Morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven [Conn.]) 1848-1894, 1891-06-22
YALE BAocALAuREATEs SERMON.
TcoNr1NUEp FRoM THE F1RsrpAeE.1

CONTINUED FROM THE FIRST PAGE,
Q as one of his children, and then should
row up into his likeness. Surely it is a |
exhortation, for, according to
ny worthy conception of God which can
nd lodgment in our minds, he must be |
ne perfection of righteousness and good
ess and truth. To become like him must
evelopment To live near to him. and to
raw near, and ever nearer to all the glory
f his manifestation of himself to our in
lost life, even as in the intercourse of the
nature years with the noblest and pur-
st of earthly fathers-this must the
7ay, beyond all other ways, of
to that which every manly
nan must desire, the fullness of his best
nd highest self. You can ask no life, my
riend, that is better than this, as you go
orth from the preparatory season into the
life of fellowship with God
md communion with his thought and his
Ipirit. 1t is the life in which the mature
nan, in the free exercise of all his powers,
s initiating the divine father and is con-
,inually finding the manliness of his man
hood enlarged and gloriied, as the depend
ant feeling of childhood makes him at all
times, seeker after strength and wisdom
and light. To walk with God through all
the years-there is no picture of our human
life more beautiful than that which these
earliest descriptive words of the Old Test
ament present to u.s. It is the picture
which the Christian message asks us, each
and every one, to realize in our own expe-
rience.
The apostles exhortation carries with it,
also, it's word of motive and reason. AS
beloved children, he says, be ye imitators
of God. The impulse to imitation in a
sons relation to his father has its sources
in many things. It rises partly from the
simple fact of his sonship; partly from the
obligations on all sides, under which he is
placed towards the father; partly from the
nearness and clearness of the revelations
of the fathers inner life, which are con-
tinual1y made to him because of the close
relationship of the family; partly from the
admiration of the virtues and excellences
which, in some peculiar degree, the father
may possess. But above and beyond all
things else, as we may not doubt, love is
the true source of the impulse-and this
not primarily, love going forth from the
son to the father, but love moving
the other way. In every child-rela-
tionship, we love because another
first loved us. The fact that the child is a
child beloved is the fact which inspires his
love in it's turn, and his activities also,
and his life move towards imitation in this
way and for this reason.
The Christian message, as it is set forth
in the brief sentence of the apostle, COM
pletes thus it's representation of the true
life for the manly years by opening again
it's resemblance to the relationship of
which we have been speaking. The work
of the true life, it tells Us, is to initiate
God as from the impulse and incentive of
the fact that we are beloved of him. The
incentive and impulse involve in them
selves an important element in the
emotion Of gratitude, the force of which
for the development of character is ever
powerful. But they involve far more
than this. Gratitude for favors bestowed
upon US is not that which, most of all,
fills the soul and moves it. The sense of
love as resting upon US is beyond the sense
of blessings given, and it is especially 30
when we are thinking of the motive pow
reaches deeper into the depths Of the soul
than any realized gifts can go, and theim
tative force passes into the one being from
what the other is, and not alone, or chief
ly from what the other does. The son
comes to know his father with the init
macy of knowledge, as he reaches his ma
ture years, and the movement of imitation
where it exists, is movement toward the
fathers real life. Yet the impulse in
the movement which is peculiar to the SON.
ship, is the impulse springing from the
fathers love.
To an imitation of God, then, we are in
vited which is BETTING us as mature men,
thoughtful, free, manly men, who know
the true life when we see it, and desire to
make it our own. We are called to it as
full-grown sons that we may have, in the
years and through all the years of our
manhood, communion in loving fellow
ship with the father whose life: reaches
out far beyond our own. We are pointed
to it as opening towards and abiding in a
of all action is the love of the divins
father, and the cooperating motive and
impelling force are love for him. We
are not left in such a life, ano
by such call, in the childishness of child
hood, but are brought into the largeness
of manhood. We are made independent
with all the independence which belongs
to our mature powers in this world, and
are left only in the dependence pertaining
to a loving sonship to God. We are asked
to grow into his likeness and towards his
fullness in the best of all ways, and are
hidden ever to be conscious of what We
are, and may be, as his children. Surely
the apostles sentence is full of meaning
and suggestion, as we bring its words
together. Its exhortation is one worthy
into itself the force Of all the words,
and making them bear upon our persona
life.
But the bearing and significance of the
exhortation are not limited to the persona
Co ~, fo1o
is never the fact in the wide-reaching ex
hortations of the Christian system. The
one man is ever regarded as bound to the
many, and he is to be what the Christian
teaching would desire him to be-
in order that he may do what
it would desire him to do-to be in
himself, that he may do for the world
With especial emphasis may we affirm this
of the exhortation now before us, for how
can a mans character become by imitation
like that of God without having as it's re-
suit the outworking of the inner life in
accordance with the outworking of Gods
like? The movement of the divine i'm
pulse in the soul must be movement fol
the good of other souls. And the apostle,
even in the form of his sentence, shows
that this thought is in his mind
His sentence does not stand in its own
in itself But by the word therefore" il
is Joined with the preceding sentences
and these sentences relate to duties towards
and dealings with other men. There mus
be no bitterness and anger and railing
against them, but kindness and forgive
ness. Forgive others-so he says to his
readers-even as God forgave you. Be ye
therefore imitators of God.
And 80 in the wide sweep of the mean
ing of the words--which reaches far be-
yond the limits and connection of this sin
gle context-the call to initiate God is a
call which sounds along all the avenues OF
our life among men. 1t is a call which
sounds most impressively at the opening Of
our life among mentor the call which is
heard, as the summons of duty, at that
opening hour is the call which guides and
controls the future. It sounds in your
hearing, my young friends, on this inter
esting day, which divides for you the past
and the coming time. How shall you imi,
tate God in your work in the world, which
is now to begin?
Your influence for the world is to be-
first of all no doubt, the reality of your
personal life. The light which is within q
man shines without him. The likeness to
God bears witness for itself. If you show
the world that, through your imitation of
God, the true life of the soul has become
yours, the power for the world will not
fail or be lost. Take the suggestions OF
the apostle himself The absence of bit.
terness and railing, the putting away OF
lying and malice, the freedom from covet-
BUSINESS, so far that it is not even named
as belonging. to you; the presence,
on the other hand, of kind
ness and forbearance, of 90 manliness
and true courage, of truthfulness and holi,