1 Bishop W. Boyd Carpenter. ' Life and Letters o/ Jamet Hinton, 206.
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3. The price we have to pay often amounts to the heart's blood. It is not only truth in the sense of knowledge that we want, but, above all, truth, in action, in our relationships to each other, in our relation to God ; and for such truth we pay no less a price than life itself — not by laying it down in one act of re- nunciation, but by making it one continuous act of dedication. We must practise what is by no means easy — an entire and resolute candour with ourselves, a strict scrutiny of our own motives ; we must exercise an untiring watchfulness over the springs of conduct ; we must, in one word, buy the truth by being true in thought and word and deed. Right opinions are very good and are worth having, but right opinions by themselves have never yet saved a soul. We do not buy saving truth by paying a stipulated amount across a celestial counter once, and then carrying it away with us ; we have to keep on paying, day by day, hour by hour, and the price is nothing less than life — gentle, upright, courageous, equitable, dutiful, generous, forgiving. That alone is the true life, and we have not only to know the truth, but to live it.
^ There is no story of modern times that shows such a per- fect blending of courage, serenity, and self-consecration to truth as the life of Bishop Colenso, the pioneer of the scientific study of the Old Testament in the English-speaking world. He had every- thing to gain by keeping his unorthodox conclusions to himself, and everything to lose by making them public ; he had, after all, only to keep quiet on this one topic, full as his life was of other interests ; but I do not think it ever occurred to him to shield himself or to save his career in the Church by cowardly silence. You remember his own account of the circumstances which first turned his mind to Old Testament criticism : " While translating the story of the Flood, I have had a simple-minded but intelligent native look up and ask, ' Is all that true ? Do you really believe that all this happened so — that all the beasts and birds and creeping things upon the earth, large and small, from hot countries and cold, came thus by pairs and entered into the ark with Noah ? And did Noah gather food for them all, for the beasts and birds of prey, as well as for the rest ? ' My heart answered in the words of the prophet, ' Shall a man speak lies in the name of the Lord ? ' I dared not do so." Reckless and malicious attacks, virtual deposition from his office, a general boycott followed, but could not deter him from following along the path he believed,
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338 BUYING AND SELLING OF TRUTH
and rightly believed, to be the true one. "I trust," he wrote, " that I duly reverence both the Church and the Bible. But the truth is above both " ; and the one thing that pained him was to see how little love of truth there was among those from whom he had hoped most. Well, he bore the obloquy, the isolation, the loss inflicted upon him by bigotry, and to-day the views for which he suffered are those of educated people everywhere ; but it was he and such as he who paid the price of truth, and the least we can do is to cherish the possessions they bought at such a cost.^
III.
The Folly of Bartering It.
♦' Sell it not."
What does selling the truth mean ? It means giving up that which we know to be right for some pleasure or advantage in this world. Every temptation is a persuasion to sell the truth. The devil says, If you will give up this or that good habit or good resolution, I will give you this or that pleasure. Moses, when he was come to years, chose " rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season ; esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt."
^ When Ahab came to Naboth to procure from him his vine- yard, " Give me," saith he, " thy vineyard, and I will give thee for it a better vineyard than it ; or I will give thee the worth of it in money " (1 Kings xxi. 2). See here three mighty tempters — the king, money, and commodity ; whereof which is the strongest, it is hard to determine : the weakest of them prevaileth with most men. Notwithstanding, Naboth holdeth out against them all : " The Lord forbid it me, that I should give the inheritance of my fathers unto thee." ^
1. It is hard to buy the truth, and easy to sell it. It is always easy to sell the best and highest things. In the ordinary market the rule is the other way : it is easy to buy, and hard to sell. Everybody welcomes the buyer and meets him with respectful