The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1899-12-01

! 1t of deriding, he can easily hold the
balance of power, and his knowledge OF
history, his familiarity with political
economy, his conviction of Righteousness
will be of the largest practical value
| The scholar in politics, II he would be
humble and brotherly and patient, IL he
would always stand true to what he
knows, would be the most inspiring fig
ure In public life; and he would soon
bring the day when practical politics
would cease to be the synonym of UNI
clean politics, and public life would be
counted worthy the ambitions of our
best young men.
These words are easily spoken, but
they mean much to the men to whom
they REFER nothing less indeed than the
self-sacriticing and gvicarious love that
brings them into fellowship with Christ
and with all who have cast themselves
into the human need; and they mean
much also to the world, no less than the
carrying forward of those redemptive
processes by which the world is being
saved. And for what diviner work Is
man fitted? TO what other destiny is
he called? We may call this work re-
form, we may call it civilization, we
may call 1t evoluton-what you will!
II is really the on-going of Gods re-
demptive process, to have part in which
is mans clearest call and brightest glo-
ry and not for one instant Of time can
man afford to weigh against this op-
portunity and glory anything that
seems to him profit or a pleasure.
These duties bed themselves in the uni
versal obligati which makes 1t every
mans high calling to be redeemer and
to assist in the regeneration of the age;
that obligation no man can deny ana
maintain a conscience void of offence
toward God and man.
To refuse ones chance, to forfeit
ones crown. to leave the obituary-nnon-
gers no better task than to search ones
record for some mitigating qualities,
some faint and vagrant sctntillations OF
divineness and to recite the names of
the clubs one belonged to and the IT,
ties of the property he held, is to show
a spirit unworthy Of our lineage and to
content oneself with the husks which
the swine do eat When Cbristiana and
her children came to the House of the
Interpreter. he took them into room
where was a man who could look no
way but downwards, with a muclk-rake
In his hand. There stood also one over
his head with celestial crown in His
hand, and proffered him that crown for
his muck AXE, but the man did neither
look up nor regard, but raked to him
self the straws the small sticks and
dust of the floor.
Then said Christiana, l persuade my
self that / know somewhat the meaning
Of this; for this is the figure Of q man
Of this world. is 1t not, good sir?
Thou hast said right, said he; and his
muck-rake doth show his carnal mind.
And whereas thou seest him rather give
heed to rake up straws and sticks, and
the dust of the floor, than to do what
He says that calls to him from above
with the celestial crown in His hand, it
is to show that heaven is but as a fable
to some, and that things here are count
ed the only things substantial Now,
whereas it was also showed thee that
the man could look no way but down
wards, 1t is to let thee know that earth
ly things when they are with power
upon mems minds quite carry their
hearts away from God" The seer who
beheld that vision was on the verge of
q larger truth than he knew for it is
not alone in the spiritual realm, and re-
garding crowns celestial that this final
principle holds. The vision is ito let
thee know" that all narrowness and sell
fishness, all disobedience to the higher
law, all Sinking of responsibility,
when they are with power upon mems
tpIc ta hot rto
from God" because they make impossi-
BILE the generous purpose and the sacri-
fetal service by which God Is saving the
world, But we are not so much con-
'cerned with the fate of the one man
with the rake, though that is sad
enough; if it We're only he that suf-
fered, If nothing were lost but his little
crown, it would not be 50 pitiful. 1t Is
the loss Of energy the world needs, it is
the base content with pettness, 1t is
the refusal to be a generator of uplift-
ing influence, 1T is the choking of the
trail, already rough enough, up which
man is toiling toward the light; there
is the sadness of it, and the crime of it.
Some other man as blind as he, seeing
the pile he gathered and knowing not
the rake when he drops It, and thus he
will propagate the ignoble succession
that keeps down the human average
and binders evolution. God teaches his
divinest and most potent truths by in
by the play of life upon life
and of soul upon soul. The Nazarene
is not the only ouch teacher the world
has had, though he stands supreme
among them all; wherever there is a
soul that accepts truth and puts truth
into life, there is a teacher sent from
God, a worker together with Him. 1t Is
this manifestation of saving truth in
the terms of human speech and of
human life that has made possible the
persistent action of the evolutionary
processes by which mankind is being
developed. Not precept, but character;
not dogma nor pedagogy, but life, is to
save the world life express
ing the divine thought, imaging the
divine projections, resplendent with
the divine glory, "The whole mission
and life-work of man is the progressive |
and finally the complete dominance,
both in the individual and In the race,
Of the higher over the lower" Love,
faith, hope, courage sacrifice, high |
thought of duty and ready respuonse to
the divine summons; these set in hui |
man form, made vital in human con- |