St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1895-08-12
LIFE OF GOD IN THE WORLD.
OF MANS SENSES TO HIS
SOUL.
POWERS OF INTERPRETATION
That Make Man Superior to AMI
mal-The Inner Force That
Inspires High EndeavOr

the theme sight of the Soul at the
Peoples church yesterday morning.
taking his text from 2 Peter l., 10,
Until the day dawn and the day-star
arise in you hearts," In substance he
said:
Sometimes we work at living and
somtimes we think about life. Our
separate moods in some men harden
into persistent habit, and we classify
such people as men of thought or
men of action. Soldiers like Sheridan
or Sherman represent men of action,
and philosophers like Plato or Hegel
are typical of the men of thought.
The greatest men combine thought and
action in nice proportions, and hence
the pre-eminence of men like Caesar
or Napoleon. The practical man of af-
fairs has his chief activity through
the senses-these are the gateways of
his knowledge, while the man of re-
Election uses the senses as ministering
to his mind force and finds his activity
chiefly in what we call the soul.
But in the intellectual development
of the race we have two quite distinct
methods. Science deals chiefly with
things-the thought is like a string to
tie together bundle of facts; here we
have the largest use of the senses and
the subordinate use of reflection. Now
in philosophy we have the maximum
of reflection with the subordinate use
OF sense PERCEPTION. The object of
science is quite different also for it
seeks what is true in the material and
present world-the world of appear
ances-but philosophy seeks to know
what is universal, and seeks beneath
the apparent to find the fundamental
reality. Religion is related to both
these intellectual methods. 1t belongs
to the historical and the external
order of the world and here it follows
the method of procedure used by
science. 1t deals with the results of
the senses. 1t makes it's home in the
world order, and by Transforming
that order it shows its definite relation
TO time and earth process But on the
other hand religion goes with philoso-
ply into the world of reflection. She
finds her native air in the inner home
OF the soul, where she too takes part
In the problems that relate to eternity
and to the absolute.
Much has been said of the science of
the first chapter of Genesis, but it is
even more significant in it's undiscussed
philosophy.
God created the world, SO the ac-
count runs, but there is darkness on
the face of the deep and no response
In the heart of the Maker. It is after
the Spirit of God had brooded upon
cead matter and made the world alive
with
THE LIFE OF GOD.
and after light had been created that
God saw-and saw that it was good
Order and light were needed for the
Divine vision, as we'll as for the Di-
VINE JOY. So order and light are neces-
| sary for the use of our five senses in
the world, and we, too, see as a double
process, partly physical and partly in
telieclual. so also our senses are re-
lated both to the body and to the souJ
Ihey are like five differently colored
| windows, through which the soul looks
! and gets five different INTERPRETATIONS
of the physical world. Human experi-
| ence with the external world is made
up OF the results of the senses, and
what the soul brings to enrich that
| result On no. other theory can be ex-
| plalned the fact Of human experience.
| what the soul brings may be called
| the power Of Interpretation. What a
| man will see in the practical world
depends upon how the man is endowed.
What we recognize as the
DIFFERENCES IN MEN
will illustrate the difference between
the human animal and all other ami
mails in their use of the world. 1t is
not alone mans keenness of sight:
other animals may see better than
he. 1t is not alone his power of hear
ing, for some sounds escape him that
instruct other animals. No; it is the
! power of Interpretation of sight and
sound that resides in man back of his
senses which has made man the su-
perior of other living beings and made
for him, and for him alone, the posi-
bility of civilization and a history.
You may ask why it is that every
man knows at once that he has a
body, but you must teach him he has a,
soul. The exigencies of life in a material
order are such that most of our walk
ing activities are put in on food,
clothes and shelter So that the en-
phasis upon the body becomes con-
tinual. Every day is the Sabbath of
the body, and every voice is it's pro-
phet; Then, in the training of child
mood, by even the best parents, are
you not careful to teach the baby how
to eat, then how to care for the body.
then how to make livelihood? Are
you not much more anxious to teach
wise diet rather than wise books? Are
not the preservative, earth virtues
your chief care rather than the heaven
virtues that belong to the soul? And
yet, in spite of the fact that the ma
terlaI activity OF life engrosses us, and
the material virtues make our training,
yet is the spirit the essential emphasis
of human history. Time was when
man was chiefly stomach, and that
cry OF lmperious hunger was his great
est teacher. But upon that animal and
earthly foundation has been builded
toward the stars q tower of spiritual
strength, and out of his mud bricks
man has always aspired toward hea-
ven. 1t is
THIS INNER FORCE
which has made civilization, and with
out which human life has never had
a meaning. The soul, considered as
tions. In the first function it is the
Interpreter of the senses. 1t takes the
result of their activity, and builds
mental pictures. These are our con-
ceptions Of the world of sense by which
we are surrounded. But the highest
function of the reason is where it
turns toward the spiritual world 1t
IS because of what it sees here that il
IS able to glorify the world. The soul
opens her eyes and sees the white gar
ments of God, and in that immediate
vision OF absolute goodness she gets a
measure for the comparison of con-
duct-her own conduct, all conduct
and SO judges the ages. 1t is this di-
rect vision of goodness that has been
the power of conscience and the re-
serve of moral force in the world. She
looks again, does the soul, again eager
for light, and she sees God now with
shining robes as the eternal source OF
all beauty, and she comes back With
her standards for LANDSCAPES, and sun
sets, and all other partial incarnations
of God. The structure of the soul
gives the axioms to mathema tics; the
: vision OF the soul gives standards fo1
| Judgment that makes man critic. and
after God, creator. These are the
poles of the uses of reason, but mid.
way between is the other use of rea.
son, which is reflection, or mediation
between the senses and the intuitions
Mind and matter come into harmony