1 T. C. Finlayson. 2 S. L. Wilson, Helpful Words for Daily Life, 240.
228 SPIRITUAL DETACHMENT
whole world is an arena of education by probation, — at once a weigh-house in which character is tested, and a gymnasium in which character is trained. It furnishes us with a plastic material, the moulding and shaping of which reveals the native royalty and develops the native capacity of our spiritual being.
If Man learns to swim by being tossed into life's maelstrom and left to make his way ashore. No youth can learn to sail his life-craft in a lake sequestered and sheltered from all storms, where other vessels never come. Skill comes through sailing one's craft amidst rocks and bars and opposing fleets, amidst storms and whirls and counter currents.1
Life is not as idle ore,
But iron dug from central gloom,
And heated hot with burning fears, And dipt in baths of hissing tears,
And batter'd with the shocks of doom
To shape and use.2
(3) This world is designed to be a sphere for the service of God. — God is a Spirit ; and we are spirits ; hence all true service of God is, in its root and essence, spiritual. Yet possibly it may be a necessity for the finite spirit that it shall be able to embody its devotion towards God in forms external to itself. At any rate, in giving to the human spirit a tabernacle of flesh, and thus connecting it with the material world, God has made that world an instrument for the expression of our spiritual obedience. If one human soul loves another, it longs for some opportunity of embodying its affection. If a servant is really devoted to his master, he rejoices when his master so takes him into confidence as to enable him to give some practical manifestation of his loyalty. And so, God has placed us in a world which may become a sphere of manifest service. He brings us into relations which are constantly trying our obedience, and therefore furnish- ing us with the means of expressing it.
Methought that in a solemn church I stood.
Its marble acres, worn with knees and feet,
Lay spread from door to door, from street to street.
Midway the form hung high upon the rood
1 N. D. Hillis, A Marts Value to Society, 46. 2 Tennyson, In Memoriam,
i CORINTHIANS vn. 29-31 229
Of Him who gave His life to be our good;
Beyond, priests flitted, bowed, and murmured meet,
Among the candles shining still and sweet.
Men came and went, and worshipped as they could —
And still their dust a woman with her broom,
Bowed to her work, kept sweeping to the door.
Then saw I, slow through all the pillared gloom,
Across the church a silent figure come:
" Daughter," it said, " thou sweepest well my floor ! "
It is the Lord! I cried, and saw no more.1
IV.
A Good Keason.
" For the fashion of this world passeth away."
1. The word "fashion" here is a translation of the Greek word schema, from which we get our English word " scheme." The text means that the present order of things, the earthly plan or scheme in which we live, must come to an end. It is true, indeed, of the earth itself. " This goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours." The fashion of this world passeth away ; even the solid earth is moving on to sure destruction.
If Above the valley of the Neckar rises the magnificent ruin of Heidelberg. To the world without it still presents a front of majesty and beauty. The mountain crags seem not more massive and enduring than its battlements of Btone, its towers and walls of solid masonry. But within, what a picture of desolation meets the eye ! Broken columns and shattered carvings are scattered in confusion about the deserted court. Fragments of costly monuments are mingled with the dtbris of crumbling walls, and trees are growing upon ramparts where once the cannon thundered to the echoes of the surrounding hills. The rent tower discloses the ingenuity of man to build, and his yet greater power to destroy.
If The word translated " fashion " literally means " stage scenery." St. Paul does not mean that everything on earth
1 George MacDonald.
23o SPIRITUAL DETACHMENT
is perishable, but that every unreal thing is perishable. Stage scenery is unreal scenery. It does not represent the actual facts of the greenroom. Many an actor is bringing down the house with laughter when his own heart is breaking. St. Paul saw that a great deal of life is simply stage acting — concealment of the greenroom. How many kind things are spoken, not in order to reveal, but in order to cover ! How many gifts are sent, not for your sake, but for the sake of the donor ! How many blandish- ments are lavished for a vote ! How many visits are paid for a subscription ! St. Paul says all this unreality will pass away. When will it pass away ? At death, you say. No ; death does not reveal the reality of life. Death does not tear away the mask from the face of my brother. Death is itself a mask, itself an un- reality. So far from causing the stage scenery to vanish, it is itself the climax of illusion. It is not to death I look ; it is to love. Love is the great dispeller of unreality. Love is the great emancipator from stage scenery. Love is the true rending of the veil between this world and the world to come.1