ROTTEN ARNE AE AOE) 2 epee ee enn ay : aaa eee — ». o “oe AL i >. Meat wit Pi iv ihe y 8 Agen ne THE PRACTICE OF THE PRINCIPLES OF JESUS THE PRACTICE OF THE PRINCIPLES OF JESUS BY f WILLIAM P. KING - NASHVILLE, TENN, COKESBURY PRESS 1926 Coprrricut, 1926 BY LAMAR & BARTON Printed in the United States of America DEDICATION To the Social Service Commission of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and to the Companion of the Par- sonage, whose life is a daily expression of the ideals set forth herein oy wy) nat iy , ey FOREWORD In response to the invitation of Dr. Comer M. Woodward of Emory University, the Chairman of the Social Service Commission of our Church, I gave four lectures at the Lake Junaluska As- sembly before a group of representative men and women of the Church. This volume is pub- lished at the urgent solicitation of this group. The four lectures are elaborated into four chap-— ters, and six other chapters are added with the same general application. ; On account of this addition, it is only just to say that this group is not to be held accountable for some ideas advanced with which certain readers may not be in harmony. I wish to express my satisfaction at the reception of the four spoken lectures. I am confident that the motive of the select company who urged the pub- lication of this volume is altogether different from that of Job, when he said, ‘‘Oh that mine adversary had written a book.’’ And now that the book is written, I do not think that I should be held under any obligation to read it. It is nothing but fair that others should do this. There should be a division of labor. For their assistance in preparing the manu- vii Vill FOREWORD script and in removing some grammatical blem- — ishes and in making other improvements in the language, an expression of gratitude is due Rev. Homer Thompson, Rev. G. L. King, Dr. Comer M. Woodward; and Dr. H. J. Pearce, Jr., of Brenau College. The readers will recognize my indebtedness, which I gratefully acknowledge, to several leading authors. I have not given the names of books from which quotations are taken, since my discussion is not so distinctively controversial that the readers would wish to verify the quotations. THe AUTHOR. CONTENTS PAGE RU EOSOR I it ed cen r a Mire cal de Mean take Ren aE PREC SISELESE UE STN OTTO i fee'y? oe ok te ae uae Ne Xi CHAPTER I. FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS .... 1 Il. THe Praqmatic TEst oF CHRISTIAN Doc- PTA Phin chi oy cic tiie ah MRE Mes eek ys iwi autre Oy Ill. Tue FAuuAcy oF THE FALSE ALTERNATIVE 53 Ve Es APOLDEN: ROUTE ice ral ey sel ilg ARS 15 V. THE GoLpEN RuuE (Concluded) . . . 105 VI. OrtrHopoxy AND OBEDIENCE .. . . 126 VII. OrtHopoxy AND OBEDIENCE (Concluded) . 147 REL RPe EM OCEADMOOLIDABITY) 66205, 20S aki WN 2 PA Ee INDUS CRUSADE i. WV ieie lh oe ey el ek oO X. THe New Crusape (Concluded) . . . 219 SY \ippaalhs) Ap INTRODUCTORY NOTE In the present volume Rev. W. P. King has done a very important piece of work. He has placed before us considerations which help us _to get and keep our bearings. In the past decade the thought world seems to have been almost completely torn from moorings and anchorages which we had considered unbreakable. To many a storm-tossed mind everything seems to be afloat and adrift. The reader of this book soon discerns that, bad as our plight seems, the essen- tials of thought and faith have not suffered ship- wreck. In the realms of the social attempt to ap- ply the Gospel to present-day conditions espe- cially, it is possible to chart a course not only toward safety, but toward a fairer kingdom of humanity than any we have ever known. It is difficult for most of us to be prophetic | and discriminating at one and the same moment. If we become prophetic, we yield to the glory of the vision before us and cease to consider closely the actual obstacles in our path; and if we proceed with intellectual carefulness we are likely to lose sight of the grandeurs of the sky. The author seems to me to have kept his eyes fixed on a noble ideal and at the same time to 4] xii INTRODUCTORY NOTE have maintained touch with the actual and con- erete. He has not loosened his grasp on his fundamentals because of the false antitheses which so sadly perplex the untrained thinker. Francis J. McConne tu, Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church. THE PROGRAM OF CHRISTIANITY ‘‘ And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up; and he entered, as his custom was, into the synagogue on the sabbath day, and stood up to read. And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Isaiah. And he opened the book, and found the place where it was written : The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, Because he anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor; He hath sent me to proclaim release to the captives, And recovering of sight to the blind, To set at liberty them that are bruised, To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.’’ —Luke 4316-19. THE PRACTICE OF THE PRINCIPLES OF JESUS CHAPTER I FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS I In an effort to reach the great simplicities of the gospel of Jesus Christ we must steer our way between different types of extremists. There are the radicals and intellectual snobs who sharpen the intellect and cut out the heart. They are fragmentary men like Wordsworth’s ‘One that would peep and botanize Upon his mother’s grave, One to whose smooth-rubbed soul can cling Nor form nor feeling, great nor small, A reasoning, self-sufficing thing, An intellectual all in all.’’ With this type of man the analytic spirit has become a frenzy, and the love of dissection a morbid passion. The radical, of whatever kind, who ignores the contribution of the past, the large element 1 2 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS of truth in the great creeds of the past, will himself be ignored by the future. The man who — fails to connect with the past misses connection with the future. We have representatives of this type of mind who turn all thought into a universal negation. ‘“Woe worth the knowledge and bookish lore Which makes men mummies, Weighs out every grain of that which was miraculous before, And sneers the heart down with the scoffing brain.’’ The opposite type is represented by Funda- mentalists who, with all their limitations and defects, are in possession of some qualities which call forth our admiration. Even the intolerance of Fundamentalists re- sults from the faith that religion is the one thing of supreme value, and they believe it is being taken away from them. My difference is with the leaders of Fundamentalism, who breathe out ‘‘threatenings and slaughter,’’ who become ex- pert in making an appeal to popular passion and prejudice, and who become in reality the enemies of the faith as they encumber it with impossible conceptions. The hurtful error of Fundamentalism is in magnifying the secondary and incidental to a place of importance along with the primary and fundamental. The Fundamentalists are bound by the utterly senseless principle, ‘‘False in one, false in all,’ — FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 3 which, if we were compelled to accept, would utterly destroy the very foundation of the faith. A wise teacher gave to a student in religious perplexity over the authorship of the Penta- teuch the counsel, ‘‘Accept first of all Jesus Christ as your Lord and Master, and when you - get to heaven, you can find out about the Penta- teuch.”’ I knew a brother who thought the Christian faith would be gone if the whale did not swallow Jonah, and yet he was opposed to foreign mis- sions. He missed the one fact above all facts that the book of Jonah is intended to teach, and that is the universal compassion of God that could not be limited to the Jewish race. He had a perfect right to believe that the whale swal- lowed Jonah; but he had no right to allow the whale to swallow not only Jonah, and the repu- tation of Jonah, but the one lesson of the Book of Jonah. Such Biblical trifling recalls the incident of some years ago when a university professor stated that Leviticus was mistaken in saying that the hare chewed the cud. The theological uproar was followed by the sage advice: ‘The bishops all have sworn to shed their blood To prove ’tis true the hare doth chew the cud; O, bishops, doctors, divines, beware, Weak is the faith that hangs upon a ‘hair.’ ”’ 4 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS These distinct and contrasted types of ex- | tremists must be persistently opposed. The ‘‘New Thought,’’ so called, finds expres- sion in a superstitious supernaturalism. It also finds expression in the elimination of all that is extrahuman. Dr. S. P. Cadman writes: ‘‘Among the rival- ries which compete with the Christian pulpit to-day must be numbered those excursions of unlicensed imagination into the unseen known as Theosophy, Christian Science, Mental Healing, and Spiritualism. They are largely the fruits of that revulsion against an overweening mate- rialism which began to assert itself during the later half of the nineteenth century. The ex- ponents of these cults have been quick to detect the longings after the invisible and mysterious, which were discounted even in the Church by the prejudice of liberal clergymen against the Supernatural. Traffickers in its wonders played skillfully upon those longings, which mere rea- son cannot satisfy nor unbelief quench. Super- stition is the worm that exudes from the grave of a buried faith.’’ Katharine Tynan dwells on the morbidness of cultured people who have abandoned Christian- ity, and remarks that she has seen the ‘‘emanci- pated’’ daughter of a bishop swoon because she caught sight of the new moon through glass. If the Church would save our generation from FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 5 the folly and loss resulting from false religious teaching, which more often than not is the more dangerous because of the half truths it embodies, she must repair herself to timely instruction in order to overcome error and fanaticism by a faith luminous with the light divine. There are those who ignore the past. ‘‘And I heard a voice behind me saying.’’ That is the voice of yesterday, and we must hear what the voice says. Dr. J. H. Jowett writes: ‘‘There is a prevalent teaching known as the ‘New Thought.’ I know the literature of this new teaching, and I say that the teaching gives no adequate place of sovereignty to Jesus Christ our Lord. He is not accorded that unique and solitary preeminence which he claims. He is a neglected factor and is left entirely out of the reckoning. And because he is absent other things are missing. I find no mention of guilt. Rarely do I stumble upon the fact of sin. In the New Thought there is no confession of sin, no sob of penitence, no plea for forgiveness, no leaning upon mercy. The atonement is an obso- lete device, the pardonable expedient of a primi- tive day. It is a destructive heresy.’’ The true prophet, in raising his hearers to new and greater levels of truth and insight, strives to understand the truth already revealed and saturates himself with those immense reali- ties by which men in past ages have lived and 6 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS conquered. Only in this way can we go forward to new experiences and new discoveries of the truth. To ignore the inheritance of the faith of our fathers is to impoverish ourselves and our chil- dren. To miss connection with the past is to miss connection with the need of the present and future. If we forget the rich achievements of our fathers, we shall in turn be forgotten by our children. There is a continuity of religious thought, and a new faith has no soil in which to grow. The false prophet has an itching desire for novelty, for the sake of novelty. His idea of paradise is to be in the limelight of a public sen- sation. The dullness of the commonplace palls upon him, even commonplace morals. His chief objection to the Ten Commandments is that they are old. We can very readily see through the thinness of the pert, shallow type of thinkers who break with the past. But the man who casts every- thing in the mold of the past and breaks with the present is also a false prophet or following the leadership of false prophets. Jesus draws a picture of this kind of false prophet, too vivid ever to be forgotten: ‘‘Woe unto you, scribes and pharisees, hypocrites! be- cause ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchers of the righteous and say, ‘If we had been in the days of our fathers, we FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 7 would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.’ ... Wherefore, be- hold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes; and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city.’’ There has been no lapse in the line of false prophets who raise stones to the prophets of the past, and throw stones at the prophets of the present. The indiscriminating idolatry of the past is a very easy and cheap affair. It has sufficient truth mixed with error to give it carrying power. This type of mind suffers from farsightedness ; or, to use a big word, presbyopia. Greatness can only be seen when it is far off in time. If a man has been dead a sufficient number of years, he becomes a saint; and if he has been dead a still longer time, he becomes infallible. But the passing centuries have no sanctifying effect on a man or a generation. I make no defense of the egotism in the humor of Mark Twain, who represents himself as weeping at the tomb of Adam because Adam did not live in his day and live to see him. But I do not pro- pose to weep because I did not live in Adam’s day. Or if I should weep, it would be tears of joy. The righteous and heroic spirits of the past are secure in their achievement, and we have no time to waste in ‘‘garnishing their sepulchers.’’ 8 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS We shall receive profit more from the spirit — than from the letter of their message. We shall be true to our fathers as they were to their fathers, as we make use of some different meth- ods to meet the new need and the new opportuni- ties of our new day. Some of the most consummate demagogues that it has ever been my displeasure to know were men who glorified the political leaders and the political traditions of a century and more ago. They deal out demagogiec drivel. Both political and ecclesiastical demagogues are fond of conjuring with the names of illustrious states- men and churchmen of the bygone centuries. They know that God has spoken unto the fathers by the prophets, but they expect no fresh mes- sage from God for the need of to-day. They would fasten the present as a slave to the char- iot wheels of the past. Jeremiah came into conflict with false prophets of this type, who took as their motto certain words of Isaiah. They won popularity by ortho- dox phrases and traditional doctrines. They laid hold of Isaiah’s words concerning the invio- lability of Jerusalem, and the words which were true as spoken by Isaiah became false. Aceord- ing to Jeremiah one unfailing characteristic of the false prophet was in getting his message out of the traditions of the past. Jeremiah was not a repetition nor imitation FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 9 of Isaiah. He was the embodiment of God’s will and truth for the generation in which he lived. The arch heresy, according to Jesus himself, is not in breaking with certain traditions of the past, but in breaking with God’s call to meet the duties and opportunities of the present. ‘God fulfills himself in many ways, Lest one good custom corrupt the world.’’ Marcus Dods, in his letters, writes: ‘‘I do not envy those who have to fight the battles of Chris- tianity in the twentieth century. Yes, perhaps I do, but it will be a stiff fight. Your very fidel- ity to the faith will demand courage to think new thoughts, to champion new theories, to pro- claim new truths, to live new ideals, to walk with the Master through new Gethsemanes to new Calvaries. The modern prophet with spiri- tual weapons must needs fight against the mighty forces of reaction and radicalism. He must needs fight again the fight of Paul in beating off the Judaizers with their narrowness on the one hand, and the Gnostics with their false liberality and philosophical looseness on the other. Every day you face a new world. Every day some ap- pendix of functionless creed is removed. Some old tradition goes to the garret; some outworn fabric of dogma is burned to ashes; new scien- tific discoveries demand new alignments of the 10 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS faith; new attacks of the enemy demand new weapons of defense; new results of science chal- lenge new adjustments; new social cleavages and groups challenge new translations of the gospel into social values.’’ There is the advocacy of a narrow sectional and provincial policy. The advocacy of a policy which promises no constructive effort, which proclaims national aloofness and isolation is against the whole mes- sage and spirit of the Christian faith. The old prophets possessed a broad ecatholicity of spirit. The modern prophet must rise to the spirit of universality. The world has only advanced through many gerowing-pains. When we say that false prophets hinder this progress, we do not mean that they are false in that they are depraved in heart, but false in a mistaken judgment. In the order of the evolution of society it has ‘always been difficult to make the transition from | one stage to another. There came a time when the discussion arose in the family as to whether or not it would remain isolated or join with other families into a clan as a matter of protection. There was violent opposition. It was argued that it had never been done before, that the unity of the family would be destroyed. Then, when the idea was advanced that the clans should combine into a tribe as a safeguard - SES te ae Es Te Pn Cee FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 11 against the attacks of unfriendly clans, the same argument was advanced that it had never been done before, and that it would involve the clan in endless wars. So when tribes came bopetlions in a state and the states into a nation of federated states, there was raised the alarm of dangerous Mo vhien the destruction of independence and the estab- lishing of a super-government. As we have reached the stage of development when the whole world is so interrelated as to re- quire a new order of international agreement, we need not wonder that the cry of the obstruc- tionist should be heard in the land. Kiphng has given us the strong lines: ‘*He knows not England, who only England knows; He serves not America best, who only America serves.’’ A belated mind is fatal to large usefulness. ‘New occasions teach new duties; time makes ancient good uncouth ; They must upward still and onward who would keep abreast of truth.’’ There are those who reply to such language with much heat and insist that we do not live ina new world, but in the same old world. We live in both. We live in an old world with its old sin, with its old human nature, with its old world and old flesh and old devil, with its old gospel, with its old salvation. 12 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS We live in a new world with its new scientific knowledge, and new discoveries and new inven- tions, with its new civilization, with its new problems, with its new duties, with its new com- plex relationships, with its new international ad- justments to be made, and with its new world solidarity. We are to shake off the shackles of the bond- age of traditionalism. There is the necessity of holding on to the good of the past and going on to the better of the future. An old man of my acquaintance accepted all innovations that made for his comfort, such as automobiles and electric lights, but stoutly re- sisted any change in the fatalism of his theology and in his antagonism to Sunday schools and world evangelization. Dr. Josiah Strong wrote some years ago: ‘‘History is strewn with the ruins wrought by political and religious revolutions rendered in- evitable by ultraconservatives who could not or would not reconcile themselves to the world’s progress, and who restrained and prevented a natural adjustment of institutions to the cease- less changes of a living and growing civiliza- tion.’’ Bondage to traditionalism is the death of all progress of every kind. If we are only true to the faith as we accept all the beliefs of our Ee ee a FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 13 fathers, then it must follow that our fathers were not true to the faith, because very fortunately they did not accept all the beliefs of their fathers. In fact, a slavish imitation of the past is a denial of the faith. We are willing to allow our ancestors to have some voice and some vote, but we are not willing that they should stuff the ballot box. Sidney Smith, in the ‘‘Fallacies of Anti-Re- formers,’’ has made some observations, which may be given in brief, and not as a direct quo- tation. What shall be said of our wise ancestors and the wisdom of antiquity? With individuals, the oldest has, of course, the most experience, but with generations the reverse is true, and our ancestors who come first are the young people and have the least experience. There has been added to this experience the experience of many centuries. We can claim against our ancestors that we are older than they are in point of the accumulation of experience. There are so-called irrevocable laws. There is the effort of the dead hand of the past to mold the future. The sovereign power at any one period can only form a blind guess at the measure which may be necessary at any future period. By the principle of immutable law, the government is transferred from those who are necessarily the 14 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS best judges of what they want to others who can know little or nothing about the matter. The sixteenth century decides for the seven- teenth, and the seventeenth makes laws for the eighteenth, and the eighteenth dictates to the nineteenth, and the nineteenth states infallibili- ties for the twentieth. The traditionalists admit that it was wise for every century to make some change from the preceding except our own. Everything has been fixed for us. Those who have least experience make irrevocable laws for those who have the most experience. To sup- pose that there is anything which a whole nation cannot do which is essential for their welfare and happiness because another generation long ago dead and gone said it must not be done is mere nonsense. There is the ery of no innovation. To say that all things new are bad is to say that all old things were bad in their commencement. For of all the old things ever seen or heard of, there is not one that was not once new. Whatever is now established was once an innovation. To abuse the new is therefore to abuse the old, since the old was once new. Because a certain thing was good in its day is no convincing reason that it is good in our day. The world is shaken, not only that old things may pass away, but also that new things may appear. FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 15 IT There are certain transitional and transform- ing forces which have borne down on the life and thought of our age with an irresistible im- pact, and which have made change and readjust- ment inevitable. 1. There is the new science, with its knowledge of nature, its power over nature, and the scien- tific method of thought. There has been a mar- velous increase in knowledge, and a marvelous application of scientific knowledge to the practi- cal uses of the world. But of still vaster impor- tance is the scientific method of thought, which begins with observation of facts in the construc- tion of a theory, rather than dogmatically as- suming a theory and endeavoring to make the facts fit the theory. 2. The scientific spirit compelled philosophy to revise her a priori methods of thought. Phi- losophy does not deny the possibility of knowl- edge, but it recognizes the conditions and limi- tations of knowledge. An increasing confidence is placed in the verdict of experience, and in the pragmatic test of the workability of a theory as affording evidence of the truthfulness of the theory. 3. The Democratic spirit has a wide and radi- cal application. At bottom it is a question of authority. There is the changing attitude to- 16 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS ward all authority, whether sacred or secular. It is seen in the awakening of nations from the sleep of centuries. It is seen in the arousing of the individual to the authority of his own con- sciousness in the formation of his political and religious belief. With this spirit the individual man refuses to be obsessed by the external au- thority of creed-makers, and rejects that which does not appeal to his own reason and experi- ence. 4. Historical criticism constitutes a part of the general advance in knowledge, and results in a change of theological thought. It was inevitable that the methods which the great historians were applying with such brilliant results to the his- tories and early literatures of the ancient world should be applied also to the Sacred Writings. 5. The study of Comparative Religion throws light on many portions of the Sacred Scriptures. We gain a reliable knowledge of the Scrip- tures only as we learn something of the neigh- boring nations, their ideas, customs, and reli- gions. Stories of the fall, the flood, the giving of the law, all have their parallels in other na- tions. There is a vast difference in spiritual quality and moral purpose. The study of the ancient monuments with the ancient codes, such as the code of Hammurabi, 2250 B. C., with its points of resemblance to the Mosaic law, is a refutation of the customary Ee a ee FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 17 idea of the absolute originality of the contents of the Old Testament. The supernatural is to be found in the superiority of the Old Testa- ment laws and narratives. 6. There has been the development of what we may call the intellectual conscience or love for the truth. We are convinced that ‘‘we can- not please the God of truth with the unclean sacrifice of a falsehood,’’ even though it be offered in the name of religion. As much as modern science may have contributed to this ‘‘nassion for veracity,’’ yet the Christian draws his first and abiding love for the truth from Him who said, ‘‘To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth.’’ 7. There is the new ethical awakening. The moral conscience which was dull to the cruelty and injustice of industrial relationships has be- come keenly sensitive. This new ethical insight has sifted out as chaff some of the former and even current conceptions of God. The doctrine of divine decrees by which God foreordained a fixed number of men to eternal damnation is now becoming impossible. Certain theories of the atonement which made God willing to accept the punishment of the innocent instead of the guilty are discarded since they make God less good than a good man. The famous protest of John Stuart Mill was: 18 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS ‘‘T will call no being good who is not what I mean when I apply that epithet to my fellow ‘men; and if such a being can sentence me to hell for not so calling him, to hell I will go.’’ The protest of John Wesley was not less em- phatic against the old Calvinism: ‘*Your God is my devil.’’ We are told of a committee who were exam- ining young candidates for the ministry when one stern member of the committee asked: ‘‘ Are you willing to be damned for the glory of God?’’ One candidate replied: ‘‘Well, no, not exactly; but I am willing that the committee should be.”’ 8. There is a new social conscience as the re- sult of a new social spirit and the ethical awaken- ing. This social conscience is altering political theories, changing industrial methods, and re- moving our social indifference. Many practices are now considered sinful which a generation ago were regarded as innocent. We hear the wail that conscience is dying out. The human conscience was never so highly developed and sensitive as it is to-day. If our consciences do not reprove us as much as formerly about our inbred sin, they reprove us much more concern- ing our antisocial sins. We are getting farther and farther away from the situation described in the incident of the deacon who was arrested by a sanitary in- spector for selling unclean milk, and who under : Ee _— FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 19 the sudden provocation used profane language. His Church disciplined him for his profanity, but regarded as too trivial for notice his vio- lation of sanitary laws which would possibly re- sult in the deaths of scores of infants. 9. The new Science of Psychology, with much of the materialistic bias which belongs to some of the psychologists, has had a sifting effect on the ideas and doctrines of men. The subliminal or subconscious realm of the mind must be reck- oned with, but we resolutely reject the theory that the inspiration of prophets and saints is merely the ‘‘uprush’’ from an unconscious or racial memory. The fact is that the prophetic revealers of God’s truth were pioneers who brought a message to men that all their personal consciousness, and all the heritage of the past, could not have reached. In many instances the message was so new that the race had never heard it before. While we may be called upon by psychology to discriminate and attribute to the region of subconsciousness some of the ideas which appear to us, yet we must acknowledge also the ‘‘down- rush from the superconscious.’’ Bishop Gore has said: ‘‘Something has occurred for which only the experience of the prophets and the wit- ness of Christ can account, and without which the moral treasures of human nature would be vastly impoverished.’’ 20 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS III One can readily understand how these trans- forming and disturbing forces have made neces- sary a restatement of the eternal essentials and vital certainties of the gospel. The apostolic age was free in its attitude to- ward the burden of traditions, and it was clear and fearless in the separation of rudiments from the vital elements of the faith. It is as truly the mission of the Christian teacher to-day to dis- criminate between the essential and nonessential as it was the mission of the apostles in the first century, even though it seems to be a perilous undertaking. Of the danger of making concessions at any point we have been warned by the well-worn illustration of the traveler, pursued by hungry wolves, who endeavored to conciliate them by morsels, until he himself made the last savory morsel. There is a strong suspicion of any ef- fort to distinguish the permanent and transient elements of our belief. St. Paul, however, dis- tinguishes between the commandments of the Lord and his own judgment. It is an easy matter to spin out pious plati- tudes; it is more difficult and infinitely better to accept facts with an honest and reverent spirit. Any fact is a thought of God and a sacred thing, FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 21 whether found on the page of nature or of scripture. There are certain advanced thinkers, so called, who would eliminate, one by one, even the essen- tials. But it requires neither advancement nor thought to be destructive. That is merely wan- ton trifling. The men who hold this attitude to- ward the Christian revelation are guided not by the evidence of historical research and investiga- tion, but solely by the prejudices and presuppo- sitions of their own minds. Dr. Alexander Maclaren, who certainly has no leaning toward destructive criticism, has said: ‘¢A clear recognition between the divine revela- tion and the vessels in which it is contained, be- tween Christ and creed, between churches and forms of worship, on the one hand, and the ever- lasting word of God spoken by His Son, on the other, is needful especially in times of such sift- ing and unsettlement as the present. It will save us from an obstinate conservatism which might read its fate in the decline and disappear- ance of traditional Judaism and Jewish Chris- tianity.”’ The slow paralysis that has crept over the faith of many is a result of the confusion of the vital and incidental matters of the faith. To declare the uncertain things as if they had been revealed, is almost as unfortunate as to declare the revealed things as if they were uncertain; 22 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS and it is very confusing, producing either intel- lectual slavery or anarchy. There are some considerations that will help us in the separation of the accidental from the universal elements of our creed. We are to recognize that Christ’s authorita- tive teaching is in the realm of the religious and spiritual. To extend the authority of Jesus beyond the spiritual domain into regions scienti- fic, historical, and literary is to destroy his au- thority, under the pretense of making it abso- lute. He does not attempt to give any authorita- tive word either on the science of Biblical criti- cism or on the physical sciences. Dr. G. T. Ladd writes: ‘‘There is no reason why a Christian student of the Bible should hesi- tate to look calmly on the imperfect and pass- ing element of the Old Testament ethics and religion; or why he should shrink from making the distinctions necessary to separate these ele- ments from the perfect and eternal Christian truth. Christ has showed him how to make these distinctions. In making them he is not setting up his judgment against that of the holy men of old; he is only using the very truth which the infallible teacher himself revealed in order to appreciate its vast superiority to that taught by the teachers who lived in the inferior and pre- paratory stages.’’ This determining principle will enable us to FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 23 make the distinction between certitudes and un- verifiable dogma and speculation. . We know that man is a sinner with the possibility of salva- tion; but we do not know the precise method of his origin or all about his history, and these problems we must leave to science. We know that Jesus Christ brought life and immortality to light, but we have no detailed picture of the conditions of life in the unseen world. It is impossible to convict John Wesley of Fundamentalism. His refusal to stickle for the dogma is a thorn in the flesh of Methodist Fun-_ damentalists. ‘‘One circumstance is quite pe- culiar to the people called Methodists; that is the terms upon which any person may be ad- mitted into their society. They do not impose in order to their admission any opinions what- ever. Let them hold particular or general re- demption, absolute or conditional decrees; let them be Churchmen or Dissenters, Presbyterians or Independents, it is no obstacle. Let them choose one mode of baptism or another, it is no bar to their admission. A Presbyterian may be a Presbyterian still; the Independent or Ana- baptist use his own mode of worship. So may the Quaker, and none will contend with him about it. They think and let think. One condi- tion and one only is required—a real desire to save their souls. Where this is, it is enough; they desire no more; they lay stress on nothing 24 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS else; they ask only, ‘Is thy heart herein as my heart? If it be, give me thy hand.’ ”’ There are essential and nonessential, perma- nent and transient elements in religious thought and belief. We have magnified the transient and passing into an equality with the permanent and abiding. There is much nervous anxiety over the things that pass away. As we fasten our faith on the surface matters, disturbances are bound to come. How can you sing, ‘‘How firm a foundation,’’ if your faith foundation is liable to be shaken any morning by a new figure on the uncertain age of the world? I am not so much concerned about the age of the world as about my own age. I am not so much concerned about lines of savage ancestry that le behind me as about whether the savagery of my own nature is being overcome. Our age has not lost its faith in religion. Man will be religious as long as he is man. Christianity holds within her bosom indestructible elements. There are some things which can never be shaken. Modern Fundamentalism is a misnomer, since its peculiar features are not fundamental. We should be content to find in the Bible an inspired authority in the realm of life and faith. In Jesus Christ we have a picture of the possi- bility of man and a revelation of the character of God. Aside from all petty questioning, we find certainty concerning man’s relationship to FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS 29 man, man’s relationship to God, and God’s rela- tionship to man. In the Bible we find the assur- ance that man’s immortal aspirations shall be satisfied. In the Bibles given to soldiers and sailors in the late war were inscribed the words of Wood- row Wilson, ‘‘When you have read the Bible you will know that it is the word of God because you have found it the key to your own heart, your own happiness, and your own duty.’’ Bishop Haygood was far ahead of his day in this discriminating statement: ‘‘Does Moses say, ‘I, Moses, son of Amram and Jochebed, wrote all that is in these five books?’ If so, where does he say it? Does Isaiah say, ‘I, Isaiah, son of Amoz, wrote every one of these sixty-six chapters?’ If so, where does he say it? It is Christianity and not a theory of inspiration nor the authorship of certain books in the Bible that we are fighting for. In what least particular would a dozen pens in the Pentateuch or twice a dozen in Isaiah affect Christianity? There in the evangelists is Jesus Christ. He is Chris- tianity.’’ The universal truths are self-evidencing and form a perfect answer to the questionings of the human spirit. The principles and doctrines of Jesus bear the marks of ultimateness and uni- versality. It is impossible to enclose the vital gospel 26 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS within a system of cold abstract definitions. You might as well attempt to gather all the perfume of the springtime flowers into a bottle. You might as well attempt to catch all the beauty of all the landscapes in a kodak. But there are some truths that are basic and fundamental: 1. God is our Father, with the necessary pos- tulate of human hrotherhnod 2. There is the fact of Jesus Christ: His in- carnation, atonement, resurrection, and ascen- sion. 3. There is the presence and power of the Holy Spirit. 4, Man is the child of God and immortal. 5. There is the fact of the kingdom of God, spiritual and universal in its nature. All of these mean a right relationship between man and God and between man and man. We are to keep the central message distinct and emphatic. This is our safety and strength. Dr. W. N. Clarke makes this forceful utterance and discrimination: ‘‘We do not keep our cen- tral message distinct in its glory as we ought to do; but we bind up with it all our views of the Bible, of doctrine, and even of Church polity. All incidental and secondary matters ought to be presented as incidental and secondary, and the great elemental truths ought to be kept in their solitary glory and tenderness. Even the Bible itself is not the end of faith, but only the FINDING THE FUNDAMENTALS eth means to an end. The ultimate object of our faith is Jesus Christ, and God the Father whom he reveals to the world. The puzzled hearer may exclaim, ‘What do we know of God except through the Bible?’ Yes, and what do we know of the stars except through the telescope? And yet the telescope is not the star, and the only use of the telescope is that the star may be re- vealed. The Bible is the telescope and God is the star, the sun.’’ Many of our human notions are at the point of vanishing and ought to vanish, but the truths of eternal value abide forever. They are for- ever beyond the reach of any sort of criticism, reverent or irreverent. They are deeply and eternally imbedded both in the heart of God and in the spirit of man. The precious diamond of God’s revelation has often changed its setting in human thought; it may change it again, but the diamond will always sparkle with untar- nished splendor. The background of our faith may change its coloring. It has changed it in the past; but the essential, vital faith in the sav- ing love of God as manifested in Jesus Christ will remain so long as there are human need and divine compassion. These fundamentals of the Christian faith constitute our inner line of defense from which we can never be driven. In human warfare it has often happened that an army that has retreated from some position 28 PRINCIPLES OF JESUS at last found itself in an inner circle of defense that was invincible. The German assault on Verdun for two long months was the most ter- rific conflict in the annals of battle. Outer lines were broken through, but the main line held, the inner circle of defense was impregnable. The words of General Petain, ‘‘They shall not pass,”’ thrilled the heart and nerved the arm of every French soldier. In the last desperate assault of the Crown Prince, 40,000 German soldiers were slaughtered in a hopeless effort to pass the French curtain of fire. The main line held. In the conflict for the faith some outer lines of human systems and man-made creeds have been broken through; and while much ammuni- tion has been wasted by theologians in defend- ing indefensible positions, there is an inner cita- del of the faith from which no long-range enemy guns can ever drive us. There is the unbreakable line which no terrific onslaught can ever bend. These vital truths—God our Father, Jesus Christ our Saviour, the presence of the Holy Spirit, man an immortal child of God, and the reign of Jesus Christ, all held in the warm clasp of a living experience—are beyond the reach of all the deadly projectiles and poisonous gases of the enemies of our faith. ‘‘There is the re- moving of those things that are shaken as of things that are made, that those things that can- not be shaken may remain.’’ CHAPTER IT THE PRAGMATIC TEST OF CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE In order to get a running start some seven other tests of the essential verities of the faith will be briefly considered before discussing the pragmatic test. Very much is being said as to what constitutes the fundamentals. The writer lays claim to be- ing a fundamentalist if you do not begin the word with a capital letter. There is a group who make the boast of being one hundred per cent orthodox. Another group boasts of being one hundred per cent American. An Irishman recently landed goes them one better and says: ‘‘I’m a two hundred per cent American; I hate everybody.’’ The religious Pharisees can never be accused of despising themselves. They are somewhat like the old brother in Georgia who always in- sisted on using the wrong preposition in the lines of the familiar hymn and sang with a voice above all the others: ‘