The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1921-10-14

|dIIlClGS anu teaching an SNAA'
beyond all computation.
When that versatile and amazing
man Paul of Tarsus, the first Chrls-
tan missionary, wrote his letters 70
the converts in. his new churcneS, ne
little dreamed that he was determin-
ing the standards of thought and lie
for countless tens of millions OF Chris
tians who were to follow, many OF
them in lands of whose very existence
he had no knowledge. We are obhgeo
to tarry here for a brief consideration
of the UNIQUE personality of this peer
Iess fetfer-writer. What DR.. James
Stalker says in his Life of 81. Paul.
is better worth reading than anything
I can pen:
r-Author-Thinl1er.
"Overpowering as is the impression
of the remarkably of this man
produced by following him, as we
have been doing, as he hurries from
province to province, from continent
to continent, over land and sea, IN
pursuit of the object to which he was
devoted, this impression is immensely
deepened when we remember that he
was at the same time the greatest
thinker of his age. If not of any age,
and, in the midst of his outward
labors, was producing writings when
have ever since been among the
mightiest forces of the world, and are
this respect he rises above all other
evangelists and missionaries.
Some of them may have ap-
preached him in certain respects
Xavier or Livingstone in the world
conquering instinct, st. Bernard or
Whitefield in earnestness and activity.
But few of these men add single
new idea to the worlds stock of be-
liefs, whereas Paul, while at least
equalling them in their own special
line, gave to mankind new world OF
thought If his Epistles could perish,
the loss to literature would be the
greatest possible with only one ex-
ception-that of the Gospels which
record the life. the sayings and the
death of our Lord. They have quick
ened the mind of the church as no
other writings have done, and scat
tered in the soil of the world hundreds
of seeds whose fruit is now the gen.
eral possession of mankind.
"Out of them have been brought the
watchWords of progress in every re-
formation which the church has ex-
perienced. When Luther awoke
it was a word of Paul which he
uttered with his mighty voice.
yet in penning his Epistles, Paul
may himself have had little idea of
the part they were to play in the
future They were drawn out of him
by the G81S6UCleS Oh his WOIh
In the truest sense of the word they
were letters, written to meet particular
occasions, not formal writings. care
fully designed and executed with a
view to fame or to futurity. Letters
of the fight kind are, before every
thing else, products of the heart; and
it was the eager heart of Paul, yearn-
ing for the veal of his spiritual chill
dren. or alarmed by the dangers to
which they were exposed, that pro-
duced all his writings. They were part
of his days work Just as he flew
verts, or sent Timothy or Titus to
carry them his counse1s and bring
news of how they Jared. so, when
these means were not available, he
would send a letter with the same de-
sign
A Wartime Revelation.
A scientist recently was quoted as
declaring that only z per cent of the
population of civilized lands do any
real thinking; the rest are intellectual
incapables. Such a remark puts the
scientist outside of his own per cent?
For before all our eyes stands the
great revelation of the war, that the
plain people of earth, even those who
are heirs to centuries of ignorance and
benightedness, have been able to grasp
those lofty conceptions of life and
civilization which were expressed in
the allf6d war aims.
This possibility, of the lowliest be-
ing able to understand the highest,
underlies the present world ferment.
Indeed, there are i1literate peasants
by the myriad in Europe and Asia
who seem to have a clearer compre-
hension of the profunditits released
by the war than apparently have some
professional statesmen. 1t may be
questioned whether any public teacher
of principles of life and conduct is
ever 'over the heads of the people" /;
he may be unable to present his sub
ject clearly. but the fault is with him
self, and not with his hearers. Usu-
ally it is the general public, the ag-
gregation of US plain folks who get the
first and firrnest grasp of the new
ideas which master mankind.
Into this profound and practical
truth we are led by a study of the
Letters of St. Paul They are con-
cededly, in parts. the loftiest flights
of the intellectual powers of man.
Their speculative philosophy scars
higher than that of any of the great
utterances of the worlds long array
of wise men. Yet these epistles were
written to groups of ex-pagans, many
of whom were slaves! In this par
ticular Letter of the Corinthians we
find heavenly sublimities set forth to
| jewellers amid the degradation and
heathenism at its worst. And Paul
expected them to understand what he
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