to the tasks which fell to his lot. +Then there came a time when by his own actions he forfeited all this. +He became as weak as a rag in the face of temptation, in the presence +of duty, in some great opportunity for valiant effort which opened +before him. And he did not realize how weak he was until he went down +in defeat. "He wist not that the Lord had departed from him." +</P> + +<P> +The spirit of self-indulgence, I care not whether it goes straight for +the coarse sins of the flesh or moves in more refined ways towards the +life of selfish ease and barren culture, will take the iron out of a +man's blood. It will take the vim out of his muscles, the power to +hold fast out of his will. +</P> + +<P> +The man who saves his life for his own personal gratification will soon +find that he has no life to save. That which makes life life is gone. +It is the habit of self-control, the spirit of self-surrender to the +will of God, the purpose of self-dedication to the highest ends in +sight, which puts power into the thrust of each man's effort. +</P> + +<P> +The circular letter which Lord Kitchener, head of the War Office, sent +to every British soldier when the English troops were ordered to the +Continent reads like a classic: +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"You are ordered abroad as a soldier of the King. The honour of the +British Army depends upon your individual conduct. You have a task to +perform which will need courage, energy, and patience. Be on your +guard against excesses. You will find temptation both in women and in +wine. Resist both and do your duty bravely. Fear God. Honour the +King. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +"(Signed) KITCHENER." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Hang those great words up in your mind! Hang the picture of that +strong, stern, brave man in your heart that you too may wear the cross +of honour. +</P> + +<P> +If it is good for men to be sober and clean in war time, why not at all +times? Have we not sore need of these same qualities in the more +exacting pursuits of peace? Every man who is worthy of the name of man +is set to guard some sacred interest, though he carries neither gun nor +sword. +</P> + +<P> +Here is the everlasting fight being waged three hundred and sixty-five +days in the year—and it is waged year in and year out for there is no +discharge in that war—against hunger and cold, against disease and +death, against poverty and crime! Why not have men at their best in +the mill and in the mine, on the farm and in the factory, in the +counting-room and in the places of trade? The armies which are sent +forth to save, to feed, and to clothe men's lives, no less than the +armies of bloodshed have need of the same high discipline. They, too, +are crippled and broken, they are driven back and hurled to defeat by +those moral foes which march under the banner of self-indulgence. +</P> + +<P> +Here is an evil traffic which flaunts its wares in our faces in every +city block where the forces of righteousness have not risen in strength +to cast it out. But we have fallen upon times when the economic forces +are lining up solidly with the verdict of medical science and the power +of religion in a relentless opposition to the use of alcohol as a +beverage. In these days the man who thinks more of his job than he +does of his grog has the floor. +</P> + +<P> +The wise railroad managers know full well that a tippler in the cab of +an engine or at the flagman's post means sooner or later a frightful +accident with loss of property and life. The owners of intricate and +delicate machinery in the great factories know that placing in control +men whose brains have been clogged and drugged with liquor is as +foolish as throwing sand into the ball bearings. "Safety First" means +"Sober First." The taxpayers are becoming no less insistent—they have +learned that the open saloon means added crime and poverty where they +must foot the bills. Decent people have grown tired of cleaning up the +muss and the dirt occasioned by the rum sellers. The moral forces of +the community recognize the fact that the liquor business allies itself +openly with immoralities of every sort. The people are saying in state +after state, in country after country, "Time's up! You have failed to +show your right to be! You will have to go." The habit of indulgence +in that which robs men of strength, of intelligence, of conscience, +finds every good man's hand against it. +</P> + +<P> +We read in this strange story that Samson's strength was in his hair. +When his locks were cut away by the fair and false hand of evil he was +as weak as a woman. +</P> + +<P> +How much of sober history and how much of poetic allegory there may be +in these glowing statements it is not easy to say. But the moral +content of this record is clear. When those slender and delicate lines +of contact which, as he believed according to his vow as a Nazarite, +bound him in loyalty to the source of all strength, were broken, then +his splendid prowess was no more. "It is that little half-inch rim of +the tree where the sap runs up to the sun that makes the tree alive or +dead." However you phrase it in the clearer light of this twentieth +century of ours, guard with all diligence those lines of communication +between your own inner life and the life of God. Maintain within +yourself that faith and hope and love which will bring to you your own +full measure of strength and joy. +</P> + +<P> +The dull, sad picture of this defeated man is not wholly unrelieved by +any brighter touch. When he was shorn of his strength, robbed of his +honour, stained in the quality of his manhood, we read, "Howbeit the +hair of his head began to grow again after he was shorn." +</P> + +<P> +It was only a gleam of hope, but it was a gleam. It was a far-off +promise of that divine redemptive process which has become the basis of +our trust. His claim upon the divine favour and his hold upon the +sources of strength were not utterly forfeited by his acts of +evil-doing. His hair began to grow again and a hope of moral recovery +was begotten in his heart. "If we say we have no sin we deceive +ourselves; but if we confess our sins He is faithful and just to +forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." +</P> + +<P> +Let me close with this plain, straight word of appeal as strong as I +can make it! You need God in your life. You need Him not as a +philosophical belief touching the origin and ground of all finite +existence; not as a mere dogma to be written at the head of your +Confession of Faith; not as a name to be introduced into some liturgy +which you may occasionally employ. You need God as a present, personal +and profound experience. To know Him is to live, and to live well. +</P> + +<P> +It was Phillips Brooks who said once to an audience of Harvard men, +"Here is the last great certainty, be sure of God! By simple, loving +worship, by continual obedience, by keeping yourself pure even as He is +pure, creep close to Him, keep close to Him, and in the end nothing can +overthrow you." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +III +</H4> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Young Man Who Became King +</H3> + +<P> +In some wise way when the door of opportunity opens upon a trying +situation there comes forth a man of sufficient size to perform the +task. When the time is ripe for the Protestant Reformation Martin +Luther is ready and walks in. When the day arrives for Napoleon +Bonaparte to be sent to St. Helena and the peace of Europe restored, +the Duke of Wellington, representing British tenacity, is ready. When +the hour has struck for American slavery to be destroyed by words and +laws and grape-shot, William Lloyd Garrison and Abraham Lincoln and +Ulysses S. Grant are ready. Back of every emergency God waits. He has +His great right hand full of men and when the fullness of time is come +He brings upon the scene His own appointed man. +</P> + +<P> +Here in a very old book is the story of the greatest king that Israel +ever had! The House of Tudor in England, the House of Hohenzollern in +Germany or the late House of the Romanoffs in Russia, never had such a +hold upon the popular imagination and affection as did "the house and +lineage of David" upon the hearts of the Hebrews. The One who was to +be born "King of kings and Lord of lords" to reign forever and ever was +to come from "the house and lineage of David." +</P> + +<P> +But how was this country boy with rough hands and all the marks of toil +upon him to become king? He was no Crown Prince—Jonathan was the +eldest son of the reigning monarch. He was neither the eldest nor the +favourite son of any man. He was the youngest son of a farmer named +Jesse and because he seemed less promising than his older brothers he +had been given the care of the sheep. Anybody with eyes in his head +and feet to walk about can watch sheep. The boy did not seem at first +glance to have his foot on the ladder nor to possess the elements of +royalty. +</P> + +<P> +He became king because he had these five qualities: First of all he +showed fidelity in the ordinary duties of every-day life. Here is the +summing up of his method—"And David behaved himself wisely in all his +ways and the Lord was with him." If a bunch of sheep became his field +of opportunity he would do his work in such fashion that no one could +do it better. He would lead them in green pastures and by still waters +so that they should not want. His rod and his staff would protect +them. He would learn the use of sling and stone so that "he could +sling," as the record says, "at a hair's breadth and not miss." If a +wolf or a bear should attack his flock, he would be able to drive them +off. +</P> + +<P> +The simple ordinary duties which belong to keeping sheep or to getting +one's lessons at school, to meeting one's obligations in some modest +position in office or store, or in doing one's best in a factory or on +a farm, become a kind of dress rehearsal for the larger duties which +lie ahead. If a man knows his lines and can take his part effectively +upon the narrower stage of action he is in line for promotion to a more +important rôle. You will find whole regiments of young fellows who +drag along, scamping their work and slighting those opportunities which +are right at hand. They are saving up their energies to do something +splendidly effective week after next. But week after next never comes +to such men. It is always to-day, and to-day in their eyes seems ever +small. +</P> + +<P> +If those men were already on the quarterdeck as captains of great ocean +liners; if they were already bank presidents sitting in handsome +offices of their own; if they were already journalists of the first +rank writing editorials for metropolitan dailies, they would do what +their hands and their minds found to do with their might. But in this +day of small things they feel that fidelity and skill would be thrown +away. They have mixed up the words of the promise—they think it +reads, "You have been unfaithful over a few things, I will make thee +ruler over everything." When a man is going up-stairs he must put his +foot first on the step which is at the bottom and then take the other +steps in order. The same rule holds in the great business of living a +man's life and doing a man's work in the world. +</P> + +<P> +The young man who was to become king showed courage and high resolve in +the face of danger. There came a day when the Israelites and the +Philistines were lined up in battle array on the opposite sides of a +valley. The Philistines had their champion fighter in the person of a +huge fellow named Goliath. His armour weighed one hundred and fifty +pounds. His spear was like a weaver's beam. He stood roaring out his +defiance against the armies of Israel, "Choose you a man! Let him come +down to me and fight. If he kills me, we will be your servants. If I +prevail against him then ye shall be our servants." +</P> + +<P> +After the manner of the Iliad he stood ready to let the issue of the +campaign turn upon the result of a solitary combat between himself and +any Israelite they might put up against him. Saul, the king of Israel, +had offered to enrich with great wealth the man who would fight that +huge Philistine. He had promised to give him the hand of his own +daughter, the fair young princess, in marriage, and to make his +father's house forever free in Israel. But no Israelite had dared to +fight the terrible Goliath. +</P> + +<P> +Then David appeared upon the scene. He had been sent down by his +father with ten loaves of fresh bread, with ten cheeses and a supply of +parched corn for his brothers who were at the front. He saw this huge +Goliath stalking up and down the picket lines between the armies. He +cried out in his resentment at the apparent cowardice of his own +countrymen, "Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy +the armies of the living God!" David was informed that even the +promise of high reward offered by the king had not induced an Israelite +to face the Philistine. +</P> + +<P> +Then spoke out the voice of faith from the heart of unstained youth! +"Let no man's heart fail because of him—thy servant will go and fight +this Philistine." The king remonstrated with him. He pointed out the +folly of sending an untrained youth to meet the disciplined man of war. +But David insisted that his rough experiences with the lions and the +bears which attacked his flock had furnished him the necessary +training. The king then offered him his own armour, which would +naturally be the best suit of armour in the camp, that the stripling +might in some measure be protected. But after trying on this suit of +mail David put it aside. "I cannot go with these," he said, "for I +have not proved them." He refused the conventional modes of defense, +relying upon those weapons which had been tested by experience. He +took his sling and five smooth stones from the brook and announced that +he was ready for the combat. +</P> + +<P> +It seemed a contest most unequal when the principals were put forth +with the Israelites and the Philistines ranged up on either side of the +valley to watch the outcome. Goliath was enraged when he saw the boy +they had sent against him. "Am I a dog?" he said. And then he cursed +David by all his gods and threatened to feed his flesh to the beasts of +the field before an hour had passed. Like many a modern combatant +Goliath was mighty with his mouth. His tongue was like a weaver's beam. +</P> + +<P> +The young man was not disturbed. His weapons were taken from the +armoury of experience, and his courage came from the same reliable +source. "The Lord who delivered me out of the paws of the lion and the +bear will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine." The moral +triumphs of those early years when a boy keeps his life clean and +strong become the earnest of the larger victories he is set to win in +his mature manhood. The growing boy who disdains to lie or to cheat, +to stain his life with dirt or to show himself a coward, will know how +to bear himself when the harder tests of middle life assail him. +</P> + +<P> +The young man's religious faith contributed to his courage. It was +moral strength pitted against brute force. It was the scornful +self-confidence which trusted in a coat of brass and a huge spear +measuring itself against the spirit of faith which became the source of +a finer form of valour. "Thou comest to me with sword and spear," +David cried, as he saw his foe advancing. "I come to thee in the name +of the Lord of Hosts whom thou hast defied." His trust in God kept his +nerves steady so that he was still able in the presence of that roaring +giant to sling stones at a hair's breadth and not miss. His moral +passion as he went forth to lift that reproach from the banner of his +nation gave strength to his right arm. +</P> + +<P> +The huge Philistine came on, brandishing his spear and roaring out his +wrath. David saw the unprotected spot below the visor of the man's +helmet. He took one of his five smooth stones and slung it with such +force and precision as to strike Goliath full in the forehead, knocking +him senseless. He then ran forward and took the huge sword of his +enemy and cut off his head holding it aloft as a trophy of his courage. +When the Philistines saw their champion fall they fled in terror and +the Israelites pursuing them won a notable victory. +</P> + +<P> +How splendid is the quality of moral courage! How kingly is the man +who can face all manner of danger undaunted because he knows that his +heart is right and his cause is just! He deserves to be crowned. The +battle is the Lord's in the last analysis and He saveth not alone with +sword and spear. +</P> + +<P> +There are sentiments and principles which become deep-rooted in a +nation's life mightier by far than the heaviest battalions. There are +habits of thought and long-cherished convictions which constitute a +more reliable form of defense than all the ramparts and battlements +devised by strategists. A nation of Davids will in the final outcome +outmatch any nation of Goliaths with all their swords and spears. And +in one's personal life the clear conscience and the heart of faith will +bring any man off from any field where he may be sent more than +conqueror through Him who loves us. +</P> + +<P> +This young man showed also a fine capacity for friendship with men. +"His soul was knit with the soul of Jonathan and he loved him as he +loved his own soul." The fine friendship of a man for a man, or the +gracious affection which a woman feels for a woman who is indeed her +friend, becomes a noble form of human relationship. Those ties where +the charm and power of the sex-impulse has no place have in them a +world of moral worth. +</P> + +<P> +It is easy for any man to fall in love with some beautiful woman—it is +as easy as rolling off a log, and ever so much more delightful. It is +easy for any man to inhale the sweet incense which arises from the +devotion of some affectionate woman's heart. But where a man loves a +man in an unsullied, unselfish friendship until his soul is knit with +the soul of that man in an interlacing and interlocking of interest, +then you have that harder, rarer form of human relationship which is +rich with promise. +</P> + +<P> +The young chap who is never quite happy with his fellows, who must +always have some adoring young woman present in order to be content, is +not quite all there. He is a "softy." He is lath and plaster where +there should be quartered oak. He has sentiment than principle; he has +less muscle and more fat than go to the make-up of a virile manhood. +The very absence of the glamour and mystery which enters into all +attachments between those of opposite sex clears the air for the +manifestation of some of those fine forms of fidelity and devotion +which belong to friendship at its best. +</P> + +<P> +Here the friendship was the more notable when we recall how the two men +were placed. Jonathan was the eldest son of the king, the heir to the +throne, the natural successor of Saul. But David by his military +prowess had come to be highly esteemed. When he returned victorious +from his wars against the enemies of Israel the proud and happy women +had sung in the streets, "Saul has slain his thousands, but David has +slain his tens of thousands." And David had been privately anointed by +Samuel the prophet as a worthy candidate for the throne of Israel. +</P> + +<P> +Jonathan, as the Crown Prince, had the least to gain and the most to +lose by protecting the life and ministering to the well-being of this +friend who might one day aspire to the throne. He made his affection a +thing resplendent by its sheer unselfishness. He saw that David might +increase while he would decrease, yet even so the sky of his affection +was unclouded by a single touch of jealousy. How great is that love +which envieth not. +</P> + +<P> +And David in turn made his own adequate response to this magnanimous +interest. He showed himself in his whole bearing a man worthy of the +friendship of a prince of the blood. Heaven be praised for men who can +find joy and satisfaction in the friendship of their fellows. +</P> + +<P> +The young man who was destined to become king was generous to his +enemies. Saul stood head and shoulders above his fellows, physically +speaking, but in his mental and moral stature he was less than +knee-high to the man who followed him upon the throne. When he heard +the women singing David's praises, "Saul was very wroth—the saying +displeased him and he eyed David from that day forward." +</P> + +<P> +When the king saw the fine friendship between his own son Jonathan and +the rising David his heart became as bitter as gall. "Thou son of a +perverse, rebellious woman," he cried to the Crown Prince, "thou hast +chosen this son of Jesse to thine own confusion." And when David +increased year after year in stature, in wisdom, and in favour with God +and men, Saul tried repeatedly to kill him. His soul cried out, "Let +me feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him." +</P> + +<P> +It is not easy for any man, especially a young man with hot, red blood +in his veins and the sense of injustice rankling in his heart, to stand +up in the face of hatred and malice and keep sweet about it. "Love +your enemies. Bless them who curse you. Do good to them that hate +you. Pray for those who despitefully use you." If you are struck upon +the cheek take a second blow upon the other cheek rather than strike +back in resentment. If a man compels you unjustly to go a mile with +him, go two miles rather than seek to be avenged. Take the rules of +action constantly from within, from the best instincts of your own +heart rather than have them furnished to you by the evil behaviour of +wrong-doers. Allow no man's meanness to master you—allow rather your +own nobility to overcome that evil with good. +</P> + +<P> +How easy it is to say it, but to do it—aye, there is the rub! It is +so divinely hard to put these fine principles into practice. The soft +answer may turn away wrath, but the hot retort comes more readily to +the lips. The humane return of good for evil points the way of +spiritual advance, but the desire to pay every man back in his own coin +with a tip thrown in for good measure is often more natural. The more +honour then to the man who has learned that greater is he that ruleth +his own spirit than he that taketh a city. +</P> + +<P> +When David had Saul within his power he refused to strike. There were +months when the young man was hunted through the hills of Judea by the +hirelings of the wicked king, as if he had been a mad dog. There came +a night when Saul was sleeping in his barricade of wagons. He had +around him the three thousand soldiers whom he had led into the +mountains in his mad effort to capture David. The young man had been +pursued until he had felt that there was only a step between him and +death. +</P> + +<P> +That very night, accompanied only by his armour-bearer, David stole +under cover of the darkness into Saul's camp. He presently stood in +the tent of the sleeping giant. Here was his enemy lying helpless at +his feet! His armour-bearer, knowing the history of that enmity, +whispered, "Let me smite him with one blow to the earth! I will not +smite the second time." One blow in the dark would suffice to end that +murderous career. +</P> + +<P> +And it ought to be remembered that this was in a day when "an eye for +an eye and a tooth for a tooth" was the law of the land. It was +esteemed the law of God. The atmosphere was not one of +forbearance—the popular heroes were men like Samson and Gideon, women +like Deborah and Jael, who did not hesitate to strike down their foes. +"Let me smite him," came the whisper in the dark. "One blow will +suffice." +</P> + +<P> +But peace hath her victories no less than war. Mercy has its trophies +no less than force. Here was a man who would not avenge himself—he +would give place unto wrath knowing that vengeance belongs to God. He +was ready to make the bold adventure of undertaking to overcome evil +with good. +</P> + +<P> +David would not strike his enemy even though that enemy had been in hot +pursuit of him. "Destroy him not," he whispered to his +companion-in-arms as he felt him clutching the sword which hung at his +side. David's greatest victory was not over Goliath, the Philistine +giant—it was over himself, over that spirit of revenge which might so +easily have ruled his heart in that dark, hard hour. +</P> + +<P> +He had in splendid measure the quality of mercy which the poet sings. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"The quality of mercy is not strain'd,<BR> +It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven<BR> +Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest;<BR> +It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.<BR> +'Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes<BR> +The throned monarch better than his crown;<BR> +We do pray for mercy,<BR> +And that same prayer doth teach us all to render<BR> +The deeds of mercy."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +We are discovering those qualities which entitled this young man to be +crowned as king. +</P> + +<P> +Finally, he was a man of genuine piety. We read in one place that he +was "a man after God's own heart." The statement has been a puzzle to +many an honest mind. This man who in his later years dipped his hands +in the blood of his foes and fell on one occasion into the grossest sin +with an attractive woman, this fellow a man after God's own heart! +</P> + +<P> +He was not an angel. As we go up and down through history we find men +and not angels. We find men with mud on their boots, with blisters on +their hands, and with scars on their souls. George Washington owned +slaves. John Calvin burned Servetus at the stake. Peter the Apostle +denied his Lord three times in a single night—he denied with an oath. +If you are looking for moral perfection you will have to look somewhere +else than on this earth. +</P> + +<P> +David was a man after God's own heart, not because he never did wrong, +but because when he fell down he got up again. He got up again faced +towards God and not away from Him, faced away from the evil which had +thrown him down and not towards a further advance in wrong-doing. "The +wise make of their moral failures ladders by which they climb towards +Heaven. The foolish make of their moral failures graves wherein they +bury all their highest hopes." +</P> + +<P> +When Oscar Wilde was imprisoned in Reading gaol for his own wretched +wrongdoing he wrote that strangely human document, "De Profundis." It +was a message "out of the depths." In that book he used this striking +sentence which I have never forgotten since the first time I read it, +"The highest moment in a man's career may be the hour when he kneels in +the dust and beats upon his breast and tells all the sins of his life." +</P> + +<P> +"God be merciful to me, a sinner." "Have mercy upon me, O God. +Against Thee have I sinned. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity and +cleanse me from my sin." This is all that any honest man can say in +the presence of his Maker, and when he does say it honestly he is on +his way to the divine favour. +</P> + +<P> +David was a man of faith and of prayer; he was a man of deep, sweet +feeling and of spiritual longing. In all his better moments when he +was truly himself his heart hungered after righteousness and his soul +was athirst for the living God. A man of that moral mood and build is +much more after God's own heart, even though he may upon occasion be +betrayed by the fervour of his nature into wrong-doing, than is the +coldly correct man who has never felt enough of warm-hearted devotion +to anything to raise the spiritual temperature a single degree. +</P> + +<P> +I do not know how many of these Psalms came from the lips or the pen of +David. No one knows—not many in all probability. But I know that +these words represent experiences which were David's beyond a +peradventure. "The Lord is my rock and my fortress, my deliverer and +my saviour. In my distress I called upon Him and He heard me. He drew +me out of many waters and He brought me forth into a large place. +Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life and I +shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever." +</P> + +<P> +He came to the throne at the age of thirty, and he reigned over Israel +for forty years. His name was handed down in human history as that of +the greatest king that Israel ever had. He never could have done it +but for the fact that he had in his heart faith and hope and love +towards God and towards his fellow men. He was a man of deep and +genuine piety. +</P> + +<P> +When William IV of England passed away there was a young girl of +sixteen named Victoria who was spending the night in Kensington Palace. +Word was suddenly brought to her that the King was dead and that she +was Queen of England. She immediately fell upon her knees imploring +divine help and guidance in the discharge of the high duties which had +been thrust upon her. May it not be that this was one secret of her +beneficent reign which lasted for more than sixty years? The rulers +who begin the ascent of their thrones upon their knees rise high +because their eyes are upon that Great White Throne which is the final +seat of all authority and of all blessing. +</P> + +<P> +Here then were the leading traits in that young man who became king! +In his early life when he was nothing but a shepherd boy he showed +fidelity in the ordinary duties of every-day life. He showed courage +and high resolve in the presence of danger. He had a fine capacity for +joyous and enduring friendship with his brother men. He was +great-hearted and magnanimous to his foes, even when he had them +utterly in his power. He was a man of simple, genuine faith in the +living God. +</P> + +<P> +Whether you are living in Palestine or in Connecticut, in the tenth +century before Christ or in the twentieth century after, are not these +the qualities which are sure to be crowned? Are not these the traits +which make any man kingly in his bearing and in the whole content of +his inner life? +</P> + +<P> +Set your hearts upon those traits and make them your own! Fight the +good fight! Keep your faith! Finish your course with honour and you +will find at the end of it laid up for you a crown of righteousness, +which God gives to every man who serves Him aright. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +IV +</H4> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Young Man Who Was Born to the Purple +</H3> + +<P> +"In the year that King Uzziah died"—it was more than a date, it was an +experience! The king had been a wise and good ruler. He had served +his country well for fifty-two long years. He showed an interest in +the welfare of his people—"He loved husbandry and dug wells for them +in the desert." He caused vineyards to be planted on the slopes of +Carmel and he increased the herds of cattle which grazed in the +lowlands. He fortified his capital by building towers at the valley +gate and at the turning of the wall in Jerusalem. +</P> + +<P> +His reign was beneficent, but now he was dead, and this warm-hearted +young patriot felt that his heart was overwhelmed. He and his fellow +citizens must now plan for the future of their county without the +guidance and inspiration of this great king. +</P> + +<P> +But "In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord." There came +something more than a personal experience of disappointment. There +came the emergence of a new and higher form of faith. This young man +saw the earthly majesty of this wise and good king go down in utter +defeat. In some strange way the king contracted leprosy. During all +the closing years of his reign he suffered from the crawling inroads of +that loathsome disease. By the stern requirements of the Jewish law he +was banished from his own capital. He was compelled to live outside +the city and to reign by deputy. He finally died a lingering and +horrible death. +</P> + +<P> +And in that dread hour the young man saw the heavenly majesty of the +King of kings resplendent and enduring. "In the year that King Uzziah +died I saw the Lord, high and lifted up, sitting upon His throne and +His glory filled the temple." The spirit of hero-worship was passing +over into religious faith. +</P> + +<P> +Let me study with you the effect of this crisis in the life of his +nation upon this young man who was born to the purple. He possessed +all those advantages which go with wealth, social position, and +education. We have here no rough man of the hills like Elijah, the +Tishbite, rudely dressed and rude in speech. We have here no man with +the smell of the fields in his garments like Amos, the herdsman of +Tekoa. +</P> + +<P> +Isaiah belonged to the fortunate class. He lived on Fifth Avenue. He +had an assured social position which gave him ready access to the court +and to the presence of the king. He was familiar with the customs and +the costumes of fashionable society, as we find in that chapter where +he openly rebukes the showy extravagance of the idle rich. He was well +educated—he had that literary skill which comes only to those who are +well trained. In all the Old Testament you will find nothing finer +than the sweep and finish of some of this young prophet's public +utterances. He was one to whom five talents had been given where other +men were struggling along with one apiece. He therefore owed to +society what might be called the debt of privilege. It is a fixed +charge upon the lives of those who sit above the salt. It has a right +to insist upon full payment. "To whom much is given, of him will much +be required." +</P> + +<P> +It is for every man to ask himself: "How much do I eat up in my +generous mode of life? How much in food and dress, in housing and +furnishing, in motor cars and yachts, in travel and in recreation? How +much do I consume in those provisions which I make for a wider culture +through books, pictures, music and the like?" What is your average +intake of this world's good things? That measure of consumption will +indicate the measure of your responsibility. If you are born to the +purple and fare sumptuously in all these ways then the world has a +right to demand that you shall render back in corresponding measure +that useful service which is your plain duty. +</P> + +<P> +In that effective cartoon which Jesus drew of the Rich Man and Lazarus, +it was the unpaid debt of privilege which brought about the loss of a +soul. Jesus showed the two men in this world, one of them living in a +palace, clothed with purple and fine linen, faring sumptuously every +day; the other in rags dying at the Rich Man's gate, hungry and full of +sores. Then Jesus showed the two men in the next world, Lazarus the +beggar now in Abraham's bosom, and the son of good fortune enduring +torment. +</P> + +<P> +There is no hint that the Rich Man had gained a penny of his wealth +wrongfully; no charge of lying or theft, of murder or adultery is laid +at his door. He was damned not by the wicked things he had done, but +for the lack of that generous and humane service which he had left +undone. His sin was that of selfish indifference. The way to +perdition is paved with moral neglect. The debt of privilege can no +more be escaped than death or taxes. To whom much is given, of him +will much be required. And a full sense of that responsibility was +brought home to this well-endowed young man in the year the great king +died. +</P> + +<P> +The fortunate young man stood out in the open confessing his sense of +moral need. There in the place of worship in that high and serious +mood which followed upon the death of the king, he caught a fresh +vision of God. "I saw the Lord high and lifted up, sitting upon His +throne. I saw Him surrounded with the winged seraphs. And one of them +cried to another, Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts! The whole +earth is full of His glory." +</P> + +<P> +The very sight of the unstained purity of Him "unto whom all hearts are +open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid," brought +this young man to his knees. He knelt in the dust and beat upon his +breast and told the sins of his life. "Woe is me, I am undone. I am a +man of unclean lips. I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. +And mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." +</P> + +<P> +The man who has no sense of sin has little sense of any sort. If we +say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves or else we lie. Where is the +man who can stand up in the presence of those who know him and say, +"Every deed that I have done was done in honour and integrity. Every +word that has fallen from my lips has been spoken in truth and in +kindliness. Every desire which I have harboured in my soul has been +one upon which the eye of my Maker might rest with approval." +</P> + +<P> +Can you say that? I am frank to confess that I cannot. I have done +wrong. I feel my need of the divine mercy. I want forgiveness, +cleansing and renewal. And every man who is honest enough to look +himself in the face, without flinching, will be moved to make the same +confession. It is up out of those moments of contrition when men are +humbled and broken before God that the spiritual impulses come which +are to beat back the forces of evil and make this earth at last as fair +as the sky. +</P> + +<P> +I care not what the man's outward station may be—he may live on the +Avenue or he may live in the slums; he may be clothed in purple or he +may be dressed in rags; he wear a Phi Beta Kappa key or he may be so +untaught that he has to make his mark when he signs a mortgage—in any +event here is a prayer which will fit his lips—it fits every pair of +lips: "God be merciful to me, a sinner." +</P> + +<P> +In that one brief sentence we have the four main terms of religious +experience. "God," the object of religion, the ground of all finite +existence, the basis of all our hope! "Me," the human soul, the +subject of religion, the field where the work of religion is to be +wrought out! "Sin," the obstacle to religion, the source of all our +moral failure, the cause of our alienation from God! And "mercy," the +agent of religion, the form of energy which accomplishes our recovery! +God be merciful to me, a sinner. +</P> + +<P> +This young man of good fortune stood up in the temple in the presence +of his fellows making his open confession of moral need. "Woe is me +for I am undone. I am a man of unclean lips." +</P> + +<P> +In that very hour when this honest confession came from his lips his +life was cleansed by the direct action of the divine spirit. He saw +one of the winged seraphs flying towards him through the open spaces of +Heaven. The angel took a live coal from the altar and laid it upon the +lips of this young man. He cried out as he did it, saying, "Thine +iniquity is taken away. Thy sin is purged." Isaiah was no more a man +of unclean lips—he could now speak with that Lord whose name is Holy +as friend speaks with friend. +</P> + +<P> +We have this profound moral experience dressed up in those grand, +Oriental robes which were dear to the people of that region. But when +you strip away the silk, the lace, and the feathers of Eastern imagery, +and get down to the bare, warm truth, this is what you find—a man +whose sense of moral lack had prompted that open confession, cleansed +in that high hour by the direct action of the divine spirit upon his +soul. +</P> + +<P> +Here is that which is basic and fundamental in all religious life! I +wonder if we have not been tempted in recent years to obscure this +vital experience. We have held those two big words, "Heredity" and +"Environment," so close to our eyes as to blind us, oftentimes, to the +larger vision of that which is superhuman in earthly experience. +</P> + +<P> +It is possible for the inner life of a man to be so wrought upon by the +action of the spirit of God that the corrupt nature is cleansed, the +weak nature is made strong, the selfish disposition is transformed into +benign love. +</P> + +<P> +It matters little how you go about it, if you go with sincere faith. +You may seek for that renewal through the regenerating influence of the +Sacraments dear to the heart of the Romanist and the High Churchman. +If you find it there, it will be because Christ is within the +Sacrament. You may seek for it in those profound emotional reactions +which come at the Methodist mourners' bench. If you find it there, it +will be because the spirit of Christ was operating through those +feelings. You may find it as you make an about face, turning away from +that which is evil and making Christian duty your supreme choice in the +quiet of your own room. If you find it there, it will be because +Christ was present in those movements of your inner life. The woman +was healed in the Gospel story by touching the hem of Christ's garment +because Christ was within that garment. +</P> + +<P> +If any man will seek for moral renewal at the hands of God he will +find. If he will knock at any one of these doors it will open. Here +is the Gospel as it stands recorded on the pages of the Old +Testament—"The spirit of the Lord shall come upon thee and thou shall +be turned into another man." Here is the same Gospel as it stands +recorded on the pages of the New Testament—"If any man is in Christ he +is a new creature. Old things are passed away and all things are +become new." +</P> + +<P> +In the joy of moral renewal this well-born, well-reared, well-trained +young man gave himself in eager consecration to the highest he saw. "I +heard the voice of the Lord say, Whom shall I send? Who will go for +us? Then said I, Here am I, send me." +</P> + +<P> +His nation, now robbed of its great king by the hand of disease, was +facing a crisis. The national church to which he belonged was steeped +in formalism and insincerity. The divine voice was uttering a +heartfelt lament over the unfaithfulness of the chosen people. "Israel +doth not know! My people do not think. The whole head is sick and the +whole heart is faint." +</P> + +<P> +There was a loud cry for men of large build with wise heads and sound +hearts to furnish moral leadership. And in the face of that demand +this son of good fortune did not allow the divine spirit to go out into +the highways and hedges in order to compel some sort of man, any sort +of man, to come in that the ranks might be filled. He answered to his +name with a clear-cut consecration of himself. "Here am I, send me." +</P> + +<P> +When war comes to any country, there are rich men who give money, +millions of it, that the war chest may be full. There are great +manufacturers who promptly place their plants at the disposal of the +government for the making of munitions. There are ship owners who turn +over their vessels to the Navy that they may be sent to do business in +the great waters of national defense. There are wise men who think +hard upon the problems of finance and statecraft that they may provide +that counsel which is more precious than rubies. All this is in the +highest degree praiseworthy. +</P> + +<P> +But the only men who give what Lincoln called at Gettysburg "the last +full measure of devotion" are the men who give themselves. These men +do not go on horseback nor in automobiles. They walk. They eat the +hardtack. They sleep on the ground. They dig the trenches and fight +in them. They march out at the word of command to be shot at. They +keep right on doing those plain things until the war is ended and +victory achieved. These are the men who awaken our warmest feeling of +admiration and gratitude. "Here am I, send me"—nothing can take the +place of that! +</P> + +<P> +In that sterner war where there is no discharge, in that age-long, +world-wide fight against the evils of earth this same sound principle +holds. Money is needed; counsel is needed; organization and +administrative ability are needed. The bringing in of that kingdom +which is not meat and drink, nor shot and shell, but righteousness and +peace and joy in the divine spirit, requires all these fine forms of +effort. But nothing can ever take the place of that personal +consecration of each man's own soul to the service of the living God. +</P> + +<P> +In that high hour when Isaiah saw the God of things as they are, high +and lifted up, sitting on His throne, he did not say, "Here are any +number of fine people, send them. Here is a man who could perform the +task better than I—send him." He said what every man must say who +means to stand right in the Day of Judgment, "Here am I, send me." +</P> + +<P> +He was the son of good fortune, and his life was bright and rich with +many an advantage. But this did not prompt him to claim any sort of +exemption from the call for volunteers. His vision of the awful +difference between the earthly majesty of that king who sank so swiftly +into a leper's grave and the heavenly majesty which rose above it +sovereign and eternal, made him feel that nothing would suffice but the +gift of himself. +</P> + +<P> +What shall it profit a man, this man, that man, any man, to gain the +largest measure of earthly success you may choose to name, if in the +process he loses himself, his real self, his best self, his enduring +self? What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world, but feels +within himself a capacity for higher things unrealized? In the great +outcome nothing really matters save the devotion of the personal life +to the highest ends. +</P> + +<P> +In the year 1840 near the city of Louvain a child was born, who came of +good stuff. He was educated for a business career, and there in +prosperous little Belgium the outlook at that time for wealth, for +social position, and for a life of joy was very bright. But at the age +of eighteen this boy offered himself for the priesthood of the Roman +Catholic Church. He joined the Society of the Sacred Heart. He went +out to the Hawaiian Islands as a missionary and was ordained as a +priest in the city of Honolulu. +</P> + +<P> +He was at once impressed with the sad condition of the leper settlement +on the island of Molokai. He resolved to give his life to those poor, +diseased, horror-stricken people. He knew that to live among them +would mean banishment from his ordinary associations and the loss of +all possible preferment in the church. He knew that he might himself +contract that terrible disease and suffer a lingering, painful, +frightful death. "No matter," he cried, "I am going." And he went. +</P> + +<P> +He not only preached to those lepers the Gospel of the Son of God and +ministered to them in spiritual things—his own labours and his appeals +to the Hawaiian government secured for them better dwellings, an +improved water supply, and a more generous provisioning of the unhappy +settlement. For five years he worked alone, but for the occasional +assistance of a priest who came to the colony for a single day. He +finally succumbed to the dread disease of leprosy and in his +forty-ninth year died a martyr to humane devotion. His name was Father +Damien, and he shed fresh luster upon the Christian ministry. +</P> + +<P> +The young man who was born to the purple, called now to be a prophet of +God, seized upon the vital elements of religion and uttered them with +power. "What does it mean to be religious?" men were asking. Some of +the dull, blind priests of that day were saying, "It means sacrifice +and burnt offering. It means the careful and showy observance of the +forms of worship." Israel did not know; the people did not think. +</P> + +<P> +Then this young prophet gave them the word of God with an edge on it. +He showed them the folly of all those outward signs of devotion apart +from the inward spirit of righteousness. "To what purpose is the +multitude of your sacrifices? Who hath required this at your hands? +When you spread forth your hands I will hide my eyes. When you make +many prayers I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood. Wash you, +make you clean. Put away the evil of your doings. Cease to do evil, +learn to do well. Then though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be +white as snow." +</P> + +<P> +"Salvation by righteousness—this is the message of the Old Testament," +Matthew Arnold used to say. "Righteousness through Jesus Christ," this +is the message of the New Testament! And this nineteenth century man +of letters was but echoing the words which fell from the lips of those +prophets in the eighth century before Christ. +</P> + +<P> +"Wherewith shall I come before the Lord?" said Micah. "Will the Lord +be pleased with a thousand rams or with ten thousand rivers of oil? He +hath showed thee, O man, what is good, and what doth the Lord require +of thee but to do justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with thy +God." +</P> + +<P> +"Seek justice," Isaiah said; "relieve the oppressed, judge the +fatherless, plead for the widow. If ye be willing and obedient ye +shall eat the good of the land. If ye refuse and rebel ye shall be +devoured." This was the heart of his message. It was the call of God +to personal righteousness. +</P> + +<P> +He represents the Almighty as sitting upon the throne of the universe, +summoning His people into friendly conference with Him. "Come now, let +us reason together, saith the Lord." Religion is not a thing of magic. +There is no sleight-of-hand or hocus-pocus in the benefits it seeks to +confer. Religion is rational and moral. It is a reasoned form of +intercourse between an intelligent and moral being who is finite and +the Intelligent and Moral Being who is Infinite. Its benefits are to +be realized in that direct impress of the spirit of God upon the soul +of the man who has made an intelligent and honest approach to his Maker. +</P> + +<P> +The young prophet saw his country threatened with disaster from both +sides. He saw upon the south the selfish and cruel designs of Egypt. +He saw the encroachments of mighty Assyria from the north. He saw the +madness of those Israelites who thought they could combine wickedness +and worship, the observance of religious forms with lives of moral +unconcern. And in that hour the truths he lifted before them were "The +majesty and authority of God, the everlasting obligation of personal +righteousness, the certainty of the ultimate triumph of God's Kingdom +over the wrath of man." These were the mighty truths by which he +sought to inspire the hearts of men to do their duty, come what might. +</P> + +<P> +Have we not great need at this very hour of just such men! It has been +given to you and to me to live through one of the great, searching +crises of human history. The world has never seen a struggle so +gigantic. We have been patient for more than two years with a certain +nation across the sea—patient clear up to the border of what has +seemed to some of our neighbours like a lazy acquiescence in +lawlessness. We have seen that nation referring contemptuously to her +own treaties as mere scraps of paper, and then openly disregarding her +solemn obligations. +</P> + +<P> +We saw the outrage perpetrated upon Belgium, an outrage which men who +know their histories better than I know mine are saying will go down as +the greatest crime in the annals of the race. We saw the drowning of +hundreds of helpless women and children in the sinking of the +<I>Lusitania</I> without warning and in flat defiance of international law. +We saw the judicial murder of women like Edith Cavell and of men like +Captain Fryatt. We have seen the Zeppelins engaged in the dastardly +business of hurling down bombs upon unfortified towns for the killing +of old women and little children—heretofore when decent nations have +gone to war men have fought with men. We have seen thousands of +helpless Armenians butchered by the Moslem allies of that so-called +Christian power,—it is all but universally believed, with its own +connivance and under its direction. We have witnessed a frightful +record of brutality and outrage, investigated and established by the +competent testimony of such men as James Bryce and Cardinal Mercier. +We have seen the sinking of hospital ships loaded with wounded men and +the sinking of relief ships carrying provisions to the famine-stricken +children of Belgium, no matter what flag they flew, or what cargo they +bore. +</P> + +<P> +We have had our own rights as a neutral trampled upon by that +government with the arrogant assumption that her necessities knew no +law. And now to crown it all we have detected the official +representatives of that country with protests of friendship upon their +false lips actually plotting with Mexico and seeking to extend that +plot to Japan with the unholy purpose of destroying the peace between +this country and its neighbours. +</P> + +<P> +The men of our country who have red blood in their veins and the sense +of justice in their hearts are saying, "How long, O Lord, how long!" +War is a terrible thing and no honest man ever speaks lightly of war. +But there are things which are worse than war. The loss of all +capacity for moral indignation is worse. The easy, lazy, cowardly +acquiescence in lawlessness and crime is worse. The loss of the +readiness to sacrifice one's very life, if need be, for those ends +which are just and right, is infinitely worse. +</P> + +<P> +There are interests which are worth fighting for and, if need be, they +are worth dying for. The sanctity of womanhood and the safety of +little children, the security of those interests which are essential to +human well-being and the protection of our homes, the honour and +integrity of our country, and the maintenance of those majestic +principles of righteousness which underlie all social advance—these +ends are worth dying for. If these high ends can be secured by +persuasion and moral appeal, well and good. But if they cannot, if +their very existence is threatened by lawlessness and hate, then let +men of sound mind and honest heart stand ready to do battle for the +right. +</P> + +<P> +In these hours of stress which have come upon our country, we have need +of men who possess the necessary moral courage to stand forth and meet +the crisis. There is a loud call everywhere for those who are prepared +to face duty without flinching. It is for every man to say touching +his own measure of ability, "Here am I, send me." +</P> + +<P> +If the cause of democracy is not to fail in those hard years which will +come at the close of this war, there is need not only of wise and +honest leaders—there is need of ranks upon ranks of plain men who are +ready to give their best strength to the service of that government +which is "of the people, for the people, and by the people." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"O beautiful, my country, ours once more,<BR> +What were our lives without thee;<BR> +What all our lives to save thee.<BR> +We reck not what we give thee,<BR> +We will not dare to doubt thee,<BR> +But ask whatever else and we will dare."<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +V +</H4> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Young Man Who Changed the <BR> +History of the World +</H3> + +<P> +Why do you write it 1917? "April 1, 1917," that was the way you wrote +it this afternoon in your letter to her. +</P> + +<P> +There was a time when it was not so. The Hebrews were dating their +calendars from what they supposed to have been the period of the +creation. The Romans reckoned their time from the founding of the city +on the seven hills. The Greeks reckoned their time from the first +Olympic games. +</P> + +<P> +But to-day if you meet a Hebrew, or an Italian, or a Greek in any part +of the world and ask him, "What year is it?" he will reply instantly, +"Nineteen seventeen." It is just that long since a certain Child was +born in Bethlehem of Judea. +</P> + +<P> +How strange it is, when you come to think of it, that the birth of a +child in an out-of-the-way village in Palestine should change the +calendars of the world! We find in this commonplace fact a prophecy of +His radical transforming power in every department of life. He was +destined to take the moral government of the race upon His shoulder as +none other ever has. He was to alter the flow of the spiritual +currents in human society and ultimately to change the history of the +world. +</P> + +<P> +He did it all while He was still a young man. He was only thirty-three +years old when they put Him to death upon the Cross. He had used +thirty of those thirty-three years in quiet preparation for the great +tasks which were to come. No wonder the three years of which we know +so much were mighty when we think of the thirty years of preparation +standing behind them! Ten years of training and discipline for one of +public action! Ten days of study and devotion for one day of healing, +redemptive effort! Ten hours of silence and prayer before God for one +hour of speech in the ears of men! +</P> + +<P> +He did it all in His youth and when He died at the age of thirty-three +He did not look down and say, "I have failed because My life is cut off +all too soon." He looked up and said, "I have finished the work which +Thou gavest Me to do." +</P> + +<P> +How marvellous was the life of this young man who changed the history +of the world! If we could get away from the idea that He is a +stained-glass window or a marble statue or a lovely story in a book +which most men seldom read—if we could only see Him as He was, the +Word made flesh, real, warm, alive, our hearts would leap. +</P> + +<P> +He was born in the manger of a stable. He grew up in a carpenter's +home and in a carpenter's shop. He never saw the inside of a college, +yet somehow He learned to think straight and to speak as never man +spake. He lived with the birds and the flowers, the trees, the hills +and the stars. He thought deeply upon the interests and needs of men +until He knew what was in man and needed not that any should tell +Him—He told them. He looked up with pure eyes and a pure heart until +He saw God. Therefore, when He spoke His word was with power; and when +He lived His life was with power; and when He stretched forth His hand, +His touch had healing in it. +</P> + +<P> +His mind was exceedingly broad. He had never been outside the borders +of His own little country, which is about the size of the State of New +Hampshire. He had never seen the mighty cities in Egypt to the south +of Him, nor Antioch in Syria to the north. He had never looked upon +Athens nor upon Rome. The man who thinks Broadway, New York, is the +center of the solar system would have called Him provincial. His feet +knew nothing save the narrow streets of Jerusalem and the still +narrower lanes of Galilee. +</P> + +<P> +Yet He moved about with a dream of world-wide empire in His head and +the vision of a Kingdom Everlasting in His heart. "I, if I be lifted +up, will draw all men unto Me." When He sent forth His disciples to do +the work He had taught them to do, this is the way their commission +read: "Go into all the world. Make disciples of all nations. Baptize +everybody into My name and the name of the Father." He had +courage—think of His standing there, a young peasant in little +Palestine, talking about a world-wide empire over which He would rule +by His own unseen spirit! +</P> + +<P> +He found little in His environment to add strength to His hope. He +lived under a government which was tyrannical and corrupt. The Jewish +Church to which He belonged was formal and lifeless. He faced a +society which was ruled by men like Herod, and by women like the +shameless wife of Herod, who cut off a poor man's head for telling her +the truth about herself. He saw the religious leaders of His day +straining at gnats of difficulty in their formal worship and then +swallowing camels of moral fault in their every-day conduct. The +situation might well have frightened the boldest heart. It never +frightened Him. "The spirit of the Lord is upon Me," He said at the +beginning of His ministry, "because He hath anointed Me to preach good +tidings to the poor; He hath sent Me to bind up the broken-hearted, to +preach deliverance to the captive, and to set at liberty them that are +bruised." And when He came to the close of His ministry, He said, +"Behold, I make all things new, a new heaven and a new earth, wherein +dwelleth righteousness." He was undaunted. +</P> + +<P> +He was an optimist. By that I do not mean one of those silly, +short-sighted individuals who goes about saying, "Look always on the +bright side." Jesus looked at both sides. He went about with His eyes +open. He saw everything. He saw the struggle and the sorrow of human +life and felt it as if it had been all His own. He looked upon the +tired, sad, sin-stained face of the race. He knew it as He knew His +own face, and He saw the heart of pain which had made it so. He was no +schoolboy shouting himself hoarse in a thoughtless enthusiasm which had +never tested its strength against the graver difficulties of life. He +saw it all, felt it all, understood it all, yet He lived and died in a +great, sweet, serene hope for the race. You cannot find one hateful, +cynical or despairing word falling from His lips. +</P> + +<P> +He stood once where the shadow of the Cross was already drawing a black +line across His path. He had twelve disciples to whom for the past two +years He had given the best part of His time, His thought and His love. +One of them had already betrayed Him, bargaining away his poor measure +of loyalty for thirty pieces of silver. In the next hour another +disciple would deny Him three times over with an oath. Another would +doubt Him straight in the face of all those pledges of genuineness +which they had received at first hand. And when the hour of trial +struck His disciples would all show themselves cowards and quitters. +</P> + +<P> +Even so, this young man did not despair. "Be of good cheer," He cried. +"I have overcome the world." He was speaking in anticipation, but He +was so sure of it that He used the past tense as of a thing +accomplished. "I have overcome the world." He had kindled a fire +which would never go out. He had lodged a bit of yeast in the heart of +the race which would finally leaven the whole lump. He had saturated a +few men with His ideas and spirit, and they would set in motion a +process which one day would cause every knee to bow before Him and +every tongue to confess that He is Lord. +</P> + +<P> +He was to change the history of the world—how did He go about it? In +the first place He changed men's thoughts about God. Men are +influenced by their environment—they are transformed by the renewing +of their minds. They are moulded by the thoughts they think and the +desires they cherish. As a man thinketh in his heart touching the +things that matter, so he becomes. +</P> + +<P> +This is true as regards all our prevailing habits of mind, but the +potency of right thought is to be found at its best when we come to a +man's thought of God. How shall we think about ultimate reality? What +is behind all these changing, passing phenomena? Who is back of it +all? Is anybody? If so, is he wise or blind? Is he good or evil or +morally indifferent? Does he mean anything by it all, or is he only an +unreasoning, purposeless force? You cannot ask yourself or your +fellows a more important question than this—"How shall we think about +God?" +</P> + +<P> +Men had been filling their minds with all sorts of wild and foolish +guesses about God. This young man placed upon the lips of the race and +within its heart that great word "Father." "When ye pray say, 'Our +Father.'" Begin with those words on your lips, with that thought in +your mind and with the filial spirit in your heart. When you worship +"Worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father seeketh such +to worship Him." When you would turn away from the evil of your life +say, "I will arise and go to my Father." When you want assurance say, +"No man can pluck me out of my Father's hand." When you come to die +say, "Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit." Death is the act of +a tired child falling back into the arms of his Father. He showed us +the Father and it sufficed us. +</P> + +<P> +This great truth was the heart of this young man's message to the +race—God is our Father. God combines the strength and the tenderness, +the authority and the devotion, the responsible control and the +capacity for self-sacrifice which belong to fatherhood at its best. +Take the highest you have ever seen in fatherhood and raise it to the +<I>nth</I> power, and then trust that, for that is God. +</P> + +<P> +How many of you believe that? It is the easiest thing in the world to +say, "I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and earth," +but do you really believe it? Are you striving to live it? If God is +your Father, then you are His children, heirs of God, joint heirs with +Jesus Christ! Your interests are His interests. Your life and His +life, your destiny and His destiny, are not things apart—they are all +one. +</P> + +<P> +In the light of that great overarching, underlying, interpenetrating +truth, there is no duty more commanding, no privilege more resplendent +than that of living daily and hourly in the filial spirit before Him. +When a man really believes that, he goes about saying by word and by +deed, "I am not alone, the Father is with me. I come not to do my own +will, but the will of Him who sent me. I must be about my Father's +business." When that great sublime truth is set within the heart of +the race, as it was set within the heart of this young man, it changes +the history of the world. +</P> + +<P> +He also changed men's thoughts about goodness. What does it mean to be +good? When may we call any man good? There were men who felt that +being good meant obeying the law, keeping the rules, ordering one's +life in accordance with the endless specifications outlined in the +Sacred Books. If a man could get through the day without having gotten +off the path for an inch, then he might be esteemed good. And the race +groaned under the burdens which this system had bound upon the +consciences of men. It was all outward, formal, mechanical, impossible. +</P> + +<P> +Jesus set Himself against that whole conception and method of goodness. +"Except your righteousness exceeds that," He said to the men of His +day, "you will not in any wise enter the Kingdom of Heaven." Goodness +must be inward, vital, spontaneous. A good tree brings forth good +fruit. It cannot otherwise. It does it as naturally as a bird sings. +Therefore, make the tree good and let the fruit come as it will—it +will be all right. A good man out of the good treasure of his heart +brings forth good deeds. He does it spontaneously. Therefore, make +the heart right and let the man do as he pleases. Love God with an +honest heart and love your neighbours as well as yourself, and then do +as you like. Love works no ill, either Godward or manward; therefore, +love is the fulfilling of all law. Here is the great underlying +principle of all righteousness to which all our ethical considerations +must be adjusted. As men rise from the practice of keeping outward +rules into the more exacting but more joyous liberty of the spirit, +they become genuinely good. +</P> + +<P> +In the third place Jesus put within our reach a power which would +change our hearts. If you are made as I am, and as I have found +hundreds of other men, you feel oftentimes that your life is weak and +thin and mean. You do not love God with an honest heart and strive to +be what He would have you. You do not love your neighbours as you +ought, and give expression to that love in unselfish action. You lag +back when you ought to be forging ahead. You lie down where you ought +to climb. You muddle along in a dull, commonplace way when your +aspirations and your high resolves should be mounting up with wings +like eagles. +</P> + +<P> +When you are frankly honest with yourself you say, as I have said to +myself, and as Paul said before us, "The good that I would I do not, +and the evil that I would not, that I do. O wretched man that I am, +who shall deliver me!" +</P> + +<P> +Here was One who knew that men are weak and thin and mean, yet He +believed that every one of them through faith in Him could have a life +strong and rich and fine, He actually believed that men who have bumped +their way clear down to the bottom of the moral stairs could climb up +again. He believed that the woman of the street, whom the bigots of +that day were ready to stone, could "go and sin no more," her sins +forgiven because she loved much. +</P> + +<P> +The publicans and harlots would go into the Kingdom—they would go in, +Jesus said, ahead of some of those respectable, cold-hearted Pharisees +who were scandalized at such talk. He knew the capacity for moral +renewal which lies in waiting in every heart, and He knew His own power +to call that capacity into effective action. "I am the door," He said, +"to newness of life. By Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved. He +shall go in and out and find pasture." Security, liberty, sustenance, +they would all be his! +</P> + +<P> +My mind goes back to a man in one of my former parishes. He kept a +little store, but he neglected his business in order to get drunk. The +wolf was often at his door. He had a good wife and two lovely +daughters, but he had broken their hearts by his evil ways. He would +become so intoxicated that he would not know his own name nor the +street he lived on. When he was coming out of such debauches he would +go about dirty, blear-eyed, trembling, asking every man he met to give +him money to get another drink. +</P> + +<P> +Then there came a day when that man's heredity was not changed, his +environment was not changed, but his heart was changed. He put his +faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and was turned into another man. He +became at once sober, reliable, industrious, affectionate, aspiring. +He put a smile on his wife's face which is there yet. He began to take +care of his store and of his family. He became an honoured and useful +citizen, chosen to positions of trust by his fellow men. He has now +gone to his reward, but if he hears what I am saying he would tell you +that it is all true. He would tell you also that he owed this change +to the transforming power of the Son of God, the Saviour of men. +</P> + +<P> +How the world changes and for the better! When Jesus Christ was here +they said of Him, "He receiveth sinners and eateth with them." They +said it with a sneer. When William Booth, the head of the Salvation +Army, did the same thing they said of him, "He receiveth sinners," but +they regarded it as the glory of his life. The first century saw the +Son of Man scorned and spat upon for receiving sinners and eating with +them. The twentieth century saw William Booth received at court by +King Edward VII and honoured with a degree from Oxford University for +receiving sinners. The world moves; there is sunrise everywhere and +the promise of a brighter day! And this great change has been wrought +by the One who brought upon the earth a finer form of spiritual energy +to renew the hearts of men. +</P> + +<P> +And finally this young man set in the sky of human aspiration a fixed +star of hope. You cannot change the world by scolding it. You cannot +change the world by petting it. You must set before its eyes a vision +of God and in its heart a passion for goodness, and in its will a form +of strength that will not accept defeat, and in its sky a star of hope. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Strong Son of God, Immortal Love<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Whom we that have not seen Thy face</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">By faith and faith alone embrace</SPAN><BR> +Believing where we cannot prove."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Jesus Christ has done that for us all—"Believing where we cannot +prove!" He has taught us how to hope and to trust and in that sign to +conquer. +</P> + +<P> +He tasted the whole human situation for every man. He was tempted in +all points like as we are, and tried by those ordeals which culminated +on Calvary. "In this world," He said, "ye shall have tribulation." The +word He used means literally "pressure." Life is not all music and +refreshments. Every honest life must be lived under pressure. It is +compelled to do its work under the steady weight of duty, obligation, +responsibility. It is compelled to fight a good fight in order to keep +its faith and finish its course. +</P> + +<P> +In the end that is the making of any life. Steam does all its work +under pressure. Turn it loose in the air to go where it will and it +becomes useless. In this world we must live under pressure. But Jesus +bade men face it all undaunted and radiant. He planted in their lives +an eternal hope, "Be of good cheer. I have overcome—you can." +</P> + +<P> +He knew that His own purposes were entirely right—"I do always those +things that please the Father." He knew that He was strongly +entrenched in the love and confidence of those who knew Him best. He +knew that the great moral order was on His side and that He could +afford to wait for results. In that high confidence He moved ahead as +serene as the sun shining in its strength. "Be of good cheer," He +cried, when He stood within a hundred yards of Calvary. +</P> + +<P> +His victory was not meant to be exceptional, it was meant to be +representative. It was to be shared and repeated by all those who walk +in fellowship with Him. How much it means when a man is making his way +through some dark forest or climbing some stiff mountainside to find +the faintest sort of a trail. "Other men have passed this way," he +cries, "and what men have done, men can do again." +</P> + +<P> +Here is a trail of spiritual victory, reaching on and up through all +manner of untoward situations! His own patient, bleeding feet marked +it out and thousands of His faithful followers have traversed it in +their turn. "Who can separate us from the love of Christ? Can +tribulation or distress or persecution or famine, or peril or sword? +Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who +loved us. For I am persuaded that neither life nor death nor angels, +nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, +nor height nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate +us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." +</P> + +<P> +When the long, hard, dark days come it means everything to a man to +know that there is that within him which cannot go down in final +defeat. His real life, his best life, his enduring life, is hid with +Christ in God, and that life will yet have its way. +</P> + +<P> +The earth is another place when it is seen to have a sky above it. +This earthly life is another thing when it is seen to have a heaven +above it and beyond it. We are saved by hope, by the hope of life +abundant, life enduring, life eternal, which shines on and on, no +matter how earth's clouds may come and go. +</P> + +<P> +When all else seems to fail we look up and hear this young man say, +"Let not your heart be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in Me. +In My Father's house are many mansions. If it were not so I would have +told you. I go to prepare a place for you that where I am there ye may +be. Be of good cheer, I have overcome and by My grace you will." +</P> + +<P> +Here then is my case! Here is my own tribute of loyalty and affection +for that young man who changed the history of the world. He did it by +changing men's thoughts about God—"To us there is but one God, the +Father." He did it by changing men's conception of goodness—to be +good is to be like Him, simple, genuine, spontaneous, in our love and +practice of the right life. He did it by changing the hearts of men +from within—"If any man is in Christ he is a new creature." He did it +by setting in our human sky a fixed star of hope to shine on until the +day dawns and the shadows flee away. +</P> + +<P> +In the face of it all how can any man of sense and conscience do less +than follow Him and act with Him until His will is done on earth as it +is done in Heaven! +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"If Jesus Christ is a man<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And only a man, I say</SPAN><BR> +That of all mankind I cleave to Him<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And to Him will I cleave alway.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"If Jesus Christ be God<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And the only God, I swear</SPAN><BR> +I will follow Him through Heaven and Hell,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The earth, the sea, the air."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +<I>Printed in the United States of America</I> +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<HR> + +<BR><BR><BR> + + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +BIOGRAPHY AND REMINISCENCES +</H4> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent" STYLE="text-decoration: underline"> +JAMES M. LUDLOW, P.P., Litt.D. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Author of "The Captain of the Janizaries," "Deborah," etc.</I> +</P> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +Along the Friendly Way +</H3> + +<P> +Reminiscences and Impressions. Frontispiece, 12mo, cloth, net +</P> + +<P> +Dr. Ludlow has observed keenly, and thought wisely and deeply; he has +read extensively, traveled widely, and rubbed elbows and wits with men +great and little of many nations and under varying conditions. He is +the "full man" of which the philosopher speaks. And all these +intellectual and spiritual riches garnered from many harvests he +spreads before the reader in a style that is remarkable for its +felicity of phrasing, the color of its varied imagery, and its humor, +warmth, and human sympathy. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent" STYLE="text-decoration: underline"> +HERBERT H. GOWEN, F. R. G. S. +</P> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Napoleon of the Pacific: <BR> +Kamehameha the Great +</H3> + +<P> +Illustrated, 12mo, cloth, net +</P> + +<P> +The history of the great chieftain who, in the closing years of the +eighteenth century, effected the union of the eight islands of the +Hawaiian Archipelago and welded them into a kingdom. Both student and +general reader will find THE NAPOLEON OF THE PACIFIC a richly, stored +mine of deeply interesting information, extremely difficult to come at +in any other form. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent" STYLE="text-decoration: underline"> +CLARA E. LAUGHLIN +</P> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +Foch the Man +</H3> + +<P> +<I>New Revised and Enlarged Edition with Additional Illustrations. Net</I> +</P> + +<P> +W. B. McCormick in the <I>N. Y. Sun</I> says: "Miss Laughlin has let nothing +escape her that will throw light on the development of his character. +A revelation of the man who at sixty-seven put the crowning touch to +the complete defeat of Germany's military pretensions." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent" STYLE="text-decoration: underline"> +FREDERICK LYNCH, P.P. +</P> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The One Great Society +</H3> + +<P> +A Book of Recollections. 12mo, cloth, net +</P> + +<P> +Records of some personal reminiscences and recollections of the author, +who, as preacher, editor and prominent member of one or two +international organizations, has met many of the world's prominent men +in the fields of divinity, philanthropy, literature and reform. +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="60%"> + +<BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE NEW WORLD ORDER +</H3> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent" STYLE="text-decoration: underline"> +PROF. A. T. ROBERTSON, P.P., LL.D. +</P> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The New Citizenship +</H3> + +<P> +The Christian Facing a New World Order. Net +</P> + +<P> +"Characterized by the thoroughgoing, wide-reaching scholarship for +which Professor Robertson is internationally noted, but also by his +fine common sense, felicity of diction and strength and beauty of +style. It is a book for busy laymen and book-reading women, as well as +for preachers."—<I>Baptist World</I>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent" STYLE="text-decoration: underline"> +GEORGE WOOD ANDERSON +</P> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +Problem—or Opportunity? +</H3> + +<P> +Which is it the Church is Now Facing. 12mo, cloth, net +</P> + +<P> +Mr. Anderson, an evangelist, has seen service with the American boys on +the battle-front, and impelled by his vivid experiences oversea, +addresses himself afresh to the problems and opportunities now facing +the Christian church. A plea for a more devoted working and +application of the program Christ laid out for His followers, to the +clamant needs of humanity at large. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent" STYLE="text-decoration: underline"> +C. B. WILLIAMS, Ph.D., P.P. +</P> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +Citizens of Two Worlds +</H3> + +<P> +12mo, cloth, net +</P> + +<P> +"A volume of addresses growing out of the spirit of this new age of +democracy and brotherhood, which speaks to the hearts of struggling men +and women who want to solve the age's economic and social problems by +following the teachings of the Nazarene. Sermons which show how to +reach up to heaven for the dynamic and inspiration to reach down to +earth and help its needy millions."—<I>Christian Work</I>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent" STYLE="text-decoration: underline"> +WILLIAM C. SCHAEFFER, P.P. +</P> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Greater Task +</H3> + +<P> +Studies in Social Service. 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A book of real leadership and merit."—<I>Christian +Guardian</I>. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Five Young Men, by Charles Reynolds Brown + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FIVE YOUNG MEN *** + +***** This file should be named 33296-h.htm or 33296-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/3/2/9/33296/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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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: Five Young Men + Messages of Yesterday for the Young Men of To-day + +Author: Charles Reynolds Brown + +Release Date: July 30, 2010 [EBook #33296] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FIVE YOUNG MEN *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + +Five Young Men + + Messages of Yesterday for + the Young Men of To-day + + + +By + +CHARLES REYNOLDS BROWN + +_Dean of the School of Religion, Yale University_ + + + + +NEW YORK CHICAGO TORONTO + +Fleming H. Revell Company + +LONDON AND EDINBURGH + + + + +Copyright, 1917, by + +FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY + + + + New York: 158 Fifth Avenue + Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave. + London: 21 Paternoster Square + Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street + + + + +_To the Young Men_ + +_of Yale_ + + _Whose friendship I have highly + valued and in whose future + I feel the warmest interest_ + + + + +Preface + +These addresses were given in the United Church on the Green, New +Haven, Connecticut, on the Sunday evenings of Lent. The audiences were +made up largely of men, many of them Yale students. I have brought the +addresses together in this little book with the hope that they may have +a certain value in their appeal to a wider audience of young men who in +school and college, in their homes and in business life, are making +those determinations which will decide the issue for them in those +exacting years which are before us. + +It has been given to us to live through one of the great crises of the +world's history. In these days the hearts of men are being tried as by +fire. If it is "wood, hay and stubble" that we are putting into our +personal moral structures, into the purposes and methods which rule our +industrial life and into our national temper and fiber, then we may +expect to see our work destroyed. The only qualities which will stand +the test are those qualities which are symbolized by "gold, silver and +precious stones." + +C. R. B. + +_Yale University._ + + + + +Contents + + I. THE YOUNG MAN WHO WAS A FAVOURITE SON + II. THE YOUNG MAN WHO WAS AN ATHLETE + III. THE YOUNG MAN WHO BECAME KING + IV. THE YOUNG MAN WHO WAS BORN TO THE PURPLE + V. THE YOUNG MAN WHO CHANGED THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD + + + + +I + +The Young Man Who Was a Favourite Son + +Which would you say is the harder to bear, adversity or prosperity? I +am not sure. If I were a betting man I would not know on which horse +to put my money. + +The Bible says, "The destruction of the poor is their poverty." The +narrowness and the meagreness of their lives, the lack of access to the +highest interests seems to drive them oftentimes into the coarser forms +of indulgence which are their undoing. The Bible also says, "It is +easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich +man to enter the Kingdom of God." The millionaire who strives to be +thoroughly Christian in all his attitudes and actions, in the secret +desires which rule his own soul and in the relations he sustains to his +fellow men by reason of his wealth has a hard task. In every great +city you will find the sons of millionaires falling down or flinging +themselves away in thoughtless dissipation where the sons of toil are +standing up and making good. + +Here, for example, was a young man who was born on the sunny side of +the street. He was the son of a rich man, and the favourite son. He +was handsome--"It came to pass that Joseph was a goodly person and well +favoured." He was habitually well dressed--"His father gave him a coat +of many colours," which there in the Orient marked him as a young man +of style. He had a vivid imagination and was a good talker. He was a +young man of parts and his story was so interesting to those early +Hebrews that here in the Book of Genesis thirteen full chapters are +given to his personal history. + +Let me notice three points in his career--first, his early +unpopularity. You do not have to know Hebrew to understand why he was +not as popular as Santa Claus. He was his father's favourite, which is +a heavy load for any child to bear. He lived in a family where there +were four sets of children. His father had married two wives, Rachel +who was handsome because he loved her, and Leah who was "tender-eyed," +the Scripture says, because she was the daughter of his employer at +that time and it was good business. There were also children who had +been born to the two housemaids, according to the easy customs of that +far-off time and place. Joseph was the son of Rachel, the favourite +wife, and her favourite son. He wore the signs of this parental +popularity in the gay coat of many colours. It was almost inevitable +that he should become vain and overbearing. + +He was also a talebearer. He looked down with unconcealed contempt +upon his half-brothers who were the sons of the housemaids. "When +Joseph was with the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah he brought unto his +father their evil report." + +The tattler in the school and the squealer on the street come in, +justly perhaps, for the contempt of their fellows. And whatever +allowance may be made for exceptional situations, the instinct which +brands the talebearer as mean is mainly wholesome. It was One who knew +what was in man who said, "Why beholdest thou the mote in thy brother's +eye and considerest not the beam in thine own eye? Judge not that ye +be not judged." It is well for every man to sweep his own dooryard +first before he begins to peddle stories as to the condition of his +neighbour's dooryard. + +This young man also had his full share of that conceit which thinks +quite as highly of itself as it ought to think. He had his daydreams, +and this was well. I would not give a fig for the young fellow who +does not see ahead of him masses of possible achievement in his +particular line as high as the Sierras, if not quite so solid. But +Joseph was soft and callow enough to tell his day-dreams to his fellows +before he had done anything to indicate that those dreams might come +true. + +He told his brothers that he would be the tallest sheaf in the field +and that they as lesser sheaves would come and make obeisance before +him. He went still further and included his elders and betters in that +general bowing down. He said, "Behold the sun and moon and the eleven +stars made obeisance to me." He saw himself as the centre of the whole +solar system and the rest of his family revolving about him as minor +satellites. This day-dream of the ambitious young man was too much +even for his indulgent father. "And Jacob rebuked him for his dream." + +There you have all the necessary ingredients for a family explosion. +When any young man is a favourite son, and a talebearer, and is filled +to the eyes with self-conceit, he has in him the sulphur, the +saltpeter, and the charcoal which enter into the composition of that +sort of gunpowder which is liable to blow him up. You do not wonder +that his brothers hated him. You are not surprised that when they saw +him coming across the fields at Dothan they said with a sneer, "Behold, +the dreamer cometh!" + +We might naturally expect that they would conspire against him. They +proposed to see whether or not this conceited young tattler would +become the tallest sheaf in the field and the centre of the whole solar +system there in little Canaan. He had himself to thank for getting in +wrong with his associates. He was not showing the qualities which make +for peace and joy and advancement. + +But in the second place he was sent early in life to the school of +adversity. The place where he "prepared" was not much like "The Hill" +or Hotchkiss; it bore no resemblance whatever to Andover or Exeter. He +took all the grades in the commonest of all common schools. He was +under the tuition of struggle and difficulty. He was a Freshman, then +a Sophomore, a Junior and a Senior in the University of Experience, +where the college colours are always "black and blue" because the +lessons are learned by hard knocks. He learned obedience by the things +that he suffered. He had the conceit taken out of him by being knocked +down. He knew the meaning of the word "discipline," so that he could +have spelled it and parsed it forward and backwards and crosswise. + +He was tried in these three ways: first, by being sold as a slave boy +into Egypt. His father sent him out to Dothan to see how his brothers +were faring with their flocks. When they saw him coming across the +plain they said, "Behold the dreamer! Let us cast him into a pit and +see what will become of his dreams." + +His brothers seized him and threw him into a deep well, where there was +no water, intending to let him die in that horrible way. But when a +company of Ishmaelites came along on their way to Egypt, a happier +thought struck those men. Judah, who was always a thrifty soul, said, +"What profit is it if we slay our brother and conceal his blood?" +There is no money in murder. "Let us sell him to the Ishmaelites." + +Here was the proverbial instinct, an eye for the main chance, already +on its feet and doing business in the very childhood of that race, +which has enjoyed such marked success in commercial pursuits. "Let us +sell him and let not our hand be upon him, for"--here emerges Mr. +Pecksniff, who is much older than the time of Dickens--"for he is our +brother and our flesh." His argument was plausible and the men drew +Joseph out of the pit and sold him to the Ishmaelites who carried him +down into Egypt. Now the hands of the ten men were not stained with +innocent blood and they were also twenty pieces of silver to the good. + +How human and how modern were the mental processes of those crafty men! +The man who decides to coin his brother's life into money instead of +killing him with an axe has chosen so much milder a form of wrong-doing +that he feels almost virtuous. "Let us not slay our brother"--that has +an atrocious sound. It smacks of the doings of gunmen. Let not our +hand be upon him for he is our flesh! + +"But let us sell him"--this is so much more humane! Let us burn out +his energy swiftly in the long hard hours of the steel mill to make our +profits large. When he is exhausted before his time we can scrap him, +flinging him aside to make room for a fresh hand. Let us set the pace +in the factory so sharp that the man in middle life cannot hold it--he +will be compelled to drop out and tramp the streets in search of a job, +while some younger man takes up his work. Let us keep the wages of the +working girl so near the danger line that unless she is splendidly +fortified with moral stamina she may be tempted after she has sold her +days to greed to add to her income by selling her nights to shame. + +Let not our hands be stained by the murder of our own flesh and +blood--let us sell them in these more delicate and refined ways to +increase the toll of profits! The voice of Judah is still heard in the +land. There on the plains of Dothan this favourite son fell into the +hands of greed and was sold as a slave boy into the land of Egypt. + +He was also tested by the accusations of an evil-minded woman. When +the Ishmaelites disposed of him in Egypt he was purchased by Potiphar, +an officer in Pharaoh's guard. He was made a house servant. He showed +himself diligent and faithful and was advanced until he was the +overseer of Potiphar's whole establishment. + +He was a handsome young Hebrew, his complexion being much fairer than +that of the dark-skinned Egyptians. He attracted the attention and won +the admiration of Potiphar's wife, who was an evil-minded, faithless +creature. As Joseph went about the house in the discharge of his +duties she approached him repeatedly with her solicitations to evil. + +He did not look her in the eye, as Billy Sunday suggests in his brisk +way, and say, "Nothing doing." He said something infinitely better +than that--"There is none greater in this house than I. My master hath +kept back nothing from me but thee. How then can I do this great +wickedness and sin against God." + +He was not one of those men who do in Rome as the Romans do, who do in +New York as Broadway does, even though that may mean a less wholesome +type of conduct than they are accustomed to put up in their home towns. +He was a man of principle wherever he was placed. How can I sin +against God! + +Heaven be praised for men of principle and for men who are not afraid! +A well-to-do Harvard student in one of the dormitories was shaving one +morning when a wretched woman of the street slipped into his room +through the door which he had left ajar. She shut the door and with +her back against it said to him, "Give me fifty dollars instantly or I +will scream for help." He looked around at her and said, "Yell +away"--and went on with his shaving. He knew that his own life was +clean. He had lived as a man of integrity and he felt that his +statement would be taken anywhere against hers, because it was worth +one hundred cents on the dollar. And she knew it--so she slunk out +like a whipped cur. If he had compromised with her or had given her a +dollar, he might have been in for endless trouble and disgrace. + +But Joseph was not in Cambridge--he was in Egypt. He was not a +well-known Harvard student--he was only a slave boy there in the house +of his master. When this woman whom he had repulsed made her ugly, +lying accusation against him she was believed and he was thrown into +prison. + +What indeed has now become of his dreams! He was a stranger in a +strange land. He was a slave who had been jailed on an ugly charge. +He must have felt that he was a long way from becoming the tallest +sheaf in the field or the brightest star in the sky. + +He was also tested by the ingratitude of those whom he had befriended. +While he was in jail he did not for one hour give up his hope of +advancement. He kept right on, attending the school of those +instructors whose names are printed in the catalogue as Professor +Adversity, Professor Difficulty and Doctor Discipline. He found them +most capable teachers. They did not teach him much of that which is +found in text-books, but they were teaching him to be a man, which +after all is the main object of all education. + +When Joseph was knocked down he did not wait for some Red Cross nurse +to come with "first aid to the injured." He got right up and was there +on the mat ready for the next round. And the young fellow with that +sort of stuff in him learns, I care not how soft, callow and conceited +he may have been in his "prep. school" days. + +He was in prison, but since nothing better offered he would show +himself the best prisoner behind those bars. He bore the false +accusation of that lying woman without a word of recrimination lest he +should injure the honour of his master, who had befriended him when he +was in his employ. He spent his days not in laziness nor in vice, not +in repining and dejection. He bore himself with such a thoughtful, +unselfish spirit that he won the favour of the warden and was made a +kind of overseer among the prisoners of his ward. + +He won the regard and confidence of his fellow prisoners by his +sympathetic interest in their welfare. When they were perplexed they +came to him. The butler and the baker from Pharaoh's household were +imprisoned for some fault, and when they dreamed Joseph interpreted to +them their dreams in skillful fashion. And when the butler was +pardoned out a few days later, according to Joseph's prediction, he +promised to remember his friend when once more he stood in Pharaoh's +presence. + +But after the manner of many he forgot all about his fellow prisoner in +the joy of his own release. Joseph still lingered in jail. How +sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless friend! There +in the jail he drank to the dregs the cup of ingratitude. + +But read on, read on! The Lord has not let His voice fall yet. This +is not a period--it is only a comma or semicolon. The mills of the +gods grind slow, but they grind; and to every man who merits it a good +grist comes at last. Read on! + +There came a night when Pharaoh dreamed. The monarch saw seven fat +cows come up out of the River Nile, which was the source of all +fertility there in the Delta. Then he saw seven lean cows come up out +of the river and they ate up the seven fat cows and yet remained as +lean and hungry as they had been before. In the morning Pharaoh called +for his wise men and his magicians, but they could make nothing of it. + +Then the chief butler remembered his fault. He remembered Joseph who +had interpreted his own dream in yonder prison. He told Pharaoh of +that strange experience, and the monarch promptly sent for this gifted +young Hebrew. "Seest thou a man diligent in his business he shall +stand before kings." Joseph had shown himself diligent in his business +as a servant in the house of Potiphar, and as a prisoner he had made +himself useful to the warden of the jail. Now he is summoned to stand +before the ruler of all the land of Egypt. + +He is the same man in name as when he walked across the fields of +Dothan with his heart full of conceit, but how much he has learned! +His coat of many colours has been replaced by the dull gray of the +prison garb. He has acquired new moods and new methods and a finer +quality of manhood. When Pharaoh called upon him to interpret his +strange dream, Joseph replied modestly, "It is not in me. +Interpretations belong to God. And God shall give Pharaoh an answer of +peace." It was in this mood of reverent, expectant awe that he +undertook the interpretation of the monarch's dream. + +How character ripens in adversity! Wheat ripens best under smiling, +sunny skies, but the rigorous winter of hardship and struggle is +demanded for the maturing of those fine qualities of mind and heart +which make up character at its best. Men have found by experience that +it is impossible to produce apples of the choicest flavour where there +is no frost. I am quite sure that the best type of human excellence +cannot be secured without frost. "He is testing me," Job said, when +all those troubles fell upon him; "He knows the way that I take and +when He has tried me I shall come forth as gold." + +Here was a young man who in early life had been a spoiled child, a +conceited prig, a talebearer among his fellows, but in the hard school +of adversity he had learned to labour and to wait. He could now endure +as seeing One who is invisible. + +The law of gravitation never forgets anything, never overlooks +anything. It matters not whether it is a pound of feathers or a ton of +lead or a planet, the power of gravitation is right there attending to +business. If a man falls out of a fifth story window in New York, in +Constantinople, or in Calcutta, the law of gravitation is there and the +man gets hurt. The moral order never forgets anything, never overlooks +anything. What men sow, they reap, though the harvest be long delayed. +If they sow to the flesh, sometime, somewhere they go out with bruised +hands and bleeding hearts to reap corruption. When they sow to the +spirit they will in the same inevitable way reap life eternal. Here at +last the man of purpose and of faith is reaping the results of +discipline bravely met and nobly borne. + +This young man owed his ultimate success to the fact that he was a man +of vision. There is a certain fascination in the story of any life +which rises from obscurity to eminence. Whether the path lies from the +log cabin of a rail splitter to the White House, from the lowly work of +the lanyard to the head of victorious armies, or from a pit on the +plains of Dothan to a palace on the banks of the Nile, there is +something in the human heart which responds to the unfolding of such a +life-story. + +The Hebrews were happy in relating how men of their race had made their +way up to places of honour at alien courts through the sheer force of +their own personal ability. Here was Joseph coming up out of the +prison house to the right hand of Pharaoh! Here was Daniel preferred +above the other presidents and princes at the court of Darius! Here +was Benjamin Disraeli belonging to a race formerly disfranchised in +England becoming at last Prime Minister of Her Most Christian Majesty +Queen Victoria! Let every man who looks down upon some lowly life +beware lest he despise what God has blessed! + +Here was a young man who had vision! He saw things. He did not merely +"look," as would some dog that bays the moon. When he walked across +the plains of Dothan his mind was not altogether upon wool and +mutton--he was already dreaming of high achievement in his future +years. When he was thrown into the pit and sold into slavery his brain +was busy with the stars. When he faced temptation he saw it all with +the eye of faith--how could he do this great wickedness and sin against +God. And when he was confronted with a problem confessedly too hard +for him he lifted up his eyes to the hills from whence cometh help. +"It is not in me. The interpretation of life belongs to God." + +He was only seventeen years old when he walked across the fields that +day to the place where his brothers kept their flocks. Now he was +thirty. He had increased in stature, in wisdom and in favour with God +and man. It had taken thirteen long years to add those cubits to his +height, but they had been well spent. The Almighty takes His time in +working out His finer effects. The spoiled child, the censorious +talebearer, the callow, conceited youth must be wrought upon by the +beat and play of human life. When any man has vision and faith there +is a divinity which shapes his ends, rough-hewn though they be by +doting fathers and envious brothers, by false accusers, and by +ungrateful companions. When a man is faced right, all things, no +matter what shape they bear, will ultimately work together for his good. + +"A man in whom the spirit of God is"--that was Pharaoh's verdict when +Joseph had skillfully interpreted his dream, indicating that the seven +fat cows coming up out of the Nile meant seven years of plenty in the +land of Egypt, and that the seven lean cows following them and +devouring them meant seven years of famine, which would tax the +resources of Pharaoh's empire in feeding the hungry people. And when +the monarch had listened to the wise words, had sensed the humane +spirit of this young Hebrew, and had seen the look of faith upon his +face, he felt that no other man would be so competent to become High +Commissioner of the Food Supply there in the land of Egypt. Thus +Joseph was set in a place of authority at Pharaoh's right hand. + +His dreams are coming true! He had framed his first anticipations out +of sheaves. Then his mind began to be busy with the stars. He was +destined to have a part in preserving the life of his own Hebrew race +and a part in that moral movement which would outlast the stars +themselves. Through all those long hard years which lay between the +pit of Dothan and the palace of Pharaoh, he was sustained by that +vision of things divine which shone perpetually in his sky. + +"A man in whom the spirit of God is"--here is the ultimate reason for +every splendid advance! Here is the ultimate reason why any man is +able to rise from those lower levels where wool and mutton are the main +considerations to those higher levels where he becomes a trusted +implement in the hand of God for a service that will endure. + +The young man was a man of faith. He had faith in God. He had faith +in his fellows, as he showed when he generously forgave the brothers +who had wronged him, having them as ruler of Egypt utterly in his +power. He had faith in himself because the spirit of God dwelt in his +heart. And it matters not whether it is Egypt or Connecticut, the +eighteenth century before Christ or the twentieth century after Christ, +it is "by faith" that men work righteousness and obtain promises, wax +valiant in fight and beat back the armies of aliens. + +In the long run the world belongs to the idealist. The ultimate +shaping of its life is in the hands of the men who walk the busy +streets and dusty lanes with their feet on the ground but with their +heads and their hearts among the stars. The men of vision and faith +sometimes lose a skirmish; now and then they are defeated in a battle; +but when the war is fought through to a finish they are on the winning +side. + +Here in this company there may be many a favourite son. You are +inexpressibly dear to the hearts of those parents. Their thoughts, +their prayers and their efforts are all reaching out for the best +things for you. They do not know and you do not know what hard tests +may lie ahead. You too may be sent for thirteen long years to the +school of adversity, but if the spirit of God is in your heart, if you +have faith, a vital and personal faith in Jesus Christ, if you have +caught the vision of what life may be made to mean at its best, then it +lies within your power also to achieve. + + + + +II + +The Young Man Who Was an Athlete + +What a roomy place the Bible is! It is not filled up with model men +and women. It is not filled up with nice little boys and girls, all +neat and sweet, good enough to be angels right off with no alterations. +It is peopled with imperfect, blundering folk like ourselves. + +Some of these samples of human life are offered to us for our +imitation, and some by way of warning. The wide variety exhibited +shows how God can use and bless the better elements in many a life +where the wheat and the tares grow together until the harvest. The +divine purpose shows an amazing measure of hospitality. "The love of +God is broader than the measure of man's mind." + +We come for example to the eleventh chapter of Hebrews. It is the roll +call of men of faith. "By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent +sacrifice than Cain." By faith Enoch was translated that he should not +see death because he walked with God. By faith Noah built an ark for +the saving of his house. By faith Abraham went out to found a nation +in which all the nations of the earth should be blessed, not knowing +whither he went. "By faith Moses chose rather to suffer affliction +with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season." + +"And what shall I say more," the author remarks in passing. "Time +would fail me to tell of all the men who by faith subdued kingdoms and +wrought righteousness, obtained promises and put to flight the armies +of evil, Gideon and Barak, Samson and Jephthah." + +Samson! The very presence of his name in this catalogue of moral +heroes all but takes away one's breath. What does this big husky +fellow, this wild, fun-loving chap have to do with the working out of +the divine purpose for the race? We are as much surprised as we would +be if we had found Jack Johnson undertaking to preach the Gospel, or +John L. Sullivan trying to be elected as a professor in Princeton +Theological Seminary. Samson as a hero of the faith! Surely this is +"Saul among the prophets." We will be interested in studying the life +of this young man who had the build and the mood of an athlete. + +He had in his youth the strength and promise of a mighty man. He +caught a young lion and seizing it by its jaws ripped it apart as an +ordinary man would have rent a kid. He caught up the jaw-bone of an +ass and slew heaps and heaps of his enemies in personal combat. He +carried off the gates of a city and hid them on the top of a hill as if +he had been celebrating Hallowe'en. He would have been the making of +any football team. If he had furnished the forward thrust of a flying +wedge it would have gone through any line that might have stood in its +way. + +It would not be easy to draw a hard and fast line here between the +prose and the poetry of these narratives. Something of history and a +great deal of folk-lore undoubtedly are blended in these stirring +tales. There are many passages in the earlier portions of the Bible +which have more value for the history of ideas than for the history of +actual occurrence. They are full of truth though they may not always +conform to sober fact. They are parables rather than records. + +But we may be sure that this interesting young giant had something more +than mere physical prowess. He had in him some of the elements of +genuine leadership else he would not have been regarded as a judge and +a leader in Israel, raised up for a great work. The people would never +have woven these stories about his name nor enrolled him among the +moral heroes of their race had he not possessed some of the elements of +real strength. He had in him the sense of power--it is a quality which +all men covet and all women adore. + +He had a keen sense of the joy of living. We are glad that the element +of humour was not left out of the Bible. It would not have been so +human, so complete, so unmistakably "the Book of Books" had this been +lacking. I am sure that the Almighty has a sense of humour. He must +have or He never would have created pelicans and monkeys. "He that +sitteth in the heavens shall laugh," we read--and He must have laughed +when He made these curious creatures. He was willing to give this +fun-loving Samson a place on the roster of the Army of the Lord. + +Samson stands out on the pages of Scripture as a big, overgrown, +rollicking boy looking upon life as one huge joke. His major study was +to turn the laugh on the dull-witted, slow-going Philistines. He tore +the young lion and when a swarm of bees had made honey in the carcass +Samson made this riddle,--"Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of +the strong came forth sweetness." He propounded his riddle to the +Philistines and made them a bet that they could not guess it. And when +they wheedled the answer to the riddle out of Samson's wife he retorted +upon them in coarse fashion, "If ye had not plowed with my heifer, ye +would not have guessed my riddle." + +He carried off the gates of the city of Gaza and hid them. He caught +foxes and tied firebrands to their tails and then turned them loose in +the ripe wheat fields of the Philistines, roaring aloud over the havoc +they made. He slew his enemies with the jaw-bone of an ass and then +made a clever pun (which the Hebrew reveals) upon the name of his +homely weapon. + +He was the joker of the pack. Time and again in the days of his power +he was able to take the trick. When he came to die that element of +grim humour was still in his heart. He had lost his strength because +he had slept for a night with his head in the lap of his enemy. His +foes had put out his eyes and had made him to grind as a slave in one +of their mills. Now he was brought as a kind of paid jester to one of +their feasts to make fun for the party. + +There in the house of his foes, holding fast to a door-post he prayed +in grim fashion that his former strength might for a moment be renewed, +"that he might be avenged upon his enemies for the loss _of one of his +two eyes_." He would leave the rest of the account to be settled +later. When he had them roaring with laughter at some of his sallies, +he pulled down the house upon their heads and killed them all, +perishing himself in the disaster. He was full of humour and had a +deep sense of the joy of living. + +He was a strange mixture of good and evil. Here was a blend of +weakness and of strength! Here was the baser metal mingled as an +unworthy alloy with much that was fine gold. "Samson got the laugh on +the Philistine men," as William R. Richards said once in Battell +Chapel, "but their sisters avenged themselves on him by making a slave, +a tool, and a fool of him. This old writer tells his story straight on +without stopping to moralize. But where can you find a better sermon +on the need of personal purity? Of the two forms of sin which +especially assail young men, Samson might guard us from one by way of +example, and from the other by way of warning. Touching no wine, for +he was a Nazarite from his birth, he excelled in strength. But placing +his head in the lap of a false woman whose name was Delilah, there came +to him weakness, blindness, the prison house, and the grave." + +He refused the cup which cheers and also inebriates, but he gave his +heart and his strength to that alluring enemy of the divine purpose who +ruined him. Where a young man is a physical weakling, then if his mind +is dull and his heart mean, he is at least all of a piece. He is +consistent in his make-up. Where his body is strong as was the body of +this young giant, revealing in every movement of it that joy and vigour +which come with abundance of life, then if his mental and moral life +are weak and thin, there is something tragic in that walking lie. The +outward man promises so much, but the inward man is a wail of +disappointment. + +"The Philistines took him," is the terse comment of the writer upon +Samson's unhappy career. But his sins had already taken him captive. +He had become the bond servant of his own passions. He was already a +slave through his lack of self-control. + +"The wages of sin is death"--if you doubt it read through to the end +the story of any man who is headed wrong and keeps going in that +direction. You will find the word "Death" written over against his +name in five capital letters. Read the story of this young man who in +his youth was so "strong and sunny," as his name in the original has +it. When you read on you presently find him dead in his eyes, as he +gropes his way about the prison house in the land of the Philistines. +He is dead in his muscles as he weakly turns the wheels of a mill, +which was the work commonly assigned to women in those rude tribes. He +is dead in reputation--the fool and the jester brought in to make sport +at the table of his captors! He is dead in his soul for he is unaware +that the Lord has departed from him. The wages of sin is death. +Whether pay day comes the following Saturday night or at the end of the +year, or in the final outcome, in every case the sorry result will be +the same. + +We are compelled to say that Samson's life was a tragedy because he +failed at these three points. He never learned to take life seriously. +The joker is not the best card in the pack, except by an arbitrary +rule--and in all the better games at cards, the joker is thrown out. +When all is said and done, life is serious business. The humour, the +amusement, the recreation are only the sauce on the table to give an +added zest and relish--they are not the roast beef and potatoes. You +cannot live on them nor by them. The man who laughs and laughs loudly +and laughs at everything will have the laugh turned on him. The very +fact that he has never brought his life under the power of a serious, +definite, compelling purpose will cause him to be left far in the rear +by those men who waken up early to the fact that the world is not to be +taken as a joke. + +There was a certain joy no doubt in carrying off the gates of Gaza. I +can recall certain episodes on the evening of the thirty-first of +October when the carrying off of the gates of some neighbour seemed to +me to fill the cup of life to the brim. There is a certain joy in +getting a cow up into the pulpit of the College Chapel or into the +belfry of some church on a dark night--the young fellow who has never +helped to solve that problem in physics has missed something. There is +a time to read the paper we call "Life," and to see some man on the +stage who can be as funny as William Collier. Where all these are the +diversions of a mind devoted to serious ends, where they are only the +by-product of human interest, they have a rightful place in our regime. + +But their lines are soon spoken, and the stage must be cleared for +those who have something of more moment to tell. "How much do you +really care?" the world is asking. "How ready are you to think +intently upon something which has no more fun in it than a page of +figures or an array of unyielding facts? How far are you ready to bend +all the best energies of body, brain and heart to the gaining of some +worthy end? How completely have you set your heart upon that which is +vital?" Your answer to these questions will in large measure tell the +story of your future achievement. + +This young man failed because he had not acquired the habit of +persistence. His big deeds were all done in a hurry, and they were +soon over. He carried off the gates of the city in ten minutes. He +tore the young lion apart in an instant. He slaughtered the +Philistines with the jaw-bone of an ass in less time than I am taking +in telling it. He tied torches to the tails of the foxes and let them +loose in the wheat fields in a careless half hour of thoughtless sport. +You do not find the man binding up a lifetime of effort into a moral +unit by an all-inclusive and dominant intention. He was never ready to +work and to keep on working until achievement of a worthy sort should +crown his effort. + +You cannot drive a long nail in to the head by hammering around all +over the board. You must hit the nail on the head and keep on hitting +it on the head until you have sent it home. You cannot sink the shaft +of a mine by digging all around over the mountainside. You must dig in +one place and keep on digging in one place persistently until you have +sunk your shaft to the vein of ore. You cannot build a life that is +worthy to be the life of a child of God unless you gird yourself for +that persistent effort which lies between you and the goal upon which +you have set your heart. It cannot be done in an hour, or in a day, or +in a year. The hard task of presenting to Him a life which will bear +His own eye and win His approval will mortgage the best strength of all +your best years. + +You may have the body of an athlete. You may have a mind with splendid +capacity in it for real achievement. You may have a heart which reacts +as promptly as gunpowder when a spark of genuine aspiration is applied +to it. You may have all these--I hope you have--but unless you have +learned the high art of staying by, of holding on, of keeping at it no +matter what comes, you are doomed to defeat. + +How often you see a young man of generous impulse, of kindly +disposition, like Esau, faltering and failing as the years come and go +until at last he is little better than a vagabond upon the face of the +earth. How often you find a man of purpose and persistence, like +Jacob, with many an unfortunate trait in him, with a heavy moral +handicap to overcome, finally winning out by the sheer force of his +spiritual tenacity. "Be thou faithful unto death," the promise has it, +"and I will give thee the crown of life." The crown is held in reserve +for those who persist clear through to the end. + +This young man failed because he lacked the favour of God. In the +early stages of his career we read of a divine element in his life. +"The woman bare a son and called his name Samson, and the Lord blessed +him. And the spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him" for those +deeds of valour. + +However we may interpret these expressions the fact is plain that so +long as he kept his life clean and true he had the sense of divine +reinforcement making him equal to the tasks which fell to his lot. +Then there came a time when by his own actions he forfeited all this. +He became as weak as a rag in the face of temptation, in the presence +of duty, in some great opportunity for valiant effort which opened +before him. And he did not realize how weak he was until he went down +in defeat. "He wist not that the Lord had departed from him." + +The spirit of self-indulgence, I care not whether it goes straight for +the coarse sins of the flesh or moves in more refined ways towards the +life of selfish ease and barren culture, will take the iron out of a +man's blood. It will take the vim out of his muscles, the power to +hold fast out of his will. + +The man who saves his life for his own personal gratification will soon +find that he has no life to save. That which makes life life is gone. +It is the habit of self-control, the spirit of self-surrender to the +will of God, the purpose of self-dedication to the highest ends in +sight, which puts power into the thrust of each man's effort. + +The circular letter which Lord Kitchener, head of the War Office, sent +to every British soldier when the English troops were ordered to the +Continent reads like a classic: + + +"You are ordered abroad as a soldier of the King. The honour of the +British Army depends upon your individual conduct. You have a task to +perform which will need courage, energy, and patience. Be on your +guard against excesses. You will find temptation both in women and in +wine. Resist both and do your duty bravely. Fear God. Honour the +King. + +"(Signed) KITCHENER." + + +Hang those great words up in your mind! Hang the picture of that +strong, stern, brave man in your heart that you too may wear the cross +of honour. + +If it is good for men to be sober and clean in war time, why not at all +times? Have we not sore need of these same qualities in the more +exacting pursuits of peace? Every man who is worthy of the name of man +is set to guard some sacred interest, though he carries neither gun nor +sword. + +Here is the everlasting fight being waged three hundred and sixty-five +days in the year--and it is waged year in and year out for there is no +discharge in that war--against hunger and cold, against disease and +death, against poverty and crime! Why not have men at their best in +the mill and in the mine, on the farm and in the factory, in the +counting-room and in the places of trade? The armies which are sent +forth to save, to feed, and to clothe men's lives, no less than the +armies of bloodshed have need of the same high discipline. They, too, +are crippled and broken, they are driven back and hurled to defeat by +those moral foes which march under the banner of self-indulgence. + +Here is an evil traffic which flaunts its wares in our faces in every +city block where the forces of righteousness have not risen in strength +to cast it out. But we have fallen upon times when the economic forces +are lining up solidly with the verdict of medical science and the power +of religion in a relentless opposition to the use of alcohol as a +beverage. In these days the man who thinks more of his job than he +does of his grog has the floor. + +The wise railroad managers know full well that a tippler in the cab of +an engine or at the flagman's post means sooner or later a frightful +accident with loss of property and life. The owners of intricate and +delicate machinery in the great factories know that placing in control +men whose brains have been clogged and drugged with liquor is as +foolish as throwing sand into the ball bearings. "Safety First" means +"Sober First." The taxpayers are becoming no less insistent--they have +learned that the open saloon means added crime and poverty where they +must foot the bills. Decent people have grown tired of cleaning up the +muss and the dirt occasioned by the rum sellers. The moral forces of +the community recognize the fact that the liquor business allies itself +openly with immoralities of every sort. The people are saying in state +after state, in country after country, "Time's up! You have failed to +show your right to be! You will have to go." The habit of indulgence +in that which robs men of strength, of intelligence, of conscience, +finds every good man's hand against it. + +We read in this strange story that Samson's strength was in his hair. +When his locks were cut away by the fair and false hand of evil he was +as weak as a woman. + +How much of sober history and how much of poetic allegory there may be +in these glowing statements it is not easy to say. But the moral +content of this record is clear. When those slender and delicate lines +of contact which, as he believed according to his vow as a Nazarite, +bound him in loyalty to the source of all strength, were broken, then +his splendid prowess was no more. "It is that little half-inch rim of +the tree where the sap runs up to the sun that makes the tree alive or +dead." However you phrase it in the clearer light of this twentieth +century of ours, guard with all diligence those lines of communication +between your own inner life and the life of God. Maintain within +yourself that faith and hope and love which will bring to you your own +full measure of strength and joy. + +The dull, sad picture of this defeated man is not wholly unrelieved by +any brighter touch. When he was shorn of his strength, robbed of his +honour, stained in the quality of his manhood, we read, "Howbeit the +hair of his head began to grow again after he was shorn." + +It was only a gleam of hope, but it was a gleam. It was a far-off +promise of that divine redemptive process which has become the basis of +our trust. His claim upon the divine favour and his hold upon the +sources of strength were not utterly forfeited by his acts of +evil-doing. His hair began to grow again and a hope of moral recovery +was begotten in his heart. "If we say we have no sin we deceive +ourselves; but if we confess our sins He is faithful and just to +forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." + +Let me close with this plain, straight word of appeal as strong as I +can make it! You need God in your life. You need Him not as a +philosophical belief touching the origin and ground of all finite +existence; not as a mere dogma to be written at the head of your +Confession of Faith; not as a name to be introduced into some liturgy +which you may occasionally employ. You need God as a present, personal +and profound experience. To know Him is to live, and to live well. + +It was Phillips Brooks who said once to an audience of Harvard men, +"Here is the last great certainty, be sure of God! By simple, loving +worship, by continual obedience, by keeping yourself pure even as He is +pure, creep close to Him, keep close to Him, and in the end nothing can +overthrow you." + + + + +III + +The Young Man Who Became King + +In some wise way when the door of opportunity opens upon a trying +situation there comes forth a man of sufficient size to perform the +task. When the time is ripe for the Protestant Reformation Martin +Luther is ready and walks in. When the day arrives for Napoleon +Bonaparte to be sent to St. Helena and the peace of Europe restored, +the Duke of Wellington, representing British tenacity, is ready. When +the hour has struck for American slavery to be destroyed by words and +laws and grape-shot, William Lloyd Garrison and Abraham Lincoln and +Ulysses S. Grant are ready. Back of every emergency God waits. He has +His great right hand full of men and when the fullness of time is come +He brings upon the scene His own appointed man. + +Here in a very old book is the story of the greatest king that Israel +ever had! The House of Tudor in England, the House of Hohenzollern in +Germany or the late House of the Romanoffs in Russia, never had such a +hold upon the popular imagination and affection as did "the house and +lineage of David" upon the hearts of the Hebrews. The One who was to +be born "King of kings and Lord of lords" to reign forever and ever was +to come from "the house and lineage of David." + +But how was this country boy with rough hands and all the marks of toil +upon him to become king? He was no Crown Prince--Jonathan was the +eldest son of the reigning monarch. He was neither the eldest nor the +favourite son of any man. He was the youngest son of a farmer named +Jesse and because he seemed less promising than his older brothers he +had been given the care of the sheep. Anybody with eyes in his head +and feet to walk about can watch sheep. The boy did not seem at first +glance to have his foot on the ladder nor to possess the elements of +royalty. + +He became king because he had these five qualities: First of all he +showed fidelity in the ordinary duties of every-day life. Here is the +summing up of his method--"And David behaved himself wisely in all his +ways and the Lord was with him." If a bunch of sheep became his field +of opportunity he would do his work in such fashion that no one could +do it better. He would lead them in green pastures and by still waters +so that they should not want. His rod and his staff would protect +them. He would learn the use of sling and stone so that "he could +sling," as the record says, "at a hair's breadth and not miss." If a +wolf or a bear should attack his flock, he would be able to drive them +off. + +The simple ordinary duties which belong to keeping sheep or to getting +one's lessons at school, to meeting one's obligations in some modest +position in office or store, or in doing one's best in a factory or on +a farm, become a kind of dress rehearsal for the larger duties which +lie ahead. If a man knows his lines and can take his part effectively +upon the narrower stage of action he is in line for promotion to a more +important role. You will find whole regiments of young fellows who +drag along, scamping their work and slighting those opportunities which +are right at hand. They are saving up their energies to do something +splendidly effective week after next. But week after next never comes +to such men. It is always to-day, and to-day in their eyes seems ever +small. + +If those men were already on the quarterdeck as captains of great ocean +liners; if they were already bank presidents sitting in handsome +offices of their own; if they were already journalists of the first +rank writing editorials for metropolitan dailies, they would do what +their hands and their minds found to do with their might. But in this +day of small things they feel that fidelity and skill would be thrown +away. They have mixed up the words of the promise--they think it +reads, "You have been unfaithful over a few things, I will make thee +ruler over everything." When a man is going up-stairs he must put his +foot first on the step which is at the bottom and then take the other +steps in order. The same rule holds in the great business of living a +man's life and doing a man's work in the world. + +The young man who was to become king showed courage and high resolve in +the face of danger. There came a day when the Israelites and the +Philistines were lined up in battle array on the opposite sides of a +valley. The Philistines had their champion fighter in the person of a +huge fellow named Goliath. His armour weighed one hundred and fifty +pounds. His spear was like a weaver's beam. He stood roaring out his +defiance against the armies of Israel, "Choose you a man! Let him come +down to me and fight. If he kills me, we will be your servants. If I +prevail against him then ye shall be our servants." + +After the manner of the Iliad he stood ready to let the issue of the +campaign turn upon the result of a solitary combat between himself and +any Israelite they might put up against him. Saul, the king of Israel, +had offered to enrich with great wealth the man who would fight that +huge Philistine. He had promised to give him the hand of his own +daughter, the fair young princess, in marriage, and to make his +father's house forever free in Israel. But no Israelite had dared to +fight the terrible Goliath. + +Then David appeared upon the scene. He had been sent down by his +father with ten loaves of fresh bread, with ten cheeses and a supply of +parched corn for his brothers who were at the front. He saw this huge +Goliath stalking up and down the picket lines between the armies. He +cried out in his resentment at the apparent cowardice of his own +countrymen, "Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy +the armies of the living God!" David was informed that even the +promise of high reward offered by the king had not induced an Israelite +to face the Philistine. + +Then spoke out the voice of faith from the heart of unstained youth! +"Let no man's heart fail because of him--thy servant will go and fight +this Philistine." The king remonstrated with him. He pointed out the +folly of sending an untrained youth to meet the disciplined man of war. +But David insisted that his rough experiences with the lions and the +bears which attacked his flock had furnished him the necessary +training. The king then offered him his own armour, which would +naturally be the best suit of armour in the camp, that the stripling +might in some measure be protected. But after trying on this suit of +mail David put it aside. "I cannot go with these," he said, "for I +have not proved them." He refused the conventional modes of defense, +relying upon those weapons which had been tested by experience. He +took his sling and five smooth stones from the brook and announced that +he was ready for the combat. + +It seemed a contest most unequal when the principals were put forth +with the Israelites and the Philistines ranged up on either side of the +valley to watch the outcome. Goliath was enraged when he saw the boy +they had sent against him. "Am I a dog?" he said. And then he cursed +David by all his gods and threatened to feed his flesh to the beasts of +the field before an hour had passed. Like many a modern combatant +Goliath was mighty with his mouth. His tongue was like a weaver's beam. + +The young man was not disturbed. His weapons were taken from the +armoury of experience, and his courage came from the same reliable +source. "The Lord who delivered me out of the paws of the lion and the +bear will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine." The moral +triumphs of those early years when a boy keeps his life clean and +strong become the earnest of the larger victories he is set to win in +his mature manhood. The growing boy who disdains to lie or to cheat, +to stain his life with dirt or to show himself a coward, will know how +to bear himself when the harder tests of middle life assail him. + +The young man's religious faith contributed to his courage. It was +moral strength pitted against brute force. It was the scornful +self-confidence which trusted in a coat of brass and a huge spear +measuring itself against the spirit of faith which became the source of +a finer form of valour. "Thou comest to me with sword and spear," +David cried, as he saw his foe advancing. "I come to thee in the name +of the Lord of Hosts whom thou hast defied." His trust in God kept his +nerves steady so that he was still able in the presence of that roaring +giant to sling stones at a hair's breadth and not miss. His moral +passion as he went forth to lift that reproach from the banner of his +nation gave strength to his right arm. + +The huge Philistine came on, brandishing his spear and roaring out his +wrath. David saw the unprotected spot below the visor of the man's +helmet. He took one of his five smooth stones and slung it with such +force and precision as to strike Goliath full in the forehead, knocking +him senseless. He then ran forward and took the huge sword of his +enemy and cut off his head holding it aloft as a trophy of his courage. +When the Philistines saw their champion fall they fled in terror and +the Israelites pursuing them won a notable victory. + +How splendid is the quality of moral courage! How kingly is the man +who can face all manner of danger undaunted because he knows that his +heart is right and his cause is just! He deserves to be crowned. The +battle is the Lord's in the last analysis and He saveth not alone with +sword and spear. + +There are sentiments and principles which become deep-rooted in a +nation's life mightier by far than the heaviest battalions. There are +habits of thought and long-cherished convictions which constitute a +more reliable form of defense than all the ramparts and battlements +devised by strategists. A nation of Davids will in the final outcome +outmatch any nation of Goliaths with all their swords and spears. And +in one's personal life the clear conscience and the heart of faith will +bring any man off from any field where he may be sent more than +conqueror through Him who loves us. + +This young man showed also a fine capacity for friendship with men. +"His soul was knit with the soul of Jonathan and he loved him as he +loved his own soul." The fine friendship of a man for a man, or the +gracious affection which a woman feels for a woman who is indeed her +friend, becomes a noble form of human relationship. Those ties where +the charm and power of the sex-impulse has no place have in them a +world of moral worth. + +It is easy for any man to fall in love with some beautiful woman--it is +as easy as rolling off a log, and ever so much more delightful. It is +easy for any man to inhale the sweet incense which arises from the +devotion of some affectionate woman's heart. But where a man loves a +man in an unsullied, unselfish friendship until his soul is knit with +the soul of that man in an interlacing and interlocking of interest, +then you have that harder, rarer form of human relationship which is +rich with promise. + +The young chap who is never quite happy with his fellows, who must +always have some adoring young woman present in order to be content, is +not quite all there. He is a "softy." He is lath and plaster where +there should be quartered oak. He has sentiment than principle; he has +less muscle and more fat than go to the make-up of a virile manhood. +The very absence of the glamour and mystery which enters into all +attachments between those of opposite sex clears the air for the +manifestation of some of those fine forms of fidelity and devotion +which belong to friendship at its best. + +Here the friendship was the more notable when we recall how the two men +were placed. Jonathan was the eldest son of the king, the heir to the +throne, the natural successor of Saul. But David by his military +prowess had come to be highly esteemed. When he returned victorious +from his wars against the enemies of Israel the proud and happy women +had sung in the streets, "Saul has slain his thousands, but David has +slain his tens of thousands." And David had been privately anointed by +Samuel the prophet as a worthy candidate for the throne of Israel. + +Jonathan, as the Crown Prince, had the least to gain and the most to +lose by protecting the life and ministering to the well-being of this +friend who might one day aspire to the throne. He made his affection a +thing resplendent by its sheer unselfishness. He saw that David might +increase while he would decrease, yet even so the sky of his affection +was unclouded by a single touch of jealousy. How great is that love +which envieth not. + +And David in turn made his own adequate response to this magnanimous +interest. He showed himself in his whole bearing a man worthy of the +friendship of a prince of the blood. Heaven be praised for men who can +find joy and satisfaction in the friendship of their fellows. + +The young man who was destined to become king was generous to his +enemies. Saul stood head and shoulders above his fellows, physically +speaking, but in his mental and moral stature he was less than +knee-high to the man who followed him upon the throne. When he heard +the women singing David's praises, "Saul was very wroth--the saying +displeased him and he eyed David from that day forward." + +When the king saw the fine friendship between his own son Jonathan and +the rising David his heart became as bitter as gall. "Thou son of a +perverse, rebellious woman," he cried to the Crown Prince, "thou hast +chosen this son of Jesse to thine own confusion." And when David +increased year after year in stature, in wisdom, and in favour with God +and men, Saul tried repeatedly to kill him. His soul cried out, "Let +me feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him." + +It is not easy for any man, especially a young man with hot, red blood +in his veins and the sense of injustice rankling in his heart, to stand +up in the face of hatred and malice and keep sweet about it. "Love +your enemies. Bless them who curse you. Do good to them that hate +you. Pray for those who despitefully use you." If you are struck upon +the cheek take a second blow upon the other cheek rather than strike +back in resentment. If a man compels you unjustly to go a mile with +him, go two miles rather than seek to be avenged. Take the rules of +action constantly from within, from the best instincts of your own +heart rather than have them furnished to you by the evil behaviour of +wrong-doers. Allow no man's meanness to master you--allow rather your +own nobility to overcome that evil with good. + +How easy it is to say it, but to do it--aye, there is the rub! It is +so divinely hard to put these fine principles into practice. The soft +answer may turn away wrath, but the hot retort comes more readily to +the lips. The humane return of good for evil points the way of +spiritual advance, but the desire to pay every man back in his own coin +with a tip thrown in for good measure is often more natural. The more +honour then to the man who has learned that greater is he that ruleth +his own spirit than he that taketh a city. + +When David had Saul within his power he refused to strike. There were +months when the young man was hunted through the hills of Judea by the +hirelings of the wicked king, as if he had been a mad dog. There came +a night when Saul was sleeping in his barricade of wagons. He had +around him the three thousand soldiers whom he had led into the +mountains in his mad effort to capture David. The young man had been +pursued until he had felt that there was only a step between him and +death. + +That very night, accompanied only by his armour-bearer, David stole +under cover of the darkness into Saul's camp. He presently stood in +the tent of the sleeping giant. Here was his enemy lying helpless at +his feet! His armour-bearer, knowing the history of that enmity, +whispered, "Let me smite him with one blow to the earth! I will not +smite the second time." One blow in the dark would suffice to end that +murderous career. + +And it ought to be remembered that this was in a day when "an eye for +an eye and a tooth for a tooth" was the law of the land. It was +esteemed the law of God. The atmosphere was not one of +forbearance--the popular heroes were men like Samson and Gideon, women +like Deborah and Jael, who did not hesitate to strike down their foes. +"Let me smite him," came the whisper in the dark. "One blow will +suffice." + +But peace hath her victories no less than war. Mercy has its trophies +no less than force. Here was a man who would not avenge himself--he +would give place unto wrath knowing that vengeance belongs to God. He +was ready to make the bold adventure of undertaking to overcome evil +with good. + +David would not strike his enemy even though that enemy had been in hot +pursuit of him. "Destroy him not," he whispered to his +companion-in-arms as he felt him clutching the sword which hung at his +side. David's greatest victory was not over Goliath, the Philistine +giant--it was over himself, over that spirit of revenge which might so +easily have ruled his heart in that dark, hard hour. + +He had in splendid measure the quality of mercy which the poet sings. + + "The quality of mercy is not strain'd, + It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven + Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest; + It blesseth him that gives and him that takes. + 'Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes + The throned monarch better than his crown; + We do pray for mercy, + And that same prayer doth teach us all to render + The deeds of mercy." + + +We are discovering those qualities which entitled this young man to be +crowned as king. + +Finally, he was a man of genuine piety. We read in one place that he +was "a man after God's own heart." The statement has been a puzzle to +many an honest mind. This man who in his later years dipped his hands +in the blood of his foes and fell on one occasion into the grossest sin +with an attractive woman, this fellow a man after God's own heart! + +He was not an angel. As we go up and down through history we find men +and not angels. We find men with mud on their boots, with blisters on +their hands, and with scars on their souls. George Washington owned +slaves. John Calvin burned Servetus at the stake. Peter the Apostle +denied his Lord three times in a single night--he denied with an oath. +If you are looking for moral perfection you will have to look somewhere +else than on this earth. + +David was a man after God's own heart, not because he never did wrong, +but because when he fell down he got up again. He got up again faced +towards God and not away from Him, faced away from the evil which had +thrown him down and not towards a further advance in wrong-doing. "The +wise make of their moral failures ladders by which they climb towards +Heaven. The foolish make of their moral failures graves wherein they +bury all their highest hopes." + +When Oscar Wilde was imprisoned in Reading gaol for his own wretched +wrongdoing he wrote that strangely human document, "De Profundis." It +was a message "out of the depths." In that book he used this striking +sentence which I have never forgotten since the first time I read it, +"The highest moment in a man's career may be the hour when he kneels in +the dust and beats upon his breast and tells all the sins of his life." + +"God be merciful to me, a sinner." "Have mercy upon me, O God. +Against Thee have I sinned. Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity and +cleanse me from my sin." This is all that any honest man can say in +the presence of his Maker, and when he does say it honestly he is on +his way to the divine favour. + +David was a man of faith and of prayer; he was a man of deep, sweet +feeling and of spiritual longing. In all his better moments when he +was truly himself his heart hungered after righteousness and his soul +was athirst for the living God. A man of that moral mood and build is +much more after God's own heart, even though he may upon occasion be +betrayed by the fervour of his nature into wrong-doing, than is the +coldly correct man who has never felt enough of warm-hearted devotion +to anything to raise the spiritual temperature a single degree. + +I do not know how many of these Psalms came from the lips or the pen of +David. No one knows--not many in all probability. But I know that +these words represent experiences which were David's beyond a +peradventure. "The Lord is my rock and my fortress, my deliverer and +my saviour. In my distress I called upon Him and He heard me. He drew +me out of many waters and He brought me forth into a large place. +Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life and I +shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever." + +He came to the throne at the age of thirty, and he reigned over Israel +for forty years. His name was handed down in human history as that of +the greatest king that Israel ever had. He never could have done it +but for the fact that he had in his heart faith and hope and love +towards God and towards his fellow men. He was a man of deep and +genuine piety. + +When William IV of England passed away there was a young girl of +sixteen named Victoria who was spending the night in Kensington Palace. +Word was suddenly brought to her that the King was dead and that she +was Queen of England. She immediately fell upon her knees imploring +divine help and guidance in the discharge of the high duties which had +been thrust upon her. May it not be that this was one secret of her +beneficent reign which lasted for more than sixty years? The rulers +who begin the ascent of their thrones upon their knees rise high +because their eyes are upon that Great White Throne which is the final +seat of all authority and of all blessing. + +Here then were the leading traits in that young man who became king! +In his early life when he was nothing but a shepherd boy he showed +fidelity in the ordinary duties of every-day life. He showed courage +and high resolve in the presence of danger. He had a fine capacity for +joyous and enduring friendship with his brother men. He was +great-hearted and magnanimous to his foes, even when he had them +utterly in his power. He was a man of simple, genuine faith in the +living God. + +Whether you are living in Palestine or in Connecticut, in the tenth +century before Christ or in the twentieth century after, are not these +the qualities which are sure to be crowned? Are not these the traits +which make any man kingly in his bearing and in the whole content of +his inner life? + +Set your hearts upon those traits and make them your own! Fight the +good fight! Keep your faith! Finish your course with honour and you +will find at the end of it laid up for you a crown of righteousness, +which God gives to every man who serves Him aright. + + + + +IV + +The Young Man Who Was Born to the Purple + +"In the year that King Uzziah died"--it was more than a date, it was an +experience! The king had been a wise and good ruler. He had served +his country well for fifty-two long years. He showed an interest in +the welfare of his people--"He loved husbandry and dug wells for them +in the desert." He caused vineyards to be planted on the slopes of +Carmel and he increased the herds of cattle which grazed in the +lowlands. He fortified his capital by building towers at the valley +gate and at the turning of the wall in Jerusalem. + +His reign was beneficent, but now he was dead, and this warm-hearted +young patriot felt that his heart was overwhelmed. He and his fellow +citizens must now plan for the future of their county without the +guidance and inspiration of this great king. + +But "In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord." There came +something more than a personal experience of disappointment. There +came the emergence of a new and higher form of faith. This young man +saw the earthly majesty of this wise and good king go down in utter +defeat. In some strange way the king contracted leprosy. During all +the closing years of his reign he suffered from the crawling inroads of +that loathsome disease. By the stern requirements of the Jewish law he +was banished from his own capital. He was compelled to live outside +the city and to reign by deputy. He finally died a lingering and +horrible death. + +And in that dread hour the young man saw the heavenly majesty of the +King of kings resplendent and enduring. "In the year that King Uzziah +died I saw the Lord, high and lifted up, sitting upon His throne and +His glory filled the temple." The spirit of hero-worship was passing +over into religious faith. + +Let me study with you the effect of this crisis in the life of his +nation upon this young man who was born to the purple. He possessed +all those advantages which go with wealth, social position, and +education. We have here no rough man of the hills like Elijah, the +Tishbite, rudely dressed and rude in speech. We have here no man with +the smell of the fields in his garments like Amos, the herdsman of +Tekoa. + +Isaiah belonged to the fortunate class. He lived on Fifth Avenue. He +had an assured social position which gave him ready access to the court +and to the presence of the king. He was familiar with the customs and +the costumes of fashionable society, as we find in that chapter where +he openly rebukes the showy extravagance of the idle rich. He was well +educated--he had that literary skill which comes only to those who are +well trained. In all the Old Testament you will find nothing finer +than the sweep and finish of some of this young prophet's public +utterances. He was one to whom five talents had been given where other +men were struggling along with one apiece. He therefore owed to +society what might be called the debt of privilege. It is a fixed +charge upon the lives of those who sit above the salt. It has a right +to insist upon full payment. "To whom much is given, of him will much +be required." + +It is for every man to ask himself: "How much do I eat up in my +generous mode of life? How much in food and dress, in housing and +furnishing, in motor cars and yachts, in travel and in recreation? How +much do I consume in those provisions which I make for a wider culture +through books, pictures, music and the like?" What is your average +intake of this world's good things? That measure of consumption will +indicate the measure of your responsibility. If you are born to the +purple and fare sumptuously in all these ways then the world has a +right to demand that you shall render back in corresponding measure +that useful service which is your plain duty. + +In that effective cartoon which Jesus drew of the Rich Man and Lazarus, +it was the unpaid debt of privilege which brought about the loss of a +soul. Jesus showed the two men in this world, one of them living in a +palace, clothed with purple and fine linen, faring sumptuously every +day; the other in rags dying at the Rich Man's gate, hungry and full of +sores. Then Jesus showed the two men in the next world, Lazarus the +beggar now in Abraham's bosom, and the son of good fortune enduring +torment. + +There is no hint that the Rich Man had gained a penny of his wealth +wrongfully; no charge of lying or theft, of murder or adultery is laid +at his door. He was damned not by the wicked things he had done, but +for the lack of that generous and humane service which he had left +undone. His sin was that of selfish indifference. The way to +perdition is paved with moral neglect. The debt of privilege can no +more be escaped than death or taxes. To whom much is given, of him +will much be required. And a full sense of that responsibility was +brought home to this well-endowed young man in the year the great king +died. + +The fortunate young man stood out in the open confessing his sense of +moral need. There in the place of worship in that high and serious +mood which followed upon the death of the king, he caught a fresh +vision of God. "I saw the Lord high and lifted up, sitting upon His +throne. I saw Him surrounded with the winged seraphs. And one of them +cried to another, Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts! The whole +earth is full of His glory." + +The very sight of the unstained purity of Him "unto whom all hearts are +open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid," brought +this young man to his knees. He knelt in the dust and beat upon his +breast and told the sins of his life. "Woe is me, I am undone. I am a +man of unclean lips. I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. +And mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." + +The man who has no sense of sin has little sense of any sort. If we +say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves or else we lie. Where is the +man who can stand up in the presence of those who know him and say, +"Every deed that I have done was done in honour and integrity. Every +word that has fallen from my lips has been spoken in truth and in +kindliness. Every desire which I have harboured in my soul has been +one upon which the eye of my Maker might rest with approval." + +Can you say that? I am frank to confess that I cannot. I have done +wrong. I feel my need of the divine mercy. I want forgiveness, +cleansing and renewal. And every man who is honest enough to look +himself in the face, without flinching, will be moved to make the same +confession. It is up out of those moments of contrition when men are +humbled and broken before God that the spiritual impulses come which +are to beat back the forces of evil and make this earth at last as fair +as the sky. + +I care not what the man's outward station may be--he may live on the +Avenue or he may live in the slums; he may be clothed in purple or he +may be dressed in rags; he wear a Phi Beta Kappa key or he may be so +untaught that he has to make his mark when he signs a mortgage--in any +event here is a prayer which will fit his lips--it fits every pair of +lips: "God be merciful to me, a sinner." + +In that one brief sentence we have the four main terms of religious +experience. "God," the object of religion, the ground of all finite +existence, the basis of all our hope! "Me," the human soul, the +subject of religion, the field where the work of religion is to be +wrought out! "Sin," the obstacle to religion, the source of all our +moral failure, the cause of our alienation from God! And "mercy," the +agent of religion, the form of energy which accomplishes our recovery! +God be merciful to me, a sinner. + +This young man of good fortune stood up in the temple in the presence +of his fellows making his open confession of moral need. "Woe is me +for I am undone. I am a man of unclean lips." + +In that very hour when this honest confession came from his lips his +life was cleansed by the direct action of the divine spirit. He saw +one of the winged seraphs flying towards him through the open spaces of +Heaven. The angel took a live coal from the altar and laid it upon the +lips of this young man. He cried out as he did it, saying, "Thine +iniquity is taken away. Thy sin is purged." Isaiah was no more a man +of unclean lips--he could now speak with that Lord whose name is Holy +as friend speaks with friend. + +We have this profound moral experience dressed up in those grand, +Oriental robes which were dear to the people of that region. But when +you strip away the silk, the lace, and the feathers of Eastern imagery, +and get down to the bare, warm truth, this is what you find--a man +whose sense of moral lack had prompted that open confession, cleansed +in that high hour by the direct action of the divine spirit upon his +soul. + +Here is that which is basic and fundamental in all religious life! I +wonder if we have not been tempted in recent years to obscure this +vital experience. We have held those two big words, "Heredity" and +"Environment," so close to our eyes as to blind us, oftentimes, to the +larger vision of that which is superhuman in earthly experience. + +It is possible for the inner life of a man to be so wrought upon by the +action of the spirit of God that the corrupt nature is cleansed, the +weak nature is made strong, the selfish disposition is transformed into +benign love. + +It matters little how you go about it, if you go with sincere faith. +You may seek for that renewal through the regenerating influence of the +Sacraments dear to the heart of the Romanist and the High Churchman. +If you find it there, it will be because Christ is within the +Sacrament. You may seek for it in those profound emotional reactions +which come at the Methodist mourners' bench. If you find it there, it +will be because the spirit of Christ was operating through those +feelings. You may find it as you make an about face, turning away from +that which is evil and making Christian duty your supreme choice in the +quiet of your own room. If you find it there, it will be because +Christ was present in those movements of your inner life. The woman +was healed in the Gospel story by touching the hem of Christ's garment +because Christ was within that garment. + +If any man will seek for moral renewal at the hands of God he will +find. If he will knock at any one of these doors it will open. Here +is the Gospel as it stands recorded on the pages of the Old +Testament--"The spirit of the Lord shall come upon thee and thou shall +be turned into another man." Here is the same Gospel as it stands +recorded on the pages of the New Testament--"If any man is in Christ he +is a new creature. Old things are passed away and all things are +become new." + +In the joy of moral renewal this well-born, well-reared, well-trained +young man gave himself in eager consecration to the highest he saw. "I +heard the voice of the Lord say, Whom shall I send? Who will go for +us? Then said I, Here am I, send me." + +His nation, now robbed of its great king by the hand of disease, was +facing a crisis. The national church to which he belonged was steeped +in formalism and insincerity. The divine voice was uttering a +heartfelt lament over the unfaithfulness of the chosen people. "Israel +doth not know! My people do not think. The whole head is sick and the +whole heart is faint." + +There was a loud cry for men of large build with wise heads and sound +hearts to furnish moral leadership. And in the face of that demand +this son of good fortune did not allow the divine spirit to go out into +the highways and hedges in order to compel some sort of man, any sort +of man, to come in that the ranks might be filled. He answered to his +name with a clear-cut consecration of himself. "Here am I, send me." + +When war comes to any country, there are rich men who give money, +millions of it, that the war chest may be full. There are great +manufacturers who promptly place their plants at the disposal of the +government for the making of munitions. There are ship owners who turn +over their vessels to the Navy that they may be sent to do business in +the great waters of national defense. There are wise men who think +hard upon the problems of finance and statecraft that they may provide +that counsel which is more precious than rubies. All this is in the +highest degree praiseworthy. + +But the only men who give what Lincoln called at Gettysburg "the last +full measure of devotion" are the men who give themselves. These men +do not go on horseback nor in automobiles. They walk. They eat the +hardtack. They sleep on the ground. They dig the trenches and fight +in them. They march out at the word of command to be shot at. They +keep right on doing those plain things until the war is ended and +victory achieved. These are the men who awaken our warmest feeling of +admiration and gratitude. "Here am I, send me"--nothing can take the +place of that! + +In that sterner war where there is no discharge, in that age-long, +world-wide fight against the evils of earth this same sound principle +holds. Money is needed; counsel is needed; organization and +administrative ability are needed. The bringing in of that kingdom +which is not meat and drink, nor shot and shell, but righteousness and +peace and joy in the divine spirit, requires all these fine forms of +effort. But nothing can ever take the place of that personal +consecration of each man's own soul to the service of the living God. + +In that high hour when Isaiah saw the God of things as they are, high +and lifted up, sitting on His throne, he did not say, "Here are any +number of fine people, send them. Here is a man who could perform the +task better than I--send him." He said what every man must say who +means to stand right in the Day of Judgment, "Here am I, send me." + +He was the son of good fortune, and his life was bright and rich with +many an advantage. But this did not prompt him to claim any sort of +exemption from the call for volunteers. His vision of the awful +difference between the earthly majesty of that king who sank so swiftly +into a leper's grave and the heavenly majesty which rose above it +sovereign and eternal, made him feel that nothing would suffice but the +gift of himself. + +What shall it profit a man, this man, that man, any man, to gain the +largest measure of earthly success you may choose to name, if in the +process he loses himself, his real self, his best self, his enduring +self? What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world, but feels +within himself a capacity for higher things unrealized? In the great +outcome nothing really matters save the devotion of the personal life +to the highest ends. + +In the year 1840 near the city of Louvain a child was born, who came of +good stuff. He was educated for a business career, and there in +prosperous little Belgium the outlook at that time for wealth, for +social position, and for a life of joy was very bright. But at the age +of eighteen this boy offered himself for the priesthood of the Roman +Catholic Church. He joined the Society of the Sacred Heart. He went +out to the Hawaiian Islands as a missionary and was ordained as a +priest in the city of Honolulu. + +He was at once impressed with the sad condition of the leper settlement +on the island of Molokai. He resolved to give his life to those poor, +diseased, horror-stricken people. He knew that to live among them +would mean banishment from his ordinary associations and the loss of +all possible preferment in the church. He knew that he might himself +contract that terrible disease and suffer a lingering, painful, +frightful death. "No matter," he cried, "I am going." And he went. + +He not only preached to those lepers the Gospel of the Son of God and +ministered to them in spiritual things--his own labours and his appeals +to the Hawaiian government secured for them better dwellings, an +improved water supply, and a more generous provisioning of the unhappy +settlement. For five years he worked alone, but for the occasional +assistance of a priest who came to the colony for a single day. He +finally succumbed to the dread disease of leprosy and in his +forty-ninth year died a martyr to humane devotion. His name was Father +Damien, and he shed fresh luster upon the Christian ministry. + +The young man who was born to the purple, called now to be a prophet of +God, seized upon the vital elements of religion and uttered them with +power. "What does it mean to be religious?" men were asking. Some of +the dull, blind priests of that day were saying, "It means sacrifice +and burnt offering. It means the careful and showy observance of the +forms of worship." Israel did not know; the people did not think. + +Then this young prophet gave them the word of God with an edge on it. +He showed them the folly of all those outward signs of devotion apart +from the inward spirit of righteousness. "To what purpose is the +multitude of your sacrifices? Who hath required this at your hands? +When you spread forth your hands I will hide my eyes. When you make +many prayers I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood. Wash you, +make you clean. Put away the evil of your doings. Cease to do evil, +learn to do well. Then though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be +white as snow." + +"Salvation by righteousness--this is the message of the Old Testament," +Matthew Arnold used to say. "Righteousness through Jesus Christ," this +is the message of the New Testament! And this nineteenth century man +of letters was but echoing the words which fell from the lips of those +prophets in the eighth century before Christ. + +"Wherewith shall I come before the Lord?" said Micah. "Will the Lord +be pleased with a thousand rams or with ten thousand rivers of oil? He +hath showed thee, O man, what is good, and what doth the Lord require +of thee but to do justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with thy +God." + +"Seek justice," Isaiah said; "relieve the oppressed, judge the +fatherless, plead for the widow. If ye be willing and obedient ye +shall eat the good of the land. If ye refuse and rebel ye shall be +devoured." This was the heart of his message. It was the call of God +to personal righteousness. + +He represents the Almighty as sitting upon the throne of the universe, +summoning His people into friendly conference with Him. "Come now, let +us reason together, saith the Lord." Religion is not a thing of magic. +There is no sleight-of-hand or hocus-pocus in the benefits it seeks to +confer. Religion is rational and moral. It is a reasoned form of +intercourse between an intelligent and moral being who is finite and +the Intelligent and Moral Being who is Infinite. Its benefits are to +be realized in that direct impress of the spirit of God upon the soul +of the man who has made an intelligent and honest approach to his Maker. + +The young prophet saw his country threatened with disaster from both +sides. He saw upon the south the selfish and cruel designs of Egypt. +He saw the encroachments of mighty Assyria from the north. He saw the +madness of those Israelites who thought they could combine wickedness +and worship, the observance of religious forms with lives of moral +unconcern. And in that hour the truths he lifted before them were "The +majesty and authority of God, the everlasting obligation of personal +righteousness, the certainty of the ultimate triumph of God's Kingdom +over the wrath of man." These were the mighty truths by which he +sought to inspire the hearts of men to do their duty, come what might. + +Have we not great need at this very hour of just such men! It has been +given to you and to me to live through one of the great, searching +crises of human history. The world has never seen a struggle so +gigantic. We have been patient for more than two years with a certain +nation across the sea--patient clear up to the border of what has +seemed to some of our neighbours like a lazy acquiescence in +lawlessness. We have seen that nation referring contemptuously to her +own treaties as mere scraps of paper, and then openly disregarding her +solemn obligations. + +We saw the outrage perpetrated upon Belgium, an outrage which men who +know their histories better than I know mine are saying will go down as +the greatest crime in the annals of the race. We saw the drowning of +hundreds of helpless women and children in the sinking of the +_Lusitania_ without warning and in flat defiance of international law. +We saw the judicial murder of women like Edith Cavell and of men like +Captain Fryatt. We have seen the Zeppelins engaged in the dastardly +business of hurling down bombs upon unfortified towns for the killing +of old women and little children--heretofore when decent nations have +gone to war men have fought with men. We have seen thousands of +helpless Armenians butchered by the Moslem allies of that so-called +Christian power,--it is all but universally believed, with its own +connivance and under its direction. We have witnessed a frightful +record of brutality and outrage, investigated and established by the +competent testimony of such men as James Bryce and Cardinal Mercier. +We have seen the sinking of hospital ships loaded with wounded men and +the sinking of relief ships carrying provisions to the famine-stricken +children of Belgium, no matter what flag they flew, or what cargo they +bore. + +We have had our own rights as a neutral trampled upon by that +government with the arrogant assumption that her necessities knew no +law. And now to crown it all we have detected the official +representatives of that country with protests of friendship upon their +false lips actually plotting with Mexico and seeking to extend that +plot to Japan with the unholy purpose of destroying the peace between +this country and its neighbours. + +The men of our country who have red blood in their veins and the sense +of justice in their hearts are saying, "How long, O Lord, how long!" +War is a terrible thing and no honest man ever speaks lightly of war. +But there are things which are worse than war. The loss of all +capacity for moral indignation is worse. The easy, lazy, cowardly +acquiescence in lawlessness and crime is worse. The loss of the +readiness to sacrifice one's very life, if need be, for those ends +which are just and right, is infinitely worse. + +There are interests which are worth fighting for and, if need be, they +are worth dying for. The sanctity of womanhood and the safety of +little children, the security of those interests which are essential to +human well-being and the protection of our homes, the honour and +integrity of our country, and the maintenance of those majestic +principles of righteousness which underlie all social advance--these +ends are worth dying for. If these high ends can be secured by +persuasion and moral appeal, well and good. But if they cannot, if +their very existence is threatened by lawlessness and hate, then let +men of sound mind and honest heart stand ready to do battle for the +right. + +In these hours of stress which have come upon our country, we have need +of men who possess the necessary moral courage to stand forth and meet +the crisis. There is a loud call everywhere for those who are prepared +to face duty without flinching. It is for every man to say touching +his own measure of ability, "Here am I, send me." + +If the cause of democracy is not to fail in those hard years which will +come at the close of this war, there is need not only of wise and +honest leaders--there is need of ranks upon ranks of plain men who are +ready to give their best strength to the service of that government +which is "of the people, for the people, and by the people." + + + "O beautiful, my country, ours once more, + What were our lives without thee; + What all our lives to save thee. + We reck not what we give thee, + We will not dare to doubt thee, + But ask whatever else and we will dare." + + + + +V + +The Young Man Who Changed the History of the World + +Why do you write it 1917? "April 1, 1917," that was the way you wrote +it this afternoon in your letter to her. + +There was a time when it was not so. The Hebrews were dating their +calendars from what they supposed to have been the period of the +creation. The Romans reckoned their time from the founding of the city +on the seven hills. The Greeks reckoned their time from the first +Olympic games. + +But to-day if you meet a Hebrew, or an Italian, or a Greek in any part +of the world and ask him, "What year is it?" he will reply instantly, +"Nineteen seventeen." It is just that long since a certain Child was +born in Bethlehem of Judea. + +How strange it is, when you come to think of it, that the birth of a +child in an out-of-the-way village in Palestine should change the +calendars of the world! We find in this commonplace fact a prophecy of +His radical transforming power in every department of life. He was +destined to take the moral government of the race upon His shoulder as +none other ever has. He was to alter the flow of the spiritual +currents in human society and ultimately to change the history of the +world. + +He did it all while He was still a young man. He was only thirty-three +years old when they put Him to death upon the Cross. He had used +thirty of those thirty-three years in quiet preparation for the great +tasks which were to come. No wonder the three years of which we know +so much were mighty when we think of the thirty years of preparation +standing behind them! Ten years of training and discipline for one of +public action! Ten days of study and devotion for one day of healing, +redemptive effort! Ten hours of silence and prayer before God for one +hour of speech in the ears of men! + +He did it all in His youth and when He died at the age of thirty-three +He did not look down and say, "I have failed because My life is cut off +all too soon." He looked up and said, "I have finished the work which +Thou gavest Me to do." + +How marvellous was the life of this young man who changed the history +of the world! If we could get away from the idea that He is a +stained-glass window or a marble statue or a lovely story in a book +which most men seldom read--if we could only see Him as He was, the +Word made flesh, real, warm, alive, our hearts would leap. + +He was born in the manger of a stable. He grew up in a carpenter's +home and in a carpenter's shop. He never saw the inside of a college, +yet somehow He learned to think straight and to speak as never man +spake. He lived with the birds and the flowers, the trees, the hills +and the stars. He thought deeply upon the interests and needs of men +until He knew what was in man and needed not that any should tell +Him--He told them. He looked up with pure eyes and a pure heart until +He saw God. Therefore, when He spoke His word was with power; and when +He lived His life was with power; and when He stretched forth His hand, +His touch had healing in it. + +His mind was exceedingly broad. He had never been outside the borders +of His own little country, which is about the size of the State of New +Hampshire. He had never seen the mighty cities in Egypt to the south +of Him, nor Antioch in Syria to the north. He had never looked upon +Athens nor upon Rome. The man who thinks Broadway, New York, is the +center of the solar system would have called Him provincial. His feet +knew nothing save the narrow streets of Jerusalem and the still +narrower lanes of Galilee. + +Yet He moved about with a dream of world-wide empire in His head and +the vision of a Kingdom Everlasting in His heart. "I, if I be lifted +up, will draw all men unto Me." When He sent forth His disciples to do +the work He had taught them to do, this is the way their commission +read: "Go into all the world. Make disciples of all nations. Baptize +everybody into My name and the name of the Father." He had +courage--think of His standing there, a young peasant in little +Palestine, talking about a world-wide empire over which He would rule +by His own unseen spirit! + +He found little in His environment to add strength to His hope. He +lived under a government which was tyrannical and corrupt. The Jewish +Church to which He belonged was formal and lifeless. He faced a +society which was ruled by men like Herod, and by women like the +shameless wife of Herod, who cut off a poor man's head for telling her +the truth about herself. He saw the religious leaders of His day +straining at gnats of difficulty in their formal worship and then +swallowing camels of moral fault in their every-day conduct. The +situation might well have frightened the boldest heart. It never +frightened Him. "The spirit of the Lord is upon Me," He said at the +beginning of His ministry, "because He hath anointed Me to preach good +tidings to the poor; He hath sent Me to bind up the broken-hearted, to +preach deliverance to the captive, and to set at liberty them that are +bruised." And when He came to the close of His ministry, He said, +"Behold, I make all things new, a new heaven and a new earth, wherein +dwelleth righteousness." He was undaunted. + +He was an optimist. By that I do not mean one of those silly, +short-sighted individuals who goes about saying, "Look always on the +bright side." Jesus looked at both sides. He went about with His eyes +open. He saw everything. He saw the struggle and the sorrow of human +life and felt it as if it had been all His own. He looked upon the +tired, sad, sin-stained face of the race. He knew it as He knew His +own face, and He saw the heart of pain which had made it so. He was no +schoolboy shouting himself hoarse in a thoughtless enthusiasm which had +never tested its strength against the graver difficulties of life. He +saw it all, felt it all, understood it all, yet He lived and died in a +great, sweet, serene hope for the race. You cannot find one hateful, +cynical or despairing word falling from His lips. + +He stood once where the shadow of the Cross was already drawing a black +line across His path. He had twelve disciples to whom for the past two +years He had given the best part of His time, His thought and His love. +One of them had already betrayed Him, bargaining away his poor measure +of loyalty for thirty pieces of silver. In the next hour another +disciple would deny Him three times over with an oath. Another would +doubt Him straight in the face of all those pledges of genuineness +which they had received at first hand. And when the hour of trial +struck His disciples would all show themselves cowards and quitters. + +Even so, this young man did not despair. "Be of good cheer," He cried. +"I have overcome the world." He was speaking in anticipation, but He +was so sure of it that He used the past tense as of a thing +accomplished. "I have overcome the world." He had kindled a fire +which would never go out. He had lodged a bit of yeast in the heart of +the race which would finally leaven the whole lump. He had saturated a +few men with His ideas and spirit, and they would set in motion a +process which one day would cause every knee to bow before Him and +every tongue to confess that He is Lord. + +He was to change the history of the world--how did He go about it? In +the first place He changed men's thoughts about God. Men are +influenced by their environment--they are transformed by the renewing +of their minds. They are moulded by the thoughts they think and the +desires they cherish. As a man thinketh in his heart touching the +things that matter, so he becomes. + +This is true as regards all our prevailing habits of mind, but the +potency of right thought is to be found at its best when we come to a +man's thought of God. How shall we think about ultimate reality? What +is behind all these changing, passing phenomena? Who is back of it +all? Is anybody? If so, is he wise or blind? Is he good or evil or +morally indifferent? Does he mean anything by it all, or is he only an +unreasoning, purposeless force? You cannot ask yourself or your +fellows a more important question than this--"How shall we think about +God?" + +Men had been filling their minds with all sorts of wild and foolish +guesses about God. This young man placed upon the lips of the race and +within its heart that great word "Father." "When ye pray say, 'Our +Father.'" Begin with those words on your lips, with that thought in +your mind and with the filial spirit in your heart. When you worship +"Worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father seeketh such +to worship Him." When you would turn away from the evil of your life +say, "I will arise and go to my Father." When you want assurance say, +"No man can pluck me out of my Father's hand." When you come to die +say, "Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit." Death is the act of +a tired child falling back into the arms of his Father. He showed us +the Father and it sufficed us. + +This great truth was the heart of this young man's message to the +race--God is our Father. God combines the strength and the tenderness, +the authority and the devotion, the responsible control and the +capacity for self-sacrifice which belong to fatherhood at its best. +Take the highest you have ever seen in fatherhood and raise it to the +_nth_ power, and then trust that, for that is God. + +How many of you believe that? It is the easiest thing in the world to +say, "I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of Heaven and earth," +but do you really believe it? Are you striving to live it? If God is +your Father, then you are His children, heirs of God, joint heirs with +Jesus Christ! Your interests are His interests. Your life and His +life, your destiny and His destiny, are not things apart--they are all +one. + +In the light of that great overarching, underlying, interpenetrating +truth, there is no duty more commanding, no privilege more resplendent +than that of living daily and hourly in the filial spirit before Him. +When a man really believes that, he goes about saying by word and by +deed, "I am not alone, the Father is with me. I come not to do my own +will, but the will of Him who sent me. I must be about my Father's +business." When that great sublime truth is set within the heart of +the race, as it was set within the heart of this young man, it changes +the history of the world. + +He also changed men's thoughts about goodness. What does it mean to be +good? When may we call any man good? There were men who felt that +being good meant obeying the law, keeping the rules, ordering one's +life in accordance with the endless specifications outlined in the +Sacred Books. If a man could get through the day without having gotten +off the path for an inch, then he might be esteemed good. And the race +groaned under the burdens which this system had bound upon the +consciences of men. It was all outward, formal, mechanical, impossible. + +Jesus set Himself against that whole conception and method of goodness. +"Except your righteousness exceeds that," He said to the men of His +day, "you will not in any wise enter the Kingdom of Heaven." Goodness +must be inward, vital, spontaneous. A good tree brings forth good +fruit. It cannot otherwise. It does it as naturally as a bird sings. +Therefore, make the tree good and let the fruit come as it will--it +will be all right. A good man out of the good treasure of his heart +brings forth good deeds. He does it spontaneously. Therefore, make +the heart right and let the man do as he pleases. Love God with an +honest heart and love your neighbours as well as yourself, and then do +as you like. Love works no ill, either Godward or manward; therefore, +love is the fulfilling of all law. Here is the great underlying +principle of all righteousness to which all our ethical considerations +must be adjusted. As men rise from the practice of keeping outward +rules into the more exacting but more joyous liberty of the spirit, +they become genuinely good. + +In the third place Jesus put within our reach a power which would +change our hearts. If you are made as I am, and as I have found +hundreds of other men, you feel oftentimes that your life is weak and +thin and mean. You do not love God with an honest heart and strive to +be what He would have you. You do not love your neighbours as you +ought, and give expression to that love in unselfish action. You lag +back when you ought to be forging ahead. You lie down where you ought +to climb. You muddle along in a dull, commonplace way when your +aspirations and your high resolves should be mounting up with wings +like eagles. + +When you are frankly honest with yourself you say, as I have said to +myself, and as Paul said before us, "The good that I would I do not, +and the evil that I would not, that I do. O wretched man that I am, +who shall deliver me!" + +Here was One who knew that men are weak and thin and mean, yet He +believed that every one of them through faith in Him could have a life +strong and rich and fine, He actually believed that men who have bumped +their way clear down to the bottom of the moral stairs could climb up +again. He believed that the woman of the street, whom the bigots of +that day were ready to stone, could "go and sin no more," her sins +forgiven because she loved much. + +The publicans and harlots would go into the Kingdom--they would go in, +Jesus said, ahead of some of those respectable, cold-hearted Pharisees +who were scandalized at such talk. He knew the capacity for moral +renewal which lies in waiting in every heart, and He knew His own power +to call that capacity into effective action. "I am the door," He said, +"to newness of life. By Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved. He +shall go in and out and find pasture." Security, liberty, sustenance, +they would all be his! + +My mind goes back to a man in one of my former parishes. He kept a +little store, but he neglected his business in order to get drunk. The +wolf was often at his door. He had a good wife and two lovely +daughters, but he had broken their hearts by his evil ways. He would +become so intoxicated that he would not know his own name nor the +street he lived on. When he was coming out of such debauches he would +go about dirty, blear-eyed, trembling, asking every man he met to give +him money to get another drink. + +Then there came a day when that man's heredity was not changed, his +environment was not changed, but his heart was changed. He put his +faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and was turned into another man. He +became at once sober, reliable, industrious, affectionate, aspiring. +He put a smile on his wife's face which is there yet. He began to take +care of his store and of his family. He became an honoured and useful +citizen, chosen to positions of trust by his fellow men. He has now +gone to his reward, but if he hears what I am saying he would tell you +that it is all true. He would tell you also that he owed this change +to the transforming power of the Son of God, the Saviour of men. + +How the world changes and for the better! When Jesus Christ was here +they said of Him, "He receiveth sinners and eateth with them." They +said it with a sneer. When William Booth, the head of the Salvation +Army, did the same thing they said of him, "He receiveth sinners," but +they regarded it as the glory of his life. The first century saw the +Son of Man scorned and spat upon for receiving sinners and eating with +them. The twentieth century saw William Booth received at court by +King Edward VII and honoured with a degree from Oxford University for +receiving sinners. The world moves; there is sunrise everywhere and +the promise of a brighter day! And this great change has been wrought +by the One who brought upon the earth a finer form of spiritual energy +to renew the hearts of men. + +And finally this young man set in the sky of human aspiration a fixed +star of hope. You cannot change the world by scolding it. You cannot +change the world by petting it. You must set before its eyes a vision +of God and in its heart a passion for goodness, and in its will a form +of strength that will not accept defeat, and in its sky a star of hope. + + "Strong Son of God, Immortal Love + Whom we that have not seen Thy face + By faith and faith alone embrace + Believing where we cannot prove." + + +Jesus Christ has done that for us all--"Believing where we cannot +prove!" He has taught us how to hope and to trust and in that sign to +conquer. + +He tasted the whole human situation for every man. He was tempted in +all points like as we are, and tried by those ordeals which culminated +on Calvary. "In this world," He said, "ye shall have tribulation." The +word He used means literally "pressure." Life is not all music and +refreshments. Every honest life must be lived under pressure. It is +compelled to do its work under the steady weight of duty, obligation, +responsibility. It is compelled to fight a good fight in order to keep +its faith and finish its course. + +In the end that is the making of any life. Steam does all its work +under pressure. Turn it loose in the air to go where it will and it +becomes useless. In this world we must live under pressure. But Jesus +bade men face it all undaunted and radiant. He planted in their lives +an eternal hope, "Be of good cheer. I have overcome--you can." + +He knew that His own purposes were entirely right--"I do always those +things that please the Father." He knew that He was strongly +entrenched in the love and confidence of those who knew Him best. He +knew that the great moral order was on His side and that He could +afford to wait for results. In that high confidence He moved ahead as +serene as the sun shining in its strength. "Be of good cheer," He +cried, when He stood within a hundred yards of Calvary. + +His victory was not meant to be exceptional, it was meant to be +representative. It was to be shared and repeated by all those who walk +in fellowship with Him. How much it means when a man is making his way +through some dark forest or climbing some stiff mountainside to find +the faintest sort of a trail. "Other men have passed this way," he +cries, "and what men have done, men can do again." + +Here is a trail of spiritual victory, reaching on and up through all +manner of untoward situations! His own patient, bleeding feet marked +it out and thousands of His faithful followers have traversed it in +their turn. "Who can separate us from the love of Christ? Can +tribulation or distress or persecution or famine, or peril or sword? +Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who +loved us. For I am persuaded that neither life nor death nor angels, +nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, +nor height nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate +us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." + +When the long, hard, dark days come it means everything to a man to +know that there is that within him which cannot go down in final +defeat. His real life, his best life, his enduring life, is hid with +Christ in God, and that life will yet have its way. + +The earth is another place when it is seen to have a sky above it. +This earthly life is another thing when it is seen to have a heaven +above it and beyond it. We are saved by hope, by the hope of life +abundant, life enduring, life eternal, which shines on and on, no +matter how earth's clouds may come and go. + +When all else seems to fail we look up and hear this young man say, +"Let not your heart be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in Me. +In My Father's house are many mansions. If it were not so I would have +told you. I go to prepare a place for you that where I am there ye may +be. Be of good cheer, I have overcome and by My grace you will." + +Here then is my case! Here is my own tribute of loyalty and affection +for that young man who changed the history of the world. He did it by +changing men's thoughts about God--"To us there is but one God, the +Father." He did it by changing men's conception of goodness--to be +good is to be like Him, simple, genuine, spontaneous, in our love and +practice of the right life. He did it by changing the hearts of men +from within--"If any man is in Christ he is a new creature." He did it +by setting in our human sky a fixed star of hope to shine on until the +day dawns and the shadows flee away. + +In the face of it all how can any man of sense and conscience do less +than follow Him and act with Him until His will is done on earth as it +is done in Heaven! + + "If Jesus Christ is a man + And only a man, I say + That of all mankind I cleave to Him + And to Him will I cleave alway. + + "If Jesus Christ be God + And the only God, I swear + I will follow Him through Heaven and Hell, + The earth, the sea, the air." + + + + + +_Printed in the United States of America_ + + + + +BIOGRAPHY AND REMINISCENCES + + +JAMES M. LUDLOW, P.P., Litt.D. + +_Author of "The Captain of the Janizaries," "Deborah," etc._ + + +Along the Friendly Way + +Reminiscences and Impressions. Frontispiece, 12mo, cloth, net + +Dr. Ludlow has observed keenly, and thought wisely and deeply; he has +read extensively, traveled widely, and rubbed elbows and wits with men +great and little of many nations and under varying conditions. He is +the "full man" of which the philosopher speaks. And all these +intellectual and spiritual riches garnered from many harvests he +spreads before the reader in a style that is remarkable for its +felicity of phrasing, the color of its varied imagery, and its humor, +warmth, and human sympathy. + + +HERBERT H. GOWEN, F. R. G. S. + +The Napoleon of the Pacific: Kamehameha the Great + +Illustrated, 12mo, cloth, net + +The history of the great chieftain who, in the closing years of the +eighteenth century, effected the union of the eight islands of the +Hawaiian Archipelago and welded them into a kingdom. Both student and +general reader will find THE NAPOLEON OF THE PACIFIC a richly, stored +mine of deeply interesting information, extremely difficult to come at +in any other form. + + +CLARA E. LAUGHLIN + +Foch the Man + +_New Revised and Enlarged Edition with Additional Illustrations. Net_ + +W. B. McCormick in the _N. Y. Sun_ says: "Miss Laughlin has let nothing +escape her that will throw light on the development of his character. +A revelation of the man who at sixty-seven put the crowning touch to +the complete defeat of Germany's military pretensions." + + +FREDERICK LYNCH, P.P. + +The One Great Society + +A Book of Recollections. 12mo, cloth, net + +Records of some personal reminiscences and recollections of the author, +who, as preacher, editor and prominent member of one or two +international organizations, has met many of the world's prominent men +in the fields of divinity, philanthropy, literature and reform. + + + +THE NEW WORLD ORDER + + +PROF. A. T. ROBERTSON, P.P., LL.D. + +The New Citizenship + +The Christian Facing a New World Order. Net + +"Characterized by the thoroughgoing, wide-reaching scholarship for +which Professor Robertson is internationally noted, but also by his +fine common sense, felicity of diction and strength and beauty of +style. It is a book for busy laymen and book-reading women, as well as +for preachers."--_Baptist World_. + + +GEORGE WOOD ANDERSON + +Problem--or Opportunity? + +Which is it the Church is Now Facing. 12mo, cloth, net + +Mr. Anderson, an evangelist, has seen service with the American boys on +the battle-front, and impelled by his vivid experiences oversea, +addresses himself afresh to the problems and opportunities now facing +the Christian church. A plea for a more devoted working and +application of the program Christ laid out for His followers, to the +clamant needs of humanity at large. + + +C. B. WILLIAMS, Ph.D., P.P. + +Citizens of Two Worlds + +12mo, cloth, net + +"A volume of addresses growing out of the spirit of this new age of +democracy and brotherhood, which speaks to the hearts of struggling men +and women who want to solve the age's economic and social problems by +following the teachings of the Nazarene. Sermons which show how to +reach up to heaven for the dynamic and inspiration to reach down to +earth and help its needy millions."--_Christian Work_. + + +WILLIAM C. SCHAEFFER, P.P. + +The Greater Task + +Studies in Social Service. Cloth, net + +"This author believes that the kingdom of God is coming; that it has +come; that it will continue to come in ever greater and greater power +and glory. He writes with force and illumination, and brings home with +great effectiveness, both to the individual and the Church, the sense +of duty and the broad scope of obligation and opportunity in the +present crisis. 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