"Beautiful Thoughts" Part 2

March 25th. Man is a ma.s.s of correspondences, and because of these, because he is alive to countless objects and influences to which lower organisms are dead, he is the most living of all creatures. Natural Law, Death, p. 155.

March 26th. All organisms are living and dead--living to all within the circ.u.mference of their correspondences, dead to all beyond. . . . Until man appears there is no organism to correspond with the whole environment. Natural Law, Death, p. 155.

March 27th. Is man in correspondence with the whole environment or is he not? . . . He is not. Of men generally it cannot be said that they are in living contact with that part of the environment which is called the spiritual world. Natural Law, Death, p. 156.

March 28th. The animal world and the plant world are the same world. They are different parts of one environment. And the natural and spiritual are likewise one. Natural Law, Death, p. 157.

March 29th. What we have correspondence with, that we call natural; what we have little or no correspondence with, that we call Spiritual. Natural Law, Death, p. 157.

March 30th. Those who are in communion with G.o.d live, those who are not are dead. Natural Law, Death, p. 158.

March 31st. This earthly mind may be of n.o.ble calibre, enriched by culture, high-toned, virtuous, and pure. But if it know not G.o.d? What though its correspondences reach to the stars of heaven or grasp the magnitudes of Time and s.p.a.ce? The stars of heaven are not heaven. s.p.a.ce is not G.o.d. Natural Law, Death, p. 158.

April 1st. We do not picture the possessor of this carnal mind as in any sense a monster. We have said he may be high-toned, virtuous, and pure.

The plant is not a monster because it is dead to the voice of the bird; nor is he a monster who is dead to the voice of G.o.d. The contention at present simply is that he is DEAD. Natural Law, Death, p. 159.

April 2d. What is the creed of the Agnostic, but the confession of the spiritual numbness of humanity? Natural Law, Death, p. 160.

April 3d. The nescience of the Agnostic philosophy is the proof from experience that to be carnally minded is Death. Natural Law, p. 161.

April 4th. The Christian apologist never further misses the mark than when he refuses the testimony of the Agnostic to himself. When the Agnostic tells me he is blind and deaf, dumb, torpid, and dead to the spiritual world, I must believe him. Jesus tells me that. Paul tells me that. Science tells me that. He knows nothing of this outermost circle; and we are compelled to trust his sincerity as readily when he deplores it as if, being a man without an ear, he professed to know nothing of a musical world, or being without taste, of a world of art. Natural Law, Death, p. 160.

April 5th. It brings no solace to the unspiritual man to be told he is mistaken. To say he is self-deceived is neither to compliment him nor Christianity. He builds in all sincerity who raises his altar to the UNKNOWN G.o.d. He does not know G.o.d. With all his marvellous and complex correspondences, he is still one correspondence short. Natural Law, Death, p. 161.

April 6th. Only one thing truly need the Christian envy, the large, rich, generous soul which "envieth not." The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 7th. Whenever you attempt a good work you will find other men doing the same kind of work, and probably doing it better. Envy them not. The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 8th. I say that man believes in a G.o.d, who feels himself in the presence of a Power which is not himself, and is immeasurably above himself, a Power in the contemplation of which he is absorbed, in the knowledge of which he finds safety and happiness. Natural Law, Death, p.

162.

April 9th. What men deny is not a G.o.d. It is the correspondence. The very confession of the Unknowable is itself the dull recognition of an Environment beyond themselves, and for which they feel they lack the correspondence. It is this want that makes their G.o.d the Unknown G.o.d. And it is this that makes them DEAD. Natural Law, Death, p. 163.

April 10th. G.o.d is not confined to the outermost circle of environment, He lives and moves and has His being in the whole. Those who only seek Him in the further zone can only find a part. The Christian who knows not G.o.d in Nature, who does not, that is to say, correspond with the whole environment, most certainly is partially dead. Natural Law, Death, p.

163.

April 11th. After you have been kind, after Love has stolen forth into the world and done its beautiful work, go back into the shade again and say nothing about it. The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 12th. The absence of the true Light means moral Death. The darkness of the natural world to the intellect is not all. What history testifies to is, first the partial, and then the total eclipse of virtue that always follows the abandonment of belief in a personal G.o.d. Natural Law, Death, p. 167.

April 13th. The only greatness is unselfish love. . . . There is a great difference between TRYING TO PLEASE and GIVING PLEASURE. The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 14th. The conception of a G.o.d gives an altogether new colour to worldliness and vice. Worldliness it changes into heathenism, vice into blasphemy. The carnal mind, the mind which is turned away from G.o.d, which will not correspond with G.o.d--this is not moral only but spiritual Death.

And Sin, that which separates from G.o.d, which disobeys G.o.d, which CAN not in that state correspond with G.o.d--this is h.e.l.l. Natural Law, Death, p.

169.

April 15th. If sin is estrangement from G.o.d, this very estrangement is Death. It is a want of correspondence. If sin is selfishness, it is conducted at the expense of life. Its wages are Death--"he that loveth his life," said Christ, "shall lose it." Natural Law, Death, p. 170.

April 16th. Obviously if the mind turns away from one part of the environment it will only do so under some temptation to correspond with another. This temptation, at bottom, can only come from one source--the love of self. The irreligious man's correspondences are concentrated upon himself. He wors.h.i.+ps himself. Self-gratification rather than self-denial; independence rather than submission--these are the rules of life. And this is at once the poorest and the commonest form of idolatry. Natural Law, p. 170.

April 17th. You will find . . . that the people who influence you are people who believe in you. The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 18th. The development of any organism in any direction is dependent on its environment. A living cell cut off from air will die. A seed-germ apart from moisture and an appropriate temperature will make the ground its grave for centuries. Human nature, likewise, is subject to similar conditions. It can only develop in presence of its environment. No matter what its possibilities may be, no matter what seeds of thought or virtue, what germs of genius or of art, lie latent in its breast, until the appropriate environment present itself the correspondence is denied, the development discouraged, the most splendid possibilities of life remain unrealized, and thought and virtue, genius and art, are dead. Natural Law, p. 171.

April 19th. The true environment of the moral life is G.o.d. Here conscience wakes. Here kindles love. Duty here becomes heroic; and that righteousness begins to live which alone is to live forever. But if this Atmosphere is not, the dwarfed soul must perish for mere want of its native air. And its Death is a strictly natural Death. It is not an exceptional judgment upon Atheism. In the same circ.u.mstances, in the same averted relation to their environment, the poet, the musician, the artist, would alike perish to poetry, to music, and to art. Natural Law, p. 171.

April 20th. Every environment is a cause. Its effect upon me is exactly proportionate to my correspondence with it. If I correspond with part of it, part of myself is influenced. If I correspond with more, more of myself is influenced; if with all, all is influenced. If I correspond with the world, I become worldly; if with G.o.d, I become Divine. Natural Law, Death, p. 171.

April 21st. You can dwarf a soul just as you can dwarf a plant, by depriving it of a full environment. Such a soul for a time may have a "name to live." Its character may betray no sign of atrophy. But its very virtue somehow has the pallor of a flower that is grown in darkness, or as the herb which has never seen the sun, no fragrance breathes from its spirit. Natural Law, p. 173.

April 22d. I shall pa.s.s through this world but once. Any good thing, therefore, that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any human being, let me do it now. Let me not defer it or neglect it, for I shall not pa.s.s this way again. The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 23d. There is no happiness in having and getting, but only in giving . . . half the world is on the wrong scent in the pursuit of happiness. The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 24th. No form of vice, not worldliness, not greed of gold, not drunkenness itself, does more to un-Christianize society than evil temper. The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 25th. How many prodigals are kept out of the Kingdom of G.o.d by the unlovely character of those who profess to be inside! The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 26th. A want of patience, a want of kindness, a want of generosity, a want of courtesy, a want of unselfishness, are all instantaneously symbolized in one flash of Temper. The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 27th. Souls are made sweet not by taking the acid fluids out, but by putting something in--a great Love, a new Spirit--the Spirit of Christ. The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 28th. Christ, the Spirit of Christ, interpenetrating ours, sweetens, purifies, transforms all. This only can eradicate what is wrong, work a chemical change, renovate and regenerate, and rehabilitate the inner man. Will-power does not change men. Time does not change men.

Christ does. The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 29th Guilelessness is the grace for suspicious people. And the possession of it is the great secret of personal influence. You will find, if you think for a moment, that the people who influence you are people who believe in you. In an atmosphere of suspicion men shrivel up; but in that atmosphere they expand, and find encouragement and educative fellows.h.i.+p. The Greatest Thing in the World.

April 30th. Do not quarrel . . . with your lot in life. Do not complain of its never-ceasing cares, its petty environment, the vexations you have to stand, the small and sordid souls you have to live and work with. The Greatest Thing in the World.

May 1st. The moment the new life is begun there comes a genuine anxiety to break with the old. For the former environment has now become embarra.s.sing. It refuses its dismissal from consciousness. It competes doggedly with the new Environment for a share of the correspondences. And in a hundred ways the former traditions, the memories and pa.s.sions of the past, the fixed a.s.sociations and habits of the earlier life, now complicate the new relation. The complex and bewildered soul, in fact, finds itself in correspondence with two environments, each with urgent but yet incompatible claims. It is a dual soul living in a double world, a world whose inhabitants are deadly enemies, and engaged in perpetual civil war. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 179.

May 2d. How can the New Life deliver itself from the still-persistent past? A ready solution of the difficulty would be TO DIE. . . . If we cannot die altogether, . . . the most we can do is to die as much as we can. . . . To die to any environment is to withdraw correspondence with it, to cut ourselves off, so far as possible, from all communication with it. So that the solution of the problem will simply be this, for the spiritual life to reverse continuously the processes of the natural life.

Natural Law, Mortification, p. 180.

May 3d. The spiritual man having pa.s.sed from Death unto Life, the natural man must next proceed to pa.s.s from Life unto Death. Having opened the new set of correspondences, he must deliberately close up the old.

Regeneration in short must be accompanied by Degeneration. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 181.

May 4th. The peculiar feature of Death by Suicide is that it is not only self-inflicted but sudden. And there are many sins which must either be dealt with suddenly or not at all. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 183.

May 5th. If the Christian is to "live unto G.o.d," he must "die unto sin."

If he does not kill sin, sin will inevitably kill him. Recognizing this, he must set himself to reduce the number of his correspondences-- retaining and developing those which lead to a fuller life, unconditionally withdrawing those which in any way tend in an opposite direction. This stoppage of correspondences is a voluntary act, a crucifixion of the flesh, a suicide. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 182.

May 6th. Do not resent temptation; do not be perplexed because it seems to thicken round you more and more, and ceases neither for effort nor for agony nor prayer. That is your practice. That is the practice which G.o.d appoints you; and it is having its work in making you patient, and humble, and generous, and unselfish, and kind, and courteous. The Greatest Thing in the World.

May 7th. It is a peculiarity of the sinful state, that as a general rule men are linked to evil mainly by a single correspondence. Few men break the whole law. Our natures, fortunately, are not large enough to make us guilty of all, and the restraints of circ.u.mstances are usually such as to leave a loophole in the life of each individual for only a single habitual sin. But it is very easy to see how this reduction of our intercourse with evil to a single correspondence blinds us to our true position. Natural Law, Mortification, p. 186.

May 8th. One little weakness, we are apt to fancy, all men must be allowed, and we even claim a certain indulgence for that apparent necessity of nature which we call our besetting sin. Yet to break with the lower environment at all, to many, is to break at this single point.

Natural Law, p. 186.