Its Ethical Fruitage, Moral Ashes.

293

times the ribaldry of Tom Paine. What would you think of a man who would write a series of books about the mountains of Japan and never find a place to mention Mount Fuji? And what would you think of a philosopher who would write a series of books on Sociology and find no place for the recognition of the greatest sociological fact of all the centuries, whose influence over the development of modern civilized peoples is greater than that of all other historical forces combined, greater than all philosophers multiplied by all social reformers,-no acknowledgment or recognition of Christ and his work?

With regard to his ethical system, I have shown in the last lecture that it approaches the moral teaching of Christianity as the morphology of the ape approaches a perfect man-a mere resemblance in the skeleton. Yet Mr. Spencer has the modesty to offer this to the world as a new regulative force. And this is the acknowledged culmination and fruitage of a long lifetime of work, and of a long list of learned philosophical volumes, a dreary system of ethics, the substance of which is drawn from Christ's teachings, but emasculated of its morality, winding up with a prophecy that-not now-but in some future age, men will mechanically do as the best men do now, only without the incentive, without the life, without the goodness which leads them to do it to-day. That age may come, perhaps, when a morphological outline of a monkey shall have become an exhaustive description of all the elements and pulsating powers of humanity. Yea, verily :

:

"Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus."

"The mountains agonize in birth-throes, and a wee little mouse will be born."

We have tried to trace out the complex forces and elements which, combined, go to make up that wonderful microcosm called man. We found what men called matter, but as we searched it, it vanished. We found forces which linked man to the lowest of material things, forces which bound him to the

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Man's Powers are Finite but Real,

Eternal Creator in a kinship seen nowhere else in our world. We found that when the forces binding us to the earth and all things below us, should be broken and our bodies perish, there was no reason why we should perish, for mind and morals and spiritual nature were a promise and pledge of something beyond to match and satisfy them, as truly as the instinct of wild-fowl sending them off to seek sunnier climes was a promise and pledge of southern skies to greet their virgin flight. We saw that the highest instincts of man were not self-regulating; they must be taught, and the highest of all which link man to God, must be taught of God.

Facts and history seemed to prove that the historical Jesus was an actual realization of the revelation of God to man,-that he brought to man's spiritual nature that which exactly fitted it, and with the help of which man could reach his legitimate development, sociology attain a satisfactory basis, political economy be simplified, and that man would ripen into human perfectness while striving after a fitness for eternity.

In a brief excursus on the workings of our higher faculties, we saw that: (1) The operations of the mind were, or should constitute, a unit. (2) The talk about the knowable and unknowable was pure fiction. The unknowable is as nothing to us. The knowable is all that we can reach. The perfectly knowable to man has not yet been found, but the imperfection of our knowledge does not render it useless. (3) Our knowledge, so far as it is knowledge at all, is not fiction, symbolic, but real; the reality on the capital of which common sense does her business, science conducts her investigations, and Christianity builds up her faith. (4) The necessary laws of thought set us on the true trend of knowledge. Our minds must all think according to logic, or blunder; and one universal goal of thought in every people where thought has ripened, is the postulate of a final cause, an Eternal Creator. Man cannot endure the

And through Jesus may Commune with God. 295

only other alternate, the hypothesis of blind chance. (5) Men have tried to reach the Eternal One, to drink at the primal fount; all philosophical attempts have failed. But we found in Jesus the bridge between the finite and the Infinite; the Incarnation solves the deepest philosophical difficulties, while it furnishes a basis for universal faith. Through Jesus, God speaks to man, and man communes with God.

We saw also that a study of history would unfold other facts than mere political agitations of nations. The unfolding of character, the solving of social, political problems, the fashioning of laws, administrations, the advance and decay of masses of people, must all be studied. And being studied, it becomes evident that whatever is suited to the nature of the unit man, is suited to the aggregate in a nation. That whatever elevated the individual elevated the race. That religion was a universal national and personal necessity; that Christianity is the best solution, furnishing a religion that works well in national development, because suited to the elements of the constitution of individual man.

This fact and the causes of it became clearer as the various religious developments of historic peoples passed before us in review. Everywhere were proofs of the universal religious instinct, and the noble purity of the very first records of religious thought. But an element of disharmony entered early, and the natural evolution of religion has ever been from good to bad and from bad to worse. In one line only, and that by supernatural intervention, the original pure idea was preserved, and in spite of the natural tendencies of the people chosen for that purpose, they were compelled to preserve for man the gradual unfolding of a religious development and moral system which should eventually prepare the world to begin to understand the God-man when he came.

Jesus came. Nothing but "God manifest in the flesh" can

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Jesus, the Fountain of Living Water.

explain the phenomenon. With the aid of the Old Testament men have partly understood him; as the ages pass on and men approach more nearly the standard he has given, we understand him still better; as the ages still move on men will appreciate him yet more fully; but only in another life shall we fully know him, for then we shall see him as he is, and with higher powers comprehend what is now unfathomable mystery as well as an unfathomable fountain of blessing. You want the civilization and the blessing of western lands; you cannot transplant the fruits and neglect the roots. The root of all that is good in Christian lands is Christianity itself; not its Ethical system merely, but the Christian religion. Remember too, there is no Christianity without the Christ enthroned as Saviour. And the Christ is no Saviour of individual man, or nation, excepting as unfolded in the Bible, our prophet, priest, and spiritual king. "And I, if I be lifted up will draw all men unto me."

The thing has been tested. The lowest of earth's sons have been saved by this story, the lowest of earth's nations have been uplifted, the best rise still higher. The moral working of Christianity is not in a rigid ethical system, but in the spontaneous outflow of a hidden life, kindled in the soul by the divine power. "In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood, and cried, saying, If any man thirst let him come unto me and drink. "

"Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye buy and eat; yea come buy wine and milk without money and without price." "And the Spirit and the Bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come, and whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely."

FINIS.

R. MEIKLEJOHN AND CO., PRINTERS, 26 WATER STREET, YOKOHAMA.