St. Paul daily globe., 1895-11-17

the golden rule to the realm of lunar
'bheories, trusting his ideals and fol-
lowing his principles only in so far
as they lead along the highway to
SUCCESS, that man, no matter what
his Sunday creed, is thoroughly ire
lig.ous.
He who recognizes in all his fellow
with THAT in which he himself re-
joices; who allows no difference of
race or class to shut off his sympa-
thies and to isolate him in fancied
superiority to dark skins or homespun
cloth; who treats his workmen as
having the same needs and desires,
prompted by the same motives, and
deserving the same consideration as
his own flesh and blood; who, in the
erring and sinful, looks through the
outer man to the spirit within, and
In it sees the image of God; who uses
his powers and advantages to help
his fellows into the life Of humane
fellowship by making them capable
of companionship with the w.sest and
the best-he who thus recognizes rev.
erently the divine life in other mem
and helps them into that divine life
he, whatever he calls himself, or is
called by the churches, is most deeply
religious.
On the base of the statue of William
Lloyd Garrison in Boston stands the
inscription: "The world is my coun-
try, to do good my religion" Since
that noble word fifty expresses the
life Of the great abolitionist, it stamps
him as truly religious man, even
though the churches branded him with
the harshest names. Since that lofty
word fell honestly from the lips of its
author, Thomas Paine, it bespeaks
him, too, as religious, although the
superstitions of his age led him into
an attitude which still leaves him be-
fore our minds the great American in
fidel.
But the man who treats other men
as creatures whom no real bond unites
with himself, with whom he can have
no genuine sympathy, from whom he
is free to hold himself aloof, toward
whom he has no due or duty beyond
that which the law ordains, this man,
having no care. for his fellows, no cour-
tesy for the lowly, no pity for the un-
fortunate, no respect for the erring,
because of his failing to recognize the
divine life in men; this man is essen
TALLY irreligious though he be elder or
church warden.
|; Religion is to recognize reverently
the threefold mystic bond of life and
Loyalty to render the dues or duties
sthereof. "Over all belief is faithful
ness
Is not this what the ancient prophet
meant when he wrote: "What doth
the Lord require of thee but to do
justly, and to love mercy, and to walk
humbly with thy God?''
Is it not what the apostle meant
when he declared: "Pure religion and
undefled before God and the Father
is this, to visit the fatherless and wild
ows in their aff1iction and to keep him
self unspotted from the world?"
Like every other principle, religion
must think itself out into clear self
consciousness, and thus have it's
thought, form or creed; must house 1t
self into guarding body, and thus
grow it's institution or church. And it
is we'll for us, ordinary folk, to defer,
as far as may be, to the thought of the
past, and to use for our souls good
the helpful provisions of the school of
character But we must remember
in so doing that religion itself is neith-
er correct creed nor true church, but
right life.
So, the divine man, who came to
bring the true relieion into the worl7,
never spoke about it, never used the
word itself, but he lived the true life
in it's threefold relationship toward
God, the inner self, and the human
brothers, and the world sees in that
life the one perfect religion.
Did our professors of religion" live
thus there would be more additions to
the church daily of "such as should
be saved" From such noble religious
ness, what undetermined man can turn
away?
1t is told of Nine. Bouverie that,
when a child, her mother was reading
to her one day description of the
beautiful lives of the early Christians
that noble passage, perhaps, in
.Athenagoras-and that, carried away