The Lambertville record., 1910-11-01
Blessings of
lmperfection
By HENRY F. COPE

Text.-we are saved By hope.-Romans
| S:A
To every man life is either an IN
fiction or an inspiration. It all de-
pends on how you take 1t, as dose
| or as spur. 1t Is easy to become SO
| conscious Of calamities possible,
troubles impending, and difficulties
present as to be oppressed with a
sense of the universe as warning
against you. or you can see it all as
glorious struggle in which it is a joy
to have part
Life is not all a joyous way of
pleasure. No person of sensibilities
need, or ever be free from the sense
of personal incompleteness, and Of un-
realized adjustment to the universe.
But this incompleteness, restlessness,
and dissatisfaction, may be the cause
of our profoundest JOY and largest
hopes.
A man is greater than an angel,
be worse. In an important sense im-
perfection is better and greater than
perfection. That which is perfect has
found its limits, has reached Its full
ness. Man sees no limit about him
and goes on forever without the sense
of completeness. That Is the mark
of living, that the more YOU live the
larger life stretches before you.
But for our imperfections there
would be no growth; the future would
lie like blank without the hope OF
larger things. This it is that makes
the new days welcome, no matter
what freight of woe they Eay bring
to us-that they stretch before, they
| promise onward steps, new vistas, the
/ chance to be more, feel more, know
| more. Perfection might mean peace,
but 1t would be the peace of death.
If ever We are inclined to complain
of the shocks of fortune, the buffets
and smarts of living. We ought to turn
and look on them all with gratitude.
+, They shake us out of dull content;
they testify to our incompleteness and
| call On us to learn life's lessons, to
gain new strength to withstand their
oncoming attacks. The fact that We
are vulnerable makes US ultimately
victorious.
Now, it matters not how religious a
man may profess to be. low freely
| he may. handle pious phraseo!ogy. If
| he spends his breath in complaining
| about the sorrows of this existence
and in signing about another world
xxrhn = xx-,fl f~11 81
| ent penalties and pains and will enter
| into the lite of perfection, the life
! that has attained and knows no fur
ther desire. his religion is menace
! to this world and to him as a dweller
| here.
Our present business is with the
life that is fun of prophecy of larger
being, that reminds US by our present
| failures and friction of the greatness
| of our shortcomings; our business Is
to take this life of pain and need and
use all it's provocations, its troubles.
| difficulties, problems as the curricu-
lum of larger life. We ought to be
! grateful, as they who take life wise
ly certainly will be, for all that moves
, low at the time of the bow.
True religion is that which places
| the night of aspiration before a mans
| eyes and sets in his heart the vision
f, of life which knows no limit Reli-
gion interprets the universe in terms
of a reasonable plan of life, with a
hope in life which does not mock US.
Religion is the spirit that enables one
| to trust the ultimate wisdom of the
plan of our present imperfection.
The present struggle is the finest
| thing that we have. Not that we need
to add to its intensity or increase its
complications. But We ought not to
try to dodge its demands nor ought We
to be blind to its splendid promise. For
imperfection is ever the prophecy of
| development, and he who bravely,
hopefully struggles on, bears. endures.
aspires. not only finds the way through
the clouds to the stars, but in the
struggle finds the high and divine IN
| himself.
Here faith plays her part aiding US
| to cling to our visions of the larger
life and greater universe, giving US
confidence even in darkest nights that
We do not walk in a maze, to come out
where we went in, hearing the mock
ing laughter of idiot gods. We believe
better things of our world, and that
means taking our world in a nobler
way and trusting that love rules
| through it all. That means finding
our way out through imperfections and
needs to a Wilderness and perfection
which we call God, the desire OF every
| soul.