The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1896-10-24

upon tne recOgnltlOn OF Irlenus IN
heaven.
When the sermon was done he
went to the minister and said: IL
liked your sermon today, but would
like you now to preach another SER
mon upon the recognition of friends
on earth, for l have attended church
here three years and no one has ever
taken the trouble to speak with me-"
have always suspected that this
fellow was quite as much to blame
as the congregation that worshipped
there. Nevertheless, it must be con-
coded that the thorough-going appli-
cation of Christ's doctrine of univer-
sal brotherhood is a rather modern
thing. A hundred years ago religion
was conceived to be a petty monarch,
ruling over one little corner of mans
nature. Today we are conceiving of
religion as queen with universal
dominion. Does it relate to the flu
ture9 Yes, but it also relates to the
present. Does it belong to the realm
of faith7 Yes, but it also has its
ethical bearing, and should rule in
the home, making better husbands
and better wives; in the world of
trade and commerce, making honest
and upright men; in the world of
politics, tempering mems ambitions
and deepening their love of country.
1t also touches the world of sentiment
and has its inspirational bearings.
And 30 the religious man becomes
the nobly ambitious man of courage,
the man of hope, the man of aspira-
ton. Thus does Gods word grow
longer and larger each year in the
application of religious truth to the
common needs of man.
II. What of its Surprising that
all you say it true about the growth
of Gods word; what of it, Well,
three things chiefly:
a. If this thing that have been
talking about is law, then this fol-
lows: fyou haze q cause, do not groaO
weary of advocating 1T. God does
not give it up. You need not. God
does not grow impatient or weary.
You need not grow impatient. Some
people treat their convictions as
book agent treats book that will
not sell. He starts in with great en-
thusiasm. He goes here and there,
and worries the life out of a few pro-
fessional men, who are too busy to
half look at it. 1t doesn't sell, and
he drops the thing, which, if he has
done his level best, is probably wise
in the case of the book agent. But
mans convictions, if they are worth
anything, are not to be treated in this
way. Men have hardly ever sold
their conviction. Men sell their opin-
ion, but conviction is something too
precious to sell. They are given
away. They are forced upon the at
tention of the world, whether the
world will listen or not Think of
ST. Paul trying to sell his convictions.
Think of Savonarola, Luther, or Cal
vim, or John Knox, or any other really
great men, growing impatient be-
cause men are not ready to accept
their truth. In this matter of the
rapid spread of truth, there are tao
difficulties. In the first place, good
deal that men hold as truth is not
really truth at all.
l remember that when as boy I
used to be interested with my father
in farming in the West, we would oc-
casionally plant field of corn and
find after two or three weeks that
hardly grain of it had sprouted.
The real fact is that we had not
planted corn at all. We had planted
starch in the shape of grains of corn,
but the germ of the corn was not
there. We learned, by and by, that
it was pretty good thing to test
the corn before it was planted. 1t
was safer to put a little of it into a
congenial soil and see if it would
sprout. If so, we felt sure that it
would grow in other soil. Now there
are, no doubt, a good many things
that men would like to have the
world receive, like this corn of ours,
that had in it no real germ of truth.
There are good many of the So
called reforms of the world that are
like patent medicine. Once in while
there is patent medicine that has
virtue in it, but if it were analysed
we should find it composed of some
very simple ingredient known to
everybody, but there are thousand
other nostrums tremendously hard
to take, and do but aggravate theil
of men, and the amazing thing about
it all is that there are so many people
ready to swallow them. So there are