Democratic messenger. [volume] (Snow Hill, Md.) 1869-1973, 1903-03-28

/ anu lnOSe great lOnEinES Oh the eoui tiidt
swell within us in our best and treest mo,
ments. so great sometimes a to be beyond
our power to articulate, these. too. II i
foolish and stupid IN us TO treat as less
trustworthy and infallblc than are the
| quIeter appetences OF the intelligence OF
the coarser instincts OF the body. There )
F., no safe creed that ,soes not start IN WIN
a confession of faith III ones own superb
self-superb in the sense OF being gifted
| with powers that put him IN direct reia'
ton with the rocks under HIM. the AR
about him. the great God overhead, anu
the eternal realm OF spirit, human ana u,
vine. And that gives man something TO
60 upon 1t at once makes the iarthest
| star i'll the heavens proper object OF IN
quiry, and laws out before him highway
into the heart and centre OF the kingdom
spiritual.
But the highway into the heart and cen.
ire of the kingdom spiritual is not a road
that is being numerousy Travelled. We are
about as far along on that road as Column
bus was on the way To the Western Conti-
nent when he was still heaving anchor IN
! the harbor of PaloS. But the road Is as
: feasible and passable as the waterway of
the Atlantic And the world is going to
get there The religious impulse, the pas
sion of TIE divine is in us for purpose.
! God is movable and He is going to 10
known. Spiritual things are dlscemible
! and they are going to he discerned. There
is such thing as the life eternal and there
/ is such a thing as having a realization OF
| that .;fe having IL here. too, as 4 matter
of clear and definite experience. We are
not saying anything just now as to the ma
ture of the highway that leads into the
midst of the spiritually discerned realities
that compose that kingdom. nothing Just
now anout the steps man takes in tread
ing that highway. The only impression |
ann studying to leave this morning is that
there Is continent OF reality as distinct
= l. - l.. -
as the Western Hemisphere of our globe
is distinct from the Eastern: that we are
endowed with faculties which TO the de-
gree in which they are developed and ex-
ercised make the matters of that remoter
continent as certainly distinguishable and
as confidently appreciate to the earliest
Spanish explorers; that spiritual discern
meut has Just as solid meaning in its re-
lation to things spiritual as ocular discern
ment has in its relation TO things material,
and that it is capable OF yielding results
that are Just as convincing and satisfying,
and he as solidiy planted in the assurance
| OF the man that has become spiritually cog
infant OF them; that the soul is endowed
with the faculty of vision that is as true
as the vision of the body. independent of
bodily vision and n thousand times more
richly and wonderfully gifted.
Men are interested in houses. lands.
| clothes. money. markets commerce. science
and art, but there is not much interest in
| religion. There is interest in the matter
| of being saved. whatever that may mean.
but desire to be saved is no more religion
! than the desire TO be gotten out of the
water when you have fallen overheard is
| navigation.
| This does not mean that there are not
| good many who have an linking of the
meaning of the spiritual kingdom. some
| thing as men at sea gain a suspicion of
distant land by observing the impalpable
blanket of mist that hovers about it. 1t is
net much in itself, and yet it is a great
deal. because of the much that it is capa-
BILE of widening out into. 1t is kind of
| spiritual coast line which. seen from afar.
appears TO be but a filmy thread, but
which is for all that the solid edge of
solid continent.
Nor does that which we have been say
ing mean that there are not those who
have already travelled a good stretch OF
distance into the midst of things, the spir-
itual verities, that make out the spiritual
world In all departments OF life and in all
directions OF growth there have always
been men who have outrun their fellows,
! pioneers in the enterprise of discovery,
giants in research who have. stood high and
! looked over the shoulders OF their contem-
! poraries, who have lived in the same
! wo-ld as they but at the same time lived
| in larger world than they. In the world
! OF religious thought and experience we
call such men prophets. \ prophet. prop
1 erly speaking. is not so much a man who
! is able to see what is going TO be as he is
ono who secs more widely than Others the
| things which are now. There is such
! thing, even in matters of science, as coming
so into accord with the spirit of scientific
truth as to be able to see with firm and
fast ision where eyes less sympathetic
have failed. Exactly the parallel of that
has been true over and over again in that
other world of truth mystcriously hidden
that IL Snapfal this
And, as | say, we. call such ones prophets.
And there are prophets now as in the old
days-men and women whose spiritual
steps are more than abreast with their
own day., They know, what they see. they
realize what they feel, and it is as feeble
| and infantle for those whose eyes have in
them feeble light TO deny the uncovering
that has been made to these prophets and
prophetesses of longer and purer sight,
as for You and me to slur over with ironi-
cal contempt the revelations brought back
to us by those who have climbed farther
than we into the heights OF the material
heavens.
But that is the way history grows; that
is the way the world becomes larger-a few
prophets, pioneers in the van, and the rest
, ploddng on behind-some not even plod-
ding, some no nearer millennium than
when history started out. OF course, the
great prophet OF all prophets, the great
seer. OF all seers, was Jesus Christ. 1t
would seem that to His eye the things of
the heavenly kindom were as near and as
distinct as were the long hidden mysteries
of the solar system distinct to the vision
OF Copernicus. He did not reason. Christ
did not. nor conjecture, nor guess; He saw
When He told OF God, of the soul. OF the
life eternal, He spoke of that which He
knew and testified that which He had
seen. He came not as a delineator. While
He was telling things to people He saw
the things that He was telling them There
is nothing in the Bible about supposing,
but there is great lot in it about seeing.
Like all the great 'verities, this one we
have been handling this morning grows
upon us with the handling 1t has made
us feel, some of us, that we are out at sea
still, and that instead of having yet planted
a firm foot upon the solid territory of the
continent eternal we are only inspecting
what rather looks to us on the whole to be
coast line, and instead of pushing or boat
w. come no nearer to actually landing
than TO get our glass out. and spend our
odd moments in trying to make out wheth-
er what we try to focus our glass upon is
land, mirage or imagination. In the mean
time the continent is there, the winds
blow athwart it, the sun warns it, the
stars smile down upon it.
a whitewashed reputation doesn't en-
idurp any longer than whifaxya shod fanna