The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1897-12-23
Dr.. Hyde Gives Account Of OBJ
serVatiOns in Orient.
STRENGTH OF CHRISTIAN FAITH
Insufficiency of Symbolism Of An
cient Non-Spiritual
Religions.

w OFk III Japan, utllNcIcu ny pcN |
Chas NJ Hyde at Central Union Church
Sunday evening, December 10, 1897.
Rev. Dr. Hyde spoke from actual OBJ
servation and the most careful study,
having spent some months in Japan:
Revelation 21:24 "And the nations
of them which are saved shall walk
in the light of it,"
I'm the beginning" so reads the rec
ord of Holy Scripture in its opening
verse in the book of Genesis, God
created the heavens and the earth.
In the closing chapters of Holy Writ
in the book of the Revelation, we look
through the eyes of the Seer of Patmos
upon new heavens and new earth |
Behold, | make all things new" is |
the declaration Of the Divine purpose
as it reaches the era of it's cOnsumma-
ton. There follows a symbolic repre-
sentation of glorified humanity,
dwelling in universe of which the
Divine presence is constantly and
clearly manifested. A city, not gar
den,-is the destined abode of a re-
deemed humanity. But it is not a So
cial order, that is the outgrowth Of
mere natural forces. "The heavenly
Jerusalem" descends from heaven in
all the perfectness of it's organization.
In accordance with the divine purpose,
and not as the product of mere human
endeavor, there comes into being a
new state of society. 1t is not new, in
the sense of being utterly ASSOCIATED
with what preceded. It is a new heav-
ems, and a new earth, that we recog-
nize as objects familiar to our vision,
but with new lustre in appearance,
new style of operation.
| How often is such an experience
vouchsafed in conversion, as the fore
taste of this heavenly vision. When
the soul, from whose spiritual eyes, as
from the Apostle PauIs there have
dropped ''as it were, scales" through
the work of the Regenerate Spirit, has
entered upon life of faith in the Re-
deeming God, it seems as if the whole
universe were new. The very air
seems instinct with life and light.
Friendship seems to have new charm,
unknown before. To be of service to
others brings a heaven of delight into
the soul The idea of God assuring the
soul of His forgiying and sanctifying
love, seems like giving to the soul a
new sense, to see the spiritual per-
: vading and ensphering the material.
We speak of the American Continent
as a New World, revealed by the genius
of Columbus to the peoples of Eu-
rope, and to the geographical science
of his day. Yet to every voyager, sail
ing from his own familiar shores across
the trackless ocean, the coast line thai
rises from out the waves of some as
yet unvisited region, looms up in al
the strangeness of it's own novelty
while after all it is land, land in its
familiar form.
The birth night of the Christ-chilo
was like the birth night of any Other
child in it's merely physical phenomena
but in it's relations to the history O.
occurrences, it stands out as the start
ing point of new era.
1t was with some such feelings o
strangeness and novelty that recent!
landed on the shores of Japan, ant
} mingled with it's people. Sights AM
sounds were new to me, but the Jap
anese nation boasts of a civilization
old when England had hardly begun t.
exist Japanese history reaches ia
back into the ages, but careful scrutin.
passing by mythical period of un
known duration acknowledges tina
since the 9Th century of the Christial
era, Mikados, Emperors, claiming des
cent from the Sun-goddess Amaturasu
have ruled over Japan. Yet the lineag
: is not such as we of the Occidental
world would call family descent
Adoption into the family perpetuate
the lineage, according to Japanese no
tions; while we should say the famil
line was extinct, if there were no chill
born to inherit and transmit the fam
lily name and privileges. This clair
of unbroken descent for the Japanes
Mikado is like other claims Of tn
japanese founded on a misrepresenta
ton as we should call it, of the fact
in the case: but according to Japanes
ideas, as essential truth, as the legs
fiction in our deeds, 'for and in con
sideration of one dollar herewith give
by the party of the first part"
In that land of the Rising Sum- a
the Japanese name their countr!
while the civilization was new an
strange to me, it seemed also like tn
civilization of past age, the vanishe
past of Egypt and Babylon. Yet i
that civilization, instead of the ele
ments that give assurance of perms
nency as well as antiquity, l could Sc
\ the indications of change and of deca.
The Japanese Themselves confess ths
neither in Confuciapism nor in Budt
hism is there power to regenerate an
save. 1t is not merely because it is OF
of harmony with the civilization of th
10th century, and the world of progress
from which Japan has for so man
ages been shut out, that such decay
imminent and inevitable. There is
deeper reason than this lack of ha1
:, mony with the developments of moo
, ern civilization Such civilization {
has for so many centuries bee
wrought out in Japan is not in acco
] dance with the Divine arrangement
and the holy appointments ordaine
for a redeemed humanity, and for,
Swallowed in the visions of ''the ne
Jerusalem"