Of course there are problems the elements of which have not been formulated, and to which, for the present, a simple Aye or No is impossible. But these are not questions that touch the heart of salvation. We live, it is true, in perplexing times, but much of our unsettlement is due, not to the conflict between religion and science, faith and criticism, but to personal indecision. L^ Alternatives are put before us which enlist the passions on the one hand and the conscience on the other, and it is for us to select between them. Faith is sometimes looked upon as though it were the product of a peculiar inspiration acting upon the finer
1 T. G. Selby. DEUT. -ESTH. — I O
146 THE CHOICE OF A MASTER
sensibilities of a passive nature. It must be swept into men by a tidal wave of supreme emotion. Devout fatalists sit on the shore waiting till the phenomenon appears. It is pleasant to believe when the flowing tide is with us, but we must not forget the part we ourselves have to play.
It were not hard, we think, to serve Him,
If we could only see ; If He would stand with that gaze intense Burning into our bodily sense. If we might look on that face most tender, The brow where the scars are turned to splendour, Might catch the light of His smile so sweet. And view the marks in His hands and feet,
How loyal we should be ! It were not hard, we think, to serve Him,
If we could only see !
It were not hard. He says, to see Him,
If we would only serve ; " He that doeth the will of Heaven, To him shall knowledge and sight be given ! " While for His presence we sit repining. Never we see His countenance shining ; They who toil where His reapers be. The glow of His smile may always see,
And their faith can never swerve. It were not hard, He says, to see Him,
If we would only serve.
^ I could not tell you too strongly my own deep and deepen- ing conviction that the truths which I teach are true. Every year they shed fresh light on one another, and seem to stretch into immensity. They explain to me life, God, and the Bible ; and I am certain that what fresh light I shall receive will be an expan- sion and not a contradiction of what I have. As for the words in which I try to make others see what I see, they are indeed poor and bewildered enough. But there is no bewilderment in my mind, though much that is incomplete. The principles are rooted in human nature, God, and the being of things, and I find them at the root of every page in Scripture. The principles cannot be reversed. My mind has grown by a regular development year by year, and I could as easily doubt my own existence as doubt those truths which have grown with my growth, and strengthened with
JOSHUA XXIV. 15 147
my strength. They are not opinions nor theories, but convictions — part of my being, of my habits of thought and life — colouring everything, " the fountain light of all my day, the master light of all my seeing." These are the truths for which men go to the stake, and relinquish, joyfully, friends, sympathy, good name,'^ worldly prospects. They do not depend upon the accuracy of an intellectual process, but upon the verdict of all the highest powers of soul. For instance, I would not give up a single thing on the certainty that St. Paul did not write the Epistle to the Hebrews. These are matters of intellectual investigation, and 1 am not sure that I am right, because I am neither certain that all the evidence is before me, nor that I have rightly judged from the evidence. But if I am asked to surrender convictions, I cannot do it for any reward, nor for fear of any loss ; these depend upon all I know of God ; they are the things seen in the noonday light of my soul ; and I cannot pretend to submit my judgment in such things to wiser men or better men. It would be mock humility. I might just as readily, at their bidding, say that green is scarlet. It may be so ; but if it be, my whole vision is deranged by which I have walked and lived, and by which this world is beautiful. To say that I am ready for any martyrdom in the defence of my convictions, and that I cannot affect to have doubts or misgivings about them, IS only to say that they are convictions.^
And they serve men austerely, After their own genius, clearly. Without a false humility; For this is Love's nobility, — Not to scatter bread and gold, Goods and raiment bought and sold; But to hold fast his simple sense. And speak the speech of innocence, And with hand and body and blood. To make his bosom-counsel good. He that feeds men serveth few; He serves all who dares be true.^
^ When Judas, knowing the Christ to be innocent, dared to sell Him to the Jews for thirty pieces of silver ; when the Bishop of Beauvais, knowing Joan of Arc to be innocent, sold her to the English for £2400 — there is no doubt as to the choice these men had made. When the constituents of James A. Garfield wished him to vote in the American Senate contrary to the dictates of his conscience, and when Garfield stood before them and said :