The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1896-11-14

and truth which is vital.
can conceive of the activity OF the
Christian centuries, and, indeed, OF
all centuries since time began having
no other adequate and legitimate
outcome beside that OF personal
union with Christ. To enter into fel-
lowship with him is to go in the way
of all truth and life.
7 mistake the real intent OF the his
tory of the Christian church II II oe
NOT to instruct us in this fact. 1t is
true. this history is filled full OF the
accounts of the struggles incident to
the rise, progress, and establishment
of certain we'll know theological
tenets; but there is fardeeper lesson
to be gathered here than that which
looks out upon us merely from the
printed page. Church history has an
esoteric meaning-one which must
be read not only between but below
the lines.
Now what is one of the indubltable
facts which the profounder study OF
this history revealss 1t is that any
thing like true Christian unity has
not vet been attained. There have
been semblances of this unity. Men
have dreamed that it was at hand; but,
thew have awakened to find that it
was only dream; and that the king
dom they sought was still in the tu'
ture.
Rut the lesson contained in the
history of the church does not end at
this point. For while it unquestlon-
ably manifests the limitations in the
lives of the greatest leaders in the
church n all ages, it likewise teaches
that there is sure prophecy in the
lives of these same men of the larger
things which are to be. The Greek
and Latin fathers and their most
worthy successors since their time
may have been unequal to the task OF
comprising religious unity; but their
thoughts and deeds and lives are now
a part of that religious culture OF
man which points unerringly to TINS
end. Indeed, their failures were
merely auguries of the better things
which we're to come to pass. goo
denied them the unities for when
they prayed and sought in order
that he might put his own in their
stead. Not by thought, even though
this thought be as sublime as Plato s;
neither by government though
this government be as comprehensive
as that of Rome, is Christian unity
to be won; but only by love. This
is the paramount lesson which the
Christian centuries, above all the
thinking and struggling which have
taken place in them, have sought to
inculcate. 1t is that the lives OF men
have not been and are neverto be bound
together in conformity of belief; but
only in the fellowship of the spirit.
Not the creeds, however perfect, hui
manly speaking, they may be; but
the person of Christ is to draw all
men together. This truth is clearly
discerned by such teacher as Dr.
John Watson; for we find him saying
in recent work: among all the
creeds of Christendom the only one
which has the authority OF Christ
b;mself ;s the Sermon on the Mount.
When one reads the creed which was
given by Jesus. and the creeds which
have been made by Christians, ne
cannot fail to detect an immense dif-
ference: and it does not matter
whether he selects the Nicene Greed,
or the Westminster Confession. They
all have a family likeness to each
other, and family unlikeness to the
Sermon on the Mount" A little far
Their on in this same discourse he
continues: "Christ did not ground his
Christianity in thinking, or in dong,
but first of all in being. 1t consisted
in a certain type of soul, a spiritual
shape Of the inner self.
"Was a man satisfied with this
type, and would he aim at it in his
own life9 Would he put his name to
the Sermon on the Mount, and place
himself under Jesus charge for its
accomplishment Then he was
Christian according to the conditions
laid down by Jesus in the fresh day
break of his religion"
Now we find something of this or
der of Christianity in the lives OF all
the great leaders connected with the
church. 1t many have been more an
unconscious than conscious part OF
themselves; but it is impossible to
mistake its real presence in them,
and the influence it has always ex-
erted and must continue to exert in
behalf of the true Christian unity.