1 Carlyle, Oliver Cromwell's Letters and Speeches, v. 151.
136 THE NEW COVENANT
She feels the Sun is hid but for a night,
She spies the summer thro' the winter bud,
She tastes the fruit before the blossom falls,
She hears the lark within the songless egg,
She finds the fountain where they wail'd "Mirage"!
These lines present to the reader the hopefulness of the spiritual mind, hopefulness not akin to the merely sanguine temperament, but based on a deep conviction of the reality of the spiritual world, and on unfailing certainty that there is in it a key to the perplexities of this universe of which we men understand so little. We know from experience that material Nature is working out her ends, however little we understand the process, and however unpromising portions of her work might appear without this knowledge. That an acorn should have within it forces which compel earth, air, and water to come to its assistance and become the oak tree would seem incredible were it not so habitually known as a fact ; and the certainty which such experiences give in the material order, the eye of faith gives in the spiritual order. However perplexing the universe now seems to us, we have this deep trust that there is an explanation, and that when we are in a position to judge the whole, instead of looking on from this corner of time and space, the truth of the spiritual interpretation of its phenomena will be clear — "ut iustificeris in sermonibus tuis et vincas cum iudicaris." This view runs through all the poem. The poet pleads for steadfast trust and hope in the face of difficulty, as we would trust a known and intimate friend in the face of ominous suspicions.1
And is the Great Cause lost beyond recall?
Have all the hopes of ages come to nought ?
Is Life no more with noble meaning fraught ? Is Life but Death, and Love its funeral pall ? Maybe. But still on bended knees I fall,
Filled with a faith no preacher ever taught.
0 God — my God, by no false prophet wrought, I believe still, in despite of it all!
Let go the myths and creeds of groping men.
This clay knows nought — the Potter understands. I own that Power divine beyond my ken, And still can leave me in His shaping hands. But, 0 my God, that madest me to feel ! Forgive the anguish of the turning wheel.2
1 Wilfrid Ward, in Tennyson and his Friends, 236. 8 Ada Cambridge, The Band in the Dark, 121.
JEREMIAH xxxi. 31-34 137
II.
The Content of the New Covenant.
The New Covenant has three notes — Spirituality, Univer- * sality, and Finality. The formula of the Old Covenant was, " Thou shalt not." These great words, like a flash of lightning, discovered to man what lies in the depth of his own being — moral obligation along with a sense of utter impotence to meet it, dark- ness and despair as of chaos returning. The formula of the New Covenant is, " I will " ; still greater words, which discover the heights above, as it were the body of heaven in its clearness, unruffled serenity and easy self-achievement of the grace of God. It would not be possible to represent what is characteristic in each dispensation more vividly than by these contrasted formulas. On the one side is a vain effort to attain, a strife between the law of the mind and the law of the members, a sense of hopeless duality that carries unrest — noble, if you will, but not less fatal — to the centre of man's being. On the other side is the rest of faith, a great reserve of spiritual power, the reconciliation of Divine ideals with the practice of human lives achieved by grace. Moral obligation persists under the gospel, but only as it is resolved into the higher freedom of the new life. As Pascal says, " The law demands what it cannot give ; grace gives all it demands."
The fireguard serves a very necessary and beneficent purpose, but its real and ultimate worth lies in educating the child to do without it. So with the Mosaic law. It served its highest ends when it disciplined the soul to independence of it. The differ- . ence, therefore, between the Old Covenant and the New was not that one was ancient and the other modern ; the mere " newness " was the least important thing about it. It was the difference between law and religion, between the letter of the one and the spirit of the other, between body and soul, between outward form and inward essence. The Old Covenant was imposed by an authority from without, whilst the New was established by an authority from within. One was graven on stone, and needed to be enforced by pains and penalties ; the other was to be written in the heart as the glad, spontaneous expression of a free spirit.
138 THE NEW COVENANT
1. The New Covenant will be spiritual. — The Old Covenant was formal, working from without inward, telling men what to do. This must come first. Childhood, of the race as of the individual, must begin life under rules. But the aim of the Law was to make itself superseded, by opening the way to a religious force which should work from within outward. A religion of forms, like an educational system, can never be closely personal. It cannot keep adjusting itself to the individual. It is machine work, not hand work. It fits only the average, and misfits every- body else. God's work is with the inner heart of each human being, where dwells his truest individuality, his real life. When this is gained, the whole is won. From it flow the upright conduct, the gentle manners, the broad benisons of regenerated society. Society is not a machine to which we may bring raw characters to make them virtuous, but the effluence and product of what individual characters bring to it. Nor will religion, or a church, or any clever society or institution within the church, turn out a new generation of new souls by its most perfect adjustments. The best of them is but a path, a hand, to bring men to God, an avenue by which God comes to them. Spirit with spirit is the method of salvation.