ECCLESIASTES xii. 13 439
and his attitude to it is one of obligation or duty to realize it. It is not something to be got or to be done, but to be or to become. It is to be sought not without, but within ; it is the man himself, in that true or essential nature, in the realization of which is fulfilled his duty.^
III.
A Eight Will towards God.
But it is not suf&cient to have a knowledge of the command- ments of God ; we must also keep His commandments. What do we mean when we say "keep the commandments"? It is an expression which has lost its force by frequent quotation. To " keep " is not to lose. To " keep " is to lay up in the high places of memory. It is to hide a thing down in the recesses of the heart. It is to observe cautiously, to treasure jealously, to hold fast, and never let go.
1. To keep God's commandments, to discharge the various duties which He has appointed — this is the very best use which we can make of life ; this is the highest good to which we can attain, amid all the difficulties, disappointments, sorrows, un- certainties, transitoriness and mystery of our present existence. And, in order that our souls may be sustained in living this life of godliness and virtue, we are ever to remember that we are responsible creatures ; we are to look forward to a future life and a future judgment. To live in the light of that coming judgment leads us to keep watch even over our secret conduct, and deepens our reverence for all God's holy laws.
*\ Our thought will prosper, and our science, as we realize that it is not the first thing but the second. It does not till then realize its own place and right. To see God and hear Him is prior to all thought about Him or His world. The perception of faith is the condition of any science of God; religion founds all theology. The world we are in is not ours but God's. We therefore revere its reality, and own a wisdom wiser and greater than ours. We do not create truth, but receive it. We do not command it, but obey it. Wisdom is over the thinker who loves it and seeks it. We are under obligation to seek and think the * J. Seth, Ethical Principles.
440 THE WHOLE DUTY OF MAN
truth ; we may not merely play with it, we may not loll in the stalls as it passes before us. It is a task, it is not a treat. And we do not legislate for truth ; we have to see that the law of thought has its way with us. Our chief act of will is practically recognition of a gift. It is obedience to a grace, even in science.^
2. To be animated by true fear is to have a right will towards God — is to have been brought into fellowship with Him as a reconciled God and Father. And hence the inseparable con- nexion of these two things — fearing God and keeping His com- mandments. Love is the fulfilling of the law. It is itself the very essence of all true obedience ; and wherever it is really shed abroad in the heart, it will, and must, tend to active personal devotedness to God's holy service. To fear God in the sense here intended, and yet to be living in allowed sin — in wilful, practical, habitual opposition to God's commandments — is a con- tradiction in terms. It is, in truth, a moral impossibility. " For the love of Christ constraineth us," says the Apostle Paul, referring to the necessary and inseparable connexion between a right state of feeling towards God, and a right course of acting — " the love of Christ constraineth us ; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead : and that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again."
•j Catherine analyses with keen insight the relations which redeemed humanity can bear to the Loving God : she tells us how the servant, obedient through fear, may become the friend, obedient through gratitude and desire for spiritual blessings ; and how these lower loves, through the operation of the Holy Spirit, may be transformed into the love of the son, who seeks God for His own sake, " with nothing between." And how shall human love, when it has reached this point, reflect the love of Him who " needs not man's work nor His own gifts " ? How become, not merely receptive, but active and creative ? Catherine gives the simple Christian answer : " God has loved us without being loved, but we love Him because we are loved. . . . We cannot be of any profit to Him, nor love Him with this first love. Yet God demands of us, that as He has loved us without any second thoughts, so He should be loved by us. In what way can we do this, then, since He demands it of us and we cannot give it to
* P. T. Forsyth, The Princi2}le of Authority, 111.