St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1890-10-27
An Interesting Connection Traced

ue uSudl CONGREGATION nil6Q the
Grand opera house, and Rev. W. S.
Vail preached on Salvation and Hered-
ity." The text was: That they may
all be one, as Thou. Father. art in me,
and in Thee, that they may be one in
us."-St. John. xviii. 81.
In the development OF the sermon.
may ask you 10 trace, one 10y one, two
very distinct ideas. to see where they
touch and possibly conflict. and then try
and find our way out of tile labyrinth
INTO which our inquiry has landed us,
10y the Christian principle that | shall
enunciate i'll the beginning. The text
Speaks of religion as unity with God.
1t assumes that man is to come to that
unity, as Christ came to it-that he
Is TO walk the same path, think
the same thoughts, feel the same
emotions. 1t assumes that to
every one it is personal experience
that he must live for himself. If you
will take larger look, you will see the
significance OF this teaching. When the
devoilt priest. by the aid of organ and
choir, performs mass, lie goes
through. i'll imagination, with the pas
si"n OF Christ. All the suffering of the
garden. the tenderness of His last words
10 His followers, the cry of pain as The
/ last agonies Of death are upon Him, all
these are re-enacted in the service. And
when the end has come, it is felt that
|. the. real tragedy has been experienced
/ by those who have partakeu. In the
SENSE Christ is sacrificed anew in the
: service. and much religion is made up
/ OF the sacrifice OF Christ in Imagination,
and then an appropriation of the bene-
hts OF that sacrifice.
But the text makes religion a growth
: The vine and the bra ncheS is the COM
I InoneSt figure in this connection. AS
the tree has its inner vitality, the sun
/ and the shower, and by these outer in
: ffuences is filled with life; so is man en-
/ lowed with spiritual instincts, coil-
: science and pirit of humanity. and is
|. drawn to God by this, and these act as
/ the wind. the rain, and san, to develop
+ his Inner life. Or. to take different
view of the subject, we see man as you
see the talented but uncultivated stu
dent in art. He has a rough sense of
beauty and color; he has an unbuunded
ambition, and lie stands before a master
w no Is able TO call out and develop the
best that is in him. If you watch the
weary hours of his first work; if you
catch his enthusiasm as he works
on in after years: if you journey
with him from the bottom Of the hill to
the top, and stand with DOnateilo as
he looks with establishment at his statue
and in awe asks, as if expecting an all
swer, why not speak. then?" so the
Christian finds his teacher able to lead
him in the ways of life, to call out his
best sentiment; in word, to develop
him i'll the direction of oneness with the
Father.
Meeting this and standing as an Off
set to our development is the theory of
heredity. If We try its three laws we
|; find there is persistence of develop
nent. variation of type. and reversi0n
to former type. Its teaching has be-
come very commonplace. We expect
/ the greyhound TO develop SwiftnesS; we
expect the duckling to swim. We know
/ that when Queen Elizabeth was aroused
to anger her father lived again in her.
We know that inNero. the Roman tyrant,
a cruel woman lived again in all her for
/ mer cruelty. Indeed, family may rep
| resent four generations, and it may be
/ that III 1t are those representing every
| shade Of character. Even tricks like
/ Stroking the forehead while asleep are
communicated from father to son. The
voice and form of the Booth family,
/ with its talent, has been transmitted i'm
almost absolute perfection to the pres
ent star of the American stage; three
i generations of scientists eliminated in
i Charles Darwin; seven generations of
/ ministers eliminated in Ralph Waldo
| Emerson; three hundred musical people
! produced, in the course OF time, John
+ Sebastian Bach. Much of the crime is
|. determined by the Inheritance of the
/ criminal. and in every large city
/ there are sections where men and
| women are brought up who have
a training that only brings out the
/ What are some of the questions
| opened up when we fairly face this
/ problem? If boy has Inherited a ten
|, dency to dissipation. if careless father
| gave him biunted moral sense when
|; he came into the world. if he sought the
l. criminal companionship with the same
|: instinct that duck seeks water. what
II are you TO say OF his personal response
l. bllity? When four generations are i'll
volved in the punishment that falls on
one man, and are also in certain way
connected with his sin. do we not see
the complications that arise from the
consideration Of this topic? And when
we see the tendencies to evil, and then
see men going to the polls and voting
for men who are engaged in developing
the worst passions of men, we cannot
help feeling that they are like
the man who built a beautiful
| house, and finished the upper
stories in the most magnificent way,
and furnished it in the NEST magnfi-
cent manner, but had the cellar tilled
with vegetables and decaying matter
that bred disease and killed his family,
we cannot help feeling that by such
action men are simply postponIng the
day that shall bring its law of retribu-
| ton.
| The sermon then discussed the way
| out of the difficulties incident to belief
in religion and the hopeful view of life
| i'm the face of facts. IL was pointed out
! that good inheritanceS were not to be
| forgotten; that the fact Of a Darwin
! being developed was as significant as
! that man could inherit criminal ten
! denotes; that reverSionS became fewer
| and fewer. variations for the worse be-
| came Scarcer and more scarce, while
| the real history showed that the law
| of Improvement was the final law that
| would never cease TO work for the
improvement of humanity. 1t WAS then
| pointed out that humanity must, by all
| men who have studied heredity, be con-
| Sidered as unit. 1t must be looked at
| as person whose life stretches through
| the centuries, and whose final education
| and publication is attained 10y the long
| experiences of many centuries. This,
| and this only, will explain the suffer-
ings of the innocent where the guilty
have bequeathed the inheritance of
weakness or sin; only this Will explain
the dark features of the scenes that
heredity brings to our view. In closing
the speaker called attention to the one
manifest fact that lay at the basis of
Christ's teaching-the idea that latent
in every man is the image of God. This
was illustrated by word picture of
Dickens hero, Sydney Carton, including
| his degradation, and his transformation
by the power of affection.
Tomorrow Will be the last