For, whatever honor _men_ may attribute to us, we know that there is no real, substantial ground of supremacy except in the excellence and power of our own spiritual nature. And this is acquired not in ostentatious and selfish striving, but when self is least thought of; in the calm work of duty, and when all conception of human merit fades into the Glory of G.o.d. And this is the great end to be desired--this strength and exaltation of the soul. This imparts the profoundest significance to that great life-struggle which goes on in these crowded streets. The city! what is it but a vast amphitheatre, filled with racers, with charioteers, with eager compet.i.tors; surrounded by an unseen and awful array of witnesses? And here, daily, the lists are opened, and men contend for success, for station, for power. But these are meretricious and perishable awards. The real prize is a spiritual gain, a crown that "fadeth not away." And, if we comprehend the great purpose of existence at all--if we look with any eagerness to its intrinsic issues and its final result; we shall heed that decree of Divine Wisdom and Justice that comes down to us through all the vicissitude of life--through all the hurry and turmoil and contention. "If a man strive for masteries, yet is he not crowned, except he strive lawfully."
THE SYMBOLS OF THE REPUBLIC.
DISCOURSE IV.
THE SYMBOLS OF THE REPUBLIC.
Thou art a great people, and hast great power.--JOSHUA, xvii. 17.
These words, originally addressed by the Hebrew Leader to the children of Joseph--the tribes of Ephraim and Mana.s.seh--have been applicable to many nations which, since that time, have risen, and flourished, and fallen. But when we consider the circ.u.mstances of its origin, its marvellous growth in all the attributes of civilization, and especially the immense _possibilities_ which it involves; without even being chargeable with a natural vanity, we may say, that to no country on the face of the earth have they ever been more fitted than to this. For, my friends, we know that it _is_ a dictate of our nature to magnify that which is our own. However insignificant it really is, man spreads an ideal glory over the land of his birth. Perhaps its historical importance compensates for its geographical narrowness, or its material poverty is hidden by its intellectual wealth. From its stock of mighty men--its heroes, and bards, and sages--who have brightened the roll of fame; or from its memorable battle-fields, on rude heath and in mountain defile; or from its achievements which have swelled the tides of human enterprise, and made the world its debtor; he draws the inspiration, he carries away the conviction of greatness--so that wherever its emblems come before his eyes, they touch the deep springs of reverence and pride. Nor let us condemn this feeling as merely a selfish and exaggerating one. This spirit of nationality exists for wise purposes, embosoms the richest elements of loyalty and faith, and is one of those profound _sentiments_ of our nature that cannot be driven out by any process of logic.
But, if a nation really inherits the description in the text, it must possess something more than an ill.u.s.trious history and an ideal glory.
We must determine its greatness by its symbols; yet these must be not merely signs of things, but instruments of achievement; not merely the ill.u.s.trations of dead works or patriotic enthusiasm, but the agents of actual power and of living performance. Now, in looking over the world at the present time, there are other nations to which the words of Joshua might be applied as well as to our own, and with as little a.s.sumption of national vanity. Other people are great and have great power, by virtue of political importance, vast possessions, and strong inst.i.tutions. To say nothing of the rest, consider that huge domain which at this hour confronts the troubled princ.i.p.alities of Europe. It stretches itself out over three continents. The waves of three oceans chafe against its s.h.a.ggy sides. The energies of innumerable tribes are throbbing in its breast. It clasps regions yet raw in history as well as those that are grey with tradition, and incloses in one empire the bones of the Siberian mammoth and the valleys of Circa.s.sian flowers. And it is great not only by geographical extent, but by political purpose--great by the idea which is involved with its destiny--an idea austere as the climate, tremendous as the forces, indomitable as the will of the gigantic north. It would set the inheritance of the Byzantine Emperors in the diadem of Peter the Great. It would make the Sea of Marmara and the ridges of the Caucasus, paths to illimitable empire and uncompromising despotism. It moves down the map of the world, as a glacier moves down the Alps, patient and relentless, startling the jealous rivals that watch its course, and granting contemptuous peace to the allies that shiver in its shadow.
In considering, therefore, the symbols which prove that we also are a great people, having great power, we should select those which indicate the possession of a _peculiar_ power. This peculiarity is not in our geographical extent or material greatness. But it _is_, I think, in our inst.i.tutions, in the tendency of our national ideas, and in the legitimate result of these. It is in conceptions and elements the direct opposite of those that work in the destiny of the mighty empire just referred to--and for this reason I _have_ referred to it.
In taking up a subject, then, which is especially connected with the conditions of humanity in the city, because in the city the conception of a people--of a public--is especially ill.u.s.trated, let us inquire--What _are_ the symbols of our republic; the signs and agents of our greatness as a nation? And, for the sake of avoiding too many specifications, I propose to consider these under two or three general cla.s.ses.
In the first place, then, I would select as a symbol of the Republic, _Whatever represents the privilege of Free Thought_. As to whatever gives full play to the intellect, whatever diffuses the intelligence, whatever wakes up and a.s.sists the entire spiritual nature of individuals and communities, I think there is really more opportunity here than anywhere else on the face of the earth. And, as a sign and instrument of this, I would point to some _District School-house_; rough, weather-worn, standing in some bleak corner of New York or New Hampshire; through whose closed windows the pa.s.ser-by catches the confused hum of recitation, or at whose door he sees children of all conditions mingling in motley play. Of all conditions, so far as external peculiarities go; for the laws of nature and the ordinances of Providence cannot be dispensed with even here; but of one condition as the recognized possessors of immortal _mind_. Those who have helped mould the Republic have clearly seen that, although intelligence is not the foundation of national greatness--for there is something deeper than that--still it is the discerning and directing power upon which depends the right use even of moral elements. They have scouted the notion that there is any ultimate evil in diffused knowledge; any such thing as "a dangerous truth;" and have affirmed that the best way to winnow the false from the true, is to equip and set a-going the intellectual machine by which G.o.d has ordained that the work shall be done. It has been felt, that, if the State can properly extend its influence anywhere beyond the restrictive limits of evil, or the punishment of overt wrong; if anywhere it may exercise a positive ministration for good; it is here, where it does not interfere on the one hand with those outward pursuits which should be left to individual choice and apt.i.tude, nor on the other, with those inward sanct.i.ties which pertain to conscience and to G.o.d; it is here, in that region of our personality from which we can best discern our duty and fill our place. For the intellect is the most neutral of all our qualities. Man is swayed by the animal propensities of his nature; he is swayed by the moral and religious elements of his nature; but the intellect, by itself, is not a motive power. It is a _light_; and no one will object to its being kindled except those who, by that objection, virtually confess that they fear the light. And this work of kindling is just what the state purposes to do for a child; leaving his religious convictions to such helps as conscience has chosen, and his position in life to the decision of circ.u.mstances. And there is no way in which it can show so much impartiality, and exercise practically the most essential conception of freedom. For thus, as I have already said, it recognizes a common inheritance--something which all have--the possession of _mind_--something which is of more importance than any external condition, for it influences external condition; (whoever saw an educated community of which anything like a large fraction were paupers and criminals?) something on which rests the claim of human freedom; for the charter of man"s liberty is in his soul, not his estate. It says to the poorest child--"You are rich in this one endowment, before which all external possessions grow dim. No piled-up wealth, no social station, no throne, reaches as high as that spiritual plane upon which every human being stands by virtue of his humanity; and from that plane, mingling now in the Common School with the lowliest and the lordliest, we give you the opportunity to ascend as high as you may.
We put into your hands the key of knowledge; leaving your religious convictions, with which we dare not interfere, to your chosen guides. So far as the intellectual path may lead, it is open to you.--Go free!" And when we consider the great principles which are thus practically confessed; when we consider the vast consequences which grow out of this; I think that little District School-house dilates, grows splendid, makes our hearts beat with admiration and grat.i.tude, makes us resolve that at all events, _that_ must stand; for, indeed, it is one of the n.o.blest symbols of the Republic--a sign and an instrument of a great people, having great power.
Or, if you would behold another of these symbols, go through this city, and pause wherever you hear the rumbling of the _Printing-Press_. As I have dwelt upon the characteristics of this great power in another place, I only allude to it here as a vehicle of that _expression_ which is so essential to all genuine freedom of thought. Mere education is no evidence of this freedom. It may be made, it has been made in one of the most intelligent but despotic countries in Europe, an instrument for drilling the human mind into an absolute routine of state policy. Mere liberty of speculation is nothing, though it has the boundless firmament of abstraction for its own, so long as it is not allowed to strike the solid ground of fact or touch one organized abuse. Let us be thankful for a free-press--the electric tongue of thought, which at every stroke is felt throughout a continent, which no dictator dares to chain, and over whose issues no censor sits in judgment--or only that great censor, public opinion. Everybody is aware of its evil as well as its good--the errors, the crudities, the abominations it sends out. But we must remember that it is only the representative, the voice, of elements that actually exist in human minds and bosoms; and, surely, it is better that they should come out into the free air, and be sprinkled by the chloride of truth, than to work darkly and infectiously out of sight. It is the hidden, not the open evil that is dangerous.
Or, still again, you might have seen a true symbol of the Republic in the spectacle which has been presented this very day--the spectacle of a _Free Worship_. The great stream of religious impulse has poured through these streets, and separated into its rills of distinctive opinion, without trepidation and without challenge. Every man has had the opportunity to commune with his G.o.d, and approach the Cross of his Redeemer, with no established barriers between. Neither the cathedral nor the chapel rest upon the patronage of the state, but in the deep foundations of individual conviction. To be sure, here and there, there is a little a.s.sumption; but it is dramatic rather than substantial, and does not amount to much. Here and there breaks out an unjust prejudice or a spiteful calumny, but it shames the source more than the object, and soon dies away in the atmosphere of tolerance and investigation. It looks doubtful sometimes, but I verily believe that the real spirit, as well as the mere form of Religious equality, is beginning to prevail.
Every day, it is more and more practically acknowledged that Christianity is profounder than any name, and exists under strange and despised names; that there really is decent observance in every church, and holy living in every communion; and a man finds that his neighbor has the same essence of righteousness as himself, though he has not half so many links in his creed. And something more than tolerance grows out of this practical liberty. It is not easy to measure the moral sincerity, the moral principle, which results from it; which is far more precious than mere intelligence; which is the perennial spring and a.s.surance of national welfare.
But I proceed to observe, in the second place, that we may select as a symbol of the Republic--a sign and an instrument of a great people, having great power--whatever ill.u.s.trates the principle of _Political Equality_. I am speaking, at present, not of our deficiencies, but of our possessions; not of the instances in which this doctrine of equality is practically contradicted, but of those in which it is practically acknowledged. The sovereignty of every man is a fundamental principle in our inst.i.tutions; it is essential to the conception of a Republic; and so far as it _is_ legitimately a Republic, we shall find this principle in operation. And, looking around for some extant symbol of this, let me select that which is the object of so much strife and agitation--the _Presidential Chair_. I do not, by any means, consider this the most comfortable seat in the nation, or that the most deserving man is sure to get there; but, as an emblem, I believe it ill.u.s.trates the n.o.blest privileges, and the proudest supremacy, on the face of the globe. And I refer to it as a _possibility_ for the poorest and humblest child in the land. No hereditary gallery leads to it--only the broad road of the people. And, as the highest seat in the nation, it ill.u.s.trates all the honors of the nation. They are possible to anybody. And I trust the time has not yet arrived when this can be said only by way of satire; can be true only because the waves of political corruption carry the meanest and unworthiest into office; but as a grand fact, a fact with which are involved the springs of our national greatness and power, it may be said that here there are no barriers of caste, no terms of descent, no depths so low that enterprise cannot rise out of them, no heights so exalted that genius cannot attain them; for, on a platform as level to the peasant"s threshold as to the nabob"s door, stand the judge"s bench, the senator"s seat, and the President"s chair.
As another symbol of this political equality, I would name the _Ballot-Box_. I am aware that this is not everywhere a consistent symbol; but to a large degree it is so. I know what miserable a.s.sociations cl.u.s.ter around this instrument of popular power. I know that the arena in which it stands is trodden into mire by the feet of reckless ambition and selfish greed. The wire-pulling and the bribing, the pitiful truckling and the grotesque compromises, the exaggeration and the detraction, the melo-dramatic issues and the sham patriotism, the party watch-words and the party nick-names, the schemes of the few paraded as the will of the many, the elevation of men whose only worth is in the votes they command--vile men, whose hands you would not grasp in friendship, whose presence you would not tolerate by your fireside--incompetent men, whose fitness is not in their capacity as functionaries, or legislators, but as organ pipes; the s.n.a.t.c.hing at the slices and offal of office, the intemperance and the violence, the finesse and the falsehood, the gin and the glory; these are indeed but too closely identified with that political agitation which circles around the Ballot-Box. But, after all, they are not essential to it.
They are only the masks of a genuine grandeur and importance. For it _is_ a grand thing--something which involves profound doctrines of Right--something which has cost ages of effort and sacrifice--it _is_ a grand thing that here, at last, each voter has just the weight of one man; no more, no less; and the weakest, by virtue of his recognized manhood, is as strong as the mightiest. And consider, for a moment, what it is to cast a vote. It is the token of inestimable privileges, and involves the responsibilities of an hereditary trust. It has pa.s.sed into your hands as a right, reaped from fields of suffering and blood. The grandeur of History is represented in your act. Men have wrought with pen and tongue, and pined in dungeons, and died on scaffolds, that you might obtain this symbol of freedom, and enjoy this consciousness of a sacred individuality. To the ballot have been transmitted, as it were, the dignity of the sceptre and the potency of the sword. And that which is so potent as a right, is also pregnant as a duty; a duty for the present and for the future. If you will, that folded leaf becomes a tongue of justice, a voice of order, a force of imperial law; securing rights, abolishing abuses, erecting new inst.i.tutions of truth and love.
And, _however_ you will, it is the expression of a solemn responsibility, the exercise of an immeasurable power for good or for evil, now and hereafter. It is the medium through which you act upon your country--the organic nerve which incorporates you with its life and welfare. There is no agent with which the possibilities of the Republic are more intimately involved, none upon which we can fall back with more confidence, than the Ballot-Box.
But there is a symbol which represents the power and greatness of a Republic more significantly than all the rest, and is comprehensive of all the rest. It is the fruit of unfettered thought and political equality, of intelligence and virtue, of private sovereignty and public duty--it is a free, true, harmonious _Man_. As the crown or the sceptre is the symbol of a Monarchy; as heraldic honors are the symbols of an Oligarchy; so, I repeat, the most expressive symbol of a Republic is a man--a man free in limb and soul, a man intelligent and self-governed, a man whose spiritual vision is clear, and in whose breast the voice of conscience is peremptory, with whom the conception of duties is deeper even than the conception of rights; in short, a man who embodies all the elements, and represents to the world the best results of Liberty. Laws are nothing, inst.i.tutions are nothing, national power and greatness are nothing, save as they a.s.sist the Moral purpose of G.o.d in the development of humanity. To this test we must bring the symbols of the Republic, and judge whether they are fitting and consistent. No matter what else they accomplish, no matter what else they signify, if they do not serve this end they are either incomplete instruments, or vain forms. For, Man is of more worth than Inst.i.tutions; Religion is greater than politics; and the designs of Providence are wider than the cycles of National destiny.
I turn, then, to the signs of our own national greatness; I turn to these symbols of spiritual freedom and political equality; and I ask--how completely do they develop this most significant symbol of all--how completely do they serve the purposes of G.o.d in History--by securing the welfare, the culture, the moral elevation of humanity? And the reply is--that, by our inst.i.tutions and our endeavors, these ends have been served in various ways. There is here, to-day, a more enlightened, free, self-governed humanity--and we say it without arrogance--than anywhere else on the globe. Our benefits are of the kind that are not realized, because they are so great and familiar--like the light and the air; but take them away, or transfer us to some other atmosphere, and how we should miss them, and pine and dwindle! Let no man, in his zeal for bold rebuke or needed reform, overlook what has been done, and what is enjoyed here, as to the n.o.blest results of national greatness and power.
But every sincere man must say likewise that, with us, the _possibilities_ are far greater than the _performance_; that these symbols are the splendid tokens of what _may be_, rather than what _is_.
And, that I may bring this discourse to a practical conclusion, let me say that two things, at least, are necessary to convert these possibilities into the n.o.blest achievement.
In the first place, it is essential that every citizen of the republic should recognize his own manhood; the sacredness of his own personality; and should recognize this especially in relation to his duties, which are inextricably involved with his rights. For here it is true in a special sense, that the ma.s.s is but an aggregate of personalities--that public sin is but the projection of your sin and mine. A man will often say that he is responsible to his country, and responsible to his const.i.tuents; but upon no claim, by no sophistry, should he suffer himself to forget that he is also responsible to his G.o.d. He does forget this, when he acts for political interests, and as one of a party, as he never would act in his private affairs. And does he suppose that there is a corporate vice, or virtue, differing from his private vice or virtue, as a gentleman"s purse differs from the public fund? There is no such distinction in moral qualities. It is your own coin that helps swell the amount; it bears your stamp, and you are responsible for the product. If the party lies, then _you_ are guilty of falsehood. If the party--as is very likely--does a mean thing, then _you_ do it. It is surely so, so far as you are one of the party, and go with it in its action. G.o.d does not take account of parties; party names are not known in that court of Divine Judgment; but your name and mine are on the books there. There is no such thing--and this is true, perhaps, in more senses than one--there is no such thing as a party conscience. It is individual conscience that is implicated. Party! Party! Ah! my friends, here is the influence which, it is to be feared, balks and falsifies many of these glorious symbols. Men rally round musty epithets. They take up issues which have no more relation to the deep, vital, throbbing interest of the time, than they have to the fashions of our grandfathers. They parade high-sounding principles to cover selfish ends; interpret the Const.i.tution by a doctrine of loaves and fishes; while individual independence and private conviction are whirled away in the political maelstrom, and the party-badge is reverenced and hugged as the African reverences and hugs his fetish. And surely it is a case for congratulation, when some great, exciting question breaks out and jars these conventional idols, and so sweeps and shatters these party organizations and turns them topsy-turvy, that a man is shaken out of his harness, does not know exactly what party he _does_ belong to, and begins to feel that he has a soul of his own. I am not denying the use and the necessity of parties as instruments, but protest against them as ends, especially when principle is smothered under their platforms, and they absorb the moral personality of a man.
It may not seem so strange that the political field should so often be the field of a lax and depressed morality, when we consider that here is the great theatre where human ambition struggles for its aims; here are enlisted the strongest pa.s.sions of the soul; here throng some of its fiercest temptations; here the stakes played for are the kingdoms of this world, and the glory of them. And this, I suppose, is the reason why the most authentic type of human depravity is a thoroughly unprincipled politician. Such an instance, at least, may strike us more forcibly, because we see the perversion of great faculties, and capabilities are contrasted with performance; while, on the other hand he may be confirmed in his moral bankruptcy by the fact that, in playing upon the pa.s.sions of men he sees the worst side of humanity. But, surely, there have been those who pa.s.sed this ordeal, and came out with brighter l.u.s.tre; who have kept the eye of conscience elevated above the ecliptic of political routine; who have made politics identical with lofty duties and great principles; whose patriotism was not a clamorous catch-word, but a breathing inspiration, a silent heart-fire. In private life they have felt the great privilege of their citizenship; the magnitude of the obligation which bound them to virtue and to consistency; while, in public life, they have kept their trust firm as steel, bright as gold; have felt, with due balance on either side, the beatings of the popular heart and the dictates of the everlasting Right; and in themselves have represented the union of liberty and law, the real greatness of a nation. Without such men, the nation has no greatness; for its significance and its power are in the moral worth of its citizens.
The second condition necessary to the fulfilment of the great results indicated by these symbols, is consistent action upon the ideas that const.i.tute the basis of our own inst.i.tutions. If many of the privileges and peculiarities which I have specified in this discourse are possessed by other nations, in one respect we differ from them all. These privileges and peculiarities are _legitimately_ ours. They have not been grafted on hereditary antagonisms. They have not grown up in _spite_ of our inst.i.tutions, but as the _fruit_ of our inst.i.tutions. These ideas, entwined with the very roots of our Republic, shooting through every fibre, running into every limb, bind us to a recognition of human brotherhood; to sympathy with Liberty wherever it struggles; and to stedfast opposition to whatever crushes the rights, hinders the development, or denies the humanity of man. If these symbols of the Republic mean anything, they mean just this; and whatever is inconsistent with this, is inconsistent with the terms of our national birthright. Depend upon it, not the a.s.sertion of Liberty, but whatever is opposed to Liberty, is the innovating and agitating element in this country. It interrupts the legitimate current of our destiny. It shocks the popular heart with inconsistency. It becomes mixed with the ashes of the old heroes, and the land keeps heaving with the fermentation. One a.s.sumption is too impudent, too nakedly in contradiction with the fundamental ideas of our Republic ever to be admitted--the a.s.sumption that the man who speaks for freedom, who sympathizes with the broadest doctrine of human rights, and sets around these the eternal barriers of justice, is an innovator and an agitator. I ask--what made our Revolution legitimate? What were the central ideas that throbbed in the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of its heroes and martyrs? Take down the old muskets bent in the hot encounter, and printed with many a death-gripe; take down the old uniforms, clipped by Hessian sabres and torn by British bullets; take down the dusty muster-rolls, scrawled with those venerable names--names that now "are graven on the stone," names that are buried in the sod, names that have gone up to immortality--and ask, for what was this great struggle? Was it not for freedom, based upon the conception of the right and supremacy of freedom? And is _this_ the legitimate conclusion of that sublime postulate--this other Fact which, never retreating, always advancing, follows the steps of Freedom over the continent like a shadow, looms up like a phantom against the Rocky Mountains, and darkens the fairest waters? On the contrary, is not Freedom that old truth, that conceded premise that does _not_ agitate? Liberty, Human Rights, Universal Brotherhood, was it not for these ideas ye fought--was it not these ye planted in the soil, and laid with the corner-stone of our inst.i.tutions? My friends, I know, and you know, could those men give palpable sign and representation, the answer that would come, as in one quick flash from bayonet to bayonet, in one long roll of drums, from Lexington to Yorktown.
These peculiar privileges, then, to which I have referred, differ from those of other nations inasmuch as they are not grafted expedients, but legitimate fruits. Unless we change the premises of our Republic, and shift the foils in our historical argument, these are necessary conclusions. They are necessary conclusions, if our symbols represent realities. Russia is consistent with its national idea. It pours forth its legions and moves to its work with a terrible consistency. And if we--also a great people, having great power--are equally consistent, we shall fall back upon no selfish conservatism, but aid whatever tends to fulfil the Providential purpose of our existence, and whatever helps and advances man.
One thing is certain. So long as any nation truly lives, it unfolds its specific idea and lives according to its original type. When it fails to do this, the sentence of decay is already written upon it. If it fails to ill.u.s.trate G.o.d"s purpose in its obedience, it ill.u.s.trates His control in retribution. For there is nothing supreme, nothing finally triumphant, nothing of the last importance, but His Law. It penetrates, and oversweeps, and survives all charters and inst.i.tutions and nationalities, like the infinite s.p.a.ce that encompa.s.ses Alps and Andes, and planets and systems. It is this that successive generations ill.u.s.trate. It is this that all history vindicates. If a nation runs parallel to this Divine Law, it is well; if false to its purpose and its control, down it goes. The prophet Isaiah, in one of the most terrific and sublime pa.s.sages of the Bible, represents the king of Babylon, while pa.s.sing into the under-world, saluted by departed rulers, by dead kings, rising from their shadowy thrones, and exclaiming, "Art thou become weak as we? Art thou become like unto us?" Thus has many a nation gone down to its doom. Shall it be so with this Republic, because false to its ideal? Shall it descend to the shades of perished pomp and greatness, and see Nineveh with dusty, hieroglyphic robes rising up to meet it; and Persia, with the empty wine-cup of its luxury; and Rome, with the shadow of universal empire on its discrowned head; and hear them say--"Art thou become weak as we? Art thou become like unto us?"
My friends, I look at the eager enterprise, the young, hopeful vigor, the tides of possibility that flow through this great city; I look at the symbols of this Republic; and I cannot believe that such is to be the result. I look back upon our history, and cannot argue such a future from such a past. A great light lay upon the wake of those frail ships that bore our fathers. .h.i.ther; the wake of past ages, the following of good men"s prayers and brave men"s deeds, the mingling currents of martyr-blood and prophet-fire. And methinks, as they struck the sh.o.r.e, and met the savage wilderness, a Voice saluted them; a voice not of profane ambition and of selfish hope, but of Divine promise, intending Divine results--proclaiming, "Thou art a great people, and hast great power." And He will fulfil this prophecy, Who leads the course of history over the broad deep and through mysterious ways, and Who unfolds His own glory in the destinies of men.
THE SPRINGS OF SOCIAL LIFE.
DISCOURSE V.
THE SPRINGS OF SOCIAL LIFE.
Let them learn first to show piety at home.--I. TIMOTHY, v. 4.
The text--which I purpose to employ not as a specific precept, but as the ill.u.s.tration of a general principle--indicates those Springs of Social Life which const.i.tute the subject of the present discourse.
The crowd in a city affords comparatively little interest, when we contemplate it merely as a crowd. But, when we resolve it into its individual particles, and consider each of these as endued with the attributes and involved with the conditions of humanity, our deepest sympathies are touched. Every drop of that great stream is a conscious personality. In some shape, the universe is reflected in it. In some way, it takes hold of the reality of life: and the living organism of which it is composed both acts and suffers, receives from the world around it and contributes to it. That entire ma.s.s of people involves nothing more than the interest of humanity, and the same interest pertains to the least unit of that ma.s.s.
And, doubtless, you have sometimes busied yourself with the speculation--"Where do all these people come from? And whither do they retire at night?" Now, this is really a very suggestive question, and to follow it out to a practical answer would yield results of the profoundest importance. For out of hidden channels, here and there, _do_ spring all these struggling activities, these human diversities, these various influences good and evil, that make up the crowd and spectacle of city life. And night after night, with the rarest exceptions, into some retreat they all disappear. Some spot--whether it seem the veriest mockery to style it so, or whether it be a synonym for the sweetest sanct.i.ties--some spot each of this living mult.i.tude calls by the name of "Home."
For some that name is a.s.sociated with a more than oriental magnificence. Man and nature wait upon them there in every conceivable form of service. There is no method of convenience or luxury which ingenuity can devise; no bounty that earth can yield from her many-zoned bosom; no shape which art can summon from the regions of the beautiful, that is not possible there. Lifting its palatial walls, and kindling with brilliant lights, it stands there as the completest symbol of material refinement and civilization. It is arctic winter without. The snow chokes up the dreary street, and the whistling wind cuts the beggar"s rags. But it is Italy, it is Ceylon, it is tropic gorgeousness within. And these are the abodes of the children of fortune, whose wishes require no talisman but expression, who, all their lives long, have been used to such indulgence, or who accept it now as the fruit of their own effort. This is the hospitality which some men find in life, and out of which they const.i.tute a home.
But none the less enviable, and perhaps much more so, are those retreats where comfort waits on moderate means, while contentment imparts to these an unpurchasable efficacy; where, blended with those infirmities and liabilities which are common to palace and cottage, the domestic affections flourish, and the dearest treasures of life are kept.
Thousands of homes like this there are, all around us. It describes the largest cla.s.s of homes, we may believe. And who can estimate their influence over these busy tides of action, all day long? That world of traffic, that world of toil, that looks so hard and gross and sordid,--is it not transformed somewhat, does it not grow beautiful even, when you think how many of its energies have their spring by the infant"s cradle and the mother"s chair? And what lights, what shadows, unseen by you, fall upon the speculative eyes, fall upon the hearts, of thousands in that homeward-streaming crowd! Light of welcoming hearth-fires, shadows of children"s play upon the walls; light of affections in which there are no decay and no deceit; shadows of sacred retirement where G.o.d alone is; light of joys which this world"s storms cannot utterly quench; shadows of sorrow around sick-beds, and in vacant places, that still make home the dearer as the arena of earth"s purest discipline and of its most triumphant faith!
And why delineate the features of that other cla.s.s of homes, whose most significant word is "_Privation_?" Where cheerlessness, and hunger, and desponding toil, or hopeless apathy, brood continually. Let your own sympathies, let your own imaginations that cannot exaggerate the reality, call up the vision of such. Think how many such abodes there are this very night, which winter besieges with all his terrors, and into which he sends his invading frost! Think what Home is to hundreds, and, therefore, how life looks to them, seen through this atmosphere of disease and want, with starvation by the hearth, and death at the door, and misery everywhere! Think, when the cold pierces even through all your wrappages of comfort, and scarcity almost pinches, what forms of humanity, with lungs, and nerves, and hearts, and every capacity for suffering, are sc.r.a.ping the moss of subsistence from the barest rocks of life, and struggling every day through an avalanche! Think what this Sabbath has been in the dwellings of the poor, you who have had time to listen to the Gospel, and have heard it comfortably--so comfortably, perhaps, that you have fallen asleep under it--think what this Sabbath has been in the dwellings of the poor! And yet, when I consider what, doubtless, the Sabbath has been in some of those places, I am thankful that the highest ideal, the richest sanct.i.ties of Home, are not dependent upon outward conditions; for even there, unfaltering duty and true love have made the bare walls beautiful, and prayer has set the desolate chamber on the steps of the Divine throne; and before the eye of faith the cold arch of the winter night, that looks in through hole and cranny, has burst into a revelation of heaven, and a path for those ministering angels that come to help the sufferer and to comfort G.o.d"s poor.
With more unqualified sadness, therefore, our thoughts must rest upon still another group of dwellings, where deprivation and ignorance are mingled with vice and crime--where want and guilt strip away the masks of civilization, and bring out the essential savage in man"s nature.
These also we must call "_homes_!" These breathing-holes of abomination, these moral tombs, where huddle the demons of violence, and cunning, and debauchery, and from which they issue. That vast Hades of social evil opening downward from our streets, where the best ideals have no type, and the purest sentiments scarce a name; where G.o.d is but a dark cloud of muttering thunder in the soul; where all that is fair in womanhood is dishevelled and transformed; and where childhood is baptized in infamy, trained to sin, canopied with curses, and rocked to sleep by the convulsive h.e.l.l of pa.s.sions all around it.
The Homes of the Metropolis! Thus diversified are they in their general types, and more numerous in their individual conditions than can be specified. And, surely, it is no vain speculation that inquires--"What are they? Into what retreats do the elements of this busy crowd dissolve, night after night?" Whatever they may be, a common interest envelopes them and links them all together--the interest of humanity.
They have vanished from the streets. One great shadow covers them, and hides their distinctions. For a time they are all equal. They have fallen asleep--poor, tired humanity at the best!--they have fallen asleep on the bosom of a common Providence, that bears them all up, as it bears the planet on which they now repose, through the orbit of its great purpose and the immensities of its love. But in the morning all these diversities will break forth again, each pouring its influence into the general stream. And who does not perceive how much the character of that influence must depend upon the condition of those homes? Who does not see that not only the interest of the common humanity in its most intimate experiences attaches to them, but the interest of community? Not only are they the reservoirs of individual power and peculiarity, but they are the Springs of Social Life. And this the apostle indicated, when he directed that certain, who bore intimate relations to the early church, should "first learn to show piety at home."
Keeping this conclusion in mind, let me ask you to consider, for a little while, what Home _must_ be.
In the first place--it is the _earliest and the most influential school_. Nowhere else is the character so moulded; nowhere else is so much infused into our entire being. For, whatever it may be, it is the nursery of childhood; and "the child is father to the man." Here dawns upon the human mind the conception of life. Here, when the nature is uninscribed and plastic, it takes its first impressions. I suppose it to be true, that more is learnt, more that is elementary and a key to all the rest, in the first few years of childhood than in all after time. I do not deny, of course, that much is corrected and overcome under another cla.s.s of influences. But the deepest impressions, the seeds of the most stubborn habits, are planted at home. Hence the peculiar anxiety of good men to rescue _children_ from the influences of a bad home. And, even then, with what obstacles do they have to contend! How radical are the prejudices already formed in that young mind! How obstinate the customs, how opaque the ignorance, how rank the growth of error! Nay, into what complete fruition have all these grown, simply in the neglect of home-culture, to say nothing of influences positively evil! Really, the color and current of a man"s destiny are indicated here, unless a shock of wonderful transformation comes over him. I do not mean to say that anybody is wholly the creature of circ.u.mstances; but he is the _subject_ of circ.u.mstances. If they do not entirely make _him_, they furnish the occasion out of which he makes something; and, viewed either from the platform of the inward or the outward, they furnish an important key to his life. And, although the path of reformation is more difficult than the descent into evil, and demands an effort which too few are inclined to put forth; though by the conditions of our nature the good is more easily swept away than the bad; still, it is encouraging to estimate the permanence and the power of those _good_ influences which are received at home. Everybody knows, when he is pitched into this whirlpool of evil that rolls around him in the world, how those old home-restraints lie upon him like a magic chain, hard to be forced away--perhaps never utterly forced away. And, seeking for those who should stand up in this boisterous sweep of sin, you would look and I would look to those who had received the best impressions under the domestic roof. If I were alone, poor, compelled to ask charity somewhere in this selfish world, I would go, not to the man who has learnt most of what he calls his "wisdom" from the experience of mature life, but to him in whose heart there evidently remains something of childhood"s tenderness, kept warm by the remembered pressures of his mother"s breast. If I were seeking to restore some wild prodigal, brazen-fronted by his own wicked will and by the scorn with which men have battered him--if I were looking for some gleam of promise in his turbulent nature, and sounding its depths to find some spring of repentance--I should never despair if I could discover one gentle pulse that beat with the memories of a good and happy home. Why, who needs to be told of the potency of this our earliest school, to say nothing of other influences, if only a faithful _mother_ presides there? O! mother, mother, name for the earliest relationship, symbol of the divine tenderness; kindling a love that we never blush to confess, and a veneration that we cannot help rendering; how does your mystic influence, imparted from the soft pressure and the undying smile, weave itself through all the brightness through all the darkness of our after life. The mould of character set on the front of the world"s great men, and gladly confessed by them, bears your stamp. Your inspiration burns along the poet"s line. It is your true courage, more than man"s rude daring, that makes the force of heroes. The statesman, when treason to humanity wears the garb of power, and duty calls him like a trumpet, hears your voice. The philanthropist, when he feels that the most efficient service is to be patient and to wait, imbibes the strength of your fort.i.tude. The sailor, "on the high and giddy mast," mingles your name close to G.o.d"s. And thousands in life"s great claims, in life"s great perils, trace back the influences of the hour to some early time, some calm moment, when,--little, timid children,--they knelt by your side, and from tones of reverence and looks of love and simple words of prayer, they first learnt piety at home.
But I observe again, that Home is the sphere where are most clearly displayed _the real elements of character_. The world furnishes occasions of trial, but it also furnishes prudential considerations.
Without any absolute hypocrisy, one measures his speech and restrains his action in the street and the market. And it is easy to conceive how small men may perform great deeds, and mean men seem philanthropic, and cowards flourish as heroes, with the tremendous motive of publicity to urge them. But at home all masks are thrown aside, and the true proportions of the man appear. Here he can find his actual moral standard, and measure himself accordingly. If he is irritable, here breaks forth his repressed fretfulness. If he is selfish, here are the sordid tokens. If he pa.s.ses in any way for more than he is worth, here you may detect the counterfeit in the ring of his natural voice and the superscription of his undisguised life. No, the world is not the place to prove the moral stature and quality of a man. There are too many props and stimulants. Nor, on the other hand, can he himself determine his actual character merely by looking into his own solitary heart.
Therein he may discover _possibilities_, but it needs actuality to make up the estimate of a complete life. He must _do_ something as well as be something; he must do something in order that he may be something. For, what he thinks is in his heart may be exaggerated by self-flattery, or darkened by morbid self-distrust. It needs some occasion to prove what is really there. And Home is precisely that sphere which is sufficiently removed from the fact.i.tious motives of publicity on the one extreme, and the unexercised possibilities of the human heart on the other, to afford a genuine test. What a man really is, therefore, will appear in the truest light under his own roof and by his own fireside. I can believe that he is a Christian, when I know that he faithfully takes up the daily duties, and bears the crosses, that cl.u.s.ter within his own doors.