2. Now there never has been a time when it was more necessary to keep in mind the truth that, in virtue of his relation to God, man is great above all that we call nature. For, apart altogether from the ubiquitous bhght of unbelief, the rush and crush of a civilization which is essentially selfish tends to dis- hearten myriads, if not drive them to despair. The ever- increasing pressure of modern life tends to divide mankind more and more sharply into two classes, those who think too much of themselves and those who think too little. It were hard to say which of these classes is the more numerous, but it is not difficult to discern which is the more to be pitied. We hear often and
1 J, LI. Davies, The Gospel and Modern Life, 97, 101. ^ PrincipalJolin Tulloch.
236 THE GREATNESS OF MAN
rightly about the curse of pride. Yet there is a kind of pride which is not only holy but the very starting-point of nobility. We quote Scripture freely as to the beauty of humility, and it were doubtless unmeasured gain if all who bear the Christian name herein displayed the Christian spirit. Still there is a false as well as a true humility. There is an estimate of oneself so poor and small as to become a dangerous slope ushering down to a bottomless gulf of despair. Self-conceit is no doubt ugly enough to merit the protests it calls forth. But the opposite extreme is far worse. Self-conceit may be objectionable, but self-contempt is ruinous. The former is quite compatible with a lofty hope and a vivid sense of duty. The latter leads straight away to depression, despair, and suicide.
^ It is a pitiful, nay, even a tragic fact, that more men and women are found to-day than ever heretofore, echoing, whether with coarse speech or in highly intellectual reviews, the old wail of Omar Khayyam —
Ah Love ! could thou and I with Fate conspire To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire.
Would not we shatter it to bits — and then Eemould it nearer to the Heart's Desire !
It is verily a real gospel for to-day that can answer such doleful quatrains with an emphatic No ! ^
^ Oh, my Father ! keep me humble. Help me to have respect towards my fellow-men — to recognize their several gifts as from Thee. Deliver me from the diabolical sins of malice, envy, or jealousy, and give me hearty joy in my brother's good, in his work, in his gifts and talents ; and may I be truly glad in his superiority to myself, if Thou art glorified ! Eoot out all weak vanity, all devilish pride, all that is abhorrent to the mind of Christ. God, hear my prayer ! Grant me the wondrous joy of humility, which is seeing Thee as All in All.^
XL
The Nobility of Man.
1. What are the chief difficulties in the way of an encourag- ing belief in man's nobility ?
^ F. Ballard, Does it Matter what a Man Believes? 158, ^ Memoir of Norman MacLeod, ii. 318.
PSALM VIII. 5 237
(1) First, there is the absurdity, as it seems to not a few, of the Almighty caring for such a race, and therefore the possibility of the Incarnation. "Which," asks Mr. Frederic Harrison, "is the more deliriously extravagant, the disproportionate condescen- sion of the Infinite Creator, or the self-complacent arrogance with which the created mite accepts, or rather dreams of, such an inconceivable prerogative ? His planet is one of the least of all the myriad units in a boundless Infinity ; in the countless aeons of time he is one of the latest and the briefest; of the whole living world on the planet, since the ages of the primitive proto- zoon, man is but an infinitesimal fraction. In all this enor- mous array of life, in all these aeons, was there never any- thing living which specially interested the Creator, nothing that the Eedeemer could care for, or die for? If so, what a waste creation must have been ! . . . Why was all this tremendous tragedy, great enough to convulse the Universe, confined to the minutest speck of it, for the benefit of one puny and very late- born race ? "
But is it not the fact that along with the discovery of Man's utter insignificance, there has come the discovery of powers and faculties unknown and unsuspected, so that more than ever all things are in subjection to him, his dominion has become wider, his throne more firmly established ? Is it not the fact that the whole realm of Nature is explored by him, is compelled to minister to his wants, or to unfold its treasures of knowledge ? Is it not the fact that more than ever it can be said —
The lightning is his slave ; heaven's utmost deep
Gives up her stars, and like a flock of sheep They pass before his eye, are numbered, and roll on !
The tempest is his steed, he strides the air;
And the abyss shouts from her depth laid bare, " Heaven, hast thou secrets ? Man unveils me ; I have none."
^ Not the production of any higher creature, but the perfecting of humanity is to be the glorious consummation of Nature's long and tedious work. Man seems now, much more clearly than ever, the chief among God's creatures. The whole creation has been groaning and travailing together in order to bring forth that last consummate specimen of God's handiwork, the Human Soul.^